iblog

Matthew: The latest British institution to be a target of a foreign bid is the London Stock Exchange. The NASDAQ has long had an interest in acquiring the LSE, but I get the feeling they will have stump up a significant premium on the share price to even get the current shareholders to consider the offer. The reason is that the LSE’s main shareholders are also their main customers. They have benefited hugely from the competitiveness of the London Exchange, which is comparitively free from regulation and light footed.

Should the NASDAQ acquire the LSE, the city of London would be under the influence of the American Securities and Exchange commission. This would require companies wishing to list on a London market to conform to the rigorous ‘Sarbanes Oxley’ regulations. This effectively wipes out one of the main attractions of the LSE and could easily damage its success.

Matthew: Richard Branson has told reporters he will be writing to the Office of Fair Trading regarding Rupert Murdoch’s purchase of a 17.9% stake in ITV. Although it is likely that Branson’s complaint is something of a cot-rattling manoeuvre following ITV’s rejection of a bid from NTL, he raises an important issue.

Although his claim that ‘we might as well just let Murdoch choose our Prime Minister’ is slightly overstated, we must examine exactly what influence Mr Murdoch may have on our democracy, and the paradox of a government intervention with the intention of securing the freedom of the press.

Although we mercifully aren’t yet in the grip of a Berlusconi-stlye political/media juggernaut, we shouldn’t be scared to stand up to Murdoch’s growing power, otherwise soon we won’t be able to.

Matthew: Ever since the FSA cracked down on banks charging credit card and overdraft fees, the finance industry has been waiting to see how banks will try to compensate for these lost profits.

In the first (and hopefully last) of these moves, HSBC’s online banking firm First Direct are introducing a £10 maintenance fee for accounts which have an average balance under £1500. This makes them the first major bank in the UK to abandon free current accounts, and sets a unwelcome precedent for consumers. Many banks incentivise people to pay their salaries into their current accounts (such as Halifax who pay an interest rate of 5.12% on monthly deposits over £1000), but HSBC are the first to actually penalise their customers for having a low balance. Hopefully its customers will relocate their account to a less discrimanatory bank, and leave HSBC with egg on its greedy face.

Matthew: The Queen opened the new session of Parliament today amid extravegant scenes of pageantry, costume and tradition.

For example, a representative of the gorvernment is ‘taken hostage’ by the palace as a guarantor of the monarchs safety. Despite the controversies surrounding the present government, they are fairly unlikely to capture the Queen and stage a coup d’etat, leaving the MP for South Shields to enjoy a quiet gin and tonic in the palace.

Another traditional role is that of ‘Black Rod’. It is his job to summon the MP’s from the House of Commons into the House of Lords, where the speech is delivered. As Black Rod approaches the lower house, the MP’s slam the door in his face, in a symbol of independence from the House of Lords. Black Rod then hammers on the oak door with his staff, and indignantly summons the commoners to attend to the Queen in the upper house.

For me, these traditions help to add a richness and sense of history to our political process, and remind us of the hundreds of years of democracy that preceded us.

However, there is an argument that these elaborate, ancient protocol only serve to obscure the real functions of parliament and reinforce the idea that politics is detached from real life and has no relevance to today’s society. People with this idea become disenfranchised with the politcal process and neglect their vote.

Steve Robinson:

Every week I take a look at the strangest gadget from the past 7 days.
This week, we meet a very undemanding phone…

“Ahh! I’m in Shadow!”

Those wizards in Japan have done it again. They’ve come up with the answer to all our battery-based problems: a solar powered mobile phone! Powered only by the rays of our very own life-giving extraterrestrial orb, the phone will never again need to touch the cold steel of a mains charger’s pin. Forget emergency batteries and your phone dying in the middle of the desert - the future is bright for mobile power!

Or, so they say. Having had a little think about it, I’m not so convinced. You see, there is one tiny flaw to this otherwise ingenious plan. No, it’s not that Britain doesn’t get enough sunlight to power the unit. It’s that I very much doubt that it will get enough exposure to the sun to charge. Where do you keep your phone? In your pocket. And what is your pocket? DARK. Very, very DARK. In fact, how are you supposed to charge the phone anyway? Leave it on the table at an outdoor cafe whilst you read the paper? In five minutes not only will you never see the mains charger again, and you’ll never see the phone either. Back to the drawing board, lads…

The NTT DoCoMo Solar phone should go into production sometime next year.

Matthew: The revelation that two fraternity brothers featured in the controversial film are suing the production company is somewhat predictable, though their arguments may cast an unpleasant light on the comedy.

The anonymous plaintiffs appear in the film picking up Borat in their RV, plying him with beer, and making various remarks that could be considered racist or misogynistic, and almost certainly wouldn’t have been made at all if the plaintiffs were aware that they would be topping the box office in their home country.

