Posts by disgruntled yank

So just WHO ARE the 15 per cent of Americans still not online?

Re: forgot the paranoid

Because, after all, common sense and reasoned discourse thrives online.

A third of workers admit they'd leak sensitive biz data for peanuts

In other news

A random survey of the people in my office says that 100% would consider themselves justified in giving ridiculous answers to ridiculous surveys. I am waiting for funding to extend the survey to the rest of the floor.

Ford's parallel PARCing: Motor giant tries to craft new tech just like Xerox

Ford

Gerald Weinberg (The Psychology of Computer Programming and many other books) claimed that he had worked on the Edsel, and suggested that Ford designed it as a failure to get the silly ideas out of everybody's systems/

Re: "Cars already decide when to change gear for you"

Hah! Try to find a station wagon with a manual transmission.

Post-pub nosh neckfiller: Southern biscuits and gravy

I don't know

Having grown up in the Midwest, I don't have strong opinions about biscuits and gravy. The one time I did have it, the meat was ham, and the gravy a good deal browner. I'd recommend looking into that.

Female blood-suckers zero in on human prey by smelling our breath

another option

An acquaintance who worked for the Centers for Disease Control long ago explained the CO2 connection. She offered as one possible approach keeping a pig about, since pigs generate more than humans do.

Lawyer brands client 'small penis asshole' before challenging him to a DUEL

Re: The Irish Code of Honour

Don't know about the Irish, but a couple of 19th Century Americans had it out in Bladensburg, Maryland, with rifles at twelve paces. This was modified from the original proposal of shotguns at ten, but was suitably destructive, leading to the death of one participant and the long convalescence of the other.

Neil Young yanks music from streaming services: 'Worst audio in history'

Quality

As GBE implies, a lot of us first heard Neil Young on AM radios in noisy cars. Engineers would have to work hard to come up with something worse.

Pan Am Games: Link to our website without permission and we'll sue

Just TOO 2015

Can I suggest a motto, namely "PanAm et Circensem"? They're getting a good start on the latter.

The US seems to notice the Pan Am games only when it and the rest of the hemisphere are more than usually at odds. In 1972, I think it was, Puerto Rico wanted to arrest the US basketball coach Bobby Knight, and the Indiana government made loud noises about refusing any extradition requests.

Re: "...mockery..."

As the old Texas joke said, "Yeah, I had a car like that, too."

Summer breeze makes IT fine, blowing through sysadmins in my mind

Hey, it's rough

'The number of times that management have come to me and said: “Here is two hundred grand. It needs to be spent and invoiced before 1 April," are too numerous to count.'

That, I believe, is what they call a first-world problem. I'd settle for "on the fingers of two hands".

Bootnote: The Land of the Free - Ha!

Re: Umm

In the BWI, I can't say. In the USA, nominally before universal male franchise in the UK. Practically, it varied considerably. After the end of Reconstruction, the first congressman of color was elected in 1928; were there MP's of color at that date? To this day the USA is not a racial utopia, to be sure. Is the UK?

Umm

For what it's worth, the United States outlawed the importation of slaves in 1810. By the 1840s, the US Navy also was harassing slavers off the west coast of Africa. And it strikes me as utterly idle to quote the 1772 case and ignore the prevalence of slavery in British West Indies through 1838. Thirty years is a longish head start on abolition, measured in the life of a man. (But in the history of nations?

Les Américains order a MEEELLION doughnuts ... from French baker

indeed

I agree that "smaller" is not what American cuisine is all about. However, even with all credit to French baking and the wonders of air freight, I don't see Paris as a reasonable source for doughnuts to be consumed here.

Rampaging fox terrorises rural sports club, victim sustains ‘tweaked groin’

rabid?

This weekend, somebody in the Washington, DC, suburbs was walking his dog when they encountered a fox, which charged them. They prudently ran like hell, and got away when the fox was diverted by the man's fallen hat. The local animal control people suppose that the fox was rabid.

Despite the Anglophilia that prevails in some circles hereabouts, fox hunting has never been much of a presence here, and is less so as the suburbs have expanded.

Houston Astros 'hack' row: St Louis Cardinals fire their chief scout

Re: Typical of today's lax kiddie "sysadmins".

Well, it is quite possible that the St. Louis sysadmins did just what you said, disabled their logins and changed privileged passwords that the departing users might have known. The problem isn't that Joe Smith's old login [e-mail] was left active, but that Joe Smith reused his password "i-hate-the-yankees" for [e-mail].

While the BOFH is probably authorized to use enhanced interrogation methods to prevent such password reuse, I doubt that MLB sysadmins are.

German army fights underground Nazi war machine hidden in Kiel pensioner's cellar

sadly let down

The Register couldn't work in one reference to a "Kiel haul"?

Goodbye Vulcan: Blighty's nuclear bomber retires for the last time

A couple of thoughts, or are they?

Is anyone else reminded of Oliver Reed's turn in "The Adventures of Baron Munchausen"?

