Andrew Beresford's Blog

Mainly for the focus of the BBC and Londoners, but here’s how the UK and Ireland are REALLY split up…

NOTE

Birmingham is NOT in the North, it’s Midlands.
Likewise, Watford, is NOT the North.
Cambridge ISN’T in the North either.
“The South” is a relatively small area compared to the rest of the UK, or even just compared to the rest of England, so it’s really nice of us to hear so much about it when you have a few flakes of snow and manage this (courtesy of The Register).

Can’t compete? Why not blame the foreigners?

Grr.

From the SMH article:

“If I were to be the CEO of Google or the founders of Google I would be very [displeased] that the best search engine in the world continues to provide as a first link, Wikipedia,” he said.”Is this the best they can do? Is this the best that [their] algorithm can do?”

I can’t think of an occasion where Google has returned a Wikipedia entry for a query and that Wikipedia entry hasn’t been totally relevant and detailed.

Besides, the contest for detail, freshness, accessibility and usability Wikipedia wins hands down; compare the Encyclopedia Britannica and Wikipedia articles on Alcohol. EB weighs in at roughly 500 words, WP at roughly 3500. Another interesting comparison: the EB article about Wikipedia weighs in at roughly 900 words, the WP article about Encyclopaedia Britannica, 7600 words.

How many people aware of the “state of the art” can readily contribute to EB? Not many. Anyone can contribute to Wikipedia. Not that Wikipedia doesn’t have it’s faults, of course. On the other hand EB isn’t always correct either.

Oh yeah – and to get proper access to Encyclopaedia Britannica, you have to pay fifty quid a year. No thanks.

OK. Another new theme. Mainly because I am running the Subversion release of WordPress and it looks my old theme doesn’t work yet.

I found this great grammatical double-whammy whilst finding an air filter.

I’ll be sure to look for the Witch under my driver’s chair when I get home tonight

I’m a rockstar! Also available from all good digital music outlets.

I like snow. It snowed a little yesterday (see here, here, here and here) which made getting to work very slow. A journey that normally takes me 1 hour took 3, mainly because of traffic and poor driving (high power, rear wheel drive cars with sports tyres don’t like the snow). However, tomorrows forecast is for significant snowfall, so I’ve spent some time at work helping the business to prepare for the bad weather. Those who need remote access to systems have it and we have put in place plans to deal with answering telephone systems and calls.

Made me laugh

Yesterday I left io global and Suffolk to move back to Holmfirth. I’m going to be working for 2ergo just north of Manchester from the 17th November (Happy Birthday Edie!). I’m really looking forward to the move back up, most of my stuff is already there.

This weekend I am in London at a gig at the Bullet Bar in Camden, followed by a short gig at the Music Live event at the NEC. I’m really looking forward to them both, but the band is something I’m going to miss dreadfully. My last gig with them is on December 6th. I’ll post more details when I know them, but for HILDA folks, I think there is a HILDA organised that day potentially.

So goodbye Suffolk and goodbye io global. I’ve got lots of happy memories – like the time that Jane stapled my arm (photo!) I’ve met some great people and I’m sure I’ll keep in touch with a good number of them for a long, long time.

Yesterday’s assault on security was accomplished using a flat cap. By ‘eck.