Posts by Moogal

Tim Cook: The classic iPod HAD TO DIE, and this is WHY

Those suggesting keeping everything in the cloud have evidently never had occasion to listen to music on the tube, or on a train where the reception is anything between patchy and non-existent, even around major cities.

Nearly half of top UK firms do not use software escrow

Now there's a surprise

So let me get this straight, a company providing escrow services releases a study to promote the service it provides? Colour me shocked.

Amazon Kindle 3 e-book reader

That's all well and good

...but how would you use the Kindle store or the web browser without a keyboard?

Apple MacBook mid-2010

Enhancements from the MBP?

Odd, my 2006-vintage Macbook also has a magsafe power connector and magnetic latch...

'Completely useless' Windows 3.1 hits Google's Android

Windows 3.1 added support for long file names

Did it? I could swear that was 95...

'Minimalist, whimsical' Google search given Bing-like overhaul

"did you mean..."

I've always thought that "did you mean...?" suggestions should be followed by a button labelled "No, I didn't"

Software engineer demands source of his speeding collar

"like red light cameras"

I don't have a problem with red light cameras - now if only there was a way they could be used to catch cyclists too...

High-speed Chinese train kicks French, Japanese butt

Um...

Crossrail may be 1/10th the length, but a large proportion of it is underground, and involves work on upgrading existing stations and the like with all the associated difficulties, so the two aren't exactly comparable.

Mozilla squirts out Thunderbird 3

@AC 13:04

It's especially useful on a system booting multiple OSes - you can keep the mail store on a separate partition accessible by each OS, then have a copy of Thunderbird for each OS pointing at it.

Spotify: We kick the tyres

For the *nix users

I've been running it quite happily under Wine for a week or two. No complaints.

Preventive policing? Don't even think about it

@Jamie

"after having partaken in some herbs" ... "I use that money to pay for service at say a petrol station"

Surely not a good idea to be driving having "partaken in some herbs"?

Man cops to $1m phony bar code shoplifting scheme

@Gulfie

It's more the repetitive nature of the job than anything - you get into a rhythm and are pretty much working on autopilot.

"Hello, would you like a bag" <bip bip bip> "That's £4.97 please. Thankyou... five o-three change and your receipt, bye" - repeat for 7 hours or so. Not difficult to let your mind wander.

UK launches major road signage review

I know what sort of "updates" we'll get.

"50" to become "30", "40" to become "20", and "30" to become "must have man with red flag walking in front"

Sigh.

Road Pricing 2.0 is two years away

The old argument

The "you can't build your way out of congestion" argument always comes up with this sort of story. Of course you can. There are a finite people with driving licenses in the country, which isn't that far off the current traffic levels. So unless we all suddenly develop the ability to drive several cars at once, where is this extra traffic supposed to come from?

Much of the congestion is due to the fact that our road network hasn't been significantly enhanced since the 1970s, other than the odd white elephant (M6 Toll anyone?). Add to that the already bursting at the seams train services, and the fact that buses anywhere outside of large municipalities are next to useless, and the whole "oh, we could let people drive on the hard shoulder" idea is like icing a burnt cake. The idea of charging for the privilege of sitting in a traffic jam is just insulting - as if anyone does that for the fun of it?

Motorola ROKR E8 music phone

Why oh why

Why on earth do phone manufacturers persist on having those horrible tiny loudspeakers built in? The sound quality is always terrible, and the only people who use them are chavs on public transport. A headphone socket would be perfectly adequate.

Then again, the advert for this phone shows exactly who they are aiming it at...

US warez sitemaster jailed for 30 months

Somebody call Roy Walker

"Say goodbye, Mr Fish."

He's waving.

Supermarket offers phones for a fiver

Just the job

If they're still doing the offer when my current 3 year-old Sony Ericsson kicks the bucket, I'll be right along there. I don't need a camera, MP3 player, radio or kitchen sink on my phone, so a basic model for a fiver will do me nicely. And as for PAYG costing more - I currently top up £20 about every 3 months, so there's no point in me paying that much a month on some daft contract.

So yes, there's definitely a market for this sort of thing. Not so long ago, a retailer I worked for stocked a basic Samsung model for £20, but gave away a £10 gift voucher with each one - they flew out.

Prank callers crash Dublin Zoo phone system

I used to work in a hardware store...

...the number of people we'd get in who'd been sent by their bosses to buy these items.

We used to pass them over to particularly gullible members of staff who didn't know any better - "The gentleman would like some Tartan Paint, can you show him where it is? We keep it by the Hammerite..."