Posts by Sorry that handle is already taken.

FTC approves $61.7m settlement with Amazon for pocketing driver tips

Re: Den Of Thieves

And why are they always protected from criminal prosecution for wage theft?

Linus Torvalds tells kernel list poster to 'SHUT THE HELL UP' for saying COVID-19 vaccines create 'new humanoid race'

I'll allow it

FBI paid renegade developer $180k for backdoored AN0M chat app that brought down drug underworld

Re: Stupid cops

All very good points. An ABC article about the Australian side of the operation included the following statement from the AFP commissioner:

...legal authorities prevented the app from being used covertly for a longer time frame.

There's probably also an element of risk aversion in the decision. If they know a murder is going to occur but don't prevent it, for example, I'll bet serious questions are going to be asked in parliament, especially if it was an innocent bystander.

Re: Stupid cops

At some point, the jig has to be up. The criminals will eventually begin to suspect they're being surveilled, as their operations are taken apart and their associates arrested. My expectation is that either that point wasn't far off, and/or LEO decided it had enough information and couldn't let them remain free any longer. A system like this would also have given them an intimate understanding of the criminal networks and which members were the important ones.

Microsoft to unveil 'what's next for Windows' ... Rounded corners and what else?

"many of Microsoft's experiments have stuttered or failed"

It's almost as if its users want Windows to be an OS and then get out of the way.

Will the real IRC please stand up? Freenode’s forest fire leaves ashes – and fresh growth

Re: Kinda the opposite of Cancel Culture, no?

Being intolerant of intolerance is not hypocrisy

Re: Kinda the opposite of Cancel Culture, no?

Here's hoping it lasts longer than Parler.

Well, Libera isn't pitched at fascists and psychopaths so I don't think it's going to have the same problems.

Why did automakers stall while the PC supply chain coped with a surge? Because Big Tech got priority access

"autos [...] can handle slightly outdated tech"

Haha yes the stereo system in my 2011 model car is worse than Winamp was in the 90s and don't get me started on its GPS.

USB-C levels up and powers up to deliver 240W in upgraded power delivery spec

Re: No excitement in most cases, unfortunately

Uhh... that was a weird mistake.

No excitement in most cases, unfortunately

No, the controller will detect a high impedance cable and send the appropriate number of elections down it. No more (and usually far fewer) than it can handle.

Have you ever noticed that if you plug your phone and the cable it came with into its 2A charger, it will deliver 2A, but if you throw it on a cheap ebay cable, it will deliver 0.5A? The charge controllers are generally designed to deal with low quality cables with minimal drama.

After staff revolt, Freenode management takes over hundreds of IRC channels for 'policy violations'

Re: Entitled douchebag, much?

Whatever he is, and I'd be very surprised if you're right about him, using the term "cancel culture" in this context simply shows he doesn't know what it means.

Ugh, "blockchain". Reason enough to abandon ship right there.

Ubuntu, Wikimedia jump ship to the Libera Chat IRC network after Freenode channel confiscations

I haven't used IRC for decades but this is fascinating to follow

Tesla owners win legal fight after software update crippled older Model S batteries

Re: The overwhelming majority of the ongoing maintenance cost and effort is ... the ICE itself

Brakes, suspension, steering, tyres, heating, cooling, AC, bodywork, trim, interior, safety features, electronics

driveshafts, differentials, axles, ball joints, control arms, linkages, possibly a gearbox

So how many of these parts are permanently (and ultimately terminally) damaged if you fail to replace consumables on a regular basis?

The fact remains ICE cars require servicing every 5,000-15,000 km because of the engine and supporting systems. Most other parts go for far longer than that, some without ever being touched for the life of the vehicle.

Re: Carbon neutral

difficult repairs

The overwhelming majority of the ongoing maintenance cost and effort for an ICE car is directly related to the ICE itself. Take that out and you've removed most of the vehicle's complexity.

Big red buttons and very bad language: A primer for life in the IT world

"Mike learned an important lesson..."

...about pushing big red reset buttons without first knowing what had made them pop out.

So don't leave us in suspense, what did the big red button do?

Google to revive RSS support in Chrome for Android

I still use RSS quite a lot

It helps me keep track of what I've missed and see article summaries without having to sort through multiple pages of a dynamic website, The Register being an excellent example of this.

Microsoft bins Azure Blockchain without explanation, gives users four months to move

Not to worry

How many customers could they have had for a slow and expensive database anyway?

WTH are NFTs? Here is the token, there is the Beeple....

Re: Whiskey Tango Foxtrot!

Yeah it's even more ridiculous

Re: Whiskey Tango Foxtrot!

Wow, the Heath Robinson-esque mechanisms they keep coming up with to attempt to address the shortcomings of POW are becoming truly bizarre. Trusted central authorities! In my blockchain!

Re: Whiskey Tango Foxtrot!

Can you explain PoA in straightforward terms?

Re: Looks like a good way to launder money

Nailed it.

