* Posts by Edward Clarke

102 publicly visible posts • joined 12 Nov 2007

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Big Tech has a big problem with Florida passing a law that protects politicians from web moderation

Edward Clarke
Black Helicopters

A solution...

Would it not be easier for all of these "social media" companies to make a simple rule:

No person in public office may have an active account with us. Any person in active public office or who is running for public office shall immediately have their account locked and hidden. Accounts shall be restored after leaving public office or withdrawing from an election for public office. Public office shall be defined as any post that is paid for by a tax levy.

No discrimination - a simple refusal to provide free advertising for politicians of any color/creed/faith.

ASUS baffles customer by telling them thermal pad thickness is proprietary

Edward Clarke

And Facebook removes the link...

Louis Rossman put up another video on Youtube this morning. It seems that a viewer put up a link to Rossmann's ASUS video on Facebook and "someone" didn't like it very much. A few complaints about "abusive content" later and the link was blocked. Rossmann doesn't have a Facebook account but learned about the block from a few of his viewers.

India ponders why just three per cent of its broadband services are wired

Edward Clarke

The answer is simple

A picture is worth a thousand words -

https://www.flickr.com/photos/johnwpratt/6981062361

Starlink creates risk of internet investment doom cycle, says APNIC researcher

Edward Clarke

Starlink seems to be installing a lot of ground stations

I don't remember seeing all of these ground stations the last time that I looked at the map -

https://satellitemap.space/

Prudhoe Bay, Alaska? St. Johns, Newfoundland & Labrador? Two stations in France? Four in Australia? It looks like they're building out the ground infrastructure as well as the satellites. If the inter-satellite links ever get going then this will really stick it to the current bunch of

Sorry - can't complete that last sentence as I descend into incoherent rage every time that I try to describe Comcast/Frontier/ATT/Verizon etc.

Clearview AI accused over free trials to US police that were plausibly deniable

Edward Clarke

So why is the facial recognition software so bad for non-whites?

According to the Pew Research center there were 476K black and 437K white prisoners in federal and state prisons in the United States as of the end of 2017. I presume that each of these people have at least one booking picture. With a sample size that large, why on earth is their recognition software so crap? For that matter, since you have a captive (!) sample, why not take one picture a month and get a really huge sample database?

OpenSSL shuts down two high-severity bugs: Flaws enable cert shenanigans, denial-of-service attacks

Edward Clarke

Raspberry Pi is update ready too

Just finished updating raspberry pi os (32 bit). Standard commands - "sudo apt-get update", "sudo apt-get upgrade" and a reboot (just in case).

HP CEO talks up HP-ink-only print hardware and higher upfront costs for machines that use other cartridges

Edward Clarke

Re: I guess I'm an unprofitable disloyal customer then

Me too - I'm using (when it's turned on) an HP LaserJet 4M plus/ps with a duplex feeder. I think it was introduced in 1994. The printer replaced a LaserJet 2 that I was using in 1991. What reason do I have to "upgrade" a black and white laser printer that prints one or two pages a month?

For color I print on an Epson 2500 series with refillable tanks. $12 for a bottle that an refill a single color tank multiple times or an HP that is makes you buy a new cartridge for three times that when you run out of one color? And HP printers wear out too easily now -

Tax working from home, says Deutsche Bank, because the economy needs that lunch money you’re not spending

Edward Clarke

Here in the ex-colonies we are dealing with a death rate of 1000/day. This is about to go through the roof since we had 163,000 new cases yesterday and both public and private hospitals are full to the brim in many areas. One of the largest nurse's unions is complaining that personal protective equipment that is designed for single use is being used several times due to shortages. Doctors and nurses can not continue to do massive overtime for extended periods - exhaustion will cause mistakes and mistakes will kill them.

Please - do not follow in our footsteps.

Snapchat domain squatter loses comedy £1m URL sellback attempt

Edward Clarke

As I recall...

Whitehouse.com used to be a porn site. It's still not affiliated with the US government.

Oracle teases prospect of playing nicely with open-source Java in update to WebLogic application server

Edward Clarke

What?

Why would anybody with a clear choice deal with java and Oracle? It seems ( from the outside ) that Oracle is nothing but a bunch of lawyers that buy up semi-successful companies with open/free/popular software and then try to charge a fortune for it. Didn't they simply lift the entire specification of SQL/DB from IBM - the same kind of action that they are suing Alphabet and java for?

If you make some super popular program that sells like N95 masks or toilet paper on eBay then won't Oracle come after you for a piece of the pie? Screw that - I hope a kraken pulls his super yacht under the next time Larry takes it for a spin.

