* Posts by The Axe

737 publicly visible posts • joined 10 Nov 2011

Climate scientists agree: Humans cause global warming

The Axe

For the balance

And for the other point of view...

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/05/17/to-john-cook-it-isnt-hate-its-pity-pity-for-having-such-a-weak-argument-you-are-forced-to-fabricate-in-epic-proportions/

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/05/14/fuzzy-math-in-a-new-soon-to-be-published-paper-john-cook-claims-consensus-on-32-6-of-scientific-papers-that-endorse-agw/

No point me trying to persuade you that John Cook is wrong. Just read the linked articles and make up your own mind.

'I think you DO do evil, using smoke and mirrors to avoid tax'

The Axe

UK FTSE

"only two of the UK's FTSE 100 companies have no subsidiaries at all in tax-friendly places"

And how many of the UK's FTSE 100 companies are actually British. Only a very very small number. Most are international and have HQ elsewhere. Listing on the London stock exchange says nothing about the company's base. Though I bet everyone in UKUncut etc all think that the FTSE is only British companies and therefore they are all tax avoiders. When in reality they are paying their legally set amount of tax - for a subsidiary/branch in the UK and not the whole business.

Prankster 'Superhero' takes on robot traffic warden AND WINS

The Axe
Facepalm

Re: Less Basil Fawlty

Used to be that you could employ a man in a shed for a pittance. That was because the man usually had a good pension and saw the job as a way of getting out of the house and meeting people, the money not being a major factor and probably spent on beer.

Now, with minimum wage, you can't employ such men. So the company loses as they have to use hi-tech, and the man loses as he's stuck at home going stir crazy and probably dying before his time.

Australia's net filter sneaks into operation through back door

The Axe
Flame

IP?

In this day and age, after all the past disasters from blocking IP addresses, you would have thought some knowledge would have disseminated down* to the politicians and lawmakers that if are going to block, do it by domain rather than hamfisted IP. Or, because blocking by domain doesn't work 'cause you can bypass it (if the dodgy site is on a fixed unshared IP which is very few), realise that blocking anything on the internet is always doomed to failure. All it ever does is stop the stupid, but those who want to get around it will do so, and easily.

I equate banning to the equivalent of continually removing harm from a child rather than teaching children to avoid harm. The former requires the parent to continually monitor every single aspect of their child's life. The later means that the child can cope when the parent isn't around and can cope with a larger variety of situations. So with the case of the internet, teach people about the dangers.

* Note that I said down, not up.

Google 'DOES DO EVIL', thunders British politician

The Axe
Flame

Google follow the law

Google is following a law created in 1966 between Luxembourg and the UK over double taxation relief. That means that a business which only has warehousing in the UK but a HQ in Lux, doesn't have to pay full tax on the UK aspect as well as the Lux part. The UK is actually a subsidiary of the Lux based Amazon. Amazon is not a UK company that is escaping the UK.

The whole setup is something that the EU was created explicitly for. To enable a business to have a single head office somewhere in the EU and to serve the rest of europe from it without having to create a full business in each and every single european country. The EU law forces businesses to only have a single base.

Either call for the EU to dictate that all european countries should have the same tax rates (and look how well just having countries to share a currency is working out - Not!) or call for the UK to exit the EU. Both options will force Amazon to create a full business paying full tax (so long as they make a profit).

The Axe
Flame

Google, the law, and morality

Google are not doing anything immoral. That's because the law, tax or otherwise, never has any moral aspect. It wasn't so long ago that gay civil marriage was illegal. Was that moral? No way. Tax law is also immoral about the sharing of property between spinster sisters sharing a house when one dies. So law is never moral. That's because its a view of the morals of a past society as law is always behind current societies views and thoughts. For instance the laws around homosexuality only changed after society became more accepting of them. Only via a private members bill, not a government backed bill.

The Axe

Re: Pot and Kettle? downvote?

Why would anyone down vote a link to a statement of fact?

The Axe
Stop

#HodgeTheDodge

It's great all this coming from the great tax avoider herself. Margaret Hodge is well known for having lots of shares (multi-million pounds worth) in her family firm which she has placed in a trust. All this so that her children avoid paying inheritance tax. She herself is not avoiding so she can claim the moral high ground. Except that she is the one taking the action on behalf of her children so that they can avoid tax. So she is a tax avoider.

Mobile tech destroys the case for the HS2 £multi-beellion train set

The Axe
FAIL

Keynesian pump-priming

And it would be really useful to do that pump priming years, if not decades after the recession. Infrastructure projects always take so long that the case for them dragging a country out of recession is lost before they have even dug the first hole in the ground.

