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Open thread – for comments of general Biased BBC interest:
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Add to their list of sins –
BBC damaging music industry: Report
http://newsbox.msn.co.uk/article.aspx?as=adarticle&f=pa_showbiz&t=3982&id=4144281&d=20061201&do=http://newsbox.msn.co.uk&i=http://newsbox.msn.co.uk/mediaexportlive&ks=0&mc=5&ml=ma&lc=en&ae=windows-1252
The Pope spent half an hour in Hagia Sophia, a domed complex that was once a Christian centre before becoming a mosque and eventually, a museum.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6158811.stm
What is a ‘Christian centre’, it was a church!!!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hagia_Sophia
A.A. Gill: ” I’m told there is a government memo telling ministers and high-level spokesmen to continue to anathematise the BBC, ITN and Sky,
but to talk to Al Jazeera.”
(‘Sunday Times’,Culture mag.,26 Nov.)
Is this true?
Gill says this of Al Jazeera: (it) “has more spin than a teams of dervishes in a centrifuge.”
Today Programs little joke!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/adventcalendar/index.shtml
An Advent calendar is a symbol of the holy season of Advent, celebrated in December near Christmas, another holiday season.
The traditional calendar consists of two pieces of cardboard on top of each other. Twenty four doors are cut out in the top layer, with one door being opened every day, from December 1 to December 24 (Christmas Eve). Each compartment can either show a part of the Nativity story and the birth of Jesus, or can simply display a piece of paraphernalia to do with Christmas (e.g. Bells, holly). Advent Calendars can also consist of cloth sheets with small pockets to be filled with candy or other small items. Many calendars have been adapted by merchandisers and manufacturers to include a piece of chocolate or a sweet behind each compartment, aimed at children. These have often been criticised for not relating to the Nativity and simply cashing in on Christmas sales. These are aimed at small children who are counting down to Christmas, because that is when Santa Claus comes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advent_calendar
Ramadam Calendar anyone?
The fourth pillar of Islam which is fasting is also called Ramadan (in Arabic: ?????, Ramadhan) • or Ramzan in several countries • and it is the ninth month of the Islamic (Hijri) calendar, established in the year 638. It is considered the most venerated, blessed and spiritually-beneficial month of the Islamic year. Prayers, fasting, charity, and self-accountability are especially stressed at this time; religious observances associated with Ramadan are kept throughout the month. God prescribes daily fasting for all able, adult Muslims during the whole month of Ramadan, beginning with the sighting of the new moon.
According to the fuqaha • Islamic jurists and legislators • in 2006 the month of Ramadan (1427 AH) began on September 23 (Middle East, East Africa, North Africa and West Africa) and September 24 elsewhere (including Turkey, North America, Southeast Asia, and the rest of the Middle East). In Pakistan, excluding some parts of North-West Frontier Province (NWFP), it was September 25. It lasted through October 22 or October 23.
They wouldn`t dare!
Socialism is Necrotizing
‘Advent calender’ aimed at big children from the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Can you imagine the BBC doing something similar?
http://www.oxforddnb.com/public/calendar/
Following Kramer’s apology on the David Letterman show for his racist abuse on stage, that was interpreted by a BBC journalist as insufficient– an older type apology from him (lifted from a Seinfeld tape)has been posted on Youtube.
For some reason an identical post is also on You Tube entitled:
“Michael Richards (Kramer) apologizes on BBC”
Now that’s funny!
”Advent calender’ aimed at big children from the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Can you imagine the BBC doing something similar?’
Starting with Lenin, moving through Pol Pot, Marx and Engels ending on Allfaithsarevalidmas Day with a long ramble on how white middle class people who didn’t go to Oxbridge are the root of all evil.
I had to read this paragraph several times, and it still doesn’t make any sense.
I suppose the message is that only Israeli actions are bad, only Israel can be accused of breaking a truce. Pretendistinians can do no ill.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6197940.stm
However, the six-day-old truce in Gaza is holding.
The Israeli army says that 14 rockets have been fired into Israel since the truce was declared.
No Israelis were injured by the rockets and the Israeli army has not responded.
14 rockets have been fired into Israel since the truce was declared and it’s still a truce ❓
.
“The stunning words and startling pictures that prove radical Islam thirsts for a second Holocaust.”
“The Islamic Genocide Plan”
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25704
.
Re: Biodegradable | 01.12.06 – 11:26 am | #
On BBC reporting about the Israel/Pally ceasfire — I don’t think things are going to their liking on (D)HYS judging by the most recommended posts. They’ll probably close the thread down soon.
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?sortBy=2&threadID=4799&edition=2&ttl=20061201122616&#paginator
Anyway, where DO they get their news copy written, they’ve probably gone and outsourced it all — to Islamabad or Karachi or Tehran or Damascus it would seem.
Was it somebody here that said the view of the BBC is whatever most comments say, but the view of the public is what the most recommended comments say. It seems to be true 80%+ of the time anyway.
They’ll probably close the thread down soon.
It is effectively closed – no new comments since 27th November.
Nothing like supporting your soul mates in the Middle East, eh Beeboids?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6197992.stm
Biodegradable,
From your link:
The Israeli army says that 14 rockets have been fired into Israel since the truce was declared.
No Israelis were injured by the rockets and the Israeli army has not responded.
I take your point about the truce, but what struck me was the absence of any mention of crudely-made or inaccurate in connection with the rockets. I believe this is the first time the BBC has made such a serious omission.
No doubt the writer and the editor of the article will soon be hauled before their BBC bosses to explain themselves.
pounce,
Vista needs a new graphics card becuase it will run Direct-X 10, which is rather different from DX9c and not back-compatible.
Direct-X 10 cards have Geometry generating functionality built into the cards, which doesn’t exist on exisiting cards. I would be very suprised to see an AGP card with Direct-X 10 capability as AGP is out-dated.
I would not buy Vista until Direct-X 10 is
a) released.
b) has retail cards that support it’s features.
Neither should anyone else.
archduke:
“My battle with liberal Britain”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1892987,00.html
Best demolishing of liberalism I’ve read for a while, thanks. Is there anything (communism, multi-culturalism et al) that history shows the left have been right about?
I’m a long-time faithful lurker. Since I live in the states and rarely watch the BBC News shown on PBS, I’m not sure why I’m such a faithful lurker, but I am.
Anyways, to the reason why I delurked myself. In my local paper today was the article British film company seeks ex-pats. From the asrticle:
“Fever Media, a British film production company, may have its job cut out for it. The company plans to make a documentary about British ex-patriots in Florida who are considering moving back.
The company is looking for families who are interested in participating. It will pay for their flights back to Britain and accommodations for two weeks. During that time they will take the families on fact-finding missions, where they will compare their lifestyles in Florida to what they would be in the United Kingdom.
The team will find out what wage the families would earn doing the same job back home, what kind of housing they could afford and how they would be able to live.
…Fever Media has developed and produced shows like ‘Big Brother,’ ‘Fear Factor’ and Michael Moore’s ‘TV Nation.'”
Well, needless to say, I have my suspicions as to what the slant of this show is going to be. I wonder if any of you are familiar with Fever Media?
Oh, by the way, you can leave comments at the article if you have a thing or two you’ld like to add.
Vista needs a new graphics card becuase it will run Direct-X 10
That’s not true. A DX10 graphics card needs Vista (if you want to see the DX10 effects at least). Vista doesn’t need a DX10 card, it’ll just be faster with one but I doubt most modern DX9 cards would have a problem with it anyway. I know a couple of people running Vista on reasonably old machines and it goes fine.
Biodegradable and DennisTheMenace,
Yes, the debate on the Gaza truce is now closed.
