Space Cadets

[Nucular]

Actually there is much debate about whether TV Detector vans that actually detect things exist or not.

I'm sceptical also. The stories that people come out with ("they can even tell what channel you're watching - from right down the street!") just sound silly. But...

If you buy a television (flat screen or no) the vendor is obliged to pass your details on to the licencing authorities so they can add you to their list.

... I didn't know that.

I lived in a shared house for a year, in which all four residents had a TV, and not a licence between us. We got letters and propaganda - but I figured, they can't break the door down - if they come round, I'll just lock my bedroom door till they go away again.

They never came, but my nerve broke about a month before my house contract ended and I took the TV to my parents' house.

 

[Nucular]

The comment is a social construction angle, which comes from the Psychological and Sociologic sciences and a development on Post Modernism. Unless you have the necessary language and thus concepts to understand something then it is rendered impossible to understand. Its a process which people such as Noam Chomsky is well aware when deconstructing political discourse. It was a comment on presented truth by those in power, and why the lie worked on the show.

Hi Malooma - but why is this relevant here? What light would a social constructionist approach shed upon Space Cadets?

 

[Crispy Duck]

Yes, the TV licensing people seem quite evil, in a small but important way. A few years back, I accidentally let my TV license lapse for about three or four months. When I eventually applied for a new one, they back-dated it to the day after my previous one had expired. I wondered at the time if they actually had the legal power to do that; I didn't challenge them, in the circumstances, but it seems they're entitled to assume that I was guilty of non-license-renewal unless proven innocent.

And I think you'll find that the legal definition of 'television' is broad enough to cover any arbritrarily elaborate system that allows you to watch. For example, I believe people have tried to get away with having a 'monitor'-style TV (ie one without a tuner), recording programmes on their VCRs and playing them back on the monitor; that's still illegal, though. I agree that an LCD screen is probably undetectable.

On a related note, an earlier post doubted whether TV detection was ever possible, even with a CRT. I remember a demonstration years ago on "Tomorrow's World" where some equipment was not only able to detect the presence of a CRT computer monitor over a distance of five metres or so, but was also able to reconstruct what the monitor was displaying. It was an old green-screen monochrome monitor, but even so - makes ya fink, dunnit?

 

[Morrison's Lament]

Slightly off topic, but Debord’s essay on Baudrillardist simulacra implies that the collective is capable of intention, but only if sexuality is interchangeable with culture; otherwise, Sartre’s model of the capitalist paradigm of expression is one of “cultural appropriation”, and therefore intrinsically unattainable. In a sense, several discourses concerning postconstructivist desituationism exist.

--- G.

 

[Nucular]

I remember a demonstration years ago on "Tomorrow's World" where some equipment was not only able to detect the presence of a CRT computer monitor over a distance of five metres or so, but was also able to reconstruct what the monitor was displaying.

A TV camera linked to a TV?

A small boy with a pencil?

A mirror?

Or was it the kind of technology that could actually work through walls?

 

[Nucular]

Slightly off topic, but Debord’s essay on Baudrillardist simulacra implies that the collective is capable of intention, but only if sexuality is interchangeable with culture; otherwise, Sartre’s model of the capitalist paradigm of expression is one of “cultural appropriation”, and therefore intrinsically unattainable. In a sense, several discourses concerning postconstructivist desituationism exist.

--- G.

 

[Crispy Duck]

A TV camera linked to a TV?

A small boy with a pencil?

A mirror?

Or was it the kind of technology that could actually work through walls?

Pffft. No, it was proper non-trivial James Bond tech. It was described as the latest threat to result from the computer revolution - in effect, all the CRT monitors in the City, for example, were broadcasting top-secret plans etc to anybody who had the right kit to listen in. A 1980s pre-cursor to wardriving.

This was in the days when monitors were unshielded and pregnant women were advised not to sit in front of them for too long, etc. There was talk of computer geeks like me being made infertile by the radiation, a possibility which has yet to be disproved in my case.

Apologies for the threadjack.

 

[Crispy Duck]

Bosh: http://cryptome.org/tempest-leak.htm

 

[Nucular]

Bish:

 

[Rolfe]

So what actually happened when they had the "gotcha" moment, anyway?

Rolfe.

 

[Nucular]

http://www.channel4.com/entertainment/tv/microsites/S/spacecadets/news/story.jsp?id=307

Nothing spectacular, it seems. They got off the spaceship, went "ohhh, you" to Johnny Vaughan, got their cash and went home.

eta: via Russia.

 

[Kell]

Nothing spectacular, it seems. They got off the spaceship, went "ohhh, you" to Johnny Vaughan, got their cash and went home.

Nobody, including the viewing public, found it especially funny it seems.
Meanwhile, reports that a number of media-trendy channel 4 executives were not only on their way to the bank but were allegedly "laughing all the way" remain unconfirmed at this time.

