Re: Yes, they will emigrate
And if you work in a technical field in Germany you will find they are pretty much all fluent in English. Most of the technical terms are used as-is (i.e. English words).
5770 publicly visible posts • joined 29 May 2007
The article didn't mention that as freelance consultants we don't get sick pay either.
A bit of extra tax is one thing, but if they make it more complex and risky then contractors are more likely to seek refuge in permie roles as they will at least will get some perks like pension contributions/sick pay/redundancy entitlement/HR protection from unscrupulous managers/protection from unfair dismissal etc.
At which point, believe it or not, the government will get less tax, not more.
Someone once told the control freaks that information is power and effectively a form of currency.
Now that they have collected all this data on everyone they need to spend it on something.
Analyst: I know, why don't we sell the nebulous idea of a war on something so we can spend all this 'information' currency and convert it into some REAL currency.
Monger: That's a terrifying thought!
Analyst: That's it! A War on Terror! We're made, it's the gravy-train for us alright...choo choo!! I'm just going to call uncle Broomfondle and let him know the good news - Magickthighs was right all along :)
I was thinking that too - how come I've known this for years yet there is new research to 'prove' it. I certainly didn't do any experiements so I must have read it somewhere (and it was a fair while ago too).
Perhaps the world is suffering some kind of reboot process where bits of it forget that stuff has already been done (prior to the reboot).
<awaits BSOD aka 'The Sky' to fall in on me>
@AC You seem to have drawn things up into two camps again, leaving little room for those who have not been convinced by the evidence so far, a lot of which is tainted by accusations of fudging and bias.
"We know as a physical fact that increasing CO2 concentration in the atmosphere will cause global warming (basic physics)."
Do we? If you only include basic physics then this is probably a fair assertion, but what about increasing CO2 concentration in the atmosphere of a complex system with a large number of subtle (and not so subtle) feedback mechanisms? Are you 100% certain there is no feedback mechnism in play that reduces the impact of rising CO2 levels in the atmosphere on heat retention by the planet?
"The poor old AGW deniers are desperate for crumbs of anecdotal evidence because there is just about no one left with half a real science qualification arguing their side, and no substantial evidence."
For the record, I'm not an AGW denier. However, I am yet to be convinced that man is the primary cause of any warming we are seeing. A lot of the rhetoric seems to focus on people who are for or against the idea, when in reality there are quite a few people who just don't think the evidence* provided so far is conclusive enough.
Whilst we are at it, you don't require evidence to prove a negative. It is incumbant on the proponent of a theory to provide evidence that can be tested rigourously by independant parties. You can't prove a negative (that I am aware of).
*especially when there appears to be a lot of fudging going on.
When it comes to actual food potential the whole spelling thing just goes by the way-side and she brings out the big-guns: telepathy.
Seriously, you've only got to think about going into the kitchen for something and she can go from 'laying on her back with her legs pointing to the four corners of the universe' to 'stalking mode with ears in jodderal bank position' in as much time as it takes to blink :)
" like dogs and the b-a-t-h."
Our dog has learnt to spell, so that one's out. If I ask her to go outside and do a wee and it isn't obvious we are about to leave the house, she gets very suspicious and I think she has now successfully managed to piece together that this is a pre-cursor to having a shower :)
New business case proposal:
1. Buy zero day exploit for $x
2. Sell zero day exploit for $x/10 to 11 customers (i.e. knock-down price)
3. Expose zero day through puppet company to reduce value to zero.
You make 10% to cover your running costs and you eventually eliminate all known exploits (or people stop buying them).
Worth a go?
@Dan, I really do think you are being far too generous with your acceptance of the possibility that the results we are seeing are some kind of unintended consequence.
The only circumstance I can see that being true is if the people making these decisions are completely unaware of all the warnings they have been given (i.e. fingers in the ears humming loudly).
If they are aware, then it's deliberate. If they aren't aware then it's incompetence bordering on treasonous (I'm re-purposing the word here to mean to work against the population, not the crown :) ).
I've enjoyed reading your posts in this thread though, your points are well made and need to be taken into consideration. Knee-jerk, frothing at the mouth type reactions will only serve the cause of freedom more harm.
If the system has been corrupted by corporate interests, then that is what we need to tackle. More oversight and controls on lobbying would be an excellent way to start limiting the power of money over the power of the vote (imho).
"But that runs into the First Contact problem. You have to be sure the person you meet in person really IS the person you want to meet and not a mole. Plus the code you use can limit your vocabulary. Try to make it too broad and it can become suspicious enough to warrant a code-cracking effort."
You would have the same first contact problem when using encryption too, so it's irrelevant to the comparison.
Why would the vocab be limited? A true cypher cannot be cracked unless you know the source text.
(I'm thinking homophonic substitution cypher here). Sure it's inefficient and unwieldy, but I can't see anyone cracking it.
"Which people would say would stick out like a sore thumb and warrant investigation"
Really? Wow. It would be so hard for a rogue encryption solution to appear like the approved version I'm sure (that's sarcasm by the way).
Have you ever looked on usenet? I could agree a cypher with someone in person and then communicate, in public, without anyone knowing anything about the discussion. I could post the message from anywhere with weak wi-fi security, using spoofed MAC addresses and fingerprinting profiles from a clean install of an OS run as a virtual guest.
This can be done right now, without the need for any encryption software. When you play whack-a-mole, the game does not end until your arms drop off or the hammer breaks.
Up until now they have been claiming 'all' they wanted was the meta-data - whom is talking to whom - now they want the details, including your bank balance and shopping profiles. What for?
These surveillance bods seem to subscribe to the 'bracketing' method of PR.
If you want to convince someone that way A is better than B, then simply represent two aspects of A as being the only alternatives to argue over. B never gets a look in.
B=Freedom in this instance
It's funny how these goons ignore the experts saying it can't be done with a simple belligerent response 'but it *must* be done, how is your problem!'.
It's also funny that they never seem to want to address the primary source material for creating extremist fundamentalists - US foreign policy.
"Critics argue that the tech is used by countries with patchy human rights records to spy on activists and journalists."
or
"Critics argue that the tech is used by countries with patchy human rights records to spy on activists and journalists."
No caveat required really since they are all at it and recognise no limits to their surveillance.
(Like GCHQ for example.)
Don't forget: a lot of these jobs will involve access to buildings as well as networks. Even if someone doesn't have clearance to get into the 'secure' room, they could still do something nasty in the canteen where people with all sorts of clearance will visit at some point.