Posts by Pascal Monett

Brit PM raps Facebook for allowing GORY beheading vids

They might be better, but from FB's numbers, you must be pretty lonely on them.

Disclaimer : NAFBU

Re: Nudity and sex is not

Not on prime-time, that's for sure.

Unless its a pay channel, in which case nudes and sex 24/7.

And after 11 PM, its open season on all flesh (the kiddies are in bed - theoretically).

The rest of the time, it's only softcore and innuendo. Bikinis are acceptable as well.

Beak orders Yahoo! to get on with Microsoft Search rollout in Asia

"irreparable harm to Microsoft"

The only thing doing irreperable harm to Microsoft is and ever has been Microsoft.

Yahoo! is barely a nuisance for it.

Furious French choke on chardonnay over NSA's phone spying in France

Re: What's needed is a way of making everyone's vote equal

You mean like in France, where the President is elected directly from the vote of the people ?

Yes, that must be what you mean.

So, it is France that is actually a "functional democracy".

The USA is more of a functional plutocracy, or, at the very least, a corperatocracy.

Facebook switches itself off and on again after GLOBAL meltdown

A brief period of time

For Facebook, it means two hours.

For you and me, it means at most 10 minutes, maybe 15 on the outside.

For your manager, it means 5 minutes ago.

MPs to grill Facebook: You're going to let our teens do WHAT?

The difference is that, for the DVLA, the government asked you for your info and is thus responsible for it, and you cannot do without it if you need to drive a car.

Facebook, on the other hand, didn't ask you for anything and you don't need it for anything. You chose to log on, creat a profile and give whatever it is you put in there, and in doing so, became Zucky's bitch.

And Zucky don't ask nobody nuthin'.

America: Land of the free, still home of the BIGGEST spammers on the planet

Also excluding respecting the human rights of US citizens on occasion.

Windows 8.1: A bit square, sure, but WAIT! It has a Start button

Then you bring her home and find out that she's stuffed her bra, wears a girdle to hide the fat and is a complete bore in bed.

Re: It's enough to make one upgrade to Linux

Ah, that old pipe dream. An agreable fantasy, I agree, but then reality kicks in.

Re: millions of beta testers said yes to it

Millions of others said no to it, but they were ignored.

Re: Whats not to like

A touch interface on a desktop computer.

I refuse having to wave my arms around to do my work.

Terminator-style robot busts leg in martial arts demo mishap

Re: characterised by slow, smooth movements

Don't be fooled by the apparent slowness. First of all, it's a lot harder to do movements slowly than it is to do them quickly - so slow means you truly master the muscular difficulty.

Second, I once saw a Tai-Chi master demonstrate a movement in slow and quick modes. I guarantee that the quick mode was quite impressive, and I do not doubt that an opponent would have been seriously injured by that flurry of activity.

Got a mobile phone? Then you've got a Trojan problem too

Re: You're trolling, right?

Not so much.

As recently as last week-end, I had a friend bring me his Win7 PC that was white-paged by some French version of the Homeland Security virus. I spent the day trying to get rid of it.

The virus was good. It entirely blocked the launching of anything, it masked the icons, the Start button didn't work, and even the USB ports were inactive. In short, nothing but booting from a CD could have a chance of doing anything.

I used my Knoppix LiveCD to snoop around and try to find the exe that launched itself before everything else, but no go. So I went to the major AV sites to find an ISO that might help. I went to Norton, BitDefender, Avast, Avira,Defender32, and a few others I don't remember the name of just this instant.

They all had LiveCD ISOs for free download. I downloaded them all, using a rewritable CD so as not to waste opticals. I spent the entire day downloading, burning, starting up the infected PC, and booting on the CD.

I also spent the entire day watching every single vendor solution fail miserably to even boot properly, not to mention actually take care of business. And this on a three-year old PC, not some old 286 dug out of a pit.

All of these LiveCD solutions are based on some flavor of Linux or another, and not one of them managed to even get me to a proper selection screen, or useable UI of any kind.

In the end, I slotted in my Win7 install disk and formatted the partition before launching the install. Problem solved.

So, yeah, snake oil.

Extreme ultraviolet litho: Extremely late and can't even save Moore's Law

Re: a cleverer compiler that could scan for bloat

I have a better solution : it's called a cluebat. It is made of very dense indignation and it is used to bash lazy coders over the head until they understand that it is the programmer that is supposed to work hard and clean up his code, not the compiler.

"Simple" multiprocessing ?

I doubt very much that anything about multiprocessing can be "simple".

But I do believe that, in terms of computing power, we are benefitting much more today from enhanced bus speeds and architecture, increased CPU cache size and better north bridge concepts.

Not to mention that SATA disks have removed the ever-annoying ISA bottleneck and brought improved data throughput as well, which is probably the major element in improving all-around system performance.

So yes, we have "enough" computing power at the moment. But I always welcome more power under the hood.

