IF EVER you needed a clear sign that the recession is here in full force then look no further than the new McDonalds burger joint in Ennis, County Clare.

During the so-called “Celtic Tiger“ period the clearest sign that our economy was on the upswing was the fact that all the services jobs went to foreign nationals. By that what I mean is most of the jobs in the service industry were being filled by non-Irish people who had migrated here because the economy was booming. Service jobs were suddenly not good enough for Irish people and they ditched them and moved on to bigger and better things.

Conversely the surest sign that our economy is in the shithouse is when the non nationals start leaving the country to head elsewhere and, most importantly, when Irish people start looking at the service industry again as a viable employment opportunity… usually becauuse there is nothing else for them to work with.

And so we come to the opening of yet another McDonalds burger joint, this time in Ennis, County Clare. When they recently advertised for staff, they became overwhelmed by the sheer volume of prospective employees hoping for a chance to join the extended Ronald McDonald family. The noteworthy item however is not just the volume of respondants (over 500), but more the fact that a huge percentage of them are well-qualified Irish professionals, including accountants, architects and bankers, all looking to sign up to serve burgers for a living. Apparently so many people responded to the adverts for the jobs that the opening has had to be put back 2 weeks in order to process all the applications. This tells us two things on the recession-o-meter:

1. There are already too many professionals out on their asses from recent job cuts and now they are looking to do any job possible to bring in a wage, even working at a McDonalds.
2. The fact that Irish are applying for these minimum wage jobs again in the service industry highlights the exodus of non-nationals to other countries.

It’s oficial folks; if you have a job do whatever you can to keep it. It’s going to be a rough 2 years for everyone.

AS INSANE as this might sound, it emerged today that an Irish air traffic controller managed to talk down text down a plane in distress into a safe landing at Cork airport when all computer systems onboard the plane had failed.

The incident in question happened last November (2007). The twin-engined Piper plane lost all onboard electrical power, communications and weather radar soon after take-off from Kerry airport on November 7th last and was in distress. The pilot, thinking quickly it has to be said, started phoning airports from his cell phone looking for someone to take him seriously and talk him down.

The only problem with this approach is that the reception on his cell phone was intermittent, and so when he eventually got put through to an air traffic controller in Cork the signal kept dropping and his call consequently kept crashing.

Still, that pilot’s karma must have been with him because the quick thinking controller in the tower in Cork airport realised what was happening and reverted to using SMS text messages to the pilot instead to talk him through approach and landing, using a direct radar fix on the plane and a visual confirmation of the ‘wheels down’ on a fly-by before finally giving the pilot the ‘go’ order to land.

Pretty impressive isn’t it?

To quote directly from the air accident investigator, John Hughes:

“In this incident the positive and proactive initiative of the ATC controller, who, on realising that mobile audio communication from the pilot was intermittent, quickly switched to texting his instructions instead. This contributed to the safe resolution of the incident and, for such, the controller should be commended for his actions.”

Fair play to the pilot for using his cell phone in the first place, but serious props to the air traffic controller in Cork for thinking on his feet and using SMS messages to get the pilot and his passengers down in one piece. I reckon that controller will be living on free pints for a few years on the back of this story!

THE IRISH BROADBAND market got a much needed shot in the arm today with the announcement that ComReg (the Commision for Communications Regulation) has directed Eircom to slash its LLU line share pricing by 65 percent, effectively droppng the wholesale price for LLU line share from €8.41 to €2.94 for other operators in the broadband market.

This is potentially great news for the Irish consumer as the price cuts will lead to more competition in the broadband market and hopefully cheaper prices along with more options for us punters as a result.

On the same day the news broke that Eircom would have to drop their LLU pricing UPC (a cable broadband provider in Ireland) announced it was launching a new series of packages from July 1st aimed at the residential market with significantly larger bandwidth for lower prices, touting a 20mb downstream bandwidth package for only €40 per month, which is dramatically cheaper than other offerings in the same space.

UPC is also improving their upstream speeds. For the 20Mbps product, upstream speeds will be 1.5Mbps. They will also be offering a 10Mbps product for €30 per month and a 3Mbps product for only €10 per month.

