2000

Second year of employment in a local authority, second year of living in the first house I’d actually owned (well, more of it was owned by the mortgage provider than me, but you know what I mean). Young, free, single, and frequently in the pub.

2001

Started dating the lady who would in time become the GLW, with the official ‘first date’ on the day of the general election (although we’d been out ‘as friends’ before that). Got engaged to her later that year, after a works night out at the Federation Brewery (who says romance is dead?).

2002

Fiancee moved in with me. Got married, exactly a year to the day after getting engaged. Very nice wedding do it was too. Discovered that vodka and orange is good for the nerves. Honeymoon in Corfu, bloody fantastic.

2003

Discovered that when you find out you are going to be a Dad in the middle of the night, it’s difficult to get back to sleep. Obtained two cats in May. First child born in October, 13 months after wedding. England won Rugby World Cup, which I watched early in the morning with small baby, who didn’t seem to be taking that much notice of England’s triumph to be honest.

2004

Moved house into current location. Bit of a wrench leaving Low Fell, as I still — even now — feel that this is ‘my’ part of Gateshead, as it’s where I spent the longest part of my teens. However, after various issues with chain, have decided that I don’t ever want to have to move house ever again.

2005

Second child born, again in October. Must be something in the January air. Went to Manchester for an AccessifyForum meetup which involved several drinks. Started blogging specifically to record this event.

2006

Went to Edinburgh with wife and two boys. Had a great time in Edinburgh, looking at shops and in particular zoo — great for the kids — although an experience on the buses did dampen my enthusiasm for the trip somewhat

2007

Went on holiday to Centerparcs. Not really a particularly exciting year; I can’t think of anything else of specific interest offhand.

2008

Oldest child started school. Seems too young to be going to school at first, but within a few weeks is perfectly settled and within a few months seems completely at home. Changed jobs — started working in private sector, sometimes working away but mostly working from home. Met up with some people I had gone to Uni with on weekend away in Lancaster.

2009

Made redundant, started up own business. Too early to say really how it’s going for sure; it seems positive but you’re always wondering where the next piece of work will come from. Had lovely holiday in Corfu with wife and kids just after being made redundant — fortunately had already been paid for by then.

The question is, will I still be blogging ten years from now when the time comes for the next decade meme?

I am, now and again, accused of writing too much. This is primarily because I don’t structure these blog posts to take up a specific amount of time to read, or words to fill. I start because there’s something I want to say, I talk about it, and then when I’m finished, I stop.

I understand that from time to time, one of my readers, if themselves pushed for time, may choose not to read the entire article, or may indeed skip it entirely. This is absolutely their prerogative and I have no objection to anyone choosing to do this.

But there is one thing that I then object to. This was summed up perfectly by a comment on a BBC piece about automated telephone systems by Clive James. And this is what the comment said:

This article suffers from a syndrome oft contemplated in the wider online community. TLDR. Too long, didn’t read. This is nothing more than a montage of the self-certainty that is your sense of observational humour, and the clarity of your modern social perspective.Marek, from Glasgow

In other words, this commenter is saying: my time is valuable, and I don’t have time to read the dross you’ve written, but I expect everyone else to read the important bits I have written, despite my public acknowledgement that I didn’t actually read the article.

And this is the height of hubris. If you don’t want to read to the end of an article, fine. Perfectly okay with me; it’s your time, do with it as you will. But don’t expect me — or anyone else — to consider that your opinion on something you haven’t actually read is worth them spending their time bothering over.

For me, the people who take this attitude have got the acronym all wrong. If you’re Too Lazy? Don’t Respond!

But if you can manage to look at your site statistics from time to time without getting drawn into this sort of nonsense, you can determine some interesting things.

Browsers

Firstly, there’s the question of what people use to access the site. The large proportion of “unknown” users (around 16% of the total) suggests that maybe the statistics package isn’t the best and latest available (and it isn’t; it’s a full release behind the current up-to-date version of that package) and so I shouldn’t draw too firm a conclusion from any of this, since any browser could be up to 16% out, but it would appear that on my site Internet Explorer (22%) and Firefox (19%) are almost on a par in terms of visits.

This is actually quite plausible, as while the proportion of Internet Explorer users in the UK is, on the whole, significantly higher than this, techies (some of whom I presume read the techie stuff on here) are much more likely to use Firefox: thus if my site is skewed towards techies, it’s also likely to be skewed towards Firefox.

If I actually drill down and look at browser versions, then you see something quite interesting. In terms of Firefox, by far the biggest percentage of users using those browsers are using the most recent version (96%), whereas the situation is reversed for Internet Explorer (only 26% using the most recent version, compared to 29% still using Internet Explorer 6).

My theory is that the reason updates of Internet Explorer are lagging behind is because of its use as a corporate platform: it doesn’t get upgraded quickly but there is a significant lag time while the IT department of the appropriate organisation get their arse in gear to upgrade everyone to the newer versions. Well, there’s that and the possibility that people who are using Internet Explorer by choice are, on the whole, less fussy about using the latest version of their browser than users of other browsers.

