Posts by genghis_uk

Won't someone think of the kids? China's Cyberspace Admin steps up, orders massive cleanup to make the net safe for minors

Re: East versus West

I have to agree here - dumbing down the whole of the Internet because a child may see something is not the way to go.

In the real world there are adult spaces where children can be tolerated but it is the parent's responsibility - being asked to moderate my language in a pub after 9pm* 'because there are children present' did not go down well! There has to be a balance.

Wrapping the little darlings in cotton wool is wrong, exposing them to 4chan/8kun and their lookalikes is also pretty wrong - they will eventually come across people like that in real life but pre-teens don't need that.

Moderating what a child sees and interacts with always used to be called Parenting - I am not trying to blame parents who have a difficult time trying to keep their kids away from this stuff but, with 20:20 hindsight maybe giving smart phones with unlimited internet access to 10 year olds wasn't such a bright idea after all? The problem is it only takes 1 ignorant parent who can't see the harm and they all want one!

Pandoras box has been opened. I cannot see any amount of regulation closing it again unless it cripples the adult version of the internet - or at least makes it difficult to navigate through ID / Age Verification etc. that most kids will learn to bypass anyway.

*in my defence it was nearer 10pm

Happy 'Freedom Day': Stats suggest many in England don't want it or think it's a terrible idea

Re: SNAFU

<quote>No of course not you despicable disingenuous person</quote>

You really are a people person aren't you?

A slight bit of disagreement and you decide to attack personally. Remember, this is opinion, mine happens to differ. That does not make me despicable. It just makes you look a little silly for not being open to the fact that my memory of the 70's/80's are different to yours. There are no real measures for how much more socially aware people were back then - my neighbourhood was probably quite different to yours so in what way am I being disingenuous?

Re: SNAFU

Why can't people stop with the Thatcher thing?

Like people were wonderful and everyone lived in a utopian society in the 60's / 70's?

The 70's started with the 3 day week and ended with the Winter of Discontent - both were in part people being selfish!

I no longer have a burning hatred for Jewish people, says Googler now suddenly no longer at Google

Re: This is confusing

As someone who had to study 1984, it appears that most people have an idea of what it is about but lack the in-depth knowledge of the subject matter...

Newspeak was a way of controlling the proles by simplifying the language. The intent was to remove large amounts of vocabulary so that people could no longer discuss (or even think about) certain concepts that went against the party line. It was not about political correctness, it was about removing a persons ability to rebel by reducing their ability to think 'bad' (ungood) thoughts.

There is a certain parallel in the 'you can't say that anymore' but the intent there is to change the way people think about a subject i.e. modifying the vocabulary to change attitudes rather than narrowing the thinking down to a minimum to control the population. They are related but in an ice-cubes and glaciers kind of way.

Xiaomi parties like a winner after coming second on world smartphone sales charts

Re: I would like to buy a phone made by free range workers paid living wage at very least

While I fully support your stance, I can't help but wonder what tech have you actually managed to buy in the last 20 years? In fact, what are you typing on now?

Globalisation and especially the move to manufacture everything in Asia makes it pretty hard to find anything that is truly free of cruelty to humans.

It had to happen: Microsoft's cloudy Windows 365 desktops are due to land next month

Thin Client

So this is basically a thin client hooked to a mainframe via a network?

"Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose" as they say in France (and Rush songs)

Florida Man sues Facebook, Twitter, YouTube for account ban

Re: Legal Scholars?

You probably ought to read up on the Schenck decision.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shouting_fire_in_a_crowded_theater (apologies for a Wikipedia link!)

https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/11/its-time-to-stop-using-the-fire-in-a-crowded-theater-quote/264449/

It had nothing to do with fires or theatres - the comment by SCJ Oliver Wendell Holmes was part of the discussion and had no bearing on the case. He later said pretty much the opposite in another case

Re: Nope

Open mouth - insert foot???

Check my previous posts and understand them before you try to put words into my mouth! I always aim for a fair balance and this post was in the same vein so I take crap like this a bit personally.

