This Bitcoin boom is going to end in tears!

I have been following the development of Bitcoin and Blockchain for a number of years now.

What was once the realm of the Alternative Web and those involved in subversive activities it has now become mainstream.

Frost on the middle meadow

Here a shot taken this morning of the middle meadow with the low sun shining through the trees.

The colours and aspect ratio seem to be very different to that seen on the iPhone. It was too cold to fly this morning.

Aerial photography

I am thinking that I will dedicate this blog to Aerial Photography as unlike some of the visitors to this site I do have other interests other than promoting myself.

This blog has nothing and never has had anything to do with who I am and what I do for a business. I have expressed an opinion on various issues but these were in isolation from anything that effected my livelihood. If I have seen or come across something that makes no sense to me I have made comment. There have been a few occasions where my views have not met with a positive response from those that I have criticised. I make no apology for this.............

Mavic gimbal problem and missing rear foot.

Having thought that the morning frost would make a good photo I managed to get stuck in the apple tree!

A ladder was fetched from the shed and much prodding of branches finally brought the Mavic back to ground with a thud. I am guessing that it landed on the gimbal as apart from some broken propellers and a missing foot the Mavic would not initialize the gimbal on start-up.

As you can see in the photo the gimbal/camera assembly looks normal but the foot was AWOL.

I managed to fix the gimbal problem by some judicious "adjustment" of the bearing of the axis of the gimbal that was sticking. Manually moving the camera in the gimbal, in this case from left to right, as shown with the camera oriented as shown above, I could determine where the gimbal was snagging. Applying some pressure in the direction away from where I thought the bearing was binding freed it and it then returned to a more-or-less central position when released. Performing a gimbal calibration and on start-up the gimbal was sticking in this position. Now the calibration proceeds with flying colours (literally).

I am now flying without the extender legs but I did get a downward sensor calibration error which I now know how to fix!

SEA as opposed to SEO

Google are really just interested in Search Engine Advertising. The overtures that they make to webmasters about SEO is just a means to an end. This being that they get revenue from both the website owners and their customers.

Reading some of Google's advice for SEO it has become clear that there is little new in what they have been saying all the time that they have been in business. There is a lot of talk bout KEYWORDS. Keywords in URLs, keywords in page titles, keywords in anchor text in fact keywords in everything. As all webmasters can confirm Google is very keen to sell you KEYWORDs and ADWORDS. This, I think, shows their real motive. Unique content seems to feature pretty low in their list of recommendations. To my mind it is the content that is key to a well designed and run website.

The use of keywords in the way that Google suggest will only work if the keywords are relevant to the website on which they are used. In addition the value of a keyword, such as "real estate" is only relevant if you have paid Google to promote your site in their SERPs. I generic term such as "real estate" will only be relevant if you have an external mechanism that will list your site when a local Internet user searches for "real estate" in your area. The use of a persons name in a websites domain or page URLs will include the site and pages in Google SERPs but do nothing unless the person making the search already knows the name. In fact, the use of a real name in a website is of secondary importance as the real reason that you should be producing a site is to promote a business and not an ego trip. This, of course, is the case unless your name or company is something like John Lewis. 

The joys of rural broadband

Last week we were "out" for 8 days, Moles had chewed through a fiber cable in a distribution box linking our house with the neighbours. BT is unable to provide us with an ASDL connection s we are reliant on a Point-to-point service. The problem with this is that there is no line-of-site from any of the towers in the area. Our connection comes from a fiber connection from the house down the road. This seems like over-kill but at least it works. Fiber sounds like we have high speeds, well we don't!

Planting some seed

I realise that it is a little late in the year but let's see if it germinates.

I am now well set for the spring. My intention is to get the middle meadow nettle-free and with a reasonable turf. More pictures to follow.

The relevance of the Internet Archive

When you see a link to the WayBack Machine for a website it is most likely to be a version of the website that the author has updated since that time.

If there is no current version then I think you can safely conclude that the archive has no relevance.

The problem with English Churches

Is that Britain is largely a secular society. Many profess to have no religion and others, like me, say that there is no god. The congregations of parish churches in rural areas is dwindling. The church down the road from us has one of just half a dozen faithful.

This is a pity as there are so many fine historic buildings that deserve support and should be maintained as part of Britain's heritage.

While it is true that we have an affection for old churches and historic buildings in general, we are not going to signup as Christians any time soon. However, we will continue our support of the local church and its maintenance. To suggest that I could be in any way intimidated into an apology for what I have reported in the past on the threat of exposure of a sexual profile that does not exist is ludicrous.

I can just imagine the response of a vicar or rector of a parish church if they were called and told to look out for me! Even if they did know me and they followed the link I doubt if it would make any sense to them. Of the 400 apparently there were only 50 to go when I was last updated on this venture. I have not heard anything since so I am presuming that they either do not care or more likely have not been called.

Threatpost.com and Kaspersky

It is interesting to note that the US government has banned the installation and use of Kaspersky anti-virus software on their computers.

Now that Hillary is telling everyone that the Russians did it, one wonders if Donald or Wayne even know who Jeff Moss is.

Threatpost are the news outlet of Kaspersky and when I was posting regularly on this topic I reported that Threatpost were saying that Cabanak were stealing $1B from banks. Since that time I am now more concerned that such comments will garner interest in the illegal activities that I have been up to. This is instead of attempting to take the spotlight off them by criticising others that can't answer back!

Find my drone

Another DJI feature that is not well documented.

It actually works quite well.

I did a little experiment and the screenshot above shows the location of the drone and the options to make the brushless motors beep.

Once again, this is a prime example of how DJI fail to explain how functions of their product and seem to rely on the Internet forums to provide information on them. If you search for "DJI Find my Drone" or "ESC Beeping" you will find many posts that allude to how this function works. However, there is no explanation of what ESC means and how the beeping is to be used in finding the drone.

ESC - is Electronic Speed Control(ler) and it turns out that you can use the controller to made the motors act as a speaker/beeper. This beeping and the Smart LED options appear if you click on the drones location on the map. These buttons will also appear if the drone has been lost for a long(ish) time, see below. and the drones battery is exhausted.

