Techie Tories Need Tax Cut
The Tories are today unveiling their technology manifesto. The “Google Government” talk of the last few years has become a promise, though it remains to be seen how it will be implemented. Francis Maude just told the launch that the next generation of Googles and Microsofts “should be British“.
Despite the best intentions of the fastest broadband network in Europe, without a real cut in corporation taxes, particularly on capital gains, research and development, the UK isn’t going to have a rival to Silicon Valley anytime soon…
Why is there a “Join the Navy” ad running on your website?
Better than the IBM one
Purcell PR team trying to bully the press?
http://is.gd/acyoP
Am I the only person who would like to fix Liam Byrne with some rope to the back bumper of my car and drive down the motorway at 10mph,15mph,20mph,30mph,100mph for a few hours?
No.
10 mph max – more pain for longer.
Don’t tow him before the election though .He is the face of new labour for the election campaign. The slimy Kinnock look alike attracts thousands of extra votes for the tories every time he is seen on TV .
Guido, that Mumsnet woman sat next to you on the Daily Politics had legs right up to her neck. How did you manage to keep your eyse off them and on Brillo?
Didn’t you see him checking them out when she picked the mug winner?
I am not even going to go there!!!
Have some taste FFS. Even on my crap old low-definition TV her skin was somewhat reminiscent of that possessed by a guinea fowl that I dressed and cooked last night.
Golden, crispy and flavoured with Calvados?
You don’t look at the mantelpiece when poking the fire.
you do if your wallet’s on it
She was a fucking stupid clueless cow….
Reminded me of the saying…. Mums Belong In The Kitchen, not omn the fucking internet
‘cos they’re paying Guido to put it there?? Same as any advertising really!
Yea, but a real revolutionary would not tolerate being used for the advertising of the state machine.
HAHAHAHAHAHA!
Thank you – I needed that
Gordon and his life support machine of spin goons will see us to five more glorious years!
Mwwaaaaahahaaaaa
Yes dear. Now play in the corner while the grown-ups are talking.
Take a razor blade with you…
Applicants must be able to stare disdainfully at third-world pirates who kidnap British pensioners from right in front of your nose.
Free iPod with every application.
I think if you ask you’ll find that the Navy wasn’t actually to blame…it was the MoD in London and Gordon Brown who presumably dithered and refused the “Go” order. My understanding from the reports published at the time was that about 10 fully armed Royal Marine Commandos were on board the Royal Naval Vessel and had been put to the “stand to” and were within 10 minutes of “go” and were ordered to “stand down” by London as they,London,thought the risk too great to the Chandlers who may have been hurt/killed in the resultant “firefight”
Someone’s iPod could have been damaged and any gunfire could have caused stress to the sailors. Also the Commander didn’t have a note from his mum.
The modern Royal Navy is a fucking laughing stock if the pirates had been a bit more quick witted they could have seized the Royal Fleet Auxiliary boat off the muppets, the cowardly Navy would simply have surrendered just like they did off Iraq.
And think of the cost, we have enough military spending at the moment, although no urgent request has ever been rejected (or made)
Because the Taliban doesn’t have one.
Guido in a suit. Nooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!
Will Straw is a total wanker. First time I have heard the Leftie Twat
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HAI GUISE
PRESLEYDENT O*BARMAN WUN AZ HE HAD THE FULL SUPPORT OF
OBAMA GIRL
HAGGISSFAYSCE GNEADS THE SUPPORT OF
SOUPER DUBBLE DYMOND ESSYQKXSZ GURL IN WELL WREDD ABOVE
FULL SUPPORT
THERE IS NO LOKAL SUPPORT FOUR DA VYYD KHAMMHERRHUN
SKOTCH MYST
HUBBLE BUBBLE TOIYL AND TRYPLE TRUBBLE
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ASTA
The Royal Navy.
Defends the Freedom of us All.
i think the broadband has gone down
If that dodgy mandleson bill goes through in the washup then the broadband will go down for many too.
Scrap the mandybill.
Scrap the copyright act.
Scrap the corporation tax
Let us get on with being brilliant – that’s how you get a techie revolution.
http://hotspotshield.com/
Hello!
Politicians eh?
The same thought process that answers questions that were not asked ensures focus on problems that are not at the root of our problems.
Wish you’d stuck to the Balls issue a little longer. He generates more bile than Alistair Campbell, Tony Blair and the Bruin put together!
don’t worry there will be plenty of rubbish from all sides soon enough.
For a moment there I thought you said..”Wish you’d suck on the Balls…..”
Phew!
Or to quote Malcolm Tucker’s character in In The Loop to an American passer-by: “Oh, suck my sweaty balls you fat F+ck!”
Fawkes on The Daily Politics today:
Guido Fawkes & Will Straw on BBC’s The Daily Politics.
How much cash does “Left Trotter Forward” get from the workers?
Daddy does rather well from the ‘workers’
Pass the ‘fags’.
Skin up Will!!!
Fuck me! That was a bit of a shock!
You need to put a warning on that link. I’d forgotten just how repulsive Dolly’s ugly mug really is!
I particularly like the new ‘death’ tax.
As it’s only applied to the first £500,000 it will only affect the poor working bastards, not the idle on benfits, or anyone in the Labour Government who are all loaded.
