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If you want my opinion, they're just another highly visible reminder that Big Brother is watching you. They disproportionately punish ordinary, decent people for minor infractions, thus keeping them in check, and make a disproportionately big show of going after the Real Bad Guys, i.e. terrorists, even though to all intents and purposes they don't exist. Meanwhile, if your car or house gets broken into, you'll have a hard time even getting the police to call round. Because in our tsrget-driven culture, why waste police hours on difficult crimes you're unlikely to solve when you could be issuing fines to people in pubs for being drunk?

You're quite right that they do a good job of making law-abiding people stay law-abiding. But pardon me for thinking we've bigger fish to fry.

I'm not trying to rub it in, but...

Then again, maybe this isn't the "diesel Land Rover" you want. BTW, in regards to safety, did you see this article? Very very sad. As a soon-to-be father with one of these trucks I'm going to make a mental note to not drive it into a river (and I don't mean in this manner) and if I do, to make sure I pull my family to safety before abandoning the truck.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=497490&in_page_id=1766&ito=1490

Anyone still think Islam is the religion of peace? Theo Van Gogh, the Dutch Mohammed cartoon riots, the Armenius family of NJ, Salman Rushdie, 9/11, the USS Cole, the Iran hostage crisis, Khobar Towers, the Munich massacre, giving aid and comfort to the Nazis during WWII, instigating the Crusades by harassing Christian pilgrims from Europe on their way to visit the Holy Lands, the summer 2006 Paris riots, female circumcision, punishing women for being raped... Sounds more like the religion of perpetual rage and ignorance. It's time for them to grow up and join the rest of civilization which has moved on without them over the last 1000 years or so.

The BBC is not anti-christian either,

Even the BBC says otherwise!

Dude, I listen to the BBC News hour almost -daily- in the USA. They are very liberal.

It seems we always hear about kids and teachers being investigated by the FBI for wearing 'bush sucks' t shirts or other silly things. that just does not happen here

Well, there's no need to investigate everyone in Britian, because you've got everyone on camera. And then, there's this:

Anti-terrorism laws

Heh, I just read this article before - apparently, if you're fat.. I'm sorry.. obese, you are not only unhealthy and the focus of some estranged witch doctors, but you're also not allowed to immigrate into New Zealand! - So those of you fed up with your corrupt governments - better check your weight before moving to the Kiwis ;)

In other news, a bunch of religious fruitcakes have barricaded themselves in a cave in Russia 'to blow themselves up before end of world.' It's only a matter of time before our comet memories are tainted. Maybe when I restore my memories from backup they can be selectively edited.

Moron, this is the UK. Maybe if you read the article, you'd know.

In the mean time, Europe is copying the US policies and in some cases even worse:

Anger as EU plans to store airline passengers' personal details for 13 years
The European Union's top justice official is due to unveil controversial plans that will allow the EU to store personal details of airline passengers for 13 years.

Airport security checks to extend across EU
Passenger checks which have brought chaos to Britain's airports will be extended across the EU, it has emerged.

EU green tax could add £100 to air ticket prices
Air passengers are to be hit with a 'green' tax as part of controversial EU plans to force airlines to pay for the cost of their pollution.

Terror crackdown: Passengers forced to answer 53 questions BEFORE they travel
For every journey, security officials will want credit card details, holiday contact numbers, travel plans, email addresses, car numbers and even any previous missed flights.

Just recent cases, I'm sure you could find even more with google.

Moron, this is the UK. Maybe if you read the article, you'd know.

In the mean time, Europe is copying the US policies and in some cases even worse:

Anger as EU plans to store airline passengers' personal details for 13 years
The European Union's top justice official is due to unveil controversial plans that will allow the EU to store personal details of airline passengers for 13 years.

Airport security checks to extend across EU
Passenger checks which have brought chaos to Britain's airports will be extended across the EU, it has emerged.

EU green tax could add £100 to air ticket prices
Air passengers are to be hit with a 'green' tax as part of controversial EU plans to force airlines to pay for the cost of their pollution.

