Anything from $20 to $350 can help someone start their own business in Karachi, Kabul or Kirkut. Read more here.

As soon as house prices started falling, people around the world (not just the USA) defaulted on their mortgages, triggering repossessions and causing losses for banks. The further property prices fell, the more repossessions, the greater the loss. Many banks lent so much money to risky borrowers that bank failure was inevitable. In a free market, they would be left to go bankrupt. But the phrase "too big to fail" was adopted by every Western government and now much of the banking sector in the US and Europe is being nationalised.

So what do the governments see as the solution? More debt.

Debt for the nation

Each Western nation has taken on massive debt - billions or trillions of pounds per nation. It will take decades to repay either through lower public expenditure or higher taxation or both. The total amount remains to be seen because we don't know how big the bank losses will be. As asset prices fall (particularly houses) there will be more repossessions and greater debts. Total debt is probably more than the banks owned up to and it will get worse as property prices continue to fall.

Debt for the citizens

Last weekend, the G7 drew up a five-point rescue plan. Read between the lines and it infers that they want to rewind the clock to the rosy days of easy credit. That is being confirmed by Gordon Brown's recent statements such as "the UK problem was not shortage of demand for homes at "the right prices" but a shortage of mortgages "at the right prices for people to buy". Again, "Crash Gordon" gets it wrong. He wants us to get into more debt to buy overpriced property. This is the man famous for stealth taxation and overspending. This is the man who promised "no more boom and bust" yet we've had the biggest bust for 80 years, lumping unimaginable debts on the British taxpayer.

Debt is the problem

Our society has become reliant on debt. A certain amount of debt is a good thing - prudent borrowing permits faster investment into the economy. But we've taken it to unsustainable levels and nationalisation of the banking sector won't fix the problem. It only prolongs the pain of paying back the debt.

Furthermore, the government does not need to kick start mortgage lending - there is no problem in mortgage lending. You can get a mortgage now perfectly easily if you meet the criteria. You just need a decent deposit and proof of income. This is exactly how it should be. Responsible lending. The last thing we need is to go back to the reckless lending to people with tiny deposits and low income.

Saving is the solution

It's time to rediscover the benefits of saving: it provides greater freedom, encourages better financial planning, establishes financial security, is a good family value, is morally good and it's responsible. God that sounds dull. Maybe that is the problem - saving just isn't perceived as sexy.

Easy money and buying stuff - now that's sexy. But that's what got us into this mess. To get out of it, we need to make saving sexy. How can we do that? Interest rates of 10% might do the trick. In fact, higher interest rates would have prevented this crisis. Yet they're not going up, they're coming down even further as our 'leaders' try to keep this consumer debt machine going.

As individuals, we can do as we choose. We can decline that overpriced house, that increased credit limit, that unsecured personal loan. And we should. Stick your money in a high interest savings account. Pay off your mortgage sooner than you intended. Start a business that does not require capital. Whatever you do, don't listen to Gordon.

JavaScript turned off warning

Not only is it a good looking message that you can't miss at the top of the page, but it's also a play on the legendary TPS report scene from Office Space. Nice touch.

When a site relies heavily on JavaScript, JavaScript turned off messages are important notices to the user. Without it, they may think the site is broken.

This requirement will be included in the next release of our book, Tick My Boxes - the checklist for building successful websites

The web developers' checklist

It's a checklist for web developers, with 80 checkpoints of the key things to do when building a website.

If you build websites, you will know many of these things already. Having them in a checklist format, together with an explanation, helps you quickly tick off the things you should be doing. If you are new to building websites, the book will help you learn lots of the best practice techniques.

We released the book in beta so that we get feedback from developers which we will incorporate in the final version, to be released later in 2008.

The book is available for £9 from Lulu.

Visit the official website: www.tickmyboxes.com

He brought some Zimbabwean dollars with him including this note that he was given 4 weeks ago. It was worth roughly US$1. By the 25th July, it was worth roughly US$0.1. By next week, it will probably be worthless.

50 billion Dollar note, Zimbabwe

Click the note to see a larger image. Notice how it has an expiry date:

Pay the bearer on demand 50 billion dollars on or before 31st December 2008.

Apparently people don't want Zimbabwean dollars any more. Instead, they use foreign currency or they barter - exchanging goods with each other. He told us of a farmer that pays his workers in bananas, for which they are very grateful.

It is a classic example of hyperinflation and a sorry state of affairs for this once prosperous country.

Apparently it occurs in roughly 1 in 1,000 eggs. Here is the dual-core oeuf…

2 hours later…

As if that was not odd enough, we just had another double yolk in from 1 egg. They both came from the same box of 6 eggs from Tesco (free range organic). Can anyone explain this?

Edited from 1 hour and 27 minutes into just 60 seconds…

Why do companies still write letters? Has nobody told them that emails are free?

I previously wrote how the Organ Transplant website showed excellent use of NHS money. Old habits die hard though, prompting me to send the following email to Christine Cole at UK Transplant. If enough people complain about needless mail, organisations will stop sending it.

Dear Christine,

I received your letter confirming my registration as a donor and the card attached to it.

However, it is pointless! If you want to confirm my registration (which the website already did on the "thank you" page), send me an email.

Post is dead….

It wastes NHS money employing staff to write, print and post letters.
It wastes NHS money on the cost of postage.
It wastes paper and plastic (the unnecessary donor card).
It wastes my time opening and then throwing away the letter.

The UK Transplant website is fantastic. Allowing people to sign up online as a donor is a brilliant idea and the site is very easy to use. Well done! Please now take that next step and replace all paper letters with emails.

Best wishes,

Jake Brumby

400 people died in the UK last year while waiting for a transplant. Register now.

In the mood to save paper? Cancel your Yellow Pages.

What I like about this alert box:

• Grey background. Just the right opacity - not too dark or light.
• Close button and X in top right. Both common standards, so user knows exactly what to do.
• "Don't show me this again" checkbox to put the user in control.
• Yellow heading with gradient, consistent with operating system messages.
• Shadow around the alert box to make it stand off the page.
• Centred both horizontally and vertically.

Is it just me, or when you were younger, could you see obvious solution to problems? Did you wonder why we put up with things that were blatantly wrong or ill-conceived? Did you wonder why it took us years or decades to implement simple ideas and still they weren't done as well as they should have been?

Recycling facilities for paper, glass, plastic and aluminium. Proper school dinners. Energy-efficient housing. Renewable energy plants. Alternatives to petrol and diesel. Affordable and reliable public transport. No smoking in public places.

Most of these great ideas are still waiting to happen, yet thinking people (particularly children) thought of them 10, 20, 30 or more years ago. I use the expression thinking people because it seems that when we get a job and then a better job and then a house and a husband/wife and a family, we forget to really think. We just go with the flow. We get into a comfort zone and are easily influenced by the media and advertising. We begin to forget those great ideas we once had and we lose the ambition to actually make them happen.

Let's not forget them. Let's nurture them and grow them through action. Let's keep our brains and spirits alive and kicking.

Now here is what prompted this post - The Story of Stuff - the latest outstanding video from Free Range Studios.