This is a little bizarre. The episode was the first time I'd ever heard of Devo. And that episode is the only episode of Square Pegs I remember, even though I watched it all the time. Given that I've never knowingly listened to Devo, 'Square Pegs' and 'Devo' are curiously synonymous for me.

And since I've had kids 'Rugrats' are now synonymous with 'Mark Mothersbaugh.'

Ha! My grandfather's funeral was held at that cemetery, and we played 'What a Wonderful World.'

The article also says that the most popular traditional hymn is 'Amazing Grace.' The reason for that is simple --- it's about the only hymn tune (bar none) 95% of people with an Anglo-Saxon background are likely to be familiar with. If folks want a religious service with a hymn, that's a pretty safe bet.

I've conducted my fair share of funerals in my time. It's not uncommon for the family to want to sing the late Aunt Betty's favourite hymn. With all respect, I tend to discourage it. There's nothing makes a funeral drag on than seven verses of a song nobody (bar me and the guest of honour) has a clue how to sing. Seriously, most people come away wishing they were in the casket.

I look forward to our utopian future in which all sensory perception is mediated by a mask, and in which all our hair has fallen out.

I thought the same. The apparent demonisation of homeless people (eg they're 'running away from debts, legal problems, family responsibilities', not to mention insane and drug users) was a fairly obvious clue. And I'm not sure what sort of outreach worker travels with journalists and police.

I have no doubt that some homeless people would hang around at Heathrow. And I'm sure some of them can be really scary. But all this article is going to do is make the police push them somewhere else where rich(er) people don't have to look at them.

Problem fixed!

I'm not a terrorist, but the boingboing readership's pretty diverse, so I'll comment anyway, and rely on somebody telling me I'm wrong.

If I were a terrorist casing out a location I'd be worried that my recon would look rather suspicious. I would be careful not to take photos that would make me look suspicious. I won't take a photo of a camera, but I might take a photo of my friend who is standing next to the pole with the camera on it. If I don't want to implicate my friend if the photos were to be found, I'm sure I could still find a way to get the photos without arousing suspicion.

Even then, do terrorists need photos of cameras? I can see why it would be useful --- for example, you might want to take the shots to an expert who can advise on what the camera is likely to be recording, field of vision, and so on --- but the location and aim of a camera could easily be marked on a map and noted for future reference. And scribbling on a notepad doesn't have to look suspicious at all!

Oh, and won't most people taking photos of security cameras show up on security camera footage?

So is this sort of thing likely to provide useful intelligence? Or is it just another stunt in security theatre?

I'm all for technology being available to the masses, but I really get a bit irked when it promises to turn your average Jo(e) into an artist.

I remember when Powerpoint was the Big New Thing. Get a little bit of content, click every button on every dialogue box you could find, and wait for the kudos to start rolling in! It took a fair bit of that before audiences started to realise that there was nothing clever going on.

I wouldn't be surprised, though, if this were to become a core feature of music curricula in a school near you. If it's on a computer it must be educational!

"A good time was had by all"?

Did someone forget to tell the kid?

Good to see Pooh bear get in on the act, though. I always thought 'honey' was a cipher for 'brains.'

Heh. I watch Top Gear mainly for the cars, and I enjoy some of the presenters. Last night I watched Jeremy drive all the way to the North Pole and commenting that as far as he could see there's no evidence there of global warming (a day after nearly losing the truck through rather thin sheet ice.)

The thing I really look forward to is the 'Jeremy Clarkson Swears for Good Reason Edition,' followed by the 'Jeremy Clarkson Tribute Special.' Funnily enough, I used to watch the Crocodile Hunter for exactly the same reason.

Are there camera stores in this mall? The hypocrisy grows by an order of magnitude...

Wouldn't it just be cheaper to hang folk upside down?

Great! I might put a photo of this on my Christmas cards next year, and put Luke 2:14 on the inside.

"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men."

@Marco

I lived in NZ for about thirteen years. I really don't think anyone would notice.

Aarghh!! I forgot the link:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/12/26/2127542.htm

According to *this* article the law will only apply to exact copies of the pyramid, so the Luxor hotel is apparently safe. Of course, this makes the law trivially easy to bypass, so the definition of 'copy' will be tightened fairly quickly.

I'm not sure how they can make it apply in other countries, though. I'm not a lawyer, but I would have thought that this goes way beyond the Berne Convention and could thus be simply ignored. Egypt relies on the rest of the world too much to try pushing this one too hard.

Here in Victoria, Australia the police have tried a similar scheme on two occasions. The idea was that they wanted to reward good driving, not just punish the bad. There were some differences, though.

First, the programme was opt-in. Anyone interested in the scheme could get a bumper sticker that publicly displayed that they were taking part. So that would fix the 4th Amendment issues (which are also taken care of by the fact we're not yet part of the US!)

Second, there were two ways of receiving rewards. If the police saw a driver (who's car had the sticker) doing something praiseworthy they'd stop the person concerned and reward them, just like in California. If you weren't caught being good you were still eligible. At the end of the programme any drivers in the scheme who hadn't committed any traffic offences were entered into a draw for a, well, I can't remember.

I don't know how successful the scheme was (they ran it twice) but I don't remember hearing about anyone who ended up in jail over it.