The Flatpack festival properly launches this evening (Wednesday) with a Curzonora extravaganza at the Town Hall. I’ll let the programme explain: “Birmingham, 1901. Electric trams are making their debut on the Bristol Road, councillors are plotting to bring water all the way from Wales, a...

Rhubarb Radio has kindly consented to allow your very own BiNS-ers Jon & Jules to have a show — on the internet radio and everything. It’ll be what you’d expect from us — intelligent, amusing, cool, and featuring ELO (maybe). We’d love you to listen to us live (at Rhubarb R...

Steven Tuck drew my attention to this remarkable piece of openness on the part of Kirklees Council. Like other local authorities they pop their press releases online, but unlike other local authorities they give the public space to say what they think.  Have a look at this example here, it is so si...

You'll have heard The Eagles' Life In The Fast Lane, of course. Did you manage to listen to it without fainting clean away? After 40-odd years, Birmingham radio station Eagle 106.9 FM has started to remove an offensive bit from the song: We’ve been up and down this highway/ haven’t seen a goddam...

""Still think that if you're innocent, you have nothing to fear from surveillance and control laws? Have a look at this news-video about Stephen Clarke, a man who was accused to taking pictures of sewer-gratings in Manchester and arrested. Though the police couldn't find any photos of sewer-gratings...

Shell will attempt to lay the offshore pipe this Spring and preparation work both on land and at sea is due to start in the next few weeks. We are determined to stop this preparation work and so people are needed from mid-March - May. We expect Shell to begin putting up security fences and building ...

A public meeting commemorating martyrdom of Maqbool Bhat, a socialist Kashmiri freedom fighter and leader and screening of a short documentary, Che of Kashmir, based on his life and cause....

ISBN: 0345502892 LibraryThing GBS_insertPreviewButtonPopup('ISBN:0345502892'); LibraryThing, of which I am a member runs a program where members are shipped early copies of books for free, with the preference for them writing a review when they're done reading the book. The books are shipped by the ...

I really like The Rainbow — a pub always slightly further up Digbeth High Street than you think it is. I like it when there are bands I like on, I also like it when it’s quiet. It’s quiet in the day a lot, which musn’t make much dosh and it really makes all its money from being w...

It’s taken me a while to get round to blogging this, I took the photo a few weeks ago of a new (to me at least) sign that has sprung up near to the bull in town. It’s quite obviously been paid for by Retail Birmingham (one of the ‘Business Improvement Districts’ that are now ...