Sep/10
18:07 7
Why Dizzy is wrong on Cameron’s lies to pensioners
Scrapbook isn’t the first lefty blog to be fisked recently by (the most entertaining) Dizzy Thinks. Our attack video on David Cameron’s lies to pensioners did not impress Mr. Hendren, who described it as a “steaming pile of bullshit”.
His argument is that, rather than being axed completely, entitlement to schemes such as bus passes and winter fuel payments will have been “changed”. This means waiting another five years for free bus travel and money given to older people for heating bills will not only be further age restricted but also cut by up to £100 for the most elderly recipients. Having promised to keep them, Tories have been in discussions about axing pension credits.
In the context of Cameron’s near hysterical outbursts about “Labour leaflet lies” during the election campaign, Scrapbook stands by our video. Indeed, as Sky News tackled the issue of cuts, ahem sorry, “changes” to bus passes:
It would be “entirely fair” for pensioners who watched the debate to assume [David Cameron's] comments meant the scheme would not change, particularly as Mr Cameron made several angry denials during the course of the campaign.
In that vein, hats off to Bob Piper for subsequently unearthing this pledge from Cameron, given at a press conference in March:
“We will keep what we inherit in all these areas. All these things that Labour are saying are complete and utter lies, and they know it too.”
Perhaps Dizzy can explain how such a categoric statement is consistent with the subsequent “changes”?
To check out our original attack video click here.
Aug/10
18:46 6
ConservativeHome: on message for coalition harmony
Here’s a good spot from Left Outside. One wonders whether the continued presence of a butchered Liberal Democrat bird logo on ConservativeHome’s famous shields is a deliberate editorial decision:
Didn’t Tim Montgomerie get that memo?
Aug/10
13:13 0
Total Politics interview
You can read an interview with the editor of this fine periodical over on the Total Politics website. It’s interesting to see bloggers scrutinised off their home turf, so a flick back through some of the their previous profiles, including Hopi Sen, Tory Bear, Dizzy Thinks, Chris Paul and Mike Smithson, is well worthwhile.
Can’t believe they left in the bit about Donal Blaney.
Aug/10
14:47 4
Dave and Nick’s big marquee
It may have something to do with Westminster’s exodus for Cliff Richards’ villa a yacht in Corfu the outskirts of Dear Old Blighty, but Scrapbook can’t help noticing the number of bloggers on the airwaves of late. Tory Bear’s hour-long LBC love-in with Red Ken on Saturday morning was followed by the appearance of not one but three online hacks on Radio 4′s Westminster Hour.
Media fixture Iain Dale was joined by Hopi Sen and Stephen Tall for a 20-minute discussion focusing on the government’s first 100 days. With Messrs Hutton, Field, Milburn and (possibly) Blunkett taking the Con-Dem shilling it may seem that Gordon Brown’s “big tent” has given way to a more substantial construction.
The recent influx of Labour talent, anathema to the 30 former front benchers found surplus to coalition requirements in May, was lamented by Iain Dale in particular. This blogger has only just got around to listening to it on iPlayer but found this (frustrated) interjection amusing:
Stephen Tall: Personally, I’m in favour of this big and expanding tent. I think it’s good for [interrupted]
Iain Dale: It’s a marquee!!
Perhaps silly season is getting to us but we couldn’t resist extending the metaphor:
Were Simon Hughes and David Davis spied near the guy ropes clutching scissors?
Aug/10
08:14 1
Tom Watson Uncut
When the Labour Uncut (@labouruncut) blog emerged from dust clouds of the party’s election defeat it was clear that the team behind it had the inside track in the Westminster village. Despite its unassuming launch, the site – with no introductory post, “about page” or list of contributors – seemed to have an immediate purchase within the lobby. It thus came as no surprise that the scheme was the progeny of former minister Siôn Simon.
Handing over control to Tom Watson, the doyen of blogging MPs, for seven days the Uncut team write:
“Uncut will not be safe in his hands. But the management team has made a judgment that he is unlikely to break it in a week. To the limited extent that it is possible to do them simultaneously: pay attention, and run for cover.”
Readers can expect discussion of the challenges for Labour’s next leader mixed in with the agitation on digital policy familiar to readers of his blog.
Scrapbook sincerely hopes Tom has held over some of his FOI muckraking for publication this week.
Aug/10
20:44 4
Eight reasons why Fasthosts suck
If you’re a regular reader of Political Scrapbook it’s more than likely you’ve seen an “Internal Server Error” on here at some point in the last year. After an absolutely exasperating 12 months trying to resolve issues with their so-called “support”, we have finally left Fastshosts, the hosting company that couldn’t run a bath:
- Their brand name is a contradiction in terms. According to monitoring service Pingdom, the average server response time for our site was 1,963 milliseconds. This dropped by more than 50% to 868 milliseconds when we moved to another (cheaper) host.
