So the United States shut down Megaupload.com today.

The United States is the major hub and remains over-represented in the management and delivery of the Internet (cf. ICANN) which, as I recall, has always been done in a consensual, multi-organisational, global environment without the need for tampering in the form of regulatory control or oversight. It’s a bit like Belgium sans gouvernement: you let people who know what they’re doing get on with it and you find that they do well enough without intervention from the political class and the money men (who are the only ones losing out here, let’s face it).

What the United States .gov has chosen to do here unilaterally – shutting down a Hong Kong company primarily serving out of China – has an obvious effect on the rest of the world, but we would be foolish to swallow any assertion that this has been done “to protect and to serve” the rest of the world.

This political blinkering is compounded by a general failure, as far as I see it, to find and support a proper, open global forum for the discussion of the Internet-specific issues beyond narrow and exclusive processes like ACTA which are about as open as a maximum security jail.

Certainly orgs on a supranational level such as WIPO have not really grasped the nettle. This may be because the ACTA process has cut them out of the deal.

Elsewhere the output of interesting developments like WSIS and WGIG has either remained fairly abstract or slowed to a trickle.

Old men with old ideas shuffling slowly

As I see it, this generation of representatives and legislators is faced with a phenomenon for which it does not really have a proper vocabulary. It continues to apply proprietary models that date back to medieval society.

These models are flawed in the online context because they are based on intrinsic notions of fixed physical boundaries and transactions conducted essentially between two parties, each with obligations that bind them to the other.

It is fairly obvious that the Internet does not slide nicely into this particular suit of armour.

To quote the Wikipedia article on WGIG:

IT experts have expressed doubts that a UN body that does not necessarily know enough about the Internet will effectively coordinate the Internet technologically.

If the Internet were a physical object, for that generation it would be a quantity of mercury: a marketable yet frustrating, shapeshifting and fairly noxious liquid which needs to be contained in a bottle.

In fact, the Internet is more like oxygen. It’s already out of the bottle, it’s all around us, you can’t measure it and even if we share a common need for it, we each have a unique relationship with it. You can package bottles and sell them in lots. You cannot package an atmospheric gas, you can only cut access to it.

So if the lawmakers have abdicated from addressing the more technical aspects of the Internet, how do they propose to address the issue?

The Internet is also, for want of a better term, a cross-cutting issue. What we are talking about here ticks an awful lot of boxes and individual institutions will find it hard to address these modern questions with the relatively narrow scope of their respective remits.

The Internet includes elements of intellectual property, the law of contract, freedom of expression, human rights, international law etc because it is the collective product of human intelligence.

If you focus on the tangible targets – the companies, the websites and the servers – you ignore the the way people behave and vice versa.

After all that, my feeling about the Internet is that it’s a reflection of our world. Some good, some bad.

Perhaps those few with the big vested interests are the ones who need to evolve instead of trying to impose their self-serving control on “the rest of us”.

I recently read a French translation of Orhan Pamuk’s Istanbul. Equal parts autobiography, meditation and literary examination, the book reflects on the past and present of one of the world’s great cities.

The central theme of Istanbul is a sense of collective sorrow that Pamuk perceives in his hometown and which he likens to huzun, a word of Arabic origin found in Islamic scripture.

Huzun translates roughly as “sadness for things lost” and according to Pamuk its use in the Koran is ambiguous. It may refer to a rejection of sadness at wordly loss since such things are nothing compared to Allah. Instead it may express the feeling of sadness provoked by a worldly event, entailing the reminder that one cannot be closer to Allah.

Pamuk suggests that huzun is an undercurrent felt by all natives of Istanbul who witnessed the years following the establishment of the Turkish Republic.

When the capital was moved to Ankara in late 1923, the Anatolian stronghold of the Republican movement, the old Ottoman seat was left to its own devices. For Istanbul the transition from empire to nation entailed a sustained period of urban decay characterised by the impoverishment of the population and the mass destruction of buildings by fire or neglect.

