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INKYTEXT 349 Part II
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PART II
Issue No 349b Thursday 27th April 2000
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Editorial correspondence should be sent to InkyText@lancaster.ac.uk
Subscription requests to Inkytext-distribution-request@lists.lancs.ac.uk
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DEATH OF MRS DEBORAH PICKETT
Deborah Pickett, wife of Professor Pickett FRS, died peacefully in
Airdale Hospital last Friday morning, following a long illness. Her
funeral will take place in St Margaret's Church, High Bentham, at 1.00
pm on Tuesday 2 May. Mourners are invited to join her family
afterwards in the Methodist Hall.
No restrictions on flowers, but donations to the Bentham Footpaths
Group towards the cost of a memorial bench will be welcome.
PART II
4. Paris Diary with a Difference.
5. Online educational e-zines: an introduction.
6. Readers' Letters: The 'Regulation of Investigatory Powers' Bill, Kind
Letters, Late Ad, Louis Barfe in Private Eye, George Cockburn, Alan
Waters, Janet Clements, Lisa Whistlecroft, Kev McMeeking, Jeremy Boreham.
4. PARIS DIARY WITH A DIFFERENCE
---------------------------------
DROVE DOWN TO PLYMOUTH to pick up Grandpa, then over to Bishop's
Stortford next day to spend the night and park the car in
brother-in-law's garage. M5, M4, M25 and M11. Debated whether taking
the A303 and M3 would have been quicker. Brilliant idea to bring a
walking stick - despite the user's reluctance.
THIS WASN'T THE USUAL TRIP: this was a 90th birthday present. I had
the usual exhortations to look smart, shave every day and not to drink
too much. Accordingly had packed three ties and five of my best shirts
(the Ungaro, Guy Laroche, Daniel Hechter, and two Pierre Cardin). In
Paris they notice these things. Realised that the Karl Lagerfeldt tie
(an enormous bargain from a TK Maxx Christmas sale) wouldn't go with
any of them. Must buy a sludge-coloured shirt.
STORTFORD TO LIVERPOOL STREET: so far so good but hadn't been able to
locate anywhere proper to eat here. (Main meal at lunchtime since with
the time-difference it'll be too late to eat properly when we get
there.) An accessible JD Wetherspoon's pub is in the station itself -
Hamilton Hall. Must have been part of the hotel. We all rate JD
Wetherspoon's for VFM food in a smoke-free atmosphere where you can
hear yourself talk. And Californian wine at 5.99 a bottle! M has
chilli, I have the Chicken Caesar Salad (not too salty), Grandpa has
fish and chips and a ginormous knickerbocker glory. Glass and a half of
red Coldwater Creek each.
TAXI TO WATERLOO INTERNATIONAL through dense and often stationary
traffic, passing by the Bank, St Paul's, Fleet St, Aldwych, King's
College - all changed a bit since his days at King's. Arrived far too
early as usual- even check-in opens only 2 hrs before departure.
EUROSTAR lives up to its reputation. Even on the English side the ride
impresses by its smoothness. It accelerates on emerging at Calais and
we zoom through empty landscapes that haven't changed all that much
since Grandpa led his tank squadron through them 56 summers ago. Huge
queues for taxis at the Gare du Nord but constantly moving. Only wait 5
minutes. Driver is a woman and she doesn't know where the Rue Cujas is
so I explain. Still has to get her atlas out for the one-ways. The 20
minute journey costs 93 FF plus tip.
MY FATHER-IN-LAW was successively a French teacher, a tank troop
commander and a headmaster. He was a post-graduate at the Sorbonne in
1931. The places he considered interesting were the Sorbonne and Jardin
de Luxembourg. Fair enough, so that's where we are: cheek by jowl with
the to end of the Sorbonne and not 10 metres from the Boulevard St
Michel. A wee bit more upmarket than my usual dives, but we're only
here for three nights.
BY THE TIME WE'RE SETTLED IN OUR ROOMS IT'S after 10.15. Have to eat
something but the cafes hereabouts will be closing. Grandpa vetos my
suggested McDonalds. At Au Depart they are piling up the chairs. Nip
into the Royal Luxmbourg and ask the barman, plying with vodka two men
propping up the bar, if we can still get something to eat. He makes a
_moue_ and says it depends what. A Croque, I suggest. OK.
WE SETTLE IN THE WINDOW and he brings us menus, paper table-cloth and
place settings plus condiments. We order croque-monsieurs which here
are on the trendy stoneground wholemeal _pain poilane_ (4F premium for
that) and come with salad. Also beers and a quarter of wine for me.
Super. The barman cooks, serves the customers at the bar and waits on
us, all swiftly, effortlessly and uncomplainingly.
NEXT MORNING UP BETIMES and out at 7.00 alone. Really is the best part
of the day in Paris or elsewhere: empty streets, cheerful people and
little traffic to spoil the view. Buy a paper and have a McDo expresso
(50p) on the corner of the Rue Soufflot. I note that a MacMorning is
still only 17FF - has been for 3 years - but they also now do a
MaxiMorning at 25FF with yoghurt and bacon and egg muffin as well.
Astonishing value for the city centre. At 7.55 students pour out of the
metro just in time for 8.00 am lectures. We meet for breakfast at the
hotel.
GO FOR A WALK but only down the boulevard and over to Notre-Dame. Then
have a long rest and expensive tea before tackling the uphill trip back
to the Sorbonne and hotel. Lunch in one of the four cafes in the Place
de la Sorbonne where students sit doing essays and reading. Omelette au
jambon and a glass of red.
AFTERNOON: Sunny so M and her dad go to sit in the Jardin de
Luxembourg and I wander off to the cybercafe to check my email, send an
Inkyflash and then to browse the bargain bookshops on the boulevard.
EVENING: Belated birthday meal. First over to a cafe for aperitifs
(kir for us, a glass of champagne for him). Then into the miraculously
convenient Salut l'Artiste which has elderly French customers rather
than tourists, and respectably starched linen but most importantly is
next door to our hotel. Excellent simple meal. Can't remember what the
others had but I enjoyed my warm goat's cheese salad, _onglet aux
echalottes_ (_saignant_ of course) and a marvellous _Ile flottante_
crowned with a huge web of spun sugar. Bottle of Muscadet and a bottle
of Cotes du Rhone. Jolly decent meal, we agree.
DAY TWO: Usual routine. Today we're going to take one of the buses on
the boulevard - Grandpa declined the tourist bus or a boat trip. Take
the 21 to St Lazare. The Opera is parcelled up in boards and polythene.
Set off to walk to the Madeleine and Place Vendome then back along the
boulevard, but it's breezy and Grandpa is finding it tough. So tea in a
still empty _grande brasserie_ beside the Madeleine. Realise we're
going to have to cut this outing short and make our way back to the bus
stop. Outside Fauchon (the ultimate grocer's) a liveried flunkey hands
a tin of foie gras to a uniformed chauffeur illegally parked.
AFTERNOON: The other bus routes down the boulevard go north. Take a 93
to the outer limits - better than a tour and only the price of a ticket
(50p if you buy them in carnets). Pass the Pompidou Centre and the
Sacre-Coeur and emerge in ethnic Clignancourt. Settle on to the
terrace of a cafe and welcomed effusively by a friendly north African
waiter who wants to practise his English. Doubt very much if they get
many English customers out here! He worked in Shepherds Bush and
Newcastle. "Eez eet still pissing down in London", he asks memorably.
FINAL DAY: Friendly farewells from the hotel staff. To the Gare du
Nord, M buys lunch for the trip and I nip out to get the wine, then
smoothly back to Waterloo. And shudderingly and bone-shakingly from
Liverpool St to Stortford on the Stansted Express. Mission accomplished
5. EDUCATIONAL ONLINE E-ZINES: AN INTRODUCTION
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E-zines come in two varieties, as websites or as mail. In terms of
network efficiency websites are preferable, but they still don't
command the attention of things that force themselves into your
mailbox. Both types are needed to satisfy different audiences and
needs. A compromise is to mail a brief contents notice announcing the
appearance of a new issue on a website
In the USA, campus news is now very refined indeed, and often there
are three or more DAILY online publications competing with each
other. On big campuses the number and range of these is staggering.
