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* Posts by Desk Jockey

264 publicly visible posts • joined 19 Jun 2009

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Watchdog drags Home Office to naughty step for dragging feet on FOIs

Desk Jockey

Some observations

Public bodies have 20 days to provide a response. If they decide that there is a case for refusal, they can respond saying they are doing a public interest test and thus have another 20 days before they have to provide the next response, thus in reality they have 40 working days for complicated FOI requests.

They can legitimately go past that 40 day deadline if there are good reasons, for example having to consult with a foreign government or a company before releasing a document. They need to try to avoid having to do this though and at all times they should be telling the FOI requestor what is going on.

An open and transparent government is great until you realise that you actually need to pay for it! Cutting the staff means people actually doing the work have to stop and deal with the FOIs. Morally fine from a transparancy point of view, but in reality FOI is much abused by journos and other interest groups who are trying to get civil servants to do the bulk of the work for their benefit. The whole process is bureacratic as hell. Having said all that, the Home Office is notoriously incompetent and no doubt deserves the kicking it is getting from the ICO.

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WW II U-boat attacks prompt new US response

Desk Jockey
Happy

only 36?

Don't know what the US is complaining about, the UK has about 20,000 wrecks in its waters with the possibility to pollute. No that is not a typo or made up figure! Sorry, not allowed to give you the source either although maybe the Maritime and Coastguard Agency will have it on thier website?

This is an old problem that many countries have been dealing with for years. It is quite an interesting area of work though.

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Desk Jockey
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Re: Fun fact

Unfortunately the risk of explosion is not as remote as they might wish... It would also be a total nightmare to fix the problem as most of the city of London would have to be evacuated just in case thus the problem has just been ignored. Not the best idea in the world...

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You want to put 3D gun designs on the web? You'll need a 2D printer

Desk Jockey
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Re: @zmodem (Ugh!)

You are right, he is a moron. I hope he is not in charge of anything more dangerous than a computer attached to the internet!

Don't bother taking my word for it, use a search engine like google to search for in depth articles on how people make guns. Stick to concepts about using steel, anything more complicated is a bit beyond you at this stage...

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Desk Jockey
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Re: @zmodem

You have gone off on a tangent irrelevant to this article as the previous poster was trying to tell you.

Whether you make a CAD file for a CNC machine or a 3D printer, it can still be controlled by ITAR if it is about making a weapon and trying to send that file abroad. Anyone in the US can send each other CAD files (free or for a fee) and make their own guns. They need a particular licence to sell that gun, they need an export control licence to sell that gun or send the CAD file abroad.

Not any CNC engineer can make a gun or gun part that a professional would trust. Making such items that wont fail on you at a really bad time requires a certain level of skill and very accurate dimensions. This is because even after a part comes out of the CNC machine, it still needs to be checked or adjusted by hand (scraping edges off for example). Any skilled gun maker has that knowledge, a normal CNC engineer does not although it should not be too hard to teach them.

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Desk Jockey
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Re: ITAR is evil

Yep, you are entirely correct. I spot a fellow sufferer!

The extra-territorial thing is a complete farce as well as being a complete nightmare for those trying to comply with the rules. The fact that the CAD files are being distributed via torrents would make it completely un-enforceable, but I bet it does not stop the State Department from trying! The US can be surprisingly flexible on which parts of ITAR it wants to enforce if you are able to push the right buttons... For all other times, it suffers from OCD!

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Desk Jockey
Happy

ITAR is evil

Nice try there, but I think you will find that weapons design is still controlled by ITAR no matter what medium is used to transmit it in. The damn guidance book on ITAR is an inch thick and can be used as a bludgeoning weapon in itself! You can bet they will get him on something.

Very good point on the personal responsibility though, export licences are very much like that in all countries and deliberately so to stop people selling stuff with an, "I don't ask and you don't tell" policy. In the old days, that was how the dodgy arms dealers avoided going to jail for breaking UN arms embargos.

The correct phrase you are looking for when needing export licences for stuff like zirconium is 'dual-use'. Military use (eg weapons, their parts or design documents) come under military list export controls and are slightly different from dual-use which tend to be a bit more opaque and more about how the item can be used rather than what it was designed for. There was a famous case of exports of Xboxes being blocked from sale to Iraq under dual-use as it was suspected Saddam wanted them to power computers for nuclear weapons manufacture.

