Re: In summary then ...
It's like suing a central bank because you dumped your cash in a fire. About as valid a legal case, at least.
Posts by streaky
1721 posts • joined 5 Jul 2010
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I own that $4.5bn of digi-dosh so rewrite your blockchain and give it to me, Craig Wright tells Bitcoin SV devs
Web3: The next generation of the web is here… apparently
Thursday 16th December 2021 03:11 GMT 
Yikes
Rumour has it you couldn't edit web 1 and you certainly couldn't own bits of it (this was actually said, in testimony to congress, by a supposed expert, I shit you not), or something (presumably the infra was all owned by aliens and the lizard people and all the content was written by AI, or something).
I hate people and don't want to live on this planet any more - it's these sorts of morons who don't know what they're actually doing who are advising governments on a pandemic that should have been over last Northern Hemisphere summer but for the dragging it out with explicit intent of feeding cash into the mouths of the likes of Pfizer.
Sigh.
Kremlin names the internet giants it will kidnap the Russian staff of if they don't play ball in future
Sovereignty? We've heard of it. UK government gives contract to store MI5, MI6 and GCHQ's data to AWS
Windows 11: What we like and don't like about Microsoft's operating system so far
Tuesday 20th July 2021 01:47 GMT
Power Users
Pretty clear Microsoft hates us. This is about all. I have many complaints - the biggest is the new taskbar; Microsoft have spent a lot of effort over the last decade or so making it harder and harder and harder to switch between tasks, now it's all but impossible - the more wider monitors are a thing (I have a super-ultrawide myself) the more Microsoft go out of their way to pretend everybody uses a portrait monitor and nothing else.
7+ Taskbar Tweaker used to resolve these problems and make Windows 10 usable, now it can't because they've reengineered how it works. If you only use a single browser window and that's your day - great, but you might as well just have a chromebook. I have a lot of horizontal real estate, let me use it please, Microsoft.
The snaps thing, yes, again, super ultrawide, super useful. A lot of third party apps including one of MS' powertoys let you do this kind of stuff before but nice to have it in there - but you see how this conflicts with what they've done with the taskbar? They pretend everybody is using 4:9 monitors with the task bar, but yet include stuff that's useful for those of us with 32:9 monitors. Very bizzare.
The good news is that the wsl2-wsgl stuff works extremely well so maybe we can dump the shell entirely and just use gnome, kde, xfce or whatever. Could be an option worth exploring.
OVH data centre destroyed by fire in Strasbourg – all services unavailable
Palantir and UK policy: Public health, public IT, and – say it with me – open public contracts
Tuesday 2nd March 2021 09:19 GMT
Public Data
The benefits to society of open data about a reasonably large nation's health that can be mined and new things found that weren't known before, potential treatments, being able to spot disease clusters before anybody really knows they are happening and all the other things you can do with this data are obvious - properly curated and well anonymized by people who know what they are doing of course - and it probably isn't illegal here what happened given it is actually, technically the government's data to basically do what they like with in our law; I personally want to feel like taxpayers are getting value out of that data and in this case I don't feel like we are. That's what really matters here.
'Massive game-changer for UK altnet industry': BT-owned UK comms backbone Openreach hikes prices on FTTP-linked leased line circuits
Microsoft warns against SMS, voice calls for multi-factor authentication: Try something that can't be SIM swapped
Friday 27th November 2020 04:47 GMT
Re: U2F
I usually register 3 keys, one on my keyring, one sits in a fire and water resistant lockbox and the other normally stays at my parents' house. Having just one key is nuts, you're absolutely right. If you can backdoor it using email or sms or something then there's no point in it - most services that support it offer recovery codes, which is a little questionable but I keep them in a password vault that supports secure notes, although that is secured by.. U2F so probably not practical :)
My biggest issue I'm having with U2F (which should be *universally* supported by now, it not being by banks, Paypal et al is criminally negligent) is dumbass companies who support U2F and *then* force you to click an email link or something after, so dumb..
Iran sent threatening pro-Trump emails to American Democrats, Russia close behind, says US intelligence
Four years after Europe sorted this, America is still going around in circles on data privacy in stuffy hearings
Wednesday 30th September 2020 04:03 GMT
Re: Yikes.
"that the eu gdpr is objectively better for consumers than the current POSL the us has"
Nice straw man argument, shame that's (clearly) not what we're talking about - quite the opposite in fact. Yikes.
https://tobaccocontrol.bmj.com/content/25/1/108
Facts matter.
Friday 25th September 2020 03:58 GMT
Re: Yikes.
