soyagi

Archived version: https://archive.ph/2Y3u6

It was difficult to maintain a poker face when the leader of a big US tech firm I was chatting to said there was a definite tipping point at which the firm would exit the UK.

I could see my own surprise mirrored on the faces of the other people in the room - many of whom worked there.

They hadn't heard this before either, one told me afterwards.

I can't tell you who it was but it's a brand you would probably recognise.

I've been doing this job for long enough to recognise a petulant tech ego when I meet one. From Big Tech, there's often big talk. But this felt different.

It reflected a sentiment I have been hearing quite loudly of late, from this lucrative and powerful US-based sector.

'Tipping point' Many of these companies are increasingly fed up.

Their "tipping point" is UK regulation - and it's coming at them thick and fast.

The Online Safety Bill is due to pass in the autumn. Aimed at protecting children, it lays down strict rules around policing social media content, with high financial penalties and prison time for individual tech execs if the firms fail to comply.

One clause that has proved particularly controversial is a proposal that encrypted messages, which includes those sent on WhatsApp, can be read and handed over to law enforcement by the platforms they are sent on, if there is deemed to be a national security or child protection risk.

The NSPCC children's charity has described encrypted messaging apps as the "front line" of where child abuse images are shared, but it is also seen as an essential security tool for activists, journalists and politicians.

Currently messaging apps like WhatsApp, Proton and Signal, which offer this encryption, cannot see the content of these messages themselves.

WhatsApp and Signal have both threatened to quit the UK market over this demand.

The Digital Markets Bill is also making its way through Parliament. It proposes that the UK's competition watchdog selects large companies like Amazon and Microsoft, gives them rules to comply with and sets punishments if they don't.

Several firms have told me they feel this gives an unprecedented amount of power to a single body.

Microsoft reacted furiously when the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) chose to block its acquisition of the video game giant Activision Blizzard.

"There's a clear message here - the European Union is a more attractive place to start a business than the United Kingdom," raged chief executive Brad Smith. The CMA has since re-opened negotiations with Microsoft.

This is especially damning because the EU is also introducing strict rules in the same vein - but it is collectively a much larger and therefore more valuable market.

In the UK, proposed amendments to the Investigatory Powers Act, which included tech firms getting Home Office approval for new security features before worldwide release, incensed Apple so much that it threatened to remove Facetime and iMessage from the UK if they go through.

Clearly the UK cannot, and should not, be held to ransom by US tech giants. But the services they provide are widely used by millions of people. And rightly or wrongly, there is no UK-based alternative to those services.

Against this backdrop, we have a self-proclaimed pro-tech prime minister, Rishi Sunak. He is trying to entice the lucrative artificial intelligence sector - also largely US-based - to set up camp in the UK. A handful of them - Palantir, OpenAI and Anthropic - have agreed to open London headquarters.

But in California's Silicon Valley, some say that the goodwill is souring.

"There is growing irritation here about the UK and EU trying to rein in Big Tech... that's seen as less about ethical behaviour and more about jealousy and tying down foreign competition," says tech veteran Michael Malone.

British entrepreneur Mustafa Suleyman, the co-founder of DeepMind, has chosen to locate his new company InflectionAI in California, rather than the UK.

It's a difficult line to tread. Big Tech hasn't exactly covered itself in glory with past behaviours - and lots of people feel regulation and accountability is long overdue.

Also, we shouldn't confuse "pro-innovation" with "pro-Big Tech" warns Professor Neil Lawrence, a Cambridge University academic who has previously acted as an advisor to the CMA.

"Pro-innovation regulation is about ensuring that there's space for smaller companies and start-ups to participate in emerging digital markets", he said.

Other experts are concerned that those writing the rules do not understand the rapidly-evolving technology they are trying to harness.

"There are some people in government who've got very deep [tech] knowledge, but just not enough of them," said economist Dame Diane Coyle.

"And so [all] this legislation has been going through Parliament in a manner that seems to technical experts, like some of my colleagues, not particularly well-informed, and putting at risk some of the services that people in this country value very highly."

If UK law-makers don't understand the tech, there are experts willing to advise.

But many of those feel ignored.

Professor Alan Woodward is a cyber-security expert at Surrey University whose has worked various posts at GCHQ, the UK's intelligence, security and cyber agency.

"So many of us have signed letters, given formal evidence to committees, directly offered to advise - either the government doesn't understand or doesn't want to listen," he said.