Fun to read article though.

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After Leveson: The UK gets an Orwellian Ministry of Truth for real

Desk Jockey
FAIL

Out of sympathy

I don't believe we have a free press. It is nearly all owned by a small group of rich, white men and while this should not matter, in reality it means that those (rather unpleasant) men are pushing their own political agendas through their newspapers. Everything else their newspapers produce are just made up, quite literally.

Investigative journalism is far from dead as a result of these reforms, in fact I rather hope that it will have a revival. A proper investigation by a journalist is usually done by someone with good knowledge, with lots of preparation and research and who knows what line they can and cannot cross. They will be able to prove their work was in the public interest and the regulator will respect that and throw out challenges. It will also throw out challenges by PR companies.

The press right now, is not only a rabid dog that any sane person would stay away from, they actually cause unbelievable hardship. They should hold those in power to account, not camp on victims doorsteps or even impede public services (mention child abduction and watch the press bombard police switchboards while the police are racing against time to try to find the child). While I respect freedom like any other person, I have no respect at all from the press and they should stop whinging and get on with proving that the whole industry is not a complete make-work, that only markets to the lowest demoninator and is capable of properly reporting news. They brought it on themselves.

16 6

Is UK web speech regulated? No.10: Er. We’ll get back to you

Desk Jockey
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Mushroom

Re: The elephant in the room @NSLD

I pretty much agree with you about the wrongdoings of the Met, but this regulator actually would have nothing to do with that. In a proper world, this would still be a crime for the police to deal with, all the regulator would do is refer the matter to the police. Despite the FUD being put out there, the regulator is not going to decide whether what the press did was illegal or not, it is not within their remit nor should it be.

Unfortunately we do need a statutory body even we would rather we didn't. As someone who has had to deal with the press, I can tell you that you would be amazed by just how much fiction they write. I am not talking about opinions or the government is wrong/corrupt sort of stuff I do mean outright fiction about people and events and basic stuff that should be factually reported. Any professional in any other kind of organisation would be fired for such poor quality work. You cannot legislate this sort of thing and you definitely cannot have politicians acting as judges. The whole issue is influenced too much by politics and a small group of rich white men. The whole rotten mess needs a kicking because the newspapers have to get their act together on this, you have no idea just how damaging it is.

Remember when Russia split up and went 'capitalist' after the Berlin Wall came down? (Damn I am old!) So many people in Russia suddenly started acting like gangsters and paying for illegal goods, buying up state assets on the cheap etc because that is what they thought capitalism/democracy was all about thanks to Soviet propaganda. It almost caused a major collapse in their fledging democracy (arguably it did as it created a situation where Putin had to act like a dictator to sort it all out). Our own press are creating the same sort of environment, history has plenty of examples. It is all because too few people have too much control over the information being put forward to the public.

I have sympathy for the concerns of The Register and Private Eye etc as they are getting caught up in this for no fault of their own, but the current situation is simply unsustainable. This problem was first flagged up over 40 years ago and politics and the media did nothing to fix it. Thus the chickens have come home to roost and something has to be done to counter both the power of the media and the politicians.

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Desk Jockey
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Re: The elephant in the room @NSLD

What various police officers did was illegal. Some of them have been arrested. What you are inavertedly suggesting in your post is that the police arrest journalists for doing things like claiming that Jefferies guy was guilty of murdering that girl in Bristol when he was 'helping police with their enquiries'. This one act was completely wrong, everyone knows that, but it is not illegal. What the police did can be fixed by improving the culture and by enforcing the law properly. It has nothing directly to do with journalism.

I would not want the police to be arresting journalists for bad articles because this IS when you end up with a police state. But by the same token, you can't have a situation where the papers can get away with this every day, and they do. Jefferies was probably able to get a lawyer on a 'take the fee out of the big fat winnings' basis, not everyone can do that. Thus some kind of system is needed and it can't be as toothless as the old PCC was.

