Brexit.

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

 

[Porsupah Ree]

You can see how many signatures the petition currently has, as well as how many are arriving hourly, over here:

UK Parliament Petitions Monitor

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

The EU should say "two years or nothing". Or "legally binding commitment to withdrawing A50 if we get here again".

 

[Tigger]

You can see how many signatures the petition currently has, as well as how many are arriving hourly, over here:

UK Parliament Petitions Monitor

It's getting so much attention that the petitions website keeps crashing.

 

[2tee2]

It's getting so much attention that the petitions website keeps crashing.

they seem to be unable to get it up /UTC+2

Thursday, March 21, 2019 11:19:32 AM
619310
Thursday, March 21, 2019 11:29:35 AM
Invoke-RestMethod : 502 Bad Gateway
Thursday, March 21, 2019 11:39:36 AM
623603
Thursday, March 21, 2019 11:49:37 AM
Invoke-RestMethod : {"status":"503","error":"Service Unavailable"}
Thursday, March 21, 2019 11:59:38 AM
644260
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:09:38 PM
674708
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:19:39 PM
696198
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:29:44 PM
Invoke-RestMethod : 502 Bad Gateway
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:39:46 PM
Invoke-RestMethod : 502 Bad Gateway
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:49:47 PM
Invoke-RestMethod : {"status":"503","error":"Service Unavailable"}
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:59:47 PM
720002
Thursday, March 21, 2019 1:09:48 PM
739029
Thursday, March 21, 2019 1:19:49 PM
Invoke-RestMethod : 502 Bad Gateway

 

[Innula Zenovka]

In the meantime, here's some light entertainment: Brexit quotes back to haunt politicians - on giant billboards
There are more of them, just do a Google search for brexit billboard tweets

The Brexit billboards are the work of the twitter account Led By Donkeys.

Don't let them get away with it

Chip in to help hold this government to account

www.crowdfunder.co.uk

 

[Innula Zenovka]

they seem to be unable to get it up /UTC+2

Thursday, March 21, 2019 11:19:32 AM
619310
Thursday, March 21, 2019 11:29:35 AM
Invoke-RestMethod : 502 Bad Gateway
Thursday, March 21, 2019 11:39:36 AM
623603
Thursday, March 21, 2019 11:49:37 AM
Invoke-RestMethod : {"status":"503","error":"Service Unavailable"}
Thursday, March 21, 2019 11:59:38 AM
644260
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:09:38 PM
674708
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:19:39 PM
696198
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:29:44 PM
Invoke-RestMethod : 502 Bad Gateway
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:39:46 PM
Invoke-RestMethod : 502 Bad Gateway
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:49:47 PM
Invoke-RestMethod : {"status":"503","error":"Service Unavailable"}
Thursday, March 21, 2019 12:59:47 PM
720002
Thursday, March 21, 2019 1:09:48 PM
739029
Thursday, March 21, 2019 1:19:49 PM
Invoke-RestMethod : 502 Bad Gateway

People on twitter have been suggesting that part of the problem is people repeatedly visiting the page and refreshing it to see what the new total is, thus simulating a DDOS attack.

 

[2tee2]

must be the case, even i'm hitting the json data every 10 minutes. i guess i should stop

 

[Innula Zenovka]

must be the case, even i'm hitting the json data every 10 minutes. i guess i should stop

 

[2tee2]

do they require peeps to uniquely identify themselves? in some more stringent fashion? I wouldn't be surprised if some are running voting scripts etc

 

[Innula Zenovka]

do they require peeps to uniquely identify themselves? in some more stringent fashion? I wouldn't be surprised if some are running voting scripts etc

You have to identify yourself when you sign the petition, of course, but I think the problem is that as soon you reach the petition's front page, you see (when the site is working) a display of how many people have signed it. Even if you don't hit refresh and simply keep the page open, it updates the total automatically every 5 seconds or so.

ETA: There's a bot account on Twitter, https://twitter.com/UltraButt, that reports the updated number of signatures every 5 or 10 minutes. People might consider checking there rather than hammering the petition site.

At the time of writing

 

[Tigger]

do they require peeps to uniquely identify themselves? in some more stringent fashion? I wouldn't be surprised if some are running voting scripts etc

It requires an email address name and postcode, it shouldn't be difficult to determine if the number of people to any given postcode is out of proportion to the number of properties it represents and after signing you must click a verification link received in the email.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

 

[Porsupah Ree]

The current state of the petition - note that the time scale changed around 0800 this morning, from sampling every hour to sampling every ten minutes, hence the apparent sudden slowdown in the rate of growth on the upper chart at that point.

UK Parliament Petitions Monitor

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Nigel Farage tries to take on Anna Soubry. He also agrees that the WA is worse than what we've already got as EU members.

 

[Sid]

Now this must be a relieve for all of our British posters and readers here:

UK's top toilet roll supplier stockpiling in case of no-deal Brexit | Guardian

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

So the Brits are desperately dependent on German toilet paper... this sounds like a cosmic joke to me.

 

[Porsupah Ree]

Yay, the septic tank of social media sites rears its ugly face again:

Theresa May’s Downing Street speech last night may have seemed baffling to those watching at home but there may be a clue as to its purpose in how the government social media machine has used the footage. Soon after she finished talking in Downing Street, the official UK government Facebook page began paying to promote a clip of her speaking under the banner “Brexit: Let’s Get On With It”. The adverts, funded using public money, began running on Facebook last night and have already been seen at least two million times, according to the social network’s new advertising disclosure rules.

So that special announcement was a literal PR exercise.

2h ago 12:26

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

The puppet and its master:

 

[Chin Rey]

It requires an email address name and postcode, it shouldn't be difficult to determine if the number of people to any given postcode is out of proportion to the number of properties it represents and after signing you must click a verification link received in the email.

And still people make the effort to sign up. The count just passed a miillion.