Posts by TheTick

IPv6 now faster than IPv4 when visiting 20% of top websites – and just as fast for the rest

Re: 20% is not noticable

Do some work with local government or some government agency and see how they spend that money they take from you.

You might not have the same opinion afterwards (I didn't).

My plan to heal this BROKEN, BREXITED BRITAIN

Re: Parliamentary Sovereignty

Well Rich 11, that's because the House of Lords and the Queen don't actually have any real power, one is an advisory chamber and the other is a ceremonial role which, while having in theory significant power, in practicality she has very little.

I have no idea why you mentioned kicking people out of Britain, oh wait, yes you are trying to tar Brexiters with the brush of heresy. Whoops did I say heresy? I meant racism of course.

Of course, given that I am engaged to a leave-voting immigrant then I wouldn't be too keen on seeing her thrown out, and I would be quite surprised if she were, considering that I actually listened to the Leave people's argument which said, on many occasions, that people who came here legally and haven't broken the law are more than welcome to stay.

Now, to respond in kind, what are your opinions on the remain supporters who want old white people to die because they voted to leave?

Re: Parliamentary Sovereignty

No, it wasn't politicians that said we would leave the EU. It was the people, and we spoke clearly.

Woe betide any prime minister that ignores the spoken will of the people. Even though I don't have the faintest idea how, I for one am prepared to take up arms against any government that abandons democracy in my country. I hope everyone else here would do the same, after all our current prime minister supports the people rebelling against dictatorial government (Libya, Syria).

And no, I couldn't care less if the spooks see this.

Dabs founder Dave Atherton returns to techland

Cheers

Cheers for letting us know, I'll stick that one on the avoid list for any future purchases.

(Dabs under that bloke was the first company I ever had to sue via small claims - successfully of course).

Brexit: UK gov would probably lay out tax plans in post-'leave' vote emergency budget

Re: MEPs make the laws

That's an appalling reason to vote to stay in the EU.

Are you seriously saying that fundamental matters of accountability, democracy, legitimacy and all the rest are less important to you than the fact the person you like got elected as an MEP in your region?

Jess, that MEP you like has almost zero power. He/She cannot propose legislation, nor propose to repeal legislation. If you are happy with that level of power then I pity you.

I don't see much reform coming from Westminster either, but the current setup is significantly better than the setup in the EU and is therefore an improvement from the current situation.

Re: MEPs make the laws

"But it's certainly not a good enough reason to leave."

Only if there was a reasonable possibility of this changing in the future. But I don't see any reform in the direction of more democracy and accountability coming from the EU in the foreseeable future.

Elected representatives proposing and repealing laws is pretty much the most fundamental reason to stay in or leave the EU. All of the other problems stem from this basic failure of representative democracy. So yes, it is a good enough reason, and it is the reason I will vote to leave.

I would urge you to not take it lightly.

"Not strictly true. MEPs make the laws"

I'm not sure that's accurate, as I understand it MEP's only get to vote on laws that are proposed by the EU Commission/Council/Whatever which is the same amount of power as our House of Lords has, they cannot propose laws themselves. Whereas our MP's do make the laws, even opposition MP's can bring a private member's bill to be voted on.

If you haven't already watched it Brexit the Movie does discuss this among a host of other issues:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYqzcqDtL3k

I strongly agree with the rest of your post however, and I've always considered the US method of open primaries to be very interesting. e.g. Love him or loathe him, the Republican voters want Trump and they are getting him.

Most of the arguments that we keep hearing all over the media, trade/how much we pay/immigration etc are of little relevance. The absolutely fundamental issues are getting next to no airing at all.

The people who make the laws are not elected by the people, they are elected by other politicians who might be elected by the people. Now I don't know about the rest of you but that's not bloody well good enough for me!

