Most of my Sunday was soaked up in Britain's biggest ever riot. Characteristically, behavior was impeccable. At one point I was lumbered with carrying half of some banner or other, which said something earnest about fisheries.
Now being in a protest march is one long struggle against boredom. But if we had LCD or LEP placards, we could amuse ourselves watching cartoons of exactly what, for example, the Berkham & Dithersby Minkhounds would do to Mr Blair if he ever chanced their way.
Added, by having these little Radiohead-style newsbite video shorts, you maximize your telegenic qualities, and hence publicity. Could also be used at football matches, and re-used indefinitely. Maybe a little pricey to replace if things got rough. But, as a better man than me said, it's only money.-- General Washington, Sep 23 2002 Light Emitting Polymers for Dummies http://whatis.techt...9_gci535060,00.htmlsimple discussion of. The HB really should be off LCD & positing everything in LEP format, I reckon. [General Washington, Sep 23 2002, last modified Oct 05 2004] LED Balloon http://www.halfbake.../idea/LED_20BalloonMight be lighter than a placard or able to be more aloft. [reensure, Sep 23 2002] say whuut?-- General Washington, Sep 23 2002 Surely video shorts are perfectly reasonable things.-- General Washington, Sep 23 2002 Except in cold weather-- whimsickle, Sep 23 2002 I doubt if such things would catch on with the countryside folks, General. After all, weren't they protesting for the right to remain firmly entrenched in the 18th century whilst receiving massive cash subsidies from all us countryside-hating townies? [hee! hee! If that doesn't start a fight, nothing will]-- DrBob, Sep 23 2002 //telegenic//
You could watch newscasts of your elves, watching your elves, watching your elves,...-- FarmerJohn, Sep 23 2002 Would be pretty easy to make a LED based text msg banner. probably baked for clothes, by now!-- pfperry, Sep 23 2002 //Would be pretty easy to make a LED based text msg banner. probably baked for clothes, by now!//
I designed a scrolling LED nametag once. 28x5 pixels, with horizontal pixel-doubling on scrolling text. Worked pretty well; probably about 4-5 hours' use out of a set of four AA batteries.-- supercat, Sep 23 2002 I dunno about that not catching on thing DrBob. British country folk like having the best of all 3 worlds, piling out of a 6-wheel drive Discovery with laser HUD into triassic animal mire, etc. You're right about the cash subsidies. Now I don't have direct agricultural connections, so I'm not being defensive, but I've always regarded those massive farming subsidies as a way of ensuring a loaf of bread costs 50p, milk 30p, etc. After all, since (as is often complained) most of the land is still held by the rentier class, we could easily go back to free trade and the pre Corn Law situation, if you'd prefer? Ball in Town's court.-- General Washington, Sep 23 2002 :0) The subsidies are actually a way of keeping the price artificially high - ensuring that farmers have enough money to live on. Basically they guarantee the farmers a minimum income - hence the massive whingeing when subsidies are removed and the farm gate prices are forced down by the supermarkets. I believe (but may be wrong) that farmers mainly vote for the Conservative party but it seems that they're only interested in the 'free' market when it's applied to everyone else. [takes ball on chest and volleys it back]. I've certainly seen clothing and baseball caps with LED displays but they only seem to consist of text banners. I haven't seen any with animations but I guess that they're probably in development even as I write.-- DrBob, Sep 23 2002 I'm looking forward to this Light-Emitting Polymer stuff which has been in dev. for ages now. Put down a grid, pour on the LEP emulsion, off you go. I'll see if I can't find a link.
<takes the DrBob ball & pockets it for later...>-- General Washington, Sep 23 2002 +1 for the title - hey you wearing pink, sir?-- po, Sep 23 2002 Not wearing pink or Pink. For the former, it's a point of honor not to say masculinity, for the latter, I'm just too damn filthy for that sort of upscale hosier. Why, po? You like pink around a guy?-- General Washington, Sep 23 2002 //newsbite video shorts//undies-- thumbwax, Sep 23 2002 don't care for the hunt but enjoy the chase.
Only AfroAssault can get away with pink in my book.-- po, Sep 23 2002 The agricultural subsidy question goes right to the heart of Western society, I reckon. We've gotten used to cheap B+ food, but in a market which puts a massive premium on the secondary and service industries including everything which comes under the heading 'celebrity', the food production business model, left to itself, just can't attract the sort of talent or quality that our suburban world wants. You can get your beef from Africa if you want. But dropping subsidies would mean that disease-free, humanely reared, A+ meat would be the preserve of the rich. As it stands, subsidies are the residue not so much of socialism as a C19 Whiggery / Enlightened Toryism (Robert Peel) that predates it by 100 years.
So British farmers are anti free trade, yes. Free trade would mean a total revolution in qualities of life for whole swathes of people: small farmers would get put out of business, agri-industry would dominate & once again, as before Peel, be able to dictate prices to supermarkets, rather than the other way around. Poorer people would be left to a proletarian diet; the demand for year-round fruit would make most consumers dependent on the shifting international free trade situation (viz. last year's EU-US banana war, this year's steel subsidies: some trading is freer than others); GM strains, insecticides and phosphates would be ubiquitous; free range produce would be something to aspire to. So my position is: pay your interior designer what you want. But don't shit on the guys who feed you.-- General Washington, Sep 23 2002 Let them drink coke.-- General Washington, Sep 24 2002 I can just see all of the evil potential this idea may hold. Attractive bar girls forced to wear tight tank tops with beer commercials scrolling across their breasts. T-shirts with *animated* obscene slogans...
... I don't even want to think about what they'd do with boxer shorts. I'll give you a croissant anyway, it's a cute idea and as po said it deserves one for the title.-- madradish, Sep 24 2002 General, whilst I sympathise entirely with the points you make (though those who brought us BSE and Foot & Mouth claiming to be the guardians of quality food production is a bit rich), I think that the people who stood on the sidelines and cheered whilst the subsidised coal, steel, transport, telecoms and docking industries were dismantled over the last twenty years are rather unlikely to get much support from those city dwellers who have had to suffer the consequences. Nor are they likely to get anything more than a few short term concessions from a government which is firmly in the pocket of big business (including the agri-business). In the early eighties I marched on parliament with close on half a million other CND supporters (including a certain Tony Blair). It didn't get us very far either.-- DrBob, Sep 24 2002 Why yes, UB, you're right - water being privatised, the coke cannery will start dispensing undiluted coke cubes. Mm-mmm!
And DrBob, well, yes, you're right as well. Politics is politics, but (as they said after the Serbs bombed Dubrovnik) business is business. I think we agree on our desiderata. I think we also agree that, with coal c.1981 and lamb c.2002, we shake our heads sadly at the futility of protesting against The Market. I guess the only thing to do is see where the weltgeist takes us in the next few years and try and keep hold of our hats on the way. Yeeha!-- General Washington, Sep 24 2002 random, halfbakery