Posts by Stuart 94 publicly visible posts • joined 8 Jan 2008
Backing both horses? I presume this means that HTC does not pay the Windows Tax on all PDAs but only those that actually have Windows. Will this mean, as with eeepc market that new exciting LOWER PRICE non-MS stuff will come to market and that to stay competitive MS will have to offer a WM 'Classic' variant? So Linux/MS lovers both win!
I presume the current Windows Tax is around 30GBP/50USD per copy of WM6 to the manufactuers. Anyone confirm?
Most UK publishers of GoogleAds are probably community based sites. That is they do not have employed people to watch and vet each and every one of the millions of pages they publish for the benefit of the community.
So ASS (whoops) want us to stop taking ads or vet them. That means losing that resource. Why? because of an Ad that some oversensitive soul found in the Guardian?
This smells of keeping the Ad world in business, for business.
I've seen a lot of negative comment based on the iPhone & WM alternatives. But Jesus is a version 3 product (if you take itouch as V1) and WM is version 6. Who can expect Google to do more than MS (and most other software developers) in taking to V3 to get a rounded/stable product?
And remember the iUnique feature of this device is, presumably, the manufacturers don't have to pay MS royalties (or Apple its developers) which gives a clear cost advantage if and when it gets to volume and competitive manufacture.
Then we can expect a manufacturer (Asus?) to deliver a groundbreaking package (ieeepc?) that will deliver smartphones to the masses just as the eeepc liberated the ultramobile from the rich/gadgetry business market.
Say £279 for an Asus 901, £30 for modem & £10 month PAYG for 1Gb. That maxes out at £549 over 2 years. Better computer, better coverage, and even less because you don't have to pay when you don't use it and you can switch to another better deal anytime.
No contest. Who uses the once great Voda these days and why?
Dumb commenting on a dumb report!
Check what was actually said and argued. It was that scence teachers should, if challenged by creationists, take time to show why creationism/ID is NOT science and why those advocating Creationism/ID are misunderstanding science.
Instead of just ignoring the problem. Or leaving it to your neighbourhood RE teacher/mad mullah or panoid pastor to explain the difference.
Can you really disagree with that? There was, in the presentation, sadly, a post modernistic treatment of different 'worldviews' (science/religion) but you can't get to demolish that if first you haven't seperated the views out.
Wind is too expensive because this (and the alternative) government ducks the nimby problem by going offshore. Not only is it twice as expensive (and much harder to maintain) - the targets are dependent on marine platforms that are not there or being switched back to oil as the price hike makes new oil projects more feasible.
So twice the price, might never be built - and if they are - nobody has yet cracked how you go beyond 20% windpower because of the interruptibility issue. There are ideas but AFAIK no substantially funded programmes to shift much non-time dependent power demand from 'instant-on' to a managed delivery. (The only crude implementation is the residential 'white meter').
Making vague promises is easy but not a lot of help when your strategic thinking ends at trying not to lose the next election.
There are people (see above) who believe they are the work of the devil and those who see them as our saviours.
The gist of the report is that the supporters (and some opposers) embellish stats to support their cause. Easy unless you are a professional statistician. But that's the error - the placement and number is not really evidenced based.
Little consideration appears to be given to the expected result of placing a camera (driver looking down at the speedo and manouver to a safe margin under the limit). Can be very effective when there is a deceptive bend ahead. Or madness if it is at a school crossing when eyes are better used watching the pavements. Not to mention the consequences of hitting the accelerator 50 yards further on - which can move the casulty further along the road but can make the gatso stats look better.
The issue is lowering casulties. And overall we have not since the crashworthiness/surviveability of cars was dramatically improved. That saved thousands of driver's lives at the cost of 100's of pedestrians and cyclists through the by-product of making drivers feel invulnerable.
Its always more complicated than politicians declare (and I fear understand). The accountants and gatso salesmen exploit that. We really need a really independent evidenced based authority to arbitrate on this.
Paris? Encouraging hands-on statistics?
Ever run out of credit on 3's broadband service? Easy, you can top up online (yes on a Welsh hillside on a Sunday evening).
Everything goes fine till 3's system calls for VoV and then blocks it! So you can't Top-up with my NatWest Visa card. Screwed me till I remembered I have a Co-operative Bank Visa card that trusts me.
