Posts by Quinch

University students recruit AI to write essays for them. Now what?

Obligatory SMBC

https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/themes

Bill Gates' nuclear power plant stalled by Russian fuel holdup

Re: high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU)

You are an absolutely horrible person and have an upvote.

US offers Julian Assange time in Australian prison instead of American supermax if he loses London extradition fight

Pick your poison?

It makes me wonder what the difference would be, given how much the powers that be want him gone. He can commit suicide in a maximum security US prison while miraculously nobody watches {that, or an unfortunate incident involving another inmate}, or an unscheduled and mysterious visit from one of Australia's fascinating lifeforms.

Wouldn't be surprised, at least.

BOFH: Oh for Pete’s sake. Don’t make a spectacle of yourself

Re: Great stuff!

I think you might have just prod his point.

Chinese AI censors live-streamed Alpacas – beasts with a very NSFW and political back story

What, no perennial Llama Song?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRozKfYGFVc

To have one floppy failure is unlucky. To have 20 implies evil magic or a very silly user

"To have one floppy failure is unlucky. To have 20 implies evil magic or a very silly user "

Or, in my PTSD-inducing experience, using floppy disks.

BOFH: Bullying? Not on my watch! (It's a Rolex)

Re: Hummmm sounds familiar...

That's why it pays to insect the contract wording carefully.

'Agile' F-35 fighter software dev techniques failed to speed up supersonic jet deliveries

Ah, "agile"

"We don't have the time to do it right, but we always have the time to do it over."

Cats: Not a fan favourite when the critters are draped around an office packed with tech

Re: What?

Well, not gonna take it felineing down...

What price your home delivery? Amazon accused of hiding real injury rate in its overworked warehouses

Wouldn't work though - that just means that the shipping load gets moved forward a bit while everything else still churns at breakneck pace. I'd pay extra for shipping if it meant they'd hire more people to shift the load across, but I'm sure it would inevitably just mean it would get hoovered up by the management.

Chinese debt collectors jailed for cyberbullying under ‘soft violence’ laws

As the old joke goes....

The government hates competition.

This investor blew nearly $300,000 on Intel shares the day before 7nm disaster reveal. Yup, she's suing

Re: I'm shocked

And properly isolated nipple anodes.

'I'm telling you, I haven't got an iPad!' – Sent from my iPad

Re: Which is why I always turn off email sigs...

Relevant SMBC;

https://www.smbc-comics.com/?id=2847

When a deleted primary device file only takes 20 mins out of your maintenance window, but a whole year off your lifespan

I don't know about that.

After huffing and puffing for years, US senators unveil law to blow the encryption house down with police backdoors

Re: Cryptographic signing?

To properly pin any requisite blame on the developer, of course.

Step on it, I've got the police on my hack: Anon swipes, leaks online 269GB of crime intel docs from cops, Feds

If we had mandatory backdoors, this would never have happened.

Logitech G915 TKL: Numpad-free mechanical keyboard clicks all the right boxes

Why, though?

To me, removing the numpad on a keyboard is equivalent to removing the audio jack on a phone/tablet. Sure, you can do without it, but why would you want to?

BOFH: It's not just an awesome app, it'll look great on my Insta. . a. a. AAAARRRRRGGH

Re: We have Bosses like this

That, or push them straight into Dummy Mode and see what you can get away with.

Shock revelation as massive American presidential election hack confirmed

Re: LBJ would be proud

Well, considering how much politicians summon the silent majority, it shouldn't be surprising they'd rise up.

http://smbc-comics.com/index.php?id=3812

I used to be a dull John Doe. Thanks to Huawei, I'm now James Bond!

Re: national security but without explaining what

re: the title

Obligatory SMBC.

https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/2013-04-28

Are you sure your disc drive has stopped rotating, or are you just ignoring the messages?

Re: I can believe it!

Good advice - from about half a decade ago.

Inkjets have been steadily gaining over lasers over the past few years to the point where quite a few of them are actually cheaper to run. Hell, some of them have even taken a step backwards in the right direction and went with the dirt cheap refillable tanks in exchange for a costlier device at the outset {extra costly depending on features you need}. Likewise, pretty much all manufacturers swapped out water and alcohol-based ink in favor of oil and pigment, so the few days it took them to dry out if not used turned into a few months.

Overall, the only thing lasers still have going for them is speed of printing and overall capacity for abuse, which can be crucial for large offices, but less so on smaller scale.

Source: Former retail drone {as of yesterday! Hooray!}

Apple in XS new sensation: Latest iPhone carries XS-sive price tag

The not-obligatory-but-always-relevant SMBC:

http://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/the-new-thing

Linux-loving lecturer 'lost' email, was actually confused by Outlook

Re: been there - seen that - never been shouted at to that extent (yet)

"A common mistake people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools."

- Sir Adams, Duke of Towel

It took DEF CON hackers minutes to pwn these US voting machines

Re: "Intrusion will be logged"

Hehe, now I want to replay Uplink.

Samsung releases 49-inch desktop monitor with 32:9 aspect ratio

Eh, still has nothing on Frank's 2000'' TV.

Fighter pilot shot down laptops with a flick of his copper-plated wrist

Re: Random PC reboots

Depends if you have a BOFH on staff.

WikiLeaks emits CIA's Wi-Fi pwnage tool docs

I suspect a routine psych eval would weed those out. Can't have people thinking the ends don't justify the means.

Donald Trumped: Comey says Prez is a liar – and admits he's a leaker

Half full of it and half empty-headed

So, on one hand we have the director of FBI versus the President of the USA.