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Desk Jockey
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Childcatcher

Re: Pile of c**p being disseminated by the media

Whilst I would agree with the sentiment that the politicians are cocking everything up, my response is that they have not done so 'yet'! The devil is in the details and so when the dust settles a bit, the smaller outlets will need to put representatives forward who will scrutinise the wording and make sure the idiots do not write something completely contradictory or stifling.

Just because something may be done badly, does not mean you should not do it at all. And while it would be unfair to punish the smaller outlets for the sins of the bigger ones, they still have to obey the rules. As they pretty much do so anyway, it should not be hard to keep them 'within compliance' as long as they make sure they are represented when drafting the legislation. That is democracy these days.

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Desk Jockey
Mushroom

Pile of c**p being disseminated by the media

Bloggers will not be classified as news organisations, that is just a load of rubbish being put forward by a press desperate to avoid being held to account for their actions. Bloggers, like any other idiot on the web, can be taken to court for committing libel. The regulator is not going to bother getting involved. Granted, the law will have to get decent wording to clearly define what is an online news publication like El Reg, and what is just a site or blog for the online ravings of an enlighted/fruitcase individual or small group. This should not be difficult as long as the idiots are kept away from doing the defining.

I also take exception to this inflammatory statement "Yesterday Parliament voted to end over 300 years of freedom from political interference in the published word" No yesterday Parliament fudged a way to try and stop big newspapers from excercising uncontrolled power with no accountability, no understanding of their responsibilities in a demoncratic society and no recourse for the victims of their excesses. The law already exists to stop hacking etc, but the law does not stop newspapers from persuing a political vendetta, printing a load of garbage as news and causing distress and hardship to innocents under the label of "in the public interest". Causing hardship to politicians and doing investigative journalism can be easily defended as in the public interest so the whinges of the press about these reforms is a threat to lazy journalism rather than a genuine grievance. They are trying to scare the small outlets and bloggers by making up a load of threats that don't exist to those not in the 'big news provider' category.

22 11

Vodafone cash supply choked as Europe tightens pursestrings

Desk Jockey
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Re: Decaying infrastructure

Rather ironically I bought a second O2 sim only contract a whle back and then gave it to my girlfiend. Thus I have been able to compare the amount of service she gets with mine at the same locations and times etc. She has signal and 3G in some locations, I don't so that is pretty simple.

The thing is that I live in a city and the 3G connection seems to always collapse around lunch time of the working day now. Pretty good clue that they are skimping on capacity. I fully accept other people might have different experiences in different places.

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Desk Jockey

Decaying infrastructure

Their 3G network is collapsing under the strain, they are just about competitive in the consumer market and they really do not offer anything particularly exciting product wise. As a current Vodafone customer, these are the reasons I will probably soon be giving to why I have shifted over to O2! Their customer service has been reasonable, but the increasing unreliability of their network is starting to significantly annoy me.

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The truth on the Navy carrier debacle? Industry got away with murder

Desk Jockey
Facepalm

Splutter

Bernard Gray seen as a procurement genius by Whitehall? Where the hell did you get that stunning bit of insight? As far as Whitehall is concerned, he is a political appointee who wrote several reports (with big holes in) before he got given the procurement job. A lot of people also forget that he, in conjunction with some rather expensive consultants, set up the procurement structure back in early 2000s. As defence projects take decades to wind their ways through the red tape, the fact that things are a mess now would perhaps indicate that his reforms were not as clever as he likes to make out...

As for blaming the current lot for less than adaptable carriers, the answer is sort of a 'no sh*t sherlock'. The current lot are being castigated for trying to change the requirement while the things are being built. If you wanted carriers capable of launching CV F35s, they should have made that decision a long time ago, changing it all back and chopping off large chunks of metal from the new carriers was bound to cost a fortune. That sort of revisionism is what got MOD into trouble in the first place.

