Posts by Anonymous Coward 101

Britain's FBI

It's a huge coincidence that this happened a day after seemingly the eighth incarnation of 'Britain's FBI' was brought into being. It's not like they wanted any big flashy stories about how hard they are or anything like that.

Probably just buying to get hold of the IP. The phone division will be thrown away.

Some things are not clear to me...

1. Why would such a critical piece of equipment be left in the hands of a relatively low level operative?

2. Would these flashing warning lights only be seen by one person?

3. Would his superiors be such blockheads that they would not deduce the same things this man deduced?

I expect an article in the Daily Mirror about how hard up Brits are reduced to buying the new iPhone 5C. Austerity, innit?

"This new straw will save us, won't it?"

PC sales are falling - laptops will save us!

Laptop sales are falling - ultrabooks will save us!

Utrabook sales have never existed - 2-in-1s will save us!...

My mums ancient DC1 still works a treat after getting a service. Nowt wrong with Dysons.

Menus...

My favourite trick is companies sending me through a multitude of queues only to get a canned statement at the end of the process that doesn't answer my question. Like Orange, when all I wanted to do was cancel their fucking £2 itemised bills, and there was no way to do it online.

Nothing lasts forever

Everyone can argue from 20-20 hindsight, but if Apple hadn't entered the market in 2007 (and in doing so showed Samsung how to make smartphones normal people want to use) Nokia would have been doing very well. I shudder to think of the barely functional monstrosities they would have been making, but they would have been doing well.

Right now on the BBC Sport Website...

LIVE BREAKING NEWS:

World Cup 2014 win unlikely - Dyke

Unintended Consequences

The peons whose job it was to sign the documents stating when prisoners were ready for court were most likely on a bonus, or knew they would get their arses kicked if they didn't get prisoners to court on time. People aren't stupid, and will tell lies to save their jobs, particularly when they are made to do the impossible.

Of course, given Serco created these conditions, they should have checked up on this. They appear not to have done so, and are being deservedly humiliated.

I imagine for some employees approaching retirement, or those that have simply given up, this kind of employment would appeal. It would most likely force out those who are ambitious.

"Under the ISAs the RSPCA promises to dispose of the information when it is no longer needed: "In most cases, it is expected that information shared with the RSPCA will therefore be destroyed within a maximum timeline [sic] of 6 years."

But there's simply no way of knowing whether this is true."

I suggest that the chances of any organisation correctly disposing of data within a given time period is close to zero. Data will be copied around a computer network, backed up, copied to memory sticks and so forth.

What were they doing before now if they could be dismissed with such impunity?

The US TV shows are about the only things worth watching on Netflix. The films, with some exceptions, appear to be direct-to-video crap.

Breaking Bad is very good, by the way.

What baffles me is how a relatively small project could balloon in size before someone said "wait a second, something is wrong." It's a disaster. Without joking, every civil servant and private sector contractor should be made to read the document.

"One ex–staff member, Jay Palmer, who brought a failed legal action against the firm, claims he was repeatedly called a "stupid American" and saw staff writing "No Americans/Christians" on a board during a meeting."

This bit does not ring true. Who on earth would write "No Americans/Christians" on a board, even if that was their hiring policy?

Great

It is tempting to view these as shameless cash-ins, but as long as these stories are as good as the Star Wars prequels, then I won't mind.

Cinema, as an art-form, has still failed to better The Phantom Menace since it's release in 1999.

"Woooow I wasn't expecting to be in a jury Deciding a paedophile’s fate, I’ve always wanted to Fuck up a paedophile & now I’m within the law!”

I do not know the case here or the quality of evidence, but imagine if you were an innocent man wrongly accused of paedophile offences. Wouldn't the standard of critical thought on evidence here terrify you?

Another cost of outsourcing

Regardless of whether the companies have a case or not, this just adds to the cost of outsourcing. It isn't just a case of following procurement procedures, it is a case of proving it. Therefore, an enormous paper trail must be created to show that everything was followed by the book. Lawyers need to be hired. Cases must be fought. Time must be wasted.

After taking these costs into account, it may still work out better to use the private sector, but it is still a cost.

Astonishing

The second part of their research will no doubt discover - incredibly - that some younger teenagers falsely state they are 18 in order to look at pornography. This will result in breathless condemnation of ISPs for corrupting our nations youth.

Aye Right

"There is also widespread suspicion in the West that even non-state owned businesses have close ties with Beijing through the ubiquitous Communist Party committees which operate within them."

I sympathise with the western intelligence agencies. It must have been conceptually almost beyond them that a non-state owned company could have close ties with the government. Such a thing has never occurred in the West.

Meter Readers

The power companies are delighted that they are going to save money (and energy) on meter readers because of smart meters. Up until a couple of years ago, they sent around sales teams to mis-sell energy tariffs to old women. I wonder how much money and energy that wasted?

'Whiff of octogenarian media lord sends 1 in 5 running'

Er, you would need to know the quarterly changes in the number of customers before the deal was announced before one could make a reasonable conclusion as to the effect of the Sky takeover.

No doubt some people will leave O2 solely because of Murdoch, but Sky's large customer base suggests most people don't care.

Presentation

Taken for itself, the porn blocker is debatable. But it was the way Cameron presented it: he (or his 'advisor') explicitly linked child pornography (or 'child abuse images' or whatever we are supposed to call it now) to bog standard porn.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23401076

In other words, the new law is being made in a spirit of hysteria.