Social Media is dying

Morning Mugs

Today is Blue Monday it seems. Another 'made up' day to apparently let everyone know that it's the day when the early Xmas pay has dried up and there's a week to go before pay day. Blimey, my pay has usually gone about 2 days after pay day , after which everything seems a blue day. If I didn't know better, and was more cynical I'd wonder if Blue Monday was marketing tool for the Pay Day loan industry. Surely not......

Anyway, in 2004 I posted 202 entries here. In 2005 it fells to 165, but hey...still reasonably prolific. Then from 2010 onwards I've only hit double figures once.10 posts in 2017. So I ask myself what happened? 

It's pretty simple really. Social media. Most notably Facebook and Twitter. I've been a pretty huge advocate of both in recent years. I looked at Facebook as a huge room in which you and friends have access to and can use it to share moments, voice opinions and catch up. it was, and still is to a degree, a great way of keeping in touch, with the choice of how much touch being with the Facebook user. But over the years, it's been sullied by targeted adverts, although the person aiming the adverts is usually horrendously off beam. And then it became a way of getting gullible people to spread horrendous cod philosophy, fake news, bullshit political claims, hatred. It became a place where gullible people could spread malware and friends lists by sharing an 'Amen' message on completely untrue stories. It now resembles a junkyard where you have to sift through rubbish to find the odd status update of any interest. In the last year, I use it for crap jokes and sharing photo's or getting photo's, local events and wining people about hoaxes on bloody Facebook. It's lost its way. It's slowly but surely dying. 

I turned to Twitter some years ago out of interest. It seemed fun, a place to get news quickly, to find out much more interesting things because you could fill your timeline with things that interest you. I have around 2300 followers now, pretty much all due to a shared interest in Chelsea FC. I've also made some truly lovely friends as well. But just as there iOS the positive, there is a negative and there are some truly dreadful people out there. Those who want to snipe, to argue, to belittle, to abuse and to dismiss. It's a mosh pit of keyboard warriors and trolls. Negotiating Twitter is now like walking through a city, you love the good people but constantly have to be scanning for the bad and the ones who wish you harm. I'll keep on there but use that account less. 

I do have one now for the Guild though, and if you're interested in short bursts of joy, angst, frustration, disbelief, anger and interest then do follow me on @GrumpyBlokesUK. It's there to complement this not replace this. I made a resolution that once the festive stuff was finally behind us, I'd try and do a little post here, every couple of days, and to try and recapture the humour of the blog from days gone past. 

Let's do this. 

Later Mugs, GJ 

Things to come?

Morning Mugs, 

Subjects to cover

Brexit
Politics
Division
Technology
AI
TV
Films
Radio
Holidays
Football, but only a little
Diet
Exercise
Places to see, places already seen
Trials and tribulations
The Daily Grind
Should I do an oldies VLOG?

And much much more......the quill is new, the inkwell full, the paper unrolled - let's get this going again

Later Mugs, GJ

Don't call it a comeback.......

Afternoon Mugs

Although that is exactly what is planned....

Later, Mugs

Change my dear, and it seems not a moment too soon

Afternoon Mugs

As long time readers will know, I am a Whovian. Yes, you can bundle me in with nerds, geeks and whatever you like for the fact the I am a Whovian. And a Trekkie to boot. But I don't like Star Wars. Not everything that is science fiction is good. Far from it. But Doctor Who...in general ...is very good. 

I go back as far as 1961 which means I can just about cloudily remember the very first Doctor Who, William Hartnell. I can even now remember the regeneration scene for his transformation to Patrick Troughton and thinking 'this isn't Doctor Who' before falling into Troughton's cleverly played clownish spell. I remember the change to Jon Pertwee and the court hearing of the Timelords exiling the Doctor to Earth and him choosing his new look.

I don't pretend to have understood much of this and this was many decades before the internet and such ideas as 'canon' and backstory became freely available to edge Whovians like me. I just knew that this iconic show kept me spellbound, thrilled, scared and anxiously awaiting the next episode during those formative years. I remember being at a cousin's house where tey had a cupboard for coats. It was always our TARDIS though. Many a happy time was spent there fighting Daleks and Cybermen and Ice Warriors as a young boy. Those old episodes haven't always worn well due to the production values and technology of the time, but they can still be watched and enjoyed with that modern day context in mind. I'm still saddened to this day as to how the hawaiian shirted wankers such as john Nathan-Turner and his ilk allowed the programme to become the butt of jokes through piss poor stories and dreadful effects. They had no inkling that good stories don't need effects. Less can be more. 

The rebooted Who from 2005 is a very different animal though. Budgeted beyond the belief of most Whovians it was written with vast story arc concepts building through apparent stand alone adventures. It was sharp, witty, convincing and above all introduced the very human element of emotion. It was in a word....sassy. I along with many Whovians on the edge of geekdom were very pleasantly surprised (having seen the rather dull Paul McGann film). Christopher Eccleston bought gravitas to the role with humour some of which was very dark. it introduced backstory intrigue with the 'last of the timelords' and 'time war' arcs. it gave Billie Piper the role of a lifetime and her character Rose brought the Doctor closer to millions of younger viewers. It was a huge success. 

Over the years that followed it has grown and become a staple of BBC success worldwide in the same way Paramount had global success with Star Trek. Not many programmes can claim that. It's had it's wobbles in my view. Some appalling episodes (The Peter Kay one and the living fat one for examples) have crept through the filtering process, although both of those I note were very popular with younger viewers, so maybe this was deliberate. Matt Smith never really grabbed me like Tennant and Eccleston until the 50th anniversary episodes and his exit episode when his true 'tour de force' as the Doctor arrived. I was never enamoured with Amy Pond and Rory as companions either. But then....then came Peter Capaldi. 

In all my years as an fringe Whovian, no-one has come as close as Capaldi in representing the Doctor. Eccentric, cranky, detached, compassionate, dark and light. Capaldi seemed to harness everything that was good about most of the preceding Doctors. The last series was quite simply the best to date, not least of all because of the inspired additions of Bill Potts (Pearl Mackie) and Nardole (Matt Lucas) along with the continuing presence of Missy (Michelle Gomez) and the reappearance of The Master (John Simm). The last 2 episodes had everything from humour to tragedy to darkness. As an ensemble piece it was superb from start to finish with true moments of horror. But at the centre was Capaldi flexing every acting muscle in his body to put in a truly inspiring and emotional performance as the Doctor coming to an end. I genuinely had tears in my eyes at the ending for both Bill (yay) and him. 

And so it moves on and in a brave and welcome move, we have Jodie Whittaker as the first woman Doctor. As changes go, its merely a variant on all thats gone before. I don't know much about her as an actor but I'm sure she will nail the role. It's shame that it appears to have bought a lot of closet sexists and misogynists to the fore across the media and various web forums. Some of them have made me feel ashamed to be a man. A programme predicated on the changing nature of its main character has merely made a change to reflect an increasingly egalitarian society. Jodie Whittaker should be measured on her ability to play the Doctor, her ability to 'pretend' as actors do and not on her gender. I for one welcome the change. Break a leg Jodie. Welcome to the Tardis. 

Later Mugs

Blame Thatcher for Grenfell

Morning Mugs

Well, that's been a roller coaster few weeks.

But overshadowing even unnecessary elections we have the spectre of Grenfell. Very few events leave me searching hopelessly for words. 9/11 certainly did, just for the scale of what unfolded 'live' before our eyes. Before that it seemed terrorism was really confined to IRA bombs in the UK and sporadic embassy incidents abroad. Then came our own version with the events we now know as 7/7. As horrific as they were we didn't see them unfurl before our eyes, we just merely witnessed the dreadful pain and sadness of the aftermath. Since then we've seen mass murder take place in Nice and Paris. In Berlin, at a market myself and my better half had been visiting just a week earlier. We've seen Manchester impacted in the most vile way, Westminster Bridge and just weeks later Finsbury Park Mosque. All leading to the futile waste of innocent lives on the back of some misguided dogma, whether religious (a fairytale then) or pig ignorant right wing hatred (equally stupid as religion). In all those cases though the perpetrators would justify the fatalities and injuries as related to their moronic cause. 

With Grenfell, there is no stupid religious or right wing dogma driving the impact. No what drove this was incompetence and the insatiable thirst for profit maximisation. It was the ultimate failure of allowing the market place to manage people's lives. 

Whatever you think of state intervention as a political creed, it can't just start and finish with collection of taxes, the NHS, defence and roads. Many years ago people lived in council houses, maybe tower blocks, maybe smaller blocks of flats, terraced or semi-detached dwellings on council estates. Yes, snobbery existed and will always exist between those who rent and those who choose to buy. But ostensibly, those people on the council estates were proud, normal, working class families who knew that having a roof over your head was the most important thing for your family. Then Thatcher destroyed that ethos. Or tried to. because she was the first major politician to whore herself (yes I mean that word) to the supposed freedom of the market place. She famously once said 'there is no such thing as society' and then used the sale of council houses to ensure that mantra became the lead force behind selling those houses on. People were persuaded it was good. it was the future. It was 'better' than renting. 

And now we have no new council houses being built. Councils can't borrow to build and then rent. House prices are rising as they have ever done. First time buyers can never get the deposit to buy, let alone the mortgage. People are forced to rent in an uncontrolled market, self governed by landlords who have constantly lobbied for reductions in red tape (i.e Health and Safety) to ensure they can maximise profit. Thatchers work. Social housing is now run by management organisations as with Grenfell, again forced to run things on a lowest cost first basis rather than a best value ethos which may not necessarily be the cheapest option. People have to pay rents in excess of what their mortgage payments would be but are refused mortgages on UNAFFORDABILITY grounds despite years of proven payments of more expensive rent payments. Where's the sense in any of this? 

A combination of these factors, especially the 'lowest cost' ethos when refurbishing the Grenfell block will be used to explain how and why this tragedy occurred. Lets hope this weak and hopeless government finally act to change this entire public housing ethos. Allow councils to borrow and build. Allow them to prioritise council housing for those who live and were brought up in the area. Allow people to build their communities within these new estates and encourage pride by making them places to be proud to live in. Remove the pathetic stigma which creates the divide between buyers and renters. Look to Germany for how to do this. But lets push for change. It's time the people really did speak and the market freedoms were put on a leash when it comes to housing, transport, education and the NHS. 

Later Mugs, GJ 

What Can We Do?

Afternoon Mugs,

It's difficult to know what we can do to stop acts of sheer evil such as seen in Manchester on Monday night. If the work was that of a lone wolf then it seems impossible. If a team of group coordinated it then surely they'd give something away that the intelligence services would pick up on?

Events such as this often invoke knee jerk reactions from people, especially across social media. Social media gives people a platform we never had in the 70s and 80s when the IRA were often involved in indiscriminate bombing of innocent people. The views expressed by me then were along the lines of why are we accepting this? Why do we say we'll just carry on regardless? Back then I was in favour of  'shoot to kill' for terrorists, or for interment with nothing other than suspicion being the criteria. I was young and hot-headed back then and those arguments are easily pulled down by anyone with a brain who can use 'reducto ad absurdum' to do so. 

I also understand the disenfranchisement people feel when these horrific incidents occur and the seemingly slow course that justice takes. Back then , intelligence was via leaks, tip offs, via infiltration of the organisations, tapping phone calls or intercepting letters. Nowadays we live is a technology driven world where it's nigh on impossible to live, let alone transact and plan a terrorist incident without something being spotted or tracked or recorded.

As a champagne leftie I would be uneasy about Draconian methods of stopping such incidents BUT would accept interment based on intelligence showing intent, a plan to intend to do something, and yes.....public radical statements and actions would fall into it. When these fanatics, Muslim extremists and Far Right nutters, walk our streets under the banner for free speech we can see the 'intent'. Their statements should be treated in the same way as someone making a joke about a bomb when going through security at an airport or port. We should recruit the illicit hacking groups with huge sums to spend their days getting into suspects computers, smartphones and tablets. 

If and when sufficient evidence comes to light via this snooping, then arrest, inter and deport as appropriate. 

Will that cure society of such horror? No, but it's a deterrent and added to stricter checks at borders for anyone returning from the middle east it might just minimise the chances of someone getting away with it. 

Later Mugs, GJ

Dear India......

Afternoon Mugs

Dear India,

I quite like the idea that you're a tiger economy. I think Indian culture has an awful lot to offer the world. I think your people have massively contributed and influenced the UK in terms of many things, not least of all food, art, fashion and music amongst many things. 

I grew up in the 60s and 70s when many, including myself through ignorance treated many of your people as second class citizens and were frankly racist to you. As I said, it was ignorance and institutionalised and inherited views that made me that way until I was about 12 or 13.  Education opened my eyes to the folly of discrimination and racism. it let me smash urban myths and downright lies amongst my equally misguided friends and colleagues, who like me knew little better. Of course some remained vehemently anti anything 'not British', but fuck 'em, they're proper wankstains.

However, please, please do something about the scourge on yours and our society of exploiting people to work in call centres, and tasking them to cold call people in the UK with lies about the performance of their PC (when like me they don't have one). Add that the other rubbish about surveys or other products we don't need or want and it all becomes a bit pernicious, especially to vulnerable people who might be lonely or old or have mental health issues. 

In other words, stop this shit now. Until then, a plague on all your houses.

Later Mugs, GJ