Posts by Chris C

$8.2m study to probe medical benefits of videogames

The good, the bad, and the ugly

First it was witchcraft. Then it was communism/socialism. Then it was music. Now it's video games. We're always looking for something or someone to blame whenever someone does something bad. Quite simply, bad people will do bad things. It might be a video game that sets them off, it might be a movie, or it might just be a bad day at work (remember the incidents in the US where postal workers were killing people?). As I recall, there has only been one idiot who even remotely linked video games to violence -- that idiot who killed somebody and said something like "Life is a video game; everybody dies." Yeah, he was the picture-perfect representative of sanity, so it must have been the video games that drove him to murder.

After so many "studies" "proving" video games to "cause violent behavior", isn't it time to do a proper study? Survey as many people as possible. Ask if they have played video games (currently or in the past). Ask how often. Ask what games they played. Here's an important one -- ask them why they played those games. Ask them what, if any, effects they personally felt from playing. If possible, ask friends and family members if they noticed any other effects or changes when the person played the video games. Now here's the most important thing -- do the same study for other activities (smoking, drinking, driving, reading, visiting the park, talking on the phone, going to the mall, etc). Then you can see what effects and behavioral changes were evident in those people playing video games, and (by comparing the studies) see if those same effects and behavioral changes occurred less, more, or the same as people engaging in other activities.

That is, as I see it, the most fair and balanced method. Then again, those people against video games don't want fair and balanced. They just want a reason to get around that pesky first amendment.

Chinese crackers blamed for US power blackouts

Chinese crackers hack gibibytes to take down the WOPR

First, I agree with Julian. While it is obvious from this thread that people have different ideas of what hackers and crackers are, I still remember a time when the terms were not used interchangeably. A time when the term hacker was something to be proud of, not something that caused suspicion.

Second, don't we have enough problems without resorting to useless speculation? We're at war (officially or unofficially, take your pick) with Iraq and Afghanistan, and probably Iran as well. We've got North Korea we still feel we need to keep an eye on. We'll always keep our eyes on Cuba (the reasons for which the government never says). And now we want to fuel speculation and conspiracy theories to create a rift between us and China. Are we actively seeking Cold War II? I know China is communist, and it's probably the only communist country we're accepting of (gee, I wonder why that could be), but do we really want another Cold War? I imagine we, the citizens, don't. Not that that ever stopped the government from doing anything.

Third, I find it very telling that the government actually has a "counterintelligence" department or agency. Sadly, I think we can safely take that term at face value.

Lastly, while I personally don't like the terms kibi-, mebi-, and gibibytes, their existence does make sense when you consider kilo, mega, and giga are scientific prefixes with defined values. Just because the computer industry changed their values when referring to bits and bytes didn't make it a good idea, and didn't make it right. How would people react if the definition of liter/litre was different depending on whether you were measuring water or gasoline? What if the definition of gram was different depending on whether you were measuring chocolate or explosives? Standards are good. They're even better when specific industries don't hijack their definitions.

Overstock and Patrick Byrne sue New York over Amazon Tax

Taxes

I am a United States citizen, and for the record, I am *not* happy paying taxes (especially the 15.3% I pay into social security [I'm self-employed, so I pay both the employee and the employer portions], since the social security fund will be depleted by the time I reach retirement age). However, I understand it is a necessary evil in supporting the infrastructure, maintenance, and protection of this country. For now, let's hold off discussing the huge excesses and "pork" fed by our tax dollars.

"Suddenly having to pay [roughly] 8 per cent tax on 10 per cent of our sales would be a really bad trade off."

That sentence sums it up quite nicely -- Overstock doesn't want to pay 8 per cent tax. I don't blame them. But there's the nub -- *they* are not the ones who would be paying the tax. They would merely be collecting it from the purchasers at the time of purchase, then remitting it to the state (probably on a weekly or monthly basis). I don't like having to collect sales tax in my state, but since I voluntarily choose to sell products, I am obligated to collect sales tax on the sales of those products.

As for those non-US readers wondering why the state of New York wants online retailers to collect sales taxes for purchases made by New York residents, it's because legally, the tax must be paid on those purchases. While we often simply say "Sales tax", the full name is actually "Sales and use tax". Under the law, you are obligated to pay a sales/use tax on your purchases regardless of where you purchased them. If a retailer does not collect sales tax on your purchases, you are obligated to remit the appropriate use tax on your tax forms. As you might imagine, most people don't do this. That being said, it is the law. It's a bit like speeding -- most people at least occasionally drive over the posted speed limit, but that doesn't make the law any less valid.

HP biased against BIOS password security

re: In the REAL world

So you're saying that because a BIOS password only prevents the system from booting, that it shouldn't be used? My, what hideous shortsightedness. I suppose you are also in favor of removing manual door locks and replacing them with fingerprint and iris sensors (if those sensors were secure and accurate)? Heck, let's eliminate all passwords, too, and rely solely on fobs such as SecurID since those are more secure.

Just out of curiosity, do you happen to use Norton Internet Security? After all, it covers more holes than just an antivirus app and is better overall (depending on your definition of "better").

As for those people who say we should all be using full-disk encryption, and that BIOS passwords (and even Windows login passwords) are useless, and so should not be used... I'm sure it comes as a great shock, but such measures are not only used to prevent your hard drive from being used if the notebook is stolen. Said measures are an easy way of keeping the general populace from accessing your data (say, your roommate when you're at the pub, or your children while you're at work, etc). Full-disk encryption is a bit overkill to prevent little Johnny from accessing the computer without supervision.

The Reg surfs for porn with a San Jose councilman

@Robert Griffin re: Censorship

"Why not get the internet to add new domain names such as .sex, .xxx, etc so that it is easy to filter out whatever you want to filter out."

