Richard Wilkinson’s Blog

So VAT is reduced

<sarcasm>

yay, woo, this will make me spend loads of money

</sarcasm>

So the government reduces VAT by 2.5 percent.  So for every £1000 I spend, I will save a whole £25.

And for that privilage I will get to pay higher taxes in a years time, probably for the next 10 years.

Cant say im convinced.

I’m just waiting for all those systems with a hard coded figure of 17.5% for VAT not being able to handle the change, it could be Y2K all over again.

Tags: vat

A Great Example Of Clear Wording In An Online Form

I was just trying to buy next months train ticket and came across this brilliant attempt by first capital connect to trick their customers into agreeing to all of the marketing junk that you always get with any sort of signup to online services:

The text reads:

We may, from time to time, send you useful information and special offers about both our and our selected partners products and services. We will however NOT provide your details to any third parties, except in accordance with our terms and conditions, other than the train company you travel with. If you do not wish to receive this information or these offers simply clear the box.

As the saying goes ‘Clear as mud’, surely ‘Check this box to receive junk mail’ is sooo much clearer?

August update

Just thought that I should write something on here as i’ve been really lazy since i started my new job, so here is a list (we all love lists right?) of what i’ve been up to, in no particular order.

• New job, we already know that.  But it turns out that if you mention the company name, then it turns up in a google alert at work and everyone reads your blog.  Well not everyone, but some people.  Lucky theres nothing incriminating on here
• Went to see former zoomf college’s band play in the legendary (apparently) Hope and Anchor, and they were quite good.  You can check them out at http://www.myspace.com/thecommissarsmusic.  And now i’ve mentioned zoomf, they are gonna see this in a google alert too.
• Went to the august london wicket user group, talked about wicket and geeky stuff in general, and drunk beer, the usuall really.  Wicket RAD looks like a really nice project for speeding up application development, if you don’t mind annotations.
• Went on Team Fortress 2 for the first time in ages, and I still kick ass

Thats about it, all the interesting stuff anyway.  I will get round to writing another technical post soon, provided I can think of something worthwhile to write about.