Just in time for November 5th, when we celebrate Guy Fawkes night every year in the UK.
Based on the graphic novel by Alan Moore, V for Vendetta takes place in an alternate vision of Britain in which a corrupt and abusive totalitarian government has risen to complete power. During a threatening run in with the secret police, an unassuming young woman named Evey (Natalie Portman) is rescued by a vigilante named V (Hugo Weaving) — a caped figure both articulate and skilled in combat. V embodies the principles of rebellion from an authoritarian state, donning a mask of vilified would-be terrorist of British history Guy Fawkes and leading a revolution sparked by assassination and destruction. Evey becomes his unlikely ally, newly aware of the cruelty of her own society and her role in it.
Good evening, London. Allow me first to apologise for this interruption. I do, like many of you, appreciate the comforts of everyday routine, the security of the familiar, the tranquility of repetition. I enjoy them as much as any bloke. But in the spirit of commemoration, where upon important events of the past, usually associated with someone’s death or the end of some awful bloody struggle, are celebrated with a nice holiday, I thought we could mark this November the 5th, a day that is sadly no longer remembered, by taking some time out of our daily lives to sit down and have a little chat. There are, of course, those who do not want us to speak. I suspect even now, orders are being shouted into telephones, and men with guns will soon be on their way. Why? Because while the truncheon may be used in lieu of conversation, words will always retain their power. Words offer the means to meaning, and for those who will listen, the enunciation of truth. And the truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn’t there? Cruelty and injustice, intolerance and oppression. And where once you had the freedom to object, to think and speak as you saw fit, you now have censors and systems of surveillance coercing you’re conformity and soliciting your submission. How did this happen? Who’s to blame? Well, certainly, there are those who are more responsible than others, and they will be held accountable. But again, truth be told, if you’re looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror. I know why you did it. I know you were afraid. Who wouldn’t be? War, terror, disease. They were a myriad of problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your common sense. Fear got the best of you, and in your panic, you turned to the now high chancellor, Adam Sutler. He promised you order, he promised you peace, and all he demanded in return was your silent, obedient consent. Last night, I sought to end that silence. Last night, I destroyed the Old Bailey to remind this country of what it has forgotten. More than four hundred years ago, a great citizen wished to embed the fifth of November forever in our memory. His hope was to remind the world that fairness, justice, and freedom are more than words; they are perspectives. So if you’ve seen nothing, if the crimes of this government remain unknown to you, then I would suggest that you allow the fifth of November to pass unmarked. But if you see what I see, if you feel as I feel, and if you would seek as I seek, then I ask you to stand beside me, one year from tonight, outside the gates of Parliament, and together we shall give them a fifth of November that shall never, ever be forgotten.
Thanks for listening, send us your questions and until next time. 🎈👇
This is a very strange one. I’m sure you’re all familiar with the famous Brexit event. How a group of countries that all speak different languages, have different cultures, lifestyles and have very different views thought they could join together and pretend they all live in one community was a huge ask.
The U.K. have never felt part of the EU, we’ve always described the countries on the mainland continent as Europe, we’ve never included the U.K. as Europe. It’s a very subtle thing but it has always existed.
Okay so you’re wondering why I am using the royal ‘we’, seeing as I’m a Dutchman? Well I’ve lived nearly 43 years in the U.K., so all my adult life has been outside The Netherlands. And by the way in case you didn’t know the Dutch and the Belgians have never really seen eye to eye. So leaving the EU has never been an issue for me, seeing as I do not trust Brussels and their unelected officials. In case you’re also wondering, I still have my Dutch passport, which means I’m not able to vote in the U.K. only in the EU elections and for the U.K. they will end soon I’m guessing.
So the other day I was listening to BBC Radio 5 Live, which is a talk and sports radio channel in the U.K. They mentioned that a video mocking the whole Brexit debate here in the U.K. was going viral around Europe. The video was a very badly copied clip, from an old movie by Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, aka Laurel and Hardy depicting them with some other folks in a car going on a holiday or picnic. After they load the car in classic Laurel and Hardy comedy style, they stop and say goodbye to onlookers. After saying goodbye many times they drive off and the car tyre is shown as driving over a nail, which means their car suffers a flat.
You can watch the clip below, it is actually quite funny. I recreated the clip myself because I felt I could do a better job compared to the original, that was screen recorded on a mobile phone. Never mind though that badly recorded clip has at the last count (at time of writing) had over 20k+ views. It wasn’t the quality, it was the mocking of the U.K. and Brexit.
