Posts by Kevin Eastman

Blade Runner tops sci-fi movie poll

Missing

I would have expected to see The Matrix and Star Trek II - The Wraith of Khan.

@Chris Collins - I think the movie you are thinking of is Damnation Alley with George Peppard

Firefox passive-aggressives adjudicate Nerd Law

Huh?

I am one of the people that use both Adblock Plus and NoScript. I didn't even know there was a problembetween the two until I read it on here. For my NoScript updates, I get a notice it needs to be updated, I click on install and it updates. After the update, it loads up the NoScript web page, at which point, I promptly close it. My point being, I didn't even know the author of NoScript had ads showing on his page.

Harry Potter hangs up wand in 2011

re: Same Length

Well hopefully, Warner Bros. decided to cut all the Riddle/Gaunt familly history filler that was both a waste of time in the Half Blood Prince book, and yet took up over half the book. If so, that would explain why they are able to fit Half Blood Prince into one movie instead of two.

Best Buy fails to impress with crucial December sales

Future Shop

I wonder if the quoted figures for Best Buy include the sales from it's Canadian subsiduary Futrure Shop.

Browsers fail password protection tests

Firefox 3.04 and NoScript

I tried it with Firefox 3.04 with NoScript, and did not allow the site in NoScript. I was unable to get past the 4 step (out of 32).

After allowing the site, I was able to complete the test, and passed on 8 of the 32 tests.

Brand new Star Trek prequel pics and trailer

Fan Film to tide you over

The trailers and pictures make this seem like it could actually be a good movie.

For any Trek fans waiting for the new Star Trek film, I would recommend they check out http://www.startrekofgodsandmen.net/main/. This is an online fan film starring many former Star Trek alumni, including Chekov and Uhurra.

Hotmail users bitch and moan about new interface

@Ty Cobb

Well Duh to me. Thanks Ty, that's exactly what I was looking for. For years, in most programs, that icon has just had Maximize, Minimize, Close etc. attached to it. I never even thought to check there. Thank you for that, it has just made my life so much easier.

Re: WTF??? Get A Life.......

It doesn't matter if it is free or not, it should still work, and if it doesn't, people have a right to complain. To me, it looks just like they did with Hotmail what they did with Office 2007, and totally F**ked it up. After using Word 2007 for 2 months, I still haven't figured out how to do a "Save As" or "Print" so I can select a different printer if I wanted to. The only reason I was able to use Office 2007 was because I new the DOS keyboard shortcuts. It's pretty bad when you have to use things from 20 years ago to get your new fancy dancy interfaces to work. What's this have to do with Hotmail. Simple, you have people whining the people are complaining how they broke a free product, well, they did it with their commercial product as well, so by their logic I'm allowed to complain.

OpenOffice 3.0 - the only option for masochistic Linux users

Not yet ready for Prime Time

If a experienced linux user has this much trouble installing a linux package, how much harder do you think it would be for the new users or Windows converts. Just goes to show that with all the talk of wanting people to switch from Windows to Linux, Linux is just not ready for Prime Time. Until such a time that the different distros become standarized, and installing a package is as easy as double clicking on the equivilent of install.exe, Linux will continue to remain a fringe product.

Blu-ray Disc a 'bag of hurt', says Jobs

Download Limits

It's all well and good to say that the future of movies is via streaming, but for a lot of people that is not an option thanks to their ISP's. Yes, the bandwidth is there, but the ISP's are putting a cap on what one can download. After streaming a couple of movies, you will be close to reaching your limit, if you haven't already exceeded it.

Personally, I like having a physical copy that I can watch anytime without having to pay again to do so. I have an HD-DVD/Blu-Ray combo drive in my computer that I found onsale for over half the cost it normally would. I have watched one HD-DVD and one Blu-Ray on it, on my 22in WS monitor connected via DVI to my computer. Yes, it looked nice, but not enough to warrant paying up to three times the cost of a regular DVD which also looks good on my set up. Also, when I go to rent a movie, there are maybe 24 Blu-Ray available compared to the hundreds of regular DVD's. Not all of the new releases are available in Blu-Ray either.

