5 ms·

I can wholeheartedly recommend a documentary called Draquila – L'Italia che trema [1] about the L'Aquila earthquake. As many of my Italian friends tell me, Ita

I can wholeheartedly recommend a documentary called Draquila – L'Italia che trema [1] about the L'Aquila earthquake. As many of my Italian friends tell me, Italy is an absolutely corrupt shit hole. I remember a scene where they showed recordings of civil protection officials gloating about the disaster on the phone, right after it happened. They talked about the opportunity to make money [2]. The head of the national civil protection service is / was notorious in his blatant abuse of emergency powers to give government contracts (construction) without oversight to his crooked friends. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draquila_%E2%80%93_LItalia_che_trema http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draquila_%E2%80%93_LItalia_che_... [2] At the end of the trailer: http://www.universalsubtitles.org/en/videos/lTyjwBhD9HOI/en/250371/ http://www.universalsubtitles.org/en/videos/lTyjwBhD9HOI/en/...

Anon84 14y ago
The italians on HN might find this interesting: http://evasori.info/ http://evasori.info/ it aims to crowd source tax evasion in Italy. Their mobile app has recently won an award: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=d4Yek0_xfM0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=... (Disclaimer: I've worked directly with several of the people involved.)
- ninguem2 14y ago
  I gather from the website that this app is trying to discourage tax evasion by exposing evaders. Your sentence "it aims to crowd source tax evasion in Italy" gives the wrong impression.
  - Anon84 14y ago
    Sorry that's what I meant. It should be "crowd source tax evasion detection" :-)
rmc 14y ago
Italy is an absolutely corrupt shit hole. I remember a scene where they showed recordings of civil protection officials gloating about the disaster on the phone, right after it happened. They talked about the opportunity to make money Just as another data point, lots of countries have corrupt and self-centred politicians. A spin doctor the UK government, on September 11th 2001, between when the towers were hit and when the fell, wrote an email to their staff saying "It's now a very good day to get out anything we want to bury. Councillors' expenses?" ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jo_Moore http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jo_Moore ). You'll always get slimey politicians who will see oppertunity in tragedy.
- objclxt 14y ago
  That's a little different. What you're talking about is burying bad news, which is indeed standard political practice. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. What it's not is corruption, which is what the OP is talking about. For what it's worth, I would say Italy does have a perception of being more corrupt than its fellow European counterparts. This may or may not be true - it's obviously a little difficult to objectively measure corruption, but the Corruption Perceptions Index[1] has ranked Italy as one the most corrupt countries of Western Europe. [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index
  - andrewcooke 14y ago
    chile should be so fucking proud of that map.
    - cpeterso 14y ago
      Why is Chile such an outlier among South American countries on the Corruption Perceptions Index?
      - 89a 14y ago
        They corrupted the Corruption Perceptions Index
      - andrewcooke 14y ago
        i don't know. i do believe it is true (chileans i know that have lived in argentina are mortified by the corruption there), and the country is very isolated culturally (by the andes in the east and desert - and poor relations politically - to the north). so it's reasonable for it to be different, but i don't have a good explanation for why it is. whatever the reason, it seems to be quite deep, culturally. anecdotally, i was shocked just a couple of weeks ago when i went to get a picture framed and the people doing the work lied to my face (they said between themselves that they didn't have the material i wanted; when i questioned that they promised they did; the results were not what they promised). that was very odd for chile (sorry, i didn't make it clear above - i live there), but the shop owners were argentinian immigrants... it is normal, culturally, here (speaking in broad terms) to speak "optimistically" of the future (so if you ask whether a shop will have something in stock next month, they will - usually, in my experience - say yes), but not to directly contradict what was said a moment earlier without batting an eyelid (i should perhaps add that i suspect i missed something myself in the exchange in the picture shop - perhaps the expected way i should have behaved was to offer an acceptable compromise instead of directly questioning what was happening - i am aware that cultural distinctions are not absolute judgements).
