July 30, 2013 · 14:21

A call centre heart attack

The news has been visible and intense. For the last month the news, to some extent internationally is growing stronger and stronger into the crashed and clashed NHS. The National Health Service is as seems to be described, as a system that has buckled. It is an infrastructure that can no longer deal with the population size of the UK, where more people and less money are two direct causes of collapse to a system that cannot sustain itself.

In this regard I will only look at the 111 helpline. I am not an MD or a member of the Medici family; I do however have the knowledge of call centres and technology. So, I will go with my strengths.

If you want to read some additional material (quality information), then take a look at http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/jul/29/nhs-direct-pullout-111-helpline, where most information is available. There was additional information on TV; however as Channel 4 chose not to transmit their service to Sydney, I cannot tell the content of that special.

When we look at another Guardian article we read “Channel 4’s Dispatches programme, NHS Undercover, found the non-emergency 111 system had staff shortages, long waits for callers, and in some cases ambulances were being called out unnecessarily.”

The second quoted from the initial mentioned article is “NHS Direct had worked on the assumption that it would cost on average £13 per call to cover salaries and other expenses for employees, but then found the actual payment it was receiving for its services was closer to £8, leaving it far short.”

The last quote comes from the NHS site itself (at http://www.nhs.uk/NHSEngland/AboutNHSservices/Emergencyandurgentcareservices/Pages/NHS-111.aspx)

You should use the NHS 111 service if you urgently need medical help or advice but it’s not a life-threatening situation.
Call 111 if:
you need medical help fast but it’s not a 999 emergency
you think you need to go to A&E or need another NHS urgent care service
you don’t know who to call or you don’t have a GP to call
you need health information or reassurance about what to do next
For less urgent health needs, contact your GP or local pharmacist in the usual way.

When we look at this in a clinical way, then we should look at this with the cold IT heart we need to have when running a call centre.

1. Staff shortages.
This is plain and simple a management issue. How many calls were expected, how many came, what staff is available and what needs to be added. This in the best of terms is nothing less than a mere exercise in Excel. Even if there was a shortage, then we see there are two sides. On one side we need more people which mean there is a budget part; on the other side we see the expectation of quicker times, again all part of a budget.

2. Long waiting time.
When you go to the hospital, when you are NOT in a life threatening situation, then how long until you receive medical assistance? Would more staff solve this (would that actually solve it)?

There is a Dutch expression which boils down to mopping the floor next to a running tap. Basically it means that the floor will never get dry. That seems to apply to the situation people face with the 111 helpline.

In addition, this quote “its reporters found many patients were left waiting for longer than the 10-minute target for a call-back from a clinician”. Is that truly a bad thing? Let us not forget that this line was not for REAL emergencies. I have been to a hospital after a heart attack, and even though I got excellent care and they saved my life, the doctor was more than 10 minutes away. It happens! I am not the only one in need, and the hospital has excellent nurses. I wonder whether some expectations, as set for the 111 helpline, really are realistic.

3. Time and money.
When looking at the second quote earlier, we see that between £13 and £8, there is a definite discrepancy. When you get the needed and actual target wrong by 40%, management either did not do their homework, or they have not ample dealt with all the elements in play.

One of the clear signs as was mentioned by Sky News is that calls took much longer. When we consider call centre etiquette, not unlike what physicians do, we need to get to the crux of things. We need structured questions and we need to keep control of the conversation. This all leads to reduced times. Letting the patient (or customer) ‘waffle on’ is just a waste of time for all parties. So it boiled down to asking the right open and then closed questions to get the show on the high speed road. Here there is a slight problem. Nurses (Doctors too) rely on what they see and what they smell, these factors are now lost to them. This means that any assessment will take longer then they think, yet call centre protocol approach would limit these losses to some extent. This is a skill that nurses might not have. They can get trained in this and over time they will get good at it, but are they given the time needed? In the end this could also reduce the amount of ambulances getting called out unnecessarily.

The last part in this matter comes from the 111 site itself. “You don’t know who to call or you don’t have a GP to call” & “you need health information or reassurance about what to do next“.

Are those truly the right expressions? In that regard the 17 year old girl dealing with the statements to tell her dad “I had sex” and “you’re going to be a grandfather“. They fit the description, yet, let us be fair whether this is an emergency? (To the girl it really is!)

The generic description gives way that all in need of more than a band aid might call. This even includes mental health issues. Is that what the 111 number is for? If so, was the budget aim correct? These are all raised issues that I could have told them before the service launched. So the question becomes were they raised at all? Perhaps they were which takes us right back to the issue of 40% budget offset. What was missed?

In addition the following quote gives way to another question in the Guardian article “was replaced by a new system in which private providers and NHS Direct bid against each other to win regional contracts“. Really? So the cheapest won? Perhaps the indication is there on how the 40% difference of income is set. How is that a solution? I get the idea behind it. The NHS must find a cheaper solution to get part of their pressure removed and as such the solution of a call-centre makes sense. However, as the human element will remain in the system, we see the need that the problem could be managerial not systematic. In addition, we need to realise that coaching the health care teams is a necessity that usually takes 20% longer than most expect. That is not bad expectations, but when those in their field move to other mediums, they need to reset the scope of their skills. (Like the loss of information by not being face to face with the patient in person). That is just a reality.

This all is visible before additional factors are added. If you think work in a hospital is intense, wait until these people get to the patients who will scream into a phone because they feel that the connection is too un personal. It will happen. Take a person under pressure and a situation where that person cannot vent, then your goose is cooked. This will result in burnouts and spiking stress levels. Were these factors included in the costs of this project? If not, then you will see further escalations of costs and shortages.

The Chief Operations Officer Dame Barbara Hakin has her work cut out for her. I reckon that this is a system that could work. I personally belief that it has a future, yet, a system that is spread over a large area, with 45-50 contractors involved means that there are additional issues to content with. Is it true that this is just about taking over and restoring confidence (as Sky News reported)? I think it needs to be about communicating realistic goals (not the golden cost reduction some politicians claimed it might be) and attending to these needs and fighting towards those goals.

It is also about looking at all of the contractors and aligning views, requirements and systems. There is for example the NHS phone App. (or website), which could help a person in determining where they need to go to, or who to call. It could be that they need to call 111, yet these few seconds of going through that path, if that is an option, might even reduce pressure to the 111 service for up to 10%. That would be a big relief for both patient and service!

 

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July 28, 2013 · 15:56

A Church of protection

Several newscasts on several fronts, they all mention it. The church is going after the loan sharks!

I think this is a good thing. We have all seen the advertisements; the ‘cash train’ is coming. It is so easy and up to $5000 can be done at the whim of a moment. The mention, that when you come up short you can get some money. The ad seems so appealing. It is however the most dangerous debt you will ever have!

The fact that it is so lucrative is shown in the amount of spam they now fester. To illustrate, my small blog gets almost a dozen of spam messages a day, all for quick loan options. They are dangerous! Before you know it, you are in deep, and soon thereafter, you will pay perhaps just a small interest amount, but in the end you would end up paying 200% of that what you borrowed. They claim to go for short term loans only. It seems however to me that they would attract the people who might not be able to make the short term payments, and then the fee’s will come.

This is dangerous!

