October 30th, 2009

MI5, an ISP lawsuit and an e-petition: More opposition to piracy cut-off plans

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 5:33 am

Categories: Discussion, Government, Legal and political, Piracy and file-sharing

Tags: Lawsuit, Internet Service Provider, Piracy, Digital Television, Internet Service Providers (ISPs), Government, Peer To Peer (P2P), TVs, Internet, Personal Technology

There has been more controversy this week with a major Internet service provider, a petition set up to harness the power of democracy, but also the British Security Service, MI5, all opposing the cut-off laws which are being pushed through by a key figure in the British government’s cabinet.

The Digital Economy Bill, which will be brought to Parliament in the next few months, began with a good intention to bring positive change to how the country’s primary source of communication was run and would continue to work, such as:

“…delivering a universally available broadband in the UK by 2012 through a public fund, including funds released from the digital television switchover help scheme.”

However, Peter Mandelson, the Business Secretary, is trying to use this legislation to follow through his apparent own agenda to fight illegal file-sharing in form of cutting offenders off the web for the maximum of a year.

Both intelligence services, MI5 and MI6 have “voiced their concerns” regarding the disconnection of citizens who are found to be file-sharing as it will make monitoring and surveillance far more difficult, while police and major law enforcement units in London are concerned due to the amount of evidence that will no longer be able to be collected as a result of these bans.

• Read more: Student suicide threat over RIAA bullying tactics
• Read more: Downloading content illegally vs. getting away with it
• Read more: Universities in hot water over students’ peer-to-peer sharing

It is important to say that Mandelson does not see “widespread account suspension” resulting, and that the “technical measures” (cutting off the Internet to offenders) will be a “last resort”.

Meanwhile, TalkTalk, a major ISP in the UK with ownership rights over Tiscali and AOL and serving over four million users, are threatening legal action against either the government for enacting the policy or even Mandelson directly.

Last month the ISP, who are massively against the three-strike plan, demonstrated how with many unsecured wireless networks still existing, how easy it would be to download illegal content or media through another connection.

With this, Andrew Heaney, TalkTalk’s executive director of strategy and regulation, has taken advantage of the Government’s e-petition service, asking the prime minster to:

“… abolish the proposed law that will see alleged illegal file-sharers disconnected from their broadband connections, without a fair trial.”

If you have or had British citizenship, you are more than welcome to sign the petition which can be found here.

As and when news develops on this rather interesting and somewhat personal topic, you’ll find it here.

October 25th, 2009

Universities in hot water over students' peer-to-peer sharing

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 4:42 pm

Categories: Breaking news, Downloads, Government, Legal and political, Money, Piracy and file-sharing, University, University fun

Tags: Network, P2P, British Broadcasting Corp., Student, File-sharing, Peer To Peer (P2P), Government, Internet, Zack Whittaker

The battle against online piracy is heating up: a new artist led initiative is taking on the diplomatic and negotiation approach whereas governments and legislators are hitting down punitive policies on their citizens.

Jon Newton of p2pnet, alongside Billy Bragg, musician and director of the Featured Artists Coalition, have begun work on a2f2a.com, a campaign started to discuss how artists can cut out the middleman - such as the suicide inducing RIAA - and ensure artists are fairly remunerated.

Along with their mission statement, the efforts seem to be focused towards not only admitting there is no technological solution to the problems artists already face, but that users would be “willing to pay for music if they can be sure that the money is going to the artists whose work they enjoy.”

File sharing itself is not illegal; what is shared, exactly, could be. With BitTorrent being used to distribute emerging artists’ music on a wide and free scale, or services such as BBC iPlayer which rely on peer-to-peer technology to reduce the load on the central services - file sharing technology cannot be simply eradicated.

Read the rest of this entry »

October 16th, 2009

Governments: Listen to citizens on broadband action

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 5:42 pm

Categories: Discussion, Government, Gratuitous rant, Money

Tags: Finland, Broadband, Government, Internet, Broadband Internet, Network Technology, Telecommunications, Vertical Industries, Wireless And Mobility, Networking

This week, Finland announced that broadband was “a right, not a privileged” and classified Internet access as important as other household supplies - water, gas and electricity.

