I am no fan of telephones at the best of times. In fact, I come close to detesting the things. Mike Smith had a brilliant rant about it a few months back that pretty much sums up my feelings.

As if it’s not bad enough that someone expects you to drop everything, some people have the audacity to do this with the aim of extracting pounds from your wallet. I will never forget the time I answered the phone only to be greeted with this almighty rude salutation, delivered in a gruff, hectoring manner: “This is just a survey, I am not trying to sell you anything. How many windows do you need double-glazed: two, three, four or the whole house?” I just love the fact that zero and even one were not options.

Others try getting you to spend half an hour answering tedious market research questions. Some despicable people even try to get you to vote for them!

I am quite disappointed in the Lib Dems. It has become a bit of a theme of this blog that I am disappointed in all of the parties and am considering not voting. As things stand, the Lib Dems are the only party that I would even consider voting. But their odd decision to interrupt people’s lives with a robotic version of Nick Clegg just makes me wonder what is going on with them.

What makes it all the worse is that you normally expect the Lib Dems to be dead against this sort of thing. They have pretty sound views on privacy and have campaigned in the past against cold callers. I think a lot of people who are members of the Lib Dems normally take a dim view of this sort of thing. It’s good to see that, for instance, Stephen Glenn has criticised the tactic and the people at Lib Dem Voice seem fairly unhappy about it as well.

These calls do invade your privacy, they are intrusive and annoying. Nowadays I do not answer the phone if the number is withheld unless I am expecting a phone call. If I have been at the receiving end of this phone call by a recorded Nick Clegg, I would probably decide not to vote for him.

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I guess this is all to do with that theory. If you have a demanding full-time job, go to night college, look after kids and do all the shopping and you have to do something, no bother, you just do it. If you are a bum who does nothing all day, gets up in the afternoon and spends two hours deliberating over what you should have for breakfast, you just get nothing done. I’m in the latter stage at the moment. I’m working on rectifying that, but it’s difficult to get going because I spend three hours a day deciding which font I should put on my CV.

It’s not that I haven’t been blogging. You may know that I have another blog which is dedicated to Formula 1. It’s that stage of the season where there is always something happening, even if it has to be contrived by the FIA. And since F1 is just a big soap opera with races in between, you don’t even need races to have loads to write about. So now I spend much of my time pontificating over the finer details of the debate over whether Buemi or Senna should get the second Toro Rosso race seat.

In the meantime, I’ve been neglecting this blog. And it becomes worse when you spend such a long time away from a blog, because then you feel this pressure to make sure the first post back is a good one. I could have easily written three or four posts by now, but I was worried about them for one reason or another. Blog depression, a truly 21st century disease.

It’s silly to get worried about it. But when you lose focus for a couple of days, suddenly it becomes a couple of weeks and then it becomes a struggle to avoid it becoming a couple of months. I’ve been blogging for a few years now though so I know how these things work. If I can just get going I will be back in the swing of things. But now it’s got to the stage where I have to either write this grovelling excuse or practically throw in the towel completely.

So I’m sorry, this is the one. I make no apology if I write about loads of nonsense for the next week or so until I get into the swing of things, although I do promise to write something or other here.

I recently bought myself a new toy, an Asus Eee PC. I did this partly so that I could get some blogging done when I’m not at home, perhaps if I’ve missed the train in Edinburgh and find myself having a couple of hours to kill (damn cheap day returns). I normally spend those couple of hours wandering around the streets of Edinburgh trying to convince myself I’m busy. Now I can tap some keys on my laptop trying to convince myself I’m busy.

Of course, there’s no guarantee that I’ll find any wifi hotspots so I am discovering the joys of Windows Live Writer. I heard rave reviews about that when it was first launched, but I had no need to use it because whenever I was at a computer I had internet access. Now I am using it on my Eee PC and can say I am quite impressed with it.

