In the news

https://www.lightbluetouchpaper.org/2016/12/05/government-u-turn-on-health-privacy/

Finland gives everybody an open health passport, and going into hospital means you consent to the gov to collect your healthcare data, which you can access online yourself.

But to hand it out to other parties means you need to give explicit permission, not this sort of underhanded fu...cu...huntery.

The Netherlands did some similar last month, I can understand governments want to collect data on health, but even with anonymisation people can be identified (big data innit, collect the dots) so it needs to be coupled with strong protection on no discrimination and fines (see HIPAA in the USA)... this is no good.

... beating the likes of beyonce erdogan zuckerberg and nigel farage

well if they put it like that trump deserves it

although i can't help thinking about the doctors working 18hr days with limited resources treating the injured in the bombed city of alepo

but no trump deserves it

dire. in a world that's all but forgotten about dead tree media, TIME magazine puts this sunbed mussolini on it's cover in a laughable attempt to appear edgy and relevant because hey! nothing sells like manufactured controversy. just like they did when they spaffed adolf hitler on the cover. fuck em all.

i think they might be trying to manoeuvre themselves up trumps big saggy ass

Mussolini was also on the cover ages ago... it's unfortunately a sign of the times (and not just the magazine) this Trumpism.

At least Farage didn't get it, as if his ego isn't bloated enough!

It's not an accolade. It's unfortunate that this is the state of things, but he's not won "best dude of the year!"

wasn't it an online poll?

Exakkerly. It's more like 'person who defines 2016' and thus hard to argue.

Hitler was Time Magazine's man of the year in 1938…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_Person_of_the_Year

Person of the Year (called Man of the Year until 1999[1]) is an annual issue of the United States news magazine, Time, that features and profiles a person, a group, an idea, or an object that "for better or for worse...has done the most to influence the events of the year".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_Person_of_the_Year

Late and repetitive, but I haz links

They did a good write up of their reasons, worth a read.

http://time.com/time-person-of-the-year-2016-donald-trump-choice/

Edited to add link, oops

and it's not strange...

Since the list began, every serving President of the United States has been a Person of the Year at least once with the exceptions of Calvin Coolidge, in office at time of the first issue, Herbert Hoover, the next U.S. president, and Gerald Ford. Most were named Person of the Year either the year they were elected or while they were in office; the only one to be given the title before being elected is Dwight D. Eisenhower, in 1944 as Supreme Commander of the Allied Invasion Force, eight years before his election. He subsequently received the title again in 1959, while in office. Franklin D. Roosevelt is the only person to have received the title three times, first as President-elect (1932) and later as the incumbent President (1934 and 1941).

an online poll along the lines of the blue peter kitten naming poll ?

i spose you're right. see also: Mrs Brown's Boys being voted best sitcom of all time.

It's just Time's annual marketing initiative, no need to panic.

They have given him nice red horns too.

http://www.thefader.com/2016/12/07/time-person-of-the-year-cover-trump-hitler

They've also mimicked the Hitler cover.

Is Putin weaponising giant squid?

http://www.express.co.uk/news/weird/735175/vladimir-putin-killer-octopus-organism-46-b-russian-army-secret-weapon-russia

See also: Epic WTF.

One of the things that releasing anonymised health data to 3rd parties has permitted is the application of large scale number crunching algorithms, previously used to detect fraud patterns, on that data. This has successfully mapped and predicted outbreaks of various diseases around the country, allowing drugs and other treatments to be allocated much more effectively, and preventing outbreaks from becoming epidemics.

Sometimes selling data can be a good thing.

I had a discussion with a mate who worked for the NHS re: this. She was convinced that it would be anonymous so would be fine.

I suggested that to be useful for studies the data had to contain a lot of fields, once you start combining the fields you are very quickly narrowing down the subject, without those fields it would be difficult to use the data.

In short, the data is very useful but the anonymity is worth shit so you have to be very trusting in who it is being sold to.

the august, october then most recent time front pages

that escalated quickly

:(

I can't see Boris Johnson lasting much longer as Foreign Secretary:

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/dec/08/boris-johnsons-remarks-about-saudi-arabia-not-the-governments-view

It's really amazing that Number 10 has to issue denials of what the Foreign Secretary says about foreign powers. NB I'm not commenting on what he said, but his role.