For centuries we have wrested power from the elites and passed it closer to the people, we fought a civil war and chopped off a king's head to prove there was no divine right to rule. This is the first time that I can think of (admittedly only an amateur student of political history) where the direction of power has been the other way round. Those who seek to rule us are now less accountable than they were 50 years ago. Back then we could directly vote for or against the top decision makers, now we can only vote for people who might vote for the top decision makers we want.

They ignore referenda in smaller countries like Ireland, making them vote again until they get the answer they want. They have desposed elected governments in Italy and Greece and placed appointed apparatchiks in their place. The EU Arrest Warrant undermines our ancient right of Habeas Corpus (Google Andrew Symeou).

I really wish all those points were the top item on the media and the Leave campaign's agenda but I barely hear a peep about it.

Re: both major parties are split.

I have it on reasonably good authority (that I won't disclose here) that the Labour Party has made a decision to look united on the EU question as much as possible in the hopes it shows them in a good light so they have a better chance at winning the next election.

Yes, that's right, Labour MP's who think we should leave the EU are keeping their gobs shut because them getting into power is more important to them than the most important referendum this country has had since the 70's (arguably even more so). Only a few mavericks like Kate Hoey are stepping out of line.

Reminds you of old Tony B.Liar doesn't it?

Brexit would pinch UK tech spend but the EU wouldn't care – survey

Re: There is so much bollocks ...

It's probably because of the stitch-up that got Vote Leave the official designation rather than the GO movement.

Now the media types that love the EU (like the EU-Funded BBC) have their ready-made reason not to invite Saint Nigel on anymore "Because he's not the leader of the official Leave campaign!".

NZ unfurls proposed new flag

Re: Yes please

Honouring your origins is not childish.

Short weekend break: Skegness or exoplanet HD 189733b?

Re: Skegness every time

The way to tell the locals from the punters in Skeg is to see who ask for a bottle and who gets a pint. At least back in the late 90's during my wonder years the pubs and bars rarely cleaned the pipes feeding the pumps, especially at Fat Louis' and Strikes - bloody horrible pints!

Red dwarf superflares batter formerly 'habitable' exoplanet

Extreme age?

"scientists put the kibosh on the prospect of colonisation by noting that the Kepler-452 solar system's extreme age - six billion years"

Is that really considered extreme age for a G-class star? Ours is about 4.5 billion years old and considered middle-aged with a few billion years left before it uses up it's hydrogen. Kepler-452 sounds like it's in it's 50's - getting on a bit but still kicking.

Assuming we could get there and colonise the planet we could get at least a few hundred million years out of it surely?

OH GROSS! The real problem with GDP

Good article

Good article on the imperfections of GDP Mr W.

It's a shame all the headlines trumpeting "The economy has risen 0.2% last quarter!" don't come with the proviso " - but take it with a massive pinch of salt!".

Personally I think GDP is too flawed to be used, not because it doesn't give some indication of economic growth, but because it provides an irresistable incentive for governments to juice the figures. Your example of paying beaureacrats more increases GDP is a good one.

But also if they use the Y = C + I + G + (X − M) calculation of GDP (Y) then governments are massively incentivised to borrow huge amounts to increase government spending (G) to get that juicy headline. Sadly the GDP calculation doesn't seem to take vast debts into account.

POLAR DINOSAURS prowled ARCTIC NIGHT, cast doubt on COLD BLOOD theory

Early Earth?

"...chillier norther climes of early Earth"

I wouldn't call ~69 million years ago "early Earth", that's like a centenarian saying "Back when I was a young whippersnapper at 98..."

That thing we do in the UK? Should be ILLEGAL in the US, moans ex-State monopoly BT

Competition

“There is not sufficient regulation to create competition"

Or in other words:

"We can't compete - government please help us!!!"

Microsoft replaces Windows 10 patch update, isn't saying why

Me too

After being pleasantly surprised that X-Com Enemy Unknown and Civ V both have Linux ports that work flawlessly through Steam for Linux...I'm out too!

Hey, folks. Meet the economics 'genius' behind Jeremy Corbyn

Gold isn't for the bad times, it's for the rebuilding period afterwards.

