MPs will not be affected by George Osborne’s latest tax raid on pensions, even though private sector workers with identical retirement incomes will be hit, said experts.

The lowering of the lifetime cap on pension funds has led some experts to warn that the Treasury will be effectively penalising pension managers who succeed in increasing the value of their funds Photo: Alamy

By James Kirkup, Deputy Political Editor

10:00PM GMT 09 Dec 2012

The Chancellor last week lowered the limit on lifetime tax-free pension savings, meaning a punitive rate of tax will be levied on pension pots totalling more than £1.25 million.

Ministers said the cap would affect only the extremely rich, but experts have warned the new lower limit could hit workers who are members of final-salary schemes. Under current parliamentary rules, long-serving MPs can retire with a maximum pension of £43,387, payable from the age of 65.

According to calculations by Hargreaves Lansdown, a financial services company, a male worker in the private sector would have to save £1.44  million to receive a £43,387 pension at current annuity rates. A woman would need to save £1.34 million.

Such private sector pensions would be hit by Mr Osborne’s new tax limit. However, MPs with a similar pension income would not.

The difference arises from the way public sector pensions are valued to see if the cap should be applied.

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  10 Dec 2012

Many public sector workers’ pensions do not have a distinct pot of cash to pay for them, instead being funded from a general fund.

Accountants say that HM Revenue and Customs calculates the pot value of a public sector pension by multiplying the annual sum by 20. So for tax purposes, the MP’s pot is valued at £867,740, well below the tax cap. Laith Khalaf, of Hargreaves Lansdown, said the figures showed the “historically generous” pensions awarded to MPs.

The discrepancy between the treatment of MPs and private sector workers emerged after The Daily Telegraph launched the Hands Off Our Pensions campaign. It calls on ministers to give private sector workers the same stability and certainty about pension rules they have explicitly promised public sector employees.

Ministers have said that recent changes in public sector pension terms will be the last for 25 years, promising state employees “a settlement for a generation”. By contrast, private sector workers have endured repeated changes in pension rules and tax raids on their retirement funds.

The lowering of the lifetime cap on pension funds has led some experts to warn that the Treasury will be effectively penalising pension managers who succeed in increasing the value of their funds.

The tax cap means that a special tax of 55 per cent will be levied on a pension pot above £1.25 million.

Adrian Walker, head of retirement planning at Skandia, the investment company, said lowering the cap could reduce the incentive for some managers to grow funds. “The lifetime allowance effectively caps good investment performance and penalises those who manage investments well,” he said.

As well as reducing the lifetime allowance on pension contributions, Mr Osborne last week lowered the annual tax-free contribution limit to £40,000. Before the Coalition took office, the yearly limit was £255,000.

Financial advisers to some of Britain’s biggest companies warned that the latest reduction in the cap on pension contributions could lead to the end of final-salary pensions in the private sector.

The National Association of Pension Funds said new taxes on pensions would raise twice as much for the Treasury as changes in the levy on banks to help cover the costs of the financial crisis.

By Jason PalmerScience and technology reporter, BBC News

Yet many technology and ethics issues surrounding civilian drones are yet to be solved, journalists at London’s Science Media Centre were told.

The UK-led, £62m Astraea project – which has participation of the UK Civil Aviation Authority – is attempting to tackle all facets of the idea.

Later in November, they will carry out a crucial collision-avoidance test.

Unmanned aircraft or UAs is something of a new name for drones, which have gained notoriety principally in the theatre of war where remotely operated aircraft are used for surveillance or air strikes.

But the same technology put to use for civilian purposes is already a hot topic of debate in the UK and abroad, most recently surrounding their use by London’s Metropolitan Police.

A recent report by the UK’s Aerospace, Aviation and Defence Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN) found that applications for unmanned aircraft are said to be worth some £260bn – replacing costly or dangerous work done by manned planes, or opening up new applications that are currently out of reach.

Crop or wildlife stock monitoring, search and rescue, and check-ups on railway lines are some of the envisioned uses of UAs.

“All these things are currently done by manned aircraft, and they’re done in currently quite hazardous environments,” said Ruth Mallors, director of the Aerospace KTN.

“We want to use unmanned aircraft in these applications, but to be able to do that we have to demonstrate that were complying with the Civil Aviation Authority regulations, which are for manned aircraft.

“There’s not going to be any new regulations – we’ll comply with the regulations in place.”

That is what brings about the technological challenge. The project involves sensors to be the “eyes” of a UA, the software to carry out manoeuvres and collision avoidance, and the aircraft themselves.

Points of debate

Plans for UAs envision that a pilot will always be on the ground controlling them, but they must have on-board technology that can perform in an emergency – in the eyes of aviation law – as well as a pilot.

“These things are going to have a level of self-determinism, particularly if you ever lose the communication link with the ground control,” said Lambert Dopping-Hepenstal, Astraea project director. “They’ve got to be able to operate fully safely and take the right decisions.

Continue reading the main story

Drones and the UK

• It is legal to fly your own drone in the UK without any special permission if it weighs less than 20kg and flies more than 150m from a congested area
• CAA permission is required if it is used for a commercial activity such as aerial photography
• Permission has been given for inspecting power lines, police use and crop surveillance
• Direct visual contact with the drone is currently required at all times
• Drones larger than 20kg would have to be approved for use by the CAA for use in UK airspace in the same way as commercial aircraft
• The CAA has made clear that it will not approve their use until it is convinced the drone can automatically “sense and avoid” other aircraft

“But we’re not talking about unthinking drones, we’re not talking about irrational and unpredictable behaviour, and we’re not talking about something that gets itself up in the morning, goes off and does its own things and comes home without any human oversight.”