[embed]https://youtu.be/ETPN9cFUo58[/embed]
I found the different clip on YouTube and discovered it was slightly longer compared to the original and actually it told a better story. The loading of the car was quite significant in the story and the comparison to Brexit, especially the slapping of each other in the process. Exactly like what is happening in the U.K. parliament. At time of writing my clip has had over 12k+
So I decided to use the longer clip and I added one other thing, the end screen shows a sad emoji. Because although it is a funny comparison, it’s turning out to be a very sad issue here in the U.K.
There also was a major error in the caption on the video, ‘How England plans to leave the U.K.’, the error being ‘England’ of course. It’s not just ‘England’ leaving the EU, it’s the whole of the United Kingdom, which includes, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. But Northern Ireland of course is the whole issue of the Brexit debate. I’m sure you have heard everyone mention the backstop and now the border in the Irish Sea.
Below is the original video clip that gave me the idea to produce mine.
Unfortunately there have been many comments on my video and some of them not so nice, so I do feel bad about posting it, because it has invoked feelings in people that might not have been the best feelings, which is not great. But the whole Brexit debate has done that and although we avoid speaking to friends and family about it, the feelings are still there. A nation divided about divorcing the EU, it’s how children must feel when their parents split up. Not everyone can get to terms with the anger on both sides of the debate, quite frankly they are as bad as each other. It’s as close to a civil war we will ever get. A civil war of words that is.
It was an experiment, I wanted to see what happened and now I know. Sometimes recreating something, maybe even copying and improving what someone else has done is a good way to get noticed, a marketing masterclass I guess. I’ve never ever had that many views on a video on my YouTube channel, I don’t even have enough subscribers to be able to monetise it. I need 1000 as a minimum and I only have just over 300.
Who knows where it will all end. One thing is for sure, millions of people in the U.K. will be very unhappy for many years to come.
You may have updated your Apple smartphone to iOS 13.1.2 and possibly are not having any issues, but likely you will be experiencing strange battery drain problems that are still in existence since the 13.1.1 update.
I missed the original 13.0 update and updated at 13.1.1 and immediately started experiencing battery drain issues. I have an iPhone 6S, which has been doing just great with its battery and I installed a new battery via the ‘battery replacement program’ back in December 2018. It’s performance has been and is currently at 99%.
So, I called Apple and support never mentioned an issue and had me walk through a lengthy reinstall process, which initially appeared to have resolved it, but it didn’t. Then 13.1.2 came out, specifically released to solve the battery drain issue, but it hasn’t resolved it.
I found that. I’m not the only one with the issue, below a link to the Apple users community, which confirms that a major issue is still at play across many different iOS users, regardless of device and regardless of battery performance. This many users can not be wrong, read the posts, if you have time.
After reading the community posts, I tried out one of the recommendations. Run the battery down to zero, let it auto-switch off and recharge from zero. After that event, it has performed slightly better, but other folks in the community haven’t had the same success with this process. It’s just on the off chance if you’re tearing out your hair and would like to try something, then maybe this could work for you.
I will come back to this article later after I’ve had a chance to contact Apple again and get their response to this. I will of course share the community posts link with them and see what they have to say.
Stay tuned…
UPDATE — October 17, 2019
So something must be wrong because Apple released iOS 13.1.3 on Wednesday October 16, 2019. No admission of anything though!
My comments so far on that version as it is performing on my ancient 6S.
Battery is no longer heating up, phew that’s good news!
I took a trip via air, for 4 hours. Battery started at 72% and I played Crossy Roads for quite a while on and off, maybe 90 minutes in total, plus I listened to music, opened the phone at least a dozen times.
When I got off the flight, the battery was at 42%.
Generally one day later things appear to be performing okay.
But that’s not the feeling off other users on the discussions forum, link in first half above. Some reporting the same battery drain issues and some saying its even worse. Hard to believe but I am not doubting them.
I haven’t contacted Apple as yet, as I’m not sure I have anything serious to report, trouble is I have no idea what performance was like before, because you only notice it and monitor it once you’re having issues.
Oh and as far as MacOs Catalina, I can see they had to update that one to 10.15.1 as well, because of installation issues. Probably leaving that one to update until Christmas, what do you reckon? 😜
Well, things are still better, although I feel it drains just a little faster then I had been used to. Unfortunately no way I can compare it with any performance from previous. Having said that, I am subscribed to the comments on discussions.apple.com, see link inn the main piece above and plenty of folks still complaining, although it has reduced significantly.
I still have no confidence in Catalina. This is first time since 2010, when I switched to Mac that I haven’t updated immediately.
Unfortunately, because of Apple’s performance, I will never upgrade my operating systems with them straight away. Now they remind me so much of Microsoft of the 90’s and early 00’s. I might leave it for 3 months after release to allow all the bugs to be cleared up.
Apple were the only ones we could trust until now and now there’s nobody. What a massive fail for Big Tech. Size matters I guess, the bigger you get the worse you get. Please come back Jony Ive, we miss you!