The point (for those who don't jump to conclusions and then react to their own misconception) was that nastiness on one side of the spectrum is not generally equivalent to the outright vitriol of the other. So called conservatives are being banned for being assholes not for their political beliefs

To slightly misquote Mar A Lago's biggest ball sack, there are bad people on both sides...

However, on one side you have woke cancellers and the occasional loud social justice warrior, on the other you have bigoted racists and misogynists actively calling for violence against people.

I am sure some of the more vocal left of centre typos get banned too when they overstep the mark but the 'conservatives' are trying to perpetuate the myth that the platforms are out to get then when really it is the hate speech that is getting them banned. Basically, don't be a dick and you won't get shut down - it's not a hard concept, most of society is based on similar lines

Devilish plans for your next app update ensure they never happen – unless you start praying

Re: Just a couple of quotes

I am not sure that Alan Moore would have written it much differently to Pat Mills.

Although his sense of humour is more defined, he is generally considered to be a little left of center (slight understatement)

Data collected to promote public health must never be surrendered to police

Re: Hearken to Prophet McNealy

That just implies that he is happy to shout about his life events from 35years ago from the rooftops.

You've got to pity his neighbours... "Is that Jake shouting about his time in Stanford again? Better go out quick before he starts on about that server rebuild in 1987 for the third time this week..."

Dude --->

I was fired for telling ICO of Serco track and trace data breach, claims sacked worker

Re: Avoidance of responsibility

<quote>These include a meal allowance every day of £5, tax relief on travel because they work at different locations - this ignores the fact they travel to the same start location every day and then use a company vehicle to travel to whichever sites they are working on </quote>

HMRC guidelines say that you can claim travel to a different place of work for up to 2 years then it becomes your 'permanent workplace'. A contractor can use this as their normal workplace is where their business is set up i.e. home or possibly the umbrella address. The meal allowance would be something the umbrella set up as a working 'off site' subsistence payment - normally a contractor can claim this with a receipt...

So both of these are perfectly normal and allowed.

An umbrella is really just a temping agency for contractors - but temp agencies are also notorious for screwing employees so nothing new there

Facebook granted patent for 'artificial reality' baseball cap. Repeat, an 'artificial reality' baseball cap

<sense of humo(u)r failure detected>

The OP didn't call all baseball cap wearers assholes, you just assumed they did and took offence (offense)

The comment said that, outside America, a baseball cap is a _good indication_ that the wearer is an asshole.. i.e. not all wearers are, but the probability is against them - equally not all assholes wear them (but it would be nice if they did so you could spot them easily).

Apparently ironic use of generalisation for humour does not travel well either...

UK health secretary Matt Hancock follows delay to GP data grab with campaign called 'Data saves lives'

Re: Note to Editor:

From: https://digital.nhs.uk/services/national-data-opt-out/operational-policy-guidance-document/what-are-national-data-opt-outs

Prior to the launch of the national data opt-out individuals could set two types of general opt-outs, via their GP practice:

a type 1 opt-out prevents information that identifies individuals being shared outside of their GP practice, for secondary uses.

a type 2 opt-out prevented confidential patient information from being shared outside of NHS Digital for purposes beyond individual care.

Type 1 opt-outs continue to be honoured until September 2020 at the earliest when the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) will consult with the NDG before confirming their removal.

Type 2 opt-outs have been replaced by the national data opt-out and are no longer valid. All type 2 opt-outs recorded in GP practices up to and including 11 October 2018 have been migrated to become national data opt-outs. NHS Digital has written to inform people who previously registered a type 2 opt-out of this change. More information on the conversion of type 2 opt-outs can be found on the NHS Digital website: https://digital.nhs.uk/about-nhs-digital/our-work/keeping-patient-data-safe/how-we-look-after-your-health-and-care-information/your-information-choices/how-opt-outs-work

India tells Twitter to obey its laws — or make wielding them easier

Re: Pick and choose

Twitter does not have to embrace freedom of speech - it is a private company. You have to conform to Twitter's terms of service which does not meant a free for all.

