Posts by Vladimir Plouzhnikov

Details, details

"What tax avoidance laws are allowable by 'Obviously' et al?"

You expect too much of Obviously! - he is too consumed by his class-struggle hatred to think about such details. The whole world apparently owed such people a life of luxury but didn't deliver...

Naive

"Similarly, if a company thinks that it's acceptable to base themselves in some tax haven, it shouldn't necessarily expect to be able to trade in various other locations without incurring additional tax liabilities."

If you try to tax the entire world all that will happen is that noone will trade with you. You will end-up a self-isolated commercial pariah state.

A novel approach to tax collection!

"Pay up or you're a kiddie-fiddler?"

Obviously! You don't demonstrate much understanding and morality yourself.

Pay up what?

Great

"Fair payment of income taxes means that we should all pay the same percentage of our gross pay, rate, irrespective of the level of that income."

Fine. Let all the minimum wage people pay 40% tax then.

On the second thought, let's bring the higher- and basic- rate payers down to 10%.

Careful, there

"FFS they make massive profits in the UK out of UK consumers/taxpayers and then wander off to support kleptomaniacs and despotic regimes in other parts of the world."

Shhh! Quiet, or Tony Blair will sue you for slander.

Wrong?

Not quite.

Is it wrong for you to shop around for something and then buy it from the cheapest vendor?

Why should it be wrong then for you to look at various tax rules and chose to arrange your affairs according to the rule that results in the lowest tax?

I am sorry, but

You are just plainly mistaken.

You wrote: "You may not know what the levels are but there is NO WAY you could be done without knowing what you had was not legal!"

As the recently discussed court case shows, you can be found in possession of "offending" material which most sane people don't find offending at all. In the case I mention the defendant successfully appealed but the success was due to the fact that he bought a book with the "offending" photographs in a high street shop! Had he downloaded them from the 'net - who knows what the result would be?

Just google for Sally Mann's images and see for yourself.

And, yes, I believe that anyone who considers those photographs of children pornographic or sexual in nature himself needs a psychiatric examination and counseling, at the very least. Yet these people are allowed to make laws and to pass judgments on others!

Casuality

Exactly. It's not p0rn that makes you a pedo but it's that if you're a pedo then you will look for child p0rn.

In the same way violent computer games cannot make you a psychopath but if you are one you will look for and tend to mostly play violent games.

Fact

"Of course in the fossil case, you could use the waste heat for district heating, but people generally prefer a larger distance between their hot water pipes and the nearest nuclear power plant."

In the Soviet Union they bred carp in the cooling ponds, then ate them. That was to demonstrate the environmental safety of nuclear power stations.

CO2

And it will be in the secondary loop - so, not radioactive.

OTOH

It may save the gunner from RSS as he won't need to hold the trigger pressed all the time...

Guns

"shells that are likely to follow the arrival of a Watchkeeper"

Shells? Where would they find money for those? We can't have both the planes AND the guns, you must know that. Just look at the new Typhoons we've got - see? No guns!

Yes, there must be another way

Nobody needs these uncrackable file formats, DRMs and other bullshit - readers don't need it, authors don't need it and publishers also don't need it (but they must fire the lawyers who have taken over management of their business and put business people in charge instead).

Why people go to libraries? - to read books that they either can't buy or don't want to buy.

If the book is not available for sale - even if the reader copies the library text he/she causes no loss to the publisher/author. That is an open and shut case.

Now, what happens If the book is available but the reader prefers to borrow it from a library? Just think with your heads, people:

Most readers would read most books only once in their lives - so if they read the library copy the publisher must have absolutely no expectation that he will sell his book again to the same person. So, even if some people would keep a copy of occasional library text, it again causes no real loss to the publisher and/or author.

Some may argue that if you have a particularly expensive specialist title (engineering, business) then people would always prefer to borrow from libraries and copy it, rather than buying it outright. But, please, explain why these titles are so expensive in the first place? Because they are published in small numbers. But if you make that book available electronically you don't need to make it so expensive anymore - so more people will buy it.

And taking into account the savings from not having to pay royalties for stupid and useless technology (DRMs) and from firing all the thieving lawyers the publisher will actually end up with more money. It is fracking simple.

Oh, c'mon

"I suggest that all the properties of a regular book are achievable in the digital realm with a DRM / escrow service where keys can be transferred between publishers & users for a nominal fee (waived for charities). It's even possible this DRM can be enforced by a P2P database in much the way Bitcoin operates with publishers and owners of books living on the same network and transactions recorded across nodes."

Why are you asking for fracking DRMs, do you feel some need to be controlled and told what to do in every little aspect of your life or something?

You don't need fracking DRMs on fracking ebooks from the library - just agree with the library to send you reports on how many times the book has been borrowed and charge an agreed rate for it. What's difficult about it?

WMD

I think you will find that in the US any grenade or dynamite stick is now classed as WMD as the recent arrest of a Texan wannabe-terrorist shows. I'm sure it is just a matter of time for this to cross the Atlantic and we will soon see yoof found in possession of fireworks charged as if they were planning to set off a nukular explosion.

@Alex King

"Men can buy and wear womens clothing as they wish, and vice versa"

Clothing stores forcing on consumers their gender-related related stereotypes about the type of clothing and price is not acceptable. Free Choice is a capitalist invention. The Government always know best and you are not qualified to dispute it.

@Lee

Now you Assanged your argument even further...

Wait a second...

"MY previous driving record, MY years of experience, MY choice of cars, MY choice of address, MY choice of parking location, MY selection of fluffy dice"

Do you really want an actuary living with you full time? Also maybe a tax inspector to assess YOUR risk of becoming a tax-evader? And a policeman to vouch that you are not a terrorist?

And why would you want anyone to know that much information about you? Nothing to hide, nothing to fear?

Common sense where?

"although young men in general are statistically more likely to claim (and their claims are also more likely to be higher) it is not proof that a particular young male driver will rack up expensive claims."

If anyone will have a proof that you will rack up an expensive claim you will not get any insurance, period. Insurance works on getting small payments from everyone with expectations that only some of them will claim in the future. If, on average, one category of people claims more often than others the insurers must either raise the premia for that riskier category (fair) or smear the increase over everybody (not fair).

"This was inevitable - young women are statistically more likely to take time off work than young men (the baby thing kind of dictates that) but only a retarded misogynist of epic levels of retardation would suggest it is OK to pay young women less than young men for doing the same job."

Employers normally pay for work already done and not for work which the employee is likely to do in the future, with the exception of sign-on bonuses or some other motivational incentives. Once again your grasp of the role of statistics in the real world is disturbingly lacking...