Afghanistan War Aims

 Media, Politics  No Responses »
Jul 252009
 

Sometimes I really do not understand some comments that crop up from time to time in the media. Apparently there are many people who do not understand why we are fighting a war in Afghanistan.

Well I guess some people are so dumb they need reminding to keep breathing.

Or are so uninterested in what is going on that they never listen to media discussions on the war.

It is not as if the reasons have not been discussed many times. And it is not as if the aims are particularly difficult to understand – we’re there to establish a stable government that is not going to let Afghanistan be used as a solid base for terrorism. Sure, things start to get a little more detailed and confused when you dig down into more precisely how that will be done especially when combating the opium/heroin trade gets mixed in.

The terrorists in Afghanistan use the heroin trade to raise funds for their activities, so it is perfectly reasonable to try to stop the funds, but it needs to be done in such a way that it does not irritate the opium farmers whose livelihood depends on the trade. As I have suggested before, the simplest way of dealing with this, is to simply buy the opium for a fair price ourselves.

So the next time someone complains that they do not know why we are fighting in Afghanistan, remember that whilst it is perfectly reasonable to object to the war for all sorts of reasons, objecting because you do not understand the aims is just indefensible.

Digital Is Better Than Film??

 Photography  No Responses »
Jul 152009
 

Every so often I encounter a discussion on whether film is better than digital or digital is better than film, which usually degenerates into someone mentioning large format film and someone else mentioning the convenience of digital (or even the convenience of film). It’s all balderdash (and I wrote this post just to use that word … not!). More or less.

When making images (which is what photography is all about after all) it does not matter whether you use film or digital, because using either you can just occasionally produce jaw droppingly good images. Indeed for many such images, the quality of the source does not matter too much as you will be concentrating on the subject rather than the relatively minor “issues” with the image quality such as film grain, ISO noise, chromatic aberration, etc.

What does matter is using whatever makes you comfortable. I cannot shoot film because the thought of actually paying money per shot makes me freeze up. Exposure bracketing ? Forget it. Others cannot shoot digital because computers fill them with horror (and I can certainly understand that!!).

For me, digital is better. For those others film is better.

What counts is the final production – the image, and not the mechanics of how it came about.

iPhone: What’s Missing (2): Where’s The Keyboard ?

 Computing, iPhone  No Responses »
Jul 122009
 

I’m very fussy about keyboards; perhaps ridiculously so. But I cannot understand the criticism of the virtual keyboard that comes with the iPhone. It takes some getting used to, and the auto correct feature whilst very useful can also be very irritating. Enough so that Apple should probably have a keyboard button marked “turn off auto correct for a while”. But it is perfectly adequate for what it is  – something to do a little text entry from time to time.

So why am I complaining about the lack of a decent keyboard ? Because quite simply if I’m doing any writing (and I don’t at present) on the iPhone, I would like to be able to type at full speed – which for me requires a decent clicky keyboard so I can get up to a reasonable speed (apparently about 120wpm!).

Adding bluetooth drivers to the iPhone should be pretty trivial for Apple after all there are already OSX bluetooth keyboard drivers available, and the iPhone operating system is OSX. So why does Apple not include one ? Sure there’s an excuse for the first release not to include one – Apple wanted to make sure that the phone was rock solid in a totally new market to them. But now?

Surely it cannot be because they feel that releasing such a driver would be an admission that the virtual keyboard is no good. After all, I’m not exactly an enemy of the virtual keyboard, but I want a real keyboard interface for those occasions when one would be useful.

iPhone: What Is Missing (1)

 Computing, iPhone  No Responses »
Jul 122009
 

The iPhone is hardly perfect, although it is quite good for a smartphone. However now we are loading up our iPhones with dozens of added applications, the old swipe-able screen interface needs a bit of care.

The first improvement would be the ability to tag particular screens with names. This would be merely an aid to organisation, but in practice would be very handy. There is plenty of space in the status bar for the “name” of a screen, or Apple could do something funkier involving putting the name onto the background.

Secondly it would be handy to have icons that could “warp” to a particular screen – presumably by name. This would work as a simplistic form of ‘folders’ for the applications.

Finally it would be useful to be able to make certain application icons “sticky” so that they remain available no matter what screen is currently active.

Theft Insurance – Who Should Pay For It ?

 General  No Responses »
Jul 122009
 

Just a random thought that just occurred to me … who should pay for insurance on the theft of things … cars, the contents of homes, etc. ? We all know that is normally the victims of theft who pay for it, but why should we ?

Why shouldn’t those who are convicted of theft pay for the cost of insurance ? Attach their earnings after they leave prison until they have paid back enough to cover the cost of insurance in proportion to the amount they have stolen.

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