Tim Dobson's Blog

Please show this to any other organisations or people who you think might be interested.

DFEY-NW (Digital Freedom in Education & Youth - North West) is a group focusing on young people and issues of freedom in the digital world, based in the Northwest of England at the moment.

In Brief

WHERE: Meet near KFC, Upstairs, Piccadilly Station, Manchester

WHEN: 12:30pm -> ~4pm

SIGN UP: http://is.gd/1ITm

CONTACT: Email - td at tdobson dot net

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MAILING LIST: http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/dfey-nw-discuss

WEBSITE: http://dfey.freedomdreams.co.uk

As posted to various mailing lists:

Digital Freedom in Education & Youth - North West (DFEY-NW), the North West of England's first group focusing on young people and issues of freedom in the digital world is looking forward to it's first meeting EVER in August.

What is DFEY-NW

DFEY-NW is a group formed in response from a growing need in the Northwest of England for a Group to encourage and promote young people's involvement with the free software community by creating a social space to make it more comfortable for young people to get involved with GLUGs and FSUGs.

The press release put out last week, seems to have resulted in widespread local coverage, which, I'm happy to see, has mainly focused mainly on the positive outcomes of the race effort.

The story was briefly picked up by Glossop.com and shortly afterwards my visitor statistics went haywire as solid mass of visitors arrived from there and other places.

Despite most of the coverage portraying the entry in a positive light, it seems that some people are puzzled at the reasons for the club withdrawing support, as "elegantly" summed up in this comment:

Why did Glossop Sailing Club withdraw its support?

As previously stated, I am unclear on this issue as this is one of the things, I seek to ascertain in the near future, as a result of a series of meetings with relevant people.

Nevertheless, The Glossop Chronicle covered the full story, and also apparently contacted a "spokesman" from Glossop Sailing Club.

SAVING THE DAY

FOUR young sailors from Glossop Sailing Club claimed a mammoth success in a marathon event that was surrounded in controversy.

A depleted youth squad from Glossop Sailing Club achieved 10th place out of a field of 28 - their best ever result in the annual National Junior 12-Hour Race in Southport recently - despite the club dropping an anchor in the works.

After the Glossop team's Southport 12 Hour Race's prerace publicity last week, a third party has put out this press release:

A depleted youth squad from Glossop Sailing Club achieved 10th place out of a field of 28, their best ever result in the annual National Junior Twelve Hour Race, held at Southport, despite their sailing club withdrawing their support and leaving them high and dry without a boat on the day of the competition.

Ben Griffiths wrote to the Open Rights Group discussion mailing list a few weeks ago:

I want to share a DRM story.

I was in Curry's in Plymouth a couple of weeks ago. A man was arguing loudly with one of the staff, his ten-year old daughter in tears at his side. From what I could gather, she had saved up her pocket money to buy an iTunes gift card - the songs she'd spent her money on, of course, didn't work on her mp3 player.
The man wanted a refund for what seemed to him a defective product; the staff member said that if the card had been used they couldn't give a refund.
The young girl cried and cried and cried.

Despite the not so flattering photo of me, the late arrival of the article, considering the Race was several weeks ago and the difficult circumstances surrounding our team entry, I am really pleased that this made the paper.

:(
It seems that my laptop's power supply fault has reached another level. The Charging Pin has fallen out and now I have no way to charge it.

For the last two years or so, the pin in the centre of the hole where you put the charging plug in has been sort of loose. It would not stay in the middle. This caused some problems whilst it was not the end of the world - I could simply just hold the laptop upside down so that the pin was in the right place, insert the charger, turn the laptop the right way up and then fiddle around so it got a good connection.

However, a few days ago I got a nasty suprise; it stopped charging. I picked the laptop up to investigate and heard a rattling.

Not good.

I have just seen why drinking ten shots on an empty stomach is a bad idea. I'm glad it wasn't my mistake. If you are having a drinking contest with russians, and they stop, don't think you have won until you have held them down for four hours at least. My game plan is and has been to drink apple juice. It's going great so far, though i wish more people would adopt my approach. Drinking in moderation is fine. Drinking to show off your ego will end badly!

I'm off to Russia for two weeks with MGS. I'm staying in St. Petersburg with a russian family and should be speaking russian. I'm "apprehensive" and I hope it all comes back to me as i haven't really spoken it since my GCSE, about 18 months ago. I return to the UK on something like the 16th of July. Dosvedanya Angliya (transliterated Russian: "Goodbye England").

I was walking my dog along Hope Street in Old Glossop, when nature took its course Bess relieved herself on the pavement.

Being a responsible dog owner I whipped out a plastic bag and picked it up. A few yards down the street was a wheely bin in someone's yard facing the road and as I walked past, I lifted the lid dropped the bag inside.

Almost instantly the door of the house burst open, and a man, wine glass in hand, exclaimed at me "Could you not do that please!"
I responded that I was "sorry 'sir'" and that I hadn't meant to upset him.
After passing me the plastic bag he complained that he "had children you know," again reiterating I should not do this again..

Is justifiable for me to be confused and hurt by this incident?