Posts by Pascal Monett

Sozzled Oz bozos in reciprocal literal ass-cap-pop

My oh my

A bit sour there, no ?

Big EU imports of Sahara sun-power coming soon?

Just one problem there

I remember reading and hearing (on TV) of numerous revolts, massacres, bands of mercenaries, etc that seem to be rather active and not totally uncommon 'round those parts.

I would hardly be surprised if some of them found it a great sport to o and blow up such expensive, high-tech installations, if only to recover some materials to sell on the black market to cover their operational expenses (you know, bullets, explosives, food and the rest).

Which means that there is every chance that these "partnership" installations will become military installations in short order, and I don't suppose European governments are going to be content with local military, seeing as it can, often as not, be bribed to look the other way.

Consequently, it'll be UN, or NATO at least, that will be protecting these installations. And given that UN does not have the right to shoot, we'll probably wind up with good ol' Euro-country troops or, if worst comes to worst, US soldiers to do the "protecting".

This is starting to sound like colonization all over again.

100 Gigabit Ethernet standard ratified

More and more bandwidth everywhere

Except the line to my router.

When will Joe User be seeing a proper 10MB/s (notice I'm not even thinking of GB here) ?

Apple accused of hushing up security update

"would be interesting to see you break into Windows 7 64"

Frankly I don't think that is much of a challenge.

More just a question of time.

Nonsense

He is officially employed in an anti-virus/security company and he is talking about securing against threats.

He posted an official release concerning things in his professional domain, and his statements have not been denied by the concerned party (Apple).

There is no hidden agenda on his part, his actions are quite clear.

Yours, on the other hand, and a bit murky. What's your hidden agenda ?

Antarctic glacier melt maybe 'not due to climate change'

Look who is in denial

Your theory is obviously that Global Warming is man-made.

This article highlights a study that has revealed one single case where IT MIGHT NOT be.

Emphasis on MIGHT.

And straight away, parrots like you are banging on about how it just might still be because of human interaction.

Who is showing bias ?

It would be hilarious to watch people like you accusing others of their own failings if the situation were not so potentially serious.

Well now

Who's showing bias here ?

FSA: Of course customers don't read contracts

Nice to see

It's nice that lawyers are finally trying to do something about those click-through licenses.

Maybe somebody will next point out the most obvious failing of the EULA : the company can change it without consent from the customer.

I'd like to see where they will go with that issue.

Google's Wi-Fi snoop nabbed passwords and emails

Let's put it this way

Any country where somebody has been dragged to court because he took advantage of some open wifi without permission should quite obviously and for the simple sake of consistency drag all Google CEOs and managers in their country before the court for the same charges.

Hey, if you're going to go nitpicking all over the little guys you have the moral obligation of doing the same to the big fish.

Windows Phone 7 compass mandatory but broken

And you wonder ?

Where do you think the compass points to ?

The nearest FBI office, of course.

Utah Attorney General tweets execution go-ahead

Still partial to the guillotine

I honestly don't think there's a better way, if you decide that you have to do it, that is.

High-living hacker swaps Porsche for porridge

Peckover ? Really ?

Good Lord, I was going to go the "serves him right" line as well, but hey, with a name like that it's no wonder he was a loner. He must have suffered no end in high school and he'll be in for some first-rate taunting in his "health farm" from his fellow . . . therapists ?

That said, he probably does have a stash somewhere. Gold bullion ? I thought that stuff was controlled.

Then again, maybe that's what got him done in.

Vatican orders Catholics to watch the Blues Brothers

Onward Christian Soldiers ?

So the next time a team of Jehova's Witness shows up at my door, I'll be shoving my Blues Brothers DVD in their face and demanding whether or not they've seen it.

I like that idea.

Expedition 24 crew board ISS

Warm welcome ?

Why ? Didn't they let the pee - um, water - cool down first before passing the drinks around ?

Sorry, couldn't resist.

Humongous star ejects jumbo jellyfish

Amen

to that, brother !

Microsoft unveils – wait for it – another mobile OS

Thank God ridicule does not kill

So Ballmer, going for another failure ?

'Cause that's what you're going to get.

Pakistani lawyer petitions for death of Mark Zuckerberg

Religion as usual

The Muslim faith recognizes the Old Testament.

In the Old Testament there is this little detail about some Commandments given by God, one of which is "Thou Shalt Not Kill" (yes, I am aware of the semantic issue between killing and murdering, thank you, but let's keep this short).

