ME and Ophelia
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
THE MORE I KNOW ABOUT PEOPLE
The more I like animals
Last year, before I switched from EDF Energy to British Gas, my gas and electricity bills totalled £1,500 (£1,000 for gas and £500 for electricity). I have only one gas appliance: a gas fire in the sitting room.
This winter is the coldest I can recall. Rainwater in a bucket that I keep outside for watering plants has been frozen over for weeks on end.
A few days ago, I noticed this tiny news item buried at the bottom of a page of the Sunday Times 11 January 2009:
Here's another thing. All pensioners in this country receive a £200 winter fuel payment from the government, regardless of whether they are wealthy or poor, working or not, at home all day or not. Woe betide those poor people under the retirement age who don't fit into any government box because they make ends meet from week to week by working hard, being prudent and saving pennies for a rainy day whilst paying taxes here there and everywhere.
Wealthy pensioners ought to donate their £200 to Age Concern. I wonder how many of them would be willing to do so. Not many, I guess. Sadly this year, I have to learn to be less generous and trusting. People take advantage and mistake kindness for weakness. Yoko Ono once said that the more she knew people the more she liked her cat. I've adopted the phrase as my new motto. The more I know about people the more I like animals. Animals are more trusty and better than people.
P.S. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown's younger brother Andrew Brown works for one of the main nuclear lobbyists EDF Energy. EDF Energy is one of the worst companies I have ever dealt with. Last November they sent me a statement saying (in tiny print, easily missed) that within seven days they would deduct £600 (my Christmas savings) out of my bank account (even though I had been paying by their gas and electricty bills automatically without fail by direct debit following regular meter readings by their staff in person). Long story short: in the end, I wrote to the Chief Executive of British Gas requesting to change back to British Gas and sent them a pile of EDF's paperwork threatening to enter my home without my consent. Had a threatened postal strike gone ahead during the week that EDF's statement arrived, £600 would have been taken from my account without my permission or knowledge. It was such a traumatic experience dealing with EDF's bombardment of paperwork and their unhelpful customer services that I still shudder at the sight or mention of EDF's name.
The more I like animals
Last year, before I switched from EDF Energy to British Gas, my gas and electricity bills totalled £1,500 (£1,000 for gas and £500 for electricity). I have only one gas appliance: a gas fire in the sitting room.
This winter is the coldest I can recall. Rainwater in a bucket that I keep outside for watering plants has been frozen over for weeks on end.
A few days ago, I noticed this tiny news item buried at the bottom of a page of the Sunday Times 11 January 2009:
Gas alertToday, I noticed this online news report from Arab Times - Oil price falls towards $38 per barrel as demand weakens - excerpt:
The National Grid is on the verge of issuing an emergency alert because reserves have fallen to the equivalent of less than a week's supply. Domestic consumers are thought to be safe for now.
LONDON, 12 Jan 2009 (RTRS): Oil fell more than $2 towards $38 a barrel on Monday, dragged down by growing evidence that recession is reducing global energy consumption. The decline came as Russia and Ukraine signed a deal to help secure the resumption of Russian gas supplies to Europe, cut off for nearly a week in freezing temperatures. US light crude for February delivery fell more than 6 percent to a low of $38.12, down $2.71, before recovering slightly. By 1420 GMT, the contract was down $2.55 at $38.28. London Brent crude was down $1.77 at $42.65. US jobless data on Friday set the tone for the market. A US government report showed employers slashed jobs by 524,000 in December, driving the national unemployment rate to its highest level in almost 16 years.No doubt the cost of using my gas fire will be reduced this summer when the weather is warmer. Right now domestic gas prices are probably based on last year when oil exceeded $100 per barrel and was rumoured to reach $200 or more. Daylight robbery are two words that spring to mind here.
Here's another thing. All pensioners in this country receive a £200 winter fuel payment from the government, regardless of whether they are wealthy or poor, working or not, at home all day or not. Woe betide those poor people under the retirement age who don't fit into any government box because they make ends meet from week to week by working hard, being prudent and saving pennies for a rainy day whilst paying taxes here there and everywhere.
Wealthy pensioners ought to donate their £200 to Age Concern. I wonder how many of them would be willing to do so. Not many, I guess. Sadly this year, I have to learn to be less generous and trusting. People take advantage and mistake kindness for weakness. Yoko Ono once said that the more she knew people the more she liked her cat. I've adopted the phrase as my new motto. The more I know about people the more I like animals. Animals are more trusty and better than people.
P.S. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown's younger brother Andrew Brown works for one of the main nuclear lobbyists EDF Energy. EDF Energy is one of the worst companies I have ever dealt with. Last November they sent me a statement saying (in tiny print, easily missed) that within seven days they would deduct £600 (my Christmas savings) out of my bank account (even though I had been paying by their gas and electricty bills automatically without fail by direct debit following regular meter readings by their staff in person). Long story short: in the end, I wrote to the Chief Executive of British Gas requesting to change back to British Gas and sent them a pile of EDF's paperwork threatening to enter my home without my consent. Had a threatened postal strike gone ahead during the week that EDF's statement arrived, £600 would have been taken from my account without my permission or knowledge. It was such a traumatic experience dealing with EDF's bombardment of paperwork and their unhelpful customer services that I still shudder at the sight or mention of EDF's name.
# posted by Ingrid J. Jones @ 1/13/2009
0 comments
Sunday, November 30, 2008
CHINA IS THINKING OF BOOSTING ITS GOLD RESERVES
To diversify away from paper currencies
Gold is poised for a dramatic surge and could blast through $2,000 an ounce by the end of next year as central banks flood the world's monetary system with liquidity, according to an internal client note from the US bank Citigroup.
Source: The Daily Telegraph by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard 27 Nov 2008:
Citigroup says gold could rise above $2,000 next year as world unravels:
Photo: An employee of Tanaka Kikinzoku Jewelry K.K. displays a gold bar at the company's store in Tokyo Photo: Reuters
To diversify away from paper currencies
Gold is poised for a dramatic surge and could blast through $2,000 an ounce by the end of next year as central banks flood the world's monetary system with liquidity, according to an internal client note from the US bank Citigroup.
Source: The Daily Telegraph by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard 27 Nov 2008:
Citigroup says gold could rise above $2,000 next year as world unravels:
The bank said the damage caused by the financial excesses of the last quarter century was forcing the world's authorities to take steps that had never been tried before.
This gamble was likely to end in one of two extreme ways: with either a resurgence of inflation; or a downward spiral into depression, civil disorder, and possibly wars. Both outcomes will cause a rush for gold.
"They are throwing the kitchen sink at this," said Tom Fitzpatrick, the bank's chief technical strategist.