Final point - there are only three full blown carrier nations in the world - Russia, France and the US (China does not count, not for several more years at least). However, there currently are an equivalent number of STOVL (India, Italy, US marines) and quite a few helicoper carrier (France, Italy, India, US marines, Russian, Australia and a few more I can't remember) around. Thus if you want to be interoperable, STOVL is actually more interoperable with other nations than carrier variant. If your carrier gets sunk, your STOVL can land on the decks of the other nations or in an emergency on the deck of a destroyer. Lose a CV carrier and if your jets cannot get to land they are all lost. As the Russians (and others) are making and selling supersonice ship killing missiles, and as the carrier is always the no.1 target... Maybe, just maybe being able to disperse your naval airforce on the assumption there is no such thing as a perfect defence, might be a good idea. It is not as if we have a hundred destroyers handy to protect carriers now is it?

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'Online sex abuse of children is growing trend', warn Brit net cops

Desk Jockey
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Re: Frankly don't believe a word of it

I have not voted you either way, but two big flaws in your argument.

The Arab spring and kiddie grooming have no link whatsoever. The people in charge of stopping 'threats to the state' have no professional interest in chasing down kiddie fiddlers. They leave that part to the police who are under-resourced and pissed-off at being screwed over their pay and pensions by the coalition. Don't expect them to help the government stamp on political dissent because they won't.

As for kids never committing sexual acts on a phone, you really have no clue how stupid kids can be do you? Someone can groom them on a chat site, get their phone numbers, exchange lots of saucy texts and then 'persuade' them to send revealing pictures of themselves, probably by first sending a picture of 'themselves' (probably from an earlier mark). Dumb little Johnnie/Gilly will then send something back. Rinse and repeat and before long the peado has a nasty photo library to dribble over and to share with their mates. Not only is this scenario likely, it is well documented to have already happened.

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Desk Jockey
Big Brother

Wrong spin?

Surely CEOP are meant to be saying this is a success story rather than the usual scaremongering. Did the press officer get sent the wrong instructions?

As the number of peados trying to meet the kids has reduced from 12% to 7%, this would indicate that they are scared of being caught thanks to recent high profile operations etc. Thus they have switched tactics to just grooming kids online for pictures which, bad as it may be, is less harmful than any kind of physical contact. The police are doing their bit, now the parents need to do theirs as the police isn't going to monitor their kids' phones/internet. (we hope!)

Rather difficult to 'force' anyone to do much online without use of blackmail material. The journo is being a bit loose with the wording there!. I think the proper phrase is 'coerce'.

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Report: Over 1.5 million UK drivers will have hydrogen cars by 2030

Desk Jockey

Just another pipe (ahem) dream

Until hydrogen is able to be manufactured and distributed in a more economic, efficient and sustainable way it won't happen. We can run cars off chip fat and chicken dung if we really wanted to, but the economic case for its demand and supply don't stack up. Hydrogen is very much in this boat and this report is a load of fiction without the technical breakthrough that makes its use practical.

Electric cars, for all their many faults, at least can obtain access to electricity relatively easily compared to hydrogen. The petrol companies would prefer that we went hydrogen for their own obvious commercial reasons...

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Ofcom mulls dishing out a world of hertz for RFID tags, radio cars

Desk Jockey
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FAIL

Re: Idiots

Actually things are even worse than you say because Ofcom want to flog off the 2.7ghz to 3.1ghz band in the future. Rather unfortunately, a shedload of air traffic radars operate in this band and are rather crucial for air safety, but that does not seem to deter them.

Expect lots of screams of anguish in the future. Except maybe from the radar manufacturers.

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British armed forces get first new pistol since World War II

Desk Jockey
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Pint

Re: 9mm?

There is nothing wrong with 9mm. It is cheap and still puts a painful hole in people. The 57 just puts a smaller, faster hole in people. 10mm is a bigger hole, but the costs outweigh the benefits.

I would treat the armour piercing claims of any handgun round with a pinch of salt. Sure they might penetrate old style kevlar, but any competent army uses ceramic plate specced to stop assault rifle rounds up to and hopefully including sniper rounds. No handgun round can compete. That is why UK soldiers are meant to use their rifles first and pistols in emergencies.

Adding the fact that the Taliban don't often have armour, just about every competent Western army has pretty much agreed that if you are shooting an armoured target with a pistol you are doing something wrong and thus 9mm is much simpler for all concerned. Even if you have to shoot a person with body armour with a pistol, just hit them in the gut several times until they fall over and then put a finishing shot in. Unlike computer games, you don't stay standing up and go 'ouch' if you get hit by 9mm even with body armour.

