* Posts by Lamont Cranston

1555 publicly visible posts • joined 28 Apr 2010

Apple users complain over MobileMe 'censorware'

Lamont Cranston

Don't the Register forum guidelines

make it quite clear that the Register reserve the right to take down any and all comments at their discretion? Fine for a comments forum, but not something I'd like to see applied by my email provider.

BBC mulls talent Twitter ban to prevent storyline spoilers

Lamont Cranston

I'd like plenty of advance warning

of anything featuring Ms. Bextor, Messers Gervais & Merchant, and Sting.

Would anyone like to buy my TV?

Glasgow cammer not thrown in slammer

Lamont Cranston

There really is no good reason for a custodial sentence

for this sort of crime. Gosh, does this mean that the justice system is working properly?

Akira Blu-ray remastered disc set

Lamont Cranston

"it becomes super-easy to pick out the jet engine roar blended with Harley Davidson"

Not sure this is a good thing - isn't it akin to being able to spot the wires used for wire-fu?

Xboxer SWATTED by armed cops after online spat

Lamont Cranston
Joke

Backtracing the IP and alerting the Cyber Police?

And I thought this was a hollow threat...

Star Wars fans want Sony sued over game shutdown

Lamont Cranston

Good luck with that.

I'll try to imagine a world in which George Lucas gives a rat's arse about Star Wars fans.

Seriously, though, I wish you well, and hope that you get to keep your game.

Lamont Cranston

The perils of online gaming, eh?

No wonder certain members of the industry are so keen on all this on-line verification stuff - lets them dictate what you play, when you play it, and for how long (want people to buy a new game? switch the old one off!). Old, off-line games last forever.

I suppose they could always hand it over to the enthusiasts, but would they still want it after all of the licensed content had been stripped out?

PopBox 3D set-top media player

Lamont Cranston
Unhappy

Can we please have a box (or a TV)

with integrated iPlayer, itvPlayer, 4oD and Demand5? That's really all I want (along with the usual PVR functions, but I've no chance of getting that built into a TV) - on demand films/streaming off a network/playback from USB is icing. Even Vista Media Centre can't handle this, which is beyond disappointing.

I get the feeling that I'll end up having to build my own HTPC, but that it'll fail the family acceptance test, as no one wants to fire up a web browser just to catch up on a missed programme.

HP TouchPad 9.7in WebOS tablet

Lamont Cranston

I think O2 had the right sort of idea

with the Joggler (bleh!) - family use, so it functions as a shared calendar/noticeboard. Still, it wouldn't hurt to give people the option, would it? Unless it mucks up instant-on, or whatever.

The troll in me says you're just worried about hiding your porn!

The freakonomics of smut: Does it actually cause rape?

Lamont Cranston
Meh

I'm glad you got there in the end!

I had a horrible feeling that this was going to end in some utilitatian arguement, such that the rape of one child would be a good thing, if distributing footage of the act would prevent more such crimes being committed.

As to the wider content of the article, I think rape is the wrong subject, and women's wider sexual experience should be considered. In normalising the treatment of women as they are in porn, women may well come to have a considerably less satisfying time in the bedroom, and expectations of men may well be such that the treatment of their sexual partners comes to border on abuse (without necessarily straying over into rape).

Lamont Cranston

I'm no fan of capital punishment,

but I would have to agree that it would drop the re-offending rate.

Brewer bashes Beeb over anti-beer bias

Lamont Cranston
Boffin

Let's all have a go:

Harvey's is a brewery, producing many, different beers, and thus not a ale in itself.

Chess crown stripped in plagiarism furore

Lamont Cranston

He can't be required to prove that he didn't do it

(as you say, can't prove a negative), but he should be able to refute the evidence presented in support of the claim that he did do it?

Otherwise, all acquisitive crimes would go unpunished (the defence of "I've always owned this Mars bar/Lexus/fortune in unmarked sequential bills" would be foolproof).

Bloke ordered to remove offensive numberplate

Lamont Cranston
Trollface

Is he sure that people aren't just laughing at him

for driving a Range Rover?

Lamont Cranston

Seriously?

He might own the physical plate, but it's now displaying an invalid vehicle registration number.

Crushing his car, would sort this problem out.

'Robots can save America', says Obama

Lamont Cranston

Zion was a dump.

Smart people surrender to the Matrix.

Nokia E6 smartphone

Lamont Cranston
Thumb Up

Damn right.

My E63 does everything I need it to do.

Asus $199 MeeGo netbook out next month

Lamont Cranston

Small and cheap?