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/03/30/icann_rejects_domain/

I mean no disrespect by asking, but are you relatively new here? The reason I ask is that ICANN *was* thinking about adding a new TLD (top-level domain) specifically for porn (yes, it was ".xxx"). The link above is, I believe, the latest news about it, where ICANN decided to reject it.

You might think the pro-filtering folks would love the idea of a TLD just for porn since it would make it easy to filter out everything from all of those domains. They didn't. For some reason, they were against it. I don't remember the specifics, but it appears it was all political, though they claim it wasn't. Those against the creation of the .xxx TLD claimed there was no guarantee that it would help (in other words, no guarantee that content producers would only use the new TLD). You'd think they'd be happy to have any method which could be used to more easily and more effectively filter the content, regardless of whether the method is perfect or not. Using their logic, we might as well not use spam filters, because some spam still gets through.

------------------------------------------------------------

@Anonymous Coward re: just say no

"... 'cos poor mommy and daddy were too busy to be at the library with their kids and KNOW what they were doing; much less where they were doing it."

First, I'll point out that these ideas of content-filtering are not specifically for "protecting" children. They are to prevent material from being displayed that the community finds offensive -- both adults and children. Whether you agree with filtering or not is up to you. But if you are going to comment on it, you should at least acknowledge it's true intent. Moving on...

Did you just imply that parents should accompany their children everywhere they go, 24/7? So if you had a child in high school (grades 9-12, roughly ages 14-17), you would accompany them to the library so that you could "KNOW what they were doing"? I'm all for better parenting, as the decline of parenting skills and lack of care in this country has reached pitiful levels. But unless you're an extremely overbearing parent who is very wealthy (so that you don't have to work), you will never be able to accompany and monitor your child 24/7.

"Last thing i need is some other idiot polluting my kids' minds....that my job."

And if your comment is anything to go by, you'll do an excellent job of it.

@Steven Hunter

I completely agree. I should have been more specific in my earlier post -- my thinking of those conditions were for public-facing computers, those computers where there is a high probability that anyone (from child to adult) will walk by the computer and see what is on the screen. While I am against censorship, I do feel there are *some* things we should be able to shield from the public unless they ask for it. For example, how many of us here would really want to walk into the library and see goatse as we're walking past the computer section to get a book?

Having said that, I also feel there should be computers in a private room, with each computer in its own private area (separate room, curtains, cubicle, etc) which are completely unfiltered and not monitored (no cameras, no logging) so that people can look up information without fear, prejudice, or embarrassment (sexuality, STDs, medical information, politics, protests, etc).

The sad thing is that no filtering would be necessary if: 1) people were considerate of those around them, and 2) people who are offended by something simply shrug it off instead of looking for someone to sue.

Conditional

I've been looking at porn since the first month I logged onto a BBS at 2400 baud sometime in the early 1990s. I remember waiting literally minutes for a single image to download, and using an app/protocol (the name of which escapes me now) which displayed the image as it was downloading, slowly displaying scan line by scan line. I remember the thrill and excitement of it. I was age 14, well under the age at which one is legally allowed to view such material. And yet, I remain unharmed. I have never raised my hand in anger at anyone, have never been involved in any altercation, have never had any problems with crime, and have never viewed women in any demeaning or degrading way. And I'm sure I'm not alone; I'm sure many of you have similar backgrounds.

In the United States, the "moral" "majority" has so much power and influence that flashing a nipple for half a second on a television broadcast results in hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines, which today (given the incredible increase in the maximum fine allowed by the FCC) would be multi-million-dollar fines. All because of a nipple, the same thing we all started life sucking on. It's sadly amusing that overweight men with large breasts are allowed to proudly display their hefty breasts, and yet a flat-chested woman is not allowed to. So it doesn't even have anything to do with the size of the breasts. So what is it? Why are a woman's breasts so much dangerous to society than a man's breasts? Why is it that in some European nations, people don't have a problem with women baring their breasts? And why is it that in those places, breasts are not stigmatized and objectified the way they are here in the United States? Anybody who can answer those questions already has the answer; anybody who cannot answer those questions refuses to listen to the answer.

However, as much as I know that nudity, sex, and porn are not the evil scourge the "moral police" claim they are, I do believe that communities have the right to decide what should be allowed in their communities. I'll repeat that. Communities, not out-of-touch politicians without input from said communities, have the right to decide what should be allowed in their communities. And so, if they want to install content filters on the library computers, I would wholeheartedly support it, conditional on the following (in this order):

1. Hold a community (city/county) vote, asking if the community feels content-filtering is necessary. Only proceed if the majority (more than 50%) of those voting vote yes to content-filtering.

2. Explicitly define what is to be filtered out. Vague, ambiguous, and relative terms such as "pornography" and "obscenity" are not acceptable; provide an explicit definition of all terms so that anybody reading the list can accurately identify what is to be filtered out, without having to guess, and without having to rely on their own personal beliefs or morals to fill in the blanks. Since this is supposed to reflect the standards of the community, ask for (and implement) the suggestions of the community as to what they feel should be filtered out.

3. Find (or create) a content filter, either hardware or software, that rigidly adhered to the above-mentioned definitions only.

4. Allow the source of the content filter to be reviewed by any person or organization who wishes to do so, at their own (reasonable) expensive and without having to sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement, and allow a method (SHA-1, MD5, etc) for the binary to be verified against the source (to prove that that the binary is, in fact, built from the provided source).

5. Allow individuals, organizations, and website agents (owners, administrators, and tech support) to inform the content-filter administrator of false-positives and provide a reasonable method to quickly remove the false-positive sites from the filter.

6. Provide an escalation route for the individuals, organizations, and website agents mentioned above if the content-filter administrator fails to remove a false-positive site from the filter (this step is to prevent the content-filter administrator from substituting his/her own sense of morality for that of the community).

7. Make it absolutely clear (by using visual signs and/or indicators) that the computers are implementing content-filtering).

There are probably a number of things I forgot, but this would be a good start.