Reminds me of when i used to play sharedealing in the office. My friend banked with NatWest and had to send faxes and stuff to confirm a share purchase. I just called a nice lady at my Brum branch. "No problem luv" and that was it. Done on trust (as in knowing your customers). Cheaper & faster. Remind me which bank loses most customer's money?
The quote may be wrong - but that is irrelevant if the police believe it? - or something very close? By coincidence I'm going to a preview of Hanif's Fringe Play tomorrow night. It is about 50 yards from where I was stopped by police of taking a photograph of a public highway where an accident had occurred but all parties to it had been removed.
Why? well they didn't want me too. OK, what law gave them the power? We have the power to sieze your camera as it can contain evidence of a crime scene. Ahem, the police had already photographed it. It was so silly, but arguing with police (particulary the silly variety) can have its downside. So I made my excuses and left.
I'm white, middle class and 60. If I have problems what hope for Hanif?
The first thing every webmaster does on hearing about Cuil is put in the prime keyword. Turn up with the same or better position than Google and Cuil has got itself a recommender. And wasn't that how Google grew from nothing?
When you have been No.1 on Google for ages and don't appear on Cuil (well I gave up after 18 pages), you have not got a convert. When none of the obvious alternative sites are there either you begin to wonder that sour grapes may not be colouring your vision too much.
But when you see (as above) copyright images from your site illustrating crawler sites you really begin to wonder. I mean we are moving into DCMA territory as 'fair use' would not apply. No - it is incompetence. I agree it is difficult to get things right first time and the interface is interesting - but a high profile launch at this time is IMHO suicidal.
This is a repeat of the MSN re-launch fiasco. It is no good saying your search is better. It has to be demonstrably better to your target market. It is not.
A retired steerage class strategist sadly returning to Google ...
We have rampant war in the internet. Bot's galore trying to break our communications and economy, trying to mislead and defraud our citizens.
And what do our politicians worry about? Not safeguarding the integrity of the internet but imposing their often dodgy moral standards on each and everyone of us.
For goodness sake - people really do have more to fear from malware & DDoS then they do from BitTorrent & Skinflicks. Address that first PLEASE!
No risk - because they are blank and we know the serias?
That's one of the real problems of border control. They are only concerned with borders. They don't even bother to take action against people with fake UK passports * as long as they were not used to get into the country *. And the criminals know that well. That's why a growing number of people use foriegn passports to get 'visitor' access and then switch to fake UK passports to get jobs, accounts & money.
Because that chip is never going to be used by employers, banks etc (and if they did the diffusion of checking would in itself make it easily breakable) - then this shows up just how silly ID cards will be. Having a fake card will be a licence to obtain money. Banks learnt that the hard way. Do civil servants never learn.
That's one of the benefits of being a SysAdmin. You are reminded on an hourly basis of the unlimited ingenuity of people trying to break your system. And they will ...
Paul Stephenson said "EDF is no longer owned by the french government iirc, it was privatised"
Yes with the French government retaining an 85% shareholding. British Energy will be an oxymoron. Believing the government should not own a strategic national resource is a fair point of view. Believing another (competitive) government will run it for our benefit and not theirs is kinda brave thinking.
France is way ahead as the least CO2 emitting electricity generator. Yep 75% of it comes from nuclear - but they have come from nowhere to overtake us in wind generation.
Maybe beacuse they stand up to the Nimby's and build on land rather than offshore. That means wind actually gets built, fast and at half the cost.
Frankly renewable is not the issue - it is CO2 reduction. Indeed a sensible energy policy is looking at displacing other hydrocarbon energy uses with electricity - so ramping up to near 100% CO2-less generation and increasing it should be a national priority.
The only two proven technologies that can do most of that are nuclear & wind. Nuclear is nasty, but the worst is having to sit around with some spent fuel. The CO2 alternative may mean many of our kids won't sitting around to worry. Or is that someone's secret agenda?
So while we should be doing all we can to increase the manufacture and installation of wind (worldwide it is currently supply limited) - we need nuclear too. The two should be bedfellows not enemies.
Which is why I support wind and oppose Greenpeace
Imagine Nominet had not disabled the unrenewed domain but had put it back in the pot to be re-registered on a first come, first served. Real live CC data gushing in from online shoips worldwide. My, that would have made TNT's custodianship of the HMRC appear very secure.
Ever had a phone call from the bank?
