Quotulatiousness

December 5, 2009

Despite (legal) danger, teens still hot for sexting

Filed under: Law, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:20

In another example of the state’s threat of legal punishment being hugely disproportional to the perceived or actual damage of the ‘crime’, so-called sexting can carry a life-long legal penalty for an act with little or no actual danger to the parties involved. In a case of “well, duh”, kids are still eager to send one another pictures of themselves nude or partially clothed, in spite of (or in ignorance of) the legal threats:

The latest figures come from a poll organised by the Associated Press and MTV, which questioned around 1200 youths and semi-youths aged from 14 to 24. What they discovered, among other things, is that boys think naked pictures are “hot” while girls consider them “slutty”.

We’ll go out on a limb here and say that boys and girls feel much the same ways about thigh-high boots and micro-skirts — one boy’s hot is another girl’s slutty, but that’s another issue. Young people do seem peculiarly blind to the long-term risks of naked photographs, though perhaps they should be admired for having such confidence in their own bodies.

About half of those surveyed thought the risks were overplayed — the rest were suitably wary, but did it anyway. Greater education about the risks doesn’t seem to be the answer: it’s almost as though young people aren’t listening to the advice provided by their elders and betters.

The risks they run include both sender and receiver being charged with various sex crimes, resulting in potentially being added to the sex offender registry for their state(s) of residence, which pretty much ends any possibility of them being able to go to university, hold a job, or lead a normal life.

November 26, 2009

WoW considered harmful, sued for damages

Filed under: Gaming, Law — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 08:41

It must be a slow news week: a gamer in California claims that World of Warcraft is harmful, seeks damages in a law suit:

Depeche Mode’s Martin Gore subpoenaed in World of Warcraft lawsuit
What do you do when a videogame makes you miserable? You take its makers to court and get the Depeche Mode guitarist to testify on the nature of melancholy, of course

In one of this year’s loonier lawsuits, Depeche Mode’s Martin Gore has been subpoenaed by an American videogamer and asked to testify on the subject of “alienation”. Erik Estavillo is suing the makers of World of Warcraft, alleging that the game has alienated him from the real, orc-less world.

According to the San Jose, California resident, World of Warcraft is a “harmful virtual environment” and its developers follow “sneaky and deceitful practices”. Despite this, Estavillo admits he “relies on videogames heavily for the little ongoing happiness he can achieve in this life”. He just wants World of Warcraft to cost less money. And to stop making him so sad.

Which brings us to Depeche Mode, those purveyors of angst and sorrow. Estavillo’s court filings put forward multi-instrumentalist songwriter Martin Gore as an expert witness on melancholy. Gore should be called to Santa Clara county superior court, Estavillio suggests, “since he himself has been known to be sad, lonely, and alienated, as can be seen in the songs he writes”.

November 24, 2009

RN ship stood by, failing to do anything

Filed under: Africa, Britain, Bureaucracy, Military — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 01:11

Max Hastings contrasts the Royal Navy of Churchill’s day with the modern one:

On February 16, 1940, the destroyer Cossack, acting on Churchill’s personal orders, steamed headlong into neutral Norwegian territorial waters in defiance of international law, boarded the German freighter Altmark and freed 299 captive British merchant seamen.

Legend held that the first the prisoners knew of their deliverance was a shout down a hatchway from a sailor on deck: ‘The Navy’s here!’ The episode passed into folklore, exemplifying the Royal Navy’s centuries-old tradition of triumphant boldness.

On October 28, 2009, the armed Royal Fleet Auxiliary tanker Wave Knight met Somali pirates transferring the British couple Paul and Rachel Chandler from their yacht Lynn Rival to a hijacked Singaporean container vessel.

When warning shots from Wave Knight failed to deter the pirates, its 100-strong crew stood by and did . . . absolutely nothing.

We know of this sorry incident only because a British sailor leaked the truth. The Ministry of Defence’s original statement declared, evasively and deceitfully, that Wave Knight had encountered the yacht unmanned. Nothing was said about the British ship witnessing the hostages’ removal.

I guess it’s a sign of progress that the Somali pirates were content with just capturing two civilians and didn’t also take the Wave Knight and her crew as well. That might count as a win — no formal inquiry, so the lawyers won’t be sent in to bayonet the survivors.

Today, instead, lawyers reign supreme, not least in the Ministry of Defence and even on Afghan and Iraqi battlefields. No warship’s captain feels able to take action that might breach the rights of others, even when those others are murderous Somalis.

The Royal Navy’s officers in the Indian Ocean know that every shot they fire is liable to be the subject of a later inquiry, possible litigation, even a criminal trial.

Then there is the galling question of human rights. You can almost hear the MoD’s solicitors putting forward the following argument: you have to be careful because any captured pirates might claim political asylum in the UK and that it would be a breach of their rights to send them back to the anarchy in Somalia.

