The Department of Health said NHS bosses must look at alternatives to treating patients ... [via Top News Article | Reuters.co.uk]

Ahhh, new meaning to that public sector buzzword of the moment "transformational", I see a whole new Web 2.0 lightweight business model where there is 2-way communication with people visiting other people.

Downloaded Windows Live Writer to see how it handles posting of images for services that support MetaWeblog API - despite the implications from the announcement page, it doesn't except via ftp upload. Does weird things with images too.

But I am mostly struck by the rebar/toolbar style - is this yet another invention or is it a rip from the latest version of Office?

Its big, seemingly written in .NET it is 6.4MB of code on disk - the toolbar dll is 140KB.

If you read nothing else about BillG and July 2008 read this: My First BillG Review. [via Joel on Software]

Interview: Microsoft security chief's new vistas.  

(InfoWorld) - Ben Fathi knows a thing or two about security. ...

We also did something that I just announced last night: the ActiveX installation service. This is something we've heard from our enterprise customers. They want to have the ability for an administrator to have an MMC [Microsoft Management Console] where they can approve internal Web sites or partner company Web sites and list the applications that can basically be white listed. So standard users can install those. We have done that and that will be available in RC1..... [via InfoWorld: Top News]

"So standard users can install those" ? I wonder what this means, presumably this is a variation on 'advertise'/always install elevated but built as a white list of things that might be done.

I don't whether it should be called radio anymore - the playing of music to listeners who occupy a geographically diverse space. Anyway, I subscribed to Whole Wheat Radio a while ago - the writing interested me on occasion. Every now and then my aggregator flags up that it is having problems reading a feed (I probably ignored the article saying the feed was going) and I eventually get round to investigating what has gone wrong.

Here is an innovative approach to a "radio station" that I haven't seen before: Wiki Radio.

Widespread HDTV broadcasts via Freeview may not be possible until after the UK has fully switched to digital TV in 2012.  [via BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Sky sets date for HDTV broadcasts]

Hmmm, its the may that worries me. From my probably poor understanding from what I have read, the word should be will. Then again they may be being completely accurate but misleading - it may be that Freeview will never get High Definition TV (HDTV) - if the governement doesn't "sell" spectrum to Freeview then it isn't going to happen - hence, in my analysis, why the BBC is very interested in broadband (but I don't think that is going to work either unless they can get away with "lets make programmes 5 minutes long" [update] or users accept overnight downloads).

There looks to be an accurate statement available (note the use of will not .... at least until):

Freeview will not have enough room for HD signals, at least until switchover. In time broadband may be another way we can deliver HD programmes. [via BBC - Digital - High Definition TV]

People who expect Labour to lose next election 65% [via Support for Labour at lowest level since 1992 - Britain - Times Online]

Matthew Parris of The Times has long held the view that Governments are like a lake into which the stones and pebbles of stupidity, incompetence, sleaze and corruption are thrown. At some point in time, the pile of debris breaks the surface and once broken there is no way back.

I am amazed that 65% expect Labour to lose. It would indicate that the pile of debris has indeed grown tall.

Ever since these numbers appeared I've been ranting to anyone who will listen in my office (0) that at 16-24 they flippin' well shouldn't be watching TV but should be doing something interesting. Once more I am indebted to those who publish something I agree with:

The BBC frets that a third of Britons now "feel that the BBC does not make programmes for them", according to its own polling, and that "60 per cent of the 16 to 24 age group watch less than three hours of TV a week". But were these figures any different during, say, the Macmillan era when the target demographic spent happy Bank Holiday weekends knocking the crap out of each other in small seaside towns? Or when the only radio stations were "Home", "Light", and "Third"? We don't know, because no one asked. It's hard to think of a time when the BBC has been more pervasive. [via BBC seeks 'Digital Assassins' | The Register]

And yes, they do seem to be getting desparate about these Assassins - I would go but I'm probably too old.

"There has been disproportionate coverage of blogging -- still only a tiny proportion of people publish them," said Paul Milsom, a senior associate director at the BMRB. [via Top News Article | Reuters.co.uk]

and also:

But in Britain, despite a rapid uptake in broadband Internet connections, only 2 percent of Internet users publish a blog, a recent survey by the British Market Research Bureau (BMRB) found, while another study said most bloggers quit after three months.

Presumably because we are all too reserved or prefer to have a chat down the pub - so its just us sad old folks at home all day who "do it".

Now we believe that our Player .... will drive broadband.  [via BBC - Press Office - Mark Thompson Baird Lecture]

Why is it "our Player". Does the BBC make TV sets, does it make any of the freeview boxes, does it may VHS recorders or PVRs? Why then must it make the broadband player. Why not open this up to market innovation in UI? Implement a bunch of services via backstage.co.uk, provide an SDK of redistributable components for Windows/Linux and Mac that allows people to access the protected content but put their own UI around it. Some people will put free things together, some might charge in the same way that you pay for a telly. Some might put together something that allows mash up of BBC output, YouTube etc - very Web 2.0 - perhaps that is the intention and I have missed it.

What I fear is that peoples PCs'/Media PCs will end up with a whole load of different players for different contexts - a success of the web has been you stay in the same appwhereever you go. With the BBC player concept as I've seen it so far, this breaks down and fails to acknowledge that serendipity extends beyond the walls of the BBC.