* Posts by John Lilburne

1026 publicly visible posts • joined 3 Dec 2009

Page:

Guy rejects top photo prize after revealing snap was actually made using AI

John Lilburne

The problem is that all AI images are some form of derivative. Getty and Corbis have found AI generated images trained on their database to output morphed versions of their logos.

John Lilburne

Re: C2PA

EXIF metadata is not only meaningless but also useless, once an image has been through any editing program. The EXIF on the last image I took, which hasn't been through any editing software [YET], says it was done at a focal length of 165mm I can assure it wasn't because it had a big fuck-off magnifying lens in front of the actual lens. The f-stop is meaningless if I've done any focus stacking. Any photomontage work and nothing in the EXIF is real.

It's time to reveal all recommendation algorithms – by law if necessary

John Lilburne

Don't let YT (or anything else) give you recommendations. If I use YT I come to it via a specific search query.

No, I will not pay the bill. Why? Because we pay you to fix things, not break them

John Lilburne

Tech support and drives.

Back around 1990 we had a HP system installed that took reading from a gas chromatograph. From day one, it kept refusing to see the hard disk. Tech support arrived installed a new disk and took the old one away. The thing they installed, didn’t have the software that did tge monitoring, and even more amazing didnt have the OS.

Google dumps interest-based ad system for another interest-based ad system

John Lilburne

Well well well

I was scanning through my browser history the other day. 1000s of page hits on Medieval Tombs, Renaissance Art history, Heteroptera and Coleoptera insects. So what ads are they going to be showing me? Funeral Directors, and Pest control most likely. Good job I don't use google browser, or their piss poor search engine, and I have all the whitelisted sites provided by AdBlock added to the blacklisted sites.

Apple's Safari browser runs the risk of becoming the new Internet Explorer – holding the web back for everyone

John Lilburne

Re: it's Chrome's insistence that API's it includes should be an industry standard.

Web browsers are more than 25 years old. From an end user's perspective they don't need new features. Perhaps better ways to stop Evil Corp (aka Google, Facebook) from slurping their data. But so long as we can watch video, browse websites, see images we diont need anything else.

All of this is just a Google whine, Apple should allow us to just block all ads coming from a the Googleplex and be done with it. SHut the fuckers out of my phone once and for all.

Not just deprecated, but deleted: Google finally strips File Transfer Protocol code from Chrome browser

John Lilburne

Re: Overkill for many sites

Mike has never obeyed his own adage. He's pretty quick to shout TROLL at anyone who doesn't agree 100% with him.

We beg, implore and beseech thee. Stop reusing the same damn password everywhere

John Lilburne

Re: Nope cant be arsed.

Thankfully work have just changed the stupid 90 day churn to a 1 year churn.

John Lilburne

Nope cant be arsed.

To much of a burden remembering passwords I'll keep using 12345678 for the foreseeable future. And some sites I've not changed since 2001.

Use a better system than passwords.

COBOL-coding volunteers sought as slammed mainframes slow New Jersey's coronavirus response

John Lilburne

Re: No so much COBOL as the tools

So 14 months ago the millenials decided to import a system I wrote into a new application. Of course they decided to designer it with the help of architects that had no experience of such a system. When they presented it to me I pointed out the issues that they would have when the first pass was extended but that was ignored. Cos we are agilating and what does this old git know about anything. So they got a whole bunch of experts in to design the GUI based on the simplified model etc. Then 6 months ago they started to move onto stage 2 and all the issues of the architecture I warned them about hit hard and stalled the project. They are still trying to work out how to fix the architecture, but of course they've got a whole bunch of GUI wrapped around it now which means that they are loath to do what is really necessary as that will junk most of the GUI. Once they've worked out stage 2, stage 3 is going to cause even more issues and stage 3 is really why we'[ve started this in the first place. But hey we agilating so that can be ignored ...

Internet Archive justifies its vast 'copyright infringing' National Emergency Library of 1.4 million books by pointing out that libraries are closed

John Lilburne

Re: It has been pointed out ...

"you can simply disappear and take your copyrighted rubbish with you as far as we're concerned."

Probably accounts for your ignorance.

John Lilburne

Re: It has been pointed out ...

So you think it is totally unreasonable to suggest that Brewster Kahle pays 5c per copy borrowed to the authors of the works? Its not at all why such should be considered the promotion of Fear, Uncertainty or Doubt.

John Lilburne

It has been explained many times ...

... that many works do not make any money in the first 25 years after publication. In your scenario a book written before 1995 and turned into a film would not benefit the author. A song suddenly made popular by a contemporary Hollywood film would not benefit the band.

John Lilburne

It has been pointed out ...

