UK police goes DDR

Speaking of eerie remnants of the DDR, the UK police seem hellbent on creating an informer society based on the same principles: If you believe your neighbours are behaving in a non-comforming way, report it to the police. Combined with the CCTV insanity going in there we've got pretty much a modern day DDR. A country where surveillance and informants make everyone a suspect:

The ad was part of a campaign for a police anti-terrorist hotline. It described a man who "likes to keep himself to himself", doesn't have a bank card and keeps his curtains closed, before advising that "this may mean nothing, but together it could all add up to you having suspicions".

You'd better not be a loner who doesn't like his neighbours peeking through the windows. If, in addition, you usually rely on cash rather than credit card, you're a potential terrorist.

This is the United Kingdom. This is 2010. For fucks sake.

Taliban loves iPhone

The Taliban apparently loves Apple's iPhone. Perhaps they feel Apple's ideology goes well with their own? You know, a totalitarian view of the world where one strong and unquestionable leader tells you exactly what to think, what to do (and most importantly in Apple's case, what NOT to do) and exactly how to do it in the most limiting and narrow-minded way?

Something tells me the Taliban are not huge fans of the more democratic approaches of open standards, interoperability and compatibility.

The mafia declares war on open source software

This sounds too ridiculous to be true, but nothing surprises me anymore when it comes to the "intellectual property" dinosaurs of the world:

According to the International Intellectual Property Mafia Alliance, an umbrella group for the infamous criminals over at MPAA and RIAA, the use of, hell even encouragement to start using, open source software is equal to software piracy, or even anti-capitalism or possibly terrorism.

A joke you say? Unfortunately not. It's the copyright mafia doing what they do best.

I can't stress this enough: Don't feed the monsters. Stop the cashflow.

The joys of modern aviation

A retard terrorist wannabe gets to board a plane with his undies full of explosives. Meanwhile my bottle of water is getting confiscated by the airport security, because clearly it poses a lethal threat.

Ah, the joys of modern aviation.

A brave new world

It's a brave new world, indeed...

Ben Franklin was way ahead of his time

Found the following quote by Benjamin Franklin on this blog (which, by the way is an excellent blogpost for those of you who read Swedish):

"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety,
deserve neither liberty nor safety."

It's a classic, and never has this been more true than it is today, with obtrusive, oppressive "anti-terrorist" and "anti-piracy" laws stripping us of basic human rights and civil liberties all in the interest of "protecting the public" (as if any of us have asked for it...) and that greedy entertainment industry. "Hey, if you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to worry about", right?

Poor old Ben would twist and turn in his grave if he knew how humanity had degenerated in the 200 years or so after his death.