Rob the workers to pay the indolent while the rich are untouched, bastards.
Remember the success of the ‘Make Poverty History’ Campaign ? No ???
Well, I now have a new lodestar:
‘Make Prosperity History’
Elect me and I vow I will make this campaign a raging success…..
IR35. Says it all about New Labour really. Chop of the nose to spite the face.
‘Of’ if you are Labour educated. ‘Off’ for everyone else.
We’ve all had an education under NuLiebour.
IR35, perhaps the most pernicious piece of legislation introduced in the past 13 years – how many hoops to jump through, and they reckon it saves almost nothing as it’s easily avoidable with a little restructuring…
I had the experience of a 4 year IR35 investigation, costing me thousands in legal fees to prove my innocence – which I did eventually.
I was treated like a criminal (no exaggeration – HMRC compliance inspectors are not nice people), simply for having the nerve to work as a one man band IT contractor.
The investigation must have cost a fortune and even if they had won it would have barely covered their costs. As it happeend the only person who benefitted was my lawyer.
Actually the other people who benefitted were the useless tossers who administer this shambles. They wouldn’t get employment anywhere else!
It’s all part of McDooms job creation by implementing difficult to interpret and administer regulation.
Jobs for the boys…
They only introduced IR35 because they had goofed up by introducing the 0% lower rate of corporation tax but were too proud to admit they’d made a mistake.
More fundamentally, they hate self-employed people. Large corporations are OK. Free citizens are not.
yes the 0% was a shambles and is another example of Brown’s incompetance as chancellor. Any window cleaner who incorporated in 2001 to pay the 0% or marginal rate will be paying 22% in the next financial year
That’s because the Liebour party prefer lickers to cleaners – more their level, you see.
IR35 ended my illustrious career in IT. In Britain, anyway.
Me too.
Me too
Indeed. Labour has done just about everything it can to kill off the British entrepreneur, whilst at the same time making life as easy and profitable as possible for companies offshoring work or bringing in foreign workers. Can they really not see that without home grown talent we are going to end up as a technological backwater?
My local council got hold of some taxpayer funds to try and help local start-up IT businesses. Before any local business got a look in, in fact before most people even knew about the fund, along comes an Indian IT company, pockets a load of cash to ‘set up’ business in the region, then brings in a bus load of Indian staff. No doubt on rock bottom salaries. Net result – taxpayers cash handed over to large Indian software company, who will of course clear off as soon as the grants run out.
I’m not blaming the Indian company. They are being very savvy. But why do the grant rules allow this abuse to happen?
Say what you like about IT people, they’re nothing if not methodical:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/7420724/Man-killed-himself-after-leaving-reminder-on-whiteboard.html
Thats the telegraph, and not the sunday sport right?
1. Jennifer Aniston`s revenge on Angelina Jolie: a very sexy photo-shoot À?20
2. Chief exorcist says Devil is in Vatican
3. Romanian street sign warns drivers of ‘drunk pedestrians’
5. US school cancels prom to avoid lesbian student bringing a date
And number 1 suggests they don’t know about character sets.
Angelina Jolie’s one of the ones who had the unfortunate accident with the collagen lip injections isn’t she? Looks like Leslie Ash on a bad day.
I’d give her one.
The Mailygraph’s basically become the Sunday Sport, but without the adverts for ’0898′ services.
I suppose we can only dream that Brown could even spell the words on his white (sorry,no specific colour) board.
“Friday 7th May – hide in bunker,refuse to come out.Pretend everything is normal (sic)”.
I must remember to Top myself after next weeks PMQs
PS dont forget to cancel Sky Sports Subscription!!
Somewhere on my website I proposed to PM Thatcher to introduce a massive reindustrialisation programme and set out a programme to finance private British inventions as our High Street Banks have failed this vital section and now thirty years, later Tories see the light, perhaps in another thirty years investment will become available, but our innovative talant will have dried up.
To be fair, we did invent some very clever ways of dressing up bad debts as magic pots of fairy gold.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1062940/I-obeying-orders—Schools-Secretary-Eddie-Balls-dressed-German-officer.html
did someone say dressing up? – my favourite!
You had a website 30 years ago? Wow!
So, I sent my first email in 1987.
You should not have been so defeatist about blogs v the Live TV leaders debate. The Blogs that offer a live discussion while the debates are in progress will fair well.
For fuck’s sake, why is this just released quietly with no big announement??
This should have been a big 09:00 press conference and wall-to-wall media interviews about transparency and access to government data.
Maybe I’m only interested in this because IT is my field, but surely this is really game-changing stuff, public access to government data is surely something that differentiates the parties in the wake of the expenses scandal??
Agree Guido about more encouragement for small businesses and startups, high taxes are driving people and businesses abroad – and I should know :-)
i thought councils had to produce figures online each month by law
They do but they don’t advertise where you can find them to the plebs.
Then again taking two minutes to log onto there site and find the link is akin rocket science to most of their Jeremy Kyle watching residents.
Spelling and grammar is rocket science to some.
“For fuck’s sake, why is this just released quietly with no big announement??”
A lot of us supporters have been asking this question about the Tories other policies. They are running a crap campaign, and a lot of that is down to their campaign chief: Rt Hon George “Oik” Osborne.
