Posts by Jemma

BOFH: We know where the bodies are buried

Shorting..

Oh, you meant shorting *stock*..

So not the guys testicles to the three-phase supply...?

No?

Well, least said soonest melted.. Mended.. I meant mended..

We 'could' send troubled Watchkeeper drones to war, insists UK minister

Re: "Does this mean they don't know how to fix it?"Reducing the likelihood?

Would those be the ones where you wanted to have red hydraulic fluid dripping everywhere because when it stopped you *were* really in trouble? Generally because the whole thing had run dry. Which is, unsurprisingly "bad m'kay".

"Boeing - British Leyland is our role model" - at least in this case..

The holy hand grenade of Antioch

"... Neither press thee F2 excepting that you then proceed to F3..."

"... F5 is *right out*...."

"Oh , bless this thy holy Drone, that it mayst blow thine enemies* into tiny bits, in thy mercy*²..."

* Gas explosions- really? Still you need practice before you join in the Alliance of the Willing all comers Whack-a-Wedding championships (AW³C)... It's like Robot Wars with Gore!

*² limited time offer - not available in the Republic of Ireland or to Windrush passengers.

GCHQ boss calls out Russia for 'industrial scale disinformation'

Re: Bude

I don't disagree that the method so far released (ie the door handle) seems crude compared to a Markov-a-like but maybe that's part of the intention (think about how many people could have been contaminated if a postie had touched that door handle, then touched all the mail on his route... Anyone who got a letter or touched one, or touched a person who did, could be a potential victim, deliberately or otherwise).

But as to *chemical weapons*, caffeine is technically a chemical weapon, if i fed you a few teaspoons of pure caffeine you'd be starring in an episode of Bones as the cadaver.. It's powder form can only be road transported under a hazchem license and signage (taurine is even more dangerous). Chlorine, phosgene and the like are chemical weapons but they're a whole different level in toxicity and manufacturing difficulties to things like tabun/sarin/soman (as the Germans found out circa '44) which again are almost secondary school level chemistry when it comes to the agents like VX and others.

Many of the more exotic agents need very specialised manufacturing plants and loading plants, not to mention munitions (binary shells and the like) and storage.

It's one thing to understand and have available the formula to make something on paper - it can be a lot harder to make said chemical especially if you want to do it in secret.

Its also possible to narrow down production using signatures such as the water a plant uses. If the water is soft at one place and hard at another then despite the fact you have perfectly formulated your chemical at both places - the result of an analysis will be different (even using the same plant machinery, set up by the same person, using identical feedstock at the same ambient temperature) - the difference in the dissolved minerals will be identifiable.

But even that can conceivably be bypassed - using bowsers to provide water as a controlled feedstock instead of using the local supply.

It really comes down to how much you want your victim to suffer, whether you care about collateral damage, whether or not you want to be identified as the perpetrators (and in some cases that's to the individuals or governments advantage) or not - and how much information you want to leave behind of a chemical nature (that may identify your manufactury to potentially unwanted attention). The more money and therefore influence you have the more you can tailor the results - from creating a situation of complete bafflement (which was the intent with Markov, although due to bad luck it didn't work) - to full on tackle out "look what we did" (Skripal) - intended to be a wake up call to the western services which has now I suspect blown up somewhat in Russias face because that poor copper got involved (I never thought I'd catch myself saying that!) and if there's one thing that ain't Cricket for the British government it's police officers getting poisoned by foreign nationals - even by accident. The bluster seems very over played, as if the Russians are really running around like headless chickens wondering how the hell they're going to get out of this one..

Re: Bude

Couple of points.

1. The person I've mentioned is one of the top agrochemical analysts in the UK including Ireland and has probably forgotten more about chemical analysis than you were ever taught. He may well have been involved in this situation so I am not mentioning any names.

2. Organophosphate residual analysis is a well known discipline as are the changes those compounds go through when exposed to all sorts of chemical substances including but not limited to air, water, adjuvants and/or wetters. There is very little that isn't known about OPs including why it's a RFB idea for Welsh farmers to try and use agrochemical formulations for spraying as sheepdip cos they can't get sheepdip*

* a hint for the uninitiated - agrochemical OP formulations were 10x the strength of the dip formulation at the time.. Get the dilution wrong and you will have very miserable sheep and some under the weather Welsh farmers..

You are broadly correct when you say that in order to make an analysis down to the "factory" level you need a signature to test against - although I'd doubt your amounts required, and even then it wouldnt be that difficult because every single label has to have been tested by BASIS and a sample supplied thereto . However to identify a particular general formula or formulation - ie to be able to say this is Temik or Round-up or for that matter VX is a lot simpler.

And just a word to the wise I'd stop running your mouth off - most of what you just verbally diahorrea'd could have been picked up by someone of average intelligence from reading a few articles.

Although you are entirely right that it's the impurities that allow a site level identification. Although I doubt you will be aware of what happens or (in this case) doesn't happen when you dilute agrochem with water from artesian wells. The particular chemical didn't work because of salts dissolved in the well water - use tap water and it's fine.

As to Miss Julia and Sergey - there have been multiple news outlets confirm NCK contamination - both of them have royally pissed off Putin - him historically, her because she really hasn't figured when to keep her (not unattractive) mouth firmly shut. KGB have long memories and short scruples.

It's entirely possible that others were involved (such as oligarchs or employees thereof) to mask the govt involvement. It certainly won't be the first time (the Americans are no stranger to that tactic in various theatres and neither are the British).

The Brits have nothing to gain from it, the Americans might (but if they did someone would have to explain it slowly and in simple language). Skripal Sr humiliated and insulted the KGB (never a good idea for a long and peaceful existence) and the daughter dived in with both feet and tried to put the boot into Putin personally.. That's about the same level of common sense as going tapdancing in a minefield. You could argue (and being an arrogant twerp) you probably will that it's circumstantial evidence that can be interpreted in different ways - but that pretty much explains espionage in a single sentence. And personally when virtually every countries government (who all have MI6 alike organisations) are happy to accept the premise that good 'ole Vlad is the cause of all this situation - versus you - guess which side of the fence I'm going to be on..

