Posts by Keir Leslie
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To licence all the music used in the background of the movie, which was a series of videos of the maker's life spliced together and overlaid onto music from the appropriate era, would raise that cost to USD400,000
What's the problem? This is like whinging that George Clooney won't turn up in your film for cheap.
That music has a value, and if you won't pay, that's your problem.
And if it costs too much, don't pay. That's the free market for you.
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Also, when I pointed out that their "MPs should get paid the average wage" policy would result on largely really rich people being in parliament, the nice young volunteer ventured that he didn't really understand all the policies...
Eh. but that's not the point of that policy; it's pure dog whistle. If you recognise that policy, it's meant to get at your gut, at the hindbrain, and say fuck it, do you want to vote for the Versaillais?
(And, of course, if the SWP get their way, there wouldn't be any really rich people to be in Parliament, anyway. You know, the class war and all.)
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<quote>Says who?<quote>
Says a scaffold outside the Banqueting Hall.
(Oh, and Bagehot. And -- um, I think an awful lot of others.)
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It's only survived from it's inception (describing where various nobles stood in a King's court) because it changes definition continually.
Firstly, `left' and `right' (droit and gauche) derive from the French Revolutionary Assembly -- you know, the one that cut the King's head off?
I'm also pretty sure that the French left can trace a reasonably consistent genealogy back to the Jacobins, and even further back if you want to get picky. The French Right is a bit harder, because lots of them rejected the Republic, but the British Tories are pretty consistent back to the Civil War or so. The British left is a bit complicated 'cause of the Labour Party, but look at someone like Bertrand Russell, or the dissenters.
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To which I say "Parliament might not be able to, but the people can, literally if need be" (it being so much easier to throw MPs into a local sewage pond when they're tied up).
Arguably we can't, because we retain the sovereign right to change our minds, as expressed through parliament.
That parliament is unable to bind following parliaments isn't a protection of parliament's privileges, it's a protection of our privilege to elect a government that answers to no-one, and no-thing, but us.
You can argue we shouldn't have that privilege, but as I see it that's the principle, no?
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The Netherlands is a very prosperous and racially homogenous nation.
Um, we're a very prosperous nation too, and we're not much less racially homogeneous than the Netherlands.
We're also not occupying an armed and angry group of territories, and no New Zealand Prime Minister has died of non-natural causes whilst in office, nor have any of the political parties fought civil wars.
NZ: more like the Netherlands than Italy or Israel.
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I also wonder if it's because Banks is getting a teeny tad preachy in his middle-age: transnational corporations are evil, though not quite as evil as their tame warmongering bitch of the KKKristian Reich Chimpy McBushitler.
Really? I thought Banks was pretty good for that; Dead Air and The Business were quite good at talking about corporation without just saying they're evil.
Use of Weapons isn't as good as Player of Games, though. I think I like the preaching, and somebody who wrote the Culture deserves to be allowed to preach about today.
I am a huge fan of Banks, except when he allows the sci-fi to cross over (The Bridge, Song of Stone).
Which is kind of funny, given that SF people think his SF is far better SF than his lit-fic is lit-fic.
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I also note that according to yourself only people with a strong background in fine arts and its history were competent to talk about Copyright.
No, only people who had a strong background in art history (and, at that, I'd really quite like a strong competence in one of the more Marxist/sociological strands of art history rather than, say, aesthetic theory) were competent to talk about the motives of artists & how they were funded. At least, if they wanted us to take them on trust; I've no bother if people would provide realistic evidence for claims.
And I'm not backing down from that; if you want to claim x, either provide evidence of authority, or back it up with evidence. People are very good at providing legal references, but rubbish at backing up claims about art history. (I'm not very good either, to be honest.)
Likewise, factual claims about the economic impact of piracy should be backed up, not just assumed.
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Because she isn't reading this. (OK, not always a true assumption, but as a rule, if someone isn't in the conversation, you should apply a higher bar.)
I've no objection to `Tizard's position on x is wrong', that's fair, because it's public policy discussion, and public policy discussions have different rules.
I do strongly object to the personal, childish `widdle self' `she screamed at us' attacks, because it's kind of pointless, very unsubstantiated, and 'cause I feel you should say that sort of thing to people's faces, not just talk crap on the internet.
Also, utterly unproductive.
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Make it easy, make it cheap, and make it good, and we'll all flock to the screen, or the radio, or the rock show, in droves.
And give everyone a pony!
Easy, cheap and good sounds a damn lot like quick, cheap, and good.
<quote>her widdle self</quote
What guts you have, to mock and slime someone who's no opportunity to reply. I'd be much more sympathetic to your arguments if you'd stop the ad homs about Tizard. They're kinda icky, I think.
Finally, lay off the Luddites. I quite respect working class activism in the face of the noose.
Many of them died in an industrial struggle; people like I/S would call them martyrs -- if it hadn't been for the fact they contradicted the march of technology, apparently quite a few people's real hero.