Another Drive4show 'Anything goes' thread

[beninho]

First topic message reminder :

https://officiating.worldrugby.org/?module=3&section=36&subsection=129&language=en

"It is not mandatory for the team receiving the challenge to face it."

How many effing times. If they don't face it up silently and respectfully they get massive media criticism.

No they don't!

This is getting crazy!

[westisbest]

Never tried skiing. Looks like it would be good fun. I guess a good bit of training.

Know a few people who have been on skiing holidays, done snow boarding. Say it’s a great time.

[super_realist]

Jas

Just a shame it isn't a golfing holiday.

Ski holidays are way better than golfing holidays Mac.

Depends if you like skiing or not. I tried it once and that will probably do for me.

Fair enough, but probably as bad as writing off the game of golf after only playing it once.
It's not just the act of skiing or snowboarding but the apres ski, scenery, pubs, nice beer, food, chalets etc.

It's true that it's not exactly what you'd call a workout once you reach a certain level as it's mostly gravity but it's nice to spend a week or two a year doing something different from playing golf every week.

[McLaren]

It was fun enough, wasn't as exhilarating as I had hoped, but I could just tell that the time and money needed to get into it just wasn't something I would commit to.

I'd happily just do the apres ski.

[super_realist]

Where did you go Mac?

[McLaren]

Hillend.

[super_realist]

Hillend.

No wonder you hated it, that's like saying you hate golf because you went to a crazy golf course.

[McLaren]

Yeh but you can get the number 4 bus to hillend.

[super_realist]

I wouldn't know Mac. Public transport is for the plebs and untermensch

[westisbest]

I wouldn't know Mac. Public transport is for the plebs and untermensch

What a stupid comment.
Dear me.

Ha

[westisbest]

Ben, I see Wycombe are on the box Sunday.
Tranmere struggling at the moment.

Could be a decent away win.

[McLaren]

I wouldn't know Mac. Public transport is for the plebs and untermensch

What a stupid comment.
Dear me.

Ha

With language like that it is surprising that super isn't a bigger corbyn fan.

[JAS]

Hillend? Is that that strip of white string vesty AstroTurf just off the Biggar Road south of Edinburgh that you can see from the Edinburgh bypass?

[super_realist]

Hillend? Is that that strip of white string vesty AstroTurf just off the Biggar Road south of Edinburgh that you can see from the Edinburgh bypass?

Basically Hillend is to skiing what playing golf in a car park is to golf.

[JAS]

Isn’t there an indoor snow dome anywhere in Edinburgh? Sure there’s one in Glasgow just off the M8 heading out toward the airport.

[super_realist]

Isn’t there an indoor snow dome anywhere in Edinburgh? Sure there’s one in Glasgow just off the M8 heading out toward the airport.

Not in Edinburgh JAS.
The funny thing about Hillend is they boast of having the longest dry slope in Europe, as if the majority of other countries needed one.

[McLaren]

Isn’t there an indoor snow dome anywhere in Edinburgh? Sure there’s one in Glasgow just off the M8 heading out toward the airport.

Not in Edinburgh JAS.
The funny thing about Hillend is they boast of having the longest dry slope in Europe, as if the majority of other countries needed one.

Super

It is a very challenging slope, you should give it a shot.

[super_realist]

Isn’t there an indoor snow dome anywhere in Edinburgh? Sure there’s one in Glasgow just off the M8 heading out toward the airport.

Not in Edinburgh JAS.
The funny thing about Hillend is they boast of having the longest dry slope in Europe, as if the majority of other countries needed one.

Super

It is a very challenging slope, you should give it a shot.

I've been Mac, it's absolute crap.

[beninho]

Ben, I see Wycombe are on the box Sunday.
Tranmere struggling at the moment.

Could be a decent away win.

We drew with them last Saturday in the cup, have them away again on sunday then at home midweek in the cup replay. Win that, and we have Chichester in the 2nd round, so hopefully a good chance of a decent 3rd round game.