Update — October 31, 2019
I have spoken with Apple Support just now, we ran a diagnostic on my 6S and he confirmed there’s no issue with the battery, the health is perfect. Well it should be it is only 1 year old (through the apple replacement program) . He then recommended to switch off ‘background app refresh’. This I had done previously with 13.1, but when 13.1.2 came out or was it 13.1.3, oh flip I’m losing count, anyway which ever one it was and the battery was behaving slightly better, I switched background app refresh back on.
So he then suggested I should monitor what happens for a few days when app refresh is off, then if it performs better start switching some apps back on, one by one to see if it is a specific app that is causing it?!
As I am talking to him (and app refresh is off) the battery dropped from 92% to 81% , then I had to check train times on an app (UK railway app) because he suggested I can also take the phone into a store and they will run a deeper diagnostic on the phone, it dropped from 81% to 72% literally within seconds. When I relayed that to him, he then said YES this shouldn’t be happening.
He concluded seeing as the battery health is fine, it has to be a software issue. He’s half saying it has to be an app, but the only difference between yesterday and today is iOS 13.2, so it HAS to be Apple’s software.
Update — November 7, 2019
iPhone 6S going through the diagnostics at Apple’s Genius Bar
So I’m in the Genius Bar in Birmingham U.K. and they confirm that iOS 13 has been an issue. All in-depth diagnostics done again and confirmed that no unusual usage and the battery drain is too fast for very little usage on my phone, at least we’re not all imagining it. They recommend a complete wipe and reinstall. The recommendation is to use the phone for a few days without restoring from backup and see how it performs. So my phone has been wiped and I will use the phone in a raw state to see how it performs. A call back from Apple has been arranged for this coming Sunday 10 November, 2019 so I will give you a further report after that.
The answer to my question, ‘what if this action doesn’t resolve it? We will have to escalate to engineering, but likely the outcome will be to wait until the next iOS update’. 🙁
To confirm, my device is S6 with 13.2 installed and a battery that’s 11 months old with a 98% maximum capacity on battery health.
**WARNING: Please do a backup before you wipe your phone. **
Success, Michael ツ
Update — November 8, 2019
After having met with Apple and done a full reset on my phone, I got back to base and charged my phone to 99%. I decided to remove it from the charge cable and use it very lightly, it immediately started to lose charge quickly and in about 6 hours it had nearly lost all of it’s charge.
iPhone 6S, iOS 13.2 — results after a full reset by Apple engineers.
According to Apple it the 6S should offer up to 14 hours of talk time on 3G and up to 10 days of standby time from a single charge. Internet use is listed as 10 hours on 3G and LTE and up to 11 hours on Wi-Fi. The iPhone 6s also offers up to 11 hours of HD video playback and up to to 50 hours of audio playback.
So unfortunately, the full reset really didn't work, so I posted an angry comment on the discussions forum and this resulted in an email from Apple, confirming the removal of my post, see email below, which includes my post.
email from Apple, 7 November, 2019
Update — November 10, 2019
After my follow-up call with support today as planned, they confirmed that all the suggested actions that they advise, have indeed been carried out. The default action when an issue like this occurs is to reset the phone from new, which was done. But as this didn’t resolve the issue, the support agent, was going to speak to two different departments, log it as a complaint too (that was new to me, never heard that before), but there will not be any response to the complaint as such.
She then transferred me and escalated my case to senior support. So after being told to run my phone without restoring for a few days, now I’ve been told to restore from back-up and then run for a few days. After that on Wednesday Nov 13 they will take logs from my phone and submit to engineering. After 3 calls and one visit to a store they are confirming the complaint. If you have the time and inclination please continue the process of reporting it, the more complaints can be lodged the better.
I guess I will just have to wait until the next version of iOS, maybe 2020 until this gets resolved? Although I would imagine that my iPhone 6S, won’t qualify for a software upgrade by then, now that would be upsetting indeed.
Email to Tim Cook
Hello Tim
I am writing from the UK. I’ve been a loyal Apple user and supporter for 9 years. I made the switch to Apple in 2010 and was delighted with my move away from Microsoft and substandard hardware. I was overjoyed.
I have spent thousands of pounds on hardware and software on several Macs, iPhones and iPads. I was hypnotised by the Apple formula, you got me at hello!
Since the past few years, I have reduced my spend to make sure I can leverage the equipment I have already invested in, my last iPhone which I am pleased to say is in 100% working order is an iPhone 6S.
That was until iOS13 was released. I have always been an early adopter when software gets released and this time I was about a week late, due to vacation and by then iOS 13.1 had already been released. Little did I know of the issue with battery drain caused by iOS 13. Sure enough I encountered very poor battery performance. I had replaced my battery through the ‘battery replacement programme’ in November ’18, so I knew it wasn’t my battery, it had to be something to do with software. So I search on discussion.apple.com and found this thread; https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250710027.
