Good news on ID cards?

From VNUNET:

Plans to use iris biometrics for the government’s national identity card scheme have been shelved because of cost and technical uncertainties.

I.e. they won't scan your eyes, but will still take your finger prints (even though some people don't actually have fingerprints due to genetic conditions and the prints also match up with Koala bears!). What about the plans for face scans (which only work if you're white and young)?

Also Not Saussure has stumbled across an article by Bruce Sneider which shows that the Yanks are no longer wanting facial and fingerprint scans, as the technology is too expensive and won't work! One of the reasons our Dear Leader is in favour of ID cards (see here for an article he wrote in the Telegraph, which I fisked) is due to US pressure, so now what will he do?

The costs of ID cards

From the Sunday Telegraph:
People would be fined up to £1,000 for failing to return a dead relative's ID card, while women who marry will have to pay at least £30 for a new card if they want to use their married name, risking a £1,000 fine if they do not comply.

David Davis, the shadow home secretary, said the fines revelation shows that the scheme "will hit the taxpayer not the terrorists" and is "just another Labour stealth tax".

He said: "It is shocking that the Government is considering charges and fines on people at some of the most sensitive times in life. The Conservatives would scrap this plastic poll tax and invest the savings in practical measures to improve security."

Joan Ryan, the Home Office minister, said that charges would apply "if a person wished to add a married surname to his or her register entry". Based on an estimate of 311,000 marriages a year, that would net up to £9 million a year for the Exchequer.

People would be charged at least £30 for lost or stolen cards. Based on the 930,000 driving licences lost or stolen each year, this would earn the Treasury more than £28 million a year, say the Tories.

In a separate plan that the Tories say could hit millions of students, Mr Reid admitted that applicants will be asked for "all current alternative addresses". Failure to update the register with details such as term-time halls of residence could result in a £1,000 fine.

Just another way to scam the public...

The Telegraph's leader column also states:

Terrorists act by concealing their intentions, not their identities: the three countries in the world that suffer most from terrorist violence [I'm assuming one of them is Israel] all operate ID card schemes.

If there is any doubt in your mind about the efficacy of the proposed system, ponder the following. The one group of people exempt from having to own ID cards will be foreigners who have been in Britain for less than six months. Recall this extraordinary fact the next time you hear a minister blathering about the need to tackle terrorism and control our borders.

ID cards don't prevent terrorism. When will the government take notice?

2006: A Musical Odyessey

Well another year has almost finished. To coincide with this momentous event, once again I’ve decided to review the CDs I’ve got and gigs that I’ve been to over the year.

Albums

Before I list my albums, I must point out that, due to reasons of personal bias, I’ve excluded three albums: (Fiery Furnaces: Bitter Tea, Sonic Youth: Rather Ripped and Thom Yorke: The Eraser) as it’d be unfair to compare the other stuff to my favourite band that no-one’s heard of, my favourite band ever and the solo album of the singer from my favourite current band… Anyway, let’s get the stuff reviewed shall we?

Be your own Pet: Be your own Pet

Noisy, shouty, punky and, er, young-y.

Beck: The Information

Odelay-esque, but with the added bonus of a cover that comes with stickers, so you can make your own unique artwork. Is this helping the fans become creative/show their support, or just laziness on the part of Mr. Hansen?

Cansei de ser Sexy: Cansei de ser Sexy (a. k. a. CSS: CSS)

Fit Brazilian women (one of whom has the appropriate name “Lovefoxxx”!) do NY disco-rock. I wish they would “make love and listen to Death from Above”…
The Fallout Trust: In case of the Flood
No, not a homage to New Orleans, but slightly dramatic indie-pop, with a very nice looking keyboardist…

Flaming Lips: At War with the Mystics
Typical Flaming Lips – weird psychadelia.

Futureheads: News & Tributes
Not as up-front/immediate as their debut, as it takes longer to get into it. It’s still as good though, but a pity their record label dropped them. It happened to BRMC, before coming back with “Howl” so don’t let it get you down!

Hot Chip: The Warning

Slightly nerdy indie-dance electro-pop from the mean streets of Putney! Local band!

Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan: Ballad of the Broken Seas

Her who was in Belle & Sebastian with him who was in the Screaming Trees get together and go all folky.

Jeniferever: Choose a Bright Morning

A lot more blessed-out than their live performances (see below), but just as good!