It's not entirely clear that "Europe" didn't make matters significantly worse and we know that the GDPR was *heavily* lobbied to favour the likes of Facebook, Google et al against potential competitors, for example, not unlike what happened with the TPD.
Until the EU sorts out its lobbying problem and outlaws things that are even illegal in the US, it's never going to produce good legislation, on anything.
Fighting an insurer over lockdown payout? UK policyholders just won an important COVID-19 test case
Thursday 17th September 2020 11:05 GMT
Questionable..
How the insurers ever thought they would win given some of the policy wording involved.
TL;DR:
If there's a pandemic, we'll pay out.
There's a pandemic.
We're not paying out, you're not covered in pandemics.
Either these people are covered or you mis-sold many of them insurance, would you like to talk about compensation now or later?
Thursday 17th September 2020 11:02 GMT
Re: I can imagine this will ultimately be a phyrric victory
"And yes, your policies will cost twice as much next year"
That's the nature of insurance, it's a hedge against unforeseen but potential events, that's what you're paying for.
It won't however be priced in such a way that insurers will assume this will happen every year until the end of time, for one thing because such a policy won't be viable.
Brave takes brave stand against Google's plan to turn websites into ad-blocker-thwarting Web Bundles
UK govt reboots A Level exam results after computer-driven fiasco: Now teacher-predicted grades will be used after all
WSL2 is so last year: Linux compatibility layer backported to older Windows 10 versions
Monday 24th August 2020 03:00 GMT
2004
Only way to get out dev/beta rings is to reinstall windows by the way, for, y'know, reasons question mark.
Had to go dev to get the GPU goodies for TensorFlow, not so fun..
That all being said not had any major issues touch wood other than not being able to install MSFS because Microsoft don't test their own software against their own OS, or something.
NCC Group admits its training data was leaked online after folders full of CREST pentest certification exam notes posted to GitHub
Virgin Galactic pals up with Rolls-Royce to work on Mach 3 Concorde-style private jet that can carry up to 19 people
UK space firms forced to adjust their models of how the universe works as they lose out on Copernicus contracts
Dutch spies helped Britain's GCHQ break Argentine crypto during Falklands War
Tuesday 19th May 2020 02:46 GMT
Uhm..
This story is complete bull, UK would have been fully aware. The Dutch probably didn't know the UK would have been fully aware - but even if neither of those things were true the Dutch wouldn't have considered for a second blowing the CIA's op. See the issue?
Utter nonsense story. Complete unadulterated nonsense.
Eclipse boss claims Visual Studio Code is an open-source poseur – though he would say that, wouldn't he?
Rust core devs mull adoption of alternative compiler front-end for improved IDE support
Assange should be furloughed from Belmarsh prison, says human rights org. Here's a thought: He could stay with friends!
Wednesday 29th April 2020 02:56 GMT
Re: Incompetent Also...
whilst prison-states like Iran and Turkey have released one third of their inmates
Yeah when you're locking people up for literally no reason you can do this - Assange isn't locked up for no reason. If he hadn't fought the extradition which always was and always will go through because he has no viable legal argument then he'd be in the US and you never know he might have been bailed - I doubt it but it's possible. Sure as hell aint happening here.
Python 2 bows out after epic transition. And there was much applause because you've all moved to version 3, right? Uh, right?
Zoom's end-to-end encryption isn't actually end-to-end at all. Good thing the PM isn't using it for Cabinet calls. Oh, for f...
Thursday 2nd April 2020 03:37 GMT
Stronk Disinformation
Crucially, the use of the Zoom software is likely to have infuriated the security services
Because? There was like 40 people that we could see ignoring staffers, families and the like. You think they discussed privileged information? Really? Oh dear.. That's not what cabinet meetings are for.
while also raising questions about whether the UK government has its own secure video-conferencing facilities
Nah man they just use Zoom for everything despite the contracts for video conferencing being fairly well publicised.
We asked GCHQ, and it told us that it was a Number 10 issue. Downing Street declined to comment.
As they should.
You people can't possibly be this simple? It's clearly a massive diversionary tactic. Pointless one sure, but lets get a grip? They wouldn't talk about anything of note over the public internet, full stop.
HMRC claims victory in another IR35 dispute to sting Nationwide contractor for nearly £75k in back taxes
Friday 6th March 2020 04:08 GMT
Re: Rigged definition of an employee
what's to stop them then saying that they want years of holiday pay and benefits etc
Depends how you look at it and it could go either way - one way is sure, employees were getting screwed in an inequitable contract arrangement and should be entitled. The other way, and this one will be common is to say that these people knew full-well or should have known full well because they're not morons what the implications of the arrangements they were entering into were. Suspect we're going to find out in court though, but not against HMRC: these cases/tribunals would need to be directed at the employer where they belong.
