The Null Device

2006/12/1

Making shameless copies of well-known foreign gadgets has been big in China; now, a Chinese company has taken it to a new scale, with an electric Smart car knockoff. The "CMEC City Smart" looks almost indistinguishable from DaimlerChrysler's petrol-powered microcar, has an electric motor, gets up to 55kph/34mph (less than half of the Smart's top speed), and, unless DaimlerChrysler can do something about it, will go on sale in Europe next year for €4,200.

(via Engadget) china fake imitation knockoffs smart 0

A group of British expatriates in Australia, fed up with being stereotyped as hygienically-challenged chronic complainers, is pushing to have pejorative comments about "poms" classified as racial discrimination. British People Against Racial Discrimination (BPARD) has launched a legal action to ban a television advertisement featuring "an overweight, pale, balding man in a Union Jack T-shirt cringing in fear at the offer of a cold beer".

BPARD, which is run by a committee of 14 and claims to have branches in Perth and Melbourne, said yesterday through its spokesman, David Thomason: "The Oxford Dictionary classes Pom as being derogatory, just like wog, wop, dink, dago, coon and abo."
Apparently they don't stand much chance of being taken seriously.

(Btw, are Poms just the English, or would Scots and Welsh be classified as Poms?)

australia culture poms racism uk victimology 2

According to the US government, al-Qaeda are planning to attack online stock market and banking sites. The fiends; is there anything they won't stoop to?

capitalism terrorism 1