"The world is not going back to normal after the magnitude of what they have done. When the dust settles this will either work, and the money they have pushed into the system will feed though into an inflation shock.
"Or it will not work because too much damage has already been done, and we will see continued financial deterioration, causing further economic deterioration, with the risk of a feedback loop. We don't think this is the more likely outcome, but as each week and month passes, there is a growing danger of vicious circle as confidence erodes," he said.
"This will lead to political instability. We are already seeing countries on the periphery of Europe under severe stress. Some leaders are now at record levels of unpopularity. There is a risk of domestic unrest, starting with strikes because people are feeling disenfranchised."
"What happens if there is a meltdown in a country like Pakistan, which is a nuclear power. People react when they have their backs to the wall. We're already seeing doubts emerge about the sovereign debts of developed AAA-rated countries, which is not something you can ignore," he said.
Gold traders are playing close attention to reports from Beijing that the China is thinking of boosting its gold reserves from 600 tonnes to nearer 4,000 tonnes to diversify away from paper currencies. "If true, this is a very material change," he said.
Mr Fitzpatrick said Britain had made a mistake selling off half its gold at the bottom of the market between 1999 to 2002. "People have started to question the value of government debt," he said.
Citigroup said the blast-off was likely to occur within two years, and possibly as soon as 2009. Gold was trading yesterday at $812 an ounce. It is well off its all-time peak of $1,030 in February but has held up much better than other commodities over the last few months – reverting to is historical role as a safe-haven store of value and a de facto currency.
Gold has tripled in value over the last seven years, vastly outperforming Wall Street and European bourses.
Photo: An employee of Tanaka Kikinzoku Jewelry K.K. displays a gold bar at the company's store in Tokyo Photo: Reuters
Labels: Gold
# posted by Ingrid J. Jones @ 11/30/2008
0 comments
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
'FLYING COFFIN'
Kills widow on way to husband's funeral
A woman died on the way to a cemetery when a traffic accident hurled her husband's coffin against the back of her neck.
Police say 67-year old Marciana Silva Barcelos was in the front passenger seat of the hearse when the accident occurred on Monday in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul.
Mrs Barcelos died instantly.
The driver of hearse and Mrs Barcelos's son suffered minor injuries.
Her 76-year-old husband, Josi Silveira Coimbra, died on Sunday of a heart attack while dancing at a party.
Source: Telegraph.co.uk 11 Nov 2008 'Flying coffin' kills widow on way to husband's funeral
Note to self: Tell B! - not forgetting: HORSE-DRAWN HEARSE CARRYING COFFIN TO A FUNERAL OVERTURNED - When a car overtook the funeral hearse quickly
Kills widow on way to husband's funeral
A woman died on the way to a cemetery when a traffic accident hurled her husband's coffin against the back of her neck.
Police say 67-year old Marciana Silva Barcelos was in the front passenger seat of the hearse when the accident occurred on Monday in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul.
Mrs Barcelos died instantly.
The driver of hearse and Mrs Barcelos's son suffered minor injuries.
Her 76-year-old husband, Josi Silveira Coimbra, died on Sunday of a heart attack while dancing at a party.
Source: Telegraph.co.uk 11 Nov 2008 'Flying coffin' kills widow on way to husband's funeral
Note to self: Tell B! - not forgetting: HORSE-DRAWN HEARSE CARRYING COFFIN TO A FUNERAL OVERTURNED - When a car overtook the funeral hearse quickly
Labels: Funeral
# posted by Ingrid J. Jones @ 11/11/2008
0 comments
Sunday, November 09, 2008
IN FLANDERS FIELDS BY JOHN McCRAE
Remember the 11th day of the 11th month at the 11th hour
On 2 May, 1915, in the second week of fighting during the Second Battle of Ypres Lieutenant Alexis Helmer was killed by a German artillery shell. He was a friend of the Canadian military doctor Major John McCrae. It is believed that John began the draft for his famous poem 'In Flanders Fields' that evening.
In Flanders Fields
John McCrae
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders Fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders Fields.
The poppy is the recognized symbol of remembrance for war dead. The flower owes its significance to the poem In Flanders Fields, written by Major (later Lieutenant-Colonel) John McCrae, a doctor with the Canadian Army Medical Corps, in the midst of the Second Battle of Ypres, in Belgium, in May 1915.
The poppy references in the first and last stanzas of the most widely read and oft-quoted poem of the war contributed to the flower's status as an emblem of remembrance and a symbol of new growth amidst the devastation of war.
Two minutes of silence at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month because that was the time (in Britain) when the armistice became effective. The two minutes recall World War I and World War II. Before 1945 the silence was for one minute, and today some ceremonies still only have one minute of silence despite this.
In the United Kingdom, although two minutes' silence is observed on November 11 itself, the main observance is on the second Sunday of November, Remembrance Sunday. - Wikipedia
- - -
"The Meaning of God"
By Mahatma K. Gandhi
(Young India, October 11, 1928)
There is an indefinable mysterious Power that pervades everything.
I feel It, though I do not see It.
It is this unseen Power which makes Itself felt and yet defies all proof,
because It is so unlike all that I perceive through my senses.
It transcends the senses....
That informing Power or Spirit is God....
For I can see that in the midst of death life persists, in the midst of untruth, truth persists, in the midst of darkness light persists.
Hence I gather that God is Life, Truth, Light. He is love.
He is supreme good.
But he is no God who merely satisfies the intellect
If He ever does.
God to be God must rule the heart and transform it.
- - -
Gandhi's Peace Prayers
Hindu Peace Prayer
I desire neither earthly kingdom, nor even freedom from birth and death. I desire only the deliverance from grief of all those afflicted by misery. Oh Lord, lead us from the unreal to the real; from darkness to light; from death to immortality. May there be peace in celestial regions. May there be peace on earth. May the waters be appeasing. May herbs be wholesome and may trees and plants bring peace to all. May all beneficent beings bring peace to us. May thy wisdom spread peace all through the world. May all things be a source of peace to all and to me. Om Shanti, Shanti, Shanti (Peace, Peace, Peace).
Islamic Peace Prayer
We think of Thee, worship Thee, bow toThee as the Creator of this Universe; we seek refuge in Thee, the Truth, our only support. Thou art the Ruler, the barge in this ocean of endless births and deaths.
In the name of Allah, the beneficient, the merciful. Praise be to the Lord of the Universe who has created us and made us into tribes and nations. Give us wisdom that we may know each other and not despise all things. We shall abide by thy Peace. And, we shall remember the servants of God are those who walk on this earth in humility and, when we address them, we shall say Peace Unto Us All.