The Tories could put out anything they like but without Pravda running it its pointless. pravda the enemy of the people closely followed by the Guardian
You cant force people to come to your party. Im sure CCHQ have tried to interest all the media stooges, but if they are all following the Labour line, which they are the Conservatives would have to do something astonishing to get any real coverage. Yeah CMD has just got to drop his trousers more often in public!!
One of the biggest problems is that most companies and layers of Government buy Micro$oft products and Wintel hardware even though it is over-priced, over-rated and resource-hungry because, as the saying goes, nobody ever got the sack for buying Microsoft (or was it IBM?)
20-30 years ago we were ahead of the field with Acorn computers and their Archimedes and BBC computers. People then knew how to use and program them. The so-called PC-literate youth of today merely know how to use “Word” or Facebook. They have no understanding of the workings of the computer. A bit like someone who drives a car may have no understanding of the internal combustion engine.
Back to Acorn who, unfortunately went under due to everyone going Amiga/Atari for gaming (where they now?) and IBM/Windows for business. I still use my Acorn Risc computer which I have had for over 20 years and have never needed to upgrade. It has 32MB (yes megabytes not gigabytes) and is still more powerful than a modern PC.
We led the world once and we still could.
Interesting to note that the old Acorn chip division (ARM) still produces the world’s most efficient chips and they are the power behind almost all mobile ‘phones.
Rant over.
A modern PC wipes the floor with the pile of crap that Acorn produced. The BBC and its shitty home PCs belong in a museum. You can’t do advanced graphics (OpenGL/DirectX) or multimedia (audio/video) intensive applications with a mere 32MB and a mickey mouse processor like ARM.
Shows what you know. Commercial video editing suites were available on Acorn Risc computers years before PCs and they were used in the broadcasting industry.
32MB is more than enough to do anything (and multitask). You are not comparing like with like.
Acorn computers and chips were properly designed and are extremely efficient. Everything on Intel and Windows is a bodge for a very poor first design.
The original x86 chip was designed as a processor for washing machines. Fact. DOS is a “Dirty Operating System”. Fact.
Everything since then has just been a fudge to keep it going and keep conning the public. “2GB not enough memory to run our super-duper new program? No problem – just go and buy some more memory. And while you’re at it, you’ll need to upgrade the mother board and processor. Oh, and by the way, it won’t run on that operating system so you’ll need to upgrade that too.”
PC programmers are undisciplined and write c**p code. If it takes more than a couple of meg to run then there is something terribly wrong with it.
It’s not the code that requires a lot of RAM it’s the textures/lightmaps/databases etc. I regularly use single textures of more than 32MB on my graphics card. Hi-res real-time graphics is impossible with just 32MB of memory. The bottleneck with any real-time graphics is the hard drive. More memory means less disk access and therefore faster, smoother graphics. I have a database of over 2.5 million stars on an astronomy program i am currently working on. It is 60MB in size (X,Y,Z co-ords and VX,VY,VZ star velocity components and magnitude). OpenGL 2.0 with its shading language, coupled with the latest ATI and NVidia graphics cards, is light years ahead of anything Acorn ever produced.
Elite – 32k. Nothing more to say.
The amiga had professional video editing suites which were use by film companies even though its processor was slower than the Archimedes. The problem was the Archimedes was it was a b1tch to program for.
Many decent PC/MAC etc 3D/CGI packages are based on code from original amiga products. Babylon 5 had its CGI done on an amiga if I remember correctly.
So an OS or hardware solution which is easy to code and get great results from, is always going to trump a faster system that dosn’t meet this simple criteria.
The amiga demo scene set many standards (Parallax scrolling etc) and ways of getting the most out of as little code as possible. There are PC demo’s of 4k in size that do amazing stuff too. Those writers are not in the pockets of hardware companies like some software outfits, forcing us to buy new hardware by writing heavy code.
An iPhone contains several times more processing power than the Space Shuttle – that’s what 30 years of progress looks like…
Yes but it cannot multitask!
China.
You monkeys.
Now they are free…er, they are making so much progress that this fucked up EU back-water will end up having to eat it’s own children, just to survive.
The market is the driving force of innovation.
The BBC and French government computer system were crap. Built by ‘Control Freak Commo/Natzi Statist Scum’
Where are they now ?
“I may have over stated
no point in posting a considered post here, the usual Ya Boo Sucks comments and the manifesto in the article are evidence if evidence were needed that the right are just about as clueless as the left in all things IT.
Micro$oft products and Wintel hardware even though it is over-priced, over-rated
Er that is crApple you are thinking of!
Employer’s NI would be a better thing to cut than corporation tax. It is a perverse tax on jobs. It isn’t going to happen, though, until Governments learn to distinguish money from water.
Absolutely correct, Employers NI is the biggest factor stopping small businesses from taking on more personnel.
Normal cobblers from all political parties, why talk about side show technology issues (never a strong point with politicians in any case) rather than the important job of clearing out the 52% of MP’s that looted scammed and stole cash from the public purse!
A promise to reduce MP’s by a minimum of 35% would be more relevant, and a real vote winner!
Politicians = Quiet about the real issues, Noisy on fluff and in fact anything they hope (fat chance) may divert attention to their looting ways.