OpenOffice.org welcomes gatecrashers to version 3.0 orgy

Hope it feels better than Office 2007

I had to buy a new computer about a month ago. I got an Acer Aspire 9550 quad core so runs 64 bit Vista just fine. It came with a 6 month trial version of Office 2007. Normally I am an OpenOffice user, but decided to give it a try. Within a week I had to put OpenOffice on. It's a good thing I grew up with DOS and keyboard shortcuts or I would have been tearing the little hair I have left out trying to get things done in Office 2007. Thanks to Ctrl P and Ctrl S I was able to do work. I finally figured out where they hid the print icon. Forget File, Print - it no longer exists. Actually, the majority of the commands from previous versions that made life so much easier is missing. At least with OpenOffice, the items one would expect to use the most, File Open, File Save, and Print are right there without having to spend hours trying to find it, not so in Office 2007. As long as they haven't changed OpenOffice 3 since one of the first beta's I tried, I will be happy with it.

OMFG, what have you done?

Not Bad

I normally get my El Reg fix via its RSS feed so do not normally get to see the main page. However, when a story is multi-page or I want to read the comments, I do have to go through the website.

For the most part, I like the changes, but do have a couple of criticisms as well.

I like the new banner. It feels more clean and you can fit more on the page.

Not too sure about the fixed width. I've never paid much attention to it before, and even tough I have a wide screen monitor, the grey bars down the side are not too hard on the eyes.

I do not agree with a previous comment that you should get rid of the comment icons, I think they add flavour to the comments. I would like to see more of a selection of icons though, like nationality flags (So I can attach a Canadian flag next to my comments). Also, I would like to see a male counterpart version of the Paris icon, to make things fair.

My only other critique is the comments. I liked being able to see the first few comments regarding a particular article. Often times, it helped me decide whether to read the other comments as well as to whether I wanted to leave my own comment, so would like to see that brought back.

Other than that, good job of the new look.

Firefox 3.1 vs IE8: 'Alpha, beta testers step forward, please'

Re: IE on Linux

Thanks for the suggestions. I will look into them.

@ Stuart

"I've noticed this too. FF3 has fixed the insane memory leak problem of older releases, but now seems to crash without warning on a whim. Very annoying. It is a rare day for me when FF3 doesn't go down at least twice."

I have used Firefox for Windows since version 1. I am currently running 3.01 with the following Add Ons; Adblock Plus, AVG Safe Search, Canadian English Dictionary, DownloadThemAll and NoScript. I can happily say that I have yet to have Firefox crash on me. The only time it has, it's been my own fault (like accidentally clicking on the BIG red X in the upper right hand corner).

I am just at starting to play with Ubuntu, so will not be able to use IE there. I am hoping there is an IE Add on though that will work in Linux, as my work website and email only works with IE.

Network Solutions writes hypocrisy into press release

@AC

The registration itself was done electronically, however, the computer handling the requests and registrations sent out confirmation emails as well as a receipt for payment. The request for a refund went through a person via email, who was already being paid to be at work to answer emails, so it didn't cost them any extra to handle my request.

@Solomon Grundy

The registrar was 1cheapdomains out of Australia. The domain only cost me $9.00 Canadian, so I am not overly concerned, it was just the principle of the thing. If there was a 5 day return policy and I had requested it within that time period, I should have got it. It was all done electronically and I still have all the emails back and forth, but for $9.00, it's probably not worth it.

5 day return policy?

What 5 day return policy? Last month I registered a domain for a client, only to find out later that day that he made an error when he gave it to me. The very next day, I contacted my registrar and informed them of it and that I needed to canel that one and register it again with the correct spelling. I was told too bad, I was stuck with the incorrect one and had to register and pay again for the second and correct domain.

Legal experts wary of MySpace hacking charges

Looking for a criminal charge

If anything, they should have charged her with Manslaughter. It doesn't matter that she did not do the actual killing, it was her actions that caused the death of the young girl.

It would probably have a better chance of succeeding then the charge they came up with.

