Posts by MinionZero

So much for nothing to fear...

This case shows government databases are even putting peoples lives at risk and at the very least crooks are using the data from their own gain at our expense. Yet the government keeps on wanting us all to believe that if we have done nothing wrong, then we have nothing to fear from ever more government databases.

Its interesting the database building control freaks see the answer must be to add ever more control to protect the ever growing numbers of databases. Its control onto control. Lets add more control. Can they find any solution that doesn't involve seeking ever more ways to control people. It shows their thinking centers on control and its inconceivable to them that their control isn't going to become total control. So as they fail to have total control, so we end up with crooks stealing data for their own gain. Wow, who would have guessed that. Clearly not the myopic narrow minded control freaks. Who are we to fear most? The crooks who steal data for their own gain, or the government and council crooks who lie to us, take our money, and then seek to control us ever more for their own gain? Both the political people and the crooks behaving the same way. Who would have guessed. Two minority groups in society, both control freaks, both seeking to manipulate everyone else for their own gain and both competing with each other to gain control of everyones lives for their own gain. There is a pattern emerging here. The people we need to fear are the control freaks who seek to control others regardless of which group they belong to.

The fact councils have already sold on a lot of our details for their own gain is reason enough not to ever trust them with yet more information for their own gain. We are being ever more violated by the control freaks for their own gain yet brainwashed by very evident lies its to protect us. It seems its more to protect them from all of us stopping them robbing us of tax payers money. It clearly doesn't protect people when it can be used to exploit people and even worse, as this case shows it can even risk peoples lives.

The control freaks are the ones we need to fear. So the solution is to side line the control freaks and prevent them gaining power over peoples lives. The control freaks are a small minority in each society and so the answer is for the majority of people to finally stand up to the minority of control freaks, then finally, they will no longer have any power and then finally we can build a fairer and safer world without their greedy manipulation and control.

The Hollywood business model...

I don't know what is more sickening. The idea they will remake it or the idea they most likely will earn money from a rehash and so consider it a success, when all they are really doing is cashing in on it and fooling people into seeking it. (See Day The Earth Stood Still 2008 for details of how to totally screw up a film yet make over $150M dollars from the hype). Bit like the marketing methodology used in the video games industry for the game "Rise Of The Robots", which was so bad its gone down in history as an example of a hype sold product. It seems scamming people is the new Hollywood business model. Oh hold on, that's the old business model used by some films, just taken to news levels of exploitation.

"where are they going to get a co-star who is as sophisticated and sexy, simultaneously, as Jenny Agutter"

Ah yes :) ... Jenny Agutter ... My vote is for Jennifer Love Hewitt. She also has it all. :)

Terminator icon, because the remake most likely will have a disney song singing, Album selling, killer robot Vampire Werewolf from the planet Cola sponsored by guess which companies.

Control Freaks

@Steve Roper: You have been reported to the Thought Police and Room 101 is being prepared for your arrival.

@Steve Roper: Joking aside, (well half-joking these days), I totally agree with everything you said. Ultimately they angle everything so that they are in control and they profit from being in control and they are determined to maintain their central importance no matter what comes along.

The problem with the Control Freaks is that they never have enough control, so they are always seeking ever more ways to add to their power to control. Many of them in positions of power show clear signs of Narcissistic personality disorder which in hindsight isn't such as surprise as Narcissism provides a competitive advantage in very competitive environments like politics and business so they are naturally better able to fight to the top in power at the expense of others around them.

Very Narcissistic people spend their lives seeking power over others out of both fear and desire. Fear because Narcissistic people fear anyone having power over them like they suffered when they were a child but they would never admit they are driven by fear and react with anger and deceit when confronted with their behavior. Hence they are never happy when they have money and power (even when they have millions in the bank they are still not happy) and so are always seek ever more money and power and always fear others gaining power over them. Also as they are so preoccupied with their self-righteous lust for ever more for themselves, they are not thinking about how their actions cause harm to others hence their lack empathy towards others. In fact some even resent thinking about others out of anger at how they were once treated so consider it fair game to behave the way they do. (The same logic all criminals use and they also don't want (and fear) others having power over them. Its also why they develop such good acts of being so strong because its actually driven out of fear, but would react with extreme anger if ever confronted about their fear and yet their anger is driven out of fear of anyone ever seeing or knowing about their fear. Its why criminals often show extreme Narcissistics like patterns of behavior. If they show fear then that risks others gaining power over them so they will never show fear).

It makes me wonder if we ever had a world of plenty we would still have extreme unfairness as this troubled minority would still seek to hoard as much money and power as they can for themselves at the expense of everyone around them and then seek to dictate how everyone else should live their lives. Yet wars are fought over which of them want to be in control of us all, with them selling us all FUD to make everyone follow them by demonising the other side, yet they are all showing the same psychological pattern of behavior. This minority of relentlessly power seekers are determined to undermine others so they can gain ever more power over others. Its why the growth of their power has to be reined in from time to time otherwise they become ever more self serving at the expense of everyone else. Its when the pain of their control becomes so unbearable that societies finally rise up and throw them out of power, then the pattern repeats again with more of them getting into power. Its like societies around the world are in oscillation driven by the pressure caused by the behavior of this minority in society and everyone else suffers (and even dies) because of it. When is the world going to wake up from this nightmare and finally stop them being so unfair to everyone.

Media feeding frenzy and the crazy surreal insecure world of showbiz...

"while the web demonstrated that it is not always the best medium for finding out the news that really matters"

I was watching in real time last night online and on TV as the news broke. It was very evident the TV people were using the Internet news as their main source of initial information. The first mention he died came from TMZ who were them quoted by TV people about the unconfirmed death, and then as soon as the LA Times web site joined TMZ in publishing he had (maybe) died (as yet unconfirmed), then suddenly all TV companies all jumped at the same time onto the bandwagon very evidently desperate not to be left behind in breaking the news. It was like watching a media shark feeding frenzy. They might just as well been shouting, "hey look at us" ... "hey look at us". They were all trying to out do each others news. They wanted to be first to say something new. It was blatant and yet all of them had nothing new to say before any official word was given, yet were desperately filling time asking the most insane questions to anyone they could get on the phone or in front of a camera.

Watching the news coverage was really kind of surreal. At times the TV interviewers were lacking more than a bit of empathy, but anyway, the Internet was definitely fueling the initial information. It was amazing watching it spread in real time. I think everyone was surprised he died so suddenly and I'm sorry he is gone. The world now feels a bit more boring, without one of its top freaks on the showbiz circus freak show circuit.

I don't however believe in holding people like him up as some kind of role model as some parts of the media are doing (thankfully The Reg isn't ... I love the comment about "fans old and instant"). He wasn't a role model he was very clearly psychologically seriously messed up and if it wasn't for his money and fame and the power that gave him, he wouldn't have been able to avoid so completely; people seeking to get him professional psychologically help. He is no role model. Endless attention seeking like him is a disorder not a virtue. So however someone like him perfects their ability to gain the attention of others, (in his case music and dance) its still driven by a disorder and still caused by a childhood lack of parental attention as with all people like him, who are usually classified as having Histrionic personality disorder (HPD). In his case, a very extreme example. So its no wonder other people with HPD will look up to someone who can gain so much world attention as a major role model. But that is no reason to emulate them. Plus as they are HPD they give very overly emotional performances on camera as they talk about him. Yes its sad he is gone, and especially so for his family, but come on, some of the fans are so way over the top. Its like they are going for some kind of Oscar performance for best grieving fan. His music was good (back 20 years ago), but I find it some what sick he is being held up by some parts of the media as some kind of top role model. Maybe they seek attention as he did and so also see him as their role model. It makes complete sense, the pattern fits and it also explains why some seek working in celebrate news media as they also want to be part of that crazy surreal insecure world.

