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News Roundup
Saturday, November 12th, 2005 02:58 amI know two news roundups in a week (or even a month) is a lot for me, but I have to share this news with you all: a Russian scientist has found a way to make tortoises into spies by attaching sensors to their shells that vibrate and direct the tortoise's movements. While this might sound like something out of a spy parody of the Johnny English/Austin Powers variety, apparently Prof. Burikov seriously thinks that these creatures have "defence purposes." By this, he means spying (which is euphemistically called "monitoring" in the article) but a tortoise isn't exactly inconspicuous. The advantage of human spies is that they can pretend to be other people, but the most cleverly disguised tortoise can only manage to look like, perhaps, a slightly different species of tortoise, which means that when spying on, say, a top secret meeting, it would still stick out like a tortoise in a top secret meeting. Once spotted, it would also be singularly ill-equipped for making a quick getaway. Now a spying cheetah would be something - we're talking accelaration to 45mph in two seconds. "Hey, isn't that ... er, wasn't that one of those cheetah agents?" The only thing I can say in favour of tortoises is that you could program them to explode when caught, and the shell could make some pretty lethal shrapnel. (A far better use for tortoises was found by the Ottomans, who attached candles to their shells and had them wander around to illuminate garden parties.)
In business news, Microsoft have settled yet another anti-trust action, this time for a paltry $30m. Of that, only $10m is actually in cash, the rest being in advertising on MSN and favourable business arrangements. Ten millon dollars may be more money than most of us will see in our lifetimes, but to put it in perspective, there are vases that cost more than that.
On the international scene, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw has managed to put the fear of God into the Iranians by saying once again that there is no plan to invade Iran. Given that with politicians you can generally apply the reverse of the Lewis Carroll's famous dictum "What I tell you three times is true," this presumably means that Blair is thinking of doing a Crassus and riding off into the Parthian desert. Cry havoc, and let loose the tortoises of war.
In business news, Microsoft have settled yet another anti-trust action, this time for a paltry $30m. Of that, only $10m is actually in cash, the rest being in advertising on MSN and favourable business arrangements. Ten millon dollars may be more money than most of us will see in our lifetimes, but to put it in perspective, there are vases that cost more than that.
On the international scene, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw has managed to put the fear of God into the Iranians by saying once again that there is no plan to invade Iran. Given that with politicians you can generally apply the reverse of the Lewis Carroll's famous dictum "What I tell you three times is true," this presumably means that Blair is thinking of doing a Crassus and riding off into the Parthian desert. Cry havoc, and let loose the tortoises of war.