Governments that should ensure freedom of speech by allowing people to criticise and discuss without harassment. India's government is blatantly failing this test.

Inventor of the graphite anode – key Li-ion battery tech – says he can now charge an electric car in 10 minutes

Re: re: Currently the EV market is in the EU

Bikes are slightly different though - on a sports bike (I have a GSX-R750 and an Aprilia RSV4) you have something like a 130-150mile range and would generally stop every 100miles or so just to stretch your legs. My friends with more rider friendly bikes (read boring, lol) have bigger tanks and can go further comfortably.

Electric bikes are not far off the same sort of range - your Zero SR as a more sporty model, will do something like 150miles in town and about 100miles if you go for it. I can see an electric tourer with a bigger battery could potentially do 180miles -200miles on a charge although I have not seen one.

We are used to this. The electric version does not change much but the charge time when you do your 100mile stop increases a lot - 1hr instead of a few minutes to get going again.

Car drivers are used to having 100's of miles of range (my car has a 450mile tank) and potentially non-stop driving for several hours at a time... with passengers and luggage. Stop after 5 or 6 hours of driving, 5 minutes to fill up and you are good for another 5 or 6 hours. That is a tall order for an EV.

Back on topic... your bike does not phone home... yet! I can see that alongside the rise in motorised computers that we drive, insurance companies will be gagging for spy in the cab features. This will inevitably translate to bikes too. Maybe not as fast but they will get there

Pakistan's Punjab province tells citizens to get jabbed or have their SIM card blocked

If you read on to paragraph 56 on page 18, it explains...

The reason is that the models show practically everyone is vaccinated (95% in this case) so the fatalities are mostly among vaccinated people as there are not many unvaccinated in the population.

The vaccine is not 100% effective so you will still get some deaths - the Warwick model is showing a peak of 300 deaths per day in a third wave, largely made up of vaccinated population.

What it is not showing is the proportion of the vaccinated vs. unvaccinated population. IT looks like 250 of the 300 are vaccinated but 50 are unvaccinated. Given the 95% : 5% split it shows that a lot more unvaccinated people will die even given some form of herd immunity in the general population (just over 3x given that is is 16.66% of the total)

Re: Seriously?

+1

It 's amazing how the commentary has changed over the last year so that El Reg is starting to look like the Daily Mail.

It shows the power of the press (and it is mostly the press not social media that just amplifies), that the fear mongering has worked. Scared people are not rational and will climb over the broken bodies of children given the right motivation - keeping people scared and angry has done wonders for press and governments around the world.

Threats of forced vaccination, threats against people who do not want to vaccinate for any reason, them and us style rhetoric... Is this really a bunch of educated IT professionals?

If someone proposed that Windows and Facebook were to be made mandatory this forum would be lit up about removing choice but if someone does not want a biological injection they should be held down and forced to take it "for everyone's safety" - OK, a bit extreme but you get the point - I hope!

A majority need to vaccination. From first dose numbers, assuming they all have a second, we should reach herd immunity reasonably soon - London is an outlier but most regions are in the high 70's% now, Wales is nearly 90% of first doses. Experts have not really given a number for herd immunity but I have seen between 70% and 82% so we are well on our way without having to forcefully inject anyone.

'Vast majority of people' are onside with a data grab they know next to nothing about, reckons UK health secretary

Re: Not that I trust Cummings,

Twice a day apparently...

Wyoming powers ahead with Bill Gates-backed sodium-cooled nuclear generation plant

As well as supplying about 20% of the UK power...

Google employee helped UK government switch from disastrous COVID-19 strategy, according to Dominic Cummings

Re: Seems consistent with my timeline

I have never understood how we could go into a full UK-wide lockdown but leave the ports and airports fully open - expecting people to 'self isolate'. Was that really going to happen? In the important early days, before the massive exponential growth, people were not going to take self isolation that seriously and our ineffective tracing only compounded the problem.

We are a bloody island! Our greatest defence in a pandemic is isolation. Catch the first few cases and lock the border, then you have control.

