Michael Geist reports in from the latest round of secret negotiations on the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, a radical copyright treaty being negotiated without public oversight or participation:The International Trademark Association (INTA) and International Chamber of Commerce have issued a release on ACTA urging countries to drop the de minimis provision that is designed to allay fears of iPod searching border guards. The two associations argue that the exception "sends the wrong message to consumers."
The International Trademark Association (INTA) and International Chamber of Commerce have issued a release on ACTA urging countries to drop the de minimis provision that is designed to allay fears of iPod searching border guards. The two associations argue that the exception "sends the wrong message to consumers."
Ofcom has ruled that Sky News did not breach broadcasting guidelines despite nearly 3,000 complaints about its coverage of the May 2010 general election.The first contentious broadcast was the second party leaders' debate, broadcast by Sky on 22 April.Moderator Adam Boulton came in for criticism after highlighted a story in that day's Telegraph about Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg's expenses.He said: "Mr Clegg, you're on the front page of the Telegraph today?"To which Clegg responded: "I am indeed for a complete nonsense story. But anyway, put that aside - complete, complete rubbish."Ofcom received 671 complaints about this claiming that it showed bias, because the other two candidates faced no such additional questioning from Boulton, and alleging that it breached the debate rules.
Ofcom has ruled that Sky News did not breach broadcasting guidelines despite nearly 3,000 complaints about its coverage of the May 2010 general election.
The first contentious broadcast was the second party leaders' debate, broadcast by Sky on 22 April.
Moderator Adam Boulton came in for criticism after highlighted a story in that day's Telegraph about Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg's expenses.
He said: "Mr Clegg, you're on the front page of the Telegraph today?"
To which Clegg responded: "I am indeed for a complete nonsense story. But anyway, put that aside - complete, complete rubbish."
Ofcom received 671 complaints about this claiming that it showed bias, because the other two candidates faced no such additional questioning from Boulton, and alleging that it breached the debate rules.
Purple rock geezer Prince has declared that the internetosphere has had its day, as he prepares to release his latest album exclusively on CD through UK newspaper the Daily Mirror. In a punctuation-light interview ahead of the unleashing of 20TEN in physical form, the Jehovah's Witness declared: "The internets completely over. I dont see why I should give my new music to iTunes or anyone else. They wont pay me an advance for it and then they get angry when they cant get it."
Purple rock geezer Prince has declared that the internetosphere has had its day, as he prepares to release his latest album exclusively on CD through UK newspaper the Daily Mirror.
In a punctuation-light interview ahead of the unleashing of 20TEN in physical form, the Jehovah's Witness declared: "The internets completely over. I dont see why I should give my new music to iTunes or anyone else. They wont pay me an advance for it and then they get angry when they cant get it."
On Sunday we reported details of how one specific app developer had managed to hack iTunes users accounts and use them to purchase his own apps - making it to the top of the iTunes charts. As the story has developed, the problem has grown far more serious than initially thought - not just that one particular developer and his apps - the Apple App store is filled with App Farms being used to steal. This post will give a complete run down of what we know and will be continue to be updated as we learn further details.
On Sunday we reported details of how one specific app developer had managed to hack iTunes users accounts and use them to purchase his own apps - making it to the top of the iTunes charts.
As the story has developed, the problem has grown far more serious than initially thought - not just that one particular developer and his apps - the Apple App store is filled with App Farms being used to steal.
This post will give a complete run down of what we know and will be continue to be updated as we learn further details.
Still, 19.4 million, the number registered by the Nielsen ratings service, is a lot of people. It's not just more people than had ever watched a soccer game on American television before. It's also more people than, on average, watched last year's World Series games, which had the advantage of being broadcast live in prime time. It's millions more than watched the Kentucky Derby or the final round of the Masters golf tournament or the Daytona 500, the jewel in NASCAR's crown. And we don't just watch.
It was the ideal metaphor for a politically troubled president. There was President Obama on the cover of the June 19 issue of The Economist, standing alone on a Louisiana beach, head down, looking forlornly at the ground. The problem was, he was not actually alone. The photograph was just edited to make it look that way. The unaltered image, shot on May 28 by a Reuters photographer, Larry Downing, shows Adm. Thad W. Allen of the Coast Guard and Charlotte Randolph, a local parish president, standing alongside the president. But in the image that appeared on The Economist's cover, Admiral Allen and Ms. Randolph had been scrubbed out, replaced by the blue water of the Gulf of Mexico.
It was the ideal metaphor for a politically troubled president.