Personally I’m a DSL customer – I tried the cable varient but it never had the support, quality and speed I needed – however with these new speeds and pricing I’m beginning to think a move back to cable might now be a smart move.

Does anyone out there reading this have any experience of UPC in Ireland to date? How would you rate them?

 

 

ONE MINUTE you’re searching the ‘Net for a PC Game related website and some cheat codes and then before you know it you’re in court defending your actions in front of judge and trying to explain that you didn’t really intend to sign up as a hitman for hire at that website and that you thought it was all a bit of a joke really. No, really!

Unfortunately this is not a joke though, and as implausible as this sounds, it actually happened as was reported today in the Saturday edition of the Irish Times newspaper. An Irish Army Private (Brian Buckley) told the Central Criminal Court this week that he found the website concerned (I’m not going to reprint it here for obvious reasons) while searching for cheat codes for the PC game “Hitman”.

To quote from the article and in Private’s own words:

“I saw a cartoon animation of a man with a gun. He was wearing a hat, sunglasses and had a pistol. It was a cartoon drawing… Out of my own curiosity or my own stupidity I decided to fill out the [application] form”

Yup. You guessed it. He was contacted and asked for details. Now at this point you might be thinking that he’s not the sharpest tool in the toolshed, if you get my drift.. .but it gets better. He decided to complete the application form and return it, listing his capabilities and preferences. When listing his ‘skills’ he responded with the following list:-

• Handgun
• Rifle
• Submachine Gun
• Shotgun
• Sniper
• Heavy Gun
• Heavy Machine Gun
• Grenades
• Basic Booby Traps
• Limited Poisons

The owners of the website knew a good thing when they saw it, so they offered him a contract to take out “two males in Ireland and one in Spain”. The only problem with this? Well, you see our intrepid Army dude was only actually qualified on rifles and grenades… the rest was in his imagination. As was his ability to be a hitman.

I’m not sure stupid covers this one folks.

Needless to say he bottled out at that point and started ignoring communications from the hitman for hire website; I guess the recruitment standards in the Irish Army aren’t what they used to be.

Anyhoo, the intended targets in Ireland and the people behind the hit are actually the subject of the court case as you can imagine and the whole thing reads like the plot of some crazy indie film, and who knows, maybe it will end up on the big screen at some point with Colin Farrell playing the lead.

So remember kiddies, the next time you cruise by a website and get that feeling that all might not be as it seems just remember the basic rule:

If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and swims like a duck… it’s probably a duck!

 

I KNOW the polling is not complete yet, but early indications are that despite huge pressure from the combined mainstream political parties for a ‘YES’ vote, the nation seems to have given them, and by association Europe, a big Fuck You! as far as the Lisbon Treaty is concerned.

I always suspected it would be a close run thing, but latest polling indicates a more decisive victory for the “No” campaign than I think anyone expected. I’ve been following the results as they are counted and confirmed in the various areas around the country and I’m very surprised by two things.

Firstly the turnout was pretty pathetic at an estimated 50% of those who were registered to vote. Secondly, the swing to the “No” campaign and the impending defeat for the Government and the Euro-planners is much higher than I – or anyone else -expected. In truth I assumed this treaty would pass without any serious challenges based upon a high turnout and the ‘no other option’ campaing being pushed by the Government.

So – two big questions remain. Why did only 50% of our voting population bother to vote? Maybe they were so confused by the issues that they simply decided to abstain, maybe they just counldn’t be arsed. Who knows. Whatever the reason it’s a big problem for future voting if we can’t get more people involved in the process.

Then of course there is the really big question.. what next for Europe? Where do they go from here?

As I write the official counting of the votes is still underway and (according to the RTE website which is tracking all this as it happens) the current national view is trending at 53.5% against the Treaty and 46.% for, but the final results are not expected in for a few hours. No doubt by the time you read this those stats will have altered, but follow that link above for the latest percentages.

Still – the trend is pretty obvious at this point. The Lisbon treaty is going down in flames in Ireland; the people have spoken and told the Government and Europe to go back to the drawing board.

