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I was at the United Nations in Geneva last week to watch what was happening to the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) as it prepares for its third outing, this December in Hyderabad, India.

Actually I was there for a different reason - an ICANN consultative meeting on the future of the organization the morning before the UN meeting - but it seemed daft to fly all that way and not check out the day of open discussions about the IGF. Plus I have a real soft spot for the IGF and the people that have worked extremely hard to make it a success.

I was a witness to the IGF’s creation, on paper, at the World Summit on the Information Society back in 2005, and then followed it all the way through various preparatory sessions as a reporter.

At the inaugural IGF in Athens, I was asked to be the conference’s “blogger-in-chief” – a position that, ironically enough, my current employer tried to veto. As a semi-official part of the IGF, I also got to see behind the scenes, and was impressed with the hard work, dedication and calm handling of what was an enormous and risky experiment. A lot of people at the time confessed to turning up just to see what would happen – spectators to what could have been the biggest diplomatic car crash for a decade. In the end, despite the odds, it shone through.

Continue reading ‘The Internet Governance Forum – third time lucky’

I have been itching to do some writing but have been caught up with other things: friends visiting, fixing up the van, and work. So I’ll quickly going to knock up a list of blog posts I want to write so I don’t forget next time I am in front of a laptop, have 20 minutes and the urge to write…

* A review of the film Bottleshock
* Fixing up a VW Split-screen camper: pain and pleasure
* Amazon’s Kindle - review of a revolution
* American politics: the horror that a bipartisan media represents
* A review of the film Gonzo
* Various book reviews
* Strange habits of Californians
* How to listen to the BBC Today programme in bed in Los Angeles
* Other nonsense

There are many reasons why people don’t surf. The biggest is probably that very few people live close to an area of sea that produces waves that can be surfed on. But there are others: it’s bloody hard work; it requires a significant amount of co-ordination; you are guaranteed to take in at least three pints of saltwater; you have to carry around a huge stick.

At the moment, the main reason why I don’t think I’ll be getting on my new surfboard again tomorrow morning is because my ribs are killing me. I forgot how punishing surfing was. I haven’t surfed in four years, not since I lived in the one part of the UK where you can: Cornwall. Exhilarating but exhausting.

Yesterday afternoon at around 4pm though, prodded by my work colleague inquiring what I was doing on my birth-day-off tomorrow, I decided I was finally going to take advantage of living right on a surfing beach. So I called up my landlord (well, building supervisor) who is a surfer dude, got a recommendation, and rode at full pelt to Horizons West on Main St, Santa Monica, where I spent a bloody fortune on a surfboard, lead, wax, wetsuit, board jacket and something else.

Continue reading ‘Surfing at 33′

I forgot to add that I also found two fantastic video clips that demonstrate the sheer madness of the TV news in the United States.

One shows the mindless self-absorption the media has with itself in such an extraordinary way that it could easily be mistaken for genius satire.

And the other is John Stewart doing what John Stewart does best - despairing but in a very entertaining way.

Continue reading ‘US news rant: the video evidence’

Forgot to say last week that the “US news: utter utter rubbish” rant I wrote a fortnight earlier appeared in a slightly more professional format on the Guardian’s Comment is Free site on Wednesday under the headline: Why TV news in the US is utter rubbish.

The title I sent them was: “Why TV news in the US is utter rubbish (blows big time)”. I still like that, although it is, admittedly, too long. Anyway, I was asked to reprise my original post and so I did by pulling the first person out of it (I *hate* comment pieces with constant “I”, “me” and “my” inclusions - in fact as an editor I would fire anyone that used the word “I” in the first three paragraphs); by adding some examples of the different traits I’d noticed; and by adding a bit on other news options at the end.

It’s not a bad piece. And even though it was swiftly off the front page of the Guardian site, it was the number six most-read piece all through Thursday, dropping down to #7 on Friday, and finally falling off the top ten on Saturday. Not bad considering the competition: John Pilger, Russia and Georgia, and John Edwards being caught with his pants down.

I also got 133 comments on it last time I looked. Hardly any were actually that useful, but then the site option becomes a place for other commenters to argue with one another rather than an extension of an article - such is the Internet way. Alot of other bloggers appeared to agree with my analysis - but then who exactly is going to stand up for the US news stations? They’re so dreadful even the Yanks can’t get patriotic about them.

