BECAUSE I HAVE A PILE of unread cuttings, I'm culling my Sunday readings today before my local newsagent opens his doors. That means I've pulled together snippets from several weekend sources that caught my eye for their relevance and timely coverage. After all, most of the content inside the Sunday papers was written and filed by Thursday so if you've read the Friday editions of Irish broadsheets you have a feeling for what will be covered in the Sunday paper rounds.
My 90g savings. I save a selection of materials from the Sunday papers. Of late, I like the items relating to baking and Christmas dinners. And I've elevated a Guardian Guide to the altar of my kitchen sideboard. [1]
I like maps. For centuries cartographers have tried to bestow order on the anarchy that is London, with its unplanned sprawl and disjointed monuments. It's fun to see London Town evolve as parts of hand-drawn, water-coloured, schematic and satellite maps. The Guardian Weekend pulls it all together. [2]
Home-brewed hydrogen. Honda's plan for marketing its FCX hydrogen-powered car depends on the success of The Home Energy Station. It uses the natural gas supply to produce hot water and heat for the home as well as hydrogen for its fuel-cell car. If an event unfolds such as Ireland's ESB union shutting down the power grid, "a built-in inverter can take juice from the fuel cell to produce alternating current for running the home." [3]
Real innovating at the edges. Gerard O'Neill points to Brainjuicer's discoveries "about creativity, innovation and the true nature of genius supports the idea that - once you try to control or formalise innovation - you kill it." [4]
Irish Cancer Detection Scandal. A lot of air time and column inches in Ireland is given over to ineffective breast cancer screening. For more than three years, people have known that Irish cancer screening was inaccurate. The percentage of detections was well below international averages. So when a review of mammograms by Dr Ann O'Doherty, a specialist breast radiologist, discovered the presence of cancer in tests given to women thought to be "all clear," the pundits started ranting. The closer scrutiny was always going to reveal the presence of cancer. The fix is already in the pipeline, in the form of centres of excellence. While I feel compassion for women who were misdiagnosed, the problem of poor cancer detection lies in the poor protocol for examinations. That has been addressed by adequate resourcing already, one would think. I wonder why the national news researchers fail to specifically verify that fact. [5]
Ireland is outsourced. In a surprisingly uninformed twittering, Jason Calacanis thinks he could get "like 5-10 folks in india/ireland/etc. to do repetative (sic) tasks for Mahalo," his online directory service. He needs to meet with the Paddy's Valley delegration to reorient his thinking. But because he's unavailable for that meeting, he could do himself well by reading the "Work" section of the weekend Guardian. And even though it might stretch his networking to encompass European noise, he might also consider pushing himself into Jaiku, since some conversation there definitely concerns himself and Mahalo. [6]
Tough Texting. "Most people have long since given up trying to use the clunky predictive text software in their mobiles. Is it a lost cause?" [7]
Serious Questions for Cocaine Author. After several inquiries about The High Society have questioned the veracity of the author's claims, a few mainstream journalists have started knocking around the background of the author herself. Kathy Sheridan writes, "The question most commonly asked is how a 33-year-old woman could apparently spring from nowhere and pull off sensational coups such as persuading a Government Minister to chat about his cocaine problem (in Buswell's of all places), cajole a pilot into confessing that he uses it regularly in the cockpit and sweet-talk a dealer into taking her on his rounds." [8a]
From the Culture magazine comes an interesting tidbit about the production team behind High Society. [8b] Michael Ross goes back to 12 years ago, to November 2, 1995. Prime Time, the RTE current affairs programme, broadcast an interview with Patrick Tuffy, who said that an unnamed person had paid him to write anonymous letters that alleged corruption in the awarding of state contracts. It transpired that Tuffy lied and the entire affair raised questions about RTE's credibility. Ross says, "As journalism, it was flawed,yet RTE gave no indication that it intended to preiew its editorial practises as a result of the controversy." Ross tracked the people behind the programme. "McGovern, producer of the Tuffy programme, left RTE after 10 years with the station and set up an independent production company, Big Mountain, two years ago. Big Mountain's first documentary for RTE was what it described as a groundbreaking expose of cocaine use among Irish professionals, including an unnamed politician: High Society.
Bourne on Top. Joshua Chaftin writes, "The Bourne Ultimatum has helped Universal Pictures generate $1bn at the foreign box office, nearly double its total from five years ago." [9]
Lost Personal Details. In the United Kingdom, "the catastrophic loss of the personal and financial details of 25m people by Revenue and Customs has made people uneasy about handing yet more details to the government. The prime minister should scrap plans for ID cards." [10]
1. The Guardian Guide to Baking: Supplement of the Year, November 2007.
2a. Simon Jenkins -- "A City Built on Chaos" in The Guardian Weekend, 24 November 2007.
2b. Simon Foxwell -- Mapping London: Making Sense of The City. ISBN 978-1906155070.
3. Nick Valery -- "All gassed up and ready to go" in Intelligent Life, Autumn Issue.
4. Gerard O'Neill -- "In Praise of Mavericks", 23 November 2007.
5. Martin Wall -- "Full details of who knew what and when yet to emerge" in The Irish Times, 24 November 2007.
6. Nic Paton -- "Continental Shifts" in The Guardian Work, 24 November 2007.
7. Alan Cane -- "Thumbs Down" in FT Magazine, 25 November 2007.
8a. Kathy Sheridan -- "Glossy CV of the cocaine author who came out of nowhere" in The Irish Times, 24 November 2007.
8b. Michael Ross -- "Comment" in The Sunday Times Culture, November 25, 2007.
8c. Bonus Link: Karlin Lillington describes how to recover an erased sound file. [8.3 MB 96 kbps MP3 file]
9. Joshua Chaftin -- "International Success for Bourne" in The Financial Times, 25 November 2007.
10. "Crisis of Details" on the editorial pages of The Financial Times, 25 November 2007.