Given what's happening with bitcoin I'd go for the weed*

*If I wasn't allergic.

The weed seems like a better long-term option.

Re: Bude

Toxicity does not equal longevity of effect. That's the first thing.

Secondly there are labs all around the UK and Ireland alone can identify this stuff, and tell you where it was made (down to the factory and batch in most cases) and all I'd need to do to book a test myself is ring my dad's mate..

This person, who I will not name, actually, as a because I'm bored project, improved the glyphosate formulation so much the company bought his formula off him because it was so much cleaner than their own... And they invented the damn stuff.

Thirdly, I've been given no reason to doubt it's Novichok and if it is there is only one state or organisation thereof that manufacturers it. Russia. It's not like glyphosate where there are generics coming out of every agrochemical factory this side of the Sunnydale hellmouth..

The fact that this trundled out of Russia (probably in a diplomatic bag), flew in an aircraft or more than one to the UK, was then trundled through security and customs where some suicidal womble made his or her way down to Salisbury and applied it liberally breaks so many international laws its hard to know where to start - and that's before the charges pursuant to trying to kill two people on British sovereign territory and putting countless others at risk of a deeply unpleasant death.

PS: I wouldn't worry about the nuclear launch passwords - there's probably only two possible options..

Password (if it's British)

Or

00000000* (if it's American)

Anything else is either too much trouble to type in or too hard to remember.

*Actually true, a US government enquiry into nuclear weapons found that all the PALs (permissive access links) had had their passwords set to 00000000 apparently on the basis it was easy to remember.

This being despite the fact that the PAL was a last line of defence failsafe against a rogue or terrorist launch§. The PAL when triggered would disable the launch vehicle in various ways (or in the case of the Russian version, when the US shared it with them, blow the missile to kingdom come - on the, for a Russian, sensible proviso that the naughty little boys and girls who were trying to launch it would be nearby).*²

§ Quite which one of these would correspond to taking orders from Donnie Dickwit has not been mentioned by the US Department of State.

*² A Golf II (refit) class submarine, K129, found this out the hard way according to some, when it tried to re-enact Pearl Harbour with a 1Mt nuke, the hijackers of the boat, suspected oznaz operatives, failed to deactivate the PAL before launching and the rocket exploded in the launch tube - cooking a fair percentage of the "crew" instantly and blowing out the keel of the boat.. Allegedly.

Bude

Is the perfect place - it's the bumhole of the bumhole of nowhere - it's down little tiny sunken lanes that are worthy of a mention in a pTerry crossover and for half the year (and I speak from experience here) it's blocked solid by recalcitrant locals on tractors trying to go one way down a single tracked "road" vs qashqui & caravan driving cretins (when I was there it was Cortinas, Granadas and Alfasuds, but the principles the same) both resolutely refusing to back down. For weeks if necessary.

There's no chance of Soviet, sorry Russian, agents or illegals knocking off the local field office because it'll take a lifetime to find it. But then it probably doesn't matter cos half the Russian department will be channelling Kim Philby anyway..

The depressing thing is that even with CCTV and all the advanced technology and skilled police *cough* it's easier to try and knock off a(n) ex spy and his daughter (which by the way is against ALL the rules and should in itself be a warning to the MIs) than it was to do the same in the 70s. Not to mention the much less targeted approach, which should be another warning that certain players are becoming somewhat less tactful.

UK.gov expected to quit controversial harvesting of schoolchildren's nationality data

Actually no, they'd probably be in a better position since they wouldn't have been forced into using European farming methods - and royally cocking up their relationship with their environment.

Yeah, welcome to autocorrect..

Re: Rotated children

The possibility that a half-formed fetus might be the norm for admittance to State Education is a little disturbing...

I can't see why... Half formed foetuses are running most government departments as it is..

Either that or Amber Rudd is an alien/human hybrid..

They mostly come at night, mostly...

That's gonna be one embarrassed face hugger!

Good on them...

Because if you knew your history you would know that most of the third world is the third world because of the British Empire (the German empire at the time consisting of a small sausage factory in Tanganyiki) and western interference ever since that's royally fubared the environment in those areas and even if it hadn't all the knowledge has been lost because of all those British troops accidentally massacring or infecting or bombing or taxing the locals to beyond a subsistence level.

Add to that supporting every sociopathic dictator that hit Asia and Africa and deliberately causing tribal wars for 200+ years and our record is starting to look a little suspect.. As the minister knows, of course, the reason behind the Rwanda massacres tracks right back to British empire interference designed to wind up the locals against each other instead of us. It worked brilliantly - unfortunately no one gave the Tutsis and the rest the memo to stop when they got independence (for a given value of the term) and they still hate each other with a vengeance (and possibly a clapped out Lee Enfield or Marconi Henry).

And if I were you I'd stop whining about fuzzies and the yellow peril in the NHS because if it wasn't for them, there wouldn't ever have BEEN an NHS.

We have, whether we like it or not, a responsibility to these people because we're most likely the ones that put them in the poverty stricken shitholes they're trying to escape and if we didn't - our government most likely supported the dictatorship that did.

Children should not have data (bar minimum necessary medical data) stored about them full stop, be they black, white or sky blue pink. Data should be collected only over age 18 and ONLY with the explicit consent of the person concerned couched in a simple one line question.

Do you consent to xxxxx storing information about you and/or sharing it.

Yes/No.

And use of a "service" like Facebook, the NHS, education or anything else SHOULD NOT be predicated on you giving up your data in order to do so.

Need a needle in an artery? Move over, doc, there's an app for that

Re: Mirtazipine

Yup you're right - only problem is, as I said, I'm not sensitive to the active itself - because I have an allergy to cats - I reacted to what happened when I came off it. The fact that my already slightly sensitive histamine system got a nice fat dose of air pollution when coming off mirtazipine had jacked its sensitivity up 500%... which of course my GP didn't bother to warn me about and most medical professionals haven't even heard about.

