Whilst it is possible to see Germany as having had a stable governmental system despite PR, in most other countries it has caused substantial instability, to the extent that in many countries PR is tweeked to reduce its impact, e.g. Greece where the party with the most votes gets an extra tranche of MPs. By contrast Belgium's record of 18 months without a government as a result of PR should be a warning to us all.
The great virtue of 'first past the post' is that it forces parties to appeal to a wider group than their obvious supporters; know nothing tea partiers mashed up with business advocates are lined up against a mixture of union placemen and minority activists. The process of coalesce has got to occur somewhere; the belief that it is best done in the spotlight of publicity of the floor of the legislature is somewhat unproven, at best. Certainly the collapse of both the Weimar Republic and the French 4th Republic are usually blamed on their use of PR; I remain to be convinced its the optimal solution.
Whilst the Republicans have played this game well in recent years, it's not that long ago that the Democrats were at it equally successfully, and in many states they still do it. Which is not to suggest that it's a good thing - but let's not get partisan about it.
We have a problem with the propensity of people to want to view garbage (broadly defined). How we control this, along with harassment, is the big issue. This piece sadly offers no useful insights.
The occurence of this sort of fraud in the 19th century led to the emergence of the role of auditors, whose responsibility is to ensure that the accounts are telling the truth; as a result this sort of fraud is rare in Western countries. The question now becomes one of who the auditors were - were they ones who should have done the job, or were the banks fooled into accepting a poor audit. In either case however the auditors will be on the hook unless they can prove that the CEO was doing a VERY good job of hiding the facts.
The ISPs should charge an extra amount explicitly on their bills to account for the cost of storage and administering all data requests under it. The data should of course be stored off line - a write only tape store would appear to be the obvious solution. Locating the store in another country with strict regulations about privacy would force any requests for information to go to the courts of THAT country...
Here's hoping!
Because his crimes occurred whilst he was perhaps covered by an FBI immunity, but not a UK one. For the FBI to expect us not to charge under these circumstances is to impose their choices, on the lapdog, who usually merely licks the master's face in response.
Given that the US has sought the extradition of UK based offenders who hacked US sites, there seems no reason for him not to be surrendered to Her Majesty's hospitality, even if he was given 'immunity' by the US.
Or will the UK once again prove to be a lapdog of the US government.
We have a separate class of 'Licensed Hire Vehicles' which are not as flexible as taxis - you have to book them rather than hail on the street. This does require explicit registration of the vehicles, but I've seen one with 'Uber' flashes, so it seems to work. This is a good solution for people who want to make a real living out of Uber, rather than just occasional.
People like technology when it works - but notice when it fails. If it works, it becomes assumed as part of life - and no longer noticed; the more one thinks about the internet, the more incredible it is.
Part of the problem is that real science is HARD. Most people can't cope and avoid it at school. They dismiss us as geeks - not least to cover their own failure to master the subject. So there's a built up frustration that comes out when it does go wrong... not healthy - but perhaps inevitable given that most people are not up to mastering the science they depend on to live (and all of us won't master it ALL!!)
In terms of the knowledge necessary to teach a subject, that hasn't risen that much. It's important to realise that higher degrees don't teach the breadth of a subject necessary for teaching - they focus down on a remarkably small area. In as far as being an academic is being a teacher, there hasn't been that much change in the knowledge needed to do the job.
The complexity comes from the fact that academics are expected to contribute their subject's advance, and that does need the depth of knowledge. However in practice the skills learnt by a PhD are more than enough to do that; the reality is that post docs exist to absorb the excess supply of PhDs.
Historically university posts were open to people with a BA (e.g. John Wesley and John Newman at Oxford in the 18th and 19th century) That it now takes a PhD and post doctoral work to get the same post means that we are training too many. Therefore the only solution is to row back on the PhDs being generated; given that governments are looking for money saving measures, this would seem an obvious starting point.
In an international free market, if US companies are seen to succumb to this pressure, open source and foreign companies will come along and sell items that (they claim( don't have the back doors. Either the US can shut up about this, or it can lose its companies...
In reality the Feds have overwhelmed every constitutional principle that they've found irritating, and the armed uprising has never happened. But it's a nice fantasy that keeps a few people quiet - because they KNOW they can do something about it when... at which point they will just be mown down in a hail of bullets.
I guess the question that springs to mind is whether that covers ALL network costs, including the high voltage lines from the power station to the sub station. I'm also wondering whether the rural nature of your area doesn't provide a degree of latency and resilience that may be more absent in an urban environment. But I'm guessing there. But yes, you do make an interesting point; thanks.
