John Walker's Electronic House

We’re very pleased to say that in episode 40, 50, 60 and 63 of Rum Doings (a four-way simulcast, and double-length), we are joined by very special guest, Dr. Ben Goldacre. The man behind the Bad Science blog and Guardian column, and the book of the same name, allows us into his London studio to discuss the subjects about which he and we are passionate. We think this was a unique opportunity for the subjects to be discussed with enough space to consider them properly, and for the good doctor to speak in a way that five minute radio interviews cannot.

In a sweary episode, we begin by talking about the peculiarities of those who threaten to sue Goldacre for libel, and the way quacks will create misleading statistics. Then via Nick’s desire for robot doctors, we discuss whether doctors are obliged to tell the truth to their patients, how new technology may change the role of doctors in diagnosis, and the potential for conflicts of interest depending upon how doctors are paid. And Nick lets John speak after the first half hour.

We ponder the potential privatisation of the NHS, and the impact that may have on patients and doctors, what happens when you privatise blood donation, and in turn, the nature of an altruistic act. We ask what doctors should be doing with drugs they know don’t perform better than placebo, even if they appear to help patients.

Dr Ben puts out the interesting idea that doctors should not be the final gatekeeper to a patient’s access to drugs, and indeed whether there should be legitimate access to outlawed drugs. There’s chat about how we should react when we see the vulnerable being tricked by quacks, how much John gets paid for writing in The Cat Magazine, how we can encourage big pharma to get out of their patenting model, and Nick’s LBC caller gets a good few outings.

All three of us express our concerns with the Comic Relief Walkers Crisps campaign, we hear Ben’s “Everything In This Box Is Bollocks” suggestion for letting adverts lie as much as they want, and Nick trots out his Trotsky theories. The idiocy of DRM rears its head, then Nick and John leap on Ben when they see a glimmer of an opportunity to evangelise free software models. And then a last second chat about Richard Stallman brings us to an end.

Spread the scientific word. Tweet it, Facebook it, ask strangers on Formspring about it. We really do need you to do this. It makes a difference, especially with a special episode like this. And writing a review on iTunes brings us more attention.

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Or you can listen to it right here!

[audio: http://rumdoings.jellycast.com/files/audio/rumdoings_e63.mp3]

Last week on RPS I spent quite a bit of time with a story about the Wikipedia entry for Old Man Murray being deleted. Rather than re-explain that here, you can read the original short post on the matter over there. But in short, one of games writing’s most significant, influential and hilarious pieces of history was removed from the encyclopaedia on extremely spurious grounds.

After we addressed this, and other high profile sites picked up on it, a review of the deletion quickly resolved the matter. In the end what it demonstrated was how efficient Wikipedia really is, and how effective its administration usually is. Of course, being made up of individuals, within their numbers will be those who make wrong decisions. This just happened to be one that affected something that we care about very deeply.

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Every now and then I remember to listen to this theme song, from the adventure game Legacy: Dark Shadows.

[audio: http://pool.cream.org/legacy/legacy.mp3]

And my day gets better.

This is the game that featured these two moments of dialogue, that I’ve written about so many times:

[audio: http://pool.cream.org/legacy/legacy1.mp3] [audio:http://pool.cream.org/legacy/legacy2.mp3]

We’re really sorry that this is a clicky episode. We have no idea what causes it, and there’s nothing we can do to fix it. It’s really not that big of a deal.

In episode 62, Nick’s broken voice becomes the first point of discussion, once we’ve established we won’t be talking about whether the English have forgotten how to make a good cuppa. We then move on to talking about Nick’s wife’s breast milk ice cream, Nick introduces a new indication law, and John tells the story of the crazy Welsh ex-policeman at his door.

We have a discussion of Sweden, talk about why John’s risking becoming a rapist by playing Bulletstorm, and then chat about violent videogames.

Make sure to tune in to next week’s too, when we’ll be releasing episodes 40, 50, 60 and 63 all in one episode, with a truly excellent celebrity guest.

Tweet it, Facebook it, ask strangers on Formspring about it. We really do need you to do this. It makes a difference, and makes our egos happy. And writing a review on iTunes brings us more attention.

If you want to email us, you can do that here. If you want to be a “fan” of ours on Facebook, which apparently people still do, you can do that here.

To get this episode directly, right click and save here. To subscribe to Rum Doings click here, or you can find it in iTunes here.

