Andy Ramblings

BBC once had a TV show called 'One Man and His Dog'  This was all about shepards, their dogs and a few sheep, Trials kind of thing. Not the most interesting program, kinda program you might catch if you were off school for being ill.

Now if they did the same show, but did it this way... Watch the video... It would have been a lot more fun, and I can only guess brought in more viewers.

THE FINANCIAL CRISIS EXPLAINED IN SIMPLE TERMS:

· Heidi is the proprietor of a bar in Berlin.

· In order to increase sales, she decides to allow her loyal customers - most of whom are unemployed alcoholics - to drink now but pay later.

· She keeps track of the drinks consumed on a ledger (thereby granting the customers loans).

· Word gets around, and as a result increasing numbers of customers flood Into Heidi's bar.

· Taking advantage of her customers' freedom from immediate payment constraints, Heidi increases her prices for wine and beer, the most-consumed beverages.

Her sales volume increases massively.

· A young and dynamic customer service consultant at the local bank recognizes these customer debts as valuable future assets and increases Heidi's borrowing limit.

· He sees no reason for undue concern since he has the debts of the alcoholics as collateral.

· At the bank's corporate headquarters, expert bankers transform these customer assets into DRINKBONDS, ALKBONDS and PUKEBONDS.

· These securities are then traded on markets worldwide.

· No one really understands what these abbreviations mean and how the securities are guaranteed.

· Nevertheless, as their prices continuously climb, the securities become top-selling items.

· One day, although the prices are still climbing, a risk manager (subsequently, of course, fired due to his negativity) of the bank decides that slowly the time has come to demand payment of the debts incurred by the drinkers at Heidi's bar.

· However they cannot pay back the debts.

· Heidi cannot fulfill her loan obligations and claims bankruptcy. DRINKBOND and ALKBOND drop in price by 95%.

· PUKEBOND performs better, stabilizing in price after dropping by 80%.

· The suppliers of Heidi's bar, having granted her generous payment due dates and having invested in the securities are faced with a new situation.

· Her wine supplier claims bankruptcy, her beer supplier is taken over by a competitor.

· The bank is saved by the government following dramatic round-the-clock consultations by leaders from the governing political parties.

· The funds required for this purpose are obtained by a tax levied on the non-drinkers.


· Finally, an explanation we understand.

Most criminals who get caught are not always the brightest sparks, well they got caught? isn't that a give away ? So here's this bright spark (well a dim one, but there is a spark there) He has a master plan, he needs to get out of the hell hole that a state prison in Georgia, USA Not Georgia in the Caucasu. Anyway, he's got this plan, Escape! It works very well, he gets out, he's a free man! Nobody say him do a runner. Brilliant, pure genius! 

This is where the real plan fails, he was out of cigarettes, he was so desperate to get some, he hatched the escape plan, got out, and raided a local store, no he didn't pay for the ciggies, no he stole them, so far so not bright spark!

The spark has now just gone out! He master plan was to escape the prision, raid a local store for a few cartages of ciggies, then try and creep back in. Yep, he got caught when he was creeping back in with the swag of ciggies. Genius!

You don't think this is true ? well it's all here on the good old BBC, here from the Huffington post.

I'll put this down as Escape Fail!

A short and very simple story .

Yes, I could be in trouble as I often go to demonstration with my camera and what does one do, takes pictures of the real trouble makers, yep, not the folks in the demo, but the cops. They, in my view, get a bit too excited and well, though their weight (law) around abit.

From today, anyone taking a photograph of a police officer could be deemed to have committed a criminal offence.
That is because of a new law - Section 76 of the Counter Terrorism Act - which has come into force.
It permits the arrest of anyone found "eliciting, publishing or communicating information" relating to members of the armed forces, intelligence services and police officers, which is "likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism".
That means anyone taking a picture of one of those people could face a fine or a prison sentence of up to 10 years, if a link to terrorism is proved. Source

So, I could be in the slammer for upto 10yrs just for taking photos. The question I would like to know is this, How do you prove a 'link to terrorism' ?

I can see these PCSO or those known as Plastic Cops (PCSO) who are basically folks who are part time coppers but can't really do coppers job. The worry is, if one of these folks doesn't like you, and you happen to be taking photos of some of the great London Landmarks, s/he could have you in the slammer with trumped up charges and your life is wrecked. This really is something that should never have been allowed to pass into Law!

