Posts by Ian Ferguson

Spaceborne-forces planners meet with orbital joyride firms

Heheheheh

I sincerely hope that video is a fan's quick knock up of their vision, not an official sales pitch. It's hilarious. I particularly like the way the enemybadevilforces don't even notice the things landing right next to them.

I'm not entirely clear in what situation this idea wins over the current US tactic - to fire an (unmanned, high explosive) rocket straight at the target.

And if it's a situation that human intervention is required locally, maybe they should be focussing on the (much cheaper) alternative of making friends with other people around the globe, so they don't need US Marines (tm) to handle each and every situation.

Philips prices up 21:9 ratio 'cinema' TV

Let me guess

All Blu-Ray disks will now play at 21:9, making your 16:9 HDTV redundant.

Grifters punt 'get rich quick' scams at Facebook users

Impressions and clickthroughs

Facebook advertising can be paid for in two ways - per impression or per clickthrough. I don't think there's a way of telling if an advert is one or the other, but I suspect these are per clickthrough with a high click bid, to try to get in front of as many eyeballs as possible at minimum cost.

So - simple answer - click on as many of them as you can. When the advertisers behind them realise that they are losing money on the ads, they'll stop paying for them.

Technically you could say this is click fraud, but it's certainly no worse than what the advertisers are doing, illegal or not.

Behind IE 8's big incompatibility list

Microsoft sites and services

I wonder if Microsoft will rework Remote Outlook and Sharepoint to fit to web standards? Those two services are the only two things I still use IE for - once they work with web standards, I'm hoping I can ditch IE altogether.

And even better, as I won't need IE, I'll no longer need Windows :)

Go IE8!

Rail workers get shirty with see-through blouses

I say, what a smashing blouse

/rikmayall

Twitter breaks Jam Festival record

I can't take sides on this one

On one hand, you have a pointless, restrictive and downright shite piece of web 2.0 bollocks.

On the other, you have a journalist who's too up his own arse to admit that his article can easily be interpreted wrongly.

It strongly suggests that $4k has been raised for a $1m target. There's no two interpretations.

Andrew, just bite the bullet and put a footnote on, making clear the difference between twestival.fm and twestival. (or was that twatival? I can't remember)

And then please run a poll deciding on the best way to describe twitter users: Twatters or Twidiots.

Samsung NC10 netbook

So near and yet so far

This looked perfect for my remote working use (I especially like the non-glossy screen and decent battery life, great for working from the beach) - but no built in 3G? That's a big no-no for me, it won't be long until I snap off the 3G dongle by mistake.

Still can't find the perfect netbook :(

Brit, French nuke subs collide - fail to 'see' each other

The question is not how did this happen...

...but what is the point of maintaining these redundant weapons?

Considering how cash-strapped Britain is at the minute, I cannot think of a single scenario in which we'd need a nuclear ICBM-equipped sub at sea.

If we mothballed them and only took them out if a) relations with a large number of nuclear-capable enemies deteriated and b) relations with all nuclear-capable allies also deteriated, I wonder how much we'd save. My guess is lots.

In fact, my initial reaction to this story is disappointment that our government haven't already quietly mothballed them without telling anyone.

Unix world braces for geekgasm

Conspiracy

Following this event, my iMac's fan is permanently stuck on max, and my MacBook won't start up at all.

As I have limited technical knowledge and an ingrained kneejerk reaction, I will blame this event. In fact, I'm going to take my MacBook to the Apple Store's Genius* Bar later and insist that it is the cause of the problem.

( * Please can the Genius Bar be renamed? Last time I took my MacBook for repair, I told them what the problem was (broken motherboard, not a gnat's chance in hell of powering up) and asked to leave it to repair. They insisted on making a 'genius appointment' in two day's time, when I had to present it to some spotty oik who tried to power it up, then displayed his technical acumen by trying to power it up in safe mode and with external power, before conceding that there may be a hardware failure)

Prime Minister out-nonsensed by Conservative Wikifiddler

The German fella

Please can somebody link to the actual Wikipedia article? I read this on Slashdot and here, but neither article links to it. I've tried searching Wikipedia for several variations on his name, and can't find the entry. I find this... suspicious. Considering the type of story, I'd be interested to see the source, rather than 'an anonymous reader' on Slashdot.

Squatting spammers take over Facebook protest site

Get rich quick ads

Recently all the adverts I've been seeing on Facebook (ie. the 'legitimate' ads on the right hand side of the page) are of the get-rich-quick kind. I get the feeling there's a real push, and probably one person/group/business behind it all.

