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The damning thing about our former nationalised industries isn't that they were inefficient in themselves, and always had the cap out for more "investment". It was their monopoly position which put the brakes on everything else. BT poured huge amounts of money into R&D on the promise of new technology whilst keeping consumer prices way up and limiting consumer choice on the grounds of standardisation and efficiency. What did any of this produce? Oh yes, a proprietary plastic plug that you cut off and replace with an American RJ6, and Prestel (incredibly slow Internet without a keyboard at 3p for a each fiftieth of a page!). Phones were the thing that the US had the good sense to break the monopoly on very early, and their business benefited hugely. The Post office still has the monopoly mindset. They are now bleating about needing to maintain one for "the universal postal service", and once again complaining about unfair competition. Heck it's 2014 not 1954! If you trust Fred's Emporium down the street to deliver your post (and not shove it in his spare bedroom) then why shouldn't you have the choice? If letters have to be repriced to reflect the true cost then there will be gainers an losers, and people will need to think more about the true costs of dead-tree email! Can you imagine being able to send a text message for free to any part of the world if the UK government still had a monopoly on all communications? There'd be regulations about everything you could do, and we'd have hectoring adverts about the responsible use of bandwidth - a nationally important resource. But enormous amounts of effort would be poured into Prestel 2 (or incompatible Minitel Deux if you are French) - which would forever be tantalisingly only three or four years away. It's the analogue of those 1950's sunny-uplands NUM banners. Yes, the Euro will fail big time, as every LD will now be able to tell you. And, they knew this all the time, but simply wanted to be "good Europeans" by not upsetting our partners by exposing them to brutal reality! They were only showing solidarity with the European Ideal, until such time as this dawned on other nations. I was thinking principally of a credit union. Do you have a wider vision?

It's the IF! State run means state financed, and we all know what happens when the state finances anything. It's just far too tempting to print more money and/or promise jam tomorrow. Rationalise this by a "we need more investment", "the industry suffers from underinvestment". What this actually means is lets paper over the structural problems for now because it will inevitably turn out to be someone else's problem.. The left corrupts the meaning of words like investment (and indeed democracy). The simple reason we are in the current mess is that Gordo kidded himself that the he'd ended "boom and bust". He squared this by pretending that we were at the bottom of the economic cycle when economists were telling him we were at the top. But the ultimate rationalisation - which I noted only his blinkered supporters lapped up - was that he hadn't created the problem at all, it was a global problem! Self delusion is part and parcel of a left wing mindset! If state controlled industries could be subject to normal market forces then, as you say, there'd be no problem. But the very fact that no one - even in communist/ex-communist countries - still has any, clearly illustrates that they can't be. "New Labour" certainly doesn't believe in nationalisation, but here the essential duplicity and dishonesty of the left creeps in. When you spout silly ideas you have to go through amazing logical contortions to rationalise them. This is why politicians like Boris and Nigel get so much support, they tell things as they are and don't try to rationalise daft and doctrinaire ideas. The public is not as stupid as most politicians would like to believe, and is increasingly wising up! The co-op long since ceased to be a mutual in the sense that its founders would ever understand. No, I think there is a future for genuine mutuals. They can and do work, and there are many models to learn from. I fully agree - we do need manufacturing. But current employment "protection" legislation has gone far too far, and that is a big drag on what is now possible. It's a very brave politician that will touch that particular subject.

I don't understand why the BNP would be against it, but they are an irrelevance anyway. It would be interesting to ask them though. The Greens are pretty much an irrelevance too - most people can see straight through them. At the end of the day they'd do things which cause real environmental and economic damage rather than abandon their left-wing prejudices. I can also understand why the Stalinist left would be opposed - any expression of individualism is bad, and we must all be subservient to an all-powerful state. But, I can't see that there is any reason why all regular politicians can't give this their full support. That's actually the reason I'm so interested in mutualism - not to mention that my grandfather was a mover in the movement. Like Malcolm I think our community could and should do a lot more here than it has. It's an apolitical way of improving things for the entire community.

Are you talking about the left or right? If it's the right you'd be seriously wrong. People with right wing views do not have a problem with worker's cooperatives. They don't oppose nationalisation on doctrinaire grounds, it's simply that it doesn't work! One of the several reasons it doesn't work is that the bureaucrats that the state puts in charge have no direct interest. They run it as their own fiefdom for their own career advancement. That's human nature I'm afraid! A lot of people in the early cooperative movement were strongly anti Labour Party, but the coop movement was hijacked.

Well... it's not lost on the bulls! They are wising up to being taken for granted too! Normally I'd make a remark like the Spanish idiots deserve a tiny bit of their own bull treatment, but that would be entirely non-PC and possibly Spanishist - so I will desist, and hope they get well soon! Yes, I will keep my "Eu-racist" remarks on ice for the snout-in-troughists in Brussels - or is it Strasbourg this week? But you know it CAN be reformed! Do tell me more about this Nick! Yup, looks like those are people who are gagging for reform!

Brilliant subject! You know the really great people in this world are at pains to admit to copying other people's ideas - only the small-minded (and creepy) attempt to "own" them. Though Isaac Newton might have admitted that he copied his famous phrase too!

Can you expand on this Adam? I'm confused as to possible motives for not supporting them. It seems to me that this is something which no rational person could offer any arguments against.

The biggest shift in politics in living memory. It gives the lie to the rationalisation that UKIP is only a bunch of disaffected Tories. That may have started the ball rolling, but Labour voters are now joining them in droves. Labour should have been piling on votes, but in places have lost control of councils to the Tories. So, Cameron's ploy that voting for UKIP can only lead to a Labour victory is also full of holes. The telling thing is that only 24% of committed Labour voters think that Miliband is competent. They have to notice that Gordon Brown's always-wrong architect of economic failure Ed Balls is still there when he should have been long since retired. The trades unions still control Labour, and they are totally out of touch with Labour's new electorate, which is increasingly new immigrant. Labour's flood-gate immigration policy of packing out its voter base at the expense of traditional Labour supporters has been rumbled. As the black UKIP guy in Croydon says, they've use the racist name-calling card against concerned and decent folks so much that it has ceased to have any meaning. Established immigrants are rumbling Labour too; the very values they came here for are being undermined by all the parties. That significant numbers of upwardly mobile immigrants are also turning to UKIP should be no surprise. The absurdity of Labour's loony left was no more clearer illustrated than the sixty-year-old Jewish lady who'd lost most of her ancestors in the holocaust being shouted down as a "racist" for simply expressing support for her adopted country. The left-leaning liberal elites (the grown-up loony left) which still control our major media have a lot to answer for, and what we are seeing is as much a judgement on them as it is on our out-of-touch politicians. Is anyone now in doubt that we have a social revolution taking place? The wealth generators are taking back control of our country from the chattering classes who dissipate and mismanage that wealth. The LabCon divide and conquer strategy is no longer fit for purpose! This has left many people confused, but the penny will drop there too.

This is just about the first common sense I've heard from the NUM. http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-27519353 Their efforts deserve every possible bit of support from all political parties. But, why oh why couldn't we have arrived at this point several decades ago, and still have some sort of mining here?! It's about putting YOUR money (and your efforts) where your mouth is, and not expecting that the World to owes you a living. This isn't something that our own Mr Lavery has ever impressed me as being any good at!

Actually: Intel Inside, avaricious near-evil American megacorp Outside. Jobs spent a lot of his life knocking Intel products, whilst moving the religious following from one dead end to the next. Then, in typical Apple fashion, left customers high and dry and moved to them. New-speak at its finest! Who do you suppose Google had in mind?

That's how it should work, and work in favour of the consumer. But Apple doesn't see it that way at all, and the US courts are heavily biased in their favour: They want to brainwash people into believing that Samsung and others weren't producing phones and tablets long before they were, and that Apple hasn't borrowed heavily from other people's designs. In fact, that they own the customer, and everything else! If anyone invented the tablet it was Nokia - I had three different Nokia Internet Tablets long before the iPad was ever heard of, and there were plenty of touch-screen phones before the iPhone. Their products have always used plenty of carefully concealed Samsung components. They are masters of spin, and still fool many people. I'm pointing out here that the next two Apple products will undoubtedly be blatant copies of Samsung firsts. That's OK by me; many people will buy them, and good luck to them. But.. when Apple start bleating about unfair competition and trying to stop competitor's products being marketed no one should believe the propaganda for five seconds. Though, that US courts will buy into their anti-competitive behaviour is pretty much a given. Look at how the US courts have treated our own BP over problems created by an American drilling company in the Gulf! A US company would have been treated quite differently. The much vaunted A-for-Apple CPUs at the heart of the iPhone and iPad are in fact British designs from ARM. Much of the graphics silicon is from British company Videologic. These UK companies receive only a few cents royalty and are bound to secrecy, whilst Apple pretends they are its exclusive intellectual property, and stacks up billions in profits offshore. They don't repatriate these excess profits because they refuse to pay their taxes to the very government who aids them in their unfair practices. Only the lawyers and the spin doctors get filthy rich. Now doesn't that sound rather similar to some situations nearer home?

