Monthly Archives: January 2013

Facebook announced its latest data mining feature Graph Search last week to much fan fare.

Throughout the presentation, Mark Zuckerberg emphasised that user’s privacy was at the forefront of the developers’ minds when creating the feature.

The problem is Facebook’s byzantine privacy settings which could mean your data gets leaked.

Enter Tom Scott and his Tumblr of actual searches focusing on the juxtapositions between the things you’ve probably absentmindedly liked over the years.

There’s the creeptastic:

There’s the potentially life-threatening:

And, of course, the simply amusing:
Actual Facebook Graph Searches

chriswaring

Former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has been taking his full €150,000 a year pension since he left the Dail, after reversing his decision to give part of it back to the State.
The revelation comes as new figures released under Freedom of Information legislation show that only seven out of 116 former ministers gave up part of their pensions last year, despite the introduction of a simple system to allow them to do so.
None of the Fianna Fail ministers who presided over the economic crash gave up any part of their pensions.

Just let let that sink in.

Bertie is trousering €12.500 a month – about €3,000 a week.  Which would be about €600 a day if he was working. Which he’s not.

Then re-watch this.

Now. Who needs a brisk walk in the crisp morning air when you can get your pulse racing like that?

Former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern does U-turn on ‘gift’ and takes full €150,000 pension (Michael Brennan, Irish Independent)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDPHqg895yk

Cystic Fibrosis sufferer Jillian McNulty (from her hospital bed) discusses the withdrawal of funding for the drug Kalydeco. Jillian is among 120 people in Ireland who require the medication

The National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics this week ruled the drug was “not cost effective””.

Kalydeco is described by CF Ireland as “one of the most important advances in the treatment of cystic fibrosis since the discovery of the CF gene” [in 1989]. It helps sufferers “breathe more easily, gain weight and resulted in significant improvements in quality of life.”

Price Agreement Expected On Cystic Fibrosis Drug (Colin Gleeson, Irish Times)

Response To Decision On Kalydeco (CFIreland)

 

What you may need to know:

1. It’s Die Hard in The White House.

2. It’s one of two Die Hard in The White House movies coming out this year. The other one, White House Down (2013) stars Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx, and is directed by the guy who did Independence Day.

3. Gerard Butler accepted a challenge following his breakthrough role in 300 (2006), to see how many utterly brutal movies he could star in. It’s been going pretty well. Here, he looks puffy and pissed off, as only a man who starred in The Bounty Hunter (2010), The Ugly Truth and Playing For Keeps (2012) could.

4. Morgan Freeman. Sure, why not?

5. How much bad CGI? A lot of bad CGI. How many cliches? ALL the cliches.

6. We’d be happier if Steven Seagal was in it instead.

Release Date: April 19 (US: March 22).