Owen abroad

Archive for the ‘Blogging’ Category

Enjoy this cartoon book about the development relationship from Survival International.

HT: Curious. 

Senator Lieberman says he is going to run as an independent, having lost the Democratic Party nomination in Connecticut.

I don't know much about how party discipline works in the US, but in the UK running against an official party candidate would lead to automatic expulsion from the party.

As far as I know, Senator Lieberman is currently the ranking Democrat on the Senate Homeland Security committee, and he sits on the Armed Services, Small Business, and Environment Committees.  According to the BBC:

Meanwhile Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada and Sen Chuck Schumer of New York – the chairman of the party's Senate campaign committee – have pledged their full support for Mr Lamont.

I wonder if Senator Reid's support for Mr Lamont includes removing Senator Lieberman from his committee posts?

This week's Economist asks why there is an invisible hand on the keyboard:

Not all economics bloggers toil entirely for nothing. Mr Mankiw frequently plugs his textbook. Brad Setser, of Roubini Global Economics, an economic-analysis website, is paid to spend two to three hours or so each day blogging as a part of his job. His blog, rgemonitor.com/blog/setser, often concentrates on macroeconomic topics, notably China. Each week, 3,000 people read it—more than bought his last book. “I certainly have not found a comparable way to get my ideas out. It allows me to have a voice I would not otherwise get,” Mr Setser says. Blogs have enabled economists to turn their microphones into megaphones. In this model, the value of influence is priceless.

Not up to the usual high standard of The Economist.

Economists blog because most of us believe that information and knowledge are more valuable shared than kept secret. As knowledge workers, we are valued by the information we share, not the secrets we keep.  Blogging is a hugely efficient way of sharing some kinds of information.

Santigie Kamara writing in allAfrica.com yesterday may be overstating the case, but only a little:

Reports reaching this press indicate that the consultant at the Ministry of Agriculture is a "square peg in a round whole" and yet still he is there, receiving thousands of dollars while our brothers and sisters who are more qualified are earn less than a million leones per month.

The objectives of technical assistance are noble; the execution is dismal.  Even before Elliot Berg's landmark report in 1993 we have known that the expert-counterpart model of long term ex-patriate  technical assistance is generally neither effective nor good value for money.  In no other walk of life do we try to train people by parachuting in an expert to do their job for a couple of years. You do not learn skills by watching over someone's shoulder: you learn through a combination of on-the-job training, coaching, mentoring, and formal structured training courses.  So why is that not the way we should provide technical assistance?

A fifth of all aid – some $20 billion a year – is currently spent on technical cooperation of various kinds (though much of it may not be spent on this sort of technical assistance).  About 40% of US aid is spent this way.  Some – perhaps a lot – of this money is wasted.  We know that this approach to technical assistance is not generally effective, and yet we go on doing it, presumably because the development-industrial complex is too powerful for us stop. 

The transfer and sharing of knowledge and skills is a very high priority for development.  Technical cooperation has an important role to play.  But we need to do it much better.

Full disclosure: I myself was an ex-pat technical adviser in an African country for two years.  I know of what I speak. 

<geek>

You may not have heard of service oriented architecture yet; and if you have have, you may think it is just a lot of hype.

But if you believe in SOA, you will have noticed that it could be the foundation of a solution to the UK Government's woes in the use of information technology.  I have written before here about the potential for a service-oriented architecture to enable government to deliver the benefits of integrated information systems while limiting the civil liberties risks of a large identity database.  And in a chapter in a new IBM book about transformation of government services, Capability, Capacity and Reform, I argue that instead of the government's vision of  data processing warehouses, the way to create more efficient and customer-oriented public services is to build smaller and more flexible shared service modules based on a common, cross-government IT architecture.

So I was interested to see that Accenture has bet $450 million of its own money over the next three years in developing new service-oriented architecture functionality.  That suggests that Accenture agrees that this is more than just hype.

Hat tip: Enterprise Web 2.0

</geek> 

The Wasington Post reports on a federal program to support cattle farmers:

At first, livestock owners were required to be in a county officially suffering a drought to collect the money. But ranchers who weren't eligible complained to their representatives in Washington, and in 2003 Congress dropped that requirement. Ranchers could then get payments for any type of federally declared "disaster." In some cases, USDA administrators prodded employees in the agency's county offices to find qualifying disasters, even if they were two years old or had nothing to do with ranching or farming.

If this were happening in an African country, there would be all kinds of complaints about corruption and poor governance.  There would be demands that we cut off aid until this kind of corruption be ended.

Contrary to popular belief, agricultural subsidies in OECD countries are not the most damaging part of the rigged international market for agriculture – that honour goes to import tariffs.  But they are a colossal waste of taxpayer money, and they contribute to the difficulties faced by agricultural producers in poor countries to make a living.  It is hard to understand why voters in developed countries put up with it.