It occurred to me that this sensibility, when expanded beyond mere notions of nostalgia or specific historical circumstances, is by no means unique to Istanbul.

I have heard something similar from Iranians strongly aware (and proud) of their past greatness.

A whole culture has grown up around the concept of saudade in Cabo Verde and Lisboa.

And then Germans, always surprising in the subtle complexity of certain of their abstract nouns, have their weltschmerz. Perhaps most famously of all, there is the gauzy, insubstantial mono no aware of the Japanese.

No single word in English may do justice to what is a very intricate cultural meme but perhaps among the best is ‘wistfulness’.

The Belgian non-government led by Yves Leterme has announced a plan to tackle public debt by the issue of public bonds. Leterme was quoted in Thursday’s Le Soir as saying:

« Vu les difficultés sur les marchés financiers, nous voulons davantage faire appel à la capacité d’épargne des Belges pour financer la dette »

Given the present difficulties on the financial markets, we want to appeal to Belgians’ capacity for saving money.

Government bonds are supposed to be risk-free – this is their principal attraction – and Belgian people are indeed notable savers among Europeans. The government is now offering the incentive of a 4% interest rate for Belgians willing to fill the coffers in support of financing their burgeoning national debt.

There are however a couple of problems with the proposal of Leterme et al.

Firstly, we have embarked on a unique period in Europe, in which the economic landscape will almost certainly look rather different in five years’ time. So while Belgium is not in the same fix as Greece, there is no longer such a thing as a risk-free investment.

Secondly, Belgium is a strongly divided nation which still lacks a government after another recent breakdown in talks (indeed the political crisis itself is thought to have cost €1.8bn so far) and many potential investors may question how their money might be used.

Today we all dined out at lunchtime for a nice change, to mark the departure of our colleague Jamila (centre in the picture above).

I was required to say a few words and I realised that this was the first time I’d ever had to do so.

Jamila is moving on to another client and she’ll doubtless be a great asset when she gets there.

وداعا لك Jamila!

Vigorously beat two or three eggs. We get ours from J’s colleague Danny who, like many Flemish householders, keeps his own chickens. Not sure what Danny feeds them, or else we’ve become all too used to the bio supermarket eggs, but those yolks are pretty fluorescent.

Up next, we beat in the usual suspects: a teaspoon of paprika (smoked paprika if you can find it: it’s rare here in Belgium), a bit of cayenne pepper, a few twists of sea salt, a crushed clove of garlic (or not, if you’re romancing), lots of black pepper and a pinch of delectable saffron.

Beat it black and blue to avoid clumping of the spices, add a drop or two of milk to taste and then beat again.

Stick the mix in the fridge and turn on the grill. While that’s heating up, pop on the kettle for some coffee.

Personally, I like single-origin Ethiopian coffees best: Sidamo is really smooth and goes well with Sunday mornings, while Yirgacheffe will do nicely for those crapola wet Mondays before school.

Some of the best I’ve enjoyed here comes fresh from Javana in Brugge but I don’t get up there often these days.

Next heat a knob of butter or a teaspoon of olive oil in a non-stick pan until it thinly covers the bottom.

Dampen the pitta breads on both sides and put them under the grill.

Out comes the orange-red, eggy goodness and into the pan it goes. Leave it a minute so until it starts to flocculate, then turn it slowly from time to time until it firms up nicely.

When the egg’s looking pretty solid in there, turn down the heat and get your pittas out. Carefully slit them open and, if you’re feeling super goloso, butter or drizzle them with oil.

Last of all, stuff those lovely pittas full of egg action. Add a dash of tabasco sauce if you’re feeling brave and maybe a pinch or two of parsley.

Eat and enjoy, preferably with loved one(s).

Source: Wikimedia Commons

Nobody sane reads the minutes of the “Monthly Meeting of the Board of Executives and the Staff Union”, right?