As the forums tell you the beeping and LED functions will not be available unless you still have an RC connection with the drone. The buttons to make the motors beep is triggered by tapping on the "lost location" on the map.This would be the case (hopefully) in the immediate event of a crash or a flyaway as you hopefully would have sufficient battery power left. You will also be able to see the radio (RC) connection signal level, the number of GPS satellites the drone can currently see and the remaining drone battery level. If the drone has performed an automatic RTH due to an RC connection loss of failure to access a sufficient GPS signal the figures you may see are the last recorded values before the loss occurred.

Using your Smartphone, using its own GPS, you will be able to walk or drive to the drone location by viewing your relative position on the map. When you get close you should be able to hear the beeping or see the LEDs. If the battery gets exhausted then this will not be an option.

Even if you don't have an RC connection you will still be able to locate the last recorded co-ordinates by using the map in the dji Go app or even use Google maps to provide you with directions to the drone. You can test the "Find my drone" operation even if you have not lost your drone as the app will record the co-ordinates of the last place that you landed successfully.

The most important feature here is that the "Find my drone" function is useful for both situations where an immediate crash or flyaway has occurred or even when the drone jut goes AWOL and you cannot find it immediately. The information on the last will be stored in the DJI Go app until the next flight has been made. You can check this at anytime by selecting the function from the main screen of the app.

A trip to the coast

Barely an hour and half drive from home.

The seafront and lighthouse at Southwold

Downward vision sensor error

I guess this post will make as much sense as those you will find on DJI related forums.

A couple of times I have seen this system error, the first I managed to clip a few branches in the back yard. So I learnt not to ignore the warning assuming it was the same as the lack of GPS signal and all I needed to do was to get a bit of altitude to get a better look at the satellites. Come to think of this it was not logical as if ground recognition was poor, due to mis-calibration, then it was not likely to improve with more height.

In the first instance, when I was at home, the error went away after re-booting the controller and the Mavic Pro. I got the same error yesterday when I was out on the meadows and decided that it was wise to come up with a better solution to the problem. On perseverance I found a menu setting that allowed me to recalibrate the down-sensors. This involved the movement of the MP in a square formation in front of me while I was holding it above the ground in my left hand. Strangely, this was not to be found anywhere on the forums???? I gave up as I was getting the message that a calibration could not be done on a terrain that was textured, this being the grass of the meadow. So I decided to go back into town and look up a solution in the library on their computers.

Here I found references to the DJI Assistant, which runs on the computer while you have the FP connected directly using a USB cable. This allows you to do the same calibration using the computer screen as a target for the sensors, both forward and downward. I did, however, manage to perform the calibration using just the drone and the "square movement" procedure that I tried in the field. I was hampered in this in finding an unobstructed and texture free area in the back yard and had to resort to the picnic table again. Still, I proved that the same calibration could be performed away from my computer. When enough data had been captured by the sensors the FP seemed to recalibrate in the same way  as it did with the computer. I will be interested to see if this technique appears on the forums, where videos of how to use the Assistant and more prevalent.

There also seemed to be a lack of understanding of the difference between the forward sensors and the downward sensors.

Time to get rid of some stuff

Having been here in the UK for almost 3 years it is time to review some of the things we shipped from Canada.

Some things have not been used, or even taken out of their boxes. A lot of this includes computer equipment. These were things that I could not sell before I left but were too expensive to just trash. Motherboards, HDDs and cases - all not re-assembled are candidates. Especially the magnetic hard drives, I have no idea what is on most of them and having migrated to solid state I don't really care.

Kind of ironic considering the nonsense on having data recovered from such drives. Which I didn't.

Mavic battery maintenance

Looks like it is going to be a no-fly day. Rain has "socked in". Time to discharge the fully charged batteries.

I am surprised that DJI don't promote the use of the USB power adapter for the Intelligent  battery packs. They suggest that you run the rotor motors to do this. Surely this would put an undue wear on them?

If you have multiple iPads and iPhones it is best to use the fully charged packs charging them.

DuckDuckGo and TOR

TOR uses DuckDuckGo for its search engine.

When I see visits to this blog from DuckDuckGo searches I am a little suspicious.

$300,000US for services from ArcDis - you must be joking! Content, Marketing, Accounting Services, SEO --- I hope that you still have Joshua Shams permission to post those videos.

Content: Public Safety News indeed! You need to be consistent. There is no point in posting random articles that have no relevance to the subject in question at the same time claiming that an unsafe product is being sold. It only goes to making you look more stupid.

As I said before, Morris Brown is not your problem. Do yourself a favour and forget Morris, you are not going to get any money from him and his business is as lame as yours. 

Does this chimney look right?

I think it should have a chimney pot.

Serious Weed killer

I will have to treat the Blackthorn stumps with SBK

The weeds and nettles are starting to grow back in all my good work.

It will soon be time for some fires

I have several piles of Blackthorn cut into lengths for the wood-burning stove.

To think that the space above was impregnable this time last year!

The Bergamot by the side of the pond needs another strim.

Claas Lexion 570+

The digital media features in Windows XP?

This is 2017 - what is Windows XP?

Search me if I can see a reference to the person "embracing" them! If you are going to quote an article that possibly shows you as someone who has benefited the masses I would have thought you could come up with something better.

Why should I, and any other person finding the quote, believe this or any of the other fantasies that you are saying make you look good? I'm sure that the University of Saskatchewan would beg to differ.

A green and pleasant land

I was surprised this morning that there was nothing on the news that today is the anniversary of 9/11

As my act of remembrance I thought that I would post some photos of more pleasant things.

Bringing in the harvest. A view of one of the fields at the bottom of the garden. I believe that is a Class Lexion 570+ you see on the field there. I will be posting more about that later.

Above is the farm where we picked many kilos of plums. Plums that have been turned into Jam for sale in fund raising for the less fortunate of this fine area that we live.

A view looking down the garden. The trees are starting to show their autumnal colours.

We are not sure what created the crater in the above picture. It can only be seen on the map and from the air. You can reach it by footpath but you would not be able to see the perspective.

Sun shining through the trees at the bottom of the garden. This was taken pretty much at ground level but still from my new toy.

Another shot looking down the garden

More fields on the walk into town.

We will have to make the full walk. Maybe not both ways as we always have the option of talking a cab back home. That is one of the many advantages of living where we do. If we were still in North America to live in such a rural location it would cost a fortune to get a taxi back to where you live. You probably would have to book it in advance and explain to the driver how to get there and back. Here it is just a question of jumping in and telling the driver where you want to go.

The pond just down the road

It looks like the Stour, but it is a lake.
.

