It wouldn’t be right to let such an awesome spectacle go completely unnoticed; although I think that the BBC are managing to single-handedly cover enough Olympic action for the whole world. Apparently if you were to take every televised minute and written sentence that has been produced by the BBC about this years Olympic games, turn them into tiny people called Olymbits whose natural inclination is to stand on each others shoulders Cirque du Soleil style, then climb up the Olymbit stack, you would actually bump into God and the baby Jesus in the sky. Apparently.

I actually love the amount of coverage the beeb are putting out this year. Non stop live coverage online for every event, mostly with video footage - 6 different live streams on the red button on tv - hours of dedicated coverage on the terrestrial channels - and 5 Live doing the business for the radio. It’s loco. All your needs catered for. Unless you’re not a sporting person of course. Actually, scratch that because surely no-one can deny how good these games have been. Pure entertainment and so many amazing feats I wouldn’t even know where to start with a list of my favourite things thus far. Though it would probably be something like…

The opening ceremony.

Managed to see bits of it while we were in Paris, and the sight of Li Ning running around the inside edge of the stadium roof was brilliant. Unless we have someone running in the London Eye like it was a giant hamster wheel, I don’t think we’ll be able to top that in 2012. (more pictures here)

Argentina coasting to the football final
After the mini dispute with Barcelona regarding Messi was sorted, they’ve not looked back, winning every game on the way to Sundays final against Nigeria and are moving one step away from retaining their Olympic title. I’m not a big Argentina fan (blame it on this) but they deserved to beat Brazil in the semis yesterday. Ronaldinho has been a bit of a non-event which doesn’t bode well for Milan this season but who knows.

Yelena Isinbayeva jumps insanely high (with a pole)
Helped in it’s greatness because of the ‘gonna kick her butt’ comments by her American rival who really couldn’t compete..

“For the first 90 minutes of the competition Isinbayeva did not attempt a vault but sat trackside, her baseball cap pulled down low over her eyes. When the bar reached 4.70m she decided to stop passing and cleared the height at her first attempt. By that point seven of the 12 competitors had been knocked out.”

- The Guardian

She then went on to sail over 5.05m (16ft 7in) for a new World Record. See, that strikes me as kinda cocky (and rightly so) but not as cocky as..

Usain ‘Lightning’ Bolt

How can someone not even really try for the last 10m or so and still get a World Record in the 100m(?) At least he worked hard for the 200m record last night. Both are unreal achievements but the latter in particular is probably more memorable. Michael Johnson, while commentating on the race, seemed happy for the Jamaican but surely deep down he’s curled up in a ball, hugging his gold shoes and weeping.

Natalie du Toit comes 16th in the 10k swim
16th doesn’t sound especially impressive but if you know about her, you’ll see why I think this is worth a mention. Good stuff. It’s the first year that the 10k outdoor swim has been an event, and I can think of few events that I’d least enjoy doing. Utterly knackering.

8 Golds, (7 World Records, 1 Olympic Record) for Michael Phelps
Not to mention approximately 173 drug tests too I’d imagine. Not that I’m trying to imply anything. He’s clearly not on performance enhancing drugs, he’s just a machine sent from the year 2029 by a race of artificially intelligent computer-controlled machines who want to crush every humans will to compete in swimming competitions in order to dominate the medals table in all future Olympic games. And speaking of the medals table..

Great Britain is 3rd
With 17 gold, 11 silver and 11 bronze (at the time of writing). Kudos to everyone involved. So many individual success stories and noteworthy moments but I’m happy to leave it at a general level of praise. Does this mean we get a massive bronze medal at the end?

Just three days left to go til the closing ceremony on Sunday and I’m sure it’ll be on a par with the opening. Politics aside, it looks like China have done a great job hosting this and heaped the pressure on London to match it in 4 years.. I’m sure it will. I mean, the logo is a great start isn’t it(?) What could go wrong(?)

Anyone know how to get tickets for the opening ceremony…?

Wow. Just wow. Evolution has taken a mighty step forward.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/page/item/epeng001.shtml?src=ip_potpw

There’s a small part of me that thinks the only really good form of journalism(/photography) comes from wars. But then I remember all the other things I like (see Boogie for example). So I think I actually mean that the only good thing to come from wars is journalism(/photography)(?) Who knows. What I do know is that Reuters consistently provide some great work surrounding awful subjects; like the Iraq War.

So, after half a decade of fighting in this current version of the war, Reuters have put together this site illustrating the work of their photographers, correspondents and staff during the conflict. Regardless of what you think about the war, the efforts these people go through to bring this type of stuff to a worldwide audience surely has to be acknowledged.. and I think the site does a great job of that. Some really brilliant photos in terrifying situations. I’d love to have a job doing that type of thing but I know I’d be really bad at it. I still find it weird trying to take photos of people in normal everyday locations, let alone in a war zone. Leave it to the professionals I reckon..

Bearing Witness: 5 Years Of The Iraq War

So Fidel Castro has announced his retirement. He’s not had a bad run has he(?) It’s been a long time coming really and I don’t think anybody can really say they’re surprised what with his obvious health issues.. He said himself:

“It would betray my conscience to take up a responsibility that requires mobility and total devotion, that I am not in a physical condition to offer”.

and that’s fair enough innit(?) 49 years in power! Must’ve done something right.