"Ignorance combined with arrogance is a dangerous mix."

The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology said that it had "worked hand-in-hand with industry and experts from around the world to develop changes to the tech sector", including during the development of the Online Safety Bill and the Digital Markets Bill.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/mNVst

This post was inspired by two things I saw recently:

• Jonny Price of WeFunder, sharing their newly designed raise page, featuring some giants of tech like Substack, Mercury and Levels.
• Xalavier Nelson Jr. of Strange Scaffold, commenting on the seemingly extreme success of Larian Studios, with the upcoming release of Baldur’s Gate, and imporing consumers that it not “raise the standard”.

The connection between these two items is not obvious, but it is interesting.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/mNVst

This post was inspired by two things I saw recently:

• Jonny Price of WeFunder, sharing their newly designed raise page, featuring some giants of tech like Substack, Mercury and Levels.
• Xalavier Nelson Jr. of Strange Scaffold, commenting on the seemingly extreme success of Larian Studios, with the upcoming release of Baldur’s Gate, and imporing consumers that it not “raise the standard”.

The connection between these two items is not obvious, but it is interesting.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/WMU7k

Sometimes, a scientific consensus is established because vested interests have diligently and purposefully transformed a situation of profound uncertainty into one in which there appears to be overwhelming evidence for what becomes the consensus view. When a scientific consensus emerges via this accelerated process, the role of the scientific dissident is not, like Semmelweis, to carry out revolutionary science. The dissident’s role is to provide a check against epistemically detrimental and artificial consensus formation. Nevertheless, the challenges faced are similar. Never has this accelerated process unfolded with such success, and such fury, as in the case of the origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

I should point out this is not my stance. However, I thought this article is a good stimulus to initiate discussion: while questioning scientific practices has led to some significant improvements despite heavy criticism at the time, how do we today justify dismissing unpopular/uncomfortable ideas while continuing to make scientific progress?

EDIT: I should point out this is not my stance. However, I thought this article is a good stimulus to initiate discussion: while questioning scientific practices has led to some significant improvements despite heavy criticism at the time, how do we today justify dismissing unpopular/uncomfortable ideas while continuing to make scientific progress?

Archived version: https://archive.ph/WMU7k

Sometimes, a scientific consensus is established because vested interests have diligently and purposefully transformed a situation of profound uncertainty into one in which there appears to be overwhelming evidence for what becomes the consensus view. When a scientific consensus emerges via this accelerated process, the role of the scientific dissident is not, like Semmelweis, to carry out revolutionary science. The dissident’s role is to provide a check against epistemically detrimental and artificial consensus formation. Nevertheless, the challenges faced are similar. Never has this accelerated process unfolded with such success, and such fury, as in the case of the origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

EDIT: I should point out this is not my stance. However, I thought this article is a good stimulus to initiate discussion: while questioning scientific practices has led to some significant improvements despite heavy criticism at the time, how do we today justify dismissing unpopular/uncomfortable ideas while continuing to make scientific progress?

In this video, a Canon print cartridge is opened up and revealed not to contain the meagre 11.9 ml (0.4 fl oz) of ink it is advertised. The proposed solution is to buy a printer designed to be manually refilled with bottles of ink (such as the featured Epson EcoTank ET-2850), though it has only been tested briefly.

In this video, a Canon print cartridge is opened up and revealed not to contain the meagre 11.9 ml (0.4 fl oz) of ink it is advertised. The proposed solution is to buy a printer designed to be manually refilled with bottles of ink (such as the featured Epson EcoTank ET-2850), though it has only been tested briefly.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/vKwZC

The new owners of the Crooked House pub in Staffordshire, which was burned down in a fire and subsequently demolished, have angered local people in a series of other redevelopment plans across the Midlands.

Planning documents reveal ATE Farms, which bought the Crooked House from Marston’s brewery in July, and its associated companies have attracted dozens of complaints over plans that include building a solar farm and holiday lodges in the countryside, and redeveloping a village pub.

In one complaint from a local person, Adam Taylor, the husband of Carly Taylor who controls ATE Farms, was accused of having a “wilfully dangerous and chaotic attitude” to managing the countryside.

The resident, who was objecting to ATE Farms’ plans to build a solar farm, office park, farm shop and 33 holiday lodges on a former quarry in Lutterworth, Leicestershire, said the nearby village of Dunton Bassett “was lucky to survive his carelessness”.