As for multiplier. Don't be so stupid. All the money spent on the project will go overseas. The trains won't be built here. The contractors that will do most of the work are international. All that will spent here is a relatively small amount on British labour.

HS2 hits the law of diminishing returns. When a train can cut the journey time from 3 days to 6 hours, then its very useful. When it saves 10 minutes off a 3 hour journey then its case it pretty much dead in the water.

Oi, Google! Stop LIBELLING us Germans, fix your autocomplete

The Axe
FAIL

Common name

Even though the complainant's name appears against "scientology" and "fraud" it's probably not him that is the reason for the appearance. Don't the German courts realise that many people have the same name. Even I with a very uncommon name have found that four other people in the whole of the UK have my name. If they were associated with something nefarious, should I sue them for bringing my name into disrepute or Google?

India's 2020 vision: a $10 BEELION software industry

The Axe
Flame

Aid

And the UK would still be giving them aid, even in 2020, if there wasn't such a brouhaha because of the recession which has raised the issue to the forefront of the public's attention.

The DfID should be scrapped all together. It is not fit for purpose. In fact it has no purpose any more at all. Any emergency aid can be supplied by the armed forces who are better organized than the useless people in DfID.

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

The Axe
Megaphone

Never underestimate

"never underestimate the ability of the law to be several decades behind what it is that people are actually doing."

Or rather never underestimate the ability of the law to be a total and utter cock and pile of shite with stupidity piled on top as a garnish, especially when its created by politicians and civil servants who have no clue about how it all works in real life.

Builder-in-a-hole outrage sparks Special Projects Bureau safety probe

The Axe
IT Angle

Re: Ref doghouse and "tenuous IT link"

Sound sensor on a Pi. When dog barks, Pi connected to a GSM module sends a text to your phone so that no matter where in the world you are, you will know someone is attempting a break in. Or the local boars have invaded.

3D printed gun plans pulled after US State Department objects

The Axe
Mushroom

@DavCrav

To be honest DavCrav, the article you link to is bollocks. So full of twisted stats to push an agenda that is could be twisting itself down the plughole.

"Owning a gun increases your risk of falling victim to a gun accident, a suicide or a homicide. ....... Eighty-five Americans are shot and killed on an average day. Sixty-two percent of those who are killed are the victims of self-inflicted wounds from committing suicide."

It first tries to make out that you are more likely to die if you own a gun. Then it lets slip that most who die do so from killing themselves. So remove the gun and are the suicides going to drop. Nope, they'll use a car a bridge or something else which would require you to say that these objects need banning too.

Then it gives three case studies. Adam Lanza being a fantastic case to use to say that the average gun owner is likely to die from a gun shot because their family member is a nut case. Keith Ratliff being a fantastic case to use when the element of surprise is a major factor in not getting to your gun first. Meleanie Hain being a fantastic case to use to highlight the build up of fear caused by the excessive publicity to gun crime to make it out that a criminal is around every single corner. All crap and spurious studies.

I'm afraid your article just makes a better case for gun ownership as the reasons for not owning one are stupid, puerile, and silly.

San Francisco caves over mobile radiation warnings

The Axe
Megaphone

Stupid

The city people must be stupid. Did they think that if they imposed such a rule that every phone manufacturer would kowtow to their demands. Did they not think that the manufacturers would just ignore their rules and just not sell phones in the city meaning a loss of jobs and businesses. A lot easier to do that than work out SAR levels. But city officials in any city in the world tend to be stupid. There is no requirement for them to know what they are doing, just to spout rubbish which a few gullible people believe and vote them in.

TalkTalk's tiny package most certainly not 'best value', tuts watchdog

The Axe
Megaphone

OMG

So the ASA jumps in again to save people from themselves.

People who are looking at different packages will look at the channels available and the price and will make a decision based on that. Sometimes after some time they might regret making the decision to go one way or the other based on the cost being too expensive or the package not having a channel that a programme they want to watch is on. But that's not for the ASA to decide on, but it seems that they do.

I went with Talk Talk because it did have the best value (a very subjective term) package for my needs. I didn't want the expense of Sky's offering which included channels I didn't watch. TalkTalk's had just what I wanted, plus the offered us 3 months free and 6 months half price and monthly is still cheaper than Sky.

Maybe I should go to the ASA and tell them that Sky's adverts don't provide the best value.

Plans for fully 3D-printed gun go online next week

The Axe
FAIL

Re: Longevity?