More of this sort of thing!

Google Chrome extension busts Murdoch paywall

Lamont Cranston
Thumb Up

Not forgetting that a blocked ad is no ad at all.

Not going to click it if you can't see it.

Alice: The Madness Returns

Lamont Cranston

I'll doff my cap to you,

as I could barely get through 15 minutes of Chuckie Egg!

Lamont Cranston
Joke

Chances are that there'll be a BBFC rating on the box,

so you won't be able to buy it.

50 day lullaby of Lulzsec is over .. for now

Lamont Cranston
Meh

"a revolution that can continue on without us"

If this is what passes for a revolution, we might as well all give up, as "the man" appears to have already won.

Man admits writing script that slurped celebrity iPad data

Lamont Cranston

Trying a car door,

finding it unlocked, entering the car, rifling through the contents and taking note of the owners details, does wander somewhat past the sign marked "Idle Curiosity", and off into bandit country...

dabs.com says sorry for delivery debacle

Lamont Cranston
Thumb Up

I tried and failed to order from them a couple of months back.

Having read the article, I now know (or suspect) why. Having read your comment, I'm now glad that I couldn't place the order.

Coalition axes Central Office of Information, 400 jobs

Lamont Cranston
Unhappy

Sadly,

some people probably do.

DRM-free music dream haunts Apple's app-store lock-in

Lamont Cranston
Facepalm

What?

I couldn't buy my son a 'droid, because it wouldn't run the apps we'd bought for his iPhone? What kind of a complaint is that? My copy of MSOffice for Windows wouldn't install under Mint, and neither Windows nor Mint was able to run games I had bought for my PS2; this is normal, I expected it, and, somehow, I coped.

Mind you, I naively assume that, since 'droid is Linux-based, and nominally open source, all the apps for it will be free, so perhaps I should cut you a little slack.

Kiwi gals swig shots of horse semen

Lamont Cranston
Pint

NZ lasses are keen to swallow spunk?

Time to renew my passport.

Beer for whichever moderator has to sift through 3 million variations on this theme.

BT wary of rights holders' site-blocking proposal

Lamont Cranston
Mushroom

The film and music industries have had plenty of time

to make their products universally available, and at a fair price. They failed to do this, and now piracy is normalised for large swathes of their target market (ie. young people).

As an older person (ie. over 30), I'm not in the habit of downloading (because my formative, internet years, were over dial-up) but, attempting to buy an album recently, I found that the only people willing to sell it to me were some dodgy-looking Russian site, or I could have a massively overpriced import through Amazon; so I googled further, downloaded it elsewhere, and kept my credit card clean.

Time for the big players in the film and music industry to curl up and die.

Lamont Cranston

Doesn't BT already operate Cleanfeed?

In which case, someone is already monitoring the tubes for our own good.

Is Cleanfeed an opt-in scheme, or do all UK ISPs have to use it?

Apple closes book on iPhone-look jotter

Lamont Cranston

This really is beyond pathetic.

Shame they couldn't just endorse the product and let it continue, as I can't imagine that it was really eating into iPod/hone sales.

Faking reviews? You should fret about more than illegality

Lamont Cranston

Professional reviews

= people paid to visit places, experience their services, then give an honest opinion.

Reviews written by professionals = people paid to write the reviews that the customer wants.

Yes, internet forums etc. are full of badly written rubbish, and they will generally be whingeing (people rarely feel the need to comment on a satisfactory experience) but that's not really the point of this article,.

Netizens mobilise to recover precious stolen guitar

Lamont Cranston
Trollface

Insurance would have been smart.

OK, the guitar is irreplaceable, but the financial compensation for the loss would probably have eased the pain somewhat (who knows, maybe his son would rather inherit 25k?). And, yes, talking about "my sound" does sound like a contender for pseuds corner (but it's probably meaningful to those who have an interest in guitar music).

Losing a collection of anything will always be devestating to the collector, and calling his son a crack-head is hardly going to help matters, is it? Then again, appealing to the better nature of someone who broke in, trashed your studio and made off with your stuff, is unlikely to help matters, either.

I hope he gets his guitar back. Troll icon for you, AC.

US air passenger cuffed over low-flying pants

Lamont Cranston
Facepalm

"I have enough motility to respond with a high level of violence"

Threats of physical violence, delivered through the medium of internet forums? Guess it's only a matter of time before you backtrace someones IP...

I thought these forums were relatively free of these sort of tedious nonsense.

Apple iMac 27in

Lamont Cranston
Trollface

"a case, which looks nice"

Which is why people buy Macs, isn't it?

