Interesting Links for 27-02-2020

[andrewducker]

Digging under the hood of the EU negotiating mandate for the future UK partnership agreement.

(tags:UK Europe trade )

Payments to English farmers to drop by up to 25%

(tags:farming uk Doom )

WH Smith is a very successful business that's trying to transition away from the high street

(tags:business uk )

Apple Bans Bad Guys From Using iPhones in Movies

(tags:movies iphone )

Clinical trials have started on a drug which may help with COVID-19

(tags:virus medicine )

If you're under 50 years old, your mortality rate after catching COVID-19 is only 0.2-0.4%.

(tags:death virus )

Comments

[dewline]

3. I remember when WH Smith - AKA Smithbooks - existed in Canada as a bookseller chain that I wanted to visit. Then, they got swallowed up by what's now the Chapters/Indigo chain and euthanised as a bookstore brand. Coles, a made-in-Canada organization is getting the same corporate euthanasia from the same parent company right now, along with the Chapters brand itself. Slowly and steadily.

4. That's a ridiculous attempted ban. It should be laughed out of the movie theatres at maximum speed by all movie-making companies. Because how likely is reality to respect that idea, anyway?

5 + 6. Good.

[andrewducker]

Yeah, I remember really looking forward to visiting their shops as a kid. And now I can't imagine feeling that way.

[cmcmck]

I'm over sixty! :op

[dewline]

I'm not too far behind you. That's the not-good part.

[cmcmck]

I take the view that I made it through swine 'flu........

[symbioid]

"Apple Bans Bad Guys From Using iPhones in Movies"

I can just hear Trump now "Well I saw it in a movie, they can stop bad guys from using it in the film - so we'll make sure they connect to our "bad guy database" and will prevent them from using a cell phone! Problem solved. Give me the Nobel Peace Prize."

Virus risk

[anna_wing]

I have instructed the minions to (a) wash their hands; (b) try not to touch their faces (people with spectacles, too bad, wiggling your nose is an inadequate substitute); (c) tell me if they're not feeling well and stay at home; (d) if they have other queries check the WHO, and Singapore health ministry pages which they may treat as updated, rational, and accurate to current knowledge; and (e) ignore anything they're told on social media, and also refrain from passing it on.

Panic is never necessary and will be adversely noted in the annual staff assessment reports.