Great, another product that'll effectively go into standby instead of powering down.
That's not how hibernation etc work. In ye old days on laptops there was a suspend mode which shut down the screen, drives and cpu but kept the memory active. It was fast, but the laptop would last a day or so in this mode before draining the battery. Then along came hibernation, where the memory is dumped to disk instead. You can hibernate a laptop, take it apart, rebuild it, then resume as all the data is on the disk. Adding hardware throws it off, e.g. I added some RAM and had to do a proper reboot. Regular PCs power management is a couple of years behind laptops, and most new ones support hibernation now.
However, PCs have had the problem you point out for many years. Ever since we abandoned big chunky on/off buttons and went to "soft buttons" (low voltage), the computer is always drawing power to look for a wakeup event. Combine that with scheduled wakeup timers, wake-on-lan etc, your computer is always slurping a little juice down.
Did you read the post you replied to? He said it precaches regularly accessed data, then you complain about memory usage? Where do you think the precaching is happening? As long as those pages are dumped quickly when real memory is needed, the computer is doing a good job if it is maximising the RAM usage.
Free local calls in the US. That hasn't been around here in Europe, and so, moving to broadband is a fiscal necessity unless you want to go bankrupt.
Not true. I had 0800 (free) dialup for two years here in the UK before I got broadband, starting some time in 2000. Used to have internet connection sharing and a dedicated line for it, providing glorious 56k light-speed communication for the whole house.
also you must consider if the pages google happens to be spidering are in china, more than likely the higher number of them WILL have normal pictures of the place
I concurr. When I visited Tiananmen Square, it was full of Chinese tourists, many visiting for the first time. (it's a huge country). Tiananmen is in the centre of Bejing and it is at the entrance to The Forbidden City, probably the biggest tourist attraction in China. Many of them had never met a westerner before, I'm in many Chinese family photo albums because of this. Some asked & posed, some just snapped a shot, and some had their family walk past you as they tried to take a shot with both you and them in the frame. Quite funny really.
I'm kinda tempted to hit google.cn/images and have a look for myself!!
For some reason process explorer seems to display sometimes totally obscene numbers when everything appears to be ok on task manager. I have no idea what's the difference about.
Don't trust the Task Manager. It only lists resident memory by default IIRC. You want the full application image size to determine how much memory it is really using.
I mean i guess it's cool they could do it and all, but... the PSP's screen size, frex, is acceptible. Barely. But my cellphone...?
The screen on my mobile is bigger than the PSPs. And I don't need to hack the firmware in order to run homebrew apps/scripts. And it has a qwerty keyboard.
you REALLY want to watch a full length movie on a moving train/bus/backseat on a screen the size of your hand?
Nope, that is a sure recipe for headaches. A ten min show is doable on a daily commute. News/weather translates well.
IMHO, mobile TV will be more of a reference than a "I have nothing better to do tonight so I will channel surf and lose yet another precious day to mindless banality", or at worst a time killer when you are otherwise stuck for something to do waiting for a bus etc.
Absolutely true, unless you happen to have friends working there.
My friends wife no longer worked there, and she never worked in the office I contacted. Nor did I mention that I knew any of their former colleagues.
Trading Standards are exactly as described above: useless tossers who need more than a thousand complaints before getting out of bed to investigate
Bullshit. That's nowhere near my experience, they could not have been more helpful for my one single, isolated complaint.
and who won't listen when you try to explain that the terms of an ISPs "broadband bandwidth provision" has changed in subtle ways.
Maybe they aren't all that up on technology, and you did not explain it very well. All you had to do was say the service did not resemble what you originally signed up for. Sure, the ISP can change the contract all they want, but that does not change the law. Ever wonder where the phrase "your statatory rights are not affected" comes from? Do you think they put that up in adverts/contracts through their own choice?
Reminds me of a recent story on fark.com, where a tunnel under the US-Mexico border was found. The linked article doesn't specifically mention it, but I'm sure the original article mentioned finding it using some sort-of below-ground radar. Google news has a whole lot of articles if you search for "mexico tunnel".
Sure, the Flying Spagetti Monster is pretty much an athiest symbol, leaning more to darwinism as a "belief". Prior to that, the Darwin Fish has been around for a while.
I'm all for the creation of an athiest "religion". More of a collection of people who are fed up of religious nutjobs fighting for their own place in heaven on a global stage. I reckon there are more of us than them and it's about time to tell them we've had enough of their bullshit dogma.