If anyone has a nut allergy or something that needs those epipen shots the histamine storm caused by the reactivated histamine receptors going hyper could easily kill simply because you're not just allergic to your allergen at that point you are allergic to everything and even everyone around you. I've a cat allergy - I stroke a cat and rub my eyes I look like I've gone two rounds of boxing. Now imagine the state I'm in in an underground train and my immunity has gone hyper and I'm reacting to everyone who's been anywhere near a cat in the last 24 hours.

There's cases of people with nut allergies where even the *smell* is enough to set them off..

Best part? I wasn't even depressed.

And FTR it could only be mirtazipine because that was the only medication I'd been on at the time and it'd been two weeks to the day from my last dose.

sadly from my research I'm not the only one this has happened to.

Now I'm going to sleep cos I've a car to go pick up in the morning and drive back. 1971 here I come.

Re: "our study highlights the potential for smartphone-based diagnostics"

They are NOT an effective tool if they result in an incorrect diagnosis and of all the smartphones on the planet the ones with the more dismal cameras are iPhones.

If your going to use a smartphone camera for diagnostics you go buy a job lot of Nokia 808 Pureview, not cretinphones.

One trained human looking at my arm diagnosed cancer in less than 3 minutes. After it took 12 *months* of verbally abusive NHS fucktards, 2 trips to the womble in centre and £150 to actually talk to someone who wasn't the NHS equivalent of a British Leyland quality control drone.

And just to give you a warm feeling - the *third* tumour resulting from this situation is just showing its happy little face.

SO I'VE GOT ANOTHER THREE MONTHS OF DEALING WITH SUB AVERAGE CRETINS WHO ARE MORE WORRIED ABOUT THEIR BUDGET THAN THEIR PATIENTS TO LOOK FORWARD TO.

If I had seen a trained diagnostician instead of a trained monkey with an idiotphone I wouldn't be suing the NHS. I would have been given the right treatment, the NHS would have been able to do it in 2 weeks, not TWO FUCKING YEARS and everyone would be happy.

So personally the next time someone waves an iPhone in my face and I'm still in control of my faculties it'll be rammed where the sun shineth not*, sideways for preference.

*and I don't mean that small valley in the Ramtops.

Mirtazipine

PPS: if you have allergies and a doctor mentions the word Mirtazipine in your presence - the correct course of action is either hell no or, to quote Monkey Dust, I will beat you like a Chipperfield Monkey..

Mirtazipine can cause a histamine storm - imagine you are allergic to everything up to and including the kitchen sink. I had that and managed to go to London on the worst pollution day of the year. Within 2 hours my face was so swollen I was practically blind. Within 4 hours I was coughing fit to bust a rib, in fact I fractured two.. Within 48 hours chest x rays because my lung function had dropped by 75%. It took me almost 18 months to mostly recover.

But this is the dangerous part. It doesn't happen when you are on the medication - it happens after you've come off after about 2 weeks - since the medication isn't suppressing histamine production/receptors the whole system goes utterly nuts.

Anyone with asthma it could easily kill them - my peak flow was 600+ before this happened - it went as low as 120-150 - and it's still not back up 4 years later!

Not in a month...

Of Saturnian Sundays.

You put an idiotphone near me in a hospital and you are very likely to spend the next 4 hours disentangling it from your lower orifices.

I had a BCC (skin cancer) that was misdiagnosed for 9 MONTHS because of some cretins taking pictures with iPhones - it's spread down my arm and I've had to have two surgeries and on top of that pay for a correct diagnosis and had abuse off my former surgery for suggesting they might be wrong.

On top of that I've been told by an experienced NHS GP that BCC doesn't spread when it's favourite sites to spread to are lungs and brain and wouldn't you know it my eye sight has just gone strange..and a lot more headaches than usual.

If you think you might have cancer, go private. And if anyone waves an iPhone in your face the correct response is "do you want lube with that?"

The thought of iPhones being used with possible stroke/TIA/heart attack or heart disease patients as a diagnostic tool makes my blood run cold.

PS : the one time the NHS took blood from an artery they managed to cock it up so comprehensively that I bled into my wrist - had a catastrophic drop in blood pressure and woke up on oxygen. It took me longer to recover from that medical treatment than it did the last Western Hognose bite I got and that was so bad I could have used everything below the elbow as a lethal weapon as it was swollen practically solid...

Shaking up the Nad Men: Microsoft splits up into 'cloud' and 'edge'

Hmm "the Nad men"

Thank you so kindly for that - now I'm going to have a mental image of bright blue dancing testicles in my head doing musical numbers with animated paper clips..

Quick Jeeves, the brain bleach..

In other news do Microsoft actually have any mobile devices? (other than in the not-really-not-a-laptop field)?

Cos the Windows phones are deader than the cat I'm sitting on.

Facebook supremo Mark Zuckerberg has flunky tell UK MPs: Nope, he's sending someone else

Re: Get an extradition order out on him if the weasle won't come over.

I'm sure MI6 could arrange for him to accidenteliberately slit his own throat in a nice pretty tourist area somewhere for some kids to find..

Or lend him a nice big Mercedes and driver and suggest popping down to have a look at at that wonderful tourist spot known and loved as the Dartford Tunnel.. Ah, such exquisite concrete pillers - let's have a closer look..

I think they used to call those particular chaps the "ways and (very) mean committee".

If the worst comes to the worst I'm sure Porton has some Plague kicking about..

Re: Hitler stopped smoking personally somewhere between 1899 & 1918

I've seen kids smoking younger than that but as I said there is more than one story about that and the consensus is post war (so as I said anywhere between 1899-1918/9). From what has been said he was one of those people who'd massage facts if he felt like it.. To make a point.

It does annoy me when you get "historical documentaries" and some Colonel-general or other is smoking like the Blucher at flank speed and not a whisper - in reality the guy would have been chewing the furniture if someone smoked in his presence.

Oddly enough there seem to be several reasons for his vegetarianism - health (which ironically might be made worse not better), Geili Raubal (the mysterious case of the knocked off neice), and several of the people whom he took inspiration from were also vegetarian.

The thing that worries me about Facebook is its almost like a self inflicted Geheime Staats Polizei or Gestapo. People put information on it before they even think of the implications... For example, Heydrich & the rest of them wouldn't need to go hunting and trawling for Jews throughout Europe nowadays - they'd just do a search on Facebook - 90% sitting there with home addresses, relatives, the whole kit and caboodle - just jump in the Opel Blitz and hoover them up..

Don't like the gun control kids and want to put a bullet into a few of them (plus/minus family members) - 10 minutes on Facebook, and a 20 minute road trip - job done. If you are an NRA employee the way it's going you might even be able to claim mileage and a bullet allowance..

Intelligent, perceptive and let's be fair utterly cynical people have been saying this for years - ask me how I know - and you've shouted them down and kept on despite the warnings..

And hasn't it just blown up in your face..

Arsebookers - meet petard...now where did I put the jalapeño laced KY?

Re: British government: I don't care how you get the little Zuckwit here, but get him here.

Are you aware of the difference between a statement and an argument?

Obviously not.

The Zuckwit collective shows a lot of similarity with the Nazi one. But it's much more pernicious because it's much more universal and much more accepted (unfortunately there appears to be a higher fuckwit percentage in post war humanity) than the Nazis ever were.

What the Zuckwit is trying to do now is what a certain Bavarian Gefreiter did successfully regarding kristalnacht, the 36 Olympics, the night of the long knives and to a lesser extent the (early) concentration camps. IE not me guv. I should probably have known but I didn't, honest injun.

If you don't like the Big H as an example another good one is Albert "I'm really really sorry but I didn't see the memo when I signed it" Speer.

The problem for the Zuckwit, that the two persons above didn't have so much, is the evidence. He'd have to be a political genius to sidestep that massive pile of glowing crap and he just isn't that good and he knows it. If any government manages to pin it to him, then arsebook will die quicker than a sondercommando in Jerusalem (what, you didn't know they were deliberately hunted down post war by their own people?).

And you might want to look into the career of a certain Reinhard von Gehlen and why he wasn't at the trials if you think the allied governments weren't just as bent and twisted. Ditto the Evian conference.

Re: Yo should be glad !

It doesn't matter if he spouts raw sewage out his mouth like a preteen in an Indian graveyard. It's not a matter of what he says (which as you say will probably be 5 parts bollocks and 5 parts waffle) it's a matter of he's been forced to be there to say it and has been forced to admit that the buck stops with him.

Because if it's done right Facebook will be defenseless everywhere and there are several countries and governments thereof that can get a little pointed with people they don't like or trust putting their people at any sort of risk (the Israelis for one) and a lot of Police forces who would like nothing better than five minutes with a Facebook staffer, an electric truncheon and a common or garden desk drawer. I don't know of any police who don't hate Facebook with a passion.

Re: Rule Britannia!

Methinks certain people haven't got the memo about satire and sarcasm.

Either that or they can't read it without sounding out the words out loud.

As Sir pTerry might say (after a few pints possibly)...

"Ya know it's --ing amazing how many --ing so called intelligent people in the world make Fred Colon look like --ing Einstein..."

Or possibly not.

I think the point trying desperately to get out like a dragon in a cardboard box was this. The UK is hardly going to help itself in this situation by going it alone outside of Europe - we've more clout against the rednecks (oh I so mean that literally *thud*) as a part of a collective than we do as a small soggy island who's highest achievements are Noel Edmonds & the Hillman Avenger.

British government: I don't care how you get the little Zuckwit here, but get him here.

Drag the little cretin here in chains if you have to. Do a Mossad-esque operation like that perpetrated on Eichmann if that's the only way it can be done (not that I'm a fan of the OVOC but that particular operation was perfection).

But get the little asshole here.

Because if he sends a minion what you'll get is what happened with Hitler pre war - Kristalnacht - "Hitler wouldn't have allowed that, he must not have known about it" was what the (particularly gullible) people said, because all they saw were the minions fronting the policy. Uncle Adi kept very quiet about the whole situation for that very reason

What'll happen with Zuckerberg will be the same if he's not seen to be responsible - the gullible will say "the Zuckwit didn't know, he's a nice cuddly family man, he probably doesn't like smoking and gives people gifts if they stop"*. While your data is splurged everywhere and anywhere where someone will pay for it. Including individuals and organisations that you wouldn't want anywhere near your private information.

Personally Facebook should operate under the same rules as the NHS does if not stricter. The NHS can only lose your health data after all. Arsebook has access to a whole lot more information than that and can do a whole lot more damage if they choose to spaff it out to the wrong people.

The Zuckwit ABSOLUTELY HAS to be held responsible and be shown to be responsible - otherwise it'll happen again and again - more to the point if Facebook is seen to have gotten around it, then other companies will try the same thing - or heaven forfend the NHS (although in their case you just need to get a job as a BR carriage cleaner and it'll fall in your lap for free)

* Hitler stopped smoking personally somewhere between 1899 & 1918 depending on which story you believe. If a smoker on his staff stopped they'd get a gift of a solid gold fob watch from Mr H personally.

PS if you have a particularly annoying vegan or vegetarian in your life, and they're getting on your last nerve by spouting on as usual you might mention - mid rant - that Mr H was a vegetarian. That usually shuts them right up (or more accurately causes them to make similar noises to a Ford Cortina on a wet Monday morning whilst trying to recover the situation). Your colleagues/family/friends will thank you for it.

UK.gov: Here's £8.8m to plough into hydrogen-powered car tech

Re: £8k subsidy per vehicle

That said, the subsidies for electric cars in most countries have basically functioned as tax breaks for retard signalling.

Fixed it for you.

But even the most cheese brained Tesla owner has nothing on the sort of idiot that'd buy a hydrogen car.

