Posts by Just Thinking

Iran bans Tehran invasion first-person shooter

For the benefit of the downvoter, I was of course referring to the dreadful way UK shopkeepers are being arrested for selling MW3.

I guess there are some things you can't be sarcastic about.

Same thing would happen here

If someone released a FPS set in, say, a future London we would ban it immediately.

Pirated software hard drive on display as art

Sometimes you need to have something explained before you find it interesting.

Many people have unwittingly bought into "copyright infringement is theft" idea simply because they haven't thought it through. Show them a hard drive and explain that it is worth $5 million because it has loads and loads of compressed files of people singing songs, and they might start to realise how ludicrous the whole situation is.

So, not some piece of skilled craftsmanship, but it might cause some people to look at things in a different way.

Black Friday: Bargain-hunting mobs on the rampage

Yes but they didn't detain him

They beat him up. That requires a much lower standard of proof.

Psst, kid... Wanna learn how to hack?

I often think that if C hadn't have been invented, Forth might have ended up doing the same job.

Ken Russell dies aged 84

Ken Russell - you could always rely on him for a bit of gratuitous nudity.

Paris because there isn't an Amanda Donohoe icon.

Wales relaunches bilingual online traffic info service

Nothing wrong with the Welsh trying to preserve their traditions and cultural heritage.

Insisting on translating traffic information, tax forms and other mundane items into Welsh seems an incredibly expensive and ineffective way of doing it.

Is that what the people of Wales want, or is it just what someone in Whitehall thinks they ought to want?

Rock star physicist Cox: Neutrinos won't help us cheat time

Oh sh*t that took me a minute or two as well!

Imaginary mass?

What is all this imaginary mass business?

Imaginary numbers were invented by mathematicians and turned out to have some interesting properties and practical applications.

They don't tell us anything about the physical world.

Just because an equation has a square root in it doesn't mean there is some special undiscovered physics with imaginary properties. Would an object have negative kinetic energy if it was travelling at an imaginary velocity?

Took me a minute or two :)

"If I were to claim to have turned wine into water, would you 'embrace it', or would you say 'ok... show me?'."

I can turn wine into water. Kind of. Would you really want to watch?

Spillover from 400lb man squeezed fellow flier into galley

There are two issues here. This guy needed two seats, and he damn well knew it. He shouldn't have been allowed to occupy a second seat while the person who had paid for it had to stand. He is a selfish f*ck for even doing that. If there wasn't a spare seat because he hadn't told the airline he needed one, he should have been kicked off the flight (or have left voluntarily).

That isn't discrimination, it is just fairness. If you can't fit in one seat you need to be allocated two.

The second question of how this is addressed and who bears the cost is completely separate. It depends to what extent you consider obesity to be a disability or a lifestyle choice, along with other "disabilities" (in this context) of being tall or very broad shouldered (obviously not lifestyle choices).

The point is, the emotive second question shouldn't influence the first. It should never be acceptable to spread yourself out over two seats while the person who paid for one of them has to stand.

Chief Rabbi: I admire Jobs and Apple and use my iPad daily

Does Rabbi Sacks believe in Jesus?

Oh hang on, you mean the *other* big J.

But that's the will of God. It's not like it's just some sh*t somebody made up.

Teacher investigated over mysluttyteacher smut site

"a spokesman was at pains to point out that it had not yet decided whether disciplinary action might be necessary"

That's a whole 'nother website.

High Court: TVCatchup reproduces copyrighted films ... in buffers

Not so far off the mark when you consider the PRS.

You need a licence to play the radio in a workshop , factory etc because it counts as a public performance, despite the fact that anyone listening could just listen on a personal radio instead.

Pakistan bans rude text messages

Well I misread it as Dalib Todger so I am sure you are right.

UK cops: 'We thwarted Royal Wedding web attack plot'

@ Andy 97

He was arrested for attempting to incite the attack. That probably means he sent a message to his mates saying "wouldn't it be funny if..."

Any indication that he had the means to mount an attack? If so why would he need to incite anyone else? Perhaps he just thought that if everyone he knew logged on at the same time it might bring the site down? That's DDOS innit?

PETA riled by Mario's raccoon skin suit

Skinning alive?

Why on earth would anybody skin an animal alive? Ten times as difficult as killing it first, a reasonable chance of getting bitten, and the pelt would get damaged.

Are you sure PETA didn't make that bit up?

BT Tower falls over, crushes X Factor hopefuls

As reality TV goes

Actually the later stages of the competition aren't that bad. Some of the contestants sing pretty well.

Compared to watching unusually thick members of the public compete to see who has the most personality flaws, or a bunch of has-been ex-celebs attempting to do things they aren't any good at, or a baby hurting itself on YBF while its parents film it rather than helping...

The theories at our house on Saturday evening were darker - Louis died, that one who got booted off topped himself, or there had been a terrorist attack. Or my favourite on twitter, it was taken off air because some of the audience were wearing poppies.

OFFICIAL: Last Western Black rhino snuffs it

If there was only one left

The species was effectively extinct already surely?

(This is going to be one of those comments that about 50 people make before the first one gets moderated, isn't it?)

