If you cast your minds back around three years, there was just one major public-facing text-based social media platform: Twitter. Now that Twitter is called X, and only Nazis and grifters seem to be left there, we’ve ended up with some people on Bluesky, some on Threads and others on Mastodon. And so Croissant makes it easy to cross-post to all three at once.
Although I mainly post on Bluesky these days, I try to keep my accounts on Threads and Mastodon active as well.
Once you have linked your accounts to Croissant, you get a nice big space to write your post, and a character count. Whilst Threads doesn’t seem to impose a maximum character limit, it’s 300 characters on Bluesky, and 500 on most Mastodon instances.
Below, there are buttons to @mention someone (which includes a search tool on Mastodon and Bluesky), add hashtags and add images. What I particularly like about Croissant is that, when you add an image, there’s a really clear prompt to add an alt text description of the image. Draft posts can be saved, and you can set how visible the post will be on Mastodon and Threads (public, unlisted etc.). You can also add content warnings if posting to Mastodon.
Although Croissant is free to download, to unlock most features you’ll need to pay an annual subscription of £20. Also, it’s only available for iOS 18 and macOS 15 (Sequoia) or later; my elderly sixth generation iPad can only manage iOS 17 so I’m only able to run it on my iPhone.
Compared to Jetpack Stats, Koko Analytics, at least in the free version, is a little more basic. You’ll get to see how many visits and page views there have been, and also how many page views within the last hour. You can also see your most popular pages and blog posts, and which web sites have referred visitors to you. And you can import and export your data too.
For me, the main benefit of Koko Analytics is that all the data is hosted locally. With Jetpack Stats, you are uploading data to Automattic’s servers, which needs to be mentioned in your site’s privacy policy. Koko Analytics is therefore more respectful of the privacy of your visitors, by not sharing their data.
Koko Analytics Pro
There is also a paid-for upgrade, which costs €49 per year per site (about £40 at present). This also allows you to track what links people click on whilst browsing your site, receive weekly reports, and export data in CSV format. The cheapest Jetpack Stats plan is currently £50 for the first year, rising to £84 in subsequent years, and only for sites with 10,000 page views per month or less. Whilst, as an individual, I can use the free version of Jetpack Stats, I’m currently on around 8000 page views per month. Overall, Koko Analytics is significantly cheaper than Jetpack Stats.
Whilst it’s basic, the fact that Koko Analytics is lightweight, and that it keeps all its data on your server, makes it a strong recommendation from me, if you need a stats plugin for WordPress.
A couple of weeks ago, a new Tube Map was published, to coincide with the new names for the London Overground lines. Besides the fact that north-east London is no longer a sea of orange but several different colours, another thing stood out to me. According to the Tube Map, there’s no step-free access on the Waterloo & City Line:
Stations that are step-free have a pictogram of a person in a wheelchair. But the platforms for the Waterloo & City Line show a regular empty circle at both of its stations, indicating no step-free access. So, surely the answer to the question of whether the Waterloo & City Line is step-free is ‘no’?
What does the step-free map say?
Actually, the answer is more complicated than that. Certainly, the Waterloo & City Line wasn’t step free in the past, as I noted in a previous blog post from 2017. But work at both Waterloo and Bank stations has resulted in the installation of lifts, meaning that the line is actually step free.
Transport for London publish a separate step-free Tube map, which offers more detail than the standard one. For example, there are letters (A, B and C) showing how big the gap between the train and the platform edge is (mind the gap), or the letters R and M if a ramp or mini-ramp can be used to help to bridge the gap. And here’s how the Waterloo & City Line appears:
Note that there’s an ‘R’ at both ends, and, unlike the nearby Bakerloo line which is shaded out as being completely inaccessible, the Waterloo & City Line is in its usual colour. So, we can conclude, the Waterloo & City Line does offer step-free access. With the help of staff with a ramp.
So, why do the two Tube Maps contradict each other?
Complicated interchange
Well, I did say it was complicated. The step-free tube map also includes exclamation marks next to some station names. These indicate that there’s additional information to read about how accessible each station is. For Waterloo, it only covers the Jubilee Line; all the information about the Waterloo & City Line is on the Bank listing:
Lifts to the Waterloo & City line are available Mondays – Fridays, via the entrance on Walbrook. Step-free exit at Waterloo is via the National Rail lift (usually available Monday to Saturday 0430 – 0105, Sunday 0530 – 0105). Please check before you travel. Step-free interchange between the Waterloo & City line and the Northern line and DLR requires a 290m journey via street and lifts.
It’s that last sentence that’s worth paying the most attention to. Bank, along with nearby Monument station, is a massive interchange and the second largest on the London Underground after King’s Cross St Pancras. It’s also just had a massive upgrade, adding step-free access to the Northern Line for the first time, and step-free interchange with the Docklands Light Railway (DLR). However, there isn’t a direct step-free interchange between the Northern Line and DLR, and the Waterloo & City Line.
