East Sussex average IQ - slight rise

Fire crews cut the bodies of five teenagers from the wreckage of a stolen car early hours of Saturday.

All the victims were aged between 14 and 16. One was named as Daniel Carwardine, aged 16. His father, Lee, laid flowers at the scene of the crash.

A look at the message reveals that Daniel must have inherited his staggering intellect from his parents:

A card left with flowers said: "To our lovely son Daniel. We will always love you, thank you for being our son for such a brief time. Mum and Dad."

Hurricane Beta hits the Caribbean

Early adopters in the Caribbean undertake important testing work on storms.

One Beta tester looked disconsolate as his roof was torn away, asking "Does anybody need any G-mail invites?"

Lowering the standard

A Hong Kong man has been convicted of movie internet piracy in what is believed to be the first case involving BitTorrent file-sharing software. Chan Nai-ming was found guilty of copyright infringement for distributing three Hollywood blockbusters using BitTorrent, said a court official.

He had been charged in April for uploading three films to the net - Daredevil, Red Planet and Miss Congeniality. The Hong Kong government said the case was its first successful action against people trying to release Daredevil surreptitiously.

"It is not acceptable behaviour to release this kind of material ever." Government spokesman Toby Wang continued "It's a piece of shit by-the-numbers movie, with that cunt in it. What's next? Affleck vanity projects Gigli or Jersey Girl? For the love of pissing christ no! This stops here."

Wang is currently uploading some kick-ass Bruce Lee flicks

Kiss me Hardy, but not french

Yesterday many people around Britain remembered what was undoubtably one of the countries most important naval victories.At the Battle of Trafalgar on 21 October 1805 the Royal Navy defeated Napoleon's combined French and Spanish fleet in a famous and crushing victory.

Generally interesting coverage was marred only by a succession of people when asked about the importance of the historic victory responded "Well, if it wasn't for Nelson we'd all be speaking French now wouldn't we?" usually with a look to camera that suggested a new Oscar Wilde walked amongst us.

Apart from the crushing banality of this oft-pronounced cliche (insert Americans/French/German as required) it's clearly bollocks. Germany defeated twice last century, not yet ordering tiffin in jolly old english.

But it might explain the continued insurgency in Iraq. Locals think American and British occupying forces are obsessed with insisting the poor buggers learn english as soon as possible. After years of sanctions and living under the brutal regime of Saddam Hussein they finally broke - thinking they're going to be forced to learn a weird language full of homonyms and odd tenses.

"Looks like an Indian put it in"

Men pay to learn British manners at what is being billed as the world's first finishing school for gentlemen, learning how to set the cutlery can be just as tricky as the fly fishing. But after three days in a Scottish castle, the students emerge knowing everything from how much to tip the gamekeeper to how to walk with a book balanced on their heads.

"We have opened the floodgates of politeness around the world," said Diana Mather whose Finishing Academy has now attracted candidates from as far afield as Canada, Pakistan and Japan said Mather, a former actress and BBC presenter - reports Australia's ABC news

Mather whose IMDB entry lists no BBC presenting work at all, just one shonky Ken Russell film (bearing in mind there is an entry as long as your arm for Kate Thornton - professional talent-vacuum, will do clip-show talking-head work for cab fare.) is tapping into the age old desire for the new-money middle classes to buy into a non-existent world of upper-class manners.

The British aristocracy are the rudest, stupidest bunch of in-bred racist curs you'd ever cross the road to avoid, but one of their few saving graces is a charming arrogance and insane self belief. They don't need some filthy prole to tell them which fork to use, as the Duke of Edinburgh would say "whichever one I choose you dirty fucking peasant".

Ronnie Corbett starts auditions

'Good evening. It's nice to be with you again, isn't it Ronnie, and in a packed programme tonight we'll be talking to an out-of-work contortionist who says he can no longer make ends meet.'

Challenge everything

Steven Spielberg, has agreed to develop three original games with Electronic Art's Los Angeles studios.

Work has already started on the first of the three projects, which EA says will be a next generation game which appeals to a broad audience.
The deal is a further sign of how Hollywood and the games industry are moving closer together.

Insiders expect the first project to be a tautly scripted tour-de-force, where a relativley inexperienced new auteur brilliantly redefines an industry - injecting enthusiam that spawns a new golden age of gaming.

Unfortunately it's likely that this will be followed up by an expensive, sprawling self-indulgent game, most likely in sepia. Gamers are looking forward to a new level of clunky emotional manipulation in games that go on about an hour too long.

Mr Spielberg is likely to get help with character design from his long-time collaborator and colleague George Lucas. Oh dear.

Happy 80th birthday

Not long now!

Stop the fucking presses!

Parents are the biggest factor in the disruptive behaviour of school pupils, say teachers.
A survey of 500 primary and secondary teachers for the Teachers' TV channel found 80% blamed discipline problems at school on a lack of parental control.

Teachers believed parents were the cause of poor behaviour.Teachers are pitifully wrong on that score. Parents are not the cause, but they are responsible for raising the little shits, and it seems most of the parents have decided to take a sabbatical.

Children are like life in the middle ages - short, mean, unpleasant and most likely disease ridden. The parents job is as a renaissance, to bring them into an age of enlightenment - where they don't talk in movie theatres.

Your child isn't special or charming to anybody but you and your family (if you're lucky). It is a selfish, dot-eyed shouting machine hell bent on sabotaging whatever scraps of tranquillity remain in this pitiful world, and every right-thinking person within earshot despises it with a coal-black intensity that would make your head spin like a centrifuge if you ever got wind of it.

It's the least you can do to raise the fucker correctly.

This demands a custodial sentence!

Eight people have been charged with the illegal online release of the final Star Wars film before it appeared in cinemas. Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith was leaked onto the internet the day before the film's worldwide release in May.

A defendant, Marc Hoaglin, 36, of Huntington Beach, California, was charged with putting the film on the internet.

Mr Hoaglin could face up to three years in jail if convicted.

California District Attorney Arwen Shoebender said they were also preparing charges against a Mr G Lucas, 61, of Skywalker Ranch, Marin county, CA. He could face 3 concurrent sentences for offences related to releasing Star Wars: The Phantom Menace in cinemas.

Mr Lucas said he would elect to serve the sentences in reverse order.