The UK however is still fairly firm in its boots that nationwide 2MB ADSL broadband will be rolled out to every house by 2012, yet Finland will be rolling out nationwide 100MB fibre-optic broadband by 2015 - two years earlier than the UK’s plans to roll out fibre, according to the BBC.

But to be fair, Finland not only has natural resources which it can still harvest but it also has excellent international relations. Such things as national security are not as high on the agenda as the UK’s.

Perhaps then this gives their government a little more to spend in terms of nationwide broadband access; allowing them to provide much faster speeds at a cheaper overall cost, in a shorter time period, unlike the British government which frankly still thinks it has the right to police the world.

Nevertheless, there are conflicting governance issues around the Internet, ironically only a week after the US government relaxed its control measures on how the Internet is run.

• Read more: Gov. to pirates: we’ll slow you down, not cut you off
• Read more: My month-long dial-up diary
• Read more: Broadband Britain, Accelerating America

The Internet is a right, and not a privilege. It is a necessity in post-modern times and without it the world would crumble. Not only does this show our societal dependency on an inter-connecting network of information but it shows how far we have come.

I believe the Internet should have some governance by entities elected in by the people based on real-world usage.

Take the laws on wireless network access. If someone leaves their wireless network unsecured and somebody comes along and accesses it, that is considered theft and under the UK Communications Act. This is similar to common law elements, such as leaving a laptop or a phone in an unlocked car. Just because the car (in this case a wireless network) is open, doesn’t mean somebody else can come and take it.

To me, that makes sense, even though the law is open to interpretation. Cutting people off from the Internet because they shared a file is unnecessary and frankly unethical. A reasonable and proportional fine could be imposed as a result of copyright infringement or illegal sharing, as opposed to ones which are entirely overboard, or a civil case could be brought against the representatives of the item which was shared and justice served in this sense. The former would work better, though.

Nevertheless, it is time governments returned to their constituent grass-roots and listened to the hearts of the communities beating. Forget the think-tanks, ignore the focus groups and don’t bow down to pressure from the corporations and industry fiends. Give the people what they want, or ignore them and lose the next election. Your choice.

October 12th, 2009

Cloud storage vs. flash storage: Security vs. simplicity

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 3:15 pm

Categories: Cloud computing, Government, Hardware, Productivity, Security, University

Tags: Security, Storage, USB Flash Drive, Robin Harris, Flash Memory, Zack Whittaker

A few weeks ago I bought a Kingston 2GB flash drive from my local music store. Only after I got back home that afternoon I wondered why I had actually bought it. I had no use for it (pot calling the kettle black) but still thought it could be useful in one of those moments where data transfer was needed and the network had failed hopelessly.

Robin Harris seems to think that optical media is as good as dead. As a non-read-only medium, I would agree with him. They are still mighty useful for distributing films and software, but flash drives seem to be taking over in some respects.

So in a vain effort to publicly and perhaps pointlessly sort out this conundrum for myself, I’ll weigh them up against each other.

A majority of the developed world has access to a broadband connection. In places such as schools, colleges and universities, the Internet connection is far faster than those commercially available. With integration now between Office and SkyDrive as well as other non-Microsoft combinations, saving a document to an online storage provider is as simple as saving it to your hard disk - and the file is available from anywhere, including mobiles.

Flash drives for me are my last ditch alternative. It’s my backup for when my Internet connection occasionally drops (feel free to detect the element of sarcasm in that). Then, I use it to transfer data from one place to another; more often than not a large movie from a friend’s computer to mine or vice versa. I also use it as an ultimate backup device - in the context of needing to give a presentation and having it there in my pocket just in case the network epically fails.

Then again, for those in student accommodation living in halls of residence, they will find that their Internet speeds are throttled to act as a quality-of-service moderator for other users. That said, most student digs are supplied with Ethernet ports, so the intranet speeds between computers in your block of flats are incredibly fast. To transfer things across the Ethernet network is near instant and much quicker than transferring to a flash drive and walking to the other room.

Flash drives also have the potential to become riddled with malware which not only self-replicate once they plug in to other machines but they exploit the nature of the device itself by installing auto-starting applications. Network administrators spend many of their waking hours clearing up the mess from devices which are infected with malware as I have previously written mentioned.

But because the cloud services are actually a bunch of servers sitting in a warehouse in Arizona and provided by organisations who can afford it, the need to protect themselves is greater than that to protect the user. So you can bet that the physical security and anti-malware features will be pretty substantive. You don’t get this on a flash drive.

However with flash drives, you have the feeling knowing that the data you hold dearly to your heart is in fact dearly in your pocket, protected and safe. It cannot be hacked into or manipulated when it is in there. You can be mugged, though. But even if you get rained on and your flash drive gets mashed in the weather, because of the solid-state goodness, the device is almost always salvageable. It’s not an excuse to drop it in the bath or down the toilet, though.

Ultimately, the cloud is a highly scalable and as secure as it can get, and the flash drive in my opinion is outdated and insecure - especially in corporate/government and university environments - but more practical than optical media. When it comes down to it, user preference always counts more than what I or any other journalist says. Personally, I prefer the cloud, but simply because it’s free.

Thoughts?

September 28th, 2009

University registration dogged by poor communication and ancient IT

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 7:05 am

Categories: Events, Government, Gratuitous rant, Money, University

Tags: Information Technology, Student, Loan, Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), Productivity, Investment, Government, Financial Accounting, Smart Cards, Human Resources

For those in the UK, the issues around student loans and university financing have been hitting the headlines over the last few weeks.

There are two ways to get a student loan through student financing: means testing and non-means testing. Means testing is basing your incoming loan depending on what your parents earn in effort to ease the burden on the Student Loans Company, the public-sector body which regulates and dishes out loans to students. The other is a simple case of sign a few documents and once your university confirms you, your loan transfers into your bank account.

Why?

That is, however, if the university decide to register you after all.

For returning students especially, pretty much everybody knows who you are. With your university ID and smart card (which I shall be writing about later today) re-registering for another year should be simple. Not always, I am afraid to say.

Dozens of students have come to the office telling me (I’m welfare officer for one of the colleges) that the Student Records system will not allow them to register because of an “unknown error”. Why?

Often the reason is because the student owes money to the university. You register for one year, get your student loan through as a result of registration (as a check to ensure you are in fact at university), study for that year, go home at the end and go through the process again. However if you owe the university money, in form of accommodation costs into the thousands or even a library fine which costs a few pounds, they will not allow you to register until that is cleared.

But the problem is that there is no definitive way of telling you so. The communications between the universities, the Student Loans Company and the students are atrocious. Instead of being told about the massive delay in means tested loans, they opted for the country’s media and a government department to report it instead.

The government says that we should pay more in tuition fees. Some of us wouldn’t mind if we got our damned loans through on time to pay it.

The main trouble, as I see it, is the lack of communication along with prehistoric systems which do not make way for the differences in communications and technologies nowadays.

Fixing it

Registration is a simple process where you access your student record through the Student Records system, check a few boxes and make sure your details are in fact correct, and that confirms you as a student for another year. But along with that, this process sends a notification to the Students Loan Company which then authorises them to release your loan.

But with the infrastructure difficulties and so many students accessing the Student Records system at the same time, no wonder the system is slow, messed up and causing all kinds of grief.

For the time being, all I can do is console those with worries and ensure them that this will be sorted out soon enough. The problem is that this will carry on year after year with the same difficulties because it is not considered “broken enough”.

Has your loan arrived late due to computer malfunction or lack of communication issues? TalkBack.

September 16th, 2009

Could Internet filtering cause more harm than good?

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 5:16 pm

Categories: Discussion, Environment, Government, Legal and political, Security

Tags: Imagery, Child, Internet, Zack Whittaker

Countries around the world are steadily rolling out filtering systems which block citizens from viewing child abuse imagery. With the United Kingdom and New Zealand with independent filters in place, and Australia potentially soon after, Internet censorship is becoming common practice across the world.

What many don’t realise is the true extent of governmental filtering across the web.

I take on two perspectives here. One, I am a godfather of two beautiful little children which I would gladly take a bullet for. Two, I worked albeit for a relatively short time in the child protection sphere. While children frankly drive me up the wall, my views and opinions on keeping them safe could well be considered controversial to the vast majority of Republicans and Daily Mail readers.

Australia is a tricky one. Because of their legislative power running through a two-chamber system, their present government cannot push through enough votes to secure the filter being activated. As of today, it is very unlikely the filter will go ahead until more votes are drawn in in the next general election, in favour of the Rudd cabinet.