The project has the participation of major contractors including BAE Systems, Rolls-Royce and Thales UK. But they are also working closely with the Civil Aviation Authority, who will ultimately control the licensing for UAs when they pass stringent safety tests.

Gary Clayton, head of research and technology for EADS Cassidian, another project partner, said the CAA’s publication CAP722 is being held up internationally as a template for aviation legislation around UAs.

But Mr Dopping-Hepenstal said the project is aiming much further than the technology and safety legislation.

“What this programme is trying to do is look at this holistically,” he said. “It’s not just the technology, we’re trying to think about the social impact of this and the ethical and legal things associated with it. You’ve got to solve all this lot if you’re going to make it happen, enable it to happen affordably.”

Chris Elliot, an aerospace engineer and barrister, is acting as consultant to the project. He told reporters that the licensing and privacy questions were points “to debate, not to pontificate”.

“We have a very robust privacy regime now for aviation, and I don’t see much very different. A lot of it comes down to what society thinks is acceptable,” he said.

“I find it interesting that Google has got away with its [Streetview] because we love Google and we all use it. If this technology positioned to something that is good for us, that we like, then people will accept that kind of behaviour.

“Pandora’s box is open – these things are going to fly. What we need is to engage everybody, the public and the specialists, with understanding the good and bad sides.”

For now, though, safety is paramount. The Astraea project will carry out real-world collision-avoidance tests using three planes in two weeks’ time, putting their autonomous control software through its paces and ensuring that unmanned aircraft can independently avoid a crash.

Dave Lee Travis is best known for his 25-year stint on Radio 1

Police said a man in his 60s from Bedfordshire was being held on suspicion of sexual offences.

The Met said their investigation into alleged abuse by Savile and others – Operation Yewtree – had so far recorded 200 allegations of sexual assault.

They have now identified about 450 potential victims of sexual abuse.

The arrest of Mr Travis, 67, is the fourth so far in connection with the Savile investigation.

In a statement, the Met said the latest arrest “falls under the strand of the investigation we have termed ‘Others’”, meaning the allegations are unrelated to Savile.

But the force said that the “vast majority” of the 450 possible victims were alleging sexual abuse by former BBC TV presenter and DJ Savile, who died last year aged 84.

Mr Travis – known by the nicknames DLT and the Hairy Cornflake – is best known for his 25-year stint as a DJ on Radio 1.

His career on the station came to an end in 1993 when he resigned on-air from his role, telling listeners he was unhappy with changes that were taking place.

Mr Travis also presented editions of Top of the Pops in the 1970s and 1980s.

He now presents The DLT Show for the Magic network.

‘Worse than feared’

The number of potential victims has risen since last month, when police said they had identified about 300 people who say they were abused by Savile and others.

BBC home affairs correspondent Danny Shaw said: “The police said a couple of weeks ago that Savile was a predatory sex offender – one of the worst sex offenders that they had come across.

“The figures that we are being given today suggest that the scale of his offending is even worse than was first feared.”

Savile, a Radio 1 DJ and presenter of the Jim’ll Fix It show on BBC1, was a household name in the 1970s and 1980s.

But since his death last year details have emerged suggesting he was a paedophile who abused young people on BBC premises, in various care homes and even in Broadmoor psychiatric hospital, over a 40-year period.

Former pop star Gary Glitter was the first person to be arrested in connection with the Met’s Savile abuse inquiry.

Glitter, 68, whose real name is Paul Gadd, was arrested on suspicion of sex offences and bailed until mid-December.

On 1 November police arrested entertainer Freddie Starr on suspicion of sexual offences.

He has denied claims made against him and was bailed after a number of hours of questioning.

On Sunday, former BBC producer Wilfred De’Ath, who is in his 70s, was arrested on suspicion of sexual offences. He was later bailed until December.

BP is set to receive a record fine of between $3bn and $5bn (£1.9bn-£3.2bn) to settle criminal charges related to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster, the BBC has learnt.

It will be the biggest criminal penalty in US history, BBC business editor Robert Peston says.

The settlement with the Department of Justice involves BP pleading guilty to criminal charges.

It is thought that up to four BP staff may be arrested, Robert Peston says.

Details of the settlement are expected to be confirmed by the Washington-based Department of Justice later.

Earlier, BP said it was in “advanced discussions” with US agencies about settling criminal and other claims.

BP said that any deal would not include a range of other claims including individual and federal claims for damages under the Clean Water Act, and state claims for economic loss.

The 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster killed 11 workers and released millions of barrels of crude into the Gulf of Mexico over 87 days.

The settlement is much bigger than the largest previous corporate criminal penalty assessed by the Department of Justice, the $1.2bn fine imposed on drug maker Pfizer in 2009.

The oil giant has been selling assets worth billions of pounds to raise money to settle all claims. The company is expected to make a final payment of $860m into the $20bn Gulf of Mexico compensation fund by the end of the year.

BP has booked provisions of $38.1bn to cover its liabilities from the incident, but the company has said the final cost remained highly uncertain.

By Lewis Page • Get more from this author

Posted in Science, 12th November 2012 11:47 GMT

Free whitepaper – Fraud alert:

November 13, 2012

This Veterans Day was an especially poignant one for us at Google. November 9 marked the fifth anniversary of the Google Veterans Network, our employee volunteer community that strives to make Google a great place to work for those who have served, their families and their friends. Our group has doubled in size every year, and we represent 34 offices in nine countries around the world.

