I’m very concerned about the attempt to rush the passage of the Digital Economy Bill through the Commons.

I run a public wifi network for our crescent of shared houses. It’s my contribution from my own time and technical expertise.

In a time when thrift is essential, it saves us all money.

I also run a business providing software services both locally and internationally. I carry out much of my work over my internet connection at home.

But should even an accusation be raised that my network is being misused, the Digital Economy Bill means I risk disconnection and places upon me the considerable monetary cost of defending such accusations in court.

Filtering is not feasible in any meaningful sense. It’s impossible for me to distinguish between legal and illegal file-sharing traffic.

The Digital Economy Bill puts at risk the good I do for my community as well as my livelihood and deserves proper scrutiny.

As a constituent, I implore you to do all you can to ensure the Government does not rush the bill through, denying us our democratic right to scrutiny and debate.

Yours sincerely,

Mark Ferry

• Soprano [25MB]
• Alto [28MB]
• Tenor [23MB]
• Bass [23MB]
• Tutti [15MB]

The files were synthesized from these MIDI files with TiMidity and then encoded with lame.

Did the Hildersham and Balsham cross-country ride last Sunday. This is a 24km ride through South Cambridgeshire including a section along Via Devana, the old Roman road that ran from Colchester to Chester.

They had 180 riders this year (down from 250 last year – the recession I guess) though you didn’t get the sense that there were very many as starting times were staggered throughout the day. (I can just imagine trying to squeeze 180 giddy horses through the horseshoe fence by the start).

Weather held out on the day being mostly overcast with only very slight spitting, and it brightened up in patches during the ride.

Anne and I arrived at Rectory Farm in Hildersham with just enough time to get tea before the Lovely View trucks arrived and started at just after 10 am.

I attempted the first couple of fences, none of which I succeeded in coaxing Tango over. For later fences I learned to made my intentions clearer, kept my pace steadier, gave Tango a little more encouragement the stride before and we jumped a number of them – some less elegantly than others.

Some of the horses were clearly rather excited with all the activity, one man performing a decent saddle bronc on his bucking horse before executing a graceful, though unintentional, dismount.

The first half of the route continued with great long stretches across stubbly fields peppered with fences, past the water tower on Rivey Hill through Borley Wood (along otherwise private avenues past camouflaged huts apparently used for deer hunting) and along sections of Via Devana. The drink stop at the half way point was most welcome.

The second half took us to Dungate Farm on the edge of Fleam Dyke and, by a more direct route, back to Hildersham.

A great thankyou to all who helped organise and marshall a wonderful event!

Other maps: large, speed, elevation.

Official photos:  Aurar Photographic.

Raw GPS data: gpx

Photos on Flickr.

gnomeza’s Snowboarding Verbier 2008 photoset

Doh.

           My calendar

       like a desert.

      I'm a
      tumbleweed
                'snagged

on the solitary

             cactus

on the 14th of June.
Sorry I can't make it.

These are fleeting moments of creativity

And that’s all I have to say about that.

132 minutes of film of which 112 were time wasted.

A bowel-voiding vile vomit-inducing video.

Also: happy valentines day.

…even though I slept through New Year.