The curious case of the new U2 video and YouTube copyright

It's my last post on this, I promise (other than an update perhaps). I just wanted to tell those interested what happened. I'm not sure whether to be impressed or scared.

So I saw the video was posted on Facebook yesterday and blogged the link. I then searched YouTube for it, couldn't find it anywhere so I downloaded the Facebook video and uploaded that to YouTube. All good so far, I embedded it on the blog and things were fine.

I then get a note from YouTube at 19:10:

Subject: Information about your video

Dear darraghdoyle,

Your video, u2, may have content that is owned or licensed by UMG.

No action is required on your part; however, if you're interested in learning how this affects your video, please visit the Content ID Matches section of your account for more information.

Sincerely,
- The YouTube Team

So I visited the site, spent some time reading the guidelines and decided to submit a claim to their dispute centre, filled out their form under

2. This video uses copyrighted material in a manner that does not require approval of the copyright holder. It is a fair use under copyright law.

which, given the fact that U2 don't seem to have an official YouTube channel and hadn't uploaded the video themselves, seems fair enough to me. I don't own the copyright, neither though do I profit in any way from it being on YouTube. Neither though do I dispute the fact it's not mine, so if YouTube decide it's not, then fair enough...

At 01:30 this morning I received an email from YouTube Support:

Subject: Copyright claim dispute - U2 - Get On Your Boots

Dear darraghdoyle,

In response to your dispute regarding a content identification match, UMG has reviewed your video U2 - Get On Your Boots and confirmed their claim to some or all of its audio content. As a result, your video is no longer available.

UMG claimed this content as a part of the YouTube Content Identification programme. YouTube allows partners to review YouTube videos for content to which they own the rights. Partners may use our automated video/audio matching system to identify their content or they may review videos manually.

Please take a few minutes to visit our Help Centre section on Copyright Tips, where you can learn more about copyright laws.

Sincerely,
The YouTube Content Identification Team

A minute later at 01:31 I received this email:

Subject: Copyright claim removed on U2 - Get On Your Boots

Dear darraghdoyle,

The claim on your video, "U2 - Get On Your Boots", has been removed by UMG. Your video has been restored to its original state.

Please take a few minutes to visit our Help Centre section on Policy and Copyright Guidelines, where you can learn more about copyright laws and our Video-Identification Service.

Yours sincerely,
The YouTube Content-Identification Team

Then at 01:32 I received an email word, for word like the original:

Subject: Information about your video "U2 - Get On Your Boots"

Dear darraghdoyle,

Your video, U2 - Get On Your Boots, may have content that is owned or licensed by UMG.

The video I had uploaded and embedded on this blog had been working. Right now, just like some of the other Get On Your Boots videos uploaded in the last 24 hours, it's muted. There are many others that aren't though. I've submitted another dispute form asking for clarification, just so I know what's going on.

In the meantime I embedded the video from a No Line on the Horizon blog which is working, like the others above. I'm curious to find out why those videos are allowed but mine isn't. It's the reasons why not rather than just the "principle" of the thing. A strange situation, eh? I'll let you know...

Ben & Jerry's Ireland are now on Facebook and I'd love a tub.

It's just gone noon and I'm starving. To have this in front of me:



which is about Ben & Jerry's Baked Alaska, vanilla ice cream with marshmallow swirls and white chocolatey polar bears:



and to see that 'Yes, Pecan' is a mixture of chocolate ice cream with white and dark chocolatey chunks with pecans, walnuts and chocolatey covered almonds



Well, it's just torture. Time to go shopping I think. I must actually dig out my Ben & Jerry's scooping certificate - I'm a trained and certified Ben & Jerry's ice cream scooper - one of the best things about working in the cinema, I reckon.

You can become a fan on Facebook here and check out their website.

What's your favourite film? People in Dublin tell JDIFF

Last month, a video was filmed as part of the 2009 Jameson Dublin International Film Festival where people were asked to name their favourite films. Here it is:



I do apologise. Blame Anthony - he sent me the email saying

The Jameson Dublin International Film Festival would like to know what your favourite film of all time is? We need one hundred people to help us with an exciting new marketing campaign that features you!

All you need to do is come along this Saturday the 6th December and have your picture taken and tell us what your favourite film of all time is and then do the same thing all over again to camera. Pictures taken will be featured as part of a fabulous print and online campaign for the 2009 festival.

So I went and I did it and now I'm part of the advertising. In fact I'm apparently on a big poster in the window of Filmbase, Temple Bar, one of the "lucky" ten. People are emailing/texting me along the lines of

"Can you imagine how frightening it was to see your face enlarged by about 100 times plastered on a poster on the front window of Filmbase?"

When we were at the Festival launch on Monday in the Odeon, I walked into one part to find the monstrosity below staring back at me. Bizarre is one way of describing it. The lighting was pink, explaining the poster. Even worse I found out I adorned a pillar outside too.





So there you have it. It's the 1997 Roberto Benigni film La Vita é Bella for me, at 2:40 in case you're that interested. In defence of my wardrobe, that was the day I filmed the Hibernian Ad - I don't dress as well as that normally!

What's your favourite movie? Can you limit it to just one?

Personal choices for the 2009 Jameson Dublin International Film Festival

I'd started this post differently but have edited to keep it a tad shorter. I'll move the other waffle to a new post, so now let's talk about the films in the festival with particular reference to the ones I'm going to see.

It's the seventh year of the Jameson Dublin International Film Festival. It's on from Thursday February 12 to Sunday February 22. It features a staggering - by my count - 121 films - or 132 events according to the website - some new, some old and all worth a look. Now, I have no intention of seeing all of them, but there are some that just beg to be seen.



The opening gala - Doubt - is now sold out but would be my top choice for the entire festival. Featuring Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Amy Adams, the film has been winning awards left, right and centre. It's on Thursday 12 February in Savoy 1 at 8:30pm, tickets are €18.

FRIDAY 13 FEBRUARY

Friday 13 sees Three Colours: Blue (link) return to the big screen, again in Savoy 1 at 2pm. This 1993 film starring Juliet Binoche is a choice of broadcaster Zbyszek Zalinski who will participate in a short Q&A after the screening.



At 6pm in Cineworld we have Armando Ianucci's In the Loop (link), a comedic farce starring James Gandolfini. The director is to attend the screening.

SATURDAY 14 FEBRUARY

Valentine's Day has Revolution (link) starring Al Pacino, Donald Sutherland and Natassja Kinski. The 1985 film is about the American War of Independence and director Hugh Hudson is participating in a Q&A afterwards.



Good (link), in Screen 1 at 4:30 pm stars Viggo Mortensen, Jason Isaacs and Jodie Whittaker in a film with a simple question ' What turned normal "good" Germans into people capable of sending millions to the gas chambers during the Second World War'.



At the same time in Cineworld screen 9 there's an interesting documentary about Paul Watson, the so-called 'Pirate for the Sea' who "takes the law into his own hands on the open seas, confronting, by any means necessary, the hunters who indiscriminately slaughter whales, seals and sharks".

Bronson (link), in Screen 1 at 6:30pm looks promising, giving a biopic of notorious criminal Charles Bronson who has spent 28 of his 34 years in prison in solitary confinement.



I can imagine though that Confessions of a Shopaholic (link) in Movies@Dundrum at 8pm, starring Isla Fisher, John Cusack and John Goodman will be a sell-out. It's the one where Fisher stars as Rebecca Bloomwood, a New York city girl addicted to shopping and drowning in a sea of debt.

The French Gala screening of The Class (Entre les Murs) on the same evening is also sold out.

SUNDAY 15 FEBRUARY



Sunday morning will see me in Savoy 1 at 11am for Clint Eastwood's Gran Torino (link). I saw the trailer last weekend - it looks brilliant, much better than Mystic River or Million Dollar Baby.

"At 78, perhaps the only actor in the history of American cinema to convincingly kick the butt of a guy 60 years his junior, the hard-headed, snarly mouthed Clint Eastwood of the 1970s comes growling back to life in Gran Torino."

Also that night is Coraline 3D in Movies@Dundrum at 8pm. Based on the Neil Gaiman book, I'd say it's the one that David Maybury and Debs, who'll be sharing their popcorn with us are most looking forward to.

The world premiere of Margaret Corkery's Eamon is also on that evening in Screen 9 of Cineworld at 8.30pm.

MONDAY 16 FEBRUARY

Monday sees the start of 'Irish Blog Week before the Blog Awards so I'm a bit limited in my choices here. But Franklyn (link), in Cineworld at 6pm has been getting great reviews in the UK. Frequently Asked Questions About Time Travel (link) has Chris O'Dowd in a sci-fi comedy with the basic premise "Three men walk into a bar; two geeks and a cynic."



Charlie Kaufman follows up Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, Adaptation and the superlative Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind with Synecdoche, New York (link) starring Philip Seymour Hoffman. That's at 8.30 pm in Cineworld 17.

TUESDAY 17 FEBRUARY

On Tuesday 17 I'll be attending Were The World Mine (link) in Cineworld 9 at 6pm. A fun, dazzling and amusing musical-of-errors; a magical modern interpretation of Shakespeare. The directors Tom Gustafson and Cory James Krueckenberg are in attendance at the screening.

WEDNESDAY 18 FEBRUARY



Whitnail and I is on Wednesday 18 February in Savoy Screen 1 at 2pm. Religulous (link), the documentary following comedian Bill Maher around the globe interviewing people about God and religion is on in Cineworld 17 at 6pm.

FRIDAY 20 FEBRUARY

Rupert Grint, Robbie Sheehan and James Nesbitt will be in Cineworld on Friday 20 February for the screening of Cherrybomb, a fast-paced Belfast based drama centering on two teenage friends whose furious rivalry for a gorgeous yet cunning girl has shocking consequences.



Colin Firth is also in Dublin for the screening of Genova, Michael Winterbottom's film in Cineworld 17 at 8pm.

SATURDAY FEBRUARY 21

Liam Neeson joins James Nesbitt for the special screening of Five Minutes Of Heaven (link) on Saturday February 21 at 6.15 in Savoy 1. The next day sees Marley and Me in the same screen at 11am.

SUNDAY 22 FEBRUARY



The closing film is The Secret of Kells (link) featuring the voice talents of Brendan Gleeson, Mick Lally, Evan McGuire and Christen Mooney. Set in the 9th century Kells Abbey where they're illuminating the Book of Kells, this animated film is apparently breathtaking, according to Gráinne Humphreys, the Festival Director.

Other events during the festival include Hospital Screenings, an over 55's Film Quiz, and panel discussions including Creative Cinema on February 18 at 4pm:

“Film is a battleground. Love, hate, violence, action, death... in a word, emotion.”

So veteran director Samuel Fuller defined Cinema in Jean Luc Godard’s classic Pierrot le Fou. But how true are those words when you are making your feature film debut, working with small budgets and tough shooting schedules.

How can you create and maintain the energy and momentum to stay true to your story and characters? Three emerging filmmakers who have impressed many with their debut features will discuss the emotions of filmmaking and other stories in a panel discussion about staying true to your creative voice.

and Star Rating on February 20 at 6pm in the IFI:

"Established three years ago, The Dublin Film Critics Circle offers the city’s professional movie reviewers an opportunity to pool opinions on recent releases, consider movie heritage and whinge about each other’s shortcomings.

This year, the Festival has invited a panel from the DFCC to chew over their favourite films screening at the event. Five DFCC members will be joined by a distinguished foreign critic and, following debate, will announce their awards for best film, best performances and best Irish films at JDIFF 2009.

The discussion, which will be broadcast on RTÉ Radio, is to be hosted by veteran broadcaster Dave Fanning. Expected a blend of high-falutin’ cinema-speak and old fashioned bickering.

The film event though I'm most looking forward to is on February 19 in the IFI at 18:30. The Irish Film Board Shorts features nine short films (for €10) including Nicky Phelan's Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty:

Granny O’Grimm, a seemingly sweet old lady, loses the plot as she tells her version of ‘Sleeping Beauty’ to her terrified granddaughter.

and the delightfully named Hoor from John Kennedy:

Hoor tells the short story of three young lads paying a visit to the local prostitute in order to lose their virginity. Only with the last boy, Ciaran, clearly the youngest and most nervous of the boys do we see what Desire is really up to.

So there you have it. There's LOADS more on, much more than I could fit in a single post (though I'd give it a go) but you'll find the complete list of films here and you can book your tickets and more on the website, http://jdiff.com. Also worth keeping an eye on will be the Festival blog - a task I don't envy that blogger at all!

Watch the official new U2 video for Get On Your Boots here

UPDATE: I've been allowed to upload it to You Tube. So here it is, even before the Irish Independent's so called "exclusive"!



According to the guy who posted it on Facebook today, Jaime Andres Rodriguez:

Alexandre Courtez directs this visual explosion of a video that twists and turns with color, energy and abstract themes.

The first official video out of No Line On The Horizon, due in stores March 2, 2009.

Thanks a million Donna - you're a star!

Mother of octuplets has six other children

Possibly one of the scarier headline in the news today.

The mother of a woman who gave birth on Monday to octuplets said her daughter already has six children at home and was undergoing fertility treatment.

That's 14 children for her to feed and clothe from now on. As CNN.com says:

In her written statement the woman who delivered eight babies in five minutes said she would soon make public the details of her "miraculous experience."

"We understand that you are all curious about the arrival of the octuplets, and we appreciate your respect for our family's privacy," she said.

"The babies continue to grow strong every day and make good progress. My family and I are ecstatic about all of their arrivals."

"Needless to say, the eighth was a surprise to us all, but a blessing as well," she added.

The six boys and two girls -- ranging in weight from 1 pound, 8 ounces to 3 pounds, 4 ounces -- are doing well following their Caesarean-section delivery at the Bellflower hospital, doctors said. They were born nine weeks premature.

Dr. Mandhir Gupta, a neonatalist, said all but one of the octuplets are now breathing on their own. That baby might be taken off breathing equipment Friday.

Doctors initially thought the mother was pregnant with seven fetuses. She was hospitalized seven weeks ago and ordered to bed rest.

During the seven weeks, a team of 46 physicians, nurses and other staff members prepared for the births. When they started the delivery Monday, they were in for a surprise.

"After the seventh baby was born, we were taking a sigh of relief," Maples said.

"It was a surprise of our life when we in fact discovered there was an eighth baby," she said. "We never had an assignment for baby H nurse or baby H doctor. We just had to go on the fly and figure out what to do."

I can only imagine what this woman must be thinking or planning. Of course in the back of my mind the Kilkenny man is thinking "All she needs now is one more for a hurling team."

The new U2 video for Get On Your Boots delayed

Damn you U2. You big tease you.

Update: 5:24 pm - From the Indo:

Delivery of the video for U2's new single, 'Get on Your Boots', has been delayed.

Universal Music have issued the following statement:

"The video is going really well but unfortunately it just wasn’t finished in time for the premiere today. Alex Courtes is an amazing director and we can assure you that it will be well worth the wait."

Mark Crossingham, Managing Director Universal Music Ireland

You will still see the video here first at www.independent.ie/u2

Despite the Irish Independent's claim that they'll have the exclusive first showing of the new U2 video live on their site at 4:55pm today, it seems to be delayed:

"3.10 pm

Delivery of the video for U2's new single, 'Get on Your Boots', has been delayed.

We are waiting for an official statement from the band and their record company.

More details will follow."

Update: the same page now (17:10) reads:

"We are waiting for a new premiere date from the band and their record company."

Come on the conspiracy theories - anyone guess why the delay?

BODIES... The Exhibition in Dublin: I'd go again when it's quieter

Last Sunday, Sinéad, Jen and I went to see the BODIES exhibition in Dublin's Ambassador Theatre. Opening weekend as it was, the place was packed, the queue for tickets long and the experience rushed. Given that, I came away with some learnings.

TICKETS:

If possible pre-book your tickets online. Again, it was opening weekend so crowds were probably higher, but the difference between the queue outside at 2pm and 2.15pm was actually a good twenty people. However, those with prebooked tickets can just walk right in.

We braved the queue and bought our tickets for a later time so could do the same. To give you an example, below is the queue outside on Sunday at 2pm, before they put up the barriers and formed multiple lines just an hour later.



BAGS AND CAMERAS:

Neither are allowed in. I was quite disappointed about the camera rule, given that photos could serve to only pique curiosity rather than repulse most people, but there you go. There is a free cloakroom where you can deposit your stuff. If it's busy, I'd recommend putting your coat in as well - it gets warm!

On a side note, I'd forgotten notebook and pen so scrawled down my impressions on the back of postcards with a borrowed biro. Therefore the below may be subject to inaccuracies as I try to decipher my almost illegible scribbles.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS:

Well, they've painted the Ambassador apparently, so the short walk down to the first room is not as foreboding as you might imagine. Signs are placed on the walls, reading:

The specimens in this Exhibition have been treated with the dignity and respect they so richly deserve

and

Why all this interest in the human body? The answer to this question seems quite clear to me. Your body is the one thing that you carry with you from the moment you are born until your very last breath.

- Dr Roy Glover, Medical Director

Photo from National Geographic

HISTORY: Where the bodies come from

Dr. Roy Glover is "Professor Emeritus of Anatomy and Cell Biology at the University of Michigan and the chief medical director of the University of Michigan Medical School Polymer Preservation Laboratory. He serves as Chief Medical Advisor and spokesman for BODIES... the exhibition". That's according to Google anyway.

In the various articles I've researched, a couple of things come up - how were the bodies acquired, what was done to them and if it's ethical.

Firstly the website for Bodies Revealed reads:

"How were the specimens on display in our exhibition obtained and prepared? All of the bodies and organs came from individuals who chose to donate their bodies to medical science for the purpose of study and education."

A recent Irish times article reads how the exhibition has been:

'... dogged by controversy with suggestions that the exhibits were either executed Chinese prisoners or were people who had not given their consent to have their bodies shown after their death.

Dr Glover said: “We have practiced due diligence in obtaining the bodies. We work with a partner that we have the utmost amount of trust in – the Dalian Plastination Facility in Dalian, China.

“The person I work with it is a personal friend of mine. We have been in the same professional organisations for many years. He has sworn affidavits to the effect that the bodies were those who have died of natural causes.

“We have examined every one of the bodies who come into the show for any evidence of trauma or any kind of physical abuse.”'

A 2007 interview with the Washington Post reads:

All of the bodies were obtained through a credited medical university in the People's Republic of China. Asia possesses the largest and most highly competent group of dissectors in the world, and they are highly skilled in preparing the bodies for educational and scientific purposes. Currently, human specimens in medical schools in China, the United States and other countries throughout the world are donated or unidentified bodies.

Finally in a 2006 article on NPR.org:

Roy Glover, spokesman for BODIES... The Exhibition, says its cadavers -- all from China -- did not come from willing donors.

"They're unclaimed," Glover says. "We don't hide from it, we address it right up front."

So there you have it. They are bodies from China that may or may not have been willing participants in the project. Does that matter? Does it make a difference to your knowledge of the exhibition once inside? For me, not really, because far from being the 'ghoulish' and 'gruesome' spectacle the ever-reliably tabloid Indo claims it to be, the bodies are displayed in a museum or gallery exhibit format.

There's not much to be squeamish about and the Polymer Preservation process involved was by far much more of interest to me.

ROOM ONE: Entering the exhibition.

You walk down a hallway and into a big room with a lot of glass cases and "models" on display, and, in my case, a lot of people. I'm not a crowd person so before I joined the fray I spent a bit of time just observing. Though not of the Dublin exhibtion, of which there are few photos that I can find, the below should give you an indication.





On the walls around the exhibition are signs and projections. They both feed back into the educative theme behind the exhibition, telling you things like 'Compact bone tissue carries your weight' or how the projections are artists impressions of the cells and tissues in your body. 'More than 200 different kinds of cell and 75 trillion cells in total make up the body'; 'Fibroblast cells build and maintain cartilage, skin and bone' and so on.

The first few exhibits I crowded in to see were bones - knee joint cartilage, an elbow joint, the top of a skull, the sacrum and lower vertebrae. Interesting stuff indeed, though not really that awe-inspiring. As the crowds parted I got my first glimpse of a body, behind which a sign proclaimed

'The study of human anatomy has always operated on to see is to know.

This exhibition uses dissected human specimens to provide you with a visual textbook to your own body, offering you a profound insight into your body, its functions and its needs or health and longevity.'

THE BODIES:



This Dara Mac Dónaill/Irish Times photo of Dr Glover with one of the specimens should give you an idea of what you'll be seeing, far better than those on the website. They are as they're advertised - bodies without the skin, but showing everything (minus the blood) that's beneath.

One model shows muscle attachment and layering, showing the four muscle layers separated from their points of origin but connected to the points of insertion. One case held the muscles of the arm and leg, giving you the opportunity to see both limbs up close.



You can walk around most of the full figures. The one above (adapted from an Irish Times photo) shows a male figure, metal filling still in teeth, which purports to "illustrate the nearly countless number of tasks the brain executes from basic to highly complex actions".


Image from The Seattle Traveller

Another fascinating exhibit was the seated figure with an exposed brain. The meningus gyrus and grey matter were apparently prominently visible, but the poignancy of the piece overlooking a case containing disected brains was quite something.

Again, each part in the case was labelled clearly and familiar parts from crime novels or CSI episodes became much more than "somewhere in the head".

ROOM TWO

Room two was dedicated to blood - the vessels, the muscles, the arteries and valves. Special dissections revealed blood vessels and specimens like the heart with coronal cut, the arteries of the kidneys and those of the stomach and thorax are, pardon the pun, very illuminating.

"Using a technique called corrosion casting, the blood vessels were first injected with a coloured polymer which hardened, The remaining body tissue was then chemically removed, revealing the delicate matrix that transports the blood."

The full body blood vessel map of a male body has to be seen to be believed.

ROOM THREE

"On average a pack of cigarettes shaves 3 hours and 40 minutes off your life. Leave your cigarettes in this gallery and stop smoking now".

Smokers beware - this is not a good room for you. Given that the first specimen in this example of smoker's lungs (I didn't embed it because it's quite gruesome), while it may not put many smokers off the habit, it's certainly a warning for the rest of us not to start, especially when compared to the model of the healthy lungs.

This room also went into the digestive functions, with a body displaying how the whole viscera, the vital organs of respiration, digestion, circulation and reproduction are all contained within the thoracic, abdominal and pelvic cavities.

There is also a specimen showing the distribution of fat on an overweight female, sectioned as she is, vertically, into four or five pieces.

EMBRYONIC AND FOETAL DEVELOPMENT

At this stage now I was tired. Tired of the crowds, of being hurried from exhibit to exhibit as more people crowded around to see the next in line. Hardly the organiser's fault but it was quite an assault on the stimuli. The sign outside this room read

Please pause a moment and consider if you wish to enter. All foetal and embryonic specimens perished in utero from complications during pregnancy as well as birth defects teat occurred during this time

I learned a couple of interesting facts in this room. One, that the sperm is the smallest cell, the female egg is the largest. Two, that the phrase "miracle of life" is indeed very apt and three that foetal development is an astounding process.

On one side of this small room, we see foetal bone development at 11, 13, 15 and 16 weeks due to a process involving Alizarin, a dye which binds to calcium to measure the stages of skeletal development. In others we get cross sections of foetuses in various stages.

I came out from there ready now to go, as awe inspiring as I found that particular section. On the steps outside was a young fella, possibly around 13 or 14 in floods of tears for some reason.

ROOM FOUR:





The last room was much bigger and contained interesting specimens of bodies in cross section, diseased or cancerous parts of the body and so on. I didn't linger though, I just popped into the very pricey gift shop (t-shirts €22, keyrings €5) and then headed out.

Before I left though, I spotted and wrote down the following from a sign, that quite probably should be at the start of the exhibit:

'We live in a world surrounded by technology, information and cement; fast paced living with little time for reflection.

When an illness is severe and our mortality comes into question, we may take this time to stop and ponder our existence. But cured, we are off again, not thinking about the extraordinary, complicated human beings we are.

Our bodies are indeed intricately more complex than all the computers and gadgetry that surrounds us today. Yet many of us do not really know what lies beneath our skins, how our bodies function, what they need to survive , what destroys them, revives them.

BODIES... the exhibition is an attempt to remedy this unfortunate set of circumstances. Take the knowledge gained from this exhibition, expand on it and use it to become an informed participant in your own healthcare. This involves more than improving your diet or beginning a long overdue exercise program.

It involves partnering with your doctor to understand what you - and your unique body - need to sustain a full and rewarding life.'

Taking all that into account, BODIES... The Exhibition is well worth seeing. The price is hefty at €20 and repeat visitors should be offered half price tickets. I think too there should also be "quiet hours", where, once the initial rush has died down, the organisers offer to let only a set amount of people in to see the exhibition and to take their time. Given it's booked for six months, this may become a reality.

You'll need to take one, maybe two hours to properly see the entire exhibition. We entered at 3pm and were out by 4.05pm but that was more due to the crowds and the heat. It sparked interesting conversation, but ultimately each of our experiences were personal, were unique and we all saw things the others didn't.

Would I recommend it? Yes, definitely. It left me with a high regard both for the human body and the healthcare professionals who deal with it. Reading all the recent articles regarding how right it is, the rights of those whose bodies are being used, of their families, the sourcing of the bodies and indeed the promotion of the show as an educational rather than a commercial experience, I still feel a sense of awe for the process, the intricacies involved, importantly the science behind it and most importantly the delicate but fascinating chance to see what's under the skin, in a human body, up close.

Steph has her review here while Aonghus recommends not getting the audio guides as they have the same information as the display cards.

I uploaded two short videos from the BODIES The Exhibition website today. Take a look. Though American and obviously promotional, they'll perhaps give you a better idea than the Dublin website can:





The exhibition is open 10AM to 8PM Sunday to Thursday and 10AM to 10PM Friday and Saturday. You'll find more information on the website here.


All photos in this post are sourced from here and here unless otherwise stated.

This past week

This week I have mostly been sleeping.

Not just eight hours but solid eighteen hours during the day. My body seemed to need it and my mind didn't disagree. I woke up this morning feeling great - blood pumping, neurons racing and thoughts flying. My not-as-much-online week has done me well. I feel energised and a wee bit rambly.

That's not to say I haven't been busy. Not at all. I started, read and finished my first Haruki Murakami novel, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, and have to ask how I have gone so long without ever encountering him before. An amazing, enthralling book that prompts me to go and buy his others.

I watched movies. 12 Angry Men again graced our screens and I've promised myself to buy the screenplay and see it on stage before year end. It's just a magnificent piece of drama. I also caught the end of Little Miss Sunshine on RTE's midweek movie and forgot how much I liked that film.

I met some interesting people. Not in my bedroom of course, I did venture out, but this week more than the last three has reminded me just how diverse people can be and how simple it is to make a difference once you try.

I became a poster boy. Literally. I must get a good shot of it (post to follow) but there's been few reactions stranger than walking in to a crowded bar and seeing your own face staring back on a poster. We laughed, a lot.

I didn't involve myself in discussions. In forums I used to frequent, on blogs I read and even through Facebook I saw conversations to engage in, harsh words to react to and staunch defences I could have made, but didn't. Sometimes it's more interesting to stay outside of these things and let them fizzle out, particularly when it's all women and they're talking about personal issues. What's that quote about fools rushing in?

I've been researching. I had forgotten how much I enjoy going through the books, websites and blogs of online marketers, of industry and thought leaders and gleaning the knowledge they have to impart, to pick and choose and help form my own ideas. Looking back on the last ten years of my working life, I can see how each position I've held, be it cinema manager or community manager has given me a view on how people should be treated online.

I've been planning. I have loads to do with both this blog and my online presence. I have two more blogs in mind, which I hope to have completed by the end of February. I have a ton of videos to shoot, interviews to post and a complete redesign to plan. There's a lot coming up in the next while that I'll be involved in so time to start making the most of it.

Now, where do I begin? Well, a warm thanks for all the comments this month and to those who nominated any of my posts for Best Blog Post in the Irish Blog Awards. Much appreciated. The list is very impressive - many there I haven't read and look forward to perusing in the following week. Congratulations to all nominees.

I was looking for some way to finish this post when my eye caught upon Once Upon A Wicked Eye again, Pat Ingoldsby's new book, and I thought I'd give you a wee flavour:

Moc San Aer

I have never yet come upon a pig in helmet and goggles
that has crashed into a tree. Oh they can fly alright.

Is there a non-blogger in your house?

I have a favour to ask, please.

My friend Sinéad has created a survey for college for bloggers and blog readers and has had loads of replies from bloggers but not from non-blogging people.

So if you can grab someone who doesn't blog, but reads them in your house/place of work/on the train and ask them to spare five minutes - that's really about all it takes to fill this in, I know she'll be ever so grateful.

The survey is here.

She's also giving away prizes of gift vouchers and hugs* as thank yous. You'll find all those details and more about the survey here.

Thank you!


(*Hugs not guaranteed, but I'll see what I can do. Hugs probably dependent on who and where you are. Terms and conditions probably apply.)

Teaching my younger sister an important lesson about the internet

We were recording the Pinkerton's video. I left the room to get something and Andrea must have recorded this on the camera while I was gone. She said nothing about it and I only found it coming home on the bus Thursday night. Niamh and I were in stitches. It's too good not to share.



She probably didn't think I'd upload it. There's your lesson right there, missy. Revenge is sweet. ;-)

Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo...

The amazing lyrebird of Australia

The Lyre bird does Seinfeld. Pretty funny, eh?



Except, when I went to research the bird and saw the original video that it's based on, from BBC Worldwide, I could hardly believe it. Impersonating the Kookaburra, the calls of twenty different species, car alarms, camera shutters, chainsaws.

The most elaborate, complex and beautiful birdsong in the world is from a bird that is very remarkable in many ways.

You have to see it to believe it. It's not April 1 yet, is it?

Film review: Milk - I was bored until near the end

There's a few major problems I had with Milk.

1. I don't know enough of the history to gauge the film as an accurate reflection on the effect Harvey Milk had at his time.
2. It seemed too camp, and camp just for the sake of it; and
3. If it hadn't been based on a true story and didn't have Sean Penn as the lead, it would have flopped as unbelievable.

I gauge every film I see in one simple way - how long does it take before I look at my watch. With Milk last night it was about 40 minutes, enough for the story to unfold and the viewer to get a sense of where this is going. In fact, before the end, I must have looked at least three times more. I'd wanted to see the film.



Harvey Milk seems to have been a great guy. The movie tagline - His life changed history. His courage changed lives - is borne out by the articles written about him. The failing of the movie though is that it just didn't go far enough with the impact his election in San Francisco had. This event made national headlines, it was a big deal in the LGBT community and he achieved a lot through his activism, his ideas and his personality. He stood up to be counted.

The film followed this route for a while but seemed content not to explain, just to apparently assume the audience knew what a big deal Proposition 6 - the Briggs Initiative - was, what wider social impact a ban on gays and lesbians, and possibly anyone who supported gay rights, from working in California's public schools would have. It made token references towards the wider influence and inspiration that Milk was providing and failed miserably at showing how the work he did could positively affect people's lives.

Instead the film focussed on those around Milk and here was its biggest failure and most disappointing aspect. The emphasis on campness (as opposed to homosexuality) was almost unbelievable. Brokeback Mountain gained notoriety from the fact two straight actors were playing homosexual men. Milk decides to up that and has every actor, including Penn, mincing, simpering, camping it up for the camera and basically diluting their believability as credible characters. Even if it's a genuine portrayal, the over-acting contributes nothing to the film other than hammering home the point again and again - these men were gay. Okay, got that.

I actually found watching it slightly offensive - not the kissing or gay sex scenes which were overdone but that's Hollywood - but the continued barrage of showing that these men were gay and that the actors were playing gay men was just overwhelming at times. It's most visible in the quieter scenes, one for example where the new female campaign manager is introduced and the men present practically faint (and then bitch fight) in the presence of a woman. A throwaway quote from Milk "A homosexual with power... that's scary." is hard to believe in both its context and given the fight he's had to get here.