Immigrants face £49k wage minimum to stay

There are jobs which pay £70K, but it is hardly the norm, even with 20 years experience. You normally earn amounts like that if you have a rare and valuable skill set which is in demand.

Work like that will often dry up at some point, so if you are lucky enough to have it I would get your mortgage paid off and put a bit away. Then if you ever end up back on £40K you can be philosophical about it.

@ZWEIBLUMEN

Yes there are people who are ten times more useful than others. Even within the same profession, eg software developers, there are some who just work harder, know more, have more enthusiasm, keep learning, take a more intelligent approach.

I've worked with people who have developed entire new products in their spare time. And people who take 25 days off sick every year because they consider it part of their annual leave. Easily a factor of ten in usefulness.

Sportspeople

If someone in sports earns less than £49K you can probably have a pretty good guess how talented they are.

(Unless they are in some obscure type of sport which doesn't have many fans, in which case what is the value in letting them in anyway).

Veg rustlers hit with conditional discharge after roadside lineup

Joking aside, if you've watered a veg plot every evening for months, not to mention the digging, planting and weeding, for some lazy workshy scrote to come and nick it, really isn't funny.

They are lucky the police caught them, not the allotment holders.

Anti-smut boss: 'We won't be net police'

We have laws against cartoons. And yet so little has really been done to prosecute paedophile rapist priests, and those in the church who covered up for them.

BOFH: We don't need no stinkin' upgrade

Remember Delphi?

Used to use it ages ago, and it was well known that only odd numbered versions worked.

Two iPads put a hole through man's wallet stomach

Tough crowd today! I won't even bother showing you my invisibility cloak.

Miley Cyrus hacker let off with probation

Three years probation might not seem a lot, but it sounds like the guy is itching to re-offend. Couldn't even keep off the internet while he was waiting to be sentenced.

So this time they got information to lock his mates up, next time they will lock him up.

Beeb measures Blighty in doormats

Erm...

@Phil You make it sound as if this is news to you. When you hear that the country is losing 3 billion a week you do know that they mean 10^9 not 10^12?

If not I have some really good news for you. The national debt, usually expressed in trillions, is a million times smaller than you thought!

BBC iPlayer to require TV licence

If taxes were only used for things like the NHS and emergency services, you might have a point. The fact is there are thousands of much more trivial things which my taxes get spent on which I don't personally benefit from, or indeed which I strongly disagree with. There are also some things which I do benefit from which everyone else is subsiding - thank you all for that.

Set against that, a service such as the BBC, which 99% of us use and which does contribute to the public good (education, relatively impartial political debate) is a prime candidate for funding out of general taxation.

The 1% or less who never use the BBC must do something else in their spare time, and whatever it is the rest of us are probably funding it one way or another.

Have the rules changed? A licence used to cover up to 4 TVs.

Can't see how this makes things any fairer. Household with three grown up children, 5 salaries coming in and a TV in every room pays *exactly* the same as a single person who occasionally watches iPlayer on their laptop?

You don't even need new talent

Jonathon Ross was paid 10s of millions of taxpayers money over the years to, basically, host a chat show.

Now he has left the BBC he has been replaced by ... himself, presenting an identical show on ITV at zero cost to the public purse. The BBC just needs to stick to doing things others don't do well - quality news, documentaries, comedy, current affairs, drama. Let the others do the rest.

That would be my preferred solution.

The TV licence is a ridiculous anachronism from the days when few people owned a TV, those who did were generally wealthy, and the BBC was the only station - it made sense for the viewers to pay.

A flat rate tax on owning a TV is no longer fair. It is generally the better off who benefit more from it (they are more likely to have more TVs, bigger TVs, internet access) whereas the poorest pensioners quite often have one crap telly and no computer. But it is the pensioner who gets fined if they don't buy a licence, did you ever here of anyone getting fined because they have 5 TVs on one licence? Just as much against the law.

When you have a public facility which almost everyone in the country uses, the fairest and most efficient system is to pay for it out of general taxation.

World heading for massive jobs slump

You do sometimes hear on the news "biggest fall in XYZ for 10 years" or "worst figures since 2003" and such. I can't help thinking, well the world didn't end back then, why would it now.

It is very odd. In our society it only takes a certain percentage of the population to provide all the food, clothing, shelter and care we need. So the rest of us can spend our time doing things to make life more comfortable, interesting, enjoyable and rewarding for all of us.

Why is that so hard?

Demand for Ruby, Hadoop and HTML5 rockets, C devs still best paid

80% of Android roles are probably contracts because they are not permanent - someone wants an Android app, when it is finished there isn't a role any more (maybe one person in maintenance).

It's a fad at the moment, do you really want to be sitting there with just Android on your CV when it all dries up in a few years?

As a grad you might just possibly persuade someone to give you a job in C# or some other language you don't have much experience in, if you are prepared to work for nothing. Once you have a bit of experience, you will find it next to impossible to switch to another language/technology, however well you have learnt it in your own time, because you will be up against people with a track record. Nobody will give you a chance, you won't even get an interview.