Anyway, you can read the whole piece in glorious Technicolor here, or put up with my site below:

Continue reading ‘US news rant on Guardian comment site’

It’s a funny thing living in the United States of America as a visa holder. As neither citizen nor green card possessor, you are an “alien” or, more accurately, a “legal alien”.

This no-man’s-land status brings with it certain absurdities. When I arrive back from a trip abroad, for example, I am questioned as if it’s the first time I’ve ever been here. The best part is when I am asked where I reside. Clearly, I live in the US. I have a one-year lease on a property here. But due to my status, I have to pretend that I actually live in the UK and this is like a really long holiday.

The worst part of living in America as a legal alien though is the loops you have to jump through when you first arrive. I meant to write a post about this back in December – eight months ago and two months after I’d arrived – but the whole thing was so dreadful I couldn’t muster the energy.

Here is but one example.

Continue reading ‘Credit Score 742: The United States finally welcomes me (and my money)’

I’ve just been through my first earthquake experience. I was on the phone and the building started swaying. It was perfectly quiet and nearly not noticeable. But as soon as you notice it - probably one or two seconds - it consumes your attention. The building continued rolling and swaying (apparently many of the anti-earthquake LA buildings are on big rollers) for about 30 seconds and then it settled.

I thought it was relatively small but according to this official site, earthquake ci14383980 was a 5.4 Richter quake (originally pegged at 5.8) with the epicenter about a half-hour’s drive inland (at the edge of what Los Angelenos called, for some peculiar reason, the “Inland Empire”). People’s reactions were interesting. Some were excited, some a little nervous. It was very clear however who has experienced some of the big ones though.

I only got a taster for what a big earthquake might feel like, but I can imagine that if the frequency of the shaking had increased - and not necessarily by much - it would very rapidly have gone from an interesting Tuesday event to distinctly worrying.

I haven’t had a new poll for a very, very long time. So, sort-of inspired by my pseudo rant last week about TV news in the United States, I have knocked up a new one. It’s on the right-hand side and included below.

That means that I need to review the results of the previous poll. An impressive 215 people bothered to vote on the value - or lack of value - that social networking sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, and so on, possess.

I posited that I might actually just be wasting both my time and everyone else’s time by using these sites to spread little more that shallow tidbits of my life.

It’s a creeping cancer too - when I wrote the post I despaired at having 26 “friends”. But last week I passed 100 on Facebook, even accidentally making someone I have never known, seen, nor heard of in my life before, my friend temporarily by clicking the wrong button.

Continue reading ‘Social networking poll result: Wasting time with old friends’

A very funny example of journalist ego gone mad is zooming around media circles at the moment. And at the centre of it, designer-stubble dork Giles Coren.

Coren’s not a bad writer and he used to write very funny pieces, but over the past year/two years it was clear his ego was getting out of control and I stopped bothering looking up his work. Well, the Guardian has gone hold of a furious email he sent to the Times’ sub-editors excoriating them for changing his copy in an April restaurant review.

What is so terrificly funny about the email is that the abusive rant is over a single letter. The letter “a” in fact. It’s so ridiculous you could mistake it for sensational satire.

This is an excerpt - but I encourage you to read the full letter:

Continue reading ‘Giles Coren - fantastic twat’

I am working from home today which has given me the rare and entirely unsatisfactory opportunity to watch the lunchtime TV news in the United States of America.

People often say that the news in the US is terrible - and it is, it is appalling. But it hit home this lunchtime when I flipped between different news channels while eating lunch. CNN, Fox, MSNBC, and god knows how many other channels. And all of it absolutely dreadful. I know for example from listening to the BBC’s Radio 4 Today programme first thing this morning that one of the world’s most wanted war criminals Radovan Karadzic was arrested late last night. I also know that a possible huge breakthrough has been made with prostate cancer.

What else do I know from this morning? Well, that India’s government may have survived a vote of no confidence; that Mugabe is talking with the Zimbabwe opposition about possible power-sharing. I know there has been some kind of attack in Israel.

Having watched an hour of lunchtime TV news in the US I know that: there are two US presidential candidates and one of them is abroad at the moment; that people have made video parodies of the two candidates and posted them on the Internet; that a TV news host appeared on a TV chatshow last night; and that someone made a stupid comment about autism on some other TV show.

Continue reading ‘US news: utter utter rubbish’