So, as I saw and read the statements that Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby is trying to compete them out of business, my thoughts are “Well done!” The fact that they are also backing up the RBS with some serious cash gives me the clear picture that SOMEONE is actually doing something about this mess called ‘financial institutions’. Interesting is that politicians fumbled the ball to such a lovely large extent that we now move towards the church, giving them the power others were not ready to have. The Independent posted on July 28th the header “Church-backed bid for RBS arm could herald creation of ethical bank on high street“, that is a good thing in my mind. It is a vision ALL politicians should have had on January 1st 2009 onwards. Yet, it seems that they have constituencies to protect. The question is who were they?
The people who elected them or the businesses and financial institutions that needed him/her to cast a vote the way some wanted? Are my thoughts out of bounds? If so, then consider the choices they made and the regulations that still have not come to pass. The current situation pretty much amounts to medals going to banks for murder and Journalist for invading privacy through crimes. No one wants to be accountable and no one seems to be willing to step up to the plate. Essential changes to the law are not being made. I wrote about some of this in “The law to hunt them down“.  Prime Minister David Cameron seems to be making some small changes to Bing (and a few others) to give warnings when certain search terms are made. I shudder at the utter ineffectiveness of it all.
So now the Church of England will gain the visibility and the support from the people. As the people will regain safety through a church directed RBS, as the people feel safe by borrowing through them and pay a decent share of interest, we will quickly see that other banks will either follow or go under. That is a working strategy. I agree that the next 5 years could change the issues for the good. They will not overnight, but the start is here. Is this the start of a move to moral and decency?

If so, then the press is now on its last legs. Yes, they claim, they will discuss, they will negotiate, yet they will never give in, hence we have little left.
The banks are first! This is what the Guardian exposed yesterday in the article at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jul/27/church-duty-payday-loan-firms.

Will it benefit the Church? Of course it will! However instead of investment firms where they get their 10%+, they will now go towards a business that might make them slightly less, overall, the people and the church will benefit by the bond it creates. Consider that we the consumers will always go back to those who treat us decent. We do not mind the shop, the bank or the individual to make money of us. We needed a service and we paid for that. It is the total unjust amount that some were making that had us all going. So when in 2015 the banks start complaining about how unfair the Church of England has moved into this field then remember today. Today you had no options, they were not willing to consider you ‘the small person’ unless you made them ‘enough’ money.

 

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July 26, 2013 · 12:28

Humanitarian Law…..the End!

We have seen a few spectacles lately that give rise to acts of a questionable nature. The Netherlands had the death of a refused refugee who after some basic checks should have passed the test of being allowed to stay with the greatest of ease. It was a black moment in Dutch affairs. Yet, this is only one case and it dwarves by a landslide when we look at the issues that Australia is facing.

In 2011 the Labour government under Julia Gillard decided that it would be a great idea to ship refugees to Malaysia, to process them there. This idea was stopped by Chief Justice Robert French right and proper. The issue is seen in ‘convention and protocol relating to the status of refugees‘ (at http://www.unhcr.org/3b66c2aa10.html).

Article 33(1). No Contracting State shall expel or return (“refouler”) a refugee in any manner whatsoever to the frontiers of territories where his life or freedom would be threatened on account of his race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion.

It was stated in the Sydney Morning Herald (21st August 2011) “The court’s full bench agreed 6-1 that Immigration Minister Chris Bowen’s declaration that Malaysia was an appropriate place to send asylum seekers was wrong“. I reckon that Mr Bowen might have forgotten about the convention Australia agreed with.

Even though I was never that active in Humanitarian Law or Refugee and Immigration laws, this event opened my eyes and I learned that the refugee issue is one that had been in long standing. Even though we can see that the Labour party bungled this play, they were not the only ones playing the game. If we step back to 2001, we see that it was former Prime Minister John Howard who stated On 28 October 2001, at his 2001 election campaign policy launch “We will decide who comes to this country and the circumstances in which they come.”

So this is an issue that affects the political field on both sides of the isle. I reckon if we had an Australian version of UKIP, it would be a three sided spectacle. Is there an issue? Well, in all fairness I reckon there is one. As these refugees end up, or quickly move to a large city (yes, we have 5 large cities in Australia) then the infrastructure could collapse as these refugees who have limits on work skills and language skills would not be able to get ahead (a realistic view, not a demeaning one). This does not mean that I am against refugees; I am only stating that a solution should be found, preferably an urban/rural one. Let us not forget that Australia has 21,000 Km of beachfront space. There should be an option on the creation of villages where they can become farmers and build a life. Some will consider other options, which is fair enough. I believe that such villages would enable these people to take some time as they get used to life in Australia. If we consider the option of growing food for export, then I see some future in several Wasabi farms. The Japanese will eat all the Wasabi they can get their grips on and as Sashimi gains popularity all over the world, the need for Soy sauce and Wasabi only grows. If we need to look for other ways to grow the Australian economy, then what about a solution using Dutch greenhouses? Their innovation of a solution that allows the growth of all kinds of fruits and vegetables that normally will not survive the harsh Dutch autumn and winter is almost legend. So there are several options. In other directions we see how refugees could start building a future for themselves as they work and get schooled into the Australian way of life (one does not learn Cricket overnight).

Yet these ideas are all nice do face another onslaught of ‘limitations’. This was shown yesterday in the Australian Guardian at http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/25/abbott-png-operation-sovereign-borders. Here we see the mention of Operation Sovereign Border. Yes, this time it is the Liberal side that comes with the ‘new’ ideas. There is the mention of “a military-led response” to combat people smuggling. The policy is published at http://lpaweb-static.s3.amazonaws.com/Policies/OperationSovereignBorders_Policy.pdf

They do waste a little space to illustrate the plans from Labour that failed, yet I am more interested in the idea that works. You see, people smuggling will ALWAYS work. People smuggling is all about paying it forward. The refugee pays upfront, and then they might make it (however usually they never do). The issue is that these events need to be stopped at the start. How can they do that? Advertising on TV in the nations of departure? Most of those will never be seen. Leaflets get thrown out and so forth. So this is about stopping people with NO options left. So however these plans are presented by Tony Abbott, there is a chance that they will fail almost completely. I especially liked the idea to turn back boats if it is safe to do so (slight voice of sarcasm). How long until less secure ships will ‘accidently’ start to sink when the ADF gets too close? Then what? Let us not forget that the refugees have paid up front, so sinking a $5000 junk dinghy whilst $50,000 has been collected is an excellent ROI for smugglers. This is why people smuggle ALWAYS works. The idea to push these responsibilities towards the ADF is equally less desired. Yes, the ADF (Navy) will patrol the shores of Australia to keep us safe, yet they are people and as such they will not (and should not) act hostile against unarmed refugees. Yes, the Navy has a job to do, there is however the danger that comes with the mission when it becomes about blocking boats. It is not unlikely that any escalation will result in the world press slamming Australia for armed intervention against non-combatants, a story, which at that point could turn nasty quite quickly. The navy is likely to end up looking bad no matter what, and the refugees, who are already victims, would just end up in the middle, a place they were already in. How is this any kind of solution?

Mr Abbott quite correctly countered labours next idea on off shore processing using Papua New Guinea. It is indeed an Australian issue to solve. There are also issues with the same charter former PM Gillard overlooked. PNG currently has 7 reservations on issues that are stated to be a clear right to a refugee. It does not matter whether PNG will remove these reservations, as these reservations are presently in effect; PNG remains an unlikely solution until these reservations have been removed. So the issues should be solved within the Australian territory. The added message is that the PNG solution will cost! At http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/54587 we read:
“The government is yet to release the cost of the PNG plan, but using the Immigration Department’s own contracts, estimates of operating processing centres suggest the expansion of Manus Island from 600 detainees to 3000 would incur an initial cost of $600 million.”
Are we not better off spending that money on locations here in Australia? If we want to start new communities, creating a small town might even be cheaper and it will grow local economy, housing and solve part of the refugee issues. I agree that my view might be lightly unrealistically skewed, yet I cannot stop wondering how deep the experts actually investigated possible local solutions.
We should all consider that as we see ‘blown-out’ spending running into the billions.

So what to do?

First there is the claim that the report Operation Sovereign Borders Policy held. “The total cost to Australian taxpayers for managing illegal boat arrivals has increased from $85 million in 2007-08 to $3 billion in 2013-14. Between 2007-08 and 2013-14, the budget for managing illegal boat arrivals has blown-out by $10.3 billion.”

I agree that this is a massive cost. I would like to see a run-down of these costs. Not generic, but specific. I believe that we should find a solution to the issues, I am however not certain that the blockade approach will work to any degree, so why press for such levels of spending? Let’s also realise that unless the navy gets a fleet twice the current size, our seafront is just too large to patrol for boat refugees. It amounts to a solution no less expensive than a very high fence over the total stretch of Texas bordering Mexico. Thoughts that were matched by former chief of the defence force Admiral Chris Barrie who said in the Canberra Times: “I can’t see this making more than an incremental difference at best.”

 

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July 25, 2013 · 19:14

The Telco is on the wall

The Dutch giant KPN is in the market to stay alive. As the message is now that they are selling E-plus to Telefonica. Consider that the sale of this company is sold for 8 billion, which might seem good. It was however bought a decade ago for 20 billion. So that means a loss of 1.2 billion a year.

So this seems not that good an investment, when you look at it. Is this turning into a moment of selling the family silver cutlery, or is it about more? KPN is not the only one in this regard. Nuon (a Dutch energy provider) is also surfing the red waves of tremendous debt. So much so that its mother company Vattenfal is now putting the Dutch energy giant up for sale. Experts have stated that some of these problems are due to the company holding on to old methods for too long. Considering that they require gas, and the price of gas is up, means that their energy is more expansive then most others.

Back to the Telecoms! In Australia, Vodafone has a multitude of problems. Due to less reliable connection issues they had, over 550 thousand customers left Vodafone Australia for other providers. That is a shift of customers that started only 6 months ago. That means that Vodafone is facing a loss of revenue approaching 20 million a month. So we are talking about a decent amount of revenue. It amounts to a loss of almost 8% of their customer base. That is not even close to the end for Vodafone Australia. They currently have a class action running against them, so that is likely to be a none too small bill, and linked to the loss of customers (at http://www.zdnet.com/au/vodafone-australia-reports-customer-losses-of-551k-7000018290/) we also see that there are currently some legal threats coming from Telstra. That can be read at http://www.zdnet.com/au/telstra-ramps-up-4g-rollout-as-3g-scales-down-7000018225/.

The quote that matters is “Riley also took aim at recent claims from Vodafone that it has better spectrum holdings than Telstra in the capital cities, allowing the company to offer faster 4G services.”

Perhaps Telstra needs to consider a few things!

First there is the article that ABC published in 2011 (at: http://www.abc.net.au/technology/articles/2011/09/28/3327530.htm).

Yes, I got to hear all about it in Uni when I was doing my mobile technologies subject (party of my IT degree), so if this is about ‘marketing’ claims, then Telstra might revoice the words stated in the claim. They could read the following: “Riley also took aim at recent claims from Vodafone that it has better spectrum holdings than Telstra in the capital cities, allowing the company to offer faster 4G services” in the air of “Riley is also aiming at the mention that Vodafone is more colourful then Telstra when offering a mobile service labelled as 4G in the capital cities“. Have you seen those BORING 4G posters all over Sydney? Yup, making legal threats against opinions, that makes perfect sense to me…..NOT!

OK, it is 2013 now and there are true 4G providers now, but what is important?

4G is the fourth generation of mobile phone mobile communication technology standards. (Quick Wiki grab). When we consider the 4th generations, we see WiMAX and we see LTE (Long Term Evolution).  The ITU (International Telecommunication Union) stated the requirements on what makes a 4G standard. So when the International Mobile Telecommunications Advanced (IMT-Advanced) specification was set for the 4th generation in 2008, there was an actual next generation target to achieve. You wonder why it took so long? Well, the ITU looks forward on what the next step would be. So they set peak speed requirements for 4G service at 100 megabits per second (Mbit/s) for high mobility communication (such as from trains and cars) and 1 gigabit per second (Gbit/s) for low mobility communication (such as pedestrians and stationary users). This would indeed be a massive step forward in a time when those speeds were not even close to an option. It makes perfect sense. You have seen this before. When we went from VHS to DVD, similar steps forward were made. This step was even larger as people moved from DVD to Blu-Ray.
It is technical evolution baby!

Yet, Telco’s are all about marketing, and Telstra was really clever. From the information that WAS then, they basically offered 3G+ and named it 4G, but that does not make it true 4G. That is how I personally see it! When I think of a power Telco offering 4G, I think of NTT DoCoMo and TATA (India). DoCoMo has close to 60 million customers in Japan, which is well over 45% of the mobile user population. How many Telco’s can actually make the claim that 1 in 2 connects to them in the Mobile community? In India there is the Tata Teleservices group with over 75 million customers, and NTT DoCoMo owns 25% of this.

So when we think Telco, Telstra and Vodafone Australia do not really measure up. Yet the interesting link here is that NTT DoCoMo had Billions invested all over the world, including in KPN in the Netherlands. Is it not interesting to see how these Telco’s seem to cross pollinate? This raises an issue that many people forget. If we consider the Vodafone class action, and if we consider the reasons of bad connections, then what is going on? Our little Island has 20 million people, which is less than a third of the active Japanese mobile phone users. So why are our connections failing (I am only considering the large cities)? It is clearly not about technology, but about infrastructure and implementation (in my humble view). Yes, we should not forget costing here either, as it all costs money, but consider the income in India and Japan, consider the amount of users. NTT ended up with a net income (after expenses and licenses) of roughly 5 billion dollar last year, which is almost 12% of the total revenue. So we see three things.

1. A ROI of 12% is not that bad.
2. Several nations are competing against giants with means we cannot fathom.
3. All of them seem to be writing off ‘losses’ on massive levels.

Is this about losses, about write offs or about something that is not here?

I reckon it is mostly about the not being there bit. When we look at incomes then we see that the Vodafone Europe CEO (Vittorio Colao) made 2.2 million Euro, whilst David Thodey, CEO of Telstra makes a mere 7 million dollars. So, yes they make decent coin, yet nothing more a mere mid-level banker is likely to get as an annual bonus, so the money is not draining away in that direction either.

No, I personally see the issues as a side effect of devaluation of technology. This is a side that has been ignored by most members of the public from 1997 onwards. You see, technology providers saw the benefit of the armistice race and went the same way. Every year we see a PC, laptop or tablet that is better, faster and newer, but how much faster? The impact with computers is not that big as it hits the individual. They deal with slightly larger programs, and that is pretty much it. Your text file is not that much larger. If you consider a 3000 word document, then that file remained relatively the same over the last 10 years. For electronic devices like TV’s it is also the same. We get the same signal and beyond that it only looks nicer, all this did not impact the provider.