Adam Taylor, under another company, AT Contracting and Plant Hire, also received a number of objections when he submitted plans to develop the Sarah Mansfield Country Inn in the village of Willey, Warwickshire.

He reportedly bought the pub in 2020 and “gutted” the interior before the council issued a stop notice. The pub was given “asset of community value” status in 2021 but this was overturned on appeal.

Taylor submitted an application to turn the first floor of the pub into accommodation and to build a property in the car park, while maintaining the bar area inside, and plans were eventually approved despite 20 initial objections from neighbours.

The planning agent Lance Wiggins, acting on behalf of Taylor, said the plans would make the pub “viable”, and if rejected the venue would have to go back on the market.

On Friday, the West Midlands mayor, Andy Street, reiterated his call for the Crooked House to be rebuilt “brick by brick”, saying he remained “laser-focused on making that happen”.

“Whoever has targeted this beloved landmark in this way has messed with the wrong pub, the wrong community, and the wrong authorities,” he said in a statement.

On Wednesday, Staffordshire police said they were treating the fire at the pub, nine days after it was sold, as arson, and were speaking to the owners as part of their inquiries.

South Staffordshire council also said it was investigating potential planning breaches after the damaged pub was bulldozed two days after the fire without permission from authorities.

It has also emerged that the excavator used to bulldoze the building was brought on site a week before the fire, according to Construction News.

Marco Longhi, the Conservative MP for Dudley North, said on Friday he would be campaigning to “close the potential loophole” that allowed the building to be demolished while the investigation into the cause of the blaze was taking place.

“Staffordshire police have said they did not have the power to stop the owner of the Crooked House from demolishing the ruins following an arson. Agencies should be given the power to take the premises under their control while investigation is being carried out,” he said.

“The site should have been cordoned off for investigation and forensics the moment the police and fire service came to the site.”

ATE Farms and AT Contracting and Plant Hire have been contacted for comment.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/dOGVA

Ever since it burned down and was then demolished last week, there have been calls for the Crooked House pub in Staffordshire to be rebuilt from scratch.

Andy Street, the mayor of the West Midlands, told the local council he wanted to see it “rebuilt brick by brick (using as much original material as possible)”, and a Facebook group calling for it to be rebuilt has attracted more than 10,000 members.

Historical pub buildings have been successfully rebuilt before – the Carlton Tavern pub in Maida Vale reopened in 2021 and was rebuilt brick by brick after being demolished without permission.

But while doing so is not impossible, it would be a “huge endeavour”, said Andrew Lovett, chief executive of the Black Country Living Museum (BCLM), an open-air museum made up of rebuilt historical buildings about four miles down the road from where the Crooked House once stood.

After dozens of calls for the BCLM museum to intervene and save the pub, Lovett issued a statement this week saying that unfortunately the organisation was not in a position to “save, let alone relocate, the building”.

“It’s a very complicated and costly endeavour and that’s one of the reasons we’re not in a position to just suddenly drop everything and go and get the Crooked House,” he said.

This week marked the start of the rebuild of Dudley’s Woodside Library on the BCLM site. The library has been painstakingly moved, brick by brick, from its original home.

“We have to number pretty much everything, from the rafter to the bricks, and take everything down one by one,” Lovett said. “The bricks get loaded in reverse order on to a pallet to help with the rebuild process at the other end. We don’t call it demolition, we call it dismantling, and the whole process took about six months.

“But Woodside was built in 1894 so you will get bricks and stonework that have deteriorated and are structurally no good. Sometimes, you can substitute a brick from an inner part of the building, or we have to get stonemasons to replicate things. Particularly if it’s sandstone, which is quite porous, it is susceptible to rain and frost and cracking, and inevitably you end up having to replace it, it’s unavoidable.”

Last year the BCLM opened the Elephant and Castle pub, a recreation of an Edwardian pub which was unexpectedly demolished in Wolverhampton in 2001 before it could be listed. They used photographs and archive material to recreate it as faithfully as possible, and asked local people to donate any old pub memorabilia, furniture or alcohol bottles they had.

“It was only possible really because we had architectural plans and photographs,” Lovett said. “We were also able to talk to the last landlords and families that lived there and say, ‘where was the bar, what did it look like?’ It takes a lot of effort but if you get it right, it can really trigger memories for people.”

