Inevitable

In spite of the "claims" they have made over the years, they were always looking for a way to get rich from it... and it looks like they've succeeded, even after paying the fines they stand to become millionaires.

No doubt the site will now over time morph into something that the new owners will try and profit from, subscription services and so forth... TPB as we know it will die and the freetards will move to other sites and the whole cycle will begin again... and the new Payrate Bay will slowly fad into obscurity like Napster did when that went legit.

Errors

Number 19 is incorrect and was never uttered, it was US not ME... as in that's another fine mess you got US into.

There's a Simple Answer to this

This is an invasion of privacy, and the more people that refuse to do anything about it the more invasive things will get and then when they suddenly find they have no privacy, there will be no one to speak out for them. I don't want my home published on the internet and as I live in an area that is supposed to be photographed by google I'm tempted to hang a big sign outside my house saying 'F*CK OFF GOOGLE'.. although that would defeat the object and make my home a target for millions of viewings when people find it. :)

The simple answer is to get the people in your street to complain to google and ask for their images to be removed... If entire streets start doing it, the whole thing becomes undermined and pointless.

Just because it's google, doesn't mean it's good.

@ Ramzi Yakob

I think you must be in a minority on this one. My entire family is now using sky broadband and the rebadged netgear wireless router. 80% of my friends have also switched to sky.

We've all done this because of the price, rather than the service. But I've been very impressed with the 8mb service I have and everyone else has too. I regularly get 700+k/s from P2P, my connection doesn't keep dropping nor does anyone elses.

The only issue I have come across is with my parents setup, where their wireless dongle (netgear one supplied by Sky) sometimes doesn't reconnect when booting the PC. But I suspect this is more to do with the fact their PC is USB 1 rather than the preferred USB 2 as plugging it back in and telling it to reconnect works fine.

First thing I did when I got mine setup (and my families) was change the default password to gain access to the router and the WPA key.

@ Micheal Hoenig

Whilst I share you hopes and optimism... I fear that neither Clinton or Obama will win, I don't think the US is ready for a black or female president yet. I don't think the US is mature enough for that, it's still a young country and firmly entrenched in the teenage years at the moment. :)

As for the laptop/phone/pda issue... It's just another reason why I will never visit the US in it's current state. I will happily go back to Canada again as I love it there... and when ever I meet an American, they often claim to be Canadian in Europe... because people are more friendly that way. :)

It's a good thing

For too long ebay sellers have had the upperhand... Here's a quick run down of the most common issues.

1: Sellers who refuse to leave feedback until the buyer does (I'd say 80% of power sellers use this tactic). The solution is simple.. once the buyer has paid for the item, their end of the deal is completed and sellers should be forced to leave positive feedback (kinda like ebay are suggesting with these changes). The buyer has upheld their end and should be rewarded for it.

2: Sellers who vastly overcharge for postage - ebay now give you the chance to rate them on several areas... I've yet to give more than 3 stars for postage costs. The reason they do this is simple... They avoid paying ebay as much in fees because postal charges are not included in the final listing value. So sellers offer something for £1 and charge £10 to ship it... but post if for about £2.50, thus making £8.50 on the sale and only paying ebay a percentage of the £1 + listing fee. 99% of all business and power sellers on ebay seem to use this tactic in my opinion... and it's a global issue not a UK one. US sellers are the worst, one guy tried to tell me it was going to cost 120 US dollars to ship a package about the size and weight of 2 dvd's... I asked if it was being wrapped in gold and told them where to stick it.

I could go on with more of the tactics used by ebay power tossers, but it bores me... I have been on ebay for about 9yrs and still only have a rating of 53 with 1 neg (retaliatory from a lying tosser who tried to rip me off)... I have however left probably over 100 positive feedback as a buyer and sellers can't even be bothered to do the same.

So now I refuse to leave feedback as a buyer until they do... and I tell them upfront that this is my policy and exactly why. Any decent and honest seller will understand and leave feedback... those that don't won't benefit from me and if they mess up.. you'd better believe I'll neg them.

They're missing because...

Casino Royal (the comedy one made with Niven/Sellers and so forth) and Never say never again are missing from the list because they are not official Bond movies.

Never say never again was simply a remake of Thunderball and flopped (although I do remember going to the cinema to see it as a kid). Whilst Casino Royale was a spoof/comedy that failed to really impress.

@ Steven

Sorry to burst your bubble on this one Steven, but spouting that tired old argument these days is a little silly.

I bet you also spout the 'guns don't kill people, people kill people' argument too... I think you'll find that the gun often helps. :)

True, unstable people are more likely to commit acts like this regardless of influences... But that doesn't mean that these people are not susceptible to the influences that these games have. There simply is not enough evidence to support either side and studies need to be done in great depth and detail. You also have to take into account the 'mob' mentality, did he act alone, was he provoked, was there peer pressure?

Whether or not TV/Films/Games/Books or any other form of entertainment or literature are a cause of increased violence is as yet unproven for either side. What we do know is that the general population have become more desensitized to depictions of it, just like we have grown accustomed to increased sexual imagery.