With telecom it’s a different cattle of fish (pun intended). When we upgrade our phones we also attach to that an almost exponential growth of data needs, as such as Apple sold around 25 million mobile phones per quarter, we see that the need for an almost exponential growth of infrastructure is needed (a lesson Vodafone is learning the hard way). Even as the large Telco’s are installing the need for hardware on a continuing base, and as we see the replacement of equipment, we see that the life time of current facilitating hardware is likely less than 40% of its actual life cycle. It is either that of build more places with facilitating equipment, with a connected drain of ‘revenue left’ as well. The last level is one that is not that apparent at present, but will hit Telco company values on a massive scale soon enough. This side can be read at http://www.globallegalpost.com/blogs/global-view/registered-patents-devalued-by-outdated-ip-laws-6786253. Considering the issues at play, then the assets of Telco companies are about (read 2-4 years) to hit a certain basement value. I reckon that there will be consequences down the road. In my view it will be that the truly big boys will continue, the smaller packs will no longer be able to compete in a field where they will get charged for services needed and then some.

What is the solution? Not sure, it is in the end a business answer. Yet, voicing a 1.2 billion loss a year cannot be that good for the ego, and as the amount of players increase, these levels of ‘bad’ news will continue. It will not hit your taxes, but consider that services falter, where will you run to when your mobile phone leaves you with the message ‘searching…’ from your provider?

 

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July 21, 2013 · 23:12

The law to hunt them down

Both Sky News and the Guardian come this Sunday with stories on how Prime Minister David Cameron is calling on web companies to block certain sexual child abuse searches.

That sounds nice in theory and I am all for hunting down these groups. Yet, that request is at least 10 years late and in all honesty, I reckon it is a massive waste of time and resources. How long until these perverts come up with ‘other’ search terms? We would even be allowing for some to get away scot free as they searched for “yummier candy” or whatever other code they would be using. The Judge would have to let these people go as they were truly looking for a place to dunk their bagels in jelly?

As stated, I am all for hunting these people down. Yet perhaps other means should be (should have been is a lot better) employed. Google had been so innovative in avoiding corporate taxation, are they not aiding the police (not just in the UK) hunting down these people? They have the hardware, the software, the expertise and more options on their shelves. In addition the PM should actually stop that gap which allows Google to only pay 0.0025% in taxation (but that is a story for another time).

No matter how quick we stop this gap of non-taxation. Google has in my view and strong belief a moral duty to train the police and other units in search and track knowledge (perhaps they are). They have no issues in teaching/aiding bosses to track their employees. Yet, hunting down criminals is not in their scope? (At http://business.time.com/2012/06/27/google-maps-now-helping-your-boss-track-your-every-move/). It was stated in the article that “the cost to workplace privacy would be serious“. Is that true? If you get paid by the hour, should you not be working? In the office, one is supposed to sit at their desk. There are always reasons why we need to go somewhere, yet we should be at our desks for a certain time. So it is easy and perfectly OK to track employees and we cannot track criminals? I get the issue that there might be some level of privacy in play for an employee (for example, his lunch break is his and his alone), but finding those hurting children are allowed protection so that they can hurt children? Such methods could aid the authorities in actually getting some protection to the children that needed it for a long time.

If we relate the options to track these child abusers to the boss tracking actions, we definitely have the technology to find these people, so what Is stopping us?

In addition, the legal side is also in play. If we consider the “Protection of Children Act 1978”

If we consider: “Section 1 (c) to have in his possession such indecent photographs [or pseudo-photographs], with a view to their being distributed or transferred digitally or shown by himself or others; or”

By adding three words we now let the issue no longer fall into the issue where the responsibility was, we now give pressure on the ISP to report this immediately. If not, they become part of the chain. Now, if we look at the defamation act, then we know there are issues, especially when we consider operators of content.

In Australia the Defamation Act 2005 (NSW) states:

32 Defence of innocent dissemination
(1) It is a defence to the publication of defamatory matter if the defendant proves that:
(a) the defendant published the matter merely in the capacity, or as an employee or agent, of a subordinate distributor, or a facilitator [or ISP] and
(b) the defendant neither knew, nor ought reasonably to have known, that the matter was defamatory, and
(c) the defendant’s lack of knowledge was not due to any negligence on the part of the defendant.

Here I added 5 words (those in bold), which could give additional levels of options to the claimants. It is nice to give certain services out for free, yet in that case, the facilitators will need to adjust their ‘terms of service’ to protect themselves and give aid in finding those using their services to further certain criminal goals. The reason to mention this is because when we look at the UK “Defamation Act 2013“, as narrated by Forbes we see the following (please read Forbes article as linked below).

The next part was in progress, when I detected this Forbes article (who had pretty much done what I was trying, at http://www.forbes.com/sites/ericgoldman/2013/05/09/uks-new-defamation-law-may-accelerate-the-death-of-anonymous-user-generated-content-internationally/)

It seems that the known issues of the ISP had been avoided here as well (an issue that had been in play for at least 8 years). There is a valid defence that  an ISP cannot monitor the massive flow of content, which is indeed a valid defence in my book, yet the cooperation required by the police to do their jobs is too often too slow or at times likely even completely lacking.

When we add ISP in the Australian case, then their lack of negligence would overturn their defence in court. So when we consider 32.1.d, then they will need to get active, creative and corrective really fast.

This translates to the UK defamation act by changing “5 Operators and/or facilitators of websites and/or virtual locations“; this would change the game immediately. Of course, prosecuting an ISP is not productive in the end, yet this part will give them the ‘negligence‘ label and as such, serious headway might be made in hunting down these child abusing criminals as the ISP is now seriously motivated to aid the police and find these criminals. The change would go further than those seeking materials. It would also give way to look at providers and mapping out these people far beyond the UK national borders. So as the map, with names, locations and acts will visibly grow, we might actually get the information the police needs.

I personally believe that law changes will get us a lot further then just blocking a search term.

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July 19, 2013 · 15:44

The Setting of strategies

The danger of any person trying to look through the mud that we know as political strategies related to ‘what is real’ and ‘what is unlikely’. There is no ‘non-reality’!
We know that certain steps have been staged (as a good politician would). This staging is not unlike the game ‘GO’ where we place the pebbles in such a way that entices to other to place their pebbles, completing our strategies.

This I discussed in last week’s blog involving the fading pension plans. Yes, and as suspected, whilst Dutch politicians are in vacation mode, the Dutch pension funds are now filling the Dutch with dread of a possible 10%-20% loss of retirement. That is some fear in their world of quick rising prices. (www.nos.nl)

Today is not about that, even though there are possible links! Today it is about renewed issues on telephone taps and how the powerful Murdoch gets another painted target. Yet are his words so wrong? We had the phone tap probe, we have seen the Leveson report, and instead of actually acting on the Leveson report as much as possible. Parties involved seem to be having another go at Rupert ‘the Piñata’ Murdoch. A lot or the press is getting a little sour as words are hashed and rehashed into statements of whatever they could be called.

You see, is this an ACTUAL criminal investigation, you know the one with barristers, judges and both parties taking notice of the evidence act?

Or is this another inquiry that has gone on for two years, giving more visibility to Chairman Keith Vaz and a few other political head honcho’s? Do not think that I am on Mr Murdoch’s side. I will instantly stand by the views of Hugh Grant and Lord Justice Leveson in the attack on the events that surrounded phone hacking, and not just the Sun/News of the world.

There is however the valid thought that cooperation is required and should be given. However the following quote “The committee has heard from the Metropolitan Police’s assistant commissioner Cressida Dick that since May ‘voluntary co-operation (with News UK) has been significantly reduced’ and that police have had to obtain court orders regards ‘requests for new material’“.

Is that the issue? This has gone on for 2 years now. Is thus the statement by Mr Murdoch “totally incompetent” when it comes to describing the acts by the Metropolitan Police entirely wrong? If this has gone on now for 2 years, then yes, I think it is time to look at the questions being asked, and asking additional relevant questions to the investigating offices.

Not doing so could turn this entire phone hacking scandal into a fair label of ‘Witch hunt’ and as such, I would see this as the premise to attack the Leveson report. This is because the two are linked. I remain in favour of implementing the entire Leveson report. Not because I am so much in the know of things, but because I have utter faith in the wisdom of Lord Justice Leveson. Those who claim to know and judge the report as invalid, whilst not in possession of a Law doctorate are required to remain very silent on the matter, unless they show actual valid documentation! I admit that this is slightly strong wording, yet having listened to a few people blatantly attacking the Leveson report in favour of unmonitored freedom of the press, after which I asked in regards to the reports footnote 417 in regards to the accuracy of information, their….. ‘emotional repartee’ in my direction gave me what I needed to know. (They had no clue, or better stated, having never read the Leveson report).

By the way, that footnote is “Clause 1(i) of the PCC Code requires the press to take care not to publish inaccurate, misleading or distorted information, including pictures” (page 673, Leveson report).

If we could only apply this requirement to advertisements at times! (Big Smiles).

So we must prevent that these events to ‘evolve’ into a witch hunt. I am NOT stating that this is happening, but after 2 years that image is starting to linger and that is wrong too. My issue is with the statement that was in that same Sky news article (at http://news.sky.com/story/1117618/murdoch-phone-hacking-probe-excessive)

“In his letter he set out how the company disclosed 500,000 documents after 185,000 man hours at a cost of more than £65m.” When the coffers are at minus 1 trillion and student costs are growing and growing, these costs are only excessive if the government is not able to make Mr Murdoch pay for these costs.

I personally have always been to mind that once we need to focus and stretch the actual letter of speech, we lose facts of what is the goal. Basically, in these words I am wondering whether the committee has lost the view of the Big picture. (My apologies if I am incorrect).

So where is the issue of strategy? Well, if we read the “The Leveson Report: implementation” (at http://www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/SN06535), then at 6.5 (in the full PDF version) we see some additional delays in implementing the Royal charter. I quote: “Lord Wallace of Saltaire: My Lords, my briefing says that it is not appropriate for the Privy Council to consider more than one royal charter at a time on the same issue. The noble Lord may consider that the Press Standards Board of Finance has therefore been extremely clever in what it has done and may draw his conclusions from that – and that accounts for some of the delay.”

So we have more delays. Granted that they are procedural, but I wonder how many papers have reported on that delay? I reckon not many! Out of sight, out of mind is a valid strategy that has been in long standing with politicians and corporate spokes people all over the world.

So is this a strategy by Mr Murdoch to keep the focus away, or is this an investigation that is getting stretched in a very expensive way to stop your privacy from getting chartered protection? Not non-privacy by government (aka GCHQ), but by those who are making money out of side stepping commercial reasoning for ignoring privacy for the simple reasons of greed?

The issues of strategies are actually wider set then most will think. Against the Dutch pension issues, there is the view of George Osborne, the British Chancellor of the Exchequer. This is viewed in the subtitle “A majority of directors at the Washington-based International Monetary Fund disagrees with its own advice on UK fiscal policy.” which is part of the article at http://news.sky.com/story/1117069/imf-board-disagrees-over-uk-fiscal-policy.

Even though this sounds good for the Exchequer, the issues of no tax rises in the upcoming years (or after 2015 as he states it) is not just short of wrong (at http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/jul/11/george-osborne-deficit-tax-rises) , I feel that this could only be kept if a play is made to the pension funds (like the Dutch are trying now), as well as the shale gas approach which is seen as ‘frackalicious’, yet, we should not forget the issues that the Dutch county ‘Groningen’ is going through as it has seen a rise in small earthquakes giving home owners massive costs to repair and additional losses in house values. These issues are to some extent denied/ignored as the investigation is going on, yet the damages that the people see in the news on a regular bases tells another story. At present corporations are now claiming for millions in damages from both the Dutch gas company (NAM) and the government. (at http://www.dvhn.nl/nieuws/groningen/article9972913.ece/Corporaties-claimen-miljoenen-bij-Nam) there is also the claim for compensation to be awarded for the loss of housing value, which adds up to over 10,000 houses for up to 25000 Euro. (Yet one house in the newscast has a value decrease of almost 150,000 Euro). Let us not forget that these were only test drilling, the actual drilling has not even commenced. If the exchequer is depending on these numbers then he might be in for a rough ride. In addition, even though Isla Britannia is decently larger then the Netherlands, there is enough evidence that these issues will have a serious impact on housings and the environment.

If this is all about strategy, then playing the cards close to the chest seems a debatable wisdom. Because when this all goes south, it is not about the Isle politicians are sitting on, but the issue whether there will be a nation left to serve.

Should you doubt that statement (which is fair enough), then consider on how ‘well‘ the US claims their economy is getting. The fact that Detroit is now bankrupt should be enough concern that the American way is not a solution.
We, the Commonwealth nations must stick together to stay afloat and survive, fight together to become the nations of true prosperity again.

None of these strategies are ready for that essential need!

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July 16, 2013 · 01:09

Is racism in America too alive?

When we look at the case State of Florida vs. George Zimmerman involving the murder on Trayvon Martin it seems clear to me that racism is still very much alive in America. Yet, the events involving this case give way that this could go even far beyond the issues of racism. Until today, I did not know that his father is/was a magistrate. Did you know that?

As a law student I know about Common Law and Criminal Law and as such, it is possible that a person can shoot in Self Defence. However, the fact that AGAINST specifically given information by the 911 dispatcher, that he was advised not to go after a person of POSSIBLE interest. There was absolutely NO evidence that Trayvon Martin did anything illegal or that he was breaking the Law in any way.

The fact that he continued on his track in a manner that I personally belief was a trajectory to be some lame kind of ‘hero of the neighbourhood‘ approach is beyond me that murdering a person keeps you out of jail. I would also like to add my personal view that the pictures of Trayvon shows us a kid who would not get the chance to grow up to be a man. The fact that George Zimmerman at 29 saw this kid as a threat gives additional food for thoughts on why this man should even be allowed a firearm whilst racing around as a neighbourhood watch (but that is my personal view).

Getting to the issue of firearms! I am not starting some boast on how evil they are. Guns do not kill people, people kill people (that has always been my belief) and the fact that firearms are a part of life in America is a factor we should accept at present. The fact that he ignored advice from the 911 dispatcher is also an issue. I can understand that in light of liabilities in the US, despatchers are cautious with words and directives. There is however an issue with a neighbourhood watch, going around armed on open public roads enforcing their ‘brand of Justice‘. Enforcing the laws and safety of public roads is for the police!

Whether there are issues on law and evidence was for the courts. I did not investigate all the evidence, mainly because there is way too much of it. 67 CD’s with a list of witnesses that seemed to have passed 100 seems a bit much to me, especially as no one ran outside at the time of the ‘execution’.

The (alleged) information that the father of George Zimmerman is/was a magistrate is also a fact we should not ignore. I am not stating in this that there was any perversion to the course of justice. His son likely got the best preparation any defence could ever desire! If a case could be settled for over 80% by selecting the right jury (as stated by some attorneys in the US), then correctly prepping the defendant for a trial could add another 5-10%. That means that the case was leaning heavily in favour of George Zimmerman from the start. The fact that the burden of evidence was enormously high as was presented with 13 shades, showing 12 shades resulting in not guilty should be some level of indication to the reader how hard it was from the word ‘go’ to get any conviction.

