In the UK (and I think most of Europe), VAT is generally included in the price of the item, and it's the retailer's responsibility to pay the VAT. People tend to complain here that items cost more than they do in the US, without realising that the US price doesn't include sales tax.
It will pretty much kill your tourism industry. The UK doesn't rely solely on VAT, we also have income tax ranging from 20% to 40% depending on your earnings (with a 50% rate coming in next year), plus national insurance on top of that. Our VAT rate is 15%, which is the lowest that EU rules allow.
If you're going to lay claim to the language then you should really start by calling it something other than 'English'.
I regretfully inform you that all communication with Honorable gentlemen should consist soley of cheers OR jeers
Sounds like parliamentary procedure to me. I don't know if you can watch Prime Minister's Questions from outside the UK, but if you can, I heartily recommend it both as an educational exercise and a right laugh.
Oh hang on, you're American... can you work out what I mean by 'Prime Minister's Questions', or do I have to define that as well?
Stop an excuse to go to war? This nation? I think not.
You make it sound like you have a choice in the matter. Yours is the nation that brought the world Norton Antivirus; of course you're not stopping an attack.
Israel's policy, which America supports, is that firing a missile into a block of flats full of civilians is okay, if they think a terrorist is in the building. The attack is not aimed at the civilians, they just happen to be there. I'm sure the same mindset would apply in this case.
My company had a hiccup with our internet connection a month or two ago, and we lost connectivity for a couple of days. The fact that our systems were still within our own infrastructure was a major problem for us, because they were customer facing services. If they'd been in the cloud (as the are now), we wouldn't have had the headaches we had.
No, the worst system is the one where the person elected has to quit in disgrace because they broke rules on donations taken during the leadership campaign that they didn't need because they were the only candidate.
Or maybe it's the best system, given that it got rid of Wendy Alexander (same party as Gordon Brown by the way).
The remote central locking on my car makes a really loud *thunk* when it locks. There's that, and the fact that it's an IR remote so you have to be right next to the car for it to work, where you can see the door locks move to the locked position.
London homes are also far less likely to be equipped with air conditioning than homes in Hong Kong or Australia, which is another reason for the discomfort.
I work for a small company. We do a lot of programming, but we acknowledge that we don't have the artistic skills to create a slick looking web front-end. We recently put some design work we needed done out to tender.
We asked for web design skills first and foremost, but also the capability to write some JavaScript and AJAX, which we didn't think was unreasonable in this day and age.
Of the dozen or so companies we approached, all but one either didn't reply, or told us they didn't have the skills to do the more technical aspects of the tender. The remaining company turned out to be two guys doing this work as a bit on the side, while not at their real jobs (and despite them never having consulted the W3C Validator, they at least produced a nice, clean looking website).
So the answer to your question seems to be this - apparently whole companies can sustain themselves on just these basic skills, while the people who are actually any use need a separate full-time job.
The Wired article author deserves 18 months in jail for that particular piece of writing. I had to follow through to the AP article to find out if the blogger had actually been found guilty or not (he hasn't).
But if your country's economy can be undermined by a blog, then there is no hope for it anyway.
Free markets the world over are based as much on confidence and rumour as actual assets. Why do you think we're in an economic crisis at the moment? It's because of a lack of confidence in the world market. Confidence can be undermined for legitimate reasons, but it can also be undermined maliciously by people spreading rumours that can be flat-out untrue, or can be self-fulfilling prophecies. Spread rumours that the stock of a company is going to tank, and investors will flee, forcing the stock to tank.
And if you think that a blog can't possibly have that much effect, consider that a senior government advisor in the UK was forced to resign recently by a blog, and the media is awash with stories about how powerful blogs are becoming.
It's important to note that nobody has been found guilty yet, and the 18 months sentence is merely an item on the prosecution's wish-list. Hopefully the judge will base the verdict on the following points:
Did the blogger make untrue or misleading statements?
Did he know that his statements were untrue or misleading?
Did his statements cause material damage to the markets?
Did he intend for his statements to cause material damage?
I would hope that they take the fourth point into account, but it's probable that the first three would be enough for a conviction.