Another, the film's coverage of Milk's relationship with his partner Lira - the film version factually inaccurate - detracts from the significance of the campaign by taking up screen time which could be better spent. The uber effeminacy and exaggeration of characters, especially Emile Hirsch's portrayal of Cleve Jones seemed a nod to the character of Lieutenant Jim Dangle from Reno 911!: Miami more than anything else, as if this was going to win them the awards, because, you know, it was so different and daring for the actors to do. Perhaps it's very accurate, meticulously researched and genuine, but it just didn't seem that way to me.

This is what I mean by how, if it was fictional, it wouldn't be believable. It's assumed we know the history, assumed we realise how far things have come and how people like Milk who put themselves out there are responsible for so many civil rights being restored (or not taken away) and why their lives were so important. But not everybody does and I think not knowing that is a major disadvantage in watching the film. Important scenes are rushed, the more sexual scenes lingered over. Where Milk has connected with others is lost, the focus on his camp personality over played. We never get a sense either of Harvey Milk the politician or Harvey Milk the man.

It's not until the last five minutes (including the credits) that I got what the film maker had tried - and failed - to do, which was to show how much what Harvey Milk did mattered to people. He changed politics. His approach - apparently flamboyant, fiery and media savvy is lost in this film. He encouraged people to come out of the closet, to bring the issue that homosexuality was not anything but how people were from behind closed doors and to everyone's attention:

I ask my gay sisters and brothers to make the commitment to fight. For themselves, for their freedom, for their country ... We will not win our rights by staying quietly in our closets ... We are coming out to fight the lies, the myths, the distortions. We are coming out to tell the truths about gays, for I am tired of the conspiracy of silence, so I'm going to talk about it. And I want you to talk about it. You must come out. Come out to your parents, your relatives... All men are created equal. No matter how hard you try, you can never erase those words.

And it's at the end, when you see how he had the support of somewhere estimated between 25,000 and 40,000 people. You see how like Milk Sean Penn is and how well cast the others were in terms of looking like who they portray that the real genius of the film is evident. While around me all the girls were crying into their sleeves, I felt disappointed that I'd had to wait that long to see what Gus Van Sant was trying to do. I think he failed and it's a pity he did.

I look forward to seeing how it does at the Oscars. I don't think Penn deserves best actor, especially against Langella in Frost/Nixon. I certainly don't think Van Sant deserves best director or even Josh Brolin for best supporting actor. Costume design perhaps, writing, perhaps, Best Picture - no way. It's certainly a debatable one.



If the film has any legacy, I hope it's that people want to find out more about how one man managed to make such a difference, and inspire them to do the same. If it can do that, then maybe it's not that bad a film after all.

Save O' Shea campaign - coming soon to a t-shirt near you

Well done The Stenner. He is also the genius that brought us Hope, Dope and Nope.

The If It's Not Broken Don't Fix It: Keep Rick O'Shea and Nikki Hayes Talking Facebook group is now up over 340 members. For more context, see my earlier post about it here.

Keeping old text messages

Every time I get a text message these days, I have to erase the one I've gotten before. From a phone with a capacity for 200 texts, I have 197 messages dating from November 4, 2005 to January 21 of 2009.

Am I the only one who does this?

Anyone who spends time with me will tell you I'm a divil for distraction, needing to do a couple of things as well as try, often in vain, to focus on what I should be doing. I think that's why I twitter so much at events - my mind refuses to be idle. I've tried to get out of the routine of checking the phone compulsively - unless I'm waiting for a call or text - but it's become such a habit for me that I predictive text without looking and will, very rudely, just interrupt conversations at times to check my phone, reply to a text, check the email or take a call. I'm trying to stop but as with any habit-breaking initiative, it's taking time.


Photo by Grannymar

Words are important to me. Far more than photos or dates, words about a time in my life, a specific event, a personal feeling, a connection with someone evoke a glad, almost visceral feeling within that I revel in. The first time I read a particular book, the first time I hear certain lyrics, the congratulatory email for a job well done, the first time someone says they love you. All these and so much more are important and if I had been any good a diarist through my life, I'd have been able to keep track of them. For now though, I only have texts. Emails disappear into the vast recesses of Gmail, stumbled upon usually, looking for something else.

I scroll through my phone occasionally, ordinarily on the bus, both to find a particular text or to see what's there. Don't worry, I haven't got all the 'Meteor would like to offer you' texts, the impersonal 'Happy Christmas to all my phonebook' texts or the redundant 'grand, see you there' texts. They're deleted if and when they're replied to.

I gave up keeping negative, abusive or pointless angry texts a long time ago - I don't see the point. Mid a failed attempt at reconciliation last year, someone told me they had "kept all the emails and texts as a record", which means that they're carrying around useless words that exoke a negative reaction every time they read them. I fail to see how it would help. Erase, remember, learn, move on.

My texts are either positive or funny or from a really good experience. Ranging from the very first, romantic:

I love you! I'm so happy we're together! Xxx 04/11/2005 07:19:05

to the thoughtful (I was living in London at the time):

Ul b happy to bear that theres a big crowd arnd Pat Ingoldsby's new book launch on d path. His sign says 'Join my book club and pay double for everything'... 18/11/2005 15:35:06

To the gratifying

Darragh thank you so much for all your help. The night was a great success. Your help was invaluable. Helen.
03/12/2006 11:18:54

To the first text messages

Hi Darragh, Niamh here. How's ur evening going?
13/02/2007 19:31:37

To the random

Is have to o wake up in two hours and i have a drunk girl on me arm so going to mobil u naill email you tomorow is that ok? 17/05/2007 01:20:49

To the inappropriate but funny forwards

I went 2c the nurse for my annual health check this mornin She said, "I think u should stop masturbating" I asked, "why?" She said, "Because I'm trying to examine u" 28/06/2007 18:01:53

To the confessions

I never told you but when you first moved to London, and we met at Dun Laoighre, I sat on the pier bawling listening to fix you bu coldplay. Watching the ferry. 26/07/2007 21:13:59

To the zeitgest

Spiderpig, spiderpig, does whatever a Spiderpig can. Can he hang from a web? No he can't 'Cause he's a pig
28/07/2007 21:36:05

To the "you'd really have to have been there"

Sleeping in jeep 04/08/2007 02:55:44

To the hard to believe but true

House closed at 3.30 today. Your bags are about to be given to security as UNCLAIMED. You need to pick them up in the next 15 mins or they will be destroyed. PLEASE COLLECT NOW 17/12/2007 15:57:48

To the utterly sentimental

Never say ur happy when ur sad, never say ur fine when ur not ok, never say u feel good when u feel bad and never say ur alone when you've got me 13/03/2008 22:33:46

To the self fulfilling prophecy

You and I need to have that couple of pints a bit more often. 19/03/2008 18:46:40

To the ah brilliant!

I have news anne just agreed to marry me were engaged 26/04/2008 14:33:37

To the spotted

That u on failte towers? 09/08/2008 22:21:32

And even in my sent items, the five I keep portray a rather poignant, if somewhat random and personal insight into my mind or the focus on the recipient at the time of sending:

The road to my hell is paved with my good intentions.

"How can your life be satisfied with small realities if your heart has big dreams? Read the quote and thought of you.

I love you. first instinct impressions are always right. x x

But, while you sit there either laughing at my attachment issues, shaking your head in despair at my disclosure, in disbelief at the shameless expression and with pity for someone who keeps such texts, let me tell you - it used to be a lot worse.

A whole lot worse.



I used to write them down.

Yes indeed, pre 2007 and the phones that came with bigger memory capacity, when I didn't know the current posse of amigos I'm blessed with, I would spend time faithfully transcribing, as above, all the texts into notebooks. The front for to-do lists and all that, the back for the text messages. They were mostly - if not all - from the girlfriend at the time. You know, something to show the grandkids when we got older? 'Look kids, here's when your Gran and I went on a date and she said it was good'. 'Look here, it's when we arranged to meet outside of Trinity one day she'd finished college early'. Honestly, it's acutely embarrassing to look back at how naive I was.



I went through one the other day. I always wondered if it would make the basis for a good book. Seems not. I cringed at some of the memories. But, the blog needs feeding and I thought someone, somewhere just may keep their text messages, may like the thought that at some stage in a day, someone thought enough about them to tap words into the phone and that maybe, just maybe, I wasn't such a

*beep beep*

Hang on. There's a text on my phone.

Warning about feeding the ducks at St Stephens Green

PREPARE FOR PIGEONS.


Photos ©Phil O'Kane





Thanks for the photos, Phil. Couldn't have photoshopped them to make me look less scaredy cat, no? At least Niamh got one of me looking fairly decent.



No pigeons - or 30 year old bloggers - were harmed in the shooting for this post. Honestly.

Wordle of Obama's Inauguaration speech

Hat tip to Darran for the link :)

Barack Obama's Inauguration Speech - the full text

My fellow citizens:

I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors. I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.

So it has been. So it must be with this generation of Americans.

That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

These are the indicators of crisis, subject to data and statistics. Less measurable but no less profound is a sapping of confidence across our land - a nagging fear that America’s decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights.

Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America - they will be met.

On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.

On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.

We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted - for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things - some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.

For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life.

For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth.

For us, they fought and died, in places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe Sahn.

Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

This is the journey we continue today. We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions - that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.

For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of the economy calls for action, bold and swift, and we will act - not only to create new jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology’s wonders to raise health care’s quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. And all this we will do.

Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions - who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short. For they have forgotten what this country has already done; what free men and women can achieve when imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity to courage.

What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works - whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end. And those of us who manage the public’s dollars will be held to account - to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day - because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.

Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill. Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control - and that a nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous. The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our Gross Domestic Product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on our ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart - not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.

As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience’s sake. And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.

Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint.

We are the keepers of this legacy. Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those new threats that demand even greater effort - even greater cooperation and understanding between nations. We will begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people, and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan. With old friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the specter of a warming planet. We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus - and non-believers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society’s ills on the West - know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world’s resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it.

As we consider the road that unfolds before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains. They have something to tell us today, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington whisper through the ages. We honor them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet, at this moment - a moment that will define a generation - it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.

For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter’s courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent’s willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate.

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends - hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism - these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

This is the source of our confidence - the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.

This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed - why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.

So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have traveled. In the year of America’s birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:

"Let it be told to the future world...that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive...that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet [it]."

America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children’s children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God’s grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

Thank you, God bless you and God bless the United States of America.


[Speech, apart from the last bit which I did type meself as President Barack Obama spoke it, as provided by the Presidential Inaugural Committee.]

Frost/Nixon review - five quick points

I saw Frost/Nixon in Dublin's Lighthouse Cinema last night. It opens on Friday.

1. It couldn't have worked as a fictional story - it just wouldn't have been believable. Even if you know nothing of the history, the man who was Nixon or have little or no interest in US politics, the story behind the film is so strong that you couldn't make it up.
   
   
   Images from Slashfilm
   
   
2. The acting is superb. Just superb. Frank Langella plays Nixon as a tribute to him - he's uncompromising, personal, humorous and intelligent. Whether the intention or not, Langella's portayal of Richard M Nixon left me with a respect for Nixon, an understanding of what he was trying to do and who the man was.
   
   
   
   The best I can say is to ask you if you've seen Jim Carrey play Andy Kaufman in the 1999 film 'Man on the Moon'? Remember Carrey in the Mighty Mouse scene? Here's Kaufman in the original. It's virtually identical. That's how good Langella seems.
   
   
3. It's funny. There are genuine laugh out loud moments. The dialogue is interesting, witty and intelligent. It doesn't assume you know, nor does it assume you don't. It seems faithful.
   
   
4. It makes the interviews look interesting. I've never been inclined to look at them before but the way that Michael Sheen plays Frost and the interaction between his character and Nixon in this film - well, if it's only half the chemistry between the real life counterparts, the last part of the last interview must be truly great TV.
   
   
5. Finally, probably most importantly, it's a damn great film. If you're looking for something with great dialogue, a brilliant story and interesting characters, this is it.

The Academy has some challenge ahead in deciding this year's Oscars, that's for sure.

Want to help the homeless? 'Get real' says John Bird, founder of Big Issue

In November 2008 I interviewed John Bird, founder and editor in chief of The Big Issue magazine.

It seems in Ireland some people are happy to let the government take a stand on homelessness (as evidenced by this survey on LeCraic.com) and some believe they should figure it out for themselves. Although in a recession and donations are dropping, people are still giving money to homeless people to help them.

John Bird says in order to help the homeless you should "Get real. Go and help the homeless to help themselves to get out of homelessness. If you give something away for nothing you enslave the recipient because you give them a reason to come back again and again.

One of the major problems with people in need is that they are kept in this constant state of living on pocket money that we hand out as and when we see fit. Get real - go and help the organisations. Petition the government to create the kind of support that is necessary to get people out of homelessness."


There are few people who can talk the talk as well as John Bird, because he has walked the walk. Born to poor London Irish parents, homeless when he was five, in a reform school at 15, expelled from college, spent time on the run from the police and social security, was a revolutionary in Paris and became a businessman all in the first part of his life.

17 years later, in September 1991, the first issue of the Big Issue magazine was launched. He was 45, had never managed anyone and his sales team was made up of homeless people who he describes as "the most unreliable workforce on God's earth".


Photo from bigissue.com

When I found out that John was speaking at Chain Reaction, a conference in London for social entrepreneurs, business leaders, community activists and more, I put him on my "would love to meet" list.

I'd read about John, followed his story, admired the uncompromising way he achieved things. He gave a talk during a busy lunch, interrupting people with a loud shout into the microphone to "Shut up. We are talking here, trying to change the world in a lunchtime." The room fell silent as he continued to speak on his ideas on business, his experiences with the homeless and the work that Big Issue does.

After the talk he was immediately swamped with admirers and business people wanting his advice. In the end I had to grab him during his lunch for a quick, off the cuff and slightly less formal interview than I had planned.

Background information:

John's first involvement with helping the homeless came through being homeless. When he went to present to the establishment homeless charities, their reaction was:

'What do you know about homeless people? Who are you? Have you got a degree in it? You haven't worked at a shelter through the night, been on a helpline, been on a sleep out, rattled cans in the street, or wiped a homeless person's arse.' I replied: 'I've been homeless, I've been a rough sleeper, and I've had drink, drug and violence problems. Maybe it's time that someone who's had the problem of homelessness was able to get involved in making the decisions'. They were completely bollocksed by that.

Homeless charities vs work:

When we started out there were literally hundreds of charities just in London alone for the benefit of the homeless. I didn't want to do a charity because charities piss me off. The ones I met were full of 'nice' people who were totally sentimental about homelessness and I wasn't interested in sentimentalism because I thought the world was a shit hole.

I thought homeless people were treated abysmally, especially by themselves, and that charities were not tough enough to say to homeless people 'Look you're causing these problems yourself. The world screws you over but you've got to sort yourself out'.

The charities we met were all about giving homeless people another handout rather than giving them the one thing they needed: opportunity. Opportunity to a homeless person is a job; in fact what keeps most of us from falling to pieces.

Work gives you social association, friendships, a sense of responsibility and the chance of making your own money so that you don't need to ponce off the state and ponce off your parents.

As a charity you can't give work to the disposessed; you can only be nice to them, and give them some soup and a roll as they sit in their doorway. This isn't opportunity, it isn't even respect: it's a kind of unconditional love normally reserved for little children. It seemed utterly logical to me to give people that have fallen to pieces the thing that keeps you and I sane, and that is work.

Photo from here

Don't give cash to homeless people, give it to the charities:

Far harder than retraining the homeless is persuading the public not to throw cash at homeless people: nothing has done more to create a dependency culture amongst the dispossessed than the indulgent attitude people have to giving. It's almost as if they're walking around with cash in their pockets saying: 'I'm really upset with this pound. But hang on, look there's someone over there who looks sad and they've got dirt on their face. Here you go...'

Even now, with the paper out there making sure homeless people are selling rather than begging, we haven't managed to control that impulse; people want to pay £5 for a magazine that costs £1.40. No homeless person is going to say 'hang on, I don't need your money', it's going to make them think that being dirty and living on the street is a sustainable way to make money.