There was President Obama on the cover of the June 19 issue of The Economist, standing alone on a Louisiana beach, head down, looking forlornly at the ground.
The problem was, he was not actually alone. The photograph was just edited to make it look that way.
The unaltered image, shot on May 28 by a Reuters photographer, Larry Downing, shows Adm. Thad W. Allen of the Coast Guard and Charlotte Randolph, a local parish president, standing alongside the president. But in the image that appeared on The Economist's cover, Admiral Allen and Ms. Randolph had been scrubbed out, replaced by the blue water of the Gulf of Mexico.
The first eBay seller to be prosecuted for bidding in his own auctions to boost prices has been ordered to pay nearly £5,000 in fines and costs. Minibus firm owner Paul Barrett was told by a judge he had been spared jail because he had no previous convictions. Barrett, 39, of Stanley, County Durham, was arrested after a complaint he sold a minibus with false low mileage. He admitted 11 breaches of fair trading regulations and was also ordered to do 250 hours of unpaid work.
The first eBay seller to be prosecuted for bidding in his own auctions to boost prices has been ordered to pay nearly £5,000 in fines and costs.
Minibus firm owner Paul Barrett was told by a judge he had been spared jail because he had no previous convictions.
Barrett, 39, of Stanley, County Durham, was arrested after a complaint he sold a minibus with false low mileage.
He admitted 11 breaches of fair trading regulations and was also ordered to do 250 hours of unpaid work.
A vocal campaign to save BBC 6 Music from closure was rewarded today when the BBC Trust said the digital music station will stay open.The trust said it was opposed to a proposal put forward in March by the director general, Mark Thompson, as part of a wide-ranging strategy review.However, the BBC Trust said it would accept a formal management proposal for the closure of 6 Music's digital sister station, BBC Asian Network, provided that it included alternative plans for meeting the needs of this ethnic minority audience "in different ways".
A vocal campaign to save BBC 6 Music from closure was rewarded today when the BBC Trust said the digital music station will stay open.
The trust said it was opposed to a proposal put forward in March by the director general, Mark Thompson, as part of a wide-ranging strategy review.
However, the BBC Trust said it would accept a formal management proposal for the closure of 6 Music's digital sister station, BBC Asian Network, provided that it included alternative plans for meeting the needs of this ethnic minority audience "in different ways".
If you are reading this article on a printed copy of the Guardian, what you have in your hand will, just 15 years from now, look as archaic as a Western Union telegram does today. In less than 50 years, according to Clay Shirky, it won't exist at all. The reason, he says, is very simple, and very obvious: if you are 25 or younger, you're probably already reading this on your computer screen. "And to put it in one bleak sentence, no medium has ever survived the indifference of 25-year-olds."
A number of Israel Defense Forces soldiers could face disciplinary action after they uploaded to YouTube a video of themselves stopping a patrol in the West Bank to dance to American electro-pop singer Kesha's hit Tick Tock.The video "Batallion 50 Rock the Hebron Casbah" shows six dancing Nahal Brigade soldiers, armed and wearing bulletproof vests, patrolling as a Muslim call to prayer is heard. Then the music changes and they break into a Macarena-like dance.The video was uploaded over the weekend, and quickly spread across Facebook pages and blogs.
The list of equipment whose trade is prohibited by Council Regulation (EC) No 1236/2005 does not include spiked batons, certain wall or floor restraints, certain leg restraints, finger-cuffs, thumb-cuffs, thumbscrews and body-worn electric-shock stun devices other than `stun belts'. MEPs therefore want them to be banned by updating Annex II of the regulation. ... With only seven EU States having produced public annual reports giving details of export licensing decisions, MEPs urge all Member States to submit reports with information such as the number of applications received, items involved, countries of destination and the decisions taken on each application. ... The resolution, which was adopted by show of hands, also strongly condemns attempts by Members States or European companies to import electric-shock stun belts, imports of which are prohibited, or other devices with similar effects. MEPs ask for a an urgent investigation by the Commission to investigate if and when such devices have been transferred to any Member State and to determine whether they have been used by law enforcement or prison authorities.
...
With only seven EU States having produced public annual reports giving details of export licensing decisions, MEPs urge all Member States to submit reports with information such as the number of applications received, items involved, countries of destination and the decisions taken on each application.
The resolution, which was adopted by show of hands, also strongly condemns attempts by Members States or European companies to import electric-shock stun belts, imports of which are prohibited, or other devices with similar effects. MEPs ask for a an urgent investigation by the Commission to investigate if and when such devices have been transferred to any Member State and to determine whether they have been used by law enforcement or prison authorities.