Hindsight is 20:20 but some things are fairly obvious

'Biggest data grab' in NHS history stuffs GP records in a central store for 'research' – and the time to opt out is now

Re: "The UK enacted GDPR through the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA2018)"

I hate to tell you but that is more normal than you imagine. Not just UK but all over the world.

Big pharma use a lot of public funded research and then surround the result in layers of patents etc. This is just a bit more obvious than most.

Re: Why opt out ?

Like almost all EU laws, there is a UK interpretation. Brexit did not change anything - this is UK law

Just before the transition period started, the UK basically signed everything EU into UK law so we are 100% aligned - the point was to stop a train wreck but it does mean that in future, we will have to repeal UK laws in order to deviate from current EU legislation...

The Wight stuff: Marconi and the island, when working remotely on wireless comms meant something very different

Re: Hovercraft

The Hover drops you off on the beach just along from the pier - it is the foot passenger ferry that drops you at the end of the pier. The car ferry drops you a couple of mile out of town.

I had a gig in Ryde once and had to run for the last ferry - that is a REALLY long pier!!

Brit MPs and campaigners come together to oppose COVID status certificates as 'divisive and discriminatory'

<quote>Agreed, there is a reported reduction in the risk of infecting others.

But it's not a total elimination of the risk.</quote>

There will never be a zero risk - nothing is life is without risk, you just have to mitigate where you can and accept where you can't. Do you drive? Have you ever flown? Hell, have you ever had a few too many and thought of a 'really good idea'? Flu will kill you if you are unlucky - is that an acceptable level? Maybe a few more?

Personally, I am looking forward to playing gigs again and going to festivals - then again I ride extreme motorbikes so my risk perception may not be the same as yours.

Nothing like a disproportionate reaction is there

<quote> Sure, but the consequence is that pubs/restaurants/shops/etc will then have to continue operating social distancing restrictions </quote>

Says who? That has never been the stated consequence.

The problem is that the government and the media have spent the last year instilling the fear of Covid into everyone and have done too good a job of it. Daily death rates and dire warnings in public 'service' adverts have scared the crap out of the public where they feel that everyone is a carrier and needs to be treated with suspicion.

Now they have a vaccine that should protect the vulnerable and reduce the impact on everyone else - we have reduced hospital patients to around 2200 (or roughly 10 per NHS Trust as there are just over 220 of them) and we have broken the link between cases and hospitalisation. Daily death rates in England are almost equivalent to daily road deaths (not quite but close) but I don't hear a lot about not commuting because of the risk factor. A sense of perspective is needed.

Covid is here to stay, get over it and learn to live with it but there is little point in denying it. We need something like 80+% take up for herd immunity but way before that we will have (and probably already have) a level where the vaccine will reduce transmission and reduce serious illness in those that get it. The problem is that while the media are all for publishing the % risk of blood clots from a vaccine, they are not very willing to do the same for % risk of Covid nastiness...

Given that the virus is at a very low rate in the UK and the vaccine is doing its job, what problem are we trying to fix with a Covid passport for normal, everyday living? It seems to me that it is mostly a crutch for the under-informed and overly anxious.

I have been vaccinated and I am vehemently against another form of control. Luckily, my local pubs and the few local shopkeepers that I have spoken to all agree with me.

Ah, you know what? Keep your crappy space station, we're gonna try to make our own, Russia tells world

Re: The King of Swamp Space Station.

What? The curtains?

Seeing a robot dog tagging along with NYPD officers after an arrest stuns New Yorkers

Re: I think this is good

Highly unlikely the robot would confuse Gun (heavy, black and worn on the right hip) and Taser (light, bright yellow and worn on the left hip).

Re: Probably..

It was a genuine request, not a dig...

<quote> The experiment has already been done in the USA with the defund the police movement. It's claimed that violent crime rose sharply in the areas where police patrols were withdrawn. </quote>

This made it sound like you had knowledge of the experiment and the "It's claimed" bit sounded like there was a conclusion. However, thanks for the links.

Definitely complicated - although sending heavily armed cops who are trained to shoot first and ask questions later into situation involving mental breakdown/suicide/domestic issues is never going to give the best outcome

Re: Probably..