Anyway, I'm always wary about us on tv we always seem to lose. I remember huddersfield scoring 7! On tv boxing day aswell I think, away at tractor boys. The glamour of being 2nd in the league!

[super_realist]

What are these idiots moaning about the rivers not being dredged for?
Removing a few inches of sediment will make zero difference, furthermore its the responsibility of the landowner to take care of the watercourse up until the centre part of the watercourse, not the bloody government.
The government's culpability is on a local government scale in regards to poor planning, building on flood plain, disrupting water cycle, bad drainage etc.

[superflyweight]

[JAS]

What are these idiots moaning about the rivers not being dredged for?
Removing a few inches of sediment will make zero difference, furthermore its the responsibility of the landowner to take care of the watercourse up until the centre part of the watercourse, not the bloody government.
The government's culpability is on a local government scale in regards to poor planning, building on flood plain, disrupting water cycle, bad drainage etc.

That was apparently one of the stated conclusions after the floods on the Somerset levels a few years ago. I remember large parts of Swindon flooded in 2007 and a lot of blame was attached to a sluice gate being on a wrong setting several miles further down the watercourse.

I don’t proport do be an expert but based on listening to expert advice I guess it doesn’t take much at a certain tipping point to go from irritating heavy rainfall and minor flooding to a major flood catastrophe. Whether it be the Environment agency or local government, both have been so hopelessly cash starved in the past decade that corners WILL have been cut. What we are seeing is the results, yes it may have happened anyway due to the sheer volume of rain but maybe, just maybe had anti flood maintenance been carried out as it should have been the effects may have been much less severe.

[JAS]

Meanwhile...Maths & Arithmetic teacher required for HMRC East Kilbride, must be able to separate fact from conjecture, must not have any football team allegiances.

[McLaren]

Who was moaning about it?

[super_realist]

Who was moaning about it?

Turn on the TV, radio, open a newspaper. All these people who are affected by flooding have not done their part to mitigate against it.
One of my first jobs was in flooding and it was amazing how stupid residents can be when it comes to things like buying a house at the waters edge when the catchment is hundreds of square kilometres and then expect not to be flooded.

What sort of moron buys a house in such an area?, idyllic as they are most of the time it is rampant ignorance and stupidity.

[JAS]

Who was moaning about it?

Turn on the TV, radio, open a newspaper. All these people who are affected by flooding have not done their part to mitigate against it.
One of my first jobs was in flooding and it was amazing how stupid residents can be when it comes to things like buying a house at the waters edge when the catchment is hundreds of square kilometres and then expect not to be flooded.

What sort of moron buys a house in such an area?, idyllic as they are most of the time it is rampant ignorance and stupidity.

It happens the world over, Florida Keys and the Bahamas are other examples (obviously from Hurricane storm surges rather than rivers but same result.

[super_realist]

No doubt it will all be blamed on climate change rather than an increasing population and bad planning.

[I'm never wrong]

I may have got this wrong, but wasn't it decided that it was cheaper to deal with the flooding than build defences? Old story in the Independent about it HERE

[super_realist]

I would imagine so INW. Flood defences often just move the problem on to someone else lower down, so someone is going to get affected.

[super_realist]

Jesus, are the political parties just trying to out loony one another?
Free broadband? What kind of Orwellian state are Labour trying to create?

[beninho]

In general I have no issues with free broadband. Its so needed in modern society that those who can't afford it or who can't receive it, are at a disadvantage.

Its better for the country as a whole compared to hs2, which is going to cost in excess of £100bn.

[superflyweight]

It's almost essential to modern living and will become even more so.

It's also the opposite of Orwellian as it would allow the population access to information and services that could make them less dependent on the State and less likely to be subservient to those in power.

[superflyweight]

P.S. his writings suggest that George Orwell himself would have supported initiatives like free broadband rather than profiteering from something that could enable the poor to educate themselves and improve their situation.

[McLaren]

P.S. his writings suggest that George Orwell himself would have supported initiatives like free broadband rather than profiteering from something that could enable the poor to educate themselves and improve their situation.

