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> I'd wager most not just don't know what it offers but don't even really know what exactly is bad about it.

This is a good reason why the EU should fail, and why people voted for Brexit, which will hopefully go some way to making that happen.

To the average citizen, the EU is a gargantuan bureaucracy, burning through enormous sums of money, whose main concern seems to be churning out reams of incomprehensible regulations. It also has some courts that overrule our national governments from time to time.

I like the concept of a more integrated Europe, but the EU is just the first attempt at it.

> It seems to me that not many people realize just how highly the EU is valued in Germany across the political spectrum. People seem to severely underestimate what sacrifices Germany is willing to make in the context of Brexit to benefit the EU.

The perception of the EU as a German project — or experiment, if you will — was one of the factors leading people to vote for Brexit.

My IO requirements haven't changed that dramatically in the past six years, and are still well served by a Mid-2010 MacBook Pro.

I've got MagSafe for power, Mini DisplayPort for video out, Mini TOSLINK for audio out, and USB 2.0 for everything else. There's a gigabit Ethernet port if I want it, but otherwise 802.11n works just fine.

I'd like faster data transfer (not that any of my peripherals are USB C compatible yet), but otherwise I don't really understand what the massive fragmentation of connector standards does for me.

By contrast, the UK now has six indoor velodromes, half of which were opened in the last five years.

Guess who cleaned up [0] at the Olympics this year?

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cycling_at_the_2016_Summer_O...

The only reason anyone is paying £1m+ for pokey two beds in Battersea is because they think a greater fool will pay more in a few years time.

The wider redevelopment has nothing to do with Apple.

The scheme got planning permission in 2011, and construction work has been ongoing since 2012.

It's a mixed-use development, with office space only part of the puzzle, and according to this article, Apple are only taking a lease on 40% of the office space.

I suspect Apple have negotiated hugely preferential rates on said space (as well as structuring the deal so as to pay the bare minimum in taxes, etc.), and the developers have agreed solely because having Apple move in is incredible PR.

It doesn't so much mean receipt as "invoice" (e.g. for taxes or utilities) or "check" (e.g. in a restaurant)

In most restaurants you would ask for the bill, then when you pay, you will receive a separate receipt.

The receipt is proof of payment.

You could also characterise it as a risk, whereby potential downsides are amplified by age.

Young voters will have to live with the consequences for most of their lives, while old voters don't have much time left.

Then again, you could argue older voters were altruistic and voting in the interests of the next generation.

If you're paying $10/month for a domain name, you're paying too much!

No. Scotland had an independence referendum two years ago, and one of he factors in that vote was the prospect of Britain opting to leave the EU.

Scotland voted decisively to remain in the UK, and to go the way of the UK on EU membership.

This is notwithstanding the fact Scotland is financially dependent on the rest of the UK, and would not survive on its own, let alone meet the criteria for joining the EU on its own.

A couple of sensationalist anecdotes.

More than 17 million people voted to leave.

Your statements about regulation do not disagree with my point that the EU is a political union.

It is, fundamentally, a political construct. It has gained legitimacy and law-making powers across its member states, but it could cease to exist tomorrow and its member states would continue to exist.

There is absolutely no comparison between TTIP negotiations and the UK becoming a member of the EEA. The latter is extremely simple to implement. It is effectively the status quo.

There are two important differences between Norway and the UK:

1. Norway is a net exporter to the EU; the UK is a net importer. Norway is effectively paying for the right to sell its goods and services into the EU. By the same logic, the EU should pay the UK to join the EEA;

2. Norway is a much smaller economy than the UK, and the EU could probably cut ties with Norway without destabilising the union. It cannot do so with the UK.

Noted that UK companies selling into the EU would still be subject to EU regulations. I don't see that as an issue.

It's all swings and roundabouts.

If the pound loses value in the medium-run, foreign investment in the UK will increase.

Brexit, if negotiations are acrimonious, will be worse for the EU than it will be for the UK, so I don't expect much of a long-term shift in the GBP-EUR exchange rate.

Outside the EU, the UK can make itself an even more attractive place to do business, no longer hampered by EU laws and regulations.

In any case, I think Brexit will be curtains for the current incarnation of the EU. It will either have to reinvent itself significantly, or collapse and be replaced by a new union.