Christian Peace Prayer
Blessed are the PEACEMAKERS, for they shall be known as The Children of God. But I say to you: love your enemy, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. To those who strike you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from those who take away your cloak, do not withhold your coat as well. Give to everyone who begs from you; and, to those who take away your goods, do not ask them again. And as you wish that others would do unto you, do so unto them as well.
Jewish Peace Prayer
Come let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, that we may walk the paths of the Most High. And we shall beat our swords into ploughshares and our spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation - neither shall they learn war any more. And none shall be afraid, for the mouth of the Lord of Hosts has spoken.
Shinto Peace Prayer
Although the people living across the ocean surrounding us are all our brothers and sisters why, Oh Lord, is there trouble in this world? Why do winds and waves rise in the ocean surrounding us? I earnestly wish the wind will soon blow away all the clouds hanging over the tops of the mountains.
Bahá'í Peace Prayer
Be generous in prosperity and thankful in adversity. Be fair in thy judgement and guarded in thy speech. Be a lamp unto those who walk in darkness and a home to the stranger. Be eyes to the blind and a guiding light unto he feet of the erring. Be a breath of life to the body of humankind, a dew to the soil of the human heart and a fruit upon the tree of humility.
- - -
Further reading
Tuesday, November 14, 2006 - Sudan Watch:
The Anglo-Zulu war - A Lesson Learned?
Cross posted to Sudan Watch, Congo Watch, Uganda Watch, Ethiopia Watch, Kenya Watch
Remember the 11th day of the 11th month at the 11th hour
On 2 May, 1915, in the second week of fighting during the Second Battle of Ypres Lieutenant Alexis Helmer was killed by a German artillery shell. He was a friend of the Canadian military doctor Major John McCrae. It is believed that John began the draft for his famous poem 'In Flanders Fields' that evening.
In Flanders Fields
John McCrae
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders Fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders Fields.
The poppy is the recognized symbol of remembrance for war dead. The flower owes its significance to the poem In Flanders Fields, written by Major (later Lieutenant-Colonel) John McCrae, a doctor with the Canadian Army Medical Corps, in the midst of the Second Battle of Ypres, in Belgium, in May 1915.
The poppy references in the first and last stanzas of the most widely read and oft-quoted poem of the war contributed to the flower's status as an emblem of remembrance and a symbol of new growth amidst the devastation of war.
Two minutes of silence at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month because that was the time (in Britain) when the armistice became effective. The two minutes recall World War I and World War II. Before 1945 the silence was for one minute, and today some ceremonies still only have one minute of silence despite this.
In the United Kingdom, although two minutes' silence is observed on November 11 itself, the main observance is on the second Sunday of November, Remembrance Sunday. - Wikipedia
- - -
"The Meaning of God"
By Mahatma K. Gandhi
(Young India, October 11, 1928)
There is an indefinable mysterious Power that pervades everything.
I feel It, though I do not see It.
It is this unseen Power which makes Itself felt and yet defies all proof,
because It is so unlike all that I perceive through my senses.
It transcends the senses....
That informing Power or Spirit is God....
For I can see that in the midst of death life persists, in the midst of untruth, truth persists, in the midst of darkness light persists.
Hence I gather that God is Life, Truth, Light. He is love.
He is supreme good.
But he is no God who merely satisfies the intellect
If He ever does.
God to be God must rule the heart and transform it.
- - -
Gandhi's Peace Prayers
Hindu Peace Prayer
I desire neither earthly kingdom, nor even freedom from birth and death. I desire only the deliverance from grief of all those afflicted by misery. Oh Lord, lead us from the unreal to the real; from darkness to light; from death to immortality. May there be peace in celestial regions. May there be peace on earth. May the waters be appeasing. May herbs be wholesome and may trees and plants bring peace to all. May all beneficent beings bring peace to us. May thy wisdom spread peace all through the world. May all things be a source of peace to all and to me. Om Shanti, Shanti, Shanti (Peace, Peace, Peace).
Islamic Peace Prayer
We think of Thee, worship Thee, bow toThee as the Creator of this Universe; we seek refuge in Thee, the Truth, our only support. Thou art the Ruler, the barge in this ocean of endless births and deaths.
In the name of Allah, the beneficient, the merciful. Praise be to the Lord of the Universe who has created us and made us into tribes and nations. Give us wisdom that we may know each other and not despise all things. We shall abide by thy Peace. And, we shall remember the servants of God are those who walk on this earth in humility and, when we address them, we shall say Peace Unto Us All.
Christian Peace Prayer
Blessed are the PEACEMAKERS, for they shall be known as The Children of God. But I say to you: love your enemy, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. To those who strike you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from those who take away your cloak, do not withhold your coat as well. Give to everyone who begs from you; and, to those who take away your goods, do not ask them again. And as you wish that others would do unto you, do so unto them as well.
Jewish Peace Prayer
Come let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, that we may walk the paths of the Most High. And we shall beat our swords into ploughshares and our spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation - neither shall they learn war any more. And none shall be afraid, for the mouth of the Lord of Hosts has spoken.
Shinto Peace Prayer
Although the people living across the ocean surrounding us are all our brothers and sisters why, Oh Lord, is there trouble in this world? Why do winds and waves rise in the ocean surrounding us? I earnestly wish the wind will soon blow away all the clouds hanging over the tops of the mountains.
Bahá'í Peace Prayer
Be generous in prosperity and thankful in adversity. Be fair in thy judgement and guarded in thy speech. Be a lamp unto those who walk in darkness and a home to the stranger. Be eyes to the blind and a guiding light unto he feet of the erring. Be a breath of life to the body of humankind, a dew to the soil of the human heart and a fruit upon the tree of humility.
- - -
Further reading
Tuesday, November 14, 2006 - Sudan Watch:
The Anglo-Zulu war - A Lesson Learned?
Cross posted to Sudan Watch, Congo Watch, Uganda Watch, Ethiopia Watch, Kenya Watch
Labels: Poppies
# posted by Ingrid J. Jones @ 11/09/2008
0 comments
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
IT'S A FACT THAT THE INTERNET IS OUR RIGHT?
The future of the Internet and Jeff Jarvis' essay on the idea of the Internet as a right
Here is a copy of a comment I've just left at Ethan Zuckerman's blog My Heart is in Accra (November 1, 2008 - The polyglot internet) re the future of the Internet and Jeff Jarvis' blog post (October 24, 2008 - The internet as a right).
Dear Ethan, I hope this finds you well. After five years, I still follow your posts. But usually, each day, after reading and writing, I rarely have enough energy left over to comment. Hopefully the length of this comment will be forgiven as I am unable to spend time on making it succinct after being up since 2am today here in England to watch live tv news coverage of US presidential election. This comment is in response to your post about the future of the Internet and Jeff Jarvis' thoughts on his essay, on the idea of the Internet as a right.