We can now add literature to the list of things Super is a complete ingenue in.

[McLaren]

Super

Do you fancy going to this together?

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/glasgow-skeptics-presents-matt-dillahunty-magic-skepticism-questions-tickets-81274202327

[navyblueshorts]

It's almost essential to modern living and will become even more so.

It's also the opposite of Orwellian as it would allow the population access to information and services that could make them less dependent on the State and less likely to be subservient to those in power.  

Agreed, but the point is, surely, that simply stating "free broadband for all!" is bloody stupid and mind-numbing. Someone has to pay for it - who will this be? How will it be paid for?

I would say, let's wait for party manifestos to see the fine detail, but they won't stick to what they say they'll do in them either, or it'll be all vague words that don't answer the important questions.

[navyblueshorts]

P.S. his writings suggest that George Orwell himself would have supported initiatives like free broadband rather than profiteering from something that could enable the poor to educate themselves and improve their situation.

We can now add literature to the list of things Super is a complete ingenue in.

Get a room you two.

[superflyweight]

It's almost essential to modern living and will become even more so.

It's also the opposite of Orwellian as it would allow the population access to information and services that could make them less dependent on the State and less likely to be subservient to those in power.  

Agreed, but the point is, surely, that simply stating "free broadband for all!" is bloody stupid and mind-numbing. Someone has to pay for it - who will this be? How will it be paid for?

I would say, let's wait for party manifestos to see the fine detail, but they won't stick to what they say they'll do in them either, or it'll be all vague words that don't answer the important questions.

You could apply that logic to anything that is funded by the taxpayer.

[superflyweight]

P.S. his writings suggest that George Orwell himself would have supported initiatives like free broadband rather than profiteering from something that could enable the poor to educate themselves and improve their situation.

We can now add literature to the list of things Super is a complete ingenue in.

Get a room you two.

We'll just hold hands at the back of the bus if that's alright with you?

[JAS]

Jesus, are the political parties just trying to out loony one another?
Free broadband? What kind of Orwellian state are Labour trying to create?

What’s loony about ensuring everyone has access to decent communication. Digital comms are now as fundamental to society as roads. This “who pays?” narrative needs adjusting slightly to how much do global corps pay back in for the benefits they’ve had over the years. By that I mean the big tech companies have benefitted hugely from technology developed from government funding. Now you could say governments were lax in the past by not clawing back more money before now but government engaging with technology companies now can redress the balance.

Slightly abstract to the original point of broadband provision but here’s the point. Apple as a company are sitting on a multi trillion dollar cash pile, a significant proportion of which came from iPhone sales. Now 5 of the 6 main ground breaking technologies in your average iPhone that made smart phones smart were developed through? Yep that’s right... government research (GPS, TCP/IP etc) so effectively, tax payers the world over have boosted tech company profits, the payback for society so far has been for the Tech companies to spend some of that money on the worlds snarkiest accountants to help them hide their wealth (made off the back of taxpayers) in places like Panama & the Cayman Islands. I therefore don’t think it’s unreasonable to start asking the big Techs to start genuinely helping all of society rather than just themselves.

[JAS]

...and another thing, I think we could get to the point where we start asking the likes of Facebook and Twitter to start helping to fund mental health services and or Social media education. There’s a generation of kids coming now that don’t remember a world before social media, we do and we can (most of us can) put into perspective some of the bilge spewing around on social media. Many of today’s kids can’t. Anyone genuinely think it’s a coincidence that bullying, depression, grooming, suicides statistics can be correlated with the growth in social media? It’s easy for us to say “well don’t use it then” rather than try to understand what’s actually going on.

