Greenpeace. Closing BP stations

Yet again[1], Greenpeace get it wrong. Being neither Green nor Peaceful.

Today they've been targeting[current] small businesses that are franchised out from BP.

They have been basically preventing customers from filling up at BP franchises by illegally blocking off entrances, trespassing then turning off the petrol pumps by the emergency switches and, unbelievably, tampering with those switches with a screwdriver to remove the physical switch.


Two things immediately spring to mind (beyond the utter stupidity of tampering with the safety system):

 1) BP couldn't give a fig about this in any monetary capacity. It's well known that there is little money to be made selling petrol to end users in the UK since the vast majority of the difference between pump price and raw cost ends up in the government's coffers

 2) Most of the profit in petrol stations comes from the concessions sold in the shop. The sweets, the sandwiches, the maps, and so on. BP don't see any of those since they're run by small businesses/families, and it is those small businesses/families that Greenpeace are hurting.

Green? Hardly. All anyone who wants petrol is going to do is go to Tesco or Shell or Morrisons down the road.
Peaceful? Trespass - nope. Tampering with critical safety systems - nope.

They really have no idea....


[1] http://advertisingbollocks.blogspot.com/2010/04/greenpeace.html

Quattron - Sharp's 'extra' yellow TV's.

George Takei: Introducing our Quattron Technology. It adds yellow to the standard RGB colour system(1) for colours never before seen on TV.

Notice the lifelike colour on this yellow seahorse.(2) Oh, sorry, yellowish seahorse, on your TV with 3-colour technology.

Observe the stunning blue sea, in your mind that is.(3)

Well you get the picture.

Actually, you don't.

Voiceover: Quattron from Sharp. You have to see it, to see it.

(1) It's perfectly possible to produce yellow using the RGB system. You simply mix red and green. Yellow's called a 'secondary' color, since it requires two 'primary' colours to make it. Your eye doesn't have any 'yellow' receptors, only red, green and blue. Completely wrong as pointed out by Nathan.

(2) Looks fairly lifelike to me, both on my TV and on my Laptop. Both of which have reduced Gamuts compared to that visible to the human eye.

(3) Why bother - it's there in front of me. And anyway - there's no yellow in blue - see below.

Another solution looking for a problem to solve, Sharp's latest gimmick is their latest attempt to part customers with their money.

A 'gamut' is the range of colours a particular device/organ is capable of observing/producing, and is typically represented on an graph, thus[1]:

The diagram above represents the range of the typical human eye.

Now, clearly a TV cannot reproduce the full range of what a human eye can see, so the range of a TV is a subset of this:

There is a formal standard for TV's and monitors to 'adhere' to which is called the 'EBU' (European Broadcasting Union) color triangle. That's what this diagram above represents. Any self-respecting TV manufacturer ensures that their TV's can produce all the colours in that triangle.

The corners of the triangle is what you'd see if only all the red, blue or green lights were on on your TV.

Going along the edges are when two of those colors are on, and the bit in the middle is a mixture of all three.

Where does Quattron fit into this diagram? Well...

Quattron is trying to convince you that the area highlighted with a blue circle (and only the bit between the straight line between green and red, and the outside of the gamut for the human eye) is so vast, and so great, that you'll easily spot the difference between a Quattron TV, and a normal TV, and that what you won't be seeing is overexaggerated yellows.

Worth the extra money? I'll let you decide.

And quite how the extra yellow makes the sea any bluer (point 3 above) is a complete mystery, since you can see from the gamuts that they're diametrically opposed to each other.



[1] Diagrams produced using the software from http://www.efg2.com/Lab/Graphics/Colors/Chromaticity.htm

Dettol - germy soap dispensers...

Protection from Germ..
Watch the ad...

Hands touch some germy(1) stuff.(2) And those germs can end up on your soap pump.(3)

Fact: Your soap pump can harbour hundreds of bacteria. (Scary sound effect.)(4)

But now there's the Dettol No-Touch Hand Wash System.(5)

It senses hands, and dispenses soap which kills 99.9%(6) of bacteria. And it's enriched with a moisturising ingredient to help care for your hands.

The Dettol No-Touch Hand Wash System. Never touch a germy soap pump again.

Here we go again. Dettol spouting utter bollocks again.

(1) Are they advertising this thing to kids? What sort of word is 'germy' to be using with adults?

(2) So what. That's what washing your hands helps to get rid of.

(3) Unless you're keeping your soap pump in a clean-room, and steam-cleaning it (unless it has larval bacteria on it - you might need Dettol Complete Clean for that circumstance) every hour, it's going to end up with germs on it regardless of whether it's being touched or not. Merely bringing your hands close to it is probably sufficient to add some more germs. What's that you say? You have to wave your hands at this dispenser to get it to dispense some goo?

(4) Scary!!! Though that said, once you've got your soap (and bacteria) from your (bog standard) dispenser - what are you going to do? Wash those germs off! Isn't that the sort of point of any soap dispenser?

(5) The wonders of technology, eh? Lets invent a solution, and look for a problem, shall we?

(6) Weasel words. It either kills all germs, or there's some non-round number of germs it does kill. All but 0.1% is not a 'non-round' number.

