Interesting Links for 30-11-2013

• The pitch for an independent Scotland has a fundamental problem
  (tags: scotland independence )
• Apple forcing operators to buy phones - even when they can't sell them.
  (tags: apple mobile_phones )
• Charlie Brooker on why video game television is so hard to make
  (tags: games tv CharlieBrooker )
• When do the sins of an artist negate their art?
  (tags: art behaviour society )
• Biker gang protects child abuse victims so they feel safe
  (tags: bikers Child_abuse )
• Glasgow helicopter crash: 'Multiple injuries' at Clutha pub
  (tags: glasgow scotland crash helicopter )

I am 93% Democrat, 91% Green, 79% Socialist, 24% Libertarian, and 5% Republican

More details, and the chance to take the quiz yourself, here

Nine Inch Decisions

I've been listening to the new Nine Inch Nails album recently, more out of a sense of duty than anything else. There are a couple of interesting tracks on there, but nothing terribly special.

And then Julie played a few tracks from earlier albums. One from Pretty Hate Machine, one from The Downward Spiral, one from The Fragile, and the difference was astounding. Not just, I think, because I was much younger when I heard those, but the whole feel of energy and emotion in both his voice and the music were radically different.

So now I don't know whether I want to go and see them live in Glasgow next year, when the last album I liked was in 1999, and the last one I loved was in 1994! They'll undoubtedly play some of their earlier catalogue, but is it worth sitting through bits of the three albums I never even got around to listening to twice?