... by Keith Kupferschmid that "Brewster Kahle is a multi-millionaire (who made his fortune during the dotcom boom when he sold two companies for millions to AOL and Amazon). ... Kahle, on the other hand, has chosen not to take money out of his own pocket but rather to take money out of the pockets of those who need it the most – American authors. Under normal circumstances his actions would be reprehensible, but given the current situation and Kahle’s enormous wealth, his actions are particularly vile."

https://copyrightalliance.org/ca_post/the-emergence-of-copyright-looting/

London court tells Julian Assange: No, coronavirus is not a good reason for you to be let out of prison

John Lilburne

Such a quaint view ...

... in the US 90% of those charged with a federal crime plead guilty. Clue 95% of those charged aren't guilty but they generally plead to some lesser charge. Risk 30 years for X or plead guilty to Y and do 6 months probation. Only 2% actually go to court and of those the majority are convicted.

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/06/11/only-2-of-federal-criminal-defendants-go-to-trial-and-most-who-do-are-found-guilty/

Netflix starts 30-day video data diet at EU's request to ensure network availability during coronavirus crisis

John Lilburne

Why hasn't ...

... Cory Doctorow, Mike Massnick, the EFF, Public Knowledge, etc burnt the netflix HQ down for violating Net Neutrality? Why isn't Julia Reda barricading herself into the EU Parliament? Why hasn't Jimmy Wales blacked out wikipedia in protest?

Former Googler Anthony Levandowski ‘fesses up to pinching trade secrets about self-driving cars

John Lilburne

But he's a Google exec ...

... isn't it the practice of Gopogle, Amazon, Facebook, Uber, et al to purloin the work of others?

https://www.theverge.com/2018/9/5/17805162/monopoly-antitrust-regulation-google-amazon-uber-facebook

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/20/magazine/the-case-against-google.html

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/09/20/open_source_companies_cloud/

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-did-google-get-so-big/

More than a billion hopelessly vulnerable Android gizmos in the wild that no longer receive security updates – research

John Lilburne

Par for the course ...

... what the tech industry wants you to do is to continue to punt out money to them every year. Software companies switch to subscription models, hardware manufacturers fail to update the firmware. Then you get industry shills whining about copyright media.

Researchers reckon 500k PCs infested with malware after dodgy downloads install even more nasties from Bitbucket

John Lilburne

Decades ago everyone had to have the top-range WP to write letters to their mother, the top range spreadsheet to reconcile their bank account, or to work out the cost per gallon of petrol. The top range relational database to catalogue their record collection, top range DTP to do a church flier, and so it went. All pirated, and eventually we ended up with MS Office and nothing else.

O there was OpenOffice but no one could use it for real commercial work. Most of us need not of it.

Not call, dude: UK govt says guaranteed surcharge-free EU roaming will end after Brexit transition period. Brits left at the mercy of networks

John Lilburne
Pirate

Re: Transition Period?

Apparently Boris has been on afternoon IT courses so he'll have a solution deployed in time just wait ans see.

John Lilburne

Re: Transition Period?

Nope.

John Lilburne

Roaming fees are the least of your worries. No fast queues through the arrivals, extra bullshit for driving, extra insurance policies with the scrapping of the E111, etc etc.

Last September we came back from France on the ferry to Portsmouth. We were one of the first off and it still took us 45 minutes to get through passport control, as they rifled through every van, caravan, and roof box in front of us.

Enjoy

Google reveals new schedule for 'phasing out support for Chrome Apps across all operating systems'

John Lilburne

Re: and giving users an inferior experience when compared to a native desktop application

Anyone with any sense will block Google Analytics with whatever browser based blocking kit they prefer.

John Lilburne

Re: So, Google is pulling a Microsoft ?

"...such as Picasa."

Like most things Google it was a bought in thing from Lifescape. At one point integrated into Flickr. Like much of web stuff if you included it as part of your workflow you were sold a pup. Still available as a freeware standalone thing, But as an integrated cloud based editor ...

Firefox 72: Floating videos, blocking fingerprints, and defeating notification pop-ups

John Lilburne

Re: Nope ...

I have 7 plug-ins that are marked as legacy 4 due to FF breaking how plug-ins work.

All of which is why software updates are such a pain in the arse. Nero switched their backup program to be some subscription based web thing, thanks but no thanks I had to reinstall Nero8 and won't be purchasing any new Nero based stuff. Other software has moved to subscription based systems no thanks.

The update of Drupal 6 to Drupal 7 broke half my website. Lesson learned won't be updating to D8.

Dread any Apple updates they have a tendency of crashing your system. An iOS update 2 years ago bricked my iPod for 4 days. Updates to windows drivers when updating iTunes had a tendency to brick windows 7 and XP.

And so it goes.

John Lilburne

Nope ...

