Joined Up Government

I went to Westminster today to meet some government mandarins. The great, the good and the irrelevant had been asked to come in for an afternoon of discussion about the perils of email spam.  
 
The nice chap who introduced the discussions was from our Department of Trade and Industry and his business card said he was their 'Director of Broadband' I pointed out that sounded like it might be a narrow subject on its own? He agreed and didn't notice the irony. Instead he talked about how he had managed to expand his remit to embrace other Interweb and electrickery problems. Well, those are my words not his.  
 
I don't have much hope that he will get that far as I think to succeed and push things through you need a strong vision and some determination. When he addressed us all for the introductions he opened with an apology that he wouldn’t be able to stay for the evening reception, as "his wife wouldn’t let him".  He then went on to use his memory of school dinners to explain why he was possibly so angry about spam. At the end he gave the floor to a nice young lady who was nervously called Heather and would be chairing us. He closed as strongly as he began by saying he had to go to find out what he was supposed to do next from his PA as she didn't let him keep his own schedule in case he lost it.  
 
These attempts at humorous endearment didn't really raise a chuckle from the assembled throng as we could tell from the weak smile that sadly, they were true.  
 
However we soldiered on throughout the afternoon and after much heated debate between consumer and business bodies, international law enforcement agencies, ISP's and Spam experts (i.e. me / my company - see ArmourPlate) We really nailed the problem for future generations.
 
We all agreed the following..  
 
1. Spam is a problem and spammers are bad people who make lots of easy money whilst we don’t necessarily.  
 
2. Someone or everyone should try and do something about it.  
 
3. Your basic computer user doesn’t know anything.
and
4. None of us including the DTI could decide how the government is going to get good press out of it.
 
Aren’t you proud?  
 
At the end of all this we were given canapés and wine whilst an actual Minister in the thin, crow like, yet intense form of Steven Timms (Rt Hon Minister for Communications) gave a small speech saying how pleased he was that the problem was being tackled in an organised fashion. He then introduced the Managing Director (UK) of Microsoft who told us how spam was their number one priority and that he wanted to work with us all. I don’t think anyone believed him as his portly fingers, fresh from many a palm greasing lunch kept trying to stop themselves crossing.  
 
Microsoft had paid for the nibbles.  
 
It was interesting in a way though, and to see the wheels of government in slow operation was as always an eye-opener. In short, expect nothing much soon.  
 

Saturday Night Ibiza Madness

 
 
I haven’t been sleeping very well lately,  and I am a bit under the weather. It’s been a stressful time. I hope however that I have restored myself by the weekend as my good friend The Duke has organised a weekend trip of serious financial and mental irresponsibility.  
 
Flying out on Saturday morning early we shall be on the beach in Ibiza by lunchtime, after that it will no doubt get blurry as we are all of to Pacha.  We shall leave Pacha on Sunday morning and fly straight back to Blighty.   I shall obviously be here on Sunday afternoon. We shall see whether I manage to write anything other than a plea to my bank manager before Monday.  
 

Wasps

 
 
Wasps have their place I’m sure. Just not around me. I have a nest of wasps in the garden in one of the compost bins. I don't like this. On Monday a man is coming from the council to make them go away. He's charging me £37.  I wonder how they reached that figure? Is it per wasp averaged by how many wasps in a nest over a period of years or what?
 
I don't know. Do you? 
 
TG