Posts by 0laf 2320 publicly visible posts • joined 25 Nov 2009
I aws going to suggest their complaints proceedure then the energy regulator. Both processes have some weight under statute and cost the business just to have you raise an issue.
Putting a DSAR (Data Subject Access Request) and then your right to rectification is also an expensive process for them at the end of which you can leverage the ICO should they not play ball.
I have always wondered if any had raised small claims court actions on the basis of these minor niggles, I must waste days every year chasing down corporate cockups. One assumes that if time is money you have a legal right to recover damages for this wasted time if it's down to corporate negligence. I wonder if everyone raised a £50 action every time they got their time wasted it might change things
Of course they are using it, they are being told to use it by the press, by the vendors even the feckin politicians are telling them that they MUST be proficient in the use of AI tech for the future and no-one is saying anything about it being bad in any way.
This golden calf is going to shit all over eveyone if we allow it to be an excuse for everything to be dumbed down to nothing, "You don't need to study or know the subject just be good at prompt engineering" seems to be the message of teh future from many.
A return to written exams is no bad thing but then kids are not used to writing much so don't have the stamina to write in a 3hr exam. Course work can just be copied from an AI output into handwritten text so as other have mentioned educators need to be better at setting questions that will highligh AI cheating.
It's probably already too late, the teachers will be using AI to write the questions with the kids using AI to write the answers.
We've said it here dozens maybe hundreds of times over the last 20yr; until information security is considered as important as health and safety with similar sanctions applicable to the board nothing will get done.
Information might not have physical weight but the impact of its loss or disclosure casues real harms up to and including threats to life.
Can you imagine a CEO doing a press conference after a set of scaffolding clearly made from cheap cardbord tubes collapsed seriously injuring dozens and then saying the usual, "Employee safety is our top priority" and "all injuries were due to a complex set of environmental conditions"? And then the H&S regulator issuing nothing more than a stern letter in response.
Many many times I had to explain that Wifi/wireless didn't mean that they would get internet everywhere.
The idea of it requiring an access point within range was lost on many at least in the earlier days of wifi.
I had lots of stupid conversation with supposedly intelligent people, for whom the computer was a magical box that defied normal conventions.
Proudly pissing money up a wall since 1993.
Never mind an actual plan just get a few pallets of gold and throw them at the encumbent suppliers.
It won't make anything better but it keeps the papers off your back till the next election and they're guaranteed to spend a good chunk of it on a nice new logo that a minister can get photographed next to.
8 was a phone UI slapped on top of a deskop OS for some weird reason, they can't even blame AI for that idea.
On a phone (personal opinion) the 8 UI was good, to me it was really good, probably the best mobile UI I've used ever.
Everything else surrounding the WP8 was a dogs dinner but WP8 was a really really good interface on top of some really solid Nokia hardware.
Of course MS shit the bed with WPho as they always do eventually. W11 I suspect is another recumbent incontinence moment, just slightly slower and with even more added corporate denial.
It's clear the beancounters / shareholders won out a while ago. Your own search, of YOUR OWN machine is now designed to point you at paid for services in a MS controlled shop.
Why let you find the feckin file or program you are actually looking for when you can be presented with a selection of vaguely similarly named apps and services from a random selection of likely dodgy suppliers? What is the MS % on apps bought through their store?
It's almost like a conflict of interest isn't it.
I've worked on MS systems since 1996 so that's nearly 30yr and W11 was the thing that pushed me over the edge. It's a data/money grab disguised as a barely functional OS.
I've started converting/replacing home machines to either linux for me or Mac for the kids and Mrs.
It is quite scary that the leader of the most powerful nation on earth and the richest man on earth think it right an proper to have a public spat like a pair of warring 6yr old schoolgirls.
No wonder the rest of the population doesn't give a shit about anything when this is the pinnacle of leadership.
What do normal republican voters (outside of Trump cult) think of this?
That probably not fair tbh.
I am a supporter of the swiss cheese model of causation since it doesn't try to symplify things down to 'how dumb are those people'.
Are they over worked or under pressure to do everything fast due minimal resourcing which has removed all spare time to think the situation through?
Why did the training not lead the individuals to react differently?
Why did the system not block the connection request?
Why was the infiltration not picked up?
Why were they able to traverse the network?
Why was the exfiltration of the data not picked up?
If you let the business just let the overworked non-tech staff take the blame you're letting them off
My older rig is not W11 compatible and I am unimpressed by both W11's functionality (or lack of it in many cases) and MS continual faffing with the UX and it's data grab.
I've worked with Linux before and maybe more importantly I quite enjoy using Linux vs MS.
