Today I vent spleen at the Royal Mail.

I never thought I'd actually write a blog ranting about the Royal Mail. Normally I'm quite the fan of our ol' posties, but this week they've royally got on my tits. 

I ordered a new pair of earphones online last week but I missed the postman on the Saturday morning that it got delivered. According to the little card they put through my door, it was being left at the Royal Mail Delivery Office on the other side of the city (despite there being at least two post offices nearer to my house but oh well).

Went up on Saturday only to find it shut (thought it might be, but you never know). Deciding I'd go this morning I caught the bus (£3.60 ticket to boot) due to it pissing it down and thought I might finally get my earphones.

It boded well, the place was actually open this time which was nice. However, it then went rapidly downhill.

Apparently they don't even have my parcel! After getting a card saying it's at the delivery office it turns out that's a load of bullshit. According to the man at the desk (who,  to give him his due, was very helpful and apologetic) it could either still be with the postman or could be at the post office just up the road from my house. 

If it's still with the postman, why is it still with him and if it's at my post office, why the hell didn't he put on the card that that's where it was?!

I left them my number so they can contact me when they finally find out where my parcel and when they do ring up I have every intention of telling them what I think! If this is the type of service that we can expect from the Royal Mail then I hope the next government does privatise the Royal Mail. Perhaps then we can expect to get our post!

How to solve play off drama in one simple step.

Get rid of them!

Honestly, why is this so hard to understand? Play offs are fundamentally unfair. Teams should be rewarded by playing consistently through a campaign. If they finish one spot behind the current automatic qualifiers/promoters then they should qualify or get promoted just as equally, not forced to play another round of games designed only to line the pockets of FIFA/UEFA/FA beaurocrats!

This case is perfectly highlighted by the Ireland vs France game last night. Ireland deserve to be in South Africa this summer, France do not. Ireland managed to go through the entire first qualification phase undefeated, despite being in a tougher group than the French. However, France will be in the World Cup. In what way, shape or form is this fair?

To compound matters, the way the French beat the Irish was through an act of blatant, if uncharacteristic, cheating by Thierry Henry. I'm not saying that the match should be replayed, that'd be ludicrous and open up a whole new can of worms. However, in order to prevent such monumental cock ups something has to be done.

Video technology has to be introduced, even if it's just in a limited capacity. It works in every other sport that it's been tried in, so why not football? People argue that it'd break up the flow of play but that's nonsense. In cases such as the one last night, how much longer would it have taken to check the videos than it did to stop players protesting?

This doesn't go for just play-offs either. It should be implemented across the board for higher level games. With football being the multi-billion pound industry that it is, shouldn't fairness be a critical issue?

5, 4, 3, 2, 1! We have lift-off!

Yesterday saw the launch of the second and third years collective baby; WINOL. After two dummy runs the previous two weeks, confidence was high in the newsroom of a fantastic first live airing. I'm glad to say we didn't disappoint and all went well! Word on the street (okay, the word of my girlfriend) is that it was a good broadcast so it's not just me being big headed.

Despite being beset with difficulties and unexpected problems (such as our main presenter being ill, network and loan counter problems etc) we soldiered on and put out a news broadcast we can all be proud of.

It's weird viewing the bulletin from the point of view of a feature writer. The news, sport and production desks and the people who work on it are a flurry of activity trying to get packages done and dusted. However, us feature writers aren't quite as pressured. Sure, we have our own stories to get in and editing and the like to do, but it seems we spend a fair whack of time on a Wednesday trying to assist the other desks in any stuff they need doing.

Obviously the more we do this the better we'll become. I just hope that we don't get really settled into our roles just as we have to leave them after Christmas. Not quite sure how we're going to be running it all on our own as well. Oh well, we'll manage, we're journos.

Democracy Live!

Having been recently introduced to the BBC's 'Democracy Live' page I thought I'd have a bit of a gander and see how useful it is as a tool for democracy (and also how useful it is to Journo's!).

'Democracy Live' is a new feature on the BBC that allows people to view Parliamentary meetings for all the major parliaments relevant to Britain, such as the Commons, the Lords, European Parliament and the various assemblies. These are broadcast live online and then recorded and aired when proceedings have finished. Furthermore, this content isn't restricted to those living in Britain either; you can access the website and live streams anywhere.

I personally think that stuff like this is fantastic. It opens up the democratic process to the public and they also get access to the European Parliament, something that people may not take as much interest in as they possibly should (especially with the Lisbon Treaty coming into effect).

I just hope that the public actually makes use of this facility. It's a fantastic opportunity for us to see how politics is played out and to really engage in the democractic process. Admittedly, things like PMQ's have become little more than a chance for some opportunistic soundbites, but still, the thought's there...

Rafa Benitez may have won this week, but one good performance does not make a season.

So Rafa's done it again; when all seemed lost he's managed to motivate Liverpool to pull out all the stops and get that much needed win. Much needed it was to, as a fifth successive defeat (against Liverpool's biggest rivals to boot) would have seen him collecting his P45 quicker than you can say "title challenge".

Benitez has developed a habit of turning things around at Liverpool, most notably in the 2005 Champions League final. However, while the red half of Liverpool will be celebrating this victory, serious questions need to be asked over the long-term future of the club and Benitez's job.

A lot of the problems Liverpool face at the moment aren't strictly the fault of the manager. Gillett and Hicks are probably two of the worst chairmen football's seen since Peter Ridsdale and their refusal to significantly back Benitez in the transfer market, as well as their constant bickering, is impacting on the club in a major way.

