'Don't worry,' Zuckerberg says, 'we won't assimilate them'

Sounds like the Borg. Is Facebook replacing Microsoft as the Borg company? I could imagine Zuckerberg with his Picard headset (à la Gates)

Teminator - Well it is the nearest to the Borg.

Samsung Bank

Well Samsung does financial services... http://www.samsunglife.com/company_en/submain.html

Nightfox - one proposed name for the Finnish markka was the omena (apple). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnish_markka

@ Craig

You say that we are unique in this TV tax, but Sweden with SR/SVT , Finland with YLE, and the Czech Republic with ČR/ČT have a licence together with no adverts. Many countries in Europe have a public broadcaster that is funded by a TV licence (although many have a small amount of advertising on the box or on the web) like France, Germany and Switzerland.

Compared with other public broadcasters, the Beeb is a fine example with many places often you find BBC shows in their schedules, and it is one of the few broadcasters that breaks the American hegemony in worldwide broadcasting, so back off.

@Jenkins

Sorry, my mistake, it is provisional, not provincial. Crap spellchecker.

I know what you are talking about, what I meant was that because there is a single ID card, fakes like those on websites like http://www.fluxcard.com/ or http://www.photo-id.co.uk/ don't really exist in say France or Germany.

Am I the only one who wants a ID card?

I know I would be hunted down by people here, but I my be one of the few El Reg readers who WANTS an ID card. The only thing I would agree on, is the abandonment of the back database and for Britain to join Schengen to allow passport free travel in Europe.

The amount of times I have been ask to produce a passport or my driving licence so I can buy half of wheat beer in my local bar (I am 24, but I look around seventeen-years-old), or closing a bank account, where they would the paper licence as well the plastic card. In my humble opinion, the amount of fake ID use by kids to buy alcohol is astonishing, helped by the lack of awareness of the Pass cards and high cost of passports/driving licences (my provincial licence cost me £42, and I don't have a car). Not surprisingly, fake ID is practicality unheard of in many European countries, due to a standard card.

I will get my coat, together with all my papers (passport, driving licence, police ID card, and BII membership card) in the pockets.

Why spy a postman?

Here some to think about, why does a man who distribute stun guns, spy on a postman from a Parisian suburb?

To those who needed to know, M. Besancenot was supported in the 2007 presidential elections by the director Ken Roach.

Je prends mon mantel, avec une copie du Canard Enchaîne dans le poche.

One small question...

where is the promised (and much needed) Outlook copy for OOo 3.0?

I say much needed as it is a popular (as in it is widely available), plus the need to help businesses cut their MS tentacles.

Of this, one possible solution is to make it from LGPL to bog standard GPL and merge it with Evoulation. However, we all that Sun likes to keep it fingers near it.

Mine is the one with reason on its shoulder.

@Miguel Farah

Russia hasn't invaded Finland, as it shows the Moscow Armistice border, bar the port of Porkkala that Finalnd got back in 1956.

Mine is the one with the Suomen Passi in one pocket

Looks like Stordanmark has more then that

It seem to also have Slovenia as well as Deutschschweiz, together with making Vorarlburg and Tyrol an independent state.

Plus, where is Kosovo (if your country recognised it) & Palestinian Territories?

It will get me coat, one with a proper map of Europe.

Still not for the next generation of HDTV

The next generation of HDTV is UHDTV which is around 4360p, not this 2000p crap.

I will get my coat, the one with the time machine remote in the pocket.

HD Photo

I think it to encourage the use of the new “standard” that Microsoft has done, called HD Photo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HD_Photo), formally known as Windows Media Photo. It is designed to replace JPEG for photos, aiming for a crisper, sharper picture.

Not surprising, currently it can only be seen by programs that exists only on XP SP2 and Vista. Mine with the fake Microsoft ID card and swipe card.

Hopefully it would mean better news on Engagdet

If this happens, hopefully it will get rid of the arse-licking that Engadget (a tech blog owned by AOL) seem to have on Apple.

I wonder if Essex CC is going to get a slice of that plate to its c tax payers?

Earlier, a few years ago ECC bought "ECC 1" for £7 000 for its executive car, in return to sell F1 and 1F, two of the oldest plates in Britain.

I get my coat,

Have the Sverige Polisen asked...

Jon Holmes?

I will get my coat, yes the one for the 1,62m (5'4") person

Becta is slowly changing.....

IMHO, from the sound of it. Becta is changing from being just a marketing department of Microsoft into something different.

The reason why I say this is because in the past (a few years ago, after Acorn computers such as the A300 and the A3000when I was at high school), Becta only allowed MS Windows and Office, if a school wanted to use say StarOffice, they would get a good mouthful from Becta.

We all know how Google is...

Cameron has rightly complained about the NHS mega IT project, but he is wrong on Google. Google is well known for it privacy, i.e. none, such as keeping records of your searches for in the UK, for 2 <b>years</b>. I don’t trust it to keep safe that one has a mental disability, privately.

Plus, should it be a concern about the links between Google and the Tories. Why Google, why not the hundreds of other companies? Plus, any thought on the NHS using the American VistA system, it is free (public domain) and it keeps the records of every US veteran.

Hope she wins...

If only to wipe that grin of Jobs. Apple has had his monopoly for too long.

Firewire? Never heard it!

Sorry, but Firewire is a bit of dead as a dodo. I have very rarely come across it, the only places I have seen it is on a Apple laptop and on a car stereo. I even had to look it up in a book to find out what it was.

Where is Father Christmas, Santa Claus, Joulupukki? It depends

If you are Danish or American, Santa lives on the North Pole, which is Greenlandic/Danish terriaryIf you are Danish or American. Santa lives on the North Pole, which is Danish (Greenlandic) territory.

If you are Canadian, Santa also lives on the North Pole (Canada), which is Canadian (Northwest Territories) territory. Although strangely, his post office is in Montreal QC

If you are British or Finnish, Father Christmas/Joulupukki lives in Rovaniemi, Finland (Lapland), which is Finnish territory.

If you are Dutch or Belgian, Sinterklaas or Sint-Nicolaas is from the Basque Country in Spain, arriving by steam ship.

So they want Sarah's law?

This is a classic example why there shouldn't be a Sarah's or indeed a Megan's law.

It is well known that innocent people get hurt by publishing untrue information, remember the vigilantes to the News of the Screws publishing paedophile information only for half of the info to be wrong.

Note to our British readers...

Why hasn't El Reg said that CompUSA is the American version of PC World (without the back-up of DSGi)?

I am pretty sure that the Brits would love to see the same axe to PCW.

I get my coat now.

After the HMRC, next the DVLA

I heard on the radio, that the DVLA has accidentally given out over 1000 cases of personal information to strangers by mistake.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/7131506.stm

@Big_Boomer

<i>Tak means thanks. Didn't you mean to say "Ja"? <LOL> </i>

Yes, “tak” means thank you, please or an acceptance message in a conversion in Danish, but it also means yes in Polish.

I think they are meant to say; “yes, tá, oui, sí, sim, si, ja, kyllä, jah, jā, taip, ano, áno, igen, da, да, ναι, iva.”