Apple store detains teens for installing iPhone game

@Adam Johnston

"'It can take up to 8 hours (perhaps even more) to reinstall all of their software'

I guess you must pay/get-paid by the hour then... if you can't figure out how to do a vanilla install of windows or a modern linux distro in 30-60 min then you obviously know nothing about IT and hence should not be reading this site."

It takes a truly gifted mind to quote someone then reply with an inaccurate comparison, all while maintaining a condescending tone and an air of superiority. Since you quoted me, please do us all a favor and read the second half of that sentence you quoted. That's it, you're almost there... Don't stop now, you can do it... Yes, that's it, right there -- "to reinstall *ALL* of their software". I certainly can perform a "vanilla" install of Windows rather quickly, but that's not what I was commenting on, and that's not what the original commenter mentioned. If you cannot even bother to read what you're quoting, then perhaps it is you that should not be reading this site.

But since you think I'm so slow doing a reinstall, how long do you think it should take to reinstall Windows, download and install the latest drivers for all hardware, then install 57 applications and 18 games? Here's a hint: longer than an hour.

re: Nexox Enigma

"It hardly takes several hours to reinstall all of the software on a desktop computer, or even some servers. I work with people that can build a new Mac from install DVD to our full baseline software suite in 30 minutes."

I'm sorry, but I have to call bullshit. It's quite clear that you have never had to wipe and reload a system. Anyone who tells you they can fully reload a system from scratch in 30 minutes is either lying or restoring from a pre-made image (which would be called a "re-image" not a "reinstall". Depending on how much software a person uses, it can take up to 8 hours (perhaps even more) to reinstall all of their software. Yes, on modern hardware. No, that's not an exaggeration.

------------------------------------------------------------

From the MercuryNews article:

"Earlier this week, the four teenagers said they were depressed about not being able to visit their favorite store again. 'I can't walk down University Avenue without going in there,' said Paly senior Daniel Fukuba, who camped out for the first iPhones last year."

So he's depressed about not being able to visit a store, and he is unable to walk down a street without going into a store, not to mention camping out just to buy some overpriced tat. Sounds like this individual is in serious need of mental health treatment.

EU project scans air passengers for terrorist tendencies

But think of the terrorists!

<sarcasm>

To all you wussy liberal namby-pambys clamoring about "innocent" people and how to tell the difference between a terrorist and someone scared of flying... Grow up. We don't care. If we stop even one terrorist, it's worth ruining the lives of everyone. Think of the terrorists! We must stop them. Better yet, think of the children. We need to protect them using any means necessary.

</sarcasm>

Sadly, there are people who seriously think that way, and think that we must stop the terrorists using any means necessary, even if it means declaring martial law. With that thinking prevailing in anyone's mind, the terrorists have already won.

On a side note, "terrorist", "terrorist tendencies", etc. are defined the same way as "obscenity" -- completely undefined, with the "definition" being "we know it when we see it". Here in the US, animal rights activists are labeled terrorists. And while I know many of you here disagree with them and their beliefs, I would be deeply disappointed if you put them in the same group as people who blow up buildings and airplanes and kill people indiscriminately.

The terrorists hate the "Western World" because of their [the westerners'] beliefs and freedoms. In "protecting" ourselves from the "terrorists", we are systematically stripping ourselves of these freedoms, while at the same time increasing the cost of everything which results in the (not so) slow destruction of the economy and even further widening the gap between the rich and the middle/poor. To anybody who claims we (the US and UK, at least) are still "free", I would question the definition of free. The way I see it, we have as much freedom as a goldfish in a fishbowl.

Microsoft urges Windows users to shun 'carpet bombing' Safari

Typical Microsoft -- security advisory with no details

I'm in the uncomfortable position of agreeing with Microsoft on this issue. If a browser (any browser) allows a website to randomly download files without the user's explicit permission, regardless of the location, it is a security issue in my opinion. Having said that, I take issue with Microsoft's security advisory. The only thing they say is:

"What causes this threat?

A combination of the default download location in Safari and how the Windows desktop handles executables creates a blended threat in which files may be downloaded to a user’s machine without prompting, allowing them to be executed."

OK, but how about telling us the how or why? Since it is a direct contributor which causes the blended threat, I don't think it's asking too much to want to know exactly "how the Windows desktop handles executables" and how that contributes to the threat.

Optical boffins cut the cost of quantum cryptography

Can someone help the ignorant?

This stuff goes way over my head, and I'm not afraid to admit it. But from my ignorant understanding from this article, one device sends these photons to a second device. If a third device intercepts these photons, they are effectively "trashed", and the receiving device knows something is amiss.

It's probably just because I'm ignorant with regard to this field, but what are the practical uses for this technology? If a man-in-the-middle device cannot exactly replicate the photons, then the two communicating devices must be physically linked (put another way, a switch or router would not be able to replicate the photons, either). I have no doubt this technology can be used to secure keys for important things (perhaps securing/validating the controllers in a nuclear power plant?), but I can't think of many uses where two devices would have a physical connection to each other. Can someone point out some examples that I'm overlooking?

Google waves Occam's Razor at web coders

Foolishness

"After increasing the number of first page results to 30 for a group of guinea pigs, Google watched as the number of searches dropped by 20 per cent. 'It turns out that it takes us longer to produce 30 results per page,' Mayer explained. 'And that latency drove the decline.'"

Yes, that must be it. It couldn't be that with 30 results per page instead of 10, the user found what they needed without having to go to the third page (for the patient) or without modifying the search (hence running a new search) when they didn't find a suitable result on the first page. No, that couldn't be it. It must be because of the latency.

Am I the only one hearing a voice saying "Shut up with the BS and have the balls to speak the truth -- fewer results per page means more pages loaded, which in turn equals more advertising displayed"?

Viacom suit is Net killer, Google claims

The problem with this case

The problem with this case, and one reason I'm glad I won't be on that jury, is that both sides have valid arguments. I honestly don't know which way I would sway, based on the information currently available.

