The traffic goons of Olde England

What other (clean and PC) phrase can one use to describe the traffic wardens of the UK. When you have stories like this to consider as evidence then the heart and compassion of Britain has truly gone* considering the following is one example of many…

Think that being badly injured is an excuse to park illegally? Think again. When Nadhim Zahawi of South London was thrown from his scooter and left lying in the road with a broken leg, a heartless warden from Lambeth Council slapped a £100 ticket on his bike.

(*I accept that it is an assumption that there ever was any)

• The Times 

Officer, arrest that man! He’s got a camera

“He’s taking a photo of Big Ben, he must be a terrorist”. Yes, the London City Police have started to place suspicion on all those people taking photos in London. Essentially it implies that every tourist that visits the UK’s capital is suspicious and probably up to no good. Not content with suspecting everyone already in the UK of doing something so evil, so wicked that they need to be watched, be monitored and (in time) issued ID cards so that they can be really watched, they are extending the scheme of suspecting everyone to visitors from overseas.

Total and utter lunacy! Dystopia has found a fabulous way of getting people to stay away from their capital city; go to Paris, at least the French want you to take photos of their great city and its only a few hours away by train.

Hasn’t anyone read 1984

• ePhotoZine
• BoingBoing
• Flickr Remixes

Car manufacturers

You’d think that a motor journal would know the nationality of a car manfacturer. Not “totallymotor.co.uk” that has moved Seat across the border to France.

• Seat is of course Spanish

Attack of the giant spider

This is doing the rounds today. Looks like NASA and Florida is being plagued by giant spiders that have a passion for liquid oxygen centered space craft. At least this is what the video evidence suggests. (Click to see the full coverage)

…or Youtube it…

Google News

Much like I am finding that Amazon is coming up with some interesting combinations, Google News today managed to mash together an unfortunate picture and headline combination…

(For those not in the know, the photo is of Lewis Hamilton, and the photo is totally unrelated to the headlines. Isn’t automation a “wonderful” thing)

A bad case of self-rightousness

There are, supposedly, a number of internet sites that are increasingly turning to desparate measures to alienate users who decide to visit their websites. They are banning, outright, the use of FireFox. Why? Simply because of a plugin called Adblock plus. What Adblock does is removes adverts from webpages, essentially making the whole web page experience a damn site better. Now this does not seem to happen if you visit, for example, Google. Google Ads are still there regardless of where you are. However, these self-righteous idiots who decide to employ a wholesale ban on the use if FireFox users seem to miss the point.

Safe as pants

I can only agree with the description…

"Leave the "Brief Safe" in plain view in your laundry basket or washing machine at home, or in your suitcase in a hotel room - even the most hardened burglar or most curious snoop will "skid" to a screeching halt as soon as they see them."

• Shomer Tec

There be Vampires

At least in Count Dracula headed your way you’d see him - maybe. This creature is a blood sucking moth that has been found in Finland. They are normally found in SE Asia, but (according to theories) thanks to global warming we are now finding these creatures in Northern Europe.

I heard about these in Singapore (whether they were in SG or not is another matter), but generally there are lots of lovely blood suckers in SE Asia (not just in the markets ). Anyway, joy for us and global warming.

• Helsingin Sanomat(via Treehugger

Pink Trabant Limo

I have no idea, nor do I care

The chances are that only a few hundred people in the world even knew what this is, of those probably a few dozen will know what to do with it, and then one or two will do something with it. The simple idea that an industry body should be trying to remove these numbers so that no one has them any more is causing, once again, the opposite affect - more and more people are knowing about them. But then again, knowing about these numbers has not changed my life nor do I care. They mean nothing unless you do something with them, it is a that point that you hunt down the writers of the tools and do something about it. In the mean time it is a pretty picture of numbers and letters.

[Wired]