Bitcoin is ‘disgusting and contrary to the interests of civilization’ says famed investor Charlie Munger

Re: Insert meme here

That said, by all means play with it. Just consider it as any other investment: you may lose a lot too.

It's no more an investment than putting it all on black at the roulette table.

Re: Insert meme here

Why do you coiners and goldbugs always capitalise "fiat"? It's not a car.

Re: Insert meme here

Supply of bitcoin is fixed

Until enough of the miners band together and decide to increase or remove the limit.

Philanthropist and ex-Microsoft manager Melinda Gates and her husband Bill split after 27 years of marriage

This article's about "Philanthropist and ex-Microsoft manager Melinda Gates"

Banks across America test facial recognition cameras 'to spy on staff, customers'

It was, to be fair, some time ago

I guess I'll be leaving the motorcycle helmet on next time I go to the bank..

More seriously, I can't even remember the last time I set foot in a bank branch. Even my home loan application was handled through the mail.

Penguin takeover: We tried running some GUI Linux apps on Windows the official way – and nothing exploded

It finally happened, 2021 is the year of Linux on the desktop!

Watchdog 'enables Tesla Autopilot' with string, some weight, a seat belt ... and no actual human at the wheel

Re: Defending Tesla

I'll bet this isn't something that would have been attempted in any other kind of car

On a dusty red planet almost 290 million km away... NASA's Ingenuity Mars Helicopter flies

Re: Well done!

Perseverance, like Curiosity before it, is nuclear powered. Even if it was solar powered, that's a manoeuvre far too risky to consider!

Re: Well done!

I understand that once the Ingenuity testing program is over, Perseverance will return to its primary mission. Unfortunately I don't think it will survive very long after being powered down.

Got $10k to burn? Ultra-rare Piet Mondrian-esque Apple laptop is up for grabs on eBay

Piet Mondrian-esque

Mondrian didn't use much green... I'd have gone for Google-esque.

Over a decade on, and millions in legal fees, Supreme Court rules for Google over Oracle in Java API legal war

Re: Unlicenced re-use of someone else's code as fair use?

Oh, I guess it's not interesting then.

Unlicenced re-use of someone else's code as fair use?

That's... interesting.

AI recommendations fail fans who like hard rock and hip hop – official science

Re: all of the recommendation algorithms are a failure

They're both bands to cut yourself to?

Another successful flight for SpaceX's Starship apart from the landing-in-one-piece thing

Re: Simulating above ground

Is this limited by the size of the header tanks? The main tanks are more than large enough for the additional propellant.

Re: SpaceX have turned rocket science into Spaghetti Engineering

It's a prototype, version 0.2 probably. Nobody's asking you or anyone else to ride it.

The thought presents itself...

...albeit too late to be of any help, and it still wouldn't have saved SN11.

Why are they pushing the envelope (quite literally) in all of the landing manoeuvre tests so far? What would you lose by simulating a landing burn with a target above ground level rather than at it and hoping everything just works? You would still identify the same problems, but have a chance to recover.

No doubt bigger minds than mine have considered this question in detail, but it would be interesting to know why.

Red Hat pulls Free Software Foundation funding over Richard Stallman's return

Demanding him to be fired, killed, eaten, dereferenced and forgotten: a bit much

I agree.

what is happening right now, and also not OK

Ahh... no.

> Calling out someone for being a creep

> Ideological purification

Yeah righto.

Ship stranded in Suez Canal shifts, but not before spawning some choice tech memes

Memes

The Register of all places should understand that a meme is more than simply a photo with words on it.

Report: Microsoft is thinking about splashing $10bn on Discord to slot it next to Skype, Mixer...

Skype's business offering is also being replaced with Microsoft Teams.

And good riddance! Skype for Business, formerly Lync, was an absolutely bloody nightmare, even compared to Teams.

WiMAX? 'Dead with no known users': Linux tips code in the recycle bin

I remember all the hype

At the time I didn't understand exactly what the tech was for, but there was something about the extreme level of hype that had me thinking there wasn't likely to be much under the bonnet. And then they stopped talking about it and I never even noticed!

Australian police suggests app to record consent to sexual activity

Facepalm

It was a terrible idea when some cryptobro suggested recording consent (in that case, on a blockchain).

But that was funny because cryptobros are idiots that nobody takes seriously. The fucking chief of police!

Boffins revisit the Antikythera Mechanism and assert it’s no longer Greek to them

I find most Hublots to be completely crass but this one is at least interesting. It looks like it replicates only a tiny proportion of the device's functions, though.

Youtube link

He's also contributed some research of his own which is nice

Å nei! Norway's Stortinget struck by Microsoft Exchange malware

"Swiss-cheese servers"

Jarlsberg, please.

What happens when cancel culture meets Adolf Hitler pareidolia? Amazon decides it needs a new app icon

Re: And this is where it goes ... pear shaped?

Is that directed at me or the author of the article?