Is the Guardian worse than it used to be?

it was my/kevin's birthday just last week, if that helps..

i can't believe how big they printed that pic.. my face is pretty and all but still

front page of today's guardian

Gay Girl in Damascus hoaxer accused of defending himself with new persona
Tom MacMaster says complimentary anonymous commenter in online forum using same IP address was friend who was visiting

There's probably something about Glastonbury in there today as well.

I almost felt a glimmer of jealousy about not being at Glastonbury, until I remembered the mud
And while staying at home, I learned that BBC2 sometimes still shows Pages from Ceefax

i thought this was going to be a clever 'i was at glastonbury and was envious of people who were not!' thing, but not even.

that was oddly formatted

they had it on in the pub last night. gosh young people's music is rubbish nowadays.

pretty sure young people don't like coldplay

'you have to be rich and old to go to glasto nowadays' - an embittered 90s guy

i don't hate coldplay, but i didn't enjoy the 8 or 9 suited-up Joy Div-alikes that seemed to be on all night.

the 8 or 9 suited-up Joy Div-alikes

see i stopped caring in about 2005 but this comment would have made sense even then...

it's like tunes and hooks are dead unfashionable. Jesse J is a bit of a disaster but getting that kid up to sing was quite cute. Our Han would've gone nutso.

the assassination of jesse j by the cowherd noodle vague

oh she is a Jessie with an i. i see. that pricetag song is a wee bit ironic considering how many adverts she's in.

pretty sure young people don't like coldplay

According to 16 yr old son, 'Coldplay were awesome'. He's such a disappointment sometimes.

dear me

at least in the 90s we liked sucky bands which were also new

lol billy

Fertility worldwide dropped but UK population rose by 470,000 in 2010 because, say experts, less educated had more children

entry level trolling http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jun/30/rupert-murdoch-monopoly-news-corp

McKenzie's not a troll, he's a cunt

the guardian is the troll

'cunt' is too good for mckenzie really

he is in my top 3 of blokes i'd like to meet in a lift whilst i'm carrying a lump-hammer

that's odd because he's in my top 3 of people who'd be markedly improved by being set on fire

what about some kind of human centipede with McKenzie, Toby Young and Littlejohn, only joined up in a loop so they're all in the middle?

think there'd be a lot of support for that proposal

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Hating-Kelvin-MacKenzie/256121164313

space must be found for delingpole in the centipede

oh god yes

delingpole is some sort of auto-centipede, perhaps even more so than the others

Hey Guardian, thanks for the 2-page spread on Andy Murray in the news section, really happy to know that James Corden and Michael McIntyre went to a tennis match!

god the BBC kept showing that tit McIntyre last night, way to show your covering a serious sport dickheads

is he the severely unfunny comedian who they interviewed before the Kvitova/Azarenka SF?

i wanted to punch him in the face and assumed it was a cunning strategy to make the relentlessly unlikeable banshee Azarenka welcome in comparison

luckily Kvitova WON IT ALL, in your face both Azarenka and Sgarapova and McIntyre

*Sharapova

yeah he is an odious little man

http://i471.photobucket.com/albums/rr75/fancylau/maracas.jpg

trebles all round at Grauniad Towers tonight!

http://www.economist.com/blogs/newsbook/2011/07/newspapers?fsrc=scn/tw/te/bl/theendoftheworldasweknowit

Printers’ ink runs in the veins of Rupert Murdoch, the boss of News Corporation. But from a pure business perspective (and James Murdoch tends to take that perspective on things) the loss of the News of the World is not at all painful. In a good year, News International’s four papers—the Sun, the News of the World, the Times and the Sunday Times—are marginally profitable. BSkyB, which News Corporation wants to buy, is likely to make more than £1 billion in profit this year.

The shenanigans at the News of the World have already slowed the attempt to purchase BSkyB, and may yet stymie it altogether. This is not just the tail wagging the dog. It is the tail threatening to strangle the dog. It needed to be cut off.

gah wrong thread

Do humans have a role in the robot wars of the future?

Wonderful CiF post title, reading would only disappoint.

Good start though:

For a book about the all-too-human "passions of war", my 1997 work Blood Rites...

lost philip k dick novel

See my book Watermelons

I was thinking of reviving this thread to say that despite my having started this thread just over 10 years ago, and the Guardian having given much evidence to it, it still seems cherishable that the Guardian exists and does what it does in what what McCartney nearly called the desperate world in which we're living in.

I think it was Paul Mason's statement that the Guardian will go bust in 3 years that focused my thinking here.

I heard recently that the Guardian employs over 600 journalists, compared to the Independent's 150. Is this right?

depends how you define "journalist" imo

There is no way the Indy employs 150 journalists unless you count every freelancer who's filed a column for them in the past year. I think it's more like 10.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/insideguardian/2011/jul/11/kindle-ipad-android
can't wait to see the iPad app; Times app is p. good, but is the Times.

> Do humans have a role in the robot wars of the future?

as the victims?

Excellent post about the future of the Guardian and investigative journalism:

hack-gate and the danger of 'free'

This is that elite business and political interests operate via conglomeration, hierarchy and force of money, using cash to convert power in one sphere into power in another. The notion that these machinations can be held to account by a public sphere occupied by bloggers, social networking, amateur commentators and rapid-turnover online-only news sites must rank as one of the flimsiest ideologies ever proffered.

otfm, big problem with the paul mason pov

http://www.guardian.co.uk/info/2011/jul/22/six-way-support

?

more and more (i know fuck all about this kind of thing, in spite of the phrase 'business models' later in this sentence) i feel like a lot of business models are going to have to rely on people just pledging their support, to survive, from now on - going out of your way to kick something a bit of money because you believe in it. i bought a guardian last saturday just to be all YEAH GUYS after the phone hacking thing. like i think buying your books through them or w/e is cool?, (certainly as opposed to via amazon/rather than your fledgling, moribund local independent book retailer, &c ...)

it's on the front page, is desperation a good look, idk