informationisbeautiful.net

Current Mood: amused

Yes, you.

Write to your MP. You can e-mail them as well(writetothem.com site makes it easy.), but a letter makes more impact. Ask them to write to the Foreign Secretary calling for investment sanctions against Burma. It will take about 15 minutes, a paragraph is sufficient.


Aung San Suu Kyi (the democratically elected leader of the Burmese people, currently under house arrest) has appealed for international investment sanctions against the regime.

In many countries trade and investment can help ordinary people, but in Burma the opposite happened. The regime used the revenue from investment to double the size of the army and increase its attacks on its own population. At the same time as new revenue came in they reduced spending on health and education. The call is for targeted economic sanctions, not blanket sanctions. Over three-quarters of Burma’s people are small farmers, no-one is calling for sanctions on agricultural exports. An investment ban would stop companies setting up joint ventures with the regime and so directly funding the generals and the abuses they commit.

Read the case for sanctions at burmacampaign.org.uk

Current Mood: distressed

arms fair protestors arrested by the police for 'a breach of the peace'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6988666.stm

Current Mood: irritated

( mememe stolen from Targ )

Tags: meme
Current Mood: cheerful

hot damn this looks like fun.

Transformer man with wheels.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWLbu1wIIEo

Current Mood: impressed

police just cordoned off the street outside my office while I was coming back in from lunch (why didn't I stay out for another 5 minutes?!) apparently someone has located a bomb in McDonalds (directly below our office!)

then we all got told we couldn't leave, and to stand away from the windows. In the absense of a clear course of action my survival instinct is issuing an imperative to continue eating my curry...

I have never seen The Strand like this.




update they have just reopened the street so I guess everything is fine...

Tags: bomb scare
Current Location: work
Current Mood: curious
Current Music: eerie quiet

this is a pretty cool tool. Lets you see which bits of the UK are going to be underwater if when sea levels rise.

http://flood.firetree.net/

Most of North London seems to be ok with anything up to 14m. The good news is Stamford Hill is a high point of around 30m above sea level, so most of Stokey is going to be ok. Hackney Marshes will be underwater at around 7m rise, and Seven Sisters and anything north of the Upper Clapton Road will be in trouble at about 12m.

South London is a different story - Rotherhithe, Canada Water, New Cross, Camberwell will start being flooded by a 4m rise. 6m will take out Bermondsey, Wandsworth, Battersea Park, Fulham, and Barnes. 8m would take out Kensington, Hammersmith, The Docklands and Greenwich.

The Greenland ice sheet melting will raise sea levels by 7m.

Current Mood: apocalyptic

'Rupert Murdoch, who bought MySpace in 2005, has already expressed concern about the growth of Facebook. His executives will now be under even more pressure to find ways of making MySpace fashionable again.'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6249520.stm

Current Mood: amused

The truth about wireless devices

Current Mood: amused

at work today and Friday I have beeen mostly listening to Lili Haydn.

Quite poppy, (described by bowed electricity as like a cross between Kate Bush and Soundgarden?!) and some tracks clearly more cheesy than others, but it's imaginatively written, the electric violin is stunning and she sings lead vocals and produces it also.

Maggot Brain on her myspace page is particularly good. very hendrix.

Tags: electric violin, music
Current Mood: impressed
Current Music: Lili Haydn - Light Blue Sun