There’s nothing in there but “can we have a better coffee machine” or “new regulations on toilet paper use”, right?

Wrong.

The other day I happened to come across a copy of the June edition from a certain company, in the midst of which somebody had angrily highlighted a couple of paragraphs.

The gist was as follows:

The Union Representative asked the Board:

If the following statements issued by the Board at the end of the last quarter are true…

• Market conditions over the last few years have been ‘very challenging’
• We are currently facing a high-value lawsuit from a government body which means that we have to ringfence funds to cover that risk
• Our profit margins have been progressively narrowed by increased competition and delivery problems on certain big projects
• Finances will remain tight for the foreseeable future until we can cover the loss of three quarters of the value of the corporate pension fund, which was significantly diminished by overexposure to certain financial markets within the broader context of the ongoing financial crisis

… how does the Board justify that, while staff salaries have decreased by 6% in real terms in the last four years, during the same period the Board’s ten highest salaries have increased by over 30%?

You couldn’t make it up.

A malfunctioning cash register inadvertently brought us some good advice with this morning’s cup of java lava. They should set this up as a proper service.

Thanks to Uncle Luc for the photo!

Source: Wikimedia Commons

What do you put on the homepage of a website about everything ever?

Wikipedia, the oracle of online omniscience, answers this question beautifully with a daily plucking from its vast repertoire of content.

With a snappy summary and an intriguing image, you’re up and away on a digital magic carpet, skimming over the fascinating landscapes of Esoterica.

However, today’s selection was an unexpected source of mirth this morning:

Fanny scratching in 18th-century London’s Cock Lane was so notorious that interested bystanders often blocked the street … Fanny scratching eventually resulted in several prosecutions, and the pillorying of a father

At first I had this pegged for the last revenge of a disgruntled Wikipedia editor. Then I clocked the date. An April Fools Day joke masquerading as a fascinating tale of pre-Victorian squalor.

She is not amused.

Source: Wikimedia Commons

The Victorians themselves would never have got the joke. We English are often reminded today that those same Victorians deserve most of the credit for our sexually-repressed English sense of humour.

The 2007 edition of Let’s Go Western Europe, an anglophone backpackers’ bible, attempts to prepare non-British readers for a visit to Britain with a bit of background.

Summing up the culture and history of a whole nation in a couple of paragraphs was never going to be a backpack in the park, but Let’s Go gamefully wades in, describing the English sense of humour as “raunchy” and therefore somewhat at odds with the popular impression of “English reserve” held abroad.

If this is actually true, it was not always thus. Indeed Victorian Britain abhorred raunch. English humour during Queen Vic’s reign was much broader than the claustrophobic, organ-fixated morals and manners of our own times. In a rare Daily Mail article (‘rare’ inasmuch as it is actually quite good), AN Wilson describes the kind of content one finds in a Victorian jokebook:

Marry a woman with a wooden leg. When you want a spree, steal the leg, she can’t run after you!

Quite. Beyond the Victorians, Wilson delves deeper into the bargain bin and comes up with Shakespeare and Chaucer: fertile ground, as John Sutherland notes in The Guardian, for richer and far ruder treasures.

With decorous dialogues and sparkling soliloquies, Shakespeare’s poetry and prose often soared high. Bawdy bard that he was however, occasionally it would also swoop very low indeed:

I’ll be a park, and thou shalt be my deer;
Feed where thou wilt, on mountain or in dale:
Graze on my lips; and if those hills be dry,
Stray lower, where the pleasant fountains lie.
Within this limit is relief enough,
Sweet bottom-grass and high delightful plain,
Round rising hillocks, brakes obscure and rough,
To shelter thee from tempest and from rain…

— Shakespeare, Venus and Adonis

Meanwhile Chaucer’s responsibility for rudeness is aggravated by the paucity of contemporary works for comparison, together with his status and singularity in English literature.

