tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35467553328959140292024-03-19T07:28:24.896+00:00Stuff that occurs to meA bit of a miscellany, with some fairly useful 'how to' posts too.Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.comBlogger881125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-56026029777737335052024-02-21T22:31:00.004+00:002024-02-21T22:31:41.692+00:00More emails trying to get a link on your site - this time it's attempted emotional blackmail "...Then the Sun shined out warmly, and immediately the traveler took off his cloak." - Aesop's fable The North Wind and the SunThere are many ways to ask someone to add a link back to your blog or website. People ask because if you link to their site because, when Google indexes the pages and links on your website, Google 'reads' the fact that you've linked to a site as a recommendation, Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-50816568688815622642024-02-12T19:30:00.000+00:002024-02-12T19:30:25.000+00:00Copyright infringement - spam email attempting to get a link on a websiteHere's some nonsense (text version at the end) - Last week I received the above email (from someone purporting to be legally-adjacent) telling me that an image I'd used on my work website was in breach of their client's copyright. To fix this all I'd need to was add a clickable link from my website to their clients. This is baloney. People use all sorts of tactics to try and get their Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-30290923784069392592024-02-01T21:41:00.002+00:002024-02-01T22:02:13.960+00:00Can I write about your interesting computer science research on CS4FN (the work blog)?I've just posted the below to PECS a mailing list for people interested in public engagement with computer science although this particular post is more about science communication (telling people about computer science research - though you definitely do need to tell people about your research if you hope to involve them in it in any way so ... two sides of the same coin I think). If you'reJohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-29006289726704182282023-12-29T20:20:00.002+00:002023-12-29T20:57:50.190+00:00Learning to touch type - some free online resourcesIf you want to learn to touch type here are some resources that should point you in the right direction. It just involves a lot of repetition of typing nonsense words to teach your hands where the letters are on the keyboard so that you don't have to consciously think about them. ListenThis record from 1960 sounds like it should have a text book to accompany it (not found an online copy yetJohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-39272690455168628662023-11-11T11:12:00.000+00:002023-11-11T11:12:01.731+00:00Currently at war with the Victoria & Alfred Hotel in Capetown, which will not stop emailing meFor the last six years (since October 2017) I have been receiving unwanted sporadic emails from various email addresses related to Newmark Hotels in South Africa. I don't seem to be able to stop it for any length of time.It looks like someone used my email address to create an account. This means that unsubscribing doesn't actually work because if that person makes a booking the hotel will Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-40656949215453428312023-10-25T11:34:00.000+01:002023-10-25T11:34:04.694+01:00Another spam email, promising me millions ;)I do love a good scam email. This was correctly categorised as spam by Gmail and placed in a folder, however I am unable to resist playing along (if you do this, don't click links) so I hoiked it out to see what they send out when you 'bite'. Not surprisingly an almost identical version of the second email can be found here https://stopscamfraud.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=25093This arrived Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-69699874268580414392023-10-11T14:15:00.006+01:002023-10-11T22:53:58.641+01:00Inundated with spammers trying to get a link on my posts ;)A post I wrote back in 2009 and
updated in 2013 receives a disproportionate amount of spam attempts in
which someone tries to get me to add a link to the page. Of course the
link they want me to add has nothing to do with the page (it's very
clear they've not read it or understood the page). The
intention in getting the link onto my page is to 'tell' Google that my
site thinks their Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-38724869831806611982023-08-16T12:56:00.007+01:002023-08-16T13:02:54.052+01:00Making your event easy to use (film festival screenings in particular)Pic credit: Dean LeggettI help run a free film festival in Greenwich (specifically the Charlton and Woolwich Free Film Festival)
and every year when preparing the listings I try and keep the following
things in mind. My aim is to make it easy for people to know what to
expect at our screenings and either reduce or at least draw attention to