If there is a side to the blame game, then it is shown in the closing arguments. As the prosecution pictures Zimmerman as a man with a mission to take the law in his own hands, then that part seems to have shown to some degree. How Zimmerman went after Trayvon whilst being told not to do this by the 911 despatcher. It is at that same part from the defence that the closing argument falters. As was stated that Zimmerman was not guilty of anything but protecting his own life they fail, because if that was truly the case then Zimmerman would not have ignored advice from 911 and he would not have gone after Trayvon after the police was notified. He went into a place where the police should have been, not an armed neighbourhood watchmen.

The racial issues are mostly exploding now after the acquittal. The part that seems to have contained those issues to some extent is because George Zimmerman is Hispanic, not Caucasian. However, after the acquittal people have taken to the streets in massive ways. LA, Oakland, NY city and several other places. I personally do not believe it is purely a racial issue. The fact that a young unarmed African American got himself murdered by an armed neighbourhood watchmen, might be getting to people a lot more than a Hispanic/African American issue.

In defence to George Zimmerman was the statement by an African American named Tony Johnson. He stated that it is not a crime to follow anybody (Source CNN). Actually, according to the National Victims of crime, it could constitute stalking as it is quoted as “Virtually any unwanted contact between two people to directly or indirectly communicates a threat or places the victim in fear can be considered stalking“. There are unknown factors, yet, an approach of distance and carefully identifying himself George Zimmerman might not have needed to shoot Trayvon Martin. Not being there at all after he notified the police would have resulted in an actual certainty that Trayvon Martin would still be alive.

 

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July 13, 2013 · 21:00

Control and Censorship

I am a simple person. I use an iPad, and I use it in a standard way. I synch, I play, I read, I listen! (Yes, I know such a selfish user I am). So when I read about the jailbreak issue I was actually surprised. Most of us never bothered with 3rd party software or other solutions. Yet, overall I do understand that some people might want to. I also do not see the issue for Apple or others to intervene. Some valid reasons might exist, and some might want this to develop their dreams, all valid reasons why a jailbreak system might be needed.

So the issue I read about today was that a game (Deus Ex) would not function on a jailbroken system. This might have been a simple issue with compatibility. No, this was not the case, as it was stated in the article the non-functionality was intentional. The person gets the message “We are sorry but you can’t fire on jailbroken devices.” So it is not just a bug but an intentional act to ‘sift out‘ certain users.

This does not make sense to me. So a person wanting the freedom to do certain things is now punished? I think it is high time that both Apple and Enix have some explaining to do. (Source: http://au.gamespot.com/news/deus-ex-the-fall-disables-firing-on-jailbroken-devices-6411343) the reader should especially accept the idea that there is a group of ‘legally jailbroken devices’ and they are in the same predicament.

It seems that the IT field is changing. This field is now more and more about personal data collection, discriminating groups and limiting the freedom of choice. At least, that is how I see it. But is this true?

When we see the jailbroken system then the following had occurred. The IOS has been modified. When we look at Apple support we see the following at http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3743. This is fair enough. It is nothing short of a person disassembling a television, then wanting it fixed under warrantee. So, I cannot fault apple for not fixing it. Yet the software gave us another issue. This is intentional intervention against those who ‘altered’ their system.

There are two sides to these events. On one side, I can understand why a system might be jailbroken. The immediate reason is that I was in the past the victim of Apple’s short-sightedness and their own party line flaws. It actually costed me thousands of dollars, so at that point, I feel that I am justified when I state ‘Apple Get Fu$#d!‘ (In regards to the lost $$$$).

The first part is the one some might remember from the PlayStation and PlayStation 2. Because some people were unacceptably greed driven, they forced many in a place where they decided what we were allowed to have and when. In the early days, games would appear in US and Japan almost a year early. To circumvent this, a ‘mod chip’ was available and as such people could order their games on Amazon in the US. Not only were the games up to a year early, in addition these games were 40%-65% cheaper, which was a massive benefit for many. Weirdly enough, the first reason was to many gamers more important than the price issue, but they happily took that benefit on board.

The second part of the ‘mod chip’ was alas less noble. It allowed people to copy original games and they would work on any modified system. For the most on the PlayStation 1, yet it had a large following in the PlayStation 2 as well. In my mind the second part was mainly due because of greed driven marketing, to exploit every person, wherever they lived to the fullest. The same was evident in the DVD market, however, there was a valid issue that Asian copyright violation was so strong that something needed to be done, yet overall the events seemed to have made little difference.

Are these dangers the same for jailbroken systems?

Because of the term ‘legally jailbroken devices’, I wonder what those were. The answer was found at the core of all hardware knowledge, a magazine called wired (at http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/07/feds-ok-iphone-jailbreaking/). This is the interesting crux! This verdict came out in 2010. So the fact that Enix had been adding a certain ‘limit’ could be read as intentional discrimination.

In the end, the quote I personally cannot disagree with Natalie Kerris said Apple won’t change its policy that voids iPhone warranties if a phone has been jail broken. “It can violate the warranty and cause the iPhone to become unstable and not work reliable”, this is fair enough, and should a jail broken system be used to play games people did not pay for, then this would be a violation, yet that was not the case in the game Deux Ex ‘the Fall’.

There is a new side to all this. Even though no longer an issue (likely only temporarily), the Xbox One with their need to connect, the Apple with jail breaking and all kinds of likely issues the PS4 will have (because even though we do not know at present, they will have their own issues), we are looking at new developments involving Digital Rights Management (DRM), deployment on the cloud via UltraViolet and the Keychest system. You the users are about to get hit by levels of user-based licensing and limitations unlike any w have ever experienced. More important, users are likely to get hit a lot harder on user license agreements then companies have ever faced over the last 15 years. In my view 99% of the population will press an ‘I agree‘ button and have no clue what they agreed to. The fact that the users who signed the apple user license and then ‘jailbroke’ their system should be ample proof of that.

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July 11, 2013 · 22:24

Boosting Pensions

Would you like to lose your pension? This is more than just a simple question. If you live anywhere in Europe, then the danger to your pension is a lot more realistic and will have a larger impact then you thought there would be.

Let’s take a look at a few countries.

Netherlands.
This was already under review, however, at present there are discussions going on to get a handle on accessing pensions for all kinds of reasons. The image in part is that the Dutch government needs this treasure vault to deal with more immediate issues as well as well as the application of spending to start an economy. As reported yesterday by the NOS, the issue at present is that the government thinks it is getting access to billions a year extra. The ABP comes to the conclusion that the changes will in the end cost billions, not save them. This comes as the government is presently trying to cut almost 3 billion Euro in retirement funding. The cut back was based on the fact that businesses and employees will save-up less per year, which might save 1000 euro, which would suit the government, as this gives them a taxation windfall of 2.3 billion. In the new system it is stated that not only do people lose the 1000 euro advantage, they will have to pay more. So there would be zero advantage, even worse, considering the amount of government jobs the treasury would be down a billion, so in the end no savings at all for the poor poor coffer, only additional losses to deal with. At a time when 6 billion in cut-backs are needed, this is not the bad news they want to hear. All this has a few more hooks. Especially when we consider the questions by Hachchi (D66) in regards pension premium raises that the ABP added in January 2012. The costs were raised by 300 million euro, as documented in  2012Z01310 (source: http://www.rijksoverheid.nl/bestanden/documenten-en-publicaties/kamerstukken/2012/03/06/antwoorden-inzake-de-verhoging-van-de-pensioenpremie-door-het-abp/antwoorden-inzake-de-verhoging-van-de-pensioenpremie-door-het-abp.pdf)

It is interesting that a similar issue is now appearing only one year later. There is more!