[dynamark]

Hi folks .On the floods there is a clue in the name -Fishlake-sadly .We just need to rely on the expert knowledge and moving water quicker may hit someone else.I worked in Civils/drainage and we used to talk about 100 year events now these come around every 5 years or so.
My old village flooded out about 8 years ago and the reason was a sluice not opened fully a couple of miles away ,Closed the pub for weeks
Broadband I have thanks very much costs about £40 a month from BT why would I want a slightly quicker process at great expense(bit like HS2 saving 10 minutes) .Most households have very adequate coverage and it is extending all time .I'm not seeing any votes in this for labour crossing over on a free Broadband issueMacdonall is utterly clueless someone has to be confident to take up these govt bonds and we may be running out of investors with all of his issues.

[navyblueshorts]

P.S. his writings suggest that George Orwell himself would have supported initiatives like free broadband rather than profiteering from something that could enable the poor to educate themselves and improve their situation.

We can now add literature to the list of things Super is a complete ingenue in.

Get a room you two.

We'll just hold hands at the back of the bus if that's alright with you?  

Hah. My mistake. I was meaning Mac and S_R.

[navyblueshorts]

It's almost essential to modern living and will become even more so.

It's also the opposite of Orwellian as it would allow the population access to information and services that could make them less dependent on the State and less likely to be subservient to those in power.  

Agreed, but the point is, surely, that simply stating "free broadband for all!" is bloody stupid and mind-numbing. Someone has to pay for it - who will this be? How will it be paid for?

I would say, let's wait for party manifestos to see the fine detail, but they won't stick to what they say they'll do in them either, or it'll be all vague words that don't answer the important questions.

You could apply that logic to anything that is funded by the taxpayer.

Yes, you could, but that's not 'free' then, is it? Maybe I'm the innocent here, but it would be nice to have a bit of honesty in the political realm for once.

[JAS]

Hi folks .On the floods there is a clue in the name -Fishlake-sadly .We just need to rely on the expert knowledge and moving water quicker may hit someone  else.I worked in Civils/drainage and we used to talk about 100 year events now these come around every 5 years or so.
My old village flooded out about 8 years ago and the reason was a sluice not opened fully a couple of miles away ,Closed the pub for weeks
Broadband I have thanks very much costs about £40 a month from BT why would I want a slightly quicker process at great expense(bit like HS2 saving 10 minutes) .Most households have very adequate coverage and it is extending all time .I'm not seeing any votes in this for labour crossing over on a free Broadband issueMacdonall is utterly clueless someone has to be confident to take up these govt bonds and we may be running out of investors with all of his issues.

I think the whole rainfall/flood/drainage debate could run and run, I get that whole 100 year event and the X-R peeps will be saying one in 100 has how become one in 5 due to climate change and totally ignoring other issues like improved farmland drainage in the upper reaches of watercourses. That kind of change does have big effects for lower down river systems. Upper reaches of rivers rise and fall quicker on well drained farmland, generally upland rivers are better equipped to cope with rapid fluctuations, however lower down river systems when the gradient is much less the water has basically no fast route out/nowhere to go so floods occur now where they wouldn’t have before. Things like dredging and sluice gates do have an important if kind of marginal role in trying to mitigate the worst effects but the biggest factor is the actual rainfall amount/time period, followed by upper river system drainage followed by lower river flood defence efforts.

[super_realist]

P.S. his writings suggest that George Orwell himself would have supported initiatives like free broadband rather than profiteering from something that could enable the poor to educate themselves and improve their situation.

We can now add literature to the list of things Super is a complete ingenue in.

Mac, I was referring to the horrors of having state run services and state run monopolies especially in regard to the availability of dissemination of information. Who on earth would want a government to provide the only option of broadband with the potential to determine what can be viewed and what information is permitted.
You clearly haven't read 1984.

[super_realist]

It's almost essential to modern living and will become even more so.

It's also the opposite of Orwellian as it would allow the population access to information and services that could make them less dependent on the State and less likely to be subservient to those in power.  

Agreed, but the point is, surely, that simply stating "free broadband for all!" is bloody stupid and mind-numbing. Someone has to pay for it - who will this be? How will it be paid for?

I would say, let's wait for party manifestos to see the fine detail, but they won't stick to what they say they'll do in them either, or it'll be all vague words that don't answer the important questions.