He said one of the main challenges of recreating old buildings was making sure they complied with current building regulations.

“There’s quite a big staircase in the Elephant and Castle, a beautiful wood one, but it didn’t meet fire regulations so there has to be a metal one underneath,” he said. “And, ironically given the Crooked House, we have to spend a lot of money making the ground safe to build on since we’re in a former mining area.”

The BCLM has taken on such a challenge before, however, when it recreated Jerushah Cottage, also known as The Tilted Cottage, by building it on a foundation at a 10-degree angle. “It can be done, we just had to lay a foundation deliberately at that angle so that when the building was put up, it was 10 degrees off,” said Lovett.

“Some people think we’re bonkers the effort we go to get the tiniest details right when we rebuild. But it’s those things that trigger memories and we get very emotional responses from people when they see it. If you’re slapdash about it, using the wrong screws or brass fittings, then it just undermines the whole process.”

Archived version: https://archive.ph/ZGo6X

Universal Music Group (UMG.AS), Sony Music Entertainment (6758.T) and other record labels on Friday sued the nonprofit Internet Archive for copyright infringement over its streaming collection of digitized music from vintage records.

The labels' lawsuit filed in a federal court in Manhattan said the Archive's "Great 78 Project" functions as an "illegal record store" for songs by musicians including Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Miles Davis and Billie Holiday.

They named 2,749 sound-recording copyrights that the Archive allegedly infringed. The labels said their damages in the case could be as high as $412 million.

Representatives for the Internet Archive did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the complaint.

The San Francisco-based Internet Archive digitally archives websites, books, audio recordings and other materials. It compares itself to a library and says its mission is to "provide universal access to all knowledge."

The Internet Archive is already facing another federal lawsuit in Manhattan from leading book publishers who said its digital-book lending program launched in the pandemic violates their copyrights. A judge ruled for the publishers in March, in a decision that the Archive plans to appeal.

The Great 78 Project encourages donations of 78-rpm records -- the dominant record format from the early 1900s until the 1950s -- for the group to digitize to "ensure the survival of these cultural materials for future generations to study and enjoy." Its website says the collection includes more than 400,000 recordings.

The labels' lawsuit said the project includes thousands of their copyright-protected recordings, including Bing Crosby's "White Christmas," Chuck Berry's "Roll Over Beethoven" and Duke Ellington's "It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)".

The lawsuit said the recordings are all available on authorized streaming services and "face no danger of being lost, forgotten, or destroyed."

Archived version: https://archive.ph/ZGo6X

Universal Music Group (UMG.AS), Sony Music Entertainment (6758.T) and other record labels on Friday sued the nonprofit Internet Archive for copyright infringement over its streaming collection of digitized music from vintage records.

The labels' lawsuit filed in a federal court in Manhattan said the Archive's "Great 78 Project" functions as an "illegal record store" for songs by musicians including Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Miles Davis and Billie Holiday.

They named 2,749 sound-recording copyrights that the Archive allegedly infringed. The labels said their damages in the case could be as high as $412 million.

Representatives for the Internet Archive did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the complaint.

The San Francisco-based Internet Archive digitally archives websites, books, audio recordings and other materials. It compares itself to a library and says its mission is to "provide universal access to all knowledge."

The Internet Archive is already facing another federal lawsuit in Manhattan from leading book publishers who said its digital-book lending program launched in the pandemic violates their copyrights. A judge ruled for the publishers in March, in a decision that the Archive plans to appeal.

The Great 78 Project encourages donations of 78-rpm records -- the dominant record format from the early 1900s until the 1950s -- for the group to digitize to "ensure the survival of these cultural materials for future generations to study and enjoy." Its website says the collection includes more than 400,000 recordings.

The labels' lawsuit said the project includes thousands of their copyright-protected recordings, including Bing Crosby's "White Christmas," Chuck Berry's "Roll Over Beethoven" and Duke Ellington's "It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)".

The lawsuit said the recordings are all available on authorized streaming services and "face no danger of being lost, forgotten, or destroyed."

One of the main reasons for the disparity is the lower taxes that the aviation industry benefits from.

If you fly from Paris to Barcelona the airline not only pays no VAT, but is also exempt from kerosene tax. If you make the same journey by train, the rail company will pay an energy tax and passenger VAT. This means higher costs for the company which are usually reflected in ticket prices.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/7Zrur