For those who want to refer to those stories of crazy drugged up people shot 30 times by police before they went down, they werent wearing body armour, they were just pumped up and nuts. Using armour piercing arounds actually makes the problem worse because the bullet goes through them rather than bounces around until it hits something important. This is why the police like shotguns, even with body armour the force will still throw you back some. You probably wont get up unless you are wearing an iron man suit!

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Desk Jockey
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Coat

@Zmodem

While the Desert Eagle may look cool, it is possibly the most useless working hand gun in existence!

Better late than never. The Glock is pretty much the AK of the handgun world - very reliable, very simple and thus very popular. Believe it or not, UK aircrew were still being issued Walther PPKs up until a few years ago. That weapon is even more out of date than the Browning.

22 1

UK armed forces could be 'fatally compromised’ by cyber attack

Desk Jockey
Thumb Down

The right evidence?

I looked at the list of people giving evidence and there was only one with even a vague prospect of being able to actually tell the committee what assets, plans and contingencies the MOD has. Funny enough he was the Head of Defence Intelligence who are not in the routine habit of divulging secrets!

The MOD is hardly going to tell a bunch of politicians how they actually intend to fight a cyber war. So the short answer is probably that there may be some gaps in capability, but the committee is highly unlikely to know what they are, much less state confidently whether the military is vulnerable or not!

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Speaker Bercow's loquacious wife finally silenced - On Twitter

Desk Jockey
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Re: £5000 fine

I didn't even know there was a section 39 order on that case. Not that I am following it and not that I even use twitter, but would I get into trouble for breaching an order I had no knowledge of?

Not that I am excusing Bercow, she is a complete idiot, but if she didn't know then as the article says, anyone famous who uses twitter probably needs to do a course in media law and keep abreast of the current court orders!

People really need to learn that public posts do have consequences if you say silly things. Just shows how stupid people are that there are all these examples and they still don't learn.

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A bitter spill to swallow, or 'how to smeg up your keyboard'

Desk Jockey
Mushroom

Apple juice

Will kill a Saitek keyboard pretty effectively. Forunately I did not pay a lot for it.

Apple really don't do this 'interoperability' thing do they? I guess it is not in their commercial interests to do so. I don't blame them, I blame the users!

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Judge drops TV ad-block block: So how will anyone pay for TV now?

Desk Jockey

Hatred

I HATE adverts. I find them tripe and irritating and generating too much meaningless noise. I honestly could not care less for the welfare of that industry. I want to consume media when I want it, how I want it and free from 'distractions' and all for a fair price. The Iplayer is truly a game changer in this and I would actually be happy to pay a sub for this sort of service.

The growth of the internet and the options it gives consumers has pretty much shaken the old business models to pieces. Adverts detract from the consumer experience, not enhance it and so it is no surprise people will want ways around it. People may talk about advertising income as being critical to funding creative content, but this does not overcome the issue that adverts do not directly benefit consumers and in fact does a lot of harm on many levels.

It's a brave new world and all that.

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Take away bad drivers' mobile phones, they still crash their cars

Desk Jockey
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Re: Shite drivers are shite?

They already do. That is what the driving without due care and attention law is about. Most commonly used on people who cause horrendous accidents by drinking (coffee or soft drinks) or eating while driving.

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Desk Jockey
Pint

Better interpretation

People who use handheld phones or text while driving are utter idiots. They remain utter idiots even when not using such devices, but are merely driving a car.

Simples!

23 5

Oregon farmer devoured by own hogs

Desk Jockey

Snatch

A great one liner paraphrased from the film Snatch for those who have not watched it, "Never trust a pig farmer."

The Hollywood script writers have done this story before, but no doubt they will be paying a visit for some fresh ideas... As for 700lb pigs, well that is a hell of a lot of bacon sarnies!

2 0

Samsung: 'You want $2.5bn? WRONG, Apple, you OWE us $420m!'

Desk Jockey
FAIL

Runaway jury?

For those who like John Grisham, you will recognise this from one of his books.

