Despite the title, this isn’t a post about the state of the world and all that’s wrong with it. This is about something which is becoming a daily occurrence in many cities across the globe.

This is to do with the burning of effigies and the reporting of such scenes. Is there a crack team of effigy burning reporters that only come out when reports of a small group of angry individuals are seen carrying a broom wearing a cardy stuffed with grass with a small cut-out of a celebrity from Hello magazine poking out the top? No matter what event, no matter how soon after the event, there is always a reporter there bang on time to witness the protest from start to end. Not wishing to start any rumours… but you have to question the authenticity of these protests and the part reporters play.

The latest was the Shilpa Shetty/Richard Gere incident. Shortly after, we were presented with scenes of angry indian males setting fire to a Richard Gere effigy. Admittedly this was good to see, but the doll itself was a sack stuffed with paper with a crinkled half torn picture on top, I’m not expecting a level of quality and standard fit for Madame Tussauds, but a carrier bag stuffed with leaves with a black marker pen face?

In addition to this, where do protesters in countries, who are clearly not fans of the U.S find American flags? Obviously, someone sells them. But who? and why? I mean, how do you begin selling American flags in anti U.S countries? In any case, selling American flags must be hazardous, if not seasonal.

As a developer, you come across your fair share of web forms. Countless hours are spent entering test data into forms to test everything from validation to an entire series of forms, such as a e-commerce checkout process.

Fortunately, help is finally at hand. (For FireFox users anyway, don’t use FireFox?!?! Your IP has been logged and as we speak a crack team of nerds are making their way to your location). iOpus have created a free (for personal and commercial use) FireFox add-on which allows you to record an entire form input as a macro.

It has demo macros to try which takes you test forms purely to give you a feel of how powerful this tool is.

What would WWII have been like if Nazi Germany introduced fully functioning armoured weaponised robots?

Its obviously something which troubled Marco Spitoni, a senior artist at EA enough to create what I can safely say is the best piece of animation you will see anywhere.

Judge for yourself…

Code Guardian Part 1

Code Guardian Part 2

Its hard not finding a link to a Wikipedia article when carrying out a Google search. It was an excellent source of information, which has now famously lost credibility with a whole host incorrect information and facts.

One thing I find amusing are the links to other articles. Is this automated? Surely it has to be. I think that unless content goes through a review phase which is highly unlikely considering the volume of content, Wikipedia’s demise is unfortunately set to continue. Which will be a shame as it is a great source of information.

Despite its problems, and to not kick a man when he’s down. Here is something which you could describe as me kicking a man when he’s down. :)

Well, the title says it all. Can you? Simple answer, probably not. :) If you are planning on leaving the comfort of employment to brave freelancing then this guide will come as a reality check by summarising typical start-up and on-going running costs. Believe me, the costs stack up very quickly.