I’ve just moved into a new apartment in London, which has one of these (see picture): In case you’re not sure, it’s an electricity meter, complete with ‘key’. Using PayPoints in local shops, you pay in advance for electricity you are going to use in cash (cards not accepted). This balance gets digitally recorded on [...]
Crowdsourcing and crowdfunding are all the rage. The “wisdom of crowds”, it seems, is the way to navigate the fiendish complexity that seems to surround us. But what if the crowd is full of morons? Or vindictive xenophobes? Or plain ignoramuses? We have to be careful. The results may not be what they seem – [...]
My RE teacher long ago set us the challenge of re-translating from the original Greek the first sentence of the Book of John: “In the beginning was the word…” As all translators – and, indeed, users of English – know, some words have more than one meaning; and the multiple meanings of a word (particularly [...]
It is not always easy to work out where we are with regard to the recent census. However, there have been some excellent efforts to date, which this short post will direct you to. The results of the 2011 census are in the process of being released in four waves. Wave one was July 2012, [...]
Last week I enjoyed speaking at the Westminster Food & Nutrition Forum on consumer understanding of food labelling and linkages to food waste. There was a packed line-up of stimulating speakers offering their views on nutritional on-pack labelling, implementation of the new food labelling policy, and informing consumers on food labelling and food waste. Delegates [...]