Terror crackdown: Passengers forced to answer 53 questions BEFORE they travel
For every journey, security officials will want credit card details, holiday contact numbers, travel plans, email addresses, car numbers and even any previous missed flights.

Just recent cases, I'm sure you could find even more with google.

Moron, this is the UK. Maybe if you read the article, you'd know.

In the mean time, Europe is copying the US policies and in some cases even worse:

Anger as EU plans to store airline passengers' personal details for 13 years
The European Union's top justice official is due to unveil controversial plans that will allow the EU to store personal details of airline passengers for 13 years.

Airport security checks to extend across EU
Passenger checks which have brought chaos to Britain's airports will be extended across the EU, it has emerged.

EU green tax could add £100 to air ticket prices
Air passengers are to be hit with a 'green' tax as part of controversial EU plans to force airlines to pay for the cost of their pollution.

Terror crackdown: Passengers forced to answer 53 questions BEFORE they travel
For every journey, security officials will want credit card details, holiday contact numbers, travel plans, email addresses, car numbers and even any previous missed flights.

Just recent cases, I'm sure you could find even more with google.

Moron, this is the UK. Maybe if you read the article, you'd know.

In the mean time, Europe is copying the US policies and in some cases even worse:

Anger as EU plans to store airline passengers' personal details for 13 years
The European Union's top justice official is due to unveil controversial plans that will allow the EU to store personal details of airline passengers for 13 years.

Airport security checks to extend across EU
Passenger checks which have brought chaos to Britain's airports will be extended across the EU, it has emerged.

EU green tax could add £100 to air ticket prices
Air passengers are to be hit with a 'green' tax as part of controversial EU plans to force airlines to pay for the cost of their pollution.

Terror crackdown: Passengers forced to answer 53 questions BEFORE they travel
For every journey, security officials will want credit card details, holiday contact numbers, travel plans, email addresses, car numbers and even any previous missed flights.

Just recent cases, I'm sure you could find even more with google.

J. K. Rowling's lawyers seems to be on a suing spree.. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=487334&in_page_id=1811 This one they lost.

Sure, the US and the rest of the civilized needs to step aside and watch as the followers of the religion of peace take out their rightful revenge on the world-wide conspiracy of baby-eating and blood-drinking Jews, who offend the believers by the mere fact of their existence.

The story seems to have originated at the Daily Mail, a far-right UK tabloid (that's probably, oh... slightly left-of-centre by US standards) which has a tendency towards the jingoistic. 'British Pilots Get Awesome Scary Technology' is the kind of thing they're keen on, although they'd usually prefer 'British Pilots Don't Get Awesome Scary Technology Because Of Labour Government' if they could get it.

The F-35 project is mostly American, but there is a substantial British component to it; according to the Wikipedia article BAE Systems are producing, among other things, the electronic warfare systems and flight control software. So it's quite likely that this nifty helmet thing is in fact British.

Way earlier.. in fact, the original source material:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/technology/technology.html?in_article_id=492631&in_page_id=1965&ito=1490

Why not just link to that in the first place?

Reading 18 blog summaries to just get back to the original story is ridiculous. If you want to credit the guy who happened to tip you off, by all means, but stop wasting our time, link to the original article.

And then of course there's the old saw about how blogs will replace newspapers - interesting that their original material often seems to come from them.

I'm sure I'll get flamed with comments like, "but what about the blog writers ad revenue stream - how dare you cheat him out of his living!" - bullshit. What exactly is the blog writer adding to the equation here that entitles him to anything? The Daily mail reporter found & wrote the story, got quotes, graphics & photos and did the layout. The blog writer said, "Hey, this is cool, check it out". Or more likely said, "hey, check out what my blog buddy said about what his blog buddy said about what his blog buddy said about what his blog buddy said about this cool article in the newspaper"

hilarious.

Link to the original Daily Mail article: The Terminator-style helmets that allow fighter pilots to see through their planes

  Note to submitters and Slashdot editors: Don't link to blogs. They get Slashdotted.

  It's especially shiatty when a blogger doesn't even provide a link to the article he's pulling his text and images from.

  Interesting how the blogger switched the referenced Schwarzenegger character of choice from The Terminator to the Predator in his 'article' to make it appear as original content.

The only problem is that someone can just post a picture of you having a pee in the middle of the street on a Saturday night and then next thing you know, it's in a national newspaper.

Rather like this

And you have an uninformed view.

"The interesting bit here is the Beeb isn't really a commercial organization"

Yes, they are. But they are a commercial organization that is allowed to keep its hand in the public's pocket by means of the licence fee.

However, the BBC also makes a lot of money off sales of programmes, sales of books, CDs and DVDs, a number of magazines it publishes sold through newsagents, and various other schemes.

"They're a public entity ..."

No, they're not. They have a charter they -- theoretically -- have to abide by, because of the way they are funded. They are *not* a public body.

  "... which is strictly required to keep itself free of commercial and political influence."

They may be required to. They've ignored their requirements for years -- particularly the latter one -- and got away with it. There's a strong left-liberal bias there. They've even admitted as much themselves behind closed doors. Unfortunately for them, the report where they did got leaked:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=411846&in_page_id=1770

Goodness, we had more proof of the obvious only just recently -- it's only what one would expect:

http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/298421/how-liberal-is-the-bbc.thtml

As for being in bed with Bill Gates, from what I've heard they certainly are pretty good friends if nothing more. But I wouldn't exactly be surprised if stained sheets did turn up at some point.

The BBC, of course, has to go a little careful. If it shuts Linux and Mac users out permanently it would have to answer to the communications regulator, Ofcom:

http://www.ofcom.org.uk/

The BBC will be well aware of that.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/technology/technology.html?in_article_id=482560&in_page_id=1965

How about double blind tests of in-person musical performance? Oh wait, did that.

How about double blind tests of literature? Oh wait, did that too.

How about double blind tests of painting and sculpture?

> You might make yourself at least slightly aware of the issue before commenting on it.

Oh I paid attention, however, I don't think you have. I understand the media has been cut off, but there are other sources of information. For example, The Daily Mail reports that thousands of protesters have been allegedly killed, yet, I don't see any mention of that on mainstream media, I did see however two stories about Britney's problems tonight.

> You dislike U.S. news media. That's great; here's a cookie. Try paying attention next time.

I hope that's a chocolate chip cookie ;)

This is London, not Uzbekistan. It is unbelievable that a website can be wiped out on the say-so of some tycoon. We live in a world where internet communication is increasingly vital, and this is a serious erosion of free speech.

Happiness Is A Warm Electrode

Hmm, I always thought that happiness was a warm gun.

It's actually both, which means, logically, that happiness is a taser.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4296997124728291988&q=Talking+CCTV&total=12&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=1
You're a little behind the curve unfortunately
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/6524495.stm
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=405477&in_page_id=1770

Sweet! They can bust out that banner again.

http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2007/04_02/georgebushAP2604_468x306.jpg

yes, unless you happen to be an immigrant

First off, the BBC's bias is legendary and self admitted.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/new s/news.html?in_article_id=411846&in_page_id=1770

They admit they are biased liberals because they feel that their view of society is intrisincally better. It doesn't mean that you can't just not listen to them, any more than you would tune out Fox. It just means that you need to know what their agenda is, and not take what they say without a grain of salt.

Sure you are. Always the anonymous sources.

As opposed to you, merely making things up, to suit your political agenda.

See this guy.

The article starts off:-

"A major security alert has been sparked after the theft of a computer database containing thousands of top secret telephone records from police investigations into terrorism and organised crime."

So you think someone hacked the computer and nicked the database.

further down the article:-

"The raid at the high-security head office of Forensic Telecommunication Services Ltd (FTS) at Sevenoaks, Kent, raised fears that vital evidence from undercover investigations may have been lost or have fallen into the wrong hands."

"The stolen computer server - a metal box the size of a large DVD player - contained details of who made calls on mobiles, their exact location and precisely when the calls were made."

FTS said in a statement to The Mail on Sunday last night: "We can confirm that the company was recently the victim of a break-in at one of our premises in Kent.

"As a result, some IT equipment, including a server, were stolen".

"The server, which is security protected, contained administrative data and details of some case files in relation to FTS's forensic work."

