Irrelevances

An all time favourite of mine, Prefab Sprout, used to inhabit my turntable and cd player back in the eighties and well into the nineties, I seem to remember. It’s been a long time, far too long. And somewhere in-between the entire record collection, LP’s singles, CD’s – the works – were lost along the way, keeping me and my past well at bay. (more…)

I’m normally not your average aggravated person, but I suppose my last post got me going, fuelling my currently sombre view of our nation’s state. We are indeed holier than thou in every respect, negotiating peace wherever we go — or so we think — and (and this is just too amusing) fly to Bali in order to instruct the world of the environmental hazards of flying.

I don’t know about you, but coming from a country whose economy depends on the exploitation of the world’s natural petroleum and gas resources… How do you rate its credibility?

Photo: The very image of Norway’s success equals that of the world’s demise (photograph from StatoilHydro)

Today I stumbled upon an incredibly stupid (for want of better words and — given the blog’s, well… stupid tagline) Norwegian blog, labelling Americans… you guessed it, stupid; New York – New Dork (a remarkably clever title, that). But it gets worse.

It would appear that the blog’s chief (or only) purpose is to discredit the American people, for being inconceivably dense. Well that’s just rich, coming from a representative of (one of) the stupidest nations in the industrialised world. Granted, the United States beat us with infinitessimally small margins, but beat us still. (more…)

I’m sure the people behind The Astrological Magazine knew exactly what they were up to, but I suppose they just didn’t see this one coming.

Bummer.

I’ve spent just about four to five months preparing the launch of, implementing and running the Nordic citizen journalism site iNorden (link to the international edition), alongside a handful of very fine people, without whom the very idea would remain in my head.

Finally things are pointing in the right direction. Traffic figures are on the rise, with an ever-increasing level of reader/user participation. I don’t think any of us really anticipated the level of involvement required by each and everyone of us, especially now that things are going our way. While user participation grows day by day, the editorial staff’s involvement is limited to a few heads, actually no more than three or four on a daily basis, which of course takes its toll on each of us.

Consequently (well, in truth, that’s not all) I’m taking a time-out, limiting my participation to contributing articles and sporadic editing. This, of course, is of no consequence to you. Then again, the blog’s name provides clues aplenty, wouldn’t you say?

Just thought I’d let you know: Whatever happens over at iNorden these days, It’s got nothing to do with me. Consider it my very personal disclaimer.

A late addition

Who am I fooling? I’m every bit as active over at iN – as ever before, in spite of significantly reduced involvement. Still publishing four – five articles a day, editing twice as many. But I do have assignments. Have to focus. Get a hold of yourself, Jarle (now there’s a note to self, the global bloggers’ all-time favourite expression, if ever I saw one).

Dear visitor, welcome to Irrelevances, my hitherto latest addition to my list of numerous blogs over the years — the third in English, as I recall. Although I’ve promised to post matters of importance elsewhere, I’m not going to foreclose the possibility of an important subject or two appearing here, too — occasionally.

I won’t go into details at this point, but chances are politics, popular culture, blogging, the Internet, media/journalism and unspecified contemporary phenomena will occur on an invariably infrequent basis. That’s just about as non-committal as it gets, isn’t it — which suits me just fine, as I’m not your regular faithful blogger.

Please forgive the disorderly handwriting on top here, written and drawn by hand directly on tablet pc screen, I’m afraid (I’m such a lazy bugger). Bear over with the obviously all too inadequate sidebar, too, please. I really just haven’t got around to set up a blogroll and what have you yet, but I’ll get there. You may have noticed that everything’s awfully b/w and slightly boring here, too, which is a lot more to my liking than the colourful designs of all sorts out there. Think I’ll try and stick to that. But for now:

Welcome to my blog. Hope to see you again very soon.

Oh, that’s right: For those of you who read Norwegian, please see my Norwegian blog, if you’re so inclined.