* Posts by Gregor

17 publicly visible posts • joined 11 Dec 2008

HP sacks English employees to bag Scots gov jobs cash

Gregor
FAIL

Re: English Taxpayers

RE: Why don't the English get a vote on an independent Scotland - because the principle is SELF determination - i.e., each nation deciding its own future. England is equally able to decide its own future, in or out of the union :-)

As for "English" taxpayers - well, erm, bit of a newsflash, but those in Northern Ireland, Wales and yes, even people in Scotland pay taxes too.

Although Scotland has 8.4% of the UK's population, about 9.3% of all UK spending is up here. Many people would say that that suggests a subsidy, as you have done. What that fails to take into account is that 9.9% of all the UK's revenue comes from Scotland.

So in fact, Scotland subsidises the rest of the UK, not the other way around.

Radiation TERROR on Scottish beach! Except it's quite safe

Gregor
FAIL

Reason for worry

As SEPA say, the issue is that it's starting to escape, and their fear is that it's going to get a lot worse, if more is eroded out.

Nowhere do they say it's dangerous now. In fact, they're doing nothing until February when they hear back from the MoD.

Their worry is how much is down there, and what's still to come up. The long term solution.

I think you need to read things properly before being so quick to have a go.

Scottish gov moans over broadband cash handout

Gregor
Thumb Down

RE: devolution

"You wanted devolution, sort out your own fucking broadband..."

Erm, thanks for that wonderful insight, but broadcasting and communications of this nature is Reserved to Westminster.

Facebook under fire over Israel, transgender bullying

Gregor
WTF?

'Sorry the link you are trying to visit has been reported as abusive by Facebook users'

I get that ALL of the time, I have no idea why.

The last two 'abusive' links were to a link in the Scotsman Newspaper about changes in MoD staffing, and a link to a PDF factsheet on ScoutBase - run by the UK Scout Association.

Evidently, both awful!

Scotland allows collection of children's DNA

Gregor
Happy

Nice rant, shame about the facts.

"Scotland has been held up as a model for England and Wales to follow on what DNA to gather and store, and how."

Let's hope not now the ID Card pushing, civil liberty crushing, privacy hating, state identity managing Labour party are out of power in Westminster."

Erm, Scotland's model is held up as a model because it DOESN'T keep the DNA of innocent folk. Unlike the system in England and Wales, innocent people's DNA is removed from the database.

Extreme porn now illegal north of the border

Gregor
FAIL

"How s the CPS going to prove that the sheep/horse/other animal didn't consent?"

I would suggest that they wouldn't, what with the legal system in Scotland being rather outwith their jurisdiction.

Games developers demand tax breaks

Gregor
FAIL

Small factual point

@ the first AC.

The UK is slipping down the rankings quite rapidly - because most of the other big gaming nations (Canada, France, Japan and Korea or whatever) give tax breaks to the industry - they don't charge VAT on R&D for example. We wouldn't be the first, we'd just be joining the rest of the world...

Office 2010 to come loaded with WGA's bastard child

Gregor
FAIL

Hmmm

"In 2008, 41 percent of software on the world’s PCs was obtained illegally or used without a license… That equates to more than $50bn in losses for the global software ecosystem"

1) Ecosystem? Really?

2) 41%; presumably a figure pulled from thin air?

3) $50bn in losses; see point 2.

I really must disagree with their working out of how much money was 'lost'. I mean, take photoshop, that's a few hundred quid. I would suggest rather a lot of kiddies playing with it can't afford it - if they couldn't crack it, would they buy it? No, they'd use something else. One cracked copy of something does NOT equal the cost of the software 'lost', that's just wrong.

Also, sticking with Photoshop as our example, if everyone who used it paid full price for it, surely Adobe couldn't justify such exorbitant prices any longer? I'm sure plenty of business up the cost of their software to compensate for this 'lost' revenue.

Is Gordon Brown safe to work with vulnerable people?

