Up 8 to 27 went Mark Summers with Summers magic, a song that was almost the dictionary definition of a Bonkers Tune. Take, if you will, the theme tune to surreal French animation The Magic Roundabout. Go on, it's there, grab it. Now add a rave beat, and the almost inevitable shouts and cheers and catchphrases from the show. And, just to confuse everyone on the planet, top and tail the record with clips from wartime radio: to be precise, Tommy Handley's It's That Man Again. The result: a hit that captures the public imagination, gets a surprising amount of radio play for a club record, though not a tremendous number of sales. There was another release covering similar ground, Badman's Magic style, but it was clearly the inferior of the two, and deservedly struggled to chart. Almost inevitably, this release sparked a bit of a revival in childrens' television, a topic we'll be revisiting on and off through the year.

(More: The end of apartheid, week 3 of the KLF War, TVAM, England collapses, and profiles of the Throwing Muses, Tanita Tikaram, Donny Osmond, Caron Wheeler, and the New Kids on the Block)

Fastest climber within the top 40 was up 14 to 5 for Praise, performing Only you. The group was Geoff MacCormack, Simon Goldenberg, and Miriam Stockley. They were the first and most successful of the Enigma clones, putting world music sounds to contemporary dance beats. The group owed their break to the use of the single in a car commercial, clearly intended to make the car seem as though it was a contribution to world peace, and not the fundamental cause of the war currently raging in the middle east. Out of this came an album, which sold rather well for a world / new age work. The group disbanded after their album, with Miriam Stockley finding much greater success as the vocalist on Karl Jenkins's Adiemus project, which topped the classical charts from 1995 until the marketing guys started selling pouting blondes at the end of the decade. We're somewhat surprised to find that the song doesn't get played much on Chill radio. Hint.

Up ten to 4 for Nomad featuring MC Mikee Freedom's I wanna give you devotion. We want to give it a place in Ver Dumper. Taking advantage of Queen's slump were 2 In a Room, up one to 3; and the Simpsons, up one to 2. Almost by default, the KLF held at the top spot for a second week.

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An unsettling decision from the supreme court, which has ruled that a criminal who legitimately comes into money can be pursued for compensation after the usual limitation has expired. Here's the timeline. 1988: man rapes woman. 1989: man is sent to prison for a very long time. 1994: six-year period to register compensation claim expires. 2005: one very long time later, man gets out of prison on day release, buys ticket, wins squillions on the lottery. 2008: court rules that victim can pursue him for the money.

Morally, the ruling is entirely correct: if someone commits a criminal act, it is right that they should be pursued for compensation. By re-writing the law after the fact, the ruling is also morally wrong. At the moment of the attack, the law was perfectly clear: six years to apply for a claim, or it'll be disbarred. Suddenly, twenty years on, the rules are changed, and that change is made retrospective. That retroaction is the unsettling thing, that courts are prepared to re-write the law without regard to fairness.

Of course, none of this would have happened if the case hadn't involved The Lottery Corp's products, nor if it hadn't been seized upon by prejudiced elements of the tabloid press. Do we really want the asses in charge of the Tabloid and Hell to be ruling the way?

Remember how ancien British prime minister Mister Tony Blair resigned his office to become an international commissioner charged with bringing peace to the middle east? Yes, remember that? Now, how often has he been to the region's greatest flashpoint, the Gaza Strip, which has been the subject of an anti-humanitarian blockade by Israeli forces since before he took up his post? Every month? A couple of times? Er, none. And how many times have his senior staff visited Gaza? Exactly as often as their boss. Just to repeat, Neither Mister Blair nor any of his full-time staff have been to Gaza since he began his role as Middle East mediator last June. What the fuck is he doing?

The Institute for Financial Studies believes that Alistair Chancellor's budget faces a gap of £8md (approx €10,5md) in the next financial year. One of the possible remedies is a 2p rise in income tax. Curiously, one of the measures announced in last year's budget by the then-finance minister Mr. The Soup Dragon was a 2p cut in income tax. It's clear that Mr. The Soup Dragon failed to build his war-chest during easy times, and now that troubles are ahead, he's facing no opposition and dancing all the way to the crater next door. Alternatively, Mr. Chancellor might like to pursue the dodges cited in wealthy avoid £13 md of tax a year.