Say, you arrive at Bank on the DLR and can’t use steps or escalators. To get to Waterloo, you need to exit the station via the Cannon Street entrance, walk/roll along Cannon Street itself, turn right up Walbrook and re-enter Bank station underneath the Bloomberg building.
Similarly, the interchange at Waterloo, from the Jubilee Line to the Waterloo & City Line, would require you to go up to street level and through Waterloo mainline station.
So yes, the Waterloo & City Line is step-free, and is indeed the only London Underground line to be entirely step free, by virtue of having just two stations. But it doesn’t offer step-free access in a way that is useful to interchanging passengers. I suppose if you arrive on a mainline train in Waterloo, and your destination is Bank, then it’s fine. But say you arrived on a mainline train at Liverpool Street and needed to get to Waterloo, there are better options that changing at Bank (in this case, Elizabeth Line to Bond Street and then Jubilee Line to Waterloo). And that’s why the standard Tube Map doesn’t show it as step-free.
Quirks of the Waterloo & City Line history
The Waterloo & City Line has always been an oddity. It only became an official London Underground line in 1994, and was previously operated by British Rail. Indeed, its trains originally carried the old Network SouthEast livery, rather than the standard tube livery. When British Rail was privatised, it was seen as an anomaly and so given to London Underground, rather than parcelled up with the other services to Waterloo that become South West Trains (now South Western Railway). As far as I am aware, it’s never operated on Sundays, as it mostly serves commuters, and since the pandemic, there has been no Saturday service either.
It was only the second deep tube line to be built in London, after the City & South London Railway (now the Northern Line). It was built by the London & South Western Railway (LSWR) to provide a link from its major terminus at Waterloo, under the River Thames and into the City of London. At the time, many rival railway companies had stations in the city, and this was the LSWR’s way of competing without needing to buy lots of land, demolish buildings and build new bridges. It’s also the only tube line to be entirely underground, including the depot at Waterloo station (the Victoria Line’s depot is above ground), and it’s completely isolated from all other railway lines. When trains require heavy maintenance, they have to be lifted out of the depot by crane and taken by road.
Since it opened in 1898, the Waterloo & City Line has remained a simple, two station shuttle. Over the years, there have been many enhancement ideas banded around. These have included adding additional platforms to serve Blackfriars station, or trying to somehow join it on to the DLR at Bank to allow through journeys to Waterloo.
If you want to share your pronouns on Bluesky, and/or want to be able to see others’ pronouns, then you can use the Pronouns labeller to show these in the Bluesky app. In the screenshot above, you can see that, under my username, it shows my he/him pronouns.
Step 1: Viewing pronouns
If you want to be able to view others pronouns, go to the Pronouns labeller profile, and click the ‘Subscribe’ button. Now, you’ll be able to view the pronouns of other Bluesky users, where they’ve elected to share them, as a label attached their posts and on their profiles.
Step 2: Sharing your pronouns
So now that you can see the pronouns of other users, you can also share your own pronouns. There’s a search tool available; select the pronouns that most apply to you, and then ‘like’ the corresponding Bluesky post. For example, I liked this post because my pronouns are he/him.
Within a minute or two, those pronouns will appear as a label on your profile. You can select up to four pronouns to share.
If you make a mistake, you can ‘like’ this post, and all of your pronouns will be removed. Once this takes effect, you can then start again.
Just a note that you can’t complete this step in isolation. In other words, you must have the labeller turned on and showing the pronouns of others, before you can share yours.
It’s all opt-in
Whilst I’m a member of the LGBTQ+ community, I think it’s important to share your pronouns regardless. As well as showing that you’re an ally, it normalises the act of sharing pronouns when you introduce yourself, and makes LGBTQ+ people like myself feel more included. At work, our standard email signature template includes a pronouns section, and it’s used at all levels including senior management to set a good example.
This doesn’t mean that you can’t share your pronouns manually in your Bluesky bio. This profile labeller is opt-in, and, as yet, Bluesky doesn’t have a great way of letting users discover profile labellers. In my experience, it tends to be the early adopters of Bluesky who use the pronouns profile labeller; recent arrivals haven’t found it yet.
Last month, we met up with a couple of friends to go to the Bolling Hall Museum in Bradford. Now, long time readers of this blog will know that I lived in Bradford between 2002 and 2010, and still work there, so surely I must have been here loads of times.
Nope. This was the first time I’ve been.
Bolling Hall is an old stately home that has been altered many times over the years. Parts of it date back to the 14th century, and in the early 20th century it was passed to what would eventually become Bradford Council, who run it as one of their museums. As various parts of the building date from different times, there is a variety of architectural styles on show.