Junior Boys: So this is Goodbye

Canadian electro-pop.

The Knife: Silent Shout

Weird Swedish brother-and-sister duo does even weirder electro/synth stuff. This is possibly why it’s my album of the year. One question: how can you share your mothers’ health?

Larrikin Love: The Freedom Spark

Skiffle, folk and punk mixed together somewhere around the western part of Greater London…

Liars: Drum’s not Dead

So are the tunes! Only kidding, I like albums that consist of stuff which verges on the unlistenable – I’m the sort of person who raves about Lou Reed’s Metal Machine Music, which probably explains a few things…

Mission of Burma: The Obliterati

New York’s punk/funk veterans go even noisy than before! Yay!

Mystery Jets: Making Dens

Like Larrikin love, but with less folk and more pop. What is it with the area around the western Thames?

Oneida: Happy New Year

Weird US band do an album that appears to be based upon English Mediaeval folk music… but with punky guitars…

Polysics: Now is the Time

Mad Japanese band – a mixture of electro, rock and metal! Fantastic live as well (see below).

The Rapture: Pieces of the People we Love

I didn’t like their debut as they just annoyed me; however, they’ve more than made up for it on this one! Think Radio 4 (when they were good), without the politics, or !!! less the cowbell. “Gotta get myself into it” and they did!

The Secret Machines: Ten Silver Drops

Less shoe-gazing than their debut, more prog.

The Sleepy Jackson: Personality. One was a Spider. One was a Bird

The new Brian Wilson? Well, he’s as mad as him, and his music’s just as orchestral, so who knows?

Spank Rock: Yoyoyoyoyo

If you can’t tell from the title, it’s a hip-hop album! Not NWA-style “Pop a cap in yo’ ass, mutha’fucka”, more party hip-hop.

The Sunshine Underground: Raise the Alarm

Named after a Chemical Brothers’ song (from their Surrender album, if you’re interested), but they don’t sound like them. They’re more indie/dance-rock; think Bloc Party less the politics.

The Strokes: First Impressions of Earth

Are they the forgotten men of New York? Not when they make albums like this!

TV on the Radio: Return to Cookie Mountain

I guess the best way to describe this lot is “Shoe-gazing barbershop quartet”…

The Victorian English Gentlemen’s Club: The Victorian English Gentlemen’s Club

They’re right when they say “Ban the Gin” – it’s the devil’s drink… well, OK, it comes second to a Flamin’ Houman (Brandy, Tequila and Tabasco sauce!)

Yo la Tengo: I am not Afraid of you and will Beat your Ass

Appalling title, but great music! Feedback, ballads and hard rock amongst others. They’re Sonic Youth-esque, but not as good (but I guess that’s unfair, as few/if anyone is).

Young Knives: Voices of Animals and Men

Like a punky, nerdier British Sea Power… they could only be British!

Gigs

!!!: Islington

Pronounced “Chk-chk-chk”. They’re one of many New York disco-punk bands that have been noticed in the past few years, but the gig was more like a late-80s/early 90s rave! Gig of the year.

Bonkersfest: Camberwell Green

Free mid-summer festival. From what I remember, it was a boiling hot Saturday and there was a lot of free-jazz – yay! – and just general noise. I hope they have another one next year.

The Fallout Trust: Islington

See their album review.

Jeniferever: Kilburn and Kingston

A Swedish band who are a mixture of Sigur Ros and My Bloody Valentine. They look like a bunch of physics students, but make a wall of sound! I was so impressed that I saw them twice in under a month and bought their album on top of their performances.

Polysics: Islington

They’re fantastic, but they had the misfortune of having the gig during the spell in the mid-summer when we had the record temperatures, which kinda spoiled it. Also the venue doesn’t have air-conditioning and the venue refused to leave the doors open!

The Stills: Shoreditch

Canadians do miserable mid-80s English indie-band – think Cure, Echo & the Bunnymen, but with a bit more of an upbeat side.

Transglobal Underground: Old Street

Davide at Nether World dragged me along to it, as they’re his mates, and I’m glad he did! A mixture of house/rave music and what gets termed “World music”, i.e. that which isn’t based on a rip-off of Chuck Berry riffs. On the down side, due to a lack of public transport in central London (!), I had to walk from the gig venue all the way to Vauxhall station in order to get the bus, instead of getting a bus from Liverpool St to Vauxhall, as was planned… bah!