The irony is so often HPD people try to prevent others seeing the real reasons why they behave the way they do (and give any other explanations as cover) and thats stopping everyone else seeing how to help them have a happier life, resulting in them ending up having very unhappy lives no matter how much money and fame they get and that is also Michael Jackson legacy as much as his music, his money and his fame. Yes his music was good, but he was very mixed up and he suffered for it.

To all Politicians: We have had ENOUGH! Stop DPI or loose your jobs! - Your move!

"we also have to secure our position in cyber space in order to give people and businesses the confidence they need to operate safely there."

Secure from whom? ... What Security? ... I'm way past confidence into outright distrust bordering into growing outrage at the moves now being made against us all. The next step for many like me is to go from outrage into militant anger at the politicians for failing to protect us from outright exploitation, not by criminal groups but by profoundly arrogant, empathy lacking, morally vacant minded companies.

The Internet is growing ever less safe the more so many groups want to use the Internet as a means to spy on everyone. All ISP spying should be made illegal. Its like the post office opening ever letter then using what they read for their own financial gain. How the hell can that be tolerated other than by dangerously ignorant Politicians who fail to understand what companies like Phorm are actually doing to people.

If the politicians are so incapable of providing protection against DPI (who don't even know what DPI is and what it does), then as they can't protect us, their ignorance of the dangers is forcing us all to develop ways to protect ourselves. Politicians are paid to do a job. Central to that is to protect us. If they cannot do that job its time to fire them and find someone who can do the job.

No more opt out cookies from companies like Phorm. Its a blatantly untrustworthy means to appear to protect against them spying on everyone and they know it. Its why they use it. Phorm companies provide no service to any online user. They only provide a service to the people who buy stolen information from Phorm. Phorm's sales pitch words are a cover for them wanting to blatantly exploit people too ignorant to know how they are being exploited.

What companies like Phorm are doing is laterally Privacy Rape of us all. Its about time such strong terms were used and spread around the Internet against Phorm, to finally shock and inform all non-technical users exactly what companies like Phorm aim to do to users. Phorm is a total violation of us all for their financial gain. Stop all DPI now!

logistical nightmare?!? ... to say the least

"It’s been a logistical nightmare getting all the actors together and available for shooting on the same days"

Yeah I bet it has ... A few of them are dead!

Still, joking aside, I can't wait to see it! :)

... ummm... no not see it like my joke, that would be kind of way too scary, even for Doctor Who!.

Thunderbirds are go ... for private backing...

It would be awesome to see a Gerry Anderson backed CGI Thunderbirds. I'll happily pay for the entire series DVD set now before they make it!

The only way these days is to side line and totally bypass the control freaks like Michael Grade. They have lost their way. They are not producing television the majority of people want to watch and their job is ever more about corporate greedy and power struggles than it is about program making. Same with the film executives.

(Reality TV is cheap TV based on the human exploitation. E.g. how to make a reality show... (1) Exploit some attention seeking Histrionic Personality Disorders in a room in front of cameras then (2) throw in a few control freak, empathy lacking, Narcissistic Personality Disorders to stir up the mix to treat the HPDs unfairly to get the HPDs emotional (not difficult) ... then (3) film for 6 weeks and call it television). (4) profit.

Forget ITV. Please get private backing because as soon as any scifi show relies on any TV channel for support then TV exec's know they gain power over the show by threatening its survival, which is what they love doing as its gives them power to control and force for better profits out of shows. (See Fox for details).

The solution must surely be to go for private backing. Then sell the episodes to every other channel in the world combined with strong plans for DVD releases plus exploiting other revenue avenues such as product licensing for a new generation of toys as spin off products to pay for the shows. People love Thunderbirds. With the shear strength of the Thunderbirds fan base, surely someone (outside of TV companies) can see the huge business potential in backing a new series and spin offs.

Intelligence and covert policing for the 1984 century...

I don't think a regional cybercrime squad is enough. We need local cybercrime squads as well. Then we can add in community neighbourhood watch cybercrime squads, policed by loyal state citizens.

Shhhsss... Its good to see they know how the Internet really works. All this remote access virtual world stuff is clearly for amateurs. Real professionals have a wifi enabled street corner bobby on the beat kind of in your face style 21st century community policing methodology. Real cutting edge stuff.

I know, why not have a centralised e crime centre, which sub-contracts arrests and other foot work to regional normal police teams. That way they only need one kind of local officer. But I guess that'll never happen as they are to busy playing their power games of who has the biggest most important team with the highest arrest records. Which goes a long way to also explaining why they now want to expand their team into e-crimes. Its business development for people who don't have a trade. More money for the heads of bigger policing departments, all played out to the sound of the team leaders jostling for power.

Meanwhile, "Janet Williams, head of intelligence and covert policing at the Metropolitan Police, is pushing ACPO's e-crime strategy."

Huh, what? ... say that again?!? ... ok, first off, "intelligence and covert policing" ... err ok, spying in other words. Then we have the spy department wanting to extend its department using an e-crime strategy. Ok I can understand international spies. They are the famous real James Bonds and been the subject of so many films for many decades. Them I understand, but local spying? ... using an e-crime strategy. That's moving into a very dodgy area. That's home land spying. Where does policing end and home land spying start?

We seem to be in this continuous growth phase of policing of the Internet as they continuously sell FUD about the Internet as an excuse to gain power over the Internet and therefore effectively power over all of what people say online. When are they planning to draw a line, or is it feature creep all the way until we have a total Big Brother world?

@Constantly Amazed:

James 85: "I am constantly amazed that, when information is so pervasively, easily and immediately available, people check facts and other information presented to them so infrequently."

I totally agree. Unfortunately too many people are way too trusting. They fail to test knowledge and simply want it spoon fed to them. They don't want to look for answers themselves. These same fools complain when mistakes are found in sites like Wiki's as they fail to see them as simply starting points for further searching for information to cross reference what they read.

They completely lack any Critical Thinking skills. Its no wonder so many confidence tricksters find an endless stream of people to trick into anything they want.

The scary thing is these overly trusting half conscious morons help vote in politicians. Which goes a long way to explaining the whole history of world leaders and how they are able to get into such extreme positions of power to be able to commit so many horrific crimes seen throughout history.

Ultimately the lack of critical thinking is one of the biggest problems the world faces because of the knock on effects of failing to stop some people who are so willing to exploit such a lack of critical thinking. But then there are some (often in high places) who wouldn't want critical thinking to be taught to people as it would prevent them getting away with what they do.

They work for us and they have proved they can't self manage...

...so now its time they were forced to work for us.

The publishing and regulation of MP expenses is nothing more than a PR smoke screen to imply they are improving but they keep proving they are not improving. So much hidden data is proof they don't want to be accountable. Another example is the new RBS boss pay deal today for £9.6m with our money. Its yet more proof time and time again they keep helping themselves to take our money to help themselves and their rich friends.

Its going to take totally independent monitoring of their expenses in an incorruptible way. I want uncensored details to be released in a machine readable format in a stream so we can data mine them as they use our money. They work for us with our money, if they don't like it thats tough as its our money. They take the job on the basis we can independently monitor where our money is going. They can release a lot more data than they have currently. For example, after they have traveled, its safe to tell us as they are not there anymore. Anything else is them hiding their true motives of going to meet people they don't want us to know they are meeting. Enough with their lies and secrecy as they play their power games.

Also their home addresses are not secure as I'm sure anyone determined can find that data but even then, they can still hide addresses by simply assigning a number to each address, so our money going into each new house they have can be caught even without us needing to know its address. Any new houses just add another number and never reuse numbers, so its a unique ID per house, so we know where our money is going.

Anyway the details can be worked around. The core point is they work for us. We need to automate data mining them. Humans need to be out of the loop, so no chance to corrupt them to stop them monitoring MPs and its one law for all MPs. They have declared open season on data mining us using our money to monitor us! ... So now its time to data mine them. I'm sure many programmers would be only to happy to spend time developing ever more complex ways to data mine MPs to keep an automated watch on how they work for us with our money. We can then highlight anything not fitting usual patterns of behavior and bring that to our attention.

I also want this applied to all money used in the past at least 30 years as 4 years isn't enough. Considering the amount of money stolen by them in just the past 4 years, then how much more money have they stolen over the past few decades. We need to know so criminal charges can be brought against them. They have all proven they cannot self manage. So now if they still want the job of representing us, its time we directly monitor our parliamentary representatives and what they do with our money. They work for us.

I just looked up "Show Trial" ...

Show Trial: "–noun (esp. in a totalitarian state) the public trial of a political offender conducted chiefly for propagandistic purposes, as to suppress further dissent against the government by making an example of the accused."

So it is a “Show Trial”. The US political puppets work for the corporations and then make laws for them, and so now we get this high profile show trial with ridiculous amounts of money uses as a big warning to all. So now we have to watch them publically punish their defenseless sacrifice on the altar of their greed. Well at least we now know who is our boss. Thanks. Everyone won't do it again. Everyone head bowed down now in respect for our rulers, for they have spoken to us all.

The current music industry business model is broken so nothing they do to prop it up will prevent it failing, no matter how threatening they get, as they try to drag us all down into some kind of totalitarian police state so they can watch us all. They need to move to earning money from a performances style business model. Live streaming events, so music moves back to its oldest business model of payments to see performances which worked for hundreds of years. As broadband finally gets better they will be able to have global audiences watching their performances worth millions. Then music can be given away for free as promotional material to build up fan bases to encourage people to see the performances. Also for really big name stars they can also stream the videos to nightclubs around the world for truly global events on scales never seen before. But the fat cats won't want that business model as it brings bands closer to their fan base and squeezes out the fat cat rich control freak middle men.

Its only bloody music, its not that important and certainly not worth changing the whole of society simply to give the music industry what it wants. I would sooner it died rather than let it create a global police state. (But it won't ever die out as there will alway be people willing to play and write music and even perform it for free simply to get the buzz of being on stage). So this battle isn't about saving music, its about maintaining profits (and control) from a dying business model.

Lock in clause? - What other political games do they play with our money?

Its a fascinating insight into the minds of politicians. Add political booby trap lock in clauses into contracts designed to discredit anyone who attempts to undo what they want done, as it then makes them look like they are wasting money. Wonderful, thanks!

So much for just doing a good job. I guess that's to much to ask for. Also yet another way they waste our money. Still its good to see an MP highlighting this manipulative booby trap lock in game rather than falling foul of it later. Usually MPs only act out of self interest and then try to tell us their moves are for our own good.

Oh hang on, if he didn't highlight it now and had to change it later, then its in his own interest to highlight it now to the public. Ah ok, now it makes sense. For a moment there, I thought an MP had our interests at heart rather than their own.

As for Tories scrapping ID Cards, they know they are unpopular, so by saying they are getting rid of them they know they get more people on their side. Which means they get more power when they get into power. Oh well, still, the MP power hungry self interest principle is still intact. Just takes a while to see through their PR smoke screens.

Anyway, I'll have to remember this political booby trap lock in clause in contracts stunt. Its an interesting chess move to get what they want. The more I see of MP's behaviour the more I detest their thinking. A political booby trap lock in clause, wow, what other games do they play with our money?

Oh ... great... thanks NuLabour...

I love how NuLabour treats my bank account like their piggy bank. When they are finished giving my taxes to their Banker friends, their other friends in the broad band business want some cash as well, so NuLabour decide to dip in and grab some more cash from us all. Wonderful.

Its not as if we don't pay (waste) enough money on taxes already ... but no, now they have to dream up some more reasons to just take more money from us.

Maybe NuLabour wants better broadband in the country because they are getting ready to retire to the country, now they have robbed us all mercilessly for years.

The Times have proved themselves to be two faced hypocrites...

The next time a paper publishes something, and then claims its sources are private, they are doing exactly the opposite of what they have done here. They want anonymity when its in their interest, yet they seek to undermine someone speaking out like this.

Who's side are The Times on? ... was this simply a hidden political move behind this to undermine the blogger? ... Because that's exactly what has ended up happening. Its a typical move that political types use to find any way they can so silence people's opinions. So much for freedom of speech in this country.

But then I guess once they install Phorm like Big Brother technology in every ISP, we will never again hear of cases like this, as they will then be able to silence all opposition opinions before it ever gets spoken about in papers, without the need of the courts to reveal the identities of bloggers.

Also ironically it sounds like this case can now be used to undermine news paper sources once they publish them. Talk about shooting themselves in the foot.

A political stunt?

"Cynics might wonder whether a bill to eradicate poverty is nothing more than a political stunt in the run-up to the General Election."

No really? ... a political stunt ... never.

So how much is it going to cost? ... How much is the directors/Subcontractors/Csars going to earn out of it? ... Where are they taking the money from? ... How much difference will it really make?

And why do I get the feeling the answers are, Lots, Lots, Us, none. So no change there then.

Ever more fear and control... But for who's gain?

Give us more control and we will protect you. Give us control and we will stop people exploiting you. Give us control and you will be safe. Control is safety. If you oppose control you must oppose safety. If you oppose control you must want to exploit others. To harm others. You are the enemy. We fear your kind. You must be controlled. Your lives are better when you are controlled. Our lives are better when you are controlled. We are in control of you. We only want what is best for you. If you don't trust us you must want to oppose our safety. If you don't trust us you must want to oppose our control.

Feel safe citizen. Control is safety. Fear is a warning of danger. Uncertainty is the risk of danger. Doubt is the possibility of danger. We fear danger. We need to know who to control. We need to know who is a danger. A danger to us being in control. A danger to our position of power of being in control. A danger to us. We fear others in control of us. We fear others in control of us and because we fear others in control of us you all need to give us more control.

... Fear fear fear.

The Internet is the biggest danger to their continued control they have ever faced and they know it because people are finally seeing and learning what the people in power are really like and how they think. The Internet is a source of freely shared ideas and that can undermine their control and as always they show how clearly they are ultimately driven by fear. Sharing ideas can hurt their control, just as the expenses claims showed up so well.

Yet if they gain control of the Internet then they keep showing they want to control others, so they prove through their actions they don't want a fair world. They fear a fair world where they are not in control. They want to be in control ultimately for their own gain. But they want us to believe their endless FUD so we give them ever more control.

We have a minority of greedy control freaks on every side of us in every country, each trying to control us their way ultimately for their gain. Its like the human race is stuck in an endless game of Tic-Tac-Toe. Whats the ultimate point of this game? ... The human race is being forced along by a minority of scared greedy control freaks endlessly selling fear so they can gain ever more control.

The whole Internet seems to be heading slowly towards this goal.

HFoster: "This is why official state religion is a bad idea..."

That's exactly my thoughts. Its all part of official state *this* and official state *that*. Who decrees what is official and so who chooses what to censor? ... There attitude is lets censor every other thought out of sight of the ones who need to be lead away from such thoughts.

What makes them think they are so bloody important that they can choose what others should see or learn?! ... Its pure self important arrogance hidden behind a thin layer of false piety. If they had true piety they would have empathy towards others rather than to impose their will on others.

So how long before we have Orthodox political search engines and Orthodox political blogs and Orthodox Internet. Are we going to let the self important censor away every thought they don't like, as they aim to push the world towards a global automated Ministry of Information.

The world is run by control freaks (literally!). The sooner everyone finally stands up to the control freaks the sooner we will have a fairer world rather than being lead by a bunch of self important know it alls who want to manipulate others into their own point of view, ultimately for their own gain, as they then get seen as the high up (self)-important powerful people with control over the thoughts and actions of everyone else.

We have suffered self important people behaving like this throughout human history. Its time to finally stand up to them before they make our lives a bloody misery forcing us all into their ways of thinking and behaving. The battle for the Internet is our time, its now, not in a few years from now. Future generations will resent us all, if all we give them is a means of thought censorship and control over their lives.

What kind of world are we creating?!...

Police Officer quote: "She made a very simple interaction with the police a very difficult task."

What so that's reason to risk killing her?! ... She used harsh words at a police officer ... so thats enough to risk killing a 72 your old woman with 50000 volts?!

My god, what kind of world are we creating where words can be so violently suppressed. Yet we are suppose to just accept this behavior!?!

Its yet another example of how our societies are going backwards not forwards.

Also so much for "land of the free" where this kind of behavior is just accepted against a little old 72 your old woman! ... I've always been suspicious of a country that tries so hard to keep convincing and so brainwashing its people into believing they are free, when the evidence like this video, keeps on showing they are not free. They are just oppressed by a different set of rules and these rules are very clearly backup up by considerable violence.

This shocking case is a warning to everyone and every company...

They should have backed up everything because backups are like building insurance. Its an extra unwelcome expense but its needed to help survive catastrophic events. What they have suffered is effectively like a virtual form of arson totally destroying their business infrastructure.

But that said, its very sad to see the people caught up in this case being forced to suffer so much due to an act of outright ruthless destruction on a massive scale. I wonder how many small businesses are also suffering now they have had their web sites wiped out and have lost contact with their customers. This act of wanton destruction shows a ruthless intent by this hacker or hackers and they have to be caught. It never ceases to amaze me how a minority of people keep intentionally setting out to inflict suffering on others. They must be deeply troubled people themselves to intentionally want to cause others harm, but that doesn't excuse their behaviour. Bring others down for their entertainment shows what kind of people they really are.

The problem for all of us however isn't just these ruthless evil minded people. The even bigger problem is the result of their actions is going to force far greater controls to be forced on us all, because the authorities will be only to happy to use cases like this, as an excuse to clamp down and monitor the Internet far more closely and they have a valid point. We do need to catch and stop people like this. The problem is however the more power we give a government to clamp down and control people, the more they will use that power for their own gain as well, so its a double edged sword. Dammed if we do and dammed if we don't.

There is however an alternative if people don't want the centralised total government control solution then the only other solution I can see that would work is to educate everyone from school age upwards in basic psychology for their own protection to make sure everyone can see there are people in this world who intentionally set out to harm others and to see why they behave the way they do. Then and only then, would most people finally act to protect themselves and their businesses from the hostile intentions and actions of a minority of people who seek to harm others. Currently too many people in the world are too naïve and trusting simply because they don't understand the mentality of a minority who cause harm to others and sadly its cases like this that show there are people who set out to harm others.

The education route has never been tried on a global scale from school age upwards but it would totally change societies into becoming far more aware of the reasons behind this kind of behaviour and so societies would much more rapidly and strongly move to stop and block this kind of behaviour where ever it was found. The spread of knowledge throughout history has had the potential to help large numbers of people. All it would take is the will to work to spread it and the Internet is now able to spread knowledge far more than at any other point in history. The irony is the minority of people who set out to treat others with contempt so often don't want people to see why they behave the way they do, as it would stop them from getting away with their behaviour and reveal why they behave the way they do. So they intentionally say anything they can to hide their true reasons. Psychologists have learned to see through this behaviour. Its time everyone learns for their own protection.

We have a choice. The education route or the total government control route. Problem is freedom and the Internet only have one of these options. The control route is the end of the Internet as we know it.

That's shocking news

Wow that's so sad. I was already feeling sorry for the programmers at LXLabs because they must be going through hell, but its shocking to now hear the boss has been pushed over the edge by this hacker.

They have got to catch the hacker or hackers behind this.

This seems like a perfect storm of mistakes!

To start with, backups are essential for any web site (in fact anything on a computer), not simply an added bonus feature as Vaserv wishes to treat it. That's a fundamental mistake in their management and now they are paying for their false economy of not properly backing up. Everyone involved should have backups of their own sites as well as Vaserv having mandatory backups. (I always keep my own backups of the entire site for peace of mind as well. That way even if the host burns down I still have my data).

But that said, they have had the misfortune of suffering a shockingly bad hacker with an attitude of pure contempt. The hacker behind this attack is going to do serious time for this. It has to be one of the most expensive criminal hacks of all time?! ... 100000 web sites destroyed! ... the cost of destroying that many is serious money. How many thousands of businesses have been hit?! ... The lawyers are probably lining up around the building wanting to get in on all the ways cases and claims can be generated from so much destruction!

I don't blame LXLabs for being unavailable to most people. Their phones must be running continuously. I feel sorry for the programmers as they are now in the center of a horrific storm.

I don't think the full scale of this criminal action has sunk in yet. The major news channels and papers should be picking up on this.

Another example of why Phorm should be considered as illegal

"NOBODY should be gathering the type of information this company has gathered, users permission or not."

Yeah I was thinking Phorm is aiming to do this kind of thing to the whole UK!

Its just swamp gas from a weather balloon trapped in a thermal pocket...

Or we are all doomed!, doomed I tell you!! ... DOOMED!!! ... Either that or I've had to much coffee this morning!

So anyway, between the alien invasion and the rise of the robot (ships) we are doomed.

Maybe the aliens and the robots are working together?! ... It makes sense. (Well my nurse agrees). The answer is simple. The aliens and robots just (for a laugh) throw some flares at the fleshlings and point their gun at them, then watch them scatter and hide.

Anyway I have to go now, its time for my medication (for some strange reason it glows green).

A perfect example of utter corporate contempt of everyone.

The utter contempt of this company never ceases to amaze me. They are a perfect example of why laws are needed to protect everyone from companies like this. This company has no empathy at all for its intended victims, which is all of us. We are all to be simply treated like cattle by them for their own gain. Yet they try to lie to us, saying its for our own benefit.

I consider what Phorm are doing is literally theft without any way for me to stop them stealing my data and my privacy.

The current government appears to be too corrupt and too spineless to protect us all from companies like Phorm, so the next government need laws drawn up to put Phorm like companies out of business forever. Nothing less is acceptable. There is no way their exploitation can be allowed to continue. People should not have to rely on their own means to protect themselves from crooked organisations. Most people do not have the technical knowledge to see how they can be exploited and they shouldn't have to. The public is expected to be protected by the state. If the state cannot provide the protection the people who vote them into power want, then its time to fire the people in power. They are there for a job and they are failing totally in the protection of people.

But then as companies like Phorm and this government have proven beyond any doubt, they cannot be trusted, so its time for all data to become encrypted though the ISPs. This issue highlights no company can now be fully trusted any more. They have broken our trust and so its time to force them with law changes. ISPs are nothing more than data carrying couriers. They do not have the right to spy on everyone. We do not expect the post office to open and copy every letter it reads and then sell summaries of all it reads to companies!. Government wake up, that is what Phorm is doing to the Internet!

I don't want Phorm to go out of business. I want all Phorm like companies legally wiped out by Parliament forever. If the people in Parliament intend to keep failing at this task, then its time to highlight exactly which corrupt people are behind helping Phorm. It looks like we may need a few more MP's to be thrown out of their jobs over allowing Phorm like companies and so failing to protect us all.

A Police State is for their gain not to help all of us ... as always. :(

@Eddie Edwards: “The only question “ your comments “raises is who the fuck” is Eddie Edwards “and why should I care what their obviously biased report says?” ... to use your own words against you. ;)

Joking aside, if you Eddie Edwards, bothered to follow the news of the relentless political power grabs over everyone in the UK and the resulting slide into a Police State run by them, then if anything this group isn't going far enough to highlight the full dangers of a government that seeks such total power over its people.

Its people like you Eddie who fail to see governments manipulate people all the time. Its simply part of the game of getting into power and holding on to power. Knowledge is power and so more knowledge is more power. People who seek power therefore seek more knowledge. There's also so many examples throughout history and around the world of how governments try and tried to create police states to manipulate and even silence opposition. They don't want our views, they want to be in power over us all. That's why they seek positions of political power and continue to seek power throughout their lives. Often they are very driven people to see power. If they are not driven, then others more driven will gain power over them. So the most extreme tend to fight to the top.

These kind of people would tell everyone anything to cover up their real goal of self interested Narcissistic greed and seeking ever more power over people for their own gain. Many of them show clear signs of Narcissistic Personality Disorder. They would tell people anything to avoid people seeing them for what they really are. But now since the expenses leak they have finally shown just what so many of them are really like. (Remember as well they tried for years to stop the expenses from leaking out ... that even shows their real two faced manipulative deceitful behaviour).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissistic_personality_disorder

But then judging from Eddie Edwards attitude to Big Brother and hostile phrasing in his post, I suspect he already knows all this and just considers it acceptable behaviour to create a Police State of control.

What's also interesting is how often NPD's do see control as the answer because they fear lack of control. Ultimately fear is behind their behaviour. So any attempt by me or anyone else to reason with NPD's usually fails as their kind don't want to see and hear about logic, because their behaviour is driven by deep personality insecurities. Logic and fairness has no interest to them. They want control.

... and yet these people think we should just trust them with gaining ever more power over everyone as they try to monitor everyone in the UK to create their Police State ... like hell ... these people need help not positions of ever more power over everyone. History has shown so many times just how arrogant this kind of person can be when they gain such extreme power that no one can dare speak out against them.

(Eddie if you can't be bothered to read history books, then just watch this DVD and see how police state power games are played).

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0346293/ (Hitler: The Rise of Evil)

Marry her?!

No wonder he didn't want to marry her?! ... Being married to someone that violent would have been hell.

I consider fireworks (or women who can strangle cats they claim are pets!), is a good clear warning sign to stay away!

e.g. Here's another one: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/05/28/dearest_tinkebell/

Its bad enough just living in a world with crazy/evil people like that, let alone having to actually live with crazy/evil people like that.

Weapon evolution

@Klaus: I expect the complex electronics are in the gun. The bullets only need a timer and a detonator plus whatever is in its warhead.

How long before we get rocket fuel in the bullet so it becomes a complete mini missile able to steer itself around targets and then explode.

Then combine these smart bullets with Metal Storm for real scary next generation weaponry.

It seems such an easy idea that weapon effectiveness evolution is directly inversely proportional to survivability. But its also so scary that this madness continues to be pushed for so much around the world. It simply means that as time passes weapons will find it ever easier to kill everyone. (Plus that is before you even consider any kind of Tech Singularity accelerating advances in technology).

2029 News: The Terminator uprising this morning is going well, with the current scores as follows (for anyone who doesn't want to see the scores please look away now, and place head in sand).

Terminators Score : 6.5 Billion

Humans Score: 0

Play ended, due to lack of humans.

Anonymous?

Just goes to prove there's no such thing as Anonymous these days. If they want to pick you up to punish you, then they can.

Given they way its going, within the next 10 years the Internet will be more like Big Brother than a source of information. How long after that, will the real world end up being watched as closely as the virtual world is starting to get watched?.

Thats a good way to make some money...

Maybe its time to buy shares in A to Z books. :)

Enough, they want Big Brother, time to play them at their own game.

The Government expenses issue highlights just how vulnerable they are to having 24/7 monitoring of their activities forced on them.

As for this “The Lords also said that surveillance should be subjected to judicial oversight, but the Government said that this was not needed.” ... they don't want to be watched or controlled in any way, yet they have shown so many times they want to relentlessly spy in ever more ways on all of us.

Jacqui Smith will never stop with her push towards a police state with her sitting in the middle of the information spiders web. So her and her kind are going to have to be forced into treating people fairly, by forcing a police state on them just as they force it relentlessly on all of us. We need to watch the watchers. If they want Big Brother then they all must be watched 24/7.

We have the technology to publish their accounts in near real time and to then create open data mining sites to extract patterns of activity from their data. Also many journalists would be happy to watch the feeds of data and to extract interesting patterns of activity. That would stop some of the corruption but we need to dig even deeper.

Its all very well trapping corrupt politicians who get paid by companies to change laws that help these companies, but I want to know which politicians change laws which help companies and then leave to go to work for these companies. That's a post dated reward to them for changing the laws and it does happen. We can find this pattern of behaviour by monitoring their careers after they leave politics.

We need to create ever more automated open feeds of information on them and ways to data mine all of them. They work for us. They want Big Brother so its time to give them Big Brother and see how they like it. They want to avoid disclosure of their details yet want to data mine us relentlessly to the point its a total violation of our privacy. We cannot stop them building Big Brother but we can force Big Brother on them. Any attempt to talk with them is pointless as they simply will not listen so we have to force Big Brother on them. They work for us and we pay them. Its time our representatives started to listen to us. They don't want to listen, then they have to be forced to listen. Enough with their greedy self serving corruption and their arrogant contempt for all of us. Big Brother can work both ways and they need to wake up to this if they insist on exploiting every new technology they can to abuse our privacy for their own gain.

If the Government has nothing to hide, then the Government has nothing to fear from us watching them.

Privilege?! ... when was it a privilege?, well maybe for a few! (like her!)

"Coming to the UK is a privilege"

Talk about over inflated view!. She is so full of her self importance. She is the gatekeeper to the great privilege of coming to the UK. Coming to the UK is becoming a sentence not a privilege. Its becoming a trail of endurance to suffer the endless abuses of our way of life, directly because of that arrogant close minded bitch and her rats nest of greedy control freak friends.

And as for this, "I refuse to extend that privilege to individuals who abuse our standards and values to undermine our way of life."

She more than anyone else in the UK not just now, but in living memory, she has done more to abuse our standards and values to undermine our way of life! ... and she isn't even close to finished yet!

As there is no country in the world who has her twisted values and deeply self righteous contemptuous desire to undermine everyones way of life, then maybe we could bundle her into a rocket and fire her at the moon! ... Its the only way we will get rid of her and finally free ourselves from her. After all, we all know our "representatives" in government won't call an election, even though they all know we all want an election. So much for being our representatives. Go the lot of you. Just go!. We have had enough. Every time she opens her mouth my heart sinks and my anger reaches boiling point.

We need a new Oliver Cromwell to throw them all out of their jobs. Go, please just go, the lot of you MPs.

Records all parents in the UK as well...

Cameron Colley: "How will they tell John Smith from John Smith from John Smith... ? You don't get an NI card until you're 16, and not all kids have passport numbers -- so how do they know which child is the one who is being seen by which social workers?"

The answer to this is easy. They just record the parents as well as they are listed as the legal guardians. But the government line is that its really just a database for children, honest! ... yeah right, after all, it will only have every parent in the UK on the database along with their contact addresses and other details! ... in one centralized database, accessible by 390000 people!!!

Triangulating in a hall of silent echoes...

"a backup for satnav location systems using radio "signals of opportunity"."

Sounds great. What could go wrong, after all one of the primary targets is to take down all communications in the city, so the enemy cannot coordinate counter attacks. That means there won't be many signals of opportunity left standing after the first wave of attacks!

Add to this, even if a few transmitters survive being initial primary targets, they will still get silenced by the loss of power generation targets.

Oh and if that isn't a big enough problem, they will find navigation via radio signals in a built up area really fun as Steel reinforced buildings distort and reflect radio transmissions like a hall of echoes. No problem if all you want to do is listen to the radio, but big problem if you are attempting to triangulate and/or time signal sources.

