Another sell-out for “The British Ambassador’s Belly Dancer” last night took us past our 1,000th person to experience it. We are one week away from moving into the Arts Theatre in the West End and hopefully welcoming that many people every couple of days – a scary thought. Baroness Sarah Ludford, LibDem MEP and (relevantly) Vice Chair of the European Parliament Committee on Extraordinary Rendition was in the audience last night. So far I’ve seen three ex-British Ambassadors – and they’re only the ones I’ve noticed.
More good news – Marks and Spencers have joined Tesco in the boycott of Uzbek cotton, and instituted audit trails to check there isn’t any in their products. This really is amazing.
I know some of my friends will find this hard to accept, but this commercial boycott has come about because, faced with incontrovertible proof of the mass exploitation of children and slave workers, these major British companies have acted out of their own desire to behave ethically, not out of consumer, governmental or judicial pressure, because there hasn’t been any. Discuss.
Yesterday was Australia Day which meant I had to hurdle prone bodies to get around Shepherds Bush. I have been trying to get my Rectorial Address into the right format to publish it as a booklet on Lulu, but it’s technically beyond me. Any volunteers?
You could ask Philip Challinor at http://www.thecurmudgeonly.blogspot.com, he has published some books via Lulu, if it is just page formatting I have some understanding of it, it always depends on how you want to have it done.
Cappella Archive (cappella-archive.com) in Malvern do beautiful print-on-demand books. They can typeset it for you, put it in a nice cover, give it an ISBN and put it in the copyright libraries, and sell it on online order. The author pays for (and receives) the first 25 or so copies, and after that gets royalties for whatever they sell.
any thoughts on making a DVD of the play?
Craig, you do yourself no justice.
Who do you think may have brought these matters to their attention?
You may not have done this single-handedly but you have certainly led the movement.
Hi Craig.
Call me a cynic, but I'd half suspect Tesco and M&S are only rejecting Uzbek cotton becasue the issue has become public and they will gain more from the boycott (PR) etc. than would be the case otherwise. What morality have these retailers ever shown at the expense of economics? I certainly couldn't bring myself to praise M&S given their association with Zionism, a good read of which can be found here:
http://www.inminds.co.uk/boycott-marks-and-spence…
Could I please ask a favour to publicise an event which could turn out to be a hugely significant event, not just in terms of domestic politics, but Internationally too.
I refer to this: "Officers from Scotland Yard have commenced a criminal investigation into the deaths of Iraqi citizens killed during the armed invasion and occupation of Iraq." due to action by "We Are Change (UK)" and "The Campaign to Make War History" which has been met with near total silence despite the information gaining public accessibility from 15th Jan 08.
A good account can be found on the antagonists blog (a member of the J7 truth team) http://antagonise.blogspot.com/2008/01/blairwatch….
Thanks.
Forgot this:
http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/supermarketwatch
It's good news about the Uzbek cotton boycott, but I wish such ethical standards were implemented uniformly across the supermarket sector. I was a little shocked when I discovered that organic dates I bought from Sainsburys originated from an illegal settlement on the West Bank. I don't subscribe to the boycott of Israel and I support the country's right to exist, but such trade relations simply help sustain an illegal occupation. I wonder whether this is deliberate.
http://www.truthdig.com/eartotheground/item/20080…
Interesting nexus of magnats, ex-president trying to emulate presidentship for life by having their partners be their frontwoman and dictators boiling dissidents in oil.
I recall Mr. Murray's article on the meeting of Kazakhestan's dictators's daughter and one of Rothschilds.
I've published a couple of books on Lulu. Basically, you need to create a PDF, unless you are planning an audio book. The template is fairly simple to create, depending on what size book you want. I could share mine with you….get in touch. Or you could consider Amazon's create space, which gets you straight into Amazon and selling immediately, which does have benefits for exposure over Lulu. For instance, my Lulu book shows as out of stock on Amazon even though it is print on demand!