The USAF somewhat later had its own delta-winged bomber, the B-58 Hustler. I never saw one, but in the early 1960s the SAC was doing tactical exercises near American cities, and one night we heard the B-58's sonic boom. My grandmother, accustomed to a quieter life, nearly achieved liftoff.

Revive the Nathan Barley Quango – former Downing Street wonk

Compelling digital content

One finger for Americans, two for Britons?

Giant male member spontaneously ejaculates over Norway

Mellow bunch, these Norwegians

In New York City, he'd attract volunteer mohels in nothing flat.

Zionists stole my SHOE, claims Muslim campaigner

IT angle?

Is it about sneakernet, or did he have one of those special shoes like Maxwell Smart's in the 1960s US TV show?

DON’T add me to your social network, I have NO IDEA who you are

Re: Bit Sneaky. Reprinting That Particular Article During Dabbsy's Absence

Indecipherable, yes, if one ignores Finnegans Wake. Erudite, well maybe on matters involving the American Civil War.

I am not a whiske?y snob, seldom a whiske{0,1}y drinker. But it seems to me that one would honor Faulkner's memory better with the illegally distilled white mule version.

Belgium trolls France with bonkers new commemorative coin

Hmm

I have no dog in this fight, but didn't Wellington, for very good reason, distrust his Belgian troops--who were not happy to have been given the Prince of Orange as sovereign--and take care to place the Netherlands regiments between the more reliable British and German troops?

Re: Rewriting history yet again

Yes, well, in 1814 the Prussians wanted to demolish the Pont d'Iena in Paris.

Teaching kids to code is self-defence, not a vocational skill

I don't think so.

Cars are vastly safer and harder than they were to steal 50 years ago. This is not because we put the baby boomers into auto mechanics classes, but because of seat belts, air bags, "crumple zones", chipped ignition keys and so on.

Using leather in 'leccy cars is 'unTesla', rages vegan shareholder

what then?

From what I remember of the Chevrolet Vega, the cow would win.

'Nobody owns 'ol Sol. Now gimme €10k to keep it that way, suckers'

the sun

There is a time-honored tradition for laying claims to this and that bit of territory, much practiced by Spaniards at one time: sail there, plant a flag, hold a ceremony, leave a placque. What's stopping Sra. Duran?

Maserati Ghibli S: Who cares what Joe Walsh thinks?

Bravo!

I hope that The Register will find a chance to review a flat-head Ford or little deuce coupe soon, and let us know just what Chuck Berry and Brian Wilson got wrong.

City of birth? Why password questions are a terrible idea

39%

"For example, with just 10 guesses it is possible to correctly guess 39 per cent of a Korea-speakers' city of birth question, since there aren't that many big cities in Korea."

Setting aside the question of what constitutes a "Korea-speaker", what does it mean guess 2/5 of the city? So if, let us say, Cincinnati were in Korea, one would be able guess the "Cincin but not the "nati"? And if I were able to speak Korea[n] (beyond "kimchee" and "bulgogi"), one could guess "Washin" but not "gton"?

Get off the phone!! Seven out of ten US drivers put theirs and your lives at risk

the numbers seem high

I see a lot of folks driving phone in hand, but I'd estimate fewer than a third actually text.

Driverless cars deal death to Detroit, says Barclays

Re: Not really

We got about 130 or 140 thousand miles on the last car traded in. It was a bit rusty, but its chief ailments were in the engine, and a general looseness in the joints, caused by driving over potholed streets. No doubt the electrical drive train will last better, but unless the pothole evasion systems are really good, driverless cars are still going to wear out at a fair rate.

Milking cow shot dead by police 'while trying to escape'

Moderation

Judging by the picture, they had to chase it to the Alps. It's a wonder they didn't call in the RAF.

Use your Apple gizmos only for good, says Tim Cook

For the non-Americans

I don't know whether universities outside the US go in for big commencement ceremonies. If not, you should know that it is routine for schools to bring in a celebrity to speak to the crowd. Generally the formula is a bit of self-deprecating humor, mixed in with world-in-your-hands cliches. (I did once hear an exception, delivered by Temple Grandin; but I imagine that Wilson College got away with it only because it is small and little known.) So I wouldn't spend a lot of time worrying about what Tim Cook said.

Putin's lapdog? Zuckerberg questioned over quisling claims

Quisling?

The purported activities have no more to do with the Vidkun Quisling than they have to do with James Gosling or Linus Pauling.

Elon Musk: I'm neither a samurai nor a bastard

Special Forces

Just for laughs, I had a look at the US Military pay charts (available at http://www.dfas.mil/militarymembers/payentitlements/military-pay-charts.html). According the chart of January 1, 2015, the lowest-paid enlisted grade gets $1546 per month after four months of service. The highest grade on the chart (major general/rear admiral) get $12827 per month with over 18 years of service, roughly an 8-to-1 ratio over the E1. A four-star general or admiral is limited to $15125 per month.

Do Mr. Musk's enterprises display a comparably narrow spread in compensation from top to bottom?