Funny, "Sheesh" is an American-ism. Why didn't also post "Gee whiz"?
Been in use in Scotland for a long time, at least in my family. I can't imagine it being said in anything other than a thick Glaswegian accent.
trading standards collect complaints, they rarely do anything to redress the balance unless they get enough of them.
Not true. You're maybe thinking of the "office of" people e.g. Oftel. Trading Standards work on a per-case basis and will phone the other party on your behalf. I've used this service before and a friend's wife used to work for them. Check their website for more info, they are a nice, helpful bunch of people, I was seriously shocked to get that level of attention from a free government service. I'd have been happy with a useful leaflet, instead they phoned the shop, the manufacturer then got the shop to pay 50% of the costs to repair a three-year-old TV with no extended warranty.
Small claims court is *not* a last resort. It is designed to sort out exactly the kind of contract disputes described.
Only when the written law doesn't already make a clear judgement. If you took this case to court, the key phrase to win it for the customer would be "Sale of Goods Act". Then the company will be blasted by the judge for being so stupid in bringing such an obvious losing case to court. I'm not saying SCC aren't useful, but when there are clear laws on your side and people well versed in them also willing to fight your corner, going for a SCC case is just nuts. It's an open and shut case; a mis-sold service. Inform them of your intentions, cancel the payments and that's it, end of story. Any hastle, Trading Standards will tell them where to go. Just make sure they know why you are cancelling; you can save some time by quoting the law in the first message so they won't send you the "you can't do that!!" message to try and scare you off.
No... I can't speak for the U.S., but in the U.K. you should not do this. [snip] Then sue the original ISP in the small claims court... this is not the terrifying activity it sounds like.
Sheesh, that is NOT how things are done in the UK. Phone Trading Standards, specifically mention that you asked about p2p beforehand and the contract is null and void there and then. If you inform a saleperson of a specific need when purchacing goods or services, you are entitled to a refund if the goods don't meet your specified needs.
Small claims court is a last resort and would be madness in this case. The law is fully on your side if you were mis-sold the service.
The WTC was targeted as a symbol of Americas economic might. The 3,000 deaths were inconcequential, the target was the financial powerhouse of the USA. If you want to attack or terrorise civilians, there are far better ways, e.g. water supply, public transport. The buildings collapse was a fluke and if it wasn't for that the death toll would have been far less tragic. Either way NYC and the NYSE would still have been crippled.
As I mentioned above, terrorists work by inciting terror.
Gandi was once considered a terrorist. Several countries view the BBC news network as a terrorist organization. "One mans terrorist is another mans freedom fighter" - Regan. It's just a word.
There are plenty of examples of terrorists striking civilian targets; just last year, for example, you had the attack on the Sharm el-Sheik resort in Egypt. In 2002 there were also some notable attacks in Bali and Kenya, also at civilian resorts, etc.
Small issue with these viewpoints..."teh terrorists" aren't one globally aligned and centrally controlled force. Neither you or the parent can make such blanket statements about what they will target. Some groups might target military targets, some might go for ecconomic or infrastructure. Others go for nightclubs full of "infidels" or what have you.
Banding them together like this is the creation of a force designed to scare and cajole you into being a good little citizen, kind-of like a modern edition of Duck & Cover. Be afraid and do what you are told! Or the terrorists will get ya!!
The perfect time to hackers attack. In the middle of the "fake" attacks they can really attack and steal some data.
Actually, that would not surprise me. On both 9-11 and the London Bombings, the authorities were conducting a simulated attack of the exact same nature. Seriously, on 9-11 they were training for hijackings and in London it was tube bombs.
You can't make this shit up. My tinfoil hat is on and I'll be watching the news...;-)
In all seriousness, I doubt we hear the half of all cyber attacks; it's rarely in the interests of the victim to announce it publically.
I only skimmed the article, so maybe I missed it, but what are taxpayers paying for this system that still will not stop someone from strapping a ring of explosives under their coat?
It's quite simple really. The company that makes it has connections to the right people and had these people made the request. The politicians then get a nice kick-back called a "campaign donation" that is all legal and 100% above board. Everyone benefits, except the taxpayers, but hey, when was the last time they donated money to your campaign?
You, sir, are a troll, plain and simple. This article was not anti-French, it had nothing to do with Iraq, yet you decided to bring it up anyway.