... I'm sticking with FF56 all the newer versions broke my workflows.

EA boots Linux gamers out of multiplayer Battlefield V, Penguinistas respond by demanding crippling boycott

John Lilburne

Re: "EA still peddle games. Are they even relevant anymore?"

"Linux fan can keep on playing at which FOSS licenses is the best...."

Haven't they still got the thrill of steering a penguin down a slope?

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

John Lilburne

Open Source is a dead end for startups

You have huge companies in place that have a massive marketing name, if they want to take you OS code and repackage it in their own products there is naff all you can do about it. The OS label just put a neon light saying "Free Stuff" above your project. Who is going to go with "Startup Inc" when the exact same stuff is available under "Mega Corp Inc"?

Delayed, over-budget smart meters will be helpful – when Blighty enters 'Star Trek phase'

John Lilburne

Apparently they need a mobile signal, and there ain't one around where the meter is located. Can just about get a signal upstairs, but even then its one bar and crappy reception. Been around 3 times now to install one and each time left without installing anything.

Spin doctors: UPS gets permission to expand drone delivery fleet in the US

John Lilburne

Re: Is there a scammier corporation

Years ago I did some farm working (bailing, root vegetable planting, harvesting, etc) Three times a day a van delivered tea and coffee from the remote farmhouse to those in the fields. Drones would be perfect for that job.

Web body mulls halving HTTPS cert lifetimes. That screaming in the distance is HTTPS cert sellers fearing orgs will bail for Let's Encrypt

John Lilburne

Re: An issue of Google's own making ...

"Secure" (in the weak sense provided by HTTPS) is very different to "trustworthy".

Indeed 2 years ago I was doing some online banking from my desktop PC using the Barclay 2 factor device and got a page that was unexpected, some security thing or something. I rarerly do online banking but it looked slightly odd and I was unsure URL seemed OK but still ... went to the online chat with the bank (using the mobile phone) and described exactly what I was seeing and how I'd got there. Person on other end of chat log said "No its OK. Its a genuine Barclays page." "So I can to enter these numbers and press Ok", "Yes its alright." So I pressed Ok and out of the account went some £965. Sudden escalation of support up the system, and Barclays refunded the money about 12hrs later.

John Lilburne

Re: An issue of Google's own making ...

"Nearly all the blogs I visit have comment sections."

They may have but very few have valid comments added to them. When I had anonymous comments enabled it was a full time job deleting the spam, even with spam filters in place. Requiring register to comment was almost as bad, every day one would get 50-100 signups (usually using gmail), which stopforumspam detected as coming from known spam and malware sources. Leave it for a few days and one had 1000s of bogus users and a similar number that were suspect.

John Lilburne

An issue of Google's own making ...

... I'll have no part of it.

If you have no SSL cert there cannot be any issue of it being exploited, or having insecure encryption, or being applied to an abandoned site, or of it being stolen.

My website is like the majority of websites in that it is a persoanl blog that has no user signups, has no comment section, and has no purchase cart. It does not need a SSL cert of any description. Which is just another bit of software to deploy on the site and as such another vector for hackers to exploit. Here we are with a proposal by the SSL scammers and their enablers (Google, Mozilla, et al) to fix a problem of their own making.

One person's harmless japery can be another's night of LaserJet Lego

John Lilburne

Re: Heavy...

Gregory Bateson's story about the Oak Beams at New College hall:

https://www.anecdote.com/2008/01/the-beams-new-college-oxford/

It's Prime Minister Boris Johnson: Tech industry speaks its brains on Brexit-monger's victory

John Lilburne

Re: Is there a scammier corporation

Hey its turned out better than one could hope. The dipshit will destroy the Tories for years to come.

Hey, those warrantless smartphone searches at the US border? Unconstitutional, yeah? Civil-rights warriors ask court to settle this

John Lilburne

Reasonable suspicion

it has argued that border agents should only need a "reasonable suspicion" to carry out searches.

Such as being at the border whilst black, or muslim.

We regret to inform you the massive asteroid NASA's all excited about probably won't hit Earth

John Lilburne

Re: Is there a scammier corporation

Well according to this article it already has:

it’ll be hovering above the Atlantic Ocean. Apophis is travelling at breakneck speeds

that is quite some trick.

Biker sues Google Fiber: I broke my leg, borked my ankle in trench dug to lay ad giant's pipe

John Lilburne

Re: 5mph!

Says he had just turned, so 5mph is probably nearer than 60mph. He was on a hog so given that you'd normally report half your actual speed 10mph would most likely be correct. MC lights are set high so its unlikely that in the dark you'd see a trench just near to a turning as the lights will be focusing a distance down the road especially if on full beam.

