Energy Drinks, Cigarettes and Health and Safety

There appears to be a bizarre trend with the British, of which I’m a member of. It seems to be the flow of logic that is best summarised as “actively pointing out the splinter in other people’s eyes, whilst having a log in their own”.

And what better example to think of than energy drinks. Personally, I drink energy drinks as an alternative to coffee. I don’t generally like hot drinks, as I don’t deal well with heat or warm weather full stop. As an energy drink is the equivalent of a few cups of coffee, it seems a sensible drink to have in moderation.

And yet, people go to great lengths to tell you they are bad for you, that they can kill you, that they can cause all manner of side effects. I kid you not, I have even had smokers tell me these drinks are bad for me. To which I feel like saying, statistically, they are far more likely to die of a whole range of illnesses than I am. Even with non-smokers, people are quite happy to get paralytic every weekend without people raising as much as an eyelid. Indeed, alcohol intake is generally seen as probably not good for you, but a social norm, so worth it.

And yet, as a country, we regularly like to moan about “health and safety gone mad”, despite this being an accurate description of my fellow Brit. “Those are bad for you, you know”, “your shoelaces are undone, you will trip” (for the record, in my 30-odd years on this earth, I have never once tripped on the incredibly rare occasion my shoelaces have been untied).

This really does become madness when you consider most of the “EU health and safety madness” comes from laws originally drawn up by us Brits; British lawmakers, politicians and civil servants.

Or, in plain English, its OK to point out other people’s flaws, but not our own.

It all seems a little narcissistic, don’t you think?

Pirate News Top Three - 25/02/2013

In a new daily feature, a daily summary of the top news in the 4 areas I cover in this blog: Pirates, Green, Gaming and Politics. In this first post? Pirates!

Just as a quick summary; the Pirate Posts will feature issues on technology, media, copyright, and the politics of these issues. Under no circumstances does this blog link to or condone pirate activities; it is my personal belief that, although copyright law needs reforming, one should always obey whatever the current laws are. For free music, film and software, choose only those freebies for which the copyright holder has given permission to download freely. A good start would be Frostclick, Frostwire's sister site, which includes only legal free downloads. If you are caught knowingly breaking the law, you deserve any penalty you get!

 1. Live Chat With Your Pirate In Parliament!

If you are a member of the European Union (or even if you are just interested) and willing to listen in Nordic at times, join your Pirate Party MEP for a live chat every Thursday at 17:30 in the UK (18:30 CET). The first of these was held in the Thursday just gone, with such fascinating insights as how lobbyists tried to trick MEPs into softening Data Protection laws for consumers. I wonder if any of our mainstream parties would be so open and direct with it's constituents!

Main Article by The Pirate Times: What Would You Ask A Pirate MEP?

2. Nintendo Wants Websites Blocked

Each year companies get to submit a list of proposals to the US government on how they could improve copywrong enforcement across the world, known as the Special 301 Report. Included in Nintendo's letter are such reccomendations as adding China, Spain, and Brazil (among others) to the USA's watchlist; publicizing raids and other sanctions to increase awareness; and giving stronger penalties to copyright infringers as well as taking to court more high-profile infringers. Nintendo's operating income has been around 37.3 Billion Yen (around £270 million) each year.

Main Article by TorrentFreak: Nintendo Wants To Hunt Game Pirates And Block Websites

3. Firefox Launch OS At Mobile World Congress

Mozilla has "Unleashed The Fox"; those attending the Mobile World Congress will be able to experience Firefox OS and The Fox firsthand. This is an interesting development, as it marks the first mainstream Mobile OS entirely created by a not-for-profit organisation. It will be interesting to see how it fares against Google's Android, which has already cornered most of the mobile market. Although Android is mostly Open Source, it is developed by it's for-profit parents Google.

Main Article by The Mozilla Blog: Moblizing Mozilla: Blazing Your Own Path

Immigration vs Racism: Some thoughts on the EU

Rarely do I get through the week without some comment on the state of "non-existant" immigration laws, or the state the European Union is in. Those powers that be in Brussels, it seems, are apparently hugely intent on controlling and ruining every single aspect or our lives, as well as wanting to make it illegal to identify as British, forcing us all into a United States of Europe.

The reality, to be honest, isn't that bad. At the end of the day, it is you and I who vote in the European elections. There are euro-parties that act as the groupings for national parties; if you elect Labour, they are grouped with other like-minded parties across Europe, if you vote Conservative they also group with similar parties and so on. The only real mistake was no British government ever asking the public whether they wanted to be a part of the EU. In that respect I definitely believe we should have a referendum, because it is something we should all have a say in. But I would vote yes, because I believe we're better together than apart.

A real dirty word in this country at the moment though seems to be immigration. A person can't comment on immigration policy without being called a racist.

Don't get me wrong, I completely hate the "them and us" mentality, that somehow a person of another nationality is less than us "respectful" British people. I don't think that's helpful at all; To be honest it's quite a worrying trend. But what frustrates me is the mismanagement of the labour market and free movement/trade within Europe.

I believe a better idea would have been to start off by categorizing a country based on its GDP in relation to other European states. Its going to sound like I'm suggesting a two-tier Europe; but I want to make it clear that the stated aim should be to equalise income and poverty levels to those of the "target" group countries (e.g. the UK, France, Germany). Members of the target group will have unrestricted access to each others trade and labour markets; pretty much how the EU works now.

