borisjohnson
Latest
London is getting a 10-day 'Games Festival' this April
The UK has never held a video game event with quite the same clout as E3, the Tokyo Game Show or Gamescom. There's EGX and the indie-focused EGX Rezzed, but neither attracts quite as much attention as their international counterparts. To remedy the problem, Film London and games trade body Ukie are launching a new "London Games Festival" this April, which will offer 15 events across 10 different venues. These include a weekend "Now Play This" convention at Somerset House, industry talks at BFI Southbank and a bunch of smaller London Games Fringe events.
London Mayor calls for UK to legalise hoverboards
Even though they can't actually levitate, "hoverboard" self-balancing scooters have become a huge hit. Celebrities are jumping on the two-wheeled bandwagon, either signing deals to promote the next big brand or attaching their name to one of their own. That's helped boost sales of the popular toy in the UK, but the law actually dictates that they can't be ridden in a public space.The Crown Prosecution Service says that the Highway Act 1835 limits hoverboard use on pavements, while various vehicle registration agencies won't licence or register them for road use. Riders can be fined up to £500 if caught doing so, but London Mayor Boris Johnson is making it his mission to legalise their use based on "intergenerational fairness."
London's new Routemaster buses might not be as green as you think
London's Mayor Boris Johnson has long championed greener public transport, but his hybrid Routemaster buses are now being criticised for faulty batteries and an overdependence on diesel. According to MayorWatch's Christian Wolmar -- who hopes to be Labour's next Mayoral candidate -- 40 drivers from Holloway Garage have put together a dossier explaining the extent of the battery problems. They say the Routemaster buses are now relying on diesel for 90 per cent of their journeys, overworking the small, conventional engines that are only supposed to run while the batteries are charging.
London's getting the world's first all-electric double-decker bus
London's red double-decker buses are going green. No, we're not talking about a change to their iconic paint-jobs: Mayor Boris Johnson today announced plans to introduce an all-electric model in the capital. London is already served by hundreds of hybrid and eight all-electric single-decker buses, but the new double-decker variant is set to be a world first. That's not surprising, given such a large and heavy vehicle will require more, or higher capacity batteries to continue picking up passengers throughout the day. (Wireless charging can only help so much.) The new vehicle is being developed by BYD and will be trialled on route 16 between Cricklewood and Victoria Station from October.
London's Mayor plans Knowledge-like test for Uber drivers
London's Mayor wants Uber drivers to pass a test similar to the "Knowledge" before they can start working in the capital. In a State of London debate, Boris Johnson said it wasn't fair that taxi drivers spend years preparing for the famous exam, which tests their geographic knowledge, while minicab drivers are able to take to the streets straight away. The MP also said he disapproves of "the brash attitudes" of large American internet companies and wants to do more to champion London's black cab industry. As such, his proposed test for minicabs would be easier than the Knowledge to ensure regular cabbies "retain their distinctiveness." It would, however, make certain that Uber drivers "understand more than the difference between left and right," according to the Mayor.
London mayor asks Apple to help curb iPhone-related thefts
London Mayor Boris Johnson has written to Apple and other smartphone manufacturers requesting help in curbing smartphone thefts in the capital. In London, 10,000 smartphones are stolen each month. V3 received a copy of Johnson's letter to Apple and other smartphone manufacturers; here are some highlights: "We need the companies who manufacture and supply smartphones to play their part and take this issue seriously. If we are to deter theft and help prevent crimes that victimise your customers and the residents and visitors to our city, we need meaningful engagement from business and a clear demonstration that your company is serious about your corporate responsibility to help solve this problem." "Each of your companies promote the security of your devices, their software and information they hold, but we expect the same effort to go into hardware security so that we can make a stolen handset inoperable and so eliminate the illicit second-hand market in these products. We hope you would support this objective. Customers and shareholders surely deserve to know that business cannot and must not benefit directly from smartphone theft through sales of replacement devices." The good news for Johnson is that Apple is already working hard on curbing iPhone theft. With iOS 7, Apple will introduce Activation Lock, a feature that will require a user's Apple ID and password to reactivate a stolen phone after being remotely wiped by the owner through Apple's Find My iPhone app. Activation Lock will also require the user's login information to turn off Find My iPhone. It is hoped that once thieves are made aware of how pointless it will be to steal an iPhone with Activation Lock, they will stop targeting the devices so much. Activation Lock will also make it easier to track stolen iPhones.