Platforms

And what sort of platform are people using?

It’s fairly clear that Windows is the platform popularity king, and WinXP is still by far the most popular version. Goes to show that for all the hype about Windows Vista, people didn’t really want it:

(Note: figures adjusted to remove spiders/bots and ‘unknkown’; these are based on known user platforms only)

(Only figures > 1.0% are shown, meaning that the likes of WinCE, Win3.1 and SunOS are not listed).

Geography

Well, it’s actually a slight surprise to discover that the country which provides the most visits to my site is the US (56.0%), what with me being based (and hosted, and ‘domained’) over here on t’other side of the Atlantic (where the UK provides 19.6%). Then again, there are simply more people in the States, which could well account for it to some extent.

But again, it’s the sheer geographic spread that I find impressive: there are 10 countries which have generated 1000 visits or more in the last month, a further 22 countries which had 100 visits or more, and another 36 which were responsible for 10 or more visits, all the way down to my solitary visitor from Yemen, who viewed two pages. Hello!

Searching

The point hardly needs to be made, but Google is very dominant in the search market, accounting for 96% of all searches which drew people to the site.

What tends to be slightly more interesting is looking at what people were actually searching for. Until I excluded it via the robots protocol recently, a number of people were still finding my site searching for “find madeleine” and then obviously sending me abuse simply because I had posited the theory that she may in fact have been dead (note: not that I felt that this was a good thing).

There are quite a few people turning up here looking for “Reynholm Industries Intranet Password” (and variations on the theme). Those looking for that will be disappointed as I don’t say what it is — but I do give a clue. “John Harrison MBE MIDSC” is also quite popular, in relation to a chain email doing the rounds which doesn’t actually contain any facts but is quite anti-Islamic, so it’s nice to see that people are trying to check up on the supposed (but not actual) author.

Although I suspect the person who arrived here having searched for “home made porn” on Ask Jeeves was somewhat disappointed. I am more than happy to educate those people wanting to know more about the unique Andy Kadir-Buxton, and to give people an idea of “when was Furness Abbey built?”. There also seems to be an awful lot of people wondering if they have swine flu…

On his Muck&Brass blog, resident Niall Connolly has called members “jackasses” and claimed a council leaflet was “like a Nazi call to arms”.

Former vice chairman Anthony Canvin, 61, said: “There’s some sick, stupid people out there.”

BBC News

My first thought was wow. Not wow as in “hurrah”, but wow as in “cripes, I’m a bit surprised at that”. At this stage, I’d not actually read anything of Niall’s Muck and Brass blog. I’d heard about it on the BBC. (Mainstream Media 1, Blogger 0)

Reaction

But I was a bit surprised at this response by Jim Hawkins, who has in the past been critical of blogging, suggesting that it does not have as much value as proper journalism…

@ThePickards Regardless, it’s a shame. One whining anonymous critic takes down most of a council but doesn’t have guts to stand for electionJimInTheMorning

…this instinctive “blogger must be wrong” response struck me as sadly typical of mainstream media (except in regard to Iain Dale who turns up bloody everywhere), and — and I hope Jim will forgive me for highlighting his mistake hiere — shows that even mainstream journalists aren’t always 100% accurate in checking their sources, since both the BBC article (which Jim retweeted) and the blog itself named the author as Niall Connolly.

Jim’s counter — that we can’t be sure he actually is Niall, since the BBC haven’t managed to contact him today — seems a weak argument since he appears to have been blogging since 2006 without anyone questioning his identity before. Besides which, before assuming someone’s identity is fraudulent, it might seem reasonable to check them out: and since the person claiming to be N. Connolly has in his possession a photo of a franked envelope sent to N. Connolly (publicly available on his blog for anyone to spot), it would seem a little perverse to be suggesting he isn’t…

Is It Right To Criticise?

The other question is of course whether or not it is “a shame for democracy”. There’s a perfectly simple answer to this. Or rather there are maybe two. And these are “No, it isn’t”, and “It depends”.

The fundamental question to the “no it isn’t” camp is whether we, as individuals, as bloggers, as private citizens, in the media or not, anonymous or not, have a right to criticise our elected representatives. My vote would be a clear and unequivocal yes: with of course the caveat that if you’ve been telling stuff which turns out not to be true, you have to pay the penalty (as Damien McBride and The Sun have found out recently).

That’s my personal belief: we all have a right to be critical of our elected representatives. And, in theory, we should be allowed also to sing their praises should such a situation ever arise.

If you’re not convinced on this, then maybe you’ll fall into the second camp: “it depends”. This camp would suggest that hang on, if the guy’s criticisms are reasonable, then maybe he is right to be critical: if he’s being unreasonable, then no.

