[sacrosanct]

> thanks for all the bits

Am I missing something here? What's the headline supposed to mean? Is it a tongue-in-cheek gesture, since GCHQ routinely hoover up personal data and spy on both their citizenry and foreign countries?

[jhauris]

I think it's a reference to "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy". Knowing Earth was going to be destroyed the dolphins leave, but they leave behind a message which when decoded translates to "so long and thanks for all the fish" (referring to how dolphins had trained humans to give them a fish when they did tricks).

[happymellon]

> Knowing Earth was going to be destroyed the dolphins leave, but they leave behind a message

He thinks that the UK is going to implode?

Probably correct even if it is mostly harmless.

[bigiain]

> He thinks that the UK is going to implode?

Arguably, it's in the middle of doing so right now...

[mindcrime]

It's a paraphrase or restatement of the phrase "so long and thanks for all the fish", the title of one of the books in Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. Changing "fish" to "bits" is interesting, as it could be "just" a reference to life in the modern age and that this individual is leaving a techie oriented job that deals with "bits and bytes". Or it could be a really on the nose "joke" making light of exactly what you say:

"GCHQ routinely hoover up personal data and spy on both their citizenry and foreign countries?"

It's hard to say which it really is.

[fundad]

doesn't bits refer to genitals?

[thombat]

In British vernacular about a quarter of all common words can be used to refer to genitals and/or intimate acts, especially when said out loud with the right intonation.

One time in London I lost my rag with a local colleague and snarled at him "is there nothing you can't make innuendo from?!?" And without missing a beat he simply leered back "in-YOUR-end-o"

[andrewflnr]

It may be more widespread in Britain, but I assure you it's equally possible anywhere. :)

[waterhouse]

On "Penn & Teller: Bullshit", there was an episode where one of the people they interviewed was a woman who's initially seen carrying a large stack of envelopes, and Penn on voiceover said something like, "We told the previous guy that we wanted to see a woman with really ... big ... envelopes. He's foreign; he didn't understand that, in America, every plural noun means tits." So there may be some regional variation.

[ChrisRR]

In addition to everyone who's given legitimate answers, it's also why they've used a picture of a dolphin and referenced "life, the universe and everything"

[nibbleshifter]

It's a Hitchhikers Guide reference, the article has a couple of them.

Its Ian ingratiating himself to the geek readership so they think he's one of them and not, well, a fucking ex government spook ;)

[tellmelies]

it's from hitchhikers guide to the galaxy. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/So_Long,_and_Thanks_for_All_...

[beardyw]

It's a reference to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. "Goodbye and thanks for all the fish" as the dolphins abandon planet earth IIRC.

[beardyw]

Four identical answers must be true!

[beardyw]

Five!