The pond is on the walk into town. Below is a view of the scenery that you walk through on the way.

When I see multiple domain registrations

.... it is normally an indication that the person making them is up-to no good.

Why else would you register a domain in the name of someone in your organisation? Why would you register a domain in the name of a company or person who you have done business with and possibly had a dispute?

No normal person or company needs more than one website/domain unless they are trying to prevent their competition registering a similar domain and attempt to "cash-in" on their success. If an indivual registers a domain in their own name they are either carrying out business under their own name, i.e. a sole proprietor, to register a domain in your own name for any other reason is pure vanity or an expression of your over-importance. In any case if you find a domain in your own name you are not likely to post content on that website that highlights your faults. If you do find one that is posting such information then you can be pretty sure that it is a "revenge" website.

When choosing a domain name one should be creative and choose one that expresses a theme such as the passage of time.

Woodbridge Tide Mill

These are some shots of the famous mill from an angle that most do not see on their visit.

and, where is Waldo?

 My partners favourite is the one looking over the river Deben estuary.

A fly-past

Following on yesterday's post here is a video version of the photographs.

Cavendish, possibly one of the most photographed "chocolate-box" cottages in the country.

Aa test to see what size of videos that I can easily upload directly from the Mavic SD card. It seems that Blogger has a size limit of 100M file size. I will have to make a few more short videos of local scenes and farming activity.

Cavendish, Suffolk

It is a pity that there was scaffold on the house behind the cottages.

The local pub

Morning Mist

This is a view over the brook from the bottom of the garden

The sun shining through the mist on what looks like another fine day. The cows have not awoken it would seem and all is still quiet. 

Fruits from the hedgerows

Autumn certainly is "a time of plenty". Yesterday,  and over the weekend we have been picking blackberries and damsons from the side of the road and across the fields.

Also a neighbour has a glut of Victoria plums and we have a cache of those as well. Much jam and chutney making has ensued and most of this will be sold in aid of charity. The problem now is that we are fast running out of suitable glass jars and we make have to camp out at the bottle bank to see what we can get from those that are throwing them out in the recycling. 

GWM - Googling While Muslim

I came across this concept while reading "Home Fire" by Kamila Shamsie.

It raises a whole lot of questions regarding data protection and surveillance techniques.

The act of looking up something, using Google or any other of the search engines, could trigger interest in you. The fact that you are also of a particular religious affiliation would also trigger that interest.

While I have no doubt that there are those that may be "on the radar" of the authorities for being associated with a particular group, as far as I know Google has no way of determining your political or religious beliefs. What you are looking for may indicate your leanings but a search in itself cannot correlate these factors.

In the air above the house

This shows the lush vegetation we are surrounded by, the church being one of our closest neighbours.

The shot was taken hovering at about 100 feet at the bottom of the garden, or the field behind. All the trees in front of the house are in the garden and the Blackthorn thicket was under the bottom right of the picture.

A direct visit to my page on Wayne McAlpine

From South Korea.

This must have been in response to my post on the fact that content has been moved from tempsfugit.ca to tempusfugit.me.uk. There was a link to this newish page on that blog post.

It could have been someone playing silly buggers and using TOR to select a random relay server, but I don't think that Wayne McAlpine is that smart.

tempusfugit.ca is now tempusfugit.me.uk

You may have noticed that requests to tempusfugit.ca are now telling you that the "requested URL is not found on the server". This is because all the content has been migrated to my UK server.

I see that there are still regular visits from Saskatoon

There seems to be a continued interest in what I might be saying about a certain person!

There is not really a lot more to say that I have not done s in the past. I will add that the person in question still is concerned that I have posted things about him that he does not like. As a consequence of this he has made up a whole host of lies about me in retaliation. This is an indication of the nature of this person and it is my contention that you should stay well clear of him should your paths cross.

DJI Mavic Pro

A new toy!

Took a great picture of the church this morning. Launching from the grave yard worked out well and I had a good line-of-sight of both the Hall and the surrounding fields.

The Mavic boards (users and owners) really are a bunch of wankers. A highly sophisticated product bought and used by those that have no technological clue. Mostly Americans. I have not come across a much bull shit since I was active on pond boards.

Your silence IS a weakness

You made the statement that I should not interpret your silence as a weakness. The fact that I did not contact you during the period from 2011 to 2016 was that I was aware that you were lurking as I was monitoring your visits to my website. I was just continuing my research into your antics and posting what I found to the Internet. So you weren't so silent as saw your interest in what I was saying.

I agree with Anthony Mannella that there was very little to be found about your dubious businesses on the Internet and that it could be concluded that I was the only one with a problem with you. I counter that with the statement that nobody else had the balls to call you out on what you have been up to over the years. What continues to puzzle me is why? I certainly have come across others that seem to have fallen victim to your devious ways, and some of them have communicated with me about you. In most cases they are not comfortable in making a statement against you. Or perhaps they are not in a position to do so and fear what you would do if they did?

I really cannot fathom what makes a person like you tick. All I did was make an innocent comment about a data recovery service that I thought was a little optimistic and then here we are 6 years later and you cannot get over it! While it is true that neither can I, but in some ways I am enjoying all this. I don't know what motivated someone to register domain names in those of people they want to discredit and then to post a whole load of irrelevant nonsense on them. Much of the content is made-up and by the single nature of its presentation it is clear to anyone finding it that you are pretty much just a "One Trick Pony".

By the way, how is the correspondence with the Suffolk churches going? I would be very interested in seeing some of the replies. Perhaps you can publish some of them to your websites about me? In the absence of any real ones you could always make some up!

As far as my interest in matters regarding security and privacy, I guess you have a point that it could be seen as a way of creating a "smoke-screen" to deflect interest from the other misdeeds that I may be perpetrating. The only problem with that is there are none. My interest is genuine and is a commentary on the nonsense that I see reported in the press. My point about the "One-Trick-Pony" serves to illustrate that there are any topics that are of interest to me as anyone who visits my sites will see. It is not ALL about you!

The Right to be Forgotten

It will be interesting to see if the new laws relating to Data Protection will make any difference to how we all carry out our business online.

I fail to see how any legislation is going to make a whole lot of difference about the amount of data that is collected by businesses. That is now part of their business models, determining their target markets by any means. The real problem is that consumers are not aware of the information that they are giving away and are likely not to be in a position to ask for its removal.

