The web world changes and we move on.

The advent of Twitter and other chatterbox facilitators has considerably reduced the number and quality of comments on tech sites and blogs.

There are some exceptions, like natural community sites — our Royal Anecdotes is a good example. But generally, comments are old hat.

So, because of the countervailing increase in spam comments, we have now turned them off across our network, with the exception of RA. Our new technology will instantly mark every comment as spam and delete it.

We may reverse this decision for individual posts, in which case you will see “Comments On” at the bottom of the post.

I’ve also decided to go full feed for RSS readers as they are now so user friendly most geeky readers don’t bother with individual sites any more.

Readers can, of course, still contact us at the email address shown in the footer.

While you’re working out why a tech review should be wistful, let me just say that the long battle between BlackBerry and iPhone for which device should equip the Syntagma offices, has been won by BlackBerry.

I was going to review the BlackBerry Curve but, as is often the case, that’s been overtaken by events.

The picture gives a clue to the wistfulness inherent in our decision. I might also have put up a shot of the new 3G iPhone that O2 is close to announcing in the UK (see below).

You get the picture. No sooner do we get the kit in than the companies announce quantum leaps in technology and new products within weeks. It’s enough to make you expectorate.

I’ll just say we are very happy with the BlackBerry Curve (version 8310) and its extraordinary powers of connectivity, plus its distinction as a pocketable writing platform, before looking ahead, not just to the 9000 — the Bold — but to the 9500 (pictured).

According to The Boy Genius, this is to be called the Thunder and is set for third quarter launch. It’s a full touch-screen device, like the Apple iPhone, with only four hard keys along the bottom rim :

… it will launch as a worldwide lifetime exclusive on Verizon and Vodafone! … If the device will indeed launch with a 4G solution, our bet is on LTE), and GSM HSPA for traveling internationally. Verizon and Vodafone will have the same unit. Currently, the model number is the BlackBerry 9500, though it’s very early and that’s likely to change.

Meanwhile the Guardian is pumping up excitement about a 3G iPhone, which has been widely expected. “The 3G version of the iPhone will be unveiled ‘in the coming weeks’, the boss of Apple’s exclusive mobile phone partner in the UK and Ireland hinted today. … [Maybe] at its Worldwide Developers’ Conference in San Francisco, which starts on June 9.”

New 3G iPhone?

Not much left to say about the 8310 Curve, except it’s a welcome addition to our office and adds enormous functionality to our operation.

Can’t help thinking we’ve been thrown a curveball though — wistfully speaking.

There comes a time in the life of every nation when a once-in-a-generation change creeps up on it unobserved.

In a single day, something grabs the country by the throat, destroys the prevailing calamity, and reveals a bright new landscape of infinite possibility.

Yesterday, that tipping point occurred in middle-England, transforming Britain overnight from a grubby little socialist island off the north-west corner of Europe, into Borisland.

In the context of massive gains by Conservatives in the local elections, London swept away its Mayor, Red Ken Livingstone — who encouraged every terrorist and barmy oddball in exchange for votes — and out popped Boris Johnson.

Boris is a classical scholar who could easily double as a standup comedian. Indeed he often chairs the popular TV panel show Have I Got News For You.

His opponents regularly portray him as “priapic” and a “buffoon”, slurs that have only embellished his aura. Being a priapic buffoon is not an easy accomplishment. Try it.

In fact, as a former editor of the prestigious and gentlemanly journal, The Spectator, he is far from making the “B” and “P” words his own.

As well as holding the Parliamentary seat of Henley, Boris is possessed of an unshakeably amiable nature and an easy approachability that makes him a huge favourite with all kinds of people.

Syntagma does not underestimate Boris as many do, nor do we underestimate the size of the task now facing him. Governing London is no job for the fainthearted or the incompetent. For now, it is enough that he isn’t Ken.

Soon though he’ll be called upon to show his mettle. We have no doubt he will succeed and lead the charge for his party leader, David Cameron, to become Prime Minister, whenever the general election is called.

Hail to Boris, Chieftan of London, the greatest city on earth — apart from Exeter, of course.

A few people have asked me what I mean by “Mediate Yourself” — see previous post.

Most of us are almost totally mediated by “the media”. We obtain our views, much of our knowledge, and virtually all of our obsessions from these rich sources.

The result is a kind of addiction by which we become dependent on being fed experiences we should be getting from real life. The media’s lack of actuality is its unique selling point. It allows us to stand back from life’s messier aspects, while getting a taste of them via the media. The blackside is that this lack of actuality means young people don’t learn the lessons of bad decisions, like criminality and violence, until it’s too late.

The obvious question then arises: who mediates the media? The answer is, in almost all cases, the zealots.

Zealots have a long history. You may remember them from the New Testament, or any other ancient and modern text. Whatever the purpose, there is always zealotry in the background. Smart readers may quickly spot that these very texts were often written by other zealots masquerading as friends of humanity. Who else but zealots would go to all that trouble?

Far from history being driven by “the economy, stupid”, as the Marxist zealots insist, it is in fact powered by all manner of zealousness. Jihadist zealotry, for example, is not conspicuously driven by money.

Now, there is nothing wrong with some elements of zeal per se. Without enthusiasm there would be no progress, and probably no fun either. But we must distinguish between zealotry and enthusiasm. The latter is harmless, the former has an unbreakable intent and a belief in their mental construct, often the fashionable assumptions of the age.

Since the media — especially television — will not tolerate anyone who is dull or uninteresting, the zealots have a head start in the race to be media performers, and even controllers of the pipes.

So we are mediated by the media, which in turn is mediated by various species of zealot.

That brings us on to what a zealot does and why zealotry is bad for us.

Zealots take hold of the unmediated, infinitely variable, analog nature of existence and pull out a range of simplistic propositions, like magicians with a hat, which, they say, represent the truth of the world. Being zealots, any opposition will not be tolerated.

For example, the present Western zealotry can be summed up in a few words and phrases: “carbon footprint”, “sustainability”, “global warming”, “climate change”. The drama of disaster movies is their weapon of choice. Fear is their stock in trade. Mediocrity and conformity the result.

Zealots of the Roman Empire turned the practical and spiritual Jesus story into the all-pervasive controlling orthodoxy of the Middle Ages — the first real totalitarianism. That zeal is still with us and has spread to other religions. Thus religion has become the possession of zealots the world over.

In politics, the “natural philosophy” of Edmund Burke, which once characterized England and the common law countries, has been transformed into the iron-girder prescriptiveness of “human rights” and the equality agenda, among many other humanmade straitjackets we have to tolerate. These are vigorously underpinned by the tyranny of statute law and various “international” institutions notorious for their bleak influence and ineffectiveness.

Zealots rule. They mediate us from their positions in the media, religion, politics, education and much of current discourse. Of course, truth eventually surfaces again, but there’s no respite. They are quickly replaced by counter-zealots who deliver fresh dollops of anxiety and suspicion.

There is no such thing as a sustainable zealotry. They last just long enough to do their damage before being overtaken by other merchants of zeal. Worse, many hide their sense of entitlement behind a benevolent front.

In the age of an overwhelmingly powerful media, we must learn to mediate ourselves or become the slaves of zealotry and mediocrity. Or might that be “mediacrity”?

Mediate Yourself — Stand Out From The Crowd, by John Evans, will be published within the next 12 months.