So can you please bring something that's actually been given a modicum of thought out to the debate next time. Thanks. :)

A lot of morons

For all of you ranting about this and that... Why shouldn't they eat whales.. we eat pigs/cows/sheep and so forth. For all those bringing racism into it (although you actually prove your own racism by doing so)... There are very few good points being made amongst all the moronic rants.

This is not about them eating meat, it's not about culture, race, colour or anything else. It's about an entire species that was almost made extinct and is still at risk of extinction. It's about money, lots of it... if they weren't making a lot of money from this it wouldn't be happening. Same thing applies to things like fish stocks in our own waters. The average size of cod has dropped by 60% in recent decades due to over fishing and stocks not having time to recover. Yet because of business interests we don't do enough to ensure that there are future stocks... Same applies to whaling, there simply aren't enough to allow them to be caught.

Whilst the Japanese are basically saying "fuck you" to the rest of the world on this issue, action has to be taken... I just don't know what that action should be... Providing no one gets hurt in the process I'm all for a little positive action.

And no, I'm not a whale loving, card carrying member of Greenpeace or any other environmental group... I rarely recycle, waste energy and drive everywhere in my big engined sports car... I just have a brain and some common sense... Shame so many morons lack both of those and are allowed to use computers. :)

@ Steven Kraft

Bill Pullman? Bill 'can't act my way out of a paper bag' Pullman?

Go and watch that film again you silly boy... Nothing worse than coming up with a good idea and ruining it with a cock up like that. :)

I think the actor you meant was Bill Paxton.. as Pvt Hudson. :)

@ Hazel Rees

"Can I have your licence plate, so next time I'm thinking about shoes & makeup I know which boy-racer to run over in my Range Rover ;)"

Oh great... another woman in a Chelsea tractor... Not to worry about it though, unless you are driving near her kids school or the local M&S you're safe. :)

Couldn't resist that one.

As for the speeding, yes it's irresponsible in the eyes of the law. Yes it's irresponsible to be driving at those speeds on public roads in the UK. Not because the bike or the rider isn't capable of handling them. But because the roads in this country are poorly maintained and he could hit a bump/pothole and that could cause an accident... But it could cause the same accident at 70mph.. so it's the roads fault not the riders. ;)

Speed limits in the country need an overhaul, I don't actually mind dropping them on urban side roads if they also remove the ridiculous traffic calming measures. But increase them on the motorways, lane 1 upto 60mph, lane 2 for 60-80mph and lane 3+ for 80-100mph.

That way your lorry/coach/caravan drivers have to stay in lane 1 and won't be the cause of congestion as they try to overtake each other over a 5 mile stretch of road causing everyone else to try and move into lane 3 to get past them.. and causing a tailback. Those middle lane road hoggers who drive at 65-70 and refuse to pull back over even when it's clear of traffic can happily stay where they are... and the rest of us can happily cruise along at 90mph... which my car is more than able to do without dropping more than 1-2mpg in fuel consumption... Not that I have proved this is the case of course on clear motorways in good weather on a 300 mile journey.. that would be wrong and I'm sure some politician would try to make out it's as bad as paedophiles if they thought they'd get a sound byte out of it.

Stil won't make a difference to real world sales

I'll still refuse to buy music in a digital form regardless of DRM or not. I won't rip any of my own CD's at less than 192bit for use in the car and at less than 320bit for use through my network. Most of the stuff you can buy online is at best 128bit and the sound quality is pretty poor unless you are using pretty poor equipment/speakers... Meaning most MP3 players.

First thing I did when buying an MP3 player 5yrs ago was throw away the speakers and buy a decent set of proper portable headphones... Still got them and they still work great as does the MP3 player.

Even then, I'd prefer to listen to a real CD as you can tell the difference..

I also agree that there is very little music these days that interests me... I've actually been on a bit of an 80's retro kick the last few months and been searching out music I already own on vinyl, but not CD. So much in fact that my next gadget purchase will be a USB turntable so I can convert that vinyl into MP3... pops, clicks and all. Some of it you simply cannot find online.

Why are people surprised

This is what always happens on a site/forum where you give people power and don't monitor how they use that power.

I have seen this happen time and time again on forums I have used. I once got banned for criticising the actions of the so called moderators... they weren't even admins. Sadly the admins never bothered to moderate their moderators... and they were able to simply lie about me and get a few friends (other mods and ex mods) to agree and hey presto... Ban enforced for life, simply for disagreeing and having an opinion.

I was so disgusted, I set up a site of my own... and 8 months later, it's already competing on level ground with them, if not actually pulling ahead in terms of active members. It's become the place, the other one should have been all along.

This is what happens when you give people power and leave them to abuse it without steps to ensure they don't. I chose my admins based on their opposing views to my own and their ability to voice them. I cannot be 100% certain my site won't go the same way... But I'll damn well work my socks of to ensure it doesn't.

Wikipedia remains a source of useful information, but I've already had people from another site try to remove links and information pertaining to my own... So moderation simply isn't working.