Where...

... is the tinfoil hat icon...?

The Mafia doesn't have any Black Helicopters.

So...

... where did Wallace and Grommit land...?

We...

... control what you read!

"the right to access information has become a cornerstone of our democracy"

Provided you don't actually try to get any information out of our "democratically elected" Government...!

And of course...

... they're not using the unsecured systems to download lots of porn....

Bullshit!

"What matters in terms of privacy, according to Detica, is how they're used."

No, what matters in terms of privacy is Data Troughing where every possible detail is being recorded on databases, whether it's actually needed (or justified).

"Where investigations are directed in a more focussed way it means members of the public will not be investigated unnecessarily"

No, members of the public should not be investigated *AT ALL* unless there are reasonable grounds for suspicion!

This is just a piece of post-hoc spin trying to justify holding large amounts of data by saying "trust us, we won't look too hard at your information, honestly!"

Let me rephrase that for you...

"a one-off visitor, especially a government Minister, should never be left alone..."

Bunch of hypocrites. "Do as we say, not as we do. We're trust-worthy, you aren't".

Well, sorry, no, we don't trust you. I wonder why...?

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh...

... Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtan!

So why not...

... just put in a check for if any fields are currently hidden and and will be affected, then, if so, pop up a message "Warning: This action will over-write data in hidden fields, do you wish to proceed? Yes/ No"?

Problem solved.

@Good old Labour party...

> please Gordon, put us all out of our misery - call an election

Co-incidentally Number 10 has just replied to the Petition calling on the Government to hold an election now. Guess what their response is...?

http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page20043

In the US...

... it seems the Kindle 2 costs $299

What's the betting that here it will cost £299??

Hmm...

1) Get paid £478,937

2) Get fined £5000

3) PROFIT!

Are you sure it was an airbed...

... not another sort of inflatable like a certain Australian was caught stealing...?!

Cenordyne...

... what an excellent ad!

(Wish we'd done something like that for the Dangerous Pictures Act...)

@Alex D

> Is it such a bad idea for the police to have a database of DNA?

Ask Raymond Easton, the guy who, although suffering from Parkinsons Disease (which meant that he could barely walk to the front door unaided) was, none the less, arrested by Swindon Police on behalf of Greater Manchester Police because his DNA was "found" at the scene of a burglary. Except it turned out that it wasn't his DNA and it was a false positive.

http://archive.thisiswiltshire.co.uk/2000/8/15/238098.html

The fact that the guy was virtually immobile appeared to be utterly irrelevant to the Police, who in their simple minded way, decided that because there was a DNA match, he *must* have been the criminal.

Now imagine that you sneeze into a hanky, someone else steals that hanky and drops it a the scene of a crime. "Oho!" says Mr Plod, "Let's check our database... Aha! Mr Alex D I arrest you for the crime of not thinking a bit more about the risks of false positives..."

Flash Mob!

Why not have someone "look suspcious" in Chatham High street by taking a few photos, then, as soon as Plod starts taking exception, have another 50 photographers all grab cameras out of their bags etc and start taking pictures of the PC/ PCSO...!

a small piece of code...

... which would instruct these services to ignore the pages.

You mean like robots.txt...?

And if they still want "the attention search engines bring", why not have an un-robots.txt blocked section that has the headlines and nothing else, so people have to click on the headline and visit their site to get the article...?

Not exactly rocket science.

Mode = Rocky Horror

I really loved the skillful way,

You beat the other girls to the bride's bouquet...

... erm...

Two nuns on a penny-farthing...

... one says to the other "I"ve never come this way before"...

Snickers bars - sponsors of Feeding America

Hmm, tell us about the nutritional value of Snickers bars. (Don't forget to mention the high sugar content which encourages obesity...)

Oh dear, how sad...

... too bad!

LOBLOSCK!

There's a cryptogram for you...

Now how about...

... they drop this ridiculous "equivalency" that assumes that £1 = $1 and stops charging us 79p for a track that the Yanks can buy for 79c?

Hint 79 cents is 48 pence...

Don't break out the champagne yet...

As Mark above points out, the Dangerous Drawings Act has been waved through with barely a murmur after a discussion at the Committee Stage by a one lot of people with an agenda and another lot who didn't really have a clue refusing to listen to those who pointed out how stupid this law would be and there is still the possibility that the Dangerous Writings Act might get the same treatment at the Report Stage...

So...

... just how much more of our money is the Government going to piss away on their Quixotic desire to convince us that they can be trusted with all our information and ID and that we're not going to have to carry a card to show we have their permission to walk down the street?

