If there was anywhere I thought would have more sense than to pass on email addresses, it would be the 10 Downing Street petitions system. But no, they too have leaked my address - the tell-tale method of mine to use a different alias for every website points the finger again. Now don’t get me wrong, I have almost no respect for any arm of the government, but the system is run by MySociety so I’m quite surprised.

Dear webmaster at PMO.gov.uk,

As the owner of the gravitystorm.co.uk domain, I frequently choose different email addresses to use on different websites, so that I can trace who is providing my email addresses to third parties. The email address petitions@[redacted].co.uk has been used exclusively on the “petitions.pm.gov.uk” website. I’m sure you can see how I can be certain that it is only you, and I, who have knowledge of this alias.

Can you please inform me as to whether you, or your contractors for the site (”MySociety”) are responsible for passing on my address to the fraudsters who emailed me (see below). I can provide the full messages that I received today if this helps in any way.

Please note that I am fully aware that you have nothing to do with the spam itself, but you are quite obviously leaking my email address to third parties without my permission.

Many thanks,
Andy Allan

——– Original Message ——–
Subject: LOTTERY WINNING NOTIFICATION{CONGRATULATIONS}
Date: Wed, 12 Dec 2007 06:32:37 -0800
From: UK COVENTRY PROMOTIONS <coventrylotterypromotions @coventrylotto.com>
Reply-To: covpayer34@aim.com
To: petitions@[redacted].co.uk

I doubt this will get anywhere, but I may as well fish for an apology (and who knows, it might even prod them into fixing whichever hole these email addresses are leaking from).

Ed: No, I don’t think it will work, but that’s not going to stop me from signing the Anti ID cards petition on the Prime Minister’s website. There are millions more people who think it’s a good idea than there are objectors like the two of us, so it’ll probably happen. But it’s important to stand up and be counted, so like the email I sent to Home Office years ago, I’ve done my bit too.

A well dressed man approaches me on Queens Gate, and asks if I know where the nearest petrol stations are. He says he’s already been to the one at the bottom of Queens Gate, but he needs to find an independent station. As I’m considering which is closer - the one at the other end of High Street Ken, or the one that Dan Climas went to in minibuses which is down towards Chelsea - he starts talking himself into a hole. He’s run out of petrol, he’s just up from Kent for the evening with his wife, he forgot his jacket so he doesn’t have his wallet, Shell will only give you free petrol if you have your driving license (huh?), but of course it’s in his wallet which he doesn’t have. Finally, the short con comes to its conclusion - whilst waving a bunch of car keys and a mobile phone, he offers to give me his details. He didn’t get to ask for cash before I walked off.

He’s probably unlucky that this happened to me a few months ago in a quiet part of East Putney - a guy shouted across the road to me, and started waving keys and talking about petrol. It’s a bit hard, since if the story was legit, the only option you would have is to approach strangers and rely on their generosity. But in both cases, it’s word for word exactly how a short con would play out, so I walked away both that time, and last night.

Most times when I get approached by people looking for change to get the tube home, I say no (although my plan for next time is to offer to top up their few coins if they are actually willing to put them into a ticket machine!).

I think I’ve fallen for a short con once when I was drunk and walking home through Chelsea many years ago - a well dressed drunk guy on a Friday night had lost his wallet and asked for directions to Victoria Mainline, and needed some cash. He seemed perfectly legitimate, but again, it would happen exactly the same way if he had been a con artist, so he probably was. Nowadays I’m much more sceptical - I’ll hear people out, up until they ask for cash. If they can come up with some way of me helping that doesn’t involve them getting cash - say, asking me to buy the petrol and put it in their car, or asking me to buy them a ticket, they would be slightly more likely to get my help.

Mr C summed up the whole day, when I passed him on his way to work this morning:

“I feel like going home, changing into shorts and spending the rest of the day in the park”

Hell yeah. Well, I managed to spend lunch down by the river, and bumped into Stu running down the Thames path, which will have to do I suppose.

They said on the news that the good weather would help the turnout at the local elections. I don’t think it would have stopped me voting even if it was chucking down, but it’s very sad that so few people take it seriously enough that the weather plays a noticeable impact.

An interesting read by Richard Feynman, which has a couple of good stories about crappy science. I now know where the term “Cargo Cult” comes from…

Cargo Cult Science.

Once again, I’m watching the BBC News, and once again, they are revelling in someone’s misery. This time, it’s a long, drawn out look at the families of some American miners who were mistakenly lead to believe that their loved ones had survied a mining accident, when in fact they hadn’t. And that’s now the entire story - the misery of the families - in minute by minute detail, illustrated in excruciating close-up for all to see.

In the reporting of any tragedy, there will be misery, but the BBC seem to be continually focused on it. They even have a section of the Breakfast program, at 8.20am each day, which seems strangely pre-disposed to getting on some members of the public who have something distressing happen to them - generally the death of a relative - and interview them about it. But why? Generally these people have nothing else to narrate to the world other than to delve into their personal misery. It’s not as if the story is of a courageous bounce back from tragedy to do something remarkable, they’re just victims.

And the BBC revel in it. You can feel them drooling over another story full of raw personal misery, just desperate to get them on air in all it’s glory. I wish they would stop.