As we might expect, the obituaries of Jeremy Beadle have been full of guff about his hidden camera shows. It's a shame that the report in the Universal Daily Registertab should contain so many errors - and we're not including the claim that he hosted a version of Animal Vegetable Mineral on Radio 4 in the early 1980s (we're still working on that one, but it's looking unlikely.) The poll putting him behind President Sadaam in the nation's popularity was made in 1990, not 2001. You've Been Framed was a UK re-versioning of America's Funniest Home Videos, not Your Favourite Home Video. The rumours about Beadle offering his mis-formed hand to shake were the subject of a libel action against The Independent in 1991, which was settled out of court. Still, never mind the facts, it's the UDR, a paper for people who want to read the Hell but are too embarrassed to ask for it.

Soup Dragon refuses to talk about his soupers with Mr. Dirtbag. Prochain ancien British prime minister Mr. the Soup Dragon held talks with pan-solar system newspaper proprietor Mr. Dirtbag in early October, just before confirming that he wouldn't be holding an election. Can we conclude that Mr. Dirtbag's dailies, the Sun and News of the Moon, would have backed Dave the eager young space cadet?

One we thought we covered in December, but didn't: The Lexicon of Newspeak.

NHW discusses the Lisbon treaty. We particularly agree that the president of the Commission is a bit of a naff job, though it will help to explain the project to the slightly thicker foreigners who don't see how states can pool their sovereignty.

Alistair McBay of the National Secular Society:

When adults decide the minds of innocent children should be force-fed a diet of superstition in faith schools, it expresses their fear that children mustn't be allowed to make informed and unbiased decisions on religion when they reach an age where they can reason for themselves.

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Over on Bother's Bar, Quirks wrote,

the lowest ever audience for a £1m win on British television is - I think - about 5m (it was either the Karen Shand win on The Vault, the very first one on TFI Friday or the second PokerFace final).

The method of compiling television ratings was completely altered at the start of 2002, to the extent that viewing figures are not comparable across that point.

The viewing figures, in millions, for television game show million pound wins since 2002 are:

1. Gibb (Survivor Panama, 29.05.02) 6.89
2. Gibson (Millionaire, 24.04.04) 6.62
3. Jackson (The Con Test, 03.03.07) 6.57
4. Wilcox (Millionaire, 23.09.06) 6.36
5. Lang (The Con Test, 16.07.06) 6.11
6. Shand (The Vault, 03.08.04) 3.87

For what it's worth, the 1999 TFI Friday broadcast registered 4.42m in aggregate: 2.59m for the initial broadcast at 18.26, 1.84m for the same-night repeat at 23.57. Remember, these figures are not comparable with more recent ones, and did not include viewers in Wales.

Of course, if we're being really picky, the lowest rating ever achieved for the first airing of a show where someone walks out of the studio with a million quid was the showing of Charles Ingram on Millionaire. That went out on ITV2 to 1.35m viewers, though the first transmission of that footage, about ten minutes previously, had gone out on ITV to about ten times as many people.

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The Torygraph tries to get to grips with Skins. Next week, E4 explains the Schleizwig-Holstein question, with reference to the treaty of Brest-Livtosk.

But while we're laughing at the Torygraph: Led Zeppelin to play obscure festival! Er... Le*z* Zeppelin to play obscure festival!

Returning to children's television, we hear that the BBC has finally put Grange Hill out of its misery. For our money, the show came to an end in 2002, after which it was taken over by Phil Redmond and completely lost its quality.

Robert Fisk has written a book. We can see his name emblazoned in gold print on the front cover. The only problem is, he didn't write it. Who did?

Rupert Dirtbag decrees: atheists not welcome. It's ironic that Myspay's response to my persistent and sincere request for help was to delete the group!

Those top ten cartoon clichés in full.

Why the BBC's end credits are completely unreadable. The only note of dissent we'd strike is with CBBC's own productions, which feature credits running over action, in full screen. C'mon, BBC1, get with the twenty-first century, credit squeezes are so 1995.

Hi there! Christopher Howse on the polite way to start and end emails.

