Jesus
twenty fucking eight.
Posts by Naughtyhorse
2416 publicly visible posts • joined 21 Jan 2010
Page:
Grooveshark cofounder Josh Greenberg dead at 28
The US taxman thinks Microsoft owes billions. Prove it, says Microsoft
Being common is tragic, but the tragedy of the commons is still true
Sunday 19th July 2015 13:38 GMT
Logical management?
How does the 'capitalist solution' hold up when corporations are, as is increasingly the case, utterly focussed on this years figures? Screw the catastrophe that's 3 years down the road, that's someone else's problem.
It may not be logical to critically deplete a particular resource.... but it happens all the time.
Pray for AMD
Neil Young yanks music from streaming services: 'Worst audio in history'
Wednesday 15th July 2015 21:58 GMT
cares about quality?
Oh come on
Neil Young?
really?
He's had a hair up his ass about digital from day 1, fuck knows why, but quality aint it.
his complaining about poor recording quality is like 1 Bentley driver complaining to another with the AC on and the window open for the extra damage it's doing to the environment!
Attention dunderheads: Taxpayers are NOT giving businesses £93bn
Sunday 12th July 2015 12:19 GMT
the merit of simplicity
Making tax simple and transparent is the last thing business wants, hence all the bollocks about tax on profits. If tax on income is good enough for the workers then it's good enough for the company, with suitably adjusted rates and allowances.
The argument that 'most small businesses would pack up and quit' don't hold water, as I dont see that many individuals, who are taxed in exactly this way, making that choice.
Sunday 12th July 2015 12:10 GMT
Re: The majority of UK Tax burden is not being paid by companies...
To be fair the homeless guy is genuinely skint, Amazon.... not so much.
which kinda points to the breakdown of the all taxes land on individuals argument, thieving bastards like amazon and starbucks et al are syphoning money out of the economy reducing the overall tax take, and hence the opportunity for the govt to invest (debatable as to whether or not this is a bad thing) and don't tell me that if amazon had to pay the appropriate amount of tax that would increase cost to the consumer, because that is bollocks.
The costs would be the same to the consumer, and there would be a shitload more schools and hospitals in this country.
Sunday 12th July 2015 11:56 GMT
Re: The Truth of the Matter is this...
Correction;
the 50% target was introduced by the grey faced pea appreciator not the grinning war criminal.
Also;
Any and all references to fixing any problem by cutting foreign aid automatically qualify your post as a loss under the Godwin principle... only in this case you are the looser AND the nazi.
BT issues formal whinge to Ofcom over Sky dominance in pay telly
Tech bubble? Pah. IPOs just return cash to early-stage investors
Reddit meltdown: Top chat boards hidden as rebellion breaks out
UK TV is getting worse as younglings shun the BBC et al, says Ofcom
Trump carded: Wannabe prez's hotels 'ground zero' in banking breach
Oil & gas? Pah. We’ve got a MASSIVE 3D printer, beams Dubai
Why OH WHY did Blighty privatise EVERYTHING?
Monday 29th June 2015 12:41 GMT
getting toward the nub of the issue..
Wheres the utility/profit in providing services who people who are stupid enough live outside central london (little bit of reductio ad absurdium never hurt no no one)
Which was kinda the point in having nationalised industries, the wealth of the nation used to provide equal access to services for the whole nation (in theory.... well more of an aspiration really) but at least to colour the economics with a service ethic, also providing good jobs and training, also happens we need good trained blokes (and blokesses) to build and run the things, so it's not all altruism.
While you may not like to think about the pensioners that froze to death last year in order to make the electricity and gas sectors even more unbelievably profitable, you can bet somewhere in a dingy basement there's a ghoul beancounter doing just that. Human life, worth 2.5 million, but that's a fit working age life with dependents, if it costs more than that to mitigate a risk.... we'll take the risk (did he say we? what we, I don't see a we...)
In the 50's and 60's there were good arguments for running certain industries nationalised, since the 80's when business dropped all pretense of ethical behaviour it's madness not to do so.
Monday 29th June 2015 12:20 GMT
Re: Thoughts
Theres a technical term, that you may well be familiar with for the whole 'privatised industries employ fewer people', and that term is BOLLOCKS.
As I highlighted in my previous missive ALL the blokes that cashed in their pensions, and took the generous redundancy offers did so in the absolute and utter confidence that they could leave the nationalised industry on a Friday, and start work for the newly privatised industry on the following Monday. With their final salary pension in place, with the redundancy payment having wiped out their mortgages and with a 150-200% hike in pay to boot.
Fact is, it takes x amount of blokes to run a water company. all privatisation did was hide the costs in the paperwork.
Paying wages does NOT necessarily come under costs (contractors come out of the asset value) and that is the only way in which most of the privatisations made any sense.
Sunday 28th June 2015 11:59 GMT
You forgot the smoke and mirrors...
You pointed out that the Govt hated investing anything in the utilities as it became part of the government debt. (and in retrospect there's one of the real reasons for privatisation - massive investment required due to new technology or crumbling infrastructure)
But the mantra of privatisation e.g. 'All OPEX is bad, all CAPEX is good' has lead to (been gamed) to hide the actual costs of everything.