I guess the other question about costings is about baseload; the issues are spelt out here:
The fact that the UK's gas and electricity prices are among the cheaper in the EU is a hint that there's not a lot of price gouging going on, as does the relative failure of the cooperative buying efforts local authorities have organised. Of course it's attractive to blame the providers when price rises happen, and there IS a suggestion that they don't lower prices as rapidly as they might when wholesale prices fall. but I'm less than convinced that the CEGB and the regional electricity boards would have been any better.Yes Labour got itself a nice little bounce at the polls by proposing a price freeze when in its manifesto for the next election; the most probable effect of that is that all the companies increase their prices beforehand
Utilities are boring because they do a simple job which generates small but predictable profits. Therefore investors put their money into them in the expectation that they will remain boring.
When a new development comes along that destroys their business model, one of two things will happen; they will increase their prices, or they will go out of business. Note that 'the government taking them over' is a subset of 'they will increase their prices'. The service that they provide; a reliable baseload supply and a safe network to distribute electricity HAVE TO BE PAID FOR. At the moment those costs are hidden in the average cost of a kWh. If private solar power reduces the average demand some of the time, the average cost of a kWh will have to be increased, or the other features be recognised and paid for.
Ladies and gentlemen, there is no such thing as a free lunch, despite politicians pretending otherwise for several thousand years.
So which does he prefer? This way he get to keep the backdoors that have been slipped in - just can't use them for evidence. The alternative is no backdoors. Great publicity for the firms; the FBI complaining they are secure. Anyone would think this has been choreographed...
The purpose of the BROADCAST regulator derives, historically, from the limited number of channels available on TV, so it was argued that there was a public interest in controlling who put what on the air. The internet is surely more like the press, where there are no such limitations, so there is no justification for regulation. That the broadcast regulator is trying to butt into internet activities does seem like mission creep - always popular with the regulators as generating more jobs for their people, and with politicians who gain some leverage over the media. NOT good for freedom of speech however...
Slashdot Mirror
Whilst it is possible to see Germany as having had a stable governmental system despite PR, in most other countries it has caused substantial instability, to the extent that in many countries PR is tweeked to reduce its impact, e.g. Greece where the party with the most votes gets an extra tranche of MPs. By contrast Belgium's record of 18 months without a government as a result of PR should be a warning to us all.
The great virtue of 'first past the post' is that it forces parties to appeal to a wider group than their obvious supporters; know nothing tea partiers mashed up with business advocates are lined up against a mixture of union placemen and minority activists. The process of coalesce has got to occur somewhere; the belief that it is best done in the spotlight of publicity of the floor of the legislature is somewhat unproven, at best. Certainly the collapse of both the Weimar Republic and the French 4th Republic are usually blamed on their use of PR; I remain to be convinced its the optimal solution.
Whilst the Republicans have played this game well in recent years, it's not that long ago that the Democrats were at it equally successfully, and in many states they still do it. Which is not to suggest that it's a good thing - but let's not get partisan about it.
We have a problem with the propensity of people to want to view garbage (broadly defined). How we control this, along with harassment, is the big issue. This piece sadly offers no useful insights.
The occurence of this sort of fraud in the 19th century led to the emergence of the role of auditors, whose responsibility is to ensure that the accounts are telling the truth; as a result this sort of fraud is rare in Western countries. The question now becomes one of who the auditors were - were they ones who should have done the job, or were the banks fooled into accepting a poor audit. In either case however the auditors will be on the hook unless they can prove that the CEO was doing a VERY good job of hiding the facts.
They are so frightened of the truth, or the freedom to spread information, that they have to scare people into not doing it.
The ISPs should charge an extra amount explicitly on their bills to account for the cost of storage and administering all data requests under it. The data should of course be stored off line - a write only tape store would appear to be the obvious solution. Locating the store in another country with strict regulations about privacy would force any requests for information to go to the courts of THAT country... Here's hoping!
Because his crimes occurred whilst he was perhaps covered by an FBI immunity, but not a UK one. For the FBI to expect us not to charge under these circumstances is to impose their choices, on the lapdog, who usually merely licks the master's face in response.
n/t
Given that the US has sought the extradition of UK based offenders who hacked US sites, there seems no reason for him not to be surrendered to Her Majesty's hospitality, even if he was given 'immunity' by the US.
Or will the UK once again prove to be a lapdog of the US government.
https://www.cia.gov/library/re... so that's not it
https://www.cia.gov/library/re...
Seems to be kosher... but fails to answer the real questions https://www.cia.gov/library/re...
