This blog is no more

I dont know if anyone actually reads this that isnt why i do it, it would be nice if someone did but i dont mind.
anyway i have now got my own blog site up and running using wordpress so this one wont be used anymore. My new blog is at blog.gfnville.com hopefully it will continue in the spirit.

Blogger has been good to me for 5 years, but its time to move on to my own (and of course if it goes wrong i will be back!)...EOL

Comment - update 25 07 11

Well i have decided to take the plunge and setup my own website for blogging and information. Having trauled the net i settled on beachcomber.net as the host as the prices simply couldnt be beaten. Also their support is excelent.
So have setup a wordpress blog and am working on a wiki for the main site, but that will definately take a while as there is a steap learning curve on setting one up based on what little ive seen so far. So keep looking out and i should have news and a new URL soon...Oh i have also purchased a logo from ebay so it should have a nice look when i get the site working...EOL

comment - 22 07 11

Well i failed, through work and other things i did not manage to maintain my one a day blog postings. So although i must admit the thought of having to do it did pop in my head, the actual habbit of if you do something for 21 days in a row you are compelled to do it forever doesnt actually work. It seems that you can break this by simply not having any time to do things.
Anyway i am going to break my own rule and catch up on a few things in one post.
the news of the world phone hacking scandal, this is getting lame, they have been interviewed by the police, questioned in the house of commons and now a member of the Sun newspaper team has also resigned over aligations of this. Heres a thought, why oh why did they have to go to the house of commons over this, to explain why they did it or why the company folder. Sorry, but to me if there was a criminal act then parliament should not be getting involved. The perpitrators should be arrested byt the POLICE and properly prosecuted, it doesnt matter if the subject of the case is rich the laws of the land still apply! so stop all the speculation, following things in the media, allowing publication of rumours all this should stop and a proper criminal trial started. If there isnt the evidence for this let it go until there is. All we are doing is helping them in getting notices.
Torchwood: miracle day, the new series has been on for 2 weeks, and sorry to say it is definately dissapointing. The acting is the same quality, but the story is dragging on to say the least i have watched 2 hours of television and am so bored i might give up. They spent an entire episode on a plane this week sorry but thats not the most exciting tv to be put on air. Things need to be re-edited to speed them up, if they have a budget they should use it. Hiring a plane and filming an hours worth might be cheap but its bl**dy boring!
Oh and on a purely selfish note, wanted to plug a great PC game, its called minecraft and can be found at minecraft.net (i am not affiliated with this in any way just love the thing) i have spent many an hour on this, you built and survive. Have a look...EOL

comment - 100711 - News of the World is dead, long live the news of the world

Well i had to jump on this bandwaggon, today marks the last edition of the newspaper (if you can call it that) the News Of The World (NOTW). It closes its doors for the last time in 160 years, this is the direct results of alligations that it illegaly obtained material from dead peoples phones by hacking! them. There are also other alligations of bribery to the police force and many others.
so rather than face the music and hope he can save the paper, its owner decided to cut his losses and close the paper down. Yes they had problems, the vast majority of the papers revenue came from advertising in its many forms but starting when the alligations were made the various advertising companies pulled their adds so not to be linked to the paper and take bad press. But this meant that revenue was down, loss of earnings and no money to keep the lights on....so he closed it down..

But there is a twist in the tale of this one, and thats in the form of another paper that is rumoured to be in the works of being published, another of the groups papers "The Sun" is said to be designing a "Sunday Sun" to take the place of the NOTW, now is this just coincidence or did a businessman take a business decision to let one ship sink so that all the resources and the advertisers could go over to a new clean decked ship ready to set sail. The new paper wouldnt have the stigma of the old one and its "dubious" goings on, would be able to offer the advertisers a clean slate. yes its the same group, and maybe it will be the same employees we will have to see..
Lets just hope that the events of the past week are enough to stop the groups takeover bid of BskyB one of the UKs largest media companies, would you want this lot in charge there, imaging the damage they could do to the brand and the television of our country if they were allowed to have a controling interest, i shall watch that story with some interest....EOL

comment 07 07 11 - mobile phone insurance

In this day and age of the smartphone and the iPhone it is more important than ever to ensure you have the proper protection for your device whilst you are out and about. Although your phone operator may offer you some protection as part of your contract there will be allot of other possibilities that they wont cover so make sure you read their terms and any cover they give you fully. Normally they only cover the warranty of the phone and if you are lucky, lost calls following a theft or reported loss from the time you report it, because if they let someone use your phone when they know it is stolen it is their fault.
What they normally dont cover is the actual, theft loss, damage and dropping in water, things that can and do happen and this is where the insurance product can come in usefull. For an extremely small fee a month (separate to your operator) you can take out your own insurance on your device, this insurance tries to fill the gaps left by your operator in what might actually happen, but be warned make sure you read all their terms and the small print. They are in business too, so they put conditions on cover, things you have to do and a timeframe to do it so they can ignore your claim if you dont meet them.
your policy could have a "must be reported to police within 24 hours" or losses must be reported within 2 hours written in and if you dont, they dont pay and you are liable for all the loss including any calls the thieves make! This has come about because my own insurance company sent me new terms, and reading through them they are allot more restrictive than i thought. I cant reprint the whole thing here as i dont have permission but an example would be "Damage to or malfunction of the Mobile Phone caused by or attributed to the operation of a software virus or any other software based malfunction." now the virus bit is normal but the software based malfunction, on most smartphones this is a definate issue you dont have cover for.

