Yes it certainly does. Unfortunately our country's laws are now changed at the behest of a semi-hostile foreign power, the USA, or an unelected foreign government, the European Commission, rather than the citizens of the country

Old it might be, but it's still hilarious

Just been to Slovakia and mine was connected to Orange's network all the time I was there, so I guess they must have reinstated it

As a British citizen with direct experience of two such cases, I would argue (with some degree of authority) that what's wrong with your argument is interpretation of what you've read (and the posters above too)

In the UK civil courts, both sides must prove the veracity of their arguments. Thus the plaintiff must show that the respondent's utterances were defamatory, and the respondent must must prove the veracity of his defence, by showing them to be truthful, justified or whatever defence he has chosen to employ. If you can prove the statement is true you will not be found to be guilty of defamation. The difference between the allowable and the absolute defence of truth in the UK & US courts respectively is merely this; in the US truth is an absolute defence and the justice systems explicitly forbids the court from finding in favour of the plaintiff, in the UK it is an allowable defence and historical precedence guides the court that in such cases the plaintiff cannot claim slander if the utterances were truthful.

Civil actions are not about proof as criminal cases are, they're more about putting forward a convincing argument.

Journalistic freedom is highly prized in the UK, and, though journalists' employers may run scared of litigation on occasion, it's very rare for such actions to be successful, and those which are are more often than not overturned at appeal.

The cases discussed here are viewed entirely differently (and rightly so) from the tabloid rumour-mongering which abounds in our newspaper industry

Or surely you would outsource it to someone you trust?

Indeed, the human can think creatively. It's true a computer is faster and to a degree better in many things, but not at making creative decisions based on unforseen events. This is why I believe it won't be possible to persuade large sections of the public that autonomous aircraft are a good thing - a ground programmer is unlikely to forsee, and code solutions to, any event beyond the extents of current flight training.

It's no triviality, the exporting of data. It's a serious breach of UK & European law. If they survive long enough to be hauled over the coals by each data commissioner they're unlikely to survive that process.

One of the great annoyances is that the quoted refund is so much more here - 40GBP is about US$66. So why are Microsoft charging us $66 for the same thing you can buy in the US for $40?

Why capitalize Lord? In UK English one would only do that if Lord were an acronym, not a proper noun as it is here. I believe US English follows largely the same rule, though I may be wrong not being an American.

Probably true in the US where most cars have auto-transmission, less so in parts of the world where manual gearbox is the norm, such as Europe. At least some form of hands free system leaves you with free hands to change gear and steer. Been in quite a few taxis where the driver's let go fo the wheel to change gear 'cos his other hand's full of phone

We used to blame immoral living etc, say these phenomenon were a demonstration of God's wrath etc,

Now we do seem to blame every small shower on global warming.

I like the idea of a warmer globe, was raised in Scotland which is too cold most of the year. I like the idea of California sinking beneath the waves, and London too and many other places. In fact, try as I might, I'm hard pushed to see the downsides of it at all

I think in this example it would be. We do have an extradition treaty with the USA (which they sometimes honour, though most times not), so assuming a successful application for extradition they would be prosecuted under UK law - just as the Lockerbie bombers were, who in essence instigated their offence from Hamburg with the loading of the luggage containing the barometric triggers bombs

The "how dare you suggest a US citizen be subject to any foreigner's copyright retrictions" attitude from many of our American contributors puts a whole new perspective to me on the US administration's concerns about software piracy in the far east, particularly China, and on the American RIAA's continuous battle to empty all our wallets for committing what are often Fair Use infringements.

In Europe we have two sets of pertinent directives, one on waste electrical equipment (WEEE Directive), one on packaging. Both are designed to make the producer of the end product (not the components therein) responsible for the costs of disposal and recycling

Since the EU is an huge market for all producers of such products, the design requirements are already built in to comply with this and several other directives, notable recently is RoHS, which banned amongst other things, lead in most solders, and certain bromide fire retardants. It's not economical for manufacturers to produce multiple versions of products, so they will seek to minimise the number of versions as much as possible, and indeed, most electrical equipment sold in the US today complies with all pertinent EU directives on waste management, recyclability, chemical composition etc. I can buy servers from the US and they'll arrive CE marked with RoHS compliance statements in the box.

How the compliance with WEEE Directive works varies between the various EU states, but in the UK collection and recycling is done by local authorities who bill a central pool of money on a per unit basis. That pool of money is paid into by the producers of equipment on a per unit sold basis. in some other EU states it's done by the retailers.

Point is, it can be done, and has been done already - the system's not perfect, but at least it's a start on forcing manufacturers to consider what happens to their products at end of life. The EU's next target for this concept is car manufacturers.

Incidentally, we saw no price rises at consumer level when this directive was enacted, electrical equipment continued it's natural downwards price trend unchanged. We just got the same rip-off prices we always have had

Yes, but does Wikipedia apply this safeguard only to those whose family or employer have some link back to the powers that be within Wikipedia? And if so, what does that mean for it's standing as an unbiased collective work

It's been pointed out many times above that their normal policy is the more usual journalistic one of "publish and be damned".

It's unarguable that publication would have served the kidnappers' ends more than those of his victim, but that is true of all such kidnappings, and it seems that Wikipedia has no qualms publishing them normally.