I have been with YouGov for almost a year so thought I would report to you my experience so far. Well, I am not too far from the payout threshold of £50, after having done about 1-2 surveys each week, which is good. I am not too impressed with the quality of the surveys though, and would be thoroughly pissed off if I were a paying client, but I am not and so perfectly happy to sit back and accrue the pennies.
If you feel like earning a few quid for completing a few surveys then you can join here.
Ok, so I only count 3, but I am sure there are more. The obvious use is to contain and protect the brain. The second is, well...
Teenagers have been charged after digging up a grave to make a bong out of a human skull.
Three teenagers were arrested after two of them told police they dug up a secluded grave near Houston, Texas, removed the skull from a coffin and converted it into a bong.
Kevin Wade Jones, 17, and Matthew Richard Gonzalez, 17 were arrested Wednesday night and were being held on misdemeanor charges of abuse of a corpse.
Is it wrong that I find this slightly amusing? How far gone do you have to be to think that was a good idea? And why would you tell the police? Weird.
Police believe the grave is that of an 11-year-old boy who died in 1921 in an unmaintained 19th-century veterans cemetery
And who says kids are good for nothing? (ooh. ah. ouch. stop throwing things at me)
The third use for skulls is, um, yeah. (if you laugh, you're a bad person)
You learn something every day!
It was necessary to keep a good supply of cannon balls near the cannon on old war ships. But how to prevent them from rolling about the deck was the problem.
The best storage method devised was to stack them as a square based pyramid, with one ball on top, resting on four, resting on nine, which rested on sixteen.
Thus, a supply of 30 cannon balls could be stacked in a small area right next to the cannon. There was only one problem -- how to prevent the bottom layer from sliding/rolling from under the others.
The solution was a metal plate with 16 round indentations, called, for reasons unknown, a Monkey. But if this plate were made of iron, the iron balls would quickly rust to it. The solution to the rusting problem was to make them of brass - hence, Brass Monkeys.
Few landlubbers realise that brass contracts much more and much faster than iron when chilled. Consequently, when the temperature dropped too far, the brass indentations would shrink so much that the iron cannon balls would come right off the monkey.
Thus, it was quite literally, cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey. And all this time, you thought that was just a vulgar expression, didn't you?
Just thought you'd like to know.
UK ISPs will shortly be required to start logging basic customer access, web and email activity on their networks for up to one year (see this article for more), which is a system that must be put in place by 15th March 2009 (2006/24/EC).
It's now been confirmed that one unnamed "lucky" ISP will soon be selected to take part in a feasibility study of the system that could continue until 2010. Naturally the whole plan continues to face heavy criticism, with most concern centralising around its security and cost:
But I think this bit is the most important...
"Part of the problem is that the Home Office would be able to self-authorise to do any searches in the database, which is very dangerous indeed," said Lord Errol of Hay. "At the moment, someone checks the access requests."
Security expert Richard Clayton agreed with Errol that the proposals were "completely not proportionate". "If the government is going to do this, it would be far better to force all mosques, churches, and public houses to fit microphones and tape recorders," he told ZDNet . "East Germany used to have a comparable system."
Quite. So the Government is essentially awarding itself the power to go fishing in the records without justification. Well ain't that just dandy?
As for microphones in pubs; don't give 'em ideas!
There seems to be some blog awards thing going on, so do pop along and vote for dear Vindico, should the fancy take you.
Go on. Stroke my ego, baby!
It seems that we have yet further evidence that the British people have no regard or understanding of liberty.
A nationwide youth curfew to help combat knife crime was backed by the public and senior politicians last night.
In the strongest sign yet of the growing fear of violence on Britain’s streets, a Sunday Times poll reveals today that nine out of 10 parents would back legal restrictions on their children going out after dark.
The full results from YouGov show support of 88% for a curfew for under 10s, 85% for under 16s, with just 9% and 10% opposing a curfew respectively. 4% and 5% respectively did not have any opinion whatsoever.
A report from a House of Commons committee will say this week that a national curfew on young teenagers could curb anti-social and violent behaviour
No shit. I wonder why that could be?!
