All Over The House

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Chatterblog

How To Start Your Own Country

Sep12
by Jennifer Kirk on September 12, 2019 at 6:32 pm

Following my recent article on micro nations, I have had a number of people (two is a number, so it counts) contact me to ask how they can start their own countries. Well I’m happy to announce that the Empire of Jennytopia has recently been created and therefore I am now a 100 percent genuine and verifiable expert on making your own country, so I will explain the process to you.

Let’s start with the first requirement…

5. Claim Some Land

All countries need land, because nations were originally conceived on the basis of the near-universal claim that “I’m having that bit over there”. Now there are some nations, such as the Ambulatory Free States of Obsidia, which claim ownership solely of a couple of small rocks (which the Grand Martial of the nation carries around in a briefcase) but the consensus that a nation needs land is enshrined in international law.

The Montevideo Convention lists four requirements for recognition as a country, and the second of those is “a defined territory” (the first requirement is to have some people but you’re already here, so you’ve got that covered). The good thing is that this territory doesn’t have a size requirement, so you can claim pretty much any parcel of land that you want. This could be anything from a square of land in your garden, to a few acres of land in Nevada with a massive train set in it (if you’re The Republic of Molossia), to wherever you decide to weigh anchor; if you’re one of the growing number of people interested in “Seasteading”, movement where new nations are created floating on the sea.

Basically, find some land that someone else isn’t going to take umbrage (or not too much umbrage anyway, nobody wants too much umbrage – it doesn’t taste great) over you calling dibs on and claim it for yourself. It worked out just fine for the Americans, nobody ever cried foul over them doing it!

No, I didn’t study history, why do you ask?

4. Decide on a System of Government

The third requirement under the Montevideo Convention is to have a system of government in place. This is, surprisingly, easy to do. If you can’t be bothered with politics and dealing with other people because they keep telling you they don’t like how you do things, you can just go ahead and declare an absolute monarchy and put yourself in charge. You can also do this if you decide to set up a dictatorship but why would you go to the trouble of pretending to have a functioning government when you can just declare yourself King (or Empress!) and get a fancy title thrown in to boot? It’s like a two-for-one sale on being in charge!

Anyway, you definitely need a government for your new nation because the fourth and final requirement under the Montevideo Convention is “the ability to conduct relations with other nations” and apparently most governments don’t react well if Johnny Whatshisface from the middle of nowhere just rocks up and asks to meet the Queen. Believe me, I’ve been there and they get really upset if you do that. It’s not a pretty sight. So you’ll need a government because these cool kid “established countries” only want to deal with people who know how to get organised.

What these other nations didn’t realise when they drafted the Montevideo Convention is that cool people like us would come along and spot a flaw in their plans. You see, they didn’t define a minimum size for a government, just like they didn’t define a minimum size for a territory. What this means is, if you set yourself up as the Absolute Monarch (which is my new nickname, by the way), you can totally claim to be your entire government! You are now free to conduct foreign relations like they are going out of fashion. Well done!

I mean sure, you could go to the trouble of setting up a real government with other people in it if you wanted to but if you’re lazy, you can totally just wing it as a free-range King. It’s definitely the way to go, in my opinion.

3. Write A Constitution

Now I know what you’re thinking – you’re thinking “Empress Jenny, you’re super cool and amazing!” aren’t you? Don’t tell me if you aren’t, I don’t want to spoil the illusion. In all seriousness, though: doesn’t the United Kingdom not have a constitution yet they managed to take over the world? Well… yes and no, as we explained in a recent article. The thing is, Britain is something of an outlier on the world stage and it does its own thing while everyone else looks on in utter confusion. Don’t follow Britain’s example, they’re weird and a bit of a bad influence.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is how you shouldn’t conduct diplomacy.

But what do you put in a constitution? Well, anything you want really. It’s your nation, so you get to decide what its founding principles are. Do you want to recognise the rights of all people to freedom; decency; and equality? Do you want to guarantee everyone in your nation the right to food and shelter? Do you want to declare perpetual war on squirrels? You can do it.

Most constitutions are basically the documents that lay out the beliefs of the creators of the nation; establish how the basic structure of the government will work; define the money that will be used (if any); lay out the principles of the courts; and tell foreigners who to talk to if they want to establish foreign relations with you (and they will because you’re the awesome new, cool kid on the block). If that seems like a lot of work, there are template constitutions available online, like this one from the Swiss International Constitutional Law website.