Higher bandwidth

"internet access at 10Gbit/s to homes"

I guess that means the ISP's can cap usage at 3GBytes/Month, so users would be lucky to get 4 seconds before the ISPs excess charges kick in. :)

"would cost up to £29bn"

At the rate the UK is upgrading to faster Internet, £29bn won't be worth the price of a loaf of bread by the time they finish installing it. We need a higher bandwidth broadband but we also need a higher bandwidth of broadband installers.

Morally Corrupt MPs == Narcissistic Personality Disorders

@EdwardP: I totally agree. They are trying find some way to make it seem a serious crime to leak this information. What has been leaked is very much in the public's interest. But the MPs want to seriously punish the person who leaked it and stop people in the future doing the same.

So many of these self righteous MPs show clear signs of Narcissistic Personality Disorder and like all good narcissistic's, they totally fail to see their own actions can be wrong and so they wrongly assume everyone against them must therefore be wrong. Now they want to seek out and seriously punish whoever told on them. (I wouldn't be at all surprised if some MPs just consider their expenses are a private matter and wrongly assume anyone against them is just angry at them out of envy and doing it for political gain. Some will simply fail to see they are wrong no matter what is said against them. Its the NPD way of behaving).

So no matter what is said at these NPDs they are not going to change their ways. They have learned over years to ignore any feedback views against them and so still carry on believing totally in themselves. So just like machines without feedback, NPDs failing to listen to feedback end up running to ever greater extremes out of control, because no one can tell them they are wrong, so they self righteously treat others with utter contempt. Its part of why they lack so much empathy. They are self serving control freaks, but they have spent years learning how to twist their words to make it sound like they do it all for us. Now with the expenses they have finally been caught out showing exactly what they are really like.

Most people still do not realise we are dealing with recognisable personality disorders. Narcissistic behaviour provides a competitive advantage in very competitive environments like politics and business. So the most narcissistic tend to fight to the top, to become the ones in power who make the laws and rules.

All societies needs to finally bring this NPD behaviour to an end. Its got to be punished and the minority who behave like this in each society need finally to be prevented from holding positions of trust and authority, because they lack so much empathy toward others and cannot be trusted to be fair or even to just represent the people who vote them into their jobs. Its the only way we will ever make a fairer, better and safer world.

Great, yet another example of a self righteous Narcissistic.

Internet created "as a place that governments couldn't reach." ... In other words the Internet allows free speech and he doesn't like it. He *wants control* over everything people say and do online because he *fears* what *stupid* criminals use the internet to do.

*stupid* - as only criminals who were total fools would broadcast to the entire world what they were doing! ... There will always be some fools who are caught like this, but that isn't going to catch the worst criminals who avoid electronic forms of communications. They are called organised crime for a reason!.

*Fear* - as its one of the two central driving forces behind the elite in power.

*wants control* - as its the other central driving force behind the elite in power.

Fears and Desires, in this case the desire to be in control and the fear of not being in control. The Internet was created as a means to share information and he doesn't like it unless he is in control of it. Well no one can be trusted with the power to silence the Internet, least of all MPs and their kind. The current fraudulent expenses have proven once again MPs cannot be trusted to misuse powers they have available for their own gain. As soon as they can monitor, censor and control Internet content, they will try to monitor and control political views being posted. Such behaviour is inherent in their relentless desire to be in power over others and they spend years, even decades of their lives learning how to gain political power over others. The power to control and manipulate the lives of the people they have power over. Its central to core underlying psychology of their behaviour, as it has been throughout history. (Of course they would never directly admit it, they would always misdirect attention from their core desire of wanting to be in control. They always word it if as they want to help. Yes sure they want to help, now ever try to tell a Narcissistic they are wrong or doing something the wrong way. They simply don't want to listen. They wrongly assume everyone who disagrees with them is wrong and so they ignore them).

For any society to function fairly then laws are needed to prevent people abusing others, when their own internal empathy and so morality is so lacking. Not all control is wrong, its only wrong when that control is hijacked by the minority of narcissistic people as a tool to use to abuse people even more for their own gain. (e.g. like MPs and Narcissistic companies like Phorm).

Society needs ways to really seriously punish all Narcissistic behaviour, to finally stop it happening and to finally provide real protection for everyone, which is exactly what laws are suppose to do. But unfortunately the laws are so often hijacked, watered down and manipulated by the very people laws are suppose to protect society from. (Which is no surprise because narcissistic behaviour provides a competitive advantage in very competitive environments like politics and business. So the most narcissistic tend to fight to the top, to become the ones in power who make the laws and rules. They would never see their own behaviours as so wrong and so laws always fail to stop people like them. Exactly like the morally corrupt bunch in power in Government now, making their own rules about what expenses they can fraudulently steal from tax payers).

Yet they want us to trust them and people like them with even more power over everyone else's lives. No one in their right mind would trust such morally corrupt, self serving, money grabbing, self righteous minority of elite minded control freaks. Their behaviour has been shown throughout history how once they gain ever more powers over other people, they end up make everyone's lives worse, not better, as they seek to make their own lives better at the expense of others. Exactly what we see in the news now with the fraudulent expenses used to steal from tax payers.

They are voted in by us, work for us and we pay their wages. Its time to force them to see they work for us and they are very much the minority. When the majority of people stand together every government has to listen. This corruption has gone on long enough. Time to change. We need Big Brother to police them and they need to be far more open to us to stop them being so corrupt with our money.

Oh great, yet another example of Narcissistic behaviour.

This advert gives a shocking insight into the mind of advertisers. Their thinking must be along the lines of: Someone has died ... ok how can I use that for personal gain ... I know, I can use this death to scare people into buying stuff from me. Talk about lacking empathy. What a totally narcissistic way to behave. Total self interest and utter contempt for others.

As for skiwear4less saying it "was a newsletter and not an ad" is utter BS. Great its PR not marketing, so they think that makes it different?!. They are totally morally corrupt and I hope the company goes out of business.

While I don't like Big Brother control, this isn't one of these kinds of cases. For any society to function fairly then laws are needed to prevent people abusing others, when their own internal empathy and so morality is so lacking. Not all control is wrong, its only wrong when that control is hijacked by the narcissistic's as a tool to use to abuse people even more for their own gain. (e.g. like MPs and Narcissistic companies like Phorm).

In this case, the ASA has done the right thing, but are so weak as near useless in really punishing this company. Still its a very small step in the right direction for a change, especially these days, but still the damage is done.

Society needs ways to really seriously punish all Narcissistic behaviour, to finally stop it happening to provide real protection for everyone, which is exactly what laws are suppose to do. But unfortunately the laws are so often hijacked, watered down and manipulated by the very people laws are suppose to protect society from. (Which is no surprise because narcissistic behaviour provides a competitive advantage in very competitive environments like politics and business. So the most narcissistic tend to fight to the top, to become the ones in power who make the laws and rules. Exactly like the morally corrupt bunch in power in Government now, making their own rules about what expenses they can fraudulently steal from tax payers).

Manipulative two-faced power seeking control freaks ... for their own gain, as usual.

Sounds like the Intellect Technology Association, is a lobbying committee for set to box companies etc.., who don't want standard open PCs to push them out of the TV market with a standard format. Looks like these companies smell money to be made, so they want to game the system, to cry foul of the BBC etc..

These negotiating PR tactics against the BBC etc.. are just to force the BBC to allow the Intellect Technology Association to take control of their IPTV.

It just shows what manipulative two-faced people are in these companies.

The people in power have a lot to answer for...

So the UK is the 2nd largest military spender in the world!?! ... OMG!

So is all this money for defensive or offensive moves? ... Then again, even offensive moves are pre-emptive defensive moves against some perceived future threat. So in effect, an offensive move is a pre-emptive defensive move. So whichever way you look at it, ultimately it comes down to defensive moves. Therefore why do we need to spend so much money?. What is the UK government so fearful of that we need to be the 2nd largest military spender in the world!?! .. Ultimately this whole behaviour is being driven by fear!.