Rowling ruling bolsters privacy chief's view of data protection

Pictures in Public Places

I saw a picture of Prince William in the paper the other day. He was on a street with a lot of people in the background. According to what some of the people on here are saying (Chris W), a photographer cannot sell that picture for publication unless he gets the permission of the hundreds of people that were in the background.

Something doesn't seem right there. If you are in a public place, you do not expect to have privacy.

Now if someone was taking pictures of said people in their own homes or gardens without consent, then that is a different story.

InPhase finally to phase in holographic disk

50 years lifespan?

So if they can advertise that it will last 50 years, does that mean that this stuff was actually invented 50 years ago, and they are just releasing it now? Will they back up this claim with a 50 year warrenty?

CIA demands UK halts interrogation tactics

CIA = AF

Sounds like something the CIA would do. Why just last week, er what's that, what do you mean look at the calendar... oh, nevermind.

NetScape Navigator put out to pasture

Netscape helped kill themselves

It really irks me when I see stories that say it was the bundling of IE with Windows that killed Netscape. It wasn't just the bundling of IE with Windows that helped kill Netscape. Corporate greed on Netscape's part did as well. At the time, I was working for an ISP and part of my job was to but together a disk of software for our users. I really wanted to use Netscape as the preferred browser and contacted them, but they wanted like $90.00 per user to distribute their browser. I then contacted IE who were more than happy for us to include their browser free of charge. Needless to say, the company opted to go with IE.

IPv6 roots planted on the net

Pity the non tech home user

It will be a lot harder to set up local networks in ones home. Instead of using the IPv4's 192.168.0.1 - 192.168.0.254, they will have to figure out that the IPv6's ::c0a8:1 - ::c0a8:fe are the (approximate) new equivalents.

Now RIAA says copying your own CDs is illegal

Also charged with sharing files via Kazaa

According to foxnews,com (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,319276,00.html)

"Jeffrey Howell of Scottsdale stands accused of placing 54 music files in a specific "shared" directory on his personal computer that all users of KaZaA and other "peer-to-peer" software could access — pretty standard grounds for an RIAA lawsuit."

For the personal copying charge, it goes on to say;

"However, on page 15 of a supplemental brief responding to the judge's technical questions about the case, the RIAA's Phoenix lawyer, Ira M. Schwartz, states that the defendant is also liable simply for the act of creating "unauthorized copies" — by ripping songs from CDs."

Zep fans warned off touted tickets

Overated???

I just bought Led Zep's Mothership collection the other day and listened to it. It certainly beats the crap out of a lot of stuff that is being released by bands today. Newer does not always mean better.

Rosetta spies nightlife on our sleeping planet

@ Keith T

As soon as I saw this, I immediately thought of Pink Floyd as well. "If the band you're in starts playing a different tune, I'll see you on the dark side of the ... Earth."

Simon Pegg to play Scotty

re: Real Scotsman

Hollywood has always had a habit of using one nationality to play another. Look at Highlander for example, You have an American born, Swiss educated (Christopher Lambert) playing a Scotsman, and a Scotsman (Sean Connery) playing a Spaniard. Personally, I always found it amusing listening to Connor MacLeod speaking in a Scottish brogue with a French accent.

Can't say as i agree with the choice of Simon Pegg to play Scotty though, Paul McGillion from Stargate Atlantis would have made a much better Scotty, and even somewhat looks the part.

Microsoft shouts 'Long Live XP'

Offices still going XP

My office will be replacing about 11 computers and getting a couple of new lap tops in the next couple of months. I found out today, they they will all be coming with, you guessed it, XP. Most everyone in the company knows it and the bugs are all mostly worked out. We don't need dual core 64 bit systems to use Microsoft Office (I did say this was the office, I use Open Office at home) as well as other customer relations related software. So for us, XP is the perfect operating system. So why would we want to dish out for the extra hardware to get an operating system, like Vista, which we don't need, and will require everyone having to learn?