The judge has effectly admitted that neither side has made a watertight case and so when the jury eventually makes a decision, no one is going to know how they came to that decision. They probably won't even know themselves! The result of this trial truly could be randomn, including the level of damages that the jury chose to impose.

The two sides might as well have gone and bought lottery tickets, they would stand to have less to lose that way!

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ICO power to stop FOI dodgers 'some way off'

Desk Jockey
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Holmes

Re: Solution

The data has to be deleted AFTER you submit the FOI request. It is all about evading providing an FOI response not the deletion of data itself. Public authorities delete data all the time as simple housekeeping. They are not allowed to do so if they know someone wants it under FOI. The key word here is 'to know'.

Rather a lot of data got shredded just before 2005 when FOI came into force. All legit because it was 'house cleaning' as no one had requested anything by then.

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Rupert Murdoch legs it from British newspaper boards

Desk Jockey
Pirate

More cynicism please

A better interpretation of this would be that Murdoch is rapidly backing away from the UK side of things due to: a hostile British public and political interests; to protect his US business which is more lucrative; and to avoid being charged with bribing public officials by the US government. All real threats to him.

From my perspective I would say good riddance. It is time the newspapers were owned by a more diverse group of people to avoid all that political power being held by a small number of nasty white old men!

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ICO: Nearly HALF all FOI complaints are about local councils

Desk Jockey
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Unhappy

Re: FOI

Browse the comments sections of the Daily Fail etc, now imagine a large number of those cretins submitting FOI requests. Now imagine they refuse to believe anything you tell them (we don't bloody have files on UFO sightings anymore, I cannot release files telling you where all the nukes are etc) and then imagine them dragging you through endless appeals.

The post from AC is very faimiliar to anyone who works with FOI and this has nothing to do with their competence or lack of. There are lots of paranoid and wierd people, they can get pretty spiteful/abusive and they are drawn to FOI under the illusion that they will obtain the miracle documents that will confirm their paranoia. You, as a private citizen can tell them were to go, government workers are not allowed to and so have to take the crap that they dish out. C'est la vie.

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Desk Jockey
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Re: Salesmen

As this post is worded, there is a blurring about when those requests should be dealt with as routine business, not FOI requests. An FOI is about requesting documents that the public authority might hold on a particular issue. Asking about the date of a contract renewal can be handled as a normal letter. Asking for a copy of the existing contract would be an FOI request.

There are plenty of fraudsters and con artists using it, but don't forget lots of legitimate people too. The FOI Act is requestor blind though so use of gmail addresses etc should be irrelevant.

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Cerner questions Epic win for Cambridge patient records

Desk Jockey

Proper assessment

The key word here is 'compliance'. If the requirements were written properly and if the more expensive bid was the only one that fully complied with the written requirements, then it wins. Being seen to fiddle around with the procurement mid-way is a bad thing though.

This is not exactly much of a story. Companies ask why their bids were rejected all the time. If the hospital is able to answer properly, then the process is being run as it should. The opportunities for when the cheapest bidder could then screw the public authority mid-way through the contract, while not completely eliminated, are now much harder.

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US defence biz fined for busting China arms embargo

Desk Jockey
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Re: It's Good to be the King^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H a Rich Corporation!

Because if you buy an American defence product, you are forced to comply with ITAR, no matter that it is just a small component in for example your plane, the whole plane is now ITAR controlled. You cannot sell it to anyone else without permission, cannot use some else to service it without permission and need to do an unbelievable amount of paperwork all the time. Effectibvely the US can now control what you do with that plane even if you made it yourself or bought it outside the US.

That is how the US apply their laws abroad and ITAR is the worst culprit.

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Desk Jockey
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Re: It's Good to be the King^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H a Rich Corporation!

Actually violating ITAR often does result in jail especially for a deal this big. In this case it looks like the US has chosen not to do so. They probably don't want to upset the company too much as they still need the software for the US attack helicopters.

It does make a joke of them applying US laws to the rest of the world though when they don't even follow it properly in the US!

7 0

Big Data megaslurp 'to save UK.gov £30 BILLION pa', raves thinktank

Desk Jockey
Joke

A famous quote applies

By Benjamin Franklin: "They that give up essential liberty for a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor security."

