Here’s the scoop:
The Financial Times has leaked the results of the International Energy Agency’s long-awaited study of the depletion profiles of the world’s 400 largest oilfields, indicating that, “Without extra investment to raise production, the natural annual rate of output decline is 9.1 per cent.”
This is a stunning figure.
I’ve been looking for a free image tagging solution for some time. iTag is Windows only but it does exactly what I want:
iTag is a free tool that adds title, description and keyword tags to your photos and movies.
The captions you enter are embedded into each file using industry standard IPTC and XMP headers - all in a lossless operation that doesn’t degrade the image.
Highly recommended.
My laptop has just been upgarde with a 320Gb WD Scorpio 7200RPM hard drive. Very fast, silent and huge space, consumes about 1 watt of power and most incredibly costs £60 (GBP). Hitachi have a 5400RPM 500Gb laptop drive that I’ll be using for data when the price comes down a bit. Big heavy 3.5″ dekstop drives are history in my opinion!
ooh a one hour talk by richard heinberg… enjoy:
Here’s a great idea for people who don’t have a garden or who have the energy to garden more than there own space:
The idea is simple. There are many older or busier people who have gardens they struggle to look after but which they like to see being used productively, and there are many younger and more able people who would like to grow food, but have no access to land. In effect, Garden Share acts as a dating agency, matching the two together.
The Totnes Garden Share Scheme on the BBC » Transition Culture
I’d be interested to hear of anyone setting up similar initiatives in Ireland.
Groundbreaking projects at the Millennium Seed Bank at Wakehurst Place in Sussex may have to be axed because of a £100m shortfall.
The money is needed over the next 10 years to maintain its work to store rare seeds from the whole plant world.
If the Millennium Seed Bank was a financial bank, governments would be falling over themselves to give it the money… (via Fluffius Muppetus)
I’d agree with Matt Croslin’s perspective about online learning:
Asynchronous tools can solve this problem by giving all learners time to think and respond. This extra time will benefit all personality types, as even the sanguine learners will share greater insights if they are given more time to reflect. This is in contrast to synchronous meetings where only some personality types will benefit to some degree.
…still seems pretty accurate as stock markets crumble (as does the monbiot quote).
but of course financial market meltdown isn’t anything compared to what it’ll be like as oil supply starts to fall by 7 to 20% per year. hold tight and get those veg in the ground!