Posts by John-Mark Gurney

Apple patents touch-sensitive controls for MacBook

Stupid patents cited

Did you notice how many other patents cited that one?

Also, apparently the USPTO still wants you to pay for your patent even after all the claims were invalided.

Customers clobber Clearwire as execs jump ship

then the international standards change

"*Whether any service today warrants the label “4G” depends on whether marketing labels carry more weight than international standards. ®"

Of course, what about when the international standards change?

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/12/22/4g_itu/

So, I'd say neither carry much weight.

Chinese ISP hijacked US military, gov web traffic

Encrypt it all

I'm just as worried about the US government snooping as I am about China. The US courts say that the government is free to snoop, and the people cannot force the government to follow the law. Encrypt all your internet traffic.

With the cost of SSL certs cheap, no website should unencrypted. I moved my home site to only allow encrypted traffic. I've also stopped visiting sites that don't have a signed certificate.

It's easy to turn on encryption for torrents (done). Many IRC servers also support TLS too.

Basic email encryption can be done if more people install a certificate. Simply install a certificate on your SMTP server and most sending hosts will automatically use TLS. Sure it isn't as good as PGP as it's still unencrypted on the sending/receiving hosts, but at least on the internet it is.

No Nook e-reader til 7 December or later

Dec 7th? Try Jan 11th

If you believe B&N's website, it won't be available till Jan 11th. I check yesterday and it said Jan 4th, but apparently things are moving even more slowly. How they can stock the shelves when you can't order it online till after Christmas is beyond me. If you want an e-reader to put under the tree, better buy a Kindle.

Google pulls essay adverts

Solution is easy

The solution is easy, any time an "example" essay is given, it is made available to a clearing house that the Universities use to ensure that the "example" is not submitted by a student. If the companies balk at the idea, then clearly they intend for the student to use it as their own work.