The social tyranny of singing ‘Happy Birthday’
Among the horrors, some aspects of lockdown were bizarrely less gruelling than expected; indeed for some people, the experience was…
The hidden cost of free technology
Back in late 2019 I met someone from Zoom who was visiting London. The company, then as now, offered free…
Video calls are the new penny post
Dear Sir, I beg to introduce myself to you as a clerk in the Accounts Department of the Port Trust…
America isn’t speaking our language
I haven’t yet read the report published by the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities. But, looking at the recommendations,…
The genius branding of the ‘Oxford’ vaccine
I am writing with a mild pain in one arm, having received my first dose of the Oxford vaccine yesterday…
Here’s a clue: we should all be doing cryptic crosswords
I was once asked by a previous editor of the Timeshow to increase sales of the paper. I was slightly…
The economics of learning languages
There is a kind of conversation which sounds intelligent, and which makes sense at first hearing, but which deeper thought…
The art of the public information ad
The art of the public information ad
The cult of London
The phrase ‘rich people’s problems’ has its uses. I once overheard a group in a Knightsbridge restaurant sympathising with a…
Hotel breakfasts are a risky business
A few Spectator readers may soon find themselves confined to quarantine hotels, so the magazine thought it timely to find…
Our obsession with city living is out of date
In March last year, the world made an interesting discovery. We found that a high proportion of knowledge-work could be…
Will remote-working strengthen the case for HS2?
Soon after the pandemic hit, the world’s airlines turned off their pricing algorithms and resumed pricing flights manually. Everything the…
Is it time to reopen technology’s cold cases?
One of the staples of crime drama is the ‘cold-case squad’. This allows programme-makers to add period detail to the…
Will video-calling kill bureaucracy?
Having grown up in a family business, my earliest exposure to corporate life was often baffling. I remember the first…
The surprising brilliance of meal kits
Ford’s Kumar Galhotra once remarked that carmaking is 100,000 rational decisions in search of one emotional decision. You spend five…
The ludicrousness of stemmed wine glasses
In 1989 I answered my first mobile phone call on Oxford Street using a brick-sized Motorola borrowed from work. Several…
My Covid risk assessment
Classes of people at moderate risk from Covid-19. Addenda to current NHS guidelines. Those at risk from coronavirus now include…
Why we should consider testing Covid on prisoners
The Covid problem lies as much in the delayed action of the virus as in the virus itself. Since symptoms…
The case for road rationing
Here’s the quandary. How in future can we make the kind of rapid advances we have made during the Covid…
Have big cities had their day?
About 15 years ago I noticed a few surviving chattel houses in Barbados and wondered what they were. As it…
Remote workers of the world, unite!
A few nights ago on Twitter, I quipped that I was planning to launch a trade union for remote workers.…
The danger of following ‘the science’
I have decided to divorce my wife after 31 years on scientific grounds. Though perfectly happy, on reassessing my original…
Why our greatest inventors are supreme hucksters
People often tell me I have a strange way of looking at the world. Obviously, it doesn’t seem strange to…
Why I won’t patent my brilliant idea
In the past 30 years, I have driven about 8,000 miles in France in right-hand-drive cars. And I would be…
Saying yes slowly is what’s hampering progress today
One of my long-held beliefs is that evolutionary biology should be taught extensively in schools. There may be some objections…
