Copacetic

So according to an InfoWorld article,

…legislators in Massachusetts, which in 2005 first required that all agencies would be forced to store public documents in non-proprietary formats like HTML or PDF, admitted in the discussion that they have not yet been able to provide tangible evidence that moving to an ODF system would deliver the financial savings some backers of the movement envision.

So one single state decides to change from a file format and suddenly faces the full might of the Microsoft marketing machine.  There are intrinsic benefits to using an open  format that accrue over the lifetime of a document, but the costs in the initial phase of changeover (the case in any transition) will outweigh the benefits. It would be doubly difficult of Massachusetts to account for its costs given the huge legal battle it has fought to date.

Its like looking into a startup six months after it hits the start line and saying, “why aren’t you profitable?”

Karlin gets the good juice on why Mary Lou didn’t get in. Though Cyprian’s election does expose one of those nasty anomalies of PR.

Sean suggests that politicians stick there stump speeches and anything else they think is relevant on mysay.com.

I like it!

So instead of debating blogging and democracy, Le Web 3 was subverted by two french political presidential candidates into a party political pitch.

 Loic Le Meur (the organiser and avowed booster of Nicolas Sarkozy) invited Francois Bayroux this morning to an unadvertised meeting with no press where he did a short speech and took questions. This afternoon Nicolas Sarkozy turned up an did a party political broadcast and was then swept of the stage to talk to the press, so much for the power of blogging.

The whole thing leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I realise that the second day had a section devoted to politics but it feels like the whole thing was subverted by Loic to serve his own political agenda. The lack of parity of esteem for the two candidates (no press or translation headsets for Bayroux, full press and headsets for Sarkozy) told the lie of this debate.

If politicians want to embrace the very active blogging community they are going to have to engage them as equals all of who have a more or less powerful ability to broadcast and interpret what they hear. We are no longer a voiceless TV constituency who must consume an endless stream of toothless platitudes.

We have a voice and we can use it to expose these soundbite set pieces which is what Sarkozy’s event at Le Web 3 turned out to be.

Seeing as how the US wants passenger manifests for all flights outbound from Europe, lets see the same thing produced for all European bound flights from the US, Miltary, CIA, Civilian or otherwise.

Can you say quid pro quo?

So the Taioseach and the Dail observe a minutes silence for the International Violence against Women day (25-Nov). But in the the same breath the Irish Times reports today (23rd November page 4) that the Sexual Assualt Treatment Unit (SATU) in Dubin, which is supposed to be manned 24×7 has been forced to close over the weekend for the past month.

So if you are raped you have to wait for up to 48 hours before you can be examined in order to collect the medical evidence that is vitally necessary in all rape prosecutions.

Hospitals say the problem is lack of funding, HSE says its lack of expert personnel.

Meanwhile women who are raped at the weekend must suffer on while somebody else sorts out this problem.

Via SiliconRepublic.com, news that you can check if you are registered to vote in Ireland with www.checktheregister.ie.

It allows you to enter you details and it searches the register for your council area. If your not found you can either fill in a,

• Application for Registration (cunningly called an RFA form) if you have never registered before
• Application for Change of Address (an RFA3 form) if you have registered previously but changed address since then (that’s me)

Full Details of the process can be had at Dublin city council voter information page. There are similar sites reachable from www.checktheregister.ie for the other councils scattered around the country.

Take this London School of Economics survey and help them decide.

Hears a clue, its a bad idea. How bad? I like Spengler’s description from GhostBusters.

Dr. Egon Spengler: Try to imagine all life as you know it stopping instantaneously and every molecule in your body exploding at the speed of light.
Dr. Raymond Stantz: Total protonic reversal.

Yep, that bad.

O’Reilly has retreated from their Cease and Desist Stance. Hooray for IT@Cork.

Tom reports that he received a Cease and Desist letter from O’Reilly regarding the use of the term Web 2.0.

Tough it out Tom, there is a long distance between cease and desist and going to court. Remember they would have to fight this action in Ireland!