2. Design a Flag

Okay, now the hard work is mostly over, so it’s time to crack open your box of crayons and get to work on the fun stuff. You’re going to need a flag for your new nation because apparently that’s an unwritten rule. If you don’t have a flag, someone else might come along and decide you’re not a proper country, so they can take your stuff. There’s historical precedence for this and it’s really unpleasant, so it’s best to avoid it all by drawing something on a sheet of paper and deciding it’s your flag.

See? It happens all the time!

Flag design is a delicate art and there are many rules about what makes a good flag but the best rule that you should keep in mind is also the easiest to remember: keep it simple. If you can’t identify your flag when it’s flying from the top of a tall building, it’s not a good flag. That means intricate drawings are out, and so are words. Nobody’s going to be able to read “Billy smells of farts” from ground level when it’s flying from the top of the Buttlandian embassy. Sorry.

Most flags go with a simple set of coloured stripes, because most countries copied William of Orange’s three-stripe Prince’s Flag from 1579. You can do the same if you want; or you can go for something a bit more wild and interesting; like South Africa did. Just don’t copy Britain and draw lines all over the place because you’ll end up making the same mistake the British did when they rocked up in China for the first time, only to discover that their flag said “Rice” in Chinese script.

That is not a joke, this really happened. Don’t let it happen to you, or you’ll have people writing about your new country in comedy articles like this one for the rest of time.

1. Declare Independence

Okay, this is the final step. From here on out, you’re on your own – literally. It’s time to declare independence from that annoying country you’ve called home up until now and forge your own destiny as a truly independent country. All you need to do is declare independence!

Declaring independence is actually easier than it sounds. Basically, you just write to the government of your home nation and tell them that the piece of land you’ve claimed as your own will no longer be part of the nation it was a part of up to this point. It’s so simple everyone here at All Over the House towers (now part of the Empire of Jennytopia – no backsies!) can’t believe everyone else hasn’t done this as well.

There’s a reason few people have done this and that’s because you’ll likely get ignored. Most of the time, your nation will be regarded as the work of a local crank. You might get a bit of attention from the press (especially the local press because let’s face it, they have to fill the paper with something) but aside from that, you’ll not be taken seriously. Do not despair! This is the first of many tests your nascent country will have to face in its long journey through history.

The big kids might not want to talk to you right away but that doesn’t mean other micronations will ignore you. There’s an entire community out there, ready to meet you and make friends. Just keep plugging away at your diplomatic relations; establishing ties with the more established micronations in the international community and learning the ropes of how to govern a country. In the end, you’ll make it and gain international recognition from the bigger states. It worked for Sealand (kind of), it’ll work for you!

Good luck, new nation founder!

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Five ways Technology Will Ruin Law Enforcement

Sep10
by Zoe Kirk-Robinson on September 10, 2019 at 3:58 pm

“The law is an ass” cry those who have ever had to deal with law enforcement or the courts; because our justice system is far from perfect. Guilty people walk away scot free all the time, and innocent people spend years in jail for crimes they didn’t commit. Sometimes we even manage to lock up some criminals along the way, too! The problem is, law enforcement is a hard job and it’s going to get even harder because we just can’t help creating new and interesting technologies to utterly destroy all remaining faith in our ability to determine the truth.

Today, we’ll look at just five of these massive problems that will wreak havoc in the courts in the future. We’ll start with…

5. You Can Fake A DNA Test

If there’s one thing that science-fiction has drummed into us over the years, it’s that DNA makes us who we are. Well, now technology has come along to utterly screw us over on that one by turning the world on its head. It’s possible to fake DNA tests thanks to unscrupulous con merchants on the Internet, who will happily concoct a set of fake results for you, for a not-too-inconsiderable fee.

Thankfully it’s also reasonably easy to prove these fake tests wrong by doing a legitimate DNA test because we don’t actually live in the world of 1995’s Judge Dredd film (thank goodness!) but that didn’t stop one horrible woman trying to trap a former lover with a fake paternity test. If she had managed it, this entry would be higher on our list.

