apis
@apis@beehaw.org
- Comment on Should you have to pay for online privacy? 2 months ago:
We dumbly agree, out of convenience or some notion that if we wanted to read the paper edition we’d have to pay for it, but one can shell out cash for the paper, pick it up in a waiting room, read a friend’s copy, etc.
As soon as we attach a subscription to an online edition, all that happens is they get more data on us (as we are les inclined to delete their tracking cookies) whilst handing over solid confirmation that we are who they suspected we probably are.
If you must subscribe, use a dedicated browser & multiple measures to confound tracking.
- Comment on The trouble with England – why rioting in the UK has not spread to Scotland and Wales 2 months ago:
Nah, they’re nutters with very weird ideas about Britishness, Irishness & everything else, but they no more look to the English for ideas about their own identity & how to manifest it than the English look to NI loyalists as a guide.
If anything they tend to rather despise Englishness, seeing their own culture as the one true, loyal holdout to the Union.
The aprons do seek to emulate Masonic regalia, but the ideals of the Orange Order are entirely contrary to those of Freemasonry, which in any case is not specifically English or even British.
- Comment on Woman who ‘first shared fake name’ of Southport suspect arrested 3 months ago:
In the absence of irrelevant descriptors, many people struggle to remember that fascists can seem quite normal in other respects. Giving a few details helps them to imagine the woman. In turn this can quell fallacies that attach to ideas about “respectable” or “nice”.
That doesn’t matter with regard to this woman as her behaviour is now a matter for the courts, but reminds Times readers that the terror threat doesn’t come solely from disaffected louts hopped up on larger & sun exposure (& who may be quite partial to kicking off violently anyhow).
I’d think that in the absence of much to go on about her, they lifted stuff from her Twitter bio.
- Comment on Northern Lights could be visible in England and Wales as severe solar storm to hit overnight 6 months ago:
Mmmmmrrrm. Idk, saw them as a child & though I had not heard of them at the time & therefore had no expectations, not even the most dramatic, high-tech camera footage has come close to those moments.
- Comment on Northern Lights could be visible in England and Wales as severe solar storm to hit overnight 6 months ago:
Overheard a lady tonight claiming they were visible “all around, everywhere, just get outside” on the phone to her friend in the centre of Birmingham. Tried to ask her for tips, but she was too distracted by it all & not looking at the sky in any case.
- Comment on Iraqi refugee's 7-year old daughter who died in the Channel was born in Belgium and lived in Sweden, but has never been in Iraq 6 months ago:
Quite, lol. Nuffink to lose tho’!
- Comment on Iraqi refugee's 7-year old daughter who died in the Channel was born in Belgium and lived in Sweden, but has never been in Iraq 6 months ago:
The article does not suggest that it is.
The guy is appealing to the sympathy of the British government, but also does not suggest it is a British problem, and likely knows he won’t even get a response - he just has nothing to lose by asking.
- Comment on NHS charter to stress biological sex when placing patients in wards 6 months ago:
Right, because screeching about trans, non-binary and intersex people as if they’re to blame for a decade & a half of Tory asset-wrecking deathly malfeasance will totally magic this extra NHS capacity into reality.
(Ok, they didn’t mention the latter two, because they never do, but we all know how it goes).
Tbh I think staff on the wards will be able to ignore this, as the demand for care far exceeds availability, but they shouldn’t fucking have to.
- Comment on Computer game helps students get better at detecting fake news 6 months ago:
Noted.
- Comment on Computer game helps students get better at detecting fake news 6 months ago:
Even more likely to forget to look at stuff I’ve saved. Think the function does exist though.
- Comment on If Britain is so bothered by China, why do these .gov.uk sites use Chinese ad brokers? 6 months ago:
Because Tory cuts mean the money to run these websites has to be found elsewhere.
- Comment on Computer game helps students get better at detecting fake news 6 months ago:
Commenting to remind self to return to re-read later.
- Comment on Not just mums go to Iceland: supermarket drops slogan to be more inclusive 6 months ago:
Can recall being a young teenager and being on the one hand struck that they were suddenly including men as consumers of household products, but at the same time that they were depicting these men as bizarre & wildly incompetent.
It took a further TWO DECADES to see an ad with a normal using a normal product like a normal person.
Was splendidly unaware of the substantive issues back then, so that I even noticed this as startling seems telling.
- Comment on Thames Water nationalisation plan could move bulk of £15bn debt to state 6 months ago:
Aye, it is a whole thing.
All of the “safeguards” they used to get the public to accept privatisation back in the day were sleights of hand.
- Comment on Sweden's public sector says goodbye to Big Tech 7 months ago:
Great news, and looks like some EU institutions and Germany are gearing up to do similar, which should encourage other countries & organisations to follow, and massively expand open source development.
