Review of WALL E

London, UK

Checkout Dan Dalton's review of WALL E at the Leicester Square Television Blog - HERE

JeremyJacobs.Com - Award Winner

London, UK

I'm grateful for USA blogger, Troy Worman and his readers for voting my other site, JeremyJacobs.Com, as an Oustanding Blog in 2008.

Blog of the Week

London, UK

Diary of a 70's Teen. Check it out.

Iain Dale on War Films

Iain Dale in conversation on Leicester Square Television with presenter Jeremy Jacobs

No to Search Engine Optimization?

London, UK

Once again Graham Jones has highlighted how ineffectual Search Engine Optimization can be. In his latest article, Graham highlights that if you want to get up the rankings, then add content, content and more content. What's interesting is that Graham suggests that it can be any content.

I agree with him on this point. When I've had a break from blogging, Google Analytics shows a drop in my readership. Is this your experience too? Or do you feel that highly focused content is best?

Wordpress banned in Turkey

Just seen this at Raincoaster. Here's her article in full.

steal this: don’t block the blog letter

Here is a really quite flawless letter that cjwriter wrote to the Turkish Ambassador to Australia regarding the recent banning of all Wordpress.com blogs in Turkey (and, indirectly, Albania, because Albania gets much of its internet access from Turkey). I suggest, as he suggests, that you copy and adapt the text and send it to the Turkish embassy in your own country. Judyb12 has supplied an abbreviated list of them:

Turkish Embassy: USA
Turkish Embassy: UK
Turkish Embassy: Australia
Turkish Embassy: Canada

RE: Freedom of Speech

Dear Mr __________,

My name is __________. I live in ______ and I’m writing to you regarding an action a Turkish court has taken that is of great concern to me.

On August 17th, 2007, the Turkish Fatih 2nd Civil Court of First Instance blocked access to the Wordpress.com domain. The ban on Wordpress, a blogging platform hosting some 1.3 million blogs, was a response to a suit filed by lawyers for Adnan Oktar alleging that defamatory statements had been made about their client by several blogs on Wordpress.com.

The ban has resulted in all blogs hosted by Wordpress.com being made inaccessible to Turkey. I feel very strongly that this is an overreaction. I am a blogger on Wordpress; I have done nothing wrong, but my readership is being impacted.

Even more serious is the fact that there are many innocent Turkish bloggers on Wordpress.com who now cannot access their blogs or are being forced to use other means to access them. It is a violation of their free speech and that of readers from all over the world.

Please understand, this is not about whether Adnan Oktar was slandered, or about the Turkish legal system; I respect your country, as I hope you respect mine. But it has gone beyond that. Now it is about innocent Turkish bloggers being forced into silence, and countless others being denied the freedom to be read. The court could have ordered that the offending blogs and any subsequent offenders be blocked, but instead ordered the complete ban of Wordpress.com. It’s the equivalent of closing a library because of a single offending book, rather than just removing the book itself.

Many websites and blogs on both Wordpress.com and on other platforms are initiating campaigns in support of Turkish bloggers, and I am writing to you to express my concern, and to ask that the Turkish authorities reconsider their position.

Yours sincerely,

____________.

Blog Changes

Re-arranged a few items on the left-hand side. A new widget "Save the Bears" has recently been added and quite a few blog links have been removed with some new friends added. In my view, if you can't be bothered top link to me, then why on Earth should I link to you? God, I can be a savage bastard sometimes! I mean, what's the point of linking to certain blogs just because they are popular? So it's goodbye and good riddance to Rachel North and Girl with a One Track Mind ( One Track Dirt Track if you ask me) and hello to Adloyada and Beaman's World.

Another great blog I admire is Jennifer Jones's "Goodness Graciousness" and her dating blog "How to tell if your Guy is a Jerk". This loosely translated to English means don't go out with a schmuck (as we say in certain parts of Norf London).

As you were.

Carry on.

Blog of the week, so far

From Scotland

Another Blogroll Change

Got bored with *LGF. So they've been consigned (temporarily) to my Room 101. Instead have replaced them with another US web/blog - Daily Shvitz

* LGF do a grand job of highlighting Arab terror, rarely reported by the pro-Arab BBC, like this

Saturday, May 26, 2007

Terror Attack in East Jerusalem

The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, terrorist wing of Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas’ “moderate” Fatah party, has perpetrated a sneak attack against Israeli border guards in East Jerusalem: 4 injured in J’lem shooting attack; 2 gunmen killed.

Two Palestinian gunmen opened fire at border patrol police in east Jerusalem late Saturday, injuring four, police said. Israeli border police at the scene fired at the attackers, killing both of them. Emergency services said four Israelis were injured and evacuated to hospital, one of whom was in serious condition.

The shooting took place in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheik Said, near the security fence. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said the two Palestinian gunmen opened fire at a joint patrol of Israeli border police and civilian guards along the barrier. Channel 10 reported that the patrol was ambushed by the Palestinian shooters.

An offshoot of the violent Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade, which is affiliated with the Fatah Party of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, claimed responsibility for the shooting attack, according to the Palestinian news Web site Maan.