Alternatively, suppose a pirate swims ashore from a craft sunk by the Navy, and uses some saved-up hijack plunder to fly to Europe. He finds a smart human rights lawyer and pleads that he was an innocent fisherman pulling in his nets when British cannon fire killed half his family.

The European Court in Strasbourg might award him almost as much booty as he would gain from ransoming a family of European yachtsmen.

It’s so bad that it may be a serious breach of human rights to refer to the pirates as pirates . . .

November 20, 2009

Those inevitable “new word” lists

Filed under: Books, Media, Randomness — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 08:21

David Harsanyi falls into the trap cunningly laid for him by the devious wordmongers at Merriam-Webster:

Like other books Americans have a duty to own — the Bible or “Atlas Shrugged,” for instance — the dictionary does not require an absurd marketing ploy to sell itself.

Yet, every year a barrage of cockamamie “word lists” are unveiled by publishers seeking to bring attention to the evolving English language.

In the end, these lists establish two facts: 1) We are unable to invent any new words of value. 2) If you put a list together, a columnist will probably write about it.

One needn’t be William Safire, though, to be unsettled that the word “philanderer” is a major mystery to so many people. According to a new list by Merriam-Webster, “philanderer” (a national pastime, meaning to be sexually unfaithful to one’s wife) was one of the most searched words of the past year because of the crush of politicians and celebrities busy hiking the Appalachian trial.

The word receiving the highest intensity of searches over the shortest period of time was “admonish” (to express warning or disapproval). It was triggered by a crude outburst of a South Carolina congressman and the subsequent moralistic “admonishment” of him by Congress.

It’s not the lists themselves that bother me . . . it’s the blatantly contrived nature of the words appearing in most of the lists. “Unfriend”? Bleargh.

There is, admittedly, one trend that could prove to be a bright spot. The newly minted “teabagger” gives us hope that crude sexual terms will now regularly be applied to politics, where they can do the most good.

Perhaps “felching” will come to describe how the media gathers material for their coverage of the White House. Oh, wait . . .

November 13, 2009

British emigration woes

Filed under: Britain, Education, Humour — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 14:02

Jeremy Clarkson enumerates all the places would-be Ex-pats can’t go:

There’s talk of emigration in the air. It’s everywhere I go. Parties. Work. In the supermarket. My daughter is working herself half to death to get good grades at GSCE and can’t see the point because she won’t be going to university, because she doesn’t have a beak or flippers or a qualification in washing windscreens at the lights. She wonders, often, why we don’t live in America.

[. . .]

It’s a lovely idea, to get out of this stupid, Fairtrade, Brown-stained, Mandelson-skewed, equal-opportunities, multicultural, carbon-neutral, trendily left, regionally assembled, big-government, trilingual, mosque-drenched, all-the-pigs-are-equal, property-is-theft hellhole and set up shop somewhere else. But where?

You can’t go to France because you need to complete 17 forms in triplicate every time you want to build a greenhouse, and you can’t go to Switzerland because you will be reported to your neighbours by the police and subsequently shot in the head if you don’t sweep your lawn properly, and you can’t go to Italy because you’ll soon tire of waking up in the morning to find a horse’s head in your bed because you forgot to give a man called Don a bundle of used notes for “organising” a plumber.

You can’t go to Australia because it’s full of things that will eat you, you can’t go to New Zealand because they don’t accept anyone who is more than 40 and you can’t go to Monte Carlo because they don’t accept anyone who has less than 40 mill. And you can’t go to Spain because you’re not called Del and you weren’t involved in the Walthamstow blag. And you can’t go to Germany . . . because you just can’t.

The Caribbean sounds tempting, but there is no work, which means that one day, whether you like it or not, you’ll end up like all the other expats, with a nose like a burst beetroot, wondering if it’s okay to have a small sharpener at 10 in the morning. And, as I keep explaining to my daughter, we can’t go to America because if you catch a cold over there, the health system is designed in such a way that you end up without a house. Or dead.

QotD: Quebec’s anti-royalist protest

Filed under: Britain, Cancon, Government, Quotations — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 12:50

Do we still have republicans in this country? Proper ones, I mean. Ones who care. I suppose we must, but I can’t imagine where you’d have to go to find them. They probably hold meetings in suburban church halls, rented on timeshare with other dimly remembered groups such as Mosleyites, and Flat-Earthers, and people still furious that the Jacobites got such a raw deal. Odd how republicanism isn’t even an esoteric political position in Britain these days. It’s barely even a political position at all.

Not so in Quebec. There, this week, 100 anti-monarchy protesters clashed with riot police when the Prince of Wales tried to visit a regimental hall. Imagine that. Imagine being that cross with Prince Charles. Not global capitalism, not the Afghanistan war, but him with the ears, who makes those biscuits.