Amazon Prime Air flight crashes in Texas after 6,000ft nosedive

John Lilburne

Re: We all thought the same!

Were they British? 'Cos that is all we really care about typical Headline/TVNews "300 dead in plane crash two were British", "Avalanche kills 50, 1 Briton missing".

OK, Google? Probably not! EU settles on wording for copyright reform legislation

John Lilburne

I'm pretty sure that the film maker could easily have replaced the 4-6 seconds with silence, or noise of passing traffic. As for the rest of that NYT article the film "Eyes on the Prize" can be obtained from Amazon.

John Lilburne

Fair dealing/use

"Google's content ID is the closest thing that presently exists to an upload filter, and it sucks. It cost millions to build and still can't handle fair-dealing properly. It's regularly abused by haters and extortionists (some of whom are the large studios themselves)."

It isn't meant to and shouldn't do either. 'regularly abused' is a push as according to Google less than 1% of DMCA complaints are wrongly formed and even less fraudulent. If someone wants to reuse some content and believes they have a fair-use or fair-dealing claim, then they should be willing to make that claim. Fair-use is a complex determination and can't be decided by some algorithm.

John Lilburne

"this wouldn't be such a problematic thing."

Yes it would. People don't generally upload 25yo music to YT, they are uploading last week's music.

John Lilburne

Re: Odd

"highly likely to suppress legitimate speech and data sharing."

Legitimate speech and data sharing is not accomplished by copying wholesale the work of another. In deed the act is a suppression of freedom of speech as a speaker has a right to speak and an equal right not to speak. The wholesale copiers deny the creator that right. Suppose A decides that their work should not appear in the Daily Mail what right does B have to put A's work on the Daily Mail? Suppose C decides they don't want their music on YouTube, what right does D have to put C's music on YouTube. What right does YouTube have to say but it was D's doing that we now profit from C's work?

John Lilburne

Re: "This tactic doesn't play well in the EU"

"Do you really believe the EU when they dismiss ..."

Clue 1: Most of the stuff was sent to the EU in the early hours of the morning 2-3am, when EU citizens were a bed.

Clue 2: Most of it came from US IP addresses.

John Lilburne

Re: Wishful thinking.

Google, and other tech companies, is nothing without the unlicensed content of others. Example of what Google really looks like:

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=site:professor-moriarty.com&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&source=lnms&tbm=isch

Contrast with Bing:

https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=site%3aprofessor-moriarty.com&FORM=HDRSC2

Object-recognition AI – the dumb program's idea of a smart program: How neural nets are really just looking at textures

John Lilburne

Re: Wrong priorities

On flickr they attempt to tag images with what they think the image shows. A photo of an insect on leaf has the leaf tagged as grass, the insect as a lizard, a butterfly becomes a bird. This even when you've given it hints such as "Gonocerus acuteangulatus" or "Iphiclides podalirius". Also they have dataset of a billion or more images.

OK, Google. Music in 2019 isn't what it was, but Play nice, will ya?

John Lilburne
Happy

Re: All the best music was written before 1988 anyway

OTOH Jon Balke's Siwan, and Brahem's Astounding Eyes of Rita were 2009.

John Lilburne

Re: Out of curiosity ...

Oddly I have had no issues with any of the CDs I've bought. They all rip properly, they all play over PLEX, off the ipod or whatever other device I upload them to. IOW not a music issue but a googleplex crap issue. You'd have been better off with a Phonograph.

Facebook didn't care if your kids ran up gigantic credit card bills – lawsuit

John Lilburne

Re: Yuk

The issue here is that the internet, as developed, is inherently monopolistic. As such T&C don't really matter if all your mates and family are on the thing and you don't want to be the Cassandra on the side warning about the dangers, or trying to convince people that don't give a shit even when they acknowledge the dangers. So everyone one uses FB, Google, Amazon, Twitter etc, and the wife gets a WhatsApp account, because her daughter puts photos of the Grandkids and other relations respond to the answer "Don't have a FB account" with "How do you get in touch with people then?" because they have all forgotten how to work email.

El Reg eyes up Article 13 draft leak: Will new Euro law give Silicon Valley more power? Some lawyers think so

John Lilburne

Re: Copyright's a good idea *if* it's easily enforcable by individuals

You do know that Disney had nothing to do with the US copyright extension don't you? That came about to bring the US into line with other countries and had nothing to do with Disney at all, rather it was that the USA wanted international protection for the works of its creators and to do so they needed to adopt the Berne Treaty.

OK so Disney was part of the lobbying for ratification of the Berne Treaty and they did make some donations to political campaigns around that time. The maximum they gave was $6,000 to Trent Lott, the average was $1,000. Now hands up all those that think that US politicians can be bought for $1K.

Page: