The future is bright

I actually took this in the cemetery, but don't let that put you off :) Blip may be rising from the grave!

The latest update from the BlipFuture team is that over £35,000 has been pledged so far. That's not bad for something that had to be put together so quickly. If you haven't already, please do go and study the information on their site (you need to register first -- this doesn't commit you to anything), and tell people about it.If you are reading this and you're not a blipper you can still help to keep the show on the road. Otherwise you might be deprived of my blips forever -- a fate worse than death, I'm sure you'll agree.

In other bright news, remember the meeting we disgruntled Orange subscribers had almost exactly a year ago to discuss what we could do about our diabolical internet connection? After about eight months we were despondent and thought we weren't going to get anywhere. But some nifty footwork from our combative mayor revealed a secret regional fund that hardly anyone knew about and which had to be spent before the end of the year. So we jumped the queue, grabbed half of it (a similarly disadvantaged village got the other half) and for the last few weeks we have excitedly followed the progress of an optical fibre laying team up the road from Fabrezan. Yesterday was the big day -- Orange came and plugged it in! Meanwhile the lucky communes which were included in the Conseil Général's plan are still waiting ...

Admittedly the fibre only goes as far as the junction box outside the Mairie, not to each house, so it's not superfast. But still, we now have download speeds of around 16 Mbits, which is a whole lot better than the 0.5 MBits we've suffered recently and means we are finally getting what we have been paying for. So it just goes to show -- determination can win the day even in what looks like a hopeless case! We never dreamed this time last year that we'd get a result so soon -- or at all.