What's a burgeoning criminal enterprise to do with its excess profits? Start a pirate cooperative, of course!

HARADHEERE, Somalia (Reuters) - In Somalia's main pirate lair of Haradheere, the sea gangs have set up a cooperative to fund their hijackings offshore, a sort of stock exchange meets criminal syndicate.

Heavily armed pirates from the lawless Horn of Africa nation have terrorized shipping lanes in the Indian Ocean and strategic Gulf of Aden, which links Europe to Asia through the Red Sea.

The gangs have made tens of millions of dollars from ransoms and a deployment by foreign navies in the area has only appeared to drive the attackers to hunt further from shore.

It is a lucrative business that has drawn financiers from the Somali diaspora and other nations -- and now the gangs in Haradheere have set up an exchange to manage their investments.

One wealthy former pirate named Mohammed took Reuters around the small facility and said it had proved to be an important way for the pirates to win support from the local community for their operations, despite the dangers involved.

"Four months ago, during the monsoon rains, we decided to set up this stock exchange. We started with 15 'maritime companies' and now we are hosting 72. Ten of them have so far been successful at hijacking," Mohammed said.

"The shares are open to all and everybody can take part, whether personally at sea or on land by providing cash, weapons or useful materials ... we've made piracy a community activity."

Read more at Reuters

This is all well and good, but I think the pirates are missing a huge opportunity. They are obviously smart business men who know a good opportunity when they see one, but I wonder if they've considered inviting the shipping companies to become investors in their cooperative?

Here's the sales pitch. Instead of paying out huge ransoms at random intervals, the shipping companies can contribute fixed amounts of money at regular intervals, thereby allowing those companies to better manage their cash flow. In return, the pirates will guarantee the safety of participating "investors" and even allow them to receive dividends should the cooperative attain a certain level of profitability.

It's a win-win for everybody involved ;-)

What happens to a Christmas tree when you combine public health and safety laws with the fear of personal injury lawsuits? A giant traffic cone covered in Astroturf?

When is a Christmas tree not a Christmas tree? When it is a giant cone covered in what appears to be green doormats.

Shoppers stared in bemusement at the mysterious object that landed in a shopping precinct in Poole, Dorset, this week. Some compared it to a giant traffic cone, a witch’s hat or a cheap special effect from an early episode of Doctor Who.

The 33ft structure turned out to be their Christmas tree, designed according to the principles of health and safety, circa 2009.

Thus it has no trunk so it won’t blow over, no branches to break off and land on someone’s head, no pine needles to poke a passer-by in the eye, no decorations for drunken teenagers to steal and no angel, presumably because it would need a dangerously long ladder to place it at the top.

From the UK Times Online.