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When the sun will literally set on what's left of the British Empire

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Re: When the sun will literally set on what's left of the British Empire

#211

Post by nine_k »

noirscape wrote: post #116
hmartin wrote: post #109

But the real question... what will happen with .io TLD? (British Indian Ocean Territory's)

It should eventually get removed by ICANN, since the country code TLDs are managed by ISO 3166-1 alpha 2 (it's however not an exact match), and the transfer will mean the British Indian Ocean Territories will no longer exist. ISO is going to be the entity in charge of removing the io country code, which it probably will do since ISO 3166-1 alpha 2 isn't just used for domain names. There's a standardized process for t…

Am I the only one who sees no upside whatsoever in sunsetting a well-established, widely used, reasonably operated TLD?

To my mind, the only reason to unregister a TLD would be the TLD falling into disuse (the registrar having gone incomunicado, too-level DNS servers unmaintained, etc), and nobody agreeing to pick it up at the price of a new TLD ($1M?).

Re: When the sun will literally set on what's left of the British Empire

#212

Post by Rexxar »

wolvesechoes wrote: post #140
capitainenemo wrote: post #82

Hm. I feel like the french republic can still make the claim though, at least according to this wikipedia map. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/67/Mapadefr...

It is always funny to ask people what country has the longest land border with France.

The other funny thing is the land border with Netherlands ... in the Caribbean.

Re: When the sun will literally set on what's left of the British Empire

#213

Post by stephen_g »

zenmac wrote: post #199
ozim wrote: post #75

As an outsider I consider Canada and Australia - British Empire. Hard to think otherwise as they have the same king.

The pictures of Queen/King is on the money, and not to mention this little fiasco in the 70's [1] is when the rub meets the road, and we figure out who is really wearing the pants in this geopolitical relationship. [1]: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/queen-s-secret-letters-re...

The legal landscape is very different now, that triggered a constitutional crisis that basically ensured it will never happen again. A lot of things were also formalised after that by Acts of Parliament like the Australia Act 1986 which cut off basically all legal ties (like any remaining ability of the UK Parliament to make laws in Australia)

Re: When the sun will literally set on what's left of the British Empire

#214

Post by tupac_speedrap »

ineedaj0b wrote: post #157

I’ve been really sad getting older and having so much more context on Britain. My family weirdly had access to all of British TV in US growing up and they had fantastic programs. Now, I feel they are a joke. They seem like a strong example of what absolutely not to do. Their cultural exports have sunk. The arrested citizens for social media posts seems draconian. The economy barely hanging on. I understand the Media…

You seem to be prejudice and cherry picking to backup your opinion judging from the way your post reads and the random unhinged comments on Spain for some reason, HN is attracting more pseudo-intellectuals these days unfortunately. I don't think anyone can help you apart from maybe a therapist but getting laid and interacting with people outside in a non-transactional may help

Re: When the sun will literally set on what's left of the British Empire

#215

Post by tehjoker »

t1E9mE7JTRjf wrote: post #210
tehjoker wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's right, though I don't want to undersell the massive levels of suffering and trickery played by the British. Their stock in trade was to sow ethnic division and steal whatever they could. For example, the million+ that died in the partition of India was a result of their sowing of tensions between Hindus and Muslims. They also did a lot of looting in Africa. Going back in time, if you read about the Duchess of…

Ah yes, the killing was the fault of someone other than those killing people. Why didn't I think of that.

If you fail to see how divide and conquer strategies are employed by the imperial west both externally and internally, much of politics will become mystifying to you.

Re: When the sun will literally set on what's left of the British Empire

#216

Post by lmm »

nl wrote: post #182
StopDisinfo910 wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wether you agree or not is the entire point. This is not a theoretical question about what could be done. The question is why should it happen in the first place? Why do you think people who have been there for 150 years and ask nothing more than cohabitation should be forcefully removed from a place? As I said, it is not that simple. It has absolutely nothing to do with "the sun setting on the French empire".

> The question is why should it happen in the first place? The OP never indicated if they agreed with the claims or not. They raised it just because it was relevant to the sun setting on the French Empire.

Yes and no. They're painting it as somehow legitimate and relevant. If you were seriously just enumerating possibilities then you could equally ask e.g. what if the Spanish decide to invade and reclaim their ancestral homeland?

Re: When the sun will literally set on what's left of the British Empire

#217

Post by tomhow »

jojobas wrote: post #196
crazygringo wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an excellent question. The Wikipedia citations don't actually lead to much, and there's no indication they use the same methodology. Best I can find is the CIA World Factbook [1] which lists France's border with Spain at 646 km (under "France" and "Spain", same value), and Brazil's border with French Guiana at 649 km (under "Brazil"). So, already a radical difference -- from a 45km difference to a 3km difference…

[flagged]

Please don't do this here. If a comment seems unfit for HN, please flag it and email us at hn@ycombinator.com so we can have a look.

Re: When the sun will literally set on what's left of the British Empire

#218

Post by bragr »

crazygringo wrote: post #194
schoen wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there a standard for measuring borders for these purposes, in light of the coastline paradox? I don't mean to suggest that there's no sensible way to do it; I just wonder if people might be using inconsistent methods sometimes, leading to not-very-comparable estimates.

It's an excellent question. The Wikipedia citations don't actually lead to much, and there's no indication they use the same methodology. Best I can find is the CIA World Factbook [1] which lists France's border with Spain at 646 km (under "France" and "Spain", same value), and Brazil's border with French Guiana at 649 km (under "Brazil"). So, already a radical difference -- from a 45km difference to a 3km difference…

When the measurement was taken is important too because any border based on natural features is in constant flux. A big storm could cause the Oyapock River to straighten or create new bends or both.

Re: When the sun will literally set on what's left of the British Empire

#219

Post by awesome_dude »

lmm wrote: post #216
nl wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The question is why should it happen in the first place? The OP never indicated if they agreed with the claims or not. They raised it just because it was relevant to the sun setting on the French Empire.

Yes and no. They're painting it as somehow legitimate and relevant. If you were seriously just enumerating possibilities then you could equally ask e.g. what if the Spanish decide to invade and reclaim their ancestral homeland?

Oh, my bad, I am supposed to mention every example that ever occurred on the face of the planet..

Instead of just showing the (relevant) example that should be watched to see if the sun is setting on the French Empire.

I mean, if you were seriously just enumerating examples you would have included more than 1... right?

Re: When the sun will literally set on what's left of the British Empire

#220

Post by bragr »

throwup238 wrote: post #200
crazygringo wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That works for smooth vector lines, like the border of Colorado, but not for rivers. The thalweg of a river is the same as a coastline -- it has the same fractal nature to it. The more you zoom in, the more it wiggles back and forth. So yes, the length of the border is dominated by the length of the river, but that's just repeating the question, precisely because the thalweg is a physical thing, not a geometric delin…

You’re thinking of a hydrological thalweg. In international law (w.r.t. borders) thalwegs are not dependent on coastlines but on navigable channels with a finite precision . The boundary monuments are often kilometers apart which creates a straight line regardless of the shifting coastline (which is a much bigger problem than the coastline paradox, since rivers can change on a dime).

Maybe some borders are that way but not all. The thalweg is the US-Mexico border along the Rio Grande and the International Boundary and Water Commission semi-regularly swaps territory to deal with the changing border.
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