Posts by Blofeld's Cat

Microsoft tries to knife passwords once and for all - at least for consumers

Re: Trust M$ with my biometric data????

Er, alphabetic order would be: "Amazon"," Apple", "Facebook", "Google"

Tesla fudged odometer to screw me out of warranty, Model Y owner claims

Re: "because the warranty had expired and the recall didn't apply to him."

"With modern poor road maintenance, bushes tend to get a bit of a hard time.

Oh, you mean mechanical bushes - it all makes sense now.

For a moment I had a picture in my mind of a car bouncing off the pot-holes and disappearing into the undergrowth.

Trump doubles down, vows to make Chinese imports even more expensive for Americans

Re: misdirection going on here, i think

Elizabeth Willing Powel: "Well Doctor what have we got a republic or a monarchy?"

Dr Benjamin Franklin: "A republic - if you can keep it."

Conversation recorded by James McHenry in his Journal on the last day of the Constitutional Convention, 18 September 1787.

UK government using AI tools to check up on roadworthy testing centers

SELECT ... WHERE pass_rate_percent > 95;

I suspect that in this case the "AI solution" will be a database query as you suggest. Possibly one that is already being done under a different name.

Don't forget that "We implemented an AI solution" sounds much better than "We ran a database query", and scores more points on the buzzword bingo card.

If, however, the powers that be bring in one of the consultancy friends, then we can expect to see a multi-billion plan wrapped around the same query.

Musk's move fast and break things mantra won't work in US.gov

Just a cotton-pickin' minute there Muskie ...

I don't suppose Elon has the time to read biographies.

Which is a pity because reading an account of the lives of Leon Trotsky and/or Ernst Röhm might be informative. Especially their later years ...

Welsh woman fined for flatulence-fueled cyber harassment

Pythonesque ...

"I fart in your general direction! Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!"

Memories fade. Archives burn. All signal eventually becomes noise

A new dark age ...

One of the fears of historians at the moment is that we are entering a new "Dark Age" where it is soon going to be almost impossible to research anything that happened after the middle years of the 20th century, from primary sources.

A friend was commissioned to write the history of a company that had been founded in Victorian days. The firm still had the minutes of every meeting written down in huge ledgers which lined the walls of their boardroom. Apparently she had so much material that writing the firm's history was very easy, with the hardest part being deciding what to omit.

These days most firms hold such records electronically and almost certainly delete them after a certain time. Quite often they are legally required to delete records that are no longer needed. To produce a similar history of contemporary firms you would often have to use potentially inaccurate secondary sources.

Obviously not every record survived when they were held in physical form, but it is a lot easier to casually wipe a hard drive than it is to dispose of a cellar full of filing cabinets and folders.

13 days into the outage, will Kaseya's Traverse trip back to life today?

Re: "they just put the clock on the round table" ...

You had sand? We used to dream of sand.

We just had an urn with water dripping out of it. - And we had to take turns counting the drips...

Japan stops measuring train crowding by ease of newspaper readership

Re: Because Science!

“I teleported home last night with Ron and Sid and Meg. Ron stole Meggy’s heart away and I got Sidney’s leg.” — Douglas Adams

Customer bricked a phone – and threatened to brick techie's face with it

Re: Motorola brick

I did some testing for a hand-held test equipment manufacturer in the mid '80s.

One of their sales reps had turned up at a potential customer's factory to demonstrate an instrument to a very disinterested manager. Part of his sales pitch emphasized the robustness of the instrument, which was one of its main selling points.

The manager stopped him at that point, "What do you mean by robust?"

Their rep led the manager to an adjacent loading bay and threw the unit across the factory yard, where it bounced off a wall and landed in a puddle, without noticeable effect.

He said afterwards that he had half expected the unit to shatter into a million pieces, but it was the only way he could think of to get the order.

Shuttle Columbia's near-miss: Why we should always expect the unexpected in space

Re: Murphy's law:

"Murphy was an optimist" - O’Toole’s Commentary

Re: Understatement there.

Zounds?

Julian Assange pleads guilty, leaves courtroom a free man

Hmm ...

Usually at the end of a long, drawn-out case like this, there is a request from the defendant's legal team to respect the privacy of those involved, and to allow them to get on with their lives away from the glare of publicity.

Hopefully everyone will honour this principle ...

Research finds electric cars are silent but violent for pedestrians

Re: Quiet ICE

I find your lack of "Tufty the squirrel" disturbing ...

Whistleblower raises alarm over UK Nursing and Midwifery Council's DB

It's deja-vu all over again ...

"The databases have no version control systems. Important fields for identifying individuals were used inconsistently – for example, containing junk data, test data, or null data ..."

Sounds like just about every corporate database I've ever been asked to merge, convert, transfer, etc.

