On why I think Twitter, Facebook and other so called social sites are not for me

Am I opposed to Twitter? I love things that new technology does, the other night in Top Gear (of all places!) I discovered an iPhone app called Grindr where logged-on gay people can track where other logged-on guys are (and how close, thanks to master Twit Stephen Fry). But I have chosen not to be involved in Facebook and specially Twitter because I can’t fit it in in my life.

A couple of weeks ago I dislocated the right clavicle from the sternum (don’t ask) and ended up two weeks at home with the arm on a sling. It was a good time to take some unexpected time off and I decided to streamline my life.

Due to privacy issues, I was never a fan of social sites (probably that’s why I write this blog under a pseudonym). I’ve decided that one of the principles I am going to be running my life is that if I am going to add something, I have to decide what I am going to stop doing. So if I am going to add the time required to sending and receiving Twitter then I have to decide what I am going to stop doing. I have not been able to identify anything that I consider less important than Twitter, so it just simply didn’t make the cut.

Now, if you use Twitter and use it effectively [Pingol, do you?] fantastic. But there are a lot of things that I categorise like that where I decided not to do those simply because I don’t want to add something more to my plate and I can’t find something that I reasonably want to unplug.

.calvin

On Ryanair’s hell on near earth, mobiles on board

Oh dear! The end is near. Last April I wrote a post on the European Comission clearing the way for mobile phone calls on air (On flying misery, and the death of the last mobile-free remnant). Well, serious airlines like Air France-KLM, TAP and BMI have been running trials on the idea, but the FT reports today that the flying coaches of Ryanair are going to be the first fleet to be fully equipped with it (Ryanair opens skies to mobile phones).

 The other day, on the 148 to Victoria, an African man was shouting so loudly on the phone, that it was a poem to see the other passengers’ eyes opening and closing with his words… even the driver had to use the speakers to tell him to be quieter, but of course he couldn’t hear him.

On Madoff’s list of conned and now, publicly shamed

I am sad. I am not in it. I can’t even afford to own property (or rent) and the addresses included on the list. I am poor.

I am still amazed at the fact that the milion and billionaire investors who has been published. With what seems personal addresses.

I don’t get it… If losing all you investmented with Mr Madeoff, they even put up up on the web for public shame. Address included.

On commodities, false tax savings, and raising crime in the British countryside

Friday morning (30Jan09), a PC from the Thames Valley Police station came to take a second statement on the attempted robbery of our humble 15-year-old  Honda. Apparently they caught some Mr Lee and they have a fingerprint match.

Funny enough, the PC didn’t know that the car was stolen again (this time for good) on 31st August. The fact that the car had the same license number and I was informed by the police when they found it 3 days after, beggars believe.

On power and sex, who’s going to be next?

Hobbes, we don’t have to go back much. We don’t even have to think of a different organism these days!

Sex, money, power, politics… in the end same dog, different collar.  It is not that I hang out with politicians, sheiks, wealthy businessmen and rich City bankers, but the few I have been in touch with, show a pattern of sex, sex and sex. I guess it comes with the package.

On smart timing, Ireland says No to the Lisbon treaty and Berlusconi uses the turmoil to score a goal to every decent Italian

It is a sad day Hobbes.

The EU seems to be in turmoil because the Irish just rejected the Lisbon Treaty or the EU Constitution with a different name. Well, I guess that was one of the two plausible results, so I don’t yet get why words as strong words crop up, since from the very beginning there was a 50/50 chance of Ireland turning its back against the treaty.

However, I commented last Tuesday about Berlusconi, the new Italian Prime Minister, trying to outlaw wire-tapping. I pointed out that the law he was trying to pass had retrospective effect, so he is personally much, much better from today.

On Berlusconi illegalising phone bugging for personal benefit

Oh dear, no sooner Mr Berlusconi took over the Italian government, when he started using the country as his own personal playground. Who the hell came out with il Cavalieri as his nickname? Il Corrotto would have been better.

It reads like a “Dictatorship for Dummies” book. First of all, secure the elections by supporting an imaginary rescue of the ill-managed and debt-ridden Alitalia.

To tip the balance on your side, deal with immigration as an Apartheid theorist and criminalise those who come in search of a better life.

On disturbing anonymous tribes in the information age

Hobbes, what a sad day. I read the news about the Amazonian tribe just discovered in the rain forest by the Brazilian government. Their location is irrelevant. That someone can be living out there, with no iPod, tax issues or dental care puzzles me and makes me smile at the same time. The fact that they have been found saddens me.

These guys were just going about their business as they had for the last thousands of years and by their reaction to the helicopter –arrows anyone?- they didn’t seem very happy.

On flying misery, and the death of the last mobile-free remnant

After so much talking about authorising mobile phone use on board, it seems that under new rules, the European Commission has cleared the way for an air nightmare.

Last time I was meddling about with my BlackBerry on board (all connections off, as any rule abiding citizen would do), an Iberia air hostess made me feel like a schoolboy bin Laden when ordered me to switch off my mobile phone since I was ‘putting everybody’s life at risk, interfering with the plane’s communications system’. The fact that I was on a window seat and she told me off from the corridor, two rows away, let’s say that didn’t make me the most popular fellow passenger on the flight.

Vatican lists seven new Social Sins

Pope Benedict XVI is having fun. Again. We would also have lots of fun were it not be for the lack of intrinsic funniness of his persona. Benny, leave it aside and keep your daytime job, stand-up comedy is not exactly your thing. Plus, the content of your shows is old and out of place (and time).

According to Bloomberg, the new seven social sins are: