Author: Carrie

  • The funny side of suicide bombing

    This guy wanted to blow up a Saudi prince. And he persuaded his brother to use a suppository bomb. The suppository bomber turns up at the Saudi prince’s place, says hello to the Saudi prince, pulls out a trigger, fires off the bomb, then blasts himself vertically, straight through the ceiling. The Saudi prince picks…

  • Why self publishing sucks (for me)

    We’ve been talking about publishing (or rather, not getting published), and G24 points out: You don’t need a publisher these days any more than you need pulped up trees to print on. I agree entirely, but I don’t think self publishing is the right road for me. There are lots of reasons for that, but…

  • Ready, fire, aim! Something to check before you write a novel

    Remember that book I was writing? I thought I’d post an update. After a lot of work, eight drafts and two printers I’ve sent it out to some people, and I’ve had loads of feedback about it from agents and other publishing insiders. The dialogue is great. It’s really atmospheric. The characters are fun. The…

  • Politicians and the Internet. It’s never good

    Hello. Sorry if I’ve been quiet lately – Baby Bigmouth was a bit unwell last week so it’s all sleep deprivation around these parts. Not that that’s stopping me from getting angry about tech things. Far from it. Here’s my take on the government’s latest ISP-related idea. Rather than, say, reining in Google or telling Facebook…

  • How many people will Google’s car kill?

    A fascinating post by Jean-Louis Gassée on Google’s self-driving car: The hardware and the software will fail, no question. The real riddle is determining the socially acceptable failure rate. Today, there are about 40,000 car fatalities per year. Note the euphemistic “car fatalities” or “car accidents”, as if the drivers weren’t to blame. You can imagine…

  • Windows 7 isn’t right for tablets

    Stating the bleedin’ obvious it may be, but Lenovo says Windows 7 isn’t right for tablets and that Android 2.2, aka Froyo, isn’t ready for them either. Lenovo’s director of new technology Howard Locker, explained it this way: “The challenge with Windows 7 is that it’s based on the same paradigm as 1985—it’s really an interface…

  • Drinking booze isn’t clever, but booze drinkers are

    According to this Psychology Today post, the smarter you are, the more likely you are to drink – although presumably there are differences in who drinks what, or Stephen Hawking would be off his face on Super Lager. more intelligent children, both in the United Kingdom and the United States, grow up to consume alcohol more…

  • How Nokia lost the plot

    Reviews of the new Nokia N8 are coming in thick and fast, and they’re not good: the consensus is that it’s a great piece of kit hobbled by not so great software. Via The Guardian, here’s a piece in the Helsingin Sanomat that attempts to describe the problems facing Nokia and what caused them. I…

  • A good book you can have for free

    My friend Chris Mitchell runs Spike, a most excellent books-and-interesting-things site on the Internet. And now, he’s put together a most excellent ebook version with some of the best bits from Spike’s last 15 years. And a few things I’ve written too. It’s a lovely thing to look at and and to read, and it’s…

  • Stripper boots – y’know, for kids

    Is it just me, or are these Lelli Kelly boots — currently the subject of near-constant advertising on kids’ TV channels — utterly inappropriate for the under-tens they’re aimed at?