Happy New Year from Cork !
Saturday, December 31, 2005
Friday, December 30, 2005
Monday, December 26, 2005
Tesco Ireland ignore Data Protection Duties
Tesco really brown me off.
On 11 October I made a request to them for my personal information using this template from the Data Protection Office. The required 40 day response period came and went so I made a formal complaint to the Data Protection Office and I'm still waiting for my information 76 days later !
It shows a few things really - Tesco are too arrogant to bother complying with legislation (look at their unweighed fruit and improperly tagged shelving) and the Data Protection Office is too toothless to enforce it.
Here is an article in the Guardian about Tesco and their data-mining.
The Data Protection Office and Comreg really fouled up as well in relation to the opt-out feature of the National Directory Database - they publicised the fact that you could register not to receive spamming phone calls. However they failed to publicise the fact that for around a month any requests made were not acted upon and affected customers had to re-register their preferences. Its becoming obvious that the so-called consumer champions are nothing but a fig-leaf and the legislation is framed for the Industry's benefit and not for ours..
Saturday, December 24, 2005
Friday, December 23, 2005
Every little helps - me ****
Tonight I went to Tesco in Mahon Point to get a few things - milk, fruit, nappies - nothing special, no "must-have" toy, no seasonal goods; just normal everyday products. Guess what ? Tesco didn't have any size 5+ nappies in stock ! None at all. I wasn't looking for eco-friendly hand-woven size 5+. I wasn't looking for VanHistelroyers Finest Diaper. No, I was looking for bog-standard Pampers.Now nappies aren't perishable. Tesco can still sell nappies after Christmas at the same price - they're not like Christmas puddings or brandy butter.
But can one of the largest retailers in the world have one of the most staple of staple goods in stock ? No. Why ? Maybe its because Tesco Ireland's management seem to be unable to manage themselves out of a wet paper bag. They don't respond to queries, complaints or even fulfill their legal obligation to respond to requests made under the Data Protection Act.
So I legged it to Dunnes . Dunnes had nappies. Where Tesco had gaping empty shelves, Dunnes had people stacking shelves. Where Tesco had yet again their non-existent managers Dunnes had managers walking the floor able to answer queries.
The difference - maybe Dunnes have managed to grasp that if you don't keep the basics in stock people won't shop with you or maybe it's that Tesco are an arrogant British company which couldn't give a fiddlers.
Wednesday, December 21, 2005
Monday, December 19, 2005
What way did your MEP vote ?
tuppenceworth.ie has an article on how Irish MEPs voted in the recent Data Retention vote. Worth having a look ---> How your MEP voted
Monday, December 12, 2005
On a more serious note..
Interesting note on www.mulley.net regarding Michael Mc Dowell's latest fascist plans. At this stage this guy is becoming almost a parody of a right-wing politician. The worst thing is that it all goes under the banner of the so-called war on terrorism which is designed to excuse all sorts of infringements of our rights...
Meet your new stalker...
Sunday, December 11, 2005
Saturday, December 10, 2005
Friday, December 09, 2005
Day of protest
Day of protest
Originally uploaded by despod.
This picture is of Connolly Hall with speakers from various unions. The protest was in support of Irish Ferries workers
Golden Spiders
Cork City Council won a Golden Spider award for their website. Its not a bad site but it has one problem - it doesn't look all that good (or work all that well) in Firefox.
Makes you wonder just what these so-called awards are worth. In fact it reminds me a bit of the farce that used be the "Doras" awards given by Tinet.
Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Baggage
In Stansted at the moment. Massive security queues , massive checkin queues.
What strikes me most is the amount of baggage some people bring with them - for some it looks like they have enough for their extended families and neighbours.
Travel
In cork airport at the moment. How things have changed over the years - now we have flights to Warsaw and Budapest as well as the more traditional routes. I wonder how busy are these routes - this mornings flight to Budapest had 35 on board which one would imagine didn't do a whole lot for Malevs bottom line.
The metal detectors seem to be set very sensitive at the moment - I beeped coming through and I was wearing my usual airport friendly clothes and everything metal was in the daybag. I just had a pat-down but the woman in front had to go through a few times.
Saturday, December 03, 2005
Mahon Point
Went to Mahon Point this morning at around 10.30 - even at that hour it was beginning to get full. We got coffee - plain black coffee in BBs isn't bad at all - and a minute later there was a massive queue for it.
I'm sure mananagement will be happy to see that people were spending - there were plenty of shopping bags around. I noticed Debenhams had a 10% off sale - thats the third of fourth they've had over the last few weeks. Last week they had a 20% off day and a couple of weeks previously they had a 20% off weekend or something like that. I wonder are their sales very slow in MP or is it a chain-wide promotion ?
Interesting site outside Debenhams was a small plane advertsing a local flying school - it immediately drew the boys attention. It would be something I would like to do sometime. Maybe for the big 40.
The Barfleur is due into Cork sometime this evening from Cherbourg in an interesting attempt by a freight-company to drum up business (or help out) out of the Irish Ferries dispute. I think its the first time a Brittany Ferries vessel has been here in December and I also think it might be the Barfleur's first visit to Cork. Who knows it might become a regular thing - I'm sure the Port could do with the business.
Friday, December 02, 2005
Thursday, December 01, 2005
3G or not 3G
The cameraphone has been changed again ! The last time for a while unless Santa brings a mega-pixel jobby.
I'm now using a Motorola E770v which is a 3G Vodafone phone. It has the usual 3G stuff - 2 cameras etc etc. It's handy that it has Bluetooth and expandable memory - boys those transflash cards really are very small. Handily it can be charged from the USB port using a normal mini usb cable which ties in nicely with all the charging gizmos I have for the Blackberry. The best part of it was the price - ?99 incl. ?100 credit ! Its currently 149 but for a while last week it was displaying on Vodafone's site at 129 but when you went further it came in at 99 - a nice bargain. You can download free GAA content which is ideal now that the championship season is over ;-( and Sky news also offers a download. Obviously there is also paid content downloads but I'm not too interested in that.
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