(But then as governments and military around the world both want to be seen as strong, they would never admit to it all being ultimately driven by fear. That's the last thing they would ever admit. Even the fact they want to be seen as strong and powerful, is in itself an admission that they don't want to be seen as fearful and weak).

In hindsight, its no wonder with so much fear driven military spending like this, its forcing other countries to update their technology fearful of what our lot are up to. Our fear (and the US fear) is driving the world to upgrade out of fear?! ... and our fear is due to their fear. Its a fear feedback loop!

The more I see, the more I'm convinced the world is run by fearful, self righteous, Narcissistic, power seekers. That means the route to world peace is to vote and throw the Narcissistic's out of their political jobs worldwide. Finally we could then work towards a more fair and less fearful world.

What a messed up world we currently have.

I still can't get over it, the UK is the 2nd largest military spender in the world!?! ... OMG! ... This is shockingly bad and we are all paying for it!

Sorry, that isn't even close to a true simulation of a CRT.

If this is being done for fun, then ok maybe just maybe its passable, but even then, it makes it harder to play due to eye strain, which detracts from the game.

However if this is being done for detailed historical research reasons, then they really need to discuss this in detail with old TV electronics engineers, as many of them would be more than happy to help with this kind of historical research. As this simulation isn't even close yet. Its almost totally wrong. Its a lot more like a made up guess of what they think an old CRT should look like, rather than a true simulation of a CRT.

/Disclaimer: I'm going into deep geek mode, look away now if you are easily scared by such talk. ;)

For a start, their simulated pixels are too quantized into individual pixels with a boundary of black. It looks like a black grid is around each pixel and then the pixels are poorly blurred with some kind of crude Gaussian blur function over the edges of the pixels into the black. It gives an overly almost cartoon style guess like take on what they think old pixels look like, rather than what they were really like. (They really need to get CRT monitors next to their LCDs to see the pixels don't look like this).

Also the noise on each pixel looks wrong. Ok the PSUs of monitors and the input analogue signals were not perfect, but they were not that noisy and the phosphor acts partly like a kind of low pass filter on most pixel noise.

A more common feature / fault / effect on some old analogue monitors was to have some signal mismatch resulting in an effect somewhat like a small amount of ghosting. (It was more obvious around one side of brighter pixels). Also the bandwidth of input signals on poor monitors had a somewhat low pass filter look to them.

If they really want to get accurate, then they can also add a simulated Phosphor burn which was common on old arcade games (yes, thanks to this conversation, I'm feeling old today). Anyway, a small amount of phosphor burn would look very effective. :)

Paint

Ok Apple, some years ago I invented something called Paintit (tm).

Patent 1: With Paintit, I can paint the object (with a brush or spray), and the applied layer dries into a hard shell around the object.

Patent 2: With Paintit, I can also paint the object (by injection molding the carbon fiber after its had epoxy applied to the fiber), and the applied layer dries into a hard shell around the object.

Patent 3: With Paintit, I can also paint the object (by injection molding the carbon fiber with epoxy and paint at the same time, so the paint is mixed in with the epoxy resin), and the applied layer dries into a hard shell around the object as part of the epoxy resin.

Patent 4: With Paintit, I can also paint the carbon fiber, then use epoxy on it.

Looks like my patents do everything Apple's patents do.

Shame someone else invented all these decades ago.

But then I don't have the huge PR and marketing budget of Apple, to try to convince people the idea is original.

Phorm and the Government are playing an extremely dangerous game...

@HamsterWheel and Phorm...

Rarely have I seen such a bunch of arrogant, self serving, self righteous people as yourselves. (Yes HamsterWheel, I assume you work for Phorm). Your total lack of empathy towards everyone, in your rampant greedy rush to exploit the privacy of the entire UK is beyond contemptible. But like all good narcissistics, you totally fail to see your own actions can be wrong and so you wrongly assume everyone against you must therefore be wrong. The creation of Phorm shows just such a totally twisted self serving mindset.

Phorm is a truly shocking display of greed at the expense of everyone else, with utter contempt for personal freedom and privacy. There is no freedom in a world where a minority choose to spy 247 on everyone else, but then you all at Phorm know this only too well. Its why you set-up Phorm to exploit everyone for your own financial gain, plus you also get the government ignorance of technology and their greed for information on your side.

Its not misinformation we are listening to about Phorm. There are over 15 million programmers in the world. All programmers know spying technology when they see it. We are not technologically ignorant as you wish to make us out to be, in your attempts to belittle our opinions. Your opt out methodology is as cynically meaningless as your claims that you care about peoples privacy. Simply put we don't trust you and phorm people have shown countless times how driven they are by rampant self serving narcissism, so no one in their right mind would trust Phorm.

The continuous profiling capabilities of Phorm combined with seeking to gain the goal of using it over the entire UK population, is one of the biggest moves towards a Big Brother police state in the history of the human race, yet that police state is going to be managed by a bunch of self serving advertisers with a continuous display of so little empathy towards everyone. Well even political views need advertising and so its no wonder you have the home office control freaks on your side, as they can see many advantages in adopting new technology such as yours.

Phorm have the same story as that self righteous, self serving, evil minded bitch Jacqui Smith. The call that we must use new technology when it becomes available. Phorm and that self righteous bitch Jacqui Smith need to learn that just because we now have ever more technology to abuse peoples privacy, that doesn't mean that's the right thing to keep on doing ever more. For example, just because we have the technology to knock down everyone's door, drag the people out of the house and strip search them in the road, that doesn't mean that's what everyone wants them to do. Same with Phorm, its going to far. Enough is enough and Phorm is going way to far.

If this government wishes to stir up a real storm of public anger against itself, then by allowing Phorm style technology the backlash is going to end up taking down any government that wishes to back Phorm. Remember the people in power are very much a small minority of the population and while the government think they run it all, if the general population decides to stand up and say no more, every government has to listen. Phorm is treading on extremely dangerous ground and the whole scam is likely to explode in your faces and in the government's face, as people get ever more angry at the ever greater controls and spying being force onto them. This self serving, self righteous greed at the expense of others needs to stop, because the more it continues and gets even worse, the more pressure it builds against such behaviour.

On first impressions, it looks very impressive for a fan film.

I'm a big fan of LOTRs and that certainly looks like its raising the bar on the quality of fan films in general, especially in cinematography. Didn't realize LOTR fans were making fan films but in hindsight it makes sense.

The one thing I hope is they get the acting right. The attention to detail in acting seems to be a weak link in a lot of fan films.

I really want to see this film now, but I guess I'll have to wait until next week to download it. I bet their website server gets totally hammered on Sunday. :)

Oh the irony ... for all the laughing at AI, finally here comes the AI's

Its more than a bit ironic fully trained pilots are now not as good as AI auto-pilots plus computer operators. I can see why the trained pilots are getting worried and so trying to resist, as they are heading out of a job and into the history books. Well thats one job the AI's have under their belt. Next stop, we are all out of a job and sitting happily on the beach while the robots cook us lunch.

So which option is it?

Option 1: "remote intelligence work"? ... whats that? ... exactly what is it? ... If thats simply outsourcing searching hard drives to other forces, but still holding onto the physical drive themselves, then ok maybe, just maybe thats ok. Although it places huge trust in the 3rd party not to download evidence which they can then say they found, and hey presto, they have a nice bonus for being such good researchers. (Wherever there are opportunities for career advancement and/or more money, then there's always sooner or later examples of corruption). Probably the only way I can see to make this safe from tampering, is the first thing they do is put the drives into a hard wired (i.e. not a computer) replication machine, so all it can do is do a couple of whole drive copies. Then they can let the "remote intelligence" people search one copy until their hearts content. That should work ok as then no computer is connected to the original drive, its simply copied by a machine that isn't a computer. So then before trial a comparison with an unaltered drive can be made to make sure no remote tampering had occurred.