Shall we have the military posted at street corners across the country enforcing a national curfew for everybody? Oh, no, sorry, I forgot, we don;t have enough military to both invade countries and subordinate our own people.
But a Fascist/Blair/Brown reason and logic dictates that a national curfew for everybody would be in our own interests, and make us more secure, and make us more free. But at what price security?
But what of this epidemic?
According to the British Crime Survey (BCS), overall violent crime has decreased by 41% since a peak in 1995.
And
If you look at the figures for the last 10 years the number of knife victims has remained relatively stable - although there have been spikes - at 200 to 220 a year.
Does this really show a need for the state to strip us of our freedom? A stable rate of 200 or so knife victims would suggest an incredibly small number relative to the whole population.
Of course, you might well ask what a child of 10 should be doing out past 8pm or 9pm (I am assuming the curfew doe snot apply when accompanies by parents!) on their own, and in practice a curfew for under 10s would affect a small number of children, but that is not the point. At stake is freedom. If I am scared then I nobody is stopping me from staying at home, but if I choose to go out then the state should not be able to stop me.
Well, he answers one of them, and badly at that. Here is the clip showing the question and Brown's answers, which I take in turn below.
First, he says to Miles, "you raise some big points". I am not sure it is meant to, but it sounds incredibly patronising. Anyway, on with the fisking...
Brown: Freedom of speech, freedom of expression, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly. These are all freedoms, liberties, that I believe are the basis, the fundamental part of our constitution, and I would do nothing to either remove or restrict these freedoms.
If you take freedom to protest outside Parliament we have increased that freedom in the last few months. If you take freedom of expression, we are going to audit every piece of legislation so we are sure we are doing everything in our power to increase freedom of expression, freedom for non-governmental organisations to express their views free of constraint. We are increasing these freedoms over the next period of time.
Freedom for investigative journalism - we will remove some of the barriers which were about to exist to the freedom of expression of the press of our country, and we have been in discussion with newspapers about how we can do our best by that.
...I want to extend the civil liberties of the people of this country, now of course there are security issues and we need to be sure that when we advance the need to protect the security of people in this country, we are careful to protect the civil liberties of every individual. ...If you look at these freedoms, this government has done more in the last year to extend these freedoms,...and I believe it is at the heart of our constitution.
Right. Quite what the monocular fuck is blabbering on about freedom for NGO's is beyond me, but taking his key points, let's have a look.
Freedom of speech & expression
How about the Racial & Religious Hatred Act 2006?
Freedom of the press
EU internet censorship and control measures.
Freedom of assembly
Serious Organised Crime & police Act 2005
There are more, but I don;t have time to go into them. Please feel free to post rlevant Acts of Parliament in the comments.
I've been tagged to write a story in six words or less. Ernest Hemingway did so very elegantly with "For sale: baby shoes, never worn". My attempt is rather less elegant, I fear, as I hastily post before jumping in to bed (heading to big smoke early tomorrow)...
"Homeless man found dead in toilet"
I won't tag anybody, but do feel free to take up the challenge.
Why is possessing tobacco and alcohol a crime?
Power to search for alcohol and tobacco: Where a person has failed to comply with a requirement under paragraph 5 or 6 or has failed to allow a CSO to seize tobacco under paragraph 7 of Schedule 4 to the Police Reform Act 2002 and a CSO reasonably believes that the person is in possession of alcohol or tobacco then a CSO may search them for it and dispose of anything found.
(Paragraph 7A of Schedule 4 to the Police Reform Act 2002 (inserted by paragraph 8 of Schedule 8 of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005).)
WTF?
I know, rubbish title, but how else could I get you to click on the RSS feed?
There are not many places where you will find Kylie Minogue hanging out with Liberty director Shami Chakrabarti and model Lily Cole.
But TV presenter June Sarpong hopes her new website, www.politicsandthecity.com, will be the cool place for all ambitious women to be.
The 31-year-old, best known to teenagers at the face of Channel 4's youth programme T4, reckons there is a gap in the market for fashionable young women who like celebrities and gossip - but also want to keep on top of current affairs.
Holy crap. Ok, so she seems to be a tiny bit more awake than half the population, but why oh why?