I cannot see government departments or their multitudes of contractors or their poorly vetted temporary staff abusing a big database containing all the details of its citizens. No not at all! Plus they would have to re-write the Data Protection Act as they could be collecting personal data and using it outside of a defined purpose. I'll pass on giving my consent thanks.

What happened to that election promise of no more big vanity IT projects?

0 0

Neo-Nazis scoop YouTube ad revenue from UK telcos

Desk Jockey
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Headmaster

Re: Confusing

Because there is no such thing as truly free speech. Would you want me to have the right to go up to your mother and randomnly slag you off to her and list a whole load of heinous and made up crimes that I think you are guilty of? This would cause you and your mother distress and infringe upon your basic rights. Thus I would be stopped (by the police and the courts) from doing it.

So by the same token, Google are simply enforcing their stated rules and removing content that is flagged up to them as illegal (a video inciting violence against a minority is illegal under UK law) or would cause distress and/or impinges upon the rights of others. In short, an individual's right to have a decent and fair life is more important than the right of someone to hassle them with abusive words.

Free speech does not equate to being allowed to be a complete arsehole to others and Google are simply enforcing an accepted and well known definition of what free speech is - free to say what you believe as long as it does not impinge on the basic rights of others. The Neo Nazis don't tend to want to honour the basic rights of various categories of people thus their 'free speech' is often calculated to impinge upon those rights. Doing a blanket ban on them is censorship though and would impinge their free speech as opposed to only banning specific videos that fall foul of the rules.

8 4

One court order could gag EVERY ISP in Denmark

Desk Jockey

Beat up the small minnows first

This idea sounds ripe for abuse. The copyright holders will just pick the weakest ISP they can find, get a blocking order in which then applies to all the other ISPs who might otherwise contest that order as being unfair/unworkable. If they want to do it properly, they need to open up the order to objections from all the ISPs before it can be applied. It would still be pointless though.

12 0

HBO 'sorry' for skewering Dubya

Desk Jockey
Joke

Heads

George RR Martin actually spoke about the heads when he was over in the UK. He appears in the extras to the series a couple of times and really wanted a replica head made of him. Sadly they are very expensive so the answer was no. They were recycling as many heads as they could get their hands on. He didn't mention the Bush head though.

Personally I would have thought a Bush like head leading an army from the sea with no justifyiable claim over Westeros, but conquering it anyway would be a fitting future scene!

2 1

'Zombie bullets' fly off US shelves after wave of undead attacks

Desk Jockey
Happy

Go backwards

Use of personal arms should only be limited to targetting individual zombies. A heavy, short range slug is far more useful than a long ranged streamlined one in the hands of a panicky human! Blatting away at a horde is not the best of ideas...

Typical Americans, always thinking the hi-tech solution is the answer. Just have a 12 pounder cannon, double shot it with a cannon ball and grapeshot combination and let loose at the horde at very close range. No aiming required apart from a pistol round to the head for the survivors. Sometimes the old ways are the best!

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HBO wants royal price for Iron Throne

Desk Jockey
Gimp

I sat on the thing at a convention at Easter. George RR Martin was the guest of honour so HBO plunked it in the hotel lobby for people to pose on. I can promise you it is not worth that much! Up close it looks and feels very plastic like.

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Ghost Recon: Future Soldier

Desk Jockey
Unhappy

Harsh

I have not played this game yet (got the PC version on pre-order), but I can't help feeling this review is a bit harsh on the basis it is not like its previous games. Sure it is important to flag this up, but shouldn't the review judge the game itself on its merits rather than scoring it badly just because it is not the same previous (and bloody hard) style? For people who have never played the Ghost Recon series before and are too used to FPS clones, this might seem like something fantastic and new and so the review should use that as a baseline.

As previously said, giving COD and BF3 high scores for just regugitating themselves well while slating this one for trying to make itself more appealing to the masses seems rather hypocritical.

