The Null Device

2002/8/22

Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the web, is #12 on a list of 100 greatest Britons ever, created by the BBC by polling over 30,000 people. Though, for some reason, Julie Andrews is #2 (behind only Alfred the Great) and David Beckham is at #9 (ahead of such luminaries as Chaucer, Dickens and Shakespeare). Ah, I get it.. it's in alphabetical order. Which makes the claim of Berners-Lee being in 12th place sound a bit daft.

Other odd entries include Aleister Crowley (didn't know he had that much of a following), Paul "Bono" Hewson (hang on, isn't he Irish?), and the "Unknown Soldier". And I'm not sure if people like Robbie Williams (wasn't he a former boy-band dancer or something?) belong on a list of "greatest Britons of all time". Ah well, at least they didn't accept Ayn Rand, L. Ron Hubbard or Jesus Christ as "Britons".

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Yesterday's crop of search engine referrals to this blog was a mixed bag: "morrissey gay", autism blog (I may be somewhat introverted, but come on...), MIT blackjack team, quickzilla and three separate Slowdive- related requests. Not to mention the usual jumble of random words; what's up with that?

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I rocked up tonight to the blog meetup day today. This time it was held at the Gin Palace, a classy (if expensive) drinking emporium, and not anywhere as offensive as the Starbucks. My old friend Cos was there as well, and we ended up talking about digital photography, Ben Sherman shirts, subcultures in Singapore and Belgian beer, among other things I wasn't sufficiently sober to recall.

I wasn't too sure at first about what kinds of people would attend a public blogmeet; I was half prepared for a mix equal parts hairy-backed warbloggers and wacky, obsessive teenaged girls. Fortunately, it wasn't anywhere near that bad. I met a number of other bloggers, among them Mark O'Meara, Pixelkitty and Jen, and ended up talking with cypherpunk Julian "Proff" Assange (who must be commended on his taste in headwear) about mass surveillance and other fun stuff.

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