Those that want old posts, in most cases made by themselves, on Social Media removed are more likely to want it removed as they just don't like it. Like the prevalence of tattoos the things that can be found are just seen as normal and not something to be ashamed of. Post made about them by other parties is the real problem that "Social" users have. In this case it is neither the "Internet Company" or the person posted about that is in control of that information. It is the one that posted it and it is they that have to ask for its removal or they delete it themselves. You will just have to ask nicely!

Coastal Foraging today

Foraging around Grayson Perry's "House for Essex". I wonder if Wrabness is "drabness" as it looks on Google Streetview?

Certainly it cannot compete with the back garden this morning.

Password Harvesting Software

I have written code that will harvest banking information from accounts at many major banking institutions. I will make this code available to anyone who is prepared to share in the profits that they make from its use.

All you need to do is to contact me and I will tell you where to download it and provide more details on how this software works. You need to act quickly as the FBI have Marcus in custody and his software may not be available for much longer.

A Message for Asheville

What possible reason would I have to "damage" your business?

It is Wayne McAlpine that has PirateJack on his autoresponder when you send him an email at theramman.com.

He is neither TheRamMan or the operator of TheRamManINC - he is the one that is spreading lies.

It is Wayne McAlpine  that you should be asking "What the fuck are you up to?". It is Wayne McAlpine who you should tell to stop using your name. It is Wayne McAlpine who claims that he is the expert on "dangerous" auto parts. As you may have read I have my interests elsewhere! But, I doubt if even you believe that one!

Wayne McAlpine will stop at nothing to divert the true away from the fact that he is a liar and a fraud.

Lauri Love and Gary McKinnon

This was brought back to my attention by an article in the Telegraph magazine last weekend.

I had posted on this extensively on my website and on this blog, but so far there seemed to be no interest in my views. I think that this is an indication that "The Masses" and indeed the Media don't really have a clue to what it is all about.

I have been interested in all this for a while now and it was the focus of most of my posting over the last couple of years. The fact that Lauri also hails from Stradishall Suffolk has also not gone unnoticed by me. I find it particularly interesting that the Asperger syndrome aspect seems to play a role here. I do think that there is more than a touch of the Americans looking for a Scapegoat in their ineffectual efforts to come to terms with hackers and hacking.

Lauri has long been the "go-to guy" when it comes to the media wanting a spokesperson to explain the goings-on when it comes to cyber-attacks. He was there when the NHS was hit by the WannaCry attack. I find it rather ironic that Marcus Hutchins, the guy that reportedly put the brakes on Wannacry, was arrested after attending  DEFCON. Lauri would have suffered the same fate if he ventured into the States, he says that he would commit suicide rather than let that happen!

As I suggested the US are looking for Scapegoats. Blaming their ills on foreigners is the pattern we see over and over again. Home-grown hackers and criminals are more likely to be given jobs with a government institution on the strength that they are the "experts" in the field and better that they are "working for us" as opposed to against us. The foreign element ranges from "back-room" hackers such as Lauri Love to Nation States such as Russia and the Koreans. All these can be vilified with impunity as they, in large part, cannot be held to accout.

Bye Bye Scaramucci

I can't say that you will be missed!

This all compounds the fact that the Trump White House is dysfunctional. Better Trump than Pence, so let's hope he is not impeached. 

DEFCON Nonsense

I fail to see why this conference gets any coverage at all?

As long as people, and the media, believe in such stuff the fact that this is just all Smoke and Mirrors will just get perpetuated. I don't really expect that the general public and certainly not politicians will ever understand all this.

At least this time it was just a robot breaking into a combination locked safe and nothing to do with The Internet of Things and taking control of a motor vehicle by WiFi.

Credibility

Information that you find on the Internet not only has to be credible it also needs to be consistent.

Simply making up a story needs evidence other than what one person says for it to be believed. This evidence also has to be credible and independent of the first source of information, The creation of another fiction is NOT credible evidence. \especially when there is a clear link between the original and the backup.

The folly of registering domain names using a false name or one that you are trying to discredit is quickly revealed when you can easily check that the registrations were made by the same person.

On the subject of consistency, you cannot claim that someone has never talked to you or done business with you and then claim that they sent you a hard drive to have the data recovered from it.

As far as I can see the only reason that someone would do this is that they don't like what has been said about them and it is the only (pathetic) way that they can come up with to retaliate. 

The second episode of GOT seems to be very popular

EZTV made the torrent at sometime after 3am, and at 7am (my time) there were plenty of peers. However there were so many wanting the upload of what I had after about half an hour I had to reduce my upload to 50k to preserve some of my bandwidth.

I don't think that this is unfair as there were so many seeds that getting a bit from all of them is not going to slow the whole process. In any case I will be uploading the file for my friends who don't want to torrent on their computers.

Episode 2 is coming tonight!

Now doubt I will be asked to upload it to my UK website for my Lebanese friend.

I have plenty of server space and the download here is pretty fast as I don't have to use a VPN. The advantage of being where we are in the UK is that our Internet does not come through BT whose block sites such as ThePirateBay. Also my upload speed is pretty much the same as my download speed as my Internet connection is symmetrical. This is unlike Canada as my upload was far slower than my download. I guess this was to discourage the running of a website on your Internet connection.

My situation is doubly ironic as there are many here in the UK that moan that they cannot run a business on a rural broadband connection as it is too slow to enable ecommerce. I think that it is more a case of misconception and a political statement about that the promise of "Super-Fast Broadband" has not been achieved when the government said it would. 

I am not sure why I bother

to update this blog.

It seems that those that visit or find it are either looking for information about themselves or looking for something that doesn't exist.

Lately I have been speculating on whether any web activity is relevant in the form of a website unless you are a major company or do your business online. The days of the private website are long past. In the days of Social Media the platform that is most useful for the private Internet user is one of those "Social" portholes.

My experience with a local village website leaves me to believe that not many visitors venture there and in most cases they cannot find it by making a search. In any case most of their activity is carried out on their Smartphones and websites are only visited when e-commerce is being performed. People send text messages rather than send emails, comments and reviews on websites are pretty useless as they are either totally in support or from those that have purchased a "duff" product or encountered bad customer service.

Interest from Calgary and Saskatoon

Ironic that I see interest on my website from both of these places on the day I get a reminder for the renewal of my hosting package in Canada.

As visitors don't seem to be bothered in finding what the website is all about, the visits from Calgary and Saskatoon know all too well so they don't have to look, it calls into question whether I should renew for another year.