Veterans Day 2012 doodle

This year, we’re honoring the spirit of Veterans Day with a week of activities from November 7-14. Googlers deployed with Team Rubicon to Rockaway Beach, N.Y. to help residents recover from Hurricane Sandy, cooked dinner for military families at VA Puget Sound Fisher House, hosted a Meals Ready-to-Eat luncheon in Atlanta, Ga., and ran a U.S. Marine Corps Combat Fitness Test in Mountain View, Calif.—just a few of the events underway around the United States.

Our commitment to supporting the military veteran community at large continues to strengthen, with a focus on helping veterans make a successful transition to civilian life. Here are some examples of how Google tools and employees have joined the fight against veteran unemployment, in particular:

• 20 resume workshops at Google offices for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans in the U.S. as well as the U.K. Many of these veterans belong to the Student Veterans of America.
• A scholarship program for veterans studying computer science and our inauguralStudent Veterans Summit
• Our first-ever Google for Entrepreneurs Day for hundreds of veterans and military spouses who are aspiring business owners in San Diego, Calif.
• VetNet, a career services platform coming soon on Google+, in partnership with the Chamber of Commerce Hiring Our Heroes Foundation, IVMF and Hire Heroes USA

We’ve also put our technology to work as sponsors of Veterans Week NYC, including:

• Google technology training for more than 100 wounded warriors and caregivers in NYC and a panel discussion, also broadcast on Google+, with advice for wounded warriors on transitioning to the civilian workplace.
• A live broadcast of the Bob Woodruff Foundation‘s annual Stand Up For Heroesconcert on YouTube and Google+ to raise awareness and funds for wounded warriors.
• Tomorrow, Wednesday, November 14, a broadcast of the Big Apple Circus for military families around the country, hosted by the USO. You can join in the fun on Google+ where we’ll stream the performance live.

Honoring wounded warriors with The Boss at Stand Up For Heroes on November 8. 

Photo by Stefan Radtke.

Please follow our new Google for Veterans & Families Google+ page to stay abreast of our support for the community all year long. Every day is Veterans Day here at Google.

Posted by Carrie Laureno, Audience Evangelist and Founder, Google Veterans Network

The terms Google bomb and Googlewashing refer to practices, such as creating large numbers of links, that cause a web page to have a high ranking for searches on unrelated or off topic keyword phrases, often for comical or satirical purposes. In contrast, search engine optimization is the practice of improving the search engine listings of web pages for relevant search terms.

It is done for either business, political, or comedic purposes (or a combination of the latter two).^[1] Google’s search-rank algorithm ranks pages higher for a particular search phrase if enough other pages linked to it use similar anchor text (linking text such as “miserable failure”). However, by January 2007 Google had made changes to search results to counter popular Google bombs, such as “miserable failure”, which formerly gave results for George W. Bush but now lists pages about the Google bomb itself.^[2] As of November 10th, 2012, the first result in a Google search for “miserable failure” is this Wikipedia article, defining Google bomb. Google bomb is used both as a verb and a noun. The phrase “Google bombing” was introduced to theNew Oxford American Dictionary in May 2005.^[3] Google bombing is closely related tospamdexing, the practice of deliberately modifying HTML pages to increase the chance of their website being placed close to the beginning of search engine results, or to influence the category to which the page is assigned in a misleading or dishonest manner.

The term Googlewashing was coined by Andrew Orlowski in 2003 to describe the use of media manipulation to change the perception of a term, or push out competition from search engine results pages (SERPs).^[4][5]

[edit]History

Google bombs date back as far as 1999, when a search for “more evil than Satan himself” resulted in the Microsoft homepage as the top result.^[6]

In September 2000 the first Google bomb with a verifiable creator was created by Hugedisk Men’s Magazine, a now-defunct online humor magazine, when it linked the text “dumb motherfucker” to a site selling George W. Bush-related merchandise.^[7] Hugedisk had also unsuccessfully attempted to Google bomb an equally derogatory term to bring up an Al Gore-related site. After a fair amount of publicity the George W. Bush-related merchandise site retained lawyers and sent a cease and desist letter to Hugedisk, thereby ending the Google bomb.^[8]

Adam Mathes is credited with coining the term “Google bombing” when he mentioned it in an article that appeared on April 6, 2001 in the online magazine uber.nu. In the article Mathes details his connection of the search term “talentless hack” to the website of his friend Andy Pressman by recruiting fellow webloggers to link to his friend’s page with the desired term.^[9]

[edit]Uses as tactical media

The Google Bomb has been used for tactical media as a way of performing a ‘hit-and-run’ media attack on popular topics. Such attacks include Anthony Cox’s attack in 2003. He created a parody of the “404 – page not found” browser error message in response to the war in Iraq. The page looked like the error page but was titled “These Weapons of Mass Destruction cannot be displayed.” This website could be found as one of the top hits on Google after the start of the war in Iraq.^[10]

[edit]Alternative meanings

The Google Bomb is often misunderstood by those in the media and publishing industry who do not retain technical knowledge of Google’s ranking factors. For example, Alex Jones creates “Google Bombs” every week by dispatching instructions to his radio/internet listeners.^[11][12] In this context the term is used to describe a rapid and massive influx of keyword searches for a particular phrase. The keyword surge gives the illusion that the related content has suddenly become popular, however it is artificial in nature because it is created by a loyal following of people to a particular media outlet, often alternative media. The strategy behind this type of Google Bombing is to attract attention from the larger mainstream media and influence them to publish content related to the keyword.

