Bubble 2.0? According to a new article in ComputerWorld , "Vendors’ rush to build Web 2.0 technologies reminds some observers of the wild run-up to the Internet bubble during the late 1990s. However, users and analysts say there is a significant difference this time". Phew!

Fear of a Paddy H-Bomb? Last night, I attended a live broadcast of the BBC Radio 4 programme "Any Questions" which was hosted in the National Gallery of Ireland. As the audience arrived, we were invited to submit questions for the panel. Guess what! My question was chosen as one of the 10 to be asked! However, as my question was allocated number 8, the programme ran out of time before it could be asked. Pity! (My question? It was "Given the recent vote in Westminister to renew the Trident missile system, and the desire of Iran and others to acquire nuclear weapons - is it time for Ireland to create its own nuclear deterrent?" Somewhat tongue in cheek, of course) Nevertheless, the show was very entertaining. It included Michael O'Leary of Ryanair and John Redwood of the Conservative Party. Michael of course was on top form and delivered some great one-liners. Indeed, the quality of debate from the British members of the panel highlighted to me gain just how poor the members of our parliament (Dáil Éireann) are at informed, intelligent discussion. One only has to compare the lively confrontations that occur during Prime Minister's Question Time in Westminister, with the agonising and miserable squabbling of Leinster House.

Comhgairdeas le Breandán Knowlton Fuaireas amach gur eisean a bhi i gceannas ar an togra idir Chomhaltas 's Happy Cog. As he reveals on the website of Rob Wychert: "I certainly considered several Irish firms when I was thinking about the project (knowing that I had to walk into Leinster House to defend my choice!) but these guys were just the best at building what I wanted to build."

A New Cog I am surprised, happy and humbled by the fact the Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann are aware enough to hire Happy Cog to redevelop their public website. Fairplay to their webmaster for persuading the Comhaltas board to get Happy Cog involved! Happy Cog and founder Jeffrey Zeldman, are leading exponents of the idea that beautiful and usable websites can be built with Web Standards (XHTML, CSS, DOM). I am very pleased to know that they have an Irish client. I can now use that to leverage adherance to Web Standards even more strongly. If Comhaltas can do it, anyone can!

Web Governance Service I recently found out about Hewlett-Packard's "Web Governance Service". This is a QA system for scanning your website at regular intervals in order to isolate quality problems. Find out more about it in an update to my Website QA article from December 2005.

Statutory Instrument (no.49) A new Statutory Instrument (no.49) means that every registered, limited-liability company in Ireland must publish certain information about itself on its public website. Read more about this in an update to my article, 'The Web and the Law'.