Oh and here's why I may in trouble... check here

Facebook group here

So, it's snowin' in the UK, from looking at some reports, you would think that it has never ever snowed in the UK.

One thing with the UK, is the multple use of webcams, and the BBC has links to many of them. So for the fun and global noteriaty some folks have taken up the dare!

Enjoy the image.

Oh and the word CUNT is one of the Bleepable words on the BBC.

The DEC are organising a campaign for the victims of the Israeli attacks on Gaza. However, The BBC refuses to broadcast this as it may affect it's 'Impartiality'. WTF? has Olmart called the Director General of the BBC like he did George Bush to prevent a UN resolution?

By the looks of it, the BBC has been spoken to by Israeli supporters and have been brought shame on what is supposed to be a bastion of Truth, fairness and honest reporting. Israel says there is no disaster, that they 'only' killed Hamas supporters. I will leave Tony Benn to take on the rest. Watch the Video below. Shame on the BBC.

Israel, is on the wrong side of the fence this time round. All the empathy of the Haulocast has been used up. It can no longer be used as a tool to allow Israel to attack the people of Gaza. Oh, did I not tell you, Hamas were voted in, in an election that was sponsored by the US. Democracy Bush style!

Looking at the response by BBC's chief operating officer Caroline Thomson, it appears that, as the BBC was one of the only news organisations allowed access into Gaza during the conflict, it was allowed to with caveats, one being, I'm guessing, that it should not report, support, transmit any new reports about the 'disaster'. That it should not support or appear to support Hamas. The problem is, this is a Humanitarian crisis, not a politico propaganda one. Israel has lost the propaganda war.  It was far to obvious to be believable.

Here's the link  'Intelligence insulting' response for the head huncho of the BBC, Mark Thompson. He is imply that we are not smart enough, that the charities are not smart enough to make sure that the monies go to those who need it, Now, Just fuck off Mark. Resign to big lump of shit.

The other day, at around 11:00, in Liverpool street Station London, 

suddenly you heard... waaaayyyyy ,,,, you make me wanna shout, Yep it was T-mobile flash mobing the station with a bunch of dancers and some goodish music. See it all here

Oh what a surprise, Israel announces a ceasefire in time for Obama's Inauguration. Who would have guess that ? Oh, Olmert won't be able to ring Bush up and ask him to delay the inauguration, like he he did for the UN resolution when Condi Rice was told by Bush via Olmert to abstain. 

Israel is to halt its three-week military offensive against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has said. He said Israel had achieved its aims and the unilateral ceasefire would start at 0200 (2400 GMT). But he said troops would remain in Gaza for now.
Source

This issue here is, Hamas don't really agree with the fact that the IDF will be lurking around Gaza, would you like to have the IDF in your back yard? I just can't trust what anyone from the IDF say. There was this website, Israeli Defense Force Spokeperson website. Now, this is a very new website. It hasn't been a website that has been around for the purpose telling people what the IDF does. 

Registrant:
   IDF
   206 Jaffo St
   Jerusalem,  91342
   Israel

   Registered through: Automattic
   Domain Name: IDFSPOKESPERSON.COM
      Created on: 31-Dec-08
      Expires on: 31-Dec-09
      Last Updated on: 31-Dec-08

   Administrative Contact:
      Foreign Press Branch, IDF  idfnadesk@gmail.com
      IDF
      206 Jaffo St
      Jerusalem,  91342
      Israel
      25485807      Fax -- 

   Technical Contact:
      Foreign Press Branch, IDF  idfnadesk@gmail.com
      IDF
      206 Jaffo St
      Jerusalem,  91342
      Israel
      25485807      Fax -- 

   Domain servers in listed order:
      NS1.WORDPRESS.COM
      NS2.WORDPRESS.COM

Looking at the WHOIS information of the website. It's using the Wordpress servers,

IP Address: 72.233.2.58 Domain TLD: com Domain Length: 15 chars Response Code: 200 Location: Plano, TX, United States

Yep, very simple guide on how to convert all your Imperial measures into Metric..

Simple really yep

Enough said. Bush, claimed 18 months ago in Annapolis, that there would be Peace with Gaza before he left office? What a way to leave office? Can't find any words to describe how much a failure George W Bush has been; but this review of his time pretty much covers all points of his failure

OK, in the techy world of beta testing. Microsoft announced that it was letting loose the next Version of Windows, names imaginatively Windows 7.  Better than giving it a name like vista, which quite frankly was daft. Anyway, MS announced that they will be releasing Beta 1 of Windows 7 at 20:00GMT to the world, but they said that they would only allow 2.5million CD keys. So, yours truly was there, waiting for the server gates to open, so that I could get a CD Key. Wow, were Microsoft so unprepared?!

Firstly by saying that they would only allow 2.5 million keys, they were bound to get a rush on their servers. SO, what happens? yep the party is over.

Due to very heavy traffic we’re seeing as a result of interest in the Windows 7 Beta, we are adding some additional infrastructure support to the Microsoft.com properties before we post the public beta. We want to ensure customers have the best possible experience when downloading the beta, and I’ll be posting here again soon once the beta goes live. Stay tuned! We are excited that you are excited!
Source

I know, this may sound silly, but why didn't MS predict this? It might have been a good idea to use Torrents, rather than try and have 2.5 million users trying to download from a server farm, But that's Micorsoft for you. Torrents for them always = bad stuff. But it is the most efficient way to send a high volume of very large files.

The 32Bit version downloads as a 2.5G file, the 64bit version runs at 3.2GB file. Yep, Torrents are a lot quicker.

Now need to hang around to get that CD Key!

Update: Website to download a beta copy of windows 7 is open again.. find it here. You will be able to download both the 64bit and 32 bit versions and their CD keys.

So says a big banner on a lot of new London buses.  This is a campaign the British Humanist Association .

The campaign, which is supported by the British Humanist Association and BHA Vice President Richard Dawkins, and in Scotland by the Humanist Society of Scotland, is a response to a series of evangelical Christian adverts running on buses in June 2008, which featured the URL of a website saying all non-Christians were going to hell. Comedy writer Ariane Sherine suggested the rational, positive slogan to reassure people who may have been scared by the evangelical adverts.

This campaign is, in my view important, as quoted. If religious nutters can go around and tell everyone who doesn't believe in their view of the world you don't have the right to be on this planet. quite frankly these people are part of the problem of why things like world  peace can never be achieved. Though they go around saying that the love their neighbour, wll they do, as long as your not, this that or the other, as long as you agree with them. So, here's one bus with Richard Dawkins.

If you want to see more images, you can click on the link below.

This could happen, maybe not out and about, but just out on holiday and have no access to your favourite graphics application and the only one available is the sad excuse that Microsoft provides, you know, Paint.. Well, worry no more. Some cool guys up in Finland have produced a pretty neat website, that has a fully fledged graphics program.

It's very easy to use, you can if you want, have your account on the webiste. You can of course upload images, which is where the application comes into it's own. Just a sneek preview of what you get to play with....

Not much of a review, but I think it's darn neat, can be useful. if you want to make nice wonky images when your bored at the office ? not that I'm recommending that you

Oh you want the URL ? well, here is its... www.sumopaint.com

Go on, give it a try you know you want to .

OK, a bit late. but just felt that, you know, better late than never. Anyway, how many of you have set yourselves up with resolutions for the year? I made one a few years back, t'is very easy to keep, in fact, I've kept it ever since, that was, to never make them again. It appears that I was correct in this, it has now been shown that making resolutions is bad for you, not only in the fact that, well, you will never keep it, but that it's bad for your health. SO says the BBC.

Deciding to turn over a new leaf in the new year could do more harm than good, a mental health charity has warned. Mind has urged people not to feel they must start 2009 armed with resolutions for self-improvement. The charity said resolutions which focus on issues such as the need to lose weight or job worries create a negative self-image. Source

I can imagine that the resolution to loose weight is most likely doomed to failure. Job worries, why is that a resolution? no idea, maybe I'l get of my arse and look harder. But I don't think that in it's self will not help too much with the current prevailing economic situation.

They use the forever usefully line, It will create a negative self-image. This is, I bet the same folks who also say, that telling a kid that they have failed and exam could damage their self image for the rest of their lives. What a load of Bull.  You learn from mistakes, you learn from failures it's called learning, it's part of life. You never stop learning. I bet the last thing you learn in life is that there isn't any heaven, but you have no way of telling anyone. My view anyway.

So, now that we are now 3 days into 2009, things are, so far, pretty much the same. Only time will tell.