That's true if most people do indeed have their music in MP3 format, but there are a large number of iPods out there and hence a large number of iTunes installations. The default import format in iTunes is AAC and iTunes Store purchases are in AAC format, so there are likely to be a large number of AAC files and music libraries out there.
The usage of the term 'MP3' is likely to exceed the use of the actual format, because it's entered the language can be is taken to mean any compressed music file.
I can't speak for T-Mobile, but on O2 if you replace the 'mobileweb' APN username with 'bypass', you can download images without the compression that's otherwise applied.
A broken neck is the intended outcome of the long drop, and there's a formula for calculating the length of the drop based on the weight of the condemned. In the event of a miscalculation it can go both ways. Too short a drop, and strangulation can occur; too long a drop, and as in the case of Saddam's half-brother Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, decapitation can occur.
Google Street View photos are not taken every day. I'd be surprised if they are taken every year. They do not focus on t/a. Bedroom windows are not tagged with any information.
They are idiots. They got uppity about their obscure little village appearing on Google Street View (where it would be no less obscure), but were quite happy to give an interview to the Times about their 'affluent area'.
You never know. Maybe burglars will be scared off once images of the angry mob appear on Street View.
The local called the police according to the article, but there's no mention of them actually turning up. Presumably they just laughed at him. Disappointing, given that the villagers were engaging in behaviour that gets protesters arrested at Faslane on a semi-regular basis.
Only in the UK as far as I know. We had fun explaining that one to our American maths teacher back in high school who, unsurprisingly, didn't believe us.
Every society has rules on what is morally acceptable and what is not, America included. Ireland, a relatively strongly Catholic country, chooses to draw the line in a different place. So what? It's not like they're banning internet porn, only offensive words in domain names.
Domain naming is not a free speech issue. If you think it is, then you're forgetting why free speech exists. When an Irish citizen is banned from discussing the domain name policy then there is a problem, but as far as I'm aware that hasn't happened.
Most UK operators provide PAYG SIMs either for free or below £1 online, probably in-store too although you'll most likely have to provide your address.
Slashdot Mirror
In the UK (and I think most of Europe), VAT is generally included in the price of the item, and it's the retailer's responsibility to pay the VAT. People tend to complain here that items cost more than they do in the US, without realising that the US price doesn't include sales tax.
It will pretty much kill your tourism industry. The UK doesn't rely solely on VAT, we also have income tax ranging from 20% to 40% depending on your earnings (with a 50% rate coming in next year), plus national insurance on top of that. Our VAT rate is 15%, which is the lowest that EU rules allow.
If you're going to lay claim to the language then you should really start by calling it something other than 'English'.
Sounds like parliamentary procedure to me. I don't know if you can watch Prime Minister's Questions from outside the UK, but if you can, I heartily recommend it both as an educational exercise and a right laugh.
Oh hang on, you're American... can you work out what I mean by 'Prime Minister's Questions', or do I have to define that as well?
First of all, the European Union as a whole has a higher GDP than the US.
Second (and because this is a UK-themed article), behold our opt-out.
You make it sound like you have a choice in the matter. Yours is the nation that brought the world Norton Antivirus; of course you're not stopping an attack.
Israel's policy, which America supports, is that firing a missile into a block of flats full of civilians is okay, if they think a terrorist is in the building. The attack is not aimed at the civilians, they just happen to be there. I'm sure the same mindset would apply in this case.
My company had a hiccup with our internet connection a month or two ago, and we lost connectivity for a couple of days. The fact that our systems were still within our own infrastructure was a major problem for us, because they were customer facing services. If they'd been in the cloud (as the are now), we wouldn't have had the headaches we had.
I think the point was that nobody in the Labour Party voted because GB was the only candidate.
No, the worst system is the one where the person elected has to quit in disgrace because they broke rules on donations taken during the leadership campaign that they didn't need because they were the only candidate.
Or maybe it's the best system, given that it got rid of Wendy Alexander (same party as Gordon Brown by the way).
The remote central locking on my car makes a really loud *thunk* when it locks. There's that, and the fact that it's an IR remote so you have to be right next to the car for it to work, where you can see the door locks move to the locked position.