For example, assume an electricity substation is worth £1M (I appreciate saying 'is worth' to Worstal is asking for trouble)
Under a nationalised system all planning, design, and much of construction (say 20% of build cost) are carried out by in house staff... paid from OPEX, and therefore in the mind of the regulator 'pissed up against a wall'
Under privatisation all planning, design and all construction is subbed out, with a 100%(at least) uplift charged by the hiring agency. (hiring back the same bods that used to work for said leccy company to do the same job) result; 40% of construction cost goes on labour, BUT it's CAPEX, so our '£1M' substation has a book value of £1.2M - which is treated as investment, which influences the profit the regulator allows the owner to make. And creates the illusion of a better performing system than the old way where the £1M investment only added £800k to the value of the network
The company makes more profit, the regulator sees increased investment, the guys with their boots on the ground see a better performing network, the customers see higher reliability, so everybody's happy, but it cost two hundred grand more, hardly efficient.
This is also what lead to, for eg, Thames water's approach to dealing with leaks in the naughties by spending a shitload of cash increasing storage capacity (CAPEX) to make up for the leaks, the repairing of which is OPEX, and didn't get done.
Truth is that either system can perform badly, and there is in that respect no hard and fast case to be made. Of course the orgy of privatisation did just happen to transform hundreds of thousands of jobs from the public sector into contractors, abet expensive contractors. And contractors, being mortgage holders and having private pensions, and earning a shitload more cash than the council house dwelling, final salaried lot from the nationalised industries are more likely to vote tory.
and there's your real reason for privatisation :-)
let the downvotes commence....
Indiana Jones whips Bond in greatest movie character poll
Second agent takes plea deal in Silk Road misconduct case
Facebook and Twitter queen Taylor Swift: Facebook and Twitter are RUBBISH
Monday 22nd June 2015 16:13 GMT
Re: self undermining?
You think so?
probably carries more weight than some fat bloke with no twatter account and 50 FB friends claiming facebook is crap..
(I'm not fat.... just cuddly :D)
TBH I couldn't pick her out in an ID parade, but she has done 2 things this week that make me think she's probably a very decent human being.
Taylor Swift boycotts Apple Music over no-pay-for-plays shocker
Sunday 21st June 2015 18:18 GMT
Re: What a load of crap posted here
Oh.. i dunno, maybe because the content they are relying on the make their (paid) platform a success does not belong to them...
If I ran a computer shop and decided to have a promo where I gave free memory upgrades I wouldn't expect Kingston to ship me free RAM.
Employees love their IT departments (almost very nearly true)
Wednesday 17th June 2015 18:33 GMT
Re: Users now expect answers in real-time
well first off it's a financial decision to limit the overall mail box limit. the inflexibility(not everyone sends large mail)... who knows.
Requesting anything more than a reset on a lost login is a waste of breath.
who said i was using mail for rev tracking?
i'm not
distributing IP in any form has risk - whether emailing or sending it by bike messenger, or printing it, and folding the drawing into a big paper aeroplane and throwing it out the window, you just have to take a grown up attitude to it (bike it round, but the messenger could be a Russian spy, deliver by hand, but the Chinese might kidnap me). e-mail just happens to be virtually instantaneous.
Typical of an IT BOFH-wannabe to know more about how to do my job than I do.
If you aint part of the solution... you must be on the helldesk.
Wednesday 17th June 2015 12:19 GMT
Re: Users now expect answers in real-time
Spoken like a true it jobsworth :-)
I'm a designer, regularly passing multiple design drawings, at a couple of meg a pop, back and fore, on projects that typically run for a few years - with an obligation to have immediate access to all past mail.
So 10 meg per mail, and 4 gb inbox works really well for me on both counts.
here's a bolt of lightning for the blue... how about tailoring IT to suit the business it serves? (yeah I know novel concept)
When your ISP flouts net neutrality rules, here's who you should contact
Unlucky, Palmer: Facebook's going to BAN Oculus pr0n apps
INTERNET of BOOBS: Scorching French lass reveals networked bikini
No Silicon Roundabout U-Bend U-Turn: Build that peninsula boys
The Martian: Matt Damon sciences the sh*t out of the red planet
Brit plods' post-TETRA radio omnishambles comes home to roost
Did you almost prang a 737 jet with a drone over Dallas? The FAA would like a word
Tuesday 9th June 2015 11:10 GMT
Re: Could a drone hurt a 737?
load of commentards on the wrong tack here, coming into land you have speed and altitude, these can be traded off against one another to quite a large degree.
taking off, howeveryou have none of either to spare, a much more dangerous situation, with way fewer options.
Tuesday 9th June 2015 00:21 GMT
Re: Don't bother investigating
I think you are underestimating the common sense of _some_ of the quad copter community. even after the first fatalities have happened, there will be a phalanx of twats saying 'it couldn't happen to me, i have madd skilzz'
except of course it won't be happening to them.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