Run a country, hohoho! they would drown if they ran a bath!
The problem for the Tories is the same as the problem for most married men.
Being right and winning an argument are two seperate and unrelated things.
There speaks a Titan!!
My my, so much wisdom and so few words!
!
!!
Broken Britain after 13 years of Labour:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/7419678/Man-dies-after-being-tormented-by-gangs-of-youths.html
That estate has been broken since the 1970s – indeed, as the former home of Brady and Hindley, it was broken well before then.
I grew up over the hill from there in the 60s and 70s – the feral youth there used to tie wires across the road to knock motorcyclists off and nick their bikes.
It did improve in the 1980s, under the right to buy scheme, but then 1997 happened…
Ah yes, but the government can spend your money better than you can, you plebs!
Looking rather svelt this morning Guido old boy – have you dropped a few pounds in response the jibes you get on here. Well done anyway. Not keen on your Dad’s suit though.
The only one there wearing a tie. Maybe Guido was going to a wedding afterwards?
He’s practising for Brown’s funeral.
Guido will soon be a Parliamentary Candidate when the Tories collapse
perhaps Leader of HM Opposition ?
For fuck’s sake. Will someone tell those Kunte Kintes in CCHQ that launching a technology manifesto with no mention of nanotechnology makes you a bunch of pricks! The ‘next generation’ of tech giants won’t be like Google or Facebook. They will be nano- and genetic-engineering startups created in the garages of Shenzhen – not Milton Keynes judging by this.
nanotechnology … we’ll see.
Genetic engineering startups. hohohhohoho ho ho. about 15 years too late to be trendy. They were a forerunner to the .com bubble of investment money but no income (on the whole … the were some good products came out of it, but probably not a huge amount of cash).
Don’t get me wrong – I do think the above are vitally important. I’d just not trust a bunch of bandwaggon jumping bullshitters to DO anything good about it and have even less confidence about what they ANNOUNCE.
The Internet was started in the 1960′s – when did Google launch? Genetic engineering, and certainly nano- hasn’t even started. I suppose there might be one American onto something http://www.ted.com/speakers/craig_venter.html
But watch those Chinese garages.
Genetic engineering did start back then. Human growth hormone, insulin, etc. But it came to a juddering halt. You can make the whole of Europe’s supply of HGH in a room the size of a garage. And they did. in liverpool, approx 20 years ago. Theres not been any particularly stunningly interesting new products, no matter how much they try and hype herceptin.
The current chinese model of doing things, is doing things effectively on a large scale. I doubt they have garage-guys doing stuff. And if there was genetic engineering product on a garage scale, you’d need a garage, some knowledge of the subject, and a reasonably accessible amount of money. “I could do that” as yosser hughes once said.
I woudn’t like to down-play the importance of the development of synthetic insulin etc, but it’s nothing compared to Craig Venter’s aim of meeting the world’s oil needs via artificially created life. How come heady, yet soon to be unveiled stuff like this isn’t touched in the manifesto?
A quick skim read of Venter’s stuff doesn’t actually give me much confidence. Doesn’t quite add up. I used to watch Tommorow’s world you know.
I’ve looked into it, and I’m convinced that although he is a great showman, what he predicts will happen. He might not be the one to pull it off, but someone will. Alternatively, the US shadow government already have, but that’s the rambling of a mad-man innit?
My quike take on that sort of thing: energy has to come from somewhere to make fuel.
You’d either need millions of tons of straw or wood chippings, or to cover vast acreages of desert with enormous concrete vats. Even if you find or create the magic organisms, you’d need enormous investment and lots of engineers. And a desert.
Ok, his angle is the energy comes from the Sun. We have orders of magnitude more accessible sunlight than human civilization will ever need. The problem is we can’t yet make it into useful power. He says he will make the organisms that will do this.
My point is we have seen incredible technological developments over the last 200 years, far greater than what Venter is proposing. There was once a day in recent human history when electricity was unknown. So why can’t the Tories’ *technological* manifesto show some serious ambition?
techie stuff:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/7420724/Man-killed-himself-after-leaving-reminder-on-whiteboard.html
The other part they have missed is the software design synthesis systems that will be needed. Something we have traditionally provided to the US from our unsupported start-ups for years. Time after time they have sold out the ideas for pittance to the US.
The next step is real robotics. Not multi-jointed “cranes” but real multi-purpose systems. That is my work. At present I have been only hampered by this government. The current plan is to finish the work to the point I can sell it to any country to fund my immigration AWAY from the UK. I have given up on the idea of creating an industry, I just need a retirement.
I think that example explains the mentality of those behind most of the real technology in this country.
If they think Dyson is high technology, then we are doomed. Dyson has one ability only: Marketing. There is no technology in his products that was not being used in industry for years. It takes a certain sort of person that can market a dirty multi part dust collector instead of those clean bag systems!
We have a company down in Cambridge that led the way with the heart of the mobile industry. Yet it was run by a sales man that should have been selling wheel nuts. They dropped the price, dropped the price, did not reinvest, dropped the price and got a part of the industry. Now they have the heart of an old industry using old technology and are being beaten senseless by the new technologies. They can not break the technology mould as they are run by the accountants and sales, not by technology. Did they have the money to buy in the new ideas when they became stale. NO. They had no money, as they sold their component for less than the on/off switch of the final product. So they will just go on like any UK industry cutting costs and tweaking the product but soon they will be forgotten.
