Daily Archives: Wednesday, December 17, 2014

  • An idea from Yorkshire

    Steve WoodsBristol, Politics

    I’m indebted to Up Our Street for the picture below.

    fly-tipping covered in Environmental Crime Scene tape
    Picture courtesy of Up Our Street

    It shows fly-tipping somewhere in Sheffield covered in tape bearing the wording “Enviro-crime scene“.

    The tape is being used in Sheffield and Rotherham in Yorkshire.

    According to the Rotherham Advertiser, the tape is being used to help make the public aware of the problem of illegal rubbish dumping.

    According to the mandatory council spokesperson quoted by the Advertiser, use of the tape “lets residents know that the council has responded and reassures the public that the council is aware of the items and that they will soon be removed.

    The spokesperson continues:

    It has also been our experience that once people realise that the council is on top of the matter it encourages residents to let us know who has been causing the problem.

    It also helps the cleaning team know that the item has been fully checked for evidence that could be used in prosecutions and indicates that it is ready to be removed.

    Can we get hold of some of this tape for Bristol’s BS5 area?

  • Crowdfunding for Bristolians only

    Steve WoodsBristol, Language, Media, Oddities, Tech

    What could have been a fine report on a local space technology story has been ruined by poor writing in the Bristol Post.

    Yesterday’s Post carried a story on Bristol SpacePlanes and its efforts to develop a reusable orbital vehicle.

    CGI impression of Bristol SpacePlanes Ascender craft
    A CGI impression of the Bristol SpacePlanes Ascender craft

    The Post’s journalist gets off to a bad start in the first sentence:

    Bristolians are being invited to help launch planes into space in a new crowd-funding [sic] campaign.

    Just Bristolians, Bristol Post?

    I thought the idea of crowdfunding (minus the hyphen. Ed.), was that anyone can be part of the crowd that provides the funds, irrespective of geography.

    This suspicion is borne out by 30 seconds research. The first item on crowdfunding I found, from Wikipedia, states: “Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising monetary contributions from a large number of people, typically via the internet.”

    Nowhere in the Wikipedia entry is there is indication at all that crowdfunding is to be restricted solely to Bristolians.

    Or am I just misreading to local media’s propensity to find a local angle to a story? Here’s a hint: it already has one, featuring a local high technology company and doesn’t need a second one! 🙂