any barriers. 1. Subtitles / captionsIf a film Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-49550430980763752212023-08-08T11:06:00.022+01:002023-08-08T11:29:03.696+01:00Imaginary GCSE MagicI remember the first time I saw my colleague Paul do magic at a work event I was at. It was great fun anyway but he also linked some of the science of the tricks to the science behind the work that we were doing (medical device safety) and honestly my mind was just ever so slightly blown by that. He and our colleague Peter McOwan (who died in 2019) at QMUL used magic to talk about computing Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-39370451779423662722023-07-23T15:26:00.012+01:002023-07-28T11:07:26.672+01:00Maps of where you can see real gas lamps (lit with gas!) in LondonLondon has lots of lamps that are lit by gas! Here is where you can spot them.Pic credit: me. Three types of gas lamps commonly seen in London. On the left is a Windsor style lamp outside the National Portrait Gallery in Trafalgar Square which is lit with a gas flame. The middle and right pictures both show mantle-style lamps, middle is a Grosvenor lantern on New Row in Covent Garden, rightmost Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-71074121226165314242023-06-20T18:05:00.007+01:002023-06-20T18:08:19.809+01:00Science festival packing list - string, scissors etc and other practicalitiesTape: brown packing tape, sellotape, masking tape, Pens: marker pens, biro pens, colouring in pens, Pencils: colouring in pencils, pencil sharpener, Tethering: string, glue (Pritt stick), blue tack, cable ties, Cutting: kid-safe scissors for activities, scissors for adults, scalpel or other thing to cut open boxes of material, Decorations: laminated sheets, logos, QR codes, bunting, painted stoneJohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-84175454251302908952023-06-13T23:59:00.004+01:002023-06-13T23:59:52.036+01:00The 'sextortion' bitcoin email scam is backFound this in the Spam mailbox on one of my email accounts today. It's a load of tosh copied and pasted and sent out in the hope that someone will bite. I see the address has already been reported, and it looks like some people have sent money. I've forwarded it to Action Fraud and have added my report to those already on ChainAbuse / Bitcoin Abuse.If you get one of these do not give them money. Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-21358721451428263992023-05-01T13:15:00.001+01:002023-05-03T11:25:51.712+01:00What support is there for over 50s economically inactive / underactive to find more work?The Government has announced that it would like more over 50s, who are able to work*, to come back to the workplace after apparently lots of people took earlyish retirement during the (ongoing) Covid pandemic. I'm not quite in that position (never retired) but since 2018 I've been working two days a week and so have some spare time, and I have no objection to the Government's wish to extract moreJohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-1246250953379420762023-04-27T22:30:00.000+01:002023-04-27T22:30:36.369+01:00I recommend pre-emptively blocking emails from Cupventi and quite possibly Beehiiv for good measureOccasionally I get spam in my Gmail account. It's usually fairly
straightforward to deal with - deleting, unsubscribing, reporting as
spam etc. You can also set up a redirect so that if an email arrives
containing a keyword it bypasses your inbox and goes to the Bin or some
other holding mailbox. Generally telling Gmail that an email is
spam and unsubscribing means that's the end Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-11579713090233072512023-03-17T18:18:00.005+00:002023-03-17T18:18:56.675+00:00Adjudications etc by the Advertising Standards Authority against misleading #homeopathy claimsOriginally posted in July 2015. Bizarrely flagged up today (!) for containing adult content. I've removed a word from Comfort Click's upheld ASA adjudication for 'Wartrol wart relief spray' as the location of the warts appears to have triggered the flagging...- - - - - - -Original postThese days it's fairly rare to get an actual Advertising Standards
Authority (ASA) adjudication on a misleading Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-63502887445856143612023-03-03T22:45:00.001+00:002023-03-04T08:00:39.447+00:00My favourite podcasts by middle aged white guysI often see Twitterers and columnists opining that we don't need any more podcasts from middle aged (or middle class) white men and I would like to be an outlier on this, and recommend the following excellent and entertaining podcasts from that demographic. Other demographics are available.Kermode and Mayo's Take: Simon Mayo and Mark Kermode https://www.kermodeandmayo.com/Apple podcasts | SpotifyJohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-48457722093375132262023-01-15T11:28:00.003+00:002023-01-15T11:28:32.364+00:00No-one's more surprised than I am that I have an Etsy shop for printables to colour inMy Etsy shop front...Recently I have been 'getting into' Inkscape (free) in a fairly big way, learning how to use it by a mix of trial and error, watching YouTube videos, reading the help files and tutorials and even asking on the forums. I have now