If this were a genuinely spontaneous occurrence, then it would seem like a legitimate exposure of remarkably bad behaviour. However, it emerges that that the students were taken to a bar by a producer beforehand, who encouraged them to drink as much as they could and be as controversial as they like, as the film wouldn’t be shown in the US. There are similar reports of the feminist artists at the beginning of the film being duped by a production assistant and a set of more credible interview questions, before Borat exposes his more provocative side.

So where does this leave the film? If its comedy comes entirely from Borat himself, then it is intact. However, it is more likely that the audience are laughing at the supposedly genuine reactions of everyday people to Borat, so the revelation that these people may have been encouraged to act in a certain way damages the humour. Similarly, can a film really be considered satirical if it goes out of its way to create the behaviour it seeks to ridicule?

Matthew: The New England Journal of Medicine has published a case study that argues for the inclusion of Google as a point of reference for General Practioners. It points to a number of cases where doctors have entered symptoms as keywords into the search engine, and obtained an accurate diagnosis.

As so many people have access to the largest information reservoir the world has ever known, it is surely only a matter of time before people diagnose themselves, and perhaps even treat themselves, according to information they have found on the internet. This self-reliance obviously has its risks, but has the potential to radically re-define the role of the GP.

It is only natural that people should want the security and confidence that a qualified individual in a white coat provides, but as we become more used to using Google and other internet databases to locate specific information, (for example, finding directions on the internet, getting financial advice), and then acting on that information, it only requires a short step to diagnose a simple ailment and even find out how to treat it.

Matthew: Leeds could do with more this sort of thing. For a city its size and with such great heritage, it has very little in the way of arts and cultural events. The Henry Moore Institute is a pleasant enough way to spend an afternoon, and the Hyde Park Picturehouse occasionally plays films that make an alternative to the mass marketed seemingly ubiquitous ‘Vue’ cinemas.

However, for 10 days in November Leeds turns into a Mecca for lovers of film. Set in the new and appropriately tasteful venue of the Carriageworks in Millenium Square, this festival boasts several UK premieres from the world of ‘alternative’ cinema. The most notable of these is the celebrated Korean director Kim Ki Duk’s latest oeuvre, ‘Time’.

There are around 25 films playing everyday, encompassing all kinds of genres. There are music documentaries such as ‘Looking for Reyno’ a charming investigation into an Argentine band led by a drummer with Downs syndrome. The ‘Cinema Versa’ selection contains films with a political aspect, such as ‘Kabul Transit’.

This is a great opportunity for culture deprived Leodensians to go and see something out of the ordinary, and reminded of just how compelling and entertaining cinema can be when it is created by those who have more at stake than box office takings.

www.leedsfilm.com

Steve Robinson:

Every week I take a look at the strangest gadget from the past 7 days.
This week, I’m sensing that something’s not right…

“How Are You Feeling Today?”

Are you the empathetic type? Then you probably can do without the SHOJI (Symbiotic Hosting Online Jog Instrument), a mood-sensing invention from the University of Tokyo. The glowing pillar changes colour depending on the different ‘moods’ it senses throughout the room. It does this by measuring such variables as light, humidity, ultrasonic waves, even the activity and body temperature of those in the room. This is then relayed to the user via a system of LED lights – red for anger, blue for sadness, yellow for happiness and green for peace. The lights shift down the pillar as the mood changes so that the previous mood can be read as well as the current.

This all sounds fine and dandy, but with a whopping $3000 price-tag (about £2000), that’s a whole lot of cash to spend on what is a very unessential item. Also, chances are that if you are in the room yourself, your sophisticated human brain will be able to discern the mood anyway. Apparently Japanese managers are willing to pay for it, so they can monitor the mood levels in their offices. However, I doubt whether the mainstream public will be in the mood to follow suit.

GS Yuasa’s SHOJI is currently being road-tested in Japan to managers and hospitals. The product release is scheduled for April 2007 for $2000 - $3000.

Ash:
In a society where everyone wishes to join the not-so-exclusive cult of television celebrity, it appears Tony Blair may have finally implemented a policy that will appease even his harshest of critics. Reality TV is getting a whole lot more real, and we’re all invited to the party.

However, one question remains. Will this next step in innovative television participation be presented in the glorious HDTV set-up to which a lucky few among us are now privy? The sad truth is no. Like the ill-fated Betamax before it, HDTV could end up on the rubbish heap of technological history (eBay) long before its time. The future, it now appears, lies with CCTV.

And is CCTV anything more than the next in a long line of mnemonics designed to make us feel inadequate with our current technologies? The Home Office – the company producing the show - would argue not. Who could disagree? The show boasts an impressive 4.2 million cameras across the country, recording each and every one of us up to 300 times a day. Now may be the ideal time to get those front teeth whitened for that perfect television smile.

I’m sure we’d all agree that liberty is a small price to pay for fame.