"Well not all our customers have a VAT number, so we use that field for their nickname. If they do have a VAT number then we put that in the Fax field, as we don't want to confuse anyone ..."

BOFH: So you want more boardroom tech that no one knows how to use

Hmm ...

While I was working on a large corporate site, there was a medical emergency - first-aider, paramedics, ambulance, trip to A&E - in one of the training rooms.

Their employee giving the presentation, in order to connect the ceiling-mounted projector to his laptop, had climbed on an office chair (with castors) that he placed on a folding table, with predictable results.

The front-desk mounted connectors, next to his laptop, were all found to be working correctly as was the IR remote. He had just failed to use any of them.

Ironically the presentation was about health and safety at work, and the presenter ran that department.

Rancher faces prison for trying to breed absolute unit of a sheep

Raising the baa ...

"rammed through the law" ... "Probably feeling a bit sheepish now"

I see what ewe did there.

Air National Guardsman Teixeira to admit he was Pentagon files leaker

Re: "National Security"

"... Death Star ... Hayne's Manual ..."

Chapter 5 - Servicing the reactor.

...

5.04 Replace the covering grate on the exhaust port.

Work for you? Again? After you lied about the job and stole my stuff? No thanks

Got to love an optimist ...

Just this week I had a former employer who stiffed me about £2k on a project, ask me if I would do some modifications to the project for him. Price to be agreed later.

I politely explained that unfortunately I was now retired and busy doing other things.

A tale of 2 casino ransomware attacks: One paid out, one did not

Re: They wouldn't have done this 60 years ago

Nowadays the perpetrators would simply be interviewed to find out what their motives were, and who they were working with.

Following those discussions, concrete proposals would be set out on how the persons involved could become useful members of society.

A supporting role in highway development might well be suggested at this point ...

Law secretly drafted by ChatGPT makes it onto the books

Re: Brave new wrodl!

The Rolls-Royce Silver Mist had to be renamed in German-speaking countries.

Share your 2024 tech forecasts (wrong answers only) to win a terrible sweater

Hmm ...

Alphabet announces that it is selling off its advertising operation, so it can concentrate on defeating attempts to track its customers.

UK signals legal changes to self-driving vehicle liabilities

Er ...

"But a report from Parliament's Transport Committee highlights a number of obstacles in the vehicles' path."

Which is rather more than the vehicle's sensors did in at least a couple of cases ...

DoJ: Ex-soldier tried to pass secrets to China after seeking a 'subreddit about spy stuff'

Re: team leader and sergeant

Tom Lehrer in his introduction to "It Makes a Fellow Proud to Be a Soldier", states that the US Army has eliminated discrimination: "by race, creed, colour and also ability".

NASA taking its time unboxing asteroid sample because it grabbed too much stuff

Re: They are doing it right.

"... Who Me and On Call ..."

Unfortunately in their excitement, nobody had mentioned the capsule to the cleaners, and during the night ...

IBM Software tells workers: Get back to the office three days a week

"I think pretty much all attempts to measure the productivity of software development have failed.

I worked on a contract where the project manager decided that such productivity could be measured by counting the number of semicolons in the source code, and got someone to write him a script to do so.

Soon after this edict, function description blocks started becoming outlined in semicolons rather than asterisks. Two blocks a day was the informally agreed rate among developers IIRC.

BMW deems drivers worthy of warmth, ends heated car seat subscription

Re: Old, really, old...

I miss the days when the difference between a Jehovah's Witness and a Skoda, was that you could slam the door on a Jehovah's Witness.

Okay, SMART ePANTS, you tell us how to create network-connected textiles

Er ...

>Whoosh!< >BANG!<

Squaddie 1: "That was close - you OK?"

Squaddie 2: "Yes I'm g..."

Suit: "Unexpected item in the baggies area"

Polishing off a printer with a flourish revealed not to be best practice

Re: Only self-damage

I'm reminded of a PHB who, needing to pin up a chart in his newly refurbished office, borrowed a contractor's Paslode nailer while he was at lunch. Like most nailers the machine will not operate unless it is in contact with a surface - an important safety feature for something that can pin battens to steel girders.

The PHB didn't know this so when he "test fired" it nothing happened. Thinking it was broken he patted the business end ...

Last rites for the UK's Online Safety Bill, an idea too stupid to notice it's dead

Re: The Reg goes all EFF, yet again

"... they'll either encrypt stuff before sending it ..."

"Granny will not be coming on Saturday, but your parcel will be delivered shortly" ...

Re: Possession

"There will be an expensive contract to develop a phone scanner that will tell an officer whether someone has veilid or any other prohibited software on their phone."