The moral is therefore simple, no matter how streight forward a policy looks...ALWAYS READ THE SMALL PRINT...EOL

comment 06 07 11 - emergency vehicles

Now this is one of my personal peeves, and i will be looking at how i can take this one further in the real world. Perhaps we should write to our MPs and open a petition on the No10 website.
What is it you ask, well i am thinking that it should be a offence not to move out of the way of an emergency with its lights and sirens on, now the thought was you get three penalty points and a 50 fine if you dont move in 20 seconds, because any delay at all for these vehicles could be life and death.
Many a time i have seen idiots, sitting infront of a ambulance at lights, blocking them in on narrow roads or not swerving out the way in rush hour...so at the minute they get nothing, they could hold up the service indefinately and people can (and sometimes according to the press) do die because of these delays. Therefore as sending police bike escorts with every ambulance or paramedic (which is a good idea) isnt really viable in these economic times why not equip the vehicles with relatively cheap cameras and scare the public into complying.
If a driver knew they would get a fine and points they would definately get out the way or at least try... isnt that what you want, would you like a loved one to die from a heart attack, burn in a fire or be beaten because someone didnt get out the way! this really is a problem of our time with more traffic on the roads.

The alternatives i can think of are to issue a outrider police to each paramedic and fire unit, but thats hundreds and there are already police cuts in the works. Have more helicopter responce units to fly over problems, there is no money most of the ones that exist are run by charrities because the government pleads poverty...and dont get me started on that one... we cant pay for police, fire ambulance local government but we can send aid and armed forces to other countries at our expence...come on. fix home becore the rest of the world...see of topic...
so i am proposing the introduction of cameras on the exterior of emergency services, a small group of admin to review and issue tickets (this will therefore pay for itself in short order) and the introduction of points so that if you do it 4 times your off the road and out of the way...doesnt it make sence...now to write to my MP and the PM.....EOL

Comment - 05 07 2011 - childrens savings at banks

Well as a parent i wanted to drop this one here, it is now actually quite difficult to get a child under 10 a proper savings account with a bank. Now i dont know if this is due to regulations, laws rules or just that they dont make the banks enough money but the offerings are pityfull to say the least.

Like most children my youngster gets a bit of money, christmas, birthdays and a few pound here and there from family and friends. Now this isnt allow but enough so we can start to teach them the importance of saving for things they want and keeping money safe. For instance my daughter thinks the bank just gives out money, when you tell her you have none she points to a cash machine and says go get bank will give. She needs to learn, so her own account might be the answer.

After only a few minutes online one thing is clear, banks are not geared to winning customers young, looking at the major banks firstly, the main thing is that most of the big banks are linked. Santander, natwest, royal bank of scotland the whole group only have one account that gives the kid a piggy bank for free, and their terms are standard and dont look atractive. Plus as they are all the same it makes you think they cant be bothered with them the website layout of these pages is identical as well. So onto the others, the co-op has an account but its all completely old school, you need an actual paper application form (yes they still exist) and you will then get a passbook for the child to use in the branch, only issue, they are slowly closing all their branches.
then there are the online banks, first direct, smile dont offer specifics for children...so a non started.
so how do these banks think the next generation of children will become their customers if they cant teach them young and hold onto them.
back in the day when i was young it was not like this, the banks recognised the importance of early teaching, hell the griffin bank (bought many moons ago by hsbc) used to set up banks inside schools giving out free gifts to new account holders. The halifax had special beginer accounts with card withdrawal and others...and then (and i actually still have my book for this) there was the post office, when i was 2 my parents got me a postoffice savings book and you HAD to deposit birthday money in it, it teaches importance of saving and back then there were post offices in every village in the land so you never had any problem...

My plea therefore is simple, come on banks help us parents stem the tide of borrowing in later life, the dependency on loans and bad debts, give us the tools to properly educate our children on the art of banking and budgeting and get yourself a new generation of customers that you can teach and earn money from from a very young age....oh and from the looks its either Natwest, or Co-op bank for our kid, natwest as its the best of the santander group these days and co-op is still local to our areaEOL