The thing about it is that I can now effectively blog in my bed. I have not yet decided if this is totally awesome or totally pathetic. In one sense, it is a great way to use that time I spend being unable to sleep doing something that I can pretend is vaguely useful. On the other hand, that is probably a sign of dire internet addiction.

I’m currently umming and aahing over whether I should buy a wireless router to accommodate this new toy. The current router is full up so when I’m blogging in my bed I’m actually doing it offline. And then the next day I have to faff around with the cables just to be able to do something with the excellent writing I did the night before. I can see that wearing pretty thin.

Anyway, that’s my comeback post. Sorry for disappointing.

It will be an informal barcamp / unconference-style event. It’s being organised by Alex Stobart who works at the Scottish Government. Dave Briggs is also helping out and the event will be backed by BT.

I’ve mostly been trying to drum up interest among bloggers because it could also be a good opportunity for some bloggers to meet up and talk shop a bit. But it will be about much more than that. It will be about the application of web 2.0 technologies in general, in government, in the private sector and in the ‘third sector’.

Among the speakers will be Simon Dickson of Puffbox; Ross Ferguson of Dog Digital; Iain Henderson from MyDex; Stewart Kirkpatrick, former editor of Scotsman.com, now at w00tonomy; James Munro of Patient Opinion; and someone from BT to talk about Tradespace.

The best news is that attendance is open to anyone who is interested and it is free. All you have to do is sign up through Eventbrite and print out the ticket.

If you’re interested, keep an eye on the ScotWeb2 website. It’s not quite finished yet but it will be fleshed out soon enough.

More information from the Eventbrite page:

Web 2 seminar hosted by Edinburgh University, supported by BT and for all those interested in learning about Web 2 from practitioners, government and business users.

An informal, bar camp style event allowing participants to listen, network and share experiences with those who have designed and are managing Web 2 services.

Speakers and workshop leaders from Health, Business, Web design, Colleges and Universities, Social Enterprises, Social Media, Journalism, Government and Civic Society…

Other from Web 2 companies, Web 2 social enterprises, Web 2 designers ( public and private sector ), Not for Profit organisations, Academia, Business and the public sector will be there to run work-shops and explain their experience of Web 2…

There will be talks, opportunities to break out into discussions and to mix with those speakers who have used and built web 2 applications, and who are wishing to see change in the way users interact with their service providers and elecetd representatives.

There is an e-mail list here

If you are interested in web 2 as a subject covering communications, marketing, consultation, participation, engagement or service provision then this event will be of interest.

At first I put up two different solutions on the one page (lifestream). But that was still out of the way, and it wasn’t very good either.

So instead I have decided to sweep up the sidebar and put in what I’m calling a ’sideblog’. Note that if you’ve come here from an RSS reader, it only appears on the homepage.

The sidebar aggregates my content from all sorts of different places — my other blogs, Twitter, Delicious, Last.fm, Flickr and more. Comments that are posted on this blog also now reside there — although I haven’t yet worked out if this is a mistake or not. Everything else in the sideblog is ‘my’ content, but the comments are clearly not. So I might separate them out again later on. Any thoughts?

The sideblog is arranged in chronological order, but to save it from getting bombarded with content from one place (for instance, I uploaded 40-odd photographs to Flickr today), I’ve limited each site to having five entries at a time. The exceptions are Delicious which is limited to 10 and Last.fm which is limited to 1.

I built the sideblog using Yahoo! Pipes (which I found very difficult to get to grips with at first, but I eventually got it to do more or less what I wanted to do) and SimplePie. Some pretty desperate CSS magic got the icons appearing kind-of where I wanted them to.

Any thoughts on it? Hopefully it will be a good way of getting more fresh content here for the times when I am posting more at other places. I’ve kept a copy of the old sidebar though in case anyone is offended enough to want the old one back.

If this happened on the train I would probably be complaining quite vociferously. As it is, I lie between the Brian Taylor and Calum Cashley in Iain Dale’s top 40 Scottish political blogs, as voted for by readers.