Need a computer - buy a PC.

Need something to match the curtains - buy a Mac.

Iranian pimp plates arse up Afghan car sales

Lamont Cranston
Pint

Doubtless I'll be told off for quoting Wikipedia but:

"By 1982, the year suffixes had reached Y and so from 1983 onwards the sequence was reversed again, so that the year letter — starting again at "A" — preceded the numbers then the letters of the registration. The available range was then A21 AAA to Y999 YYY, the numbers 1–20 being held back for the government's proposed, and later implemented, DVLA select registration sales scheme."

http://bit.ly/hyDPUw

I would argue that being part of the "DVLA select registration sales scheme" qualifies as a non-standard numberplate. Point taken, though, as the P4EDO plate may not be quite as unlikely as I assumed (I'll bet it's either unsold or withdrawn, though!).

Lamont Cranston

That's a non-standard numberplate,

and looks very much like an abbreviation of "paedophile". 39, on the other hand, is a two digit number, quite likely to occur on a number plate, and rather innocuous unless you insist on ascribing some undesirable meaning to it.

Lamont Cranston
Trollface

£250 seems like a fair price,

if you really must badge yourself as a self absorbed muppet.

Lamont Cranston
Joke

Send over Westwood and Xzibit,

to educate the Afghans on the true meaning of pimp.

Or maybe just Anthonio Fargas, and some large hats.

Apple iOS 5 gets web 3D...for ads only

Lamont Cranston
Joke

3D iAds?

That'll be way less annoying than Flash pop-ups.

Panasonic preps outdoor Android slate

Lamont Cranston

A tablet that bounces when dropped,

is certainly an attractive proposition (childproof, please). Then again, a ruggedised tablet for outdoor use would probably make more sense at 7".

Facebook fuels Israeli cottage cheese insurgency

Lamont Cranston
Boffin

Does Israeli Cottage Cheese

produce some sort of dizzying high?

The stuff you can buy over here is minging, and no one (barring a few dieters) would fuss at the price going up (I'm not the only person I know who finds it uncomfortably similar to baby vomit).

UK operators band together for NFC revenue

Lamont Cranston

This looks like the unwelcome reappearance

of unsolicited marketing texts. Good job I'm with Three, then.

Nintendo: no DVD, BD playback for Wii U

Lamont Cranston
Thumb Down

My Playstation2

was my first DVD player, and has outlived 2 DVD/home theatre systems (and one VHS player), thus proving itself invaluable. I think Nintendo are missing a trick here, as I would welcome some sort of integrated home entertainment system - something like the PS3 offers, perhaps - and I think many other families would, too (families are Nintendo's target market, right?).

Man says he lost $500,000 in virtual currency heist

Lamont Cranston

I thought that

"everybody who has money in bitcoins" were all in the drug trade?

Whatever, Bitcoin looks like a pyramid scheme, and more fool anyone who gets involved with it.

Toxic Plankton feeds on Android Market for two months

Lamont Cranston

Google approved or not,

the update should still be offered. Microsoft can manage this on the desktop (with the option to roll back) as could my Mint install. Android is an OS, and should damn well be treated as such.

Lamont Cranston
Unhappy

The inability to update Android devices

is a real concern, and may well put me off getting a tablet that runs on it.

Cabinet Office talks to Facebook & co about new ID system

Lamont Cranston
Thumb Down

I can't think of anything worse

than tying up my bank login, my facebook login and any activity with public services. A big sign marked "Please rob me" affixed to my back would be just as desirable.

If we must have a unified ID, then the National Insurance database will probably suffice (the NHS already has its own system for identifying us).

Duke Nukem Forever rocks up on shelves

Lamont Cranston

With a bit of luck,

crap reviews will bring the price down, so I can pick it up without feeling too guilty. Even still, I get the feeling that it's going to be a bit like watching your dad dancing: "Look at me, kids! See, I used to be cool..."

Can cloud save the NHS?

Lamont Cranston
FAIL

This:

"The implication is that the government is such a big client that suppliers will want to accommodate procurement requests if at all possible." is the funnies thing I've read in a long while.

Consultancy firms will happily sell any old shit to the NHS, and the NHS will throw money at consultancy firms. The recent london ambulance debacle has amply demonstrated that the public sector cannot procure the correct IT solution to save its (or anyone else's) life.

Midlands council laughs at zombie-apocalypse threat

Lamont Cranston

Working in a council office,

you'd assume the zombie apocalypse had already happened.