It's a bit more than a single use weapon. If you read the previous reports into the story you will find that they did initially start off with a single use one, but after re-designing etc, they can now use it multiple times. Still not as long a life as a real metal gun though.

The Axe

Rent

CNC milling machines might be expensive to buy, but why limit your thinking to just that path. You can rent, hire, or just ask a company to make one for you.

As for not having a CNC machine, many don't have a 3D printer either. In fact there are fewer 3D printers in the world (at the moment) than CNC machines. They will be overtaken as 3D printing takes off (thanks to the publicity like this), but for now it's still easier for someone to go to a company with a 3D printer or CNC milling machine then to do it themselves.

Tech giants reject tax dodge name and shame plan

The Axe
Megaphone

Law & Morality, never the twain shall meet

"There's no suggestion any of the companies mentioned above do or have ever done anything illegal on the tax front. The morality of their practices is for readers to decide."

The law is never moral. Tax laws are not moral either.

The law until recently made it illegal to be a homosexual. Was it moral then? No. So why is it moral now.

The law until recently taxed women as though they were part of their husband. Was it moral then. No. So why is it moral now.

US Ambassador plays Game of Thrones with pirates

The Axe

iTunes

"...despite Game of Thrones now being available on iTunes mere hours after it airs in the USA, for just $AUD2.99 an episode"

Well there's the problem. Not everyone has an Apple device.

Canadian TV station wails: NFC bonking... it's not SAFE

The Axe
Trollface

CBC

Well CBC regularly promote AGW which is just as dodgy in science terms as the idea that getting just the number and expiry of a card via NFC is the end-of-times for credit cards.

Outsourced space trucks battle for US middleweight lifting title

The Axe
Boffin

Jobs for US workers

Why this fixation on jobs for US workers. In the 60s there were tens of thousands of people working on the Saturns etc. But with the advancement of technology and science, it's not necessary to use that many people to create even better rockets. It sounds like a lot of money, but compared to America's GDP and to the overall economy it's a tiny percentage.

Politicians are fixated on something that was true in the past, but no longer. Manufacturing and other businesses that require lots of people to generate work are declining in importance throughout the world. Service is the new manufacturing idiom.

TalkTalk ads banned by watchdog over 'misleading' YouView offer

The Axe
Happy

We got it free

We got the box free. We even got first six months free due to a cock up in the transfer from the old Tiscali TV service to the TalkTalk YouView service which left us with no TV for a week (only got an old analogue tube TV).

For all those that complain to ASA. Have they not got a life. Have they not got any common sense to realise that unlimited is a marketing term, just like free is. Always look at the small print (or the bill).

Or are they doing it on behalf of others who they think are so stupid as to not realise what they are buying? Not got much faith in humanity have they?

ACLU documents shows free access to emails for IRS tax police

The Axe
Mushroom

Re: Bribery by any other name.

And a good reason why the state should not be so large and controlling that it's worthwhile for companies and organisations (fake charities) to lobby the government.

With a small state, and more local democracy, it would be harder for lobbying to work as they would have to do it many times in many places rather than just once to some naive, weak willed , spending-someone-elses-money civil servant or some money grabbing, power mad, empire building politician.

StreetView spots possible roadside nookie down under

The Axe
Paris Hilton

The woman is waving at the google car, so I suspect a bit of a setup situation, rather than being caught in flagrante delicto.

<-- Obvious

Publishing ANYTHING on .uk? From now, Big Library gets copies

The Axe
WTF?

Wayback machine

Typical. An existing private service exists, but the government thinks it can do better and copies it. Using tax payers money in the process. What a waste.

Boss of Irish-based R&D hub: Man, this place is the back of beyond

The Axe
Facepalm

Sounds like someone saying "It's not fair that we made a bad decision. We shouldn't be penalised for making a mistake. Spend lots of money on our special case please government. Then we can be successful without having to spend any of our own money."

Patent shark‘s copyright claim could bite all Unix

The Axe
Go

Actually a clever April Fool.

All the right pieces to make it half believable but with a smidgen of hints to give a few clues that it's a joke.

Google Street View releases devastated Fukushima town tour

The Axe
FAIL

Not driverless

You can see the driver in the mirror at this location.

https://maps.google.com/maps?q=%E6%97%A5%E6%9C%AC,+%E7%A6%8F%E5%B3%B6%E7%9C%8C%E5%8F%8C%E8%91%89%E9%83%A1%E6%B5%AA%E6%B1%9F%E7%94%BA&hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=37.493064,140.995115&spn=0.001215,0.002642&sll=37.760834,140.474728&sspn=0.635121,1.234589&geocode=FTofPAIdzn9nCA&hnear=Namie,+Futaba+District,+Fukushima+Prefecture,+Japan&t=m&layer=c&cbll=37.493182,140.995093&panoid=OYt1D9wiPm8g_q8A1EUG7w&cbp=12,62.24,,0,0&z=19

Presumably you know very little about the radiation levels. They are very low.