As usual, this little thing is promptly forgotten as soon as somebody feels righteous indignation over some self-imagined slight, and we get Strict Sharia Law that authorizes itself to be above God's Commandments.

Thou Shalt Not Kill.

It is short, clear, specific and inescapable. There are no exceptions, no mitigating circumstances or miscellaneous addendums.

Deal with it.

Terror data handover seriously flawed

How ?

Easy. Just have a bunch of administrative officials in highly paid positions with no opinion of their own. Enter Uncle Sam who flashes bright white teeth, a winning smile and charms everyone and their wife (especially the wives) off their feet.

No promises made, nothing substantial obtained, some money, sorry "gifts" exchange hands, VIP travel abounds, and there you go, a one-sided deal to which nobody on our side has the balls to stand up to.

Other version : a stern Uncle Sam enters the room with a load of manila envelopes, looks at all the men present and says "If any of you dares to not approve this deal, I'll just have to publish the damning information I have on those who don't". Cue angry look and off he goes; leaving quaking pencil pushers fretting over whether or not they'll still have their precious limousines next week.

Mix and match at your leisure, but it all boils down to nobody having any balls on our side.

Shame.

Report damns health records scheme

"its findings would be considered"

Now if that isn't a Yes Minister moment I don't know what is.

Apple apologizes for iPhone 4 gaffe

Fear-driven ?

Since when has El Reg been afraid of Apple ?

Or do you consider that criticizing something is an admission of boot-quaking fear ? Rather simplistic, I'm afraid.

Firefox's oldest friend dumps it for Google Chromium

I started reading, but

stopped when I got to "so-called social web browser" and understood that this Flock thingy is just another "social network".

So I'm not interested.

I'm avoiding Facebook articles all day long, I don't have time for Yet Another Social Network article.

And I don't see why I shouldn't be proud of it. I don't see you posting on software help forums. Then again, you probably don't have the time, what with all the socializing you seem to find so important.

Eastern European banks under attack by next-gen crime app

Wait a minute

This criminal gang wanted to "avoid attacking banks [...] in the criminals' own backyard" - but then that means they have been attacking banks in other countries ?

With a next-generation authentication attack thingy ?

Does this mean that Western European banks have been attacked ? Why haven't we heard anything about it ?

Or have we ? And if so, who got attacked and where did they get through ? Or are we supposed to believe that Western European bank security is robust enough to shrug off next-gen attack kit without skipping a beat ? At least, between two sessions of loosing confidential user ID data, that is.

Microsoft inks search pact with...Opera

Congratulations

That is a strikingly vivid way of painting corporate relationships, one that will remain in my mind for a while.

Applied to some other companies, it makes things so much clearer...

Radiation warning labels for deadly mobes!

The mobile phone is a health risk ?

Well now, we have warning labels on cigarette packs that specifically say that smoking can kill you. Doesn't seem to have stopped smokers from puffing, now does it ?

I wouldn't worry. This won't have the slightest effect on the mobile-addicted.

Lightning bolt smites 60ft Jesus statue

Um, it's been a while but

isn't there some passage in the Bible in which God supposedly forbids creating objects in His image ?

I really do seem to remember something about that.

Apple reels as Steve Jobs Flashturbates

Astroturfing FTW !

Let me see, CEO of major computer and gadget company throwing a tantrum, banning apps left and right without any other reason than he doesn't like them, and bad-mouthing other important companies while religiously ignoring any wrongdoings on his part.

Throw in misrepresenting upcoming standards and he might as well be screaming and rolling on the floor in his playpen.

Doesn't look cool to me.

Not one bit.

Internet 1 - England goalkeeper 0

Do I understand correctly ?

FIFA is issuing takedown notices on personal cams that spectators make of football games ?

And no one is disputing this ?

What gives FIFA the right to go medieval on personal films in a public sports arena ?

FIFA has the license to broadcast on TV and real-time on the Internet, I agree, but FIFA has no exclusive rights to all images on all media for any amount of time.

This is blatant violation of individual rights.

Scandalous.

Apple slapped with lawsuit over 'iAds' monicker

Do come on

It is the guy who it gave it to that is complaining, not the poster. Learn how to read.

South African Bill to block all porn

Yeah, whatever

Go ahead, try to ban it.

It used to be alcohol, now it's porn.

Won't matter, guys. Alcohol made it through, so will porn. You can squeeze as tight as you want, there will always be a way and as long as there is a demand, there will be somebody stepping up to monetize that market.

Personally I find that there are more pressing issues for any country than using resources and legislation to ban a perfectly normal and historically unavoidable human behavior, but hey, who ever said that politics took care of important stuff ?