Incidentally someone mentioned LPG. I'd happily put it on my new car - to help the environment - but I can't afford to and the government won't fund the £1200 but will fund £6-8k for a teslidiot.. I am so pleased I don't bother voting because none of the utter traffic pollution hellmouth we're diving into is my fault.

There are so many perfectly good vehicles that can, could anyone be bothered to do the work, be easily updated with more efficient engines - multispeed transmissions (6+) - even putting up tyre pressure across the board by 5psi can get you 4%. Make engine pre heaters compulsory - that'll get you anything up to 30% depending on engine and journey (I know, I've done it).

But no, it's teslidiot hugging and hydrotards for the win. What could possibly go wrong? Oh yeah, uncontrollable global warming..

Galileo, Galileo, Galileo, off you go: Snout of UK space forcibly removed from EU satellite trough

Re: Airbus will be next..

I shouldn't worry about it for too long, by the look of it they both bought autonomous cars..

Its going to end in tears but who the hell cares? By the time anything moves we'll be more worried about rising sea levels/Trump II/Putin III/Deccan Traps 2.0 (delete as applicable).

Rising sea levels will totally spoil the old joke..

Kiss me somewhere warm wet and smelly..

Sorry love, Canvey Island is looong gone..

On reflection that's probably not a bad thing.

Re: #headdesk

New ICD entry?

Munchhausens by Pillock?

Incidental fact. A certain Aileen Philby suffered from Munchhausens. Can you guess who her husband was?

Bonus question: why did she loathe a Jewish woman called Litzi?

Uber's disturbing fatal self-driving car crash, a new common sense challenge for AI, and Facebook's evil algorithms

Re: Driving 101

Wrong.

My driving instructor was someone who taught the police advanced drivers to drive and what he said was simply "watch everything". Because if you don't know what the car coming from the right is doing it doesn't matter if you have clear road now, 2 seconds later you might have a face full of Audi.

Assume all other drivers are Maureen from that driving show

Assume all pedestrians are worse

Assume all cyclists are suicidally entitled and WILL ride six abreast on a 1 track 60mph road because they're frigging cyclists..

Assume that the average police driver is the worst of the lot and be guaranteed that if you don't have ABS some utter idiot will do his best to test your brakes to destruction.

You have to be thinking three cars ahead at least - you have to concentrate as much (or more) on what the dumbass blonde in the BMW 140 with 2 months driving experience is going to do.. Because if you do she will plough into you. She'll plough into a tree soon enough..

Then there's car parks - the Mos Eisley Cantina of incompetence and cretinology..

"I don't need to take notice of the one way system..."

"You don't need to take notice of the one way system..."

"I can go about my business..."

"you can go about your business..."

"move along..."

It's the Teutonic side of the force...

I really hope that you aren't serious because if you are I'd happily take you off the road using any means possible, legal or otherwise, because quite frankly you're dangerous just sitting thinking about driving a pushchair.

Re: You've missed the scariest parts

I by no means underestimate the fact that most drivers around my area shouldn't be trusted with a pedal go cart let alone a 450hp porsche SUV. I've driven in the US and if anything they're worse. I've had pricks in Jaguars bragging they almost killed a kid (ex boss), idiot driving instructors turning across a roundabout, in the left lane and then calmly instructing their student to turn RIGHT - simultaneously almost taking out 5 cars, idiots who think the minute they hit Birch Park they've suddenly become Colin McCrae on a frigging special stage and of course they just happen to be driving a g-wagon (up the hedge at one point I kid you not). Then theres the muppet who backed a Saab estate over his laptop TWICE. And every single one of those mindless cretins that do 25mph in a 60 and then 50 in a 30..

Im well aware of all levels of driving fuckwittery and that is my point. Unless you are going to brainship (finally a use for chavs) the autonomous car they won't have a hope in hell. Even then you'll have the cockwombles who think fitting a lift kit and tractor wheels to a clapped out Disco is a good idea.. Not really, the stub axle snapped and the wheel stove in an 11 year old girls skull - who incidentally had just been given the all clear from cancer - and killed her..

I've said it for years - the only way autonomous cars will work is if every single one is autonomous from day one and no one needs to be in control. And that is never ever going to happen.

As for certain disabilities getting semi autonomous cars.. An indescribably bad idea.. Ever tried driving a car with late stage MS? Technically anyone with a driving licence can buy a Bugatti Chiron or even a second hand Ferrari 400i (about 15k) are you gonna tell me you'd feel safe with someone with Downs or who's functionally blind or even someone with advanced parkinsonism behind the wheel. Because that is what will happen - it'll be we wanna cos autonomous! We want a license cos entitlement - which is great until the car has a brain weeble or a bad update.. Cue carnage. Pun extremely intended.

I don't want to be anywhere near that situation because you can bet your bottom dollar that if they cause an accident they won't be the ones that end up paying for it, they'll run someone off the road and *they'll* be the one to kill an entire families worth of kids..

Unless autonomous cars are 100% autonomous and 100% perfect in that autonomy they should be killed with fire and extreme prejudice because all they'll do is make already imperfect situation worse.

Safety systems yes. Live monitor health of the driver and take over to stop the car if necessary (WITHOUT spaffing data to all and sundry) all well and good. Other than that for heavens sake just bloody stop before someone else gets killed unnecessarily.

Re: Shouldn't lidar work *better* in the dark?

From what I saw she was wearing blue jeans and a light coloured top or jacket. But hey..

I'm reminded regarding the cops in this of a scene from Squidbillies. The two cops should be arresting Dan Halen for serial murder. Dennys all for it until Sheriff reminds him "We can't arrest Mr Halen, he's our boss.. "

Or to put it bluntly "They're as bent as a 9 bob note"

You've missed the scariest parts

1. The car was speeding apparently - which shouldn't to my understanding be possible and is one of the many "points" of this pointless exercise; to stop speeding.

2. There is good evidence to suggest that the footage has been doctored. A local man drives the same road at night - and it's lit up like a Christmas tree. It's practically daylight! So how for the Uber car is it darker than halfway up a badgers butt? Which asks questions. The local piglets would know that road and the conditions at night but they accept the footage *and* try and blame the poor woman at first - despite the contradictions in light levels.. I'd be looking at their personal bank accounts myself..