[edit]Google bowling

By studying what types of ranking manipulations a search engine is punishing, a company can provoke a search engine into lowering the ranking of a competitor’s website. This practice, known as Google bowling, is often done by purchasing Google bombing services (or other SEO techniques) not for one’s own website, but rather for the website of the competitor. The attacker provokes the search company into punishing the “offending” competitor by displaying their page further down in the search results.^[13][14] For victims of Google bowling, it may be difficult to appeal the ranking decrease because Google avoids explaining penalties, preferring not to “educate” real offenders. However if the situation is clear-cut, Google could lift the penalty after submitting a request for reconsideration.

[edit]Beyond Google

Other search engines use similar techniques to rank results, so Yahoo!, AltaVista, and HotBot are also affected by Google bombs. A search for “miserable failure” or “failure” on September 29, 2006 brought up the official George W. Bush biography number one on Google, Yahoo!, and MSN and number two on Ask.com. On June 2, 2005, Yooter reported that George Bush was ranked first for the keyword ‘miserable’, ‘failure’, and ‘miserable failure’ in both Google and Yahoo!; Google has since addressed this and disarmed the George Bush Google bomb and many others.

The BBC, reporting on Google bombs in 2002, used the headline “Google Hit By Link Bombers”,^[15] acknowledging to some degree the idea of “link bombing.” In 2004, the Search Engine Watch site suggested that the term should be “link bombing” because of its application beyond Google, and continues to use that term as it is considered more accurate.^[16]

We don’t condone the practice of googlebombing, or any other action that seeks to affect the integrity of our search results, but we’re also reluctant to alter our results by hand in order to prevent such items from showing up. Pranks like this may be distracting to some, but they don’t affect the overall quality of our search service, whose objectivity, as always, remains the core of our mission.

— ^[17]

By January 2007, Google changed their indexing structure^[2] so that Google bombs such as “miserable failure” would “typically return commentary, discussions, and articles”^[2] about the tactic itself. Google announced the changes on its official blog. In response to criticism for allowing the Google bombs, Matt Cutts, the head of Google’s Webspam team, said that Google bombs had not “been a very high priority for us.”^[2][18]

Over time, we’ve seen more people assume that they are Google’s opinion, or that Google has hand-coded the results for these Google-bombed queries. That’s not true, and it seemed like it was worth trying to correct that misperception.

— ^[19]

[edit]Motivations

This section may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia’s quality standards. No cleanup reason has been specified. Please help improve this section if you can. (May 2010)

[edit]Competitions

In May 2004, the websites Dark Blue and SearchGuild teamed up to create what they termed the “SEO Challenge” to Google bomb the phrase “nigritude ultramarine“.^[20]

The contest sparked controversy around the Internet, as some groups worried that search engine optimization (SEO) companies would abuse the techniques used in the competition to alter queries more relevant to the average user. This fear was offset by the belief that Google would alter their algorithm based on the methods used by the Google bombers.

In September 2004, another SEO contest was created. This time, the objective was to get the top result for the phrase “seraphim proudleduck“. A large sum of money was offered to the winner, but the competition turned out to be a hoax.^{[citation needed]}

In .net magazine, Issue 134, March 2005, a contest was created among five professional web site developers to make their site the number one listed site for the made-up phrase “crystalline incandescence”.

[edit]Political activism

Some of the most famous Google bombs are also expressions of political opinions (e.g. “liar” leading to Tony Blair or “miserable failure” leading to the White House’s biography of George W. Bush):

• In 2003, Steven Lerner, creator of Albino Blacksheep, created a parody webpage titled “French Military Victories”.^[21] When typed into Google, the first result (or the “I’m Feeling Lucky” result) led to a webpage resembling a Google error message, reading, “Your search – French military victories – did not match any documents. Did you mean French military defeats?” The page received over 50,000 hits within 18 hours of its release. Links near the top of the page led to a simplified list of French military history. The only war listed as a win for the French was the French Revolution, in which they fought themselves. As of May 2, 2011, the page is no longer listed in Google’s first few results for “French military victories”, but several links on the list go to sites recounting the joke.^[22]

• In 2003, columnist Dan Savage began his campaign to define the word “santorum” after former US Senator Rick Santorum made several controversial statements regarding homosexuality. One search engine expert has pointed out that this campaign doesn’t qualify as a google bomb, arguing that it is instead a successful new definition for a word explained by a website.^[23] (see search engine optimization)

• In 2004, Jewish writer and activist Daniel Sieradski urged visitors to his blog to link to the Wikipedia article for “Jew” in response to findings, first publicized by Steven Weinstock,^[24][25] that a search for “Jew” returned the anti-Semitic website Jew Watch at the top of the results. The campaign was successful in displacing the site from the top result, although www.jewwatch.com still appears on the first page of search results.^[26]

• In the same year the Persian Gulf naming dispute was the subject of a Google bomb by an Iranian blogger named Pendar Yousefi.^[27][28][29]

• Also, in 2004, a Google bomb involving searching “ladrones” (Spanish for thieves) on Google linked the SGAE website.^{[citation needed]}

• In France, groups opposing the DADVSI copyright bill, proposed by minister Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres, mounted a Google bombing campaign linking ministre blanchisseur (“laundering minister”) to an article recalling Donnedieu de Vabres’ conviction for money laundering. The campaign was so efficient that, as of 2006, merely searching for ministre (“minister”) or blanchisseur (“launderer”) brings up a news report of his conviction as one of the first results.^[30]

• In 2004, after the controversy that erupted in the Philippines over the allegations that President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo had cheated in the elections, the phrase “pekeng pangulo” (Tagalog for “fake president”) was linked to her official website.^{[citation needed]}

• In 2004, kretyn (Polish for moron) and similar insults referring to stupidity were linked to websites of various Polish politicians including Andrzej Lepperand Roman Giertych.^{[citation needed]}

