British Vocabulary

Drake Tungsten · March 11, 2003, 12:05

I hope the thread title adds a veneer of respectability to this otherwise worthless thread. Anyway...

Quote:

Originally posted by The Stinger
I'm a low to very low grade functionary in a Quango( which is basicaly a government body not directly run by a minister).

The quote is from Lancer's tragically closed resignation thread. So, a quango is a real thing? Can someone explain it more thoroughly? I always just thought it was some nonsense word that Blur made up...

Oh, you should probably discuss other aspects of British vocabulary as well...

Dauphin · March 11, 2003, 12:07

Its an agency or organisation that is financed by the government but acts independently of it.

Quasi-non-governmental => Quango.

Zkribbler · March 11, 2003, 12:10

[Please move right along to the next post. Thank you.]

Drake Tungsten · March 11, 2003, 12:10

Do you know of any American equivalents? I'm drawing a blank...

Zkribbler · March 11, 2003, 12:16

Quote:

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
Do you know of any American equivalents? I'm drawing a blank...

The U.S. Postal "Service" and the University of California are both "public corporations," i.e. wholly owned corporate subsidiaries of the government. That sounds stupid, I know, but it's the government for Pete's sake--it's supposed to act stupid.

FrustratedPoet · March 11, 2003, 12:18

At least Drake has a good taste in music.

/me waits for Pattycakes to turn up and say that Blur are ****.

ThePantaloonDog · March 11, 2003, 12:22

I would like to know who exactly came up with Quango.

It seems to me that the British are always coming up with nonsense words to further confuse American English speakers.

Drake Tungsten · March 11, 2003, 12:23

Quote:

At least Drake has a good taste in music.

I'm glad someone finally appreciates it. You wouldn't believe how much crap I took in high school for listening to Blur...

FrustratedPoet · March 11, 2003, 12:25

Quote:

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
You wouldn't believe how much crap I took in high school for listening to Blur...

At high school in England during that time you took a load of crap if you DIDN'T listen to Blur.

Drake Tungsten · March 11, 2003, 12:26

Quote:

At high school in England during that time you took a load of crap if you DIDN'T listen to Blur.

Britpop wasn't quite as popular here in Nebraska...

Dauphin · March 11, 2003, 12:35

All Your Life, All We Want, Cowboy Song and Young and Lovely. Great songs that many non-Blur fans have never heard.

Drake Tungsten · March 11, 2003, 12:37

All Your Life is my favorite Blur song ever...

Young and Lovely is excellent as well.

Dauphin · March 11, 2003, 12:41

I prefer All We Want. Beachcoma leads my Windows Player count (out of the Blur category) though.

Drake Tungsten · March 11, 2003, 12:44

All Your Life is the leader on my iTunes list.

I Love Her, Supa Shoppa, Swallows in the Heatwave, Tame and Ultranol are tied for second.

Felch · March 11, 2003, 13:10

Is Blur more Oasis or Radiohead? All I've heard was that horrible "Song 2" dogpile.

Drake Tungsten · March 11, 2003, 13:13

Probably closer to Oasis, but they aren't really similar to either band...

Of course, their new stuff is closer to Radiohead than Oasis, so I guess any attempt to categorize them is futile. You confused now?

Dauphin · March 11, 2003, 14:55

Quote:

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
All Your Life is the leader on my iTunes list.

I Love Her, Supa Shoppa, Swallows in the Heatwave, Tame and Ultranol are tied for second.

Tame and Swallows are good, the others are so-so.

Have you heard Out of Time? The new album, Think Tank, should be out in early May (at least for people who don't P2P).

Clear Skies · March 11, 2003, 16:54

Quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisation...

alva · March 11, 2003, 16:59

Quote:

Originally posted by ThePantaloonDog
I would like to know who exactly came up with Quango.

It seems to me that the British are always coming up with nonsense words to further confuse American English speakers.

How do you thinks that affect the rest of us

Drake Tungsten · March 11, 2003, 19:55

Quote:

Have you heard Out of Time? The new album, Think Tank, should be out in early May (at least for people who don't P2P).

I haven't heard Out of Time yet. I'll probably pick the new album up when it comes out in the States, even though I'm a bit leery about the band becoming the "Damon Albarn show" now that Graham is gone...

Buck Birdseed · March 11, 2003, 20:15

For what it's worth: although I usually hate blur, I thought "Out Of Time" was okay, if a bit on the "Mr. Tambourine Man" side.

Dauphin · March 11, 2003, 21:07

Oh crap, Snapcase likes it. If paiktis likes it too I'll have to stop listening to their music.

Buck Birdseed · March 11, 2003, 21:27

I didn't say I liked it. It was crap. Not bad for being blur, considering that their usual stuff is so insensitive, ironic, derivative, chirpy, witless, and self-conciously trend-following.

paiktis, otoh, loves blur. I think.

KrazyHorse · March 11, 2003, 21:29

Quote:

Originally posted by Big Crunch
Its an agency or organisation that is financed by the government but acts independently of it.

Quasi-non-governmental => Quango.

We call them Crown Corporations here.

CBC, power companies, etc.

Drake Tungsten · March 12, 2003, 00:01

So PBS would be a quango?

Frozzy · March 12, 2003, 03:01

quango is almost as bad as CHOGM (Commonwealth Heads Of Government Meeting).

Chog-um.... sounds like a war threat

TheStinger · March 12, 2003, 04:04

A quango is any organisation which is set up by an act of parliament that has freedom form direct government control. It has its budget set by the government but other than that they are supposed to be independant. There is normaly a non executive board or council to overseas the running of it.

Frozzy · March 12, 2003, 04:14

In other words a State-Owned Enterprise(e.g. British Rail pre-privitisation)?

TheStinger · March 12, 2003, 04:17

I don't thinks so. State owned enterprises have the secretary of state as the largest(only) shareholder and therefore the government had more influence.

In reality the goverment has a lot of influence on most quangos its just not official

Frozzy · March 12, 2003, 04:21

Quote:

State owned enterprises have the secretary of state as the largest(only) shareholder and therefore the government had more influence.

Not necissarily. I'll take Air New Zealand as an example, as I know it.

Air NZ is a SOE. The NZ govt. owns ~ 80%. Qantas buy 25%, and get 2 board seats. The govt. has 5 and some other guy has the last.

So... the govt. has the majority, but Qantas gets the revenue, like any other enterprise. Yet, because the govt. has the larget share in Air NZ, it is still classified as an SOE.