Webs Wonder Design

At the very end of the 20th century I wrote to the Newcastle Emlyn Town Council and offered them a website for the town. The town didn’t have one and I said that I was prepared to pay for the cost of hosting and of development, if they would provide some copy, and allow me to put some advertising for Webs Wonder on it.

I heard nothing back from them for months, until early one Thursday evening, I got a call from the Town Clerk. He was just about to leave for the monthly Town Council meeting and sheepishly asked me, with reference to my letter to the Town Council, did my offer to create the website free of charge mean they wouldn’t have to pay anything? “Yes!” I said. “Totally free”. At last! I thought, the wheels of local government turn slowly, but they get there eventually. So I waited for a reply to my letter, and waited and waited, But none came. In fact, I’m still waiting to this day….

Continue reading Newcastle-Emlyn.com

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August 2008 update: The new BBC iPlayer, with its new selection of BBC TV programmes available for a week, plus all BBC Radio programmes available live is a huge improvement on the original iPlayer download-only service referred to in my article below. It combines ease of use and excellent video quality at relatively low bandwidths. The new iPlayer is definitely a huge step forward. Hopefully the copyright restrictions which force the use of DRM and downloading will progressively be lifted.

Please Note: This article won’t tell you how to crack The BBC iPlayer DRM or tell you how to uninstall the iPlayer. It contains my and other peoples opinions on DRM and the iPlayer and some useful links at the foot of the page, but that’s all.

I’ve heard a bit about the new BBC iPlayer, so I thought I’d sign up for the Beta service. It was a short and disappointing experience, but then getting into bed with Microsoft, as the BBC has done, you’d expect that to be the case. Initially, in my ignorance, I tried to access the player with the Firefox browser and I got this message:

Sorry, but to use the BBC iPlayer you need the following

• Windows XP
• Internet Explorer
• Windows Media Player

Continue reading The BBC iPlayer – a step backwards

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This week I’ve launched a site for Tinashe Mushakavanhu, a talented young writer from Zimbabwe. Tinashe is the first African writer to do the MA in Creative Writing at Trinity College, Carmarthen in Wales, having graduated with a first class honours degree in English Literature from the Midlands State University.

Tinashe is a fellow of the Crossing Borders Creative Writing Project and was invited to help organize the Africa section of the Hay Festival and his festival blog can still be read. Tinashe is already published in several countries as a Google search reveals.

Continue reading Mazwi.net

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Electricity prices may rise by 50% because the UK isn’t as windy as the developers claimed when getting their large government subsidies.

Investors are flocking to wind power, not because it is an effective way of cutting greenhouse emissions, but because it is a good financial bet, due to big handouts from a government desperate to meet it’s renewable obligations .

As with most government green policies, it is only short term. The long term will see an increase in greenhouse gas output. The measures which would really make a difference, like seriously improving insulation and reducing other energy waste are underfunded because they are not “sexy” enough to get votes.

Wind power is just like the New Labour Government. Loads of spin, but ultimately ineffective.

Listen to BBC environment programme “Costing the Earth” Click here .

Download and read a presentation by Professor Peter Cobbold (PDF format 6Mb)

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