The thing reads like it was written by some trendy no-hoper who has swallowed a book of techno-jargon: skunkworks (do people really still use that term?), “data file” (erm, tautology, if it doesn’t contain data what does it contain?),
The open data stuff (like publishing salaries of public servants and spending) is not “technology” it is open government – wrong manifesto section, lads.
The section on “fixing gov procurement” sounds like some 18 year old spent an hour asking his dad how software is produced. Here’s a clue CCHQ, you are preaching to the converted, we know all of this already! What you say in that section is how we in the commercial sector do it already! First they say that you will prototype (“The design process should first explore simple, low cost solutions and examine existing solutions before contemplating bespoke commissioning.”). Then they say they will use software interfaces (“Open standards will also enable large contracts to be broken into small modular components, so reducing risk and enabling more small businesses to bid for government IT contracts”). Who doesn’t already develop software like that?
Oh for fucks sake, the entire document is not worth wiping my arse with. They’ve not cottoned on that industry needs more training, and in particular short courses (one or two weeks, subsidised but given by private companies). They haven’t cottoned on to the fact that Computer Science courses in this country do not create graduates who can use computers! (Software companies are more likely to employ maths, physical sciences or engineering students than Computer Science students.) Fix those areas of training please!
The problem with IT as taught these days is as follows:
“I’m qualified in computers”
means
I can use Microsoft Word and can send a Tweet.
“I’m good at computer networking”
means
I can use Myspace.
“I can design websites”
means
I can use a piece of drag and drop software which writes all the code for me, don’t need to know what the code actually does, and why does that CSS keep screwing up?
The UK DOES NOT value any kind of science, engineering, or IT. And when I say IT, stop the bs talk of “Web2″ apps, social networking and all the other garbage.
Once thing you learn only after slogging yourself at uni doing the difficult science and engineering degrees is, you’d have been better off “studying” English. You would have had three years of propping up a bar, with dirt cheap course books, and easy to do exams. Then you’ll leave uni and earn more than most who studied a science / engineering.
A sad fact, but only the very best of the best (if you have a first) makes any decent money at engineering / IT. The heartache does not justify all the hassle you spent learning your specialty.
Guido
Of course you are right….
But I do not think the Tories are capable of agressive free market economics…
Sadly…
Many countries have tried to set up “Silicon Valleys”…
But only the Americans can do this sort of thing…
A combination of aggressive capitalism wiith a load of top level technical universities Stanford etc in the region…
The only sector where the UK has/could perform with such success is Finance…
And we all know what totally dysfunctional and incomptent regulation and Zanu arrogance has done to that…
It’s a big mistake to even think re-creating Silicon Valley is desirable. Significant capital isn’t important – education and intention is. See http://ycombinator.com. They specialise in web start-ups, the next government should be thinking along these lines re nanotech.
Of course, awarding small start-ups £5k – £10k and saying to them “that’s it, make it or die”, won’t play well with politicians who are keen to patronise their flunkies with multi-million pound ‘grants’. There’s nothing new there, that story’s as old as the hills.
Why are all these ‘pledges’ so vague?
Why not just say ‘we will turn the UK into Utopia’?
Exactly. Does the no mention of nanotechnology reveal a lock-down on imminent technological developments? Heaven forbid the proles should get their hands on tech that can fuck up the political class beyond comprehension. Where the fuck is my replicator, lol!
Give us something FUCKING DECENT to work with then;
MONEY
EQUIPMENT
FASTER INTERNET
Will be a good start.
Nah. Not when it can be done cheaper in Katoviche, Guangzhou and Delhi.
“Offshoring”. Ring any bells ?
I know all about it mate, spend most of my days now packing all the stuff up to be sent overseas so some poor sod on sixteen grand can do a better and cheaper job than some of us over here.
And ban Orange from having any business in the UK – the worst broadband service ever created,staffed by total morons.
Utter utter crap – “Orange,when the future is like Labou”.
And their sexist to boot. they sponsor female only book prize. What a load of bollocks! As if women need positive discrimination in order to sit down at a keyboard and write. Haven’t these dimwits ever heard of the Bronte’s or Jane Austen or Agatha Christie, the list is endless
Katie Price, is she one?
Who is Katie Price?
The future’s orange.
When I was watching the Apple conference back in January I thought to myself “I wish we had companies like this”. Thanks to Gargoyle Brown and New Labour strangling industry for 13 years the only notable businesses we have are coffee shops, supermarkets and insurance companies.
There is a rather good Rock Shop in Brighton.
UK’s silicone valley is very pert, thank-you.
. . is Silicone tits, – usual trash stuff at which UK excels – all show, no substance.
Bit like Bliar really, – and them as try to emulate him.
By the way, are we due for another ‘River of Fire’ anytime soon? – like what Tone had?
Or was that hopeless clown just posturing?
Wer’e still here you know, we haven’t gone away.
This will be unleashed when monomince Gorgon wins the election. It will be like the London Blitz all over again.
he’ll just burn the whole fuckin lot down this time?
I think we should be told
I’ll have you know my moobs are totally natural. The old ticker may not be – I wasn’t awake at the time – most people aren’t when having heart surgery thank god – but the moobs are all my own work. Cherie can’t get enough of ‘em.
The Conservatives backing the Techies – that’s a good one.
I have gone through every line of the ‘manifesto’ and I could not find any reference to IR35, BN66 or combating the abuse of the work permit system through intra-company transfers (ICT). There is nothing for anyone working in the sector. It looks like the Conservatives will be just as hostile to the techies as nuLieBore have been.
The Conservatives haven’t got a clue. They don’t deserve any support from anyone in the technology sector. A vital part of the future economy has been betrayed by all political parties.
They just don’t get it. Science, engineering and technology are dirty words in 21st century Britain.
Meanwhile our universities keep churning out graduates in Media Studies, Basket Weaving and Morris Dancing
and Public Relations…
and PPE.
do yer mind – it’s meedya!
orlso . .
‘otel Mangement
Leeshar Studies
‘n that
innit
fings where yer don’t av ter count stuff or wurk out fings
veers lodes more
Press enter?
White Hot Heat of Technology – or somesuch – is what I calls it.
But only us oldies remember that.
That, and the IMF bailing us out.
Do you remember those 4 boys with the strange haircuts from Liverpool? I do.
“The white hot heat of the technological revolution”
We know what that produced !!
.. oh yeah – and ICL – or was it IBL? – or I Be Ill? . . never could work it out.
Comrade Benn had it figured though.
ICL, which was flogged off to Fujitsu
Nippon no 1 engrish.
Now go dig your vegetables.
Bit of a pattern there, great British companies being sold abroad…
ICL was always known in my firm as “It Can’t Last” – and it didn’t.
ICL, Ferranti, Marconi – All favoured over Lyons (yes, the tea shop people), who actually had a working business computer more advanced than IBM, but not the right friends in government.
There’s a rather good book called ‘A Computer Named Leo‘ which tells the history of this massive fucking of British entrepreneurship and technological skill.
All presided over by the Postmaster General of the time, whose spawn still infests government in the person of the Enviroloon in Chief, and there seems to be a third generation of the scum waiting for a safe seat.
ICL was not a computer company it was an abortion created by Loony Ben under the auspices of the Old Liebore White Heat of the Technological Revolution Dept for meddling in good businesses and making them fail (All stand for the Red Flag) by expropriating English Electric and International Computers and Tabulators and creating a heavily unionised company that specialised in large metal boxes with less power than an electric torch.
The Moulton folding cycle?
The Gannex Raincoat.
Dyson Ball Barrow.
Michael Aspel’s wanking spanner.
World leader in ‘crisps’
The TSR2, most advanced military aircraft in the world by miles, could have been a major earner for the UK, cancelled by Labour government at the 11th hour.
Now that’s something to be v. proud of.
And where is it today?
In a bloody museum!
Bastards!
Sickening isn’t it. If there is one characteristic that defines this country it is technological innovation. The UK has always punched well above its weight in this area. The achivements of our scientists and engineers have been truly astonishing in recent hitory, but this sector is now completely ignored by government.
Go to any university and you will see very view British students now on engineering courses. They’re all from countries who understand the importance of these subjects and why having a pool of engineers and scientists is essential to the prosperity of their countries.
We seem to have forgotten that lesson.
Here’s a depressing fact: More money was spent on bank bail outs in 2009 than was spent on scientific research in this country in the last 2000 years.
“The UK has always punched well above its weight in this area.”
I always find that a funny turn of phrase. What weight should a nation which built the modern world be punching? A nation with a lengthy history of academic, scientific and manufacturing innovation and excellence.
The best brains of an Empire moved civilisation forward in leaps and bounds*. Hell, it was a job lot of scientists and engineers from Avro Canada (iirc) that were responsible for getting the US to the moon. Some bloody big rockets helped as well but the US Space Program was far from a US only enterprise.
* Driven by economic competition with other nations – international consensus politics and business is stagnating our development and wealth creation.
In typical Labour scorched earth style all the tooling and jigs and most of the airframes were destroyed so that there could be no going back – Labour, vandals then as now.
PING (sadly)
(fading)
p i n g
Ariel 3
Not the Ariel Arrow, that was two stroke m/c.
There was no future in space – rockets, or satellites
Persil
Blue Streak/Black Knight
Those were condoms, weren’t they ?
I guess their bubbles burst.
Blue Streak was handed over to the French and now forms the basis of the Ariane rocket used by the ESA.
Major earner? Not really. How much money did the uk make from harriers?
Have you read why it was cancelled? Info has come out – It was a nuclear bomber (out of date idea), to carry a bomb that was of the wrong size.
At least its engines were useful in the fastest white elephant of them all.
Its the spin offs that are important, and that’s where we really fall down – we don’t exploit them.
Projects such as these are a major driver in all sorts of areas, materials technology, electronics and so on.
Our engineers are brilliant (take the Concorde ‘white elephant’ for example – able to cruise at supersonic speed without reheat, 30 years before this was ‘invented’ by the Americans)
They are let down by lack of government support and by British businesses that, rather than develop the ideas, can’t sell off the intellectual property quick enough.