Surely it is a fact that the Internet is our right? I reckon that the great British physicist, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who gave up a fortune so that the world wide web could belong to the people, would be interested in reading Mr Jarvis' essay on the Internet being our right. Here's why: see below copies of some posts from the archives of my personal blog ME AND OPHELIA. Good luck with all your great work Ethan and thanks for such interesting blog posts. Best wishes, Ingrid.
- - -
Saturday, August 30, 2003
VINTON G CERF
Father of the Internet
What a great gentleman.
On a visit to MCI : Cerf's Up a few days ago, I felt moved to send this email:
Dear Mr Cerf,
Just to say thank you for all your pioneering and hard work.
Six weeks ago I was able to afford my first home computer.
Within a few days I discovered weblogs and started one - free of charge through Blogger - called ME AND OPHELIA at http://www.meandophelia.blogspot.com
I have picked up a little HTML, purchased a new house sign, sent gifts of chocolates and flowers, visited art galleries and auctions, had groceries and books delivered; been reunited with old friends, have sent and received emails all over the world, met many interesting bloggers and had some good laughs....all without speaking or leaving the house.
This new laptop and the Internet has opened up a whole new life for me, for which I thank you.
It means a lot to me because I am housebound and horizontal 23.5 hours a day, with limited energy, due to a severe form of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis - known as ME here in England and CFIDS in the US - from which I am still hoping to recover.
These past six weeks have been the most interesting - and least isolating - weeks that I have spent since falling ill in October 1999.
Thank you once again. You are a hero. I have put you at the top of my web links column in my right sidebar.
Hope you will visit us one day.
With love and thanks once again from Ingrid and Ophelia (my wonderful cat) x
In my email box the next day, four words leapt out of my screen:
From: vinton g. cerf
I was thrilled. What a gentleman. I shall treasure and frame this:
Dear Ingrid,
I am copying two other people who will be very pleased to hear your story. One is Robert Kahn, who initiated the Internet project and with whom I worked to do the initial design. The other is Tim Berners-Lee, who invented the World Wide Web - that is the application that is helping you so much. Of course, Tim has pointed out that without the Internet, WWW would not so interesting and vice versa.
Thanks so much for taking time to write.
Vint Cerf
# posted by Ingrid Jones @ 8/30/2003 0 comments
http://meandophelia.blogspot.com/2003/08/vinton-g-cerf-father-of-internet-what.html
- - -
Wednesday, June 09, 2004
FATHERS OF THE INTERNET
And World Wide Web
Following my post here yesterday on Desmond Tutu's message to the Internet and today's rally for the Sudan at Harvard in Boston, I emailed Vinton Cerf at Cerf's Up and sent him a copy of the post. Several hours later I was thrilled to receive this reply:
Ingrid, your email reached me easily.
Sir Tim did receive a handsome 1 million euro prize earlier this year so fortune has followed fame at least in some measure. However
neither Tim nor Bob Kahn nor I nor the others working on the Internet protocols patented or made intellectual property claims on the
technology so as to stimulate its uptake without obstacles. It seems to have worked :-)
vint
- - -
Surely this proves the Internet is owned by *us* the people of the world, and that nobody can control it or take it away from us - it will be *ours* forever.
Or will it? What if bodies like Microsoft or Google could control it? If such a thing was possible, what could we do about it?
Hopefully, the Internet is like an amoeba or some sort of living organism that if cut in two could regroup, and replicate itself in cyberspace, to escape greedy predators trying to dominate us and take control.
Vinton Cerf, Bob Kahn and Tim Berners-Lee will go down in history. What a shame all three did not receive the same handsome prize earlier this year.
We need our three heroes to leave us a cyber manual on what to do if anyone tried to muscle in and take ownership of the Internet. And we Internet users ought to get up an online petition to nominate all three for a Nobel award. Here is the list of Nobel Laureates in Physics 1901 - Present. If anyone knows how to do such a thing, please let me know and I'll do all that I can to help.
http://meandophelia.blogspot.com/2004/06/fathers-of-internet-and-world-wide-web_09.html
- - -
P.S Ethan, the following link leads to some of my other posts on Sir Tim and the internet (some are copied here below for easy reference)
http://meandophelia.blogspot.com/search?q=berners+lee
- - -
Thursday, November 02, 2006
WEB INVENTOR FEARS FOR THE FUTURE
Sir Tim Berners-Lee is concerned about future of web
Nov 2 2006 BBC report says Sir Tim Berners-Lee is concerned about the future of the web. Excerpt:
The British inventor of the internet says he is worried about the way it could be used to spread "misinformation and undemocratic forces".
The web has transformed the way many people work, play and do business.
But Sir Tim Berners-Lee told BBC News he fears that, if the way the internet is used is left to develop unchecked, "bad things" could happen.
As a result he wants set up a research project to study the social implications of the web's development.
The changes experienced to date because of the internet are just the start of a more radical transformation of society, he says.
But he is concerned about the way it could end up being used.
His new web science research initiative will be more than just computer science, he insists.
He wants to attract researchers from a range of disciplines to study it as a social as well as technological phenomenon.
Sir Tim, who developed the web in the late 1980s, says of his invention that he was "in the right place at the right time".
# posted by Ingrid Jones @ 11/02/2006 0 comments
- - -
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
WEB INVENTOR SIR TIM BERNERS-LEE
Warns of 'dark' net
Today, a friend emailed me this BBC report with the message: "This is the man you and I are so grateful to/for. I'm always astonished, every day, to consider the ways in which the WWW has changed my outlook on life."
The web should remain neutral and resist attempts to fragment it into different services, web inventor Sir Tim Berners-Lee has said.
Recent attempts in the US to try to charge for different levels of online access web were not "part of the internet model," he said in Edinburgh.
He warned that if the US decided to go ahead with a two-tier internet, the network would enter "a dark period".
Sir Tim was speaking at the start of a conference on the future of the web.
"What's very important from my point of view is that there is one web," he said.
"Anyone that tries to chop it into two will find that their piece looks very boring."
An equal net
The British scientist developed the web in 1989 as an academic tool to allow scientists to share data. Since then it has exploded into every area of life.
However, as it has grown, there have been increasingly diverse opinions on how it should evolve.
The World Wide Web Consortium, of which Sir Tim is the director, believes in an open model.
This is based on the concept of network neutrality, where everyone has the same level of access to the web and that all data moving around the web is treated equally.
This view is backed by companies like Microsoft and Google, who have called for legislation to be introduced to guarantee net neutrality.
The first steps towards this were taken last week when members of the US House of Representatives introduced a net neutrality bill.
Pay model
But telecoms companies in the US do not agree. They would like to implement a two-tier system, where data from companies or institutions that can pay are given priority over those that cannot.
This has particularly become an issue with the transmission of TV shows over the internet, with some broadband providers wanting to charge content providers to carry the data.
The internet community believes this threatens the open model of the internet as broadband providers will become gatekeepers to the web's content.
Providers that can pay will be able to get a commercial advantage over those that cannot.
There is a fear that institutions like universities and charities would also suffer.
The web community is also worried that any charges would be passed on to the consumer.
Optimism
Sir Tim said this was "not the internet model". The "right" model, as exists at the moment, was that any content provider could pay for a connection to the internet and could then put any content on to the web with no discrimination.
Speaking to reporters in Edinburgh at the WWW2006 conference, he argued this was where the great benefit of the internet lay.
"You get this tremendous serendipity where I can search the internet and come across a site that I did not set out to look for," he said.
A two-tier system would mean that people would only have full access to those portions of the internet that they paid for and that some companies would be given priority over others.
But Sir Tim was optimistic that the internet would resist attempts to fragment.
"I think it is one and will remain as one," he said.
The WWW2006 conference will run until Friday at the International Conference Centre in Edinburgh.
# posted by Ingrid Jones @ 5/23/2006 0 comments
- - -
Friday, September 09, 2005
CERF'S UP AT GOOGLE!
Posted by Vint Cerf
Historic news in a post today at Google Blog ... by Vint Cerf!
[Note, Vinton G Cerf is one of the three founding fathers of the Internet. Up until recently he worked for many years at MCI and had a web page called Cerf's Up. He is not a very wealthy man. Click here to read a post I wrote in August 2003, a month after I discovered blogging, about an email I sent him, and the reply I received]
"The news is out that I will join Google on October 3 as Chief Internet Evangelist (I tried for Archduke, but it didn't work). What I really like about Eric, Larry, Sergey and the whole Google family is its collective and eminent practicality and seemingly boundless creativity. In fact, my recent interactions with many of Google's senior staff have simply underscored my admiration for the extraordinary talent at Google that has been assembled in a short amount of time. Google has come so far since the early days!
Among other things, I am committed to the vision of Google's criticality to the daily lives of hundreds of millions of people. The public Internet and the growing cadre of corporate virtual private networks are already enablers of Google applications. As information pours into the Internet from all sides, Google tools will become, if they are not already, indispensable.
I appreciate deeply the opportunity to become part of the Google family and to do what I can to contribute to its future.
See you on the 'Net!"
- - -
Photo: Vinton G. Cerf (MCI)
Note, Vint (the Internet's two other founding fathers are Robert E Khan and top British physicist Tim Berners-Lee who btw gave up a personal fortune so the web could be freely used by everyone) has been hard of hearing for a number of years and does a tremendous amount of great work for those who suffer similar disabilities.
To me, the Internet is a God send. Hardly a day goes by without my counting it as a blessing and being truly appreciative. It has revolutionised my life.
Read previous post "Fathers of the Internet - Getting the net off the ground and internetting" March 5, 2005.
# posted by Ingrid Jones @ 9/09/2005 0 comments
- - -
Saturday, March 05, 2005
FATHERS OF THE INTERNET
Getting the net off the ground and internetting
Today, the BBC reports on the fathers of the Internet, Vinton Cerf and Robert Khan. Early attention to security issues might have given us a better internet today - or the project might never have taken off at all, says Robert Kahn. The net's co-inventor tells BBC Click Online how it all began, when, as an assistant professor of electrical engineering at MIT, he took a leave of absence to brush up on his networking theory. He was the system designer of the Arpanet - the very first computer network.
Dr Kahn, pictured above, who never expected to be become part of technology legend, dubbed his project 'internetting'. Also, the BBC report quotes Dr Khan as saying:
"The work that we did was principally on designing what a network would look like. It was me working alone writing memos on the subject. I thought, at that time, that this was about as much practical experience as one would really need, to be a good theoretician back in the university. But it turned out that an agency of the US government, the Defence Advance Research Projects Agency, known as Darpa (it was known as Arpa back then) actually had plans to build a computer network in the country.
At the time, many people didn't think this was a very practical thing to do because it clearly didn't look like a business opportunity and there weren't that many computers around. But I thought it was an interesting technical challenge, so I was actually the system designer of the Arpanet - the very first computer network.
When I got to Darpa, I got involved in the creation of two more nets. One was using satellites, a kind of Ethernet in the sky, on Intelsat-4, and the other one was a kind of a mobile network where the nodes were packet radios that broadcast to each other, so all the nodes could be in motion, in principle, or they could stay fixed as well. The whole goal of that effort seemed pretty straight forward at the time: given that you've got the nets, put them together and get the machines on them to work together. That was the genesis of the project itself."
How to 'internet'?
"When I first started the programme I was talking about what we were trying to achieve, which was netting these different computers and networks, so I called the project 'internetting'." - Robert E. Kahn.
Photo: Vinton G. Cerf, who is hard of hearing, was the other key player in the creation of the Internet.
- - -
The future of the Internet and Jeff Jarvis' essay on the idea of the Internet as a right
Here is a copy of a comment I've just left at Ethan Zuckerman's blog My Heart is in Accra (November 1, 2008 - The polyglot internet) re the future of the Internet and Jeff Jarvis' blog post (October 24, 2008 - The internet as a right).
Dear Ethan, I hope this finds you well. After five years, I still follow your posts. But usually, each day, after reading and writing, I rarely have enough energy left over to comment. Hopefully the length of this comment will be forgiven as I am unable to spend time on making it succinct after being up since 2am today here in England to watch live tv news coverage of US presidential election. This comment is in response to your post about the future of the Internet and Jeff Jarvis' thoughts on his essay, on the idea of the Internet as a right.
Surely it is a fact that the Internet is our right? I reckon that the great British physicist, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who gave up a fortune so that the world wide web could belong to the people, would be interested in reading Mr Jarvis' essay on the Internet being our right. Here's why: see below copies of some posts from the archives of my personal blog ME AND OPHELIA. Good luck with all your great work Ethan and thanks for such interesting blog posts. Best wishes, Ingrid.
- - -
Saturday, August 30, 2003
VINTON G CERF
Father of the Internet
What a great gentleman.
On a visit to MCI : Cerf's Up a few days ago, I felt moved to send this email:
Dear Mr Cerf,
Just to say thank you for all your pioneering and hard work.
Six weeks ago I was able to afford my first home computer.