Surely everyone would agree with these two being the only reasonable camps: after all, the only other possibility is that your elected representative can do whatever the hell they like and you’d be the one in the wrong if you were to say anything about it.

Challenge The Media

So what has Niall actually had to say? Have any of the journalists (and let’s just watch today’s papers to see) actually read his blog before drawing their conclusions? Well, this is where it might just get interesting…

There are, at the time of writing, only eighty-five posts on the blog, so while it might take a little effort, it’s certainly possible to at least skim the posts and pick out the relevant ones. (And read some half dozen of the council minutes too)

So I have done. As I say, if the story is picked up by other sources tomorrow, let’s see which “proper” journalists have done the same (and without “coincidentally” picking up on exactly the same points as me)…

What’s The Story?

In 2006, there’s no real vitriol only a few references to the council, one of which simply states that the age profile of the town is somewhat elderly, and the makeup of the town council reinforces this profile. There are a few references to the Somerton Town Plan of 1977 — isn’t it right that someone is taking an interest like this? — and then he ponders whether the council are doing enough to engage with the community.

I don’t know if anyone at the meeting was under forty but it certainly didn’t look like it. So where is the wider community? Clearly they don’t get involved and its useful to ask why not? Maybe the very nature of ‘local politics’, certainly as they are pursued in Somerton, just turns people off.

I can’t think of any situation where — assuming the comment to be true — a Council wouldn’t seek to determine why this should be the case and try and engage with younger people. If he’s wrong, or the council were engaging with the youth in other ways, then surely it’s simple enough to say so.

Of course, the bigger question seems to be whether or not things are going through proper channels:

It was proposed to the meeting that Tony Canvin, the well known builder and local and district councillor, would use his ‘buying power’ to negotiate the best deals. It was proposed that there would be no tendering evidently because tendering is a tedious process which doesn’t offer any benefit.

This strikes me as seeming a bit unusual. I would have thought that tendering for deals would be a requirement, and that anyone who was a local builder should have to declare their interest at this point, and then have no further part in the process.

Reasonableness

And then you’ve got the questions of whether the criticisms are reasonable:

Somerton’s dominance in the Precept League is again underscored when you consider the average Precept charged by the 121 Town Councils in South Somerset. The average Precept charged per property across those Councils is a paltry £24.85p and Somerton exceeds that by close to 400%.

Now assuming these figures are accurate — and I’d presume these figures are, by nature, publicly available, so anyone can check — then surely it’s not unreasonable to ask why you’re paying four times more per head for your town council than those residents of other councils. Is this not a reasonable question? And here I’ll introduce some of my research:

Somerton’s plans for 2007-08 showed that it was expected that there would be a shortfall of £40,000, which would have to be met from reserves. Of course, when it came to the 2008-09 prediction, there were revised figures for 2007-08 which showed that the council didn’t make a loss of forty thousand at all. It would appear that they actually spent — with an income of around £275,000 (including £220,000 precept) more than one million pounds more than their income.

Not only is this a rather spectacular amount — particularly as the next highest amount which needed to be paid from any of the other town council balances was less than seven thousand, it’s also around 25 times greater than the council expected.

I think it’s perfectly appropriate for anyone to question why this should be the case… Blogger 1, Mainstream Media 1

Accuracy and Correction

Then there’s the question of whether a blogger is allowed to say things he knows to be factually inaccurate. Would a blogger who wasn’t honest and decent allow something inaccurate to stand, would they quietly drop the allegation (as I’m sure has been done before) without actually publishing a clear retraction, or would they publish a clear correction? Let’s look at Niall:

On the 14th October an anonymous comment was posted to Muck&Brass suggesting a connection between Wild Meadow Farm and Hawthorns SW. Muck&Brass has been assured that there is no financial connection between these two companies. Muck&Brass: Correction

Note, this isn’t retracting an allegation he has made, this is correcting an allegation an anonymous source made during the comments. If only the media published their corrections, retractions and apologies on their front pages…

Not only that, but you also have this:

Recently this blog has received a number of comments which have not been published because they contain information which cannot be verified. I would ask those contributors to contact me directly in order that I might learn more about the issues that they raise.Muck & Brass: Request for Information

Blogger 2, Mainstream Media 1.

The Lone Nut Theory

Next, I’ll look at the implication that the blogger is a lone nut: as with the JFK Walnut commission investigation. What about other sources? Do other people agree with these sort of views? Well, yes…

Terry Bastyan, speaking on behalf of residents living in the Badgers Cross Lane, said: “We feel let down by the council because you are supposed to be representing us. “The only reason all these people are here is because two of us found out and let everyone know. “We fully support recycling, but question the need to move from the current site.”

The current site is owned by Somerset County Council and managed by Viridor. The proposed new site is a disused quarry owned by Mr Canvin.

This Is Somerset

Does this seem to then be a lone voice? Well, no… (look at the local election results also — which also demonstrates that if he didn’t stand for election, he was actively involved in the process).

Blogger 3, Mainstream Media 1

Is There A Case To Answer?