“…able to cruise at supersonic speed without reheat…”
Hmmm, only partially right Groucho, Concorde required reheat from about .9 mach right up to 1.7m, but I grant you that it did then remain in the cruise without the need for burners.
Labour also let LDV go bust in favour of the W errBankers ,who at the time had a Bomb proof vehicle on the production line for Afgahanistan
and a fully electric version of the Maxus van
but rich people are what labour get off on so its gone !
After WW2 the then Labour government decided to give the USA our R&D data on the jet engine – giving away the UK’s technological advantage, the rest is history.
In the 1960′s the then Labour government decided to give the USA data on high speed wing design for supersonic flight (ie. Concorde) – again giving away our technological advantage, the rest is history.
In the 1960′s the then Labour government gave away data on rocket design to the USA. We struggled on with Blue Streak and nearly cracked it, but was eventually scrapped as British data gave the USA the information it needed to jump our designs. There was even a TV show about that a few months back.
Can you see a pattern emerging yet?
Stick to football…
We are experts there…
England will be beaten by Algeria.
Really ??
Perhaps we will have to do a Crusade then…
We used to be good at things like that…
. . but hey . . we’re all one religion now!
. .and debt – don’t forget debt. We’re very good at debt, – thank to me.
Oh and knocked up teens – that’s because we invest in flats and benefits and .. where’s my list?
I suspect this may be a case of ‘be careful what you wish for’ in the Tory camp.
Once the online identity issues have been resolved (as they appear to be already in the online tax submission) individuals will be able to vote on policy within seconds online. We could have one referendum per day. It begs the question; will we still need to be respresented in parliament? We will certainly wish we’d provided everyone with a better education!
Why would we continue to pay for an elected group of people who pretend they represent us in Westminster? Why would we continue to pay an additional 46 million pounds per day to the EU for a group of unelected bureaucrats who don’t even pretend to represent us?
Many more questions than answers I suspect but you can see where this is heading. Keep the tech ideas coming Mr. Cameron. We are lapping it up over here at UKIP….
There’s not a snowball in Hell’s chance of any ‘instant referendum’ system being permitted here or in any ‘mature democracy’.
If you can’t manage the answer, never ask the question – see the dishonourable Lisbon Treaty welching from both Labour and Cast-Iron Conservatives (thus losing my vote and many others I hope).
Example No 1. Should we restore catital punishment ? Referendum answer, overwhelmingly in favour.
Example No 2. Should be stop all Islamic immigration. Referendum answer, overwhelmingly in favour.
That’s why they’ll never do it, because once they start, those questions would soon be top of the list and they dare not allow us even to think about them, never mind answer them.
Should we string up Brown?
Answers on a postcaed…
O/T : Lie-Bore new 10% death tax
they bleed you to death and then tax you for being dead !
they are now introducing a death tax to pay for the elderly care costs
motorists pay for wife beaters
the dead now pay for the old what next ?
victims paying for criminals board and lodgings whilst they are in prison ?
labour =we will tax you out of existance- it’s the right thing to do !
Perhaps you could pop round and trim my gargantuan growth!!
i’ll trim it after you’ve had a rummage in my undergrowth
I can never find the clematis.
be carefull not to spill your seed !
It’s near the Fish pond
From the OED (Bullingdon Edition)
Wisteria (n)
A frantic looking back to a better past, a terror that the good times will never return.
Anyone care to guess which year the email and search engine taxes will be introduced into the UK.. They will be extremely easy to administer and building on precedents such as the TV license etc. MY MONEY IS THAT WE WILL HAVE THEM BY 2014
I see the ‘seen elsewhere’ that the shortest suicide note in history HAHAHA
signed by non other than
Kevin (toilets) Maguire, Associate Editor, Mirror
Now I know whatever is in that note is total utter bollox and hopefully the shortest suicide note in history. Surprised they did not write to the Mail but are forced into using the only other organ to spiut such dire shite.
I fear irrespective now whatevers happens this country is finished thanks to these wnakers in government
Education, education, education.
Teenagers who complete two weeks’ work experience at a McDonald’s restaurant will be awarded a qualification worth up to a B grade at GCSE.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1257045/McGCSE-Work-McDonalds-weeks-equivalent-B-grade-exam-pass.html#ixzz0hsNMlIwd
Go Cook Somewhere Else
…I am surprised that MacDonalds is prepared to lower its standards.
Or the Hampstead NuLabour version:
Guacamole, Carpaccio, Souffle and Escoveitch
(most of whom are in the Upper Fourth at the Oratory…)
http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid69900095001?bctid=71211948001
Well that’s it then everyone agrees that Brown is a lying deceitful C*nt.
Drag the Lying bastard back before Chillcot Now !
according to Brown he is right everyone else is wrong
will do waht, exactly?
Bastard.
If there’s anyone from CCHQ having a look at this and who’s prepared to grow a pair, that’s one for next week’s PMQs.
The Devil is in the vatican
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/vaticancityandholysee/7416458/Chief-exorcist-says-Devil-is-in-Vatican.html
That’ll be Blair visiting the Pope again.
Next time The Leader’s taking his medication, how’s about one those abused underlings giving him a glass of holy water to wash it down with?