Update: It’s official – Irish voters have rejected the Lisbon Treaty by 110,000 votes - a margin of 53.4% to 46.6%.

A SURVEY released by the Referendum Commission today shows that – shockingly – approximately 80% of people surveyed do not yet understand what the Lisbon Treaty is about.

This is one of the most important treaties that Ireland has had to consider thus far in relation to European influence over our economic and military affairs, it’s due to go to a referendum in just under seven weeks… and yet most Irish people haven’t got a clue what it’s about yet.

It seems that just 5 per cent said they understood the treaty, while 15 per cent answered that they understood it to some extent. A total of 30 per cent did not know the name or subject of the referendum. I suspect, given recent polling on the topic, that the referendum is going to be one of the closest in living memory, considering the current difference between the Yes and No camps is only a few percentage points, and it’s pretty certain that this situation is only continue to change as the voting day looms ever closer.

It’s not exactly a surprise to me though that people are a bit slow catching on to the treaty given the incredibly confusing job the Governament has done so far in trying to communicate just why a “YES” vote is so important to them (apart from the embarrasment of course if the country tells them to ‘shove it’).

The “Vote No” campaigners are busy getting their side of the story out but there is still an overwhelming need for a simplification of all the key issues to be published, enabling the average joe and jane in the street the opportunity to understand the key items and changes under consideration in the treaty.

If you don’t know what it’s all about then please do lookup some of the following sites to get yourself informed:-

• Referendum Commission Website (www.refcom.ie)
• Irish Lisbon Treaty Website (www.lisbontreaty2008.ie/)
• Wikipedia Treaty of Lisbon Page (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Lisbon)

I MIGHT ACTUALLY WATCH IT this time around, especially if Dustin is on stage!

I refer of course to the ever-present Dustin the Dublin turkey, a famous muppet puppet if ever there was one in Ireland. This turkey has pedigree. He ran for president of the country for a while before being ousted. I think he even got into politics along the way. Rumour has it he has turned down a top job at the Football Association of Ireland (FAI) in order to concentrate on his singing career and more specifically Eurovision 2008.

And why should anyone care? Well you see Dustin is not just a turkey, he’s a hand puppet. That’s right, this stuffed, insane and manky turkey with a hand up his arse is getting almost as much press coverage as Clinton and Obama here in Ireland, it’s even making some international publications and I love it! Really. I mean Ireland has it’s problems these days, but seriously… where else in the world could you get a turkey with this much talent?

The mad turkey – if he makes it to the final stage – will be singing his song entry entitled “Irelande Douze Pointe”. No doubt some sanity will interfere with the plan, but the possibility of having a hand puppet representing Ireland and delivering a truely aweful song in the Eurovision would actually make me want to watch the damn thing, possibly even sober. Can you just imagine the ensuing carnage from the other competitors that would follow, especially if he scored some points in the process? Mmmnnn… fun indeed.

Ah hell, given the state of the political parties in this country I’d even give the damn bird my vote if he decided to run against the Fianna Failers and their bitches the Greens.

G’wan ya mad thing!

I JUST THOUGHT it was worth giving a quick mention to the latest invention from a student in Dublin. The Dyson design award has been picked up by Laura Caulwell, a 22 year old graduate of the National College of Art and Design (NCAD), for her tree shaped PC that allows users to upgrade parts of the computer separately.

Caulwell, who was awarded €2,000 after scooping the top prize, will now go on to represent Ireland at the prestigious International James Dyson Award held in January 2008. She calls her new PC invention the “Cultivate”.

Shaped as a tree, the “Cultivate” allows each part of the computer to be upgraded separately so that as a user’s needs change, the tree grows. The trunk of the tree houses the motherboard, while 10 branches also hold the central processor, RAM, battery, power supply, expansion cards, storage, two speakers, an ambient light, and a mouse. Any of these components can be “plucked” from the tree and sent back to the supplier for upgrade, recycling or remanufacture.

Pretty clever isn’t it?