Pyongyang Photoshop tomfoolery shows wet Norks, skirts blown up

The Axe

Groupthink

Looks like North Korea is starting to believe it's own hype. Oh well, let them start a battle. They'll lose, the leaders will be deposed, and the people will rise up. A few people will get killed in the process.

You know how your energy bills are so much worse than they were?

The Axe
WTF?

Re: "There is no mainstream party [...] which offers to dismantle these crippling stealth taxes"

Ok, so UKIP are effectively the Conservative Party as the current lot have moved to the left to replace New Labour as the current Labour lot move towards true Marxism. But are the policies themselves right wing? Number 3 is possibly the only one as the EU is really the EUSSR. All the other policies are just sensible stuff that should be carried out by any intelligent person. Oh yes, intelligent. Something lacking in the majority of politicians.

Microsoft, Adobe, wilt during Australian price gouge grilling

The Axe
Holmes

Re: Gouging

Well yes, companies can charge what their customers are willing to pay, but I wouldn't call it gouging. I call it market forces. If they charge too much then they won't sell as many products so their profit might not be the maximum they could make. But they balance that against selling more at a cheaper price, but again their profit might not be the maximum they could make. See Laffer Curve. Whilst I don't like Microsoft or Adobe's prices they don't have a monopoly. There is LibreOffice and Gimp to name two alternatives. But there are non-free alternatives too. In all cases you get what you pay for. For the vast majority of customers of the products, write and mspaint would be adequate for their needs if they really look at them.

Holly(oaks) talking head is FUTURE of face messaging, claims prof

The Axe
FAIL

Voice is crap

Considering the quality of some text to speech systems where the voices sound very natural, "Zoe"'s is very robotic.

Paying a TV tax makes you happy - BBC

The Axe
Holmes

License fee is only cheap because everyone pays

The license fee is cheaper than a Sky subscription only because everyone pays. So if you don't watch much BBC TV you are subsidising those who do watch a lot of it. You are also subsidising the creation of expensive programmes watched by only a few people. If people who actually watch the BBC paid a fee, then it would be comparable with Sky's.

Drilling into 3D printing: Gimmick, revolution or spooks' nightmare?

The Axe

Why the state involvement?

Why does the state think it needs to get involved with handing out a few million? If it's good, then pure market forces will ensure that the good products will succeed. As it is, government hand outs tend to keep the bad stuff going.

World's largest solar collection plant opened in Abu Dhabi

The Axe
WTF?

Re: Good place. Not so good tech.

Cheap? $600M cheap? The energy it generates it is not cheap. Anything but. Someone is taking the proverbial if they are using cheap passive collectors.

LOHAN hooks up with top-flight rocketeer

The Axe
Trollface

Big Bang Theory

So you need certificates for being a rocket scientist. You must be pretty intelligent to be a rocket engineer then. Sheldon would not approve.

New nuke could POWER WORLD UNTIL 2083

The Axe
FAIL

Re: connected to a drain plug of salt that has been frozen solid

That you won't be going near the tank for decades is better than not going within 100km of the destroyed nuclear power plant for eons. The point is that the tank is there for a major catastrophic disaster. So it doesn't matter if it takes days or weeks to cool down or that you might never be able to get the contents out.

Samsung's new Galaxy S 4: iPhone assassin or Android also-ran?

The Axe
Happy

Swappability

For me, the main thing I look for in a phone is the ability to swap batteries and swap uSD cards. Using a phone a lot during the day, even for emails, tweets, RSS, and the odd little game uses up nearly all of a battery and many times you don't get a chance to recharge when running low. Having a back up battery to keep you going is important. Similarly being able to backup to a uSD and insert into another phone when the inevitable happens is also very important, especially when phones can store gigabytes and you keep many personal documents/photos in them.

My current ancient phone of a Dell Streak 5 has those features. I'm glad that the SIV has these features too. These two facts will make it a major reason why I will switch to the SIV when I've saved up some money.

Drunk driving: No more dangerous than talking on handsfree mobe

The Axe
Mushroom

Texting whilst driving leads to arrest

"And while texting at the wheel would perhaps lead to a a charge of driving without due care and attention or similar, it's typically hard for police officers to spot a texting driver and the offence generally goes unpunished."

