Jakub Korab

So, why no blog posts lately? Most of the interesting stuff that folks blog about are those issues and ideas which have currency, those at the forefront at their minds. Tech blogs too deal with the everyday. Issues that we have come across, interesting ideas, problems and techniques. However, in this day of corporate non-disclosure agreements and overly keen security departments sometimes it’s just not prudent to scratch that blogging itch, regardless of how tangential the topic might be.

On the flipside, if you didn’t know, Eclipse 3.4 aka Ganymede is out! With a whole bunch of new goodies as standard. After my first cursory test drive, the concensus is… very nice.

An unfortunately pessimistic, yet topical, post this time. You only have to walk past the news stands any given day to see the topic of the month. Knife crime is increasing, with the victims typically being teenagers. What were a couple of isolated incidents now appear to be accelerating into a sustained trend. Anyone who has read Malcom Gladwell’s Tipping Point would not be surprised to see the similarities between the case studies described, and what’s going on. Ironically, bringing media attention to the issue, and staging marches in unity against knife crime only serves to validate this behaviour as an appropriate way to resolve disputes. Seeing one’s peers behaving in a particular way serves to validate that behaviour as an acceptable form of expression. The current trend will only be stopped by applying lessons from past equivalents. In the meantime, we can unfortunately expect it to accelerate.