YouTube does take down videos, so it would appear that they do fulfill their obligations under the DMCA. Nothing that I know of obligates them to proactively monitor the content they host (though Congress may very well change that in the future), so that argument carries no legal weight (not that that really makes any difference).

On the other hand, YouTube seems to bear more than a passing resemblance to StreamCast Networks (makers of Grokster, Morpheus, and Kazaa), wherein Streamcast was found guilty by the US Supreme Court to have "induced" its users to infringe copyright. And let's face it, Google has shown all too well that it doesn't care about copyright infringement (for example, by scanning [and thus making a copy of] every book it can get its fingers on without the author's permission).

Both sides are nothing more than power- and money-hungry corporate behemoths willing to do anything to increase their power and money. In this case, it's the taxpayers and those who will be on the jury (for which you only get paid $50 per day after the third day [you get nothing for the first three days]) who will get screwed the most.

Japanese customs dish out free dope

Sad

After reading the comments to this point (last comment posted 27 May 19:30), I am truly disappointed and amazed at the lack of outrage. Most of the commenters here seem to think this is a big joke. I can assure you if the innocent person whose privacy was invaded is caught with this in their possession at their destination, they will be less than amused. Especially if their destination is a country where possession means life in prison or death. Virtually all "third world" countries, and even some "first world" countries (such as the US) wouldn't care about the circumstances of how the pot came to be in the person's possession, and wouldn't believe the stranger-than-fiction story of lax security operatives using innocent people's luggage for such tests or failure to retrieve their training materials. The "guilty" person will be immediately thrown in jail or executed. And all most of you commenters can do is make a joke about it, hoping that it happens to you. I hope this does happen to you, and then you can see how amusing it really is. It must be nice to be so ignorant as to believe "it won't happen to me".

FCC boss mulls free* wireless for all

Why?

"That's not the way a speedy government ought to work."

I'm sorry, but who ever made the mistake of calling the US government "speedy" (at least since the end of the Cold War)? Or even any single branch, organization, or department of the US government? Anyone with more brain cells than an amoeba will tell you the US government is anything but speedy (especially those foreign citizens who need to renew their Green Cards).

As for the subject of this article, I just have to ask -- why? Why do we act as if wireless internet access is going to save mankind? Why do we act as if it's a necessity? It's not, especially when you consider the value of the internet. As time rolls on, the internet becomes more and more useless. People can use all the buzzwords they'd like, but the truth is that with every passing day, the internet becomes more and more a joke. Yes, it grows more every day, but that doesn't mean it gets better. Anyone who was here from the beginning up until it became popular around 1995-1996 or so (right around the time 33.6kbps modems became popular) will tell you it's gone to hell. Seriously, are we to believe that eBay, YouTube, MySpace, FaceBook, Wikipedia, Second Life, and more spam than you can shake a stick at have actually increased the true value of the internet?

Speaking more broadly, let's also dispense with the notion that computers help people learn, or that filling our schools and homes with computers will result in smarter people. Right around the time the US started putting computers into its schools en mass is when students started becoming more stupid (which, as it turns out, is exactly when the internet started becoming popular).

If anything, I would say the internet has destroyed the hacker mentality. Look at the young people (age 16 and younger) you know and those around you. How many have the hacker mentality? How many really want to know how a computer works? How many are completely enraptured with learning and seeing how they can push the hardware? How many know what a BBS was? How many would recognize the name Future Crew? How many have heard of Mode X? How many know which ports are used for video? Hell, how many even know what a port is? How many would care to see what they could cram into the fewest bytes possible, like the old 4k and 64k comps? Most people nowadays say bloat doesn't matter because processor speed, memory, and storage has increased so much. What was the last demo you saw, and when was it made? The last ANSi art? The last MOD, S3M, MTM, or 669 you listened to? The last BBS you dialed?

Progress is a wonderful thing, but if you ask me, the internet (and Windows 95 and up) has destroyed the seed of curiosity which was implanted into so many of us, and has destroyed the communities we grew up with through BBSing. Nowadays most people get into IT because they think it's a high-paying field, or because it's become the "cool" thing to do. But look around at the youth of today and ask yourself -- do you really think the youth of today have anything of substance to offer the field? Will the youth of today revolutionize computers the way IBM, HP, Sun, Intel, AMD, VIA, and Transmeta did? Will they push the audio-visual envelope the way Future Crew and other demo groups did? Will they revolutionize gameplay the way id, Apogee, 3drealms, and Epic Megagames did? Somehow, I doubt it.

The internet is a great thing to an extent. Email can keep people in touch over great distances at low cost. We (those of us not firewalled from the world) can see what's really going on without having to rely on local/national media we don't trust. We can easily communicate with the manufacturers of the products we buy, download product manuals, etc. But in many areas online shopping has displaced local shopping (as has Wal-Mart, but that's a discussion for another day). Search results have gone from meaningful to useless because of the extra noise and spam (and why the hell does Google return results when the words I typed only appeared on a page linking to that result, not actually appearing in the result shown?). And the internet has become a place where every idiot with a browser can make their own "home" and upload their life story, letting everyone know, in excruciating detail, every second of their mundane existence.

It's like television. 300 channels, and it's all shit. And yet we act like it's a necessity. Don't worry about the hungry or the homeless. Just give me my free wireless internet access.

Wikimedia Foundation muzzles Wikinews

Three most popular cults

I'll probably get verbally assaulted for saying this, but as I see it, the top three cults in this world are:

Church of Scientology

Wikipedia

Google

(and no, not in that particular order).

Netflix to sell set-top box for streamed movies

Comcast?

So will this cause Comcast (and other high-bandwidth-offering ISPs) to restrict more services and claim more users are "unfairly" transferring "exceptionally high" amounts of data using the bandwidth they were offered and are paying for?

