As "best" practice, even "good" practice, falls away ...

"Netiquette" or unofficial "bloggers union rules" were quite the thing way back when all sorts of "good practice" was voluntarily followed as blogging took off around 2004-6 and the key rule was attribution of sources, linking to others to give them reader visits as well as yourself.

By around 2010, the start of Pigboy Dave's tenure, all sorts of "best" practice, even "good" practice, had largely fallen away, replaced by top down governmental interference as campaigns such as No2ID became popular, as new types of bloggers appeared, vlogging, netflix, tiktok, all sorts, as blogging as citizen journalism was replaced by any newbie following any practice he/she wanted in personal behaviour ...

... while the quality of the new Millennials and Zoomers themselves, reflecting the new parenting and poor school teaching, abided by no rules except what gained them advantage ... cutting corners became the thing, finding themselves and self-fulfilment, victimhood, shortchanging by mean little amounts becoming the thing, public behaviour becoming poorer, all sorts of aberration becoming the norm ... plus the global invasion picked up speed and pretty much replaced the at least lip service ethics which had been vaguely subscribed to over the preceding centuries.

At the same time, govt corporatism was becoming more and more draconian on things like copyright, with a view to extorting money for cronies and killing pleasure for the masses, pricing them out of any pursuits they'd once enjoyed. 

Some of you saw the clip of the two twin kid sisters walking from the ice-cream van after the extortionate prices demanded, plus it had to be card.

That's not what this post is about but it does background what follows ... it's about shoddy, cut-price, corner cutting practice ... this time in "modern" house building:

Around 25% of Britain’s housing stock was built before 1919, the highest proportion in Europe. These houses were built according to time-tested techniques to manage the ambient moisture of Britain’s Atlantic climate through air flow – that is, the very draughts we now spend money attempting to eradicate. Air-permeable lime mortar between brick and masonry and lime plaster on the walls allowed moisture from within the home to evaporate outside, much like a high-tech wicking fabric. Draughty single-pane glazing allowed air to circulate, preventing the build-up of mould: the problem of heating draughty houses was efficiently solved by the simple, if now unfashionable expedient of burning vast amounts of wood, and later coal in open fires.

But after WWI, when many skilled tradesmen had been killed in the trenches, housebuilders adopted the newly-introduced solution of gypsum-brd plasters and cement mortar, as cheaper and quicker to work with. Because both are impermeable to moisture, houses began to be constructed with air cavities and external vents or air bricks for circulation. Over time, the old skills were lost, and houses built before 1919 – perhaps including yours – were renovated with impermeable gypsum plaster, and overlaid with non-breathable plastic-BRD paint.

Draughty windows were replaced with sealed double-glazing and chimneys were bricked up in favour of central heating, reducing air flow further. The result was an explosion of damp in British homes, and whole new industries of damp-proof courses and chemical injections – none of which work – aiming to resolve the newly-introduced problem. …

In my own place, there are two contrasting situations ... no mould at all for most of the place but rotted ceiling in another with direct water leakage from outside, not mould ... go out onto the inside sealed landing and there's mould everywhere, rising damp etc., also into the stairwell.

No mould at all for most of my own place ... why not?  It's because it's draughty in all sorts of places, making the triple glazing a joke, necessitating me keeping the heating on well into May and after Gates's cloud seeding ... into June.  Expensive, yes? Me no worry ... no mould, not ill.

But spare a thought for the poor sods reliant on woodburning to stay warm and even cook ... and there are quite a few ... then we come back to some fallacies about the "good old days" of homebuilding.

https://dailysceptic.org/2024/05/31/why-modern-british-homes-are-getting-mouldy/