Snowden: 'I have data on EVERY NSA operation against China'

Re: "wrapped up in [..] a general naiveness as to how the world works"

What exactly is that supposed to mean ?

Are you implying that Snowden should have said to himself : "I cannot stand this blanket surveillance state anymore, but everyone is doing it, so I'll just resign quietly and forget about the Constitution of my country" ?

Is that what you're saying ?

Because that's how it looks to me. And I disagree. We obviously need more naiveness.

MEGA ASTEROID could 'BLOW UP EARTH' - Russian space boss

Re: a tax on people who can't do math

Lottery winners don't have to do math anymore

Windows 8.1: Read this BEFORE updating - especially you, IT admins

Re: Do we have to install Windows 8 then 8.1 every time

Yup.

Welcome to Microsoft ! Where was it you wanted to go today . . . ?

Re: Microsoft really needs to address this

It is. By pushing you to the Cloud.

Re: I'll be very interested to see how fast it is when I throw on a Linux distro later

Oh come on. You know as well as we all do that with Linux your lappy is going to run faster than a scared mynock.

HEY EVERYONE ! This one guy didn't have any problems, so STOP COMPLAINING !!

Re: get a better provider

Yeah, sure. My choices are SFR, Orange or Free. I quite Orange for SFR, and Free doesn't offer broadband in my village.

Any other bright ideas ?

Re: They did a good job of hiding that fact, however

Another wonderful service from your friendly desktop dictator.

Really, it's for your own good !

It's useless to resist anyway, we've included a whole barn door for the NSA in the update you just installed, so your profile is online whether you want it to be or not.

Re: burn it to a DVD

Probably would be of no use. I suspect that, even if you did manage to intercept the download and set it aside before the install kicks in, you wouldn't find an executable to launch, maybe not even an msi file.

This is coming through the store, not Windows Update. As such, I suspect that Microsoft deliberately made everything so that it could only be auto-launched from some process in Windows 8 that knows where to get the data. That would mean that you have to download in order for the process to kick in.

Remember : Microsoft is no longer concerned with service to the public, only to its customers. You and I are NOT Microsot customers, the Fortune 500 companies are. We're just the chaff on the side that have next to no choice on what OS we buy our computers with.

EC: NSA slurps scare you? Europe's clouds are open for business

The Commission has the right to wish that Euro-clouds not be closed to the US

And I have the right to choose a provider that guarantees no ties to any country abroad.

Not that there are any that do that now, or that I actually place an ounce of trust in the Cloud for anything important, but still, that is what I require.

Do not adjust your set: TV market slows, 'connected TV' grows

I agree with you. My viewing habits are as follows :

- watch Mentalist, Game of Thrones and a few others during the week with my wife and family in front of the dumb TV

- watch reruns of The Avengers or some other TV series I know by heart on my second screen while playing games on my PC (not much interested in game sounds any more)

- follow some YouTube channels I am interested in (Zero Punctuation, . . ) on the PC when I come back from work

- amble from my home office desk over to my daughter on the living room couch who calls me to show me some new thing on YouTube she think's I'm interested in

- on Sundays, watch a DVD with my family

As far as I can see, a tablet brings zero to this configuration, and a connected TV is not going to bring me much more.

Oh, and I have a beautiful 36" Philips CRT TV with Pixel Plus which is already 8 years old and working fine. I will obviously have to replace it one day, so chalk me up for a replacement buy in the next five years. That will be a problem for me, since I have no intention of allowing anyone to spy on my viewing habits without my express consent and I doubt very much that in 5 years time there will be any dumb TVs left.

Screw Internet-of-Things: Boffins build Internet-of-Sound UNDERWATER

The wetnet !

Of course.

Microsoft plugs Xbox One consoles into its cloud - what could go wrong?

"Bearing in mind the cockups that have and do happen with [the cloud] . . ."

Bearing in mind the absolute intolerance that gamers show for anything that even remotely ressembles an impediment to getting their game on, I'm quite sure that Microsoft is going to learn a lot in several key areas (reliability, throughput, dictionary extensions, biological enhancements and sexual positions) when this system is put into production.

Microsoft Office on iPad: U can't touch this (yet) says Ballmer

Of course it's necessary ; for all those high-level suits who must be able to check with their fashionable Ithingy the latest spreadsheet about their weekly progress in meetings while not being burdened by those horrendous, worker-grunt things called "laptops".

COMET DIAMONDS from SPACE found in Libya's glass desert

Re: wont tell us jack about the comet itself

I'm not sure you can say that.

The content of the comet might have influenced what kind of radiation bathed the sand and we might be able to discern that, deduct the cometary composition and make educated guesses about its trajectory and speed.

Science is a vast and complicated field, and new elements of information can come from very unexpected places.

Wanna run someone over in your next Ford? No dice, it won't let you

Re: "killing one person [..] using a system that saves 999 [..] is surely worhthwhile odds"

Unless you're the one.