In Google We Trust: Health docs depo now open to Americans

Use for spam?

I can't believe no one's pointed this out yet, but think of the possibilities for spam. Let's face it, Google's servers aren't exactly uncrackable (is any computer, unless it's hard powered off?), so there *will* be data theft at some point.

Now let's think about it logically. People's medical records on Google's servers. Medical records including erectile dysfunction and breast augmentation, probably with email addresses, too, but tied into Gmail so you can get their email address once you're in anyway. This is a spammer's goldmine. Imagine capturing that data for actual targeted spamming instead of random spamming.

And, quite frankly, I imagine it won't just be spammers in the end. I fully expect that Google itself will punt ED and breast enlargement advertisements to people based on their medical records. Oh, sure, they'll say it's not them, it's their advertisers, and they had no idea. And the naive and Google-trusting people will believe it.

--------------------

As for Pete "I couldn't be more in favour of it", I'm sure you feel that way now. How will you feel once Google shares your medical records to send you advertisements? What about when they share your medical records with "research" organizations who find that you include the "violence" gene and you're locked up to preemptively protect society? Or when that "research" organization links one of your genes to cancer and your insurance won't cover it if you develop cancer because it's a "pre-existing condition"?

Google won't do it, because they "do no evil"? Keep telling yourself that.

Go ahead and call me paranoid. But as they say, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean it's not true. I can't believe some people are actually stupid enough to even consider placing important personal information in the hands of the largest advertising broker on the planet, especially when this broker is under no obligation to protect your information. They could get everyone to sign up for this and upload their medical records, then share those records with the world. What's the worse that'll happen? Since there's no law against it, they may get a stern "please don't do that again".

I'm not naive enough to think my personal data is somehow private or protected, or that organizations can't get it through various means. But that doesn't mean I'm willing to hand it over myself.

re: Not.

"And if they put up the usual disclaimers, then why am I wasting time with them rather than consulting an honest-to Gaia (or whatever you worship) pharmacist"

Please be advised that your Intarweb 2.0 license has been revoked for failure to follow proper Web 2.0 practices; specifically, for thinking you know more than the Hive Mind; more specifically, for thinking, period. Thinking is not allowed. You do not need to think. The Hive Mind will do the thinking for you. Please remain where you are and an administrator will soon be along to begin your retraining.

Unmanned Aerial Manhood outrage at Kasparov rally

Stay in Sadville

Great, now the retards from Sadville are playing in real-life, too? What do these idiots think is so funny about a flying penis? Is it their pathetic attempt to show the world how big theirs is (when the truth is, I would guess, exactly the opposite)? I imagine these are the same people who think prank/crank phone calls are funny and think the majority of YouTube videos are funny.

Am I just getting ornery? I'm only 30, so I can't say "in my old age"...

Google under fire again for handing user info to police

re: Someone remind me

"What was it now 'Do no....... ?'"

I believe it was "Do no[t do anything to diminish The Bottom Line]"

On a side note, we all know the real reasons the US invaded Iraq and overthrew its democratic* government, but the publicized reasons were to get rid of the WMDs** and to "democratize" the country. Not only that, but the president has said he wants to "democratize" and bring freedom to the world. And yet, two of the countries we do most of our business with, China and India, are quite freedomless. We simply overlook the fact that China is communist and has a list of human rights violations longer than Bush's list of failures and misstatements. And now we find that India is so freedomless that you can't even state a negative *opinion* about a politician without being thrown in jail? All the while, we say it's Cuba we need to protect our citizens from***.

* For the sake of this post, let's not argue about whether it was a real or fake/coerced democracy, as it's not relevant to my point

** Let's not even discuss this one

*** Unless you're talking about Cuba's baseball players, in which case we're happy to deal with them

Stungun shootout in Colorado leaves slowest man standing

Where was Mr Kotter?

Is this a real story, or was someone reminiscing about "Welcome Back, Kotter" and just wanted to mention Epstein's mother?

Apple okay with Safari 'carpet bombing' vuln for now

re: Not a security issue?

"MS might take forever to develop a patch, they might even try to blame someone else, but at least they would acknowledge the bug!"

Have they ever acknowledged Vista's "Long Goodbye" bug (the one where simply copying, moving, or deleting a file sometimes takes forever)?

But more on-topic, I do agree with you about Apple. For them to not consider this a security vulnerability is ludicrous. Being able to download any file onto the user's system (even if it is only in the default download directory) is a huge security vulnerability. This isn't the 70s or 80s anymore. Content on the internet cannot be trusted by default.

Samsung to demo next-gen, 240Hz LCD TV tech

Waste of power

Has anyone else thought of the extra power this thing is going to pull? If it needs to interpolate and create three new frames for every transmitted frame, then it's interpolating and creating at least 72 frames per second. That's likely going to take a good amount of processing, thus a good amount of power draw. I'm no "greeny", but I certainly don't want to increase my electric bill using a TV that will (in all likelihood) actually look worse than its predecessor.

IM represents 'new linguistic renaissance'

I question their selection

I seriously question their selection of "subjects". I would go so far as to say they started with their conclusion and worked backwards. Everyone I have seen using IM uses the abominable abbreviations such as "u", "r", "c", "1", "2", "4", "ne1", "2nite", "b4", "ur", "wut", "omg", "idk", "ppl"", "k" (instead of "ok"), "rofl", "roflmao", and a whole list of others that I don't even know (and don't care to know) like "rolfcopter". Sarah showed an example of that with "ZOMG" (what the hell does that mean?). That doesn't even get into the misspelling of words or the dreaded "prolly" which pops up on this site far too often.

As we've commented before, the fact that these youths are using this "style" to communicate with each other is bad enough. But some of them also use it in school papers and online learning (school/university) forums and message boards, and many of them use it when communicating (or attempting to communicate) with others.

I'm sorry, but I can never consider it a good thing when you lose the ability to effectively communicate with others.