Source?

Not disbelieving but I would like to see the report myself

OMG! New free speech social network won’t allow members to take the Lord’s name in vain

Re: Twitter is not a monopoly

I feel a little dirty posting a wikipedia link but please take 2 minutes and read what a monopoly is...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly

Happy Friday

How to ensure your tech predictions catch on in a flash? Do the mash

I wondered if anyone was going to mention these - congratulations sir --->

(too young to remember any of them originally but what they were doing in the early 60s was amazing for the time)

Re: You may remember...

Any episode with Lt. Ellis in it...

We can't avoid it any longer. Here's a story about the NFT mania... aka someone bought a JPEG for $69m in Ether

Re: What is this

How long before this turns up on The Pirate Bay?

Gummy bears as a unit of measure? The Reg Standards Soviet will not stand for this sort of silliness

Re: Eating Wales

Oh, it's a harpoon...

Google, Facebook, Amazon et al look on nervously as Biden bumps anti-Big Tech warriors into key posts

Re: Make them Pai!

Ok, not necessarily all are from great backgrounds but they have certainly worked to get to the upper levels. Pelosi's father was a Congressman and later Mayor of Baltimore and Schumer, while having more humble beginnings, went to Harvard Law so is probably considered in the upper classes now - he is a Senator so there is substantial money somewhere. That said Dems are not the ones generally complaining about 'elites' to appeal to the working classes.

The point really was that the like of Trump and his cultists rail against the 'elites' while coming from very comfortable backgrounds and having had what most would consider elite education. The elites are not in the background pulling strings, that is mostly lobbyists for large corporations, the elites are the ones gaslighting the voters.

From the time of the founding fathers, the system was set up to only allow the elites to govern. When they said 'the people' they did not mean everyone - just the people that matter!

Re: Make them Pai!

Biden has been in the White House for 7 weeks and is still getting his appointees approved.

What exactly were you expecting in the first 49 days? He has already backed out some of the more divisive Trump era policies...

The interesting bit of the mid-terms in '22 will be what happens to the GOP. Trump could split the party and make it difficult for them to get a majority despite what the Democrats do.

Also a Brit and slightly interested in US politics. However, the whole 'elite' thing is a BS term like fake news. The politicians ARE the elites and always have been - have you seen how much money you need to get into US politics? Show me one who is not from an upper class background (or at least very wealthy upper-middle class). They actually work for the lobbyists who fund them.. that is all of them, on both sides.

MPs slam UK's £22bn Test and Trace programme for failing to provide evidence that it slows COVID pandemic

Re: To put it in context...

I would also add that DWP put the whole furlough scheme payment system in place and rolled it out in record time. Credit where it is due.

Can you imagine the outcome if Corbyn was in power over the last year?

He can spout on a soap box all day but was useless when faced with actually having to do something

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

Re: Godwin's Logo, or, If only Chaplin had smiled more often ...

Oliver Hardy was known to smile occasionally ;)

That's another fine mess Amazon got themselves into (and out of apparently)

Spotify to introduce lossless audio streaming: Better sound or inefficient gimmick?

Re: @ genghis_uk -- All recorded music is shit

The rig is a Genz-Benz Shuttlemax 9.2 into a Barefaced cab... Believe me it is plenty loud enough when I can use it properly.

The problem is usually the venue - boominess that makes the whole lot sound out of tune or more usually, tight for space so I stand next to my cab. As Bass takes a big of distance to resolve, standing less than 4ft in front means I can't actually hear what I am playing despite the volume. Now fixed with in-ear monitors but that has its own complications.

Re: All recorded music is shit

And yet, in a band situation the bloody guitarists still complain that they can't hear themselves and turn up!!

As a bass player I can only hear the screaming Marshall stack on one side and the white noise of the crash cymbal on the other (on a good day with bit of snare thrown in). In many gigs I have worked on the air from my cab hitting the back of my legs so I know something is happening...

Live music may sound great to an audience if well mixed but it rarely sounds good to the people playing it. Even with great monitoring each player has their own mix so they are not hearing the front of house version.