The Cultivate computer tree also features silver aluminum “leaves” which act as external heatsinks, cooling down each component. They are attached by the user, and can be bent and curled into all manner of shapes so not only is it functional but you can tailor your own PC to suit your astethic tastes. Well done Laura, and good luck in the International competition!

WHEN YOU THINK of weddings and family celebrations the images which typically permeate your conciousness are probably along the lines of old aunts drinking a little too much sherry, old uncles grabbing the microphone and treating guests to various drunken renditions of Elvis classics, even perhaps kids sneaking the odd alcohol treat when no one is looking. All in all, you probably think of weddings as one of those events which brings the entire family together in celebration of starting a new branch of the family tree.

When you think of possible venues for such an event Tinakilly House Hotel - a four star victorian mansion set in the woods of County Wickow, Ireland – is one of those locations most people desire; secluded, steeped in history and elegant enough for the wedding event of your dreams.

Unfortunately, this is not the image which most people will be left with after the last wedding ‘event’ down in Tinakilly house. Rather than a wedding, it’s perhaps more accurate to describe the affair as a grudge match. Police were called to the scene when a brawl broke out between the two families gathered for a wedding last Friday. Not just any kind of disagreement however, this brawl involved the participants weilding machetes, pick axes, slash-hooks, knives, wheel braces and even a sawn off shotgun (no wedding pun intended!). Apparently up to 30 or 40 people were involved in the fight, which I’m sure must have looked like a scene from Apocalypse Now by the time the cops arrived.

You see this was a traveller wedding.

You may be more familiar with the term tinker or gypsy but in Ireland the term most people seem to use these days is travellers. A traveller wedding (that photo above is one that did the rounds on the internet a few months ago from another (possible) traveller wedding) is a big deal and as a distinct grouping of Irish culture they face enough challenges getting anywhere to accept them (in pubs, in clubs, in hotels etc.) because of their reputation for being a tad unpredictable… but after this outbreak of machete driven fun and games I’m thinking it’s going to be even harder for them to get any kind of sympathy going forward.

Travellers are so named because they don’t really do the whole ‘settled’ thing. Houses don’t work for them; they prefer the open road. They have their own culture and almost their own language, and pretty much live apart from the rest of the settled community except for those occasions when they need services – as in this case – such as a venue for a wedding.

Everyone is remaining tight lipped thus far about what caused the brawl in the first place, but to be honest the issue for me is not what or who started it, it’s about the fact that these people think it’s normal to bring machetes and slash-hooks to a wedding. I don’t have any problem with these folks wanting to live their lives at the side of a road if that’s what they prefer. I do have an issue though that they think they are outside the same laws which apply to the rest of us in this country.

So, the next time you find yourself in the vicinity of a traveller wedding (you’ll know trust me!) I suggest you don some kevlar body armour and ring for backup. Either that or pick up a machete and raise a toast to the bride and groom, just like everyone else!

AT 6PM TODAY the world may well change, for the better. Irish company Steorn are set to launch a public display of their so-called heretical invention – that of a clean, constant and free energy system which they claim will do away with the global energy crisis.

Just for those in the back who don’t get the significance of this… we are talking about an energy device which runs on nothing and yet is capable of producing limitless power.

I’ve written about this amazing discovery before, almost a year ago now in an article entitled “Irish Company Stumbles Upon Free Energy” and at the time there were many many skeptics who denounced the discovery as being a sham and a publcity stunt. Since then Steorn has invited 22 of the worlds top scientists into a one year validation programme to prove their claims, at the end of which all information will be released for public consumption.

That was nearly a year ago.  Today the same company hopes to unleash “free energy” onto the world…

Today marks another big milestone for the company as they unveil a simplified device which demonstrates this free power in action. Not content with lighting a lightbulb (because the wires may suggest hidden batteries to the naysayers) Steorn have constructed a simple weight lifting device to demonstrate the production and consumption of free power. They call this invention “Orbo Technology”.

I said it back in August 2006 and I’ll say it again. If this is not just some publicity stunt, and if Steorn has actually discovered the secret of free energy… I will never get tired of telling the story of how a small Irish company changed the world, for the better.

G’wan the lads!