retree

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.

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.

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 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.

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.

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 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.

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

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.

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?

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.

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

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...

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.

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