471 people say they have the same issues, over 90 comments and 5,887 views of the article. I would suggest it’s one of the most active discussions I have ever witnessed.
Phew I wasn’t the only one, but little assurance, because now my iPhone has been rendered useless. I even called support twice, they told me to go into a store, I spent hours and days trying to resolve the issue. It is still an issue today even after version 13.2.2, released the other day.
At no stage has Apple admitted there’s an issue. I get it with well over a billion of devices installed worldwide and just a few hundred reporting an issue, it’s not really that big of an issue is it? But it is a real issue not ‘fake news’, many folks are all having the same issue, some may believe that it’s just part of Apple building in redundancy, to force us all to buy new devices. Well maybe the new device we buy is not an Apple device?
My question is, why won’t Apple admit to the battery drain issue with iOS13 and let us know that you are working on a fix?
I look forward to hearing from you.
Best regards, Michael
ps. I haven’t dare install Catalina, I’ve heard all sorts of nightmares with it too. Oh dear, this must be the worst year of software updates for Apple, I’ve never known it this bad, it has always been faultless in the past
Update — November 11, 2019
I’ve had a response from Craig Federighi! See below…
Hi Michael,
I was forwarded your note to Tim. (I head up iOS Software at Apple).
I’m very sorry to hear that you’ve experienced a degradation in battery life in your iPhone 6S since upgrading to iOS 13. Something very odd is going on; we worked very hard to maintain both performance and battery life in iOS 13 (and iOS 12), and our current field telemetry is not showing any widespread regression among customers who upgraded (including those with older devices).
I would very much like to figure out what is going on with your phone so that we can correct it. To do this, I’d appreciate if you’d be willing to send me diagnostics from your phone. If you’re willing to help, please click on the link below (on your iPhone6S) to begin a diagnostic session. You will be guided to collect a sysdiagnose, which contains diagnostic information helpful in investigating issues. You will have the option to review files before sending to Apple. This link is valid for 7 days, and cannot be reused once a device has started the diagnostic session. If you would like to view a diagnostic session that is in progress, you can tap this link again or go to Settings > Privacy > Analytics > View Enhanced Logging Session.
Diagnostics Link: [link removed]
Thank you!
- craig
Update — November 11, 2019 pm
So my first full day, or rather half day of using my iPhone 6S iOS 13.2.2 without being on charge. Have a look at how quickly it drained, with very very little activity. Fascinating…
Update — November 12, 2019
So Apple Care USA got in touch with me, more information to follow, except to say that if you are experiencing this issues then you MUST pick up the phone and call Apple Support, it will be worth it. The senior Apple Care support individual suggested that not enough people are reporting if they have an issue.
Update — December 2019
After detailed and regular communication between USA and Ireland Apple Care, I am now the proud owner of a replacement iPhone 8. So how did this come about?
Well after my engagement with Apple Care USA, they told me that it had been decided to replace my iPhone. I have to just say that I donot have any Apple Care Cover! So how this was decided, I have no idea.
But…
Jim (name changed) in the USA was not able to organise the transaction, because I live in Europe, so he advised me that someone from Ireland would be in touch. But before he hung up, he told me that the process would be as follows. Apple sends me a new phone and after I have transferred everything, I send the old phone back to Apple, through their approved courier service, of course at their expense. One small thing, they would need to take a credit card hold for the cost of the phone, just in case. Fair enough I thought.
Sure enough Apple Ireland contacted me, but…
No, I would have to send my iPhone to Apple Ireland first and then after they check it, they will then send me a new iPhone. Oops, that’s not what I had been promised. No worries I said I will get back in touch with the USA, they will sort it. Several emails later, no response from the USA. What to do next?
Ask Ireland to challenge it, that’s what I did. The answer came back again, no, they can only do it this way. Send us your iPhone and then we will send the new one to you, oh and don’t bother telling the USA, they have no say in Europe about how we operate.
So I sent this email to Craig:
Hello Craig
Sorry to disturb you. I wanted to give you an update on what has happened, since you reached out to me, as I believe it is important that you guys know what actually happens in your support cases.
Jim (don’t know his surname) from Apple Care USA reached out to me on Nov 12 and we had a lengthy conversation. He confirmed that he wanted to organise a replacement phone for me and advised that the replacement iPhone 8 would be sent and that I would need to return the iPhone 6S via FedEx, which is fine. He confirmed that he would need to take a credit card number to guarantee that I would be sending the iPhone 6S back, which is also fine. He then tried to process this on his system, when he then realised as I am in Europe, the system wouldn’t allow him to move forward with this. He advised me that someone in Europe would get in touch with me.