In order to progress on last seasons finish Liverpool needed serious depth added to the squad, namely another striker, another box-to-box midfielder and another right back. Admittedly Liverpool signed Glen Johnson, but they sold Alvaro Albeloa, who was probably Liverpool's most improved player last season. Even more significantly they sold Xabi Alonso, whose absense has been keenly felt. Add to this the replacement they bought, Alberto Aquilani, was injured upon signing and has only just got back training doesn't do anything to improve matters.

While Liverpool need to add depth, they also need to get rid of the dead wood in the squad in order to get some funds to sign some quality. Players such as Voronin, N'Gog and Lucas wouldn't even make it into the Stoke City first team, let alone into a team hoping to contend for major honours at the end of the season. Personally I can see someone like Carlton Cole moving to Liverpool as he'd compliment Torres nicely, can score and will be desperate to impress Fabio Capello and be picked for the World Cup squad. Players such as Ricardo Montolivo would also add additional technical quality to Liverpool's game and help shore up the midfield.

If Liverpool can use this victory to kick start their season then all the better, but some serious action in the January transfer window is needed if Liverpool are to keep up with the rest of the pack. If they don't push the title challengers to the wire, Benitez will find himself like so many other people at the moment; looking for another job.

Freud and all that jazz.

So today we've been guided through to wonderful world of psychobabble and all the wonderful bollocks that goes with it. Freud, to me, comes across as a bit of a knob in all honesty. Even if we ignore his blatant hating on women folk (of which there was an awful lot), the idea that everything can be traced back to sexual repression and wanting to tap my Mum is laughable. The human brain is far more complex than that, as science has shown. Yes we have primal urges, but these run right at the background of our mind in our lower brain functions.

Religion also plays a major part in Freud's psychobabble, especially in regards to his analysis of women. Most mainstream religions repress women, especially the Abrahamic religions, which Freud thought to be a good thing. According to Freud, women are miserable creatures as their sexual functions are so appalling (aka periods) and so are themselves self-repressed due to this horrible act (everything is about sex, remember?). They also wish they were men and have this thing called "penis envy". That doesn't mean they see a guys dick in the shower rooms and think "Oooh, look at him. Wish I was as big as that". No, this is that they wish they just had a penis as vaginas are horrible things that bleed every month.

This is all quite frankly bollocks. I'm yet to come across a woman who craves to have a cock attached to her and while periods are kind of shitty, I doubt they cause women to become disgusted at themselves. No doubt there are women who wish they were men, but there are also men who wish they were women. Freud would probably just say they wanted to shag their Mum's but couldn't so they just wanted to be like her or something equally bizzarre.

While Freud is a nutter, not all psychology is as mental as he is. It helps people overcome mental illnesses such as depression and is a valuable medical practice. It also helps that modern psychology has pretty much discredited a lot of Freuds ideas, so putting stock in Freud's quite frankly sexist and insane theories is a short trip to the loony bin yourself.

By the power of Twitter! Democracy isn't dead!

Goodness gracious, Twitter's had an eventful week. On the 12th October it managed to get Carter-Ruck, a big scary law firm representing a company called Trafigura, to back down on an injunction against The Guardian newspaper. This injunction prevented The Guardian from reporting about accusations that Trafigura is responsible for the dumping of toxic waste on the Ivory Coast that may have led the to death of 15 people.

The news of the injunction was massive on Twitter, with Trafigura and Carter-Ruck topping the most discussed topics on site that day. This massive campaign by 'Twitterers' had an equally massive effect on Carter-Ruck: they were forced to drop the injunction and freedom of speech won a monumental victory. The implications of the injunction were gigantic, and the fact it even got to a stage where it took the power of the people for what was right to prevail is seriously scary.

However, despite having dealt a huge blow to a corporate powerhouse, Twitter wasn't finished being the centre of attention, no sirree!

The recent death of Boyzone member Stephen Gately left everyone surprised, saddened and baffled as to how a fit, young and healthy man suddenly dropped dead of natural causes. Sadness soon turned to anger, however, as Jan Moir's article in the Daily Mail (orginally titled 'Why there was nothing "Natural" about Stephen Gately's death') managed to cause Twitter to erupt in a way that made the Trafigura scandal look like a lovers tiff.

Her article resulted in a massive backlash from celebrities and the public, with Twitter being the major outlet from whichthe anger could be expressed. Notable famous faces that have striked her off their Christmas card list included Stephen Fry, Derren Brown and Charlie Brooker.

Jan Moir, unfortunately, is still on the Mail's payroll, but her article is being investigated by the PCC (even though they're useless) and could result in her justifiable sacking. More significantly however is the fact that major companies such as Marks and Spencers, Nestlé and Nescafé all voiced their disapproval of the article. This level of outrage has left Jan Moir's reputation in tatters and effectively ended her career as a journalist. As Derren Brown put it: "If Gateley's [sic] passing causes today's kind of gutter-journalism to be held to account, we can perhaps take that as a tribute."

The fact that this and the Trafigura furore resulted in action against two incredibly powerful insititutions shows just how influential Twitter has become in the short time it's been online. Combine this with its ability to convey breaking news at such a rapid pace (for example, as it did with Michael Jackson's death), Twitter is probably one of the most powerful tools available to a journalist today and I urge any journo who doesn't have a Twitter account to get one ASAP!