This is less of a matter of whom to side with and more along the lines of which of these two buttclowns to disbelieve more.

Proposed PATCH Act forces US snoops to quit hoarding code exploits

"chaired by an Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official"

I completely trust this idea with no reservations whatsoever.

US visitors must hand over Twitter, Facebook handles by law – newbie Rep starts ball rolling

Re: But

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, remember?

Apple eats itself as iPhone fatigue spreads

Gratuitous SMBC comic;

http://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/the-new-thing

BOFH: What's your point, caller?

Re: Gaffa tape

Upvoted for a fellow Schlock reader.

Is there anything left to ask Bill Gates? (Other than gissus a million?)

Re: When will he stop his genocidal and other dark practices...?

Upvoted for SMBC reference.

Apple growth flatlines ... Tim Cook thinks, hey, $80bn is still $80bn

Re: A sad day

"They will come out with another hot idea soon."

I mean, they're bound to sooner or later, right?

I'll build a Hyperloop railgun tube-way in Texas, Elon Musk vows

Re: Pure Genius

A businessmad?

Firefox joins the insanity

Nice to see a fellow Seamonkey user - originally I started using it because I wanted something that would behave like Netscape, now I'm holding on to it like grim death because it seems to be one of the few browsers remaining that aren't rapidly turning into bloatware.

Mine's the one with the "lighter, safer alternative to IE" nostalgia in the pocket.

Dummy-readable benchmarking tools

Dummy-readable benchmarking tools

I've got a question, and I figure a bunch of fine, snarky, platform-agnostic* gents and ladies might offer some advice.

So, I work retail in a chain that flogs, among other things, electronics. The clientele can, by and large, be classified as either "newly weds" and "nearly deads" within the town itself, with a bunch of farmers in the surrounding areas.

I'm growing gradually tired of trying to explain the nuances of hyperthreading, multi-core architectures, and given the upcoming Christmas mobbings, I'm going to be increasingly short on time too, so I figured what I could do is use visual aids, rather than trying to explain to various hexo-and-octogenerians why computer A is going to be more responsive than the computer B, even though it has a higher number by the word CPU and they remember hearing that them pentiums are pretty fast. Something simple that doesn't clutter up the output with SHA1 hash times and JPG decompressions, just a dumbed-down score, or as close as possible, to represent how fast their computer will be able to pull up their Word documents and Facebook profiles that I can slap on as a wallpaper on the demo units.

Lay it on me.

* i.e. equally irreverent

Big browser builders scramble to fix cross-platform zero-day flaw

A true cross-platform vulnerability that affects all browsers

So how do they plan to fix the users?

Chewbacca held up by TSA stormtroopers for having light sabre

Re: I'm not seeing the problem

Such a walk can be artificially affected - and the article points out that the reason Mayhew was pulled aside because the cane was noticeably heavier than they tend to be - hence the presumed checking for said illicit items.

I'm not seeing the problem

They spotted something that looked like a possible weapon, carried by someone who looked like he could use it with deadly efficiency. They pulled him aside - didn't steal anything, didn't land their Millenium Falcon in his exogorth - he was in and out in five minutes.

While I haven't had any firsthand experience with the TSA {and the horror stories I hear make me avoid transferring via US, damn the plane costs}, this looks like exactly the kind of thing they - and any airport security, for that matter - is obligated to do. Keep eyes open, identify possible threats, investigate quickly, politely and professionally and if no threat exists, thank the passenger for their time and send them on their way.

Authority abuse is apparently commonplace in the TSA, but the knee-jerk reaction to jump down their throats whenever they do anything is counterproductive, IMO.

We're losing the battle with a government seduced by surveillance

Re: Time to pack up and leave

Just make sure it's a woods and not a mountain. Otherwise, a few years down the line, you'll get a phone call about that book you were supposed to have written by now.

Google accused of hypocrisy over Glass ban at shareholder shindig

Re: The reality

Because field of view is not a thing? I'm fairly sure Google Glass will be able to record things that are outside a 5° angle.

As for activation prompts, I give it a week after release before a package with a user-friendly setup hits the net.

Jobs' 'incredibly stupid' prattlings prove ebook price-fix plot, claim Feds

Re: Bah!

Of course, you tight-fisted nincompoop. How do you expect the author to make a living from his books if we shorten the copyright?

Google releases Glass' roots, warns it may turn specs to bricks

Re: So, ...

Or, depending on how much they paid for the specs, shit them.

Larry Page acknowledges creeping vocal paralysis

So...

Bill Gates, funding research for malaria.

Larry Page, funding research for his sore throat.

It's good to have priorities.

Borked your iDevice? Pay EVEN MORE to have it fixed by Applecare

"Cupertino is reportedly planning changes to Applecare with a move towards shop-based iDevice repairs and a potentially lucrative subscription service scheme."

Call me cynical, but I think the last word is misspelled.

Court orders Visa partner to allow donations to WikiLeaks

"...pay a fine of 800,000 ISK ($6,829) per day."

I'm sure they'll hasten to comply. I mean, that's almost an entire rounding error.

British designer builds $15m iPhone for Hong Kong mogul

"This beautiful handset took 9 weeks of detailed intricate work"

So basically, just long enough for it to become obsolete?

Gates and Allen reshoot historic 1981 Microsoft photo

Re: That first photo

"I've said some stupid things and some wrong things, but not that."

Amazon yanks SimCity download from store

I've got no sympathy.

EA has pulled this crap again and again in the past {and again, and again, and again, and again}.

Those who do not learn from history and all that.