Some are official. Try the Yale Bulletin and Calendar
(http://www.yale.edu/opa/current/ybcurrent.html) But now look at the
oldest college daily, Yale Daily News (http://www.yaledailynews.com/)
Wow.
Or try the Yale Herald, another so-called 'undergraduate' production
of quite extraordinary professionalism. (http://www.yaleherald.com/) I
particularly liked Rumpus Magazine (http://www.yale.edu/rumpus/) which
features an extremely thoughtful and sophisticated piece on 'having
one's breast signed by Larry Flynt' complete with picture.
The Berkeleyian OnLine is the web version of an official weekly for
staff published by the University. Remarkably newsy
(http://www.urel.berkeley.edu/berkeleyan/). But there is also the
Berkeleyian Magazine, a glossy termly mainly about the vulgarization of
research. Then there is Cal Monthly, official publication of the Alumni
Association, and even Letter Home, a newsletter for Cal parents.
However alongside these one finds The Daily Californian, a real
newspaper by and for students. Published Monday-Friday during the
academic year by The Independent Berkeley Student Publishing Co., Inc.
The nonprofit IBSPC serves to support an editorially independent
newsroom run by UC Berkeley students. (Check it out at
www.dailycal.org)
The Cornell Chronicle is another official publication and appears
weekly (http://www.news.cornell.edu/Chronicle.html). But the respected
Cornell Daily Sun is run by students and for the local comunity.
My favourite is The Daily Illini which is a credit to its campus
(http://www.illinimedia.com/di/apr_00/apr26/news/index.shtml). The
online version seems to produced with extraordinary professionalism by
students. But take a look also at BUZZ, Champaign-Urbana's alternative
website (http://www.illinimedia.com/buzz/).
Harvard Monthly is a new e-mail based news service about the
University. Subscribers will receive FREE monthly e-mail newsletters
each month. A useful link with alumni and donors.
The Stanford Report is another term-time official daily
(http://www.stanford.edu/dept/news/report/). The Stanford Daily is the
student answer but not arguably perhaps not so good this time
(http://daily.stanford.org/).
If anyone knows online campus publications of the calibre of these on
this side of the Atlantic please let me know. But things are improving
and Lancaster is falling behind. LSE, for example, runs News and Views,
another official weekly. Can't honestly say I spotted many views
though. (http://www.lse.ac.uk/Press/newsandviews/)
Nearer home you might want to cast a glance at Lookout, a biweekly
(during term-time) official newssheet published online by the
Communications office of UCLAN. Simple but reasonably effective.
(http://www.uclan.ac.uk/comms/lookout/index.htm) In addition there is
A.u.lookout, a global email service provided by the Communications
Office and ISS to bring staff current campus news in (mercifully) one
single global email. It is posted at least once every week but only
reaches staff on the Administrative and Academic Network. Pity.
Clearly, in the world of online universities we have a long way to go
to catch up on that first division.
6. READERS' LETTERS
-------------------
If you've read the papers of late, you may be aware that Jack Straw
has introduced the 'Regulation of Investigatory Powers' Bill, which
relates to the use of encryption on the Internet. The name of the Bill
may seem bureaucratic, benign even, but its intent is serious and it
could affect you and people whom you know.
Essentially the Bill will give the police, and others, the power to
demand that you give them the encryption keys if you use such devices
to keep your Internet transactions and messages private. I rarely use
such keys, but without them any message that you send and any download
that you make can be intercepted by another who wishes to do so. Many
secure sites, such as banks, use these keys.
