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Heave-Ho Harry’s Place

Here we go again; another random party using our atrocious Libel Laws to close down criticism and debate. In this case it appears to be Sheffield Academic Jenna Delich, or her supporters, making legal noises to intimidate the iSP hosting the blog Harry’s Place.

Harry’s Place comments:

Though we have not yet seen the complaint submitted, we assume it runs along the lines that pointing out that Ms Delich linked to the website of a known neo-Nazi figure and former Ku Klux Klan leader is defamatory.

 

This is extraordinary since Ms Delich has not denied that she circulated links to David Dukes website. There would be no point since the evidence is in the public domain.

They committed the unforgiveable sin of “publishing a fact”, which means that any Libel Case is down the toilet for a start - if my legal head is screwed-on correctly tonight. And any iSP should know that, but the law makes it easier to give in. If allegation is not correct (I think it looks fine), then they (and the rest of us) may be skewered.

Leftish imbroglios and nuances are not my strong suit - but closing down debate by running squealing to an iSP using Britain’s nonsensical Libel Laws is the best way to make yourself look ridiculous.

The actors in this case: Jenna Delich is an activist with a bee in her bonnet for the campaign for an Academic Boycott of Israel, and the UCU is one of the main Unions for staff in Higher Education.

No, it has nothing to do with the dead rising from the grave and eating brains convening a parliament. Rather, I presume that it is supposed to be a damning indictment of Cameron and the Conservative Party:

This zombie politics offers rich pickings to a clever opposition. While the party in power gets on with the [...]

It is a little over a month since Cease and Desist notices were sent to a series of bloggers.

I want to look back on what has been achieved - in both concrete terms and “soft” terms.

You can get up to speed by reading my “Introductory Guide“, or the list of people posting in support, or even the Press Room:

Dave Walker is a cartoonist who runs a popular website, which includes the blogs We Blog Cartoons, Cartoon Church and The Cartoon Blog.

On the morning of July 22nd 2008 he received a cease and desist letter threatening legal action unless he removed 75 posts from his Cartoon Church blog by lunchtime - i.e., half a day’s notice.

These 75 posts had reported the developing situation over a 2 year period in a UK book chain called SPCK, which had been taken over by a company run by Mark Brewer. Dave Walker’s was the main published source reporting the situation, asking questions about the management of the chain, and highlighting the treatment of the employees.

So, what has happened?

What happened to your email … (click through)

Cartoon: Wellington Grey

I am doing an upgrade of Wordpress, so you may see some interesting changes while I am doing the process.

Victory for the Pommes!
Congratulations to Sports minister Gerry Sutcliffe. His opposite number in Australia, Kate Ellis will now have to wear an England jersey to a sporting event thanks to our athletes not only getting more gold medals that the ever winging Aussies, but actually getting more medals over all. We have become [...]

[Ed: Er … no comment]
<tabloid blogging>

I’m not making it up.
</tabloid blogging>

Cartoon: Gaping Void

The Electoral Commission wants to close a loophole that allows donations to political parties without declaring their name - by doing it under a corporate guise. The new proposals would make organisations such as the Midlands Industrial Council list their donors and the amounts given by them.
To be honest, the proposals seems pretty fair. If [...]

Barack Obama introduces Joe Biden, Senator for Delaware, as his running mate at a rally in Springfield last Saturday.

Is over at Amused Cynicism.

The roundup is a compendium of last week’s outstanding posts in the British Blogosphere.

A quick post to say that I am continuing to find the odd glitch with the new template on the blog - especially in numbered and bulleted lists.

The Web Elves are working on it.

This is Simon Sarmiento’s fourth Guest Column on the Wardman Wire, while David Keen is on holiday from the blog.

This week looks at American politics, and in particular at the Saddleback Forum - a debate hosted by one of the USA’s Evangelical Megachurches. And he explains why he will be taking on the role of Fat Controller of St Albans in mid-September.

Continuing the experiment with Viral Videos…

Is we is? Or is we ain’t?

Click through for the full size version.

A cartoon from ASBO Jesus.

A weekly roundup of publications, reports, events & articles from the leading UK think tanks.
Welcome to this week’s Think-tank Roundup. This week we have calls to scrap the next census, ‘Policy Exchange do Blade Runner’ and even the suggestion that all this web stuff is slowly throttling the very idea of think-tanks – your correspondent, [...]

The Carpet baggers aiming to turn sporting success into party political advantage have started already, and the ex-Sports Minister Richard Caborn MP is first out of the blocks with an article over at Labour Home.

This is annoying - a commenter on Political Betting had the right attitude with a comment that the best way for the Labour Government to benefit from the Olympic success is to keep quiet and bask in the reflected glory.

Instead, Mr Caborn has stuck his oar in, got a lot of things wrong and ended up looking rather silly - as well as being an opportunist out to exploit Olympic success in the course of grubby politics.

The fact that he is posting at Labour Home is interesting - there’s an interesting debate to be had about how the relationships between official parties and grassroots websites will evolve - across all parties.

But for now, a little light rebuttal over afternoon coffee beckons.

Even in the 21st Century, some people manage to make 1010 and 1101 equal 5.

Click through on the title for the full size version.

Cartoon: Wellington Grey

This is a bit old, but I’ve only just found it - being a Mac-o-Sceptic, I usually ignore the hype for a few months before taking a real look.

I am updating the theme of the blog view of the site, so things may be a bit changeable for a couple of hours.

You can read headlines and excerpts undisturbed in the Magazine View.

Completely and utterly deluded. Especially when polls are suggesting that after the next election, there may be a Conservative Commons majority of 260. That Brown thinks that Labour will win the next election really shows how separated he is from the real world.
I agree with Eric Pickles, who says:
The analysis is that it is now [...]

Independent Video Journalist Arrested

Brian Conley is an independent video journalist who usually works for Alive in Baghdad, who was working as part of a team with New York artist James Powderly. From the Committee to Protect Bloggers:

Brian Conley, was arrested at 3:00 a.m. Tuesday in Beijing. Brian, the founder of the Alive in Baghdad video news project, as well as an employee of the Hub, was documenting the activities of New York artist James Powderly, who uses lasers. In this case, it looks as he was planning a Tibet-themed event at the Olympics.

Four other arrestees are also bloggers: Jeffrey Rae, Michael Liss, Jeff Goldin and Tom Grant.

This needs to be written about. Boing Boing has more.

There’s a blog redesign coming later on. In the meantime click on the title for today’s cartoon.

Cartoon: Wellington Grey

I’m making a few changes to the blog and I’d appreciate feedback in the comments.

• I’ve added a “Video Box” to both the Magazine and the Blog Versions of the site. These are currently running sponsored videos, but mayalso include news and other videos.
• Later on this evening I will be revising the header section of the blog to remove the Google “links”, and revise the links section below the banner to give Quick Links to currently live “post series”. The idea - just at it is with having a magazine front end - is to make it easier to find substantial articles that have gone off the front page.

One problem I have noticed is that when (on the blog view) the small player expands, and it doesn’t seem to be shrinking back to the small size afterwards all the time.

Thanks for your help.

Our MPs are often criticized for not having an appreciation of the younger members of society, and in particular of the sexual habits and attitudes of more recent times.

It strikes me that, with the impending banning of family members from working for MPs, and a consequent influx of young and impressionable researchers and secretaries into a family-free work environment, this particular problem may soon be going to get fixed.

Cartoon: GapingVoid.com