• In 2005 an Estonian blogger led a successful campaign to link the word masendav (Estonian for dismal or depressive) to the homepage of Estonian Centre Party.^[31] The Centre Party’s website still ranks first in the results for masendav as of 2011.^[32]

• In the 2006 US midterm elections, many left-wing bloggers, led by MyDD.com, banded together to propel neutral or negative articles about many Republican House candidates to the top of Google searches for their names.^[1]

• Also in 2006, Siedziba szatana (satan‘s headquarters) was linked to the website of controversial Christian broadcaster Radio Maryja.^[33]

• In January 2007, Google announced they altered their search engine algorithm to significantly reduce the effectiveness of the technique.^[34]

• In March 2007, the Washington Post reported that Nikolas Schiller was able to Google bomb “Redacted Name” to highlight his website’s block on search engines.^[35]

• During the initial stages of the anti-Scientology campaign, Project Chanology, hackers and other members of an anonymous internet group Google-bombed the Church of Scientology‘s main website as the first match found when the term “Dangerous Cult” was searched.^[36]

• In September 2008, John Key, leader of the New Zealand National Party was Google-bombed with the query “clueless”.^{[37][self-published source?]}

• In January 2009, a successful Google bomb was performed against the site of the Bulgarian Government by a loose group of bloggers and forum users. It was discovered that by mistake, the robots.txt on the government.bg forbade the crawling of the site by indexing machines which allowed for Google bombing. The group linked the search term “провал” (failure) to the government site. Within a couple of days, the first search result for “провал” was the Bulgarian Government’s site regardless of the search results language.^[38]

• In April 2009, the website Smart Bitches, Trashy Books launched a Google bomb against Amazon in response to its removal of ´LGBT material from their ranking lists, Amazon citing it as “adult material”. Within hours of its creation the page appeared on the first page of returned search results for the term “Amazon Rank”.^[39]

• In July 2009, Opie and Anthony successfully performed a new method of Google bombing in which a specific word or phrase is artificially raised in theGoogle Trends reporting. The phrase ‘Rev Al is a racist’ was made #1 on Google Trends for 07-08-09^[40] due to the controversial comments made by Reverend Al Sharpton during Michael Jackson’s Memorial Service. “Corey Feldman is Hurting” was also number 14 on the top Google Trends for the same day in response to Feldman dressing up as Michael Jackson during the memorial service.^[41][42]

• In France, in July 2009, “trou du cul du web” (eng :”The Asshole of the Internet”) returned as the first result the official website of French president Nicolas Sarkozy; in September 2010, the same tactic resulted in President Sarkozy’s Facebook page being the first result.^{[citation needed]}

• In Iran, in September 2009, the phrase “ahmadinejad president of iran” returned a fake Google search page which reads, “Did you mean: ahmadinejad is NOT president of iran. No standard web pages containing all your search terms were found”.^[43] The phrase which is suggested by the fake Google page, ahmadinejad is NOT president of Iran, is linked to a video explaining events happening in Iran after Iranian presidential election, 2009.^{[44][self-published source?]}

• In September 2010, 4chan users tried to Google bomb the phrase ‘Robert Pisano MPAA CEO arrested for child molestation!’, as a related action to DDoS attacks on the RIAA, MPAA and British Phonographic Industry (BPI) websites. This was in retaliation for DDoS attacks carried out on The Pirate Bay and various other file sharing sites.^[45]

• In February 2011, anti-abortion activists managed to make it so that the page for abortion on English Wikipedia was the second highest ranking result for the term “murder”.^[46][47][48]

• During the summer of 2011, a joke in response to Craig James’ role in the firing of Mike Leach was posted on EveryDayShouldBeSaturday.com. The joke was indexed often enough by a major search engine that typing ‘Craig James’ into the search box at the search engine resulted in the autocomplete function including ‘killed 5 hookers.’^[49] Later this humorous search index behavior was characterized as a “google bomb” in regards to Craig James’ campaign for elected office.^[50]

• As of February 9, 2012, typing “cum sa te inscrii in pnl” (Romanian for “how to enlist in National Liberal Party (Romania)” brings you “Did you mean: cum sa te inscrii in pdl”, PDL being Democratic Liberal Party (Romania)

• Since July, 2012, searching the word “plagiator” (Romanian for “plagiarist/cheater”) returns the personal page of Victor Ponta, prime minister of Romania, accused of plagiarizing his PhD thesis, and various news websites which provide information about the scandal that erupted around the politician. This Google bomb has become itself a piece of news in the Romanian media. ^[51]

• Since October 2012, searching the phrase “completely wrong” on google images, returns pictures of Mitt Romney, the Republican Nominee for the US Presidential Election in 2012.

^[52]

[edit]Commercial use

Some website operators have adapted Google bombing techniques to do spamdexing. This includes, among other techniques, posting of links to a site in an Internet forum along with phrases the promoter hopes to associate with the site (see Spam in blogs). Unlike conventional message board spam, the object is not to attract readers to the site directly, but to increase the site’s ranking under those search terms. Promoters using this technique frequently target forums with low reader traffic, in hopes that it will fly under the moderators’ radar. Wikis in particular are often the target of this kind of page rank vandalism, as all of the pages are freely editable. This practice was also called “money bombing” by John Hiler circa 2004.^[53][54]

Another technique is for the owner of an Internet domain name to set up the domain’s DNS entry so that all subdomains are directed to the same server. The operator then sets up the server so that page requests generate a page full of desired Google search terms, each linking to a subdomain of the same site, with the same title as the subdomain in the requested URL. Frequently the subdomain matches the linked phrase, with spaces replaced by underscores orhyphens. Since Google treats subdomains as distinct sites, the effect of many subdomains linking to each other is a boost to the PageRank of those subdomains and of any other site they link to.

