Most of us are fortunate enough to live our lives in peaceful obscurity. Not many of us do things that attract attention from more then our circle of friends and family.

There are those though that either through their skill or through opportunity attract unwanted attention. While Brian writes about the attention that Prince William is getting, in Australia, we who make princes of our sportsmen are debating the latest scandal involving cricketer Shane Warne.

Warne is one of the most gifted bowlers in the history of the game, but away from the field he is a rather unsavoury man who has gathered a well earned sleazy reputation.

An enterprising South African woman has tried to cash in on that reputation by making allegations against Warne. It seems that for once there is little truth to the story, and indeed she’s been charged by the South African police with extortion. Whatever the truth of this sordid affair, the media spotlight is once again firmly on Shane Warne. Sometimes that spotlight steps over the boundary of what is acceptable by the media after News Corporation’s flagship newspaper “The Australian” took a photograph of Warne having a smoke in his backyard.

While in general little sympathy need be wasted on Warne, in this case, I feel for him. His response to the affair has been to keep as low a profile as possible, and every person has the right not to be photographed if they don’t want to be.

Governments are notoriously inquisitive about the private matters of their citizens, but they are not the only intrusive Big Brother out there.