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/new s/news.html?in_article_id=474788&in_page_id=1770

No thanks. I would rather not move to a country that has 4 security cameras for every person. Heck you guys are even adding capabilities that allow the cameras to talk back. It just seems a bit Orwellian...

Banks can make significant amounts of money by intentionally ripping off customers and making it difficult to get their money as a matter policy. A customer may have the right to sue but it is unrealistic to think that is a viable possiblity for most people.

Longer than the goat that Sony slaughtered, just to promote God of War II game. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/new s/news.html?in_article_id=451414&in_page_id=1770&c t=5 That was the last day that I would buy anything from Sony.

When I was still a member of what is probably best termed the British Jihadi Network - a series of British Muslim terrorist groups linked by a single ideology - I remember how we used to laugh in celebration whenever people on TV proclaimed that the sole cause for Islamic acts of terror like 9/11, the Madrid bombings and 7/7 was Western foreign policy.

By blaming the Government for our actions, those who pushed this "Blair's bombs" line did our propaganda work for us.

More important, they also helped to draw away any critical examination from the real engine of our violence: Islamic theology.

The attempts to cause mass destruction in London and Glasgow are so reminiscent of other recent British Islamic extremist plots that they are likely to have been carried out by my former peers.

And as with previous terror attacks, people are again saying that violence carried out by Muslims is all to do with foreign policy.

For example, on Saturday on Radio 4's Today programme, the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, said: "What all our intelligence shows about the opinions of disaffected young Muslims is the main driving force is not Afghanistan, it is mainly Iraq."

When I was still a member of what is probably best termed the British Jihadi Network - a series of British Muslim terrorist groups linked by a single ideology - I remember how we used to laugh in celebration whenever people on TV proclaimed that the sole cause for Islamic acts of terror like 9/11, the Madrid bombings and 7/7 was Western foreign policy.

By blaming the Government for our actions, those who pushed this "Blair's bombs" line did our propaganda work for us.

More important, they also helped to draw away any critical examination from the real engine of our violence: Islamic theology.

The attempts to cause mass destruction in London and Glasgow are so reminiscent of other recent British Islamic extremist plots that they are likely to have been carried out by my former peers.

And as with previous terror attacks, people are again saying that violence carried out by Muslims is all to do with foreign policy.

For example, on Saturday on Radio 4's Today programme, the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, said: "What all our intelligence shows about the opinions of disaffected young Muslims is the main driving force is not Afghanistan, it is mainly Iraq."

...and it's not like the people here before us weren't the descendants of immigrants themselves, either. No one has a legitimate claim to this land that isn't based upon force. No one. The ones with the most force are the ones who currently hold it. Which is pretty much the same everywhere. People who don't like it can start building a force of their own and see how well they do. But the peoples laughably called "native americans" have no better claim to the lands of this continent than the europeans did. Maybe less; like other less developed peoples who were displaced before them and by various groups of them, they were manifestly unprepared to deal with a more organized, more technically adept society bent on expansion. Nations are notorious for being unsympathetic to "I was here first" as a legitimate land claim. As exemplified by Russia's recent annexation of areas by the north pole.

Mind you, I have no objection whatsoever to immigrants. I think we need them, I think we're mistreating them, and I think this "build a wall" idea is one of the most stupid ideas I have ever heard. That's because I don't see a particular difference between a guy who was born here, as opposed to a guy who was born there. I think the entire idea is just unethical class prejudice masquerading as something noble. My family's been here since 1634; that doesn't make me one bit more valuable than some Mexican dude. The very idea is stupidity on the hoof.

tell that to this kid; shes the youngest member of MENSA yet, at only two years of age, and the youngest kid in her family to boot! http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/new s/news.html?in_article_id=463539&in_page_id=1770

Good reply. Tenure reform seems to make sense based on what I read above. But not tenure abolition. Perhaps something like a peer-reviewed performance evaluation, whose results could be used to revoke tenure (in addition to the usual rules like - don't snog a student :P)?

We're now getting into the realm of semantic differences, but I'd prefer ten-year renewable contracts.