Alexander Smith from Ireland contact me on Nov 14 and he outlined that the way it works in Europe is that I would need to send my phone to Ireland via DHL, they would check the phone out and only then would they send a new phone out to me. So the process that Jim had offered me, he could not do the same. I said I would check this out with Jim.
I communicated what Alexander told me to Jim on Nov 14 by email.
I followed this up via email on Nov 18, as I had no response. Still no response as of today, Nov 25.
I also called the support line and left a voice message for Jim, as per the procedure he had outlined to me in an email on Nov 12, no response received.
I suggested in my voicemail that maybe a workaround would be for me to travel to my nearest Apple Store, about 50 minutes by train in Birmingham UK and do the swap in store in person. I’d be happy to do that at my expense. I also then suggested this to Alexander in an email Nov 21.
Alexander called me today Nov 25 and advised me that this process of taking it to a store would not be possible, after his discussion with engineering. He also told me that Jim has no jurisdiction in Europe, so basically telling me there is no point waiting for a response from the USA on this, as Ireland would not accept it anyway. He then told me that he would need to set a deadline of this Wednesday Nov 27 to get things moving. When I challenged him on forcing a deadline on me, he retracted it and suggested he’s not putting a deadline on me, but we’d need to get things moving by Wednesday.
I also asked Alexander if he knew Jim to which he said no and then afterwards he said he could see the case notes and that he would get in touch with Tim. So now I was left wondering why he couldn’t have done that for me in the first place and why I had to do all the running around without success.
As you may appreciate, being without a phone for several days, maybe up to a week, is not very workable for me. I run my own very small business and clients rely on me being available. Unfortunately I have no old phones I can use in the meantime. I’d be without a phone for the whole period it takes to send a phone back and wait for a new phone to arrive.
The case number is 100940133420 and hopefully you will be able to see all the notes there.
Again sorry to disturb you with this, you can see how this case is not a great case study for Apple Support.
I appreciate your support with this.
Kind regards, Michael.
Sure enough within just 24 hours, I was contacted by Executive Liaison in Ireland, who basically told me they would honour the original promise of sending the new iPhone, take a credit card hold and then I can send the old one back, once I’m happy that everything is okay.
So to cut a long story short, that’s what happened.
But…
After a few days of using the iPhone 8, with the new ear pods that go into the lightening port, every time I was on a call the call dropped off the ear pods. So I emailed Executive Liaison, then spoke to Apple Care, tested things out and they concluded my iPhone 8 probably had a faulty lightening port.
This was happening just a few days before Christmas!
They organised for a new iPhone to be shipped to my nearest store in Birmingham UK and once it got there, I could travel in and exchange it, which is what I did on December 23, 2019.
I now have a working phone, upgraded to iPhone 8, free of charge on Apple, no battery issues any longer and the ear pods work great.
So I’ve written this article for 2 reasons, basically to record what happened with the battery drain after iOS 13, but more importantly to record that actually it does pay to complain and raise the issue as high as possible in the organisation. I had never ever expected the result I got, but I did and I am of course grateful to Apple and the Apple Care team.
They have restored my faith to a point, I am still concerned about possible technical issues going forward. I will unlikely upgrade to a new software release on iOS or MacOS immediately, I will wait for a few months until all the bugs have been removed.
For those of you who are still having battery drain issues, get in touch with Apple, they need the reports before being able to take it seriously.
Donald Trump and Mette Frederiksen — #weekly cartoon — Michael and Josh
For me this is THE story of the year. Donald Trump demanding to buy Greenland. The response by the Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen was even better. It definitely inspired our latest cartoon titled: ‘I’m buying Greenland’.
An episode with a difference. We share some of our own current stories from our world in public speaking and storytelling. Some of the topics we will be touching on include, Vanessa Van Edwards and Captivate, Harry Truman, past president of the USA, the brand new documentary on Amazon Prime ‘Rocketman’, the lucky golfer Gary Player, Donald Trump and his hands, the analysis of hundreds of TED talks and why they went viral, the use of #hashtags for your stories on social media, especially Linkedin.
Next month we will be back with our analysis of an amazing speech from the movies, which will be from the movie V for Vendetta.
I recently watched The Great Hack on Netflix. At the time when the Cambridge Analytica story broke I was right on it and it changed my view of Facebook forever. I still have an account but the truth is I’d rather not. Trouble is because so many people are on Facebook, you can’t ignore it as a channel to promote your business or event. I hate that they have such a hold on us all. It’s actually worse then governments, we are such slaves to social media and especially Facebook, yuk!
I actually was a massive promoter of FB way back when they were just a spot on everyone’s mind. I even introduced friends and family to join it so we could engage with each other. Some friends even said, really Michael, you think it’s important for me to be on Facebook?