On February 2, 2007, many have noticed changes in the Google algorithm that largely affects, among other things, Google bombs: only roughly 10% of the Google bombs worked as of February 15, 2007. This is largely due to Google refactoring its valuation of PageRank.^{[citation needed]}

[edit]Quixtar’s bomb

Quixtar, a multi-level marketing company, has been accused by its critics of using its large network of websites to move sites critical of Quixtar lower in search engine rankings. A Quixtar independent business owner (IBO) reports that a Quixtar leader advocated the practice in a meeting of Quixtar IBOs. Quixtar denies wrongdoing and states that its practices are in accordance with search engine rules.^[55]

[edit]GoDaddy bomb

On December 26, 2011, a bomb was started against GoDaddy to remove them from the #1 place on google for the term “Domain Registration.” This was in retaliation for supporting SOPA.^[56] This was then disseminated through Hacker News.^[57]

[edit]See also

Internet portal

• Adversarial information retrieval
• Googlewhack
• Link doping
• Page hijacking
• Political Google bombs in the 2004 U.S. Presidential election
• Spamdexing
• Twitter bomb

[edit]References

Visit www.66khz.co.uk

Dear oh dear, I had a bonfire and plants get burnt whatever next???

Tut tut…

See story sourced from Yahoo.

A man is to be questioned by police after an image of a burning poppy was posted on Facebook on Remembrance Sunday.

Kent Police said the 19-year-old, from Canterbury, was detained last night on suspicion of making malicious telecommunications and is in custody awaiting interview.

The force said in a statement: “A man is due to be interviewed by police this morning following reports that a picture of a burning poppy had been posted on a social media website.

“Officers were contacted at around 4pm yesterday and alerted to the picture, which was reportedly accompanied by an offensive comment.”

The arrest was met with disbelief on Twitter, where people mounted a fierce discussion over civil liberties.

Tom Williams, tweeting as @tomwilliamsisme, wrote: “The scary thing is, the man wasn’t arrested for burning a poppy – that’s not illegal. He was arrested for putting it online.”

Jamie’s Pants, under @thisisrjg, tweeted: “We do not have a right to not be offended. We certainly don’t have a right to lock up someone for offending some people”,

And Thom Lumley, tweeting as @Hotstepperrr, wrote: “Dear idiots at Kent Police, burning a poppy may be obnoxious, but it is not a criminal offence.”

David Allen Green, a journalist and lawyer for the New Statesman, tweeting as Jack of Kent, wrote: “What was the point of winning either World War if, in 2012, someone can be casually arrested by Kent Police for burning a poppy?”

Australian musician and comedian Tim Minchin also tweeted his incredulity, saying: “You’ve a right to burn a (fake!) poppy. Whether I agree with the action is utterly irrelevant. Kent Police are out of line.”

Meanwhile, a man who skateboarded alongside a Remembrance Sunday parade wearing a pink outfit and horned mask has been charged under the Public Order Act, police said.

Jose Paulo Da Silveria, 38, is alleged to have skateboarded beside marching troops as they made their way past the cenotaph towards College Green in Bristol city centre.

Monday, November 12, 2012
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
Editor of NaturalNews.com

(NaturalNews) There’s a secret that’s much bigger than politics, health freedom, science or even the entire history of the human race. That secret remains entirely unacknowledged — even condemned — by the scientific community, and yet it is the single most important secret about everything that is. Yes, everything.

That secret is simply this: We all survive the physical death of our bodies. Our consciousness lives on, and upon our death in this Earthly dream, our consciousness transcends this physical reality and experiences an existence so amazing and powerful that the human language cannot even begin to describe it.

This is the message from Dr. Eben Alexander, author of the newly-published book, “Proof of Heaven.” I recently read the book and found it both fascinating and also confirming of several important theories I’ve been developing about the nature of life and the Creator. (See below.)

A lifelong science skeptic who never believed in God, Heaven or consciousness

Long before this book was ever written, Dr. Alexander was a practicing neurosurgeon and a lifelong “science skeptic.” He did not believe in consciousness, free will or the existence of a non-physical spirit. Trained in western medical school and surrounded by medical colleagues who are deeply invested in the materialism view of the universe, Dr. Alexander believed that so-called “consciousness” was only an illusion created by the biochemical functioning of the brain.

This is a view held by virtually all of today’s mainstream scientists, including physicists like Stephen Hawking who say that human beings are nothing more than “biological robots” with no consciousness and no free will.

Dr. Alexander would have held this view to his own death bed had it not been for his experiencing an event so bizarre and miraculous that it defies all conventional scientific explanation: Dr. Alexander “died” for seven days and experienced a vivid journey into the afterlife. He then returned to his physical body, experienced a miraculous healing, and went on to write the book “Proof of Heaven.”

E.coli infection eats his brain

It all started when e.coli bacteria infected Dr. Alexander’s spinal fluid and outer cerebrum. The e.coli began to literally eat his brain away, and he went into an extremely violent fit of seizures, verbal outbursts and muscular spasms before lapsing into a brain-dead coma.

In this coma, he showed zero higher brain activity and was only kept alive via a respirator and IV fluids. The attending physicians soon concluded that Dr. Alexander would die within a matter of days, and that even if he lived, he would be a non-functioning “vegetable” with limited brain function. Statistically, the death rate for patients with e.coli infections of the brain is 97%.

