Posts by Dan 55

Starliner: Boeing, Boeing... it's back! Borked capsule makes a successful return to Earth

Re: Chilton also called out how pristine the capsule looked

Should have just left it in the hangar.

Fuming French monopoly watchdog is so incensed by Google's 'random' web ad rules, it's fining the US giant, er, <1% annual profit

Re: They've got a strong point.

We seem to have collectively given up on regulation because Internet and because disruptive and because Google and the rest spend billions on lobbying politicians so they can have it that way.

This isn't Boeing very well... Faulty timer knackers Starliner cargo capsule on its way to International Space Station

Re: Santa Express

Even my kid at school has worked out that time-based loops don't work in Scratch. Shame the teacher hasn't.

FYI: FBI raiding NSA's global wiretap database to probe US peeps is probably illegal, unconstitutional, court says

Re: Read the 14th amendment

I think it's important to get this one right, there's a lot of misconceptions, even commentards that frequent this illustrious organ are under the impression that the constitution doesn't apply to foreigners inside the US.

Amazon slams media for not saying nice things about AWS, denies it strip-mines open-source code for huge profits

Those that don't depend on cloud services are doing okay and can carve out a niche, those that do are just having their work ripped off by the cloud services oligopoly. How did the cloud services oligopoly get where they are today? By open source.

The business model did pay off, it doesn't now. As a start up, your established competition has made billions innovating using open source as a base to start with and has reached that point where it doesn't need to innovate any more. Perhaps the internal culture won't even allow innovation any more, maybe it will only allow money to be invested in things it 'knows' will be successful.

Those megacorps which are already there have billions to invest in staying on top of the pile. They do that by copying and pasting open source and buying up promising apps or services by start-ups and shutting them down.

Google has announced they may bail from cloud services in a couple of years if they're not successful (this 'burning platform' announcement may even help that happen). If they can't do it, nobody can.

"Stung by an article mulling Amazon Web Services' market dominance on Monday"

What's the WSJ's take on strip-mining open source?

Log us out: Private equity snaffles Lastpass owner LogMeIn

Re: Taps

I look forward to it turning into the Bonzi Buddy of password managers.

Re: Google

You sync the password file with the file on your NAS.

I don't want to go on the cart! Windows 10 Mobile hauls itself from the grave one last time

"It really is time to move on."

iOS and Android, what a grim choice. Sailfish anyone?

FUSE for macOS: Why a popular open source library became closed source and commercially licensed

Re: Free as in beer

Seemed to work after WW2.

Let us remember the lesson of OpenSSL

Basically the entire Internet runs off it but none of these good corporate citizens started to think about paying for it until it blew up and it looked bad that nobody was paying for it.

WhatsApp chaps rapped for crap app group chat zap: Infosec bods find a way to nuke messages, fix issued

Re: How very dare you?!

How are you comparing "this kind of crap" to "for free"? (Answer: with JavaScript, probably wrongly, maybe.)

Deadly 737 Max jets no longer a Boeing concern – for now: Production suspended after biz runs out of parking space

Re: Rebranding exercise

Ah, well, just don't fly Ryanair, to be sure.

Re: Rebranding exercise

I imagine the seat reservation screen will give the game away, but I believe in the longer term the plan is that they change over completely to MAX, which means the solution is simple - don't fly Ryanair.

My eyes thank you, Google: Android to get dark mode scheduling in future update

Re: Patents.

The answer is 2) because Google are desperate for your fine-grained location and this person is good at coming up with bullshit excuses:

Want to use an app which scans for WiFi APs or Bluetooth devices? "Oh, we need you to activate location because the app could harvest MACs and talk to its mothership to work out where you are (even though it may not have the Internet permission)" -> You turn location on to allow device scanning in the app to work -> Google gets your location.

What to use a dark mode app? "Oh, we need you to activate location because when we tell the app to go to or leave dark mode, the app could use that sunrise/sunset time as a way of working out where you are." -> You turn location on to allow dark mode in the app to work -> Google gets your location.

Adjusted for the exact position of the app on your screen, which is why each app needs the location permission.

Buzz kill: Crook, 73, conned investors into shoveling millions into geek-friendly caffeine-loaded chocs that didn't exist. Now he's in jail

Re: WTF...

Spammers don't seem that clever themselves:

This is what happens when you reply to spam email | James Veitch

Re: Mercedes

If that figure isn't missing zero (or two) they're not doing it right.

VMware warning, OpenBSD gimme-root hole again, telco hit with GDPR fine, Ring camera hijackings, and more

Re: Ring is just the latest in a long line...

All the more reason to use proper 2FA as mentioned above.

You would also want to beware of customer service, if Ring follows Amazon's usual CRM, the customer service agent can basically rummage round your account and do whatever they want.

Oracle leaves its heart in San Francisco – or it would do if, you know, Oracle had a heart

Re: "poor street conditions"

Perhaps you could cite a better report? The one I cited is still cited today in the Wikipedia article (36).

Re: "poor street conditions"

I didn't downvote but I don't know what a Cockaigne is.

It seems 20% of homeless comes from California state and 10% from the rest of the US, making 70% homegrown. Doesn't seem too unreasonable to me for a city like SF.

San Francisco’s Homeless Crisis is Homegrown and a Catch-22

Re: "poor street conditions"

Does Oracle, you know, pay its taxes?

No, no it doesn't.

Google shifted $23B in overseas cash to Bermuda tax haven in 2017, report says

For years, tech giants Google, Apple Inc., Microsoft Corp., Cisco Systems Inc. and Oracle Corp. have used what’s known as the “Double Irish with a Dutch Sandwich” to reduce their global tax bill by funneling all foreign revenue into an Irish subsidiary, who sends it to a Dutch subsidiary, and back to a third Irish subsidiary with a mailbox in Bermuda, which has no corporate income tax.

So, why are they getting precious about poo and wee and homeless people on their doorstep? It's a result of their tax avoidance, it's what they wanted to happen. Perhaps their clever accountants could connect the dots next time and pay the taxes so the city can set up homeless shelters.

100 mysterious blinking lights in the night sky could be evidence of alien life... or something weird, say boffins

Re: Why aliens?

Because the simulation of the universe we're running in only has memory to run for up to a minute. Afterwards the the beings who are observing the simulation take down their results, delete it, and set up another one, of course.

Re: Why aliens?

Put it into perspective, how old is the universe?

Re: Need a version of this icon with half-a-pint of foaming goodness in the container...

Meanwhile, on Earth, we have a Kardashian level II civilisation.

Rant, moan.

"Either way, we'll take a one-way ticket, please. Now. Thanks. Good"

No, you're not escaping the UK's great filter that easily. As Wikipedia says, "a barrier to the evolution of intelligent life, or as a high probability of self-destruction".

Microsoft's Teams goes to bat for the other team with preview on Linux

Re: Meh

If it were up to me I'd have changed over ages ago. But... it's not.

Re: Meh

I have upvoted your comment for the sentiment but I actually hope they do port across the big four Office 365 programs + Teams, that way there would be a way of dumping Windows at work.

We are a essentially Linux shop too and yet we're made to use Windows on our PCs. It's mad.

With a warehouse of unsold AR goggles, Magic Leap has a brainwave… let’s rebadge ‘em and sell to business!

Re: I'm struggling here

8pt text and delivered in monotone? Luxury!

Re: I'm struggling here

Didn't MS do exactly the same with HoloLens? The difference is that ML aren't MS so execs won't buy their toys.

Another senior Gov.UK bod makes a dash from public sector, falls into AWS's arms

Nobody can claim the government is not interested in the environment

There's a stampede to the Amazon to see for themselves.

Tesla has a smashing weekend: Model 3 on Autopilot whacks cop cars, Elon's Cybertruck demolishes part of LA

Re: I Can't Stop Myself

You know if there warning or not because Tesla has telemetry which shows that the car did not detect the obstacle and warn the driver in time.

Re: I Can't Stop Myself

How can you have that if your level 2 car has decided to plough into another car with no warning? You can't have it both ways.

Re: I Can't Stop Myself

Your entire argument is based on a fallacy, you have absolutely no data on which to base lives being saved by Teslas running on "autopilot". The badly-named cruise control feature only takes over when the driver is not driving and requires driver attention at all times as it only achieves level 2 driving.

In a dangerous situation the cruise control will:

a) notice and deal with the situation

b) notice and realise it can't deal with the situation, disengaging warning the driver to take over who does that - the Tesla didn't save lives.

c) not notice but the driver will and takes over - the Telsa didn't save lives.

d) not notice but the driver won't be ready causing accident or death

e) not notice and the driver won't notice either causing accident or death

The only possible way a Telsa can save lives is a) and even then there is no proof that the Telsa dealt with the situation better than the driver could do without assistance. b), c), and d/e) are progressively more dangerous than human drivers.

Finally you've started talking about "safety features". No, let's bring it back to over-sold level 2 cruise control. That's what we're talking about here.