I picked PoP!_OS as a distro that was flagged as being particularly good with steam and the GeForce card in the box.
Installation was easy..until it wasn't. It didn't detect the GeForce card properly or pull down drivers. I had to work with a GPT to work out how to get the right driver installed then that process caused a complete failure to initialise the desktop. Turned out the driver install had corrupted the user profile and I had to drop to a recovery mode to create a new profile and delete the old, then hey presto all was well.
But that process it utterly beyond most non-IT folk. The description of that to them will casue them to run out and buy a new W11 laptop and thrown the old kit straight into the trash.
Unless the OS is preinstalled I don't know how to get round that, even a one button conversion is likely to induce too much fear.
what is sad is that after all that I like the Pop!_OS and think most windows/mac/phone users would be very comfortable with it. There is a shop/app store of stuff which handles your apt-get needs, updates are automatic. The UX to me is very pleasent I like it a lot.
My Mrs is a charity trustee and they are going through some trauma after MS just withdrew the 365 licenses they were using to force them onto basic with web apps only. I described how I could give the charity some free computers by putting Linux with Libra Office onto some older kit, how it was easy to use, free for life, very reliable......nope not interested. Got be windows or they'll run away.
Until Linux is a brand of sorts its got no chance. MS knows this so it's quite happy to do the bait and switch on charities for an extra few coppers knowing they'll likely cough up.
Kindof sometimes. I got a laptop when I had to live for a while in a place with not much room. Having a laptop form factor took up less space both when using and when not. Real portability was not a consideration and as such I got a heavy workstation type desktop replacment which was only portable in theory. Lot of people have laptops not for portabilioty be to avoid have a number of large boxes taking up space permanently.
One assume now that Ukraine will either not be telling the USA much or may even be spreading misinformation to the USA knowing that it is not unlikely it will make its way to Russia.
I had read that the driver were effectively unaware of what they were carrying and it was just another delivery job. Poor buggers if that is the case.
Depends on the job. "IT manager" in the public sector is often a fairly junior role. Would not be shocked to see the public sector advertise "IT manager" at £27-35k tbh.
This isn't in the same league as the "Head of infosec" that was advertised the other year for £55k. TBH £60 doesn't sound all that bad at all relatively speaking.
Reading the little bit of description you've got there, when I was in public sector we'd have called that an "IT Team leader" but then the organisation I worked for coveted the "manager" word. "Team leader" would get about £45k now I guess.
No one in a minor public sector organisation gets big bucks other than the heads of service and the exec teams. Professional roles are generally very poorly rewarded. If you're in the public sector you really want to be at the bottom as they generally pay well for unskilled/entry level jobs, (living wage + decent pension), or at the top (face in paper, take the money and retire) but not in the middle whioch is poorly paid and very stressful.
It's been many many years since I've used an old school clacky keyboard but as I recall they were a bit too clacky for me.
I'm going througn a phase of trying and discarding keyboards at the moment.
Your cheap MS standard - actually quite like them tbh
An expensive Steel series with adjustable key pressures and all the wizzy lighting you could want - Good but couldn;t be arsed faffing with the chaing pressures and it would occasionally glitch and switch presure itself so you'd suddenly find the F key wasn't working unless you thumped it and resetting required unplugging, firing up a personal machine with the software and updating the keyboard again. Happened often enough to be a PITA and I'm no serious gamer so all the programmable things were wasted on me.
Got an old Mac mini keyboard for a tenner to try, quite good for a little one (AA batteries so has longer life than the new ones), but US layout which I can cope with although again PITA.
Currently using a Keychron K4 with 60% layout, smaller wireless and retains the numpad. Still getting used to the layout size but very much like the feel of the keyboard and the build quality is excellent with the alu chassis. Wrist rest is continually out of stock though.
Anything has to be better than those fecking chiclet keyboards that were everywhere for a while
I get it, it familiarity with the most well known OS. And it will comfort people who might be considering a switch without much knowledge of what is going on behind the scenes. But tbh if you were going for popularity then a look-a-like of W10 (or 7) would gain more traction.
Seems like a bit of a chicken and egg thing with linux.
People will like the idea of using lininx as it's free, does basic tasks well (for 95% of non gaming users), generally reliable and opens up a world of FOSS to them.
But they are terrified of tech change, we here are the wrong audience, most home users want nothing to do with the guts of a computer and never want to see a command line.
So they need help to switch, or need a switching service. And that's not going to happen for free. As soon as you introduce the idea of paying for linux they will switch off and will buy a W11 machine, an iPad or just do without and use their unsupported W10 kit. So free with no help they won't switch, small charge to hlep switch they won't bother.