But here’s the real shocker in all this: Rather than experiencing nothingness during these seven earth-days of unconsciousness, Dr. Alexander found himself “awakening” from the dream of his earthly life, suddenly experiencing an incomprehensibly vast expansion of his consciousness in the afterlife.

This experience is described in more detail in his book “Proof of Heaven,” but here are the highlights:

• The experience of the afterlife was so “real” and expansive that the experience of living as a human on Earth seemed like an artificial dream by comparison.

• There was no time dimension in the afterlife. Time did not “flow” as it does in our universe. An instant could seem like eternity, and consciousness could move through what we perceive to be time without effort. (This idea that all time exists simultaneously has enormous implications in understanding the nature of free will and the multiverse, along with the apparent flow of time experienced by our consciousness in this realm.)

• The fabric of the afterlife was pure LOVE. Love dominated the afterlife to such a huge degree that the overall presence of evil was infinitesimally small.

• In the afterlife, all communication was telepathic. There was no need for spoken words, nor even any separation between the self and everything else happening around you.

• The moment you asked a question in your mind, the answers were immediately apparent in breathtaking depth and detail. There was no “unknown” and the mere asking of a question was instantly accompanied by the appearance of its answers.

• There also exists a literal Hell, which was described by Dr. Alexander as a place buried underground, with gnarled tree roots and demonic faces and never-ending torment. Dr. Alexander was rescued from this place by angelic beings and transported to Heaven.

God acknowledges the existence of the multiverse

The passage of “Proof of Heaven” I found most interesting is found on page 48, where Dr. Alexander says:

Through the Orb, [God] told me that there is not one universe but many — in fact, more than I could conceive — but that love lay at the center of them all. Evil was present in all the other universes as well, but only in the tiniest trace amounts. Evil was necessary because without it free will was impossible, and without free will there could be no growth — no forward movement, no chance for us to become what God longed for us to be. Horrible and all-powerful as evil sometimes seemed to be in a world like ours, in the larger picture love was overwhelmingly dominant, and it would ultimately be triumphant.

This passage struck an important cord with me, as I have long believed our universe was created by the Creator as just one of an infinite number of other universes, each with variations on life and the laws of physics. (Click here to read my writings on the Higgs Boson particle, consciousness and the multiverse.) What Dr. Alexander’s quote confirms is that our life on planet Earth is a “test” of personal growth, and that the way to make progress in this test is to overcome evil while spreading love and compassion.

Even more, this passage also confirms the existence of free will and even helps answer the question I’m often asking myself: “Why are we placed here in a world of such evil and surrounded by ignorance, darkness and deception?” The answer appears to be that Earth is a testing ground for souls that have been selected by the Creator for the ultimate test of good versus evil.

Earth as a testing ground

Although “Proof of Heaven” doesn’t go as far as I’m explaining here, my working theory is that our planet Earth is among the highest evil-infested realms in the grand multiverse. Only the most courageous souls agree to come to Earth by being born into human bodies and stripped of their memories.

From there, the challenge of life is multi-faceted:

1) Figure out WHO you are and WHY you are here.
2) Learn to recognize and overcome EVIL (tyranny, slavery, oppression, Big Government, etc.).
3) Learn to spread love, compassion, healing and knowledge.

Upon our death, we are judged by a higher power, and that judgment takes into account our performance in these areas. Did we achieve a measure of self-awareness? Did we work to overcome evil? Did we express love and compassion and help uplift others with knowledge and awareness?

As you’ve probably already figured out, the vast majority of humans fail these tests. They die as bitter, selfish, substance-addicted, greed-driven minions of evil who mistakenly thought they were winning the game of life while, in reality, they were losing the far more important test of the Creator.

The most important part about living a human life is not acquiring money, or fame, or power over others but rather achieving a high “score” in this simulation known as “life” by resisting evil, spreading love and expanding awareness of that which is true.

For those who respect life, who practice humility and self awareness, who seek to spread knowledge and wisdom while resisting tyranny, oppression, ignorance and evil, their souls will, I believe, be selected for special tasks in the greater multiverse. That’s the “real” existence. This Earthly life is only a dream-like simulation where your soul interfaces with the crude biology of our planet for a very short time span that’s actually the blink of an eye in the larger picture.

In reality, you are much more than your body. In fact, your soul is infinitely more aware, intelligent and creative than what can be experienced or expressed through the brain of a human. Trying to experience the full reality of what you are through the limited physical brain matter of a human being is a lot like trying to teach an insect to compose music like Mozart.

The multiverse is teeming with intelligent life, including multidimensional beings

Dr. Alexander’s journey also confirms the existence of intelligent life far beyond Earth. As he explains in Proof of Heaven:

I saw the abundance of life throughout the countless universes, including some whose intelligence was advanced far beyond that of humanity. I saw that there are countless higher dimensions, but that the only way to know these dimensions is to enter and experience them directly. They cannot be known, or understood, from lower dimensional space. From those higher worlds one could access any time or place in our world.

This not only confirms the existence of other intelligent civilizations throughout our known universe, but more importantly the existence of multidimensional beings who can come and go from our realm as they please.

Throughout the cultures of the world, there are countless accounts of advanced beings visiting Earth, transferring technology to ancient Earth civilizations, and possibly even interbreeding with early humans. Even the very basis of Christianity begins with the idea that an omnipresent multidimensional being (God) can intervene at will, and can therefore transcend time and space.

Alternative researchers like David Icke also talk about multidimensional beings visiting Earth and infecting the planet with great evil. According to Icke, the globalist controllers of our planet are literally reptilian shape-shifters who have invaded our world for the purpose of controlling and enslaving humanity. Although nothing like this is covered in Dr. Alexander’s book, it is not inconsistent with what Dr. Alexander was told by God during his coma… Namely, that there are multidimensional realities, that certain high-vibration beings can traverse those realities at will, and that Earth is infested with a great evil with the specific purpose of testing our character.