 

[Flange Desire]

I Have recently been attempting to debate a group of homeopaths on a forum. You can find it here;

http://www.tanasen.com/Forum/topic.asp?ARCHIVE=&TOPIC_ID=962

as you will see all of my posts have been removed by the administrator, I presume this is because they don't wish to be embarassed. One thing that I couldn't understand is why these people, and the entire homeopathic community believe that homeopathy works even in the face of a complete lack of evidence.

Hi doggie,

I registered there after I saw your post, but was banned after about 3 hours (6 posts).
They also deleted all my posts.
No reason was given, and none of my email protests acknowledged.

I wonder how the stats measure up regarding ...
bannings from JREF versus bannings from homeo furums
total JREF forum users versus total homeo furum users

Does anyone know if such comparisons have been attempted?

 

[mgdwcb]

I'm sceptical also. The stories that people come out with ("they can even tell what channel you're watching - from right down the street!") just sound silly. But...

... I didn't know that.

I lived in a shared house for a year, in which all four residents had a TV, and not a licence between us. We got letters and propaganda - but I figured, they can't break the door down - if they come round, I'll just lock my bedroom door till they go away again.

They never came, but my nerve broke about a month before my house contract ended and I took the TV to my parents' house.

Interestingly, the TV lisensencing people claim:

"We have a range of detection tools at our disposal in our vans. Some aspects of the equipment have been developed in such secrecy that engineers working on specific detection methods work in isolation - so not even they know how the other detection methods work."

This is bound to make uninformed people worry - but stupid. Why? No device used for detection of crimes can be used in a court without full details of how the technology works being available to the defence council (so they can challenge whether it was working within its paramiters).

So `secrecy' means the technology is useless!

 

[Rolfe]

Seems like a bit of a derail, but all the homoeopathy forums are similar. The only variation is how long it takes to get banned. Some will keep a pet sceptic for quite a long time, but if more appear and they feel seriously threatened then everyone is likely to be banned as a job lot, even those who only joined the previous day. I speak from experience.

By the way, wanna be an anti-homeopathy illuminati?

Rolfe.

 

[NeilC]

I heard that they DID actually go into space but the government has covered it up.

 

[richardm]

Nothing spectacular, it seems.

Part of the problem was that they told them it was fake before the final reveal. They were getting ready to do a "space walk", when a video came on in their pod with Johnny Vaughan tipping them the wink. It would have been much more effective if they'd just flopped open the wall of the pod to reveal the audience. Hey, they're young and fit, and not likely to drop dead from shock

That said, I did laugh at the wail they gave out when they saw the video of the outside of the "shuttle" for the first time!

 

[Miggins]

We`ve just had a letter with BIG RED type on it threatening us not only with an `enforcement officer` but also a trip to Court, and no doubt a prison sentence of 20 years hard labour after that. You can imagine how scared we all were!
The thing is, we have got a licence. I think what`s happened here is that my husband recently bought a new telly, and when presented with the form everyone has to fill in with their name and address on it at the till, got cross and put himself down as A. Copper. 999 Letsby Avenue. How did they know ? ! perhaps they have got a psychic who can see where we live, like the ones who help the police in murder cases- ` I see a body in a small place near water`
As a kid I was told that T.V. Detector vans crawled the streets looking for men dressed as ladies. I was also told that ice cream vans only play music when they`ve run out of ice cream. Happy days.
The thing about the T.V. licence mafia is that they seem to think they are entitled to bully and threaten the customers in a govermental big brother way- their advert`s are similar to the ones about benefit fraud- `we`re watching YOU`
You`d think they would be a bit more polite about getting us to cough up for their crappy programmes. I think someone should make a telly that only shows B.B.C 1 and 2. Obviously I wouldn`t be able to buy one, because then my family wouldn`t be able to get their (almost) daily dose of misery Cockney style (Eastenders) and I`d be left all on my own. Even the baby knows the theme tune now.

 

[Flange Desire]

...By the way, wanna be an anti-homeopathy illuminati?

Possibly.
Who or what is illuminated?
Any tangible costs or benefits?

btw, I have struck a brick wall in my recent dealings with The Better Health Channel (an oz vic gov site), and I really need some ideas for lobbying upstream.

Sorry for the derail.
Hungover.

 

[eyes_in_the_sky]

Not quite sure how this thread got from Space Cadets to detector vans ...however , perhaps a final comment on the "Cadets"

What the viewing public didn't realise and probably the biggest bit of deception in all this , was that the final reveal was filmed over three hours before Vaughan announced it as a live event.

So , anyone expecting a hint of "live TV " spontaniety was denied even that by Ch4's producers.

Shame really , because the concept was quite good , but it was totally ruined by poor direction , and tacky humour.