Re: I Can't Stop Myself

This is my limited understanding of the problem space:

Presumably you say that because there's no other way need to learn about how people get killed on roads and there's no existing data to draw from. The sacrifice will be worth it, after all were it not for the pedestrian getting killed on a road but not on a pedestrian crossing, Uber would have never have learnt that not recognising people off pedestrian crossings could get them killed. Were it not for people's Telsa's driving straight down a dividing motorway or under trucks, Telsa would never have known that these things are possible.

So here's to live crash-test dummies. So modern. So disruptive. So beta. So fucking absolutely brain-dead stupid in that tool-like arrogant way that only present-day Silicon Valley tech is.

Now that it's been proven in La La Land that calling someone a "pedo guy" + repeating the claim more specifically without evidence + sending a private detective after someone is not defamation, perhaps El Reg could use Elon "Pedo Guy" Musk for as name in all stories featuring him from now on*. After all, it's a quote from Elon himself and it's only 1/3 of the way that Elon went. What can the thin-skinned billionaire narcissist possibly object to?

* Which will be about one of 1) his rocket measuring contest with Bezos, 2) his magic battery-powered AI deathtraps getting people killed, 3) his latest ill-advised Twitter tirade/podcast interview.

Co-op Bank online and mobile banking goes TITSUP*

Re: I wouldn't know

I have no idea why people should be obliged to buy new phones. The government finally obliges banks to offer basic bank accounts and banks come up with yet another way of locking people out. Any mobile website + authenticator app will do the job for a non-card reader solution on a mobile phone. Well yes, I do have an idea, the marketing possibilities are fewer.

In tribute to Galaxy Note 7, BBC iPlayer support goes up in flames for some Samsung TVs

I'm not sure why the BBC would announce a Samsungoclypse

Instead of calmly telling people how to turn on updates and perhaps pinning a video in iPlayer which shows people how to do this.

Worldwide, perpetual, irrevocable and royalty-free: Amazon's Alexa NHS contract released

Well

The Tories certainly got that sorted out before the elections, just in case.

In the remote chance they do get kicked out, I wonder which multinational they'll turn up in next.

Homeland Security backs off on scanning US citizens, Amazon ups AI ante, and more

1) Announce something outlandish, 2) Pretend to give way a bit,

3) Original objective achieved

The Department of Homeland Security has withdrawn a proposal asking for everyone - including US citizens - to pass through facial recognition cameras as they travel in and out of the country.

Bet they're still going to scan resident foreigners though.

Listen up you bunch of bankers. Here are some pointers for less crap IT

Re: Why I tried Monzo.

Then on the other side of the new and shiny FinTech coin N26 had security holes you could drive a bus through a couple of years back, mostly to do with the server trusting the client too much and having a non-rate limited API which was too chatty. Hopefully their standards have improved since then.

Re: You might have hoped they'd be doing this already

Just an idea I've got without any proof, perhaps perhaps the investment banks kept all the good people after the ring fencing rules made banks split high street and investment banking.

Lazarus group goes back to the Apple orchard with new macOS trojan

goto fail;

And other bits that Apple added.

Register Lecture: Can portable atomic clocks end UK dependence on GNSS?

Re: The European Commission and Galileo

If the other countries in the EU change the rules to suit us whenever we want then they surely must make up a sensible, democratic, efficient, and technocratic organisation and they are good.

Otherwise if they don't change the rules to suit us whenever we want then they are crazy, antidemocratic, burocratic, inefficient, and, er, technocratic and they are therefore evil.

Got it.

Re: first lecture of the decade

Centuries and millennia start at year 1 but when we talk about "the 1900s" most people think of 1900 as the first year.

Presumably decades should also start at year 1 but that ship already sailed centuries ago.

You can forget about that Black Friday deal: Brit banks crap out just in time for pay day

Re: Everyone Else Is Doing It

The difference is we don't give thanks on the Thursday, we just indulge in the orgy of excessive consumption on Friday.

And the prices are probably down from last week but raised from two weeks ago anyway.

Re: I'm exposing myself as a boomer by making this comment, but ...

Halloween is Irish, as I'm sure you know.

Eggs, baskets...

Seems you need at least to be a customer of two different banks from two different banking groups, preferably using two different card companies.

And have 20 quid in your shoe.

That's Microsoft price: Now you can enjoy a BSOD from the comfort of your driving seat

Re: ASDA

Windows Always Lapses, Mainly Affecting Regular Trade.