Posts by Daniel 132 publicly visible posts • joined 5 May 2007
Legally, it may not be blackmail, but when an Attorney General threatens to drag someone through court when it is perfectly clear that they are legally innocent, it is morally blackmail. It is also reprehensible, and one of the great failings of our legal system is the lack of any good redress for the victims of such tactics.
-Daniel
I really wish that Buckmaster had quite literally said: "We're protected by Federal law, so sit and spin. Oh, by the way, you should know this, so you're clearly incompetent hacks as well - we're really not worried about seeing you in court. Hugs and kisses, craigslist."
I can understand why he didn't, though - the system has evolved to the point where being dragged through court is more punishment than most people would deserve even if they were guilty of breaking the law. Frankly, this country fucking disgusts me.
-Daniel
"There seems to be this autonomic belief that shifting development to India somehow implies a drop in quality and the end to development due to some unspoken belief that Indians can't develop code, just imitate and support Western coders. This is verging on racism."
Yes, but it's also easy to understand. Many (most?) Western coders have only had exposure to the very cheapest of Indian outsourcing shops, chosen by management on the basis of their extremely low price. In general, these shops have "engineers" who are poor at communicating with their Western customers, produce shoddy work, and all too often can't even pretend to follow a requirements document. In the end, they get paid peanuts, and the customer actually spends more money figuring out and fixing the mess afterwards than they would have if they had never gone down that rabbit hole in the first place.
This does not mean all Indian engineers are of this nature, of course. I too had the pleasure of working with a handful of extremely skilled Indian engineers in my career. However, it was always in a long term arrangement - either direct hire or long term contract - in situations where cost may have been one of many, but was never the one and only, consideration.
-Daniel
"But...grades affecting tuition? So grades given out *by the institution* directly affect the revenue received *by that institution*?"
Actually, most universities over here in the States require a student to maintain a certain minimum grade to retain scholarships. In addition, while many scholarships are funded from outside the institution, some are directly funded by the university. So yes, it is entirely and legitimately possible for the grades handed out by an institution to impact the revenue received by the institution.
-Daniel
"Is it just me or is the fact that Skumanick said that HE found it provocative says more about him than the photo of a child in a swimsuit?"
I just know that with him up for reelection, that if I was in his district, or better yet, his opponent, I'd be screaming from the rooftops that he's clearly a closet pedophile - as demonstrated by his finding of a photograph of a girl in a swimsuit to be worth to charges because he found it "provocative."
On second thought, change that - he's not even a closet pedophile, he's pretty damn open about it. Better yet (from his point of view), he's managed to land himself a job where he gets to look at kiddie porn pics on the job safely. I wonder how much hand lotion he goes through.
-Daniel
"No, but short of antitank weaponry you won't be slowing this thing down much. And if you blow it up, what exactly have you accomplished? It isn't like killing an enemy soldier, or even a military transport or combat vehicle."
Resource exhaustion. A D9 isn't cheap, you know. Blow up enough of them and you start to drain the resources of your foe. At minimum, you can at least really annoy them.
-Daniel
Re: Cat as a weapon
Actually, anything capable of causing significant damage becomes a weapon the moment you use it as such. Depending on the size of the cat and how it was thrown, you could really hurt someone that way. I'd rather see the whole thing handled as "assault and battery with a weapon" as opposed to "unlawful possession of a weapon," but I would totally classify the cat as a weapon in this context.
Law: "Cheer up AC... she said he got what he wanted, what more can you want?"
Well, I can say that you wanted a cattle prod rammed up your posterior, but that doesn't make it true, does it? No, I have to agree with AC 16:39 on this one.
-Daniel
"They don't have the right to read a book out loud," said Paul Aiken, executive director of the Authors Guild. "That's an audio right, which is derivative under copyright law."
While I'm not an attorney, I suggest that Mr. Aiken has the wrong end of the stick here. Amazon is not reading a book out load, the user is using a device to read a book out loud. Legally, there is a world of difference. In addition, even if that were determined to be an infringement in some cases, so long as there are substantial non-infringing uses, it would still be a legal feature to have. Seeing as accessibility for the seeing impaired would serve as a primary, if not the primary, use, I'd say that the Kindle is in the clear.