Winter is coming

Winter has come for the Freys.

The army in the North is assembling. The Whitewalkers now have a giant.

Winter is coming for the Waynes

The thicket is almost conquered

The blackthorn thicket is pretty much cut down. A bonfire is alight and most of the scrub has been burnt.

I can pretty much see from one side of the property to the other, around 600 pages when I counted. It is amazing that I can clock between 30,000 and 40,000 steps without leaving the property.

Making something out of nothing

In some ways I can see what Donald is saying. This Russia "thing" really is a distraction when he should be concentrating on "Making America Great Again".

Similar to the continued interest in this blog by a certain person (of even a group of people from Saskatoon) seems to indicate that someone has something to hide. Are the visits to this blog made in the hope, or fear, that something new is going to turn up?

Like Donald and the "Russia Thing" there is nothing here, everyone should really move on. However, in the case of Trump what he is trying to hide is that he is an idiot elected by a group of malcontents who believe in his promises. The "Russia Thing" is actually helping him as it takes the focus away from the fact that all he has done so far I his term is actually making America even more of a failed experiment than it was before. I have never believed the American Dream and the rest of the world seems to be "getting it" as well.

Nice trip to Bury St. Edmunds

Free parking after 3pm makes a difference it was also a while since we had been up to "The Big Smoke".

It was raining so umbrellas were the order of the day but we did not intend staying for long so it was not too bad. We didn't make it down to the Abbey and to take a walk around the gardens.

Buzzed by an Apache

The brook at the bottom of the garden seems to provide a perfect training valley for the local Apache helicopters to make their runs.

You can feel the vibrations from the rotors before you see and hear their motors. At a low altitude I can see the terror that they would instil in an enemy. Some have the guns/rocket launchers strung either side, today not so. One wonders if they are carrying ammunition.

and what does this mean?

Part of a post that is supposedly about me made by someone who thinks that I "have it in for him":

And all the people if you have harmed now we have the proof who so how does the bully like being bullied now put the pants and shirt on and jacket because it’s going to get f****** cold b****

All of the people (if) {I} have harmed
I have "harmed" nobody. Not even you it seems!

now we have proof - who so - how does the bully like being bullied?
What proof? Bullying???? - that is just an accusation that I made you of. and who is the "we"? - you are on your own on all this.
Making up stories about me is ludicrous - unlike what I have told the world about you.

now put the pants and shirt on (and jacket) ----- cold?
What???? Pants, shirt and jacket.........

Local Music Festival

I am really looking forward to this event! Held at the village hall, the local musicians and singers will be performing.

A BBQ and a clown for the kiddies, what more could you ask for?

The fires still burn

Last week I had a bonfire that lasted 6 days. The one I started on Saturday is still alight this week. The one I started last night is still alight this morning. The trouble is getting enough brush to feed them both.

Looking for deleted pages and graphics

Again I see a log entry for an image of my image of "Articles of Dissolution" from Montreal.

There was no search for it in Google cache so I am assuming that the person who was looking does not know how to do this. I am also assuming that the access was made from a Google Image search, although I am not sure how that would work for anyone interested in what I previously posted.

There was a similar visit from Montreal on the 27th June again I was not what this was all about.

Riverwalk Drive, Connectut

Where I lived when I worked on a contract for Executive Risk.

Looking back on Google maps it is strange to think that I once lived there. The location is quite superb looking overlooking the hills of Talcott Mountain State Park. My daily commute was a cycle ride along the disused railway line only crossing highway 10, State 202, the once before I arrived at work. At one point, when I was there on my own, I didn't even have a rental car. At the height of the contract there were 4 of us there from Canada and we rented two houses on the Riverwalk development.

To be honest I don't really know why I was there. The work was not that demanding but it was fun living in the States for a while and the money was good. The weekly commute from Toronto to Hartford was not a difficult one as Air Ontario were still in regular operation. Unlike when I was in New Jersey when they were more than often on strike and I had to make my way to Newark on other airlines. This was an opportunity to see the terminals at LaGuardia and Newark, and to experience carriers such as Continental.

It was also the time when my partners father passed away and I spent long hours emailing her mum in the UK. I think that I helped. I would spend a large part of my day writing to her looking out over the turning trees the other side of the Farmington River.

Simsbury was a strange place, not the America that Donald seems to want to make great again. In some ways I don't really see it as America. My views on that have changed since then as I was happy to call Canada my home at that time.

Times were different then, this was the age of  Oksana Baiul running her car into a tree. She was a resident to Simsbury at the time when she was training at the International Skating Center. This was also the age at the start of the Internet revolution. There was email and some websites but no Social Media and I am not sure if blogging had been invented. I can remember the wonder of making a search on Netscape and being amazed at the results.

34 Years in Canada

I really can't believe that we spent s long in Canada. On Canada Day it is time for a little reflection. We have been back in the UK for about 2 and a half years now and in some respects it was like we never left. I grew up in rural Essex and now I am back. A completely different part of the county but never the less the same one as my childhood. Perhaps that is why I have such an issue with the "Council Houses".

Canada was great for us. Leaving the UK on the eve of Margret Thatcher was probably a good move. Canada benefited from our UK education and they reaped all the taxes from our employment.

This place "just fits". In truth, where we currently live is not really the UK. The UK is currently in crisis with Brexit, something that I think will be a good thing in the long run. However, whatever the outcome it will not be something that will effect us too much. In a lot of respects the political situation has no bearing on our day to day lives.

Now living in a house that parts of which date from the 14th century with a garden that approaches 2 acres, we are having a lot of fun living the country life. Never in my wildest dreams, both when I originally lived in the UK and in Canada, did I think I would live in such a place. I must have cycled past such properties in my youth never thinking that I would ever live in one. As for the Social Class aspect of it all, I guess that Canada allowed us to side-step all that. Now we are rubbing shoulders with those that have had business and military careers and represent the "elite" of the UK.

In some ways this feels like an extended vacation. We joke between ourselves about extending the holiday rental and putting the flight date back. So are we Canadians? We are citizens and our first year we put the Canadian flag on the front gate on Canada day. Now I am not sure where it is. Will we ever go back to Canada, perhaps not for a vacation but possibly to sort out some business and finances. Most of our money is still in Canada, which is probably the best thing due to the current fall in Sterling. Eventually all the money will have to be repatriated and who knows what Canada pension we are entitled. RSPs will need to be converted or closed in any case. As far as a company pension my investments are taking care of that. I have long been amused by the "Pension Debate" that constantly goes on here in the UK. The "Triple Lock" certainly has little relevance for us. As for a heating allowance I am busy building a wood pile.