But looking at the broad spectrum of governmental filtering across nations, the one and main reason these vast Internet filters seem to want to accomplish is the reduction in access to child sexual abuse imagery. All good and well, you would say.

From a professional point of view, paedophilia is an illness; a genuine psychological condition which causes a sexual interest in children, whereas a convicted child sex offender (CCSO) is a branding caused by a consciously committed offence against a child of a sexual nature. One is an illness and poses a potential risk to children, whereas the other is a branding of conviction caused by someone who acted upon their desires.

The two sides to these filters is firstly by reducing (with the aim of entirely removing) the chance of a citizen being exposed to child sexual abuse imagery, and the other is to prevent people seeking out child sexual abuse imagery to satisfy their urges. Both are preventative measures, but the latter is something which cannot be avoided without medical intervention.

The filter would not deter paedophiles or CCSO’s from indulging in their desires. The World Wide Web has been around for nearly two decades, but anthropologically speaking in Western society, these crimes would have been accomplished without the aid of an international network of computers. In some areas of the world, what we would call crimes are societal normality’s and even though we would be horrified to see it, their society dictates differently.

Point being, removing access to child sexual abuse imagery online would not deter those who are determined enough. Previous non-offenders could potentially seek out children in their determination to fulfil their need and drive the issue underground and away from law enforcement.

Even though every time a child sexual abuse image is viewed, it essentially perpetuates the abuse further, but one could argue that physically assaulting a child is somewhat in an entirely different league to the aforementioned.

This aside, Internet filtering around the world is far more widespread than the average user thinks. For example:

• United Kingdom has Cleanfeed - provided by the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) to identify child sexual abuse imagery and provides a simple 404 error message. ISP’s can if they wish use their own systems.
• Norway provides a DNS filter which blocks access to child sexual abuse imagery deemed so by the regulatory authorities.
• Germany asked Google.de to block access to anything which is deemed to incite Nazi propaganda, which is somewhat appropriate due to the country’s history.
• The Czech Republic passes not only Internet but mobile web traffic through the UK’s Cleanfeed system.

In the US, because of the First Amendment, Internet filtering would be considered a violation, whereas some would consider the DMCA an act of filtering to remove content which is deemed copyright.

So a simple question to ask you, the audience: could Internet filtering at governmental level cause more harm than good?

Because of Pandora’s Box theory - once something happens, it can never be undone and is no doubt deemed to repeat itself in the future. Where does it stop? Should the Internet be entirely monitored and blocked to ensure the safety of its users? When is Internet filtering an abuse of governmental power, and how should it be regulated?

One thing is for sure, and that is the Internet cannot be open and fully accessible for everyone with what we see and experience in post-modern society.

Comment away. It will be interesting to see where this one goes.

September 1st, 2009

Apology solicited for death of computing founding father Turing

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 7:48 am

Categories: Discussion, Government, Hardware, Legal and political, Major breakthroughs, diversITy

Tags: Work, Computing, Computer, Enigma, Productivity, Zack Whittaker

Alan Turing can rightly be called the founding father of computing. Born in 1912, he studied mathematics and logic, and was not only one of the most advanced computer scientists of his age, but of the entire generation.

During the Second World War, he solved the Enigma code - the code used by Nazi Germany to send encrypted messages from one place to another. He worked at Bletchley Park, the foundation of modern day GCHQ, which is the third leg of the British intelligence services, which provides electronic support and signal interception.

However, with decrypting the Enigma came a dilemma. It was, and still is to some extent, considered that during the Coventry Blitz, one of the most devastating air-raids on British territory, the Enigma code was intercepted and Winston Churchill, the prime minister at the time, knew about the impending raid.

But as not to let on that they had cracked the Enigma code, no defensive measures were brought in. Hundreds of people were killed, in the hope that the decrypted Enigma code would go on to save many others.

As a result of his work, the Allies were able win the war. (And yes, thank you America, even to this day we recognise your support, albeit a tad late).

With his knowledge of mathematics and computing, he developed further theories and understanding into artificial intelligence, which then led him to creating the Turing test - a test performed to a computer to gauge whether the computers’ response and that of a humans were indistinguishable.