- Fasthosts boast that their service is “reliable” – it is anything but. From November 2009 to August 2010 we had 244 separate instances of downtime, including one week in April where the site worked just 84% of the time! It’s no shock that they don’t offer a Service Level Agreement (SLA) for shared hosting.
- Repeated complaints about the same error were not addressed. We filed numerous support tickets pleading along the lines of “This is exactly the same recurring problem as we’ve had before”. Their support team simply close tickets when your site resurfaces only for it to disappear again hours (or minutes) later.
Leaving Fasthosts for a (cheaper) host dramatically improved our server performance
- The company use three-month discount offers to hook customers into year long contracts. By the time we realised their service was a joke it was too late for us to leave.
- Their technical support deleted (without informing us) the crucial .htaccess file. This completely crippled our WordPress installation, requiring us to restore the file from our backups.
- Their custom-built user interface is appalling. Enjoy the hassle of being logged out every ten minutes? Then Fasthosts is for you!
- Their internal systems are so poor that the support team can’t even access your account. Nearly every request for assistance elicits the response “Please send us your FTP username and password”.
- For a significant period, their billing system couldn’t deal with bank verification for certain cards. They couldn’t take payment from you can pulled your site. The only way to resolve this was to pay the bill over the phone.
In conjunction with a number of other blogs, including Liberal Conspiracy, we plan to move to a new cloud server shortly. Site owners will be charged fees commensurate with their level of traffic, which is a good way to bring high-end hosting to smaller blogs, leveraging economies of scale so everyone benefits.
If you’re interested in this initiative then get in touch.
Aug/10
17:51 7
Who are the fifty most influential lefties?
Left Foot Forward are conducting a Dale-esque poll on the left’s most influential left-wing “politicians, journalists, bloggers, think tankers, academics and campaigners” and are canvassing suggestions for their longlist. The proposals of Scrapbook’s handful of contributors, the subject of no small debate [you're not kidding - Ed.], include:
- Irfan Ahmed*
- Charlie Brooker
- Sarah Brown
- Alastair Campbell
- Shami Chakrabarti
- Lynda Clark
- “Gorgeous” George Galloway [groan - Ed.]
- Johann Hari
- Nick Lowles (Hope Not Hate)
- George Monbiot
- John Sentamu
- Peter Tatchell
Who would you nominate for the public vote?
Email Shamik Das with you suggestions.
*Come back, Irfan. It’s been too long!
Aug/10
09:05 1
‘Tis the season to be silly
As we begin the first full week of parliamentary recess, politicians, lobby hacks and (some) bloggers alike have now decamped to the beach. With the flow of real stories tapering to a mere trickle, Scrapbook is turning its attention to exactly what kind of nonsense can be made to pass for “news”.
We’ll be posting regularly on the silliest stories of silly season (video footage of a sneezing bear cub had a pretty good outing on Sky News last week) so if you see anything truly ridiculous let us know.
Roll on September 6th.
Jul/10
19:04 5
State of play: UK social media in 2010
Just how big is social media in the UK? This video from Simply Zesty has some seemingly unbelievable statistics.* Of the 85% of the UK is now online, it is claimed:
- 25 percent write blogs – that’s over 12 million British bloggers
- 60 percent read them – 31 million readers
- 1 in 3 UK adults agree with the statement “I could not live without the internet”
And if you want to show Political Scrapbook some social media love, you can do so on Facebook and Twitter.
Hat-tip: Mashable
*The research was conducted by market research company TORA but, clearly, a social media consultancy has a vested interest in exaggerating the importance of, um, social media!
Jul/10
09:17 4
It’s our birthday – now go vote for us!
Scrapbook's biggest fan cutting the cake at our recent birthday bash
“You should remain aloof to it”, said one lefty blogger, forgetting for a moment that we are naked populists and crave approval. He was referring, of course, to the Iain Dale Total Politics Blog Poll.
Without a small handful of questions to weight responses to the profile of UK adults* it is a terrible way to compare competing tribes on the political blogosphere. But the political party and left/right lists will be pored over by hacks, even those who boycott the whole process [cough].
Yesterday was our birthday. It’s been a great twelve months, breaking two of the year’s biggest viral videos, terrorising cricetinae and torpedoing the Tories’ flagship social media campaign along the way. We would really appreciate our readers’ support at the virtual ballot box:
- Compile a list of your favourite political blogs. You must select at least five and up to ten blogs
- Rank them in order, starting at 1 for your absolute favourite
- Email the list to toptenblogs@totalpolitics.com
Now mosey over to your email and vote (for us!)
*Or at least the profile of UK blog readers, which presumably leans strongly towards an ABC1, quality newspaper demographic. Hitwise would have this data.
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