Google Analytics and Blogger Stats

The data reported here seems to be via two independent methods. In the case of this blog I use both Google Analytics and the built-in Statistics that is part of Blogger. I can see that there are far more visits recorded by Blogger that appear in my GA reports. This is also strange as I have  told Blogger not to record my own visits, something that I previously did with GA but gave up as it used cookies and required more programming.

I am surmising that the discrepancies are due to visits from those that are suppressing Javascripts but I am not sure if Blogger excludes visits from spiders. On the later I would think that Blogger does suppress Googlebot as it is part of its own DNA so to speak. However, I do see that a newly posted entry gets a visit soon after posting and I assume that is the first scan by the robot and have observed that the entry can then be found when making a Google Search. This is an indication that the new page is in the Google index.

This is not a problem for me as the combination of the two tracking methods allows me to get a pretty good idea of who is visiting and what they are interested in. The additional information that I can get from Google Analytics is useful as I can see geographic location and time of access more readily, but this is just icing on the cake.

As one of the reasons for running a website and this blog were to understand the dynamics of all this it is of little consequence to me that there are these differences. However, it is an interesting point to note and is in keeping with the over-all trust of my sites. As I am decommissioning my Canadian website, I don't intend to renew the current hosting when it expires I am relying less and less on what I see in the Analytics reports. I am also migrating some of the content from my Canadian domain to a UK one, but that is getting only limited response (in compared to this blog) so I might just continue with this blog exclusively. 

Strimmer fixed

The clutch spring from Einhell finally arrived. Fitting it was a question of taking off both shoes and attaching the spring so that they are pulled together. This is not easy as you have to fight with the spring, the solution was to stand on the shoes having offered them together at an angle I used a piece of cardboard to prevent the shoes getting scratched, as that possibly would have scored the inside of the clutch.

I should get around to posting the photos of the disassembled strimmer so that anyone else who has an Aldi 2-in-1 Grass trimmer/Brush cutter can see how to replace the clutch spring.

EU Lawmakers and Google

The latest fine imposed on Google for misleading the public in their shopping habits is a prime example of why voted to leave. The EU seems to think that we are all stupid in that if we make an Internet search we are not able to disseminate the results. The fact that there may be a bias that favours their own interests is obvious. It does not mean that this is unfair, it is just up to us to make our own determination of what is true and what is the best way to make a purchase (if this was the reason for out search). Google is a private company not a public service, is their any wonder that they may be promoting items where their business model makes money?

The last time that I made a comment on the EU and their stupidity regarding Internet searches was in relation to the "Right to be forgotten" legislation. In which the proposal was that outdated information about individuals would be excluded from search results when some searched for their name. I made a comment that I could not even search for my own name - this did not turn out to be the case and you can find out information that way, largely incorrect I might add!

The EU lawmakers seem to think that they are the guardians of the Internet and want to protect their citizens from "Big Brother". In the case of Microsoft and their inclusion of Internet Explorer in Windows was a case in point. It was not as if there are not alternative browsers, they didn't have to insist that a special version of Windows be produced for the European market without I.E. being the default browser. As far as I know this ruling has been about as effective as the "Right to be Forgotten", and there are no differences in the versions of Windows that I have purchased recently in Europe. Perhaps the EU determined that the UK had already left the union?

It is my contention that Google's approach to this is more of a competition with the likes of Amazon. This is all part of doing business in the Internet age. I do have a problem with the fact that rulings like this have an effect on the share price. I personally see a fall of thousands of $US in my holdings of Alphabet stock. I also own Amazon, so that probably balances it out.

Why I maintain this blog

Basically to get things off my chest. My wide following of visitors seem to be interested in what I post and, hopefully, find some interesting information on people and services that I comment on.

As you will see if you take the trouble to look around at some of the posts on this blog the subject matter is very wide and is not restricted to a particular topic. Unlike many blogs and websites this blog does not focus on a particular agenda such as the promotion of a political ideology, discussion of a particular technology or certainly not as a means to discredit an individual that I disagree with.

The difference between a Blog and a Website.

A blog is essentially a chronological account with the most recent post appearing first when the site is accessed. In this case that post becomes the "Home" page of the blog. With a "website" you can choose a "home" page.

The navigation of a blog is mainly via a calendar list of posts. A Website would have to have a specially designed menu system. As such the blog will display the last item that the author has posted to the blog. This may not be the intention of the owner of the blog.

A blog is generally easier to maintain as all the "overhead" is taken care of by the blogging software. If you run your own design of website you are responsible for not only the HTML of the pages but also the upload and organisation of the files on an Internet server. It is far easier to maintain a user feedback mechanism in the way of comments using a blog as the moderation and handling of those comments is taken care of by the blogging software. If you have just an email link on your website you will have to administer that separately from the blog. While it is possible to include a comment facility on a website, it is no trivial task. Typically the communication portal outside the blogging environment is a prime target for hackers and you will find that most of your time will be spent dealing with blog spam. However, some blogging software such as Wordpress, suffers from the same problems with respect to spam.

Using a blog or website to discredit. 

While this can be done there are far better ways of using the Internet to make your point. In the days of Social Media there are many ways to post vitriol about someone that you have an issue.

As most of the population spend many of their waking hours on-line using Social Media, platforms such as Facebook and Twitter would be the obvious choice for such an attack. Donald Trump makes a lot of capital using his Twitter account. The only problem with these platforms is that you have to be famous in the first place for people to follow you and to make your their friends. However, this is where the majority of the action is on-line these days and the users of such platforms are not likely to follow blogs or visit random websites. Sure, these users will make the odd Internet search (often for their own names or for people that they know), but the major source of information and news is from the "new normal" of Social Media. Not that a blog is not part of the Social Media mix, it is just one that requires the average Internet user more effort to participate in.

and there is You Tube.

Another form of Social Media that seems to be popular these days.

Articles of Dissolution

The graphic of a copy of my "Articles of Dissolution" was of interest to someone in Montreal yesterday.

I am not sure why as the corporation name had been removed as was the corporation number. The date of dissolution was still there and I guess that could be used to track down my details if that was the intention of the visit. Again, I am not sure what value this would be as I never ever did any business under the corporation named on the Articles.