Still, she’s not alone in faking things to get what she wants. You probably did it at some point without even realising it, in fact, because…

4. We Create Fake Photos For Gimmicks

Snapchat has a lot to answer for, aside from making it far too easy for your annoying aunt to send you weird photos when she’s drunk. Those filters Snapchat offers are basically augmented reality and while they aren’t usually all that convincing (I’m sorry but it doesn’t matter how often you use the Dog Filter, you’re not going to be mistaken for Lassie) the technology behind them is surprisingly powerful.

It’s possible to take a similar form of this technology and use it to place yourself into photos with famous people; or make it appear that you are somewhere you aren’t. This is all well and good when it’s done for the purposes of making a nice souvenier at a football match, for example, but it’s less good when it’s used to create an alibi; which it very easily could be.

“How could I have been murdering that woman, officer? You can clearly see from this photo that I was on Snapchat, using the Dog Filter to send drunk pictures to my ex at the time – and you can see from the background that I was over at the Space Needle at the time, not at Jane Doe’s house. No, I can’t explain the blood stains, there wasn’t a filter to remove those.”

It’s only a matter of time.

3. Simple Camera Tricks Ruin Video Evidence

A few years ago, everyone on the Internet was amazed at dash cam evidence that proved the existence of ghost cars in Russia. As it turned out, the “evidence” was nothing more than a simple, if accidental, camera trick where a car had been hidden from the view of the camera until the exact moment that made it seem like the car appeared from nowhere.

This ghost car footage took the Internet by storm and it was quite a while (in Internet terms at least) before someone was able to explain what had happened. If this can be done accidentally, imagine what the possibilities are if you have some experienced camera people sit down and work out how to pull off a camera trick on purpose.

With the right forward planning, it could be remarkably easy for experienced camera operators to make something appear to happen (or not happen) while producing video evidence. That’s why it’s so important to not believe everything you see just because you saw it. If it’s on the Internet, you aren’t seeing the whole story.

2. Hackers Can Tamper With Evidence

Every year there’s at least one film or TV episode where the plot revolves around breaking into somewhere to steal, plant or tamper with vital evidence. It’s usually the deciding factor in a tense drama that’s fun to watch; but probably nowhere near as fun to actually experience if you’re relying on that evidence. Well, start worrying because it’s actually a reality. Hackers can delete, insert or modify any evidence that is stored on a computer; or make evidence disappear if the record of where it is being held is stored on a computer. Welcome to Twenty-first Century law enforcement.

Moreover, it turned out a while back that the software in police body cameras is vulnerable to hacker attack too; so if you were hoping that the bodycam footage from whatever incident you had with the police was going to save you; you’d better hope that nobody was interested in seeing you come to harm because if they were, there’s no guarantee that footage still exists (if it was even recorded at all).

1. Deep Fakes Mean You Can’t Trust Confessions

Here’s the most disturbing video you’ll see all day; unless your plans for the evening include trawling the deep web, of course.

Deep fakes are getting scary. In this one, we see Jim Carrey’s face transposed onto Alison Brie’s body. What do you think will be the societal effects when this technology is easily accessible to everyone on their phone? pic.twitter.com/j4ZMyGsBkX

— Ken Rutkowski (@kenradio) September 3, 2019

That’s Jim Carey’s face on a woman’s body and while it’s not 100% convincing, it’s getting close. This is a Deep Fake; a composite video created for amusement but which shows off just how advanced AI-driven video editing technology has become. It wasn’t long ago that these videos looked ridiculous and were easy to spot but the technology is advancing rapidly and soon it won’t be possible to tell the real video from a Deep Fake.

Why is this a problem in law enforcement? Well, there are two possible results of this technology. The first is that it will become incredibly easy for a crooked cop to frame you by creating a Deep Fake of your confession to whatever crime they decide to pin on you. You probably won’t be moving too much when being interviewed; which will remove the main source of a human being able to tell when a Deep Fake is, well, fake – the faces don’t match up as well if the angles change.

The second problem is that these videos aren’t limited to simple face-forward editing; they can insert you over an actor doing just about anything. So if you’re on a jury and you see CCTV or eyewitness footage of the accused committing a crime, it’s only a few years before you’ll have to ask yourself if that video was a Deep Fake.

We live in very interesting times, my friends; and technology is to blame.

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