- Comment on Warning after people fined because they used Royal Mail stamps 7 months ago:
Makes one nervous that this will be yet another scandal in which postmasters & postmistresses end up under attack…
- Comment on Study finds anti-piracy messages backfire, especially for men 8 months ago:
Depends whether or not they hide some code to give them the option to remote disable your files after you’ve downloaded them, and if they to restrict your ability to create backup copies & play your files on devices you own.
There’s no reason why they couldn’t make stuff available in ways which buyers could feel confident in.
- Comment on Tory peer Philippa Stroud, who has close ties to an international network of climate crisis deniers, appointed government's low pay advisor 8 months ago:
They ordinarily attempt to double-speak the intention of these groups & roles in how they name them, or at least go for neutral-seeming, so a shift to a title which so bluntly states intent seems to me to indicate something. I don’t know what that something could be, and drawing a blank when I attempt to speculate.
Last week was reminded that they unofficially appointed a “Minister for Common Sense” (MP without Portfolio, Esther McVey) but that seems a different flavour of brazen, openly mocking Orwell’s warnings, but we also know it is designed to appeal to voters who are unable to cope with the complexity of reality.
Anyhow, enough of my pointless ramblings. Am off to seek further verification of this story. Well know Tories to be ghoulish, and those currently controlling the party to be especially so, but feel that think tanks, etc. mostly push to have their ideas adopted, rather than the party pushing them to provide ideas.
Which is a nitpick if the ideas are implemented, but an accurate view of the workings of these relationships seems a necessary aspect of a robust counter-offensive.
How I loathe all of this. Ugh.
- Comment on Jobcentres told to stop referring benefit claimants to food banks 8 months ago:
Work Freedom Areas, as Tufton St. prefers.
- Comment on Jobcentres told to stop referring benefit claimants to food banks 8 months ago:
They did… until their mates who are hankering for free labour reminded them they don’t own any businesses in Rwanda.
- Comment on Jobcentres told to stop referring benefit claimants to food banks 8 months ago:
Seems like an intentional misinterpretation of the legislation.
At this rate the Tories will have the DWP send benefits claimants to workhouses run by Capita or G4S or other awful getup.
- Comment on Junior doctors in England offer to call off strike if given more time for talks 9 months ago:
Then it isn’t realistic for the NHS to have junior doctors…
Though the Tories want nothing more than to finish off their destruction of the NHS, they still need enough of the working age population to have sufficient health to be in the workforce. As things stand, too many people cannot access healthcare in a timely fashion, and have had to leave work, with consequent impact on the similarly vandalised benefits system, and the nation as a whole.
This is not remotely sustainable, and their plans to privatise healthcare will only exacerbate the problem. Reversing the damage inflicted is the only way forward.
- Comment on Apple accuses UK gov't of ‘unprecedented overreach’ on privacy, putting users at risk around the globe 9 months ago:
“if the UK rejects an update, that update cannot be released in any other nation and the public would not be informed of the decision.”
I get that nations can insist on all sorts of things from businesses that want access to their market, and that companies only comply if the finances still stack in their favour.
Is the UK really valuable enough to consumer tech companies, relative to the rest of the world combined, or is this some feint as part of a different negotiation entirely?
- Comment on UK state pension age will soon need to rise to 71, say experts 9 months ago:
The robotic, having been trained at the whim of the public schoolboy, but now lacking the need to avoid such scant societal pressure which sometime feigns to temper the worst excesses, will of course be more caring… to consolidate power & wealth.
My hope is that they somehow neglect to weave their cruel systems into the same servers upon which the distribution of such essentials as water, food & medicine rely.
- Comment on Scientology-linked UK drug rehab left vulnerable people ‘traumatised’ 9 months ago:
Erm, if the CQC does not have the remit to regulate “alternative” services as they claim, why the hell had the CQC given this provider a rating?
And why is a programme which has never been assessed listed in an NHS directory?
- Comment on Fujitsu bugs that sent innocent people to prison were known “from the start” and hidden from lawyers of wrongly convicted UK postal workers 9 months ago:
Possibly attempting some “we’ve changed now” reputation-saving. They have no hope of winning any cases against them, and probably not even of minor points of the cases.
- Comment on UK Monarchy Opinion Survey 9 months ago:
Go for it :)
- Comment on UK Monarchy Opinion Survey 9 months ago:
Won’t use the survey as it is on MS. Am sure they know me better than I know myself, but prefer to avoid nevertheless.
Abolish, but if we’re pushing for major reforms, ditching FPTP in favour of STV seems a far greater priority.
If we end up going for ab elected figurehead, the US model seems awfully risky, but that used by Ireland could be ok?
- Comment on England heads for obesity disaster as minister frets about nanny state 10 months ago:
Yeah, but she’s got to consider growing all those donations from the sugar & processed food lobbyists.
- Comment on Ex-minister David Davis intervenes in street attack near Parliament 11 months ago:
Good on him.
Intervening is scary, because it is genuinely risky, and though the article mentions he has training, that was a long time ago.