More to the point, this list is definitive proof that this blog is the second best non-aligned non-MSM Scottish political blog (behind Ideas of Civilisation). I always knew it. (Any way to make the result sound more impressive, huh?)

Overall this blog is 16th, which is a dramatic fall of fourteen places from my previous position in this list. Still, I got off lightly. The person who was number 1 in that previous poll is nowhere to be seen in the top 40 now. Just goes to show what a fickle world this popularity malarkey can be.

I’m actually quite pleased for this blog to be up there still in 16th place given the increasingly sporadic nature of my blogging. I certainly can’t complain about the blogs above mine in the list, nor a few below mine. So thanks if you voted!

Another point to note is that Scottish Roundup is number 31 (in the week that it celebrates its 100th roundup too). Not bad for a blog that has next to no original content. Scottish Roundup is run by me, but it is a thoroughly collaborative effort with many people chipping in. So if you have contributed to Scottish Roundup before, give yourself a pat on the back.

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I have to say where I was when each of these events happened.

Princess Diana’s death - 31 August 1997

I was in bed. I first heard about it when my brother came into my room wanting to play the PlayStation but ended up watching the television a bit instead. At first I thought it must have been the Queen Mother who had died, and when I found out it was only Princess Diana I struggled to see what the fuss was about. Never liked her.

Margaret Thatcher’s resignation - 22 November 1990

No recollection whatsoever. I did know of a time when Thatcher was Prime Minister, and I of course remember John Major being in charge. But I remember nothing of the transition.

Attack on the twin towers - 11 September 2001

I remember this very clearly. I was at school in my German Writing class. The first time I realised something was up was when the lesson hadn’t started after we had been sitting there for ten or fifteen minutes. Our teacher was constantly moving between the classroom and the staff room. I didn’t mind because German Writing was my least favourite subject at that time.

Eventually our teacher wheeled the television through and said, “I’m going to show you this because it’s very important and there will be a lot of consequences” (or words to that effect). I was a bit peeved that he chose ITN over the BBC, but never mind. One of my strongest memories is the fact that one certain person in our class particularly struggled to grasp what was happening. In retrospect, I suppose he was right to be so sceptical of the idea that people would be mad enough to delibrately crash planes into buildings.

Of course, we did not get any learning done in that class. Of course, not everyone’s teachers wheeled the television through like ours did. I suppose most teachers will have been completely oblivious. It was the major talking point among my classmates after school, but people from other classes thought we were tacking the mickey.

It was also strange going home, and I got the feeling that I could kind of tell who knew what was happening and who didn’t. I remember seeing a few people driving cars who obviously looked like they were listening to what was happening on the radio. When I got home my parents were both in the living room watching the television (my dad had the day off for some reason that I can’t remember). I carried on watching it for around two hours.

England’s World Cup Semi Final v Germany in - 4 July 1990

I have no recollection of this match in particular, but I was aware of Italia 90. I liked the mascot, ‘Ciao’! I also took in the design of the graphics used during the matches — an early example of my interest in television presentation.

President Kennedy’s Assassination - 22 November 1963

I was 23 years away from being born.

I now I need to decide who to tag:

• Onebrow
• Jack Deighton
• MatGB
• Colin Campbell
• Mr Eugenides

Better than being number 1 in Scottish Unionist’s list, though, was the testimonial he gave this blog:

Non-partisan analysis from a thought-provoking contrarian. Fantastic.

Reading that particularly pleased me because it confirmed that I am achieving pretty much everything I have come to wish to achieve by blogging. Over the years I’ve been blogging (since 2002, would you believe), I have spent some time thinking about what I want to achieve as a blogger, what makes bloggers good and what sets them apart from the mainstream media.

One of my conclusions has been that there is no point in being predictable if you are a blogger. There is no point in setting up a little platform to express yourself only to be boring when you climb onto it.

One of the biggest crimes any writer can commit is to give you what you expect. When I started to go off newspapers, it was because the op-ed pages are always full of clichés, sloppy partisanship and ideological tub-thumping. More often than not, you can read the heading, see who wrote it, then practically write the column yourself.