Derk was the nyght as pich, or as the cole,
And at the wyndow out she putte hir hole,
And absolon, hym fil no bet ne wers,
But with his mouth he kiste hir naked ers
Ful savourly, er he were war of this.

— Chaucer, Miller’s Tale

Were he here to answer to the charge of excellence in picturesque smut, Chaucer’s excuse in The Canterbury Tales might be that his characters – his Miller, Reeve and Wife of Bath – are doing the talking. Moreover, they’re only treading the well-worn pilgrim’s path of a literary genre called fabliau in which a certain degree of filth was expected and even encouraged.

Today, both Shakespeare and Chaucer are of course required reading on the syllabus of every schoolkid in Britain. Say no more.

When I was a kid I graduated from paper rounds to a part-time job in a supermarket. If you took a few moments’ time out from sorting the soups from the baked beans, you could learn a thing or two about life.

I stocked up so much material during my two-year stint that I seriously considered writing a modern day Canterbury Tales set in a branch of Tesco.

Some people moan that Christmas starts earlier every year, almost at the end of November. Not supermarket workers. They know that Christmas paraphernalia is piled up in an enormous warehouse outside some town in Cheshire until mid-August.

That’s when it ships out to the stores where it remains in a dark corner until the last days of September. Occasionally a member of staff might pass by and hear the faint sound of a Santa doll packed deep in a cardboard box, playing jingle bells until the unbranded battery runs out.

The majority of those people – the early Christmas moaners – they’ll still pucker up and start early, buying their jars of mincemeat and their half-price value packs of recycled, charity greetings cards in November. Or, like J and I, they’ll make a pact with their nearest and dearest not to spend pots of money on gifts. But we go further than that. We renounce all pressies for ourselves.

Rather than being an honourable resolution, this is regrettably the point every year where we enter a state of Gift War.

Gift War is like the Cold War only it happens at home. We decorate our tree with modesty and restraint and we stand back and we admire it. Next day, I feel like taking another self-congratulatory look at our handiwork and – to my horror – there’s a stack of beautifully wrapped little presents on one side of the tree.

I feel a flash of anger. I’m annoyed at myself and I’m no longer thinking about our erstwhile pact. I’ve got nothing for J and there are only a few days until Christmas.

I have to go one bigger and one better. I find a good-sized, boxed gift and I have the shop wrap it. I smugly head for home to counterbalance the tree with it. When I get there all rosy-cheeked, she’s put more neat little packages on her side. My nice box is no longer sufficient. The gift race – the building up, the stockpiling of presents on either side of the tree – this goes on right until the shops close on Christmas Eve, without a hint of perestroika.

Then Christmas Day finally comes. The hostilities cease. We sit on the floor, either side of the tree, and laugh at how we broke our pact yet again. And we have a sherry and we forget about the mad month we’ve had, racking our brains for new ideas, running around the shops, hiding stuff in silly places.

We forget at least until the following October, anyway.

Source: Wikimedia Commons

When I came to work in an international environment here in Brussels, I made a very British choice.

It will be remembered that Britain drives on the left, uses different plugs and spells English words correctly.

My choice was to stick with a qwerty keyboard while everyone else works with the azerty version.

The trouble with azerty you see – apart from the fact that the order of some alphabetical keys is different – is that punctuation and numbers all require a shift key. Indeed, getting certain characters frequently used in programming can require a special talent for finger gymnastics.

Of course, when it then comes to writing emails in French, the qwerty lets us Anglophones down. No sign of any fancy accents and graves and circumflexes and unless we want to borrow everything one by one from a character map, we’re a bit stuck.

My solution requires a good memory for patterns. It’s basically a cheat sheet of codes usable in Windows, because all those fancy characters are actually accessible via simple combinations of the Alt key and a numeric code:

I printed off the list and then fixed it to the side of one of my screens. When writing text in French I didn’t need to look far for the appropriate combination. Over a period of time and use, I actually memorised many of the most common ones.