Gregor
WTF?

Flawed, flawed, flawed

Please remember that Gordon Brown's constituency is in Scotland; our laws on this are rather different (yes, shock horror, PM's plans don't affect his own constituency).

I would proposition he would need a basic Discolsure if he were to be working with children, perhaps an enhanced Disclosure if he were to be left alone with vulnerable people.

In Scotland, you CAN get an individual Disclosure, for yourself (for the self-employed and the like), or you can get one through a parent organisation. Where you got the idea that these 'umbrella bodies' would charge a fortune, I don't know. But if they are a voluntary group, they certainly would not be charged.

Yet again, El Reg is trying to apply English law in Scotland. It won't work. CRB checks, the ISA - none of these apply North of the Border.

Euro Parliament agrees roaming caps

Gregor

There is a data cap

Of a euro a meg - did you not read the article?

I think what people are missing is that these figures are for companies charging other companies - so for example, how much o2 have to pay your host network when you're in France, and using your phone.

It has no direct consequence for customers, although the domestic watchdogs will go a tad mental I think, if they're continuing to be too ridiculous with it.

Tory terror police were 'fishing' for Liberty

Gregor
Unhappy

Yet another example

of the Government overstepping the mark. I do not like the Tories, at all, ever, but they are Her Majesty's Opposition, and should be protected in the fullest extent of the law when they are fulfilling their duties accordingly. These duties include holding the Government to account.

I'm not even going to waste energy discussing the uselessness of the Speaker.

Students Union reps vote to ban cheap booze for students

Gregor
IT Angle

Just another reason

I'm exceedingly happy that my Student Association is not a part of the NUS.

Scottish Parliament pr0n law faces angry opposition

Gregor
IT Angle

"English Parliament"

In the story.

"English Government" in the comment prior to mine.

When were such institutions established?

If people cannot get such basic facts right, how can we be trusted to believe anything else they say?

Prime Minister out-nonsensed by Conservative Wikifiddler

Gregor
Paris Hilton

@ Ian Ferguson

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl-Theodor_zu_Guttenberg

That wasn't too difficult now was it? :P

Went to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_government then http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabinet_of_Germany to see the full list of ministers, picked the one I want.

BBC pumps 60 quid a head into Gaelic

Gregor
Unhappy

The only problem

I'm not going to comment on the xenophobic comments or the blatent lies. Rather I will rise above the petty squabbling and comment on the article's points itself.

The problem with BBC Alba is that no one can see it. It's only on Sky and now FreeSat. How much of the Gaelic population can receive that? I live in a city where I can get 100meg FTTH broadband, but I still can't see this station.

The channel needs to be shown on Freeview, and Virgin.

Opera sings praises of Microsoft-browser statement

Gregor
Stop

A few facts

I hate to rain on some incredibly silly folks' messages, but I just thought I should clear things up..

Norway isn't in the EU.

Opera is a Norwegian company.

Therefor, Opera isn't an EU company.

This is not an example of cronyism.

Furthermore, this is about being able to remove IE, and to prevent you *having* to use IE. It's not about bundling things in or not, like the WMP debate at all, Opera do not necessarily wish Windows to ship without IE. This is about MS forcing you to use IE for things like Windows Update.. And also about being able to remove IE from the system altogether.

If you so wish, you can remove Safari from OSX. From my machine, I can remove Safari, Chrome, FF, Opera, but not IE.

As for the Americans thinking the EU has the power to remove programs from machines already out there, just wtf? Your ignorance is frankly, astounding.

I think this can only be a good thing, if it goes ahead, as at least it will force people to think about what they're doing with their machine. And it will be amazing to see the vast increase in security of any Windows box post-IE.

Microsoft's Silverlight 'so good' it claims Netflix tech jobs

Gregor
Paris Hilton

Maths?

If you had 75 techies, and now have 15 - how many did you lose?

At the school I went to, it was 60.