Option 2: If however remote intelligence means going on a fishing trip using a back door into everyone computer. Then thats another big move (of so many) moves towards a full on totalitarian state, with Jackboot Smith sitting in the middle of the information spiders web, feasting on ever more tax payers money, while looking over everyones shoulders, to see if anyone wants to stop her and her corrupt friends from robbing us all. ... judging from the way Jackboot Smith behaves I'm sure she prefers this option and would do it in a heart beat, if she thought she could get away with it (and she probably thinks she could get away with it, given how she is behaving with big moves towards Phorm style Big Brother monitoring of everyone).

I hope we are talking about option 1 ... because if we are talking about any moves towards option 2 at all, in any way at all, then that self centered tyrannical leader Jackboot Smith will find she is abusing people's privacy to far. That evil minded frankly bitch needs to learn that just because they now have ever more technology to abuse peoples privacy, doesn't mean thats the right think to keep doing ever more. She has the technology to knock down everyones door, drag the people out of the house and strip search them in the road, but that doesn't mean thats what everyone wants them to do. “Think of the terrorrroorrrooorists” isn't the answer to ever more abuse of peoples lives, for the peace of mind of the ever more corrupt plutocratic leaders abusing their position of power.

Utterly dismayed by the mainstream media and its silent acquiescence.

This link between the Phorm and the Home Office should be front page news. It proves how close the Home Office is in talking and listening to Phorm.

Whats even worse is the Home Office is learning from Phorm just what kinds of monitoring it can do and how to use such technology. This is why Phorm's plans for ISPs is so close to Home Office plans for ISP tracking everyone, both using Deep Packet Inspection technology.

The Home Office is planning to put the entire general public of the UK under continuous wiretap style monitoring with more automated profiled of whatever is said and done, more than any police state in the world has ever achieved before!. Yet the main stream press like newspapers are failing so far to pick up on the news! (Maybe the news papers have got so lethargic with telling us endlessly about pointless 5 minute celebrity lives, that they can no longer think through the technical details required to see the Home Office is literally creating Big Brother!).

Democracy cannot truly exist when the elite minority in power know the views of the voters. Thats what 1984 was trying to show. Big Brother violates the principle of the secret vote, which prevents political manipulation of the voters to try to get them to vote and behave in certain ways. The more we move towards vast automated profiling, the more we undermined democracy, freedom and fairness. Its not as if the elite in power are abusing their position of power to rob us all of millions of tax payers money to help themselves and their rich friends, while millions of people risk loosing their jobs and everything.

Its madness this isn't being picked up by the newspapers. We are walking blindly into literally a Fascist police state. Are people so blind that we have to suffer the same mistakes again seen throughout history.

The next step is leaving laws wide open to allow for ever more feature creeps, so ever more people can dream up reasons to monitor everything people do and say online. Then they can slowly over time start to add more hidden punishments like restricting government jobs and government contract jobs to only the politically loyal people. Hold back opponents. I'm sorry your company cannot have this government contract as you employ 3 people who have openly protested online against the current government. This shows your company and employees are not behind the current government and so your company will not get this contract or grant. This will force any company wishing to win government contracts, to weed out anyone politically motivated. That will also help them rid themselves of anyone potentially willing to back the formation of unions to force more fairness out of employers. We have seen that so many times throughout history. Now the police state will be able to gain this kind of information like never before. No one will be able to stand up and speak out against government or job conditions in the future, without risking loosing their jobs or getting punished and held back in other quite ways. How long before we have profile lists sold to companies containing lists of names of people who complain about job conditions online. That would be useful when interviewing people. That would really help avoid empolying anyone who many speak out and stand up to the boss about treating employees with some fairness. Thats just one example of so many ways to manipulate people into silent acquiescence.

Its like the mainstream media has been taken over by mindless zombies!

If you are an MP, then 1984 is an instruction manual.

Criminals will just use ever more complex encryption, or simply not use the Internet to talk, so won't be affected.

Meanwhile millions of innocent but non-technical general public will be profiled more than any police state in the world has ever achieved before.

So much for freedom and democracy.

As for ruling out a central database on “privacy grounds” ... thats an utter lie and direct evidence of government use of manipulative wording. They know it undermines privacy.

At least now the government has finally shown why they haven't stopped Phorm. They want Phorm. But Phorm is more than DPI. Everyone technical keeps getting caught up in discussions about DPI. This isn't about DPI, its about Phorm style technology building automated profiles on everyone. Phorm like technology uses standard data mining techniques to extract profiles of everyone, in effect creating automatic summaries of people. Thats literally Big Brother and its what the government gains by using Phorm like techniques.

The next step is leaving laws wide open to allow for ever more feature creeps, so ever more people can dream up reasons to monitor everything people do and say online. Then they can slowly over time start to add more hidden punishments like restricting government jobs and government contract jobs to only the politically loyal people. Hold back opponents. I'm sorry your company cannot have this government contract as you employ 3 people who have openly protested online against the current government. This shows your company and employees are not behind the current government and so your company will not get this contract or grant. This will force any company wishing to win government contracts, to weed out anyone politically motivated. That will also help them rid themselves of anyone potentially willing to back the formation of unions to force more fairness out of employers. We have seen that so many times throughout history. Now the police state will be able to gain this kind of information like never before. Government employees are profiled now, this technology will simply allow deeper profiling.

I wonder who are the governments real targets? ... Most criminals will not be affected by this police state. Whereas millions of the general public can oppose the MPs and even throw the MPs out of their job. Looking at it from the government point of view, it looks like the general public is a bigger threat to MPs than criminals. Which would explain why the MPs want a police state to monitor everyone who can stand up and oppose them.

We have a right bunch of self serving, truly arrogant, utterly self righteous people at the top.

All employees need to become a lot more business minded to avoid feeling exploited.

Pierre: "Workers are surprisingly loyal given that their employer will very happily fire them instantly for nothing more than a pat on the back from the shareholders"

I agree entirely. Most workers are initially won over by the talk of their bosses and are lead to believe that by working hard for their company, they are then also investing in their own future. Employees are not working for their own future no matter what their bosses tell them. For a start, almost all bosses don't pay what an employee is worth (although they tell their employees they do). Bosses simply pay however low they can get away with. Also employees are not investing in their own future. They are investing in their bosses future. The proof of this, is that employees are not shareholders of the business they work for. That means legally the boss can make them redundant and the employee looses all their hard work, as the boss effectively walks off with their profits.

All employees need to become a lot more business minded to prevent them being so easy to exploit. This would also prevent employees feeling they were being totally unfairly exploited by their bosses. (This survey taps into that feeling of exploitation by offering people a chance to dream about finally getting something back from their company and so a sizeable amount jump at the chance. Although there is a difference between dreaming about selling info to actually doing it. I expect much less would actually do it, but it does highlight how unhappy employees are in their jobs).

I've found the most effective way to prevent being exploited is to judge people by what they do and not by what they say. Ignore totally their excuses and explanations and judge them instead on how they treat others. This works in every aspect of life. So it also helps to see through what a boss says.

I've also found it really helps in wage negotiations to know what my bosses are earning (and what I'm earning them). Everyone can legally find this information out by going to www.companieshouse.gov.uk. (Use their WebCHeck service).

(It only costs £1 per document, and I've found spending £20-£30 the best investment I've ever made. (The documents are end of year financial reports about what shareholders get etc.). Depending on how complex their company is (some bosses run more than one company and move funds between the companies, so its a bit of a paper trail to seek out the company which is really them).

I've found it a real eye opener to see what I've earn my bosses (to the point of being completely shocked at what I've found). It helps put into context what bosses tell me. It also makes me less afraid of feeling guilty to ask for more money in pay reviews and less willing to just work for free for the betterment of the company knowing I'm not going to see a return on investment. Its a far better quality of life to simply enjoy more free time instead. (Unless they are willing to pay me extra to give up some of my free time). All employees need to become a lot more business minded.