After listening to the "the tech guy" 519 on Leo Laportes' Twit.TVI was struck by one of the news items at the begining of the show. It was about a boy at school in the US who was handing out a linux distribution to his class mates. Apparently the teacher freaked out when she realised what was going on and confiscated the said disks, only to then go on and sing the virtues of microsoft and windows at the class, and that the kids were not to use this "linux" as it wasn't part of the school cirriculum and therefore somehow not relevent.Well, I say fair play to the kid for looking beyond what schools call "learning about computers". The thing pointed out in the show is that todays children are growing up with computers around them in a way my generation never did. They are just a part of the funiture, a part of everyday life to these kids. To some off my generation the advent of computing was and still is an enduring marvel, something to gawp at and sometimes drool over.What concerns me here is that schools tend to be teaching kids that using computers is about learning to use microsoft products such as word, powerpoint etc, all very well, but how about introducing elements of computer science into the classroom and not just leaving it as an option for further education. Anyhow, the event is fully talked about in the the tech guy podcast.

I'm not surprised, but I really wish I was. Let me tell you why.I listen to digital planet via a BBC world service podcast every week, and last weeks version was an eye opener and yet it wasn't!One of the Items during the program was about trials of electronic voting in the UK that had taken place last year and two years ago. The trials were observed by a chap called Glyn Wintle. Glyn is a programer and an officialy acredited election observer,and what he saw worried him. He found that his biggest problem, being an election observer after all, was that there was no way to tell if the machines where doing their job properly. He said that there where no means of auditing the system, and thus no way to tell if the system was being compromised.

 So, unlike lets say online banking there is no tracking built in to the system, no auditing trail. At least with the paper system you can go back and recount the votes. So; there is no actual way to tell that the electronic system used on the day by the voter is the same one that is going to cough up the results at the end of the process.Interesting ommisions I must confess, and as Bill Thomson pointed out, The prizes for compromising the system are so great (like running the country) that atempts will be made.Lets not forget that in 2005 over 250 fraud allegations where made against the postal voting system. All this in the United Kingdom, the supposed mother of all democracy, although I would like to point out that in this country, we are not actually british citizens! No, in the eyes of the officialdom and of course the monarchy, we are subjects of the queen. Got a problem with the erosion of civil liberty and the ever increasing security measures trying to poke their way into our lives? Well don't be bothering the politicians about it. Oh no! Take it up the queen and good luck to you!                                                       

  Oh how I wonder, why are we sold cars that are capable of 100mph + only to be held back at 70mph on our motorways. The ecological argument just doesn't hold water any more, not when you have cars that have six and sometimes even seven gears.

 What about safety? Well the truth is that it is quite dangerous to be driving at 70mph on todays motorways, because you see people all the time being sandwiched in the middle lane not going fast enough past lorries and coaches. When I see the bulk of traffic flying past at a steady 85-90mph there is a real sense of this traffic staying out of harms way and finding itself space.

 When all the traffic is stuck at 70, it tends to bunch up and you see people pulling into the outer lane rather dangerously because a truck will have to pull out into the middle lane to overtake someone driving dangerously slow in the left lane. Sometimes going that bit faster is the safe thing to do as it can keep you clear of potential trouble.

 Having said the above, I do however believe it's important to stick to the 20/30/40mph speed limits that exist in built up areas for very obvious reasons.