In Austria I've seen another type of splice. Take a rather thin screw (think a cover plate screw) and a weird nut with three wings sticking up if you lay it flat on a table. The wires are bent around the screw and the nut is tightened, the wings keeping the wire from silding out. Then everything is taped. I stumbled over those at a friend's place (supposedly 1961, but very conservative wiring in most regards) and first thought of replacing them. in the end I just unwrapped each and every one, tightened the screws and retaped. Probably lasts longer than anything else. Don't care for making up such a connection though...