But of more import seems to be the activities of one Councillor Tony Canvin, who has been the one at whom most of Muck&Brass’s vitriol appears to be aimed at. Is he being unfair and just picking on the poor man? Or does he have a point? Well, let’s take a look…

A proposal to relocate Somerton Household Waste Recycling Centre from Bancombe Road Trading Estate to Badgers Cross Lane has been submitted by Tony Canvin.This Is Somerset [2]

Okay, then, if we were to work on the assumption that what is in these articles is accurate (it has been produced by “proper” journalists, after all), doesn’t anyone else think that it is inappropriate for a councillor to submit a proposal for the council to move one of their centres to some land he himself owns? I’m not saying it’s against the rules — I don’t know the rules — but as with MPs expenses, it’s one of those things where my opinion is that if it isn’t against the rules, it ought to be.

M&B has received a number of emails regarding a ‘new’ planning application which seeks permission for an amenity site out at Badger’s Cross. This development will effect everyone in Somerton and has been rumoured for over a year yet it has not been discussed by Somerton Town Council and it is fair to ask, ‘Why not?’.

This application comes from none other than ‘Mr Somerton’ himself, Tony Canvin (aka Cllr Canvin) …

Muck & Brass: It’s That Damn Badger Again

Niall also makes a sound point that leaving a meeting for five minutes here and there does not necessarily mean that there is no conflict of interest:

Obviously the applicant’s consultants were quick to point out that, in a situation such as this, where the applicant faces possible accusations of ‘conflict of interest’, the applicant would leave a Council Meeting whilst their application was being discussed. But the community is beginning to appreciate that the issue is not the relatively short period of time when the application is being considered that is under scrutiny. Under scrutiny is the far longer period of time, possible a year or 18 months before the application is made, when the applicant can use their extensive access to the process to prepare their position. In the face of this advantage, the community is starting to feel abused.Muck & Brass: Shaved Heads and Earrings

Now, I don’t know whether there is anything actually wrong in all of this, but to me it poses an interesting question — the council may well have resigned en masse because of criticism from a blogger, but the question should be posed (and of course answered by the council, and former members, where appropriate) as to whether that criticism was justified. If so, then perhaps they have been forced to resign through their own actions, rather than because of blaming one blogger.

And of course this is before we look at other claims: councillors shredded a letter of questions sent out to them and sent the shredded bits back; suggestions of intimidation and vandalism and so on…

Blogger 4, Mainstream Media 1

Money Where Mouth Is?

And it appears Mr. Connolly has been prepared also to put his money where his mouth is…

Whether the wider community agrees or disagrees with the views expressed in this blog, the information provided to the External Auditor is all based upon fact, backed with documentary evidence. In the light of that evidence, I believe that the community of Somerton has been very badly let down by its Town Council and its Town Clerk.Muck & Brass: Thank You

Of course, I’m not claiming to know what the facts of the case actually are. That’s why I’d like to see Somerton Town Council — and former councillors — put their side of the story. My personal opinion is that it would be appropriate for some outside and independent agency to investigate these claims and stories and report publicly whether or not any wrongdoing has taken place, and either clear the name of the councillors, or take whatever other action may be appropriate.

However, I would suggest that those people who immediately assumed that the council was in the right have obviously not looked into the allegations which I think suggest there is a case to answer. For those of you who judged someone before knowing the facts (which, admittedly, I still don’t know — that’s why I suggested an external, independent, public investigation) — shame on you.

Blogger 5, Mainstream Media 1

Summary

To sum up though, I hope Jim will forgive me, but his thoughts — democracy is the loser, anonymous, whining blogger — and so on, seem very much to be a case of “kneejerk reaction first, establish facts later”. Which is strange, because that lack of attention to the facts, and the lack of investigative reporting (such as that carried out by Niall), is always something that the mainstream media seem to criticise bloggers for.

Perhaps this is simply proof that bloggers can be better, after all; perhaps there is still a place for the independent crusader and local resident to actually make an impact on local politics. Perhaps local government ought to be accountable to its residents. Perhaps people shouldn’t jump to conclusions just because they are biased against bloggers.

…or perhaps all of the allegations and suggestions are false. I don’t know, and because I don’t know, I didn’t jump to conclusions based on prior bias, and that is rather the point.

But instead perhaps the question I should ask in return is why don’t you blog? Most people generally enjoy communicating their thoughts and ideas with others, and the medium of a blog is pretty much an ideal way to do this. Fair enough, there are things you should maybe consider — such as how much personal information you actually want to put online — but you may be surprised at how many people actually would want to read what you have to say, even if what you want to say isn’t earth-shattering, providing you write as least reasonably well.

I HAD MY BREAKFAST AND I HAD A BOILED EGG AND SOME TOAST AND THEN I WNET TO THE LAVATRY AND HAD A WHIZZ AND THEN I THOUgHT I NEEDED A POO BUT I DIDNT SO THEN I FNISHED GETTING DRESSED AND WNET TO WORK

…although unless you think you can do better than the above, you might possibly want to give it a miss.

But assuming you can write better than this (and lets face it, most of us can), then what is actually putting you off? If it is the idea that blogging is difficult, or that you think cost will be prohibitive, then you really have no excuse.

You Can Blog For Free

A chap contacted me a week or so ago through my contact form, and asked if I would give him a quote for putting together a blog for him. Given that he’d already written a couple of books, I reckoned that he was probably capable of forming coherent sentences and therefore that blogland wouldn’t be the worse for having him on board. So I said that I could do such a thing, but from the sound of what he was after, I didn’t think he’d really need a quote, because I reckoned that at least 90% of what he was after could be done entirely cost free, through having a hosted wordpress.com blog.

So with not too much work required, I put together a blog site for him to talk about his interests — walking, climbing and so on. Whilst never having described myself as a climber, I’ve certainly done some walking in my time (usually in the Lakes) and so from purely selfish reasons it’s been fun putting together his blog. I’ve enjoyed putting it together, I’ve enjoyed reading what he has had to write, and the link back to my site will hopefully help promote my services to others.

Okay, granted you can’t necessarily guarantee that someone will be around to help you set up a blog, but if you personally know any bloggers, they probably will (if they have time) be happy to help. And even if you don’t, it isn’t actually that hard. Which brings me to the next bit…

Blogging Isn’t Difficult

Then, when we’d got something we were at least content with, he then said that he felt that he would possibly benefit from some training, so that he was able to put together posts for himself. Again, I said that if he was really desperate for some training, I’d be able to put together a quote for him, but I didn’t really think he needed it. Instead I sent him some simple instructions about how to add a WordPress post:

1. Login (link at bottom right). Username [redacted] password [redacted]
2. This will take you to the admin page, where you’ll find all the functions, most of which you’ll never need to use
3. To add a new post, either click ‘new post’ from the logged in bar across the top, or select posts/new post on the left hand side of the admin detail.
4. You’ve then got a WYSIWYG editor to add a new post. There are two rows of icons – the top row of icons allows you to insert media into the post (e.g. the top row, left hand button allows you to insert an image; the one fourth from the right on the second row is the ‘more’ tag – anything you put before this is the ‘teaser’ text; anything else goes in the main post body only).
5. You can save the post without publishing it by pressing ‘save draft’. You can set to publish immediately by pressing ‘publish’ or if you set the date by using the Edit link next to “publish immediately” and set a date/time in the future, this changes to ‘schedule’ so you can schedule the post to publish at a specific time.
6. You can also mark posts as belonging in a particular category, although you don’t have to.
7. … and that’s about it — just have a play around

Advice on creating a wordpress post

See? It’s not difficult. In less than a week, someone who had initially described themselves as a ‘technical neanderthal’ has been adding their own wordpress posts, inserting media, and is now looking at tagging posts and so on.

Because They’re There

The blog is maybe still “under development” to some extent as the creases get ironed out and further tweaks are applied, but it’s certainly up and running. So if you’re interested in walking — or what you can do with a blog quickly, easily (and perhaps most importantly free-ly) why not ramble over to Because They’re There… and take a look?

And remember, next time you’re wondering why someone else blogs you should maybe turn the question around and see if you can really justify to yourself a reason why you don’t.

And then when we’ve got you doing that, let’s look at getting you on Twitter…

It’s also important to differentiate what this is — a wordpress post produced simply to have some content (admittedly of dubious quality) on a particular day with someone holding a post (photo by David Boyle; image links to the image on his flickr account). These are are different types of posts, and in the image, holding is an active verb, as opposed to part of the noun used to describe the type of post. Hope that’s cleared that up.

I do most humbly beg forgiveness from my loyal readers, I am of course most remorseful and apologetic. Well, not really that remorseful, otherwise I could easily have decided not to publish this post and/or to write something deep, meaningful and insightful instead. But that would probably have worried you all just as much.

Oh yes, and it’s not the sort of post you would tie things to/hold things down with either, such as in the cowboy films where all of the cowboys can tie their horses to a post or a rail just outside the saloon before they go in and get shot up by the Dalton Gang or whatever they are called in that particular film…

Anyway, that’s it. More normal service will be resumed soon

Before even reading the policy, I can tell that this is a good idea. This is something that Councils — and other large organisations — need to be dealing with. If you don’t have a policy about it, employees will do it anyway, and will share information on Facebook and so on. You need to be aware of it, and you need to ensure that your employees are aware of their responsibilities in this regard.