G and I went to see An Inconvenient Truth, which is a documentary about Al Gore's efforts to increase awareness of the threat of climate change.

I thought that I was pretty well informed about climate change, and frankly expected to be a bit bored. I did not really see how a film of somebody giving a powerpoint presentation was going to be all that interesting.   Boy, was that wrong. I found the film informative, gripping, even entertaining in places. I learned a lot, and the film increased my (inexpert) opinion that climate change is one of the most serious challenges facing the planet.

The film is more than just a presentation of charts and figures.  It cleverly weaves in Al Gore's personal narrative: the journey he made, as a student, as a Congressman, a Senator, as Vice President and as a Presidential candidate.  He comes across as smart, funny, likeable and utterly sincere. His story, and his insights into how public opinion gradually understands serious social challenges of this sort, give the film a liveliness, pace and emotion, instead of just a worthy-but-dull recital of the science.

The film finishes with an upbeat message: there is much that we can and should do to address global warming but we are fast running out of time.

Even if you think you know all about climate change, and are already committed to doing something about it, please go to see this film. Take a friend. You will enjoy it much more than you expect, and you will learn something. 

Human Rights Watch says that the G8 must act on Darfur:

“For the third year in a row, Darfur will be on the agenda at the G8 meeting,” said Peter Takirambudde, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “This year, the G8 must make a decisive public statement. As the killings continue, G8 leaders need to tell Khartoum that it has no alternative but to accept the deployment of a U.N. force in Darfur.”

Take a look at this BBC photoset to see what life is like in a camp in Darfur.

Syd Barrett, one of the founders of Pink Floyd, has died.

The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, Pink Floyd's first album, must rank as one of the finest debut albums of all time, and it is a testament to Barrett's genius.

As Barrett became more unreliable, possibly because of his use of drugs, the group hired Dave Gilmour so that there would be somebody playing the guitar when Barrett stopped.

When Barrett left the band (they simply decided not to pick him up in the tour bus on the way to a gig in Southampton), he had a wholly unsuccessful solo career, and ended up a recluse, living with his mother in Cambridge.

Shine On You Crazy Diamond was recorded by Pink Floyd in 1975, on the album Wish You Were Here, as a tribute to their lost friend, Syd Barrett.   

Remember when you were young
You shone like the sun
Shine on you crazy diamond
Now there's a look in your eyes
Like black holes in the sky
Shine on you crazy diamond
You were caught on the crossfire of childhood and stardom
blown on the steel breeze
Come you target for faraway laughter
Come on you stranger, you legend, you martyr, and shine!

Coincidentally Barrett made an unannounced appearance at the recording studio while the band was recording this track. They didn't even recognise him. 

Tim Worstall’s weekly roundup
of the best of British Blogs is up.

With my sister Virginia visiting from Brighton, England, we have been touring the California wine region, which is an hour north of here.

Here is a photo of me and my sister drinking champagne at the Korbel cellars at 10am in the morning, at the start of a hard day’s tasting. Grethe made the ultimate sacrifice of being the designated driver.

That’s a heading I never thought I would write. 

The Cato Institute – a right-wing libertarian think-tank in Washington – has published an analysis of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act:

The DMCA is anti-competitive. It gives copyright holders—and the technology companies that distribute their content—the legal power to create closed technology platforms and exclude competitors from interoperating with them. Worst of all, DRM technologies are clumsy and ineffective; they inconvenience legitimate users but do little to stop pirates.

Most papers from the Cato Institute are either obvious, or wrong, or (usually) both.  This paper is neither – full of interesting insights into why digital rights management is in the interests of neither the companies nor consumers.  It explains how digital rights management undermines the very characteristics we need for progress: interoperable products, consumer choice and competition.

As well as sharing these general concerns about digital rights management, I have a particular concern, which the paper touches on but does not discuss in detail.  I mainly use open source software: I am writing this using Firefox on a computer running Linux, with no proprietary or closed-source software.  Open source computing already provides much of the infrastructure of the internet (from email systems to the majority of web-servers) and is likely to play an increasingly important role for consumers over the coming years. But there is a fundamental inconsistency between using digital rights management to restrict what you can do with media files and open source applications.  With open source software, any user can change the line that says "do not allow file to be copied" to "allow file to be copied" – so DRM relies on the existence and widespread use of proprietary software.  And that is not acceptable to me.

From today’s news.

I intended this as a spoof,
on November 3rd last year,
not as a recommendation!
 

G and I saw Capote last night.

Philip Seymour Hoffman plays Truman Capote, a writer (author of Breakfast at Tiffanys and writer for the New Yorker) who becomes obsessed with the murder of a family in Kansas, and forms a bond with one of the men accused of the murder, Perry Smith (top row of photos).  Through his friendship with Smith, Capote researches material for his book, In Cold Blood, which is published to critical acclaim.

