retree

Pfft - in my day we used to power our web servers using a potato: http://d116.com/spud/

Correct me with I'm wrong - but I think all DMCA notices have to be electronically signed by a human under penalty of perjury.

Whilst I think only one or two people have been convicted of sending false DMCA notices, the penalties are stiff enough to not let a program sign DMCA notices on my behalf.

I think the effect is more significant at Oxbridge though. At Oxbridge you have "supervisions" or "tutorials" as an undergrad. These consist of a 1-on-1 lesson with a fellow or grad student where you are questioned mercilessly on every section of your essay or problem set for an hour. They ask you about every single sentence or step in your solutions. You have to prepare carefully, and even then you have to learn to wing it, because they're going to find flaws you didn't know existed. Given that there is no-one else to back you up or interject with an answer, if you don't learn to wing it quickly, you're screwed.

Oh, and most of this article about Oxbridge is complete crap. I'm working 10 hours a day for 6 days a week in order to prepare for my exams this term at Cambridge, and I'm one of the lighter workers (including English/Classics students). I've never been offered sherry (though I did get some wine at the end of last term), and the interview process is nothing like he described. It's bloody intense. I had 2 interviews and 2 tests in a day and felt like I didn't answer a single question correctly.

As someone else mentioned, if prospective applicants take this article at face value they're in for a nasty shock.

DA notices aren't legally enforceable though. Most newspapers comply voluntarily.

They're overseen by a committee of both government representatives and those from the press and news distribution (including Google's Europe head of PR)

see http://www.dnotice.org.uk/

I like the no comment scores, orange dot idea (which has made a comeback).

I hope it leads to less of the mob voting mentality which seems to take hold every so often in some of the more popular threads and less of the "Sorry I downvoted you" comments that appear every so often.

On the other hand, comment scores are a very quick and easy way to see what's popular, which is still normally an informative comment. Having to wade through a lot of highly voted comments may take a bit more effort but will expose people to a greater variety of opinions.

But how come Scandinavian and many European countries manage do provide it?

The simple answer is we don't.

England has a body called NICE (National Institute for Health and Clinical Evidence) who assess each and every treatment. They're a body of experts who look at all the evidence on a particular treatment and work out how much it will cost and how much of an improvement it will bring to a persons life. It it doesn't reach a certain threshold - measured in cost per QUALYs (quality adjusted life years) - the government won't pay.

It comes in for criticism every so often (usually when it won't fund a new, very expensive cancer drug) but in the physicians (and government's) eyes it does a very good job for something so hard.

This makes a lot of sense and echoes my experience. I'm lucky enough to study Engineering at one of the (if not the) top universities for Engineering in the UK. It also has a reputation for being one of the most theoretical in the country.

Right from day one, we have design orientated tasks, whether or not it's a structural design project linking in with our structures course, or designing an automated robot in a team from scratch (combining the mechanical, software and electrical courses). I think they've realised that people become Engineers because they want to see the fruits of their labour physically and not just in a purely mathematical sense.

I know without these design projects and frequent lectures from leaders in industry I would quickly lose sight of what I'm actually doing and would almost certainly have transferred course.

I also find that the World News section of the Times is second to none (in terms of depth), and yes, that includes the BBC.

This won't last very long.

I just hope they don't start confiscating them off visitors at border points like they've been to know to do with guide books before now.

No, travel costs $500-$1000 per month

If you're careful, travelling can be even cheaper. I went travelling through Vietnam, China, Mongolia and Russia on my own this year and probably spent ~$10 a day, and that includes food, accommodation and travel. If you're young, stay in decent hostels and never fly.

Take the train everywhere and even if you don't speak the same language, people are incredibly friendly and generous. One of my best memories was drinking vodka with a group of Russian soldiers whilst on the Trans-Siberian.

    - People don't hate Americans

A good article. Too often I feel the debate about wikileaks has become polarised.

On the one hand you have those saying everything should be open and available. And then on the other hand you have those who say that nothing should be leaked because it puts people at risk.

There is no doubt that, in the world, there are some very unpleasant people who want to harm/kill other people, and for that reason surely some things should be kept secret? But then surely those trying to protect us should be held accountable? There is a fine line, and people draw that line at different points.

Wikileaks provides a valuable service, but I do find it ironic that, for an organisation that tries to cut through and destroy government PR/propoganda, Julian Assange is very good at using similar PR to further his goals.

John Young of Cryptome has been very happily leaking documents without the whole "not staying in the same place for than 2 nights" mentality that Assange has.

It's true, my college tenancy agreement explicitly says "The student agrees ... not to use the room for any professional trade or business."

Not only businesses, but any jobs are forbidden at Cambridge as well. If you're not allowed to work behind a bar for minimum wage, it's sort of implied that they're hardly going to look kindly upon you running a business are they?

It's definitely true that the UK has lots of startups. But I think the problem is that people at universities, or university staff don't even consider it. Looking at the two best known (to your average consumer) startups in the UK - Betfair and Ocado, both were started by people in their mid 30s. I can't think of many started by people in their early 20s, which I think is a huge oppurtunity being missed.

There is definitely a stigma of failing. It feels like if your startup fails in the USA it isn't too big a problem, you just pick yourself up and start again. In Europe I get the impression that a failed start up reflects poorly on you - leading to a risk averse culture.

it is taboo to drop out of universities, which remain poor incubators

This is definitely true. I'm currently at a top UK university, and there is very little incentive to start a startup. Whilst a friend a Stanford has access to an entrepreneur group with a budget of half a million dollars just for having a good idea, we have business plan writing competitions.

The very idea of dropping out of universities is met with horror, by other students, staff and relatives. They would rather you just go through uni and get a job at a nice bank or accounting firm somewhere. Starting a startup as a student isn't the norm, there seems to be too much friction.

There also appears to be much less of a can-do atmosphere and much more aversion to risk in the UK for current university students. This isn't to say there isn't a good startup scene here - but it's mostly hardware/biotech; most of the other stuff seems started by mid-30s ex Goldman Sachs bankers.

Edit - I've just found this article - http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/rorycellanjones/2010... from Rory Cellan-Jones of the BBC which is a good read as well

The situation in the UK, is that anything (and this includes fixtures, logos, statistics, even live twitter score updates) has to be licensed through a company called Football DataCo. The costs coming to ~$6000/season just for fixtures. You can't even use names that sound similar. For example calling Liverpool 'Merseyside Red'. [1]

They enforce this strongly, outsourcing it to a company who only does this sort of thing.

[1] http://www.epltalk.com/2010-11-premier-league-opening-day-fi...

I understand the video is important - but what if we can't get round to making it in time?

My cofounder currently lives the other side of the country (we're currently studying in different colleges) and so a video together would be kinda hard at the moment, not to mention expensive to meet up.

Do you have any suggestions - we've looked into recording Skype video calls but it's hard to make it feel natural.

My university tried to write their own. But then each faculty decided they didn't like it and then wrote THEIR own.

Now I have to log into about 5 different systems to get anything done.