What I am REALLY afraid of is academia turning into a microcosm of industry when each have their uses and each must exist, independently to some extent. The potential for short-sightedness is just too dangerous.

Industry is short-sighted, but that doesn't mean we can't take their pay/salary model and tweak it to have a longer characteristic timescale.

I do take your point about young researchers not being allowed to take risks. That, fortunately, is a problem that can be solved at the department level since the hiring committee, comprised of professors, can easily reward a young non-tenured researcher who dares to take (well-thought out) risks.

A good idea in theory, but it doesn't work in practice. Given a choice between a semi-decent candidate with a proven record, and a brilliant high-risk candidate, they'll take the semi-decent candidate. This is certainly what I saw when I was on a faculty search committee. String theory isn't as high-risk as you make out when you consider that the "payoff" that counts for hiring isn't experimental validation but rather high profile publications.

Also, I must admit that I have NOT thought that far ahead - marriage, family, etc. The two-body problem may be soluble, with the right super-partner, but you do know that no one has yet solved the three-body problem? :D But seriously, you make some excellent points in that regard. For a single guy, a GSR's salary (for me at least) is like living in the lap of luxury (no jokes). Of course, this will change at some point. It is ironic that one's wants increase with increasing salary

Some people do get carried away with increasing salary, always wanting more (a boat, another car, a fourth bathroom) than they can afford. A lot more people just want a good marriage, good health, a house, two kids, and a decent education for their kids. These things go a long way towards happiness, but they're unfortunately becoming harder and harder to get.

Please, for your own sake, take an afternoon and do these calculations. Look up the cost of an average house (around here, a typical starter home is half a million, and it's almost impossible to get anything for under $400k in a neighborhood that won't get you shot). Look up interest rates, mortgages, tax rates, etc. Look up typical salaries. Figure out how much time you'd spend at work, how much time commuting, and whether you'd have any time for your family and your health. This is your future, and you shouldn't just let it happen to you without planning. I see a lot of people who just "follow the path" in front of them, and end up unhappy because they didn't figure out what was really important to them.

I certain that we're at the same school, same department. Small world! Good ol' Anne :D. What would we do without her?

I don't know. Anne does wonders to help grad students, and the department wouldn't be the same without her. BTW, I'm guessing you're in your second or third year. Am I right?

The UK's Daily Mail ran a campaign on how to stop junk snail mail.

The Post Office responded by informing residents that if they took up this scheme, they
risked losing delivery of official government letters such as bills, council tax and passports.

Booming sales of laptops have led to a surge in the number of computer users with back and muscle problems, experts have warned.

Girls as young as 12 are being diagnosed with nerve damage caused by slouching over screens, a group of leading chiropractors said.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/hea lth/healthmain.html?in_article_id=458548&in_page_i d=1774

What are those lines on the display? (see picture in article).

If this is a PR thing for Sony, that's a REALLY bad 1st impression.

I came out of education a few years ago and we got plenty of education about the Holocaust, GCSE level History was two years mostly spent on the German history between WWI and WWII.

Ditto. At my school, we not only learned all about the Holocaust, but we went on a school trip to visit Auschwitz. There were plenty of Muslim students in my class, and none of them complained, they got on with the work like everybody else, because if they didn't, they'd get Fs.

I clicked the link and laughed as soon as i saw the URL: http://www.dailymail.co.uk./ They make no references to the number of schools or anything else.

For non-Brits: The Daily Mail is the UK equivalent to Fox News. So right-wing it used to be nicknamed "the Daily Heil". Their current bogeymen are political correctness and immigration, so the idea that the nation's schools are pandering to Muslims is right up their street, even though it's not a widespread practice and it's being eliminated next year.

I believe when i last saw this pop up it was a single school somewhere, and i believe it was a single Muslim school.

I came out of education a few years ago and we got plenty of education about the Holocaust, GCSE level History was two years mostly spent on the German history between WWI and WWII. Infact, i remember hearing that the German ambassador (or somesuch) was unhappy about how much our history lessons centred on this.

I clicked the link and laughed as soon as i saw the URL: http://www.dailymail.co.uk./ They make no references to the number of schools or anything else.

