Today I vent spleen at the Royal Mail.

I never thought I'd actually write a blog ranting about the Royal Mail. Normally I'm quite the fan of our ol' posties, but this week they've royally got on my tits. 

I ordered a new pair of earphones online last week but I missed the postman on the Saturday morning that it got delivered. According to the little card they put through my door, it was being left at the Royal Mail Delivery Office on the other side of the city (despite there being at least two post offices nearer to my house but oh well).

Went up on Saturday only to find it shut (thought it might be, but you never know). Deciding I'd go this morning I caught the bus (£3.60 ticket to boot) due to it pissing it down and thought I might finally get my earphones.

It boded well, the place was actually open this time which was nice. However, it then went rapidly downhill.

Apparently they don't even have my parcel! After getting a card saying it's at the delivery office it turns out that's a load of bullshit. According to the man at the desk (who,  to give him his due, was very helpful and apologetic) it could either still be with the postman or could be at the post office just up the road from my house. 

If it's still with the postman, why is it still with him and if it's at my post office, why the hell didn't he put on the card that that's where it was?!

I left them my number so they can contact me when they finally find out where my parcel and when they do ring up I have every intention of telling them what I think! If this is the type of service that we can expect from the Royal Mail then I hope the next government does privatise the Royal Mail. Perhaps then we can expect to get our post!

5, 4, 3, 2, 1! We have lift-off!

Yesterday saw the launch of the second and third years collective baby; WINOL. After two dummy runs the previous two weeks, confidence was high in the newsroom of a fantastic first live airing. I'm glad to say we didn't disappoint and all went well! Word on the street (okay, the word of my girlfriend) is that it was a good broadcast so it's not just me being big headed.

Despite being beset with difficulties and unexpected problems (such as our main presenter being ill, network and loan counter problems etc) we soldiered on and put out a news broadcast we can all be proud of.

It's weird viewing the bulletin from the point of view of a feature writer. The news, sport and production desks and the people who work on it are a flurry of activity trying to get packages done and dusted. However, us feature writers aren't quite as pressured. Sure, we have our own stories to get in and editing and the like to do, but it seems we spend a fair whack of time on a Wednesday trying to assist the other desks in any stuff they need doing.

Obviously the more we do this the better we'll become. I just hope that we don't get really settled into our roles just as we have to leave them after Christmas. Not quite sure how we're going to be running it all on our own as well. Oh well, we'll manage, we're journos.

Democracy Live!

Having been recently introduced to the BBC's 'Democracy Live' page I thought I'd have a bit of a gander and see how useful it is as a tool for democracy (and also how useful it is to Journo's!).

'Democracy Live' is a new feature on the BBC that allows people to view Parliamentary meetings for all the major parliaments relevant to Britain, such as the Commons, the Lords, European Parliament and the various assemblies. These are broadcast live online and then recorded and aired when proceedings have finished. Furthermore, this content isn't restricted to those living in Britain either; you can access the website and live streams anywhere.

I personally think that stuff like this is fantastic. It opens up the democratic process to the public and they also get access to the European Parliament, something that people may not take as much interest in as they possibly should (especially with the Lisbon Treaty coming into effect).

I just hope that the public actually makes use of this facility. It's a fantastic opportunity for us to see how politics is played out and to really engage in the democractic process. Admittedly, things like PMQ's have become little more than a chance for some opportunistic soundbites, but still, the thought's there...

Freud and all that jazz.

So today we've been guided through to wonderful world of psychobabble and all the wonderful bollocks that goes with it. Freud, to me, comes across as a bit of a knob in all honesty. Even if we ignore his blatant hating on women folk (of which there was an awful lot), the idea that everything can be traced back to sexual repression and wanting to tap my Mum is laughable. The human brain is far more complex than that, as science has shown. Yes we have primal urges, but these run right at the background of our mind in our lower brain functions.

Religion also plays a major part in Freud's psychobabble, especially in regards to his analysis of women. Most mainstream religions repress women, especially the Abrahamic religions, which Freud thought to be a good thing. According to Freud, women are miserable creatures as their sexual functions are so appalling (aka periods) and so are themselves self-repressed due to this horrible act (everything is about sex, remember?). They also wish they were men and have this thing called "penis envy". That doesn't mean they see a guys dick in the shower rooms and think "Oooh, look at him. Wish I was as big as that". No, this is that they wish they just had a penis as vaginas are horrible things that bleed every month.

This is all quite frankly bollocks. I'm yet to come across a woman who craves to have a cock attached to her and while periods are kind of shitty, I doubt they cause women to become disgusted at themselves. No doubt there are women who wish they were men, but there are also men who wish they were women. Freud would probably just say they wanted to shag their Mum's but couldn't so they just wanted to be like her or something equally bizzarre.

While Freud is a nutter, not all psychology is as mental as he is. It helps people overcome mental illnesses such as depression and is a valuable medical practice. It also helps that modern psychology has pretty much discredited a lot of Freuds ideas, so putting stock in Freud's quite frankly sexist and insane theories is a short trip to the loony bin yourself.

By the power of Twitter! Democracy isn't dead!