These vehicles should be killed with fire. The problem is simple. In order to have some understanding of the situation when meatbags are driving and walking (or for that matter, cycling) in close proximity you need to be a human or a human level intelligence. These cars would be out thought by a mentally challenged Bullet Ant. But the worst a single bullet ant can do is sting you (which by all accounts isn't fun, hence the name) whereas a full size SUV can easily turn you into human flavour wall paper paste.

And for heavens sake who picked cars like the Hyundai Tucson and the like as test autonomous cars - could you be any more stupid? They're so big they almost qualify for Metacentric stability, they've got all the grip of a skateboard on black ice, and have all the handling poise of a blue streak Marina on crossplies...on a soaking wet skid pan.

Oh. It slipped my mind. Americans

Volvo do their testing on small hatches and saloons, it's still utterly pointless in every way but at least this approach doesn't cause the equivalent of a terrorist incident every time someone accidentally adds an extra "goto 10" line.

Here, that's a thought. Given that there is a special place in hell for autonomous car engineers I've the perfect punishment for eternity. Make them code, enter, debug and compile the entirety of Windows Vista on a rubber key 48k Spectrum. I think that should make the point..

Another day, another self-flying car pipe dream surfaces

Re: Hope they're restricted to Silicon Valley and other liberalvilles

Corrected: 101 redneck bang sticks for every 100 humans. Which is bad enough..

Re: Hope they're restricted to Silicon Valley and other liberalvilles

You sub average cretin.

I don't WANT, nor do I in any way need to have access to guns.

There is precisely zero reason for me to have access to guns. The reason for this is so very simple even you can understand it.

No one else has a gun. Apart from farmers, sport shooters, and gun club patrons. ALL OF WHICH ARE LOCKED AWAY and controlled by law.

Were I to have a child - there is less than a 0.0001% chance that one of their classmates will be carrying or have access to a gun. American school it is over 100% statistically (for access to a gun) since by your own government stats there are 101 redneck bang sticks for every human being in the United States, and thats just the legal registered ones.

FFS just today a 9 year old boy blew his 13 year old sisters brains out in an argument about a game controller. Mississippi if you are curious.

I'm not even going to waste my time. Because none of you see anything wrong with the above paragraph.

But be aware you are really lucky I'm not Prime Minister because the next time a British citizen got shot by some gap brained US retard I'd be on the phone to ole Vlad buying up every pallet of Novichok he's got in the store and practicing the phrase "omlettes and eggs" as the missiles launched.

I'm sick to death of listening to screeds of names killed by idiots supported by bigger idiots and I'm even sicker of you backing terrorism in the UK (IRA) and stirring it up overseas so we get the benefit (7/7).

Note to past, present and future American presidents. THE TERMS CRUSADES, CRUSADERS and anything associated with same shall not be mentioned on pain of you having a large sharpened stake rammed up your ass with extreme prejudice (and no lubricant) - upon which you will be left to think it over while you slowly slide down it under your own (over)weight. Although on the subject of lubricant.. KY and jalapeño oil is tempting.

Do I sound upset? I want to sound upset..

Re: Hope they're restricted to Silicon Valley and other liberalvilles

I shouldn't worry inbredneck - I'm sure your teenage daughter will be on the Bofors* quad and banging away before they even know what's hit them.

That's of course assuming she hasn't had her brains splattered up the wall because she wouldn't give her little brother the Xbox controller.

I've watched Drawn together and Squidbillies and the like, and I know they're supposed to be parodies but life is imitating art a little too closely if you ask me.

As to autonomous cars. I think they're a brilliant idea to solve the world's problems. Here's how.

Make up a couple of million autonomous systems.

Go to India

Buy up every single Austin A55, Hindustan Ambassador, Contessa and other clapped out, crumple zone free, drum braked heap you can get hold of.

Add autonomous systems to above and solder as necessary (be aware positive earth might let the magic smoke out).

Transport same to the US.

Start em up (the funny pull control with the cross pattee markings is called a Choke.. You'll find it helps)

Let the splatter commence..

Could even televise it..

Redneck Wars... Phillipa Forester and Craig David.. Career resurrection part infinity.

Best of all they'll probably still be running leaded heads so they'll eventually give up the ghost after a few months of massacring.

I am *so* happy I'm not an American parent right now because if the kids have any level of functional IQ they're going to realise that it's their parents, grandparents collective fault that they're getting riddled at school/home/gym/delete as applicable.

I'm just waiting for the day some kid opens up on a funeral for a school shooting - that'll be the day when the rest of the world needs to have a serious think about some pest control.

*fer duck huntin'.

You know...

I've always wondered where you fit the starting handle on a flying pig...?

still, it could be worse, it could be a coffman starter...

"I'm going to do this one with the ignition off to clear the cylinders..."

*baconsplosion*

After repeated warnings Facebook bans Britain First for 'inciting hatred'

Tell that to the..

Templars

Cathars

Christians of Najran (notable for being a Jewish crime against humanity)

The Turkish Armenians

The 38-45 Jews

The Jews (most of the rest of the time)

The gypsies

Practically everyone in Stalinist Russia

The Native Americans (various but a really nasty one was British troops giving Indians (mostly women and children) smallpox laced blankets).

Should I go on...?

There is no such thing as a moderate Christian Conservative. That's like saying there is an Austin Maxi somewhere with street cred.

It just ain't happening.

Even the least sociopathic ones have bigot written through them like Blackpool rock - all the way up to westboro baptists who attacked service people's funerals to such an extent the funeral cars ended up with protective convoys of bikers and off duty cops and in some cases gravestones were desecrated. Aka the "God hates fags" brigade.

Personally people like her and Jimmy Jihadi are lucky. If I was in charge of immigration they'd be taken behind a small shed and ole yeller'd. Save the world any more problems it frankly doesn't need.