Uncle Sam demands summary judgment on Snowden memoir: We're not saying it's true, but no one should read it

Edward Clarke

Re: Lovely use of English

I believe that was a misprint - it should be spelled "codpiece".

Dot-org price-cap scrap latest: Now ICANN accused of snubbing registrars with 'sham' public comment process

Edward Clarke

Question...

Did Benoît Battistelli move from the EU Patent Office to ICANN?

You'll never guess what US mad lads Throwflame have strapped to a drone (clue: it does exactly what it says on the tin)

Edward Clarke

Been done...

Kid did it with a small semiautomatic pistol. Here's the URL -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBBC-xL_MTg

Feds were not impressed at all with his clever hack.

Experts: No need to worry about Europe's navigation sats going dark for days. Also: What the hell is going on with those satellites?!

Edward Clarke

That picture deserves a caption contest...

"BOFH - Watch her face when the Galileo chip in her boyfriend's phone shows him on Oudezijds Achterbergwal in Amsterdam..."

Timely Trump tariffs tax tech totally: 25 per cent levy on modems, fiber optics, networking gear, semiconductors…

Edward Clarke

Re: It hurts the Chinese...

"shot in it's own foot." ... not quite. This picture is more accurate -

https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/bigstock-Juvenile-Hands-Shoved-A-Real-G-235299274.jpg

US Supremes urged by pretty much everyone in software dev to probe Oracle's 'disastrous' Java API copyright win

Edward Clarke

Hasn't this been decided in the other direction already?

IBM vs Amdahl for the 370 instruction set.

Intel vs Zilog for the 8080 instruction set.

Intel vs AMD etc.

Could Intel ask for royalties from Oracle for translating Java into Intel machine code? Now I'd pay to see that court case!

Now, hold on. This may shock you... Oracle allegedly juices its cloud sales with threats and shoddy on-prem support

Edward Clarke

Oracle vs AWS in Pentagon contract?

I wonder how this will play out in the ongoing fight between Amazon and Oracle over the Pentagon contract? If their own stockholders are saying that the Oracle cloud is crap then that sort of undercuts the Oracle arguments.

At least Sony offered a t-shirt, says macOS flaw finder: Bug bounties now for Macs if you want this 0-day, Apple

Edward Clarke
Mushroom

If they won't pay then you can always donate it to the government

of North Korea.

DPRK Embassy

Glinkastraße 5-7, 10117 Berlin, Germany

Ca-caw-caw: Pigeon poops on tot's face as tempers fray at siege of Lincoln flats

Edward Clarke
Pirate

Tom Lehrer has the solution

https://genius.com/Tom-lehrer-poisoning-pigeons-in-the-park-lyrics

Oracle robbed just about anyone who wasn't a pasty white male of $400m, says Uncle Sam

Edward Clarke

Larry must be pissed...

What? You forgot to rob the pasty white guys too???

Mark Zuckerberg did everything in his power to avoid Facebook becoming the next MySpace – but forgot one crucial detail…

Edward Clarke

Re: Facebook is the info gathering arm of the US spy agency

"the US spy agency"

I believe that you misspelled "anyone with money".

Et tu, Brute? Then fail, Caesars: When it's hotel staff, not the hackers, invading folks' privacy

Edward Clarke

Re: Caesars have proven themselves incompetent

"It is legal to carry concealed or openly in a bar or restaurant, even while consuming alcohol. One cannot possess a firearm if their blood alcohol content is more than .10 BAC (NRS 202.257). It is legal to carry openly or concealed inside a casino, on the Las Vegas Strip, or at the Fremont Street Experience."

https://www.nevadacarry.org/

https://www.nevadacarry.org/open-carry.html

But wait, there's more - Nevada is a "Stand Your Ground" state.

https://www.shouselaw.com/blog/nevada-stand-ground

That naked lady in the shower would have been legally able to shoot both of those guys. Might have lost her room deposit though.

Dear alt-right morons and other miscreants: Disrupt DEF CON, and the goons will 'ave you

Edward Clarke

Re: False flag attack

See Trump, for example.

The internet's very own Muslim ban continues: DNS overlord insists it can freeze dot-words

Edward Clarke

Re: Playing with fire

The organization should deal with the root domain servers directly and give up on ICANN. I would suggest dealing with the Wide Project and JPRS to start with. These two run the M root server and "endeavors to coordinate operational service" with the others. That does not look like an absolute rule to me though. The next organization to deal with is RIPE NCC - which runs the K root.

None of these are under the control of ICANN. Furthermore "Anyone may apply to host a K-root node. Get details on the expansion plan and application process."...