If all this sounds a little too spooky for you, consider the words of the Bible itself: An upright talking reptilian snake spoke in audible words to Adam and Even in the Garden of Eden, did it not?

The science skeptics are wrong (again)

Regardless of what you might think about multidimensional beings, intelligent life beyond Earth, and the existence of great evil on our planet, there’s one aspect of all this that’s crystal clear: The science skeptics are dead wrong.

Science “skeptics” are actually misnamed. They aren’t skeptical at all. They simply follow their own religion with its own sacred beliefs that cannot be questioned… ever! Those beliefs include the utter worship of the materialistic view of the universe. Simultaneously, so-called “skeptics” do not believe they are conscious beings themselves because they believe consciousness is merely an “artifact” of biochemical brain function.

There is no afterlife, they insist. There is no mind-body medicine, the placebo effect is useless, and there’s no such thing as premonition, remote viewing or psychic phenomena. Oh yes, and they also insist that injecting yourself with mercury, MSG and formaldehyde via vaccines is actually good for you, that fluoride chemicals are good for the public health and that we should all eat more GMOs, pesticides and synthetic chemicals.

It’s no surprise these religious cult members of the “scientism” cult don’t believe in an afterlife. That’s what allows them to commit genocidal crimes against the human race today via GMOs, experimental medicine, toxic vaccines and other deadly pursuits. In their view, humans have no souls so killing them is of no consequence.

As Dr. Alexander says,

Certain members of the scientific community, who are pledged to the materialistic worldview, have insisted again and again that science and spirituality cannot coexist. They are mistaken.

Well of course they are. The “science skeptics” are dead wrong about almost everything they claim to advocate. But their biggest mistake of all is in denying the existence of their own souls. Needless to say, they are all going to fail the human experience simulation once they pass on and face judgment. My, what a surprise that will be for those sad souls when they day arrives…

I would hate to face God one day after having lived a life of a science skeptic, and then have God ask the question: “You doubted ME?” How could anyone take a look at the world around them and not see the signs of an intelligent Creator? Even the very laws of physics have been tweaked and fine-tuned in precisely the right balance so that our universe itself can support the formation of stars, and planets, and carbon-based life forms. This is called the “Goldilocks Enigma,” and there’s a wonderful book by that same name written by Paul Davies.

No biochemical explanation for Dr. Alexander’s experience

For those skeptics who may be reading this, Dr. Alexander goes through nine possible biochemical hypotheses for his experiences and then meticulously and scientifically dismisses them all one by one. The result? His experience was REAL. In fact, it was “more real” than life as a human being.

Remember, Dr. Alexander is a neurosurgeon. This guy knows the physical brain like no one else. The nine medical explanations he considers and dismisses as possible causes for his experience are:

1) Primitive brainstem program.
2) Distorted recall of memories from the limbic system.
3) Endogenous glutamate blockade with excitotoxicity.
4) DMT dump.
5) Isolated preservation of cortical regions of the brain.
6) Loss of inhibitory neurons leading to highly levels of activity among excitatory neuronal networks to generate an apparent “ultra-reality.”
7) Activation of thalamus, basal ganglia and brainstorm to create a hyper-reality experience.
Reboot phenomenon.
9) Unusual memory generation through archaic visual pathways.

Dr. Alexander may be the most credible afterlife witness in the history of humanity

Dr. Alexander’s experience (and subsequent book) is arguably the best-documented case of the afterlife that exists in western science today. The fact that a vivid, hyper-real afterlife was experienced by a science skeptic materialistic brain surgeon who didn’t believe in the afterlife – and who subsequently found the courage to document his experiences and publish them in a book — adds irrefutable credibility to the experience.

This was not some kook seeking fame on a TV show. In fact, his writing this book earned him endless ridicule from his former “scientific” colleagues. There was every reason to NOT write this book. Only by the grace of God was Dr. Alexander healed of his e.coli infection, restored to normal brain function, and granted the VISION of the afterlife so that he could return to this realm and attempt to put it into words.

Personally, I believe Dr. Alexander, and his experience mirrors that of countless others, across every culture, who have reported similar NDEs (Near Death Experiences). There is life after life, and the shift in consciousness of Earthlings that is required to take our species to a higher level of understanding begins, I believe, with embracing the truth of the immortality of our own souls (and the existence of a grand Creator).

What does it all mean?

Dr. Alexander’s spiritual journey gives us a wealth of information that can help provide meaning and purpose in our daily lives.

For starters, it means that all our actions are recorded in the cosmos and that there are no secrets in the larger scope of things. You cannot secretly screw somebody over here on Earth and think it won’t be recorded on your soul forever. It also means that all our actions will be accounted for in the afterlife. If this message sounds familiar, that’s because an identical idea is the pillar of every major world religion, including Christianity.

It also means there are people living today on this planet whose souls will literally burn in eternal Hell. There are others whose souls, like Dr. Alexander, will be lifted into Heaven and shown a greater reality. What we choose to do with our lives each and every day determines which path our souls will take after the passing of our physical bodies.

What matters, then, is not whether you actually succeed in defeating evil here on Earth, but rather the nature of your character that emerges from all the challenges and tribulations you face. This is all a test, get it? That’s why life seems to suck sometimes. It’s not a panacea; it’s a testing ground for the most courageous souls of all — those who wish to enter the realm of great evil and hope they can rise above it before the end of their human lifespan.