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Kate Moss. Really. What is the point? She wears clothes in front of other people. She gets naked in front of other people. Well so would I, for what she earns. Actually, I’d do it for a hundredth of what she earns. Any takers?

She’s a symbol for a tribe of them. Into all the celebrity events they waltz, looking Very Important, because of their great skill at wearing clothes. They had the fortune to be born pretty, but then so did lots of other people.  

However, I accept that this is not my world, a world in which a newspaper can carry the headline “Rita Ora wears two outfits in one afternoon at Glastonbury”.

I think what irritates me is the rich, bored look of these people, pretending to be cross at being snapped by the paparazzi. I wouldn’t mind a Kate Moss if, just once in a while, it issued a statement expressing its weeping, on-its-knees gratitude for the enormous slice of luck the world has sent its way.

Anyway. Some people who can wear clothes or get naked get tickets, or can afford tickets, to events like Glastonbury. I watch it on the telly.

The Rolling Stones. Yes, I watched it. What was the point? I mean, some of the dear old buffers looked like they had a vague idea of where they were and what they were doing. Great songs, great songs. But Jagger’s weird hand-pumping pelvis-thrusting dance moves just look eerie and wrong on a man of his advanced years. You don’t see Brother Fiddle wiggling his bottom like that, and thank the Lord. It’s undignified.

But then, am I being fair?

One of the most magnificent things I have ever seen in all my life was the comeback tour of the great and godlike Leonard Cohen, which began in 2008. He returned to the stage in his 70s because his former manager had nicked his pension fund. And it’s ageist and therefore wrong to mock the Stones for their many wrinkles.

Perhaps the thing is ubiquity: the Stones are everywhere and have been for years. So long as you’re willing to pay what they ask, you can buy any of a thousand albums or concert DVDs or go to a gig. (They must have expensive medical needs – I dread to think what Keef and Ron’s joint bills must be).  The great and godlike Cohen had been all but invisible for 15 years. Ubiquity is not a good thing – something the sport industry does not yet understand.

What was the point of all that BBC overkill, by the way? I thought it was hilarious that they spent a reported £2 million sending an army of people to cover the biggest rock festival in the world and then, with dozens of stages full of live acts, got acts to come into their studio and perform for the cameras. With a town the size of Sunderland plonked in the middle of a Somerset field, full of literally thousands of performers, they sat people-shaped presenters on a sofa and got them to tell us how epic and awesome the whole thing was for them.

Anyway. Many people are not very sure at all about the point of Mumford and Sons. They’re universally loathed by the trendy. I gather part of the reason is they’re from public school, well-off backgrounds.

Well, I don’t believe in holding the circumstances of anybody’s birth against them. And nobody had a go at the titled Sir Mick Jagger and his millions. Watching the Mumfords’ commitment and attack and passion in their closing show, I could definitely see the point. This is no pretend band – as a live act they were great. Yes, it all sounds a bit the same after a while, but you can’t fake meaning it, and they looked like they meant it.

Reet petweet

What is the point of Twitter? This was the subject of a heated debate after evensong last week, in which the Brother Who Must Not Be Named  insisted that Brother Fiddle and I were talking rubbish if we thought the use of social networking to promote political change was a reality. Take Edward Snowden, he said. We might argue that the worldwide expressions of support for him on Twitter might achieve something, but the reality was that he would be pursued by the American right for the rest of his days.

I think the BWMNBN is probably right about that: there is nothing on the face of the earth that can sway what passes for the mind of the American right. 2,000 years of evolution haven’t managed it yet.

But I think he is wrong to use this as an illustration of Twitter’s pointlessness. For example. For years the media in this country have portrayed the left as a tiny, lunatic minority whose ideas are barking mad. Twitter, however, is immune to the controls of the traditional media, and I find it enormously comforting to see the huge community of people out there sharing support and hope for a future that is not based on greed and selfishness. Yes, Justin Bieber has a million followers. But I’m not one of them.

Just this morning, Twitter enables me to pass on to you two truths that are not available to you in more traditional media:

A Medical Brother who finds himself in Australia tweeted a link to the Pulse Today article that reveals a 12% increase in doctors applying for permits to leave the health service and work abroad. Yet another wonderful commendation of the expensive and damaging ongoing privatisation of the health service.

And next time Iain Duncan Smith pops up on the news to tell you, once again, that people who are on benefits are wretched scroungers who must be punished for the mess we’re in, you can now  look up the detail of the evidence against him when Parliament investigated his alleged employment of his wife Betsy. http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200304/cmselect/cmstnprv/476/476we02.htm

Those are two good points to Twitter’s existence. Here’s another one.

Last week some old colleagues from the legendary Plymouth Evening Herald sports desk of the 90s were reminiscing. Those were the days, after all, when real journalists made newspapers that sold in their tens of thousands. I tweeted to say they were only a good team because my features desk, next door to them, taught them how to spell. Brother Badger, their former leader, Tweeted back: “Nonsanse”. I chuckled all day. Now that’s the point of Twitter.