Tech support chap given no training or briefing before jobs, which is why he was arrested

Edward Clarke

Re: Vetting? Does he thinks he's James Herriot?

Back when I started as an operator at a three letter company our personnel department had removable disk packs locked up to keep salary information away from unauthorized people. They'd stay in the room while salary projections were run and immediately take the printouts away after locking up the disk packs.

At which point the operators would print out a copy for themselves from the scratch tape that was left mounted after the job was run.

Hacking charge dropped against Nova Scotia teen who slurped public records from the web

Edward Clarke

Hold off on that repurpose the gofundme money.

And no official word on when they get their computers back. According to CBC, the family's criminal lawyer says "that can be a lengthy process."

I'm sure that the criminal lawyer hasn't been working for free. And perhaps use it to sue some of the officials for defamation as well.

Oi, force Microsoft to cough up emails on Irish servers to the Feds, US states urge Supremes

Edward Clarke

I'm sort of confused here... If you need the damned emails, why don't you just ASK FOR THE BLOODY THINGS from the Irish government? It sounds like they would be perfectly willing to turn them over.

'There has never been a right to absolute privacy' – US Deputy AG slams 'warrant-proof' crypto

Edward Clarke

In any case his comment that "There has never been a right to absolute privacy" is wrong. The Bill of Rights is considered part of the constitution and -

Amendment IX

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Amendment X

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.

I guess that fat hairy arsehole can't count beyond two and never read the rest of the constitution.

So. A cross-Europe cyberwar simulation. Of ransomware

Edward Clarke

Re: Cloud?

The "Black Death" is endemic in the western United States. A few people get it every year but it's easily dealt with by antibiotics. Here's a link to news from a few days ago:

https://nypost.com/2017/06/29/more-cases-of-the-plague-confirmed-in-new-mexico/

Meh.

Ex-NASA bod on Gwyneth Paltrow site's 'healing' stickers: 'Wow. What a load of BS'

Edward Clarke

"Seriously, he "converses with a high-level spirit" about medical problems."

Just a thought, but he's communing with a dead guy - probably one who took the "radium water" cure in the early twentieth century. If earlier, then probably someone who used strychnine as a snake bite cure ( I have an old 19th century book that recommends this ).

Loadsamoney: UK mulls fining Facebook, Twitter, Google for not washing away filth, terror vids

Edward Clarke

Re: Facebook doesn't have to provide free speech

You are correct - almost. Restricting by deletion makes Facebook/Google/Twitter responsible for content that is uploaded according to the DMCA. Every time some idiot posts that Trump's parents included a mutated butternut squash... Facebook/Google/Twitter would then be open to a libel suit. Who would you rather sue? Kid-In-A-Basement or Google?

Euro Patent Office hit with wave of anti-Battistelli letters

Edward Clarke

A reason to look closely

You would think that having someone try to kill this man (bike brakes) would send a clear signal to everyone involved that something is seriously wrong. Leaving him in there when everyone is trying to get him out is a recipe for disaster.

Oh my God, 911 is down. Quick, call… aaargh!

Edward Clarke

Re: Free market fail.

"A number of cities have switched to having fire department "subscriptions". If you don't pay your FD bill, they still have to go out to protect the neighboring houses, but they let the non-payer's property burn to the ground."

Ok, where the hell is this happening? It's not April fools day for a couple of weeks.

What should the Red Arrows' new aircraft be?

Edward Clarke

Sopwith Camel Biplane Fighter (1917). They were still flying in NZ in 2011 and seven are still believed to exist in 2016. "One single fighter, flown by Major William Barker, shot down 46 enemy aircraft, more than any other fighter in history."

How many other hundred year old planes do you know that are still flying?

Obey Google, web-masters, or it will say you can't be trusted

Edward Clarke

Re: Moms going to love this

Change the browser to forbid loading sites with certificate errors. Your mother should be prevented from going to a site that claims to be secure but is not. "http:" is for insecure sites, not "https:". Make the popup message read "This site is insecure but claims to be secure. We suggest you use Lynx to view it.".

Showing my age...

As US court bans smart meter blueprints from public, sysadmin tells of fight for security info

Edward Clarke

I thought I recognized "Sensus"...

http://www.alipac.us/f19/angry-customers-return-smartmeters-245780/index2.html

Briefly - it looks like there have been a lot of fires associated with Sensus devices. Here's a partial quote: "utility provider SaskPower to announce that it would be removing all of them". I'd take this with a grain of salt, I haven't heard of problems like this from other sources. You'd think that houses being burned down would be a major news story.

IBM staffer at risk of redundo? Capita will wipe away your tears

Edward Clarke

We care about you!