And he`s probably called Benny as well!
But the figures don`t add up! He`s 85 years old, claims to have fought as a partisan in WWII and also claims to have “performed” some 70,000 exorcisms. So, let`s assume he became a priest and exorcist at the age of 25 (is that possible?). That would give him an active working life of 60 years, or, 22,000 working days. 70K divided by 22K = an average of 3.1 exorcisms per day, every day for the last 60 years. Naah!
It almost makes John Holmes`s claim of having poked 16,000 women believable.
A slightly different take on WWII from old Ratzenberger, then?
I hear that the Horst Wessel song is often echoing down the corridoors of the Vatican…
That’s enough politics for one day.
Let’s move on to the gags
I bought a new deodorant stick today. The instructions said remove the wrapper and push up bottom. I can hardly walk now but when I fart it smells fucking lovely
Youtube under threat….We won’t get anywhere with the control freaks in this Country, they are more interested in creating a great firewall of the U.K
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/7368174/YouTube-under-threat-from-Digital-Economy-Bill-changes.html
As long as they leave YouPorn we will be OK.
Pornhub. You know it makes sense.
We shall internet jihad them if they start restricting us.
I’m just waiting for the danger signals to start after the election – loads more “I didn’t supervise my kid’s Facebook and Twitter use and they got done by a nonce” stories.
Cue calls for more internet “supervision” (e.g. censorship/monitoring) right down to your SMS texts.
It pisses me off just how infantilised most of the population’s become. If you breed, they’re your sprogs, they’re your responsibility. Not the gummints, not plods, Yours.
Yet another example of “even out here…” (in darkest Somerset…) following on from the labour-voting bloke I posted about the other day is a typical ZaNu “mum”. She’s just about to hit 35 and suddenly she’s acting like she’s 20 again. Or how she wanted to be when she was 20. When she was busy getting sprogged-up. Now she’s her daughter’s best mate, and will happily vote for Ghordoom because under ZaNu, apparently “we’ll be more safe”.
WTF ? Grow up.
[...] Guido Fawkes calls for tax cuts, maybe. The issue for taxes in the still very largely free-lance IT market though is not the rate, it is the iniquitous IR35. [...]
Will the 12 technical academies be in white or black areas of our cities?
How on Earth did we manage to be the foremost industrial country in the world with just grammar schools and elementary schools and apprenticeships? I have worked in the IT industry for many years and only those with high I.Q.s actually produce more work than they cause. Why put leading edge schools where the brains aren’t?
The Tories are politically correct crap and their plan is bollocks Asking Dyson about high technology? When did hoovers become high technology? If I look inside my PC, will there be a hoover, there? What about under the bonnet of my car? They really are clueless; why not askfor guidance a successful high tech company like ARM holdings which actually is our nearest equivalent to Google in terms of global IT success, for crissake?
incidentally Guido you looked extremely grumpy on the Daily Politics show today as if you couldn’t really be arsed to be there. Bad day or naturally a grumpy looking sod?
Trolling is the future of the internet, cutting peoples access from information and chasing them away from the internet.
The state of IT in this country is a joke, albeit not funny.
IT is run by simpletons.
[i]… the next generation of Googles and Microsofts “should be British“.[i]
Yer avin a larrrrf … The fucking idiots coming out of ‘universities’ can’t even read or do simple arithmetic.
The only things the drugged-up bastards have any skills in are, picking crabs out of their dirty arse-holes, vomiting booze and kebabs in the back of taxis, and spreading pox while fucking like dogs in the street.
Bil Gates never came out of university like Sam Walton of Wal-Mart fame.
Labour are seriously considering introducing a law to register all bicycles , mke them cqrry number plates and rfid chips tax them at 15 euro PA and insist that all cyclists have third party insurance.
Surprise Surprise this had come from The EU
Contact this gentleman
a.bodor@ecf.com
I realy should spellcheck
Labour are seriously considering introducing a law to register all bicycles , make them carry number plates and rfid chips, tax them at 15 euro PA and insist that all cyclists have third party insurance.
Surprise Surprise this has come from The EU
Contact this gentleman
a.bodor@ecf.com
I’ll vote for that – the fuckers are a menace on the roads, and even worse on the pavements. Third party insurance and being able to trace the culprits would be a great improvement.
Mind you, if it’s just a Labour policy, then maybe I won’t ever vote for it.
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If anyone at CCHQ reads this blog, please take a look
at
http://www.ifm.eng.cam.ac.uk/working/briefings/09_1_shanzai.pdf
As an alternative to all the failed top-down initiatives to encourage
science, innovation and manufacturing in this country
A google search for shanzhai or shanzai is also quite interesting
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francis maude only looks at porn online.
microsoft is past it.
google’s struggling to catch up with facebook and losing the game.
he ain’t got a clue.
Tech is not just software we need some hardware as well we have had enough of governmental Scottish mist from Mandy and his crew
Mr Gove wants to nationalise private education. He is also a journalist and former striker, I fail to see why he should be regarded as Conservative. He is and out and out socialist, but he probably doesn’t realise it. Lift the stones and look at Conservative policy, it’s what Kinnock wouldn’t have dared to hope for.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010/mar/07/conservatives-lure-private-schools-state