"Can I just verify who you are sir?"
"No, verify yourself first."
"Sorry we can't for security reasons ..."
Muppets - Paris who knopws a thing or two on first come, first ...
Nothing new here I think. This is typical 'big power thinking'. It is locked to large power stations trying to deliver electricity on variable demand across the national grid. That's what power stations do.
Unsurprisingly wind turbiines are different. You match supply & demand in a different way. Two ways:
* STORAGE - the problem with hydro is that it runs out of water, not suddenly, but over a season or two. Opportunistic wind balanced with hydro gives effective storage. The water is saved on windy days and is there to deliver immediate electricity at a few moments notice when it is needed (yes, you need to change the generator/capacity ratio but this need no be expensive). It also means we could further expand our hydro option. Hydro accounts for more power than wind atm so this choice is significant. In the future electric cars charging overnight or whenever can use opportunistic wind and provide a pool of stored electricity and more balanced base load.
* DEMAND - In the domestic market we only have the crude 7hr White Meter option to offset demand. Using variable power sources (tidal as well as wind) has to be balanced with managing demand more efficiently. Fridges don't need power during TV commercial breaks. We already have a way to signal power devices to turn off/on if they don't need a continuous supply like fridges. Its the AC frequency which moves down when supply is limited and up when not. There is work going on in this area but the key is to find a way to discount this type of interrupable supply agains the non-interruptable (like the light ALWAYS comes on when you click the switch).
Frankly if we could manage supply/demand better in this way now - our emissions would be much lower without building a single turbine (but even lower if we do).
So if I send a dirty text from England to my (ex-)friend in Scotland - where would the action - hence offence been committed?
If the sassenachs don't follow the touch jocks in legislating this south of the border does this make us a haven for text sending? Will the scots be putting up border controls to nab us if we stray too far north?
Pete - Sonar detection (or avoiding it) was rather important in 1982. PM Putin sends his bombers to test our fighter defences. Do you presume he has retired his navy from our waters?
Oh and don't Islamic states have hostile navies sharing the Gulf with the RN right now.
Surely wind + hydro would be the perfect combination?
Hydro is great for delivering peak loads from (watery) reserves to deliver power when people need it. Wind delivers power when .. errr .. the wind blows. It then displaces hydro which effectively mean any excess leccy helps the dams refill - cheap and effective wind power storage for an unrainy calm day.
NZ has only 322Mb of wind capacity. And those fossil generators are now going full belt at peak gas/oil prices. Not very forward thinking are we?
No surprises in this report - exceppt possibly to Dave Cameron as it pretty well rubbishes Zac Goldsmith's Conservative energy policy (home CHP by 2012).
So what about Labour? 11 years and how many committed nuclear power stations do we have? They have managed to both piss off the lentil eaters by talking about them without delivering any. Even if they get their skates on we couldn't expect much before 2020. Oh and wind? Good idea for reducing the absolute number of nuclear stations by 2 or 3 - except they have virtually ditched the fast and (relatively) cheap land option because of perceived nimbyism for hopelessly expensive, difficult to maintain sea based farms which inevitably leads to the Shell/Thames array fiasco. Turbines are in short supply which makes them expensive. Combine that with having very little infrastructure to pile drive and install these monsters far offshore and you see fast delivery of green electricity is not blowing in the wind.
The LD & Green party policies sound nice. But try and atach them to the grid to supply reliable power requires a lot of wishful linking.
An explosion of the local utility transformer took Rackshack's main DC off grid for 4 days a few years ago. Not a minute of downtime was experienced by 17,000 servers.
The subsequent write-up of the event showed both an amazing amount of pre-planning that initially kept everything going and fast adaption to cope with unexpected consequences to keep it going. A long list of lessons were learnt at Rackshack. Were these all passed on to The Planet when it acquired them?
And anyone who has a mission critical server without a geographical seperate backup - presumably doesn't understand the concept of backup - or why you have a minimum of two DNS. When those phones start ringing I hope they say "You are fired!". Putting client's businesses at risk (like no email?) is just darn unethical as well as bad business.
O look forward to hearing any excuses ... from £60/month for a deicated server phrases like a pennyworth of tar come to mind.
You mean the guy who transformed tiny Racal Vodafone into the only global pure mobile giant - while everybody else fell by the wayside or had to sleep with the enemy (fixed comms). And he did it profitably. The supreme deal maker without whom the shares would be worth no more than Racal's!