What people don't realise is that if you give something away for nothing you enslave the recipient because you give them a reason to come back again and again. I was homeless, I was living on the streets. I hated the people who gave me money and I loathed the people who didn't. It changes your mind. It screws your life.

If you indulge homeless people and give them no barriers or limitations they demand more and more attention like a high maintenance lover.

Still a way to go:

I still think we haven't come within a mile of our potential and that's my biggest concern. The very idea that you take people who are in crisis and instead of saying 'this is what we're going to do for you' you say 'what are you going to do for yourself?' is really revolutionary and of course could go way beyond homeless people.

If you took the Big Issue concept and used it in a doctor's surgery, a school, in nutrition... actually getting people to take responsibility for their issue, that's the potential of The Big Issue and it's huge.

We also need to be a bit honest: our intervention into the lives of homeless people is not without its issues. A third of the people we help will use the money to stick stuff down their throats and unto their arms. This is life, let's not kid ourselves that we can achieve 100%.

Another third of our vendors will say: 'ah, I've got a job for life. I can sell 200 papers a week, and I can live off that'. Like all interventions our solution has created a new dependency, and yes, it's better than begging, but it's still dependency. We have to find new methods of moving people on.

What people can do:

Get real - go and help the organisations, the charities that work in the hostels. Go and help the homeless to help themselves to get out of homelessness. Petition the government to create the kind of support that is necessary to get people out of homelessness. Now that is around drink, drugs, psychological help.

We need to make a very heavy investment in the lives of single people, single homeless people. We need to give them a Rolls Royce service, the kind of service that the posh can give their children in order to get them out. The thing is, the homeless cost more money than the posh spend on their own families. It's like that.

One thing you can do right now, if you haven't already, is click here to buy a copy of Homepages, a collection of stories from Irish bloggers. it will cost you €14 and is a great read. Proceeds go to Focus Ireland, a charity which people out-of-home.

To read more about John Bird, including his thoughts on social entrepreneurship and business, you could buy Everyday Legends, the stories of 20 great social entrepreneurs, on which this interview and post was heavily based.



Featuring John, Jamie Oliver, Bob Geldof, Trevor Baylis, Siobhan Freegard and more, the book is a fascinating insight into how ordinary people can play a part in changing the world.

----

[I am aware at the end of the video, I say "and now, over to you" - over to who I'm not sure, it was just to the lovely person holding the video camera. It was very, very funny at the time.]

The reply from RTE 2FM about Rick and Nikki's shows.

Dear Darragh,

Thank you for your e-mail.

Your comments in relation to the changed format of the Nikki Hayes and Rick O'Shea shows will be included in our Audience Log of calls and e-mails, which is circulated for information to senior management in RTÉ Radio and is reviewed at the weekly meeting of the Editorial Board.

Your e-mail is also being brought to the attention of the Head of RTÉ 2fm.

We appreciate you taking the time to make your views known to us, thanks again for writing.

With best regards
Nina Ward
RTÉ Information Officer

I took two minutes today to send an email today to complaints@rte.ie to voice my disappointment at the new format of Nikki Hayes and Rick O Shea's radio shows, which now have little to no engagement, interaction and/or connection for me. What were once shows are now formulas. Where as before I'd make every effort to tune in, now I'm not that bothered. I've got my iPod for my music.

What galls me most about it is that the management haven't really come back and said why they're doing this, what audience thought it was a good idea, what benefit they think it will have to the station or the listeners or how, because of this decision, other services will improve. Why not? Because they probably didn't do that. As Grandad says, they probably crunched numbers and made two plus two equal minus three.

A lot of people have joined the Facebook group to register their disappointment. You'll find all the information there.

Have a break (but don't get chocolate on you)

Photo spotted here

Now, would you sit on it or eat it?

Nyom nyom.

New U2 single - Get On Your Boots. Listen now!

It's the first song from their new album "No Line on the Horizon", it's called Get On Your Boots and you can hear it here.

From the U2 site:

Get On Your Boots, the first single from U2's new album No Line On The Horizon, will be released as a digital download on February 15th with a physical format to follow on February 16 through Mercury/Universal (UK).

Released on March 2nd (March 3rd in the US), the album will come in a standard format with 24 page booklet and in digipak format. The digipak includes an extended booklet and the album's companion film "Linear" by Anton Corbijn. A limited edition 64 page magazine will also be available, featuring the band in conversation with artist Catherine Owens, and new Anton Corbijn photographs. No Line On The Horizon will be released on 180gm vinyl.


Album artwork from U2.com

The album cover artwork is an image of the sea meeting the sky by Japanese artist and photographer Hiroshi Sugimoto.

Full tracklisting:

1. No Line On The Horizon
2. Magnificent
3. Moment of Surrender
4. Unknown Caller
5. I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight
6. Get On Your Boots
7. Stand Up Comedy
8. Fez - Being Born
9. White As Snow
10. Breathe
11. Cedars Of Lebanon

I think the new single is actually quite good. Could grow to like it!

Damien Mulley's advice on Online Marketing and Business Blogging

Damien promised to give away his online marketing document if 103 people commented on the Mulley Communications blog post he did. 155 so far. So last night he sent out his advice on Online Marketing.

The 24 page Online Marketing document includes an introduction for website owners (as opposed to just blogs) to SEO including metatags, links and ranking.

There's a brief introduction to blogging as well as social bookmarking, Google adwords advertising, Google trends and on social networks including Bebo, LinkedIn and Facebook.

For the latter, Damien has created a comprehensive step-by-step guide to creating and maintaining an advertising presence on Facebook - very suitable even for those unfamiliar with the site and how to do things on there. The document ends with advice on YouTube and on actively listening to see what people are saying about your business.

You can "free to reuse the document for commercial or non-commercial uses but a mention of where you got the content from would be nice but is not mandatory". You'll find more how to get the free documents here:

http://mulley.ie/blog/2009/01/giving-away-our-online-marketing-documentation/

The public react to the Liverpool St T-mobile ad dance

Love the woman at the end "I was in a bad mood when I come 'ere, I'm in a good one now."


Don't know what they're talking about? Check this out.

U2 perform at the Barack Obama Inauguration Concert

Bono and the boys giving it loads with Pride and City of Blinding Lights yesterday outside the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC for the We are One Inaugural Celebration.

Great photo of the Obamas arriving there in this morning's Metro:



Gavin Sheridan is over there. You can see his photos from yesterday here.

How to know you're a geek #42,135

When you get an email like the below and you're happy about it.


[Click for bigger]

(Because, of course, you added him first)

The internet's Ben Kenealy on using technology to hook up

Damien shot this video of Ben talking to a roomful of teenagers who have never had to deal with dial-up connections, MSN Cam lags, IRC, slow download speeds and not being able to google/facebook someone to find out who they really are.

Single male blogger would like to meet the following:

Rick has started a meme.

Name 5 bloggers you haven’t met in the flesh before that you’d like to say hi to at the Blog Awards, say why if you want, link to them. They then, in turn, link to 5 bloggers they’d like to meet and so on.

That’s it. It’s just an icebreaker for the night. Yes, I know they might not be coming but it might act as an incentive.

Damn it Rick, only five? Really?

Well. I know already that Fústar won't be making it, so that's one down. However, there are some people who I want to buy me a pint say hello to, in no particular order:

1. Lette (she's already promised me a hug)
2. Gray Wright of Sinful Origami Paper
3. B'dum B'dum
4. Elf in Amsterdam
5. Jennifer (and OJ) from Paws for thought.

To add to the meme, I'd love to have a pint with Off the Meatrack, Narocroc, XBox4NappyRash, Pedro Monscooch and AJ of Le Craic fame.

But it's worrying. That's only 30% females. Hmmm. Which means I've either met a LOT of the female bloggers I read or that I just don't read enough and I'm not sure which it is.

Who would you like to meet?

Would you give these people a hug?

"All I think about is you and I hate you for that. Go commit murder or bomb planes, so I have a reason to fall out of love with you. All I think about is you and you don’t have the slightest idea. All I think about is you."

"Every time you talk about him, it’s like daggers in my heart, but you need someone to listen, so I continue to bear it"

"I know I deserve better, but I can’t block you out. You come and go as you please, take stuff as you need, and then we don’t talk for months on end again - then you come back. And I always accept you back, knowing I will end up hurt. I sit here writing this with tears running my face because of frustration or something, I don’t know what. I just want you to know I need more from you, or nothing at all."

"i feel like i can tell you anything and it’s really cool, but makes me sad that it’s not him. i think you know me more than he does sometimes"

";-; whats wrong with me?whats wrong with me?whats wrong with me?"

"you called me and told me you had something important to tell me in person and not over the phone. i ran to you. i find out that you’re back with one of my best friend. cheers."

"i don’t know how to stop loving him. i worry that i will never find anyone else i can love again. i don’t want to get hurt again."

"i’m proud of myself.

i fell into depression because one complete douchebag’s constant lying to me:
- “i love you.”
- “no, i’d never cheat on you.”
- “no, i’ll never cheat on you again.”

and instead of becoming suicidal and turning to harmful things to make myself feel slightly better, i’ve managed to become the happy, beautiful person that i’ve always wanted to be. all because you spurred me towards success. thank you. luck with your new whore of a girlfriend. i pity her deeply."

"i dont care if theres a scientific explanation for it. when street lights go out as i walk under them, it makes me feel special. sometimes i secretly think i have untapped powers."

These confessions and more over on Group Hug.us | anonymous online confessions. There's more about it here. You can give the people who confess a hug over there if you want to.

Having a coffee and interview with Messiah J

They've just been nominated for The Choice Music Prize, Irish Album Of The Year, for the second record in a row. In the video interview we've done, Messiah J describes the group as "a two piece music making machine, influenced by hip hop, psychedelia, reggae and classical sources; hip hop but not as we know it. Left of centre and then left of centre again. Accessible music that people can dance to, can think to - people who are as flawed, confused and ordinary as us." They're successful, they're Irish and they love what they do.


Photos from MJEX

I hadn't heard of MJEX until I got their latest album, From the Word Go. Actually, that's not entirely accurate - I'd heard of them but never listened to their music, wouldn't have considered going to a gig, didn't know what they were about and, to be honest, didn't try to find out. Hip Hop for me was that dancy stuff; gangsta rap, Beyonce, Eminem and Nelly all lumped together in my mental file. I think the term became too broad and multi-discipline encompassing to understand so I just left it. To hear of a Dublin group doing it seemed a bit Commitment-esque - I mean, it's just Irish guys trying to be black, right?



But I stuck the CD on. Pretty quickly my foot tapping turned into dancing. As part of the research before this interview, I went to check out the reviews online - RTÉ called it "an assured and catchy release... the album overall has an uplifting effect as it is mostly fast-paced and melodic." Hotpress called it a 'classic' while Sputnik Music said it was "every bit the record it threatened to be: challenging yet accessible; diverse yet coherent; serious yet playful; pop but not pop."

State consider it their "finest album to date" while Jim Carroll called it the sweetest thing they've ever done going on to name their new single, Turn the Magic On, with lead vocals by Leda Egri as "a tune which every DJ at every music station in the land should be playing off the air."

I read the reviews, read some interviews, saw this video for their first single from the album, Megaphone Man and wondered just who I'd end up meeting. What was evident from the interviews I've read is that they're passionate in their beliefs about what music can do and the responsibility they feel they have. Their CD "questions the state of the world we live in today. The songs are about every day things, good and bad, all set against the backdrop of a pretty confused world and its people."

"The stance we're taking is that we don't know it all or even pretend to know it all, but we're trying to make people aware that this is stuff they should get to know about. We're as confused as everyone else." they said in a brilliant Irish Times interview:

"I think there has to be more talk about political issues from people our own age, not some fiftysomething career politician coming out with loads of jargon. Bands, though, are afraid to speak about political issues because they feel they have to have all the answers or be on a podium, but that's not the case. You can take an interest and be flawed. You can't be a hypocrite, but you can be flawed."

The first thing to note about John Fitzgerald - Messiah J - is that he's remarkably polite. When we meet at the Central Hotel, he greets Darren and me with effusive thanks for the opportunity, thanks for the time, thanks for the nice words. There's no "call me Messiah" or any of that. Darren's here to take photos but more than that - his familiarity with MJEX through the Choice Music Prize is a welcome addition to the conversation.

We bounce through topics at a rate of knots - conversation flows easily because John is a comfortable guy to be around - he knows his stuff without making that part of any persona. As I scribble what becomes a 9 A5 page interview, I start building a real picture of who Messiah J is.

How would Messiah J change Dublin, his home town?

"Well, I wish... Hmmm. I wish people were nicer. More polite. More civil to each other. That's important. I also wish everything wasn't so drink based.

Dublin is for me a strange one - it's sometimes a hiding place and sometimes a thing to hide behind. We have some under the carpet racism that I'd love to see gone. I despise the word foreigners. Foreigners is an exclusionary term, a way of dividing people, so yes, I wish the phrase "the foreigners" wasn't used so much, particularly towards Polish people.

I also with there were less promises that can't be kept - services, metro lines, infrastructure all promised and then not happening. The things that really matter - healthcare, welfare, people - that's what matters. Focus on that."

How he became Messiah J:

"I was about 15. I was always listening to hip hop and thinking "I like this and I don't care about anything else." I think to get your identity you have to say "I'm into this" and mean it. So, I listened to the music, wore the gear and obsessed about the subculture.

Writing it then, well that started quietly. It was all very hush hush - writing was like masturbating in my bedroom, a guilty secret. I kept it to myself so I wouldn't get laughed at.

I never tried the whole mimicking America thing. I never felt that I had to be anyone else or do it in any style but my own. I was expressing myself and that was it.

I started wondering then, Is anyone else doing this? This is the mid to late 90's and Hip Hop was kind of coming into a phase of its own. If you followed it people asked you which style, which person you were - Ice T, Ice Cube or Snoop. I didn't identify with that.

I met The Expert (Cian Galvin) who was a pirate DJ doing a show on DLR called Hip Hop Saturday. Then a friend called Dylan Collins introduced a lot of us and we'd get together at the City Arts Centre and just jam. That then became the Stonecutters and then we had Creative Controle for three years. It was good fun."

Getting on with The Expert:

"Well we know each other for what - ten years now? So at this stage we almost have a telepathy between us. We just keep on trying to get better at what we do. When we're in the studio together working on stuff, we can almost spontaneously sing the same melody line as we both create it.

We don't fight. We argue for the greater good and we reject each other's work far more than we accept it, but it makes us better.

I remember Friday nights before we'd meet to record stuff. I'd be in my dressing gown - it's my writing robe - pacing, feeling it was like the night before an exam, wondering if he'd like it. From the very start I could tell that this guy knows his shit. I respect him. The Expert is a genius. We maintain a healthy competition between us. It's a good song writing partnership.

We record in our own studio called Labbey Road. It's pretty basic but it works for us. Since we decided to release on our own label, Inaudible records, it's given us a freedom to have our own style, to do it the way we want. As I say, we don't have to be anyone but ourselves I don't pretend to be American when I rap, I rap in my own accent. We support each other on that - it's the way we've always been."

Playing live:

"Playing live is warts and all. You fuck up and everyone sees. There's no hiding place. When something's written we'll get it while it's raw. It's very exciting and tiring, it's like you're fighting for perfectionism.

I mean, videos are fun, yeah? There's a theatrical element to them, you're on a set, there's a different environment, it's a different discipline. You shoot, you have ideas, you try them out and when you're happy with it, it's done.

Live though, well, in some ways when we go on stage it's a kind of a release. We can take over the place. To put it one way, it's the exact opposite of someone at a party having a think. Everything releases. For me, it's a amplified version of everything I am. I'm completely different off stage then."

Critics and feedback:

"Yes, I listen to critics, be they bloggers, journalists or fans. Ultimately critics will help you sell records. There's a perception sometimes that music critics are all dickheads - they're certainly not. A bad review can point you in a good direction, a good review does no harm at all.

We're making independent music, so people writing about us and talking about us is massively important and really complimentary.

We don't get as much mainstream radio play as we like. Rick O Shea and Colm and Jim Jim are two presenters who have been great to us. I suppose it's to do with the music too. I mean, when I first heard Megaphone Man fully, I thought it might be too edgy, a bit too bizarre. But it's out there and it works.