The result is a slick looking site which covers, politics, news, fashion, beauty, gossip and music
Hmm. You be the judge.
She promises celebrity blogs will be written by Tamara Mellon, Natasha Bedingfield, Kathy Lette, Baroness Amos and Kelly Hoppen.
And she is keeping people hooked up with breaking news by linking her ticker to the BBC News website.
Ooh, a ticker! And are you sure Baroness Amos and Natasha Beddingfield can go side by side on this new site? I know she's trying to do something different, but I really can't help trying to appeal to two different markets will end up attracting neither. If I was an investor I would be asking where is the focus?
"So many of my girlfriends, who are smart, successful women, don't have a clue about politics - and it's not because they don't want to," she says
Well, I sort of understand that comment but, if they really wanted to, they would find out wouldn't they? They have to be pretty ambivalent not to pick up background knowledge of current affairs.
"On the website, we have a box with each subject that will explain things clearly - you know, this is all you need to know about the Lisbon treaty."
Wow, why hasn't the BBC thought of this? Boxes which explain everything. Genius. Incidentally the Lisbon Treaty has no entry on the site at time of checking. Ok, so a bit harsh, but still.
I get the idea. A noble aim to try and appeal to women who walk through life with their eyes shut, and only care about shoes and celeb love lives, but is it possible to reach out to them? An informal, chatty style might do the job, but I get the feeling people wanting gossip and fashion will go to specialist websites, and those interested in politics will do likewise. Can they be combined? I doubt it.
Un-fucking-believable. I have just phoned 3 to request a PAC code since I will be switching to the 3G iPhone (along with my friend who's question I posed a few posts earlier).
I got put through to some numpty in Bangalore who, needless to say, tried to offer me deals and upgrades to get me to stay with 3. Not only that but I had to speak to two different people who put up the same barriers only to have this surreal conversation with said numpty...
Me: I'd like to get a PAC code please
Numpty: Are you giving a PAC code or do you need one?
Me: I need one
Numpty: Surely Mr xxx, bear with me one moment. (greensleeves)
Numpty: You are aware you are eligible for a free upgrade?
Me: Uhuh, but I want to switch
Numpty: What package are you getting? Let me just look at yours...you're paying for minutes you don't use...blah blah blah
Me: I know (fucksake!)
Numpty: I can offer you £15/mth, blah blah blah
Me: No, I want to change thanks
Numpty: Ok. Can I be asking you why you want to leave?
Me: I want to take advantage of a deal
Numpty: You know I can offer you a good deal?
Me: No I want the iPhone
Numpty: Oh, Mr xxx, you know we don't stock the iPhone...
Me: Yeah, that's why I'm switching
Numpty: The reason is because of radiation...
Me: What!?
Numpty: Yes, there are three things...
Me: What are they please?
Numpty: Hang on just one moment please......Human health issues from radiation, no Bluetooth data transfer and when the battery goes you cannot replace it.
Me: Radiation?
Numpty: Yes sir
Me: Nothing to do with Apple's exclusivity deal with O2 then?
Numpty: [pause] I don't have any information on that
Me: No, course you don't. Can I have the PAC code?
Numpty: Yes, I will text you the PAC code now. You have 30 days...blah blah blah
Some 3 dipshit actually tried to tell me there were health issues with the iPhone due to radiation, in order to get me to stay with 3. Sorry mate, you can jam that lie up your black hole of Calcutta, thanks very much. What about European SAR limits? Are you trying to tell me the iPhone exceeds these and is dangerous? You fucked with the wrong person here.
Saw a repeat of Mock the Week on Dave the other day and it made I laugh, it did. Just wonderful...
It must be summer because the sensitive goody goodies at the BBC have donned their socks and sandals and travelled to the extreme of patheticness...
Motoring show Top Gear has been criticised by the BBC Trust after viewers complained about "highly irresponsible" footage.
The Polar Special featured hosts Jeremy Clarkson and James May drinking while driving as they tried to reach the Magnetic North Pole last year.
The trust said the scene "could be seen to glamorise the misuse of alcohol".
The show's executive producer said they were beyond the jurisdiction of drink driving laws in international waters.
