Posts by Intractable Potsherd

Bold as brass metal thieves disrupt rail, comms, electric

@ formally Matt

Unfortunately, that is regarded as nothing more that an occupational hazard by some. 18 months inside and a criminal record may not have the same impact as it would on you or me. That is reality, not insult to anyone.

@thecakeis(not)alie

I'm going to put the same comment as some of the others, but in a far more appropriate way: In the UK, there is no need for anyone to starve. We have a good, comprehensive system of social care that, in the USA, would be regarded as fantasy.

Unlike some others who seem to be from my country, I am extremely proud of that fact.

Discovery survives feeler gauge disintegration

You must be thinking of ...

... the Allegro. What a useless contraption.

Google brings 2-factor authentication to Gmail

"they get some extra information on you"

With Google's datamining, if you've ever put your phone number in an e-mail, they've got it already!

UK.gov shreds last ID scheme hard drives

True...

... but the temptation to chuck them in the incinerator with the drives might be too great to resist!

Flames, obviously ...

Nominet asks what you think of police domain grab

The police shouldn't have any such power...

... "evidence" or not. It should go before a judge who could issue something called, say "an injunction" based on any evidence, and representations from other interested parties (such as the website owner). These "injunctions" could be issued temporarily pending representations from the website owner in the event that it seems important to do it quickly.

Oh, wait, we have those already ... but the police don't always get what they want using the current system. Can't have plod being thwarted, can we?

Don’t Look Now hailed top Brit movie

I agree with TheltCat...

... "The Italian Job" is one of my favourite films - always has been, and always will be. However, it is a *great film*, not a *great FILM*. Of the top 10 listed, I think I only consider one to be in the second category ("A Matter of Life and Death"), because it has the same elements as "The Italian Job" (humour, problem solving, marvellous leading characters, lightness of touch, and overall 'feel-good'), but it does it without the plot holes, the dodgy editing, and a sort of "that'll do" feeling to the production. However, once all the films that I consider to be dross are taken out of the list (which includes anything by Roeg - boring as hell, all those I've seen) are taken out, "The Italian Job" would probably be well into the top 20!

@ Jedit

Donald Sutherland is Canadian, not American - http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000661/

TERRORISTS IN SUBMARINES menace the Free World!

That ...

... was brilliant, AC! Thank you!

Employer settles with Facebooker who called boss 'dick'

For those who seem to support this woman...

... where would your sympathy lie if it had been the other way round, and the boss had referred to her in public as scumbag and ... well, the female equivalent of "dick"? Either you support both situations, and my reading of the commenters on here is that most wouldn't support the hypothetical situation, or you don't support either. If we are going to have ridiculously low levels for bullying, then it has to work both ways, and if the boss had done this regarding the employee, it would be regarded as bullying.

Both of these are people (even the boss concerned), and both deserve the same amount of respect for their feelings.

Patent judge hits out at legal tactics used against file-sharers

His age ...

... was 45 as of last September (http://www.justice.gov.uk/rss/judicial-200910-075.htm).

Could it be ...

... that "AC" here actually stands for "Andrew Crossley"? I don't see many other people making that argument with that self-satisfied tone of voice.

Bank scorched by stupid Facebook policy

This is a serious question ...

... does anyone have any good experiences of HR? I certainly don't, and I've been involved with many organisations over the years. I have come to the conclusion that HR (management, at least) is the final resting place of people who cannot actually *do* anything: adapting the old adage, it seems to be "Those who can, do; those who can't, teach; those who can't teach, research; those who can't research go into the government; and those who can't get into government go into human resources management".

Oh, and what was wrong with calling them "the Personnel Department". I am not a f****ing "Human Resource", and I don't know any. Perhaps changing the name to something less depersonalising would focus their minds on what they are supposed to do.

HMRC warns (again) over tax refund phishing scams

That isn't accurate in all cases...

Maybe that's how it works for you, but I had a refund just before Christmas, and first I got notification that I was due something back, and that it would be sent separately. A few days later a cheque arrived (surprisingly, since it was sent during the bad weather and pre-Christmas backlog).

UK police crime map website: Who's the victim here?

Just because other things are ridiculously expensive ...

.... it doesn't mean everything else should be. There is absolutely no good reason why the RR and the footballer should cost so much, but they are not paid from taxes, so it doesn't matter in this context. They have nothing to do with whether this is a good use of a taxpayer's money.

When I was a registered nurse ...

... the "job" of giving medications properly was distilled into "the right medication, to the right person, at the right time, by the right route". Perhaps it is time to adopt these principles to gvt contracts - something like "the right action, in the right place, at the right time, by the right method". Can't that be written into contracts in some way?

Diary of a Not-spot – the final chapter

Once again, Bill, ...

... congratulations on this. Putting together all this, and then having it survive 100mph winds with only a bent bit of mast - incredible! You are an engineer in the best British traditions - I bet you have a great shed!

Have one on me - you deserve it!

Home Office crime maps go to street-level detail

The thing is ...

... what does "nearby" mean? I can think of several areas where I live where there is a less salubrious area next to a very nice one. The first may have high crime rates (usually drugs related), whereas the second doesn't have much a problem at at all.

