Following the least effective example

"Internet users will be protected from abusive bloggers and malicious Facebook postings under proposals to set up an independent internet watchdog, The Daily Telegraph has learnt."

"Under the proposals, the new internet watchdog would operate in a similar way to other industry bodies such as the Press Complaints Commission, which enforces a code of practice for the UK newspaper and magazine industry, covering accuracy, discrimination and intrusion."

Obviously the Telegraph isn't going to say this, as it is part of the conspiracy to keep the politicians in the dark about the PCC, but it does no such thing.  What the PCC does is deflect calls for more formal governmental regulation of the media by pretending to regulate newspapers and magazines. If you are rich and influential you have some hope if it slapping the odd wrist but apart from that it, like any other self regulatory body is pretty toothless. Admittedly not all politicians are fooled.

The telegraph article also says "It is understood that it would also be able to order bloggers and social networking sites such as Bebo and MySpace to take down offensive messages or photographs." presumably backed up with some sort of mechanism to have court orders granted, which is fine for any site or service based in the UK but many are based overseas. The Americans have already started to backlash against our libel courts it doesn't take a great leap to see them objecting to this sort of order as well.

Food Survey

Please click here to take a quick survey on food shopping and welfare.

Labour are utterly screwed.

John Prescott has said: 'no potential successor had the "right skills" to replace the PM.' in other words Gordon Brown is the most qualified person the lead the party right now.

On the other hand, do you trust what JP has to say?

New web project

It is clear to me that there is a niche in the market for a price comparison site comparison site. Unlike the 1st generation comparison sites there is unlikely to be commission to pay for it all but I imagine annoying adverts will do the trick. After all people will be so grateful to learn which site out of them all saves you most. Obviously we would start in the car insurance sector, then other insurance followed by the wider financial market.

Of course since this is such a fabulous idea soon there will be lots of similar sites, but we will remain one step ahead as we will have the price comparison site comparison site comparison site ready to roll out. Anyone feel like putting in the start-up capital?

What do the outsiders see?

Is it a truism that every organisation needs to examine itself thoroughly from an external point of view from time to time? To not only look for validation of what it is doing (and how and why) but to ensure that the image it is portraying to the general public is the right one.
I am a member of the Open Rights Group and subscribed to their main discussion list. From inside the tent things look good but then I saw something that a friend wrote:

I don't so much mind Andrew Orlowski being a bitter and twisted polemicist, but he could at least get his facts straight.
'The British ORG [Open Rights Group] originally grew out of a campaign against copyright, and a contempt for creators and peformers is what binds it together.'

Erm...no it didn't. This is the original pledge, which mentions nothing about copyright. And, while it's clear the ORG is by no means perfect, I'd certainly not say it had contempt for creators and performers - there are frequent, balanced debates between a bloke who runs his own music company and the rest of the list. Shame, really, as the ORG *does* have a tendency to be a little smug about it's own (eg, the people who post most) and some decent opposition could help keep it on the straight and narrow. What a wasted opportunity. - Catherine

I will admit that last bit struck a chord, I don't know what is being done in ORG's inner circle, but I hope that there is work going on to keep the campaign grounded, relevant and coming across appropriately to the general public. The sort of things I am talking about is sessions working with external perspectives; opposition position work/devils advocate arguments; reviews of media coverage from a neutral point of view and the like.

I would say the same about the other campaigning group I am a member of, CAMRA but that tends to have the opposite problem, there are plenty of differing points of view, so the list of motions at the AGM will always have at least one pair that contradict each other. On the other hand we do manage to run a pretty fine beer festival.

Vote

Don't forget Iain Dale is running his survey for the top political blogs in (or about) the UK.

If you haven't voted yet, send in your top ten blogs, ranked in order to toptenblogs@totalpolitics.com.

In other voting news, it has been very interesting watching the reaction to Glasgow East, I think the most damaging for the clown in Number Ten is all the coverage of who is trying to dampen down any rebellion. Having David Blunkett as one of your top cheerleaders must be one of the most depressing things that can happen to you in politics.

No such thing as a free lunch

I had an opportunity to eat for free today, the combination of being an unrepentant omnivore and seeing I am off to see the film it is currently tied in to tonight I decided to try the Dark Whopper^[1] for lunch. My nearest BK is in the station and along with all other Select Service Partners outlets it has signs telling you that you get your food for free if you don't get handed a receipt, which in this case I didn't. I thought for a moment but decided not to mention it, partly because I disagree with the policy on environmental grounds (I know that merely eating that kind of food has it's impact, but they don't need to kill the extra trees).