Vista security credentials tarnished in malware survey

re: AC @dustin

"How much command line utilities does Windoze give you when you do have major issues ? ... Can you goto CLI mode and do a recovery of GUI in windows without having to fiddle with it ? or even change your windows manager for kde to gnome or whatever ? ... Can you actually debug and fix install anything useful from CLI ? ... When the jerks sitting behind the keyboard click yes and yes and more yes do they get prompted for a root password ? ... Can they get as part of the OS tools FREE tools provided by OS to find cure issues caused by a badly written OS ? ... the answer is NO so back to the jerks who design this shite.. and the jerks who support it like YOU keep jerking behind windows dude you will get to see the light one day and it wont BE MS lol"

Sadly, it is this type of person who has the loudest voice in the FOSS world. And let's be honest, when you hear/read something like this, what's your first reaction? Mine is to walk away. This is the kind of attitude that will keep the average person (and many businesses) away from FOSS. Mindless, foaming-at-the-mouth babbling like the above does nothing to help your cause. If you really want people to understand that your choice of OS is better than Windows (whatever your choice is), then be polite and give clear, concise information and reasons why you think that way. Then again, from my experience, the type of person who writes such drivel as the above, and constantly bashes people for using Windows, is the same person who says they don't want the average person using their choice of OS (obviously because they somehow feel superior or "leet"). In the past, I've defended the IT workers and have said the stereotype is wrong. Perhaps the stereotype is more correct than I thought, and I'm just different.

Useless stats

How many of those Win2000 systems were servers? I find it difficult to believe that servers are infected with malware, unless you consider "malware files stored on servers" as infections. And if you do that, you can even claim that Samba servers are infected with Windows-based malware and viruses.

I haven't used Vista much. It came on my notebook and I replaced it with XP. I didn't like how it was so slow, I didn't like the look and feel, and I didn't like that most software (at least when I purchased it) had problems with it. I also didn't like how the Automatic Updates did not give any meaningful progress indicator. However, as much as I dislike Vista, I do so, and will continue to do so, on the merits. I will not bash Vista because of people's stupidity.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again -- a computer cannot protect people from themselves. In the end, it is the user who instructs the computer what to do. As an anecdote, I had a client a number of years ago (2001 or 2002, I think) who had infected her computer with a virus, and I was called out to remove it. She had antivirus software on her computer, and it was an older virus, so I didn't understand how she got infected. When I asked what happened, she said she received an email and the antivirus software warned her that the email attachment was infected, but she selected to ignore it and run the attachment anyway. When I asked her why she ran a file she knew was infected, her answer was "Well, I had to see what it was".

If you build a foolproof system, they will build a better fool. When you have users who click "OK" and "Yes" buttons without even reading the messages they are responding to, you cannot blame the OS. There are those of you who will say you can blame Microsoft because you feel they conditioned people to click on things, but in the end, it's the users performing the actions. As such, it is the users' fault for not reading what they are responding to. This goes for pop-up windows as well as license agreements and contracts.

Apple to issue refunds for sparky, prematurely dying products

Purchase a refund?

"More specifically... a Store Credit cannot be used to purchase or obtain a refund on iTunes content..."

How exactly can you PURCHASE a REFUND? By definition, a refund means credit/cash/value is being returned to you (which, to any logically-thinking person, is the exact opposite of a purchase). I know Apple has always been different, but this takes the cake. Then again, I'm sure a number of Apple fanbois would be perfectly happy to pay Apple in order to receive a refund.

Gordon Brown claims a Brit invented the iPod

Innovation?

How can anybody seriously claim the ipod as innovative? Long before the ipod we had these things called walkmans, and then cd players. Hell, the ipod wasn't even the first digital audio player. Though I believe it was the first digital audio player retarded enough (from a consumer point of view; genius from a vendor point of view) to use a non-replaceable battery. Battery dies, buy a new one. Welcome to the throw-away society.

And as for "The ipod, like countless inventions before it, was the product of quality engineering coupled with splendid industrial design."

Seriously, with all that stroking, I can see why the ipod is white.

Shareholder sees golf as AMD cure all

Not too bad

While it pains me to say this, that suggestion may not be too bad depending on the costs (you say it's expensive, but didn't mention how expensive, and I can't be bothered to investigate). After all, the kind of person who can afford to play golf usually has plenty of cash to throw around and likes to look smart by mentioning names and buzzwords. Unfortunately, the game of golf (yes, it's a game, not a sport) is probably too much of an ego strokefest (no pun intended) for them to even notice the names of their sponsors.

Hitachi slips past Fujitsu with speedy 320GB laptop drive

Why the constant bashing?

Why is it that when there's any article about hard drives, you have a load of people bashing the manufacturer or the drive. In this case, it's the "Deathstar" issue which occurred and was resolved many years ago. Do you idiots actually think that a 2008 2.5" SATA II drive has any relation to a 2000 3.5" PATA drive?

And why is it only hard drives that you guys do this for? Why doesn't anybody bash Intel? After all, they had the P3 FDIV bug. They also had the opcode (which I forget, but have written down somewhere) that would lock up your machine when th CPU tried to execute it. That one worked at least up to the P4, even in WinXP.

Visiting the past may be nice in some cases (like reminiscing about old games), but it's illogical to think that current technology is stuck in the past, or to forever bash a company because of past mistakes (especially when the past mistake was made by a different company).

If you avoid every hard drive manufacturer who has produced faulty hard drives at one point in their history, you will find that you are left with none.

Creative to free Audigy Windows Vista compatibility app

The height of cheekiness?

"We've seen software developers charge money for updates that allow previously working apps to gain compatibility with either Vista or Mac OS X 10.5, forcing users to pay twice simply for having the temerity to upgrade their operating system.

By all means charge for new features, but to do so to simply allow a user to carry on using your product is, we think, the height of cheekiness."