I don’t really know where I am with the French Canadians, to be honest. Obviously one can only have the greatest of admiration for any group of people whose major cultural export throughout 300 years of history has been Céline Dion: The Essential Collection (disc one — disc two is kind of patchy) but still, I couldn’t pretend I know what makes them tick. I can understand, I suppose, how they might, on balance, reckon it’s a bit silly for them and us to still have the same monarch. But to actually riot about it? Baby, as Céline might say, this is getting serious.

Hugo Rifkind, “Protesting against Prince Charles? Bonkers: The people of Quebec must have something better to do”, The Times, 2009-11-13

November 9, 2009

QotD: Society must be protected

Filed under: Britain, Bureaucracy, Media, Quotations — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 14:03

I think this does not go nearly far enough. Clearly the company behind Red Bull should be closely regulated as it is only a matter of time before someone drinks one and jumps off a building and falls to their death because contrary to their claims, Red Bull does not in fact ‘give you wings’.

In short, as people who are not ‘experts’ are moronic halfwits incapable of telling reality from advertising hype, we must simply turn over all aspects of our life to government approved self-important technocratic prigs qualified ‘experts’ who can determine what we are permitted to see.

We must ‘do it for the children’ of course.

Perry de Havilland, “All your images belong to us”, Samizdata, 2009-11-09

November 4, 2009

No wonder it had to be kept a secret

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Law — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 01:10

Cory Doctorow looks at the “too sensitive to expose to public view” Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement and finds it awful:

ISPs have to proactively police copyright on user-contributed material. This means that it will be impossible to run a service like Flickr or YouTube or Blogger, since hiring enough lawyers to ensure that the mountain of material uploaded every second isn’t infringing will exceed any hope of profitability.

ISPs have to cut off the Internet access of accused copyright infringers or face liability. This means that your entire family could be denied to the internet — and hence to civic participation, health information, education, communications, and their means of earning a living — if one member is accused of copyright infringement, without access to a trial or counsel.

Clueless, but powerful . . . meet powerless, but distributed. Combatants, take your corners.

Update: Your kids could go to jail for non-commercial file sharing.

November 3, 2009

Being “a bit boring” is part of his shtick

Filed under: Britain, Humour, Technology — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 08:54

Colby Cosh looks at “Frygate”:

I realize I’m late to the party, but I didn’t find out until today that the remark which made Stephen Fry melt down was that his tweets were “a bit boring.” Really? Look, we all adore Stephen Fry, especially those of us who are ungainly, neurotic, and a little old-fashioned, so I hope someone will explain to him gently that he is a bit boring — not only his tweets, but just all-around. QI wouldn’t have a premise in the first place if it weren’t somewhat difficult to be interesting; Kingdom was served with rather overgenerous lashings of scenery and mopeyness; and Fry’s impeccable gadget reviews, considered strictly as entertainment, would try the patience of anyone who doesn’t add up the grocery bill in hexadecimal. Being just a little boring — presenting the perpetual risk that he might go on just a little too long about number theory or the battle of Stamford Bridge — is essential to the unostentatious delightfulness of Stephen Fry, just as a soupçon of boringness is essential to the charm of a warm woollen sweater or a newspaper comic strip. (OK, bad example. No newspaper comic strips now being printed possess any charm at all.) Nobody needs Stephen Fry to be a source of unpredictability or chaos. I would argue that any institution whose merits are obvious and whose utility is uncompromised is, by definition, a bit boring. Volvos? Boring! Vin Scully? A little boring at times! Oatmeal cookies? Lovely, if they’re the sort of thing you’re into, but they don’t exactly send anybody’s pulse racing, do they?

October 30, 2009

Cory Doctorow on Britain’s ill-advised ‘3 strikes’ move

Filed under: Britain, Law, Technology — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:39

Cory Doctorow would have the British government do something other than their idiotic ill-advised move to enforce the “three strikes” rule:

Peter Mandelson’s proposal to disconnect the families of internet users who have been accused of file sharing will do great violence to British justice without delivering any reduction in copyright infringement. We’ve had 15 years of dotty entertainment industry proposals designed to make computers worse at copying. It’s time that we stopped listening to big content and started listening to reason.

Since 1995 — the year of the WIPO copyright treaties — the entertainment industry has won extrajudicial powers to enforce its rights without the need to prove a case in court. “Notice and takedown”, as the system was called, was supposed to stop copyright infringement on the web. It gave rights holders the power to compel internet service providers to take down material simply by stating that it infringed their rights, and obliged those providers to act or face liability.

A decade and a half later there is no indication that this has reduced copyright infringement online (certainly there is more today than there was in 1995). And, predictably, a system that allows for legalised censorship without penalties for abuse has itself been abused.