Further information : Resolution Updating EU trade ban on torture implements Recording of debates Council regulation [PDF] EU's Human rights & Democratisation Policy
A "big budget" porn film was shot in a London hospital when it hired out one of its wards to a film company. The movie generated "substantial income" for the hospital, Tory MP Penny Mordaunt said. Ms Mordaunt, Portsmouth North MP, was speaking during a House of Commons debate on improving transparency in government accounting, on Monday. NHS Kensington and Chelsea said the incident occurred before 2002 when the primary care trust (PCT) formed.
A "big budget" porn film was shot in a London hospital when it hired out one of its wards to a film company.
The movie generated "substantial income" for the hospital, Tory MP Penny Mordaunt said.
Ms Mordaunt, Portsmouth North MP, was speaking during a House of Commons debate on improving transparency in government accounting, on Monday.
NHS Kensington and Chelsea said the incident occurred before 2002 when the primary care trust (PCT) formed.
A single person in the UK needs a gross income of at least £14,400 in 2010 to live to an acceptable standard, a charity says. And a couple with two children need £29,200 for a minimum acceptable standard of living, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) said. The figure indicates a growing gap between the national minimum wage and the minimum income standard. The charity claimed this was due to rising inflation for necessities. "This research shows what ordinary members of the public think is needed - not just to survive but to take part in society," said Julia Unwin, chief executive of the JRF.
A single person in the UK needs a gross income of at least £14,400 in 2010 to live to an acceptable standard, a charity says.
And a couple with two children need £29,200 for a minimum acceptable standard of living, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) said.
The figure indicates a growing gap between the national minimum wage and the minimum income standard.
The charity claimed this was due to rising inflation for necessities.
"This research shows what ordinary members of the public think is needed - not just to survive but to take part in society," said Julia Unwin, chief executive of the JRF.
Adam Smith: The Wealth of Nations (Project Gutenberg)By necessaries I understand, not only the commodities which are indispensibly necessary for the support of life, but whatever the custom of the country renders it indecent for creditable people, even of the lowest order, to be without. A linen shirt, for example, is, strictly speaking, not a necessary of life. The Greeks and Romans lived, I suppose, very comfortably, though they had no linen. But in the present times, through the greater part of Europe, a creditable day-labourer would be ashamed to appear in public without a linen shirt, the want of which would be supposed to denote that disgraceful degree of poverty, which, it is presumed, nobody can well fall into without extreme bad conduct. Custom, in the same manner, has rendered leather shoes a necessary of life in England. The poorest creditable person, of either sex, would be ashamed to appear in public without them. In Scotland, custom has rendered them a necessary of life to the lowest order of men; but not to the same order of women, who may, without any discredit, walk about barefooted. In France, they are necessaries neither to men nor to women; the lowest rank of both sexes appearing there publicly, without any discredit, sometimes in wooden shoes, and sometimes barefooted. Under necessaries, therefore, I comprehend, not only those things which nature, but those things which the established rules of decency have rendered necessary to the lowest rank of people. All other things I call luxuries, without meaning, by this appellation, to throw the smallest degree of reproach upon the temperate use of them. Beer and ale, for example, in Great Britain, and wine, even in the wine countries, I call luxuries. A man of any rank may, without any reproach, abstain totally from tasting such liquors. Nature does not render them necessary for the support of life; and custom nowhere renders it indecent to live without them.
By necessaries I understand, not only the commodities which are indispensibly necessary for the support of life, but whatever the custom of the country renders it indecent for creditable people, even of the lowest order, to be without. A linen shirt, for example, is, strictly speaking, not a necessary of life. The Greeks and Romans lived, I suppose, very comfortably, though they had no linen. But in the present times, through the greater part of Europe, a creditable day-labourer would be ashamed to appear in public without a linen shirt, the want of which would be supposed to denote that disgraceful degree of poverty, which, it is presumed, nobody can well fall into without extreme bad conduct. Custom, in the same manner, has rendered leather shoes a necessary of life in England. The poorest creditable person, of either sex, would be ashamed to appear in public without them. In Scotland, custom has rendered them a necessary of life to the lowest order of men; but not to the same order of women, who may, without any discredit, walk about barefooted. In France, they are necessaries neither to men nor to women; the lowest rank of both sexes appearing there publicly, without any discredit, sometimes in wooden shoes, and sometimes barefooted. Under necessaries, therefore, I comprehend, not only those things which nature, but those things which the established rules of decency have rendered necessary to the lowest rank of people. All other things I call luxuries, without meaning, by this appellation, to throw the smallest degree of reproach upon the temperate use of them. Beer and ale, for example, in Great Britain, and wine, even in the wine countries, I call luxuries. A man of any rank may, without any reproach, abstain totally from tasting such liquors. Nature does not render them necessary for the support of life; and custom nowhere renders it indecent to live without them.
