England’s Chief Medical Officer has recommended that everyone be treated as an organ donor unless they opt out. Surveys show that around 70% of people would like to donate but only 20% of the population get around to putting their names on the donor register. It makes sense both morally and practically to have an [...]

“Innovation, design, and technology are all flowing into one another to form a single river of roaring change radically altering our culture, and especially business culture … [But] There are two great barriers to innovation and design in the world today. Ignorant CEOs and ignorant designers.”
Bruce Nussbaum argues that designers must accept business culture, [...]

iTWire reports that the Firefox web browser continues to make inroads into Internet Explorer-dominated territory. Web monitoring service XiTiMonitor reports that Firefox’s market share in Europe has increased dramatically in the last year, and especially in the last four months. The picture is very mixed across the continent, however, and while it has nearly 50% [...]

“That such a constraining and technical ‘line-by-line’ process is accepted by so many as a useful or necessary approach speaks volumes about how neutered politics has become – apparently everyone must sign up to an agreed version of the latest ’science’ before any debate or discussion can begin.”
Tony Gilland asks some very valid questions about [...]

Death Piglet reproduced by permission of Johan. Original here.

“We make the future in much the same way: we use reasoning and evidence to predict what we can, and whenever we bump up against uncertainty, we fill the void with the present day.”
Cory Doctorow argues that the way in which we interpret and use futurist predictions are dependant both upon what we are using [...]

“The United States and the European Union are close to signing an agreement that would allow their satellite navigation systems to work together to provide more accurate images and information.”
Reuters notes that allowing the two satellite systems to use the same frequency would bring benefits such as higher accuracy, a second option where one system’s [...]

“They tend to make martyrs of the accused, arousing sympathy for them … Most importantly, however, genocide denial laws suggest that we do not have the facts and the documentation to prove that these people are liars.”
I completely agree. However, Deborah Lipstadt later goes on to argue that such laws are an acceptable exception in [...]

“Four Russian diplomats will be expelled from Britain in response to Moscow’s refusal to hand over the ex-KGB agent accused of murdering Alexander Litvinenko.”
The government’s reaction to Russia’s refusal to extradite Andrei Lugovoy is justified and the correct response. Russia is hiding behind a political smokescreen, complaining that they cannot extradite a Russian citizen under [...]

Reproduced by kind permission of Chris from the Book of Biff, here.

“According to a new Facebook job posting, the company is looking for someone to run their stock option plan who knows how to deal with the SEC and Sarbanes-Oxley paperwork. Why would they need someone to do that?”
Inside Facebook, here, reports that the social network may be looking into an Initial Public Offering (IPO) on [...]

The SNP are arguing that because Scotland lands around 70% of the UK’s fishing catch, a minister of the Scottish parliament should represent the UK at EU fishing negotiations rather than someone from Westminster. While I see their point, I disagree. If Scotland and England negotiated every time there was a discrepancy like this, the [...]

“The slackening of the category of incitement under Britain’s anti-terror legislation – where you can now even be convicted of ‘indirect incitement’, a situation where your allegedly inflammatory words inspire someone somewhere to do something, even if it was not your intention – has seriously denigrated universal legal principles.”
The imprisonment of three men for expressing [...]

“The company added an auto-complete feature to its search offering Thursday … Yahoo’s search suggestions aren’t perfect, however. Start typing ‘Kinks,’ for example, and Yahoo will suggest the terms, ‘kinks,’ ‘the kinks,’ ‘kinks lyrics,’ ‘the kinks lyrics,’ and ‘kinks lola lyrics.’ Why the redundancies?”
Wired has a short analysis of Yahoo!’s new auto-complete function. It’s interesting [...]

“The Lib Dems want to cut the basic rate of income tax from 20p to 16p in tax changes they say will leave households earning up to about £68,000 better off.”
First, it seems likely that this is an opportunistic policy aimed at gaining more votes. And second, it is questionable whether or not all the [...]

This is great! Bob Dylan calmly rips apart a Time journalist’s entire profession and purpose in life. The interviewer just sits there looking weedy, lost for words as Dylan coolly explains why he doesn’t care what the journalist writes. From YouTube, here. Found via the Last.fm blog, here.

“On Monday, Reuters leaked news of a JP Morgan report that trumpeted the imminent arrival of a smaller, cheaper version of Apple’s new-age smarphone … Now, less than twenty-four hours later, The Unofficial Apple Weblog has dug up a new JP Morgan report that calls Chang [its author] an idiot - roughly speaking.”
I love the [...]

“When Waris was five, her mother held her down on a rock while another woman cut off parts of her genitals with a razor blade.”
As police offer a reward for anyone who helps convict those involved in female genital mutilation, Somali-born model Waris Dirie gives her personal account of the horrors she endured. Also known [...]

“A flotilla of plastic ducks is heading for Britain’s beaches, according to an American oceanographer.”
The times reports on 10,000 plastic ducks washed overboard in a 1992 storm. From the Pacific, the Friendly Floatees circled Japan, moved up towards Alaska, sailed through the Bering Strait and are now on course for Britain Times article here. [...]

If only I’d thought about this before blogging! From bLaugh, here.