The most important assets for bad times are family, friends and community, and a little bit of arable land near fresh water doesn't hurt either.

'Sunspots drive climate change' theory is result of ancient error

Re: Deniers?

@RIBrsiq

"http://theconsensusproject.com/"

That whole website has zero evidence for anything. Just a bunch of links to articles saying "we're right and that's that!". It peddles the discredited 97% of scientists statistic as if it's not completely and utterly bogus. If I remember they counted any paper that even mentioned climate as though they agreed with the "consensus". They also counted those who believed mankind has an effect on the environment but did not think it would be very significant.

That website is more like a bunch of kids stamping their feet shouting "IT IS IT IS IT IS!!!".

So I repeat my question: Is there any solid, proven evidence of *anthropogenic* global climate change? I'll add significant climate change to that question, as me farting adds to climate change, though only the missus notices that much.

Re: Deniers?

"Because at this point in time, I cannot fathom what else can make any sane person deny anthropogenic global climate change."

Is there any solid, proven evidence for anthropogenic global climate change? Serious question.

And yes the "denier" tag is disgraceful as it attempts to link skeptics with holocaust deniers (don't even think about "denying" that!).

Cause of Parliamentary downtime on Microsoft Office 364½ revealed

I'm a raging libertarian capitalist, but even I see the problems of having all the emails of our Parliamentarians on the servers of a foreign company, no matter how much they say they will never, ever take a little peek...

Why on earth hasn't the government set up an IT division to provide public sector organisations, including Parliament, with an internally managed email solution/file services etc? An NHSMail for government.

Stop forcing benefits down my throat and give me hard cash, dammit

"The problem is the UK's welfare spending is an order of magnitude bigger than that"

I couldn't agree more, it's a huge problem that the UK govt spends so much on welfare. I'm fairly sure that both of us can think of instances where govt welfare spending is not, shall we say, efficient?

As per my response to Mark #255 above - it's not a liberty for you to have an employment contract, it's an imposition forced on businesses by the government.

I don't think Tim is suggesting that you be unable to voluntarily write a contract with an employer that matches the current state of affairs, so long as both sides agree.

People in the UK give over £10 billion a year to charity, despite also being taxed. Lots of people are nice and charitable. I've lived and worked with all sorts of people in my life (except the significantly rich) and I've found most people will give someone a hand when they are in need. It's just p*ss-takers they have a problem with. The vast majority of people are NOT selfish jerks.

Welfare was initially a few shillings for people over 70 (something like the equivalent of over 100 in life expectancy now), who would complain about that eh? But it quickly expanded as soon as politicians realised they could buy votes with it. Now we have a permanent benefits culture trapping millions in poverty with marginal tax rates higher than the top tax band (haven't kept up with this though, perhaps the Tories have sorted it?) and all these people will vote for the parties that keep them down on benefits street rather than give them a hand up to main street. State welfare has nothing to do with people's welfare.

Zero hour contracts are desired by quite a few people. Why would you take that flexibility away from them just because you don't like the thought of it?

Re: hmmmm

"extra "flexibility" imposed on us."

Erm, it wouldn't be imposing anything on you, I think he's suggesting that current impositions on employers are removed. Whether you think that's a good idea or not is another issue, but he's suggesting less impositions, not more.

Of course in a free market if you feel you are being treated badly as an employee or contractor you can look elsewhere for work and find somewhere better, or start a better company yourself. As a contractor this is nice and easy as you simply don't renew the contract which is much less hassle than resigning.

I've never heard of a company off-shoring to temporarily push up share prices, they do it to reduce costs and have a more flexible workforce without so many govt regulations weighing them down. Now if everyone was a contractor it's a million times easier to reduce the workforce by, again, simply not renewing contracts. That may sound bad to you that companies can just let people go without issue, but it also means companies are less reticent to hire contractors when they know there's no chance of a tribunal if they forget to cross their t's on the redundancy notice.

Unions have a bit of a history of their "collective negotiations" being little more than blackmail with things like the closed shop and the coal miners bringing down Ted Heath. Thatcher was right to stamp it out. Unions helping their members is no bad thing, but some use their members for their own political aims.

Companies restructuring themselves to pay less tax? Well so do I, and so probably do you (got an ISA?).

I'd love to see a more flexible workforce like Tim suggests, even though in my personal case I'd probably be worse off (currently on a pretty high wage for what I do which they don't have much choice about thanks to some TUPE arrangements a couple of years ago). Companies would be so much more inclined to hire people for work without all the bullcr*p that comes with employees, and wage renegotiations will be much easier for contractors; done a good job and they are asking you to renew? Ask for 20% more!

Windows 10 marks the end of 'pay once, use forever' software

Re: Linux

After a particularly annoying evening trying to simply get into safe mode and do a system restore after a dodgy install borked my Win8.1 system, I am going to finally install Linux Mint Mate edition and give it a proper trial as my main day to day system.

Apparently my OS drive was "locked" which meant the recovery usb couldn't do either a system restore or repair and didn't tell me how to unlock it either. Eventually I found the command to re-enable the F8 menu on boot and got it done (FYI it's "bcdedit /set {default} bootmenupolicy legacy" from an elevated command prompt).

The above kerfuffle has just added weight to my concerns abouts Win 10's Cortana, the mandatory auto-updates, the pushing towards a Microsoft account and OneDrive and mostly the fact there's no straight answer on whether this will change my retail Win 7/8.1 keys into OEM ones yet.

Win 10 makes me uneasy, Linux deserves a shot.

So what the BLINKING BONKERS has gone wrong in the eurozone?

Re: Sorry for the rant, but...

@Arnaut the less

In the period of the classical gold standard to which I was referring, the British pound was no longer a pound in weight of sterling silver, it was about 7.32g of gold minted into gold sovereigns along with a little copper.

While I'm certainly not an expert I have struggled through a few economics books in the past thank you for your concern. But as I said in my last post, I was not advocating a return to the gold standard, merely comparing it with the unfettered fiat currency expansion of today.

In fact the gold standard suffers from fractional reserve banking as well, with banks producing more notes backed by gold than the gold they actually have. But at least there was a limit to the amount they could print because at some point people want to see the shiny metal itself.

Since 1971 however there has been no link to gold at all, and inflation took off like a rocket. Debtors consider this state of affairs to be wonderful, savers less so.

Re: Sorry for the rant, but...

@Tim

Oh don't get me wrong I'm a fan of Friedman since first picking up Capitalism and Freedom and agree with him on a range of issues.

But I'm just also a fan of F.A.Hayek and lean more towards his thinking that an expansion of credit (money supply) fuelled by artificially low interest rates leads to mis-allocations of capital, a boom, followed by a bust. 2008 seems to bear that out a little bit more than the Chicago school. Although I admit I'm no expert at all.

Re: Sorry for the rant, but...

@Arnaut the less

You will build a house now, because you then have a house to live in. Otherwise you will presumably be out on the street or giving your money to a landlord for the rest of the year.

My mortgage is 3.29% fixed, so I am, right now, losing 3.29% on interest payments. That's actually worse than waiting a single year and building a house for 3.29% less cost, because I am paying 3.29% for 5 years followed by the lenders SVR for the remaining 20, not just paying one single time over the odds.

As for the seed you are right, the farmer would not. But if every farmer stopped planting the price of the crops would rise pretty sharpish, making it profitable again. Food on average will always make a profit up to the point everyone is stuffed full.

As for your "gold standard idiots" remark, firstly insulting people loses the argument immediately, secondly I did not advocate a gold standard, merely compared it to the present system. I'm with the Austrians on this one; whatever people freely and voluntarily use as money is money, and the thing that performs the function of money the best (whether gold/dollars/pounds/bitcoins) will become the de facto money.