Employment benefits isn't a matter for the HMRC, by the way.
Friday 6th March 2020 04:04 GMT
Re: Rigged definition of an employee
and also guilty of not providing benefits, etc
That's literally half the reason IR35 exists - if you remember back to the time before this was a thing they were expecting the taxpayer to pick up the tab for things like sickness saving themselves a pile of money, and not paying the requisite taxes for those things in the first place - or put another way taxpayers were getting double screwed.
Friday 6th March 2020 04:02 GMT
Re: Rigged definition of an employee
Its helpful when HMRC have basically rigged the definition of an employee to be be "anyone we think should have paid tax at an employees rate".
No.
What HMRC have done is rigged the rules to say anybody who is pretending to be a contractor yet is for all intents and purposes is an employee for all intents and purposes for tax evasion purposes is an employee and should pay tax like an employee.
It's not hard to guess why people are triggered though, given it doesn't apply to legitimate contractors..
If you're writing code in Python, JavaScript, Java and PHP, relax. The hot trendy languages are still miles behind, this survey says
Quantum compute boffins called up to get national UK centre organised for some NISQy business
Monday 2nd March 2020 07:13 GMT
Ugh.
Bit ragey this thread. Let the yanks piss away cash on the hardware, they're not playing long game: applications of. We learned this with so many technologies over the years and that's what we're world leaders at. The sheer volume of effort we put into the jet engine and didn't play the long game and we got nothing for it other than a few industrial gas turbine makers and a car maker building jet engines - they're very nice jet engines but BA aint no Emirates.
We should be aiming for the Emirates of QC - whatever that looks like - not the Pratt and Whitney.
UK contractors planning 'mass exodus' ahead of IR35 tax clampdown – survey
Friday 14th February 2020 06:06 GMT
Re: Anonymous Contractor
a person is either an employee or a contractor
Except that plainly isn't true. Companies started making people who were *explicitly* even previously employees doing the same job become contractors for the sole purpose of not paying tax they aught pay, people were taking sick pay from the state (i.e. taxpayers) rather than the company who should have been paying it and all sorts of nonsense. That's how bad it got.
The whole thing is *supposed* to be coercive. Everybody involved is supposed to look at the situation and say "oh shit, that doesn't work for us, lets not do the contracting thing and pretend and employee isn't an employee because the tax implications of not keeping it legit are catastrophic" and those employees are supposed to look at it and say to their employer "I'm not playing that game with you, it's not worth my time". Again, to make absolutely clear, it's *supposed* to be coercive to all parties that's why when you come under it then it becomes a horrible nightmare.
Now, if what we're really talking is people who shouldn't be considered employees but are under the system that's a whole different argument/discussion, but it's one that it's utterly impossible to have because of all the noise around people moaning about it doing the job it's supposed to be doing.
It's not that I don't have sympathy, because I do - I got my current permanent job via a freelancing job, I've been there and I get why people freelance. My thing is we need to start by separating the two issues out, telling the people who IR35 actually targets to stop ruining freelancing and contracting and do one; only then can we seriously get into the detail of what the actual problem is.
Friday 14th February 2020 05:58 GMT
Re: Anonymous Contractor
Avoidance is another way of saying evasion. Avoidance is used as a polite term by press because they think it sounds less accusative than evasion. What they mean is they're not paying a tax they should be because they found some loophole in the law. All synthetic "avoidance" measures are now illegal (via catch-all) in UK law are are, in fact, evasion.
Thursday 13th February 2020 03:34 GMT
Re: Anonymous Contractor
> Well, when contractors get holiday pay, sick pay, bank holiday pay etc...
I see we're still confusing legitimate contractors with the people IR35 explicitly targets as what you'd politely call tax avoiders and more accurately call tax evaders.
People targetted by IR35 are explicitly entitled to all those things because they're employees *pretending* to be contractors. That's why IR35 exists.
Because we can't have an adult conversation about the execution problems we can't have a conversation and the government is going to ignore the noise as a result - much like, by the way, Universal Credit - the parallels make my head explode.
Can't believe we're still arguing about this shit. The law is clear. It doesn't affect all contractors. It affects employees posing as contractors. If you're an employee posing as a contractor you're entitled to employee protections.
I know these forums are packed with contractors - and I'm going to get downvoted as a result for speaking truth - I used to be one and I get the pain, but please can we stop confusing who the IR35 is targetting, execution problems (to the extent they exist) and ACTUAL contractors doing contract work - IR35 for the latter being relatively trivial. Our tax system aint that complex and we should stop pretending it is.
