Excellent new book has been published about how the UK has become a surveillance society.
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A review of the book has been posted on spyblog.org.uk
Month: August 2008
If my mother ever distributed my likeness without written authorisation I would disown her. Sgt. Brad “Iceman” Colbert
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The Genius of Charles Darwin
Richard Dawkins back to what he does best explaining the theory of evolution.
Episode 1 of Channel 4’s three part documentary The Genius of Charles Darwin
Really great stuff.
The Telegraph reports that Scotland’s most senior police office has called for the creation of a DNA database of the entire population.
I can understand the logic that leads people to think that instituting massive surveillance systems or creation of large databases that hold information about every single citizen. If a little of something is good then a lot of that thing must surely be a great thing.
It is believed that because we derive benefits from the current DNA database that increasing the size of that database will derive a commensurate increase in benefits. But that is not the case and any little increase in benefit is I believe far outweighed by the costs both in terms of privacy but also financial.
As a database increases in size the number of errors in that database increase which could lead to mismatches and criminal acts erroneously linked to innocent people.
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Quantum of Solace theme song
Joe Cornish and Adam Buxton of Adam and Joe fame have submitted proposals for the theme song for new James Bond movie Quantum of Solace.
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Olympics 2008
Beijing 2008 has begun and I’m surprised to discover that sprint swimmer Mark Foster is the flag-bearer for Great Britain as I can’t believe that he’s still competing at nearly 40 years of age. Most swimmers have limited longevity for example Ian Thorpe retired in his early 20s and that Foster is still able to compete at an Olympic standard is astonishing.
The BBC’s Monkey animation for the opening of their TV coverage is very cool.
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