Incidentally, the late 19th/early 20th centuries under that horrible old gold standard was probably the greatest period of economic expansion in human history. Just a thought.

Re: Sorry for the rant, but...

Well there is gold mining to expand the supply, but I'm not too taken by the theory that we absolutely need an expanding money supply at all. Sounds like a bankers/politicians excuse for eternal inflation which allows them to continue borrowing and buying votes public spending.

A static money supply in an expanding economy means things will simply get cheaper as time goes by, rather than more expensive like now. Not so great for debtors, but savers will be rewarded for once, and as someone who is leaning towards the Austrian side of the economics debate savings are what are needed for proper growth, not debts.

And to head off the inevitable argument "But if savings can buy more stuff a year later (price deflation) people will stop spending and the economy will crash!!!" I would like someone to give me an example of a product that you desire but would NOT buy today if you knew it would be 1-3% cheaper next year?

Food - nope

Housing - nope

Clothing - nope

Home electronics - nope

Car - People buy cars brand new right now and lose 20% of the value as soon as they drive out of the showroom so nope

Perhaps there are some business investment reasons that price deflation would be horrendous but that's out of my area of expertise. I can't think of anything that would stop people spending with price deflation of 1-3% a year.

Sorry for the rant, but...

I've slowly been coming to the view over the last few years since the crash that the whole intellectual basis for modern day economics is deeply flawed, and that is the root cause of the economic problems we see around the world.

Take GDP for instance. Does anyone really believe all of the needs/wants/labour/trades of the 65 million people in the UK can be distilled into a single number with a pound sign in front of it?

I remember even as far back as A-Level economics being told that GDP (or might have still been GNP back in the mid-90's) was not considered an accurate measure of the economy and has many flaws. Yet the GDP figure is what is used to determine whether the economy "grew" or "shrank" and even a figure of -0.1% is enough to get politicians hot under the collar and enact policies to try and grow that number - policies that will have unintended consequences like everything politicians do.

GDP does not distinguish between voluntary economic activity between willing participants to produce things that they actually truly value, or government spending to get labourers to dig holes and fill them in again. Though the former is real economic activity boosting prosperity and the latter is not.

And as for the money supply BobRocket above seems to have hit the nail on the head in his strangely downvoted post. Money supply is debt, which is a multiple of "base money" which is itself a fiction in the minds of the people as it is just paper or binary digits.

Mr Worstall mentions the dread the economists have of "deflation" (which I believe he is using in the correct fashion - the reduction in the supply of money), and that this can happen when banks go bust. But that only happens when banks go bust because the money supply is all a load of hot air!

If gold was the basis of the money supply (and was not used in a fractional reserve system), there would be no reduction of the money supply because it would all be real, physical stuff sat there in the vaults. You can't reduce the money supply of gold unless it is destroyed or lost.

So our economists and politicians are all working off a false premise, and manipulating the economy in order to tweak the virtual dials. Why do they do this? I suspect it is because the false narrative of GDP in a fiat currency system is actually very helpful to their political aims. They can manipulate GDP by borrowing and spending more on crap before the election, whether that boosts real prosperity or not, and GDP will rise ("Ooh look GDP up we are all rich - horray!"), despite the fact that prices have risen commensurately with GDP so people can't actually buy any more real stuff with the extra cash in their pockets.

To illustrate the smoke and mirrors the central banks and politicians use we actually have three separate measures of inflation. Most of us have heard about the CPI and the RPI (with RPI including housing and energy if I remember correctly and is therefore higher than the CPI, which is why G.Brown got rid of it to hide his real inflation). But there is the little known "GDP deflator" as well, which is used to convert absolute GDP "growth" to real GDP adjusted for the fact prices are going up as well.

Except of course this GDP deflator is invariably lower than both the CPI and RPI, making it look like the economy grew when in fact it shrank - smoke and bloody mirrors.