Armed police raid home after mistaking Lara Croft dummy for gunman

The bottom line with this I believe is it's simply a way for councils to make more money. Currently they simply don't get enough money from the government, so they turn to unreasonably fining people. We've heard about people being fined over scraps of paper, councillors wanting to survey peoples homes to try and charge more council tax, and more similar stories. The councils are just getting desperate for money and it's horrible to watch.

There is an umbrella that allows you to "watch slide-shows". It has a built-in camera, and allows you to transfer pictures to flickr. It's also got a GPS and a compass. I don't quite think it is as practical as a hands-free umbrella, but maybe if you combined the two, you'd have something.

Actually, the idea of a minimal-impact burial is alive and well. Fitting with the tradition, it's called a "green burial". Google isn't all that helpful at this point, but it's essentially being unembalmed, being thrown in a cardboard box and having a tree plotted over you as opposed to a traditional process. I'm not sure how popular it is now, but an article from about a year ago denotes a small, but growing, trend:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/femail/artic le.html?in_article_id=389741&in_page_id=1879

1. Bad Advertisements. Everyone talked about them, everyone said "WTF", everyone shook their head. Again this isn't an awful move, but combine it with the rest of this list and we got the "PSP".

The early "Pass It On" ads were fine. The most recent "Find Me" is cool. I will grant you that the animated mice ads, and the the european red robots ads were fucked up. And the "black-white" posters were tone deaf (but then, they come by that honestly.)

The cheese ads didn't doom the handheld, or even harm it, because those ads came well after the PSP launch. Those ads were irrelevant to the fate of the PSP, because the PSP's fate was already sealed at launch. It was overpriced and crippled. If you don't get traction at launch, no amount of advertising, good or bad, will change your fate.

2. Attacking the fans. People bought the PSP and homebrewed it. Sony closed the gaps. Now this isn't a bad thing but it forced people to make decisions between upgrading to buy games and leaving it at 1.5 to play homebrew. Overtime we've found ways to upgrade to 3.0+ software and play homebrew, however the sore feelings came early and lingered. When people were forced to make that choice and picked homebrew, then sony lost money right there. Games is all Sony's going to make money on.

No one gives a shit about homebrew. And by "no one" I mean the 99% of the people that own a PSP or would consider purchasing a PSP. It's an infintesimly small segment of the market. Sure you may care. Your friends may care. But you and your friends probably also get your jollies recompiling your kernel or something equally hardcore geeky. You're not mainstream. This point is irrelevant.

3. UMDs. Not the worst idea ever but UMDs are clunky and a poor format. They are also slow. Notice that DS is a cartridge. Yeah they are outdated but they also have no load time, and little if any problems. Sony was smart enough to protect the disc instead of putting the laser right next to it, but the UMD is a failed concept that no one was going to buy. Blu-ray is slightly better, but forcing it on the consumer was bad voodoo.

You've got the right point, but for the wrong reasons. The PSP failed because of UMD. UMD was going to be the big content delivery system. You were going to buy movies and games on UMD and use the memory stick for only saving preferences and the like. UMD was doomed from the outset because no one was going to buy movies that could only work on a 4 inch screen. A kick-ass 4 inch screen mind you, but a 4 inch screen none the less. You would have though Sony would have learned there lesson after the Minidisk fiasco, but no. They suffer from terminal not-invented-here syndome.

If Sony had went with all internal storage. iPod like storage, then they would have had something. I mean 4 GB max from an overpriced flash card? No. For the same price you could get an iPod with like 5 times that much space when I considered a PSP a few years ago. Games are cool and all, but I wanted the whole portable media experience Sony was promissing, and not providing. Not that the iPod completely provides it either, but does give me music and video, albeit not on nearly as good of a screen.

5. Ports. This is perhaps the most damning of them all. The PSP is the Playstation portable. The Gameb

Yup.. They share the same fate as the goat. Guys, Sony as a company has completely lost their heads. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/new s/news.html?in_article_id=451414&in_page_id=1770&c t=5

Well you don't hear of many schoolkids being arrested here for writing an essay. There are occasional acts of police, prosecutor, and school administrator stupidity, but You get that everywhere.