In one view we read that the ABP in 2010 was set at 105% coverage (which means that if 100% pension is paid out, 5% remains for growth). It is however interesting to read from the NRC (at: http://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2011/12/01/abp-verhoogt-pensioenen-niet/) we read that in December 2011 the coverage was only 94%, so in one year they went down to some degree. The same can be read at http://www.pensioenbelangen.nl/label/abp/ , more interesting, the numbers state that per September 2012 is was only at 101%. So if we recall the blog I wrote a week ago “The Age of ‘no retirement left’ is coming“, it is interesting that in that case the government is stating so much wealth. As the ABP is considered to be the largest one, we should wonder whether the Dutch politicians have any clue on what they are doing. More important, is this about short sighted cutting avoidance, or is it about more. Do not worry, they are not alone, we will have some fun looking at the UK situation next.

Is there actual evidence to support my theories? Well, the sources above clearly show that the ABP is only marginally above 100%, yet they had remained below 98% for a decent amount of time, so there is a valid amount of concern. In addition, when we consider the questions as stated in

2012Z01310, then certain issues in the recovery measures of pensions were not known, yet the initial billing would have been there, so this again is a piece of evidence that reflects 11th hour budgeting. The fact that this was never completely properly addressed remains a worry and not a reflective concern considering that in part the same issues are now again in the news.

The issues are only part of the entire picture. The fact that the Dutch pension administrator PGGM, has stated that there are issues with Walmart, could have some serious repercussions. Reuters quotes that “PGGM held 2.76 million shares of Wal-Mart as of March 31” (at: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/dutch-pension-group-halts-wal-211416613.html) this was only last week. Should the PGGM pull out then there would be concerns on both isles of the Atlantic river. Those shares represent well over 200 million, which means that Wal-mart might get some renewed problems down the line. Whether this would be due to PGGM is not a given, the fact that questions from a shareholder holding almost 3 million shares are not answered is certainly matter for concern. If we consider the economic downturn the Dutch have faced over the last 2 years, considering the issues the IMF reported in 2011 on Dutch pension funds. In that time, people entering their retirement saw their funds cut and a support capital of 50 billion was needed. So when we read less than 2 years later that those finds are so rich and that they should be opened for additional means, whilst a week later we read on some of the alleged dangers, it seems to me that playing politics with pensions is a very bad and not too bright idea. The 2011 article can be found at http://www.europeanpensions.net/ep/imf-team-recommends-adjustments-to-dutch-second-pillar-system.php

United Kingdom.

So, let’s take a look at Australia’s baby brother UK (as UK is only 3% of the size of Australia). The UK is in dangers no less immediate. The Guardian reported last November that issues would impact greatest on savers and pensioners. Yet, the story behind several issues is not brought here. For that we should look at what is happening now. Part of that is set here as http://www.guardian.co.uk/sustainable-business/capital-markets-climate-change-pension-funds. Is that even a fair assessment? If we read the quote “The way pension funds invest will determine the future, which means that to thrive they’ll need to wake up to climate change” I will wonder whether this is wishful thinking of whichever politician or investor whispered to the author. When we looked at the Netherlands and other places, these nations are all looking at sustainability solutions. Yet at present the ROI of these options are not up to scrap, so WHY use pensions there. These are fields that have been ignored be several administrations. If it is SO lucrative, then why not invest in it yourself (me asking governments)? Yes, it will be the future, but at present too expensive, so getting articles out there for pension funds to invest in the future might read nice, but as ROI reports falter it will not hold a candle up to the coming rage. This view is shared by James Cameron, chairman of cleantech investor Climate Change Capital. I know that the next part sounds dodgy as hell, but when we consider the quote “Future pensioners are going to have to bear more of the investment risk themselves“. In that case Pension funds are much better of owning parts of Raytheon and Northrop-Grumman. It seems that governments all over the world are seemingly ready at the drop of any hat to buy missile technologies, and as such the ROI for pension funds are much better off going to those places. I agree that the statement is less appealing to read, but why should pensions now be put under more and more pressure whilst, those behind the scenes refused to budge when they should have done so. The investment risk reads like a joke considering the article published in May at http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2013/may/22/one-five-poverty-line-state-pension where it states that  20% of those retiring this year will fall below the poverty line. This is in my mind the consequence of a housing issue never properly dealt with for over 27 years, whilst pensions were left alone. Taking both in the balance, then pensions might cover 80%-100% of the rent for this year, and those will come up short 2014 and later. So that is in the most positive case where people do not need to eat or drink ever. This is only for those not living in London, living there would almost amount to instant suicide. At least the Dutch can claim that their retirement issue had never been THAT bad. So, as there is a collective boost to raise the value of the RBS, that former bastion might be used to actually boost and increase value and strength of British pensions as they focus on getting back on the horse of profit (or at least try to get on that horse). Pensions are being cut in other ways too. That part can be read at: http://www.independent.co.uk/money/pensions/expats-call-for-fairer-pension-payouts-8659717.html. Some of these pensioners (almost 10%), saw the unaffordable future they saw coming their way and as such they moved to other areas. Some saw the light in time and bought a small place on Crete, some left for alternative Mediterranean locations and some went to the warmer regions of South Africa. These people saw the light, saw the non-linear growing costs and chose a better solution. It goes even further. What is less than possible in the UK becomes very affordable in India, where a week’s pension gets you a 2 bedroom secured apartment for a month, considering that rent is the most expensive part, three weeks of pension should keep a person well fed. So why not consider this? Instead of going on an exotic vacation, live in an exotic place, and of course, the Indians are all on average Cricket nut, so not the worst place to be during Cricket season. If these people are forced back because of pension issues, would the British government have the means to suddenly appoint housing to these people? They might not get an option in this as they froze pensions. In that regard, I do hope that the Exchequer George Osborne considered the consequence of even part of those 1.2 million pensioners returning to England and his 2 billion pound winter fuel allowance. That is only one post. On the other side, there is a genuine and acceptable concern of the people who are abusing that system. There had been earlier mention of the situation where UK men marrying Thai brides is a reason for the foreign pensions increase. If we voice the scenario where a pensioner marries a woman under 25 and she then gets the allowance after he is gone, then this would indeed be an unfair use of the system. We could argue that a marriage, not validated in the UK would not be seen as a marriage (I know, the legal nightmare behind this is so not nice). However, that those who never added to the British system, not being eligible for those funds would be slightly better phrased, yet the consequences for consulates to keep track of these people would be almost disastrous. Even though this would be spread over several countries, the fact that they could be required to deal with over 700,000 additional requests a year, is not likely to become a ‘relief’ to the system. Yet I must agree that something must be done. The dangers of cutting the transferred pension, if there was a marriage, could mean that these people might have a claim on humanitarian grounds to receive full Visa and transfers into the UK, which in the end might add up to be a lot more expensive. The only solution could be legislative, yet which of the ‘evils’ to choose from is not really for now. In my mind the options grows to make the pension only transferable if the marriage was longer then a certain period (5 years) or the spouse must have been a UK resident or lived, worked and paid taxes in the UK for no less than 10 years. I am just grasping the 5 years out of thin air, yet this would limit the dangers of UK pension abuse, it would also give a clear message to the valid pensioners that THEY are protected, yet that there are limits on passing over a basic state pension. In regards to those who are valid recipients of the basic state pension and their foreign setbacks there is more information at http://pensionjustice.org/.