Saturday was a good day for comebacks: readers will be aware of Wales's transformation from 13 down to 7 ahead. They may not have seen reports of a very close match in the NFL between defending NFL champs Donegal and Super Bowl All Ireland champs Kerry. Donegal had the better of the first half, but could only lead by a single point at the interval, by which time Kerry had had a man sent off. Kerry took the lead, and with the clock approaching the final minute, scores were tied. Then Kerry scored a point, then another in injury time. Just when we were chalking this up as a defeat, Donegal managed to turn a free kick into a goal, and run out winners by one point. RTÉ match report.

Inner Brat dissects the ins and outs of Willow and Kennedy's relationship. No, not that sort of in and out, the sort about Willow being an overprotective girlfriend.

Andy Gill explains the cunning plot behind Adele. And Amy Whingebag, Katherine Nash, Leona Lewis, and Ketevan Meluargh. It's the BRIT school, an academy for stars. Hmm. That could make a decent television series. But it didn't.

Boo and hiss to UK Gold, which has issued a press release complete with a Made Up Opinion Poll. According to the television company, owned by Richard Branson, such people as Mona Lisa, Dick Turpin, and Lady Godiva only ever existed in fiction. This will come as news to them, for all three are real dead people. It just goes to show that publicists really will try to deny the existence of the ground beneath their feet.

The meaning of furniture names, at least the flat-packed self-assembly system that cuts corners on Finnish furniture you finish yourself.

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Once again, danah boyd has articulated what we were thinking. She's writing about the social graph project, and is addressing the other unanswered question: what problems are caused by making these connections? What are the downsides to linking someone on Ultra-Serious-Business-Cabal via Photos-R-Us and Ubiquity-Mail to Apathists-Unite? Compressed to a sentence, boyd's argument boils down to, Failure to expose them is not a matter of security through obscurity... it's about only being visible in context.

Context is everything. In the context of Ultra-Serious-Business-Cabal, it's necessary to declare a link to Photos-R-Us, perhaps to Ubiquity-Mail, but certainly not to Apathists-Unite. In the context of Apathists-Unite, it's necessary to link to Ubiquity-Mail. The problem arises because Ubiquity-Mail is linked to Ubiquity-Search, which is publishing all the links through Ubiquity-Network, a service that doesn't include anything that might pass for context.

Context is everything. Indeed, this was something that we discussed with Mr. Pokery back in September. At the time, we proposed partitioning the data into various sets, with complete knowledge assumed within each set, and directional knowledge (or lack of knowledge) assumed between partitions. The difficult question is authentication, and it's been ducked in the initial implementation of the social graph. We accept that this is a very hard nut to crack - we've compared the difference between fully-public and semi-public data to problems complete in P and NP.

Context is everything. In the absence of a decent method to establish these partitions, people will force the issue, by creating multiple profiles on various systems. Don't want people on Ultra-Serious-Business-Cabal to know about your membership of Apathists-Unite? You'll have to create another Ubiquity-Mail account, or use Hurrah-Mail.

Context is everything. A heads-up to Joshua Porter, who states in comments, Now, if Six Apart said "we're publishing XFN and FOAF whether you want us to or not"...then that would be a problem. Guess what. Six Apart forced all Livejournal customers to have XFN™, and has always provided FOAF for its internal services. What's more, the customer has no control over the published data; they cannot differentiate between friend and acquaintance, which is the whole point of having gradations of inter-relation. We said at the time, We wonder why Six Apart has rushed to publish inaccurate data without allowing the submission of correct data; a cynic would say that the company wished to impose its view of the social graph over that of its customers. This section can be partially-disabled if a customer specifies their own FOAF file, but it's still not possible to alter the automatically-generated information, nor to withdraw from this system. This policy has not altered since Livejournal was sold to the Kremlin.

Nick Dynice proposes putting XFN declarations behind OAuth, a reasonably elegant method of semi-anonymous authenticion. If implemented sensibly, this could be the start of the directional trust between partitions we mentioned earlier.

Livia Labate brings the conversation back to the important point: context is everything. Technologies .. have the power to take things that are already exposed and public IN context and consolidate and expose them OUT of context.