We are already at the point where it is a reasonable and sensible thing to say that access to the internet is a human right (at least in the west). Mandelson’s three strikes provision will deny innocent people access to the internet (for all it will take is accusations that do not need to have proof), which for more and more people will be the practical equivalent of being exiled from the country. No internet access would mean children can’t get access to school work, parents can’t get access to their bank accounts, and everyone will be cut off from large parts of their social circle (more and more people depend on email, Twitter, Facebook, and other social media to stay in touch).

Due process? That seems to have been lost in the rush. Proportionality? That’s been gone for years.

October 29, 2009

Another non-surprise development in Britain

Filed under: Britain, Bureaucracy, Law — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 07:58

You can’t be a proper Nanny State without properly trained nannies:

Only council-vetted “play rangers” are now allowed to monitor youngsters in two adventure areas in Watford while parents must watch from outside a perimeter fence.

The Watford Borough Council policy has been attacked as insulting and a disgrace by furious relatives who say they are being labelled as potential paedophiles.

Of course, like all such idiotic measures, it’s intended to “protect the children”, so no rational thought is welcome on the subject. All across Britain today, local councils are suddenly wondering if they should adopt the same kind of policy for fear of being held responsible should anything happen.

The Daily Telegraph disclosed on Tuesday how employers will come under pressure to register staff with the Government’s anti-paedophile database even if they have little contact with children

Sir Roger Singleton, the chairman of the Independent Safeguarding Authority, said the scope of the planned database could increase significantly because companies would fear losing business if they did not have their employees vetted.

Last month, he was asked by the Government to look again at the complex definitions of “frequent” and “intensive” contact following concerns that the scheme would lead to state supervision of all relationships between adults and children.

It may not be the intent, but it will almost certainly be the final result.

October 21, 2009

Soccer stupidities, explained

Filed under: Britain, Economics, Soccer — Tags: — Nicholas @ 12:21

David Goldblatt reviews Why England Lose and Other Curious Football Phenomena Explained, by Simon Kuper and Stefan Szymanski:

“Anyone who spends any time inside football soon discovers that just as oil is part of the oil business, stupidity is part of the football business.” Well, football may not spend billions of pounds actively seeking out stupidity, piping, refining and selling it, but as Simon Kuper and Stefan Szymanski demonstrate over and over again in Why England Lose, it is certainly swimming in the stuff.

[. . .]

Economic rationality is just not football’s strong suit, and nor is emotional intelligence. As Kuper and Syzmanski demonstrate, the transfer market is full of obvious irrationalities. For example, scouts over-report blonde players — who stand out and stick in the mind — irrespective of their actual performance. Despite all evidence to the contrary, clubs also overpay for teenagers, for players of fashionable nationalities and for recent stars of international tournaments without properly assessing their likely course of development, their suitability for the football culture they are moving to or the latter’s real long-term track record and value.

In fact, almost every mainstream football homily is revealed by the authors of this book to be hokum: untested, prejudiced myth spawned by an unreflective, anti-educational and above all closed culture. What other business would allow a single person to take all the key purchasing and personnel decisions unexamined and untested by the rest of the company? They certainly don’t do that at Shell, but then Shell makes money while football and its megalomaniac managers pour it down the drain.

October 17, 2009

Tweet of the day: Mayan prognostication

Filed under: Americas, History, Humour — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 00:09

cetaylor: Everything you need to know about Mayan 2012 nonsense: They couldn’t foresee the end of their own effin’ civilization in the 16th century.

October 12, 2009

Protip: a police station parking lot is not a “private place”

Filed under: Britain, Law — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 12:59

BBC News reports that a couple of Edinburgh pub-goers chose a particularly unsuitable place to go have sex after meeting in the pub:

An amorous couple have been fined for having sex in broad daylight — in a police station car park.

Leanne Richardson, 26, and Ross Welsh, 30, had to be physically stopped mid sex act by officers from Portobello police station in Edinburgh.

They both pleaded guilty to committing a breach of the peace in the car park on 21 April and were fined £200.

QotD: Next Nobel Prize nominations

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Humour, Quotations — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:19

In the light of this week’s ridiculous announcement that Barack H. Obama had been given a Nobel Peace Prize, for no perceivable reason — the same empty honor having previously been bestowed upon such luminaries as Jimmy Carter and Albert Gore — it is my honor and pleasure to present you with our own nominations for the next Nobel Prize.

Briefly, I thought hard myself about Madonna (words I never thought I’d see myself say), although I’m certain that excellent cases might be made — employing the Nobel committee’s apparent guidlines — for Gary Glitter, David Hasselhoff, Peewee Herman, Charles Manson, Paris Hilton, Lou Costello, Hello Kitty, or Jack the Ripper. Basically anybody who can afford a box of Crackerjack to look for the prize inside.

L. Neil Smith, Libertarian Enterprise, 2009-10-12

« Newer Posts — Older Posts »

Powered by WordPress