So the user voluntarily changes operating systems from XP to Vista, which is a huge change in virtually all aspects. It is, quite literally, a brand new operating system. It's not "upgrading" your operating system; it's CHANGING your operating system. And you then expect a company (say, Creative Labs) to toil around trying to get its software to work with a brand new architecture (probably with little or no documentation from Microsoft), with no compensation? Anyone who thinks like that is, to use the word so favored lately by this website, a freetard. Would you also expect them to offer builds of their software for MacOS and Linux free of charge?

Yeah, let's blame software vendors and expect them to effectively build new products for free, simply because Microsoft is in the RIAA/MPAA's pockets and are forcing DRM onto everyone. And before you try to say "it's not about DRM", take a moment to think why Microsoft wants all audio data to go through the CPU -- it's all about the "protected pathway" the RIAA/MPAA wanted.

Id Dooms gamers to new shoot-'em-up sequel

Let's hope

As much as I enjoyed the graphics and playability of DOOM 3, let's hope they don't require all of us to buy a new computer again just for a new game. Maybe I'm getting old, but I'm sick of buying a new $1200+ computer (which includes a $400+ video card) to play a $50-60 game.

As for some of the negative comments here... You may very well have not liked the games of the past, and you're perfectly entitled to your opinion. I, however, think that both Wolftenstein 3D and DOOM were the pinnacles of their day. And no matter who you are, you cannot reasonably argue that video/computer games would be where they are today without those two.

Sometimes it's nice just to reminisce about the old games... Wolfenstein 3D, DOOM, Duke Nukem 3D, Blake Stone, Corridor 7, One Must Fall, Raptor, Epic Pinball -- though I could never real get into Rise Of The Triad or Hexen. And of course, who could ever forget The 7th Guest.

Air France pilot in white-knuckle near miss

Near-miss?

As George Carlin pointed out many years ago, this occurrence and others like it are *NOT* near-misses. They are near-HITs. A collision would be a near-miss. As in "we nearly missed".

Wikipedia goes to court to defend defamation immunity

re: easy solution

"Just block access to wikipedia from the US. Then sit back and watch the quality of children's homework (and the standard of PhDs) plummet."

I'm afraid to ask, but are you serious? Anyone with more than one brain cell knows that Wikipedia cannot be trusted. Period. If Wikipedia were to disappear today, and students could not use it as"research", then the quality and quantity of actual research would skyrocket overnight. I dare say the IQ of the average person would be brought up a notch. The problems with Wikipedia are that it is not, and never was, meant to be authoritative about anything, there is often no real research behind the articles and no attribution (hence no verification of accuracy). Let's also not forget the constant edits when somebody wants to offend/attack someone, when someone doesn't like something for whatever reason, for good/bad PR depending on who's doing the edit, and when the Wiki ruling class wants to show the world they're in charge of the "project".

Simply put, anybody with a brain knows that Wikipedia is a joke. If I was a teacher, and a student turned in a paper showing Wikipedia as a source of information, with nothing else to back it up, that paper would receive a failing grade. Between Wikipedia and text messaging, our children have become stupid, are unable to communicate their thoughts, are unable to spell, and are unable to construct a simple sentence. I'm sorry, but to me, that's too great a cost for the "progress". The word "sheeple" has never been more accurate.

Windows XP SP3 leaps into the tubes

re: French ISO

I can't tell if you're serious or not, but if you are...

No, it's not a French ISO. I don't know why, but "FRE" is just part of the filename. According to the Windows Server 2008 download page, "Files are also platform-specific, where 'x86FRE' is intended for 32-bit platforms and 'amd64FRE' is intended for 64-bit platforms." I do agree, though, that it's confusing, as I too thought FRE indicated a French version before I read that message.

As for no verification, why would there be verification, especially for an ISO? The machine you're downloading it from has no bearing on where you need to install it.

As for Steven Raith's comment, you (and others who are in a rush to install SP3) are either brave, foolish, or stupid (I'll leave that selection to you). I wouldn't touch SP3. Not yet, not for a long while.

Canadian toddler dies after VOIP 911 call

Am I the only one?

I think we can all agree this is a sad occurrence, one which should not have happened. So I don't mean to diminish or demean it, but am I the only one who's sick of people saying things like:

"This is a first for Canada, and it's a tragic one... This was a very young boy."

Would it have been any less tragic if the boy was older? The simple fact is that it was a routine emergency call (if there ever can be such a thing) that could have possibly had a better outcome had the emergency services arrived more quickly. It doesn't matter if the person was 2 years old or 20 years old. The fact that a decent life (not a violent criminal) was lost is what makes it sad, not the age of the person.

Added green burden could ground flying cars for good

Forget about it

Flying cars are, and have always been, a stupid idea. They might be good eye/brain candy in sci-fi movies and books, but they're an awful idea in reality. Anybody who expects air travel to still be relatively safe once many of the current road drivers take to the sky in PAVs is an idiot, plain and simple. The only reason air travel is safer than road travel right now is because of the relatively few "vehicles" in the air at any given time. Don't forget, we already have air travel accidents. And that's with "drivers" who have been professionally trained and actually know what they're doing, and "vehicles" that already fly themselves.

30 years of Spam - and we ain't finished yet

re: And where did Sophos get this 95% number from

I would guess that 95% is a pretty accurate number. I have one client who is averaging 99.468% spam. From 17 Mar to 15 Apr, they received 2,283,349 messages. Of those, GFI MailEssentials detected 2,271,209 as spam (which still isn't all of them, because there are still spam messages which get past the filters). That leaves 12,140 possibly legitimate messages.

Of those 2,271,209 spam messages -- 2,179,780 were directory harvesting (non-existing recipient addresses); 7,098 failed SPF; 2,338 failed spam URL blacklist; and 74,233 failed Bayesian analysis.

If you exclude the directory harvesting messages and only include properly addressed and received messages, that's 103,569 total messages minus 12,140 possibly legitimate messages, resulting in 91,429 spam messages (88.27%).

