I’m implementing a registration requirement for comments. I’m hoping this will help to kill off spam, and also help me in troll control. Please tell me if you find this requirement too burdensome, and I’ll try to find another way around all this.
Testing
Hi everyone. I’m testing a bunch of things, and this is an open thread where you can discuss them if you want. Among other things, I’m looking at different themes (=skins/designs). If you’re interested there’s a lot to choose from here. I’m imposing the following constraints
(i) Two-column layout
(ii) Widget ready
(iii) Fast loading (not too much Javascript etc).
The current theme, which is fairly bland, is Aqueous-lite and meets all these criteria. I may be able to do a little bit of fiddling with fonts and similar, but please don’t just say “change the font”, give me some idea what you would like.
On point (iii), I apologise for the technical problems with the site lately, including breaking of the RSS feed for some users. I am looking into all this.
I’m trying to minimise hand-coding stuff and am now working with widgets like the Active Discussions at the top of the sidebar. Suggestions for good widgets gratefully accepted.
Discussion policy for RSMG
One of the reasons I’ve taken a break from this blog is that I’ve found the effort of dealing with various kinds of disruptive commenters to be more than I can justify. Unfortunately, the same problems emerged at the RSMG blog, so I’ve developed a new discussion policy. The policy prohibits flames, snarks, trolls and especially sock puppets. When the new improved version of this blog returns, I’ll be adopting something similar, though probably a little less restrictive (I enjoy a good snark from time to time, but you so rarely get a good one).
So, if you’re interested, pop over and take a look. If you’re so minded, make comments, bearing in mind that the policy is already in force.
New posts at RSMG
While taking a break here, I’ve put up a couple of posts over at RSMG, and there’s an interesting piece from Nanni over the long-running fight to stop leading academic publisher Elsevier from running arms fairs.
I’ve posted on why I’m glad my frequent flyer status has been downgraded, and a newly-published critique of the McKibbin-Wilcoxen plan for reducing CO2 emissions.
Taking a break
With a hugely successful fundraising appeal just completed, this seems like a good time to take a break for a few weeks. When I come back I hope to have some new ideas, new features, better defences against trolls and spammers and some policies to promote discussion and discourage flamewars.
In the meantime, I’ll probably post a bit at the Risk and Sustainable Management Group blog, and maybe also at Crooked Timber occasionally.
While I’m on this topic, I should note the departures of Mark Bahnisch from Larvatus Prodeo and Helen Dale (Skepticlawyer) from Catallaxy. Both have made big contributions.
Thanks to everyone
I just banked the cash and checks I collected as part of the World’s Greatest Shave. Along with contributions on the site the total came out at $6037.10 towards an Australia-wide total of nearly $2 million. You can still make a last-minute donation if you want to, but I’m really thrilled with the effort.
Four years on
The Iraq war began on March 20, 2003. I’ve run out of things to say on this tragedy, but feel free to discuss it in the comments thread.
Monday message board
It’s time, once again for the Monday Message Board. As usual, civilised discussion and absolutely no coarse language, please.
Rip van Winkle
When Rip awoke from his 20-year sleep, he had a beard a foot long, and had missed out on some big political events. I’ve been paying attention to politics for the past 30 years or more, but events in the world of shaving have mostly passed me by. I was aware that it was no longer possible, as it once was, to get a shave and a haircut for two bits, but I was surprised to discover that you can no longer get a shave at all, at least, not at a barbershop – perhaps a long-delayed reaction to The Man from Ironbark.
Instead, having had my hair trimmed and my beard clipped down to Number 0 (as shown here), I was left to rely on my own devices to remove the stubble. Of course, I had no such devices, but I thought that the relevant technology would be fairly much as I remembered it. On the contrary, shaving now appears to require five blades and a power supply. Actually, I did read about this on CT a while back, but of course skipped over it as being of no relevance to me.
I’m slightly bemused by it, but I’m the ideal target market for this kind of thing, since the only memories of shaving that have survived three decades are the painful ones. So, I’m now on the bleeding edge of technology, literally, but hopefully not bleeding as much as I would be if I stuck with the old gear.
And here’s the result!
update The whole event is now documented at Flickr