They were in THE FUCKING NORTH POLE, you sad fucks!!!
"Glamorise alcohol use"? Oh fuck off you vegetarian cunts. I suppose we ought to regulate the use of satellite phones while driving across the vast icy expanse? How about smoking?
And God forbid some Polar bear needs counselling after seeing some blokes rosy arse-cheeks as he takes a dump. Fuck me. The BBC seems to have no problems with the big gun the team were carrying in the car, but alcohol, Christ, burn in hell devil people.
I thought this episode was one of the best the Top Gear team have done, although I was very concerned that Clarkson did not feed the steering wheel, or check his mirrors before executing his manoeuvres!!!
Message to the BBC Trust: Jam your PC bollocks up your arse and quit with the fucking nannying.
I was asked a question which flummoxed me, so if anybody knows the answer please let me know. The question is as follows...
Person A has a mobile phone. The phone, however, is a contract phone and the name of the account holder is Person B. So Person B is the account owner but Person A is the sole user of the phone (e.g. a parent giving a child a phone).
Now Person A wants to switch network to take advantage of a deal, but wants to port their mobile number. The question is can Person A take out a contract in their name with the new operator, but have their old number (from Person B's account) ported across? Or can a number only be ported where the account holder is the same person?
I am guessing that it should be possible. The account holder (Person B) would need to obtain the PAC code, but I don't see why Person A could not use this PAC code to port the number. Anybody know?
Irwin Stelzer doesn't hold back in this piece. Some paragraphs of genius...
More significant was the proposal Brown brought to Jedda, as a clue to the sort of thing he will be proposing next week at the G8. Faced with all those windfall profits that were piling up in the Saudis' treasury, Brown's first instinct was to do what he has done in Britain - tax them away. Unfortunately for the Exchequer, his writ does not run to Saudi Arabia.
So instead he proposed that the Saudis pour money into renewable energy projects in Britain. Why the Saudis would want to stimulate the growth of competing energy sources, and why these shrewd investors who do not lack for professional advice would give any weight to suggestions from a man who had never worked in the risky investment sector, eludes most observers.
But not me: Gordon Brown simply can't sit still, let others shoulder some of the burdens of government, and focus on a few big ideas. Nor can he trust markets to allocate capital and other resources to uses most desired by consumers.
And this is the crux...
"he really believes that he can spend people's money more productively, or in a morally superior manner, than they can."
Brown is Prime Minister by divine right, remember. He knows best. But this is just truly astounding...
That's why he has had some 2,823 laws passed during his first year in office - eight per day and 64 per cent more than Lady Thatcher averaged - many aimed at regulating businesses and commercial transactions between private parties, such as the buyers and sellers of property.
Eight new laws a day! Fuck me. What Irwin doesn't say is how these are calculated, whether the figure includes Statutory Instruments, EU regulations and directives, etc., but 8 a day is astonishing. That volume of legislation is most certainly beyond the reasonable capability of MPs to scrutinise and debate effectively, showing just how hollow democracy is in the UK.
Apparently a total of 141 access/security passes have been lost or stolen by the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) and its executive agencies in the past 24 months.
BERR has 2,500 staff. 106 access passes lost or stolen in 2 years represents 4.25%, an unsatisfactory proportion in any organisation, surely.
The Insolvency Agency and Companies House, its two executive agencies, between them employ a total of 4,000 and managed to have 35 passes lost or stolen. That is 0.875%, a much more reasonable proportion.
So why the large discrepancy? Are executive agencies simply better managed than 'in-house' departments?
Only Companies House specifies whether the cards were lost or stolen (9 were lost, 0 were stolen), but do we conclude this is replicated in BERR and the Insolvency agency? Is BERR just full of very forgetful people, in which case their suitability for employment has to be questioned, or does the large difference result from a higher proportion of stolen passes?
Hmm!
From the Today programme, this clip has Ken Clarke talking about his bodged proposal to solve the West Lothian Question of Scots MPs voting on English laws which don't affect their constituents. The interesting bit comes at 6m 20s when Clarke says..
"I'm not in favour of federalism in any organisation"
Oh really? News to me.
