iblog

Rushda: It's sad that some people can be put off from buying a book because of an ugly author. But it's almost horrific that this could be the case even with absolutely classic authors such as Jane Austen, who has recently been deemed by publishers to be "too ugly" for a book they are printing about her life. Wordworth Editions have now enhanced a famous picture of her by adding make-up, hair extensions and removing her night-cap, simply so that she looks acceptable for the book. Austen has been idolised by many for what actually counts - her writing talent, so it seems awful now that she could be insulted like this in order to appeal to more fashion-conscious young people. I'm sure I echo many people's views when I say that we want to see the real Jane Austen, who doesn't exactly need to be fit for the cover of Cosmopolitan. Let's leave the makeup for those who need it.

Rushda: It's been a long time since the previous Bean film was released, and that was really well received as were his TV shows. I've just come back from an advanced showing of his new anticipated film Mr Bean's Holiday and I'm still undecided as to what to think. There were a lot of funny moments and it was an entertaining hour and a half, that's for sure, but I suppose if you compare the film as a whole to the previous one, it wasn't as great. Or maybe I'm just getting a little too old for the simple humour? Who knows. But I'm sure some people will be thinking Bean should have just stayed on holiday and not come back in such anti-climactic style.

Steve Robinson: Recent reports suggest that Apple's new operating system OS 10.5 - known as Leopard - may well slip to as late as October this year, with compatibility issues with Windows Vista cited as the probable cause. The key addition of BootCamp in Leopard - a program which allows users to run Windows natively on a Mac - seems to have caused the problem, and so the postulated March release date now seems unlikely. The new OS - originally thought to be launching in Spring 2007 - is seen by Apple as a key incentive in their attempt to entice PC users to switch to Apple Macs instead of upgrading to Windows Vista. As the Apple website declares: "Why upgrade to Vista when you can upgrade past it?... Why go through all that hassle when you can just get a Mac." Whilst the hope is that Windows users feel they can still run Windows-only programs using the BootCamp software, Apple conveniently negates to mention on this page that this would involve the purchase of the Windows Vista operating system as well, increasing the overall price. Now, somewhat ironically, it seems the release of Apple's own upgrade has been put back due to compatibility issues with the Vista software. However, some analysts believe this to be a minor setback -since this is a slow time for PC sales anyway - and believe that a few more months achieving compatibility with Windows will help ensure Apple a larger market share when Leopard finally ships. Still, this is yet more time for Windows Vista to cement itself in place of the aging XP system. The real battle will come when Leopard finally squares up to Vista on the shop floor, though when that will be is not yet clear.

Virgil: When we change to British Summer Time in the early hours of Sunday morning, little will we know it but the broadcaster of the national time signal will completely switch locations, from its current house at the antenna in Rugby, to a new one in Anthorn, Cumbria - marking a change from BT to VT Communications. You know when you're listening to BBC Radio, or watching the BBC News? You know the little beeps, or "pips" that precede official broadcasts? The ones that sound 5 times before the Radio 4 News, or the ones incorporated into the themetune for the BBC News main television broadcast? Those little beeps are controlled and kept in sync by the very same national time signal, whic is also used by banks, phone networks and the emergency services to keep everything in top timing across Britain. The signal is accurate to within a 1,000th of a second, and tweaked to be correct every day. Now to be located at a Ministry of Defence site in Anthorn, our timekeeping continues to broadcast from a more reliable, maintainable and modern antenna, pulsing away across the nation.

Virgil: The "gangster" rapper "Snoop Dogg", who I'll refer to by his real name, Calvin Broadus, was recently denied a visa for his UK tour, and I'm not surprised in the least. I'm also quite glad on completely biased reasons, because I think his whole "scene" is ridiculous and promotes more problems than you can shake a stick at. But my joy at his absence is not solely based on music-taste; the man is certainly a dangerous criminal as well, so I'm doubly glad we'll be missing not just his music, but all of his explicit content. Of course, being a "gangster" criminal is just what makes the man so successful as a rapper. Unfortunately, this seems to be the formula for hip hop: being so 'cool' that you dabble in any number of the following: drugs, guns, assault, theft and organised crime. Mandatory is swearing in a forcefully silly voice. It is precisely for this reason that I think the "scene" promotes problems, and also precisely this reason that Calvin was denied a visa. He was cautioned by police last year at Heathrow, held overnight by police last month in Sweden, and arrested 3 times in the US last year, for which he is now facing weapons and drugs charges.