Goodness gracious, Twitter's had an eventful week. On the 12th October it managed to get Carter-Ruck, a big scary law firm representing a company called Trafigura, to back down on an injunction against The Guardian newspaper. This injunction prevented The Guardian from reporting about accusations that Trafigura is responsible for the dumping of toxic waste on the Ivory Coast that may have led the to death of 15 people.

The news of the injunction was massive on Twitter, with Trafigura and Carter-Ruck topping the most discussed topics on site that day. This massive campaign by 'Twitterers' had an equally massive effect on Carter-Ruck: they were forced to drop the injunction and freedom of speech won a monumental victory. The implications of the injunction were gigantic, and the fact it even got to a stage where it took the power of the people for what was right to prevail is seriously scary.

However, despite having dealt a huge blow to a corporate powerhouse, Twitter wasn't finished being the centre of attention, no sirree!

The recent death of Boyzone member Stephen Gately left everyone surprised, saddened and baffled as to how a fit, young and healthy man suddenly dropped dead of natural causes. Sadness soon turned to anger, however, as Jan Moir's article in the Daily Mail (orginally titled 'Why there was nothing "Natural" about Stephen Gately's death') managed to cause Twitter to erupt in a way that made the Trafigura scandal look like a lovers tiff.

Her article resulted in a massive backlash from celebrities and the public, with Twitter being the major outlet from whichthe anger could be expressed. Notable famous faces that have striked her off their Christmas card list included Stephen Fry, Derren Brown and Charlie Brooker.

Jan Moir, unfortunately, is still on the Mail's payroll, but her article is being investigated by the PCC (even though they're useless) and could result in her justifiable sacking. More significantly however is the fact that major companies such as Marks and Spencers, Nestlé and Nescafé all voiced their disapproval of the article. This level of outrage has left Jan Moir's reputation in tatters and effectively ended her career as a journalist. As Derren Brown put it: "If Gateley's [sic] passing causes today's kind of gutter-journalism to be held to account, we can perhaps take that as a tribute."

The fact that this and the Trafigura furore resulted in action against two incredibly powerful insititutions shows just how influential Twitter has become in the short time it's been online. Combine this with its ability to convey breaking news at such a rapid pace (for example, as it did with Michael Jackson's death), Twitter is probably one of the most powerful tools available to a journalist today and I urge any journo who doesn't have a Twitter account to get one ASAP!

Give the BNP their spot on the BBC. Its the only way they can be shown for what they really are.

With the edition of Question Time featuring Nich Griffin, leader of the BNP, and representatives from the Lib Dems, Labour and Tories fast approaching on the 22nd October, the controversy over the move is sure to become a key news story over the coming week and a half.

A lot of bad press has been levelled at the BBC for giving the BNP a platform from which to spew their propaganda and while I'm by no means a supporter of the BNP, I feel this criticism is unfair.

Much of the BNP's leadership is unmistakably racist, with some having been known members of Neo-Nazi organisations when they were younger (including Nick Griffin). However, in the last European and local elections the BNP managed, much to my disgust, to gain two seats in European parliament. This gives them an unfortunate right to representation and the BBC, who are supposed to be unbiased, have an obligation to the electorate to air their views.

Far be it from giving the BNP and chance to expand their supporters, the BBC has actually given the main three parties the chance to really put them to bed once and for all by thoroughly destroying the wooly arguements the BNP have. All the main parties have to do is take a copy of the BNP's manifesto with them and show that it's more full of holes than Swiss cheese.

Unfortunately for us and the rest of the right minded people of this country, the BNP aren't some minor nuisance that will go away overnight. They're a party with support in a deluded electorate. For this, the best remedy is to display the BNP's views for what they really are; racism masked up as policy.

Who needs to know about particle physics, I mean we can't see the stuff, right?

Max Planck once said: "A scientist is happy, not in resting on his attainments but in the steady acquisition of fresh knowledge." Profound words and no doubt true. So why is it that the STFC (Science and Technology Facilities Council) have decided to "re-focus" the science budget towards more industrial sciences such as pharmaceuticals and biotech. So, despite the science budget being relatively miniscule at only £3.5 billion (it may sound a lot, but that's buttons and lint compared to the budget of the NHS or armed forces, it's been decided that research grants will only be given for a year at a time. Congratulations, you're certifiable morons!

I first noticed this due to following Professor Brian Cox on Twitter, who's got little northern knickers in twist over this and quite rightly so. While it's important to have significant funding for the pharma and biotech industries, more academic sciences such as physics also need their fair share of the funding pie. Massive projects such as the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, as well as smaller research projects that you get at Universities need the money to find the answers to the questions that we've been asking since we banged rocks together and climbed trees.

What the sciences really need is an increase in funding across the board. £3.5 billion is a paltry sum for what we as a nation are capable of. We risk being left behind other nations in regards to science and we've shown throughout history and to this day that we are able to be the best for science. From esteemed scientists such as Isaac Newton, Stephen Hawkins and the aforementioned Brian Cox to television documentaries such as Planet Earth and The Planets we consistently punch above our weight in the sciences. To risk throwing that away simply for a few million quid would be outrageous and tragic.