Messiah J and the Expert are hip hop. It's not a definable sound, it's not that we feel the need to justify the type of hip hop we are, but we are more than loops and stupid rhyming lyrics. Genres can case you in - we like to think the new album is more than a Hip Hop album, it's something for people who like everything."

On their song topics:

"Am I trying to make a difference as a songwriter? Yes. It's an enviable position to be in. I don't do it as a "it's for the kids, man" but people should be talking about the issues around them. It's not just politicians - it's people that are listened to, whether they're teachers, entertainers or writers, bloggers - people should take responsibility. I'm not saying I have any answers or my way is the right way, but I'll ask the questions and I'll look around me and I'll talk about things.

Songwriters have changed my life with some of the things I've heard and listened to. We've seen it with people like Dylan and Lennon where you can have a massive influence, once it's not contrived, it's not fake or for the sake of it. Too much music is bland and without substance. It doesn't have to be. It's quite a powerful thing to be able to talk about the world around you and not be seen to be on a lofty pedestal. it's as I said earlier, it's for people as flawed, confused and ordinary as us.

Discussion is what it's about - it's part of what music is. Opera was political music. What we do is political, but only in the people sense. There's a time and place for escapist music, but there's also a place where people can ask questions and think about things too."

On the future:

"We're just going to keep doing what we love, pushing ourselves to get better, making it great. We want to be a great band, not just in Irish Hip Hop but by any standards. I mean, if we wanted to leave a legacy it would be that we made a difference, that we tried to musically and lyrically chart new territory. We made people dance."

Messiah J and the Expert are playing support to The Streets on Jan 25 in Dublin's Olympia Theatre. They'll then be in Vicar Street for the Choice Music Prize on March 4. You'll find their blog here, their website here and MySpace here.

Big thanks to John for taking the time out to talk to me, Darren for the photos and Emma for helping to arrange the interview.

Flash Mob dancing, Liverpool Street Station, Thursday morning.

So you're in London on the way to wherever you're going at 11am on Thursday morning, you're in Liverpool Street Station and suddenly this happens...


It's definitely worth seeing the high quality version.

It's the new T-mobile ad, with slogan Life's for Sharing.

How the hell did they do this? How did they get it done? Irish advertisers, the gauntlet has been thrown down to you. Heuston Station next, perhaps?

How often have you heard Journey's Don't Stop Believin'?

Or at least the four chord melody of it? Have a listen. I'll bet it's a lot more than you think it is.


The Axis of Evil bet it is too. They're Sydney's greatest musical comedy rock band. Check out the live video here. They're on MySpace and their website is here.

Speech Bubbles - WHY?

Rain is millions of tiny speech bubbles unused
The collected breaths of mutes
And all our silent exhalations
Where we should've put words
Or words we had no one to tell
Emptied from clouds like clearing horns spit valves
Coming back to us now
To remind us what we meant to say
Or that we meant to say something

Coming down and dying
In one giant quiet
On the streets and cars
Huzzled like jewels in girls' hair
On the fake wool collar of my bomber jacket
And on my glasses and feet

Cut 'em deep and weep out loud
Just dust and just a hair in your mouth
You drink and think you're tonguin' something to shout
But it's just dust and just a hair in your mouth

And now these empty breaths reflect
The feedback of headlights
Push leaves and coffee cups
To lower altitudes and gutters
Rain is confession weather
And we become booths of prayer if we let us

Loving these lyrics from Californian band WHY? Thanks Naomi.

President Bush wearing a Brian Cowen mask perhaps

As spotted on the Irish Times website this morning:



Caption under the photo of President Bush Brian Cowen reads:

President George W Bush walks away after making his final televised address to the nation last night. Photo: Reuters/Jason Reed

Someone, somewhere has got some explaining to do...

What's that word the young people use these days? File? Fall? Fool? Flail?

Bike blenders: now you really can have smoothies on the go

So you like that healthy kick in the morning, but you're also facing a hectic bike ride into work?

Now, thanks to Rock The Bike, you can combine both!

Just grab yourself a fender blender:



From the site:

Crank out smoothies at your party or school with pedal power!

The smallest and most affordable bike blender we make, it fits on any bike. Pop it on a trainer, and start blending!

Using the optional Bottle Blender accessory, your FBU blends while you ride safely. Prop your bike up on your stationary bike trainer and you have a human power generation station where ever you choose!

It takes about 60-90 seconds of medium-hard pedalling to blend a smoothie with a Fender Blender.

You think I'm kidding?



Just look at the prices! This must be why the USA is considered a world leader.



At the time of writing, 399.00 USD = 302.21 EUR. Surely that's worth it for your smoothies, no?

Sometimes it's hard to beer a woman

Click images for bigger versions:







Goldstar Beer - Thank God you're a man - advertising from the McCann Erickson Advertising Agency, Tel Aviv.

Rex the Dog - Bubblicious

Love this video.

Jaydiohead free album

Radiohead and Jay-Z mashup album produced by Minty Fresh Beats. You know what? It's really rather good.

Track list:

1/10 - Wrong Prayer
2/10 - 99 Anthems
3/10 - No Karma
4/10 - Lucifer's Jigsaw
5/10 - Optimistic Moment
6/10 - Dirt Off Your Android
7/10 - Dreaming Up
8/10 - Change Order
9/10 - Fall In Step
10/10 - Ignorant Swan

Go get it.

Messiah J and the Expert for beginners

I interviewed Messiah J from 2008 Choice Music Prize nominated group Messiah J and the Expert. If you haven't heard of them, here's an introduction for you:



A fuller detailed interview for fans will be available later.

My favourite letterbox in Dublin

Do you know where Palace Street in Dublin is? Walk down George's Street towards Dame Street. Take a left at The George. You're on Palace "Street", though it's hardly a street, is it? More of a continuation of Dame Lane, but who are we to argue with Google?

Go down there about half way towards the gates of Dublin Castle and have a look on the wall. There, on the right hand side, amid the street art and graffiti, you'll see a letterbox. This is my favourite letterbox in Dublin.





It's not often you'll get the opportunity to post a letter to God, a letter to the past or the future but here's a box that invites you to share a memory, thoughts or ideas that mean something to you. When I first noticed it in May , it was inviting letters to God - "your chance to give the big man a piece of your mind" - but it's since gone on to invite submissions on a variety of themes.

Dublin rarely disappoints. The submissions, though few (possibly owing to location) are quality reading, an insight into the person who stopped and stared, who fumbled in pockets for card, paper and pen and who thought about what they'd say.



"I just met someone like me who I'll never see again" reads one, while another to God reads "Where have you been all my life?" One of my personal favourites, as below, is "My eyes are CDs and my mind is the player." Another reads "Why did you make lemmings only to run them off cliffs?"



The MySpace page that the address on the box leads to gives more details. It's part of an interactive street art project where the letters will be used as inspiration for the work of the owner as an artist. Some letters of the series are also published in the Baby BEEF fanzine, a zine for art, creativity and freedom of expression, which was, apparently :

born part out of frustration against the 'stook up its own ass' art world and out of the urge to just create something fun and give everybody a chance to get their work out there.

You can check out the albums for the letterbox on their MySpace here. Below are the ones that I really like:

Vote for John and Peter in the Shorty Awards

They're the Academy Awards of Twitter, if you take the academy to be all your followers who'll vote for you and the award to be for best producers of short content in 2008. It's great to see John Williams of @mcawilliams fame and Peter Donegan of @doneganland notoriety reach the finals of the first Shorty Awards. Go on the Irish!



If you are on Twitter and haven't voted, just head on over to the Shorty Awards website here, click Vote under doneganland in the Green category and under mcawilliams in the Personal category and complete the form. It's very easy and they'd appreciate your votes.

Good luck to yis both :)

Work for a year for your favourite charity and still get paid

Want to work for your favourite charity for a year. And still get paid?

Do you want to make a real difference?

I'm thinking of preparing an application to the Vodafone World of Difference project.

Four Irish people will get the chance to work for the charity of their choice with all expenses paid and a salary of €40,000. I'm very aware of what friends of mine working in charities are earning and that is a generous amount.

From the World of Difference website:

"Show us just how passionate you are and prove to us you have the relevant skills, knowledge and qualities necessary to make a real difference to your chosen charity.

Whether it is taking time out to support your favourite charity, be it with people, animals or the environment; or approaching a charity with an idea that you believe could revolutionise their cause, Vodafone Ireland Foundation wants to make it possible for you to focus your energies full-time on your selected cause."

Last year's winners went on to work with GROW Ireland, the mental health organisation; with the Mayobank Intercultural Association supporting immigrants to develop skills, enabling access to employment; with Biobank Ireland, "a revolutionary initiative which offers a bridge between cancer research and treatment" and with Doras Luimni, a charity focused on creating a development skills programme for immigrants in Limerick.

Applications are open until Friday 20 February at 5:30pm. The judges this year are Roisin Ingle, Ray D'Arcy, Claire Byrne and Gavin Duffy. There's only five sections to be filled out - that's got to be worth a shot, hasn't it?

As if I needed an excuse to go back to London

I'd completely forgotten about this until a friend emailed me about it.

The new Fagin in the new production of Lionel Bart's Oliver!?

Rowan Atkinson.



Cameron Mackintosh is behind this new staging, the first in the West End since 1994. It's at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane and has a cast of over 100. Jodie Prenger, winner of the TV series I'd Do Anything is playing Nancy and Burn Gorman, who played Owen Harper in Torchwood is Bill Sikes.

Fagin is one of my favourite musical characters - I think the best characters in theatre tend to be Jews - and I'm brilliantly fond of Ron Moody's portrayal of him in the film version. When he bounces out during I'd do anything always brings a smile to my face.



Still though, I'm looking forward to seeing what Rowan Atkinson could do with the role. I think he's a fantastically understated character actor, particularly given his film role choices and this could bring a whole new dimension to the character and the audience. he's due to star as Fagin until July 18.

I'd be tempted to go over just to see him perform this, my favourite Fagin song:



The official website, with times and prices, is here.

One week to go

Photo take from this morning's Metro.

Outgoing US President George W Bush smiles at his final press conference in the White House yesterday, admitting he was disappointed that Saddam Hussein didn't have weapons of mass destruction.

It's somewhat surprising and relieving to think that in less than a week President Bush won't be in charge of nuclear weapons, foreign policy, aid donations or military attacks. He said he'll get "off the stage" to let his successor get on with things. I know a lot of hope is riding on Obama's shoulders, but things will have to change.

In related news, the Obama team is said to have been inundated with applications to join the administration. More than 350,000 people applied for a position in the team, four times the amount that applied to work for the Bush administration.

I wonder if they're accepting applications from Ireland?

Unconvention Belfast, an unconference for musicians and industry professionals

Unconvention is an unconference aimed at the grass roots of the music industry - bringing together musicians and industry professionals for conversation, inspiration and collaboration.

I'm hoping to attend this conference taking place in Belfast on February 6 and 7. Aimed at musicians and all those who support them - photographers, PR, technicians, agents, recording artists, coaches and more, the two day event promises to allow people to come together in an informal but collaborative environment where constructive discussion and networking can take place.

Andy McMillan, Nick Fitzsimons and the lovely Tracy Dempsey, all who I met at last year's Barcamp Belfast are organising the event along with Rich Dale and Jennie McCullogh. They've got a lot of music knowledge and experience between them so I can imagine the event will run both smoothly and with good awareness of the needs of musicians as well as those who work with them.

They're inviting speakers to give a talk, attendees to participate and have some really interesting ideas for discussion including Making ‘Local’ Music Credible; Music & The Semantic Web and my personal favourite What have you done for me lately?: Creating “Stickiness” with fans. There'll also be a showcase for musicians on the Friday evening.

The event is taking place at the Black Box, Belfast and starts at 10am on Friday 6 February. All the details are up on the website.

Coming out to my mother - my story

I tell this story better in person. It evolves too with each telling, words changing, inflection and intonation differing, depending on the audience. The Kilkenny accent plays an important role, as does the knowledge of the listener of my mother in "real life" - particularly how challenging a serious conversation with her can be with her constant interruptions, as well intentioned as they may be.

I've tended to tell it over dinner or a pint to someone or people it's come up in conversation with, or who out and out ask. I've hesitated about sharing it online before now, doubtful I could do the full extent of the effect and reaction justice. However, tonight I read Stephen, Russell, Scott and Ben who have all posted their coming out stories, their difficulties and challenges in sharing who they are with loved ones, so I'll give it a go and take this opportunity to tell you mine.



It's the year 1999. I'm almost 21, I've lived in Dublin now for almost two years. I'm home for the first time in a few weeks, my studies in the seminary providing a demanding schedule. Easter is next weekend and the evening before I'd been talking to my younger sister on the phone, who had told me things my mother had been telling our relatives. Andrea knows I value my privacy, knows the way things spread around our small village and, I guess, she wants to stir trouble as well, so she gives me a run through of overheard conversations and things people have said to her. She doesn't like it - I'm embarrassing her again. After a restless night of thinking and rehearsing, I took the first bus and arrived home a day early, telling my mother we needed to talk.

I'd changed a lot that year. My experiences in Kimmage were nothing but positive - I was studying in UCD, cycling out every day giving me that necessary exercise boost. The contemplative, spiritual side of my life had helped me get to know myself a lot better, to focus on my thoughts and deal with them maturely, while the social aspect of dealing with parishioners and fellow seminarians boosted my self confidence and taught me a lot about interacting with people. Teasie's little boy was growing up fast.

Dropping my bags in the hallway, I can hear the TV blasting from the kitchen. I didn't have a mobile then so had no way of telling the folks what time I'd be home. I preferred it this way almost, the thoughts of laid out tables, cups of tae and chatter about stuff we'd already discussed on the phone far from my mind. "She's been saying things about you, Darragh" Andrea had said, "She's been telling them why you don't like girls and stuff." I think I'd almost have preferred not to know.

Growing up I went to all boys schools so never had much interaction with girls. I've written about this previously, but it's worth pointing out that UCD was a huge surprise for me, it providing a bewildering amount of girls who - I couldn't really understand - seemed to like being with guys and each other. This was different.

The girls I'd encountered at home and on the school bus were bitches, pure and simple. They took every delight in tormenting each other and any one on the bus that they chose to pick on, gender irrelevant. I was a constant target, being quiet and not bothered to react. I left for Dublin with certain apprehension that they'd be the same everywhere - just out for themselves, with no concern for anyone's feelings. At least, that's how I perceived it.

I pushed open the door. My father was on the chair, watching a GAA match on the television while my mother was playing patience at the table down at the sliding door, the light being perfect for her eyesight. They didn't notice me for a second, so I said a casual "Well hello there" before sitting opposite my mother. We'd only spoken the night before so there was little catching up to do.

"Mam" I said, when the journey questions were answered, "Can we talk about something? I think we need to talk."

She looked up at me. I was expecting the look, what my sister had told me still in my head, but the sudden change in her face emphasised how important this suddenly was to her. Her eyes softened, she took off her glasses and smiled and said "Of course son, what do you want to tell me?"

"Well, look, it's important we talk about something. It'll only take a few minutes but I want to tell you it now."

It was as if I was reading next week's lotto numbers to her. She had anticipated this, I could see it in her face. The smile got wider. On the couch, my father stayed intent on the match, not a flicker of interest apparent.

"John" she said, "Come over here. Darragh wants to tell us something. Make him a cup of tea there John and come over"

"It's okay Dad", I said, "Stay where you are. I'll talk to mam."

"Are you sure Darragh?" she said. "Do you not want your father here as well? John, would you ever turn down that telly and make him a cup of tea, for feck sake. Come over here."

My mother is a formidable woman at the best of times. You'd really have to hear the accent to understand how forceful her words can be. Many's the guest in our house have had a cup of tea made for them, whether they want it or not.

"Look, it's grand", I said, "Watch your game. I'm all right for tea. I don't feel like tea, I just want to get this over with."

"Son, you know that we love you".

(If I ever do this on stage some time, I'm going to have violin music play at this point. Possibly 'O Danny Boy'.)