Or you can listen to it right here!

[audio: http://rumdoings.jellycast.com/files/audio/rumdoings_e62.mp3]

Goodness me, I get back from a peculiar day of splendid time with friends, and the miserable destruction of my car, to find that the internet (well, Twitter) is alight with anger and confusion about Rob Bell. Because he said… well, nothing whatsoever.

Rob Bell is the leader of Mars Hill church in Grand Rapids, Michigan – an enormous church that is often described as being part of the “emerging church” movement, although never uses that description of itself. He has become an enormously popular figure in the modern church, recognised both for his fervent evangelical approach to the Bible combined with a consciousness of the real world and living in reality. His book Velvet Elvis was a phenomenon amongst Christians, breathing exciting ideas and stirring up entertaining controversy. Despite its awful name, it’s a superb book. His NOOMA video series made his name even more widely known. A strangely modest man, he has yet to visibly demonstrate any of the diva attitudes of so-called Christian celebrities, and he has this odd tendency not to to demand everybody’s money for a yacht-based ministry. Seeing him speak last year on his Drop Likes Stars tour, it was odd that it took place in a medium-sized church building, rather than a large theatre or perhaps even arena. Afterward he sat at a small table, saying hello to those who wanted to chat, like a stand-up comic at the end of a gig.

And with all this popularity came the obvious backlashes. Any of his ideas that are either complex, confusing, or perhaps just simply wrong, are hailed as the proof that he’s a false prophet, the devil in disguise. He upsets two sides of the church: the traditionalists who worship their religion rather than their God, and the megachurch-leading televangelists, who fear his popularity combined with his lack of money-grabbing. People are hunting for reasons to shoot him down, to deflate his rise.

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This episode almost died. Audacity, for the second time in Rum Doing’s history, crashed at the end of the recording before it could be saved. Last time it meant we lost the episode forever. This time the remaining fragments could be recompiled by our super-computer, and the entire thing is saved!

As you know we can no longer post round-numbered podcasts, so this episode 61 follows on directly from 59. There is a reason for this – an episode 40, 50, 60 is going to happen next month, for definite-sure.

This week we don’t discuss whether we have any use for the British library. And in order not to have to talk about the Big Society, John mentions that we’re drinking Italian beer. Which is like rum, in so much as it’s a liquid. There then comes some analysis of how Nick and John constantly fight online, which is clearly always Nick’s fault.

Stephen Green gets a belated discussion, Behold The Man gets an ever belatedier discussion, and then Stephen Green gets even more chat. And then: death, robots, and quantum physics. Which is one of our favourite chats we’ve had. Is it irrational to fear not existing? Can arrows hit targets? And what are photons up to?

Tweet it, Facebook it, ask strangers on Formspring about it. We really do need you to do this. It makes a difference, and makes our egos happy. And writing a review on iTunes brings us more attention.

If you want to email us, you can do that here. If you want to be a “fan” of ours on Facebook, which apparently people still do, you can do that here.

To get this episode directly, right click and save here. To subscribe to Rum Doings click here, or you can find it in iTunes here.

Or you can listen to it right here!

[audio: http://rumdoings.jellycast.com/files/audio/rumdoings_e61.mp3]

Welcome to Rum Doings Talk Radio, edition 59.

I’m far too busy to tell you what’s in this episode. We’ve recorded a couple in advance – this week’s and next week’s. Amazingly Nick has been told by the doctor he must not speak for two weeks. At all. That’s how come you’ve heard those angels singing. So I imagine we probably talked about some drink, radio, probably wittered on about TV at length, and Nick probably accused John of being something terrible. You know how it goes. Very entertainingly. That’s how.

Tweet it, Facebook it, ask strangers on Formspring about it. We really do need you to do this. It makes a difference, and makes our egos happy. And writing a review on iTunes brings us more attention.

If you want to email us, you can do that here. If you want to be a “fan” of ours on Facebook, which apparently people still do, you can do that here.

To get this episode directly, right click and save here. To subscribe to Rum Doings click here, or you can find it in iTunes here.

Or you can listen to it right here!

[audio: http://rumdoings.jellycast.com/files/audio/rumdoings_e59.mp3]

Welcome to a leathery 58th edition of Rum Doings, where we don’t discuss what we are doing to protect our English cricket greens. But we do instead discuss celebratory Welch’s grape soda. What are we celebrating? Well, it seems that John has proposed to a woman. And not curtains.