London scraps plans for cellular coverage on the tube, bums Huawei out
Technical complexity and financial naiveté have meant that London's ambitious plans to cover its underground train network with cellular signal by the 2012 Olympics are hitting the scrapheap. In spite of Huawei's most generous offer to provide £50 million ($81m) of equipment for the project for free, the London Mayor's wish that UK mobile operators be the ones to foot the installation bill -- without a penny coming out of public coffers -- has unsurprisingly found little favor. Compounded with the logistical hellride of trying to get everything up and running by next summer, that's now led to a mutual agreement among all parties concerned to abandon the project. Mind you, the plans to get WiFi up at 120 stations in time for the Olympics are still on track, so at least we'll be able to pull down some data before diving into those dark, damp tunnels.
Source London: network of 1,300 charging stations coming by end of 2013
London Mayor Boris Johnson has announced a plan to create a city-wide electric vehicle network dubbed Source London. It calls for 1,300 public-use charging stations to be installed by the end of 2013 - assuming the Mayan's weren't right about 2012. Any driver who registered for the network and paid an estimated annual membership fee of £100 (roughly $160 at the current exchange rate) could juice their EVs across all of the stations. For perspective, keep in mind that the city already has 250-plus stations with 16,729 electric vehicles and hybrids registered, of which only 2,100 draw power by being plugged in. That implies if the plan is completed, drivers would technically have better odds of finding a charging station than a gas pump in the city. Combined with Johnson's schemes to provide cell coverage in the tube and city-wide WiFi, it's also yet another example of how jolly old London is prepping for the future in between bites of scones and episodes of Top Gear. To learn more about the project, make sure to check out the source link below.
London to become one giant WiFi hotspot by 2012, because Boris says so
Look at this man. Just look at him. Isn't it obvious that Boris Johnson gets what Boris Johnson wants? In case you've been misinformed about the power this man's wishes hold, you should know that he's well on his way to establishing the first muni-fi project to actually work -- or so he hopes. By and large, every attempt to sprinkle WiFi onto entire US cities has fallen short in one way or another, but London has a motivator that no American borough ever did: the 2012 Olympics. Boris' plan is to blanket all of London in WiFi prior to the opening ceremony, with "every lamppost and every bus stop" having a router or repeater in it. The scheme is part of a larger plan to make London the "technology capital of the world," but unfortunately, your hopes of connecting for free may be dashed. According to the London Evening Standard, "no details of pricing have been given," and we get the impression that those in charge of the rollout would've jumped at the chance to gloat about its free-ness if that were indeed the case. But then again, who are we to question the might of London's Mayor?
British Parliament member says we need to stop playing games
Boris Johnson, a journalist and member of British Parliament, recently spoke out against video games in all shapes and forms, stating "as the strobing colours die away and the screen goes black, you listen to the wail of protest from the offspring and you know that you have just turned off their drug," later going so far as to call these kids "addicts." We wouldn't be so quick to label these kids as addicts, instead choosing to label said children as nothing other than "brats" and perhaps offering a solution in "beating some sense into their backsides." Perhaps we're horrible people or have no idea how to be proper parents, but we can honestly say, during our youth, that nothing of the sort occurred between us and our parental units.Boris attempts to further strengthen his argument by reinforcing the addict stereotype of children who cry and crave video games, one which we would have to wholeheartedly disagree with. Anything, when looked at in a certain way, can be considered addicting, including the Tylenol we take for our head aches. Of course, he could just be incredibly out of touch with today's youth. Also, who's to say that these kids don't behave this way with everything else in their life, crying at a lack of chocolate or when they are denied purchase of a certain toy whilst shopping with their parents? We cannot begin to assume what is going through this man's mind, but we know we do not agree with it. What say you, lovely Nintendo faithful, in response to his claims? Is he just a British version of our good friend Jack Thompson, choosing to attack gaming as a drug instead of violent games and their affect on youth?