Re: you support the rape of a 16 yr old

May I remind *you* that the police last year said that if the old cretin was still alive he'd have been investigated and charged because there was many more than one person came forward to state he was a sweeper of the chocolate chimney with a penchant for underage boys.

To be blunt - there has to be an avalanche of evidence on something for the British police to even suggest they might have considered looking into it (they've abandoned rape cases with witnesses AND perfect dna evidence - everything bar a confession (sans use of desk drawer)) so on the balance of that I'm perfectly happy to consider him a gay Jimmy Saville.

Re: you support the rape of a 16 yr old

Sigh

Just how long have you lived in the UK?

The Police have an interest in protecting two things. Their pensions and their families - in that order. I learned that at 13 years old.

Other than that it's all lip service and nelsoning (I see no pedo priests - nor one notable pedo prime minister (Ted the Ped)), despite the first complaints against him being in 1981!). I should probably remind you that Ted was white, the priests were white so I find it odd you fixate on the Muslims..

More power to UK, say 'leccy vehicle makers. Seriously, they need it

Re: PS

Ever seen a modern car crash tested against a modern 4x4? Doesn't matter whether you have crumple zones there either - the engine will be sat on your broken tibias before you even have time to start coughing up blood. It's actually pretty terrifying to watch.

The bloody things should be banned except where provably necessarily and they certainly shouldn't be driven by 25 year old girls, all of 5ft nothing who can't see over the dashboard to steer (think Philo Beddows mom in Any Which Way but Loose, but hold the yoda) who like nothing more than doing their lippy at 60mph on country lanes.

Re: In less than two weeks..

As I stated. It would have the same performance as a 1300 hyundai accent *if* it had a 5 speed box.

Its *actual* fuel consumption is actually better than the Accents Kia relative (last tank was 32mpg).

Most people who look after their cars *still* do a 1 year/6000 oil change *despite* what the manual says and a car we had based on 12000 mile changes was in such good nick mechanically when Vauxhall got it back their engineers phoned us to ask why.

Because it was run in properly and serviced religiously at 6000. It also did better than the published mpg.

As for mpg I would not be surprised if I could get 40mpg out of it with a couple of small mods. A sump heater and eco driving plus slightly higher tyre pressures.

You're right the mark I was lethargic. But the II had a few more hp, better torque from a 9.1 head and different ratios (almost identical to the Accent) and if it were geared identical it *would* be faster or equal to 60, as it is the figure for a II is 15 seconds, an Accent 12.2. The B series has a better torque curve with both a lower rpm torque and hp max.

I've had 3 classics and 2 modern cars and without fail the ones that let me down are the modern cars. The two Sceptres and the SD1 never missed a beat. They all have better visibility than modern cars, they're arguably more comfortable (I'll admit they're not as ergonomic) , and from personal experience I'll take a classic any time.

More to the point, if something *does* go wrong I can get to it and fix it. Not like the Kia Rio IAT sensor that's an inch off the bulkhead, secured by Phillips screws, known to be a failure point and is impossible to remove.

The Accent has been in the garage for 6 months and has been fixed (bodged) by swapping solid lifters for hydraulics, now the garage only has to sort out the intake manifold leak they've caused after the 15 attempts to get this modern car working. That's after I replaced most of the sensors and then the garage replaced them again because the readings were garbage and Hyundai so engineering lead in the UK came to try and sort it.. And couldn't.

And as for 60mpg out of a 1.8 petrol they saw you coming. My parents brand new 1.6 diesel was supposed to do 70mpg. It barely manages 52mpg, worse than the previous identical model they had which did 56 on a 60mpg official rating.

PS

It's tax exempt too.. And the insurance is half that for my current car.

/smug mode: off

In less than two weeks..

I'll be buying a "new" car.

It's an executive car, not exactly quick but almost exactly the same size as my Hyundai Accent 2005 hatch (a small family car apparently). A saloon. With a bigger boot, better interior space in the same size body, front wheel drive - 32-35mpg. 1.8 litre transverse engine. Oh and unlike many modern cars it doesn't have electric windows but it DOES have a temperature and oil pressure gauge.. And if it had a 5 speed box it would perform *better* than my Accent. Oh and it doesn't have the massive blind spots the Accent has.. an interesting idea called windows, you might have heard of them (not the Jagdpanther vision blocks fitted to current cars).

Designed by a bloke born in the Ottoman empire.

Anyone guessed it yet?

A 1971 Wolseley 18/85 II

A car that was designed basically in 1965 and is almost exactly the same dimensions and performance (if you stuck in an extra gear) as a car designed in 2000 - it's even got the same final drive ratio. But it has a bigger boot, more passenger room (bar headroom), better suspension and ride (to be fair that's not exactly a technical challenge) and doesn't spend 6 months in a garage because even the MANUFACTURER can't fix it.

That's embarrassing.

We have gone backwards in almost every respect in 40 years of "progress".

And then they come up with electric cars....

And as for range.. Remember if I pull in to get petrol in the Landcrab and I'm on fumes; I'm filled up and gone in about 7 minutes. When you can equal refuelling an electric to refuelling a 40 year old car, and *all* of its cleanly generated you can come and see me.

So I'll be seeing you in about 40 years then..

I wonder incidentally what would happen if someone cattle prodded a Tesla ala Demolition Man or BOFH. I suspect it'd make sugar in the tank look positively affectionate.

Will have to be my new years resolution

"I promise I won't toast a Tesla.."

But it's sooo tempting.

Privacy folk raise alarm over schools snooping on kids' online habits

Re: Defend Digital Me, a children's privacy campaign group

Nice one Gordon.

Slight problem.

From what you've just said she'll be just the type who'll trust anyone right up to the point the ex sinks a carving knife into her.

If kids are constantly controlled they stay kids, they don't grow up because they aren't allowed to. They're abysmal as adults as making decisions and reading people because they've never needed to. Welcome to being me - borderline sociopathic parents who tried to control everything and were manipulative. Not a good childhood.