Published: Sunday, 26 November, 2006, 09:04 GMT 09:04 UK
First comment: Sunday, 26 November, 2006, 10:06 GMT 10:06 UK
Last comment: Monday, 27 November, 2006, 12:01 GMT 12:01 UK
Number of comments: 50
Most of the highly-recommended comments favour Israel. So the “HYS” propagandists close the topic down after little more than a day.
How they must regret introducing that ‘Readers Recommended’ function.
ambisinsitral:
Never heard of Fever Media but there was actually an article about this on the BBC news site a couple months ago. It was about ex-pats in Florida who don’t have health insurance and have to fly back to good olde Britain for help. They got lambasted in the comments, things like “we need close these loopholes in the NHS”, “most jobs in the US come with health insurance but you make it seem like nobody has it”, and so on.
I’m sure Fever Media will be able to find some depressed home sick ex-pats to give them what they want though.
The company is looking for families who are interested in participating. It will pay for their flights back to Britain and accommodations for two weeks. During that time they will take the families on fact-finding missions, where they will compare their lifestyles in Florida to what they would be in the United Kingdom.
I suppose they might attract a few families out for a paid flight to the old country, but with no intention of returning. Why would anyone living in the land of the free and the brave want to return to the PC, dhimmi, chilly UK?
Unless they are worried about hurricanes, that is.
Bryan,
Are you having a laugh? It’s obviously impossible to generalise given the vast range of living experiences on offer in the UK and indeed Britain, but having had the pleasure of experiencing both on a similar income/job/urban location I could give you a lot of reasons why I’m much happier in Blighty. If you’ve ever lived in the US you’re welcome to your opinion. If not then don’t believe all you read.
It’s Friday, it’s Pollyanna time!
This is a good time to strike at the monstrous power of the media
http://media.guardian.co.uk/presspublishing/comment/0,,1961355,00.html
Could she be talking about the BBC? Not a chance.
“Meanwhile he (Murdoch) relentlessly attacks the BBC – the only force preventing his domination of broadcasting. The government may be swayed: the BBC risks losing £1.6bn if it only gets a rise of inflation or below, despite bearing the whole cost of turning the country digital. How that will please Murdoch.”
“…the whole cost of turning the country digital”
In what sense is the BBC “bearing the whole cost of turning the country digital”? In the sense that a mugger might bear the cost of giving you back your belongings that he has just mugged you for?
What a load of tripe.
The BBC’s current bid is particularly high because the Government expect the BBC to fund a significant proportion of the costs of analogue switch-off.
Who would benefit from analogue switch-off?
The Government are set to benefit financially from analogue switch-off. It is estimated that the benefit to the UK economy will be between £1.1 and £2.2 billion. The Government will be in direct receipt of substantial proceeds from any sale of the analogue spectrum.
If the BBC doesn’t get the licence-fee uplift and therefore cannot lead analogue switch-off, then the government will have to pick up the costs of analogue switch-off itself.
Either the licence-payer pays or the tax payer has to pay.
Depending on your marginal rate of tax you may prefer it one way or the other.
My guess Ritter is that you personally would be better off if they took the licence-fee route.
So, unless you’ve turned into a redistribution leftie while I was away….quit whingeing.
…sorry…that last should have been personally addressed to Ritter.
Cockney,
Nope, I was serious, though I take your point about generalising. But as far as not believing everything I read goes, do me the courtesy of not jumping to confusions re my ability to think for myself.
I’ve never lived in the US, but I’ve been there numerous times. I happen to think it’s the greatest country on earth with the warmest, most open, accomplished and welcoming people.
Sorry about that, old chap.
I take your point about the truce, but what struck me was the absence of any mention of crudely-made or inaccurate in connection with the rockets. I believe this is the first time the BBC has made such a serious omission.
Bryan | 01.12.06 – 3:17 pm
I noticed they stopped using the ‘rarely cause casualties’ line when referring to actual rocket attacks since one killed a woman waiting at a bus stop and seriously injured a security guard near Amir Peretz’s home in Sderot, and yet another man died in a separate rocket attack. They are still emphasising that the 14 fired since the ‘ceasefire’ was declared have harmed nobody – as if that was their intention.
The latest example of the phrase being used was as recently as 28th November:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6190964.stm
Groups like Islamic Jihad said that their crudely-made missiles were a response to Israeli raids and air strikes.
Curiously if you use the BBC’s search engine using “sderot rockets” you’ll only find old reports of Israeli caualties under “All of the BBC” – search in “BBC News and Sport” and there are no direct results for recent Israeli casualties – only reports of suffering Paleostinians which mention in passing that some of these rockets have actually killed and maimed Israeli civilians.
http://search.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/search/results.pl?q=sderot%20rockets&tab=all&recipe=all&scope=all&edition=i
http://search.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/search/results.pl?tab=ns&q=sderot%20rockets&recipe=all&scope=all&edition=i
JR.
Talking of whingeing redistributionist lefties, this Guardian article provides a handy menu of ‘grand projets’ the BBC could drop, hand out free freeview boxes to every pensioner in town, and still have spare change.
BBC ££££££sss future cash projects:
Manchester move
‘ultra-local’ TV
High Definition TV
FreeSat Satellite system
iPlayer / mobile / internet etc
‘superinflation’ sports rights and talent deals.
We’re not even talking about a potential cut in the tv poll tax or so-called ‘licence fee’ here, we’re talking about it keeping pace with inflation.
The BBC needs to get a grip on it’s ever burgeoning costs. It has no need to compete with commercial television, ie replicating everything that commercial television does. It gets it’s guaranteed tax payers funding to develop content that no-one else will do.
BBC faces £1.6bn spending cut
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/media/story/0,,1960025,00.html
“The BBC’s spending plans, set out in October last year, suggested it could find £3.9bn of this money from “self help” measures, including £2.6bn from internal cost savings.
But this still left a £1.6bn funding gap which it said could be covered with a licence fee settlement of inflation plus 1.8%.
So if it only gets a licence fee deal in line with inflation, the BBC will have to tighten its belt to the tune of £1.6bn.
The BBC director general, Mark Thompson, has already warned that if the corporation gets less money than it requested, the £400m plan to move several programming departments, including BBC Children’s and Radio Five Live, to Salford could be axed.
In the BBC’s spending plans, a further £200m was set aside for “new local investment”, including the proposed expansion into “ultra local” TV services, a new TV region for central England, new radio stations, open centres and buses.
The BBC allocated £700m for digital infrastructure, including kitting out transmission masts for digital TV and radio, high definition TV, FreeSat and internet distribution.
Given that there is no capacity on Freeview for regular, national HDTV services before digital switchover in 2012, this could fall victim to a BBC spending review.
Freesat – the as-yet-unlaunched alternative to paying for Sky Digital – could also be dropped, but it is hard to see how other digital infrastructure expenditure can be cut.
The BBC wants £1.2bn for new digital services, including the iPlayer and other on-demand projects, the creative archive, mobile, broadband and interactive offerings. This is another area where the corporation may have to pull in its wings in the face of opposition from commercial rivals.
Providing “quality content” for the BBC’s existing TV and radio services makes up the biggest single chunk of the 2007-2014 spending plan, with £1.6bn allocated.
This money would fund Mr Thompson’s aim of reducing repeats and low-cost, derivative and “copycat” programmes and increasing higher-quality original drama, comedy, entertainment, children’s and factual output.
Such investment in the BBC’s core services would probably be the easiest for the BBC to justify.
The final category the BBC identified for extra investment was £1.4bn for an “increase in base costs”, or superinflation in broadcasting costs such as sports rights and talent deals.
This is an area where the BBC has come in for considerable criticism – especially for talent deals with the likes of Jonathan Ross – and the £1.4bn figure looks ripe for a bit of pruning.”
I heartily agree.
Cockney
It’s obviously impossible to generalise given the vast range of living experiences on offer in the UK and indeed Britain …
… which are rapidly dimishing, because of the thieving, socialist swine you voted for at the last election. Oh, I suppose it’s fine if you live that great liberal craphole called London, everything goes there. But if you happen to live in a rural area, are patriotic, value your culture, heritage and birthright, own guns, hunt foxy woxy and drive a German gas-guzzler, then you’re untermensch. Well sod that.
Now you being a Spurs fan living in Nelson Mandela House, I acknowledge that you do have a ‘vast range of living experiences’. Tomorrow they will range all the way from ‘beaten’ through ‘stuffed’ to ‘mullered’ at the home of the mighty Gunners.
Allez les Rouges.
The BBC and half a story.
Misbah refuses to leave Pakistan
The schoolgirl Misbah Rana has said that she will not leave Pakistan to go back to the UK as ordered by a court.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/highlands_and_islands/6198066.stm
Anybody else notice how the BBC has presented this story in which to appease public opinion in both the Uk and Scotland that Molly Campbell (aka Misbah Rana) is better off with her Islamic father.
When this child was stolen from her mother by her sister and father the pictures of the child in Pakistan where of a uncovered child which promoted the image that contrary to what the mother and grandmother feared this child would have a better upbringing in Islamic Pakistan;
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/42038000/jpg/_42038968_newmollybody203getty.jpg
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/42103000/jpg/_42103500_misbahbody203getty.jpg
The visual image presented by the BBC was this child didn’t have to subscribe to the oppressive mores of Islam and so disable the fears of people for the child of living under shria law.
Then the BBC decided to rewrite this childs name from ‘Molly Campbell’ to ‘Misba Rana’ so in a way quietly promoting the notion that a Muslim child must live with her Muslim father. (as per Shria law)
Now that the child has been ordered to be returned to her father, the BBC present the child in full Islamic get-up in which to push the image to Muslims that a muslim child is to be stolen from her Muslim father and returned to her non-Islamic mother.
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/42374000/jpg/_42374254_misbah300getty.jpg
(Notice the colour of the shawl. Green the Islamic colour. How better to infuriate the Islamic hoards than to play the religion card)
Lastly remove from the upset child article how the judge who sat on this case berated the father for stealing this child from her mother.
“The father of the schoolgirl who ran away from her mother’s home in the Western Isles to live in Pakistan has been slammed by a judge for failing to act as an “upright, fair and honest man” during what has become an increasingly bitter custody battle. Sajad Ahmed Rana, father of Molly Campbell, came under heavy criticism at the High Court in Lahore as the judge explained his decision to return the 12-year-old to her mother in Stornoway, Lewis, accusing Mr Rana of behaviour “tantamount to fraud”.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2479627,00.html
Err BBC, Molly Campbell is a child, she is the ward of her Mother. No matter how much Molly Campbell stamps her fat feet and cries foul play, she has to do as her mother tells her. Let’s be honest here. The mother by remaining silent on her relationship with her ex-husband has to be commended. Pity I can’t say the same for the fat little brat and her even fatter father for playing the “Oh is me” game.
The BBC and half a story.
Pete_London,
LOL as they say in the classics.
Biodegradable, interesting. I’ve found myself wondering of late exactly how exuberantly unfettered the BBC would be in its propaganda if nobody ever challenged it. Blogs and other input must certainly restrain it to some extent by continually highlighting its sins.
John Reith wrote:
“Who would benefit from analogue switch-off?
The Government are set to benefit financially from analogue switch-off. It is estimated that the benefit to the UK economy will be between £1.1 and £2.2 billion. The Government will be in direct receipt of substantial proceeds from any sale of the analogue spectrum.
If the BBC doesn’t get the licence-fee uplift and therefore cannot lead analogue switch-off, then the government will have to pick up the costs of analogue switch-off itself. ”
The only real benefit of the analogue switch off is a better use of broadcast frequencies. This, in theory, means more channels.
For the license payer there is no other benefit.
If you cannot have cable tv, the only benefit the analog switch brings you is the fact that you can have pay tv without the satellite dish.
Switching to digital forces every single license payer either to buy a new tv or buy a digital receiver. The first generation digital receivers often have software bugs and other defects. In addition, they make watching tv a more complex task, which causes problems for the elderly people.
For the license payer analog switch off mostly brings new costs in the form of license fee increase due to investments to the improvement of the broadcast network plus the new equipment needed for watching digital broadcasts.
So, please, jr don’t try to hype up the benefits of digital broadcasting.
In my country the digital broadcasting has already started and I have already had problems with the bug-ridden digital receivers more than I’d like to have. There are some new channels available but they are mostly crap anyway.
I have a satellite dish already, so the benefits of digital broadcasting are marginal at best.
The BBC and its pro-Hezbollah stance;
Huge Beirut rally demands change
Hundreds of thousands of supporters of Hezbollah and its pro-Syrian allies have held a mass rally in Beirut to protest against Lebanon’s government.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6197992.stm
and how many turned up?
“Police estimated the crowd at 800,000 people, but Hezbollah said it was larger, said Associated Press news agency.”
And now contrast the above with this BBC report of a large congregation of people in Beirut
Thousands attend Beirut funeral
The funeral of murdered anti-Syrian politician Pierre Gemayel has taken place in Lebanon, with tens of thousands of people paying tribute.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6175508.stm
and how many turned up for the funeral of Pierre Gemayel?
“Several hundred thousand people had assembled to pay their last respects to Gemayel, who was gunned down in a brazen attack in Beirut on Tuesday. Police later estimated that fully 800,000 people came to Thursday’s funeral.”
http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,450408,00.html
So Hezbollah ships in thousands of people by bus, coach and donkey in a media savy organised demonstration in which to ‘DEMAND’ more power and the BBC is happy to promote the “Hundreds of thousands protesters” line in which to substantiate that stance. Yet a genuine from the heart ad hoc protest which brought out the same number and the BBC underplays the protest by stating “Tens of thousands”
Yup the BBC really does enjoy blowing the flute of Hassan Nasrallah in which to put a smile on his face.
The BBC and half a story…
Pounce
the BBC present the child in full Islamic get-up
I wonder if the coverage is similar in Scotland, clearly I’m bracketing out BBC Scotland here? After all Nationalism is in the ascendency there! Presumably there must be photos of Molly Campbell in school uniform looking like a normal bonnie Scottish child instead of her in cultural fancy dress?
Did anybody catch BBC Radio 4s The World Tonight, last night
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/news/worldtonight/
22:32 Paul Moss reports from Mirpur in Pakistani-administered Kashmir – from where over half of Britain’s Pakistani community originates.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/6178092.stm
The piece on Mirpur begins at 32:43 minutes
At 41:20 minutes
Labour MP Shahid Malik is interviewed about the difficulty of Pakistani’s integrating in the UK:
Malik: “…Some of them feel as if they are not completely accepted in the UK perhaps they’re called, er regarded as Paki’s by some people, then when they go to Pakistan they get called English, and they kind of lost in the middle and this leads to an identity crisis…..”
Classic!
Look at this image:
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/42373000/gif/_42373846_davidhare.gif
“I knew who the surgeon was going to be, so I had a fair idea what the operation would look like”
Bill Nighy’s best line – on Iraq War – in David Hare’s new play
“Best line”, says who? Can anybody find the article this is referring to?
pounce,
Yet a genuine from the heart ad hoc protest which brought out the same number and the BBC underplays the protest by stating “Tens of thousands”
Yes, the BBC did the same thing with Darfur, claiming that “tens of thousands” had been killed in the conflict when everyone knows it’s actually hundreds of thousands.
Probably it’s partly bias and partly an inability to grasp the concept of numbers – something that is rife within the journalist world. But I’d bet money I don’t have that the BBC would never inflate the number of fatalities in Darfur, just as it would never minimise the fatalities in Iraq, since it’s so intent on cuddling up to Islam.
I suppose the BBC could claim that “tens of thousands” is not untrue, there were just a helluva lot of tens of thousands at the funeral. That would be typical of the half-truths it keeps on pumping out. Worse than outright lies.
How do they ever estimate crowd sizes anyway? Have they filled up the streets with people before and counted how many can fit in?
The only people I’d ever believe are the police. And that’s only the police from developed countries and without a political agenda, so not the Lebanese police.
BBC and the BNP link:
BBC – The Leopard Has Not Changed Its Spots
http://www.radical-and-right.org/index.html
Socialism is Necrotizing:
Nobody gets sent to prison for owning a computer but not buying Microsoft products.
That’s not for lack of trying on thepart of MS, of course. If they had their way all computers would be Microsoft computers. If you’ve seen the EULA for Vista you’ll know what I’m talking about. They take the arbitrary right to lock out your computer at any time they please, for any reason they please.
FTP: whilst some of your points are undoubtedly correct, the one about security through obscurity doesn’t apply to Linux and open source. The stats speak for themselves. By far the most dominant OS used for internet servers is Linux, with various other Unixen surrounding it. Microsoft’s Windows Server product is trailing miserably behind, with a tiny percentage, yet that one product is the single most cracked, hacked and generally broken-in-to server OS out there. If it were obscurity that did it, Windows would be safe and Solaris would be a regular on the exploits list. Ain’t so. The reasons for this are quite simple: Microsoft doesn’t have a proper security model in its OS. For starters there’s the file permissions thing. A typical Linux user can’t edit, or often even read, any files outside his /home directory. All the system executables and system configuration files are kept outside that directory, which means that they aren’t writable by anything that the user might run. Secondly, and this is one of the big booboos MS made right at the start files aren’t executable by default. You have to make them executable. In windows you can make any file in to an executable by tacking .exe, .bat, .pif or any other number of extensions on to the end. Linux doesn’t base such permissions on the filename. So if a user downloads a file it’s extremely unlikely that they’ll accidentally activate it.
Then there’s the final problem. Back in the day, a set of standards for security were created, with various concepts for different things. One was the concept of security rings giving different levels of priviledge to running processes. Ring 0 is the System, where only the kernel and certain other absolutely necessary blobs of code can run. Ring 1 was driver space, Ring 2 was where the OS tools run, and Ring 3 is userspace, where a user’s files would be executed. Ring 3 processes can’t acess Ring 0 ever, or only in a very specific set of circumstances that are incredibly rare. They have to send a message up to Ring 2, which goes to Ring 1, and then on to Ring 0. This concept us used, with variations in the number of rings, in every modern OS. Of course Microsoft punched a great big hole in their rings by moving certain processes from ring 1 in to ring 0, specifically their graphical rendering subsystem and some other related systems. As time has gone on they’ve punched other holes, moving other processes in to rings where they have no business running, with the upshot that a program ostensibly running in userspace has direct kernel access. Even in Vista this particular security hole still exists, even after their attempts to paper over the cracks. And that’s not even getting to all the others…
It’s definite that there will be flaws found in Linux and other OSes as time goes by, but the fact that Linux is open source, easily fixable by anyone with the knowledge, and the fact that discovered flaws are usually fixed in a single day on average, compared to Microsoft’s average of several weeks makes it far less likely that crackers will go after Linux with teh same ferocity as they do windows.
And with that, I shall complete my rant and bid you all goodnight. Whisky calls.
One thing though: I installed a Linux distro called Kororaa on my Toshiba Satellite laptop the other day and ti worked out of the box, setting up the touchpad with all the cool nifty features such as the side-scroller and whatnot, by default. Previously I had re-installed windows on it after a slight accident, to find that it didn’t do this. It set it up as a mouse, nothing more. In my opinion Linux isn’t just ready, it’s more advanced. But that’s my opinion. Others will invariably have different experiences and in a truly competitive market they would be free to try them out without too much worry and hassle. However, Microsoft has managed to create a situation whereby every machine sold by major OEMs such as Dell has a surcharge on it, paid to Microsoft no matter what OS might be installed. It’s essentially a license for the computer. The only difference between the BBC and MS is that MS arrived in that situation from private beginnings. The attitude is the same.
The only comment I’d make about the Lebanese police is that it’s unclear to me what the Muslim/Christian breakdown is. I imagine that would be crucial in determining whether or not they would work with Hezbollah in taking control in Lebanon.
As far as crowd size goes, I suppose you could roughly work out the number of square metres the crowd occupies and then guestimate the number of people per square metre, depending on the crush, multiply one by the other and there you have it.
But, as I indicated above, there are a helluva lot of journalists out there who can’t do simple maths.
vista = os X rip off.
very funny set of videos , that have bill gates talking about Vista and its features – while video is doing what he is talking about on OS X…
part 1
part 2
part 3
I have been running Linux as my main Desktop OS since 2000. I am no techie or nerd. I can do anyting I want to do with my computer.
I don’t know how much Memory is in the UK and I suspect you may have some VAT they doubles the price but here memory is cheap. I run 2 gigs on this computer and 1 on my other desktop machine, 2 gigs in the file server and half a gig on the Wife-Persons old computer.
We only have XP on one system and it hardly ever boots to XP as Linux does everthing we need to do. As my wife is hardly computer literate and uses OS X at work her uptake of Linux was quite swift.
Linux is ready for the Desktop for 99% of the users out there and current installers are mostly painless.
“Who would benefit from analogue switch-off?
John Reith | 01.12.06 – 5:27 pm | ”
digital reception is utter crap where i am. unlike analog , which merely faded in and out with static, with weak digital signals you get an on-again, off-again stacatto effect which makes the channel unwatchable.
added to that , the plethora of “quiz tv” on the digital channels, and i’m half tempted to throw the box in the bin.
banned in britain ->
1 gig ram = £63.39 including vat.
http://www.savastore.com/productinfo/product.aspx?catalog_name=Savastore&product_id=10279994&pid=207&rstrat=3115
archduke writes:
”
added to that , the plethora of “quiz tv” on the digital channels, and i’m half tempted to throw the box in the bin.”
One of the greatest ironies of this whole digital nonsense is that those Freeview boxes consume electricity like nobody’s business – even on standby.
So here we have the same bunch of clowns that are forever exhorting us to be ‘Green’, helping enforce a changeover to one of the least ‘ecologically sound’ domestic appliances since the tumble drier.
And yes.. I get better value out of my tumble drier, too. ‘Freeview’ has turned out to have been a very typical ZaNuLabour con: more money for less service.
thanks in part to the uncritical coverage of Rosie Millard, the BBC’s erstwhile arts correspondent, who was hardly ever off our screens at the height of the “Britart” phenomenon, chirping away about its “relevance”. The word “Zeitgeist” may have cropped up, too. It usually does when people don’t know what they’re talking about.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2006/12/02/do0208.xml&sSheet=/opinion/2006/12/02/ixopinion.html
Biodegradable | 01.12.06 – 6:16 pm | #
and do you really think the source quoted actually said the words “our crudely made missiles”?
seems to me this is blatant biased eitorializing
and why attribute the quote to “groups like islamic jihad”? why not name at least one of the groups supposedly being quoted, and then perhaps add that it is a group like…?
or perhaps this is simply a new version of “some say”, because possibly no-one acutally did?
i recall that when i was a young’un writing essays, i simply was not allowed to bring in any information prefacing it with remarks like “it is believed” or “it has been said” without getting the question “by whom?” and possibly with the question “are you making this up?”
cured me soon enough!
general question:
sometime back, j reith supplied information of bbc articles which prompted at least one person to ask him whether he had access to some sort of internal bbc search engine.
i’m just curious – was that question ever answered? if so, could someone direct me back to that particular thread? so many threads, i can barely keep up!
thanks!
The spud-thick BBC and half a story.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6197768.stm
and the full story
http://eureferendum2.blogspot.com/2006/12/egyptian-paradox.html