As is tradition I wish all a very Merry Christmas.  Probably a celebration more keenly appreciated and felt this year than most.  This second year of COVID has been a grind and more difficult than 2020 when we first exerienced the effect of restrictions. 

As is my practice I republish one of the most heartfelt and brilliantly written paean to the Christmas celebration and optimism and being unafraid to reject cynicism of our current age; Yes, Virginia: There is a Santa Claus.  It is as apt today as it was in 1897. More so.  The prose is wonderful and little wonder it is history’s most reprinted newspaper editorial.

The article provides:

DEAR EDITOR: I am 8 years old.
Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.
Papa says, ‘If you see it in THE SUN it’s so.’
Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?

VIRGINIA O’HANLON.
115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET.

VIRGINIA, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You may tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, VIRGINIA, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

The ubiquitous use of some software coupled with their vulnerabilities makes for a massive cyber security headache as the Australian’s article Millions face cyber attack via compromised Log4j Java-based software makes clear.  Log4j Java is installed on more than 100,000 devices, apps etc..  In cybersecurity terms it is a story that has been around for a while.  On 11 December Kaspersky reported on the vulnerability.  The Google Security blog put out a post, Understanding the Impact of Apache Log4j Vulnerability on 17 December. 

The Australian article Read the rest of this entry »

The Court of Appeal upheld the summary judgment decision of Warby J in HRH The Duchess of Sussex v Associated Newspapers Limited [2021] EWCA Civ 1810 which found that Associated Newspapers Limited had breached the Duchess’ reasonable expectation of privacy with the publication of a letter from her to her father Thomas Markle.

FACTS

The court summarised the facts as:

• Mr Markle did not attend the wedding of the Duke and the Duchess on 19 May 2018 [14].
• He was admitted to hospital days beforehand for emergency heart surgery.
• Text messages from the Duchess  made it plain that  before the wedding Mr Markle behaved in ways which caused her

“concern because of the publicity they were likely to and did cause, and the impact on her, [the Duke], and [Mr Markle]”.[14]

• • Mr Markle:
    • engaging with the media (e.g. a front-page Mail on Sunday report on 13 May 2018 was headed “Meghan’s Dad staged photos with the paparazzi”, and reported that Mr Markle was “colluding with the paparazzi to stage a series of lucrative photo opportunities”, for which he apologised by text to the Duchess on 14 May 2018).[15]
    • being well aware that the Duke and Duchess wanted him to avoid engaging with the media, and that all their correspondence was personal and private in character [16].
    • continuing, thereafter, to have dealings with the media which resulted in press articles. The Articles themselves referred to “a series of damaging interviews” given by Mr Markle [16].
  • The Duke texting Mr Markle on 17 May 2018 asking him to “stop talking to the press for your sake and hers”, and expressing concern that Mr Markle had not “returned any of our 20+ calls since we all spoke on Saturday morning” [15]. the run-up to the wedding was fractious, revealing substantial differences of approach to dealing with the media.

The letter

• The Letter was sent on 27 August 2018 with bold text identifying words published in the Articles, and italicised text being the judge’s interpolations [18]:

Read the rest of this entry »