In contrast, those in the "developing" group will have a more restricted policy on migration and the like. However, all countries in the target group will be required to pay into a fund with the sole objective of raising income levels in the poorer European countries. As well as this, money should be put into language education in all member states for any other member state, to foster genuine free movement and communication between countries based on common languages. The main aim would be to slow down economic migration, so that all member states are truly equal in terms of pay; so that the free movement of labour really is based on demand and skills rather than purely being paid more in another country.

For now I think the best policy would be to require all member states just to monitor migration between the countries, so we get a more accurate picture of what is happening in the continent, rather than cheap opinions from UKIP and the BNP, or rhetoric from the left.

Interested in seeing debate on the subject.

Fighting the Copyright Cowboys and their Copyright Crusade (aka RIAA)

I'm going to start right off with something that could be quite unexpected: copyright is something we need, and continue to need for the foreseeable future. "Are you serious?" You may be thinking. Why, yes I am; without licenses such as the General Public License, it is unlikely projects like Android, Firefox, OpenOffice/Libreoffice would thrive quite in the way they have done. Copyright law has given these projects the right to determine how others can use their program and source code, whether or not others can profit from it, the right to have code attributed back to the original project and the right to grant anyone the ability to look at the original source code and learn from it. Without copyright law, we really would be in a Wild West of ideas stolen and profited from by Copyright Cowboys; or rather, corporations with lots of money that could (and would) take any of this free software and sell it as their own, with no repatriation or acknowledgement to those that wrote it.

I also assert my right to have my writing here attributed to myself, and the right that only I may profit from it. It isn't so much about my going on a copyright crusade in order to protect my work, and it certainly isn't about me advocating a limiting of our internet freedoms just so you can buy a single, DRM protected right to read this article on only the devices I decide. It is simply me saying I put a decent 30 minutes in writing this, so don't fob it off as your own. Other than that, you are free to do as you please; my work is licensed under a Creative Commons license, so within those bounds you can be my guest.

But anyway. What absolutely angers me are these shadowy figures, in the UK and beyond, that (despite between £millions to £billions profits) claim piracy is "destroying jobs, income and livelihoods", and that because of this media companies and the police should have unprecedented powers to collect and snoop on ANYONE's data. While they are at it, they may as well be given the right to install cameras in our homes just to be doubly sure exactly WHO in a household is taking part in this crime which is certainly not victimless!

The attacks on our freedom of privacy, expression, and civil liberties is bad enough. But what offends me as well is this claim that it is all done in order to enforce the rights of content creators. Is that so? Does that mean, as an independent content creator, I have access to the same amount of police support/snooping in order to "protect" my intellectual property? I didn't think so. All these laws amount to are a protection racket perpetrated by the wealthy and vested interests of popular media. They are the mobs with easy access to guns and muscle. The reality is it is nothing to do with enforcing copyright laws; just enforcing it for those that can afford.

Fighting the Copyright Cowboys and their Copyright Crusade (aka RIAA)

I'm going to start right off with something that could be quite unexpected: copyright is something we need, and continue to need for the foreseeable future. "Are you serious?" You may be thinking. Why, yes I am; without licenses such as the General Public License, it is unlikely projects like Android, Firefox, OpenOffice/Libreoffice would thrive quite in the way they have done. Copyright law has given these projects the right to determine how others can use their program and source code, whether or not others can profit from it, the right to have code attributed back to the original project and the right to grant anyone the ability to look at the original source code and learn from it. Without copyright law, we really would be in a Wild West of ideas stolen and profited from by Copyright Cowboys; or rather, corporations with lots of money that could (and would) take any of this free software and sell it as their own, with no repatriation or acknowledgement to those that wrote it.

I also assert my right to have my writing here attributed to myself, and the right that only I may profit from it. It isn't so much about my going on a copyright crusade in order to protect my work, and it certainly isn't about me advocating a limiting of our internet freedoms just so you can buy a single, DRM protected right to read this article on only the devices I decide. It is simply me saying I put a decent 30 minutes in writing this, so don't fob it off as your own. Other than that, you are free to do as you please; my work is licensed under a Creative Commons license, so within those bounds you can be my guest.

But anyway. What absolutely angers me are these shadowy figures, in the UK and beyond, that (despite between £millions to £billions profits) claim piracy is "destroying jobs, income and livelihoods", and that because of this media companies and the police should have unprecedented powers to collect and snoop on ANYONE's data. While they are at it, they may as well be given the right to install cameras in our homes just to be doubly sure exactly WHO in a household is taking part in this crime which is certainly not victimless!

The attacks on our freedom of privacy, expression, and civil liberties is bad enough. But what offends me as well is this claim that it is all done in order to enforce the rights of content creators. Is that so? Does that mean, as an independent content creator, I have access to the same amount of police support/snooping in order to "protect" my intellectual property? I didn't think so. All these laws amount to are a protection racket perpetrated by the wealthy and vested interests of popular media. They are the mobs with easy access to guns and muscle. The reality is it is nothing to do with enforcing copyright laws; just enforcing it for those that can afford.