Simply, what is the point in reading what Polly Toynbee has to say about rich people? Because you certainly won’t learn anything. I can only think that the only people who read Polly Toynbee are those who take delight in fisking her on one side, and those who are seeking to have their own prejudices confirmed on the other.

As a blogger — i.e. someone who says to people, “look at me and listen to what I have to say” — I owe it to my readers to be interesting. There would be no point in me writing something bland and predictable — and that is one of the reasons why my posting can become quite sporadic at times. Better to say nothing at all than to say something boring, I think. If it ever got to the stage where I stopped offering anything different, I would find myself with no readers left.

That perhaps means that I am tempted to exaggerate my views and emphasise the areas where I am out of phase with the general public. Indeed I do sometimes use “artistic license”. Often I will put forward what may be seen as an unusual view, though I do so more to ask the question and raise the point rather than because I actually agree with it. However I certainly don’t lie or put my name to something that I don’t believe in.

This is an extension of my “real life” self. I often find myself, almost unwittingly, arguing against my own beliefs in the instance where I agree with the person I’m having a conversation with. There is little that worries me more than agreement. Disagreements are what makes the world go round, and it can all get a bit too cosy if I find myself agreeing too often.

This isn’t because I am a combative person, because I am not. But I am genuinely scared of groupthink. If we all agree about things and fail to challenge received wisdom, we will soon find ourselves being the victim of the scenario we failed to foresee. Either that or we will find ourselves stunted by complacency. Debating issues keeps the mind sharp, focusses attention on why we believe something and reminds us why we reject the alternative. In short, disagreement is a good thing and should be encouraged in my view!

There is also the prospect that people are jumping on the bandwagon and are agreeing for the sake of agreement. You might say that I disagree for the sake of disagreement, but I think that my approach is the safer option. Almost inevitably, the truth lies somewhere between two extremes and I think it is wise to experiment with the balance to see where it lies.

So I was delighted to be described as a non-partisan, thought-provoking contrarian. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I think, though, that most of us bloggers know all this. The blogosphere is a wonderful place to have a discussion. Our world is a normally respectful one where alternative ideas are discussed with seriousness. It can be a great platform for people who have ideas that are not well represented in the mainstream media.

That is one of the reasons for the existence of that gulf between Joe Blogs and Joe Public. We know there is no point in just regurgitating the views we see in the mainstream media. Our role is to question the mainstream media and consider the alternatives.

The blogosphere is no place for boilerplate clichés and ideological tubthumping. Boring, predictable writers are ignored in this great forum of interesting debate. So let’s see some more contrariness!

Despite the fact that I have been blogging for a slightly worrying six years, I have never met up with any other bloggers (except for those I knew anyway who happen to also blog). There have been a couple of close encounters in the past with two people, but no chit-chat was exchanged and I was totally oblivious both times. So this will be the first time I’ve met up and had a chat with any other bloggers.

I guess I will be the baby of the crew because I reckon everyone else that’s going is at least a few years older than I am. Believe it or not, this will also be the first time I have ever attended any event vaguely related to the Edinburgh Festival.

Here are the full details in case you’ve missed them. We meet at around 7pm at Udderbelly, Bristo Square, Edinburgh. Then we might go to see Britishness.

Check out SNP Tactical Voting for the full info.

Over the weekend I set up a blog for him at which he posts as his science fiction writing alter-ego, Jack Deighton. It’s called A Son of the Rock.

I did the “gold” and black masthead because I thought he would appreciate that being a fan of Dumbarton Football Club. However, coming up with a complementary colour for the links was a tough job. Despite a plethora of suggestions I received on Twitter and Facebook (thank you all), nothing looked right to me. Perhaps that’s because I just don’t like the mustard colour. In the end I settled on the blue.

The eagle-eyed among you will spot that the theme is basically the one I use for Scottish Roundup but tweaked a bit (which, in fairness, is in turn just the default WordPress theme tweaked). That was part of the problem with the blue links. If it was scrolled down and I couldn’t see the masthead it reminded me far too much of Scottish Roundup. Hopefully I’ve tweaked it enough to keep it fresh and different.