ThatBritGuy:
[Car ownership]'s not an unreasonable assumption out here. Buying a jalopy for a thousand pounds or so is cheaper than trying to get around on public transport. The point isn't whether or not public transport is available, but how much it costs. Public transport in London isn't that much more affordable - if at all - than a car is here.
The point isn't whether or not public transport is available, but how much it costs.
Public transport in London isn't that much more affordable - if at all - than a car is here.
Note £400 a week is £20,800 a year. I don't know whether the calculation that assigns that much in housing benefit to a household assumes a larger family than the 2 asults and one child that supposedly need at least £29,200 a year... By laying out pros and cons we risk inducing people to join the debate, and losing control of a process that only we fully understand. - Alan Greenspan
having a car is not seen as necessary in the U.K.
London is not the U.K.
Either you live in a large, dense, metropolitan area or a car is a necessity.
For instance (from my experience) the periphery of Nottingham requires a car because even in parts served by the local authority's buses they don't run often. According to Wikipedia
Whilst the City of Nottingham has a historically tightly drawn boundary which accounts for its relatively small population of 288,700, the wider Nottingham Urban Area has a population of 667,000 and is the seventh-largest urban area in the United Kingdom, ranking between those of Liverpool and Sheffield.
since 2008, the JRF has gathered information from focus groups to set a benchmark for an "acceptable standard of living". For example, it now considers a computer and home internet connection as essential for all working age households. In previous years this has only been necessary for people with school-age children, it concluded. Pensioners, however, thought the internet was growing in relevance - but not yet a necessity. ... The essentials required for a minimum standard of living have not been reduced in people's thinking, despite the level of economic uncertainty, the Foundation said. For example, a week's holiday a year in the UK was still considered necessary to participate at an acceptable level in society.
For example, it now considers a computer and home internet connection as essential for all working age households. In previous years this has only been necessary for people with school-age children, it concluded.
Pensioners, however, thought the internet was growing in relevance - but not yet a necessity.
The essentials required for a minimum standard of living have not been reduced in people's thinking, despite the level of economic uncertainty, the Foundation said.
For example, a week's holiday a year in the UK was still considered necessary to participate at an acceptable level in society.
By necessaries [we] understand, not only the commodities which are indispensibly necessary for the support of life, but whatever the custom of the country renders it indecent for creditable people, even of the lowest order, to be without.
Club scene. Reputation for research. Proximity to parents' washing machine. All issues prospective students will be weighing up over the next few weeks as they make final decisions about which university to choose. But some will be asking another question, too - which institution will allow them to feel comfortable about who they are?It is a question the lobby group Stonewall aims to help answer for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) students through a new guide to "gay-friendly" universities. The online guide, published today, measures more than 125 institutions against a 10-point checklist, covering issues from whether they specifically mention sexual orientation in their harassment policies to whether they organise special LGBT social events. It supplements these facts with information about the strength of student LGBT societies, any reported incidents of homophopia, and whether honorary degrees have gone to prominent gay or lesbian figures ... or prominent homophobes.
Club scene. Reputation for research. Proximity to parents' washing machine. All issues prospective students will be weighing up over the next few weeks as they make final decisions about which university to choose. But some will be asking another question, too - which institution will allow them to feel comfortable about who they are?
It is a question the lobby group Stonewall aims to help answer for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) students through a new guide to "gay-friendly" universities. The online guide, published today, measures more than 125 institutions against a 10-point checklist, covering issues from whether they specifically mention sexual orientation in their harassment policies to whether they organise special LGBT social events. It supplements these facts with information about the strength of student LGBT societies, any reported incidents of homophopia, and whether honorary degrees have gone to prominent gay or lesbian figures ... or prominent homophobes.
Over breakfast this morning I caught bits of a documentary on Sky Arts about the history of the pop video. I was astonished to discover that MTV had initially refused to air the video for Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean" (1983) on the grounds that the artist was black.
Don't forget, this was just 4 years after the blatantly racist "disco Sucks" campaign that led to Disco Demolition night. Black music was considered to be mainstream TV poison. keep to the Fen Causeway