Battle of the stats: Blu-ray beats HD DVD

Apples and Oranges

"Sony's claim to have shipped 1.3m PS3s in Europe during 2007"

As I am not a console gamer, I may be missing something here, but is the PS3 not a gaming console? Excuse me if I am wrong, but from what I know about gaming consoles, don't must people buy them to .. oh I don't know, PLAY GAMES maybe, not to watch movies. So the fact that they support Blue Ray is a meaningless statistic as most gamers could care less. My computers DVD drive, which I have had for quite a while, accepts HD-DVD. A fact I was not aware of until recently, which shows how important it is to me. I have yet to watch one on it though. I will occasionally play a regular DVD in the computer. The biggest reason I got a DVD drive for my computer was so I could play games that were coming out on DVD.

Novell owns Unix copyrights after all

Maybe too early to party yet

This is in the US remember, there can still be years of appeals before this is all said and done, unless SCO goes bankrupt first.

'Portable' CD player puts MP3 into a spin

Old technology made new again

Not much new about this except the design and format of playing the mp3's, I have a portable cd player, that I have had for a couple of years now, which not only plays regular cd's, but mp3's burnt onto a cd as well. Has come in very handy on occasion.

Harry Potter and the Virus of Doom

Good Idea for a Fan Fic Story

Has an avid reader of Harry Potter and Harry Potter fan fics (yes, I am an adult and admit to it), I know just the fan fic author to suggest it to. Hmm, hate to see Harry piss off the BOFH or pfy. I wonder if Simon would have a problem of someone were to write a cross over story. LOL

AllofMP3.com owner faces jail time

RE: At least the RIAA and music fans agree on one thing

Franklin wrote:

"or give their money to Russian outfits, and give NO money to the artists"

I am not sure if it is blindness or an unwillingness to believe that other countries may have laws that are different from the USofA, however, those "Russian outfits" HAVE been collecting money for the artists, and paying it to ROMS, as required by Russian law. Roms in turn has tried to pay the RIAA so that the artists could indeed receive their royalties. The RIAA however, are the ones saying NO, "if we can't control how much money to collect (rip off from the consumer) then we refuse to accept any money and then we can cry foul that the artists are not being paid their royalties". As far as AllofMp3 and the other Russian sites that pay into ROMS goes, the only ones to blame for artists not getting their rightful royalties is the RIAA.

Cloak and dagger Chinese firm tells Google to change its name

You get used to it

Having the same name as a famous personality (if you like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), I can speak from experience and say that yes, it can sometimes be annoying, but, for the most part, you get used to it and not let it bother you. If Guge is getting phone calls for Google, all they have to do is politely say, "I am sorry, you called the wrong number". How does that interfere in their business model? Does this mean I can sue my namesake for the inconvenience of he becoming famous?

One more thing, no, Raphael's favourite colour is not green.

Russian copyright wars to continue despite AllofMP3 shutdown

Re: I love the logic

Franklin posted: "I've always enjoyed the reasoning of people who support allofmp3.com and other illegal music-sharing sites and networks."

You are overlooking one important detail. Allofmp3.com was not an illegal site. They were actually legal in their country of origin. It was the RIAA that said they were illegal. They paid royalties the Russian Copywrite Royalty Agency (I could be in error on the name). The fact that an American company did not agree with the policies of a royalty board in a foreign country, doesn't make make the companies that pay into it illegal.

Also, as someone else here has stated, if companies like Allofmp3.com can make a profit of selling songs at such a low price, why isn't the RIAA following suit. The only reason is that they want to gouge more money out of the consumer, while still not giving back to the atrists. The only reason that the RIAA is trying to force legal companies like Allofmp3.com (yes they are (or were) legal in Russia) out of business is because they did not like the competition and does not like it being proven that selling DRM free songs for low cost on the internet can actually be a profitable business.

Brit uploaders teach Yanks man-hug techniques

Homophobic Tripe from the Reg???

I quite enjoy the El Reg, and respect it's opinions most of the time, but after reading the homophobic tripe Mr. Lewis page spouts in this article, I may have to re-evaluate my own opinion of El Reg. I am surprised to be reading an article such as this, in this day and age.