Even before the CA story broke, I had stopped using FB, maybe I just sensed that they were a timesuck for everyone and that the fake news brigade were pointing a fire hose at it.
One thing that did surprise me from The Great Hack documentary was a name I had not heard of before Brittany Kaiser, she was the deal maker for CA and did the deal with Donald Trump’s campaign team. Wow, how lucky was Trump that she walked into his campaign HQ. She showed a significant degree of remorse and even described the tools they had used as military grade weapons.
Mark Zuckerberg reminds me of one of the characters straight out of Star Wars, you know one of the evil officers on the enemy ship, especially with his haircut. We like to describe Trump like evil, but actually Zuckerberg is 100 times more evil compared to Trump. The billions have definitely gone to his head.
I believe it won’t be long before he’s out of Facebook now.
The documentary, which I know focuses almost exclusively on Facebook, is probably just the tip of the iceberg and of course they’re not the only company who are data miners. They all are, Amazon, Apple, Google (Alphabet), Microsoft and many others that aren’t even famous yet. In case you’re thinking WhatsApp or Instagram, you are correct, but they’re part of Facebook, who are already guilty.
The biggest crime I believe Facebook are allowing is companies uploading our emails or mobile numbers to their Facebook custom audiences product, which means they can target us directly. And Mark Zuckerberg says he doesn’t sell our data, which is a complete and outrageous lie. Every couple of weeks I go inside my personal settings and delete a bunch of companies who are using my email address to target adverts to me. They have to physically upload my data to FB and then FB lists those companies on my ads settings. Unbelievable! 🙈
All of us need to get educated and realise that our data is being mined by all of the biggest companies on the Internet and there are no signs on the horizon that this is going to change anytime soon.
With this episode we start a 5-episode series of discussing 5 of the most famous and greatest speeches from the movies. We start with discussing ‘A Few Good Men’, starring Tom Cruise, Jack Nicholson, Demi Moore and Kevin Bacon. We unpick the content of the speech and examine it against the ABC of delivering speeches, the colourful language, the metonymies used to make the audience work and remember the speech. Enjoy!
In this dramatic courtroom thriller, LT Daniel Kaffee, a Navy lawyer who has never seen the inside of the courtroom, defends two stubborn Marines who have been accused of murdering a colleague. Kaffee is known as being lazy and had arranged for a plea bargain. Downey’s Aunt Ginny appoints Cmdr. Galloway to represent him. Also on the legal staff is LTJG Sam Weinberg. The team rounds up many facts and Kaffee is discovering that he is really cut out for trial work. The defense is originally based upon the fact that PFC Santiago, the victim, was given a “CODE RED”. Santiago was basically a screw-up. At Gitmo, screw-ups aren’t tolerated. Especially by Col. Nathan Jessup. In Cuba, Jessup and two senior officers try to give all the help they can, but Kaffee knows something’s fishy. In the conclusion of the film, the fireworks are set off by a confrontation between Jessup and Kaffee.
I’m sorry, but I don’t want to be an emperor. That’s not my business. I don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone — if possible — Jew, Gentile — black man — white. We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness — not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone. And the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way.
Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost….
The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men — cries out for universal brotherhood — for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world — millions of despairing men, women, and little children — victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people.
To those who can hear me, I say — do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed — the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish. …..
Soldiers! don’t give yourselves to brutes — men who despise you — enslave you — who regiment your lives — tell you what to do — what to think and what to feel! Who drill you — diet you — treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men — machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don’t hate! Only the unloved hate — the unloved and the unnatural! Soldiers! Don’t fight for slavery! Fight for liberty!
In the 17th Chapter of St Luke it is written: “the Kingdom of God is within man” — not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people have the power — the power to create machines. The power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure.
Then — in the name of democracy — let us use that power — let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world — a decent world that will give men a chance to work — that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfil that promise. They never will!
Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people! Now let us fight to fulfil that promise! Let us fight to free the world — to do away with national barriers — to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness. Soldiers! in the name of democracy, let us all unite!
The Great Dictator was Chaplin’s first film with dialogue. Chaplin plays both a little Jewish barber, living in the ghetto, and Hynkel, the dictator ruler of Tomainia. In his autobiography Chaplin quotes himself as having said: “One doesn’t have to be a Jew to be anti Nazi. All one has to be is a normal decent human being.”
Chaplin and Hitler were born within a week of one another. “There was something uncanny in the resemblance between the Little Tramp and Adolf Hitler, representing opposite poles of humanity, ” writes Chaplin biographer David Robinson, reproducing an unsigned article from The Spectator dated 21st April 1939: “Providence was in an ironical mood when, fifty years ago this week, it was ordained that Charles Chaplin and Adolf Hitler should make their entry into the world within four days of each other….Each in his own way has expressed the ideas, sentiments, aspirations of the millions of struggling citizens ground between the upper and the lower millstone of society. (…) Each has mirrored the same reality — the predicament of the “little man” in modern society. Each is a distorting mirror, the one for good, the other for untold evil.”
Chaplin spent many months drafting and re-writing the speech for the end of the film, a call for peace from the barber who has been mistaken for Hynkel. Many people criticized the speech, and thought it was superfluous to the film. Others found it uplifting. Regrettably Chaplin’s words are as relevant today as they were in 1940.
If I said to you that the Internet was being run by criminals and the only way to stop them is for you to stop using the Internet, you would never do it. The reason you’d never do it is because you can’t do without the Internet. It’s like electricity, gas and oil, you and everyone else couldn’t survive without it.
The same applies with Facebook. Facebook is so much part of society, an eco-system we just can’t do without. Most of us know that it causes untold harm in the world, people post the worst of humankind on the platform and Facebook are struggling to regulate themselves.
When Facebook became mainstream, we were all so overjoyed, apart from email there was nothing, well okay maybe Friends Reunited and MySpace, that allowed us to communicate and befriend almost anyone. In the beginning we would only connect with family and friends, this then grew beyond people we knew and we accepted requests from complete strangers. I wonder why we did this? Maybe we wanted to receive more likes (love) from strangers to makes us feel good about ourselves?
Facebook is like electricity, like gas and oil, maybe even food. We can not live without it, governments know this too and they can not live without it either, so any regulation or the dishing out of fines will always be small, because they need to make use of the platform to enable human surveillance, I know because I’ve heard this from Cyber Security professionals who advice the U.K. government.
Not everyone is staying on the platform though. They have lost users and more people tell me that they don’t do Facebook. They often say they prefer Instagram, haha they don’t realise it’s also Facebook! Some say they don’t do either, they prefer WhatsApp to stay in touch with friends. Oops that’s also Facebook! You see you can’t get away from them. Thousands of small business owners who have your email address and/or mobile phone number are able to add it to Facebook audiences and target you with ads and the latest changes to Facebook, which means you can’t even get your details removed from the advertisers that uploaded them, even if you’re not there. Facebook says nobody can see those details, but Facebook has them!
And what if that actually was true? I was walking Pip the Dog one morning and I was a little later than usual, when often I pass some kids walking on their way to school.
Without fail every single one is holding a smart phone clutched in one hand and sometimes both hands, like some prized possession. And yes they are walking and staring at their phone all at the same time. They definitely can’t see where they are going. I often want to walk directly towards them with my arms open, but then I know that would get me into trouble big time, so I don’t.
I’m sure as a parent you have no idea that your kid is doing this, correct? I’ve even seen several kids walking together all staring at their phones. Wow, that’s a really sad situation.
When mobile phones first came out, we weren’t holding them in our hands whilst walking and staring at them, because there was nothing to stare at. We would get the phone out of our bag or briefcase when we needed to call someone or accept an incoming call. Now with the advent of smart phones they are not just phones, they are addiction devices.
Kids are addicted, adults are addicted, we’re all addicted to our phones.
Oh, by the way, it was a beautiful sunny day, fluffy clouds, birdsong, trees bending in the breeze and they missed all of it. They didn’t have a clue, the day passed them by, never to be experienced again.
I don’t blame the smartphone makers as such, I blame the app makers, the social media tech companies, whose sole objective has and always will be to make us totally addicted to their advertising engines.
Michael-Don does some fabulous challenges throughout this episode to hold us both to account when discussing the differences between a Speech and a Story. We go back and forth, running around the Rabbit Hole, deciding how we can differentiate them. Is a speech just factual? Is a story just a narrative with characters? Is there absolutely no storytelling in speeches?
#weeklycartoon — Boris and Gove in Amsterdam — Michael & Josh
Over the weekend here in the UK we heard how at least 6 politicians, who are standing to be chosen as Britain’s Prime Minister, admitted that they’d taken illegal drugs at some point during their lifetime. A massive debate has ensued whether they are fit to be in office or whether we forgive them for their past mistakes. Imagine if one of them gets selected, the fact that they took illegal drugs will be forever in the forefront of our minds, correct? Forever…
Anyway it inspired us to create this little cartoon. Boris Johnson and Michael Gove, both forerunners in the contest admitted to both being weed smokers. I imagined that if we never leave the EU, it would actually be in their favour!
In this third episode of the Story of a Speech podcast, we examine what a story actually is. What is the structure and it’s impact on the viewer/listener? Now because Michael de Groot is the resident storyteller, you will hear a lot of him in this episode, well of course it his specialist subject after all.