I went to Cuba a couple of years ago and it really is(/was) a superb place to travel around, albeit in a limited fashion. It’s a beautiful country in so many senses and we’ve often talked about going back. However, I think it remains to be seen how much the country will change without Fidel at the top.. As long as America doesn’t get it’s grubby hands on it, I think it’ll do fine. There’s a quote on the BBC page from Bush, saying “…we’re going to help. The United States will help the people of Cuba realise the blessings of liberty“. Wow. Lucky Cuba. Because that approach always turns out well doesn’t it(?)

BBC Video of Castro’s ‘career’

KRS-One; purveyor of true hip-hop to some, babbling mentalist to others, undisputed legend to all. He has his moments. One of the more positive things he has been orchestral to is the Stop The Violence Movement, which regardless of your opinion on hip-hop, is nothing but a good thing. Started in the late 80’s, they try to get people ‘to take responsibility for the way in which conflict is resolved‘. Noble. The site is worth a visit if the song ‘Self Destruction‘ means nothing to you. There was a west coast single too called ‘We’re All In The Same Gang‘ (with Ice-T, NWA and MC Hammer amongst others) which I actually prefer but that’s beside the point. Anyway, by most accounts, it’s been a fairly quiet few years for the movement, but they’re re-starting in 2008 with a potentially stonking new single..

Over a three day period from February 7-9, The Game, Chamillionaire, Nelly, David Banner and 55 other artists joined Kris at the Los Angeles Recording School to record new audio and video for the initiative. A number of artists from the LA underground also turned out to show support, including Rakaa Iriscience of Dilated Peoples, and Planet Asia. The legendary MC has also confirmed future contributions from artists such as 50 Cent, Busta Rhymes, Snoop Dogg, Fat Joe, Cassidy, Lil Wayne, Rick Ross, Lil Mama, Talib Kweli and MC Lyte.

- XXL

It’s debatable as to how much clout KRS (/the STV Movement) can have nowadays but it’s good to see people like The Game and 50 Cent show their support (although even that poses questions about hypocrisy and whatnot).. I’m curious to see what comes out of this new lease of life. Could be interesting.

..because it’s going to ban negative seller views. They’re taking away the ability to leave negative feedback about someone which, to me, is one of the best things about eBay. Not that I particularly enjoy leaving comments of that type, but surely they’re core to one of the best things about eBay - user ratings.

Clearly, the system as it stands isn’t perfect. I’ve been tainted with some unjustified negative feedback before and it’s frustrating to think that future buyers opinions of my trustiness will be affected by that but fuck it, I’ve got a 98% rating and I’m happy to let the buyers make their own mind up. Similarly I like being able to read feedback (both + and -) about sellers before I decide to place a bid on something. Buying from someone with 100% positive feedback isn’t a guarantee that you wont be done over and nor is it a definite that someone with no feedback at all will be trying to fleece you BUT they’re actually fairly reliable indicators and generally, I think the system works. Or at least, I think it works better than what eBay are proposing to introduce as a replacement.

Who comes up with these ideas? Madness! You’d've thought that with all the free time eBay employees have (because let’s face it, they do fuck all. Ever tried to get in touch with their customer ’service’? Not happening.) that they could come up with a better solution to the feedback ‘problem’ they have.

p.s. Like what I’ve done with the image here? ’stupid-bay’? Get it? Clever innit.

In other random eBay news. Feel free to buy me this. It’s awful, and I’d never buy it for myself but I’ll happily accept it as a gift

Genuinely a bit sad to hear about this earlier.. Jeremy Beadle provided the highlight to many a weekend when I was growing up. I used to love Beadles About and You’ve Been Framed (I was very young). (It’s a shame that the latter has been tarnished with Lisa ‘the fat one from Emmerdale’ Riley and Harry Hill but that’s largely irrelevant here.)

Really though, respect due to the Beadle..

If you don’t know who he was: Jeremy Beadle obituary on BBCi.

Billboard adverts are done to death. No-one cares about them anymore. Some places even ban them completely because it’s 100% agreed that they’re ineffective (at least, I’m pretty sure that’s the reason). So if you’re in advertising, what do you do(?)

A. You get into the minds of people walking past them. Obviously.

This new billboard for the tv series ‘Paranormal State’ (which, btw, sounds like a quality production *cough* Most Haunted *cough*) effectively tricks people into thinking they’re mental by sending sound straight into their tiny little brains.

Mounted above the billboard, the system projects an isolated beam of sound down onto a targeted area of the sidewalk - from seven stories up! People who pass by the billboard are startled and entertained by the sudden message, and their attention is drawn directly to the billboard itself. Meanwhile, quiet is preserved for all of the neighbors.

Lucky neighbours! Not so lucky innocent people walking past who don’t actually want to pay attention to your poxy advert. Apparently, ‘the sound of a women’s voice whispers, “Who’s that? Who’s There? …It’s not your imagination.”‘, which in my book is really creepy. By ‘creepy’ I mean ‘irritating’. By ‘irritating’ I mean ‘a ridiculous invasion of personal space that should surely be illegal or something’. It’s tantamount to those people who block your way on pavements by holding up luminous signs with ‘Unlock your phones! Next street across!’ on just following you down the street all up in your face going ‘ooohh, you love your phone being unlocked don’t you.. oooh…’.

It’s not on really is it(?)

That said, it’s very clever :). If only these powers could be harnessed for the power of good..

more info: http://holosonics.com/PR_AE.htm