We seriously need to have a good hard think about how the economy is measured, or in fact if it even needs to be at all. We could do worse than take a leaf out of Sir John Cowperthwaite's book, the Financial Secretary of Hong Kong in the 60's:

"As for the paucity of economic statistics for the colony, Cowperthwaite explained that he resisted requests to provide any, lest they be used as ammunition by those who wanted more government intervention."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1508696/Sir-John-Cowperthwaite.html

Worth taking a few minutes to read his quotes as well, a real free market hero: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_James_Cowperthwaite

Beaten blokes hate the women who frag them in online games

Re: Missing

Or, indeed, how do women respond to winning and losing?

The US taxman thinks Microsoft owes billions. Prove it, says Microsoft

Re: I hope this will be useful

"No. Try going to the third world and you'll see how much good charity and a lack of cohesive government structure does. Put simply, people die...A LOT"

I have been, I've seen families in rags living in shacks by the side of the highway in the Philipines where my better half comes from. What these countries are is POOR. The *proven* solution to poverty is free market capitalism and a society that protects peoples property and businesses not one that removes it from them.

And the reason charity does poorly in places like Africa is not because of a lack of state power, but because of it. Bastards with guns and corrupt politicians siphoning off the charity of good people. Less state-backed violence is necessary not more.

Protection rackets? Are you the same Anonymous Coward above with horror stories about there being no roads/hospitals/welfare if the state couldn't tax us?

Re: I hope this will be useful

@Anonymous Coward

Roads - so you agree with me that roads will still be provided. Good. (Note I did not advocate private provision, merely noted that it would be provided - it would).

Hospitals - Normally no way to afford it? Normally? No, the only real concern is for those who have no means to pay, whether by their own fault or bad luck. The answer to this is, once again, private charity. Perhaps a fund set up to fund A&E access for anyone who needs it, I know I would pay into that. It's not hard to imagine a circumstance where I end up in A&E unconscious and without my insurance documents so I would want A&E available to everyone (real A&E, not stubbing your toe).

Welfare - Being at the mercy of charity is better than starving in the street, after all charities are staffed and funded by...merciful people! What little faith you have in humanity if you think the only way the truly needy will be helped is by putting a gun to the head of peaceful people and taking their wealth.

I have to laugh at all the downvotes, do you all truly think none of these things would be provided if the state didn't threaten us with violence to take our wealth? Or do you just not like that fact that what I said was true?

Re: I hope this will be useful

"but without taxes there would be no hospitals, no roads, and no welfare."

Don't be ridiculous, we would have all three without taxes.

Roads - probably a touch difficult to arrange compared to state provision but there is a demand for them so they would be there.

Hospitals - huge demand so they will be provided.

Welfare - Both Brits and Yanks give billions to charity every year even with a massive welfare state, so in the absence of a welfare state private charity would step in to help people (and probably only help those who really need it, rather than scroungers, so a distinct improvement).

You can make the argument that the state would do a better job of things, but you can't argue they would cease to exist.

UK TV is getting worse as younglings shun the BBC et al, says Ofcom

Re: As a 20 something

"How do you think all those companies who advertise on TV pay for it? We are *ALL* paying for it because the cost of the advertising is built into what we pay for their products!"

What an utterly ridiculous statement. All companies will advertise through whatever medium is available. If there was no TV then the price of the product wouldn't go down, they would just find another way to get the message across to you. Probably one that is far more expensive such as junk mail and the price of the product would be higher than without TV advertising.

Not to mention the most obvious point that no one forces you to buy anything that is advertised on telly, and competition between brands keeps prices down. Whereas a state-enforced tax has no such restrictions.

And as another poster said, I don't need to wait 15 years for those 47 different versions of cruddy programs they are already here - that's why I dropped the BBC in the first place and am a happy tax-free streamer. :D

"Methinks you don't know much about the history of broadcasting"

Enlighten me - which regulations enabled Game of Thrones to be made where it otherwise would not have been?

Or House of Cards, or Lillehammer..etc...etc...

Re: As a 20 something

Seem to be a lot of beeboids on here today judging from your downvotes and Just Enough's upvotes.