I need to say it: Brown is a monocular fuck
The average family is now being taxed to the tune of £21,000 to support the activities of the State – up by £8,500 in the past 11 years. Families would like some of that money back to help them deal with soaring bills.
That is all.
Certain things send me into a rage instantly, and destroy all my good work getting my blood pressure down from my last rage. Some foreign MEP, with the brain if a newt, reckons bloggers should be certified (probably in both meanings of the word!)...
Ms Mikko clarified her intentions: “We do not need to know the exact identity of bloggers. We need some credentials, a quality mark, a certain disclosure of who is writing and why. We need this to be able to trust and rely on the source.”"The Economist is a valuable brand, its articles are trusted by readers without contributors having to reveal their names,” she said. “If there is a way to validate the best bloggers the same way that publishing in the Economist validates its writers, it should be done.”
“It is clear that a Harvard professor of international relations is likely to treat, for instance, the Middle East peace process or European integration in an educated and balanced manner,” she added. “The same trust cannot be put in a radical high school student from Gaza or a Eurosceptic who has never been out of his village”
“The reader should know why this or that blogger should be trusted on a particular issue.”
I think perhaps people can make their own minds up about what is to be trusted or what isn't. Brands form naturally. If I want factual reporting I scan the big news sites, and then visit blog for razor sharp analysis and commentary and to learn about the bits the big news sites miss out.
I don't want some bureaucrat or politician deciding what is good or bad for me. In fact you are already poisoning my atmosphere you mendacious bitch; you should be capped under the emissions trading scheme.
Note she lumps Eurosceptics among those not to be trusted. How nice. I feel honoured. Of course, it never occurs to her that perhaps 'balanced' reporting is not particularly useful, or at all possible to achieve. You see issues are very subjective, and thus make obtaining an objective view near impossible. What is more I also believe a balanced opinion is formed only by reading differing opinions and view points from multiple angles, and cannot be formed by having a few sources distilling these viewpoints down.
Certifying bloggers simply places power in the hands of the state, opening up the way for censorship, silencing, harassment, prosecution, and 'news' provided by the state. This situation is otherwise known as a horrible socio-fascist police state of Orwellian proportions. So just fuck right off!
Following on from Harry Haddock's well spotted quote by some fucking teenage labour idiot missing the fundamentals of wealth creation, I spy this wonderful comment in relation to the image below, which shows the share of state spending in each of the regions of the UK.
At last! Im Scottish and have been waiting for something like which breaks england down into it's economic regions for ages. Hopefully it will help tabloid readers in the south-east understand that Scots are not 'subsidy-junkies' anymore than people in the north-east and north-west. Also simply stating 'Scotland gets more public spending per person than England' dosen't make much sense as the two countries arent really similar enough to be compared effectively.
What the fucking fuck? How did you work that one out?
1. People in the North East of England do not get bloc grants under the Barnett formula a la 'Scortlend', NI and Wales.
2. English regions do not have devolved parliaments and executives to spend such bloc grants.
How about devolved parliaments get tax powers? Then if you want to spend like moronic socialist you can, without dipping your hands into the pockets of the English? Or we have a new formula for allocating bloc grants? I'm not blaming the Scots, simply the fucking mess that is devolution.
Anybody else spot the problem?...
A £19m scheme to support existing and new businesses in south west and mid Wales has been launched.
Almost 2,000 grants of up to £5,000 are being made available in five counties - Carmarthenshire, Ceredigion, Swansea, Pembrokeshire and Neath Port Talbot.
It is supported by £8.9m European funding, and there are claims it could create about 1,000 new jobs.
It is the first local council-led project to win EU Convergence support, which replaces Objective One funding.
Assuming each grant is the full £5k: 2,000 grants * £5k = £10m. So where does the other £9m go?
Posting has been a little thin on the ground this past week, so apologies to all those of you waiting in desperation for your next fix (I am sure there are some of you out there!). To tide you over until I get narked again, enjoy these two amusing, but also slightly aggravating, stories...
A bid to catch fly-tippers by hiding a spy camera in a rubbish bag back-fired - when council workers threw it away.
The expensive camera was placed inside a black bag beside a notorious illegal fly-tipping site in West Sussex, reports the Daily Telegraph.
