IR35 was introduced because contractors often pay less income tax than employees (by using dividends from their one-man limited company, and by deferring income to maximise use of allowances). So the government is out money.

It seems they're fine being out this money if it's genuinely a business-to-business kind of deal. But not if it is disguised employment.

The only time I was ever asked to fill out IR35 paperwork I pointed out that I was contracting as an individual, rather than through a limited company, expressly because the contract was basically tantamount to employment and I had no interest in paying less than the full rate of tax. They were... surprised.

It can fire them, by removing them from their system. And they are paid wages - on a piecework basis rather than per hour, but at the employers' rates. This used to be very common in the UK before the trade union movement was strong.

The ruling actually gave 'worker' status, not 'employee'. The former carries only some of the obligations of the latter and is a sort of half way house between ongoing employment and being in business on your own account.

Critically, it does cone with rights to the minimum wage and holiday pay, though.

If you read the actual court judgment, you'll find a slight nuance. The algorithm was invented by Thales. They licenced it to EM. EM and another company called Delphi make immobilizer equipment using it and then sell the kit to Volkswagen and others. The researchers informed EM; EM failed to inform anyone else. VW found out a few weeks before publication and were pissed off.

Which is not to blame the researchers (except perhaps for notifying everyone, rather than simply the maker of the one component they compromised) but it does explain why the judge was fairly scathing: "It may well not be the defendants' fault that Volkswagen were not told earlier, but once the defendants were told about Volkswagen 's concern a responsible academic, concerned with responsible disclosure, would have realised that publication should be delayed, at least for a reasonable period, to allow for discussion with Volkswagen."

Sure. And those costs would then be offsettable against your profits for the purposes of paying tax on the bitcoins mined. You have been declaring them as taxable income, right?

It's worth bearing in mind that this is the second time that the Lib Dems have killed this particular bill. Also that their members are pretty virulently pro-privacy, and that the party currently has the balance-of-power in Parliament.

I'm sure something similar will be proposed again, but I'd be waiting until after the next election (2015) before it's likely to be passed.

Problems of schools gaming the stats not withstanding, this isn't a good approach. Your friends and family will have only anecdotal evidence of some schools at some periods of time; reputations tend to catch up with actual quality in the long run, but this can take several years.

In short, your algorithm is an excellent way of finding out what some people like you thought were good schools some years ago - it's not an efficient way to find out where your kid might be best off in the future.

Oxford's campus-wide wireless LAN project, OWL, operates like a hotspot scheme with open access points and a redirection to a login page for temporary credentials when you open a web browser. If you're a student or faculty member, you can instead use Cisco Anyconnect to access the university VPN and bypass the login screen.

Not only does the university support Anyconnect on Linux clients, it also provides guidance for setting up an entirely Free Software alternative for those who would rather not download the official software. It's really quite good.

Further details at http://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/network/wireless/

There's actually quite an extensive economic literature on what the optimal economic term of copyright might be. See for example Pollock, R., 2009. Forever Minus a Day? Calculating Optimal Copyright Term. Review of Economic Research on Copyright Issues, 6(1), pp.35-60.

The short answer is that the rational term is much lower than the present one - of the order of twenty years or less. The majority of works make no money that long after release, so the average economic value of the longer term is tiny, especially when the net present value of the income is calculated at a reasonable discount rate.

The school trips part of your argument (at least) is bogus. At state schools in Britain, nobody is obliged to pay for school trips (see http://www.education.gov.uk/popularquestions/childrenandfamilies/parenting/a005627/i-have-received-a-letter-from-my-childs-school-asking-for-contributions-towards-a-school-trip-do-i-have-to-pay) and merely being unemployed isn't going to stop you getting the begging letter.

It's worth pointing out, for those who don't know much about the British parliamentary system, that the title of this post isn't true. One of the Parliamentary Select Committees has recommended that the NHS should stop funding homoeopathy. This is not a decision and will not automatically result in the money being withdrawn. This should be seen as the starting of a conversation on the issue in Parliament. In reality, the government has effective control over public spending and unless and until the Department of Health decides to change the way its money is spent then there will be no change in practice.

Congresspeople and other politicans pay attention to three things: (1) manually typed, manually signed letters from registered voters with reasonable arguments and tone (2) contributions of $$$ (the more the better, but any amount gets attention) (3) contributions of manhours.

Disclaimer: I just answer these letters, I don't actually make policy...

We don't care if letters are posted, faxed, emailed or if people ring in. In either case we'll read 'em, log 'em and you'll get a letter back (love the franking privilege). You don't have to manually type it, though we prefer people who make an effort to write their own letters rather than paying a company to fax us on any issue the company feels is important (that's just evil).

If you don't want to write by hand, there's a web form at www.house.gov/writerep/ to work out zip->representative and send an email. If your rep doesn't like email, WriteRep will tell you.

Be careful with cash, as well - it's not legal to receive campaign contributions on federal property so sending $50 to Washington offices is a bit icky.

Basically, as a constituent you'll get decent treatment, and there's probably nothing you can put in your letter to make it get in front of your representatives themselves. If the staffer thinks it's an important enough issue (or if the volume is high enough) then action will be taken.

HTH,
Tom