Slashdot Mirror

The majority in Northern Ireland want to remain part of the UK. Reference: http://www.ark.ac.uk/nilt/2005/Political_Attitudes/NIRELAND.html

as noted by a sibling, you're wrong: this wasn't in response to you at all, but my immediate parent. threading is useful.

on the 98% figure, however: i think you're confusing the turnout with the results. the turnout for the 1973 plebiscite was about 58% (due at least in part to the boycott of a large portion of the Catholic population); the results were over 98% in favor of remaining in the United Kingdom. CAIN has a summary of the plebiscite. Catholics are still a minority in Northern Ireland today, so if you're correct about the population growing there (i have no idea) i imagine they still would've been trounced without the boycott. also of note is this more recent (but smaller) opinion survey showing that 40% of folks in Northern Ireland think of themselves as Unionist while only 22% think of themselves as Nationalist.

the rest of your argument seems to mostly be trying to convince me to hold the position i'm already arguing for. so, um, good job! :-)

"And that N. Ireland thing really bugs me. Get out already." It's not that simple. This poll shows that 38% of Northern Irelanders are Unionists (who want it to remain part of the UK). They will oppose any move to make N. Ireland part of the Republic, and an Independent N.I. would have conflicts between the same groups as today. The Northern Ireland Assembly may one day evolve into a stable government where conflicts are resolved in a civil manner. However there are many obstructions that need to be dealt with before that happens.

Dear Mr. Huhne,

Please could you use your influence to challenge the proposed EU directive on Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement which will be voted on on March 8th 2004. This directive as it stands is deeply flawed as it treats individual people who may unintentionally infringe copyright in the same way as ruthless criminals and counterfeiting gangs. Please support (on my behalf) an amendment to the directive which would target the master criminals rather than the ten year-old boy who taped his favourite song off the radio.

While I agree that copyright is an important thing to protect (as an artist, I would not like my work to be ripped off against my wishes), I am concerned that granting corporations the right to invade people's homes with private police forces is just too far into George Orwell's 1984 to belong in a free 21st Century.

I am concerned about the way in which this directive is being rushed through parliament by certain parties without proper debate. It should be altered so that measures taken are relative to the scale of infringement so as not to erode basic civil liberties nor stifle innovation.

Thanks for your time,
Malcolm Smith

[Vaguely modelled on the EFF's page]

Come on people: take a few minutes this weekend to ensure these good people have messages in their Inbox on Monday morning!

Some Irish-Americans, perhaps, acting as private citizens. That's like blaming Germany because Muslims living in Germany contributed heavily to Al-Queda. That doesn't fly.

Yeah and I suppose funding of Al Qaeda by private US citizens is not illegal? It's more like blaming a country for taking no action against its citizens who collude in the murder of innocent men, women and children.

Personally, I'd recommend allowing NI a referendum on joining Ireland, as that would solve the whole problem.

Hell, why didn't successive UK governments think of that? Because the vote would go in favour of NI remaining in the UK, check out the demographics, and the aggrieved would remain aggrieved and the Unionists would be even more instransigent. For goodness sake, the maniac Paisley just got the biggest share of the vote in the elections for the NI assembly and he is virulently against the Good Friday agreement.

The election results are here. Note that the republicans of all flavours got 42 seats against 59 for Unionists with 6 for the Alliance (we love everybody) Party and one independent!.

Anyway, just days before a similar vote last year, people also lamented about there being "nothing more they could do" in the same way when the EU tried to legalise spam, but then intense popular opposition did help overturn the pro-spam majority at the very last minute, making a solid anti-spam provision part of the Telecommunications Data Protection Directive instead (unfortunately a similar success could not be achieved to eradicate another article which "allows for" data retention, however this is mostly inconsequential though, as trying to implement what the directive tries to permit in this regard is unconstitutional in many Member States anyway).

Therefore, heck, no, it's only too late if we let the proposed Directive get parliamentary assent. On the other hand, the geek crowd will not be forgiven (nor ever forgive itself) if it lets this happen, especially not on the eve of an international conference like the WSIS that aims to make this whole world a better place by promoting our technophile way of life.

To see for yourself that contacting the MEPs directly is possible, follow this link, find a wealth of information regarding the MEPs from your respective country (especially the socialists seem to be reconsidering their support right now) - and then use it.

This is an Excellent example of why software patents are bad

Right now, if you are a European citizen, like I am, then Write to your European Member of Parliament (MEP), and tell them that you think software patents are a bad thing, and that they should vote against them on June 30th.

The forthcoming European vote was covered here on slashdot a few days ago, but did not make the front page, so did not get much coverage.

You can find a list of European Members of Parliament here To avoid annoying them, do write you your MEP, not to a party leader. If you have several, please take a look at which issues they cover, and chose the one that take an interest in trade/technology etc.

Remember, Write NOW! we don't want this sort of cr*p in

yep

its all stupid

patents should be on a process and as such software should not be patentable

its like saying I have copyrighted the ability to write trashy novels

there is no way that you could get away with this

simple because its too wide rangeing people argue that their software patents cover very specific things but unfortunatly you cant have them if you dont allow the wide rangeing

frankly its all a mess

just say no to software patents in europe

write to your MEP if you live in europe

Who is my MEP

regards

John Jones