Posts by Billy Goat Gruff

Security minister defends ID cards, longer detention

@How will these ID cards help?

No no no, you're still assuming that they need to justify anything to you.

We joined Bush's war because we wanted to topple the evil dictator and implement democracy with a longterm plan. Don't you remember? The justification before, during and after can change no matter how disastrous the results.

We know there is no reason for ID cards that benefits us. I can see some reasons why HMRC and councils would love information, and the ability to market it to selected organisations... but I really can't see why they are pushing it so much. Surely HMRC has got better methods of wasting billions, god knows the council are creative enough, so why is it so important. Does it really just come down to one huge gravy train?

Lost CD may put pension holders in peril

EBCDIC

Of course, if it were encrypted they would say so, but they also said they refused to answer because of security reasons... my second thought was that they meant the CD is in a mainframe/EBCDIC/Tape/nonISO format which looks unformatted to Windows and encrypted in a storage dump but is perfectly readable if you're keen enough to figure out which.

Security is a process which starts with a single step of getting caught with your pants down.

Mandriva bigwig (nearly) accuses Ballmer of b-word

Look to your own house

Why should we feel sorry for a generation of students in a foreign country who don't get to use the better OS - when we are happy to insist our own kids use the MS stuff?

The Nigerian govt (corruption aside - I did live there once) has a duty to educate their kids in whatever environment *we* impose on the modern business world. As long as we insist young employees understand how to use Windows-based software then educating them in something else is wrong. We should get our own act in order - any UK school that uses Windows should ensure they don't use Word, or IE or anything that'd make OS independence harder for students and employers.

Peru is a shining example of how *we* should be acting, but we can't seriously expect developing countries to take the lead in FOSS when the 1st world businesses treat it like a dirty secret.