They built a 420 degree version, but they sited it north of the North Pole.
London homes are also far less likely to be equipped with air conditioning than homes in Hong Kong or Australia, which is another reason for the discomfort.
I work for a small company. We do a lot of programming, but we acknowledge that we don't have the artistic skills to create a slick looking web front-end. We recently put some design work we needed done out to tender.
We asked for web design skills first and foremost, but also the capability to write some JavaScript and AJAX, which we didn't think was unreasonable in this day and age.
Of the dozen or so companies we approached, all but one either didn't reply, or told us they didn't have the skills to do the more technical aspects of the tender. The remaining company turned out to be two guys doing this work as a bit on the side, while not at their real jobs (and despite them never having consulted the W3C Validator, they at least produced a nice, clean looking website).
So the answer to your question seems to be this - apparently whole companies can sustain themselves on just these basic skills, while the people who are actually any use need a separate full-time job.
The Wired article author deserves 18 months in jail for that particular piece of writing. I had to follow through to the AP article to find out if the blogger had actually been found guilty or not (he hasn't).
Free markets the world over are based as much on confidence and rumour as actual assets. Why do you think we're in an economic crisis at the moment? It's because of a lack of confidence in the world market. Confidence can be undermined for legitimate reasons, but it can also be undermined maliciously by people spreading rumours that can be flat-out untrue, or can be self-fulfilling prophecies. Spread rumours that the stock of a company is going to tank, and investors will flee, forcing the stock to tank.
And if you think that a blog can't possibly have that much effect, consider that a senior government advisor in the UK was forced to resign recently by a blog, and the media is awash with stories about how powerful blogs are becoming.
It's important to note that nobody has been found guilty yet, and the 18 months sentence is merely an item on the prosecution's wish-list. Hopefully the judge will base the verdict on the following points:
I would hope that they take the fourth point into account, but it's probable that the first three would be enough for a conviction.
That's true if most people do indeed have their music in MP3 format, but there are a large number of iPods out there and hence a large number of iTunes installations. The default import format in iTunes is AAC and iTunes Store purchases are in AAC format, so there are likely to be a large number of AAC files and music libraries out there.
The usage of the term 'MP3' is likely to exceed the use of the actual format, because it's entered the language can be is taken to mean any compressed music file.
It does support AAC though, which produces higher quality sound for the same bitrate, and is less patent-encumbered than MP3.
I can't speak for T-Mobile, but on O2 if you replace the 'mobileweb' APN username with 'bypass', you can download images without the compression that's otherwise applied.
A broken neck is the intended outcome of the long drop, and there's a formula for calculating the length of the drop based on the weight of the condemned. In the event of a miscalculation it can go both ways. Too short a drop, and strangulation can occur; too long a drop, and as in the case of Saddam's half-brother Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, decapitation can occur.
Google Street View photos are not taken every day. I'd be surprised if they are taken every year. They do not focus on t/a. Bedroom windows are not tagged with any information.
They are idiots. They got uppity about their obscure little village appearing on Google Street View (where it would be no less obscure), but were quite happy to give an interview to the Times about their 'affluent area'.
You never know. Maybe burglars will be scared off once images of the angry mob appear on Street View.
The local called the police according to the article, but there's no mention of them actually turning up. Presumably they just laughed at him. Disappointing, given that the villagers were engaging in behaviour that gets protesters arrested at Faslane on a semi-regular basis.
Only in the UK as far as I know. We had fun explaining that one to our American maths teacher back in high school who, unsurprisingly, didn't believe us.
Every society has rules on what is morally acceptable and what is not, America included. Ireland, a relatively strongly Catholic country, chooses to draw the line in a different place. So what? It's not like they're banning internet porn, only offensive words in domain names.
Domain naming is not a free speech issue. If you think it is, then you're forgetting why free speech exists. When an Irish citizen is banned from discussing the domain name policy then there is a problem, but as far as I'm aware that hasn't happened.
One of these. It's a SIM-only contract.
Most UK operators provide PAYG SIMs either for free or below £1 online, probably in-store too although you'll most likely have to provide your address.
The government is democratically accountable, the IEDR is not.