Within a few days I discovered weblogs and started one - free of charge through Blogger - called ME AND OPHELIA at http://www.meandophelia.blogspot.com
I have picked up a little HTML, purchased a new house sign, sent gifts of chocolates and flowers, visited art galleries and auctions, had groceries and books delivered; been reunited with old friends, have sent and received emails all over the world, met many interesting bloggers and had some good laughs....all without speaking or leaving the house.
This new laptop and the Internet has opened up a whole new life for me, for which I thank you.
It means a lot to me because I am housebound and horizontal 23.5 hours a day, with limited energy, due to a severe form of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis - known as ME here in England and CFIDS in the US - from which I am still hoping to recover.
These past six weeks have been the most interesting - and least isolating - weeks that I have spent since falling ill in October 1999.
Thank you once again. You are a hero. I have put you at the top of my web links column in my right sidebar.
Hope you will visit us one day.
With love and thanks once again from Ingrid and Ophelia (my wonderful cat) x
In my email box the next day, four words leapt out of my screen:
From: vinton g. cerf
I was thrilled. What a gentleman. I shall treasure and frame this:
Dear Ingrid,
I am copying two other people who will be very pleased to hear your story. One is Robert Kahn, who initiated the Internet project and with whom I worked to do the initial design. The other is Tim Berners-Lee, who invented the World Wide Web - that is the application that is helping you so much. Of course, Tim has pointed out that without the Internet, WWW would not so interesting and vice versa.
Thanks so much for taking time to write.
Vint Cerf
# posted by Ingrid Jones @ 8/30/2003 0 comments
http://meandophelia.blogspot.com/2003/08/vinton-g-cerf-father-of-internet-what.html
- - -
Wednesday, June 09, 2004
FATHERS OF THE INTERNET
And World Wide Web
Following my post here yesterday on Desmond Tutu's message to the Internet and today's rally for the Sudan at Harvard in Boston, I emailed Vinton Cerf at Cerf's Up and sent him a copy of the post. Several hours later I was thrilled to receive this reply:
Ingrid, your email reached me easily.
Sir Tim did receive a handsome 1 million euro prize earlier this year so fortune has followed fame at least in some measure. However
neither Tim nor Bob Kahn nor I nor the others working on the Internet protocols patented or made intellectual property claims on the
technology so as to stimulate its uptake without obstacles. It seems to have worked :-)
vint
- - -
Surely this proves the Internet is owned by *us* the people of the world, and that nobody can control it or take it away from us - it will be *ours* forever.
Or will it? What if bodies like Microsoft or Google could control it? If such a thing was possible, what could we do about it?
Hopefully, the Internet is like an amoeba or some sort of living organism that if cut in two could regroup, and replicate itself in cyberspace, to escape greedy predators trying to dominate us and take control.
Vinton Cerf, Bob Kahn and Tim Berners-Lee will go down in history. What a shame all three did not receive the same handsome prize earlier this year.
We need our three heroes to leave us a cyber manual on what to do if anyone tried to muscle in and take ownership of the Internet. And we Internet users ought to get up an online petition to nominate all three for a Nobel award. Here is the list of Nobel Laureates in Physics 1901 - Present. If anyone knows how to do such a thing, please let me know and I'll do all that I can to help.
http://meandophelia.blogspot.com/2004/06/fathers-of-internet-and-world-wide-web_09.html
- - -
P.S Ethan, the following link leads to some of my other posts on Sir Tim and the internet (some are copied here below for easy reference)
http://meandophelia.blogspot.com/search?q=berners+lee
- - -
Thursday, November 02, 2006
WEB INVENTOR FEARS FOR THE FUTURE
Sir Tim Berners-Lee is concerned about future of web
Nov 2 2006 BBC report says Sir Tim Berners-Lee is concerned about the future of the web. Excerpt:
The British inventor of the internet says he is worried about the way it could be used to spread "misinformation and undemocratic forces".
The web has transformed the way many people work, play and do business.
But Sir Tim Berners-Lee told BBC News he fears that, if the way the internet is used is left to develop unchecked, "bad things" could happen.
As a result he wants set up a research project to study the social implications of the web's development.
The changes experienced to date because of the internet are just the start of a more radical transformation of society, he says.
But he is concerned about the way it could end up being used.
His new web science research initiative will be more than just computer science, he insists.
He wants to attract researchers from a range of disciplines to study it as a social as well as technological phenomenon.
Sir Tim, who developed the web in the late 1980s, says of his invention that he was "in the right place at the right time".
# posted by Ingrid Jones @ 11/02/2006 0 comments
- - -
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
WEB INVENTOR SIR TIM BERNERS-LEE
Warns of 'dark' net
Today, a friend emailed me this BBC report with the message: "This is the man you and I are so grateful to/for. I'm always astonished, every day, to consider the ways in which the WWW has changed my outlook on life."
The web should remain neutral and resist attempts to fragment it into different services, web inventor Sir Tim Berners-Lee has said.
Recent attempts in the US to try to charge for different levels of online access web were not "part of the internet model," he said in Edinburgh.
He warned that if the US decided to go ahead with a two-tier internet, the network would enter "a dark period".
Sir Tim was speaking at the start of a conference on the future of the web.
"What's very important from my point of view is that there is one web," he said.
"Anyone that tries to chop it into two will find that their piece looks very boring."
An equal net
The British scientist developed the web in 1989 as an academic tool to allow scientists to share data. Since then it has exploded into every area of life.
However, as it has grown, there have been increasingly diverse opinions on how it should evolve.
The World Wide Web Consortium, of which Sir Tim is the director, believes in an open model.
This is based on the concept of network neutrality, where everyone has the same level of access to the web and that all data moving around the web is treated equally.
This view is backed by companies like Microsoft and Google, who have called for legislation to be introduced to guarantee net neutrality.
The first steps towards this were taken last week when members of the US House of Representatives introduced a net neutrality bill.
Pay model
But telecoms companies in the US do not agree. They would like to implement a two-tier system, where data from companies or institutions that can pay are given priority over those that cannot.
This has particularly become an issue with the transmission of TV shows over the internet, with some broadband providers wanting to charge content providers to carry the data.
The internet community believes this threatens the open model of the internet as broadband providers will become gatekeepers to the web's content.
Providers that can pay will be able to get a commercial advantage over those that cannot.
There is a fear that institutions like universities and charities would also suffer.
The web community is also worried that any charges would be passed on to the consumer.
Optimism
Sir Tim said this was "not the internet model". The "right" model, as exists at the moment, was that any content provider could pay for a connection to the internet and could then put any content on to the web with no discrimination.
Speaking to reporters in Edinburgh at the WWW2006 conference, he argued this was where the great benefit of the internet lay.
"You get this tremendous serendipity where I can search the internet and come across a site that I did not set out to look for," he said.