-Daniel
Ah, I wrote several paragraphs here, and then decided what the hell, there's really no point in arguing with the moderatrix, especially when I don't really disagree with her that much. Besides, I really do believe we're talking past each other.
You're a fine Lady, Ms. Bee! Keep up the good work, and try to keep us civilized.
-Daniel
P.S. I do apologize for incorrectly assuming you thought the model had a case. That was a mistake on my part.
Because the US is totally fucked up, that's why. In most (all?) states on this glorious union, either parent can pack up the children and run off with them and it's not child abduction unless there is a standing court against it. At this point, the children are with that parent, and generally remain with that parent until either a) they relent, or b) a court issues an order otherwise, which can take months unless the parent they are with is a clear and present danger to the children. What is best for the children during those months is generally ignored. It's disgusting.
-Daniel
"You lot don't half worry me sometimes. Yesterday it was a model who'd been bottled in the face and subsequently abused online by some nasty little git who was a terrible bitch. How is it that you manage to jump to this conclusion every time?"
Just because the nasty little git was a terrible bitch doesn't mean that the model deserved to win that case - US law and standards are pretty clear on public figures and libel. I do agree that the nasty little git was a bitch, though.
On this article, however, I agree with you completely. Anyway, back to the kitchen with ye! :)
-Daniel
Actually, I know 2 people who are severely disabled, far worse than what my understanding of McCain's injuries are, who use a computer. That having been said, they use accessibility aids, and they are slow compared to an able bodied person. If I were in McCain's shoes, I'd have an assistant do most of my actual interfacing as well.
-Daniel
It's not that it isn't any better; it's that it isn't sufficiently better for the price. Besides, I always watch my DVDs upscaled, which while not as good as native HD, is pretty decent. Best yet, I already own the laptop I use for upscaling. Eventually, when BD comes down in price, I'll buy in. Until then, I'll just stick to DVD, thank you.
-Daniel
Actually, in the US most disasters are short lived. Tornadoes, earthquakes, flash floods, etc. all do a lot of damage very quickly, then leave the survivors to pick through the ruins. Being able to call for help on your mobile shortly after the disaster could be very nice indeed. The main exceptions to this are hurricanes and blizzards, both of which can last more than long enough to run an 8 hour battery pack dead.
-Daniel
"It really surprises me that this is claimed to be worse than having a conversation with someone in the car"
What you, and so many others also miss, is that the person in the car is usually someone who can adjust their conversation for driving conditions, while the person on the other end of a phone conversation can't - they have no idea that you've just been cut off, are about to miss your turn, etc. In turn, I've noticed myself that it is much harder to have a conversation with someone in the car who is not themselves a driver, with young children being the hardest of all - the less connection the passenger has to the driving experience, the less likely they are to know when to shut up, point to an exit, or even scream in terror. :)
-Daniel
I was waiting for some jackass like you to speak up over the executive orders item.
Every report I've seen - and I've read quite a few - is in reference to his using executive orders to REVERSE THE EXECUTIVE ORDERS OF THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION. Yes, because congress is to slow. So what? He's just reversing 8 years of despotic rule by Bush.
Ultimately, I don't have very high hopes for Obama. However, after nearly a decade of the worst president in U.S. history, I'm welcoming him with open arms. If he manages to be just slightly better than horrible, he'll be an order of magnitude better than what we've had.
-Daniel
Actually, I consider the forced digital upgrade to be the final death blow to free-to-air television. While I almost never watch television now, I do have one - when it's important, I can turn on the news or get an emergency broadcast to find out what's going on. However, I will NOT upgrade my television just for this occasional viewing, especially when it is likely that during the times I need it most it will not work (storms, etc.). As far as I am concerned, broadcast television has already been killed, it just has not stopped twitching yet - it will do that in 2009.
-Daniel
"While we appreciate the FCC's attempt to address significant issues raised by broadcasters and others, every American who values interference-free TV should be concerned by today's Commission vote,"
Actually, I don't give a crap about interference-free TV (I hate advertisements, and watch everything on DVD even if it means I have to wait for it to come out), but I like the idea of more wireless bandwith floating around, so I think I'll back the FCC on this one, thank you very much.
Oh, and the wireless mic people can get stuffed - they're whitespace squatters themselves, why should they get special treatment over any other whitespace squatter?
-Daniel
Well look at that, an Anonymous Coward posting what appears to be the Sprint party line.
On the off chance that you don't receive your paychecks from Sprint, and are just running your mouth about something you don't understand, perhaps you should check out the earlier article from when Sprint first pulled this crap. Sprint didn't just pull the plug - they're not routing Cogent addresses, period. This means that they are actively killing Cogent address space in their routing tables, which would stop packets from flowing between Sprint and Cogent across ANY network. It's also a dumbass thing to do. If I were a customer of theirs, I would consider this a breach of contract and notify them of my intention to cancel service - and if they tried to charge me a fee for doing so, they would be receiving a nastygram from my attorney.
-Daniel
"Greem - I'm sure most people don't create extra accounts for their friends kids."
Not very wise of them, then. Personally, I have a guest account which I let any non-household member use; that way I don't have to worry about them screwing up my computer. Incidentally, it also eliminates issues such as this one.
Oh, and P. Lee - that feature isn't really a Linux exclusive anymore. Both windows and OS X can do the same thing now, though I have to say, I find Windows to be the most awkward of the three.
-Daniel
Has anyone else noticed that nearly all of the blatant right wing lies showing up here are spouted by people who don't have the guts to even use a nickname?
Anyway, I'd go over why most of what you all said is complete BS, but it's already been touched on, and frankly, I'm getting tired of arguing with people who really don't care what I have to say, and are just trying to stir up trouble. However, unlike most of you lying mudslingers, I'll at least sign my name the same way I do all my posts to the Reg.
-Daniel
P.S. - This is not at all meant to insult Republicans who DO have the honor and integrity to both avoid blatant lies and sign their names. I know you're out there, it's just the obnoxious ones who make the most noise.
When Anonymous starts sending thugs to people's real life doors, harrasing them, and even killing them, THEN, and only then, will I believe that they are worse than the Scientologists.
This is not to say that they are right, mind you, just that your perspective is way off.
-Daniel
Sir, you are still missing the point.
We are not talking about the same user base Apple had back when they dropped SCSI; at least, not entirely. Many of Apple's current generation of users haven't been with them that long, and aren't as psychotically devoted to them. As for myself, there are 4 computers in my household, and only one of them is a mac - the first mac I have ever purchased. All of them have firewire. I was using firewire before I ever purchased a mac. And I repeat, I won't be buying a mac that does not have firewire. Which is unfortunate, because I like OS X - but not enough to sacrifice every other piece of equipment I have for it.
-Daniel
Everyone blowing off the removal of firewire is missing the point. There are at least 3 reasons why this is a horrible move on Apple's part:
1) When floppy drives were phased out, there were low cost usb drives you could attach in order to still access your old disks. While there are a few USB to firewire dongles, they are windows only, and the performance is inherently crap, defeating much of the point of firewire.
2) When floppy drives were phased out, the 3.5" floppy was clearly antiquated. Not so firewire, which is still THE interface of choice for a lot of new equipment.
3) Apple users tend to have a large investment in firewire devices, which perform very nicely. Apple is basically using those devices as hostages to force their longer term customers to buy their more expensive kit.
However, what Apple seems to have forgotten is that their recent success comes in large part from people (like myself) who have made the switch in the last 3 years. Aside from my keyboard and mouse, everything I currently use is firewire. What's more, I'm not going to spend over $2,000 on a laptop; the macbook line is in my price range, but the macbook pro is not. So my options are: Replace all of my Firewire equipment, or buy something other than a mac. Guess which one I'll be doing?
-Daniel
"The son of a Democratic Tennessee state lawmaker pleaded not guilty on Wednesday after being indicted for breaking into the email account of US vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin."
The article doesn't make it clear, but since he was indicted, an arrest warrant was probably issued. In these cases, it is somewhat standard practice to give the accused a chance to show up at the local police station and allow themselves to be arrested with at least a little bit of dignity left.
The real question, as has already been raised, is why he was then brought to court in shackles. Usually people who have been cooperating with the proceedings are not restrained unless they are considered a safety hazard.
-Daniel
While I normally take a fairly laid back approach to regional spelling, and tend to consider those who rabidly insist on either British OR American spelling to be a bit thick, in this case, Scu is more or less correct. Not because we are talking about a generically American "thing," but because we are talking about a proper noun. As such, it has a definitive spelling. If you insist on spelling it with your own regional variation, even if your region is the oldest, you are wrong. If you doubt this, go back and ask your 5th grade grammar instructor.
-Daniel
"[T]he ability to validate certificates should always be present at border crossings..."
Or better yet, we could toss out the whole passport idea altogether, and just let people get on with their lives. I for one would not at all mind never again having to hear some overblown official demanding to see my travel documents.
-Daniel
I understand where you're coming from, so I'll just say this once more, and then drop it from here on out. Have you considered that many of your readers who appear to be using "ad-blockers" are actually running script blockers? I know that I'll happily let static images or text advertisements through, but I run with noscript - a firefox extension that has been recommended in some of your own articles. As a result, I can't remember the last time I actually saw an ad on the Register. Just something to consider.
-Daniel
If El Reg would like to get more ad revenue, perhaps they should consider dropping ads which require flash or javascript to view. I don't use an adblocker - after all, the fine people at El Reg and various other sites I use need to eat, too - but I do run noscript, which kills just about every ad on theregister.co.uk. What's more, I absolutely will not poke holes in my security for someone else's benefit, and considering that this site has a highly technical audience, I can't imagine I'm the only one in this position.
Other than that: I hate the new design, change is bad, I'll get used to it. :)
-Daniel
"Most normal people speak at around 60 words a minute..."
What???
Try 170 words per minute for the average english speaking adult. For those who remember him, Mr. Rogers* spoke at 124 wpm. In contrast, most high school students speak (and have full comprehension) at approx. 145 wpm., which can cause problems when teachers speak at what they feel to be a normal pace. 60 wpm, however, is more closely associated with those just learning the language and people with developmental disabilities.
-Daniel
* For those who don't know, Mr. Rogers was a very popular children's show host years ago on PBS here in the States.
"I appreciate the satire as much as the next man, but when something is published under a (semi) open licence it should be respected... that said this *is* funny - there is a copyright allowance for satire right? :)"
No, anything which attempts to reduce our Fair Use/Fair Dealing rights should most certainly NOT be respected. And yes, at least under Fair Use, satire is allowed, so feel free. :)
Sometimes I wonder what it is about Apple that makes otherwise sensible people froth at the mouth. I've had to deal with a lot of laptops in my time, and my experiences line up fairly well with this survey. What makes Apple rank so high in satisfaction is the support experience when something does break. I've never had Apple support claim that an obvious hardware fault was a driver issue (HP), return a laptop with a wiped hard drive after being sent in for a non-drive failure (Dell, HP), or fail to fix a problem once they had taken it in for service (Dell). However, top marks go to Toshiba, where I have no idea how good their support is, because I've never had one of their machines fail.
Dell, on the other hand, makes some of the crappiest low-end "big brand" laptops I've ever had the misfortune to touch, and HP isn't far behind - except for HP, it's their entire line. I've never touched an Acer, and haven't worked with enough Sony machines to have formed an impression either way. As far as price goes, I'm not at all convinced that Apple is overpriced, since in order to get equivalent features on any other machines, you are usually within $100 - either way. Note that I'm deliberately leaving out the experience of actually USING the laptop - there are arguments to be made for both Windows and OS X, and I'm tired of hearing the screaming matches, much less participating in them.
You don't have to like Apple - the heavens know there are reasons not to - but this frothing hate comes across as either an ignorant mob or penis envy. It's not particularly attractive, and it's annoying as hell to listen to over and over and over again.
-Daniel
"use cameras at demonstrations as a means to wind individual officers up. Undoubtedly, this happens – although as with any such abuse, perhaps it should be punished appropriately when it does."
If an officer can be wound up by someone taking photographs of them, then they should be relieved of duty, evaluated, and quite possibly permanently barred from working in any security position, public or private, ever. You can not abuse a police officer by taking pictures of them doing their job, and even suggesting that such a thing is possible undermines your credibility on this topic.
-Daniel
???
I already knew what a moon cup was, and I'm certainly not squeamish about the topic - not only am I, too, married, but I'm familiar with reusable menstrual pads /and/ I do the laundry around here. I fail to see the reason for squeamishness. HOWEVER, I totally don't get the reference to decorators, and yes, I tried google.
-Daniel
P.S. - I have NEVER blamed a woman's behavior on her hormones. I don't believe in letting people of either gender off that easily. :)
Well, I know that if I found out that my kids were being spied upon in the toilet, I would make it my mission to have everyone involved, from the CCTV installer to the individual members of the school board, to be charged with production of child pornography.
Of course, I'd also be trying to sue the school very literally out of existence. I wouldn't make a secret out of my goal, either. I may not like the idea of CCTV throughout the school in general, but I absolutely draw the line at in the toilets.
-Daniel
"The rogue link remains even after the user copies a new batch of text. The only way to remove it is to reboot the computer."
That the problem can't be resolved by less drastic means, such as logging off, user switching, or killing the offending process seems... unlikely. In fact, according to at least one poster, they solved the problem by killing the firefox process. I suspect that the attack works by running a loop which continuously inserts the malicious link into the copy and paste buffer. This is supported by another poster reporting that they can, in fact, copy and paste another block of text, assuming they do it very very quickly.
If I had more time today, I'd fire up a virtual machine and go looking for a copy of this exploit myself; it looks like it would be fun to disect.
-Daniel
"Dude, grow up. There is a HUGE difference between the US going into coutries where Dictators or Theocracies have KILLED THOUSANDS OF THEIR OWN CITIZENS and in Iraqs case invaded neighboring countries, to put in Democratic governments (granted yes Democracy isn't perfect either, but better than someone who uses Mustard gas on his own civilians) and Russia invading small neighboring Democratically elected governments under the guise of "peacekeepers"."
Speaking as an American, I fail to see a positive difference between the most recent invasion of Iraq and the current Russian/Georgian conflict. In fact, if I were insistent on drawing a comparison, it would have to be with the first invasion of Iraq. You see, South Ossetia declared independence from Georgia in 1990, effectively in the later years of the collapse of the Soviet Union. The only real reason the U.N. considers them to be a part of Georgia is a combination of politics and pragmatism. However, it is foolishness to think that this region is really a part of Georgia, and thus the military action by Georgia against South Ossetia is more akin to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait than anything else in recent Iraq history, with the response from Russia being most akin to the American response.
Personally, I find this comparison lacking in any number of ways, but it is FAR closer to reality than the current popular fantasy of Russia as the prime aggressor. True, Russia is using this as a method of flexing their might, but then, they are far from unique in that regard. No, I think if you'd bother to actually learn a little bit about what's going on, you'd see that we (the U.S.A.) really are being quite hypocritical here.
-Daniel
You'd be bang on - IF the U.S. Senate had ratified the treaty. Of course, they haven't, so it has no legal force in the U.S.
Personally, considering how long the U.S. has dragged it's feet on this, I'm surprised - and somewhat disappointed - that Britain doesn't exercise Article 24 and terminate the treaty. That's not to say that I think the U.S. should ratify it - I'm actually against extraditing our citizens - I just think that the current situation is fundamentally unfair.
-Daniel
I think this is a great idea. The only real problem is that they haven't gone far enough. Since this will be a small chunk of spectrum providing internet access for a large number of people, and paid for via taxes, then we finally have a solution to the traffic shaping problem. Low cost (that is, free) access with porn, streaming video, bittorrent, etc. blocked. On the other hand, people who need high bandwith applications can continue paying an ISP, who will no longer be able to claim that the heavy users are upsetting service for the light users, and will have to actually provide the service they are advertising.
-Daniel
It really doesn't matter what ANYONE here says, COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT IS NOT THEFT. Theft is legally defined. Copyright infringement is legally defined. They are not one and the same. As a moral judgment, copyright infringement is usually bad, yes. However, if you think it is theft, you are either ignorant or obstinate.
Repeat after me: Legal terms are not defined by consensus, they are defined by law. No one here can redefine copyright infringement as theft. If you still think otherwise, you are a drooling moron.
-Daniel, who is sick to death of idiots.
P.S. - I also can't stand this "freetard" and "paytard" crap. Grow up.
"14 comments so far and 6 of them have been to point out that the speed of light is affected by the medium*? Crikey, don't you READ the comments before having to show the world how clever you are?"
Yes.
By the way, did you know that the speed of light changes through various mediums according to their refractive index? Thus the speed of light in our atmosphere is, in fact, different than the speed of light through a vacuum.
-Daniel
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