Graham Jones and those Internet Secrets

As Graham points out in his most recent post, there's rarely new things out there. Many internet marketing ideas are old ones repackaged.

clipped from www.grahamjones.co.uk Internet Marketers don't have secrets So what do all these Internet Marketing Secrets really tell us? Well, other than a few technological methods, not a lot that business people didn't already know. All you have to do to succeed online is find your target audience, build a relationship with them, find out what they want and sell it to them at the highest price they are prepared to pay. That's it; it's worked offline for centuries and it now works online very well indeed. How annoyed do you get seeing another web site offering you "Internet Marketing Secrets"? How upset do you get opening that email providing you with "Secrets of the Online Gurus"? And how frustrated are you when you read such "secrets" to find they are the same old stuff you already knew?

Blog of the Week

Lady Banana has bucketloads of photos on her site. Never boring even if she is a banana.












UPDATE

Jungle Jane nearly made it as Blog of the Week. Her blog is digital narcissism at its finest. Petite Anglaise, eat your heart out.

Haircut

Had a haircut yesterday afternoon, but according to "In fact" at Prospect Magazine.........

In Italy, until recently, it was not possible to get a haircut on Monday.

I wonder if Welshcakes has a take on this?

What's your own favourite post in 2007 so far?

Mine's this beauty from early January poking fun at the London Evening Standard.

Wednesday, January 03, 2007

Oh my God It's Winter!

Well, blow me down with a feather, it's winter. On page 21 of this evenings Evening Standard, the
headline reads "Don't get comfortable, there's snow on the way" - Really. Well, fancy that.

Mark Prigg, the ES's Science Correspondent(because an ordinary journo couldn't have written this) writes that a Met. Office spokesman said today: "there could be, by the end of February, sharp cold snaps lasting a few days and we think there is a high chance of snow". No shit Sherlock. This usually happens this time of year.

Well known weather geek, Piers Corbyn (brother of the famous Commie Jeremy Corbyn) says "it could be bad for Eastern England" (watch out Ellee). Simon Keeling of the Weather Consultancy, which produces long-range forecasts said "our predictions point to a very average year". ( I mean, why doesn't someone say that Monday will be before Tuesday) - the article goes on to say that GP's are concerned about the cold because it affects people badly. Well short of pissing off to a warmer climate for the entire population what do you expect fellas? Then we're told about El Nino, global warming and how former BBC weatherman Bill Giles says that he's seen certain vegetables in his garden he doesn't normally see until March.

This article is typical of the patronizing fuckwittage spewed out by the ES most days. No wonder they're losing out to those "freebies".

What's yours?

A question for Ellee, Harry at Chase me Ladies

Hugh MacLeod

Necessary Skills

Eastcoastlife

Marianne Richmond

SG

LLM

Evnucci

Ilker Yoldas

Jonathan Phillips,

Raincoaster

Raedwald

Ms Smack

Amanda Chapel

Patricia Hannigan

Ian Grey

Tim Kevan & Michelle

Dr Simon Moores

Norm

Tisha

Zaftig

Lord Nazh

Iain Dale

The Spine

Petite Anglaise

Devil's Kitchen

Arleen

Life Wealth

Random

Innings

Liz Strauss

Robert Scoble

Tully

Eric Jackson

Menssana

Oh the Joys

Company Bitch

and finally Michel Fortin

New Bloggers on this site

I've linked these new bloggers on this site: Lord Nazh, Ruthie Zaftig, Crushed by Ingsoc and Guthrum. Welcome to you all. Just play nicely and behave yourselves.

Code of Conduct for Bloggers

In today's Guardian, Tim O'Reilly, who apparently coined the term Web 2.0, calls for a Code of Conduct for Bloggers. The code would exhort bloggers not to say anything on-line that you wouldn't say on-line.

Personally, I share the view held by Seth Freedman from Israel. He says: "It's important to see the extreme reactions so people can gauge how certain topics bring out the worst in people."

Stroke the Blego

I'm so grateful to Ken Yarmush of Technosight for this wonderful phrase. Stroke the Blego is simply:

Bloggers have egos, better known as a “blego” (blogger ego). If you really want to impress a blogger, talk about a recent post they wrote. Stroking the blego will definitely win you brownies points and increase the likelihood that they will write about you.

There's also a reference to "Blego" at Active Voice from 2004.


How big is your Blego?

Can Iain Dale compete with this rant blog?

A wonderful "new" site. Try this

I don't suppose for a moment he'll compete with Iain but you never know.

New on the Blog

1. Reuters have launched a new Photo Blog


and..............


2. Will Kintish and his amusing moments as the UK's leading authority on networking.

Watch out Jeremy!!

The latest cartoon from Gaping Void says it all!!

Guest Blogging at Ellee Seymour

Ellee Seymour very kindly asked me to post something about my recent Trek in Africa on behalf of Breast Cancer Campaign.

Guest blogger today is Jeremy Jacobs writing about his cathartic trek in the Maasai foothills to boost funds for the Breast Cancer Campaign following the tragic young death of his sister Jackie.

How have you marked the death of someone close? My family bought a wooden bench in memory of my father and added a plaque with his name. It is in the grounds of Walsingham shrine in Norfolk where he found much comfort, especially towards the end of his life.

I sponsored Jeremy’s trek with a cash donation and also posted him some of my son’s football strips to hand out to local schoolchildren, hope they liked the Tottenham Hotspurs and Manchester United shirts.

This is Jeremy’s story: