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Frobnitz

Listed below are comments made by Frobnitz between Thursday, 22nd May 2008 and Friday, 21st August 2009.

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Valencia left deflated by Schumi absence 12:19pm on 21 Aug 2009 It doesn't say much about that state of F1 if the return of a driver from 3 years ago could be the best thing to happen in what I regard as one of the most intriguing seasons for a long time. I think that this incident has brought into relief the biggest problem that F1 has to face in that the personalities are now more important than the racing, which is not a formula for long term success.
Silencing the analysts 12:21pm on 24 Oct 2008 Good comment - tell your colleagues down south in London town to heed your words.

On your other point though, it is interesting to notice how Westminster based Scottish polititians fail to remember how different the legal system in scotland is with regard to property, when it suits them - other times they are extremely quick to point out the differences. Odd. Must be the subsidised bars
Citizen and the state 4:58pm on 04 Aug 2008 Hmm, I don't know.

I was unemployed for 4 and a half years, in that time I didn't feel any less empowered than when I was employed - I could (and did) still vote, I could (and did) write to my MP, I could (and did) engage my council about issues and so on...

On the other hand, I had come from a relatively well-placed middle class background, I had a very good education to degree level, and I had always been told what I could expect from society, and what society could expect from me.

I think there is an increasing problem of areas of society becoming more inward looking, instead of asking the council about problems, the go to "friends who can get things fixed" instead of going to the Social Services for loans for a fridge, and being faced with a mountain of paperwork and red-tape, they go to the friendly (sic) shark on the estate who gives money without question, yet the smile will disappear when it's time for payments - but these are people the disadvantaged and disaffected can talk to. Without getting too bogged down in history and sociology, I think that throughout history people have looked to a local, community based person to talk to, and that's what people what now, yet I don't think that decentralisation will ever go down as far as the community.

People see the state as an abstract overlord, ruling from afar - they want friends.
The war on drugs 12:38pm on 30 Jul 2008 Tolerate, decriminalise, legalise...

The Dutch have gone for option 1 for cannabis - cannabis is illegal in the Netherlands, but no action is taken against people using it in the correct places - and the Netherlands has one of the lowest incidents of drug misuse in the EU.

The Swiss and Spanish have gone for option 3 on cannabis - and very few people know this. They are not swamped with drug tourists, so the argument over unilateral legalisation doesn't seem to hold water. Also, both countries have very low levels of drug misuse.

I favour either option one or two. If the government want to turn a profit, and in these days of financial crises, you'd think a product that they could slap 1000% tax on would appeal.

I've limited my comments to cannabis - a drug universally accepted to cause less harm than either alcohol or tobacco - but arguments can be extended to other drugs. Currently we have absolutely no way of controlling misuse of drugs, prohibition has failed, drugs are very, very easily obtained, in spite of spiralling amounts of money being spent on policing it (in spite of the heir to the throne doing his bit).

Admit defeat, try new tactics, and you never know, the problems of drug gangs may well be an historical footnote.
Knives, guns and teens 12:33pm on 04 Jul 2008 Violence and crime are probably decreasing, but our awareness of those that occur is increasing due to the increasing amount of media time to give attention to the stories.

30 years ago, the News was on TV for about three 20 minute bulletins per day - now with 24hour coverage - and add in the desire for news to be as compulsive viewing as possible - there is a lot more coverage of these issues. This leads to the perception - probably incorrectly - that crime is increasing.

Maybe the media should address the way they report such things so as to give the public the correct impression?
No defence for 'stealing' music 2:58pm on 03 Jul 2008 Laugh a minute...

I've just read Bill Thompson's blog, from the same BBC technology page as this blog is linked from.

Everyone should go take a look at it - it has a markedly different, and, in my opinion, a markedly more realist, honest, open, and correct approach to the issue - and doesn't rely on dubious semantic arguments that aren't semantic arguments at all!
No defence for 'stealing' music 12:46pm on 03 Jul 2008 Pundits self-righteously proclaiming the evils of P2P downloads, and in the process bigging themselves up (I deleted them when I realised it was a crime - PAH), is the current flavour of the month.

They all make the same flawed and facile analogies equating civil copyright violations with criminal theft - repeating an invalid argument doesn't make it true, it just makes you look very silly.

In this instance, the music and film industry are fighting a battle they are very unlikely to win. There are many, many other methods of getting the files - Usenet, IRC, old-fashioned FTP sites (increasingly common) based in "safe" countries, and so on. Sooner or later it is probably some bright college student/hacker/coder will code a replacement to BitTorrent that prevents users identifying each other, and it's back to square one for the music.biz

No figures posted have shown that unauthorised downloading has any significant effect on purchases. Radiohead's flawed attempt at giving an album for free, which subsequently topped the paid-for charts highlighted this magnificently.

The music industry is facing an ongoing revolution, and it doesn't know what to do. Bands no longer need recording studios, a home computer does just as well. Free promotion avenues are becoming more available via YouTube, MySpace etc, and distribution is also available through the internet. Internet radio stations are always looking for content - I could go on for some time here.

Simple conclusion - if the industry wants people to stop downloading music, make it available simply, at a reasonable price point.

As a side note to indicate the hipocrisy of this article - media organisations (including the BBC, as far as I am aware) are increasingly sourcing stock photographs by trawling online photographic stores, Google images and so on. No by-line is given to the people whose images are stolen, no royalties are paid, and these actions are putting many photographers out of work.

Morally, how is this different from home-users downloading records of the internet? People don't put the photos online so that commercial organisations can weasel out of royalty payments.
Ireland votes No - what next? 3:26pm on 13 Jun 2008 To be honest, I don't know if this is a good thing or not - because I don't understand the terms of the treaty.

The Yes campaign would not, or could not, simply explain the contents of the treaty - and as such, a No vote is very easy to understand.

The average person in Europe sees the seat of power and influence receding, and becomes aware that their voice in Europe is similarly receding - being one person in an Electorate of 3million is fairly small, being one person in half a billion is vanishingly small - but the influence of business and corporation is strengthened as they only have one government to talk to, not 27.

European expansion and consolidation is frightening to the man in the street - tell us clearly why it shouldn't be, tell us how our voice will be heard, and tell us in a way we can understand and accept.
Caption Competition 4:59pm on 22 May 2008 God throws a spanner in the works with the latest fossil discovery

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