Bolling Hall overlooks Bowling Park, to the south of the city centre, and is in what is now mostly the residential area of West Bowling.
Inside, the rooms have been mostly laid out as they would have been in Georgian times, including the kitchen and several bedrooms. There’s also a small exhibition about Bolling Hall’s role in the English Civil War; its owners at the time supported the Royalists, whereas the wider Bradford area backed the Parliamentarians.
As with most council-run museums, Bolling Hall is home to various objects in Bradford Council’s collection. This includes the first piano owned by Bradford-born composer Frederick Delius.
It’s not a big museum, and we spent about an hour there. Whilst there are gardens outside, these were mostly roped off when we went.
Being a very old building that has been altered several times, accessibility is not great. If you’re unable to manage stairs, then you can use an accessible entrance to see some of the ground floor rooms, but there isn’t a lift and the upstairs rooms are on different levels.
Bolling Hall Museum is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays. Entry is free. Parking is available on site, and it’s well-signposted. It’s served by bus 635 from Bradford city centre.
Good grief, we’re 92% done with 2024 now. Just the month of December to go.
December is always a busy month for us, what with preparing for Christmas, and with a couple of birthdays coming up as well – one of which is a round number birthday. We’ve started, but by no means finished our Christmas shopping.
I’m only working for the first three weeks of December, as my workplace is closing up on Friday 20th. I’ll be off work until the 2nd January, giving me a not-quite two week break. That gives me Monday 23rd to finish off any last-minute Christmas shopping, albeit with an eight-year-old in tow as school will be closed that day.
As usual, we’ll be spending Christmas with my parents in York. We’re meeting the rest of the family towards the middle of the month for a meal and to exchange presents.
Oh yes, and I’m already several weeks in to the Christmas drinks at Starbucks.
Now I’m not saying that it’s mandatory for queer men like myself to like musical theatre – but, let’s face it, lots of us do, and I’m no exception. Both my wife and previous girlfriend were involved in a musical theatre society at university (same university but not at the same time), and I’ve seen a number of shows, both locally and in the West End in London. And, seeing as Wicked is now a film, it’s a good theme with which to base a playlist on. So, here are my favourite songs from musicals. As ever, you can listen to it on Spotify.
“Defying Gravity” from Wicked, by Kerry Ellis. This isn’t the version on either the stage or film soundtrack, but a belting cover version by Kerry Ellis. Although, to be fair, Ellis played Elphaba for a time during its West End run. This is one of my morale boosting songs.
“The Greatest Show” from The Greatest Showman. Friends fear that he’s been listening to the Greatest Showman soundtrack and has just found another excuse to include this in a playlist. Yes, I included it in July’s ‘duets’ playlist too.
“You Can’t Stop The Beat” from Hairspray. It’s not quite the finale but it’s the big number where the audience is usually encouraged to join in. Back before Netflix was available in the UK, I rented the DVD of Hairspray, not realising it was the (non-musical) 1980s original with Ricki Lake, and not the then new (musical) film version.
“I Wanna Be A Producer” from The Producers. This is one of those songs that I randomly break out into. I enjoyed the film adaptation and have also seen a good amateur production in Bradford.
“Just Around The Corner” from The Addams Family. I don’t think enough people know that there’s an Addams Family musical, especially after Wednesday came out a couple of years ago. It’s about Wednesday coming of age, and this song is a solo by Morticia.
“When I Grow Up” from Matilda. We managed to see the Matilda musical in the West End shortly before it won loads of awards, and it was excellent. This song manages to be both fun and heartbreaking at the same time. Also, it’s the only one of these that I’ve performed in a show before.
“Let It Go” from Frozen. Oh come on, just because this song has been massively over-played, doesn’t mean it’s not good. How many kids songs manage to include words like ‘fractals’?
“How Far I’ll Go” from Moana. I haven’t actually watched Moana all the way through in one go, but I’ve probably seen all of it collectively as our eight-year-old has watched it multiple times on Disney+. Whilst it’s not made it to the stage yet, this is a good song. I imagine we’ll be watching the sequel at some point soon.
“Ex-Wives” from Six. Six is a musical that I really want to see, but haven’t managed to yet. I’ve listened to and enjoyed the soundtrack a few times though.
Indeed, there’s a number of reasons that you may need to pay money to the DVLA, and can currently only do so by posting a cheque or postal order. You may have passed your driving test in another European country, and now want a GB driving license. Or, you may need to get your license back after being disqualified from driving (for the absolute avoidance of doubt, no, I have never been banned from driving and have a full clean license). In all of these situations, it’s not possible to pay online.
As I mentioned in my blog post a couple of months ago, frustratingly there’s still a need for paper bank statements, and, it seems, cheques. Sure, almost every bank, including online-only ones like Starling, Chase and Monzo let you pay in cheques by scanning them into their apps using your phone. But what if you need to write a cheque for someone else? Online-only accounts do not seem to offer any way for their customers to pay by cheque.
