Monthly Archives: July 2005

Today

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I’m afraid I did what the Commisioner told us not to do: I went in to Central London.

See, I live in Hackney, in the East, but work in Wimbledon, in the South-West.  So I was going to have to go into the centre sometime, to get home.  I just left work early.

The trains were running into Waterloo, pretty much as normal (but largely empty).  Of course, once there, there was no way to get across town: the Tube was closed, and no buses were running in Zone 1.  I took to Shanks’ Pony.

Zone 1 is bigger than you think.  I guess I knew it extended as far as Angel, but it goes all the way up Essex Road.  I ended up getting a bus halfway along the Ball’s Pond Road.  It took me about two and a half hours to get home.

Which isn’t bad, all things considered.

Fortunately, the kids were going home from school with a friend’s mum, so they were fine.  I left early mainly so as not to leave them with her too late.  And of course, to avoid the probable madness of the rush hour.

I am, of course, intensely angry at the scumpigs who would do such a thing.  But on a positive note, a lot of people seemed to be doing the same thing as me, and it was strangely pleasing to see so many people walking through London.  We should do more of it.  And for much better reasons, of course.

I feel I should have more to say, but am blank.

Software patents: dead in Europe

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In other good news, over on BoingBoing, Cory is telling us that Euro software patents are dead:

The European Parliament voted 648 to 14 to reject the Computer Implemented Inventions Directive.

The bill was reportedly rejected because, politicians said, it pleased no-one in its current form.

Responding to the rejection the European Commission said it would not draw up or submit any more versions of the original proposal.

This is excellent news, though as Cory goes on to say,

Software patents have been staked through the heart before, but they keep rising from the grave. There’s too much monopoly rent waiting to be extracted by anti-competitive companies for them to simply give up and go home. The price of liberty is eternal vigilance.
A year or so ago the number one or two hit on Google for “software patents” was an article by an old friend of mine, John Gray, who is a Patent Attorney, in favour of them.  With well-reasoned arguments, as I recall.  Sadly the article appears to have gone now, though links to it remain.  Such is one of the weaknesses of the web, unfortunately, when you can’t trust (some) publishers to keep their URLs pointing at something.

Update: asajeffrey found a mailing list post that, if not John’s article that I was thinking of, certainly discusses the same ideas.  Thanks, Alan.  Note that I am not the “Martin” referred to in that post.

2012

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So, London gets it.  I was against it, but now I feel strangely pleased.

I think I was for it at first; I really enjoyed watching the Athens Olympics last summer, the kids enjoyed it, and the idea of having one just down the road sounded great.  But then I looked at the plans, and turned against it.  The main reason for my opposition was the effects that I think it will have on the Lower Lea (or Lee) Valley.  As far as I can tell, our beloved wilderness will be turned into bland parkland, with the associated loss of wildlife habitat.

However, it may not be as bad as all that, and there’s no doubt that the potential regeneration here in East London — in particular the transport improvements — could be great.

My other concern is, of course, the cost, and how we taxpayers may be paying for it for decades.

But what the hell: my kids will be 15 and 11 in 2012, so it  should be fantastic for them.