They just take care of those who yell loudest. And, it would seem, in South Africa the puritanically frigid are yelling very loudly at the moment.

Appeals court absolves firm that exposed man's SSN

That's rich

So, if I understand correctly, when my privacy is properly assured I do not need special bank monitoring and other measures that are costly.

But when my privacy is breached by incompetent companies and I have to take measures to protect myself and my identity, measures that have a non-negligible financial cost, that cost is not a damage ?

In short, if nobody has done anything with my identity, then I have no reason to claim damages.

In other words, I'll have to wait until the horse has bolted before closing the door and calling the police.

Nuts.

Microsoft's Ballmer and Ozzie tag-team on mediocrity

Beancounter mentality

Ballmer is nothing. No ideas, no drive, and let's not even think about vision.

Heck, I could do his job.

By the way, I'm on the market . . .

Ballmer says Windows will shame iPad

There's only one thing Windows will ever shame

and that is the idea that computers can be reliable.

No, seriously. Monkey Boy is trying to convince people that Microsoft can outdo somebody nowadays ? The leader of the firm that popularized the "it's screwed, reboot it" mentality is trying to impress who exactly ?

Microsoft lives on OS license rape and Office sky-high prices. And they even manage to make Office backups incompatible every other release. For the rest, MS is nowhere. Mobile ? Nonexistent. Internet ? Missed the boat since 1995, paddling upstream furiously ever since.

Bing ? Doesn't even have a paddle, but the rowboat itself has aluminum railings.

It is however fitting that a Microsoft CEO mention the concept of shame. Normally, though, it would be when stepping down.

Steve Jobs – Apple's not business, it's personal

Not quite

He isn't beheading anyone.

He's just managing a multinational in the same manner as a hissy-fit-prone 6-year-old would.

I'm just thankful I don't have any Apple stock.

Microsoft picks over Google's Windows exit strategy

"our focus and investment continues to surpass others"

Of course it does ! When you build a sieve to hold water, you're gonna need a lot more hole-patching funding than the guy who builds a proper bucket.

Not impressed.

ID cards poster girl laments her £30

My feelings exactly

A bottom-feeding pond dweller.

No sympathy from me.

Ballmer, black turtlenecks, and Microsoft's next big idea

"Time for Ballmer to slip into a black turtleneck"

He can't. He's not shown an ounce of vision since the beginning of his tenure. For some reason, though, he still impresses the beancounters. Maybe it's all the zeroes that confuse them.

The only credit I will give him is "developers, developers, developers". At least he's got that on Jobs, who seems to think that developers are just sons-of-bitches. Unfortunately, when Ballmer showed his support for developers, Gates was still head of Microsoft.

And he still hasn't done anything remarkable since.

Steve Jobs talks Flash, 'lying S.O.B' devs, sex, and Gizmodocrime

"95 per cent of all apps submitted (...) were approved within a week"

Uh, Steve, it's not the apps that don't get approved that are the issue, it's the ones that get approved, then get yanked off x weeks later for whatever reason that is the problem.

Well, it's not a problem for me, it's a problem for the "son-of-bitch" developers who continue to work for Jobs' platform despite the fact that His Jobsness is starting to sound more and more like a certain Zuckerberg. Or at least a bullying brat.

Google tells staff to snub Windows after China hack snafu

Let me correct that for you

"Using Windows without a brain is like Playing Russian Roulette"

There, that's better.

Now, I'm not saying that Windows is secure. Dear God, no. But I am sitting behind a hardware firewall with a non-IE browser as my default and I haven't had a problem in years. Of course, I'm intelligent enough not to click on any "super funny video HERE" or "check out (latest chick name in the spotlight) nude pics HERE" link that happens to continuously find its way into my mail.

No, not even when a friend of mine sends it to me. If that happens, I phone my friend and tell him that he's got a virus on his system.

Oh yeah, and I don't use Outlook or MSN either. Or FaceBook, or MySpace, or any other "social network" thingy.

In other words, when running Windows you can avoid attacks if you approach your keyboard and mouse like you would a rabid lion.

I'd gladly go to a Linux platform, really, but I'm a gamer, so no choice there.

Met lab claims 'biggest breakthrough since Watergate'

No microphone ?

Then how can you be sure that the program is not just arbitrarily putting nothing in the recording since it doesn't detect any input ?

I don't mean to say there isn't any, I mean to say that the engineers that devised the program probably included some threshold barrier under which the decision is to simply record "nothing".