What you said, Brenda, was completely sensible and accurate and as a 30-something-almost-40 I completely concur with your view.

All you gits wanting other people to be forced to pay for your preferred viewing need to get a grip on reality. The telly tax will be history within 15 years and good riddance.

Hang on, what?

High quality programming only occurred because of regulations imposed by the government?

Methinks this is bovine faeces.

Cisco gobbles OpenDNS, sorts out cloud security portfolio

Re: On behalf of OpenDNS users...

"hateful corporate monolith" - really?

Any evidence for this hatred? And hatred to whom?

Or is it you that hates it? If so for what reason?

Sigh.

EU: Explain your tax affairs. Google, Amazon, Facebook: Mmm... nah

I'll agree with you that lobbying is (badly) disguised bribery as you say.

My solution would be to remove the power from the politicians to make laws and regulations that gives these firms the advantages they lobby for.

So if they are not going to show up to a show trial, then the politicians should not let them bribe them anymore, is that what you are saying?

Chill, luvvies. The ‘unsustainable’ BBC Telly Tax stays – for now

Re: Auntie forever

So presumably you would willingly pay for it if it was a subscription based model?

Then why are so many people afraid of that ever happening?

"I'm don't drive. Why should I fund roads?"

Err...you don't - car and fuel taxes do

"I'm not a woman. Why should I fund maternity services?"

Because maternity services are far more important and useful than Strictly Come Dancing

"I don't take trains. Why should I fund the railways?"

You shouldn't (I'm no expert, but you probably don't)

"I don't like foreigners. Why should I fund the aid budget?"

Charity should not be forced upon us by the state, it's not charity then. And we all know "aid" goes mainly into the pockets of kleptocrats and bureaucrats.

"I'm not disabled. Why should I fund disability benefits?"

Because helping the truly disadvantaged is a sign of civilization, and far better than the aforementioned Strictly.

Your comparisons are ridiculous. The BBC is a media organisation not an emergency service. And as you are so keen on it, surely you would be willing to voluntarily pay for it, wouldn't you? Or is it just that you want *other people* to pay for your stuff as well?

Ubuntu 15.04 to bring 'Vivid' updates for cloud, devices this week

"instead of on a single, unified menu bar at the top of the screen (like OS X)"

Like Amiga Workbench.

Sony tells hacked gamer to pay for crooks' abuse of PlayStation account

And this is exactly why the move to cloud storage, digital accounts for games/books/films/taxes/banking etc are so worrying. The power is now with governments and organisations with their own agendas, values and interests at heart - not yours. They have the off switch, just like Aaron Russo prophesied in America: Freedom to Facism.

"Convenience will be how the world will lose the freedoms it took millenia to gain". I can't remember where I read that and it's probably mis-quoted but sums it up.

Adobe Flash fix FAIL exposes world's most popular sites

Re: Last week I finally uninstalled Flash across our office

Recently did the same at home, now I'm feeling justified today.

Surprisingly few websites are broken as a result so quite happy with the decision.

O2 notifies data cops 'for courtesy' ... AFTER El Reg intervenes in email phish dustup

Had the same with William Hill, signed up with williamhill@mydomain, got spam addressed to williamhill@mydomain.

Didn't report it, they are just on my never deal with again list.

Scientific consensus that 2014 was record hottest year? No

Re: Well

"so if the 3 warmest years since the 1800s are in the last decade, that sort of supports the global warming thing right? "

It supports global warming from the 1800's (the end of the little ice age or thereabouts), it doesn't support anthropogenic global warming. Presumably something stopped the little ice age and I doubt there was enough CO2 released in the 18th & 19th centuries to be the cause of that temperature rise.

Up until the late 90's there was a correlation between increased CO2, due to mankind's industry, and temperature, but that correlation between the two appears to have broken down in the last 15 years.

My conclusion is that no one knows yet but that further study is warranted before governments start taxing the crap out of us and telling us how to live.