This is a particularly good example of such a policy because it is short and punchy. You don’t need, and don’t want a fifteen-page policy full of legalese and incomprehensible management-speak. The document clearly sets out who the policy relates to and why:

…details the ground rules for employees who should ensure that the content of their blogs/social networking sites does not bring the Council into disrepute or breach their obligations under the Code of Conduct [...] This policy applies to all Council employees and Members.Cambridgeshire County Council Blogging/Social Networking Policy

The Council provide simple advice — if you can, try not to mention your work or reference the Council on the web. If you do mention/reference however, you need to make it clear that any views you express are your own and are not necessarily representative of the council, and in addition, you must not breach the Data Protection Act; disclose any information not already public; post illegal material such as child pornography; breach Council copyright; make defamatory remarks about the Council, colleagues or service users; publish anything that could undermine public confidence in you or the council; and not misrepresent the Council.

For the most part, this is a sensible list of things a council employee shouldn’t do. However, I think that in the case of some of the issues — such as breaching the Data Protection Act or posting child pornography — the Council would be quite within their rights to take disciplinary action even had they not mentioned them in the blogging policy (and indeed the employee may have more significant issues to deal with — such as criminal prosecution — than an internal disciplinary matter). But it does no harm to mention them in the policy, I suppose.

I’ll just be clear: I fully support Cambridgeshire County Council having a policy, I think it’s great that it’s so simple and straight-forward, and I think it is fantastic that they have chosen to share it with others. However, that does not mean I have to agree with all of it.

Firstly, let’s look at “publish material or comment that could undermine public confidence in you as an employee/Officer of the Council”. The problem with this is probably that it is too broad. What would be deemed to “undermine public confidence”? If you go out on a works leaving do, and some photos of you and colleagues the worse for wear end up on Facebook, is that undermining public confidence? Would that be the same for members of the Drug & Alcohol teams? Is it undermining public confidence to express your political views, if clearly stated as your own? Would that be the same for BNP supporters?

On the other hand, I think it’s important that the Council don’t try to get bogged down in too much detail: if examples of the sort of thing that might undermine public confidence are available elsewhere on your intranet, just link to those — I’m sure this sort of thing will apply to your behaviour in public as a whole and not just online.

But I am also unclear about precisely what the council mean when they say:

make defamatory remarks about the Council, colleagues or service usersCambridgeshire County Council Blogging/Social Networking Policy

…simply because there appears to be key differences between some definitions of defamation:

The accepted legal definition of defamation is “the publication of a statement which tends to lower a person in the estimation of right-thinking members of society generally.”Weblaw.co.uk

Defamation law exists to protect the reputation of a person from defamatory statements made about him/her to a third party without lawful justification. A statement is defamatory if, when said about a person and published to a third party, it would make ordinary people think less of that person.Channel 4

Any disparaging statement made by one person about another, which is communicated or “published,” may well be a defamatory statement and can give rise to an action for either libel or slander in English law.

Generally speaking, slander is when a defamatory statement has been made orally without justification. If the statement was made in a permanent form, for example, recording words onto tape, it would not be slander but libel.

Libellous statements are those that are recorded with some degree of permanence. This would include statements made by email or on on-line bulletin boards.

Out-Law.com

There’s a slight difference in implication here. Some seem to suggest that any negative statement may be defamation, but it would only become slander or libel under other circumstances (for example, it not being true). I would assume that the Council would be using the term ‘defamation’ meaning ‘untrue and negative remarks’, but this isn’t entirely clear.

After all, if they were simply using it in the ‘negative’ sense only, this would mean that if I was a resident and an employee of a local authority, then I would have less rights to complain about something the Council was doing badly than some other resident would have. And surely that can’t be right.

But while I might call for clarity on that point, Cambridgeshire County Council have already done more than many other Councils. They’ve given their employees some guidance on what they can say. And it’s a very useful starting point for any other Councils (or similar organisations) wishing to do the same…

So here’s the run down.

1. Akismet is the spam-blocker extraordinaire. If you don’t bother with any other plugins, bother with this one. You will need a wordpress.com account to get your API key however.
2. Spam Karma 2 is a customisable spam blocker which allows you to set up a blacklist, monitor different settings, make regular commenters less likely to be identified as spam, and generally do many of the same functions as Akismet. I use it alongside. It is no longer being maintained, but it still works fine for me.
3. Bad Behaviour looks at the delivery method for the spam and attempts to stop spam bots from posting to your site. I have generally found this to be very good, although again it is used in conjunction with Akismet and SK2 so it’s sometimes difficult to know who to hand the credit to…
4. Author Highlight deserves a mention, even if I’ve just stopped using it. This outputs a class attribute if a specific author comments on your site. I used to use this to output a little avatar for my comments, in order to make my comments stand out more clearly as belonging to the site owner. However, since the redesign I have been supporting Gravatars, rendering author highlighting redundant for my purposes (although you could, for example, use it to ensure all author comments were displayed against a particular coloured background).
5. Get Recent Comments is a widgetised plugin which allows you to easily view recent comments on your blog and stick them into your sidebar. You can also include pingbacks/trackbacks if you wish.
6. No Self Pings is essential for me. If I refer to one of the other pages on this site, I don’t want to create a trackback link, because I feel that not only does it clutter up the comments, it starts making me come over as a complete dick who keeps talking about himself (this might indeed be the case, but I’d like to minimise the number of instances of giving that impression). Therefore I can link to my other pages without cluttering up the site with a whole pile of trackback links.
7. Mike Cherim and Mike Jolley‘s Secure and Accessible Contact Form. Not everyone likes this (although I’ve never heard a complaint from someone who has actually used it, merely that there are too many css hooks in it), but it’s the best contact form I’ve found: it cuts down on the amount of spam coming through the contact form dramatically, and it’s accessible.
8. Twitter Tools. I’ve talked about this before, but really if you want to integrate your twitter account with your blog in some way, this is where you should start looking.
9. WordPress.com stats sounds as though it is a plugin which will monitor stats for wordpress.com accounts. However, what isn’t so clear is that it will also monitor stats for self-hosted wordpress blogs, as long as you have your API key (which you need anyway, for Akismet). Brilliant for people who want to spend every day checking whether their number of visitors are going up or down and agonising over why.
10. WordPress database backup, for taking backups of your database. Use as part of your backup routine, whatsoever that may be.
11. WordPress Popular Posts is a widgetised plugin and relatively new to this blog (you can see it in the third column, just under “recent posts”). This allows you to identify the most popular posts on your blog by either total page views, total comments or average daily page views, and can be done over a 7 day, 30 day, or ‘all time’ time period. I am currently runnning this on total views over the last 7 days.

Blogging against Disablism Day for me isn’t just about writing your own post, it’s also about reading what other people have to say, accepting I won’t necessarily agree with all of it, I won’t necessarily like the writing in some of it, but still an interest in what other people think and experience. From previous years, I know there will be some gems to be found in there, and if you don’t go looking for them, you will never know what you’ve been missing.

So to make it easier for those of you who aren’t prepared to go reading through the official Blogging Against Disablism Day 2009 post in order to find out what everyone else has to say (or maybe you just like reading the ‘review’ posts), I’m going to offer you up a selection of the ones I liked the best. Although at the rate I’m finding them, this is liable to be about half of the posts…

The first BADD post I read was a personal account from Bad Cripple which still makes me smile: someone standing up for themselves is always a good thing, although the point is they shouldn’t have to — not everyone would have the courage to do this.

There’s Linguanaut, who found the RNIB unhelpful as he has one ‘good’ eye, and points out that speaking more loudly to him does not, no matter how often people try it, improve his eyesight. He also (and not surprisingly, given the name of the blog) has a small look at language, which always interests me. However, on the down side, he includes Order-Order and Ian Dale’s diary in his blogroll…

There’s a personal journey from SpeEd Change which highlights the way that homogenised treatment and expectations can actually single out disabled people. Similarly, something which was obviously intensely personal produced this; sad but beautiful in its simplicity:

There’s a word for that kind of thing … when a newborn is treated as another pending, tragic statistic because her genetic diagnosis arrives before she does

What Sorts of People…

There’s The Iron Chicken who describe ‘A Convenient Myth’ — if everything is inaccessible, disabled people can’t go anywhere, so people don’t see as many disabled people, so it’s assumed that not many people are disabled, so there’s no need for accessibility. This is also illustrated by another post from Radio Clare which highlights how some people want people with disabilities to be hidden away from the rest of us, just so nobody gets offended (and also references “political correctness gone mad!”, hurrah!), and who also demonstrates that not only is she non-disablist, she’s managed to overcome her own prejudices and is also now non-beardist, and non-glassesist.

Wheelchair Dancer tells us to piss on pity, a phrase which I must alliteratively describe as pithy. The Goldfish extends this, describing a personal journey that everyone is different in a variety of respects and she no more needs to feel obliged to explain her impairments or her thoughts around disability to society at large than anyone else should feel obliged to explain why they are gay, or straight, or have chosen to dye their hair.

This actually reminds me of one of the few things I learned from an equalities course once. We all know to treat people with respect (or we should); what people might not consider is that if they are the “one” of type x, then they will feel singled out if people keep asking them questions about it, irrespective of whether the questions are sensible and reasonable. If you have one Muslim and thirty nine non-Muslims interested in finding out more, each asking their own questions, that person might feel quite harrassed and picked on, without anyone being overtly offensive. And that takes me back to Radio Clare again…

The incurable hippie also picks up (as I did) on disabled Martin Ryan being allowed to starve to death whilst in hospital, something so shocking I was surprised hadn’t received bigger media coverage.

In a strange land talks about language, and in particularly the way disability terms are used as insults — “lame”, “spaz” and so on — which implies a lack of worth in people with those disabilities. And you can lump the Moylesian “gay = not very good” terminology into this category too.

Batsgirl offers us a take — not so much on language, but more with perception — with well meaning insults — and in particular one insult which I had already read on her blog, which I suggested had handed her the BADD topic on a plate. I had said then that I looked forward to reading her post: it didn’t disappoint.