"You know that. We support you, we're very proud of you. You're a great son altogether, going off there to Dublin and doing what you want to do, it's great. We..."

"Yes, yes I know all that", I interrupt, as patiently as I can manage. "I just want to talk to you about this."

"Well you go on son, I'm listening. I'm here for you. JOHN! Will you turn down that telly? We're trying to talk here."

I took a deep breath. "Well, look. I've been away from here nearly two years now and I've been thinking a lot."

"You have son, and it's done you the world of good. Sure you were never happy here, it held you back. Not enough opportunities," she interrupted.

"Be that as it may", I said, "I'm enjoying the second year in UCD. I like what I'm doing and I love being in Kimmage"

"Sure aren't you doing God's work, son?" she said. "Isn't it what you want to do? You're very brave. I don't think you should be there now, but sure you're happy. And that's all we want, your father and me, you to be happy."

"Yeah, I know, but look. I want to tell you something. I want you to know this. I need you to know this."

"Go on, son, go on", she smiled, the words forming on her lips in anticipation.

"I know I never seemed interested in girls the way the other lads were when I was younger..."

"But sure weren't they all bitches to you boy? Jealous! That's what they all were, jealous. You'd be much better off without any of them from here..."

"... Yes, but look! I have a lot of friends in Dublin. Some are guys, some are girls, and I know I'm living with a group of men and I know I'm going to be celibate..."

"Yes, son, I do, go on". She's sitting in the chair like a jockey on a racehorse, ready to reach over and pounce with an almighty hug if tears began or when the words come.

"...But I want you to know something. It's important I'm honest with you. There's something about me that you don't seem to know, maybe I haven't been clear."

"We love you, son. Whoever you are and want to be, we'll love you anyways."

"Yeah, I know that!", I'm getting manic, trying to force the words out, hating how long something so simple, something I've come to terms with, thought about a lot, prayed about a lot and have accepted about myself after years of doubt and denial is taking. "But look, I'm just telling you now. I'm straight. There, I've said it. I like girls, I'm not gay and that's it."

"What did you say?" Her tone is incredulous, as if I've just announced I'm actually a small kangaroo named Skippy.

"I said, I'm not gay. Andrea's told me what you've been saying, told me you told people you were proud of me whether I was gay or not. Well, I'm not. I don't want a boyfriend, I don't want a girlfriend, but I'm not gay."

"But..."

"But nothing, that's it! That's who I am. I've thought enough about it to know."

"Well", she said, at once utterly deflated, her own self congratulation at being a modern mother and supporting her son's identity no matter what evaporating while her acute embarrassment at having gotten it so wrong rose like her blood pressure.

"Well...

If that's the way you want to live your life, you go and do so."

The vehemence in her tone was shockingly funny. I had to laugh. She gathered her cards and her spectacles, and without speaking to me, turned her back and walked out of the room, shoulders slumped with the burden of a disappointing child. Her dream had ended.

My father looked up. "Is everything okay?", he said. "What happened?"

"Ah, I told her I wasn't gay."

"Sure I've been telling her that all along. Don't mind her. Will you have a cup of tea?"

"I will" says I. "I think I will."

My mother didn't speak to me for the rest of that evening and didn't really forgive me for a month. "My son, the gay priest" was not going to be a part of her vocabulary for the rest of my life. We laugh about it now, but every so often she'll ask "So, any sign of a girl? Or a fella?" There hasn't been. A funny woman, my mother.

Not a word of a lie. I came out as straight to my mammy. I had to. She wouldn't have believed me otherwise.

Do you think they saw it coming?

Making this blog ALT tag friendly

Spot the difference between these two images:





It may not be obvious, but the bottom image now has an ALT tag on it, meaning it's easier for people using screen readers, who have their graphics turned off, who surf the web with a text only browser or who might be on a handheld device.

An ALT tag is a simple bit of code that goes on the end of the image source, which describes what's in the image being shown. The more technical definition is

a HTML tag that provides alternative text when non-textual elements, typically images, cannot be displayed.

As I've said before, I use Picasa for most of the images here, preferring it to the integrated blogger image upload system. To add an image to the blog, what I have to do is copy and paste the code from Picasa to the blog and delete the album hyperlink that comes with it. It's pretty much the same as how I described putting comment buttons on a blogspot blog.

So now, when I have my image code in:


I just type in

alt="description of what I'm describing"

before the closing > bracket, as highlighted below:



And that's it! I'll just need to improve my skill at describing what's in a photo. If you have any helpful suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

Wordpress.com users, rejoice. In your image insert function, you can easily specify the alt text, or caption, as shown below.



A huge thank you to Digital Darragh for advising me to do this (albeit ages ago!). I hope it improves the experience of this blog somewhat. I'm getting there...

The grafitti/street art by the way is located in a laneway - Palace Street, perhaps - in Dublin 2. Not sure who the artist is but a lot of stuff down there is worth a look.

I'm in the new Hibernian Avivia Insurance TV ad

Yes indeed, that is me in the new TV ad for Hibernian Aviva Insurance, thanks for noticing. (Thanks Will, for the video link). It was indeed a challenging, but enjoyable experience as I endeavoured to bring my starring roles to life with an injection of enthusiasm and personality I felt would suit them.

In December I was part of the shooting over a weekend, where I played an investor involved in the bank runs in the 1930s, an emigrant from 1950s Ireland and a dole queue participant in the 1980s. Two full days shooting (9am start Saturday, 6am call time the Sunday) for such an integral part of the advertisement.

In case your eagle eyes missed my starring roles, here they are:

Me heading off across the broad Atlantic foam:


Looking for my bank money:


In the dole queue (with the rest of the Commitments):


Now, in case you think i'm joking, it was quite a revelation to see how much time, effort and money went in to creating this ad - how many extras, how many costumes and how much time we spent filming in order to get those brief few seconds.

The 1950s emigrant ship scene was shot on the Liffey very early morning. This iwas probably the most fun to do. There were some 200 people there for a few hours providing tourists who had braved the cold with some pretty unique shots.



The level of detail was impressive, from the 1950s costumes





right down to the real-looking fake cow they had suspended from a crane above the boat.





How did I look? Like a gombeen. Or me grandfather. After the funeral.



The 1930 bank scene was shot up on Cathal Brugha street. A call time of 9am to be in Temple Bar, a shooting time of 2pm and a finishing time of approximately 4.30. The overhead shot was achieved with some fancy camera angles





And some angry looking men. Considering how long we'd been waiting to move, this wasn't much of a stretch of our acting abilities.







How did I look? Like a gombeen. Or me grandfather. After the funeral. I play that part well.



I don't seem to have photos of the dole queue scene. Considering I'd spent the morning emigrating in the freezing cold, my fingers probably weren't working. Not to mention of course that digital cameras weren't invented in the 1980s...

I did, however spot this on the way home through Temple Bar. A photo opportunity if ever there was one...



Being an extra, though at times a lot of standing around is fairly easy money. If it's something you or someone you know might be interested in, check out MovieExtras.ie. A brilliant (Irish) service where Derek, Don and Claudine would be happy to look after you.

Colin Farrell, Gabriel Byrne and Slumdog Millionaire win at Golden Globes

It's never really interested me before, but this year's Golden Globes - the 66th apparently - had such a diverse range of films and acting roles in competition, I must admit I was a little bit hooked.

Irish winners are Gabriel Byrne and Colin Farrell. Kate Winslet won two and Slumdog Millionaire won four.

House and 24 were beaten as were Brendan Gleeson, Judi Dench, America Ferrera, Christina Applegate, Hugh Laurie, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Sally Field, Frost/Nixon, The curious case of Benjamin Button, Tom Cruise, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Sean Penn and well... you get the idea.

So, winners last night were:

The Cecil B. DeMille Award:
Steven Spielberg

Best Motion Picture - Drama:
Slumdog Millionaire (Saw this last night. Highly recommend it. Very well made.)

Best Motion Picture - Musical Or Comedy
Vicky Cristina Barcelona

Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Drama
Mickey Rourke – The Wrestler (as expected)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Drama:
Kate Winslet – Revolutionary Road (as expected)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy
Colin Farrell – In Bruges

Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy
Sally Hawkins – Happy-Go-Lucky

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture
Heath Ledger – The Dark Knight

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture
Kate Winslet – The Reader (Second win of the night - we can expect to see a lot more from her!)

Best Animated Feature Film
Wall-E

Best Foreign Language Film
Waltz With Bashir (Israel)

Best Director - Motion Picture
Danny Boyle – Slumdog Millionaire

Best Screenplay - Motion Picture
Slumdog Millionaire
Written by Simon Beaufoy

Best Original Score - Motion Picture
Slumdog Millionaire
Composed by A. R. Rahman

Best Original Song - Motion Picture
"The Wrestler" – The Wrestler
Music & Lyrics By: Bruce Springsteen

Best Television Series - Drama
Mad Men

Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series - Drama
Anna Paquin – True Blood

Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series - Drama
Gabriel Byrne – In Treatment

Best Television Series - Musical or Comedy
30 Rock

Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series - Musical or Comedy
Tina Fey – 30 Rock

Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series - Musical or Comedy
Alec Baldwin – 30 Rock

Best Mini-Series or Motion Picture made for Television
John Adams

Best Performance by an Actress in a Mini-series or Motion Picture made for Television
Laura Linney – John Adams

Best Performance by an Actor in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture made for Television
Paul Giamatti – John Adams

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture made for Television
Laura Dern – Recount

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture made for Television
Tom Wilkinson – John Adams

As always, check out the great Movies.ie for more on the films.

We don't get spammed by just anyone, you know

Reading the emails and comments I've gotten this week while I've been recuperating (thank God for painkillers and Deep Heat is all I can say) I notice that spam comments are on the rise again. So I go about deleting what I find. They're the usual - clothes sites, painting sites, online gaming sites, insurance sites and then...



Oh yes.



That's right.

I get spammed by the Jedi Council. The Jedi Council. The Jedi Council. The Jedi Council of Morm-Jordil no less. Damn right. None of this small town, small island spam for me no more, I now get the spam from galaxies far far away.



Well, okay it's someone representing them, or directing me towards them or asking me to write to my local MP about Ewan McGregor. Oh okay, so it's not Yoda or Mace Windu or Yarael Poof or Ki-Adi-Mundi or Plo Koon. But it's still pretty cool, right? With 390,127 Jedis in the UK in 2001, it's got to count for something, eh? I mean, in spam terms, it's not often you get asked to defend the honour of someone like George Lucas, is it?

So there was I all geeky smug about it, till I googled it. And what did I find? Himself. The ould fella. The smug one with the new book. The git had already been there and blogged it. Sixteen months ago!

Donncha had as well in October. And some fella called Sean Bonner. So really, it's not special spam, not even a little.

So I deleted it. Ewan McGregor can continue his so-called treachery. Boo to Supershadow and all his ilk. I'm not happy being his fourth. Not happy at all.

No more dancing for Matt? Matt Harding: a fake fake.

*EDIT* - the last line of the post has the most up-to-date version of things.

He finally admitted it. Matt Harding, geek hero, cewebrity and inspiration to many who loved his dancing videos, visited the WhereTheHellIsMatt.com website and, indeed, reposted his videos on their own blogs came clean recently and admitted that the doubting YouTube commenters were right, and that he is, in fact, a fake.

He is in fact an actor whose previous biggest accomplishment was playing a corpse on CSI: Miami. He is terrified of flying and has never left the US. He was hired by New York based viral ad agency Buzz!Brain to feature in the project, on the basis of his "affably horrible dancing ability".

The project, as this video shows, involved a huge amount of photoshopping, green screens and an army of animatronic puppets (including one called Larry) to maintain the secrecy necessary to create the illusion. He revealed how he almost drowned during the non-gravity scene, which was really filmed in a hollowed out Boeing 727 in an Olympic swimming pool. He also showed the budget, which, though expensive he feels was worth it, and features the costs of the puppets ($8,000,000), secrecy bribes ($2.5m) and robot uprising insurance for $1m.


Click here for larger.

At the Entertainment Gathering (EG) conference in Monterey, California where he revealed the hoax, the actor playing Harding comments on how the original video, which Time Magazine has named the best viral video of 2008, inspired so many comments, that people had

"a profound joy of feeling connected to the whole world by watching this simple act of uncoordinated, unselfconscious silliness shared by everyone"

that he wished the video had been real. "It wouldn't solve anything or change anything" said Harding, "Our problems are still our problems, but maybe there's some value in being reminded of the really basic stuff we have in common." And so invited the audience up to dance with him at the end of his talk.

And then, of course, at MacWorld this year - this video was published a short time ago - he reveals that that hoax was a hoax:


So, there you have it. The Matt Harding videos are not fake. Odd seeing/hearing him speak, eh?

Are you looking for a good detective agency in Kilkenny?

Tony was. He rang me while I was showing Andrea how to use her digital camera.


So there you have it. If, like Tony, you're looking for a great detective agency in Kilkenny, check out Pinkertons.ie.

An international security guard and detective agency with a fine history and unrivalled case list, we're they're now bringing our their reputable and excellent service and expertise to the city and county. One of their opening offers - if they can't find your pet, it's your money back and a free pet.

Whatever you do, don't bother checking out Vultures Private Investigators. Don't watch (or read) their cheap, badly scripted and amateur anti-Pinkertons campaign and don't eagerly await episodes 5 and 6 which are shooting at the moment.

And don't bother asking Ross or Ken if I'm right. They'll only say no.

Pinkertons.ie - they never sleep either.

How to recognise and deal with comment spam on your blogspot blog

"Susan said...

I recently came across your blog and have been reading along. I thought I would leave my first comment. I don't know what to say except that I have enjoyed reading. Nice blog. I will keep visiting this blog very often."

Aww? Isn't that nice? Comments like that are great. They're why I wrote the beginners guide. They're the ones that Grannymar calls the readybrek of bloggers. Except, in this case, it was spam. Bold Susan or Deborah or whatever you were called.



One name to begin with, but signed Deborah and a link to an insurance website. Spam spam spam.

Many blog writers will be more than familiar with such comments. Wordpress users have their own filters to deal with such, but people new to blogspot/blogger might like to know the following.

Why it happens:

This is just another form of bad advertising. The same way your web email gets "gr0w y0ur pen1$" and "cheap r0llex watch" emails, so some people write comments in the hope that the link they attach will either boost their SEO rankings (how quickly and easily people will find them in search engines) or that you or your readers will click on the link and buy.

Believe it or not, companies actually pay for this. One such site is pictured below:



They advertise how "they hire skilled writers who are trained in creating high quality blog comments. They post relevant comments on websites that have a strong connection to your website’s niche. By posting a username at each comment with a hardlink directing back to your website, our commenter creates a high quality backlink for your site with each comment."

You'll be glad to know though that unless you or a reader clicks on the link, it doesn't work. In January of 2005, Google created a nifty piece of code called "nofollow" which means links in the comment section of Blogspot don't benefit from any Pagerank boost, the very thing the spammers are after.

These companies are out there though and I'm seeing a lot more of their spam creep through. Darren Rowse over at the well-worth-a-regular-read Problogger.net has more on it here.

How to recognise a spam comment

Well, like the above, it's usually in the name or the fact they've included a non-relevant URL or website in their comment. As well as the above, I have some examples here:

Example 1: No name provided and a non-descriptive URL linking to a site that could be anything:


Example 2: No name provided, another link to a site that could be anything and a foreign language. (I really hope I'm not deleting a comment that is telling me I've won something.)



Example 3: Sometimes they're nice comments! However, given the facts that no name is provided, I guess we can say they're probably more spammy than not.



Example 4: We have a name, we have a decent, relevant comment but it's still bad advertising, it's still a link to a site I have no relationship with, so it still gets deleted.



What you can do about it.



Your first visit should be to your Dashboard. You can then choose Settings and then Comments and set things up there, from who you want to comment on your blog to whether you'd like to enable comment moderation or word verification.

• If you enable comment moderation, you can view new comments and approve or reject them before they appear on your blog
  
  
• If you enable word verification, this will require your readers to enter a unique code - or captcha - when they comment which will deter automated comment spamming systems.