So a person who builds an empire is not best suited to running one - especially as the market matured (saturated). Different skills. Sarin had a rocky ride transforming a sometimes incoherent global empire into an operationally profit motivated group.
Someone who can turn a £35bn revenue stream into a £10bn profit (really?) can't be doing too much wrong except, possibly, beating the regulators into allowing such a rip off of our mobile phone charges.
OK so they had a builder and a transformer. Now they probably want to stabalise the business with an administrator. Mobile is getting boring. The new Chris Gents & Hans Snooks will be building new industries elsewhere. But where?
Decent ISP? I use the one with 3 letters beginning with the last of the alphabet.
Excellent - and i guess there are a few more offering good 'pure' broadband and can be trusted to contine unless they get snapped up by one of the majors.
And that's the problem. The good guys are small, expensive and no advertising budget. Even if you are prepred to pay that five/ten pounds a month for a decent service - how do find the good guys except by personal recommendation?
I wish they would band together into a trade group (after all their real competitive market is not with each other but with dissatisfied customers from the majors). A few well timed press releases using SamKnows figures could do wonders.
"Would you like your broadband traffic shaped or pure sir?" Lets give people a real choice.
Oh dear - those who know of Steve Green on usenet will understand his obsessive and continued degradation of DAB and any who question his particular analysis. This despite his repeated claims to have first class degrees yet demonstrates a complete lack of grasp of elementary statistics as his presentation of the graph again demonstrates.
Yes there is much wrong with DAB and Steve does have some good points. But he has succeeded in alienating potential support by committing the same sin of some of the Beeb/Ofcom people by bending facts to the cause. IMHO the figures sugest that DAB is not a failure - nor a runaway success. Its here, we should try and improve it. Winning the hearts and minds of Ofcom/Beeb ain't going to be easy. I don't think this is going to help.
Or is there any other explanation for posts that see any question of their way as that exclusively of "tub thumping imperialists" and similar?
I could forgive one post doing their thing by accident - but am I paranoid about a pattern of posting here which is strangely atypical of the normal diversity and skepticism we see in this glorious organ ...
But keep on posting - that is your right ... however convincing arguement rather than abuse may be more effective.
"The Chinese have their own priorities and their own way of dealing with things. I'm pretty sure that Western Democracy, especially post 9/11, has little to teach them about "freedom"".
True. But then I don't think the Tibetans are too happy with the Chinese version either. Why not let them choose?
Michael wrote:
"The Dalai Llama should consider 2 things before mouthing off again (a) If he wants his face on TV all the time, well, people need TVs to see it."
Ahem - I think you will find the DL doesn't want his face on TV. He merely wants it and the rest of his body to be allowed to live freely in Tibet. Know who has a problem with that?
"Zoos are closing all the time, there are plenty of struggling Llamas who love his job if they had the chance."
Only if approved by the Chinese Government. Funnily enough I think the UK is the only other major country where the government appoints its major religious leader. But that is an accident of history, not a way of trying to control the political future of a country (sorry Province. Tibetans are not allowed to express an opinion on that).
Enjoy your really cool (Chinese) TV.
"Needed to buy a house ... " Do I detect another way to make them ID Cards compulsory (at least for the muddled mortgaged classes). Goodness me I bought and sold houses for nearly 40 years without the need to do more than to affix my signature to a contract and rather too many cheques.
Supporting criminal terrorism? Mine's the concrete overcoat ...
Around 1999 I was in the tiny office of what is now a major UK domain registration company. The domain searches from the website flashed up. Interesting ones were registered.
Ahem, <legals>Of course I'm sure they must have been to protect the customer's interest</legals>.
BTW it was a little company then. When a domain was purchased the CC number went on a paper slip through an old CC sliding thingy ... Cutting edge is what happened if you put your fingers in the wrong place.
One major extinction event? Ephesus harbour marooned by drop in water level in last 1800 years?
Is this guy crazy? Did he bother to check out these two assertions with anybody qualified in the field? Or just read a primer or even google?
There have been many extinctions. Water levels may rise and fall - but so does land in one of the most gelogical active areas (Google Ephesus & earthquake). Or was the usual explanation of silting by the local river also totally discounted.
