May 29
Kevin Myers writes, in the Irish Independent of Friday 25 May, 2009: “Google Amnesty International and Hamas, and you will find many, many condemnations by Amnesty of Israel; but you will have to work very hard indeed to find Amnesty’s condemnations of Hamas. Yes, there are some, but they are seriously muted in comparison to …
May 28
I attended a seminar on the chilling effects of libel this evening, hosted by the Science Gallery in TCD. Simon Singh spoke about his successful fight against the British Chiropractic Association, and Peter Wilmshurst spoke of his ongoing battle with NMT Medical, a US medical devices maker. Two lawyers also addressed the gathering. After a …
May 26
I deleted my facebook account today, though it will take fourteen days for the cancellation to become final. [If you want to know how I did it, follow the simple instructions at WikiHow.] If you really want to opt out, then it’s worth checking that link. Facebook don’t make it easy to permanently delete your …
May 21
This week, scientists created artificial life. Well, sort of. Truth is, once you snip away the press release puff and spin, it’s more a case that scientists copied life. Here’s how the BBC reported what happened: ‘The researchers copied an existing bacterial genome. They sequenced its genetic code and then used synthesis machines to chemically …
May 09
Linux is hard. I know this is true, because I’ve been told it so many times. Never mind that I’ve been using it quite happily for the past few years, it’s hard. Sometimes, I even have to type something using the dreaded Command Line interface. Never mind that all the programmes I need are stored …
May 01
Discworld is a strange place, Lord of the Rings meets Monty Python. Even so, some things look familiar: “The press waited. It looked, now, like a great big beast. Soon he’d throw a lot of words into it. And in a few hours it would be hungry again, as if those words had never happened. …