The disguise was so good that Chichester District Council workers cleared the camera believing it was genuine rubbish.
The council did not disclose how much the camera cost, but similar systems involving a miniature video camera cost between £7,000 and £10,000.
And this gem...
A student who scribbled an expletive on an English language exam paper was awarded 7.5 percent for accurate spelling and effective communication, The Times newspaper reported on Monday.
The pupil, who wrote "f--- off" after being asked in an English exam to "describe the room you are sitting in", got 2 marks out of 27 and would have got more if he had added some punctuation, chief examiner Peter Buckroyd told The Times.
"It does show some very basic skills we are looking for -- like conveying some meaning and some spelling," said Buckroyd, who works for the Assessment and Qualifications Alliance examinations board. "It shows some nominal skills but no relevance to the task".
"If it had had an exclamation mark it would have got a little bit more because it would have been showing a little bit of skill".
Oh how funny it is to live in Britain! My parents have recently been pushed over the edge and become so incensed that they are seriously contemplating moving abroad to some small and independent country to get away from all the shit we have to put up with here. I don't blame them.
Shock Horror! The way to cut accidents is remove all the signs, lights, arrows, and crap...
If you find yourself crossing the road in the German town of Bohmte, look both ways – and then perhaps check again.
It has scrapped all its traffic lights and road signs in a radical experiment designed to make the streets safer. Yesterday, the local council said the scheme was a complete success.
In the four weeks since the signs were ripped up, there has not been a single accident
Let's hope it catches on here. I hate the multitude of signs, lights, railings, crossings, bollards, etc. It turns every journey into a test and makes our towns and villages look horrible. Let's remove them and get back to some common sense driving. The problem today is that we don't feel we own the community and instead feel like robots in a system, constantly being told what to do and what not to do.
There's nothing I despise more than being engineered, as if I am some kind of toy soldier to be controlled and manipulated by my owner. I get even more angry when the overlord dishing out the diktats is a one-eyed, slack-jawed, cunt...
Gordon Brown is to set out his vision of increasing fairness and social mobility, in what Downing Street says is a major policy speech.
Parents will get £200 for agreeing to such options as getting treatment for children with behavioural difficulties, or taking up free childcare places
No. Just fucking NO! Leave me alone, leave my family alone, leave my friends alone. We don't want to be part of your social engineering project. We clearly have enough social mobility/equality of opportunity in this country or else stupid fucks like you wouldn't make it to Parliament.
And while I'm at it, what thick pillock came up with this?...
Smokers in the poorest areas of Dundee are being offered £150 worth of groceries by the health service if they are able to give up cigarettes.
1. Why is it anyone's business whether somebody chooses to smoke and so perhaps kill themself? If we weren't forced to pay for a tax funded NHS, which externalises the cost of lifestyle choices, we could all just get on with our lives.
2. Is the saving of the cost of the cigarettes themselves not incentive enough? At almost £6 for an average pack of 20, a 20-a-day smoker would save £42/wk. Is an extra £12.50/wk (for 12 weeks) really going to sway them? Any normal person would way up the health benefits, plus the annual savings of over £2,000/yr, factored over several years. There is more then sufficient incentive.
3. The lost tax revenue from cigarette sales means higher taxes or less public spending for the rest of us non-smokers. Thanks a heap! It also means higher state pension liabilities, again funded by us non-smokers, as well as higher private pension liabilities to be paid for by us non-smokers. Add in old age care, housing supply, etc, and keeping people alive longer is of no benefit to me, or any other citizen. If people want to smoke themselves to an early grave for my benefit then more power to their elbow.
4. I can't help wondering whether the drive to beat smokers in to submission encourage smokers to quite has anything to do with EU requirements? Quite how the health of individuals can be conceived as a competence of the EU is simply absurd. I know the treaties make it so, but it is plainly ridiculous. (Incidentally I object to the term 'public health'. There is individual health only, which can be compared collectively, but 'public health' introduces a meaningless collective perspective that makes it seem important to control)
So Brown, Johnson, et al: fuck off and die.
Oh dear. I'm so very sad. Found this amusing animation creator and made my own dancing Davis.
