links for 2009-01-27

Peter Hornsby suggests making some explicit "Antipatterns" for things that are easily done in an interface but which have sub-optimal results.

Great diagram and blog post about how to position local news.

Sir David Attenborough says: "They [creationists] always mean beautiful things like hummingbirds. I always reply by saying that I think of a little child in east Africa with a worm burrowing through his eyeball. The worm cannot live in any other way, except by burrowing through eyeballs. I find that hard to reconcile with the notion of a divine and benevolent creator."

A really good bit of unsensationalised reporting about Norfolk's Child Abuse Investigation Unit from Rachel Buller which provides a welcome contrast from the usual media depiction of social services.

"A new scheme forcing sellers to spend hundreds of pounds on home reports before they put properties up for sale was last night branded a 'nail in the coffin' of Scotland’s beleaguered housing market. Estate agents blamed the controversial new system for a slowdown in sales". Yeah, that'll be it. I mean, nothing to do with over-inflated prices and the difficulty of getting a mortgage at the moment, it *must* be Home Information Packs. Estate Agents, eh?

"Last night Clunes's agent admitted he had been approached for the Doctor Who Christmas special but denied there was a dispute over cash and that the deal collapsed four days before filming". So, basically, your whole story is a nonsense then - especially given the way the plot pans out in The Next Doctor...