That's above and beyond all this plainchant whining about sex education. Ditto things like the HPV vaccine. Personally having watched my partner die slowly of cervical cancer at age 22 when the vaccine would have protected her it drives me mad when idiots whine that my kid is 12, she no fucky fucky, the whole point being she will eventually and be protected.. And not die slowly and horribly on the No Hope Service, and that wasn't the worst of it. Any parent who refuses should be done for child abuse on the spot.

As to watching kids showering??!! If you or I did that it'd be a quick trip to the paedofinder general shortly followed by a discrete shanking. How is it it's OK for a school to do this? I am more and more sure that people should have to pass a test before theyre allowed to breed. Any school that has cameras in changing rooms, toilets or the like should be forced to rip them out and any footage should be taken and destroyed.

We never had cameras in a school and I imagine most of the parents would have thrown a fit if their kids were being surveilled - how is that different from being in a dictatorship - it's just one step from creepy "protection" to something much nastier.

It almost reads like one of the nastier Torchwood plots. I wonder if the education secretary has a cyberlady in his wardrobe? Oh wait that's Amber Rudd.

IF cctv is to be used, playground, classrooms corridors. At most.

ZERO tolerance of bullying - two strikes and you're out of the school system permanently.

And just as an aside. FFS stop with the "everyone gets a prize" crap. Life is not like that, never has been, never will be.

PS: dear schools, while you are "educating" our kids and teaching them nothing less than utter garbage (most teenagers I've talked to think Reinhard Heydrich was a member of Genesis) can you PLEASE teach them to cross a frigging road. You get 11 bloody years, it can't be too much to ask!

Tim Berners-Lee says regulation of the web may be needed

All the people pretending to be teens and tweens?

Reminds me of a certain monkey dust sketch (chat room perv). Best one is when he meets up with Charlotte..

Still Nazi Grandfather for the win though.

"Is this going to happen at *every* nursing home we take him to...?"

Re: What's the problem?

You've never been on a field trip to either South Wales or Northern Scotland then?

When the sheep weren't watching carefully for the perfect moment to punt you over or into hill/cliff/MOD facility electric fence, they were trying to grab your food (and I use the term under advisement) by main force.

Which in itself is odd if you think about it since a sheep's overriding ambition in life is being found dead, upside down with its legs in the air, in a clarty* hole.

*northern dialect word for slightly muddy bit*. Everyone else considers it to mean "that half mud/half slurry bit that just swallowed a 5ft6 teenage girl up to her shoulders". It didn't take too long to get her out, after we managed to stop laughing hysterically at an irate head poking out of the ground.

*muddy translates as "a large goopy pit in the middle of the path just deep enough for you to disappear up to your waist"

In Australia this ecological niche is filled by the Kangaroos - an animal that can kick your intestines out through your ears in one go. Male 'roo don't like male humans especially during mating season - what they think of female humans hasn't been imparted to me..

Remember...

Tim-Nice-but-Dim?

This suggestion couldn't be more idiotic if it tried. Did TBL have a TIA and nobody noticed?

As someone else has said this'll give Amber Spud and her successors power over the Internet (even if it's just in their deranged little heads) and that is the sort of bad idea that gets people killed.

Oooh, we want a trade deal with China - so legitimate protesters online re Tibet for example suddenly go very quiet. Some girl is going to be kicked out of the country so the rapist and murderer she escaped from to the UK can get his claws into her (sound familiar Theresa May, you remember, the one who's extradition you frigging had broadcasted on the BBC just to *make sure* he knew she was coming). Oh look, her supporters websites are suddenly going up and down like a whores drawers.

Did you play too much rugby as a kid Tim? Cos it sounds to me like you've a case of Dribbling Footballers Syndrome, and in that suggestion I'm being kind. The only other thing I can think of is you've picked up a nasty dose of FHPD (Fscking Huge Payoff Disease). Please share, interested people want to know..

I don't disagree that social media is the scum of the earth - but giving control to the deputy scum of the earth is not much of an improvement especially when they already think they've divine (more like duh-vine) right to rule as it is..

Screw everything! French swingers campsite up for sale, owners 'tired'

Re: Nude Petanque

Best cars we ever had. Better than the Mercedes - one of which ate its turbo in 1500 miles. The 2.5 automatic did 100,000 miles with nothing more than services and tyres.

I bought one myself for £600 that was doing OK until two years ago when wiring gremlins and stuff started showing up - and with a sump heater, waiting, and pulse and coast it managed a regular 28-30mpg urban - the rating was 22 with the auto.

A shame they stopped bringing them over here - big Renault/Citroën and Peugeot most comfortable cars I've ever been in. Just don't try and tow a 16ft caravan at 85mph - I was driving after dad's hernia op and we hit a long hill at 60, halfway down it had crept to 85 and started snaking. The cruise control went on after that.

Re: Nude Petanque

Sigh. We were tourists, driving either the cream of English, a Vauxhall Cavalier, or the cheese, various Ford Cortinas. You really have never understood the concept of suicidal if you haven't tooled around north Wales in a Ford Cortina with no other tapes than Cliff bloody Richard!

Still must have rubbed off, after 87 we had 4 Renaults in a row - two 25 and two Safrane.

My parents have still got those old balls - as smooth now as 30 years ago, and they've still only been used about twice..

That's a thought actually - if we subverted all the US radio stations to play Cliff Richard on a constant loop - probably have the same effect as VX gas, and be soooo much cheaper.

Has to be said I've never seen the point of swinging, usually more flakes than Cadbury.

NHS Digital to probe live-stream spillage of confidential patient info – after El Reg tipoff

They've been incompetent muppets....

For years...

Why on earth does anyone think they'll change now.

They regularly breach their own guidelines, they refuse to update or use medical tests and services if they didn't design or discover them*.

They're so far out of date in certain fields that Sir Bernard Spilsbury would be appalled at their backwardness (before he was out of short trousers).

To paraphrase "They're utterly incompetent in every way"

How do I know? Personal experience.

* NDH Syndrome (not designed here). It's so prevalent in the NHS they're considering an entry in the new ICD.