Yo la Tengo: Kentish Town

2½ hr, including 3 encores, of feedback, indie-pop, piano ballads, and various other types of music.

Also various other obscure bands – so obscure, that I can’t remember their names! – in places in central London and the weekly Thursday gig night in Wimbledon.

UPDATE: See Obsolete for his list, which has a lot more detail than my list....

The Lone Carol Singer

I've stuck photos on Flickr from last night's SCOPA Carol Service/Protest. I'll do a proper write-up over the weekend...

UPDATE: I'll only do a short write-up on what happened as it's been more than adequately covered by Davide, Rachel and Tim, amongst others, and there's not that much to add, apart from the fact that I'd already decided on my SCOPA form to protest against carol singers - I was being seasonal, I didn't know at the time that Tim had this planned!

This was the coldest one yet - guess the freezing fog that's hanging around the Village and south-east England didn't help. It was more a case of keep moving and try and prevent frost-bite, even if you're not actually protesting...

After the usual one hour Tim handed out song sheets and candles and a saxophonist led us in traditional Christmas songs (one of the things I was protesting against!). Tim also passed round a bucket for charity and we raised over £80 plus 75 eurocents.

I should have worn more than one pair of socks - my toes went numb! - but at least we got warmed up in the pub afterwards - yay alcohol! - where Rachel handed out little muffins and I dished out some choccies I had on me (thank you work!).

Hi to the Disillusioned Kid, Rabbit Strike and the Chris from Radio 5's Pods & Blogs site.

The Lone Carol Singer

I've stuck photos on Flickr from last nights SCOPA Carol Service/Protest. I'll do a proper write-up over the weekend...

Not one, but three databases!

From the BBC:

The government has abandoned plans for a giant new computer system to run the national identity cards scheme.

Instead of a single multi-billion pound system, information will be held on three existing, separate databases.

Now the information will be spread across three existing IT systems, including the Department of Work and Pensions' (DWP) Customer Information Service, which holds national insurance records.

This might seem a good thing, but, one of the many reasons I'm opposed to the cards is the fact that the data will be linked together. all they're doing is swapping a big, independent database, for several smaller ones, all of which will be linked together - there's no real difference! On top of that, the information in the databases will have errors - what to do if the data in one conflicts with that in another?

Also, once again, the Tories and Lib Dems have the right idea:

Shadow Home Secretary, David Davis, for the Conservatives, said ... the decision to use existing databases was "an admission of what will turn out to be a financial disaster for the taxpayer".

He said Mr Reid "has tried to sneak this announcement out in a written statement that is not subject to scrutiny betrays just how fragile the government's confidence in their own scheme actually is".

Nick Clegg, for the Liberal Democrats, said: "These are sticking plaster measures in which the government is cutting corners to make the increasingly unpopular ID card scheme more palatable.

They can see what a disaster it'll be, why can't Labour?

Non-illegal protests?

According to the Parliament Protest blog comes word of a Bill in the House of Lords (the Public Demonstrations (Repeals) Bill) to repeal, amongst other things, the SCOPA Parliament protest ban. Unsurprisingly, the proposer is a Lib Dem Peer.

I don't think it's likely that it would pass as it'd mean that the government would vote to repeal part of its own Act.

I sent this email to her - hopefully others will do the same:

Dear Lady Miller

I came across a website which mentions your Bill to revoke, amongst other things, the SCOPA Parliament protest ban.

Thank you for proposing this, you have the majority of the public behind you.

I hope it passes as I am only one of many people who have had to waste the Police's time and taxpayers' money by registering in order to use my democratic rights.

Yours sincerely

Let's hope it gets a lot of publicity and passes!

Bliar's not as bad as Hitler!

The NO2ID campaign placed the following advert in the Guardian, which resulted in a total of 8 complaints (it's not known how many were from Labour people):




























Due to the number of complaints, the Advertising Standards Authority were called to make a decision on whether the ad should be removed due to it causing public offence. They said the following:

The ASA noted the ad had been intended to encourage discussion on a sensitive political issue. We considered that, although the ad may have been distasteful to some, it was unlikely to be seen as making a serious comparison between Tony Blair and Hitler but instead as highlighting a lobbying group's opinion that ID cards should not be introduced because of the threat to civil liberty they posed. We concluded that, as such, the ad was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offence.

You should read the full article including their judgement, it's quite interesting, especially the evidence the NO2ID people use.