Re: EVERYTHING now sounds awful.

The problem is that kids don't know when they are wrong...

Too much ego and too little experience - put the phone down and learn something!

<wasn't like this in my day.. mumble, mumble, pass the tea dear>

Re: nobody needs to spend £100 per metre of cable

I seem to remember that What HiFi have used 13A mains lead in a speaker cable test - late 90's or thereabouts. It came out much higher than you would expect too. Something like 6th out of 10 cables meaning 4 were worse than mains lead!

A quick google does not show it and I can't be bothered to do a long search. I will say that I was a cable sceptic - it's LF, why would cable make a major difference? But I replaced the rubbish wire on an old hifi with something half decent and was gobsmacked at the difference... I still can't explain it scientifically but my ears could definitely tell

Seagate UK customer stung by VAT on replacement drive shipped via the Netherlands

Re: But, but

Not 100% correct, The EU Commission negotiators were trying to drive the cost down and refused to budge on the waiver that the pharma companies wanted regarding liability if anything went wrong. This delayed things to the point where Germany and France split and started their own negotiations.

The EU also wanted all of the paperwork i's dotted and t's crossed before they moved forward - the analogy I saw was the pharma companies had all of the chapters written but had not compiled the book. The UK moved on the basis that the work had been done but Europe wanted the book bound and a ribbon on it. Note: having worked on EU projects, I can absolutely believe this.

The stories are in Germany, France and Belgium at least so it is a bit disingenuous to say it is only the UK that are reporting it:

e.g. Der Speigel Germany (a good investigative reporting outlet) fro mid-December 2020

https://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/the-planning-disaster-germany-and-europe-could-fall-short-on-vaccine-supplies-a-3db4702d-ae23-4e85-85b7-20145a898abd

Qualcomm under fire for 'anticompetitive' patent shenanigans causing pricey UK smartphones

I was going to say the same - Qualcom have a long history of this.

It's partly why US phones lagged far behind Europe in the late 90s and early 2000's.

Australian government fights Facebook news ban by threatening 0.01% of Zuck's ad revenue

Re: Just goes to show how out of touch our politicians are

<quote>Ultimately though, the bread and butter of it is that FB are profiting (directly or otherwise) from displaying locally generated news content, at the cost of depriving the sources of that content of revenue.</quote>

I am not sure this is 100% correct. Facebook may get some advertising revenue from pages where news has been linked (note: FB didn't link it, users did) but I have seen no real independent data to show that these links are depriving the sources of revenue. If anything, they may have increased traffic from Facebook links. Again, if the small snippet of news does not entice a person to read the article, it that the fault of Facebook or the author? It's not exactly a teaser if it does not tease is it?

<quote>I do wonder what would stop news sites just posting links to their own site over and over as well, essentially generating their own income under this law</quote>

From what I understand, they did. The major news outlets had their own pages and posted links to their own material - now they want to be paid for the privilege too.

The Aus government are now saying pay for the new s (that you don't want) or we will fine you or remove our advertising revenue... The politicians obviously do not understand how the internet works and have been embarrassed by Facebook's response so they are doubling down.

Side note: People are complaining that too much of the article is shown so no-one clicks through but If the headline + tagline teaser is the whole substance of the article, it is probably not worthwhile journalism in the first place.

House Republicans introduce legislation for outright ban on municipal broadband in the US

Re: Great way to lose voters

And guns... don't forget the 2nd Amendment rights that Dems would rob them of (without any evidence that they would)

There are a lot of poor Republicans - look at Trump's 'base'. Unfortunately, they are also the least educated and least likely to understand that they are being mugged by their politicians.

I saw a program at the start of Trump's presidency where the guy living in the woods with his wife and kid was praising Trump for the tax break. He was a few dollars a month better off and didn't care that millionaires were significantly better off - the handful of dollars made a difference to him so he loved Trump. You can't fault the guy's logic but the fact that his education and living standards were awful as a result of politicians failing his family and others like him did not register. Ignorance can be bliss I suppose