Not only that, his work created one of the first primitive super computers (which wouldn’t even compare to that of a modern day computer, to be fair). As the Independent reported when GCHQ revealed details of his work:

“Colossus [the computer] contained 1,500 valves, 10 times more than other electronic machines of the day. It was designed to run through millions and millions of possible settings for the code wheels on the German enciphered teleprinter system, processing 5,000 characters a second.”

Turing was, and still is, a national treasure for the United Kingdom. But amongst all his achievements and his extraordinary work — work which helped the Allies win the war — he was gay.

• Read more: diversITy: can being gay hold your career back?
• Read more: Google colors their ads for Gay Pride week

Because of the now-clearly abhorrent laws we had, he was convicted under the gross indecency act of law which punished homosexuality. As a result of this, his national security clearance with GCHQ was revoked and due to the Soviet era already heightening tensions, he was essentially hung out to dry. He could not practice the work he had loved, and was not able to discuss the work he had accomplished.

Two years later, he committed suicide at the tragically premature age of 41.

As a result, the Number 10’s E-Petition service (which I have previously written about) has been inundated with signatures for a petition which asks the present Prime Minister to apologise for past the governments mistakes, and to posthumously exonerate him from any convictions.

It is mentioned that an official apology is unlikely due to the fact no known surviving family can be there to receive it. Nevertheless the symbolic nature of these actions would still go towards something rather poignant.

If you have or had British citizenship, you are more than welcome to sign the petition, which can be found here.

August 31st, 2009

An open letter to the RIAA: Illegal file sharing problem solved?

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 6:11 am

Categories: Discussion, Government, Legal and political, Major breakthroughs, Money, Multimedia, Piracy and file-sharing

Tags: Revenue, RIAA, U.K., File-sharing, Peer To Peer (P2P), Taxes, Free Trade, Internet Service Providers (ISPs), Personal Finance, Internet

Dear the Recording Industry Association of America (the “RIAA”),

I know I’ve said some harsh things before, and to be honest, I still stick by them. The Family Guy musical sketch describing the characters’ opinions of the FCC could well be replicated here in view of your own organisation.

However, today I offer you a potential solution to the illegal file sharing problem that seems to have gripped the world stage.

In a nutshell, if you live in the United States and are caught downloading illegally, you can consider yourself already bankrupt, as the RIAA will sue you into the ground. However, under new legislation in the UK, instead of hefty fines, the Government could order your ISP to cut off your broadband connection.

This has annoyed the ISPs on this side of the pond because they claim while they provide the service, it is not their job to police how their customers use it.

The problem

I honestly believe that with the price of media at the moment, the vast majority of people would be content in buying media online - provided they could have it there and then in a download. The problem is that many popular items are simply not available online to buy. Granted, this has changed with the Amazon and iTunes wave of technologies and services, but it still isn’t up to scratch.

Also, the peer-to-peer technology and online file sharing is an open Pandora’s Box and now cannot be closed. You can attempt to take random people to court and financially send them back into the Stone Age, but you cannot convict everyone.

The recording and broadcasting industries must change to survive. You cannot sustain the business model you once had because the times have changed, along with the content delivery system and the generation of people.

Read the rest of this entry »

August 14th, 2009

British PM at TED: "First generation to change the world for the better"

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 11:49 am

Categories: Discussion, Events, Government, Legal and political, Next-generation technology, Security, University fun, Web 2.0

Tags: Prime Minister, Video, Corporate Communications, Performance Management, Marketing, Human Resources, Workforce Management, Zack Whittaker

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is an unlucky man. Within the first few days of his premiership, there were nationwide floods, a foot-and-mouth outbreak and attempted terror attacks in London that were only discovered through sheer luck.

The extent of this man’s bad luck was emphasized by popular Irish comedian, Dara O’Briain yesterday which would extend to him finding a chain in the Lake District on his recent holiday, wondering what it is, pulling on it and ending up watching as the entirety of the Lake District just drain out through a hole in the ground where the plug was. The video is here - it’s hilarious but absolutely not safe for work.

But amidst all this, he spoke at TED, widely confirmed as one of the most brilliant conferences of modern time where the very cream of the crop of intelligence, knowledge and understanding come together to share their thoughts.

