Panopticon

So our dear government, not 18 months after stopping the last lot of authoritarian fuckwits bringing in the same law, are going to track all our emails, texts, web site visits and, if they could get away with it, trips to the lavatory.  We've just seen a week when a young man was locked up for two months for tweeting a racist remark as apparently it would seem that putting "LOL" after saying a black footballer was dead now "incites hate"^* and now all our words pushed out into the ether will be checked by the ever-loving state, all for our own protection of course. I'm fully expecting our four internet horsemen: terrorism, pedophiles, extremists and whoever they have decided the bete noir is today to be trotted out by Dishface today.

It's utterly pointless of course as I will now demonstrate.  I live in a NUCLEAR family and I'm sure we're all going to have a BLAST at this year's London OLYMPICS. Whoops did I just set off your alarm bells Mr Government Person?  And as for tracking the websites I visit well I'm sure its fascinating that you're keeping up on my reading of the winemaking forum and that scambaiting site I visit but do you really think when I visit throbbingdonkeybondage.com  ^** I am going to do so without using a couple of proxies?  And you can be sure that Mohammed Al Suicidebomber is going to be doing the same as well when he visits his jihadist bomb making and hate preaching sites. For anyone who is a bit tech-savvy this is really simple now; proxies are point and click, you can download the TORBundle and be browsing completely anonymously (but rather slowly) in seconds, if you're getting really paranoid you can downloads Tails to a USB stick and leave no trace of activity on your computer at all.

Of course the government know this and know this is bugger all to do with security. At the least its security theatre from the "something must be done" school but at worse is pure state terrorism; watch what you say little people, watch where you go because this is the new Panopticon and we are watching you. Always.




^* I think we can agree it's tasteless, crass and stupid but if we locked people up for those things there would be nobody who wasn't in jail.

^** I'm thinking of getting that domain but I'll bet its already gone.

Communications failure

Nearly half a million people, described by the UN as "the poorest of the poor", will soon be able to make mobile calls. As part of a UN programme to tackle poverty in rural Africa, 79 villages across 10 African countries will be hooked up to cellular networks.

"Hello? Hello? No I'm on my ox cart on the handsfree. No, on the OXCART. I can't hear you. I CANT HEAR YOU. Oh hang on we're about to go through a tunnel..."

You would have thought that access to clean water, a reliable food source and a government that didn't keep trousering the wealth of their countries would have been a priority but I'm only a dragon so what would I know.

Vodafone - Bastards

You may not know this but most of my vitriolic outpourings on the interweb are tapped into the laptop as I zoom up and down what is laughably called "The Fen Line" by the railway company and then squirted into the ether by a GPRS card which sticks its bright red aerial out of the side of my PC making my lappy look like a dog with a stiffy (memo to self: do not lend laptop to Eric Gill).

As you can guess from the colour of said aerial the card hooks up to Vodafone and, for twenty five quid a month, I get 250Mb of download traffic. All fair enough until last month when I get hit with a 118 quid bill. Quick look at said bill confirmed that they hadn't included my "inclusive" quota of blog postings and internet porn so I ring up to sort it out.

"Oh yes, we've made a mistake, we'll send you out a revised bill."

Week later, no bill and 118 quid missing from the dragon's horde.

Big mistake; There is a pile of eviscerated knights out by the bins¹ which should serve as a warning that pilfering from my big pile of gold, jewels and collateralised debt securities is not a good idea.

Ring Ring: "Hello Vodadog? So how come you've taken this money out, when you said you wouldn't?"

"Oh yes, some bills went out in error. We'll refund you on the next bill."

"Hang on, you're in possession of ninety three quid of mine. Are you going to refund the interest?"

"Er No."

"Give it back now then."

"Can't"

"Can't or won't?"

"Can't. I can't do refunds. Talk to your bank."

"I assure you that is exactly what I shall be doing. Can you take a complaint?"

"Yes."

"Good, now this is how you spell 'shoddy customer service', 'theft', 'fraud' and 'please stand still while I immolate you'"

Cunts. Wonder what O2's reception between London and Cambridge is like.

UPDATE: I'm not alone, apparently.

UPDATE UPDATE: Bank were sweetness and light (they get like that when they look at the balance of the hoard) and promised I'd have my money back within a day.

¹ Bloody council refuse to take them away. No idea why I pay my council tax, shoddy bastards.