So there’s much discussion of that, as you might imagine, with the full story of how it all happened so John can point people to listen to this rather than have to tell everyone who asks. We explain the necessity to avoid diamonds, and the means by which a lady will agree to marriage.

Then there’s some familiar ranting about the Liberal Democrats, discussions of the death of the NHS, and Nick takes on some sacred cows of classic radio comedy. We ponder the Two Ronnies, Sorry!, and then misery of 70s and 80s sitcoms. And there’s an explanation of how to write like your favourite RPSer. And then after a bit we stop.

Tweet it, Facebook it, ask strangers on Formspring about it. We really do need you to do this. It makes a difference, and makes our egos happy. And writing a review on iTunes brings us more attention.

If you want to email us, you can do that here. If you want to be a “fan” of ours on Facebook, which apparently people still do, you can do that here.

To get this episode directly, right click and save here. To subscribe to Rum Doings click here, or you can find it in iTunes here.

Or you can listen to it right here!

[audio: http://rumdoings.jellycast.com/files/audio/rumdoings_e58.mp3]

Today the Daily Mail has a sad story in which the ex-wife of Christian Voice front man, Stephen Green, explains how he mentally and physically abused his family for many years.

Stephen Green came to fame when the BBC announced they would air Stewart Lee’s Jerry Springer: The Opera. Considered by Green to be blasphemous (and by Christians who can think to be satirical), he vociferously campaigned against the broadcast, and then against the stage show itself, and succeeded in bankrupting the previously successful production. But his real victory was a strong media presence, his name being put at the top of most media outlets’ contact books for matters of Christian controversy. Despite it being abundantly clear that he was an extremist, and despite his organisation repeatedly having been demonstrated to be pretty much just Stephen Green in a mobile home, everyone from the BBC to the tabloid press would seek a quote from him if they wanted to spin a story as conflicting with an imagined version of Christian values. He was guaranteed to deliver, saying something printably outrageous. His ludicrous views would be countered by those affected by the story, and in the publication’s mind some manner of editorial balance had been achieved.

But most interesting is the Mail’s relationship with the man. Their latest story describes Green as a “monster”, a “fundamentalist.” The article goes on to note,

“Stephen was immersed in Christian Voice, which allowed him the autonomy and freedom to express his increasingly bizarre views unchallenged. As its founder and director, he was answerable to no one.”

And just who was it who was letting Green’s views go unchallenged?

Well, take for example this article about student stunt marriages that appeared in a newspaper just fifteen days ago:

“The students’ wedding was condemned by Stephen Green, national director of Christian Voice, an organisation that represents Christians.”

The story then goes on to quote Green at length, without editorial comment. And which paper is it who let this extremist monster go unchallenged? That would be the Daily Mail.

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Episode 57 begins with a discussion of the number 56. You can’t pin us down. And we’re not discussing for how much longer we shall have to put up with the SCOURGE of HOMMOsexual adoption.

Then we take leave of our senses and attempt an alcohol free beer. We attempt a few one or two-word impressions. Then we discuss the poly-attractive nature of Susan Kennedy. At length.

And finally, after mentioning it a hundred times, we explain what a BEMLi are. Which takes us onto discussing the sad collapse of Chris Morris, and the rise of Charlie Brooker. Nick angrily points out why John’s job is stupid, and then attempts to get himself – and himself alone – sued. John painfully attempts to explain why it’s bad business to be a corrupt games magazine, and Nick explains that it’s Stockholm Syndrome. The attacks on John continue as Nick tries to uncover corruption in his past, and John wants to cry. Then we discuss Kieron Gillen’s riches, and RPS slash fiction.

Tweet it, Facebook it, ask strangers on Formspring about it. We really do need you to do this. And there’s a small group of you who faithfully do. But the rest of your are lazy scabbers – give something back in return for the unbridled joy we bring you. And writing a review on iTunes brings us more attention.

If you want to email us, you can do that here. If you want to be a “fan” of ours on Facebook, which apparently people still do, you can do that here.

To get this episode directly, right click and save here. To subscribe to Rum Doings click here, or you can find it in iTunes here.

Or you can listen to it right here!

[audio: http://rumdoings.jellycast.com/files/audio/rumdoings_e57.mp3]