Followed quickly by discovering that, because of inadequate field testing by the contractor, a common app accidentality confuses the scanner and produce a lot of false positives.

After the first few high-profile false arrests, smart lawyers would ... [continued p94]

New Zealand supermarket's recipe-generating AI takes toxic output to a new level

Hmm ...

A few years ago a newspaper* in the UK ran a competition to find the most revolting drink that could be made from ingredients found behind the bar of a typical pub.

I can't remember the exact recipe of the winner, but it used the liquid from the jar of pickled eggs ...

_{* OK it was a long time ago.}

Turning a computer off, then on again, never goes wrong. Right?

Hmm ...

Let's see: unexpected hardware, unfamiliar software, not the system you installed ...

Use the pink paint, deploy the SEP field and GTFO as rapidly as possible.

Ripoff Vuitton handbag smaller than a grain of salt fetches $63,750 at auction

Re: There's an old proverb

"Never give a sucker an even break, or smarten up a chump." - W. C. Fields

Google asks websites to kindly not break its shiny new targeted-advertising API

Hmm ...

I wonder if anyone has actually done a study in to how many actual sales result from targeted advertising, compared to the scattergun variety?

I presume there must be some sort of benefit to the advertiser given the time, trouble and expense required to compile the targetting data.

Perhaps only the companies selling the advertising space benefit from this.

Just in case there are any advertisers reading this, may I politely point out that it is extremely unlikely I will need another washing machine until the one I recently bought keels over. I mention this as you appear to assume I am some sort of manic washing machine enthusiast who is anxious to complete their collection.

BOFH: Good news, everyone – we're in the sausage business

Er ...

I think the Boss may be fearing the wurst.

Virgin Orbit-uary: Beardy Branson's satellite launch biz shutters

Er ...

Did anyone else read that as "Virgin Obit"?

Cheapest, oldest, slowest part fixed very modern Mac

I hope he kept a note of what he did ...

BT is ditching workers faster than your internet connection with 55,000 for chop by 2030

Re: This is the tulip bubble all over again, isn't it?

Probably just after cold fusion ...

BOFH: Ah. Company-branded merch. So much better than a bonus

"... accidentally picked up by the office gossip."

Or accidentally swapped with the stick containing the photos for next year's calender.

BOFH: Generating a report the Director can show the Board – THIS is what AI was made for

Re: One line.

"If you gave him another brain cell, it would be lonely."

Romance scammers' favorite lies cost victims $1.3B last year

Re: Young 'uns

You can always help Franz to blow up the theatre ...

Ring system discovered around dwarf planet Quaoar leaves astronomers puzzled

Er ...

I suspect "(full stop)" should be "(comma)".

Bank of England won't call it Britcoin but says digital pound 'likely to be needed in future'

Re: Hey, You!

If you're going to jump on a bandwagon you need to be smart enough to get off again before it becomes a tumbrel.

Prepare to be shocked: Employees hate this One Weird Clause

Er ...

Many years ago I was working for the consultancy arm of a large OS supplier. We were working at the head office of an insurance company and our team occupied half a floor of the tower block.

One morning an officious person from HR appeared, shoving papers in front of everyone present and demanding they sign them "at once" on pain of being escorted from the building.

Our boss intercepted her as she was about half way round the room. He took the remaining papers from her and read one while she got more and more annoyed.

He eventually handed back the papers saying, "You clearly are unaware who we are or what we are doing. Please gather up the rest of the papers, then go and do some basic research."

She didn't return.

Tech CEO nixes AI lawyer stunt after being threatened with jail time

Elevator music ...

... written by the elevator.

Three seconds of audio could end up costing Fox $500,000

Re: Harmony by disharmony

"So what would happen if there was an actual air raid at noon on the first Wednesday of the month?"

I worked in a building where on one occasion a fire in the switchroom had been discovered by the person sent there to do the weekly fire alarm test.

There was apparently some difficulty getting people to evacuate the building, so the rules were changed. When I worked there everyone now had to leave the building when the alarm went off - unless told not to by the fire wardens.

NASA may tap SpaceX to rescue ISS 'nauts in Soyuz leak

Re: Escape pod???

Reminds me of the report into a "spotting" autogyro designed to be towed by a WWI U-boat. The report noted that in an emergency the U-boat crew would cut the towing cable and crash dive.

"The autogyro would then descend into the water and the observer would drown in the usual manner."

Chemical plant taken offline by the best one of all: C₈H₁₀N₄O₂

Re: Ah, but what was the coffee?

As there were two processors it could have been a "double espresso".

Tesla owner gets key fob chip implanted in his hand

Re: YIKES

A friend of mine has been chipped since her days as a veterinary assistant.

Apparently the cat she was holding moved at exactly the wrong moment.