The article wasn't anti-French, but the bulk of the comments were. Just look up. Part of the reason I read this discussion was to look upon in dispair at the "France surrenders" posts that predicatably turned up. This hatred for France is completely artificial propaganda, "Freedom Fries" anyone?
I have NO ISSUE with anyone who points out the complete and utter hypocracy of this point of view. If you put up with the imbecilic "France Surrenders" remarks, then you should STFU when someone points out the bullshit.
That is all good and well, but that is not the way one should act. One should generally follow laws even when they are imperfect.
Nonsense. Rosa Parks? OK, so comparing the US civil rights movement to kids downloading Britney isn't really valid, but "generally follow laws" isn't really the case.
Most people don't murder others because it's wrong, not because it's illegal. Some people smoke pot because they don't agree with the "danger" touted in campaigns. The illegal nature of it does nothing, except perhaps entice kids to do something rebelious.
You don't tap foreign officials for things to be "admissible in court" - you tap them so that you get the information of what their plans are.
Exactly. And it's not just foreign officials. A friend of mine worked for the SNP, a Scottish political party. They were warned on the first day that their phones were tapped and they should watch what is said.
The only scandal about Watergate was that they got caught.
Or do you think that the Bush admin has the scruples not to tap its allies?
It's not a parisan issue. The tapping of foreign officials predates the bipartisan system that some people mistake for democracy.
A *lot* of ISPs block incoming SMTP from residential/dialup/dynamic addresses.
Really? AOL is the only one that bounces my mails as far as I can tell. The only other place I have issues with is my employers email system, which does the same thing.
Parents are liable for the behavior of their minor children.
No they aren't. They should be, but under the law in most countries they are not. Try and find examples of a parent being convicted of a childs crime that was committed without the parents knowledge.
In your strawman case, the parents can, in fact, be sued for negligence.
You can sue someone for anything. Doesn't mean you'll win. How many parents lock up their car keys? How is it negligent if a child takes keys out of a kitchen drawer? Good luck winning that case.
I've long argued for legislating parental responsibility. Parent's should accept a percentage of their childrens crimes. So, if the child gets caught stealing once, no biggie. However, if the parent then does nothing to change things, the parent should be convicted of every third crime done by the child. Exceptions would be if the parent was actively trying to improve things. Many of the problems in society are caused by increasing amounts of people not giving a fuck about others. Force them to and things will improve.
AOL have been blocking our mails for years, go on, try it. Run your own SMTP server and try and send a message to an AOL account. Instant bounce. Here's what you get:
550-The IP address you are using to connect to AOL is either open to
550-the free relaying of e-mail, is serving as an open proxy, or is a
550-dynamic (residential) IP address. AOL cannot accept further e-mail
550-transactions from your server until either your server is closed to
550-free relaying/proxy, or your ISP removes your IP address from their
550-list of dynamic IP addresses. For additional information,
Are you saying that if the USA had a different attitude then (non insolationist), WW2 would not have happened? That is a completely preposterous statement. At best the war might have ended more quickly, but NO NATION had the resources to fight in 1939.
I think you're implying that it's OK for Osama bin Laden to kill 3000 innocent Americans because the US had bases in Saudi Arabia. Is that what you're saying? Because that was the main reason Osama was supposedly pissed at us
"Supposedly"? There is no doubt about it! The USA army is in Saudi Arabia propping up a corrupt repressive dictatorship.
Or does he just want to spread militant Islam across the globe?
No. While some asshats like him want to see the global rule of islam, that's not the goal. They are reacting to us spreading capitialism (without the freedom) by backing corrupt governments with cash and weapons. We went there are started messing about first.
People like you always remind me of Starship Troopers, were one guy points out that they started the war and gets ridiculed as a result. Even though it's plainly obvious what the cause was.
The latest is that they will stop plotting to kill Americans if we pull out of Iraq. Right...
And stop staging coops in other countries. That's pretty much been their goal since day one, but our leaders tell us "they hate freedom" and we accept that unquestioningly.
There is no rhyme or reason to madmen
Oh yes there is, and you are the one who is mad if you dismiss your enemies as "madmen" without the slightest background in how the current situation came to be.
People don't just wake up and decide to strap a bomb to themselves. Kill a few family members, overthrow their governent and then you have the makings of a suicide bomber.
The Bible? Are people still quoting that thing? Do you want me to quote the bit where it explains that you can rape women provided you give them 24 hours to grieve after you kill their parents? Or the bit where it says that wearing two different kinds of cloth at the same time is a mortal sin?