Philip Seymour Hoffman is astonishing as Capote – capturing not only the mannerisms and speech of Capote, but also manages to convey some of the turmoil and contradictions of the man who both sympathises (perhaps even loves) the accused men, and yet exploits their predicament.  Hoffman must be a candidate for Best Actor.

Definitely recommended.

West Wing ends:

Executives from NBC in New York confirmed yesterday what many industry-watchers had been expecting and its admirers dreading. They intend pulling the plug on the programme for good when its current season – the seventh – ends in May.

I am enjoying BBC’s The Thick of It, a kind of a cross between Yes, Minister and The Office which has just transferred from digital to terrestial TV, but Hugh Abbot won’t take the place of President Bartlett. 

It is almost enough to make me oppose term limits.  At least for fictional presidents …

Danny Glover in the National Journal on the importance of blogging in US politics, arguing that bloggers are indirectly influential, because they help to frame issues and define the agenda.

As Hampton Stephens points out, there have been few, if any, examples in the US of blogs affecting US foreign policy (yet), though arguably they have been important in the UK in keeping some attention on the controversy over extaordinry rendition.

Alex Singleton makes an interesting point about patent and copyright protection in the WTO (known as TRIPS):

Free trade liberals take the view that unilateral liberalisation is good for countries, regardless of what anyone else does. But those, like Pugatach, who believe it would be a disaster to liberalise without an IP agreement can only, logically, be opponents of unilateral free trade. Without such an agreement, free trade would be a race to the bottom. … It is not uncommon for market-oriented people to believe in the necessity of TRIPS and also in the virtue of unilateral liberalisation. But the fact is that you cannot serve two masters: if you think that civilization will crumble without TRIPS, you have to reject unilateral free trade.

Is there an intellectually valid reason for supporting unilateral trade liberalization while still believing in the need for multilateral copyright and patent agreements?

I think there probably is a defensible distinction.  In short, it is this: there is a colossal market failure in the market for knowledge-based products which can only be corrected by government intervention, nationally and internationally, which menas that "free trade" in these goods would produce a sub-optimal equilibrium.  That is why they are different from other products.
Read the rest of this entry »

Binyavanga Wainaina, writing in Granta about how to write about Africa:

Throughout the book, adopt a sotto voice, in conspiracy with the reader, and a sad I-expected-so-much tone. Establish early on that your liberalism is impeccable, and mention near the beginning how much you love Africa, how you fell in love with the place and can’t live without her. Africa is the only continent you can love—take advantage of this. If you are a man, thrust yourself into her warm virgin forests. If you are a woman, treat Africa as a man who wears a bush jacket and disappears off into the sunset. Africa is to be pitied, worshipped or dominated. Whichever angle you take, be sure to leave the strong impression that without your intervention and your important book, Africa is doomed.  ….

Broad brushstrokes throughout are good. Avoid having the African characters laugh, or struggle to educate their kids, or just make do in mundane circumstances. Have them illuminate something about Europe or America in Africa. African characters should be colourful, exotic, larger than life—but empty inside, with no dialogue, no conflicts or resolutions in their stories, no depth or quirks to confuse the cause.

Animals, on the other hand, must be treated as well rounded, complex
characters. They speak (or grunt while tossing their manes proudly) and
have names, ambitions and desires. They also have family values: see how lions teach their children?
Elephants are caring, and are good feminists or dignified patriarchs.
So are gorillas. Never, ever say anything negative about an elephant or
a gorilla. Elephants may attack people’s property, destroy their crops,
and even kill them. Always take the side of the elephant. Big cats have
public-school accents. Hyenas are fair game and have vaguely Middle
Eastern accents.

You must read this in full.

Interesting article in The Grauniad by Laura Barton who claims that 2005 has seen a decline in the monopoly control of the marketing departments of music companies:

This has been the year fans have increasingly taken music into their own hands, rejecting the over-processed diet served up by many major labels in favour of something a little more homemade. In the process they have notched up numerous high-profile successes, including Arctic Monkeys, Arcade Fire, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Spinto Band and Nizlopi.

It does seem to me broadly right that it is in the interest of songwriters and performers that people should be able to share music, rather as many of us did with cassette tapes many years ago.

I have no inside information about this, but I don’t think Gordon Brown will become leader of the Labour Party, or Prime Minister.  My reasons are:

• the clear favourite almost never succeeds (think Gaitskell/Bevan, Foot/Healy)
• with David Cameron in charge of the Tories, the Labour Party will want someone of a younger generation
• Brown will be blamed, fairly or not, for slower economic growth and the impact of fiscal constraints in the coming years
• I suspect Blair will pick the moment of his departure to minimise Brown’s chances of succession

Who will it be instead?  My guesses would be (in no particular order) David Miliband, Ruth Kelly or Douglas Alexander.