We have a separate class of 'Licensed Hire Vehicles' which are not as flexible as taxis - you have to book them rather than hail on the street. This does require explicit registration of the vehicles, but I've seen one with 'Uber' flashes, so it seems to work. This is a good solution for people who want to make a real living out of Uber, rather than just occasional.
http://green.autoblog.com/2007...
is an alternative outcome - registration to avoid London's congestion charge (for driving in the streets of much of central London)
People like technology when it works - but notice when it fails. If it works, it becomes assumed as part of life - and no longer noticed; the more one thinks about the internet, the more incredible it is.
Part of the problem is that real science is HARD. Most people can't cope and avoid it at school. They dismiss us as geeks - not least to cover their own failure to master the subject. So there's a built up frustration that comes out when it does go wrong... not healthy - but perhaps inevitable given that most people are not up to mastering the science they depend on to live (and all of us won't master it ALL!!)
In terms of the knowledge necessary to teach a subject, that hasn't risen that much. It's important to realise that higher degrees don't teach the breadth of a subject necessary for teaching - they focus down on a remarkably small area. In as far as being an academic is being a teacher, there hasn't been that much change in the knowledge needed to do the job.
The complexity comes from the fact that academics are expected to contribute their subject's advance, and that does need the depth of knowledge. However in practice the skills learnt by a PhD are more than enough to do that; the reality is that post docs exist to absorb the excess supply of PhDs.
Their universities are coming up to speed nicely...
Historically university posts were open to people with a BA (e.g. John Wesley and John Newman at Oxford in the 18th and 19th century) That it now takes a PhD and post doctoral work to get the same post means that we are training too many. Therefore the only solution is to row back on the PhDs being generated; given that governments are looking for money saving measures, this would seem an obvious starting point.
It's a rounding error in the accounts of an organisation like that; at least one more zero on it would have been a good start...
In an international free market, if US companies are seen to succumb to this pressure, open source and foreign companies will come along and sell items that (they claim( don't have the back doors. Either the US can shut up about this, or it can lose its companies...
In reality the Feds have overwhelmed every constitutional principle that they've found irritating, and the armed uprising has never happened. But it's a nice fantasy that keeps a few people quiet - because they KNOW they can do something about it when... at which point they will just be mown down in a hail of bullets.
I guess the question that springs to mind is whether that covers ALL network costs, including the high voltage lines from the power station to the sub station. I'm also wondering whether the rural nature of your area doesn't provide a degree of latency and resilience that may be more absent in an urban environment. But I'm guessing there. But yes, you do make an interesting point; thanks.
I guess the other question about costings is about baseload; the issues are spelt out here:
http://www.economist.com/news/...
not quite sure how that translates to the western side of the Pond.
The fact that the UK's gas and electricity prices are among the cheaper in the EU is a hint that there's not a lot of price gouging going on, as does the relative failure of the cooperative buying efforts local authorities have organised. Of course it's attractive to blame the providers when price rises happen, and there IS a suggestion that they don't lower prices as rapidly as they might when wholesale prices fall. but I'm less than convinced that the CEGB and the regional electricity boards would have been any better.Yes Labour got itself a nice little bounce at the polls by proposing a price freeze when in its manifesto for the next election; the most probable effect of that is that all the companies increase their prices beforehand
Utilities are boring because they do a simple job which generates small but predictable profits. Therefore investors put their money into them in the expectation that they will remain boring.
When a new development comes along that destroys their business model, one of two things will happen; they will increase their prices, or they will go out of business. Note that 'the government taking them over' is a subset of 'they will increase their prices'. The service that they provide; a reliable baseload supply and a safe network to distribute electricity HAVE TO BE PAID FOR. At the moment those costs are hidden in the average cost of a kWh. If private solar power reduces the average demand some of the time, the average cost of a kWh will have to be increased, or the other features be recognised and paid for.
Ladies and gentlemen, there is no such thing as a free lunch, despite politicians pretending otherwise for several thousand years.
So which does he prefer? This way he get to keep the backdoors that have been slipped in - just can't use them for evidence. The alternative is no backdoors. Great publicity for the firms; the FBI complaining they are secure. Anyone would think this has been choreographed...
The purpose of the BROADCAST regulator derives, historically, from the limited number of channels available on TV, so it was argued that there was a public interest in controlling who put what on the air. The internet is surely more like the press, where there are no such limitations, so there is no justification for regulation. That the broadcast regulator is trying to butt into internet activities does seem like mission creep - always popular with the regulators as generating more jobs for their people, and with politicians who gain some leverage over the media. NOT good for freedom of speech however...