And, towards the bottom, Alison Mac proposes an answer to the question we posed last week: what's in it for us? What's the great advantage of the social graph for the user? Two-thirds of diddly-squatt. If I thought for one minute that this was about Google developing an application that made my life easier, I might go for it; but all of this is just about harvesting my networks as a consumer.

Who would ever have thought it? Capitalist company employs naïve geek to make it more money.

Further thoughts in this area, that we're going to point to but not dissect: Marshall Kirkpatrick

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We have the tabloid press we deserve, says Septic Isle, after seeing one too many front pages about a former pop singer driven mad by, er, the constant attentions of the tabloid press. Emma Forrest has a personal reflection.

Why G****e talks are always boring. They always talk about things everybody already knows and do not elaborate about the future of Google, their strategy and thoughts. They do not inspire the audience. Sounds like Mr. Fitzpatrick has found his natural home, full of people who make bad services, and can't be arsed to support them.

Jenni Russell on the utter pointlessness of education tests. A regime of continual testing and practising was having a seriously negative effect on teaching. It had resulted in a narrow and impoverished curriculum, and poor-quality teaching of that curriculum.

Sometimes, a newspaper publishes two columns that really should have been combined. See, for instance, Hamish McRae and Deborah Orr in Wednesday's Indytab. McRae goes long on why governments miss their targets (the target culture magnifies errors) and Orr talks about the content of council documents (a load of incomprehensible jargon). Could it be, do you suppose, that governments miss their targets because the people who are trying to hit them are confused by the utter nonsense spouted by colleagues. At least we understand what Mark Steel's on about: Vote for Bob the Builder.

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New national number ones, and other notes...
Germany Alex C's Doktorspiele is new at 4, Gwen Stiffeny's Early winter makes it in at 6, but DJ Ötzi's Ein stern is the talk of the chart, making its 52nd consecutive week in the top 15. And it's better than Chasing cars. And Umbrella.
Netherlands Kane's Catwalk is in at 2.
Finland Chisu takes the top with Mun koti ei oo täällä, and Basshunter's Now you're gone completes the nap hand of Scandinavian top 10s.
Sweden Do you love me? asks Amanda Jenssen. Enough to make you number one, dear.
Norway Almost inevitably, Bleeding love claims its sixth number one position, after UK, IE, LV, EE. Leona's also spending her second week at the top of the German charts.
Flanders And look who's moved to the top here! Bleeding love is now a seven-nation chart-topper.
Ireland If we thought their nomination of Dustin the Turkey for Eurovision was a bit odd, just look at the new entry at number 29. Mister blue sky from that well-known contemporary hit-making band the Electric Light Orchestra. Only thirty years after the song's recording, there.

A quick look to the airplay chart, where pre-release tracks from the Feeling, Kylie, and Duffy are all in the top 5. The Scandinavian invasion is go, as Alphabeat and BWO (formerly Bodies Without Organs) both make the top 30.

New entries low down for Iwasacubscout's Pink squares (71), Flo Rida's Low (68), Blood Red Shoes's You bring me down (64), and Chris Brown's With you (63). Duffy's old song, Rockferry, climbs to a new peak at 45. And here's something unusual: the French number one is a British hit, Yaël Naïm's New soul enters at 42. No objections to that, it's a fabulous song, though quite why the UK should have picked up on this and left the entire career of Sheryfa Luna behind is unclear.

Second hit for Frozen Embryos, From yesterday lands at 37. Quite why the critics don't like Jordan Catalano's band is unclear, unless this is a very subtle joke being played by the Brianites. It's had its physical release, and can be expected to fall almost as fast as an Elliot Minor record next week. Timberyokel's Scream enters at 36, and Kiddyfiddler Jackson's pointless remix of The girl is mine clambers into the chart at 32 after two weeks in the 40s. He's had a physical release, and the single's in the shops, too. Are Biffy Clyro still going around? Who's got a match is up 33 to 27 on its physical release.

A shame as Lykie Ignoume's Wow makes the top 20, ensuring that her best record remains her smallest hit. New at 18 for Goldfrapp with A&E, the group's first single since their 2005 breakthrough, and it's in the same indefinable mould. In at 14 comes Morrissey's That's how people grow up, which sounds almost exactly like everything he's recorded since his 2004 comeback. And it's one of the smallest hits: only two of the ten singles peaked below 14. Moz is on his physical issue, natch. The Feeling are in at 12 with I thought it was over; they're following up the three top ten hits from 2006. Biggest was Sewn but Fill my little world is the one that's stuck around on airplay. Up 13 to 11 goes Brown / Cracknell's The journey continues, tying He's on the phone as Cracknell's biggest hit.

