Hacked off

There was more on TV about the News of the World phone "hacking" scandal today. I've sort of lost interest in it, so I can't say I've been following every twist and turn. I assumed it was a battle in the BBC/Guardian vs. New International war, so I was unclear as to what was at the root of it (which, I think, was something to do with slebs being too thick to change the default passcode on their voicemail services). Anyway, I saw this thing about it on the news, and once again the newsreader used the example of Sienna Miller. They refer to her as an actress, but I've no idea who she is, and can't be bothered to go and look her up on IMDB. I didn't recognise her from any films, as far as I could tell. So why is she the "poster child" of the scandal? I assume she already has more money than I will ever have in my entire life and that she will never have to work again, so it's not like I'm going to feel sorry for her, and I'm pretty sure her voicemail messages weren't at the wikileaks level, so no-one cared about those either.

In the future, everyone will be famous to fifteen people.
[posted with ecto]

Comfortably dumb

I haven't yet got over the shock of nodding in agreement to Julie Burchill's December outburst in The Independent, lambasting the new aristocracy (founded on celebrity rather than land ownership) and its devastating impact on our society. She mentioned in passing the case of Charlie Gilmour, son of Pink Floyd guitarist Dave Gilmour (who has an £84m fortune). Naturally, his son went to an expensive private school and Oxbridge and, more recently, went off to stick it to the man.

Gilmour - who studies history at Cambridge University - issued a grovelling apology, but incredibly claimed he did not realise he was insulting the memory of Britain's war dead.

[From Student riots | Cenotaph yob is son of Pink Floyd star Dave Gilmour | The Sun |News]

A testament to New Labour's legacy, where only the privately-educated can expect a decent education and a place at Oxbridge (private school pupils, according to the latest figures, are 22 times more likely to get into a "top" university), yet they are as dumb as the sea of chavs they float above.

In the future, everyone will be famous to fifteen people.
[posted with ecto]