The biggest reason I didn't was they nagging suspicion that while it would mean a free lunch for me, it would be a world of pain for the lad serving me. I must at this point stress that all this is supposition, I have never worked for SSP, so none of this is based on observed facts of their employment rules. Having worked in the service industry, those serving the public are under a lot of pressure from management to make the most from each customer through up-selling, cross-selling etc and to minimise waste. That pressure is applied as in most arenas using carrots and sticks, cooperative ladders and voucher incentives for those that do well, harsh disciplinary penalties for those that are considered to be failing or cannot balance their till at the end of the shift.

In that moment contemplating I thought about the possible scenarios for the person in question after I had my money back, a black mark on the record or even having the money deducted from their wage packet all for not handing me something I didn't want or need. It was this last one that definitely stopped me, I wasn't going to risk that he would have worked for more than an hour during the lunch rush for no pay to feed me.

^[1]If you want to know, not anything to write home about, probably why I can't really compare it with last time they did it it just doesn't stick in the mind. Not as disappointing at the Angus 6 pack, or as tasty as the angry whopper and no-where near the excitement of walking in and asking them to Kong my whopper!^[2]
[2]Note to self: I must remember to finish tweaking that footnote plugin.

Judge gets it on security

The Dutch judge who has overturned the injunction stopping Radboud University revealing how they cracked the Mifare Classic chip said:

Damage to NXP is not the result of the publication of the article but of the production and sale of a chip that appears to have shortcomings.

Bruce Schneier said:

As bad as the damage is from publishing - and there probably will be some - the damage is much, much worse by not disclosing.

and then rightly pointed out that assuming that no criminals were exploiting this problem was a foolish position to take.

This is of course an analogue of the classic security position that encryption algorithms shouldn't be kept secret, they should be open for everyone to examine for flaws and only the key should be secret.

Lack of visibility

As I walked past the Town Hall this morning the only sign of a strike was a lone placard leaning against the wall next to the back door.^[1] I thought about wandering down to the nasty modern building that has many more actual council workers in it to see if there was a better turn out there but decided against. Unison obviously wasn't really making an effort. They missed the prime opportunity to be visible as people arrive at the various bus and tram stops near the Town Hall on their way to offices or streaming past to the station. The chances to put their case to people lost. I don't really support this strike anyway, while yes they are getting low pay rises this year, so are most of the rest of us. The economy is screwed and while I understand that they say that they haven't had decent pay rises in previous years when the country wasn't feeling the pinch, it seems somewhat foolish to hold your biggest strike in years when there isn't any money.

I am much more disappointed that I haven't seen anyone in uniform for the TA's centennial 'Uniform to Work Day' I hope that if I go out for lunch I will get to see people being proud of this very important work they do.

^[1]I think you go in that door if you want to licence your taxi or register a birth, marriage or death. As I have never done any of these things I am not 100% sure.

Will this be as magic as their roundabout?

It is difficult to be definitive about the announcement from Swindon about withdrawing from the local "safety camera" partnership. They point out things that are demonstrably true, such as the money goes to the treasury, but also point at research into the statistics, which without seeing the figures is impossible to comment on. So it is impossible to say if they are the sane ones fighting against the camera stazi or if they are truly feckless endangerers of their resident's lives.

The council's position, that they think the $400,000 will be better spent on other measures is the key point and it would be nice to know that they have thought this through and are actually putting the public's safety first. As I understand it the economic argument is much less clear cut, given that while the revenue from the cameras heads to Westminster the money in question here will have originally been a grant from central government. I do hope that Swindon release the statistics they are basing this on, they may well already have done, I can't see them on swindon.gov.uk or in any of the press reports (the later being of no surprise, even if they have been released) and I will be interested to see what measures they will use instead. I think that both sides are probably somewhat correct cameras help, in some places, but you need other measures elsewhere.

The last point the coverage raises is if Swindon Borough Council are giving £.4m to Wiltshire & Swindon Safety Camera Partnership and the rest of Wiltshire is giving £1.2m how many real live human traffic police could you get for the £1.6 million pounds?

Of course they could just build more of these.

A law about the law

Should it be illegal to represent the law?

Should a PCSO face action when they tell a photographer they aren't allowed to take photos in a public place when even the Home Secretary states "there is no legal restriction on photography in public places"?

Is it right to be aggrieved when you are told in a pub "It is against the terms of our licence to serve you that" when you ask for a Black and Tan or a Snakebite, when what they mean is "the manager doesn't like people drinking those in case people think the beer is off"?

What do you think?

Are they worried for his safety the rest of the day?

