tsKegel.com

I wrote this a while ago and think it might be appropriate to post it.

I am sitting on an airplane somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean.

Today [by which I mean Saturday the 12th of July, I may not be able to post this immediately] I left for the United States, I will not be returning for quite some time. The next time I am likely to be in London will be for Christmas and even then, it’s not going to be the same, I will not be living there full time.

Instead my days shall be spent in the US, originally on Long Island for the summer and then later (and for longer) at Haverford College just outside of Philadelphia. This will be my home for the next four years (assuming everything goes smoothly). I’ve had a great time in London but ow its time to move on. My one piece of advice for those staying in London is to check out the Pepper Tree, an excellent thai restaurant in Clapham.

So long London and Londoners, its been great.

The Open Rights Group just launched a new membership drive. It was actually launched at Opentech last weekend (Saturday the 5th of July 2008), but I’m a bit slow. The purpose of the drive is to obtain new members that can support the Open Rights Group well into the future.

By December of this year, we intend to double the amount of financial support we receive directly from individuals who are concerned about the erosion of civil liberties in the digital age.

Why? Because we want ORG sustainable with money from individuals’ donations. After all, we’re here to protect individual rights for all tech users. And we think the best way to do that is through the direct advice and support of smart, well-informed individuals.

Their blog post is available to read in full here.

I will be keeping their widget on my blog for a while to track their progress in gathering new supporters. You should be able to see it in the left had side of the site fairly soon.

I was due to attend Opentech, where it was announced, and would have loved to have gone but unfortunately I was ill (I still highly recommend the conference to others though, cheap and very interesting).

The Open Rights Group recently released their report on the London mayoral elections as I previously posted, I was part of the team observing the election. The report is highly detailed and comes to this conclusion.

There is insufficient evidence available to allow independent observers to state reliably whether the results declared in the May 2008 elections for the Mayor of London and the London Assembly are an accurate representation of voters’ intentions

I wholeheartedly agree with this conclusion and encourage you all to read through the report yourself. It can be found here.

If you look carefully, you can see my name in it!