 

Germany.

We should consider the German system, even though it is thought to be strong, secure and to some extent safe. They share the dangers those in the UK currently have. As reported by The Spiegel at http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/germans-fear-poverty-in-retirement-even-after-life-of-work-a-855352.html, even though their economy is in a strong state, the lost investments, the futures of retirement are almost none existing. In fact, their pensions are a lot worse of then the UK ones. A person there would end up getting a mere 32% of their income. If we consider the Dutch system where 70% does not even foot the bill, the desperation of 32% is a lot less appealing. The question becomes important when we consider the required pension buffers these pension funds need to have. The interesting addition is that a report in 2012 from the labour ministry stated that “the Labour Ministry itself, which indicates about a third of current full-time employees could end up receiving social welfare unless the pension system is changed. Those who have spent 35 years working full time but earn less than 2,500 euros a month would also end up depending on welfare.”

So this is the third country playing politics for non-visible short gain and massive shortages in the long term. This gives serious concern for the bill the Germans adopted that as of January 2013 “for a reduction in the statutory pension contribution rates”. And that helps your citizens…..how?

So this is not just a national issue, this is a European issue on several levels. Unless some strong actions are taken, a large part of Europe will enter living conditions worse than that of several 3rd world countries, whilst comfortable living would be found for those moving to places like India and Argentina.

Go figure!

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July 10, 2013 · 02:50

About Entertainment

I stumbled upon an article by Gilbert Cruz called “The Lone Ranger Represents Everything That’s Wrong with Hollywood Blockbusters” (at: http://www.vulture.com/2013/07/lone-ranger-is-everything-wrong-with-hollywood.html). It is actually quite a nice read and the conclusions that I personally do not completely agree with are still well supported and seem to make sense.

His ‘unease’ with franchises are well accepted by many including me, as we read and have spoken out against these reiterations often enough. when addressing the origin story problem he states “Give us a story that works and then, if you’re lucky enough to earn a sequel, you can give us flashes of an origin tale down the road, as opposed to weighing down your first movie.” That is one view, yet it is the view of the director that counts. It should be about the vision of the director. Perhaps it is less about the origin story and more about having a visionary director. My view is supported by mentioning the hidden gem ‘Margin Call‘. I think that this is a movie any economic student should watch. It watches like a story, yet there are layers of events that give it all an actual strength. The fact is also about a story portraying the initial stages of the 2008 financial crises are set in a movie.
Can anything be more dull then that? And even though this movie is pretty much all star, it required a visionary director to pull it off. That is how I see the origin story as well, without vision it is a presentation. It does not matter whether we watch a movie containing a Wild Wild West version of Sparrow, or the start of the lone ranger. the same for Thor, Spiderman and so forth, how they ‘became’ is part of the movie, but how to address it?

This dilemma is approached within the slogan of TV channel ‘FX’. “The story is everything!” I think when it comes to TV channels; it is the most brilliant slogan ever. Yes, we remember the special effects, we see the stars we love and idolise, but without the story…. (Imagine the sound of a flop!).

This is also why (for now) I stayed away from the Hobbit. I loved the lord of the rings. I have been a fan of Tolkien since long before I was at the legal drinking age. So seeing the movie was a massive moment in my life for me. Like many fans I did mentally object loudly when the freeing of the shire was missing (as this is the moment the hobbits experience what those around them went through), yet to see the book on the big screen was a moment I loved. To see the Hobbit was indeed something I was looking forward to, yet to see a 320 page book in 3 movies of around 3 hours each is stretching it all a bit thin.

So as most might agree with, is the fact that a good story requires a visionary. Perhaps this is why James Cameron has been so successful? 2 movies bringing in almost 5 billion is just insane! We should not forget that timing is also extremely important. I feel that this is shown when looking at ‘Dances with Wolves’ and ‘a man called horse’, which was a shining moment for Richard Harris. Perhaps the world was not ready for the ‘going native’ view in the 70’s.

The article stamps out a side I actually never gave much notice of. He states “So in order to ensure sequels and appeal to the maximum number of people, it must be rated PG or PG-13. Good luck finding an R-rated summer blockbuster.” He makes a fine point here. I want to see a movie that is good; I am not all in favour of bloody or bloodless movies if they hinder a sense of realism. Although I was never a fan of zombie films, the ‘realistic’ view ‘the Waking dead’ brings, is why I am eye locked to the small screen. So, the ratings requiring certain lack of levels of gore would be counterproductive to me. I do not believe that it is about gore and blood-letting. This is why I enjoyed the movie ‘the A-team’, where with 17,000 bullet you see no one gunned down (keeping in pace with the original TV series), yet the opposite of ‘Act of Valor’ is a gem as it is about the efficiency of making every bullet count (Navy Seals apparently are not about wasting time). So my stance floats a little with the movie I am watching, again, the story makes it happen.

This is why the hammer on ‘The Lone Ranger’ feels a little harsh to me. If it is about entertainment, then the Lone Ranger provides, yet the points the article brings up should not be ignored either. This is a Disney movie and Disney factor is important as that brand has a following with an audience they need to protect. Consider that the (Grand) parents, with younglings on a day out will see the protection that the Disney logo brings and as such a gore driven Zombie film with a Disney logo is unlikely to ever happen.

The final part where I slightly disagree with the views Gilbert Cruz offers, is when he mentions The Phantom and The Shadow. These 90’s movies failed because there was a lack of vision (as I see it). The characters are well established through the radio shows and the comic books. If we consider the slogan of FX and if we consider a slightly more Frank Miller themed view, then consider Howard Chaykin’s ‘The Shadow: Blood & Judgment’. That was more than just a mere piece of comic book. That was graphic art on an entirely different level. As much as Baldwin failed to portray the Shadow, the blame should fall to the lack of vision the director showed (perhaps with a small degree of ‘technology lacking’ options). Consider what Tarsem Singh achieved with ‘Immortal’, now let him have a go at ‘The Shadow: Blood & Judgment’. The result could be a lot more than a cult movie that we will remember for a long time. The result could be a blockbuster R-rated movie. Again, it is about timing and for 2013-2015 the timing seems right to take these old ‘heroes’ off the shelves and give them to visionaries, not to the directors that come from the ‘Hollywood blockbuster template machine’. In that regard we all hope that Luc Besson will achieve to revive the French hero that should be seen as an international landmark. As he is remembered for the Fifth Element, this visionary could make the heroes Valérian and Laureline truly immortal. As franchises go, a trilogy of these two characters could reshape the way people see comic book heroes. The only sad fact is that this movie arrives almost 40 years after I read the comic books. Even now, I still remember the art of Jean-Claude Mézières. What is also intriguing is that the art you see in ‘The City of Shifting Waters’ had a lot of similarities that the TV-Series ‘Revolutions’ showed almost 35 years after the comic book came.

It is also interesting that, considering the success of the lord of the rings and the implied upcoming blockbusters that the Hobbit seems to become, that not a larger net was cast on the type stories that have this epic view. We all remember Flash Gordon. Some trough the view of Ted (a McFarlane sense of humour), some through the exquisite music by Queen, however I still think back to the comics as drawn in the 60’s and 70’s. In that same style there are the stories of the ‘Trigan Empire’. It seems so strange that these successful works of art still have not made it to the big screen.

So I believe that there are plenty of options out there, it just takes faith (and funding) in one visionary to take that step forward.

 

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