It’s not a much better situation even if you do bank with a ‘traditional’ high street bank. I switched to a new bank account earlier this year, and whilst I got a new debit card through the post, I wasn’t issued with a chequebook as standard. And that should be fine – the last time I remember writing a cheque myself was about nine years ago. Most places accept bank transfers by BACS if they don’t accept credit/debit cards or cash. Sure, I can request a chequebook, but then the bank will need to print and dispatch it to me by post.
Postal orders
Thankfully, the DVLA also accept postal orders. In my 22 years of adulthood, I have never needed to request or send a postal order, but they have been around for years. Originally, they were a way for people without bank accounts to send money by post, in a way that means that only the named payee can use it.
To get a postal order, you go along to a local post office, tell them who you are paying and how much the postal order is for, and then pay cash, plus a fee. For £10-£99, there’s a 12.5% fee, and a fixed fee of £12.50 for postal orders of £100-£250. They’ll then print you a postal order which you can pop in your envelope to the DVLA, or whoever else you need to pay.
It’s certainly a solution if you don’t have a chequebook, but, as mentioned, you have to pay an extra fee on top which you wouldn’t pay using a cheque. Plus there’s the cost of getting to a Post Office if one isn’t local to you.
Ideally, the DVLA will drag itself fully into the 21st century, and enable more tasks to be completed online with card payments. But until then, some of us are stuck using cheques and postal orders.
I recently got a popup message on my phone from the Canon Camera Connect app, which I use to download photos from my Canon EOS camera. It took me to this announcement, which states that, from later next year, I’ll need to sign in to my Canon ID to use the app.
This seems silly. All I use the app for is to move photos from my camera to my phone wirelessly. The camera and my phone have a persistent Bluetooth connection when both are switched on and in range, and then when photos are to be downloaded, it switches to a private peer-to-peer Wi-Fi connection. There’s no need for me to be signed in to a Canon ID to be able to use the app, as no data needs to be sent to Canon’s servers.
Canon’s stated reasons for requiring a sign in with a Canon ID are that it’ll allow better integration with their cloud services. At present, these are separate apps, but I’m assuming they want people to upload their images to their cloud service, so that they can charge a subscription. I don’t know if digital camera sales are falling, now that everyone has a pretty good camera in their smartphone, but I suppose Canon see this as an additional revenue stream.
And there’s being able to use people’s personal data, too. If people are signed in using your app, you can track what they do.
I like using Cory Doctorow‘s term ‘enshittification‘ for this, as it’s an example of requiring a user to do something that isn’t going to make their experience any better. It’s a very one-sided act on the part of Canon. I would also argue that it goes against the spirit of Principal C of the GDPR, which is to minimise the data being captured. I think even Canon would struggle to argue whether it’s necessary for people to surrender their personal data, just to use an app that works locally between their devices. Indeed, I may well draft a complaint to the Information Commissioner’s Office about this to pre-empt this change.
As for alternatives to Canon Camera Connect: the only one I could find is PhotoSync. The ability to download photos from Canon cameras (and other brands) requires the purchase of a Premium subscription, which is either a £25 one-off payment, £6 per year or 80p per month as I write this.
Yesterday, Storm Bert came to visit us, and delivered quite a lot of snow, followed by significantly more rain.
In some respects, we were lucky that temperatures rose as quickly as they did yesterday, as that later rain could have been more heavy snow. As it was, once the snow started to thaw and the gritters and snowploughs were able to get out, we were able to get on and do most of the things that we would normally do on a Saturday.
However, the rapid snow melt and heavy rain could cause some more problems. There’s flood alerts for the River Calder and River Ryburn in Sowerby Bridge. We’ve seen the Calder rise steadily over the day and are keeping our fingers crossed that it doesn’t result in a repeat of Storm Eva at the end of 2015. There’s been a lot of flood defence work that has taken place in the (almost) nine years since then, including Slow the Flow, a project to boost natural flood defences in upland areas to prevent the rivers from being inundated during storms. Alas, further up the valley, the new multi-million pound flood defences weren’t enough to stop flooding in Todmorden and Mytholmroyd, although it hasn’t been as bad as 2015 or 2020 so far.
It doesn’t help that we had snow earlier in the week, followed by persistent cold weather. There was a reasonable snow fall on Monday night, which by the time it snowed again on Thursday was still lingering on the ground. More snow fell yesterday but it’s almost all gone now. Meteorologically speaking, November is considered an autumn month in the northern hemisphere, so to have this much snow before winter has ‘officially’ started is concerning. And this is the second named storm of the year, too. This isn’t ‘normal’ weather by any existing definition, and I hope it doesn’t become the new ‘normal’.