The Wild West in the UK — Michael & Josh — #weeklycartoon
It has been a few interesting weeks in the UK. The UK prime minister Theresa May resigning, EU Elections and the Brexit party winning (or losing?), you name it, we have had it all. UK politics remind me of the old Wild West and cowboys fighting it out with each other and that gave us the idea for our latest cartoon.
Last Chance Saloon.
For non-uk viewers, scene explanation; Boris Johnson and Michael Gove, UK MP’s are shooting it out to see who wins the leader of the conservatives/temporary prime minster position. There are many more in the race, but I am taking a punt, that it will be these two who will be fighting it out in the last rounds. After all, Gove stabbed Johnson in the back when the last race took place. I’m assuming that their campaigns will be based on ‘No deal’ for Johnson and ‘Withdrawal Agreement’ for Gove, but It is a wild wild guess. Vince Cable (outgoing Liberal Democrat leader) is holding his yellow handkerchief out, so when it drops to the floor they can shoot! Of course his campaign is for a 2nd vote. Nigel Farage (Brexit Party leader with largest EU parliament members voted in), is sitting on the bench drinking a milkshake and of course shouting, as he regularly does; ‘Brexit means Brexit. Note that Jeremy Corbyn is missing, he’s still making up his mind up what the Labour Party policy is going to be over Brexit, so far it has been painful.
In this second episode of the Story of a Speech podcast, we’re examining what a speech actually is. Now because Michael-Don is the resident signature speech coach, you will hear a lot of him in this episode, well of course it his specialist subject after all.
We would love to hear your views, comments and ideas for topics in future episodes. Reach out to us via Twitter, @mdonsmith and @stayingaliveuk.
Michael-Don Smith and Michael de Groot introduce the Story of a Speech Podcast. In this episode they introduce themselves, why they started this podcast and many other insights, ideas and discussions around the topics of public speaking, presenting and storytelling. We would love to hear your views, comments and ideas for topics in future episodes. Reach out to us via Twitter, @mdonsmith and @stayingaliveuk
As mentioned in the podcast if you wish to listen to Michael-Don’s full story, you can hear it on the #shareyourstory podcast.
‘Fear and Doubt’ are potentially the two words that sum up all suffering by humans on this planet. Although they are two different words, they are in fact the same for me. Doubt indeed can create fear and fear causes doubt. But together they make an interesting couple or are they two different sides of the same coin?
Just think about anything that you have ever encountered in your current life that has been a challenge for you, whether in business, your personal life, in relationships and you will come to realise that ‘Fear and Doubt’ will have featured heavily.
‘Fear and Doubt is used by governments to keep control over their citizens and stop them from creating revolutions against those governments in charge, no matter how badly they are performing. Just consider the dictatorships that exist and have existed around the world through the ages. They have all used ‘Fear and Doubt’ to exert control over their citizens. Only when the people of nations decide to over come the fear and doubt that has been bestowed upon them, are they able to create meaningful change, which has happened for example during the Arab Spring some years ago.
Apart from governments, teachers use the same techniques to exert control over their students to prevent any bad behaviour in school, usually very unsuccessfully.
In all areas of society, the workplace, society, medicine, homelessness, relationships, the already mentioned governments and many other areas, ‘Fear and Doubt’ is used to control us and more importantly even our own attention on these means we exert control over ourselves.
It is all part of what Tony Robbins calls, conditioning. In fact he calls it ‘Neuro Associative Conditioning’ or NAC.
We condition ourselves and we have been conditioned to stay in ‘Fear and Doubt’.
This all adds up to what the Buddhists call ‘suffering’. The human condition and our biggest task on this planet, how to overcome suffering and find happiness.
So I developed this ‘Happiness Formula’, which if you have read the above will make perfect sense, I hope.
Happiness does not equal suffering and suffering is a function of ‘Fear and Doubt’. See image below. 👇
Now knowing that this is true, and you will have to put it to the test to prove it to yourself, is one thing but to reverse it is another. Those years of conditioning are tough to undo.
But have no fear I am giving you something to ponder. My wife, Clair and I were mulling this over one day and we jointly arrived at a beautiful statement to counter ‘Fear and Doubt’.
‘Courage and Clarity’.
So the real answer to happiness is ‘Courage and Clarity’.
Hope you like it, now go and test it out and I would love to hear how you get on.
Theresa May as the Pied Piper — #weeklycartoon — Michael & Josh
Lots happening in the UK Parliament today (27 March 2019). Nobody knows what will happen next, however I got an image in my head of Theresa May (UK Prime Minister) as the pied piper with just a few rats, oops I mean politicians, following and the rest of the rats way behind and going in opposite directions. History is being written right now. Enjoy!
