Posts by Phil O'Sophical

Re: This requirement for paper bills/statements...

Ah, but you aren't moving to a new address in France. Everyone wants proof of address, and woe betide you if the electricity bill is in the name of "Phil", and your official ID says "Philip", clearly not the same person...

Re: Lying in the Chamber

does he actually expect those smuggling stuff to put the required trackers in their goods????

Doesn't need to. It could be like motorway/bridge tolling. ANPR camera reads the license plate, and a sensor scans for a tracker. If the tracker responds, and the system shows that the correct paperwork has been filed, you treat it like the "green channel", and just do random spot checks, like today.

If there's no tracker, or the response doesn't match the paperwork for the vehicle, customs are alerted and stop the vehicle further on for a full search. Much the same as a "paperwork, please" check at a border post, but without the stop or the border post.

Re: An alternative solution

Independence is normal. Hundreds of countries manage it. Of course, after Indy we will have governments that make crap decisions - that's inevitable. But then WE will have the ability to change our government, unlike now.

Which is, curiously enough, exactly the argument made in favour of leaving the EU.

Re: Mission Impossible

Where do you get the 'no re-voting until 'right' result is reached'?

It's the standard EU approach, as used for the the creation of the EU by the Treaty of Maastricht (initialliy rejected by Denmark) and its remodelling by the Treaty of Lisbon (initially rejected by Ireland).

It's one of the problems at the heart of the Brexit negotiations, the EU leaders simply can't understand why Westminster doesn't just call another vote and spend the necessary money to get the "right" result, instead of stubbornly insisting on implementing the first vote, as if they have to actually listen to the voters. It's not the way the EU does democracy, and they just don't get it.

Re: Mission Impossible

Given that anti-EU feeling has been growing steadily for the past 20 years that seems like wishful thinking to me.

Re: GFA?

People born in the Northern Ireland have rights under the GFA that people born in the rest of the UK do not automatically get i.e. the right to an Irish passport.

The Irish government has always accepted that anyone born anywhere on the island of Ireland is entitled to claim Irish citizenship and an Irish passport, it's not connected to the provisions of the GFA.

Re: Question?

With a .eu domain, you will have your individual and consumer rights brought under the aegis of European standards and regulations.

What complete bollocks. Since when did ANY internet domain name have that effect, anywhere?

The .eu domain is now closer to your ambitions, achievements and dreams. It is the bridge connecting you to your friends and family – even if you live outside the EU. It will always show your roots, your outlook, and your cultural values.

Someone's been at the Mission Statement generator again.

Re: Government Advice and Actions

inside the EU the UK could negotiate with other EU governments to get changes made and direct the EU from a position of power.

That might have worked in the Common Market, with someone like Thatcher in power, but in a 28-country EU with Blair or Cameron there was no chance.

Ultimately the UK government has a veto (as do other member states).

That's becoming less and less the case. With 28 countries, some tiny, the EU can't afford to have anyone with a veto. More and more of the decision-making is now on a majority basis, no veto permitted.

Re: Government Advice and Actions

Sensbile thing would have been to treat it as advisory, a democratically stated indicator that some things about the EU need to change.

We've been saying that for 25 years, it's never made any difference, not will it ever. The EU isn't run by people who want to listen to the voice of the masses.

Instead, Cameron made it his hill to die on.

Well, he did come back from the EU, waving his letter about agreed concessions like Chamberlain, and called the promised referendum fully expecting people to agree that he had achieved significant changes. Since he actually achieved damn all he shouldn't have been surprised, and that fact that he was surprised shows just how out of touch he was.

Re: Yes EU Minister

and only the UK chose English.

Malta is an EU member, and also listed English as it's official language.

If and when the UK leaves then English will no longer be an official EU language,

The Maltese get very upset when people suggest that.

Re: Brexit

before trying to negotiate new deals from an awful position.

Bad though that would be, it would still be easier than trying to negotiate new deals once locked into a bad deal as the price for leaving. We can only hope that both sides will recognise that some compromise for a deal that works for both sides can be achieved, but I have little hope that the more intransigent of the EU negotiators will be open to that.

Re: Jennifer Arcuri, Tech Innovator

Dishonest, narcissistic, corrupt, ugly, blond,

Wow, so being blond is wrong, now? Funny, I never noticed it being an issue for the Scandinavians.

Re: Battleship!

I remember getting kicked out of our Belfast office by a bomb scare because someone had parked a Dublin-registered car in a restricted zone. Controlled explosion had revealed no problems, just a tourist who couldn't read the signs. As we were walking back to the office we saw the car, now looking worse for wear (roof bulging upward, no windows, no boot lid) and an upset-looking woman standing beside a policeman who was in traditional pose, with his notebook out. As we passed the only words we heard were "but what am I going to tell my husband? It's his car".

Re: Ah, those laser links....

Mind you microwave comms doesn’t work in misty weather either

A village near me has one of those radar speedlimit signs that displays your speed and flashes Slow Down if you're over the limit.

On quiet winter days it's not unusual to see it showing 8 or 9 km/h as it clocks the snowflakes drifting past...

Re: Good riddance!

It's about time people stopped pre-emptively taking offence on behalf of other people. If I refer to someone as "he" and that person replies with "I prefer to be referred to as she" then I should apologise and remember that for the future. It should only be considered offensive if I continue to use "he", or if I deliberately used it knowing I would cause offence.

I use a contraction of my first name which is now generally considered to refer to a man, but in the past was often used by women. If someone gets my sex wrong because of that, why should I be offended by what is clearly a genuine mistake?

Re: Is this just an English thing ?

I wonder how these things pan out in French with it's masculine and feminine words

Same kind of political correctness overkill. Instead of, say "les chefs" versus "les cheffes" you're now supposed to use "les chef·fe·s",. with the centred dot as a sort of "boolean or" operator. Who knows how that's supposed to be pronounced. Doesn't help with singular articles, though, is one boss le or la chef·fe? L·e·a chef·fe?

The Académie française is not happy.

Re: Email?

The legal descriptions I've read on this sort of subject all seem to hinge on intent : they feel a bunch of ascii in an email is a valid indication that you meant the email to be taken as your intent and that it's therefore as good as a signature.

Isn't this somewhat analogous to an illiterate person making an "X" on a document beside the works "John Smith (his mark)", i.e. it doesn't need to be a cursive squiggle that actually says "John Smith". What matters is the perceived intent to sign.

Re: Just when you think UK politics can't get any weirder or messier.

Not unless Corbyn gets elected.

Re: Why?

In case of emergency you can always create a SIP connection whilst your main line is being reparted for example.

Unless you're with Orange in France, where they use a proprietary wrapper around SIP to stop you doing this.

SIP has functionality that ISDN, Analogue does not,

Indeed. For one, it's so much easier for telemarketers to spoof caller ID

SIP eliminates the need for dedicated copper lines. Everything can go down the same FibreOptic or IP connected line..

Provided that both ends, and all the intermediate cabinets, have backup power supplies. Otherwise things will go very quiet in a power cut.