I need to post more photos

Problem is that I take them on the Surface and I have forgotten my Google password. I could reset it but I am too lazy to get my partners mobile phone so that I can receive a text with the code that I will need to reset it. In any case my Lenovo is permanently logged in and I don't want to change the login just for that.

I have a lot more of the house and garden to post. I even have one of the centrifugal clutch, showing where the spring is fitted and so that I can see where it is when I finally get the part and I have to take it apart again. I guess I could still use the trimmer with the clutch permanently engaged if I am careful with it. Still, the best bet with nettles is to pull them by the root.

The "back forty" is looking much better now that I have got the Blackthorn under control. I have had a few bonfires now and the one last week was alight from Monday until Saturday. The pheasants are having a field-day with all the ash in the old fire. I have a new one on the other side past where the thicket was. Some old raggedy cedars have been taken down and I can now see the fields beyond the lower drain much better. There was much activity yesterday taking the hay bails away to be stored. I also thing that the farmer was also checking to see where all the chainsaw noise and smoke was coming from.

I really need to get back to dredging the pond and the Bergamot is growing back around the western bank. The ducklings seem to have moved on as I have not seen them for a couple of days. I can also continue with clearing the stream and the lower pond as that was popular with Mrs. Duck and her 3 youngsters. 

Centrifugal clutch

The spring on the centrifugal clutch on my "Whip-a-Snipper" (Strimmer in the UK) broke and the head rotates continuously. I don't think that it is safe and I have ordered a replacement. The Blackthorn thicket is coming on quite well but I cannot strim the groind I have exposed. Still, pulling nettles out by the root is probably for the best.

I can now see into the field at the foot of the property. The farmers were harvesting hay on the weekend and there are now a nice arrangement of plastic wrapped bales in view now. Maybe we will see some horses or cows in the fields now.

Encryption vs. Privacy

This has been a subject that I have been blogging about for some time.

On a personal note I don't really care about my own privacy. I can make myself as anonymous as I require. I am aware that anything you do online is potentially there for anyone to see. The use of end-to-end encryption is something that I have been interested in from an academic perspective, although I don't have a requirement for such methods myself.

There have been those that have suggested that end-to-end encryption be banned as it denies the LEAs the ability to detect the planning of terrorists. However, there are others that continue to promote the use of such methods to keep us all safe.

Many make a big deal about privacy, I personally don't really care that there are people "listening in" to what I have to say. I am not doing anything that could be construed as illegal or a threat to my security or anybody else's. Encryption and security part and parcel of how we all carry on business over the Internet, otherwise whose that see fit to exploit us would have a much easier job.

The use of encryption is essential for the operation of electronic communication and business transactions. Without it everything would laid bare. There is no "half-way-house", you cannot suggest that communication platforms, such as Snapchat, do away with the use of encryption or insist that "backdoors" be inserted into all manner of software.

The banking community is also ready to embrace Blockchain technology to make transactions more secure in the future. The concept of a "Distributed Ledger" kinda flies in the face of those that both condemn the actions of terrorists and those that use BitCoin on the Dark Web. They are all intrinsically entwined with the extensive use of cryptography and encryption.

The problem is that all this technology has gone far beyond the level of understanding of those that we elect to govern us. All we get are nonsense statements  and "knee-jerk" reactions at the latest crisis. These include hacking attacks and terrorism.

Privacy is just an additional benefit of all this and something that cannot be sacrificed for an increase in matters that "keep us safe".

and then there is You Tube

I have posted about my distain for this form of Social Media.

Whereas I have watched few You Tubes and have found some useful information from them. However, in most cases the media is really a nonsense - content is poor and in the most part self-serving. Those that post videos are ding so for their own self promotion and their "3 minutes of fame".

I particularly find that the comments are particularly puerile. Those that make the comments are worse than those that post them (IMO).

I have recently been witness to a series of You Tube videos that ate beyond stupid. These videos are just ramblings from a disgruntled client of a company who was supposed to help their business grow by re-vamping their website. The people, or one person in particular, with the company providing the alleged website upgrade has also participated in the same nonsense of posting such videos.

The posting of a video that purely consists of the camera pointing at a computer monitor and a half coherent commentary hardly make for compulsive viewing. The computer screens are supposedly proof that a fraud and a scam has been perpetrated and all they really are just things that have been found on the Internet. Many of these are from my website and blog. Permission for which was not sort or given for their use, even if they are in the Public Sector.

Am I supposed to care about who is selling whose car (vehicle)? and how is this a matter of Public Safety?

Video Blogging has also found a following and those that are too lazy to type found  that they could achieve the same result by sitting in front of their webcam. An example of this was that of Texas Fred, who took his whole blog down due the abuse that he was getting from his followers. He said that he would close it if Hillary won the US election but continued even when Donald made it to the White House. His form of political rhetoric was particularly amusing as is his use of the word "Lib-tard".

Getting a website shut-down

and barring the author access to the Internet.

There are only a very few cases where this is possible. These include where a Nation-State has the power to block and pursue criminal proceedings against the operator who is engaging in activity that is disadvantageous to the State. This would include the promotion of terrorism and hate, possibly the commission of other criminal acts. In many cases some Nation-States, such as China, Internet content is highly controlled as there is a great desire to limit what their citizens see of the outside world.

As a private citizen, or an enterprise, you are not likely to be in any position to have content removed from the Internet and the authors of websites banned from posting their thoughts on any subject. You may not like what they say, but the Internet is largely an open forum for free-speech.

It has been claimed that I have had my website shut down and that I was banned from the Internet. This was not the case. At the time I was self-hosting my website on my Rogers cable connection using a Linux server in my basement. I was not sure if this was allowed under the EUA that I had with Rogers but they did not seem to care. The unfortunate consequence of using my home connection to host a website was that the I address resolved to the location of the Rogers server. A person that I was having a dispute with at the time, it is presumed,  contacted Rogers and asked to have my connection revoked. They did not do this and in fact never contacted me about the matter. However, at the same time I decided that my experiment with self-hosting had come to a conclusion so I reverted to a private hosting service. The process to migrate to this service took some time. At no time was my Internet connection disrupted.

As I said, a waste of time!

and money. Now we have to face Brexit with a hung parliament!

The most interesting thing yesterday was watching James Comey's testimony at the Senate Intelligence committee. At the time of writing this I don't think that "The Donald" has Tweeted a comment on this - we shall see as he has to do something when he has his early morning pee.

