I have to give it to my Jamaican people; we know how to take things to another level. The only problem is that half the things we take to a higher level needed to have remained stagnant.

Since last week when I wrote that we had all gone mad, so many things have taken place it's not funny. Where do I begin? Well, the whacking that Dr. Jephthah Ford received has to be pretty near the top. After hearing of the man's injuries, my mind went back to video clips I have seen of South African police beating youths in Soweto and Johannesburg during the days of apartheid. Regardless of what caused the beating, the goodly doctor was whipped like he killed Bob Woolmer!

Then, of course, there was the church incident in Manchester where the residents didn't take kindly to having an allegedly gay fellow being buried there.

Local video creates a mighty wind

If, as Marshall McLuhan said, the medium is the message, then this message is one that the medium of print fails to do justice.

The 31/2-minute clip features a boy named Spencer using a hidden device to simulate the sound of breaking wind upon unsuspecting patrons at Doylestown's library, at Starbucks and on Main Street.

Teen fools YouTube into removing videos

A 15 year old boy in Australia caused the removal of hundreds of video clips from Google Inc.'s YouTube service by pretending to be an employee of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). He sent a signed letter to YouTube falsely claiming he represented ABC, and asked the site to remove clips of a popular local comedy series that were uploaded by users of the site. Shortly after, lawyers for ABC contacted the boy and he apologized for his actions. "Everyone does dumb stuff when they are 15," the head of ABC television comedy, Courtney Gibson, told ABC Radio. "We really appreciate that he's apologized and we'll be following up with him next week." She said it wasn't clear why the teenager decided to take the action. YouTube does not block video content subject to copyright from being uploaded to the site, but will remove it once requested by the copyright holder.

Call for video sites to refuse cyber-bullying videos

Alan Arthur Johnson, a British Labour Party politician and the Secretary of State for Education and Skills, has called upon Internet websites to help tackle the growing problem of cyber-bullying against students and teachers. He said that video websites such as YouTube should ban malicious video clips of teachers and school students and filter them like already done with pornographic content. Johnson spoke about the problem at the National Union of Schoolmasters and Union of Women Teachers (NASUWT) in Belfast. "Cyber-bullying is cruel and relentless, able to follow a child beyond the school gates and into their homes," he said. "The online harassment of teachers is causing some to consider leaving the profession because of the defamation and humiliation they are forced to suffer." Teachers now have the right to confiscate mobile phones in the classroom to prevent bullies from recording footage of teachers or students for malicious intent.

Camcorder perfect for kids, but not perfect

A couple of months ago, I received an e-mail describing an inexpensive little video camera that's easy to use and makes it easy to post recorded video clips on community sites such as Grouper, Google Video, and MySpace.

The one I'm talking about is the Pure Digital Point and Shoot Camcorder. It's small and light (like a compact camera), inexpensive ($130 for the 30-minute model; $170 for the 60-minute model) and runs on two AA batteries.