Under the Bill, such information can be demanded if the police (or
others) are suspicious that you may be engaged in illegal activity, in
activity that affects national security, or in activity that threatens
the economic well-being of the UK. If you refuse to comply, or claim to
have lost the key (which may be true), you will be liable to
imprisonment.
Also, as John Naughton pointed out in his excellent Observer column on
April 16th, if you are asked for such a key it will be illegal for you
tell any one about this - this includes family, friends, employers and
legal advisors. Catch 22, no one can come to your help, because if you
ask them, you will face a prison sentence.
Perhaps the most critical point is this. The keys of innocent people
will be required. The nature of public key encryption is that the
recipient of a message has to hand over the key, NOT the creator of the
enciphered message. If you refuse (for whatever reason you may wish),
the innocent party becomes the criminal.
This affront to civil liberties is bad enough, but police suspicion
can rest on someone's view that the economic well-being of the UK is
threatened in some way or other. Thus, in one swoop, those with civil
liberties concerns and those who work for multi-nationals become
bed-fellows. Something that I thought even New Labour could not
achieve.
Please could I encourage you to take this seriously and to write to
your MP about it? Unless something is done, the Bill may become law in
the autumn and then that's it. Remember, you'll never hear how the Bill
is being used, because it will be illegal to tell.
Perhaps this University and others could declare itself against the Bill?
For more information, you might wish to look at the following web-sites.
http://www.stand.org.uk/
http://www.fipr.org/
Professor M. Pidd
President of the Operational Research Society
Head of Department of Management Science
--------------------------------
Andy's analogy is probably (never liked "prolly") a little incorrect.
Whilst true, is it not also true that, after a while, very little, if
any, trace of the water would also remain on the knife.
However, if we assume that you (through Inkytext) have been the knife
in Lancaster's environment, its water (its swamp ?), then on the real
world side of the analogy, the water will certainly have left some
trace on the knife, if only a general deteriation in sharpness, through
various erosional processes. N'est-ce pas ?
Here's hoping that your whilst your organ may wither, you (or rather,
your slant on things) may still leak out, now and again,
A Contributor.
---------------------------
Fully understand your reasons for wanting to stand down, and it's
obviously pointless to try to persuade you otherwise, but just wanted
to say a very big word of thanks, both personally and on behalf of the
many others I know who have benefited so much from your efforts, and to
let you know that whatever you say about knives ands water, your
contributions to raising our critical awareness and enlivening our
daily round here has been enormous, and will be sorely missed!
With all good wishes for your future existence!
Alan Waters
IELE
-------------------------
Don't really believe you, given Inkblots, of revered memory, given
MLRC News, given the remarkable service you have rendered to us all -
including the "establishment" - these many years; but, if it is so,
then thank you very much.
Suspect you are daft to think there will be a successor.
George Cockburn.
[NOTE: Thank you. Your maiden contribution is much appreciated, though
you left it rather late! Nah, I'm not that daft, but I hope to have
made a point that even the more obtuse can't fail to recognize the
truth of. (Ed)]
------------------------
I prolly (ugh! used only in honour of your usage!) won't have occasion
to read whatever it is you move on to - and I shall miss your insights.
And I'll miss the sense that there was someone out there who, one day,
would tell me why we have a kiddies adventure playground lurking in the
South-east of campus - and why it is fenced off so that kiddies (well
this one anyway) can't play on it. And I'll miss knowing that someone
else on campus was grinning over the idea of security fencing off the
"left-hand side" of the perimiter road...
Good luck with your new ventures. I hope our uni spontaneously pops
into Nick Bardsley's alternative universe and seeks a proper solution
to the void you will leave.
Lisa Whistlecroft.
------------------------
I met Helen Ronald at Reebok in Lancaster the other day, she works in
the Customer Services Department. She wished to be remembered to you
and as she has no e-mail I said I would pass on her greeting.
All the best. It won't be the same without you even if Inkytext finds
a new editor. Your notes for Joan and me have been copied by numerous
folk. We have just sent a composite copy to friends in Cyprus who are
going to Paris.