I’m always impressed when someone makes me consider something that had not previously occurred to me, and Kethry made me consider whether it is disablist to commend a deaf person on his or her speech. I still don’t have a firm personal opinion on that one: I’ve got as far as “it depends”. Which I find is generally an accurate, if unhelpful, answer to most questions.

On a similar note, what happens to disabled refugees or in a war zone? It’s probably no surprise, but it is persons with disabilities that are first to die. I also liked this post for the typo, suggesting that the blog behind BADD was “Dairy Of A Goldfish”, wondering where I can get a pint of goldfish milk…

Bitch Queen Emily (hey, her phrase, not mine!) talks honestly about a relationship with a disabled person and trying very hard not to be ableist — which isn’t always that easy. From a personal relationship to a spiritual one: Sophia’s Call gives a perspective from a Catholic hospital chaplain which, I know some people might be inclined to dismiss because of the source, although I would rather hope not: after all surely the point here is to fight against judging people? Besides which, you’d miss a really interesting post, and one not about strictly physical issues for a change…

Then there’s another one which looks at people’s perceptions towards those with autism, and cautions, not so much about making initial assumptions, but in not seeing past these assumptions later:

And the thing is, I honestly can’t blame people for making these initial assumptions; it’s an easy trap to fall into. I do, however, think that sticking to these assumptions even in spite of evidence is very much worth criticism.

Normal Is Overrated

One of the things I like about BADD is it gives me the opportunity to read a whole pile of blogs that I wouldn’t normally read. If I particularly enjoy them, I might come back and visit later; I might read some of their other stuff. I’ve found quite a few blogs like this today. It’s particularly pleasant when within two paragraphs I’m thinking “what a lovely turn of phrase, I’ll be coming back here again”.

…my haphazard attempts with the petrol lawnmower, which under my visually impaired and fibromyalgic direction becomes more of a ploughing device than a cutting device. It looks like shite before I mow and looks like hammered shite afterwardsA Load of Old Squit

After one thing that made me laugh comes another, this time from Ham.Blog with their Invisible Illness Bingo.

Attila the Mom has a story to which she simply remarks WTF? As I’m less refined then her, I’ve also provided the expansion of the anagram in case there was anyone who didn’t realise that the “F” in it was for “fuck”. Those of you with a nervous disposition should have looked away some time ago. However, she’s spot on with her sentiment. Read the story to find out why.

Hello to you out there in Normal Land
You may not comprehend my tale or understand

Ian Dury and the Blockheads: Spasticus Autisticus

And, like all variety numbers, it’s appropriate to finish on a song. Particularly a song which is by one of my favourite singers/bands: the late and very great Ian Dury. For this reason I implore you to take a look at Marmite Boy’s post No, I’m Spasticus!

Finally, apologies to anyone not included in this run-down. I have still read your post (or at least those added before 20:30 “Goldfish time”); I too value your contribution; it’s just that I’ve not included it here. However, I probably did like it very much, as my initial run-through of this post was listing the majority of the posts on BADD, rather than simply offering a selection. Also, there’s only a certain amount of writing I can do in one evening without my wife and kids demanding a little more of my time, so if you’ll excuse me pinching a disability metaphor for something else, I’ve run out of writing spoons for the time being…

You can still see my blogger archives if you visit my last blogger-powered post. Some of them were migrated, but many were not. By my reckoning there were 48 posts which were not migrated, meaning that this is actually my 981st wordpress post, and in total, my 1,029th blog post.

Well, I think for such a significant figure as that (look, let’s just pretend it’s a nice round number, okay?) I am entitled to be a little self-indulgent, so what I have chosen to do is to selected one post from each block of one hundred published to date and link to them here for your delight and delectation (as I’m sure some of you naughty, naughty people haven’t yet read all of my archives).

• Post 66 (June 2006): The eternal question: should you blow your nose or watch for meteorites?
• Post 126 (September 2006): Living with thanatophobia
• Post 244 (December 2006): Blogswap: Christmas Message
• Post 350 (May 2007): I’m not a racist, but…
• Post 471 (November 2007): Accessibility vs. the free market — attitudes to Target
• Post 551 (February 2008): The Sudocrem Kid
• Post 621 (May 2008): WCAG 2.0 Release Candidate Part 1 of 5: Intro
• Post 776 (September 2008): Delightful Durham
• Post 825 (November 2008): What not to put on my Christmas list
• Post 983 (April 2009): 33^rd Newcastle Beer Festival — review
• Post 1001 (April 2009): Mind Your Language

But, as it’s a special post to commemorate the fact that this is my 1,029th blog post, I am going to mention one more. This was my 413th post, and it isn’t so much notable for the post itself — Hi, Barry Scott here… but for the You Tube video embedded in it. The Barry Scott / Cillit Bang Techno Remix. If you’ve not seen it before, it’s worth a look!