The EU is just a political union. It can break apart without necessarily destroying the economies of its member states.

You are suggesting the EU member states would be willing to sacrifice their economies (by punishing the UK) to save the union. I believe the opposite to be the case.

Why would access to the single market need to be paid for? All things being equal, the UK would buy more from the market than it would sell into it.

If anything, the EU should be paying the UK to join the single market.

Such is the absurdity of EU officials pretending they can punish the UK.

The cost of another country leaving may indeed be higher, but the EU simply can't afford to punish the UK, even as a deterrent. They're all talk and no trousers on that front.

I'm not sure what you mean by "special benefits". Yes, the UK negotiated the rebate and certain special conditions of membership, but fundamentally it was a net contributor to the EU.

I think the current EU is toast either way, so the argument of what deal the UK negotiates with it may end up being moot.

I'm sure the EU wants to make the UK pay, but it can't afford to.

The EU is too reliant on exports to the UK to play hardball.

That's the calculation the British public made. The UK pays more in than it gets out. It imports more from the EU than it exports to it.

The EU needs the UK more than the UK needs the EU.

Just look at the immediate aftermath in the markets. FTSE 100 closed 3.15% down, whereas almost all EU indices saw losses 2-3x as much.

The UK will obviously lose the "benefits" of EU membership, but it was a net contributor in financial terms. All else being equal, the UK could replace all EU funds spent in the UK, and have cash to spare.

In trade terms, the EU faces a prisoner's dilemma. It may be beneficial for them as a whole to play hardball with the UK, but major exporters to the UK (e.g. German car manufacturers) won't accept it. There'll be some diplomatic bravado, some tense negotiations, and the UK will be granted access to the common market.

Granted, but money talks.

EU industry is not going to stand for punishment tariffs against the UK.

On the other hand, the EU does not need free trade with Norway as much as it does with the UK.

There might not be an EU by the time Scotland gets a vote to secede and begins an application to join the EU.

Fascinating time to be alive.

This is quite an elegant solution, and I like it.

I also think if we just held the same EU referendum again -- a sort of "are you sure?" -- the response would be a decisive remain vote.

Barely anyone knew who represented them in Europe. Fewer still knew what powers those representatives had.

I suspect 99% could not name more than five people in the EU machine, including Nigel Farage as a free point.

The EU is absolutely other people to the UK.

The EU is an utterly bewildering bureaucracy.

Barely anyone fully understands what it does.

On the contrary, the fact the EU had enormous power over British people, yet barely anyone knew what it was, what it did, or why it was important, was a compelling reason for the UK to leave.

Yes, it's a supply side problem. The housing stock is virtually fixed.

Being a member of the EU undoubtedly pushes demand up.

Good luck making the selling of individual envelopes commercially viable!

That said, totally agreed there's a gap for bringing the "sharing economy" to things people buy but rarely use (lawn mowers, leaf blowers, pressure washers, etc.)

There are already similar laws in the UK and other countries.

See this recent example, where a sexual health centre accidentally leaked a list of 800 people who had attended HIV clinics.

They ended up with a £180,000 fine: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-36247186

> Yes, some people have chosen to run their own mail servers for some reason and those people might conceivably get a bit more spam for a while.

Once your email is out there, there's no going back.

Email addresses are personally identifiable information, and revealing a relationship between a business and a person is potentially very dangerous.

For example: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-36247186

Not necessarily. When the capital gains from simply sitting on a property are so great, I'm sure a lot of landlords are actually making a net loss on a renting operation, and don't care all that much.

Regardless, the point is that a lot of people see the mortgage repayments equalling the rent and don't think about the extra costs of ownership.

You do incur a lot more costs as a property owner than as a renter, which you should bear in mind.

Over the life of your average 20-25 year mortgage you should expect to have to replace numerous appliances, encounter a couple of catastrophic and unexpected issues (leaking roof, etc.), and after 10 years the decor will be outdated and shabby.

To get optimum resale value you will have to sink a lot of time/money into remodelling (the money you will likely recover, but not the time/effort), then you have the stress of trying to sell the place.

You are also bearing the risk of a downturn in the housing market, and could end up in negative equity.

As a renter you have greater flexibility, much greater certainty over your outgoings, etc.