Look who's back! Back!! BACK!!! It's wet! Wet!! WET!!! Weightless is the group's first top ten hit since 1997, and thirteenth in total. They're best known for their chart-topper Love is all around, but split three years later because Marti Pellow was being an ass. It's a fanbase sale, watch for it to fall like a Cliff Richard Christmas Single next week. Physical release propels David Jordan into the top five with Sun goes down, and Rihanna's belated physical issue puts Don't stop the music back up one to 4. Adele slips to 3 with Nickelback up one to 2, leaving Basshunter on top for a fifth week.

If you're James Masterton or Reggie Yates and think that's dull, just look at what's on top of the albums chart. Jack Johnson with Sleep through the static. With this in our ears, we'd be able to sleep through the end of the world. Adele slips one to 2, Nickelback holds at 3, Hot Chip enters at 4 with Made in the dark, and Scouting for Girls dip 3 to 5. New at 6 comes Mary J Blige's Growing pains, and in at 27 is Dionne Warwick's valentines collection. Good climbs for Billy Fury (15-10), Andrea Bocelli (44-16), David Jordan (41-28) and James Blunt (46-30). Lower entries: Lenny Kravitz 42, Morcheeba 59, Duke Spirit 63, Rascal Flatts 64, Charlie Landsborough 73. And love collections from Kenny Rogers 47, Alexander O'Neal 49, and Pavarotti 52.

 5 10 David Jordan - Sun goes down
 7  6 Hot Chip - Ready for the floor
10 NE Wet Wet Wet - Weightless
11 24 Mark Brown / Sarah Cracknell
  - The journey continues
13  9 One Night Only - Just for tonight
14 NE Morrissey - That's how people grow up
16 11 Scouting For Girls - Elvis ain't dead
18 NE Goldfrapp - A&E
21 14 Robyn - Be mine
25 21 Alicia Keys - No one
28 26 Cascada - What hurts the most
30 27 Mika - Relax take it easy
31 25 Wombats - Moving to New Amsterdam
33 28 Leona Lewis - Burning love
34 30 Scouting for Girls - She's so lovely
41 33 Amy MacDonald - This is the life
42 NE Yaël Naïm - New soul
43 35 Sugababes - About you now
44 36 Hoosiers - Goodbye Mr. A
45 54 Duffy - Rockferry
51 40 Robyn - With every heartbeat
55 41 Sugababes - Change
57 58 Paramore - Misery business
58 50 Freemasons - Uninvited
62 49 Bloc Party - Flux
65 65 Jay-Zed / Linkin Park - Numb / Encore
71 NE Iwasacubscout - Pink squares
72 64 Mika - Happy ending

.. 34 Urbnri - Young free and simple
.. 52 Bullet For My Valentine - Scream aim fire
.. 59 Robyn - Handle me
.. 62 Wombats - Let's dance to Joy Division
.. 66 Hoosiers - Worried about Ray

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This week, we've been watching and hearing...

• Ready to Wear (unknown for Fourth Programme) A brief history of the suit since the war, including how it resisted the charge of fashion. We would like to know if it was Raymond Sinclair who provided the voice for the readings, but we couldn't see it because the w*nkers shrunk it down to the corner of the screen.
• Summits (Fourth Programme) This week, Kennedy and Kruschev visit Vienna. Lots of propaganda from both sides, and we're surprised at the blatantly partisan tone of the reports from Kennedy's side. It does explain the North Moronican attitude to Cuba: it was their client state, now it's someone else's, and the ickle kiddies can't bear to think that someone's no longer their fwend.
• Feedback (City Media for Radio 4) Arlo White explains how he commentates on the Off White Cup, Robert Peston's boss talks about his style in semi-scripted pieces, and Rod McKenzie on when Newsbeat places Britney in its bulletins, and when it doesn't.
• The Late Edition (The Fourth Programme) Like Peter Stringfellow, only more attractive. Really unimpressed with Rich Hall, a man who made one joke very badly, and added nothing to the discussion. We'd have got more intelligent conversation out of Toby Cat, and he's better looking. Do stick around for Marcus's rant against the £1.99 chicken.