Alternatively, I can think of an area where there were a couple of very nasty domestic incidents - no-one else was harmed, or likely to be. Should they affect the insurance premiums and house prices for all those "nearby"?

We should be finding a way to reduce house prices, but I'm not sure this is a good way to do it.

Or alternatively ...

... it will add an extra level of doubt over whether to call the police about a crime - "How will this affect my house price?". Unintended consequence?

Gatwick Airport security swoops on 3-inch rifle

I worry about this...

... so I always put keys, phone, wallet etc in my bag or one of the many pockets in the coats I travel in. Less chance of forgetting stuff, gets you away from the smell of sweaty feet quicker, and reduces the chance of thievery.

"If it could be (mis)used as a weapon, you cannot bring it on the plane."

That's worrying, because almost anything can be used as a weapon. People can be killed or very seriously injured with most parts of the body, for instance.

I doubt that I am the only one who has gone through the stuff I am allowed to take on board a plane and thought "If I wanted to, I could ..."

What do you mean, I am? I hear the helicopters ... goodbyyyyyyeee

Man knows when you're signed in to GMail, Twitter, Digg

Perhaps ...

Whilst I do not *rely* on El Reg's comments pages for my computer security, I have been directed to security-enhancing software and techniques by commenters here. Not all of us here are primarily employed in computers and security, and when I first started reading El Reg I was essentially clueless as to how to effectively secure my machines ("anti-virus and firewall? Must be safe")!

When it comes to security, things like NoScript work so disproportionately well (as far as I can tell from the literature) compared to their complexity that reminders that it exists fall into the category of information that cannot be said too often. You never know when someone will benefit from it.

I'm sure Eq and AC don't think that we should avoid a list of things they already know, so I don't know what their actual complaint is.

Scotland bans smut. What smut? Won't say

But, AC, ...

... they are *exactly* the type of things that the prosecutors should be telling us, or at least giving guidance on. If there is a "margin of appreciation", we have the right to know it so that we can be sure what the consequences will be. At the moment, they are just saying, "Well, you know, it sort of depends on who it is, whether the newspapers might pick it up, and whether we need a PR coup at the time. We don't give a fuck whether these are really relevant to the pursuit of justice, we just want to make sure that it works to our advantage. After all, if it is one of us, or one of our paymasters that is caught, we don't want to have to do anything, but if it is some teacher somewhere, so that our staff can get their faces on TV, we want every possible chance to do that".

Also...

... there is absolutely no evidence that a true "snuff film" has ever been made. It seems to be just another tabloid fiction that has made its way into the mainstream.

R v Brown is relevant here.

You can't consent to flogging in England and Wales. R v Brown made that very clear. You do not have the right to consent to any injury other than that for medical purposes (e.g. surgery), body piercing, tattooing, and branding (the latter made clear in R v Wilson), and injury sustained in the line of sport (their Lordships didn't want their enjoyment of boxing and rugby to fall foul of the law).

I get very angry by this every time I teach it, but I'm being calm today.

Airbus secures whopping 180 plane deal

I love Airbus...

... in principle, but if I had the option between an Airbus and a Boeing, I'd go for the Boeing every time. They just somehow feel better put together - like the difference between a Series Landrover and an Alfa Romeo.

NASA trumpets rocky exoplanet find

Another example of that law ...

... that says that you will always make a spelling error when you have pointed one out - it should be "minuscule", not "miniscule"!

(Even though I have assiduously checked this, I just know there will be an error somewhere!)

Police reject Labour MP's call for Bristol-wide DNA test

Vindictive women ...

... find the Labour Party very attractive, it seems. They seem to think red rosettes suit them.

Out of interest...

... has anyone definitively said that it *was* a man/men that committed the crime, or is it just an assumption? Since they don't seem to have a clue who did it, couldn't it conceivably be a woman? I know, it might be unusual, but can it be totally ruled out?

EU in Chinese garlic-crushing operation

Of course...

... you are merely teasing us, and you have the evidence for your claims already written down and ready to post, haven't you?

You haven't? Well, you aren't worth listening to, then.

EU law not tough enough for online piracy, says Brussels

To be fair...

... that is only partially so. EU laws are written with the least co-operative countries in mind. They are *dramatically* overstated in order to get the minimal compliance from all countries. From a dual handicap of always playing by the rules, the UK always ends up with law that no-one else in Europe dreamed would be the result, since it takes every word of the original EU document, and then adds a bit! This is why you can still see people in some countries walking across roofs with no safety gear at all, having got up there by shinning up a 95-year-old ladder with a bad case of woodworm, whilst it is an offence to stand on a chair to reach for a book without a harness, helmet, and more padding than an American footballer in the UK, for instance.

Then there are those in the UK parliament that simply want to blame someone else for what they really wanted to do, and ignore the wording of the EU legislation to get their own stupid ideas through. The "Metric Martyrs" case need never have happened - the EU legislation did not apply to unpackaged goods at all, and on packaged goods, it simply said that the metric equivalent must be displayed alongside any other measurement. OK, maybe it was a mistake on the part of the drafter, but in this case, I'm going for malice rather than incompetence.