Is Linux install easy, well yes IF it works. I have been a PC user personally and professionally for 30yr, I've used Linux off and on for nearly 25yr and I still find fixing Linux an utter bastard at times. If the install fails it is not easy to fix, not at all and I have a much better idea what to do than most.
What might work, is an AI LLM switching assistant. When switched my W10 machine to Linux and the install crapped out on a display driver I used GPT to help fix it. I would not have been able to do it alone. I think a trained LLM could be the cheap way to hlep people switch.
Got to wonder if the cyber insurance will pay out on M&S or any others in similar circumstances. I'm assuming it's like other insurances like home insuracne where they won't provide cover for a burglary if you didn't lock your doors.
If it turns out M&S (or others) weren't patching, didn't configure firewalls properly, haven't resourced IT or infosec, or haven't trained staff; why should the insurance pay out? They've left the doors unlocked.
Shareholders don't care about the products or the services only the profits and the share price. Profits are good, Nadella is paying off meatbags to balance the books with AI spend, shareprice is steadily up in the long term. Why would they get rid of him. Crap product has no impact to them.
Nice speech but underneath you already know the answers.
"if you want to build a product that is respected and could someday be looked back upon as a turning point for a given industry, the beginning of a new market, a product with global significance...you hire British engineers and you pay them well...If you want to produce the next wanky ad supported phone app that nobody will have heard of and definitely won't remember in 18 months, you go for the cheap talent. "
Sorry to say that your wanky execs aren't asking that questions, they want to know what will produce them the most profit and therefore the biggest bonus in the next 2-4 quarters. Quality, functionality, longevity are all of zero importance. AI is a just the current buzzword term to get shit-talkers up the greasy pole a little higher.
Human on Human battles don't generally go well for non-combatants caught in the middle.
I'm not sure I see where AI Vs AI wouldn't be the same outside of the virtual field.
As for students taking writen exams, we've allowed education theory to go too far now with kids not requiring to write and now could rightly claim that hand written work puts them at a disadvantage. That and universities seeing virtual exam rooms as a way to cut costs and charge the same fees.
Rolling back enshittifications seems to be a very steep uphill battle.
This is an excellent development and the people behind it are to be applauded. They could really do with this sort of initiative to reach out to charities as well. MS recently downgraded their free charitable offering to the charity my Mrs chairs with an offer of a discount now being on the table. FOSS should really be the norm for charities but they have the same technical deficit and tech fear as the general population.
I have switched my non-W10 compatible desktop to POP which so far is fine, I think it has a very friendly UX that most windows users would find simple to use. IInstall went the usual Linux way, which was, easy until it wasn't, then a right bastard. Took an hour with GPT to get to the bottom of the issue which was that the NVidia drivers had corrupted my user profile. However all working well now.
My son has SFF 2nd hand W10 machie which is also incompatible and he might be nexct for the nix treatment. I might get him an old Mac Mini and linux it, he'll like the shiny I think.
It might be that now really is the time for Linux since people are skint and the idea of a machine wflled with FOSS might tip some into making the effort.
But I think it will take a big expansion of initiatives like this and po-up linux install cafe etc
Knowing how long procurement takes this change away from the US must have begin a long time before the Orange POTUS took charge.
Obv his unreliability and perchant for flip flopping on critical issues should mean we look to others to spend our defence bucks. The Scandanavians have been producing some nice kit for years and are boringly reliable.
If anything the war in Ukraine has shown us that if Russia is the likely main enemy combatant we don't need £50B fighters made of unobtainium to beat them, kit from the last three decades seems to work very well against Russian vapourware superweapons. Why aren;'t we just building more of what we've got with a few improvments. If the Eurofighter and Chally 2/Leopard 2 are working well is it not going to be easier/cheaper to build more of what we already know and have tooling for? And that's without mentioning the £300 drones that work better than many weapons 100x the price.
Clearly that doesn't fit with the pork barrel of military procurement and nothing sucks down money like a new bit of shiny but then we end up where we are with carriers with a minimal number of jets that the supplier might brick, armour vehicles that cripple passengers and a lot of shareholder value.
Unfortunately no they won't. Your average punter doesn't really care about MS data grab or AI being forced into their machines. They migh care if it gets slow or if it gets increasingly hard to use.
But MS has already lost a large chunk of home users to Android and Apple as most punter just use tablets or their phones for many tasks.
MS only cares about Enterprise these days but only cares enough to gouge them and not enough to make product that actually works for their customers
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