Lies, damn lies and election polls: Why GE2015 pundits fluffed the numbers so badly

"shy tory"

In the US we speak of "voting-booth candidates". Years ago, Jesse Helms was a couple of times polled as losing his senate seat from North Carolina, but then won handily. Then Marion Barry, who had been videotaped consuming crack cocaine, was elected mayor of Washington, DC, despite polls showing him doing badly. In both cases the voters polled presumably answered according to the tone of the question rather than according to their true intentions.

Facebook echo chamber: Or, the British media and the election

Hmm

First, http://xkcd.com/1521/ .

Second, back in late 2008, the NY Times asked various pundits to weigh in with advice for Barack Obama. It was slightly disturbing to find that the best advice came from Gore Vidal, but it did: Don't read the New York Times, read The Financial Times.

How Groucho Marx lost his voice and found his funny bone

Indeed

On the other hand, Groucho told in his autobiography of one of his brothers coming back from a vaudeville show and saying that he had just seen the world's greatest comedian: Charlie Chaplin

2016 might just be the year of Linux on the (virtual) desktop

What a streak!

What is it, twenty years in a row?

Welcome, stranger: Inside Microsoft's command line shell

fondly

"It's easy to look back now and wonder how people put up with such a manual, non-user-friendly system, but personally I still look back on it fondly. Many hours were spent learning every command available, all the switches and what they do."

Yes, indeed. I remember the customer's employee who was working his way through the commands manual one night, and zapped most of the data.

I have done a little scripting with PowerShell, but have not yet warmed to it. I'm not sure why.

Japan showcases really, really fast … whoa, WTF was that?!

Re: It would be great...

Making sure that people can't wander onto the track is a bad thing? I know someone who sat through probably six hours of delays following on two suicides between Aberdeen and Wilmington. And you may remember the disaster of some months ago on the Metro North line above New York, where a woman trying to beat the gates got herself killed, along with a few commuters.

To create a new right of way between Washington and New York would require massive use of eminent domain, which can be a touchy political matter. Even with the leanest construction budget it would be quite expensive, with the money coming largely from appropriations. It would probably not be practical to have such a train stop anywhere but at the current Metroliner stops, and maybe not all of them. So if I live in Aberdeen and have my commute disrupted for years so that I can some day drive an hour and a half into Baltimore and save a couple of hours train time to New York, I might not see the benefit.

Yes, I guess it could get political.

National Grid's new designer pylon is 'too white and boring' – Pylon Appreciation Society

the band will feel left out

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pylon_%28band%29

Australia finds $1 BEELLION to replace No-SQL DATABASE

Non-relational != flat-file

Model 204 is not really a flat-file system. A friend used to work with it years ago.

Popular crypto app uses single-byte XOR and nowt else, hacker says

Old school

Back in the day, WordPerfect used XOR encryption. A key was created by XOR-ing the password onto itself with right-shifts('ABC' -> (SLR ((SLR 'A') XOR B)) XOR C), then the text of the file was encrypted with a running XOR against the password. The key served to reject obviously wrong passwords. In 5.1, you had a sequence of a dozen or so null or space bytes following the key: for short passwords there was no point in even checking the key.

Sendero Luminoso naively trusted in the security of WordPerfect's encryption, with disastrous results when one of their safe houses was raided.

SPY FRY: Smart meters EXPLODE in Californian power surge

Re: Just because the US still have an outstanding number of wires on poles...

Ah, but if the local water utility drills down and nicks the cable.... They did it once in our development, and I came home to dim lights and an unusable stove.

Starry-eyed hackers stuff Eurovision's voting app

results

"TIME's Person of the Year is a common target of hackers in web cesspit 4Chan who will direct bots to get tyrants to the top of nomination lists."

I would point out that in a pre-computer age, Hitler made Time Magazine Man of the Year once and Stalin twice. And there were plenty of second-tier sorts with less than a deep commitment to democracy.

Guardian: 'Oil reserves will soon be worth NOTHING!' (A bit like their stock tips, really)

excessive

"It's not going to come as all that much of a surprise that those who worry excessively about climate change aren't really all that up to speed with economics as a subject in general."

It would be useful to know what "excessively" means. Perhaps The Register should introduce a measurement for degree of concern, where 1 would be just right, The Guardian something large, and the American Petroleum Institute something very small. Since Mr. Worstall seems confident of his judgment in the matter, could we call it The Worstall? Since it would be our own arbitrary scale, nothing prevents us from damning the API with "milliWorstalls" or mocking The Guardian with "kiloWorstalls".

Post-pub nosh neckfiller: Smažený sýr

Another option?

Since we are no longer in the nuclear heat phase, why not have a look at what the western US calls the Denver omelette and the rest of the country calls a Western omelette? It is not one of the masterpieces of world cuisine, it probably isn't on the American College of Cardiology's heart-healthy list, but it is very decent comfort food.

'Why Digital?' Seriously? You plainly don't Get It enough. Or at all

More titles, please

How about we designate a Chief Information Architecture Officer? He can then ask the scoffers, "What part of CIAO don't you understand?"

Revealed: Facebook Boss Zuckerberg's One Weird Trick When Hiring

should have been two articles

One on Zuckerberg's odd remarks about hiring and organization size, one on the privacy matter. I don't regard this as trickery, just carelessness.