reached the status of Adequate At This, coinciding with a burgeoning in my use of it for work and fun. I began using it in 2019 as I wanted to Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-17936380821662972882022-12-24T15:10:00.006+00:002022-12-24T15:13:07.492+00:00Last-minute Chrismas gifts and activities that are emailable or printable or bakeable Depending on where you live there may well be a smaller shop open for emergency snacks. Where I live in Blackheath we have Best One Xpress open in the village (24 hours) and Pravin Supermarket in Blackheath Standard is open from 10 until 3pm. I hear that Deliveroo is likely to be up and running too. Here are some ideas for gifts that don't require leaving the house or having them Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-84321087945901751512022-12-24T13:25:00.006+00:002022-12-24T13:26:30.573+00:00Santa Trackers and seeing the International Space Station as it goes over on Christmas morningFestive image by Clker-Free-Vector-Images from Pixabay If it's not cloudy in the UK tomorrow morning (Sun 25 Dec 2022) at 7.12am you may be able to see - with the naked eye - Father Christmas in his sleigh and the International Space Station flying overhead, travelling from West to East. They'll appear as a tiny bright white dot moving quite fast, with no blinking.The latitude table linked Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-25955162132883304492022-11-20T15:28:00.005+00:002022-11-22T22:14:23.694+00:00Save the Westminster gas lamps: London-lighting lovely lanterns under threat The above lamp, in Bull Inn Court Westminster, is a Grosvenor style gas lit lamp (see the spotters' guide below). Update 22 Nov 2022: Westminster City Council has said it will now only electrify 94 lamps and leave 174 as gas. This has been welcomed cautiously by the London Gasketeers campaigners as it raises more questions than it answers.- - - - - - - - - - - - - Westminster has nearlyJohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-1001648762619747052022-10-30T12:16:00.005+00:002022-10-30T12:17:44.881+00:00Consultation Watch - keeping an eye on consultations from UK Governmental departmentsBack in 2012 I wondered if there was a single online place, on the Gov•UK website, where people could find out about all the various governmental consultations that were currently open for input. Since then, yes, it's here - 1. Get Involved- information about all sorts of ways you can be that bit more civic-minded, which includes information about submitting a response to consultations. 2. Open Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-2049161225653885352022-10-21T19:06:00.000+01:002022-10-21T19:06:01.667+01:00Mayoral Christmas card competitions for kids in the UKA cartoon of a Christmas tree that I drew Today I had a (regular subscription) email from the office of the Mayor of London telling me that there's a Mayoral Christmas card competition for kids age 4-14 in London. This is the sort of thing I tend to tweet so I searched for the link (I do this to save writing my own tweets and surface someone else's!) but didn't find it, so widened my search Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-68742091843115062622022-10-09T23:21:00.004+01:002022-10-22T12:29:47.131+01:00Christmas 2022: Where to watch ELF in cinemas in LondonDecember - it's the most wondELFul time of the year. There will be several screenings of Elf in cinemas in London and it's pretty likely that more will be announced between the publication of this post and the start of the Elf season. Hooray!"See Elf in cinemas in London in 2022", in Curlz MT font.1. Spreadsheet of published screenings2. Screenings organised by venue and provider3. Bonus Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-33219710075728811822022-09-29T12:55:00.001+01:002022-09-29T23:29:43.252+01:00Introducing 'PECS' - a new mailing list / community of practice for people involved in Public Engagement in Computer ScienceNew mailing listPECS = for anyone involved in Public Engagement in Computer Science https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/wa-jisc.exe?A0=PECSPaul Curzon and I are on a lovely EPSRC grant running over the next three years and he is one of five new "ICT Public Engagement Champions". One of the things we said we'd do in our application was create a community of practice (pragmatically = a mailing list)Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3546755332895914029.post-7990377715447509962022-08-26T16:32:00.001+01:002022-09-05T22:49:21.643+01:00Here's how to advertise your film festival on Kermode and Mayo's "Take" podcast - freeSharing your film festival or film-adjacent event on Kermode and Mayo's Take (formerly Wittertainment) podcast.I help run the Charlton and Woolwich Free Film Festival, one of several Free Film Festivals in London, and have been really pleased that Mark Kermode and Simon Mayo's 'Kermode & Mayo's Take' podcast now has an opportunity for community film festivals and other film-y special events Johttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17150960025351599805noreply@blogger.com0