Texas man tries to cash $360bn cheque

Re: Land of the free - and stoopid!

"I keep telling you: The IQ of the USA is constant."

Speaking as an ashamed citizen of the USA, I think that period was typed prematurely. Surely what you really meant to say was 'I keep telling you: The IQ of the USA is constantly declining.' Interestingly, it seemed to have started happening right around the time we started pumping our classrooms full of computers.

Watchdog demands MSN Music mea culpa

As expected

Anybody in the computer industry should have seen this coming. And guess what? It doesn't stop there. Every piece of media which requires external validation will come to this inevitable conclusion -- O/S product activation (XP, Vista, Server 2003, etc), other product activation (Radmin3, Norton/Symantec antivirus, etc), and any other product which requires an external server to give the user permission to install or use what they have already legally purchased.

All servers currently in operation will be shut down at some point in time. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. It may be tomorrow, it may be twenty years from now. The problem is that everything you have purchased which relies on those servers to give you permission immediately becomes useless. <sarcasm> Not that it would ever happen </sarcasm>, but this sure would be a great way for a company to force you to upgrade, wouldn't it? "Due to the extremely low utilization of those servers, it was not in the company's best interest to keep them operational" or some such BS to keep the regulators/watchers happy. And that, perhaps, is the best reason to avoid (if possible) anything which requires activation or relies on external servers in order to install or continue operation.

McAfee 'Hacker Safe' cert sheds more cred

re: Does anybody actually believe those little tags

"Does anybody actually believe those little tags?"

Among The Reg readers, probably not. Among the general populace, most certainly. Don't forget, there are many people who believe everything they read on the Internet, whether they've read it on a "respected" site like the NY Times or the Washington Post, or they've read it on MySpace. These types of people will blindly accept anything someone who is supposedly more knowledgeable tells them (say, for example, completely made up "information" used to justify starting a war with a foreign nation). Most people want to trust other people and want to think that other people aren't going to injure them (physically, mentally, or financially). There are also way too many people in the "it won't happen to me" camp.

Also don't forget, a lot of people assume privacy and security where technically-minded people know there is certainly no expectation of privacy or security. For example, many people think nothing of sending private (or even confidential) information in unencrypted email.

Astroboffins moot massive Moon-mirror heliograph

Cost?

Let's see... It costs millions of dollars to put one small satellite in orbit. How much, then, will it cost for the countless shuttle/other_vehicle trips to deliver the materials required for this project? On top of that, how much would it cost to produce those materials? And then how much would it cost to install those materials once delivered to the moon? And finally, how would "we" protect those fragile mirrors? Or do these guys think that nothing ever collides with the moon? Hell, forget collisions, what about simple dust/contaminant buildup on the mirrors?

I've heard a lot of stupid ideas from people who desperately try to justify their pathetic job titles (and hence, their pathetic and utterly useless lives), but this one definitely ranks up towards the top.

Judge muzzles Sequoia e-voting attack dogs

Electronic voting machines

Face it, electronic voting machines *ARE* the way of the future, as they should be. Paper ballots appeared to work relatively well for a long time, but that's only because we intentionally overlook their pitfalls. Electronic voting machines can be much more efficient and accurate, and less prone to errors or corruption. However, this can only be the case when you have companies who *WANT* to design such machines.

When you have a company (say, Diebold) who publicly endorses a particular candidate, and may have even gone so far as to say that that candidate would win an election, it is completely irresponsible and reprehensible to use any type of voting method provided by that company.

Electronic voting machines *CAN* work. We just haven't seen anyone honest enough who wanted to design one.

Department of Homeland Security website hacked!

re: Shock Horror

As a U.S. citizen, I hate the government just as much (probably more) than your average Joe. And to me, DHS represents one of the primary reasons -- it's another useless organization designed to waste taxpayer money (with little or no benefit) and push the U.S. further along into the police state the government has wanted it to be for many years (if not decades).

However, as much as I hate DHS, do a little research before you go spouting off and making yourself look stupid. DHS can't possibly be responsible for the events of 11 Sep 2001. Why, you might ask? Because DHS didn't exist yet. They were created *in response* to those events. So unless they've developed a time machine that you know about, they had no way to stop it.

If you want to bash the government, go right ahead. But do so for actual reasons. There are plenty of real problems to discuss without resorting to creating fake ones.

Not a surprise

Why do you seem surprised that the DHS site was hacked? Remember, this is the government organization who just last year finally managed a non-failing grade (a 'D', which is still pathetic) in computer security, their first non-failing grade ever (the testing started in 2003):

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/04/13/us_gov_security_audit/

Motorised meat-smoker droid vigilante patrols Atlanta

Bad guys?

So the vagrants, who are allegedly begging people (and worse) for money are the "bad guys", but threatening someone with an assault rifle makes you the good guy? Assault, threat of assault, and harassment (whether direct or through a third party) are all illegal. So why is this guy not in jail? Don't get me wrong. I'd love to clean up the streets of our various cities, but that's not the way to do it.

Facebook Troll sends mob against Cluley

EOL

It's stories like this that reaffirm my belief that we must prevent the human species from reaching other planets. We, as a whole, should *NOT* survive. The best thing to happen to the universe will be the destruction of the human species. And looking at recent history, it won't take that long, either.

US court beats up FTC over Rambus 'patent ambush' ruling

Huh?

So let me get this straight... RAMBUS joins a *STANDARDS* committee in an attempt to create a universal *STANDARD* for computer memory. RAMBUS provides technological information to the standards committee. RAMBUS does not disclose that they hold one or more patents on this technology. Draft becomes standard. World memory makers adopt standard. Memory becomes popular. RAMBUS sues for patent infringement.

Yeah, um, how's that not exclusionary or monopolistic? To purposely hide that you hold patents in technology, technology you are proposing to make into a standard, is nothing less than fraud.