Archive for November, 2012
What does Leveson say about the Internet?
November 30th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
As I explained in this posting, a particular interest of mine around the Leveson Report is the relationship between print media and online media. According to an item in the “Guardian” newspaper today, in the course of 2,000 pages, Leveson only devotes one page to the Internet. But this is not accurate. In a report of 1,987 pages, […]
Posted in British current affairs, Internet | Comments (0)
A new picture of baby Catrin
November 28th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
It’s three weeks since I posted a photograph of my granddaughter Catrin and I know how much visitors to this blog enjoy seeing evidence of her progress, so here’s a picture taken today: As I try to do once a week, I collected her from nursery at the end of the afternoon. We then spent […]
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (5)
The things that I’m learning about water
November 28th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
It is now eight months since I was appointed the independent Chair of the Customer Challenge Group at South East Water which supplies drinking water to 2.1 million customers in Kent, Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire and Berkshire. I’m paid to do a day a week, but obviously the actual workload varies from week to week. This week, I […]
Posted in Consumer matters, Environment, My life & thoughts | Comments (0)
Waiting for Leveson – my note to the Hacked Off campaign
November 26th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
This short note suggests that the Leveson Report might need to be seen in the wider context of the Government’s Communications Review which is being led by the Department for Culture, Media & Sport. In May 2011, the then Secretary of State Jeremy Hunt issued an open letter which launched the DCMS Communications Review which is […]
Posted in British current affairs | Comments (1)
“Inside, I’m screaming” – or another view of the Chinese ‘miracle’
November 25th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
There is quite a lot on my web site about China because I have visited the country three times and read several books about the subject. In many ways, the economic developments of the last three decades have been amazing and hundreds of millions of Chinese citizens have been lifted out of poverty. But more […]
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
The rise and rise of Stella Creasy
November 25th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
On an earlier version of this blog, I tipped Barack Obama as a possible future US President while he was still fighting for a Senate seat in Illinois. so I hope that readers of this blog were watching when, almost two years ago, I did a posting suggesting that Stella Creasy, then a newly-elected MP […]
Posted in British current affairs | Comments (0)
Looking out for Leveson – and the struggle to achieve an effective system of press regulation
November 24th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
This week, I visited the offices of Hacked Off, the campaign for a free and accountable press, and, on Thursday, the Leveson inquiry will report when the judge will make recommendations on the future of press regulation in the UK. Meanwhile I’ve been looking at the book “Everybody’s Hacked Off” by Brian Cathcart and I support fully […]
Posted in British current affairs | Comments (0)
16 segments of European states that threaten to break away – or have already effectively done so
November 23rd, 2012 by Roger Darlington
Some people thought that the European Union project would dampen down pressures for bits of European nation states to seek secession. The idea was that we would have a ‘Europe of the regions’ with citizens less concerned about which country they beloged to. It hasn’t happened like that. In EU nations both large and small, […]
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
How information technology came to the aid of the babysitter
November 22nd, 2012 by Roger Darlington
On Wednesday, the nursery attended by my granddaughter Catrin (almost two) was closed for staff training and my son and daughter-in-law asked me if i could help out by looking after her for the day. My clever plan was to team up with my young friend Jen and her son James (just over two) and […]
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (5)
Is the customer really king?
November 20th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
The whole of my portfolio career of the last 10 years has been about representing the interests of the customer/consumer/citizen – see my current and previous appointments here. So I was interested this afternoon when I visited the offices of the Hacked Off campaign for effective regulation of the press because it is located in […]
Posted in Consumer matters | Comments (0)