The Weekly Round-Up: 11.07.08

This week the Round-Up is weaving its words of wisdom while nursing a sore head after a week of hard partying to celebrate 10 years of silicon.com.

Yes, that's right folks - the business and technology site you know and love has been delivering news from the world of tech for a decade - and the occasion required some serious letting down of hair.

Back in July 1998 when Billie Piper ruled the singles charts, The Corrs and Beastie Boys ruled the album chart, and France was about to stuff Brazil in the World Cup final, silicon.com was born into a world where the internet was starting to make sense and the good times were rolling. Ahh, such innocent days, when the dot-com era was starting to bubble and fizz…

Frankly, to take the edge off the post-celebration hangover following this week-long party, the Round-Up would like nothing more than a snooze in the park - although this year it would probably be advisable to take a snorkel rather than a sunhat.

In fact, two of the silicon.com team actually spent a couple of hours working in London's St James's Park last week and found it thoroughly agreeable. And the sun made its one scheduled appearance of the summer that day too, which was nice.

But - just because you are typing in the park it doesn't mean you can let your guard down. Our hardy reporters had to cope with tourists, glare on their laptop screens, freak gusts of wind, the terrors of flat batteries and… spiders. The horror! The horror!

Despite these obstacles, many would see the great outdoors as a good opportunity to get away from those annoying emails and other office annoyances.

And yet for those working in the glass citadels in the City it might prove a bit stressful - it seems they're so obsessed with checking their work email that they'll even check it on holiday.

That's according to a survey of 300 City of London workers in which more than a quarter admitted to sneaking a peak at their work email at least once per day during their summer hols.

Now, the Round-Up feels sorry (slightly) for these people as they're apparently suffering from paranoia that their colleagues will be making them look bad in their absence. Obviously if the Round-Up worked in their office that's highly likely but, come on, it's a dog-eat-dog world.

And checking emails isn't going to solve anything anyway. Don't these people know they should have finished everything they need to before leaving for two weeks in the sun? And if you're going to be out of the office then make sure there's someone around to keep an eye on things while you're down at the beach. After all, Tony Blair left John Prescott in charge when he went on holiday and that always went well.

Still, it seems these people have got less to worry about than the young scamps downloading music via file-sharing websites. The European Union has pressed play on plans to get web users who consistently use music and film file sharing websites kicked off the internet.

If the EU is so keen to stop this widespread activity, this does seem a good way to go about it. Losing internet access would be like losing an arm to these people. But there seems to be a few obstacles in the way of this one. According to reports, such a law would force ISPs to warn, then disconnect, those customers they think have been sharing copyrighted material online.

Think?

Doesn't seem like the greatest burden of proof. The Round-Up would wager that, in the digital arms race which enables people to download music there would be some innovation to make it very hard for ISPs to spot exactly what was being downloaded - which rather puts everyone back at square one.

Speaking of young people, there's been a bit of a debate around ID cards. As students are going to be one of the first groups to be given the opportunity to join this wonderful world in 2010, the government has been asking for opinions on the MyLifeMyID.org.

Bad idea.

Students have been letting rip on the website, condemning the plans as "illegal" and "creepy", with hardly any positive comments about the scheme.

And to make matters worse, the ID cards will cost £30. Not only is there an issue with personal liberty but the government wants to charge you for it. To be fair, expecting people to stump up for something they passionately oppose does seem a bit rich.

Besides, that £30 could be much better spent on chips and tie-dyed clothing - or whatever students spend their money on this year. Mr Brown, you have been warned.

Highlights on the website include: "I'd rather emigrate or go to prison". The same person added: "They [the government] have proven over and over that they can't be trusted with people's data. They do not listen to the public, or even their own teams of experts. Yet they are pressing ahead with ID cards."

Another respondent attempted to find 100 good uses for ID cards but failed to get beyond one - it was scraping ice off car windscreens in winter, in case you're wondering.

Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith, said in a statement: "We see identity cards delivering real benefits to young people, which is why their opinions on the cards and how they might use them are so important."

Presumably if these opinions are actually used to tailor the scheme to suit young people, as the website says, that'll mean scrapping ID cards completely or at the very least making them free. So we'll see on that one shall we?

And as for people who say they'd rather go to prison than have an ID card, perhaps they'll soon change their tune. They might have to face The Boss if they do end up in the clink. Now that doesn't mean the very nice man that signs your expenses. Oh no - this is something much more uncomfortable.

The Boss is the Bodily Orifice Security Scanner. These high tech chairs will be used in UK non-high security prisons from March 2009 to find mobile phones being smuggled into prison by visitors. You can probably guess where those mobile phones might be hidden.

Ex-chief constable David Blakey announced the measures in a report, adding there should be more tech in prisons including CCTV - surely an obvious one - biometrics, scanning and phone blocking tech.

The Round-Up couldn't agree more but has an even better suggestion: robot guards. Think RoboCop who wasn't quite good enough to get into the real police.

In other news, the government has announced a way to boost local election turn-out by entering voters into a prize draw to win an iPod. One newspaper compared this with the US where in some polling stations voters get a free doughnut or chicken dinner.

On announcing the plan in a government white paper, Secretary of State for Communities, Hazel Blears, said it would play a part in boosting local democracy and empowering communities.

Wrong. What it'll really do is merely confirm one thing: people like free stuff. It might boost voter turn-out but it's doubtful these people will become genuinely interested in local politics just because they could win an iPod. But hey, who knows?

And finally this week - apparently there is a new mobile phone out today or something? The Round-Up vaguely remembers someone mentioning it. Find out more here…and here…and here…

Still at a loss as to what to do on a Friday afternoon? Time to give the silicon.com caption competition a go…