Americans get indoor iPhones

An alternative

If you're desperate to use your iPhone abroad, download the Skype client fring, and take a WiFi base station with you instead. All the benefits - none of the hassle. (except of course if people call your phone number rather than your skype number)

Of course, the networks could make life for all of us easier by playing nicely with each other and removing the ridiculously high and unnecessary roaming charges. And pigs might fly.

Ticketmaster and Live Nation forge unholy alliance

Well, that's me doomed

I work for one of the few remaining independent theatres, and well, we're fucked then, frankly.

Live Nation and Ticketmaster now control the whole process end to end - creating, producing, marketing and selling the show, and at their own venues.

Increasingly we're left out of national advertising for tours; as Live Nation pay for the adverts, they just list all of the venues and a single Ticketmaster phone number and website. When we point out that customers won't find us on the Ticketmaster website and will book somewhere else, they just shrug and say there isn't room to advertise our own website.

The only solution presented to us is to offer some or all tickets through Ticketmaster, which they often contractually force us to. We make little or no revenue on these tickets (as the theatre really only gets any money from our own booking fee, not the ticket face value), and the customer is screwed too due to massive Ticketmaster ticket fees.

Live Nation is a soulless corporate entity which cares nothing for artistic value. We are merely a small charity they can stomp all over.

O2 saunters into laptop market

Hmm, dubious

O2's site is pretty light on the details, suspiciously so. My main worries:

- There is no mention of 3G ANYWHERE. No modem speeds mentioned of any kind.

- The allowance is quoted as '3GB'. Per... what? Term of contract (18 months)? Year? Month? Day? The latter is implied, in the quote '3GB is roughly enough to do the following each day:' - but somehow I suspect it is not.

Personally I'd be happy to sign up for one of their USB modem deals, £15 a month, but the lack of specifics makes me highly suspicious.

Large Hadron Timewaster

Hmm

A dig at physics research spending on an IT site?

You're preaching to the wrong crowd, mate. Try the Daily Fail.

Canadian boffins develop mindreader headband

Interesting

I can think of one application - sit a person of suspicion (ie. every tenth person or any slightly funny looking) in a chair at airport check-in, fit this to their head, and present them with a sequence of images: Osama bin Laden, the American flag, Karl Marx, George Bush, Fidel Castro, etc.

Official Amazon Kindle 2 images leak out

Ugh

Still looks awful. What's the point of a keyboard on a reading device? Surely an on-screen keyboard would be much more suitable?

US spooks want 'stand off' biometrics-harvesting iPhones

Are they mad?

"quickly and easily capture high quality images of people for identification purposes"

Have they ever tried taking a photo with an iPhone? 'Quick', 'Easy' and 'High Quality' are attributes I would NOT apply!

I take it they'll be using some kind of external face-grabbing gadget. And then... er... emailing it to the iPhone, given it's lack of bluetooth or wired data transfer potential?

I'm wondering if these geniuses have seen an iPhone firsthand, or just noticed that all the cool kids have them nowadays.

Windows 7 'upgrade' doesn't mark XP spot

And why is this a bad thing?

I would never trust a new version of Windows to 'upgrade' for me - a clean install is the only viable way of avoiding all the registry/system crap that would otherwise be copied over.

I give this thumbs up for being actual sensible advice from Microsoft!

MySpace fingers 90,000 nonces

Registered sex offender != paedophile

Despite what most people seem to think...

Competition regulator kyboshes Project Kangaroo

Such a shame

I use iPlayer, and am vaguely aware that some other channels provide on-demand content, but have never successfully used them (mainly because I can't be bothered to find out).

A centralised system would encourage sporadic TV viewers like myself to sample more channels. As it is, I'm going to end up only watching BBC shows, because they're easiest.

What I'm hoping now is some genius whizzkid will hack together an application or service which takes feeds from each of the on-demand services and packages them together in one easily browsable lump.

Facebook turns pollster in search for cash

Hmm

The only way Facebook will make money is by charging a subscription fee.

Which will drive down their membership and prevent new registrations.

And potential customers will start looking for the next free alternative.

Much like their predecessor... what were they called? Friends Reestablished? Fred Reunited? Whatever.

Blizzard of smut cuts off Council websites

Virus and Porn Researcher

That sounds like 50% of my perfect job.

Windows Vista stuck on single digit enterprise adoption

History repeats itself

Remember Windows Me? How much it was derided, and how soon afterwards (no more than a year) its successor Windows XP came out?

I think Windows XP wouldn't have been welcomed with such open arms if it wasn't compared so favourably to its predecessor.

It makes you wonder if any of this is intentional, or at least astroturfing. Everybody's looking forward to Windows 7, and raving about how wonderful it is... mainly because they are so disappointed with Windows Vista. If 7 was the direct successor to XP, I'm betting the tech press would be looking at it with a much more critical eye.

Sky hints at 3D TV launch

Innovation?

More like another gimmick to sell new TVs... after all, it won't be long until every home has a shiny HDTV, so they'll need something new to flog.

US mulls clicks for cameraphones

Re: Errm...

The iPhone is completely silent if you flick the little switch to vibrate mode.

However, you do of course have to thumb repeatedly at the screen to get it to camera mode, wait a good few seconds for it to wake up, then hold the iPhone rock steady in good light to get a remotely passable picture. To do this without the subject's consent would be pretty tricky. And then the result could hardly be called pornographic, when it's just a vague blur which may or may not be a photo...

Spammers target Twitter

Twamming?

May I also suggest:

Blamming: Posting blog spam

Damming: Posting Digg spam

Ramming: Posting spam on the Reg's comments section

Jamming: Posting spam on Just Giving's short donation comments section (an expensive form of spamming, to be fair)

Hamming: Posting spam on theatre discussion boards

Spambing: shaving spam into the side of sheep

etcetera ad infinitum.

IT manager sorts Italian Job cliffhanger

That's quite clever

I can see how it wins, unlike most of the proposed plans it is reasonably practical.

And in response to all the inevitable 'but they're still stuck' answers, they could possibly re-inflate the tyres then coast down the mountain until they find somewhere with cars they can borrow/steal/buy.

BOFH: A safe bet

I still like these but

the early stories were better.

Can't you kill off the PFY? The early BOFH would have got sick of him long ago.

UK's top IT volunteers named

Re: OpenSource

Maybe, but that's missing the point a bit - open source =/= charity.

Admittedly charities could use open source software, but they'll still need the expertise to install and maintain it.

Oh and in my experience charities are less keen on open source than commercial businesses - because they can get the paid-for equivalent at massive discounts, sometimes free. (Microsoft, Adobe, Apple, etc).

Apple in iWork piracy boost

Or

If iWork.com is successful and the best element of iWork, maybe you'll need to prove existence of an iWork license when you log in? (with serial number or maybe Apple login)

This move would simply remove the annoyance of having to prove your right-to-use twice.

Opera sings praises of Microsoft-browser statement

MacOS?

Forgive me if I'm being dumb, but can somebody explain to me why MacOS and Safari are less tied than Windows and IE? Last time I installed MacOS, Safari was the default (and only) browser.

I haven't installed Windows in years so maybe IE is more insiduous ;)

Where has all the bad storage gone?

Re: Backup, Archive, Recovery

Yes, I've used Time Machine to recover an entire system, several times.

Even better - a few weeks ago I bought an iMac, and wanted to move everything from my MacBook to it - documents, music, identity, applications, everything. On the initial setup, I just selected 'move from a Time Machine backup' rather than move from another computer - and half an hour later, my iMac was an exact mirror of my MacBook. Wonderous stuff.

I've just realised the original article misses something important - ZIP disks! How could you forget such things? When I was at university, it was the enforced standard of data transfer. My God, they were bloody awful things. Remember the click of death? There were all kinds of reasons why a disk would suddenly stop working, inevitably the one with your PhD thesis backup.

The only saving grace of ZIP disks was the eject mechanism - carefully angled, the drive could fire the disk across the desk...

Perfect solution

I run Windows under Parallels in MacOSX on my iMac - possibly the perfect solution, if you must use Windows. Not only is the whole virtual machine backed up automatically with Time Machine - but I can save copies of the Windows image should I want to try something and maybe roll back. I'm guessing it would also work with Linux, or even previous versions of MacOS, if you're particularly methodical about programming for backward compatibility.

Time Machine is simply glorious - my MacBook died an ignomious death on the weekend as it was rattling around my motorbike's top box - which it has done many times before, but I must have gone over a few too many sleeping policemen this time, as the hard drive is buggered and the LCD disconnected. However - I know for a fact that it last connected to Time Machine on Friday - and when I plug the repaired laptop back in, it will restore perfectly.

I am now smugness personified.

Aussie air zealot savages prêt-à-porter stealth fighter

Simple solution

How about, er, not going to war with Russia?

UFO wind turbine prang site sealed

What?

“If a stealth aircraft struck the turbine, it may be made of some material which is itself classified above top secret.”

Eh? Or, it might be made out of steel. Or carbon fibre. Or cheese. It may be shaped like a raspberry. Or it may have come from Mars. Or you might be speaking out of your arse. Idiot.

Occam's razor means nothing to these people. Is there an equivalent expression that assumes the most complicated, unlikely explanation for the simplest of mysteries? How about Occam's Gillette Mach3 Turbo Champion?

Web 2.0rhea hack mistaken for end of universe

I think I love you

that is all.

US doc demands $1.5m for donated organ

"donate"

While I feel sorry for the guy's heartbreak, he frankly has no right to demand payment for the kidney. He's missed the key word in the process - he DONATED his kidney.

It's probably the "first case of it's kind" because nobody else has been dumb enough to presume they can subsequently charge for a gift.

UFO damages Lincolnshire wind turbine

AAAARGH

"Until we have some idea, some plausible explanation that it was not a UFO, I don't think we should rule it out."

Yes, of course it's an Unidentified Flying Object - because it was flying, an object, and unidentified!

An object is an UFO *until* it is identified. He's got it the wrong way round - it IS a UFO, but once they have an idea, it will no longer be.

/pedant

Send old Shuttles to Mars, says Scotty ashes prang man

Good idea

That's actually a very good idea, although I wonder if the shuttles would provide sufficient radiation shielding.

However, I suspect NASA and the US administration is too conservative to put it into practice. They'd want the very latest technology, or not at all. After all, the bazillions invested in space research is blatantly to create jobs and new technologies; recycling is an alien concept.

Online crime maps go live

Oh here's Hampshire

http://www.hantsiowcaddie.gov.uk/caddie-2/portal

Not mentioned at all on Hampshire Police's website. Ho-hum.

Re: Well done El Reg, the police forces have based their data on Ordnance Survey maps, and as such would be breaking their license by publishing it on some fancy Google mashup or the like. Apparently the Met are on shaky ground, legally.

List of links?

Has anyone found a list of all 43 links? The Home Office press release is next to useless as it doesn't link to a single one. There doesn't seem to be any central website for the initiative. I've been trying to find the crime maps for Hampshire & Isle of Wight but their website www.hampshire.police.uk doesn't mention the existence of such a thing.

Israel hacks Arab TV station

Inappropriate

So instead of tuning in to the usual cartoon, Palestinian children were presented with politicians being shot?

Lovely. I'm sure that'll win hearts and minds.

Picasa for fanboys arrives

Hmm

The only reason I'd need the Picasa client is to resize/reformat photos for backing up on the Picasa web service... and there's a Google plugin for iPhoto which does that.

Ho hum.

And in response to A J Stiles; probably, nothing. But 99% of Mac users, like me, have jobs to do and just want stuff to work, not to have to mess around with code and compiling and stuff.

Microsoft and Apple: 25 years of couples therapy

Messenger for Mac

Personally, I love MS Messenger for the Mac. It's SIMPLE - pretty much all it does is text conversations. MS Messenger for Windows tries to interrupt this basic function will all kinds of annoying enhancements.

I think it's great that Microsoft's Mac division stopped developing Messenger beyond the basics. Now if only they'd done the same with Office, and left it at version 5.1...

Council to crack down on Cracknuts Lane

Political correctness GOOORN MAAAD

I'm not sure why Rachel Powell blames political correctness - it seems to be a catch-all scapegoat nowadays. The council clearly state that it's to reduce defacement. It would be a case of political correctness if they did something like renaming 'Brown Street' to 'Interracial Street'.

On another topic entirely - for GOD'S SAKE, REGISTER, PLEEEEASE make use of a cookie with your bloody annoying 'Reg Reader Research' javascript popup. I've clicked the X innumerable times and filled it in with rubbish three times so far just to stop the fucking thing appearing in front of every story and comment box, but you don't appear to have any kind of cookie or session variable that says 'this person has filled in / clicked the X and doesn't want to be annoyed any more'.

Home Office denies remote snooping plan

Reader Reg Research

Reader Reg Research

I'd like to ask you a few questions.

It'll only take a couple minutes, and all the information you give is anonymous.

If you don't want to, it's fine. But I'm going to keep bugging you ALL DAY to participate, even if you have already.

Do you want to now?

Do you?

How much will you spend on your next car?

Have you already? Have you changed your mind about anything?

How much will you spend on your next next car?

Can you fill it in again for good measure?

Boffins bust web authentication with game consoles

Handy for hackers

An ideal con for those naughty hackers with 300 PS3s lying around the house doing nothing.

Health minister promises Rate-My-Doc! service

"rather like Strictly Come Dancing"

Yes, it will: The voting will be biased by large numbers of trolls using the system for cheap entertainment and voting up the funniest, most inept performer. Soon, the hottest doctors and nurses who tell the best jokes will be swamped with appointments, while the competent but slightly funny-looking and grumpy doctors will be voted out of employment.

Samsung digital picture frame CD infected by virus

Why a CD?

I'm always confused as to why USB devices need an installation CD. Why can't the driver be written to the device? Possibly as part of the firmware? There should be some kind of standard for this - it would certainly help with packaging.