It seems unlikely that Labour can win a majority which means that they don't have to actually be able to fulfill any of their proposed plans.
This sort of gimmick just shows how absurd Labour's plans are, as if aboloshing private schools wasn't laughable enough and the privatisation of rail and postal services wasn't ruinously expensive and leading to no imorovemtn is services you have to wonder what planet McDonnel is on and what on earth he is smoking.

[super_realist]

Hi folks .On the floods there is a clue in the name -Fishlake-sadly .We just need to rely on the expert knowledge and moving water quicker may hit someone  else.I worked in Civils/drainage and we used to talk about 100 year events now these come around every 5 years or so.
My old village flooded out about 8 years ago and the reason was a sluice not opened fully a couple of miles away ,Closed the pub for weeks
Broadband I have thanks very much costs about £40 a month from BT why would I want a slightly quicker process at great expense(bit like HS2 saving 10 minutes) .Most households have very adequate coverage and it is extending all time .I'm not seeing any votes in this for labour crossing over on a free Broadband issueMacdonall is utterly clueless someone has to be confident to take up these govt bonds and we may be running out of investors with all of his issues.

If you worked in civils and drainage you would know very well that the term 1 in 100 doesn't mean that an event actually happens once in 100 years, it refers to the magnitude of the event and it means there is a 1 in 100 chance of that flood happening in one year only. You could have them very close together and sadly this is something the public doesn't grasp. They think it means it will actually only happen once in 100 years.

The majority of freshwater watercourses in the UK have a capacity for 1 in 5 event, which doesn't leave much room for error if you've built on the floodplain.

JAS correct to say that the XR doomsday cult will blame it on climate change as if that is the only issue here . That might of had an influence but there is many more aspects which are much more important such as removing trees, vegetation, building on floodplains, covering large areas in concrete, straightening/covering/narrowing of watercourses, adding flood defences elsewhere, adding buildings which massively increase surface area for watershed, reduction in through flow, transpiration etc.
The amount of rain in the UK has not increased appreciably, nor has the number or duration of rainfall events. We simply hear about them more because of population increase and the number of people affected has increased because of poor planning and flood management

[McLaren]

Super

By the way I am being serious about the Dillahunty gig.

[dynamark]

Super are you having a bad day mate ? I was 20 at the time(war had just ended ) and the term was 1 in a 100 year event used in the design of drainage systems.it had a basis.
If you buy any property now the legal folk will give you a flood report and advise on that possible likewise insurance companies.That didn't happen 40 years back.
I'm just about to go out to the pub in a nearby village and on the wall are old pics of the place flooded out maybe 30 years ago and we don't see it now because the environment agency guys are on the case .Sympathy for those involved but it can happen every few years

[McLaren]

P.S. his writings suggest that George Orwell himself would have supported initiatives like free broadband rather than profiteering from something that could enable the poor to educate themselves and improve their situation.

We can now add literature to the list of things Super is a complete ingenue in.

Mac, I was referring to the horrors of having state run services and state run monopolies especially in regard to the availability of dissemination of information. Who on earth would want a government to provide the only option of broadband with the potential to determine what can be viewed and what information is permitted.
You clearly haven't read 1984.

No but I have read Animal farm, which is an allegory about the frustrations of poor rural fibre availability.


In general I agree with a lot of what JAS has said so far on this topic. At the very least it might be a good idea to re-nationalise the communications network (phone, mobile, broadband, fibre, +industry versions) and force any company using it to provide a certain quality of service which is available to all customers. Although at that point why not nationalise the whole lot?

Post brexit the UK is going to have to think about how it will attract new business to the country and a state run world leading communications network might be one way. Think of all the great innovations involving telecommunications technology that can't be rolled out because not enough people have decent internet connections.

An upcoming example is the google stadia service which is a gaming platform where the game your playing is processed on servers and streamed to whatever device you want. The pool of potential customers is tiny because hardly anyone has decent bandwidth.

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