Laboured effort of e-government
Shouldn't the party that would have us communicating with government via the internet be setting an example? The Observer 's thoughts precisely. Imagine our correspondent's disappointment then, when his request to get accreditation for the party's annual conference electronically was rebuffed. 'We haven't the facilities,' snapped a Millbank clerk. 'You'll have to fax back an application form.' Filled in with a quill dipped in old-fashioned Quink, naturally. E-government? RIP.

One for the books
<@large is delighted to hear that embattled electronic bookseller, Amazon.com is to salvage itself by becoming the Arthur Daley of the internet. Quite clearly if the similarly troubled Waterstone's bookshop announced that it was about to flog off unsold Rovers, we'd all see the business sense. But dotcoms are different, aren't they? No doubt Amazon will be making use of its famed distribution network to next-day deliver the latest Star Cruiser to America's overworked soccer moms. We look forward to 'people who bought this book, also bought a Ferrari from us' when you try to buy the latest Harry Potter tome.

Pippa on a dippa
So whatever happened to Pippa Scholes, the cleaning lady turned web music guru whose rags-to-riches story was splashed across front pages back in February? Readers with an interest in tabloid tales might remember that Pippa was offered an astonishing £500,000 cash deal by internet developer Phase 8. In return, Pippa became the creative director of pipstars.com, a 'unique women-only talent centre'. Rumour reaches us that the site would be better described as a 'unique woman-only centre' given the rather underwhelming response to the site.