Wonderful column by Harry Pearson. Sample:

The radio filtered alarming news to my vantage point high above. From what I could make out from an incoherently angry caller to 6-0-6, it seemed that the Manchester United right-back Gary Neville had taunted visiting Liverpool fans at the final whistle by standing in front of them and kissing – and here was the shocking bit – his badger.

That, at least, was what it sounded like. Many would instantly have dismissed the idea as implausible. Those who have been around football as long as I have, however, know better. If we were to eliminate things in football just because they were implausible we’d have to chop out huge chunks of the game’s history – Graham Taylor’s spell as England manager, for example, or Jorge Campos’s shirts, or Rio Ferdinand.

In football you learn to trust Sherlock Holmes’s maxim: “When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.” Steve McClaren is favourite to become the next England manager. I rest my case.

Such cruelty! Good Morning, Silicon Valley reports that,

The Aibo lived seven years — or 49 if you count robotic dog years.

On Thursday, Sony pulled the plug on Aibo, its peppy robotic dog with a software-controlled personality and abilities that has entertained thousands of faithful owners. The dogs, which cost upward of $2,000 each, can dance, whimper, guard and play, developing personalities based on interaction with their owners. Sony has sold more than 150,000 Aibos since launching the product in May 1999.

The Tokyo-based consumer electronics giant is restructuring under new Chief Executive Howard Stringer. Sony said Thursday that it plans to focus on three core businesses — electronics, games and entertainment. Its two robotics efforts, the Aibo and the Qrio humanoid robot, got the ax.

And to forestall all those kind readers who will write in to point out the misspelling of “axe”, it’s in the original quotation and follows American usage. As Oscar Wilde observed, “England and America are two countries divided by a common language”.

The news that Steve Jobs is to join the Board of Walt Disney (as a result of selling his company, Pixar, to them) prompted the following exchange on Slashdot:

Does this mean that Mickey Mouse will now only have 1 button?

Yes, but when they release the new Minnie Mouse her button will provide 4-way scrolling action.

Apologies: geeky joke. Explanation: Apple’s fanatical commitment to a one-button mouse was one of the longest-running annoyances in the business and was widely attributed to Steve Jobs’s intransigence. (He has Strong Views on interface matters.) But he must have changed his mind because Apple recently released a fancy multi-function mouse called Mighty Mouse. It’s terrific, IMHO, especially if you suffer from arthritis.

Thanks to Dave Hill for spotting the Slashdot thread.

The great muckraking journalist has died, aged 83. There’s an appreciative Guardian obit which recalls how much Anderson was loathed (and feared) by those in power. FBI chief J Edgar Hoover once described him as “lower than the regurgitated filth of vultures”. Wow! To be so reviled by such a creep as Hoover is praise indeed.

Very good biography of Anderson on Spartacus.schoolnet.