Come on Reg you can do better than this. Modelling future climatic effects is at the limits (or maybe just beyond) our capabilities with current data. All the more reason to address the problem based on facts rather than fantasy.
I used to recommend business customers use Freeserve. Not because it was cheap but because it was good. The nearest to Demon you could get at the time. Even though there owned by DSG.
I used to recommend anybody use Orange mobile because Hans Spaak made it the best and most innovative network.
Hence both have had their share of good but demanding customers who expected innovation (or just stability) to continue.
And they are just the people who have taken flight. Now getting better deals/performance from O2/T-Mobile for mobile and even BT for broadband. BT - well when people switch that way - you know you are in serious trouble. That is everybody not in Orange Towers.
Sad. I love the French but they have screwed this company up appallingly.
Its hard to imagine anybody using data roaming - except by accident.
Whereas '3' Pay to Play & T-Mobile's Web'n'Walk are good deals that I have no problem enjoying. Why don't they want my business when I'm abroad?
Goodness - I can WiFi for free at many bars/restaurants - and in the cheapest hotel chains (take a bow B&B et Premiere Classe). I am willing to pay a little for the extra convenience of not being in a bar or a hotel - God am I that sad? - But not a lot. Enough for a decent margin for the networks.
The BBC didn't get to be one of the highest rated sites in the world because of subsidy - just that it is the very best at what it does (well apart from the odd iPlayer debacle).
People who use mobile phones, PDA's etc see the difference between the BBC's level of professionalism and the rest. As a profesional web designer I have followed the BBC website for close on a decade and a half. It has been a reference for doing stuff well and moving on. Bit like in conventional broadcasting - it sets a standard for the competition to try and match (even occasionally exceed).
Without the BBC website - and particulary the news.bbc.co.uk - we would be poorly served by the inadequate ITV and the biased NI empire (just take a look at Fox News for fair and balanced reporting).
Peter Sage questions my statement "In other words their <German> policy of replacing nuclear with wind will *increase* their fossil powered needs"
Simple. Nuclear is about 28% of their current consumption. It has taken 6 years for the most enthusiastic windfarm builder to get to around 6% of power from wind (with 10x as many as the UK). Peter, the Germans own half the wind industry - do you really think they can up the wind percentage to even 28% before nuclear closure. Plus any growth in demand. And what percentage of extra (Russian) gas powered plant needs to be added as cover for low wind situations. Remember - there are very big unanswered questions of grid control when variable renewals go over 20%. There may be solutions but no-one has proved them yet (don't quote Denmark who are at 30% but whose small grid is covered by the more resilient German grid when the wind doesn't blow. It won't work the other way!)
Your inability to distinguish between pro-wind & anti-wind posts does embarrass me. I'm an ecotricity cuistomer and devotee. I campaign for wind farms. But folks like you undermine the wind message with your conception of an idealised green world that is just not practical.
Getting the UK to 20% affordable wind by 2020 is unrealistic atm unless the government gets itself sorted. 20% is not even going to handle the current ageing nuclear baseload - so where is the other 80% coming from? Adding all the proven renewable stuff together doesn't add another 20%. So your future looks like the majority of our electricity will be fossil generated. Not very Green. That's why we need to add nuclear into the mix. Nuclear & renewables displace fossil - not each other!
Germany is the greatest global wind power by far with around 10x installed capacity of the UK producing about 6/7% of their electricity. In other words their policy of replacing nuclear with wind will *increase* their fossil powered needs!
Oh and nuclear power is best at base load. Gas is best for predictable fast power wind-up & wind-down. Wind is best at gas fuel substitution (when the wind blows - the gas-fired stations won't emit any gases).
I really wish the nuclear/wind camps would stop shooting each other in the foot and turn on the true enemy of carbon emmissions - coal fired station. We need nuclear, we need renewables and we will need gas powered stations to manage peak loads.
Oh - and unproven technology tends to deliver late and short. So not a good choice as a major part of our plans upto 2025. Hopefully after that they will be in shape to replace nuclear. Nuclear is not nice but the waste issue is only an issue if we succeed in avoid catasttrophic global warming. The consequences of fossil waste gases is rather nastier and less easy to avoid.
I hope Gordo's plans are for some sensible nuclear technology. The Finn's are having problems with next generation stuff. Lets get some proven technology sop we get it on time and on cost. Leave it to the French to sort out the future - then nick it (as they did the reverse with our aerospace industry)
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