So they won. Big deal?

Despite the best efforts of many of us, the result of yesterday’s referendum on electoral reform was a sadly predictable “No”. One way we could respond to that would be to mourn the death of democracy, to stare glumly into our whisky, and become so disillusioned and disenfranchised that we give up. Our prediction that this was our only chance for a generation becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. Why let that happen?

I won’t be voting for you (pt3)

I have received a second reply from Alex Williams, our Tory candidate. Oddly, he seems to be unaware that the Digital Economy Act has already been passed, and writes in the future tense:

I won’t be voting for you (pt2)

I have received a response from Kate Green (the emphasis is my own):

Dear Mr Yon

Thanks for getting in touch. I’m proud to be standing as the Labour party candidate, and very proud of the many achievements of the Labour governemnt [sic] since 1997. I am committed to representing the people of Stretford and Urmston in parliament – as Bev Hughes has done. I simply don’t believe independent candidates are either as effective or as accountable to the electorate.

best wishes

Kate Green

Labour parliamentary candidate for Stretford and Urmston

I think that is the funniest thing I’ve read during all of this tragic week.

UPDATE @12:37: Alex Williams (Tory candidate) has responded simply with “Thank you for your comments.“

Dear candidate: I won’t be voting for you

Our current MP Beverley Hughes did not vote last night on the Digital Economy Bill. Nor has she bothered to reply to my correspondence on the issue. As she is standing down, I have written the following letter to the person who wishes to be her successor:

News travels fast, nonsense travels faster

“RIP Johnny Depp” is currently a trending topic on Twitter. I’m pretty certain that, were he dead, the BBC would have picked up on it. I’ll be perfectly happy to admit I’m wrong if I am (after all, people do die unexpectedly), but I’m going to guess that somebody has produced some misinformation, and thousands of sheep have believed it without question and passed it on. People do that. But what’s interesting about it happening on the Twittervine is that news agencies are starting to rely on social networks to give them the heads up on what they should be reporting. People are going to start gaming this. It’ll be interesting to see what rumours get started in the election run-up.