I'm just wondering
a) How many batteries this thing uses.
b) How you sanitise the thing after you've changed the batteries/changed the empty soap dispenser when you've done so using your germ covered hands, since you can't use the bugger to wash the germs off until you've performed the change.
c) What comparable research Dettol have done on the bacterial level on soap bars. With or without pubes ;)

I believe in women's rights...

... So did Muhammad [current].

I believe in women's rights. So did Muhammad. Sultana Tafadar - Barrister.

This would be the same Muhammad/Mohammad/Muhammed... (the alternative spellings go on and on,) who('s followers) espouse such great rights for other groups such as homosexuals[1], members of other religions[2], and those who wish to leave Islam altogether[3] would it? I'm assuming so, since Sultana says in her speil:

Working as a barrister at a leading human rights firm, I often get asked the question:  how are you able to reconcile your choice of profession with Islam’s views regarding the role of women?  The question usually stems from the false presumption that Islam sees women as unequal to men. This could not be further from the truth. (see [6] below) My answer is that there is no conflict to reconcile.

Oh, and lets not forget women's rights [4] [5] [6] [7].

This advertising (Cranmer's photo appears to be in an underground station judging from the curved wall) is either absolute bollocks and is trying to gloss over the darker side of Islam, or Muhammad has a lot of followers who didn't bother listening to him and/or are willfully misinterpreted his teachings.



[1] "Both the Qur'an and the hadith have been generally interpreted as condemning sexual relations between persons of the same sex."
[2] "However, Jews and Christians have not been completely responsible with their revelation and should still be called to the Muslim faith."
[3] "But is the death penalty for apostasy really “good” for Islam and Muslims? Does it prevent apostasy? The death penalty may indeed discourage some from apostasy, but it would also encourage hypocrisy. And is it really better to have a lot of hypocrites among Muslims than to have a lot of apostates?"
[4] "The women are killed, police say, because they failed to wear a headscarf or because they ignored other "rules" that secretive fundamentalist groups want to enforce."
[5] "In India a 2001 ''acid attack on four young Muslim women in Srinagar ... by an unknown militant outfit, [was followed by] swift compliance by women of all ages on the issue of wearing the chadar  (head-dress) in public.'' "
[6] "They have fewer rights than men in family matters; their freedom of movement is restricted; and their economic opportunities and rights are limited. Frequently, women’s actions and choices hinges on the permission or wishes of their mahram (i.e. husband or closest male family relative)."
[7] "Women in Saudi Arabia should give their breast milk to male colleagues and acquaintances in order to avoid breaking strict Islamic law forbidding mixing between the sexes, two powerful Saudi clerics have said."

Magical, revolutionary, and at an unbelievable price...

... well one out of three [current] isn't bad.

Magical? Unless you're a luddite, or perhaps don't use computers, hardly.

Revolutionary? Unless you consider being unable to multitask, no decent keyboard, being unable to put it in your pocket and lacking upgrade paths as being revolutionary, hardly.

Unbelievable price? Well, on that I can agree on. You can get at least half-decent laptops for £430 that are smaller than this and are a lot more functional. At least you can browse the web, take a Skype phone call over WiFi and play Solitaire at the same time on a laptop.

Evony

Edit: For those tempted to start playing this (or if you already are), a couple of interesting articles from July '09:
http://www.bruceongames.com/2009/07/15/more-about-evony/
http://www.bruceongames.com/2009/07/16/is-evony-malware/

Original:
Yes, I know - done to death elsewhere, but having played this for a week or so having clicked through a more reasonable picture advert (not featured,) I didn't make the connection with the old adverts which I found somewhat... surreal... given the game itself.

First, the (some of) the adverts:

... and the, more mundane, reality?

Civilisation/Age of Empires, mixed with Farmville. Advertised by boobies.

Best of British...

... imports.

It would appear that Hewitt and May, British makers of 'hand-made' shirts (hand made abroad that is) have gotten into a little trouble with one of their latest email shots[current]:

5 reasons why you shouldn't miss out

1. Incredible value - get FREE delivery and save 50% on shirts which normally retail for up to £50.
2. Best of British Shirtmaking - Hewitt & May is a small but honest firm - proud to be British. 
3. Exclusive fabrics - sourced from the finest cotton mills - handpicked by our in-house designers. 
4. Jermyn Street quality - let's put it this way: Hewitt & May don't manufacture in China...
5. Fast & responsive customer care - visit our customer testimonial page.

It would appear that someone, then subsequently the ASA, took offense at point #2, since they seem to be implying that their hand made shirts are designed, material sourced, and the shirts made, in Britain.

I would hazard a guess that in #3, that the materials aren't sourced in Britain, shipped to Egypt (or wherever) to be made then the shirts shipped back.

While point #4 may be true, in that they don't manufacture in China, they appear to be implying that they manufacture (solely) in Britain.

As Hewitt and May, in their defense, told the ASA:

They said that if their shirts were made in Britain then they would have claimed "Made in England".

Rather telling that this isn't one of the 5 reasons you 'shouldn't miss out.'