Bénch

Wednesday, February 28, 2018

Saturday, February 24, 2018

Me & Cath went to Square Chapel Halifax last night to see Strange face: Adventures in a lost Nick Drake recording
A full house .
Watch below a you tube video for background of the project.
Michael Burdett is a lovely bloke who talked and held the audience comforably for over two hours.
Ironically Amusingly.I had wanted to take a photo of Michael talking during the show ,but such things it seems are copyrighted...........
Instead ,I share a photo of me in Halifax in the early 70's (channelling my 'inner-drake' )I was one of those (very) rare souls who actually bought a Nick Drake album (Pink Moon) in his lifetime.
Below ,some photos from the past 2 days...........

View all this gallery here /

You can "borrow" this book for 14 days .Simply go here: for free download (it's copyright free)

Wednesday, February 21, 2018

sepia saturday 407

I take this week's sepia saturday to be about bicycles.

The sepia movie was shot in 1952 (the year i was born & christened "Karol")

Its called "how friendly are you?"
It Stars a young lad called Karl

I imagine its purpose was school/education -related?

A splendid evocation of that period.

Charmingly innocent.(although I worry slightly about all that "fudge"!)

Whatever.An important & timeless topic.

I can imagine it was a good way into a subject that kids will always find difficult to acknowledge.

It's a pity nobody filmed the audience resposes......that would have been even more interesting than the film itself.

https://archive.org/details/0038_How_Friendly_Are_You_14_48_41_20

Monday, February 19, 2018

John Perry Barlow

https://www.vpnmentor.com/blog/5-lessons-john-barlow-taught-world/
This week, Grateful Dead lyricist and digital rights activist, John Perry Barlow passed away. Although we mourn the loss of a great visionary, we will forever remember his lessons of free speech, personal growth, and marketing tactics. Here are five lessons we learned from the digital rights activist.
1. Freedom of Speech is important
Barlow believed that the world should be a place that “all may enter without privilege or prejudice accorded by race, economic power, military force, or station of birth… a world where anyone, anywhere may express his or her beliefs, no matter how singular, without fear of being coerced into silence or conformity.”
This is probably due to Barlow’s humble lifestyle on a cattle ranch. Here the idea of being free and having a wide-open space for oneself developed. Barlow was an advocate for net neutrality and believed that the internet was where people could speak openly, having that wide open space as he did on the ranch.
As he himself said, “there is a lot of room to define yourself. You can literally make yourself up.”
2. People appreciate familiarity
Barlow was not only passionate about self-development through the internet, but believed that putting one’s digital goods out there for the world to see and hear was the best marketing strategy.

As the lyricist for the Grateful Dead rock band, Barlow developed a marketing strategy in which he let people bootleg the Grateful Dead’s concerts so people became more familiar and would flock to the music they learned to love. He believed that the secret to marketing was in the availability and familiarity of the product.
3. Live freely and without fear
In 1990, Barlow took a stance against the government and created the non-profit organization Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). https://www.eff.org/
Here, he fought against the government for individual’s freedom of speech and personal liberties.
He believed that people should have the opportunity to express themselves freely and that the internet was a great place for this purpose. It was because of this that he went to every measure to do so.He took a stand against the government and authorities for what he thought was right.
4. Security matters
Although Barlow strongly believed in the internet and all the good the internet had to offer, he was not blind to the darkness of the internet.
He believed that people needed to have secure communication methods. He therefore provided, as part of the EFF, security measures through tips, tools, how-tos, tutorials, and software for safer online communications.
5. Stand up for what you believe in
Barlow believed in an open internet, a free internet, and he held that belief until he died. It is through Barlow’s strength and stance with the government that today we have the safety, security, and free music and movies to listen and watch.
Today, as he can no longer do so, we must take the stance for ourselves and stand up for what we believe, just like he taught us to do. There must be someone from your friends or family who deserves to know what John did for our internet freedom.
Share this post to let them know. https://www.vpnmentor.com/blog/5-lessons-john-barlow-taught-world/