I have some interesting scrawled notes from a train conversation with Richard earlier today. He was talking about software engineering management (don’t go away, I’m going to relate it to other things in a moment), and how there is a scale upon which you can slide too far one way and things go wrong. This […]

Imagine that someone owned a patent giving them the exlusive right to know how to make a piece of toast, or how to lock a front door. Everytime you did one of these simple actions, you risk being sued and forced to pay huge damages for patent violation. In the world of software developers, this […]

The media is an interesting and double edged sword. Newspapers and TV can act for freedom and democracy, unearthing problems in government, championing what the common man would do himself (if he had the time and the contacts). On the other hand, they can be a divisive barrier, splitting us apart from our elected representatives, […]

Exciting national media fame. Yesterday, the Independent newspaper printed a story about MP voting records (view it now before the Indy charge you for it next week). It’s entirely based on data from Public Whip. I made them a special report of the voting record for the 2002-2003 parliamentary session. You can find the full […]

Some of my blogging energy has been siphoned off into an irregular newsletter for Public Whip, the MP voting website that I do with Julian. I just sent out the second issue. You can read it here. You might want to sign up if you like what you see.

This week we released the game that I’ve been working on. It’s called FleaFall, and it rocks. Try it out! Naturally, now comes the job of marketing. You don’t understand capitalism until you’ve had a go yourself. Most of us are quite isolated in corners of a hierarchy somewhere. We’re not really sure what the […]

Sarajevo (first photo) was absolutely astonishing. I arrived unknowningly some way out of town at an eastern bus station, and was amazed by the taxi ride through what seemed like a teaming metropolis. I’d expected it to be rundown and wartorn, but by night it was a thriving European capital. After leaving my luggage at […]

I quickly visited the ancient ruins of Butrint in the south-west, which were a bit disappointing. Tirana, the capital of Albania, was even more so. I arrived too near sunset, with the guidebooks both warning you to be careful going out at night, at least in the suburbs. In a rush, I found a decent […]

Land borders are always fascinating places, and the one between Greece and Albania was no exception. The bus services are awkward or non-existent to border posts in this part of the world, so you have to hire a taxi to drop you off there. After crossing the Greek checkpoint on foot there was a long […]

Just a quick post, as internet access is expensive here. Or at least it feels expensive as you have to put coins in a slot. I’m in Kalambaka towards the north of Greece. The attraction here are the impressive Meteora, huge pillars of rock topped by 14th century monastries. The Byzantine empire was collapsing, and […]