Obviously if this was a story about shared transport like a mini-bus or coach with other children this would be a sensible and sane decision. But it isn't, it is about the lad's mother, trained in the use of his drugs trying to make things safer for him by travelling with him.

This needs to be added to the list of things where some common sense is applied as Tom Mullarkey of RoSPA suggested last year while criticising the Health and safety “extremists”.

a Synod in the right direction.

Even the most liberal Christian will acknowledge that as archaic as the staunch traditionalist view is on gay clergy, it is at least based on something explicitly stated in the bible.

The arguments against women as priests before and as bishops now are altogether more to do with interpretation and supposition. The Internet and academia are littered with essays written on this subject from both sides none of which have the direct word of Christ or God on the matter. There is the primary argument that we should follow his example and he only chose penis wavers to be fishers of men. However on that note no vicar can eat pizza, Christ didn't. Archbishop don't get on that aircraft, is is not approved by the demonstrative school of rules about following the apostolic succession.

The secondary arguments are mostly based on readings of the Epistles, the salutation to Junia (along with Andronicus) in Romans "my fellow-prisoners, who are of note among the apostles, who also were in Christ before me" Vs 1 Timothy and "Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection" with of course the attendant debates about authorship of those letters.

In any case we can but speculate about the motivations for the all boys club, so why do some people hold that there opposition to the ordination of women is a gospel truth?

Badger fight

In the red corner, former Chief Scientific Adviser and Director of the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment, Sir David "I never met a nice South African" King

In the blue corner, the Principal of Jesus Oxon., Vice President of the Royal Society, John "Son of the Cycle" Krebs Baron Krebs of Wytham

Ok, ok I'll stop with the grandstanding it was a long night trying to nurse some health into a broken switch. What am I on about? Hilary Benn's decision not to cull badgers in order to try and control bovine TB, which flies in the face of scientific advice and also follows it. The arguments are figure-headed by a an ornithological zoologist and a chemist. The former designed a series of experiments to determine the efficacy of culling and has concluded that the government should use other weapons to combat the disease. The latter had the data re-analysed and concluded a cull would be effective. Both sides of the argument are using data from the Republic of Ireland to back up their position and claiming the other side is looking at in the wrong way.

Perhaps we should cull the cattle for giving the Badger's TB in the first place?

Two scientists, both alike in dignity,
In fair Britannia, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where Badger's blood makes civil hands unclean.

Pointing out the bleeding obvious

A good number of you will have seen this already as a bunch of you must be gamers and if you are a gamer you have to watch and like Zero Punctuation right?^[1] this week Yahtzee is talking about web comics but the narrative about childish attitudes both to people being critical and by those critiquing sounds very familiar, it probably always did, but at the moment it is just in our faces.

There are two classic examples in the air right now, first the ironed sardines situation where a man who causes great offense (nothing to do with his criminal one, but his views on certain subjects, you will note he hasn't been on my blog-roll for months) has the balls to admit it was him behind the mask. Second the fall out from the liberal bloggers' event at the Guardian, specifically the session on feminism. (I have to at this point say I rarely write on feminist topics, I have far to many penises to be really qualified to speak on them. Any previous blog posts^[2] about that sort of issue have tended to be more about scientific method etc than the feminist principles involved). For example Penny Red's rejection of 'ignored VS abused'. and all the other posts documenting self defeating arguments of the XY crowd.

So sit back and try and rewrite the script of the video for 'blogging' rather than running a comic, bet they both look the same though.

^[1]Zero irony ;-> besides if you aren't a gamer but a politico reading this you must recognise the style from Lee's political pastiche
^[2] abortion for example

Word map of this blog

Frustration at this nation

I have railed before at people objecting to something third or forth hand when they haven't checked the original story. I have also covered (along with many others) the extremes you get with commenting on mainstream news stories. This story about some research by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation follows the pattern, I found the report a few clicks away from that page but it is quite a way down the page, after a large number of comments all suggesting that because there was a suggestion of suing public transport that it had to be all done in London because no other tons or cities shave public transport, before someone else who has bothered to read it points out that most of the work was done in the Midlands of England with London having a check group along with Wales and Scotland. Why they couldn't have read the report I don't know.

The other great thing the comments highlight is that because the result isn't exactly right for them the commenters have to do tedious and pointless maths to show how they are special, missing somewhat the point of statistical benchmarks they are there to measure populations against not you you self centred idiot, they are there to inform policy to ensure that more people, preferably everyone has a decent standard of living and it is unlikely that any policy maker is going to specifically draft something just because the 43 doesn't run at the right times for you to get to work so you drive or you have a large student loan due to re-sitting a year. Get a grip.