A two-tier system would mean that people would only have full access to those portions of the internet that they paid for and that some companies would be given priority over others.
But Sir Tim was optimistic that the internet would resist attempts to fragment.
"I think it is one and will remain as one," he said.
The WWW2006 conference will run until Friday at the International Conference Centre in Edinburgh.
# posted by Ingrid Jones @ 5/23/2006 0 comments
- - -
Friday, September 09, 2005
CERF'S UP AT GOOGLE!
Posted by Vint Cerf
Historic news in a post today at Google Blog ... by Vint Cerf!
[Note, Vinton G Cerf is one of the three founding fathers of the Internet. Up until recently he worked for many years at MCI and had a web page called Cerf's Up. He is not a very wealthy man. Click here to read a post I wrote in August 2003, a month after I discovered blogging, about an email I sent him, and the reply I received]
"The news is out that I will join Google on October 3 as Chief Internet Evangelist (I tried for Archduke, but it didn't work). What I really like about Eric, Larry, Sergey and the whole Google family is its collective and eminent practicality and seemingly boundless creativity. In fact, my recent interactions with many of Google's senior staff have simply underscored my admiration for the extraordinary talent at Google that has been assembled in a short amount of time. Google has come so far since the early days!
Among other things, I am committed to the vision of Google's criticality to the daily lives of hundreds of millions of people. The public Internet and the growing cadre of corporate virtual private networks are already enablers of Google applications. As information pours into the Internet from all sides, Google tools will become, if they are not already, indispensable.
I appreciate deeply the opportunity to become part of the Google family and to do what I can to contribute to its future.
See you on the 'Net!"
- - -
Photo: Vinton G. Cerf (MCI)
Note, Vint (the Internet's two other founding fathers are Robert E Khan and top British physicist Tim Berners-Lee who btw gave up a personal fortune so the web could be freely used by everyone) has been hard of hearing for a number of years and does a tremendous amount of great work for those who suffer similar disabilities.
To me, the Internet is a God send. Hardly a day goes by without my counting it as a blessing and being truly appreciative. It has revolutionised my life.
Read previous post "Fathers of the Internet - Getting the net off the ground and internetting" March 5, 2005.
# posted by Ingrid Jones @ 9/09/2005 0 comments
- - -
Saturday, March 05, 2005
FATHERS OF THE INTERNET
Getting the net off the ground and internetting
Today, the BBC reports on the fathers of the Internet, Vinton Cerf and Robert Khan. Early attention to security issues might have given us a better internet today - or the project might never have taken off at all, says Robert Kahn. The net's co-inventor tells BBC Click Online how it all began, when, as an assistant professor of electrical engineering at MIT, he took a leave of absence to brush up on his networking theory. He was the system designer of the Arpanet - the very first computer network.
Dr Kahn, pictured above, who never expected to be become part of technology legend, dubbed his project 'internetting'. Also, the BBC report quotes Dr Khan as saying:
"The work that we did was principally on designing what a network would look like. It was me working alone writing memos on the subject. I thought, at that time, that this was about as much practical experience as one would really need, to be a good theoretician back in the university. But it turned out that an agency of the US government, the Defence Advance Research Projects Agency, known as Darpa (it was known as Arpa back then) actually had plans to build a computer network in the country.
At the time, many people didn't think this was a very practical thing to do because it clearly didn't look like a business opportunity and there weren't that many computers around. But I thought it was an interesting technical challenge, so I was actually the system designer of the Arpanet - the very first computer network.
When I got to Darpa, I got involved in the creation of two more nets. One was using satellites, a kind of Ethernet in the sky, on Intelsat-4, and the other one was a kind of a mobile network where the nodes were packet radios that broadcast to each other, so all the nodes could be in motion, in principle, or they could stay fixed as well. The whole goal of that effort seemed pretty straight forward at the time: given that you've got the nets, put them together and get the machines on them to work together. That was the genesis of the project itself."
How to 'internet'?
"When I first started the programme I was talking about what we were trying to achieve, which was netting these different computers and networks, so I called the project 'internetting'." - Robert E. Kahn.
Photo: Vinton G. Cerf, who is hard of hearing, was the other key player in the creation of the Internet.
- - -
Labels: Internet
# posted by Ingrid J. Jones @ 11/05/2008
0 comments
HOMEPAGE
July 2003
August 2003
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October 2003
November 2003
December 2003
January 2004
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Thank you to Blogger for this weblog - you can start yours for free now at:
Please contact me anytime
Email: Ingrid Jones
Friday, October 17, 2008
S.O.S. PLEASE EMAIL ME AND OPHELIA
2 years of emails lost
On Wednesday, 15 October 2008, two engineers from British Telecom IT Support were here for a specially ordered appointment to ensure a smooth changeover from my current ISP, Virgin Media, to BT Broadband.
Sadly, it turned into a 3-hour job. The engineer, after deleting the Virgin email address from my PowerBook G4 (Mac OS X 10.3.9) said it had never occurred to him that the contents of my AppleMac drafts email folder would also be deleted, along with the contents of my folders for sent and incoming emails. In their experience, such a thing had never happened before.
Groan. Over the past 3-4 weeks, apart from the 3 hours yesterday, I've spent what seems like a total of 20 hours on the phone to BT, from here to Scotland and India, ever since initial call to BT's broadband sales office.
BT couldn't set me up for broadband for a few weeks resulting in connection to BT dial-up service in the interim - for which I almost got charged £18 for Day One if I hadn't checked tarriff for the 'Pay As You Go' option that BT signed me up to, instead of the 'Anytime' package costing £1 for first month.
Not to mention the ordeal I went though trying to obtain an internet cable for a few weeks of the dial up service. And then the service itself. By the end of Day One, BT dial up Tech Support told me the loss of connection every few minutes was nothing to do with them and blamed my internal modem as being corrupted and broken. Not true, I discovered next day.
Yesterday morning, I awoke feeling gutted, bereft and exhausted over the whole experience. More than one thousand draft items and scores of photos for future blogposts which, despite Apple's best efforts (a further 1-hour ordeal over phone last night) are no longer recoverable. All gone. Vanished. Forever. Nightmare.
Years of hard work and precious energy wasted. I feel sad at losing so much, just when I was getting back into the swing of things after ten bereavements (including my mother and three longstanding friends) and the toll it took on my health.
Chin up. Worse things happen at sea. I'll endeavour to continue blogging while working on piecing together lost drafts, updating email address in my blogs. re-subscribing to news alerts, etc.
Right now, the thought of having to find all the pieces to put back together again, and recall people's latest email addresses that may or not be in my computer's address book, is too overwhelming.