You should also ensure you have your email address entered in the Comment Notification Email section, which will ensure you get an email whenever anyone leaves a comment. I have a filter set up in my Gmail meaning every comment goes to a special marked label and is easy to find.

What I do is delete all of the spam comments I get, usually immediately but always as soon as I can. It's just a matter of clicking the little delete/trashcan icon on the comment itself.



I hope that helps someone. If you happen to think though that this is far too basic, that people must or should know this information already, do spare a thought for Rhonda:



Check out the Quick Online Tip to help you locate the ANY key on your keyboard.

Spam: not fun, funny sometimes, only good in a Monty Python sketch. Or a blender.

An awful pain in the backside

Nope it's not a plug for Maxi's new award and nope, it's not a complaint about an Irish broadcaster/phone company/other blogger/state of the world :-P. It is however a post about me. I'm very very sore.



It's not something I've ever spent too much time thinking about, my bum. While I'm careful to protect my lower back and avoid strain as much as the next person, my posterior has just been there to sit on or get smacked occasionally followed by "Jaysis Doyle, you're so bony!" Its role in my general movement has never been something I've contemplated, all those hours studying anatomy in school wasted on me.

I won't be sitting on it today. Not for a while.



I spent an energy-less day in bed yesterday without the ability to do anything. Days like that are frustrating, knowing how much email was piling up, knowing of computer stuff I had to do, Christmas decorations to take down and things I wanted to do. My sleeping patterns are all over the place these days too which isn't helping. Come 11pm though and I'm feeling better, I get up, dress the bed, tidy the room a bit and bring the two half full mugs of coffee downstairs.

Big mistake.

Coming down the all wooden, no carpet stairs, mug in each hand, my legs gave way and I sat down. Heavily. On my sacrum.



In other words: I fell on my arse.

The crash was loud. The coffee flew everywhere. Clothes dripping, walls dripping, stairs sodden I immediately shouted in pain, stood up and ran for the bathroom. Don't ask me why, I think with the fright of it it was the first place that came to mind.

"Are you all right, Darragh?" was dad's first shout, him having gone to bed only a few minutes before. "What's wrong with you, son?" my mother wanted to know. They headed for the stairs, his bedroom upstairs, her's down. "What the hell happened?" they both wanted to know, no doubt looking at the devastation.

I couldn't talk. I was in agony. "I need painkillers", I said, "lots of painkillers." She brought them down to me and headed back to the kitchen. I took four.

I walked very stiffly back to where she was. I'm not sure if it was the pain of the fall or the embarrassment or knowing that my father was cleaning my mess on the stairs in his boxers that was worse. "What happened?" she asked again, "Are you okay?"

"I fell on the stairs," I say, winning first prize in the most obvious statement of 2009 award. "Did you hurt your back?" she wanted to know, "Do you want me to rub it?"

For a brief millisecond, for the time it took for my brain to process what my ears were hearing, the little boy in me, the one who had run to mammy with grazed knees, sore elbows, bruised forehead and ego, the one who believed she could kiss it better and that the Disney plasters really were magic almost said yes. Reality kicked in.

"It's, erm, not my back." She looked confused. "It's my bum. I fell on my bum."

I'm not sure which of us started laughing first. Loud, boisterous laughs, reactions to the fright of mere minutes before. Dad walked in "So what's wrong, then? Why are you walking like that?"

"He... he fell. On his arse." she managed to say amid the snorts. Though concerned, what else could she do? Dad had either less humour or was more tired. I was walking, talking and didn't seem to need a doctor. In his books I was fine and he headed back to bed. She fussed around me for the next few minutes, prescribing deep heat, a hot water bottle and sweet tea. She's great like that.

I tried to walk the pain out of it. I couldn't. I couldn't bend, I couldn't twist and there was no way I'd get back up stairs. In the end I just threw myself on the couch. Remember Del Boy falling? That was me.

I've passed the last few hours in considerable discomfort. Nothing's broken, I didn't damage my coccyx which I know from personal experience is a lot worse but I can barely move that part of me. Horizontal to vertical is almost impossible.

I fell going up stairs as well, just because I would, but once I got to me leaba, sleep soon came. I'm typing here this morning from my bed, every movement a reminder, every strain triggering pain. it's a bruised bottom and a bruised ego and even more bed time for me. Bummer.

All I can think of is this song:

Garfield Minus Garfield beating xkcd and Dilbert to best comic strip title

At the time of writing, I'm delighted to see Garfield Minus Garfield, the web comic created by Dubliner Dan Walsh, aka Travors, is beating other great web comics including Randall Munroe's xkcd, Scott Adams' Dilbert, Chris Muir's Day by Day and the bizarre Jesus and Mo by Mohammed Jones to the title of Best Comic Strip in the 2008 Weblog Awards.

You can cast a vote for your favourite here until 10pm on Tuesday January 13.



Garfield Minus Garfield is a frequent stop for me and it's great to see Dan getting even more recognition for his work. The New Yorker have a great interview with him here.

Update: Just as I hit publish, figures are: 2,216 votes cast with Garfield Minus Garfield at 1,008 votes, xkcd at 698 and Dilbert at 94.

Wo ist der liebe? German police stop youngsters from eloping

Everything was set. Having spent New Year's Eve together, they'd decided to elope. They couldn't wait any longer, and he, emboldened by his recent travels in Italy, assured her how easy the escape would be. "We'll get to the airport", he said. "That'll be the most difficult part." She, trusting his maturity and experience, agreed.

They knew their parents may not approve. Finish your education, they'd say. Work hard to improve your chances, they'd say. Spend more time together to see if you really want to be together. Typical German parents trying to put their kids on the right track.

They wanted none of it.

Let's go to Africa, he said. They'd watched a documentary on it the night before, and full of youthful optimism, of love and of a healthy regard for warm weather, they decided where to go. They packed the practical essentials they thought they'd need.

Who though to act as witness? They decided his sister, Anna-Lena would be the perfect choice and confided in her. She readily agreed. They didn't plan a long trip - just long enough to have the ceremony and return.

As the New Year dawned over Hanover, they made their escape. Sunglasses on and wheely suitcases in hand they walked the kilometre to the nearest tram stop and went to Hanover train station where they waited for the airport shuttle.

That's when a suspicious guard, possibly jealous of the young love, possibly spurned by a partner previously and still bitter, possibly angry about working New Year's morning or maybe just seeing it as his "duty" decided to get the police involved.

Two officers made their way to the station. They questioned the three, almost without provocation, on their plans for Africa, requesting to see money, tickets and passports. They brought them to the police headquarters where the three got a chance to have a good look around. A consolation prize perhaps.

Parents were called. "I'm still in a state of shock." said his mother, "I thought 'I'm playing a part in a bad movie.' When we realised they were missing we went looking for them." It was only when the police had called that they knew what happened.

Their luggage was searched. The pink lilo they'd dragged was put with their summer clothes, cuddly toys and provisions.

They knew their parents would have something to say. Would try to stop them. They wouldn't be happy when they arrived. But they smiled for the camera. They knew their love couldn't be stopped for long.


Photograph: /AFP/Getty Images

It's hard to be a six-old-boy and a five-year-old girl in Germany. Mika and Anna-Bell are told they'll have to wait until they're older.

"They can still put their plan into action at a later date," Holger Jureczko, a police spokesman said. One wonders how long it will be before they try again.

Of all the surprisingly stupid management decisions...

The end of Rick O' Shea's radio show? At least in its current format anyway. I read this, via @damienmulley over on On The Record

Per yesterday’s Sunday Tribune, management have decided that the station’s afternoon shows - ie Nikki Hayes and Rick O’Shea - are to be talk-free zones. Instead of the usual features and banter between the tunes, the DJs will now simply say “that was that” and “this is this”. Having spent a couple of years actually building, developing and maintaining audiences for these shows through listener interaction (something every single show on every single radio station tries to do), the 2FM grand poobahs (Michael Cahill is the lad credited in the piece as delivering this dastardly plan) have decided that the future will be a chit-chat-free one. Sure, we thought that was what digital radio was all about?

It's bizarre. In a society reliant on MP3 players, web players like Blip.fm and last.fm, iPods, iTunes, CDs, downloads and so on, do people really listen to afternoon radio for the music?

Fine, I kind of know Rick off air as well, but I listened to his show before I'd met him. It's the crossover between the show and his blog, the show and his twitter and the rapport he has with his listeners that make it interesting. This is the show that got random people to wink at each other. It brought us the story of that lady who travelled from America to find her "one-night stand" guy. It brings single people together for cinema nights out and was very on the ball with movie reviews and interviews. It was a pop culture show and, in truth, one of my only links to what was happening in that world.

Even more he was one of the only "mainstream media" DJ's who took "advantage" of the followers he had who are bloggers and twitterers and fellow geeks. He catered towards us, mentioned our blogs, invited some on to talk about their projects and gave us a boost. It's quite sad he won't get the same opportunity to do that now.

We have a surfeit of radio stations for such a small country. 98FM and FM104 are just that bit too tabloid for me, Radio 1 that bit too staid, Newstalk is good but a bit too serious. Today FM is what I'd listen to for the morning presenters which made Rick's show such a pleasure to tune into, a break away from dull and dreary afternoons. To my mind, the songs were mostly requests, old familiars with the odd new number and with that element of comfortable listening that required no major involvement. Bubblegum for the ears almost.

It's bewildering that the decision was made by a former DJ, no matter what his reasons were. This seems a complete lack of regard for the audience - an audience, which as Jim pointed out, is built and maintained - and remarkably short sighted. Will I be tuning in to hear Rick play music? Possibly. Not probably but possibly.

Jim makes a great suggestion about Mark McCabe being in a far better position to direct 2FM:

... a confident pair of hands who would be quite happy and determined to make the changes necessary for the station to survive. That's what the station needs if it stands any chance of still maintaining any kind of relevance in the next 10 years. It can’t be just more continuation of the old order on the grounds that G Ryan is such a great advertising magnet.

Why is it that 2FM management can't seem to cop on to the needs of their audience. Or maybe it's just me. Maybe I'm too online. Maybe people do listen to afternoon shows for the music. Do you?

Rag Order. (How long will it take you?)

I have wanted to publish Damien O'Donnell's submission to the 4daymovie project practically since I first saw it last June.

Watching the audience reaction was wonderful, seeing the dawning of comprehension on people's faces as they 'got' what they were seeing. It's an intelligent and innovative way to capture a song and I doubt it will be the last time we see that method used.

Update: Once you recognise the song, how many places in Dublin can you recognise in the shots? Thanks for the suggestion Niamh!

Enjoy!

The day I met Bosco's mammy for coffee

His red hair is now quite scraggy. The wool, glued on, was never going to last major wear and tear. He's missing one eye, the missing felt one a casualty of being thrown, dragged and hugged too much. I have no idea why he's wearing a yellow jumpsuit or where his original white and green striped shirt, jeans and boots are. He was my Bosco teddy and I've had him a long time. My sister had a matching one. We called them Biddy and Miley.

Fast forward some 24 years later and I'm sitting in Coffee Republic, hot chocolate in front of me waiting for the door to open and a lady I've wanted to meet for a long time to walk in. It started with twitter; I'd written a post about children's TV shows, someone had seen it and said the magic words "My mammy's Bosco" and now I'm waiting for Paula Lambert to join me for coffee.



Before I go further, for those not in the know, Bosco was an Irish children's television programme which ran during the late 1970s and 80s. Bosco, a small puppet of indeterminate gender (or so people thought) lived in a box, or his bosca, which was decorated with the number 5, because that's how old he was. You had to knock 5 times on the lid for Bosco.

Bosco's favourite colour was green (though Niamh says yellow), he was curious about everything. He was normally joined by two adults who would sing songs, read stories and make-and-do things with him. Songs included 'This is where I live', 'I'm painting', 'The Shadow song' and 'Poor old Michael Finnegan'. This was children's television back then - half two, just before Dempsey's Den - and we loved it.



There's a lot on the Irish web about Bosco. There are loads of unofficial Bosco Bebo pages, he pops up over on Boards.ie threads a lot and Donncha O'Caoimh's 2005 post on Bring back Bosco is up to over 80 comments. When researching the interview I felt I had to find out a few things. What gender is Bosco? Was he really kidnapped? Did Zig and Zag really throw him around? Where did he come from? Did the magic door really work? Come on, boys and girls of all ages, let's find out together!


Paula and Emily arrive. Coffee ordered, the first question I ask is the most obvious. "Yes," she says "I was in the box underneath for all of them". It was something I'd always wondered, once schoolyard conversations became old enough for someone to show their hand and say "What's this? Bosco naked!" - who was the person behind/underneath Bosco?

The history:

"Well Bosco was designed first as a doll, in the very early days. It relied on having the presenters work him which wasn't very practical so he became a puppet. I based the character on Emily, who was herself a red head, and quite bold and cheeky." Paula laughs while Emily goes a bit red, but seems used to it. "I think that's what Bosco is. Just an ordinary child. What gender is Bosco? I think of him as a boy but it's up to children what they decide themselves."


(Image from here)

Paula is from a - if not the - quintessential showbusiness family. Her father Eugene and mother Mai are behind the much loved Lambert Puppet Theatre and such TV shows as Wanderly Wagon and Murphy agus a Cairde.



"Dad was always making puppets" says Paula, "He started his ventriloquism act with Frankie, a predecessor to his famous Finnegan character. Him and mam moved to Dublin in 1950, when they were both 22. Mam entered him into a talent show, he won and that was the start of it." (There's a great interview with Eugene on Fústar's blog here)

"From there were the theatres, the musical halls, the tours and Jury's Cabaret. Dad was starring in the Olympia with people like Laurel and Hardy, Maureen Potter and Jimmy O' Dea. He then started with Telefís Éireann as it was at the time with Murphy agus a Cairde and then on to Wanderly Wagon. I played the squirrels on that show. I started with Bosco in 1980, and did around 360 programmes in all."

Why do Bosco?

"Well I suppose in those days I was just really grateful to have a job. The money was terrible but I've always loved children and found I could communicate well with them. A lot of people seem to use children's TV as a stepping stone, but it was where I wanted to be. I wanted to be a children's entertainer."

Bosco's voice?

"The voice just came very naturally to me. I could always do it, and really don't remember not doing it. I did have a lot of input into who Bosco was - he was 5 because my daughter was 5. I was given free rein really, allowed to do what I wanted."

The magic door:


The magic door was Bosco outside - sometimes in a playground (Oh Mr Sun, Sun, Mr Golden Sun, please shine down on me...) and other times to a creamery or to the zoo, where, for me anyhow, it was my first look at a lot of the animals. I didn't get to visit Dublin zoo for the first time until I was about ten.

"Ah, we were treated like royalty when we went to the zoo. My children would come with me. We'd be allowed to handle the animals, to go into their cages and everything. I remember being put in with the tigers - the keeper standing with a sweeping brush saying "Ah you'll be grand". Another time, I got a big fright with a snow leopard who leapt pawing at its glass wall when a woman in a leopardskin coat walked by."

"Most embarrassingly was the time I introduced a bird in the Aviary as a fukken cockaburra, the keeper, Mr Stone, having told me that's what it was called and me not copping on. That didn't go out on air, I can tell you."



The UCD kidnapping:

"Yes, Bosco was kidnapped from UCD. I was out there having finished a show and was loading the gear into the van afterwards. There's a lot of stuff in putting the shows together. I had just put the suitcase with Bosco down and it was whipped. They took the Bosco puppet and dumped the suitcase in the lake. That stuff was unfortunately ruined. I rang the police. The kidnappers brought Bosco on holidays to San Francisco, sent a photo to the Star newspaper.

It was big news at the time. We had reporters on the doorstep and Emily, only a young girl, dealing with them all. Because Bosco was gone, I was out of work, but there was rumours that I'd set the whole thing up! Coronation Street was running the Reg Holsworth gnome storyline at the same time and I think that might have been the inspiration. Anyway, they sent Bosco, fairly unharmed back to the Star offices.

Zig and Zag:

"Yes, I've heard the rumour and no, it's not true. Any professional puppeteer takes very good care of their puppets - after all, this is your livelihood. The guys behind Zig and Zag know this and would simply have more respect. So no, Zag was not throwing the Bosco puppet around."

Gift Grub and Dustin:

"Yes, that is Bosco with Bertie on Gift Grub. Quite simply Mario Rosenstock got in touch and asked me to do it. He also has appeared with Dustin - himself and the Turkey have a fraught but funny relationship, and they seem to like working together."

Growing up with Bosco:

"We were annihilated," says Emily. "We went to school in Cabinteely and my brother and me got it all the time. Don Conroy's son was in the same school and got hassle as well. I guess it just comes with the territory. Ronan used to be called Bosco. He dyed his hair black and they started calling him Sooty. There was no escape.

But we got to do loads of cool things, to hang around RTÉ, to see the shows being made and to meet loads of people. So the good far outweighed the bad."



Bosco's return:

"Well, he never really went away, you know." Paula admonishes me, "Just off the TV screens. Bosco had a record that beat U2 in the charts in 1983, you know. The first Bosco DVD came out around 3 years ago and has gone seven times platinum. We did an AIDS benefit cabaret in the Tivoli with Lily Savage and Phil Coulter, which was great fun. We did Electric Picnic in 2005 and the crowd reaction was amazing. All they wanted were to hear the old songs and phrases and sing along. Vodafone ran a Bring Bosco Back campaign a couple of years ago. He's been part of the seasons I did in the Gaiety and comes on tour. But it's more about entertaining children these days."

Paula runs The Paula Lambert Puppet Theatre, now widely recognised as the Premier Touring Puppet Theatre Company in Ireland. She presents a choice of four productions on tour: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel and Sleeping Beauty. Bosco travels with the show too, making the odd cameo appearance.

"Children now don't know that Bosco was on the telly, they don't know about the magic door or Seamus Spud or the plonksters or any of that. But they react to him almost exactly the same. We do shows in St Marks in Tallaght, a school with 400 junior infants. You'd imagine they'd be a tough audience but they love him."



"At one birthday party I put Bosco's legs and feet over the side of the box and one child shouted "Now mummy, I told you he was real!" At a school in Killiney where we were doing a show for GOAL, the principal made all the children sit and be quiet as they waited for Bosco to come back. "Don't let me down, children," she said to them when one little boy put up his hand and said "But miss, Bosco needs us to shout." Every reaction is magical and makes it worth it."

"I have a lot of puppets," says Paula, "but Bosco is my favourite. He's been with me now for almost 30 years. He is one of the family." "He even" Emily confides, "has his own little bed with covers and a hot water bottle."



"I suppose it's in the blood", says Paula when I ask her why she keeps doing it. "You can lose your inhibitions behind the puppets, no one can see you. I enjoy it. I consider myself very lucky to have a job that I love. So many people don't. I get to hear children laughing, singing and clapping. There's nothing glamorous about it, it's hard work. There's a lot of travelling, set-up and carrying gear, but that's part and parcel of what I do. I reckon Bosco goes to bed at night a very happy little boy altogether."

I wish there was a more apt word to describe her, but Paula herself is a lovely woman - genuinely warm, funny and easy to be around. Though shyer than I expected (hence no photos), her eyes positively glow when talking about Bosco, about the children's reactions and with the memories of the show and her experiences.

She seems a bit surprised by the reaction she still gets from adults - she'd been interviewed on i105-107 that morning, but takes it all in her stride. She's fiercely protective of Bosco - won't let a bad word be said, but has a great sense of humour that kept Niamh and me in stitches over the hour or so we had with them.

Emily is of course the person behind EmilyTully.com, a new Public Relations and online communications service for smaller budgets and start ups. You can find her blog here. There's also rumour that Bosco may be getting his own offical website soon...


A huge thanks to Paula and Emily for taking the time to indulge this big child. Of course I haven't met Bosco himself yet, but that's no reason not to leave you with this. It certainly brought back some memories for me.

"Time to go, goodbye, goodbye, put everything back in its box,
See you soon, goodbye goodbye,
And remember now, you're the tops!"

This blog is being followed; hello followers.

In August I found the Show off your Followers function for Blogspot.

By enabling it, you can choose to display the people who read and follow your blog as well as follow your own favourite Blogspot blogs through the handy reading list feature on the blogger dashboard - which itself feeds into Google Reader. A very handy way of staying in touch with what people are writing about.



Being as nosy curious as I am, I wanted to find out a bit more about the people following me and spread a little bit of link love in the process. Some I was familiar with, some I visited for the first time tonight. So, in no particular order we have:



Jennifer from Paws For Thought. Jennifer is blind and writes her blog as "an online diary of training and working with my first guide dog O.J." who she got in June of 2007. By doing this, she says,

"I hope to talk to new people, hear their experiences, and help educate others about the importance of guide dogs in the lives of blind and visually impaired people."

Her blog is far from being 'just' a blind blog though. She has an exuberant passion for music, as evidenced by all the gigs she goes to, which is how she met Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova from Swell Season, above. I loved reading OJ's first blog post - his experiences of helping Jennifer around. Aslo, if you have any ideas for fundraising to help raise the €38,000 it costs to fund one guide dog, let her know here.

Jennifer is a great example to me of how someone makes the most of what they have rather than worrying about what they haven't. Her blog is always an interesting read.



Hope from The Road Less Travelled. Hope is from Southern Carolina and is interested in

"People's stories. Who are you? How'd you get to be that way? Are you happy or is there something you want to change?"

Her blog is a lovely mix of memories (this recent post is fantastic), personal admissions and questions about the way things are done. I enjoy the detail in her posts - it's a real glimpse into her life.



Tony is possibly my oldest follower at 252, or so he claims. He's from Yorkshire and blogs on ßench which is a comprehensive collection of photos, videos and memories. I hadn't known what Spike Milligan's grave looked like until I saw his post on it.



I've been reading Susan's Stony River Farm blog for a while now. She's got a new look for the new year on her blog about "fiction writing, disability and rustic living and occasionally a bit of silliness". This recent post of hers called Sorry kids has been my favourite. Read on past the below:

"Suddenly, I snapped. Just snapped.

"THAT'S IT," I said, on the day before Christmas Eve. "I'm sick of it all." "I'm not cooking Christmas dinner," I said, "and I'm doing no more shopping, no more decorating, no more baking, no more ANYTHING."

They looked at me. "Don't I deserve a holiday too?" I said. "There's nothing you can say to change my mind," I said. "I'm cancelling Christmas." And I did".

I didn't know until today that she has another blog called This Irish Photograph, which an album of her family journeys and experiences. I like this photo:






Another name I've become familiar with is Stephen Spillane. He's blogging on Stephen Spillane's My Opinion which as he says is where he spouts "on about many things from Eurovision to Politics". Check out his recent blog posts on his best of 2008 - Jan to March, April to June and July to December to get a real sense of what he's about. His tips for new bloggers are also well worth a read.



Another Stephen following me is Stephen Neill, an Anglican priest in the diocese of Limerick & Killaloe. He blogs on PaddyAnglican about politics, happenings in his village of Cloughjordan and Moneygall - he's a big Obama fan - I believe he's singing on the Barack O'Bama song - and sometimes on things like the horse at the end of a rainbow. I'd bet for that horse too, Stephen!



Vladimir is a mathematician in Dublin and blogs on Etre moral, etre sincere. Hie blog is a record of the things he does and sees, what's going on in his life and some rather odd things he finds online. His tongue twister post has me talking about plucking pheasants very carefully.



Though we've never met I feel like I know MJ for ages. A frequent commenter, her blog at Shadows at Sunset is a mix of ideas that suddenly occur to her, things she's been thinking about and practical tips on approaching banks, creating a business plan and doing some market research. If you're starting a business, they're well worth a read.



Ken Armstrong is a guy I have a lot of respect for. With an enviable writing resume to his credit, his blog, Ken Armstrong Writing Stuff is a mix of random thoughts, personal musings and then posts like this one that made me pause for a long while afterwards. This one though made me laugh out loud.



Russell Anderson of Russells Random Thoughts is following me. I like his choice of URL - "random thinking of a pseudo genius". A starting blogger with 3 posts to his credit so far, his most recent - Homo/Hetero sexual.. big deal starts with :

My name is Russell and I have a boyfriend. Yes Russell is a male name and you read that right, I'm gay. How do you feel about that?

I'm looking forward to reading more from Russell this year.



Emerging Writer, as you can imagine, blogs about writing. She seems to keep her finger on the pulse of every writing competition and magazine submission procedure going and seems to have had a very productive year.

It's her other blog, Poems In the Waiting Room that grabbed my attention though. It seems this is part of a new project in Co. Kildare to provide poetry leaflets for waiting rooms all over the county.

"Initially these are doctor's surgeries, hospitals and libraries, places the public has to wait. The waiting room is the one place that at some point, everyone has to pause. It is a room full of strangers that levels us and where we have a chance to reflect."

One of my own favourite poems is Leigh Hunt's Jenny Kissed Me. You can read some of the history here or download a PDF of the poem here. Some of the other poems included are Emily Dickinson's Hope and Robert Louis Stevenson's Bed in Summer.

(Yes, this is a very long post.)



I'm a big Cloudsteph fan, and not just because she bought me drink at the Web Awards. I've been following her on Twitter for a while and she always delivers interesting links, funny videos and we share a bemused horror of the inappropriate. She's a person I'm glad to have met.



Cleo's blog at Rosin Dubh is a very honest, sometimes harsh and unforgiving look at her life and herself. I find her blog challenging to read sometimes, being at a loss of words on how to respond. Take for example her post on fertility and sperm. Or indeed her post on pubic hair.

That's not to say she's trying to be controversial. It's just honesty. Her train station story made me gasp, while her finger lengths post is a nice wee bit of research. The blog has only been live since October so I'd imagine there are other great stories that Cleo has to share.



Kate West writes reviews. In fact this LA lady has an extensive theatrical background and has been reviewing plays, musicals, one-acts, improv, comedy sketch and much more since 2003. From Tony Award winning plays straight from Broadway - Spring Awakening - to Jane Austen based plays to Newgrange Falconry, a family business based in Meath, Kate writes with an enthusiasm that is just a bit contagious. Visiting her blog guarantees a surprise every time.



Quickroute is another of those names I'm familiar with. His blog Paddy in Buenos Aires is as it sounds - the experiences, thoughts and musings of an Irish Ex-patriat now living in Argentina. The seven part odyssey he began in August - the Irish Rover - is a great way to get to know this irascible personality. Also illuminating is his about page, showing he's visited an impressive 338 cities in 51 countries. You can also read what he's been watching on Argentinian TV. Eye opening stuff.



I have to admit, when I saw the username bbbbbbbbich in the list, I assumed it was probably a spam blog. But no, Becky's blog - love moondust peace - is her little corner of the internet where she shares her thoughts on her experiences in Houston, Texas with her friends, family and more. Her last post was December 31 and I'd love to know what the acronym(?) iohasfdiohweiufh is about.



I'm hoping Shelley comes back to add more to her promising blog, New Media and the Virgin Blogger. It fed directly into the conversations and discussions for the Arts Council New Media seminar recently and what she's trying to do sounds very interesting indeed.

"I am also looking at how Arts organisations in Ireland could mazimise their potential by utilising You Tube, Flickr, Blogger.com and the many other sources of new media.. and how little Arts organisations actually take advantage of what is right at their fingertips."

I just love the header image for Inner Kook art. I just had a look at her post about drawing as a child which again makes me question how much thought we as adults tend to put into what we say to children. I've also found her Life Purpose Project blog which looks like it could be come something interesting.



"If you think you understand gammagoblin, you don't understand gammagoblin". How very true. The blogger for the 2008 Cork Jazz Festival has his own blog over on Riemann's Cut. How can I describe it? Geeky? Well the posts about the particle accelarators, the no-humans-inside boxes and his takes on iGoogle, Google Reader and Apple all suggest so.

But there's music posts in there too, along with a thermal imaging one and a well researched piece comparing Obama to the Antichrist. It's a bit of a free-for-all I guess - almost impossible to predict what will come next - and it's all the better for it.



"Tall tales of the little Elf in big Amsterdam" is how Clair describes her blog, Elf in Amsterdam. She hasn't updated in a while, but I guess her recent trip home to Dublin is reason enough for that, not to mention how active she is on Twitter. I can thank Clair for introducing me to Maeve Clancy's Flatmates the comic though, one of my regular graphic stops.



Anna Lally's name is one I've come across a couple of times and I'm delighted to find that she's the person behind the Irish Media Women blog. Anna is hoping to see the blog and network develop as "a space for shared ideas, wisdom, learning and opportunities".

She already points to some interesting links and workshops, but as with any ambitious project, could do with some help. You can find out more here. I think 2009 could see Anna connect with a lot of people out there who will be able to contribute.


And to the final two - retrobates who happen to be personal friends as well as followers.



I was asked to describe Maxi Cane's blog recently and the first word that came to mind was unapologetic. Creative, funny, shocking, obscene and DURTY all came to mind immediately afterwards but readers of this blog need to go in eyes wide open knowing they could find anything in there.

Maxi is of course the mastermind behind the group stories we've been involved in. He's also king of the bad pun. The rest of his posts are, by and large, pure filth - though not, let it be said, to intentionally disturb - it's just the way his mind works and you can quickly come to accept that. The kind you'd never write but relish reading.

The word "succulent" comes to mind. They're even funnier - if that's possible - when read on the Odeo reader he has on the site. Go on, have a go. You'll see.



And then of course there's himself. Darren should probably update it. When he does it will no doubt be with adventures, reviews, findings, thoughts and reactions to the world around him. A bit like my blog tries to be, only shorter and better. Different in a good way.

There you go. Followers all. Thanks for following people, hope you're finding something here you're interested in. If you haven't already done so, have a think about clicking below and telling us

who you are, where you blog and what you blog about.

If you are on blogger, you can find out more about following here. There are some brilliant blogs and lovely people out there waiting to be found.

How to copy your N95 web bookmarks to Firefox

I've been using my Nokia N95 8GB for almost a year now and have managed to accumulate a serious amount of internet bookmarks.

I have two varieties of bookmark - links I use, like Gmail, mobile Twitter, Facebook, RTÉ mobile and so on, and then there's the ones I see linked to, click on to save and read later but rarely get back to. I needed to save all these bookmarks to read on my computer.



I went googling last night on how to copy bookmarks from the phone over. Whatever search terms I used didn't bring me up what I was looking for until I found this 2007 post on n95blog.com detailing how you might want to:

isolate the .nbu files, convert them to .nfb and then export to HTML with another program

and ending with the writer admitting "I haven’t tested this, but it seems to be possible." Yikes.

Reading on though I found a simpler comment on what to do, which worked. So, following from my "How to comment on a blog" and "How to embed YouTube videos into your blog" posts, here's my beginners guide on how to copy the bookmarks you create on your N95 8GB to your internet browser. At least, it worked for me...

I'm using Vista Home Premium SP1 on an Acer Aspire laptop. I assume the instructions below can be adapted for your own computer set-up. My browser is Firefox 3.0.5 but we'll be using IE as well. Please make sure Internet Explorer is closed before you start this.

Assuming you have the Nokia PC Suite installed (if not, download from here), connect your phone and select PC Suite. You're finished with your phone for now.



On your computer Start menu, go to All Programs -> Nokia -> Nokia Nseries -> PCSync.



When the PC Sync window opens, choose Settings and you should see something like the below:



Select Bookmark Items and then click on the Bookmark tab.



I've chosen to Export to Microsoft Internet Explorer (even though it's not the browser I use) as it seems to be easier for the exporter to work with this. Click OK at the bottom and then click Synchronise Now on the next screen. It should only take a moment and when done you'll see something like the below:



When finished, it's simply a matter of going to File -> Import... in your Firefox browser:



Choose to import from Microsoft Internet Explorer



Select Favourites and then click Next > and that should be it! I now have a folder in my favourites called Mobile bookmarks which I've synced with my Google Bookmarks meaning they're accessible to me anywhere.



A bit easier than searching for .nfb and .nbu files, eh? I hope that helps someone.

If you have any hints or tips, suggested applications requested how-tos for the N95, please let me know and I'll see what I can do. I'm still only learning my way around it and am open to learning and sharing any hints and tips!