Ben Miller talks global warming: "... let’s face it, the planet is not in any danger from global warming, or global cooling, or global stay-the-same-ing for that matter. The planet is a lump of rock — 6,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 tonnes’ worth to be precise — which started life as a molten fireball so hot that even after hurtling through space for the past 4.5 billion years, it hasn’t properly cooled down. It has, at times, almost completely frozen over or basked in temperatures so sweltering that the polar ice melted and crocodiles swam at the North Pole. A few greenhouse gases and a rise of a couple of degrees in global temperatures isn’t even going to touch the sides. What we really mean by “saving the planet”, of course, is “saving the humans”. I’m not sure we deserve it. For a start, we did the damage in the first place. And what’s so great about us anyway? Sure, we made it to the top of the food chain. But we did it, basically, by learning to gang up on rival species and one another. You don’t see many Neanderthals out shopping for precisely that reason. Now we have finally come up against a challenge that can only be bested by all of our tribes acting together in our common interest. I don’t want to appear cynical, but I don’t think we’ve got a hope. In short, there’s a theory for what happens next, and it’s one of those which does exactly what it says on the tin — catastrophic die-off. You may be thinking: perhaps it’s for the best. Perhaps humanity has gone as far as it can go, and it’s time to hand the baton over to some more highly developed beings with a more self-aware intelligence that respects the environment. Well, forget it. There’s no guarantee that the species that takes our place will be any less selfish, belligerent and short-termist than we are. Evolution (and the planet for that matter) doesn’t care. There’s only one quality our successors will almost certainly poss

I really enjoyed JCVD. It's a low budget movie and the director seems to be have a thing for using the 'rose tinted' lens at every opportunity, but it's the best thing the old karate chopper's done in a while. I don't understand why Van Damme didn't accept a role in The Expendables but hopefully JCVD will set him up for some decent roles in the future. Here is the famous monologue, where JCVD speaks from the heart.

On my walking tour, I started to appreciate that London isn't a world apart from Paris. We share similar metro/underground systems and we both have a river cutting through our cities in a similar fashion. London even has a semi-decent cafe culture these days and there are many public parks where people can lounge about in the sun. I do think the average level of civility seems a bit lower in London than Paris, but then I was surprised to see pianos left outside in the open air for public use, both at The British Library and Leicester Square. As I mentioned earlier, London appears to be more diverse when it comes to both people and prices. The large slice of pizza pictured above cost a mere £1.90 in Leicester Square, for example. However, Paris is far more aesthetically pleasing with a much higher ratio of boutique stores versus big name chain stores. Contrast that with this image I took in a street in London. It isn't very clear but in a row we have: KFC, Starbucks, Costa, McDonalds, Pret A Manger, Flights Express, WHSmith, and Tesco. Pretty bland but I guess it's what customers want, and if it means lower prices you can count me in as well.

That's some good eating right there:

The life of a businessman.

I'm loving the vibe of this track by La Roux. Their official video on Youtube is here, the one below is a live performance: It's good gym music. Now "Pump the guns, blast your ass, and feel the burn damn it!" Here is my favourite clip from The Wire (only four episodes in so far): This 'Extreme Sheep LED Art' video looks like a corporate hoax, but it's still pretty cool:

GOLD !

You know you are getting old when you keep rejecting the pop-up invitation to upgrade your internet browser. Well, after six months of hitting the 'Later' button, I accidentally accepted the option to upgrade my Firefox from version 2 to version 3. Thankfully, the upgrade was completely painless and the many personalisations that I had made to the browser were automatically ported across to the new version. Importantly, all the core add-ons continue to function perfectly fine and the one that didn't (Super DragandGo) was easily replaced. The latest Firefox looks kind of snazzy and is definitely faster than the older version, but it'll be a while before I take a look under the hood to see what's new. In a fit of optimism, I decided to download the Google Chrome browser, which was a very quick process although everything hung when importing the settings from Firefox (just skip this stage if it happens to you). Chrome looks like a nifty, lightweight browser that could be worthy of a play around. Judging by the slow pace of development of other Google Projects, many of which are in eternal 'beta', I reckon it will remain light years behind Firefox. However, it may be worth keeping in the background as it was lightning fast when accessing Gmail. After these relative successes, I figured it was time to upgrade my Internet Explorer v7 to the latest v8, which has just been launched. In typical Microsoft fashion, the IE installation process took absolutely ages and it was the only browser update that required a full system restart at the end. Also, once installed, it told me to download a Microsoft Update patch that is over 200MB in size. Um, no thank you. I think I'll stall that one for as long as possible! One day, I'll get around to playing with all these browsers and all the new functions they offer. These include such amazing things as 'web slicing', 'accelerators', 'incognito modes' and 'omniboxes'. I used to brim with enthusiasm at such things. Right now, I kind o

What did we learn from the Soviet Army? (hat-tip to kottke) Answer: How to break-dance!