If you have ever emailed me, no matter how long ago, please email me NOW with copy of last email or just a few words or, better still, photo of your pet, to enable me to save your address safely in a new folder for easy future reference.
My new BT email address is now in the sidebar here at ME AND OPHELIA.
Me and cat Ophelia are always here. Happy to receive emails that are not spam. It still pains me to be so slow in replying. I fear that taking weeks and months to reply puts people off from staying in contact.
P.S.
Mostly I am sad at losing photos of pets belonging to some of my favourite bloggers. I adore cats and had collected some pretty special photos for a Cat Watch Blog that I'm creating as a place for me to visit when the going gets tough at my watch blogs and I feel disappointed in human beings.
If you know the personality of any cat (or dog, especially if it gets along with cats) and have a photo of the pet, please send it to me so I can create a little story for posting (with your permission and credit/link to you) at the most suitable of my three new blogs (currently under construction) namely: Cat Watch Blog, Heavenly Cats, Pets in Heaven.
Here's looking forward to learning about cats living in different parts of the world; curious to know if cats all over the world have same habits and act in same way, or behave differently from mine here in England. If anyone ever thinks of sending us a greetings, especially over Christmas and New Year, anything for my pet blogs would be cheerfully received and warmly appreciated. I promise to reply with a few observations and questions about your pet's charm and character.
Having said all that, I'm bracing myself for the possibility that no-one will take notice of this although, even during long blogging breaks, ME AND OPHELIA continues to receive thousands of visitors. I have no idea of how many people read my blogs via a news reader who visits in person. I don't even know if the feed for my Sudan Watch blog still works. It no longer works in my newsreader, NetNewsWire. Hey is anybody out there? Please say something!
With love and thanks from Ingrid and cat Ophelia, posted by the sea on south west coast of England, UK xx
An edited version of this post will appear in some of my network of blogs, namely: Sudan Watch, Congo Watch, Uganda Watch, Ethiopia Watch, Niger Watch, ME/CFS Watch.
2 years of emails lost
On Wednesday, 15 October 2008, two engineers from British Telecom IT Support were here for a specially ordered appointment to ensure a smooth changeover from my current ISP, Virgin Media, to BT Broadband.
Sadly, it turned into a 3-hour job. The engineer, after deleting the Virgin email address from my PowerBook G4 (Mac OS X 10.3.9) said it had never occurred to him that the contents of my AppleMac drafts email folder would also be deleted, along with the contents of my folders for sent and incoming emails. In their experience, such a thing had never happened before.
Groan. Over the past 3-4 weeks, apart from the 3 hours yesterday, I've spent what seems like a total of 20 hours on the phone to BT, from here to Scotland and India, ever since initial call to BT's broadband sales office.
BT couldn't set me up for broadband for a few weeks resulting in connection to BT dial-up service in the interim - for which I almost got charged £18 for Day One if I hadn't checked tarriff for the 'Pay As You Go' option that BT signed me up to, instead of the 'Anytime' package costing £1 for first month.
Not to mention the ordeal I went though trying to obtain an internet cable for a few weeks of the dial up service. And then the service itself. By the end of Day One, BT dial up Tech Support told me the loss of connection every few minutes was nothing to do with them and blamed my internal modem as being corrupted and broken. Not true, I discovered next day.
Yesterday morning, I awoke feeling gutted, bereft and exhausted over the whole experience. More than one thousand draft items and scores of photos for future blogposts which, despite Apple's best efforts (a further 1-hour ordeal over phone last night) are no longer recoverable. All gone. Vanished. Forever. Nightmare.
Years of hard work and precious energy wasted. I feel sad at losing so much, just when I was getting back into the swing of things after ten bereavements (including my mother and three longstanding friends) and the toll it took on my health.
Chin up. Worse things happen at sea. I'll endeavour to continue blogging while working on piecing together lost drafts, updating email address in my blogs. re-subscribing to news alerts, etc.
Right now, the thought of having to find all the pieces to put back together again, and recall people's latest email addresses that may or not be in my computer's address book, is too overwhelming.
If you have ever emailed me, no matter how long ago, please email me NOW with copy of last email or just a few words or, better still, photo of your pet, to enable me to save your address safely in a new folder for easy future reference.
My new BT email address is now in the sidebar here at ME AND OPHELIA.
Me and cat Ophelia are always here. Happy to receive emails that are not spam. It still pains me to be so slow in replying. I fear that taking weeks and months to reply puts people off from staying in contact.
P.S.
Mostly I am sad at losing photos of pets belonging to some of my favourite bloggers. I adore cats and had collected some pretty special photos for a Cat Watch Blog that I'm creating as a place for me to visit when the going gets tough at my watch blogs and I feel disappointed in human beings.
If you know the personality of any cat (or dog, especially if it gets along with cats) and have a photo of the pet, please send it to me so I can create a little story for posting (with your permission and credit/link to you) at the most suitable of my three new blogs (currently under construction) namely: Cat Watch Blog, Heavenly Cats, Pets in Heaven.
Here's looking forward to learning about cats living in different parts of the world; curious to know if cats all over the world have same habits and act in same way, or behave differently from mine here in England. If anyone ever thinks of sending us a greetings, especially over Christmas and New Year, anything for my pet blogs would be cheerfully received and warmly appreciated. I promise to reply with a few observations and questions about your pet's charm and character.
Having said all that, I'm bracing myself for the possibility that no-one will take notice of this although, even during long blogging breaks, ME AND OPHELIA continues to receive thousands of visitors. I have no idea of how many people read my blogs via a news reader who visits in person. I don't even know if the feed for my Sudan Watch blog still works. It no longer works in my newsreader, NetNewsWire. Hey is anybody out there? Please say something!
With love and thanks from Ingrid and cat Ophelia, posted by the sea on south west coast of England, UK xx
An edited version of this post will appear in some of my network of blogs, namely: Sudan Watch, Congo Watch, Uganda Watch, Ethiopia Watch, Niger Watch, ME/CFS Watch.
ME and Ophelia
is the personal blog of Ingrid J. Jones
I live by the sea in England, United Kingdom
Here on my laptop I communicate to my friends
About things in general and my life with M.E. and cat Ophelia
Home user technology and business services
Food and household management
How it all impacts on my *lifestyle management programme*
And my battle for more energy.
My Blogger Profile
My other blogs:
Archive:
HOMEPAGE
July 2003
August 2003
September 2003
October 2003
November 2003
December 2003
January 2004
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March 2004
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October 2008
November 2008
January 2009
February 2009
April 2009
May 2009
June 2009
July 2009
August 2009
October 2009
November 2009
January 2010
June 2010
August 2010
Thank you to Blogger for this weblog - you can start yours for free now at:
Please contact me anytime
Email: Ingrid Jones