Well... actually... it's the joke for tomorrow: Cameron, Miliband and Clegg are on a long flight in RAF One. Clegg produces a £50 note and says "I'm going to throw out this £50 note and make someone down below very happy." Not wanting to be outdone, Miliband says, "If that was my £50 note, I would split it into 5 x £10 notes and make five people down below very happy." Of course Dave doesn't want these two characters to outdo him, so he boasts "I will take 100 x £50 notes and throw them out to make 100 people even happier still." At this point the UKIP candidate pilot, who has overheard all this bragging and can't stand it anymore, comes out and says, "I'd like to throw all three of you out and make 60 million people absolutely ecstatic." Yes! Use your vote to support the UKIP Pilot! Cameron, Miliband and Clegg are on a long flight in RAF One. Clegg produces a £50 note and says "I'm going to throw out this £50 note and make someone down below very happy." Not wanting to be outdone, Miliband says, "If that was my £50 note, I would split it into 5 x £10 notes and make five people down below very happy." Of course Dave doesn't want these two characters to outdo him, so he boasts "I will take 100 x £50 notes and throw them out to make 100 people even happier still." At this point the UKIP candidate pilot, who has overheard all this bragging and can't stand it anymore, comes out and says, "I'd like to throw all three of you out and make 60 million people absolutely ecstatic."Cameron, Miliband and Clegg are on a long flight in RAF One. Clegg produces a £50 note and says "I'm going to throw out this £50 note and make someone down below very happy." Not wanting to be outdone, Miliband says, "If that was my £50 note, I would split it into 5 x £10 notes and make five people down below very happy." Of course Dave doesn't want these two characters to outdo him, so he boasts "I will take 100 x £50 notes and throw them out to make 100 people even happier still." At this point the UKIP candidate pilot, who has overheard all this bragging and can't stand it anymore, comes out and says, "I'd like to throw all three of you out and make 60 million people absolutely ecstatic."Cameron, Miliband and Clegg are on a long flight in RAF One. Clegg produces a £50 note and says "I'm going to throw out this £50 note and make someone down below very happy." Not wanting to be outdone, Miliband says, "If that was my £50 note, I would split it into 5 x £10 notes and make five people down below very happy." Of course Dave doesn't want these two characters to outdo him, so he boasts "I will take 100 x £50 notes and throw them out to make 100 people even happier still." At this point the UKIP candidate pilot, who has overheard all this bragging and can't stand it anymore, comes out and says, "I'd like to throw all three of you out and make 60 million people absolutely ecstatic." Yes! Use your vote to support the UKIP Pilot!Cameron, Miliband and Clegg are on a long flight in RAF One. Clegg produces a £50 note and says "I'm going to throw out this £50 note and make someone down below very happy." Not wanting to be outdone, Miliband says, "If that was my £50 note, I would split it into 5 x £10 notes and make five people down below very happy." Of course Dave doesn't want these two characters to outdo him, so he boasts "I will take 100 x £50 notes and throw them out to make 100 people even happier still." At this point the UKIP candidate pilot, who has overheard all this bragging and can't stand it anymore, comes out and says, "I'd like to throw all three of you out and make 60 million people absolutely ecstatic."

We've known for a while that the iPhone 6 was going to be a fair bit bigger (once again), but here is a leak of one of the dummies supplied to case manufacturers to ensure they have their sizing absolutely correct. The white phone is, of course, a Sammy Galaxy S5. The Apple copy of the Galaxy Note seems to be due later. That this exists is in no doubt, and is another climb-down for a firm which ridiculed the original Note (and just about everything else they have slowly backtracked on). The Note 4 will be out near year end, so Apple have a lot of catching up to do. What it will be called is intriguing as surely they won't stoop to calling it the iNote? iPadPhone sounds more than awkward! None of this would matter if Apple adopted a live and let live attitude to competitors, and didn't constantly spin that their own originality and innovation was being compromised. The truth is that they are the biggest cloner of other people's ideas on planet Earth!

Myners (and other's) shock tactics seem to be working - there's a surprising unanimous vote for fundamental reform. Pity he can't do the same for parliament! Give the man a peerage - oh!

LOL they'll have to do a lot more than that to sell Norton AntiVirus to me!

Here's cast-iron* proof that you can still go on conning at least half the populace. The people who voted this down were fooled. Notice that the description on this vid clearly says: But.. still more than half the audience ignores the label and sits through an almost ten minute spoof video because they want to believe in something for nothing! Some have even wasted materials and even more time actually trying something that "has a zero percent chance of improving your internet and download speeds". There's a lesson in this, and it's one not lost on the political establishment! ------------------------------- * English words used in their regular sense, and not the Cameronian meaning of please fall for my bogus promise yet again.