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There was a mass exodus from Chad's capital N'Djamena after two days of heavy fighting. Rebels invaded the city on 2 February, and though the authorities claimed to have restored normality, people kept leaving.

O'Ryanair has been fined £4000 after stranding passengers who had nothing to do with terrorism, just looked a bit brown.

On the upside, Kenya's two main parties are nearing an agreement to share power, bringing an end to six weeks of violence.

On the downside, just as one rigged election is resolved, another is declared. Russia's forthcoming presidential election cannot be free and fair decrees the OSCE, because independent monitors will not be allowed to review the build-up to the elections. The pro-Poutine candidate is everywhere on the television, and there is deliberate suppression of opposition candidates.

Logician of the week goes to Rowan Williams, who proposed that mohammedist social law could be given a place in the law. Mr. Williams, the current leader of the world's anglicanites, wishes to extend the cultural acceptence extended to his faith, the ratfans, and the mosesites. Thanks to the current climate of hostility against mohammedists, Mr. Williams's plea brought forth cries of he supports patriarchy and he'll be calling for beheadings next, and the opprobrium of the disgraced philanderer Mr. Plunkett. Of course Mr. Williams supports chopping people's heads off on the say-so of one all-powerful man. That's how he got his job, when Henry Tudor told Roland Rat's representative on earth that his mythology was no longer required. If Mr. Williams is defeated in his argument, he will know that society no longer accepts divine revelation as the source of law, thus undermining his own position, and leading to the disestablisment of his church. Mr. Williams is, of course, an antidisestablishmentarianist at heart; how could he not? (More: Septic Isle|Blairwatch|Orr)

Election news

The results from Serbia's presidential election are in, and it's a win for Boris Tadic. He beat Tomislav Nikolic by 50,5% to 47,9%, and will continue to steer Serbia closer to the EU and away from the isolationist embrace of Mr. Poutine and his corrupt cronies. Serbia's continued westernisation is dependent on the country handing over criminals from the 1990s civil war for trial. More: The threat of a flare-up has not gone away

Campaigning has begun in earnest for Spain's general election, which will be held on 9 March. The right-wing Populist Party (PP) said that it would bar people from wearing headscarves for religious reasons, though it appeared to concede the demands of fashion. The party's leader, Sr. Rajoy, spouted xenophobic rhetoric that sounded like Robert Kilroy-Shaft. The PP also said that it would plant 500 million trees during the four years of its government: that's almost four trees per second, day and night, every day of the year. Quite how it will fit all this greenery in the country is not clear. Prime minister Zapatero, leader of the Socialist party, said that he supported the supreme court's decision to bar parties linked to Basque guerillas from the election.

President Napolitano has dissolved parliament; there will be fresh elections in Italy under the current system. The tax-dodger Sr. Berlusconi is favoured to win, and began by spreading malicious falsehoods about his rivals.

The second week-end of matches in the Six Nations saw Wales power past Scotland by a huge margin, while France and England survived late come-backs by Ireland and Italy, respectively. From this point, it looks as though Wales -v- France in the fourth round will be a grand-slam decider, with Wales able to secure the Triple Crown against Ireland a week later.

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A band of heavy rain spread in on Sunday night, with a further front passing over on Tuesday. The latter resulted in a day of heavy showers. After that, high pressure from the continent began to dominate, with depressions kept to Ireland and Scotland. The anticyclone will continue to dominate the weather next week, with calm air. Expect it to get colder as the week progresses, so do wrap up.

04 Mo rain o/n, sun      2/ 8, 8.5
05 Tu showers            8/11,18.0
06 We sun                6/ 9, 2.0
07 Th mist               5/11
08 Fr sun                7/11
09 Sa sun                3/13
10 Su sun               -4/12

Rainfall in February: 28.5mm; monthly average: 54mm

Degree heating days: 465
2006-7: 310½/499
2005-6: 448½/684
2004-5: 361/556
2003-4: 483/754

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