Rushda: I've just come across this article in the Telegraph about a controversial new classification system that judges alcohol as more harmful than harder drugs such as ecstasy. A group of leading scientists have published a new table whereby they classify drugs by the amount of average harm they do rather than dividing them up by class. Ecstasy, they say, kills around ten people annually, whereas alcohol, a legal substance, kills more than 300 annually by poisoning and causes many more thousands of deaths by road traffic accidents and heart disease. From this, the scientists deduce that ecstasy is a milder and less harmful drug than alcohol. I have very limited knowledge of drug science but this new classfication sounds completely flawed to me. There are so many issues that have to be considered - e.g. moderation of use. For example, if someone had a glass of wine, that wouldn't harm them and could even be said to be beneficial. But if we compared that to taking a tablet of ecstasy, it's pretty obvious the ecstasy will be so much worse. Also, given that fewer people take ecstasy we have yet to discover the harmful long-term effects of its use, whereas with alcohol the risks seem more established. This list of unconsidered differences goes on forever. I know that many people find the current Misuse of Drugs Act inconsistent and confusing, but this new system seems far crazier to me.

Rushda: It's a startling and chilling concept and I simply can't imagine what was going through users' heads when they logged onto an ordinary chatroom and watched a man proceed to hang himself in front of his cyberaudience. Kevin Whitrick, a 42 year old electrical engineer from Shropshire, had logged on to the chatroom and announced that he wanted to commit suicide. The audience, many of which thought he was joking, egged him on by typing "Get on with it then!". Very late in the process a user dialled 999, but by the time the police arrived it was already too late, as the man was swinging from a rope in front of his computer. The case, which is believed to be the first of its kind in Britain, is an example of the kind of suicide many suicidals would want - a suicide which has an audience and yet no one can stop. It's a startling idea that had the depressed man not had the support and attention of his internet audience (none of whom mattered at all to him in any real sense), he may not have committed such a horrifying act.

Rushda: Some of you may have seen the film The Rocketeer, a cheesy 90s film about a person who discovers a jet pack that allows him to fly. Well, the idea isn't as fictional as once thought, as a Swiss pilot has actually done the same thing and been able to fly by strapping a pair of wings and two jet engines to his back. The mas has to jump out of a plane as he can't take off in the conventional way due to obviously not being able to run fast enough. But once he's in the air he has been able to sustain over four minutes of free flight at 2500m, controlling himself with handles under the wings. It's thrilling and much better than being a bird, he says. Sounds exciting, and the idealistic amongst us may now start imagining a future where human flight really is an everyday occurrence!

Virgil: Yesterday night saw the European release of Sony's flagship next generation gaming console, the PlayStation 3, which was expected to be a major hit. Sony were so sure the console would sell like hotcakes that they even gave away free HDTV's with every purchase in London. However, the turnout was not quite as expected - in many locations across Europe, the media present at the opening outnumbered the customers. To top it off, Microsoft (the company behind the vastly popular Xbox 360 console, a next generation system that came out long before the PS3 made its entrance) really rubbed salt in the wounds. They gave out chairs to people who were waiting in queues, each printed with a website address - at which a user would find a chiding message to Sony, saying welcome to the next generation, but you're quite late! In France, a boat covered in Xbox 360 logos sailed up and down the Seine whilst a moored Sony boat, selling PS3s, got no customers. On the other hand, in Berlin, people were given free PS3 consoles for publicly smashing their Xbox 360s to bits! Whether the PS3 will be a hit or a flop remains to be seen, but it will suffer greatly from not only being late, but also being heavily priced.

Virgil: France has recently released into the public domain all its files and documents related to UFO sightings over the past 5 decades. It has thus become to the first country in the world to do this; in the UK such information has to be requested on a case-by-case basis. The French will be able to access over 10,000 documents including photos, videos, and even police reports. Alongside all this information also comes explanatory notes. For instance, one event involved 1,000 people seeing the same bright light at the same time; this was successfully shown to have been a rocket fragment falling back into the Earth's atmosphere. Interestingly though, only 9% of cases come with these explanations, and over 1,600 cases are known as "Category D" - inexplicable. The new information has been released thanks to the work of a team calling themselves the Office for the Study of Unidentified Aerospace Phenomena, which has made the content available on a dynamic website which will update with new reports. However, so many people have now tried to access the website that it has been caused to crash!