I don't think that the "needs of the many" argument holds much water in court either. If you run over someone you're still guilty of manslaughter. Saying that the system didn't do its job is not going to get you out of jail.

IBM checks itself into therapy after touting Frankencloud to the CIA

That's the quickest and most gratuitious Goodwinning I have ever witnessed.

MI5 boss: Snowden leaks of GCHQ methods HELPED TERRORISTS

"that is why we must keep secrets secret"

Keep your bloody secrets, we're not interested in them.

Just let us keep our privacy, which you had no right to take in the first place.

Protecting the people is NOT done by watching their every move.

Re: "do something that makes money"

Well, what do you think the drug trade is for ?

OCZ balances books, files results following 4-year omnishambles

Jail for what ?

Running a private company to the ground is not a crime. It also comes with its own sanction, as the managers have nothing left to give them revenue.

Of course, you will rightly object that the workers are out of a job too, but hey, we're talking about managers here.

London plod plonks, er, pull request on EasyDNS

Re: "The police's job is not to act as hired muscle for the music industry"

Could someone please engrave that in marble, and then use said marble engraving as a cluebat on every police commissioner that forgets it ?

That would be nice. And yes, I'll take fries with that.

Microsoft watches iPads flood into world's offices: Right, remote desktop clients. It's time

That is most likely because you're not the one doing the reselling.

Digital 'activists' scramble to build Silk Road 2.0, but drug kingpins are spooked

Re: I have no love for the US govt's view they are some world police

To be perfectly honest, the US has rather often received requests from the rest of the world to do just that.

Wikipedia Foundation exec: Yes, we've been wasting your money

Maybe she did try internally, but was stonewalled at every turn and ended up resigning in disgust.

Now she's saying why.

Apple hires streaming vid bloke: Nurse, the corpse of Apple monster telly is twitching again

"I feel like I have gone backwards in time"

You have. You have gone back to a time when providers and large companies did not have the luxury of scrutinizing my life and finely tuning their advertising to correspond to what they think my desires are.

And you know what, Tim ? As far as I'm concerned, it's going to stay like that. I want my TV to be a dumb box, because the dumber it is, the less you will learn about me.

And that suits me fine, because you're NOT my friend.

Yahoo! Finds! Cash! Behind! Sofa! For! Proper! Bug! Bounties!

Spot on, my good man. That is a scandalous lapse of journalistic integrity. It is simply not tolerable around here in any form, wot wot ?

Jarvis, another cuppa, please.

In defence of defenestration: Microsoft MUST hurl Gates from the Windows

Re: there simply are no other alternatves

That you know of.

Active Directory is not the only authentication tool available. The biggest network on the planet is called the Internet, it runs fine and Active Directory is not part of it. Check out the technologies that allow the Internet to work and you will find that Microsoft is not the one-stop shop you think it is.

As for calendaring and scheduling, well I have to agree that Outlook has the market pretty much sewn up, but there are actually alternatives now, for those who don't have MS blinkers on, and there will be more in the future because, like it or not, FOSS is here to stay.

Steve Jobs AIRBRUSHED from history by APPLE months before his death

You don't enter a Microsoft Store.

As soon as you swipe, it bluescreens and you're stuck outside.

Patent law 102

A patent is supposed to describe something useful that has never been made before.

The glass door has prior art.

Revolving doors have prior art

Cylinders with logos inside have prior art.

Why this got patented is just another failure in the system.

Copyright I could understand. Patent I cannot.

Boffins create bulk-process on-silicon optics

"create a complete photonic processor and memory system"

Is that the start of the positronic brain ?

I sure hope so.

Curiosity keeps on trucking despite government shutdown

RE: millions [..] wasted because a bunch of old men can't communicate with their colleagues

Oh I think they're communicating all right.

They're loudly saying FUCK YOU! to each other.

US.gov - including NASA et al - quits internet. Is the UN running it now?

Re: the US political system is FUBAR

And as long as corporations are legally allowed to masquerade as people it will stay that way.

Big data: You've got to spend a dollar ... to make fifty-two cents – report

Because of the 4th reason Wikibon did not list : managers jumping willy-nilly on the bandwagon to not look like they're behind the times.

Now they're just going to look stupid. Especially those who played the "I'm smarter than you all because I'm managing a Big Data project" card.

I have no pity for them either.

Facebook allows full personal data ransack with Graph Search

Re: The next generation may not be as absolutist as ours on privacy

If our generation had been "absolutist" on privacy, Facebook would never have gotten off the ground.

And I don't see that we'd be missing anything.

Yahoo! Pays! Paltry! $12.50! Bug! Bounty! For! Nasty! Email! Vuln!

One difference : people have to eat, they do not have to look for bugs for Yahoo!.

Another difference : grocers are not paying people to come buy their wares.

Please do not take offense, but your grocer analogy is wrong on just about every level. That said, I do believe that it is rather difficult to make any kind of analogy with the Internet Security scene, because it is the only "market' in the world where people can work for a company without obligation, a contract or any legal framework.