Election day

What a total waste of time!

Let's hope that folks are sensible enough not to elect Jeremy Corbin to PM. Theresa May is bad enough.

At least the EU negotiations can be returned to. Not that I expect that anyone is going to agree to anything anytime soon. I predict that the UK will exit the EU many years hence, if ever. The whole point in getting out is that it takes so long to come to a decision about anything. It is a true Catch-22 in the political sense:

You have to try and come to a resolution (not being mad) with a political body that is dysfunctional (mad). You have to be mad to want to be a member of such a body.

Comey's testimony is fascinating

I wonder how Donald will respond?

The concept of "independence" seems to be beyond Trump. The FBI is not a "tool" that he has at his bidding, at least I hope not. "Loyalty" is what he wanted, "Honesty" is what he got. Let's not talk in public (or with others to hear) , a "one-on-one" is the way to go. A good job that there were no secret recordings made!!

... and what does "misleading the vice president" mean?

“Because I have been very loyal to you, very loyal; we had that thing you know" - "That thing"?

I can't believe that we actually live here!

Why did we spend so long in Canada? True, it was a good place to accumulate some wealth, but the cultural and natural beauty of where we live is far superior to Ontario, or at least around Toronto.

The intention was to buy a property in the UK, it still is, but where we are currently renting is almost perfect. More land than we would probably purchase, but all the garden work and firewood you could ask for.

Blackthorn Thicket

Work continues on the clearance.

It is really nasty stuff it is not called BlackTHORN for nothing! In some places it is as high as the canopy of the original trees and cutting the trunks of the Blackthorn just leaves it hanging with the top still entangled in the canopy. It is a miracle that I have not bent the bar of the chainsaw yet as it inevitably gets stuck in the trunk of the Blackthorn when a cut is made.

Still, there will be plenty of firewood.

The audacity in calling me a Terrorist!

In light of current events I think that it is rather rich that Wayne McAlpine did this in an email to me and subsequently posting it on one of his stupid websites that he set up in an attempt to discredit me.

The recent terror attacks in Manchester and London are real terror attacks not the simple posting of an opinion about someone's business and ethical practises. This is just what Wayne McAlpine did. It is clear that he has no idea what true terrorism is and he should be called out on that fact. I urge anyone reading this to contact him and tell him that you think that he is despicable and should not accuse those that are clearly not involved in violent acts that they are tarred with the same brush.

Wayne McAlpine tried to liken the use of a pseudonym and making anonymous comment on his and his business associates as an act of terror. I guess this was on the strength that the so-called "victims" did not no for sure who was making the claims about them and there was nothing that they could do defend themselves.

The real nature of  terrorism is that the perpetrators are well known, as with the case of Islamic State. Far from being an unknown threat we are all too aware of the threat that they posed on society today. Far removed from the petty squabbles of a "second-rate" failed business person from Saskatoon, Canada.

Guide to Suffolk Churches

A really great guide to these churches can be found here.

Sam (D.P.) Mortlock is our "go-to" for our visits.

Climate change is a bit like God

.... in that neither exist and the only ones that believe in them are those such  as the Pope.

Who cares about saving the planet, as long as America is Great again!

Deleting comments on posts

.... in such a way that prevents someone who is being criticised from giving their side of the story.

While I have deleted some comments on my posts, I have never deleted any that raise a contrary view to my own. To someone to suggest that a reason for not allowing comments on a blog/website that they created with the expressed purpose to discredit what I have posted about them, is that they have commented on this blog, and I have deleted those comments, is preposterous. 

The enemy of my enemy is my friend

Striking an arms deal with a bunch of Sunnis that have a dispute with another bunch of Shias just because you have a chronic problem with a Shia nation-state is not going to help. 

I voted to leave the EU, Not for Theresa May

My opinion of Theresa May was not that high when she was Home Secretary under David Cameron. Her stance on surveillance was ill-informed and in my opinion not practical. The so-called "Snoopers Charter" was opposed by both David Davis and now Nick Cleg.

I posted extensively on this subject at the time way before the referendum and now this pointless General Election. 

The money won't run out

... but life may!

Now a second friend has passed in the last wee while, one has to contemplate ones mortality. 

Using my real name

I have never used my real name in relation to anything that I have publically posted to the Internet. When I originally registered my website domain name I briefly used my real name but I changed it to John Smith when I was trying to remain anonymous in some of my posts.

When  I returned to the UK I changed the name on my Canadian domain registration to my real name. This was due to the fact that a certain person could not have any influence on my personal activity in Canada. Now, in the UK, nobody I know here has any idea of my Internet activity. In  which case there is no reason for me to use a pseudonym for my identity online.  

It looks like get_iplayer's time has come

I can't say that I am surprised and that it is amazing that it has continued to work for as long as it has.

Maybe it will resolve the "Failed to download program schedule" Warning as it has in the past, but I am not holding my breath.

As iPlayer is the BBC's flagship streaming and downloading service it is not surprising that it has seen a lot of continuing development over the years that it has been in operation. The development on get_iplayer, however, stopped when  Phil Lewis withdrew his support when he determined that it was a conflict of interest for him with his work with the BBC and the UK broadcast industry. As the original developer of get_iplayer, as he was instrumental in the development of the original iPlayer (I believe), he was privy to its internal workings. Without that "insider" knowledge of the process it was a potential that should a major change be made that the original programme would break irrevocably.

The iPlayer/get_iplayer process is multi-facetted in that it not only consists of the processing of the streamed data (this I believe has remained much the same) but the location of the resources used by the system. It is this location of the streaming resources that has caused get_iplayer to fail in the past. It was not the only reason over the years as there had been some changes regarding the encryption of the streams, but this was all covered under the RTMP/RTMPE schema that iPlayer has used all along. The current problems stem, probably, from the BBC developing its strategy to maximise its use of it server space and to provide new functionality to the iPlayer service itself. For example, there have been many changes that have been made to the availability of program material and the BBC's downloader has been completely revamped since I first looked at it. The changes, I believe, were made to enhance the regular users experience, not to stop the users of get_iplayer.

The result of this is that those that want to continue to download material to keep will now have to use Bittorrent. The irony here is that the UK has pretty much been successful in blocking access to sites such as thepiratebay, with most ISPs (such as BT) restricting access to this and other torrent tracking sites.