Sorry, but a book like that is not where I look for moral guidance. Nor do I treat it as a historical record of what was going on at the time. It's had more edits that A New Hope. David probably shot Goliath first in the original...
If it wasn't for the "we are superiour and divine" attitude preached by these books, slavery would likely never have happened. In order to support slavery, you must be able to see the slave as a lesser-person. The bible, the koran and the talmud all do that. Religion and nationalism are the foremost causes of slavery.
Remind me: How much tobacco, sugar, or cotton does Great Britain produce?
At one point, most of it. Remember the thing called "The British Empire"? We gave up slavery for moral reasons, not because they weren't useful in our home country. Which also has a lot of agricultural industry; I'm sure slaves can grow tomatos and potatos just as well as cotton. Most UK "ethnics" are from the Indian sub-continent who came here of their own choice utilizing their British nationality. In fact, I believe that they were given incentives to come over and work, as there were labor shortages. Contrast that to the number of African decendants of people who did not choose to go to the USA. This legacy is still visible today in the make-up of our populations.
Besides, the TRADE of slaves was banned, not just the use. That meant that any (law abiding) merchant could have nothing to do with slavery.
From the 1650s through the early 1800s, the English dominated the slave market.
During that period, the English dominated ALL markets. If you disagreed, they'd kill you, or enact regime change to a more profitable system. Nothing has changed.
Slashdot Mirror
That's not how hibernation etc work. In ye old days on laptops there was a suspend mode which shut down the screen, drives and cpu but kept the memory active. It was fast, but the laptop would last a day or so in this mode before draining the battery. Then along came hibernation, where the memory is dumped to disk instead. You can hibernate a laptop, take it apart, rebuild it, then resume as all the data is on the disk. Adding hardware throws it off, e.g. I added some RAM and had to do a proper reboot. Regular PCs power management is a couple of years behind laptops, and most new ones support hibernation now.
However, PCs have had the problem you point out for many years. Ever since we abandoned big chunky on/off buttons and went to "soft buttons" (low voltage), the computer is always drawing power to look for a wakeup event. Combine that with scheduled wakeup timers, wake-on-lan etc, your computer is always slurping a little juice down.
Did you read the post you replied to? He said it precaches regularly accessed data, then you complain about memory usage? Where do you think the precaching is happening? As long as those pages are dumped quickly when real memory is needed, the computer is doing a good job if it is maximising the RAM usage.
Not true. I had 0800 (free) dialup for two years here in the UK before I got broadband, starting some time in 2000. Used to have internet connection sharing and a dedicated line for it, providing glorious 56k light-speed communication for the whole house.
I concurr. When I visited Tiananmen Square, it was full of Chinese tourists, many visiting for the first time. (it's a huge country). Tiananmen is in the centre of Bejing and it is at the entrance to The Forbidden City, probably the biggest tourist attraction in China. Many of them had never met a westerner before, I'm in many Chinese family photo albums because of this. Some asked & posed, some just snapped a shot, and some had their family walk past you as they tried to take a shot with both you and them in the frame. Quite funny really.
I'm kinda tempted to hit google.cn/images and have a look for myself!!
Don't trust the Task Manager. It only lists resident memory by default IIRC. You want the full application image size to determine how much memory it is really using.
The screen on my mobile is bigger than the PSPs. And I don't need to hack the firmware in order to run homebrew apps/scripts. And it has a qwerty keyboard.
you REALLY want to watch a full length movie on a moving train/bus/backseat on a screen the size of your hand?
Nope, that is a sure recipe for headaches. A ten min show is doable on a daily commute. News/weather translates well.
IMHO, mobile TV will be more of a reference than a "I have nothing better to do tonight so I will channel surf and lose yet another precious day to mindless banality", or at worst a time killer when you are otherwise stuck for something to do waiting for a bus etc.
My friends wife no longer worked there, and she never worked in the office I contacted. Nor did I mention that I knew any of their former colleagues.
Trading Standards are exactly as described above: useless tossers who need more than a thousand complaints before getting out of bed to investigate
Bullshit. That's nowhere near my experience, they could not have been more helpful for my one single, isolated complaint.
and who won't listen when you try to explain that the terms of an ISPs "broadband bandwidth provision" has changed in subtle ways.
Maybe they aren't all that up on technology, and you did not explain it very well. All you had to do was say the service did not resemble what you originally signed up for. Sure, the ISP can change the contract all they want, but that does not change the law. Ever wonder where the phrase "your statatory rights are not affected" comes from? Do you think they put that up in adverts/contracts through their own choice?