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Met cops get new pocket-sized fingerprint scanners

Desk Jockey
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Re: @desk jockey

Actually it was pretty reasonable. They never asked my name, they just asked where I had been and did not ask for further details. They asked for me to consent to turning out my pockets and I agreed happily enough because I did not have anything incriminating on me. (apart from 'copied' CDs but they did not look carefully). In short, they were polite and asked nicely. I responded in kind.

Sure there are bad coppers out there, but if you act like an arsehole then they will treat you as one! The secret with coppers is not to make yourself interesting to them. Act all gobby and they think you have something to hide. Even if you do have something to hide, be polite and apparently open and you might get away with it. I once drove down the wrong way of a one way street. I apologised sincerely to the copper, made a good sounding excuse (I did not know that road well at all) and he let me off. Believe it or not, they have more important things to do than hassling your arse with finger print scanners. If you are not the person they are looking for, they don't want to fill in the paperwork!

I have to admit, I did think the two policewomen were a set up. I kept looking around them for the 6 footer male cop. It turns out that Exeter is a reasonably safe place!

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Desk Jockey

In the real world

Cops stop you on the street and say, "Excuse me sir/madam, we have had reports of a violent incident in the neighbourhood and a suspect known to us fled the scene who matches your description. Are you that person? No? Could you please provide us with a fingerprint?" After fingerprint taken. "Looks like you are not the person we are looking for. Sorry to have detained you, you are free to go."

Cops don't know the face of every crim on the street. They get told on the radio who to look for (name if they are lucky, most of the time a vague description) and they look for people mactching the description or who are nearby and might have seen something.

I speak from the experience of once being stopped on a sat night by two pretty police women looking into a pub brawl who very politely asked if I knew anything about it (I didn't) and if they could check my pockets for anything illegal, did I wisht to declare anything before they did so? After looking upset that my bag of sweets was empty (I am good and don't litter!) they let me go. This is pretty much similar to what the fingerprinting tech is for.

2 8

Audi proposes PC-packing stunt bikes

Desk Jockey
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Re: "can produce speeds of up to 50mph."

I only hit that speed 'cos I was going down a steep gradient, with about 15kg on the back pannier and the brakes had failed! I am still alive because I don't keep doing it!

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Desk Jockey
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Re: "can produce speeds of up to 50mph."

Having taken a normal pedal bike up to 45 mph myself I can confirm it is sh*t scary. Of course, Audi could put bigger tyres, more weight etc to make it more stable, but the actual pedalling performance goes downhill pretty rapidly. You are now in motorbike territory and might as well get a legal e-motorbike and forget the pedals!

If you actually want to go past 30mph, I suggest you do not use a bicycle (e or traditional) unless you are into proper racing and have found a nice quiet road somewhere without large potholes...

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Watchdog tells Greenpeace to stop 'encouraging anti-social behaviour'

Desk Jockey

Training courses

Ya do know that Greenpeace actually run training courses on how to conduct 'direct action' activities. Not to be compared with terrorist training camps of course, but they are funny and enjoyable. Not that those people have 'real' jobs or anything.

As a poster says, the lifestyle is somewhat relaxed... I object to funding it though and direct action is frequently about breaking the law, lets call it what it is.

5 3

Real-time drone videos get GPU-tastic

Desk Jockey

Camera shake

Not sure the camera on a bike analogy is the best one. The shaking is severe due to the physical forces being exerted on the camera frame and there is only so much you can do to iron that out. Mainly, you have to solve the problem at source rather than attempting to fix the resulting output eg. shock absorbing camera mount.

Maybe this tech can work and really clear the image if the video is being slowed down? Otherwise, it sounds like it is best suited to dealing with grainy low frames per second images. Many bike cameras now do HD quality imagry, it is still shakey as hell though, not the camera's fault. Drone imagry sent over limited bandwidth is another matter...

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NHS trust goes 100% over IT budget in patient records rollout cockup

Desk Jockey
Unhappy

God help me if I ever have to be admitted to these hospitals in an emergency! For those who live in Bristol, they already know that you should refuse to let the ambulance take you to some of the hospitals (particularly the BRI) as due to horrible MRSA infection rates and the like you are going to come out worse than you went in! Throw in dodgy electronic records and your survival rates do not look good.

That BUPA hospital must be doing good business with this lot in charge of NHS care!

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