Overall, the EU makes good legislation - look a bit closer to home when the words "stupid law" come to mind.

IMO...

... "partly because the development of legal offers of digital content has not been able to keep up with demand" should read "entirely because the management of the media companies have refused to update their business models to meet demand".

FTFY.

Runaway hydroponic fungus attacks real-world Starship Voyager

It may come a surprise to many ...

... but there are some of us that don't know what cannabis smells like, in any of its stages of production/consumption. I certainly wouldn't know it!

Disappearing filth leads to dropped charges in extreme smut case

But fortunately...

... juries have a tendency to bring in "perverse judgments", i.e. they ignore the law and do what is right instead!

Or ...

... they have been persuaded by the CPS to take this course of action since they have realised that there is no sensible chance of getting a jury to convict on such a pointless crime!

(OK, maybe a bit paranoid, but the cases of "extreme porn" so haven't been very successful at trial).

Min of Justice to crack down on dodgy compo claims

Had the same ...

... with a unpleasant woman whose car I ran into the back of at parking speeds. Both identical Citroens. My car had a dislodged front foglight where it had been poked by her car's exhaust, hers had nothing (the deformable bumpers did their jobs. Daft bint admitted that she stepped on the brakes because she'd dropped her mobile phone! Nonetheless, she put in a claim for whiplash, and got it because the insurance company wouldn't fight it.

Yes, I am still bitter about it!

Unfortunately ...

... the winners of any legal action are the lawyers. When I look at the pain and anguish caused by divorce lawyers in particular, I begin to agree with Shakespeare.

Pickles throws down gauntlet on council data

In my opinion...

... yes, it should only be the actual pay. The rest is something else that we as a country need to address at a later date. So, no council employee to be paid a salary more than the PM in pure financial terms as published (and even then, I think it is too much by far).

But...

... there needs to be an adequate assessment of how much management is too much. It is hard not to look at the multitude of managers in public organisations and wonder whether they really are necessary, and whether their wage might be better spent in actually providing the service to those that need it.

Dubai assassins used email trojan to track Hamas victim

There seem to be a lot of porky tellers, then ...

... since I have heard the same thing from dual-passport Israelis of my acquaintance.

Called 999 recently? They've got your number

Brilliant quote ...

... and it says it all about the current situation, unfortunately.

They *were* there to help the public...

... there is very little evidence of that now, unfortunately.

I want to trust the police, honestly, but they just don't give me the chance.

The Fiona Pilkington case...

... is as a result of the police not doing what they were supposed to do in the first place. The call records, for once, are biting the police on the arse.

No, Martin...

... it is utterly bizarre that they do. There is no need for permanent records of any calls.

It is a big deal

Seriously, it is. Proportionality is vital in maintaining trust.

Given that...

... if I don't call the police for someone else in an emergency, nothing happens to me (inaction is not punishable - at least not yet), but if I do call, there is a finite risk that it will come back to bite me on the arse, then yes, I agree with that sentiment. However, I would like someone else to call the police if I am in an emergency situation, and so, following the Golden Rule, I must put myself at risk for someone else's sake. However, in putting myself at risk, I am also putting people I know at risk, since the top of most suspect lists is the caller followed by those around them. Do I have the right to do this?

The problem is that the police in this country have lost all the good-will they had up to not that long ago by acting as if they are separate from the society they should serve, not control. Successive governments have been complicit in this, and now there is effectively no way to retrieve the situation. Society is, as a result, more dangerous, and less effective at protecting those that need protection, which is a disgrace.

You are missing the point.

The length of time that calls are being held is beyond reasonable. Simply logging the call, and the recording of the call, for a short while (six months would be ideal) unless something else indicates that it needs to kept longer (perhaps it is a a call from someone being involved in an actual incident) is fine. Beyond that, perhaps a simple log of numbers called from can be kept for a while longer to identify false callers, but the requirement of reasonableness still applies, so let's say two or three years.

Hanging on to anything and everything because it *may* be useful later is contrary to Data Protection rules, and is distinctly creepy. This sort of action by the police is why I don't trust them as a body any more, and would not go out of my way to assist any individual member.

Speed-cam stats to be published, indicates gov

Way to build a straw man, AC!

Wanting higher speed limits on motorways is not the same as wanting higher speed limits on residential roads (ie "just outside your children's school"). Residential areas are not motorways or major A-roads, and no-one has suggested that they are.

I'd rather...

... have drivers concentrating on what is outside the car but going a bit (or a lot, depending on the conditions) over the speed limit than paying more attention to the speedo than the environment. Any sane person would.

Disconsolate Spanish smokers driven out into blizzard

Regrettably...

...I agree. I really do think the smoking bans are a terrible infringement on people's liberty, but I appreciate the fact that my clothes don't stink of smoke after a night out! I feel all confused when I go to my second home in the Czech Republic and enjoy proper pubs where people are enjoying a fag with their drink, but get cross about the fact my eyes sting and my clothes need washing more often!