ELECTION NOW, GORDON!

Plod will love this...

... Excuse me Sir, but was your jacket taking a photograph of this building which may be of use to terrorists...?

Mine's the 12MP coat...

@Anonymous Coward Posted Thursday 9th July 2009 14:33 GMT

> I often wonder why organ donation isn't an opt-out system, apart from religi-tards I don't know anyone who objects to the process.

I am not a religi-tard and I am signed up as an organ donor however I certainly object to the idea of it being "opt out" because it is my *CHOICE* to donate.

The State should not get to decide what happens to my body at ANY time, allowing this sets a dangerous precedent.

Re: 101

I'm in Portsmouth and I've actually used 101 a few times for things that were worth contacting the Police for (eg idiots bombing up and down the road on a mini-moto late at night) but not worth dialling 999 about.

It was actually a good idea and I would have hoped to see it rolled out nationwide instead of being dumped...

Great. but now...

... how about actually giving the ICO some teeth instead of them only being able to wag a finger and say "naughty people, you should make customers' data secure"?

@Jody and Stevie

Congratulations! You get today's 20/20 hindsight award... See icon for details.

... of course if this turns out to have drawbacks that weren't obvious now, but turn up 20 years in the future, you'll be obliged to return the pin, although you can keep the rest...

@David 105

Yep, that's what I thought too, just as we keep being told how "successful" the use of DNA is in criminal investigations, even though in many cases the perp would have been caught without it.

Still, why let the facts get in the way of a good bit of spin...?

Part of the backlog...

... was caused by too many "speculative seizures" by technologically naive detectives.

And much of the rest was caused by them engaging in desperate fishing trips in the hope that they could find something, anything, on the computers that they could do the suspect for...

Right on, Commander!

... I had a 4MW beam laser on my Cobra Mk III...

"Daily Mail-pleasing" mode

And this is the real problem, coupled with them knowing that they're going to get a kicking at the next election.

So they're going to try to push through as much populist legislation as they can to make themselves look good in the media whislt, at the same time, force their personal agendas on the rest of us before they're thrown out of power.

When the two co-incide (as they might well do in cases like this) then we're in deep shit...

As the old joke has it...

... Got any naked photos of your mother?

No.

Want to buy some...?

@Tony Davenport 1

> Writings about "acts likely to result in serious injury to anus" ...

> What have I done???

It's ok, as long as you weren't sexually aroused by them...

Icon for the burning of books...

... so that's every copy of the works of the Marquis De Sade, Venus in Furs by Sacher-Masoch, The Story of O by Pauline Reage...

How long before the British Taliban decide that even more stuff must be banned to protect our Moral Purity...?

But does anyone get to say...

... Launch all Vipers!

They missed an obvious application...

... the Government should require high powered versions to be built into ALL clothing with a remote control available to all Police and they won't have to bother giving cops tasers any more...

Why not just...

... add a Taser attachment.

THAT would stop people singing off-key...!!

Err...

... what, exactly are "underage products"?

Normal?

This must be some strange definition of "normal" that I wasn't previously aware of...

Bollocks...!

"The prof added that, counterintuitively, it is those with little confidence in their own beliefs who are least willing to consider opposing views."

I frequently have problems in discussion forums, getting accused by some people of not being willing to listen to other points of view and only accepting stuff that agrees with my own beliefs etc.

But what these people don't realise is that I've developed my opinions over 20 or more years of such discussions. I will still listen and I'm perfectly willing to change my position, but they're going to have to come up with a damned convincing argument to show why my position is wrong.

"I don't see any evidence of that"

Gamble then went on to say that he had seen no evidence of the Pope being a Catholic or bears shitting in the woods, so, obviously, these claims had no factual basis...

Usenet RIP :-(

Despite the ignorance of Steve Kay, Usenet is still of use to many people.

Unfortunately now, given this nonsensical ruling (how is Usenet supposed to deal with any illegal copying?) coupled with the excuse used by certain providers that "Usenet is used for distributing kiddie porn, so we're not going to carry any Usenet groups", it looks like it's going to be wiped out :-(

And I was all ready...

... to make a comment about this being a Chicken Shit idea...

The government sees young people as...

... less immediately opposed to carrying such a card.

Translation: they don't realise what the risks to their basic liberties are.

In other words: Get them young and by the time they've figured it out, it'll be too late.

iReal...

... iPod, iPhone, iTunes, iGoogle...

... can I please trademark iDespair?!