So you don't see any ENF variation because the program decided to write "nothing" instead of writing the actual nothing it was getting.

Get it ?

Or do I not get it ?

I'm confused now.

Quit Facebook Day flops

Smart ? Really ?

The laws of statistics are against you, good sir. Out of 450 million "addicts", I hardly think that there are 400 million of them who are actually "smart".

Because if you're smart, you don't need Facebook to keep in touch with your friends.

Just goes to show

how low people's expectations really are.

Microsoft Tag emerges from beta

Hardly some evil MS-thing ?

Google's approach works because it is for the public, and we all know that the public has to have its ass on fire before it worries about buying an extinguisher.

This tech is directly aimed at businesses. As such, we'll see just how many of them appreciate the "total Redmond control" aspect of the tech.

If this thing is a failure, then we'll just have to accept that it was indeed "some evil MS-thing".

Oh please !

I enjoy a good MS bash just as much as the next guy, but try hitting where it hurts, okay ?

MS is a private company and its remit has nothing to do with solving world hunger. Neither is that the goal of any of the Fortune 500, nor is it the goal of your friendly baker next door. Get a grip.

O2 limits unlimited broadband packages

Not legally wrong ?

Since when is imposing caps on an "unlimited" service not legally wrong ?

It hasn't been tried in court yet, agreed, but there is no lawyer worth his diploma that can possibly defend such a practice.

The only thing is that nobody has had the balls (or the money) to stand up to the weasels who are illegally imposing caps.

How comprehensive you are

And what an astute observer.

Pray tell, do you or did you, per chance, work at O2 ?

Halting McKinnon extradition not in our power, says Clegg

"they are getting rid of the ID card scheme"

Um, if I were you, I'd wait until it's actually done to congratulate them for it.

Just saying, is all.

Plug-in pledges to rid web of Justin Bieber

Hasn't bothered me yet

I see no reason to panic about it now.

Now that this has been brought to my attention, I checked out the Wiki page on this kid. Seems he's gone platinum on his first album thanks to his thousands of teen female fans begging to swoon over anything he does.

So he'll soon slip back into anonymity. Nothing to worry about.

Twitter tw*ts ad networks

"the company would soon update its API terms of service to make things official"

Gotta love the Web culture of today.

So Twitter defines a service and Terms Of Use, then, barely a month later changes and breaks everything but without forewarning or even changing its TOS, and nobody has anything to say ?

What kind of management is that where you just go and make changes and, if it sticks, then you change your TOS ?

Does anyone have the slightest notion of what a CONTRACT actually is ?

A contract is an agreement between two parties that engage themselves to the clauses of the contract. Once signed, no clause can be changed without the agreement of BOTH parties.

Frankly, I blame the EULA for implementing this kind of mindset. The EULA is supposed to be a contract, but it's materialized by a web page that can be changed by the company on a whim, without any semblance of acceptance by the customer, and no judge has found anything lacking in the process.

Now we have companies that rip up the contract and make up a new one without consent from anyone else, making things official after the fact.

Then again, this is Twitter we're talking about after all, not something important. But still, I would hardly be surprised if a class-action lawsuit came up. And the complainants would be, in my mind, entirely right.

74 Democrats defy Obama man's net neut plans

Protecting jobs ?

Let's talk about that one.

Google is a multi-national entity, with so many servers and sysadmin requirements that they design their own datacenters and a lot of the hardware that is used therein.

It takes the likes of IBM to do that, nobody else has the clout.

Google is now over 10,000 employees (if you trust their corporate page, and why not on that matter) worldwide. Google is the single most important search engine on the Web, no other can even start to threaten it.

Whatever its faults, Google has brought a raft of useful tools (toys ?) to the general user, and that free of charge. Nobody has done so much to make the Web so useful, not even Microsoft.

All of that happened under a regime of Net Neutrality.

I'd like those congressrats to tell me how Google would have become what it is now if, in 1998, there had been no Net Neutrality.

And I'd like even more for someone to explain to me why I should see a tiered service when everyone who is connected pays full price for their bandwidth. Seems to me that there should be more than enough bandwidth to spare for whatever is supposed to be going through the pipes.

And as for network infrastructure costs, well cry me a river. Those telcos are practically printing money, so it's not a measly million bucks for a fiber-optics line that is going to keep the CEO from getting his $100 million yearly bonus, now is it ?

Murdoch's paywall: The end of the suicide era?

Slow down, people !

Let's not encourage them just yet, shall we ?