A friend of mine, Steve Clayton, summed up his experience of the video:

“I’ve always pondered that given his lacklustre performances we regularly see on TV. It shows how much our impressions are formed by the media as I thought this performance was brilliant. He spoke passionately, excitedly and with humour. For 18 minutes I was actually transfixed by our Prime Minister. He was really rather good and he seems to understand the power of the web to change the world. OK you can argue that he made lots of bold statements and action are how we should be judged but one pure delivery, it was the best I have seen from him.”

This video really shows how much power this generation has with the Internet and the good that can come from using it to speak out and use technology to our advantage. I strongly recommend you take 20 minutes from your day, sit down with a cup of tea and listen to his vision for using the wired web for a global good. Besides, he ain’t half funny for a middle-aged politician…

July 31st, 2009

£10bn national ID card scheme vs. £65m cuts in higher education

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 9:15 am

Categories: Breaking news, Government, Legal and political, Productivity, Security, University

Tags: Education, Card, National ID Card, U.K., Identity Card, Government, Zack Whittaker

Two very controversial topics met in the middle today, when one potentially pointless national identity card scheme which would cost the UK taxpayer between £10-20bn according to the London School of Economics, and a cut of £65m in higher education at university level would cut a further 1,500 full time lecturing and support staff.

Even though the two stories are entirely unconnected, caused by decisions in two separate UK government departments, it has nonetheless sparked anger with union leaders.

Wes Streeting, president of the National Union of Students, spoke to me earlier on:

“Given the huge pressures on public finances in the midst of this recession, we understand that government must make difficult choices about spending priorities. But the fact that the government is pressing ahead with non-essential and expensive projects like ID cards while university teaching budgets are being cut would suggest that the government hasn’t got its priorities right.”

The Home Secretary pushed ahead with the scheme, which is supposed to offer fraud protection and another tool to fight the war on terror, but opposition leaders say it is money spent which the UK cannot afford. Even though the cost of the card will “even out” as the cards are paid for by citizens, the amount of taxpayer investment into the project and the fact that the cards will not be compulsory has sparked even more anger.

Dave Page, spokesperson for No2ID, a pressure group designed to counteract the plans said:

“Once you are on that database, you can never come off it. From the moment you’re registered you’ll have to tell the authorities of any change in your circumstances for the rest of your life - and pay whatever fees they ask for the ’service’.

You’ll never know who’s looking at your details. It won’t protect our safety. It won’t be convenient - except for Whitehall. This scheme is an expensive and dangerous con.”

The BBC provided an example card which shows the final design for the non-compulsory identity card. To see the full-sized image including the back of the card, follow the link on the image.

It seems the UK is the only country that is really pushing for identity cards. The only national identity card in the US is in form of a passport. There have been plans to roll out separate identity cards but the “plans are unlikely to pass because states view the proposal of a national ID card as an infringement on their state rights“.

With the Real ID Act 2005 introducing a national ID card controversy for the US, many are against the scheme. So far, nineteen states have rejected the idea throwing the scheme close to failing. After speaking to my friend, Bryant Zadegan, he believes (paraphrasing) that more states will reject it causing the Obama administration to try and pigeonhole the idea, if not already.

Australia is in a similar situation in that people mostly seem to oppose a national ID card. After speaking to a recently graduated Australian student, most people have some form of high-value identification with them anyway and claim their right to privacy.

Going back to the point about university teaching cuts, the fact of the matter is simple. Around £10-20bn has or will be spent on a national ID card scheme which isn’t even compulsory, yet England’s universities will face massive cutbacks on teaching staff because the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills needs to save money.

The chief executive of Universities UK, Diana Warwick, said:

“We said back in May, when the secretary of state first outlined this £65m cut, that this was a blow to institutions, not least in that the detail of the institutional allocation would not be available until now, so late in the year. This has made planning for the year ahead, 2009-10, all the more difficult in what is already a very challenging financial climate.”

But at the same time, the government announced that it will be opening up an extra 10,000 places for prospective students, but won’t be able to fund them because of the mentioned cutbacks. The “priority course” areas include technology and computer science, but the equipment isn’t the be-all and end-all - the teaching staff and lecturers are.

Is it just me, or does any of this simply not add up? “We’ll cut your funding but we’ll give you more places. And we cut your funding so we can invest in pointless schemes which won’t actually have any benefit.”

The world, or at least the UK, has gone utterly stark raving mad.