Here's some friendly advice from another company:

http://www.chron.com/news/bizarre/article/Employer-advises-Dumpster-diving-for-axed-workers-1878457.php

Dead Steve Jobs is still a crook – and Apple must cough up $450m for over-pricing ebooks

Edward Clarke
Facepalm

Monopoly pricing

Here's the result of publishers setting prices on Amazon.

Print List Price $27.00, Hardbound Price: $18.39, Kindle Price: $13.99

Sold by: Penguin Group (USA) LLC, This price was set by the publisher

Print List Price: $27.00, Hardbound: $16.07, Paperback: $7.23, Kindle Price: $13.99

Sold by: Random House LLC , This price was set by the publisher

I want both of these particular books but I'm going to wait for them in the library. The pricing is way out of line. Look at the difference in price between the kindle and paperback prices for example.

Former security officials and BlackBerry CEO pile in on encryption debate

Edward Clarke

Correction -

"Of course the big difference between being in government and having left government is that you no longer have the direct responsibility to keep people safe."

A better reason would be:

Of course the big difference between being in government and having left government is that you no longer can be fired for telling the truth.

GSMA offers a share and share alike approach to the C-Band

Edward Clarke

Shared spectrum could be a problem

That's part of the amateur radio spectrum in ITU regions 2 and 3 while Great Britain also has a small part of the 9cm band although it's in ITU region 1. In the US (ITU 2) we are permitted to emit 1KW from 3300-4000 Mhz. Is front end overload an issue at these frequencies?

The Lazarus Effect: Saved by Linux and Cash Converters

Edward Clarke

Use what you have

While Kali isn't the best distribution for new users, it might have been the distribution that he had with him. His machine was crashing at random intervals between thirty seconds and half an hour. Trying to download a Linux distribution to windows and then burn a CD or copy to a USB stick on a machine that crashes that frequently does not sound enjoyable.

At this point he was only using the machine for fun and Kali served his purpose. Once he gets home he can try a more "new user" oriented distribution. He certainly doesn't need penetration testing unless he's going to compete with GCHQ.

ICANN running the global internet? It's gonna be OK, it's gonna be OK, US Congress told

Edward Clarke

So... what enforcement powers do they have?

What is to keep the general internet from simply ignoring ICANN? What actual enforcement powers do they have or think that they have? Do they actually pay for the running of the root domain name servers or are these paid for by the local governing bodies?

In other words, why not show two fingers up to ICANN and not in the good way.

The Great Windows Server 2003 migration: How to plan your trip

Edward Clarke
Pirate

Black Hats Rejoice!

If I were a black hat then I'd hold back any new ways to break into Server 2003 until Microsoft is no longer willing to supply updates. This would give me a longer lived and more valuable back door into systems owned by idiots.

HAHAHA! Go on, HOST YOUR NEWS on FACEBOOK, FOOLS!

Edward Clarke

Re: "We’re not trying to go, like, suck in and devour everything."

In a tiny soft voice ... "only the profitable parts. You can keep the rest."

Activist investors DESTROY COMPANIES. Don't get me started on share dealings...

Edward Clarke

Re: Activist Investors & Venture Captialists

"See Icon -------------->"

Sorry you spelled that incorrectly. It's "Icahn" not "Icon".

Britain’s snooping powers are 'too weak', says NCA chief

Edward Clarke

Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.

Benjamin Franklin, 11 NOV 1755

IBM PCjr STRIPPED BARE: We tear down the machine Big Blue would rather you forgot

Edward Clarke

75mm in diameter.

Comcast Corp to merge with Time Warner Cable in MONSTER $45bn deal

Edward Clarke
Devil

It is the end times...

This merger will create a monstrous pile of suck to the point where it will become the first (and last) man made black hole. Shortly after the merger is complete the Comcast headquarters will collapse in upon itself from shear suckiness and the rest of the world will rapidly be pulled in after it. Get your last minute shag in now for the world will soon come to an end.

How much will Apple cough for ebook conspiracy? Trial starts May 2014

Edward Clarke

Apple has said that the government's remedy is "absurdly broad, invasive, vague, draconian and punitive".

The penalty should fit the crime and is fairly easy to figure. Apple should pay the price differential between the prior average and the new average times the number of books sold since the start of the Apple conspiracy. In addition, the board of directors should be sent to Singapore and each given twenty five strokes of the cane.

(Why yes, I do buy a lot of e-books).

Google 'disappoints' US congressman over Glass privacy controls

Edward Clarke
Trollface

Re: Scary

Of course he has a mobile phone. You can get a 25 foot phone extension cord at any Radio Shack.

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