Reminds me of a recent story on fark.com, where a tunnel under the US-Mexico border was found. The linked article doesn't specifically mention it, but I'm sure the original article mentioned finding it using some sort-of below-ground radar. Google news has a whole lot of articles if you search for "mexico tunnel".
Sure, the Flying Spagetti Monster is pretty much an athiest symbol, leaning more to darwinism as a "belief". Prior to that, the Darwin Fish has been around for a while.
I'm all for the creation of an athiest "religion". More of a collection of people who are fed up of religious nutjobs fighting for their own place in heaven on a global stage. I reckon there are more of us than them and it's about time to tell them we've had enough of their bullshit dogma.
Been in use in Scotland for a long time, at least in my family. I can't imagine it being said in anything other than a thick Glaswegian accent.
trading standards collect complaints, they rarely do anything to redress the balance unless they get enough of them.
Not true. You're maybe thinking of the "office of" people e.g. Oftel. Trading Standards work on a per-case basis and will phone the other party on your behalf. I've used this service before and a friend's wife used to work for them. Check their website for more info, they are a nice, helpful bunch of people, I was seriously shocked to get that level of attention from a free government service. I'd have been happy with a useful leaflet, instead they phoned the shop, the manufacturer then got the shop to pay 50% of the costs to repair a three-year-old TV with no extended warranty.
Small claims court is *not* a last resort. It is designed to sort out exactly the kind of contract disputes described.
Only when the written law doesn't already make a clear judgement. If you took this case to court, the key phrase to win it for the customer would be "Sale of Goods Act". Then the company will be blasted by the judge for being so stupid in bringing such an obvious losing case to court. I'm not saying SCC aren't useful, but when there are clear laws on your side and people well versed in them also willing to fight your corner, going for a SCC case is just nuts. It's an open and shut case; a mis-sold service. Inform them of your intentions, cancel the payments and that's it, end of story. Any hastle, Trading Standards will tell them where to go. Just make sure they know why you are cancelling; you can save some time by quoting the law in the first message so they won't send you the "you can't do that!!" message to try and scare you off.
Sheesh, that is NOT how things are done in the UK. Phone Trading Standards, specifically mention that you asked about p2p beforehand and the contract is null and void there and then. If you inform a saleperson of a specific need when purchacing goods or services, you are entitled to a refund if the goods don't meet your specified needs.
Small claims court is a last resort and would be madness in this case. The law is fully on your side if you were mis-sold the service.
Seeing as you linked BBC, here's their take on this. (Ctrl-f, "fit for purpose")
As I mentioned above, terrorists work by inciting terror.
Gandi was once considered a terrorist. Several countries view the BBC news network as a terrorist organization. "One mans terrorist is another mans freedom fighter" - Regan. It's just a word.
Small issue with these viewpoints..."teh terrorists" aren't one globally aligned and centrally controlled force. Neither you or the parent can make such blanket statements about what they will target. Some groups might target military targets, some might go for ecconomic or infrastructure. Others go for nightclubs full of "infidels" or what have you.
Banding them together like this is the creation of a force designed to scare and cajole you into being a good little citizen, kind-of like a modern edition of Duck & Cover. Be afraid and do what you are told! Or the terrorists will get ya!!
Actually, that would not surprise me. On both 9-11 and the London Bombings, the authorities were conducting a simulated attack of the exact same nature. Seriously, on 9-11 they were training for hijackings and in London it was tube bombs.
You can't make this shit up. My tinfoil hat is on and I'll be watching the news... ;-)
In all seriousness, I doubt we hear the half of all cyber attacks; it's rarely in the interests of the victim to announce it publically.
It's quite simple really. The company that makes it has connections to the right people and had these people made the request. The politicians then get a nice kick-back called a "campaign donation" that is all legal and 100% above board. Everyone benefits, except the taxpayers, but hey, when was the last time they donated money to your campaign?
The article wasn't anti-French, but the bulk of the comments were. Just look up. Part of the reason I read this discussion was to look upon in dispair at the "France surrenders" posts that predicatably turned up. This hatred for France is completely artificial propaganda, "Freedom Fries" anyone?
I have NO ISSUE with anyone who points out the complete and utter hypocracy of this point of view. If you put up with the imbecilic "France Surrenders" remarks, then you should STFU when someone points out the bullshit.