Sounds rather like yet another of those nuggets of ancient folklore - that someone just invented. At least Wikipedia would demand attribution.

You know you are old when... your jaw drops watching this: ...or... when it's hard to remember how we used to send our text messages.

Yup, you could have bet money on it! I wonder what a current generation BBC journo would make of CP/M?

LOL I rather hoped that someone would steer the thread away from computer talk! It's in the article about The Game of Thrones guy. He doesn't like spelling correctors, and still uses Wordstar on an old disk operating system (sic) machine, apparently. I'd have imagined someone would have ported it to 'doze, or there are emulators which can run the old Wordstar codebase at many times the speed. http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-27407502 Anyway, has anyone seen my flares? This retro thing could easily catch on.

...you read an explanation like this in a BBC news item: Not MSDOS computers please note. Maybe I will be around long enough to read this: Just kidding! Has anyone seen anything in print which made them seem old?

Yeah, there are lots of live CDs that are just as good or better at diagnostics, but the Puppy distros seem to be USB stick (UFD) centric and super-small. Don't know about you, but the last of my machines to have a CD drive hit the cupboard several years back, and I positively hate getting an external CD/DVD drive out. The disro I'm using is only a few hundred megs, but you wouldn't know that it when it pops up. On the downside the file system is a bit wierd; it loads a pseudo-disk file into RAM, and a quick attempt to install GCC has thrown up all sorts of probs. Searching on the error messages I'm surely not alone here. Just going to install the latest Java SDK and see if it is a viable development platform. But for an average end-user there's more than enough functionality and it's delightfully free of set-up nonsense. Some of this may be due to an obvious attempt to kill all "localization" but our mother tongue! Even the package manager offers to remove any language bloat from its downloads. That sure gets my vote! You're root all the time, except for an option to run the internet stuff as user: spot (spot the dog - gerrit?). This undoubtedly raises eyebrows, but simplifies many things.

I knew about it but I'd never actualy tried it until earlier this week. I'm talking about Puppy Linux. It's a Linux that you don't need to install. One that is very small (but perfectly formed), and which boots very quickly. Actually there are numerous Puppies because there is a tool called Woof that makes it very easy for the computer savvy to generate yet another one. I've now got a USB stick in my "man-bag" that can fire it up on just about any machine, and optionally install it permanently. Why would you want to do this? Well.. when you turn on that old lappy or desktop and it tells you that M$ got sick of waiting for you to buy the same old Windoze code yet again (a pop-up on the XP screen I'm told by a third party), then think Puppy Linux. You can have the old clunker working better than it ever did under Microsoft in no time at all, and you needn't pay a penny to M$ - ever! Also great if a machine refuses to boot as you can likely get at all your files, and test that it's not a hardware problem, both at the same time. This post is being written on an old Asus EeePC that was gathering dust for years. All it turned out to need was a new keyboard; £14 from Amazon. The battery is seems pretty good, so's I removed XP completely and installed Puppy. It's now better than new! Just about all the hardware was immediately recognised - no Windows driver hell!!! I will write full instructions to put Puppy on a USB stick, and make it bootable, if anyone asks here. The information is out there is you search, but there are a bewildering number of ways to do it. It only took me a few minutes and a £3 8GB stick is more than adequate. In fact a 4GB would do almost as well. Puppy saves your work back to the stick by default, so you can resume your session on other hardware. Even with slow USB 2 this is still faster than the usual Windows XP boot sequence, and it tells you what is going on at every stage. Magic! That's the new keyboard tested then! Posting beats the quick brown fox, any day!

Is that a yabba-dabba-doo then? Last year's is surely a page right out of history. Legal Notice: Any similarity to dinosaurs - political or otherwise - is purely coincidental.

...so you'll need to check that whatever you buy has a HDMI socket to connect it to your telly. People tend to either love or hate Chromebooks. So, buy your first one from somewhere that will give you a week or two to take/send it back for credit. According to Forbes the new batch (of about 20 models) is a month or two away from the shops. This could also throw up even better prices on the existing few models. So... it will probably pay to take your time. We'll also see 14nm chips in Windoze machines too. They are quoting eleven hour battery lives (from quite small batteries) for the new crop, which is highly impressive, even if this is a bit exaggerated for real-world use. http://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthof/2014/05/06/google-aims-new-intel-powered-chromebooks-at-mainstream-buyers/