The only time you will get the opportunity to learn a new language is if you move to a different project with your current employer. This will happen from time to time (depending on who you work for) and these are the dual skills, together with a few years domain knowledge, which will get you a well paid job. Probably in some sector you never expected to be part of.

If you have found a Java job with half decent pay, its a pretty good start.

Miley Cyrus cracker: 'I'm too short for the slammer!'

Not really

Read the quote starting:

"The government does not contest the presence of the various factors pointed out by probation..."

To paraphrase it says yes, he is quite short, no, that isn't of any relevance to the sentence.

The only thing they are "bizarrely" agreeing is the fact that 5'6 is quite short.

Feds nab granny in moon rock sting

Transport costs would be horrendous though.

Job-seeking university bods panic over incriminating online info

Put another way

A quarter of students checked their credit rating in the previous year? That's more than I would have expected.

What a racket. We'll gather information about you from various unreliable sources then hand it over to the banks whenever you apply for a loan. The information is probably wrong, but pay us a fee and we will consider correcting it.

If a quarter of students are doing this (and presumably will continue forever) what proportion of the general population are coughing up on an annual basis?

Sunday Mirror must face Kylie's ex-lover in France privacy case

'The ruling related to "personality rights", which do not exist in all EU countries. There are no "personality rights" in UK law.'

He is allowed to sue in France, but the French courts are not allowed to apply stricter laws than in the UK.

So how can he sue over an issue where there are no laws in the UK?

Web czar: 'Drag your nan online'

Suppose it did work

8.7 million people all trying to sign with an ISP on the same day?

But it won't happen. Anybody who isn't online yet probably never will be for whatever reason.

Certainly the only people I know who aren't online are a great aunt (well on the way to 100) and an elderly relative who was brought up in wartime rural Poland and has simply never felt the need to have anything electronic other than a TV and a landline phone.

BT cable ballsup hooks up punters to wrong numbers

Had a similar problem when I moved into a new build house a few years ago. Phone not working at all. Waited in for BT half a dozen times over the course of a fortnight. Every single time they would test the line from the exchange, decide it was fine, and not bother turning up.

When I eventually persuaded them to come out, they discovered that my line was indeed working properly, but it was connected to the unoccupied house next door. Took 10 minutes to fix.

Then an hour later a second BT engineer turned up to fix the same problem.

Groupon IPO seeks $11.4bn valuation

What???

Unbelievable site. How is it worth anything at all?

I expected it to have loads of offers, but there are 4. A half day cake decorating course (located in a unit on an inustrial estate) for £35, which sounds about right for this type of leisure cookery course. It is supposedly reduced from over £100, which is way off the mark.

A satnav at exactly the same price as Halfords. Some iPod speakers at more or less the same price as Amazon. And a £72 hair cut (yeah right) reduced to £21.

Zero choice and the same price as everyone else. WTF?

Crap alchemist jailed for poo-into-gold experiment

"I'll wager with anyone here that this transmutation stuff is something science of tomorrow will explain, if its real."

The science of today explains it. It's called nuclear physics.

The same argument surely applies to endangering life. If it never occurred to him that the stuff might catch fire, where was the intent?

(And if he thought he could turn crap into gold by heating it, he probably didn't realise it might catch fire).

Sometimes unintended consequences do get taken into account in sentencing, it doesn't always seem entirely fair. But the alternative is a world where people get punished for doing things which might have caused damage, while others are let off for things which did cause damage.

UK has enough sheep shearers, needs more coders

And in the long run you end up funding a million unemployed 16-24 year olds who haven't been taught any relevant skills.

Man 'drinks 2 pizzas' before skidding off road

It just isn't funny

asdfmovie

That's funny.

@ AC would not be bootnotes

Looks like anyone who doesn't agree that this is the most interesting article ever published gets downvoted at the moment. Playing havoc with my averages.

I really don't get it. It isn't the lack of an IT angle, its the utter pointlessness of the story. Stoned driver says something a bit odd to the Police - yep, they tend to. It is more like something you would read in The Onion (except they use deliberately pointless made up stories for comic effect).

Ahh, is that it? Went straight over my head.

Facebook flashplodders lose appeal against 4-yr jail stint

Inciting a riot is indeed a serious offence. Those who phoned their mates to come and join in the ongoing riots in London deserve everything they get. The incitement is crystal clear.

But there is an important distinction between unsuccessfully inciting a riot, and never having the slightest intention of inciting a riot.

Facebook *can* be like knocking on peoples' doors trying to persuade them to start a riot. But it can also be like running down the street shouting "let's riot" through every letterbox - a joke, no intention to actually start a riot, and no chance of ever starting a riot.

The court needs to decide which of these it was. I am not convinced a court understands Facebook well enough to do that fairly. "Modern technology" was used in the actual riots, so jail 'em seems to be the attitude.

Duck and cover: ROSAT is the next re-entry

Really?

I'm assuming 50Kg is the weight of the piece which actually hits the ground (maybe I misread the article).

At 8000m/s isn't that around 16GJ of kinetic energy? Surely that would harm anyone within a certain distance of the impact, whether it hits them or not?

If that is the case, the size of a person becomes irrelevant, what matters is the probability that someone is within the danger area.