So true. Every French person wakes up and the first thought they have is "how can I piss off America today?" That's just how they live their lives.
/sarcasm for the humour impaired.
Nonsense. Rosa Parks? OK, so comparing the US civil rights movement to kids downloading Britney isn't really valid, but "generally follow laws" isn't really the case.
Most people don't murder others because it's wrong, not because it's illegal. Some people smoke pot because they don't agree with the "danger" touted in campaigns. The illegal nature of it does nothing, except perhaps entice kids to do something rebelious.
Exactly. And it's not just foreign officials. A friend of mine worked for the SNP, a Scottish political party. They were warned on the first day that their phones were tapped and they should watch what is said.
The only scandal about Watergate was that they got caught.
Or do you think that the Bush admin has the scruples not to tap its allies?
It's not a parisan issue. The tapping of foreign officials predates the bipartisan system that some people mistake for democracy.
Really? AOL is the only one that bounces my mails as far as I can tell. The only other place I have issues with is my employers email system, which does the same thing.
No they aren't. They should be, but under the law in most countries they are not. Try and find examples of a parent being convicted of a childs crime that was committed without the parents knowledge.
In your strawman case, the parents can, in fact, be sued for negligence.
You can sue someone for anything. Doesn't mean you'll win. How many parents lock up their car keys? How is it negligent if a child takes keys out of a kitchen drawer? Good luck winning that case.
I've long argued for legislating parental responsibility. Parent's should accept a percentage of their childrens crimes. So, if the child gets caught stealing once, no biggie. However, if the parent then does nothing to change things, the parent should be convicted of every third crime done by the child. Exceptions would be if the parent was actively trying to improve things. Many of the problems in society are caused by increasing amounts of people not giving a fuck about others. Force them to and things will improve.
Here is the original story from 2003.
Are you saying that if the USA had a different attitude then (non insolationist), WW2 would not have happened? That is a completely preposterous statement. At best the war might have ended more quickly, but NO NATION had the resources to fight in 1939.
I think you're implying that it's OK for Osama bin Laden to kill 3000 innocent Americans because the US had bases in Saudi Arabia. Is that what you're saying? Because that was the main reason Osama was supposedly pissed at us
"Supposedly"? There is no doubt about it! The USA army is in Saudi Arabia propping up a corrupt repressive dictatorship.
Or does he just want to spread militant Islam across the globe?
No. While some asshats like him want to see the global rule of islam, that's not the goal. They are reacting to us spreading capitialism (without the freedom) by backing corrupt governments with cash and weapons. We went there are started messing about first.
People like you always remind me of Starship Troopers, were one guy points out that they started the war and gets ridiculed as a result. Even though it's plainly obvious what the cause was.
The latest is that they will stop plotting to kill Americans if we pull out of Iraq. Right...
And stop staging coops in other countries. That's pretty much been their goal since day one, but our leaders tell us "they hate freedom" and we accept that unquestioningly.
There is no rhyme or reason to madmen
Oh yes there is, and you are the one who is mad if you dismiss your enemies as "madmen" without the slightest background in how the current situation came to be.
People don't just wake up and decide to strap a bomb to themselves. Kill a few family members, overthrow their governent and then you have the makings of a suicide bomber.
Sorry, but a book like that is not where I look for moral guidance. Nor do I treat it as a historical record of what was going on at the time. It's had more edits that A New Hope. David probably shot Goliath first in the original...
If it wasn't for the "we are superiour and divine" attitude preached by these books, slavery would likely never have happened. In order to support slavery, you must be able to see the slave as a lesser-person. The bible, the koran and the talmud all do that. Religion and nationalism are the foremost causes of slavery.
At one point, most of it. Remember the thing called "The British Empire"? We gave up slavery for moral reasons, not because they weren't useful in our home country. Which also has a lot of agricultural industry; I'm sure slaves can grow tomatos and potatos just as well as cotton. Most UK "ethnics" are from the Indian sub-continent who came here of their own choice utilizing their British nationality. In fact, I believe that they were given incentives to come over and work, as there were labor shortages. Contrast that to the number of African decendants of people who did not choose to go to the USA. This legacy is still visible today in the make-up of our populations.
Besides, the TRADE of slaves was banned, not just the use. That meant that any (law abiding) merchant could have nothing to do with slavery.
From the 1650s through the early 1800s, the English dominated the slave market.
During that period, the English dominated ALL markets. If you disagreed, they'd kill you, or enact regime change to a more profitable system. Nothing has changed.