robertelder 14y ago
Should be [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draquila_%E2%80%93_L%27Italia_che_trema http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draquila_%E2%80%93_L%27Italia_c...
jivatmanx 14y ago
Not all of Italy, only the South. That's why the biggest party in the north is a secessionist party. A lot of cool stuff comes out of the North, like Arduino.
- riffraff 14y ago
  for the record: the last major of milan was, for lack of better word, "impeached" after it was found out her son had built an abusive "batcave". The current governor of lombardia and the whole council is in a corruption and vote marketing scandal. The head of the secessionist party for the last twenty years left his role after it was found out he and his son had been using the party as a revolver bank account. And, noticeably, the Dear Leader Silvio Berlusconi is from milan. There is a lot to say on the north vs south in italy, but saying "northern italy is not corrupted" is as silly as it gets.
  - trhtrsh 14y ago
    Holy cow, the plot of Sin City (Politician's son builds a rape/torture chamber, and the son is protected from punishment because the politician wants him to produce an heir) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0401792/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0401792/) actually really happened in Milan?
    - riffraff 14y ago
      ah I'm very sorry for the misunderstanding, no. I meant abusive as in "abusive financial practices", a synonim for illegal (per merriam webster), not abusive as in "physical abuse". Please excuse this non native speaker for making something look worse than it was :)
- conradfr 14y ago
  Isn't Berlusconi from Milan ?
- lbolla 14y ago
  This is bullshit, let me tell you. Corruption is everywhere in Italy: North AND South. Public sector AND Private sector. I am Italian, from the North, I lived in Milan for years and I am married with a woman from Rome: I know what I'm saying...
duiker101 14y ago
As an italian I can confirm this, there are many people speculating on this sad events. You can find many articles on the net about how many initiatives to send money often make those money "disappear". When the money actually arrives, the people how need to rebuild often rebuild using cheap material and take the money for them. Some of the cities hitted by quackes many years ago never really recovered and maybe after 20 years a lot of people might be living still in containers.
mc32 14y ago
Whether or not the seismologists gave some kind of reassurance or not, it seems ridiculous to try them for manslaughter. Perhaps professional incompetence or the like, but it's not as though the town would have done anything different had they said without any provable foundation "a major earthquake is imminent". Seismology is in such infancy that holding people responsible for acts of nature, which state of the art are highly unpredictable, is on the surface, ludicrous. What's next, the meteorologist on trial for getting the forecast wrong about heavy rains which cause floods and damage, etc? It's reminiscent of the tratment of Galileo.
- seanc722 14y ago
  I agree. When I had first read the title I thought maybe they somehow CAUSED the quake. Definitely got me interested until I actually read the full article. Seems a little overboard the amount of "justice" taken upon them.
davidw 14y ago
> absolutely corrupt shit hole While it's corrupt, labelling it a 'shit hole' is going way too far. For those interested in a detailed book about what's good and bad, and what needs to happen, I'd recommend: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B008F86HBK/?tag=dedasys-20 http://www.amazon.com/dp/B008F86HBK/?tag=dedasys-20
klez 14y ago
> I remember a scene where they showed recordings of civil protection officials gloating about the disaster on the phone, right after it happened. They talked about the opportunity to make money Actually they where enterpreneurs

Anon84 14y ago

The italians on HN might find this interesting: http://evasori.info/ http://evasori.info/ it aims to crowd source tax evasion in Italy. Their mobile app has recently won an award: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=d4Yek0_xfM0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=... (Disclaimer: I've worked directly with several of the people involved.)

ninguem2 14y ago
I gather from the website that this app is trying to discourage tax evasion by exposing evaders. Your sentence "it aims to crowd source tax evasion in Italy" gives the wrong impression.
- Anon84 14y ago
  Sorry that's what I meant. It should be "crowd source tax evasion detection" :-)

rmc 14y ago

Italy is an absolutely corrupt shit hole. I remember a scene where they showed recordings of civil protection officials gloating about the disaster on the phone, right after it happened. They talked about the opportunity to make money Just as another data point, lots of countries have corrupt and self-centred politicians. A spin doctor the UK government, on September 11th 2001, between when the towers were hit and when the fell, wrote an email to their staff saying "It's now a very good day to get out anything we want to bury. Councillors' expenses?" ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jo_Moore http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jo_Moore ). You'll always get slimey politicians who will see oppertunity in tragedy.

objclxt 14y ago
That's a little different. What you're talking about is burying bad news, which is indeed standard political practice. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. What it's not is corruption, which is what the OP is talking about. For what it's worth, I would say Italy does have a perception of being more corrupt than its fellow European counterparts. This may or may not be true - it's obviously a little difficult to objectively measure corruption, but the Corruption Perceptions Index[1] has ranked Italy as one the most corrupt countries of Western Europe. [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index
- andrewcooke 14y ago
  chile should be so fucking proud of that map.
  - cpeterso 14y ago
    Why is Chile such an outlier among South American countries on the Corruption Perceptions Index?
    - 89a 14y ago
      They corrupted the Corruption Perceptions Index
    - andrewcooke 14y ago
      i don't know. i do believe it is true (chileans i know that have lived in argentina are mortified by the corruption there), and the country is very isolated culturally (by the andes in the east and desert - and poor relations politically - to the north). so it's reasonable for it to be different, but i don't have a good explanation for why it is. whatever the reason, it seems to be quite deep, culturally. anecdotally, i was shocked just a couple of weeks ago when i went to get a picture framed and the people doing the work lied to my face (they said between themselves that they didn't have the material i wanted; when i questioned that they promised they did; the results were not what they promised). that was very odd for chile (sorry, i didn't make it clear above - i live there), but the shop owners were argentinian immigrants... it is normal, culturally, here (speaking in broad terms) to speak "optimistically" of the future (so if you ask whether a shop will have something in stock next month, they will - usually, in my experience - say yes), but not to directly contradict what was said a moment earlier without batting an eyelid (i should perhaps add that i suspect i missed something myself in the exchange in the picture shop - perhaps the expected way i should have behaved was to offer an acceptable compromise instead of directly questioning what was happening - i am aware that cultural distinctions are not absolute judgements).

robertelder 14y ago

Should be [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draquila_%E2%80%93_L%27Italia_che_trema http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draquila_%E2%80%93_L%27Italia_c...

jivatmanx 14y ago

Not all of Italy, only the South. That's why the biggest party in the north is a secessionist party. A lot of cool stuff comes out of the North, like Arduino.

riffraff 14y ago
for the record: the last major of milan was, for lack of better word, "impeached" after it was found out her son had built an abusive "batcave". The current governor of lombardia and the whole council is in a corruption and vote marketing scandal. The head of the secessionist party for the last twenty years left his role after it was found out he and his son had been using the party as a revolver bank account. And, noticeably, the Dear Leader Silvio Berlusconi is from milan. There is a lot to say on the north vs south in italy, but saying "northern italy is not corrupted" is as silly as it gets.
- trhtrsh 14y ago
  Holy cow, the plot of Sin City (Politician's son builds a rape/torture chamber, and the son is protected from punishment because the politician wants him to produce an heir) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0401792/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0401792/) actually really happened in Milan?
  - riffraff 14y ago
    ah I'm very sorry for the misunderstanding, no. I meant abusive as in "abusive financial practices", a synonim for illegal (per merriam webster), not abusive as in "physical abuse". Please excuse this non native speaker for making something look worse than it was :)
conradfr 14y ago
Isn't Berlusconi from Milan ?
lbolla 14y ago
This is bullshit, let me tell you. Corruption is everywhere in Italy: North AND South. Public sector AND Private sector. I am Italian, from the North, I lived in Milan for years and I am married with a woman from Rome: I know what I'm saying...

duiker101 14y ago

As an italian I can confirm this, there are many people speculating on this sad events. You can find many articles on the net about how many initiatives to send money often make those money "disappear". When the money actually arrives, the people how need to rebuild often rebuild using cheap material and take the money for them. Some of the cities hitted by quackes many years ago never really recovered and maybe after 20 years a lot of people might be living still in containers.

mc32 14y ago

Whether or not the seismologists gave some kind of reassurance or not, it seems ridiculous to try them for manslaughter. Perhaps professional incompetence or the like, but it's not as though the town would have done anything different had they said without any provable foundation "a major earthquake is imminent". Seismology is in such infancy that holding people responsible for acts of nature, which state of the art are highly unpredictable, is on the surface, ludicrous. What's next, the meteorologist on trial for getting the forecast wrong about heavy rains which cause floods and damage, etc? It's reminiscent of the tratment of Galileo.

seanc722 14y ago
I agree. When I had first read the title I thought maybe they somehow CAUSED the quake. Definitely got me interested until I actually read the full article. Seems a little overboard the amount of "justice" taken upon them.

davidw 14y ago

> absolutely corrupt shit hole While it's corrupt, labelling it a 'shit hole' is going way too far. For those interested in a detailed book about what's good and bad, and what needs to happen, I'd recommend: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B008F86HBK/?tag=dedasys-20 http://www.amazon.com/dp/B008F86HBK/?tag=dedasys-20

klez 14y ago

> I remember a scene where they showed recordings of civil protection officials gloating about the disaster on the phone, right after it happened. They talked about the opportunity to make money Actually they where enterpreneurs