Incidentally, my dad is now the third member of the family to have started blogging. He joins me (obviously) and my brother who blogs at Onebrow along with his girlfriend Laura.

I side with Ken Smith on this occasion though. I hate spelling mistakes and love to point them out. Only yesterday I saw a greengrocers’ apostrophe and instinctively growled. But that is only because I am a cheeky wee pedant. Deep down, I know that the rules of the English language are strange and, ultimately, pointless.

What is the purpose of language? I would say language is what allows people to communicate with each other. Accordingly, rules should develop naturally, and as long as the two parties communicating understand each other all is well. However, for grammar fascists, language rules are just an opportunity to crack the whip.

It is worth remembering that a strict one-size-fits-all suite of language rules is a very modern concept. Standardised spellings only came in when some smart fellow decided to become the first lexicographer and hoodwink people into believing his services were vital.

William Shakespeare did not even have a standardised spelling for his own name. Was he wrong? If we follow the joke that the easiest mark in an exam is for spelling your name correctly, it looks like Shakespeare himself would have failed his English GCSE.

Now, hopefully you have noticed that I like to take care over my spelling and suchlike. But this is a personal choice that I took because I believe that adhering to these rules allows me to reach the widest audience possible. That, and it means I don’t get bombarded by complaints from snobs.

If someone else is content to spell things incorrectly but can still convey their message to its intended recipient then that is their personal choice. There is nothing wrong with people deciding how they can speak and write for themselves.

Language has always evolved naturally, and I see no reason why that should stop now. The purpose of a dictionary is to record language as it is written, not to tell people how to write it. If different people spell things in different ways, then that is just part of life’s rich tapestry.

After all, we tolerate and even celebrate — and rightly so — variations in pronunciation in the English language. Only the snobbiest of snobs would demand that everyone speaks RP. In this age where regional accents are celebrated, we usually find we have no trouble understanding people. So why should people also be expected to write in the same bland, standardised, colourless RP all the time?

What gets me is the sheer snobbery of some people who insist on “correct” spellings. Who is to say that you are right and they are wrong? Closing your ears and stomping your feet complaining about how thick the other person is does not get anyone anywhere. Is there not room for some give and take, just as there is when having a conversation with people who have a different accent?

Ideas of Civilisation attempted to show how ludicrous Ken Smith’s suggestion is by filling his post with a myriad of misspellings. Of course, were Ken Smith’s idea to take hold and language was allowed to evolve naturally, we almost certainly would not face a wholesale dumping of the dictionary, with standards completely replaced by arbitrariness. Instead, new standards would emerge while the most common misspellings would be tolerated.

Txt spk is the perfect example. Snobs may turn their nose up at it, but there is no denying that this development which emerged naturally has had an important influence in simplifying the language and removing barriers to communication. In fact, it is an ingenious solution to the problem we all face, stuck with the QWERTY system which was originally designed to slow typists down. What is wrong with people using their initiative to speed things up again?

Then there is the text message itself, where brevity is key. Messages are limited to 160 characters which means you have to keep it short if you want to avoid being charged double or even triple your normal rate. The new standard of abbreviations is a clever and natural way to evade this restriction.

That is not to mention instant messaging, where speed is as important as clarity. When you are having a fast-paced IM conversation, it is only sensible to take the odd short cut. It should be no surprise that in an age where we rely more heavily than ever on inefficient keyboards and restrictive technologies that new standards should emerge.

Moreover, what is wrong with “embarassing”, “beleive” or “pleasent”? Or even the odd “there” instead of “their” or vice-versa? You would still know exactly what I meant were I to use those spellings. Any exam marker with two brain cells to rub together would know that as well. If he were to mark down someone for putting one ‘r’ instead of two even though the meaning is still perfectly clear, then that would make him a petulant, authoritarian shit.