Ong Bak was a landmark event in martial art movie-making. There was no CGI, no 'wire-fu', just spectacular, bone breaking fighting with realistic sound effects and unparalleled levels of athleticism. Since it's release however, I believe Hollywood has learned almost nothing from Ong Bak, and Tinseltown's efforts are increasingly amounting to little more than glorified versions of Steven Seagal's rapid hand-slapping victories over an endless string of truly useless baddies (remember these fights?). While wire-fu magic was put to great use in earlier Chinese kung-fu movies (e.g Jet Li in 'Once Upon A Time in China), it has been used in excess ever since The Matrix, and is now looking extremely tiring. I realise that it is too much to expect normal actors to learn a martial art, and that Hollywood actors probably couldn't get the insurance to take the crazy risks taken on the set of Ong Bak, but surely some of the new breed of action stars (e.g. Statham ... umm, and some others) can do something along these lines? I just hope the miraculous Tony Jaa doesn't got snapped up in a potentially ruinous Hollywood deal (just look at some of the god awful efforts of Jackie Chan and Jet Li when they came to the West). For more background on Tony Jaa, read the wikipedia entry: 'Jaa grew up in a rural area and watched films by Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan and Jet Li at temple fairs. He was inspired by them and whilst doing chores or playing with friends, he would imitate the martial arts moves he had seen in the films. He would practice in his father's rice paddy or, when bathing the family's elephants, he would somersault off their backs into the river.' For now, we can continue to revel in the joys of Tony Jaa in the Ong Bak series. Here is the trailer for Ong Bak 2: And if are wondering about potential cheeky use of CGI and wire-fu, check out this clip of the making of the film. From about 1 min 20 in, it really hots up: And scroll forward to the 2 min, 30 sec mark in this

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18 pictures The bulk of Dubai's populations comprises of South Asian migrant labourers, many of whom are employed in the rapidly contracting construction sector. I don't think I would last more than a couple of days in their shoes. During the holiday, I described these hard working folk as Oompah-Loompahs, but they were more like the Doozers from Fraggle Rock.

I enjoyed watching Slumdog Millionaire last week. Overall, I'd give it about 3.5 out of 5 - it is definitely worth watching watching, has great acting throughout, and it wonderfully captures the dark, manic beating pulse of Mumbai. However, I do think the film has been over hyped, and that the unrealistic premise that holds the story together conflicts with a film that is otherwise very realistic, gritty and un-Bollywood like. Is this the beginning of a wave of mainstream films from India? Perhaps. The provider's of entertaining film reviews at 'Ain't it Cool' have this to say about the upcoming 'Chandni Chowk to China' (backed by Warner Bros): '... imagine KUNG FU HUSTLE mixed with a Bruce Lee movie mixed with the 36TH CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN mixed with SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE, with a dash of MOULIN ROUGE, James Bond and an Adam Sandler movie. I know that last ingredient smells bad, but trust me… when you mix it all together it makes a delicious dish.' Not sure about this one.

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Three more video photos: Creatures of the deep - at the Dubai Aquarium Discovery Center Hatta pools 1/2 Hatta pools 2/2

Flickr allows it's professional members (i.e. paying customers) to upload short video clips to its site - the idea is to create a genre that sits somewhere between the photo and the video, a kind of moving photo. I liked the idea and took a series of such 'video photos' whilst in Dubai (although I've uploaded the clips to Youtube because it is free!). First, some off-roading clips: The Hummer tentatively slides down a dune: Jeep Wrangling up Pink Rock - the Jeep failed on its first two attempts. After your resident lardy got out of the vehicle, it zipped up without a sweat: Range Rover raised off the ground (look at the clearance)

This is quite something. A French guy and a Brit sneak into the Burj Dubai and base jump off the top. Hat-tip to Chris for the link. The French guy's deep, philosophical verbiage (quoted below) is in stark contrast to the matter of fact, practical, and more limited commentary from the Brit. George Mikes picks up on this difference in How to Be an Alien. 'It's very surreal. When the sun rises, and lights up everything...you're all alone. ... You feel like everything belongs to you. A little moment of eternity. ... There's nothing but us. At that point, I'm free. I'm doing what I want to do. No one's there to tell me it's good or bad, it's a moment of freedom, of total freedom.' 'During the fall, it's a bit like being in a dream. When the chute opens up it's like waking up. What's always the best is the first time. The first time you jump off something, it's always different. Once you leave the edge, you're happy. The stress comes while you're waiting, before you go. Once you start to act, it all happens by itself.'