Though when it does get noticed, and it is easy to spot after an accident just by looking at a phone's record, it does lead to jail time. Though it does depend on whether you are a politician or a nobody.

Phillipa Curtis got 21 months for causing a death but the Labour Solicitor General, Vera Baird asked for it to be extended as she felt it unduly lenient. However when Lord Nazir Ahmed did the same thing and only got a few weeks Vera was surprisingly quiet. Something to do with being friends with the dodgy Lord who thinks his sentence (he only spent 2 weeks in jail) was the result of a Jewish conspiracy.

One rule for pigs, another for the plebs.

Era of the Pharaohs: Climate was hotter than now, without CO2

The Axe

/sarc

I know that P_0 was being sarcastic, but I was thinking about the poor deluded fools who wouldn't be able to pick up that nuance. ;-)

The Axe

Pure marketing gimmick. Perfect way to get more money to compensate for "climate change" caused by us western capitalist pigs.

On International Woman's Day we remember Grace Hopper

The Axe

Re: @ YAAC - universities

So anyone who went to the many other dozens of universities was a dumb-nut? Anyone who went to any university benefited. That Turing went to a top university is just coincidence. Other greats went to other universities.

Here's the $4.99 utility that might just have saved Windows 8

The Axe
Thumb Up

That and other utils

A big thank you for highlighting the product. Will help my wife use her PC as she hates Win8. Everything is too different and it gets in the way of doing tasks. Multiplicity from Stardock will be dead useful at work for me. I can now have three monitors even though my PC can only handle 2, just use a spare PC. Offloads processing power on to the spare PC too.

Bacon sarnies can kill: Official

The Axe
Trollface

Re: Noooooo!

Soylent Green is government approved meat replacement.

The Axe
Facepalm

Low quality science as well as meat can kill

Low quality science as well as meat can kill. Ignore the report. It's the usual attempt to make some science out of nothing to up someone's published article count and then used by a dumb and stupid MSM to make scary headlines which is the usual attempt to up the reader count on their websites.

'Million-strong' zombie army devours Raspberry Pi's crunchy base

The Axe

Why?

I always wonder why DDoS are carried out. They can only last for a short while, and so all you do is wait it out and back comes your website. Yes, some organizations like banks might lose some custom during that period and their customers will be a bit upset, but they are few in number. There are very few organizations that only use the internet for interaction and will lose lots of money from even the shortest period of DDoS.

Health pros: Alcohol is EVIL – raise its price, ban its ads

The Axe
Mushroom

Re: I'm all for it

Living is not good for you. You always die. Loads of evidence to prove that too.

No matter what people do, someone will find an excuse to prove that it's detrimental to my life. Well, guess what! I want to live my life and enjoy it. If that means I do things that shorten it, so be it. Better that than live a life imposed on my by those who think they know best which will leave me bored out of my brain and more likely to cause harm to others around me from the psychological damage of not enjoying myself. I'd rather die young and happy than old with dementia in a nursing home having to have all my bodily functions handled by a care worker on minimum wage.

The Axe
Mushroom

@JohnSmith19

"What it's actually saying is ban the advertising"

That's only the start. You cannot stop bansturbators by saying "it's only a ban on advertising". Once they've got that they will progress on to the next step. They never stop until they have the cold hard facts that their actions are actually leading to more deaths (the US poisoned neat alcohol so that it couldn't be used to make drinking alcohol - leading to a number of deaths) and that the vast majority of the population don't agree with their minority views that are very extreme to the point of fascism.

You have to stop such nannying fussbuckets at their first attempt. Otherwise welcome to a world where someone else decides what is good for you and you can not make any decisions about your own life.

Already some are wanting to stop giving health care to the obese or smokers because that is what led to their health problems. Whats to say that such people will not decide that extreme sports fanatics should not be given any medical help if they have an accident.

SpaceX rocket reaches orbit but Dragon fails to spit fire

The Axe

Problem fixed

Keep up El Reg. SpaceX have already said "After Dragon separated from Falcon 9’s second stage approximately nine minutes after launch, a minor issue with some of Dragon’s oxidation tanks was detected. Within a few hours, SpaceX engineers had identified and corrected the issue, normalizing the oxidation pressure and returning operations to normal. Dragon recomputed its ascent profile as it was designed to and is now on its way to the International Space Station (ISS) with possible arrival on Sunday, just one day past the original timeline." http://www.spacex.com/press.php?page=20130301