Stuart Riley
----------------
A brief message to say thank you for all the hard work over the past
years. To keep me in touch with Lancaster and the University from
deepest devon 1 issue of inkytext must be worth 10 copies of the
Lancaster Guardian. A sad loss.
Kevin McMeeking
Lecturer in Financial Accounting
Exeter
--------------------------
Sad news indeed about the demise of InkyText. You and it are of course
unique and inimitable and your contribution to life at Bailrigg is
immeasurable. Henceforth we shall have to learn to live in darkness. I
only hope you may learn a little of how much you are appreciated. To
that end Furness would like to host a tertulia for you in Furness SCR
at a mutually convenient time and date. Probably a Friday night. Could
you suggest some dates and when we've agreed time and date, would you
advertise it to all Inkytext readers in your last edition?
I'd just like to say how much I enjoyed your writing on your two most
unforgettable characters, Bunny Mason and Hector MacIvor. Your stylish
writing and amazingly vivid recollection of these two teachers was
outstanding. My Mum read them at the weekend 'cos I thought as a Scot,
albeit a different vintage from you, she would appreciate the cameos.
She did indeed and told me that the tawse had in fact been applied to
her when she was at school in Buckhaven.
Hope you're having a splendid sejour in Paris.
Janet Clements
---------------------------
Dear Inkytext
O please don't go,
Dear Inkytext
We need you so.
Your measured voice,
Biting or calm:
Opinions, news,
Warnings of harm...
That voice, if stilled,
Will leave us poor.
Dialogue ended,
Heard no more.
Behind each door
Each face then shut,
Mirror shattered
Cords all cut.
The knife in the water is a poor simile. John Donne is closer: 'No man
is an island.' By the loss of one we are all diminished. The absence of
your voice leaves us all impoverished, just as its presence enriched
us.
Anon.
[NOTE: Why thank you, but no sentiment puh-leeze. It's not been the
house style and this is no time to start! (Ed)]
---------------------------
Hello, Could you please insert this ad in your for sale column:
"Colour Toshiba TV, brand new (unused) 14", with remote. Worth ?130.00
offers over 80.00. Please phone 01524 382 794 or email
c.holland@lancaster.ac.uk."
[NOTE: Sorry - see last issue. No more ads - and only one more issue.
(Ed)
----------------
From a recent Private Eye: "Who says hacks don't drink any more? At
the recent Oldie of the Year awards, Publishing News writer Louis Barfe
set a fine example after encountering the awards' overall winner in the
gents.
"I've just stood next to Peter O'Toole," he exclaimed to the unimpressed
crowd at the bar.
Barfe was so excited he then proceeded to enjoy his "Lunch" until 7pm
before spending the evening asleep, travelling back and forth on the
District Line.
He woke up at 11pm in Barking, more than a little confused."
Gordon - enjoy life after Inkytext!
Steve Dunthorne,
News and sports reporter,
The Chorley Citizen,
-----------------
Can't believe you're leaving Inkytext, it's the end of an era!! I'm
leaving the University on Thursday and do not want to miss the final
editions of Inkytext or any potential future ones. Therefore, please
could you unsubscribe Deborah.Birchall@lancaster.ac.uk and add
Birchall@high-barn.demon.co.uk.
It goes without saying that InkyText will be badly missed.
Deborah Birchall
--------------------------
So are you sending movements 3 and 4 of your Hanham Symphony to those
who request it? If so I'd rather value a copy. (In complete confidence
of course.)
An excellent penultimate issue (though I've only seen half of it) with
some very quotable quotes. Has Martin Wainwright of the Guardian been
informed of your imminent retirement?
Jeremy Boreham.
[NOTE: Lots have asked that. Have to think about it, Jeremy. I'd have
to please my judicial friends and that would leave it a bit bland.
We'll see. No, I don't think the excellent Mr Wainwright still reads
us, but I might quote from him in the Best of Inkytext loyalty bonus
that comes out after the final issue. (Ed)]
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NEXT TIME: THE FINAL ISSUE AND MORE ON MARDIS