I cannot believe there are so many comments with a lack of understanding of what 100/1 is. I cannot believe one of them has been modded +3 interesting.
100/1 means if you bet £1 and the bet wins, you get your £1 stake back and your winnings of £100. Their winnings aren't 1%, they are 100x i.e. 10000%. So if contact was made, the bookmaker would lose £100 on a £1 bet, and hence would have somehow had to turn that £1 into £101 beforehand in order to not make a loss. Forget the people talking about how 3% is impossible, there is NO savings account or bond that'll let you do that in a year.
I think you misread the quote above, he was talking about people who were taking the other side, ie Betting that contact wasn't made..... so 1/100 odds, or 1%.....
And therefore arguing that it was brilliant by the bookie, he keeps the nut job's money outright, and he only has to pay 1% to the people the bet the other way...... As he said...Brilliant!
I think in many ways it is better to have all this information stored forever. As with most decisions, the more information you have the more informed a decision you can make...
I think the argument that people forget and therefore can forgive is true, but I think we need to then adapt how we forgive. If we accept that people change, then it doesn't matter that we have a store of someone's past actions - we can let then 'reinvent' themselves while still knowing where they came from.
Right now that may be difficult, but that's because the internet is still a relatively new phenomena in Human history. As we progress, I assume we'll evolve to accept that all our actions are remembered indefinitely, and mature to not let past events completely out way current ones.
That does not compute.