Posts by Justin Case

Python joins movement to dump 'offensive' master, slave terms

George Carlin

@TReko - I'd never heard of the aforementioned George before. Many thanks for the introduction!

Google keeps tracking you even when you specifically tell it not to: Maps, Search won't take no for an answer

Re: Perfect ending: Makes perfect sense. ®

It all makes perfect sense, expressed in dollars and cents, pounds shillings and pence.

(c) Roger Waters

Rights groups challenge UK cops over refusal to hand over info on IMSI catchers

Re: "ISMI is or ISMI ain't fake access?" (with apologies to an ancient TV advert)

Got the tune running through my head right now together with fragments of crustacean based frustration. Such is the power of advertising.

US websites block netizens in Europe: Why are they ghosting EU? It's not you, it's GDPR

Re: Overreach

>> but you have to take into account the purpose of the legislation

Oh, puh-lease! Think of the children. We only did it to protect you. It's in your own best interests. The EU knows best. Along with patriotism, the restrictions for the greater good, are the last refuge of a tyrant. What I'm seeing here is tyranny writ large. Why should a US corp have to jump through hoops to satisfy the megalomaniac leanings of whoever it is who drafts and passes these EU laws?

I was getting on pretty well with my ad-blockers thank you very much. If a site required them to be disabled to enable me to view its content then I could make my own decision as to whether that was a trade I was prepared to make. If a site required registration, again, I could decide for myself.

Now, I have no choice. Except being of a technical bent I could always subvert the ban. But why should I have to?

Overreach

I'm in the UK. I fully expect EU sites to comply to EU regulations. If I choose to visit a site in a different jurisdiction I fail to see why the EU should have anything to do with that. I know that the EU says it is so, therefore it is, but still it sticks in the craw.

This feels like the thin end of a very wide wedge. Possibly, the end of the world (wide web) as we know it.

I am discombobulated by this.

Adobe acquires Magento to go B2B2C and beyond

Adobe and eCommerce...

Given their extraordinarily great record for robust online security, demonstrated early and often with that fantastic contribution to safe browsing experiences that is Flash, I'm sure that Adobe's influence will be positively benign.

Certainly my confidence in this particular platform, tainted as the Magento brand was in my eyes by its association with eBay, has undergone a major shift in the light of this news.

Hacking train Wi-Fi may expose passenger data and control systems

Re: Routers, Routers, Routers

@ SloppyJesse

>>I recall stories of proposals in the early days of mobile for just that since they had a huge wired commas network for trackside

Imagine if someone hacked that. What an apostrophe!

Make masses carry their mobes, suggests wig in not-at-all-creepy speech

Re: Implant them at birth:~

They already identity chip dogs. When that came in I posited that it wouldn't be long before they'd make it a requirement for humans too.

Can't log into your TSB account? Well, it's your own fault for trying

Re: Curse you, Dabbsy

>>a paddling pool of disembodied breasts looking at me

Yikes - that's all. Yikes!

Sysadmin’s worst client was … his mother! Until his sister called for help

She may be your sister, but...

>>>My sister picked up the word 'puter from somewhere

That just drives me mad. Worse than errant apostrophes. Willful arrogant ingorance.

Ass-troplastic! Printing parts from p.. er... human waste

>>When did this infantile word "poo" come into common use by adults...

I hate it too. Poo is a word for 3 year olds. But everybody's doing it now, from vets to doctors, the NHS to the BBC. No escape from a torrent of poo.

We put Huawei's P20 triple-lens snapper through its paces

Re: Am I that much of an antique..

@Dave 126

>>Sensor and lens aside, your proper camera consists of a screen, processor, storage and a battery.

No.

A proper camera uses film as a sensor. Batteries and all the rest unnecessary.

Re: Just to be clear ...

@hairydog

>>My Huawei phone is wonderful at RF. It works where other phones can't even detect any signal.

Mine too. To the point where I can choose to use my mobile at home to make calls with quality as good as the landline. For the first time in 20 years.

How machine-learning code turns a mirror on its sexist, racist masters

This mighty old news?

>>Text data analyzed during 1910 showed that the adjectives commonly...

Anyway, I'm not convinced this is AI as such. Just lists of related words.

Brit cloud slinger iomart goes TITSUP, knackers Virgin Trains, Parentpay

I was a customer of Melbourne

who sold out to Iomart.

I remember looking at the new owners and thinking Oh No when I saw their EasySpace connection.

EasySpace were the first ever domain name registrars and hosting service I used, before the turn of the century. I found their habit of charging you to release your domain name to another registrar quite apalling. I swore, once I'd coughed up the necessary Danegeld to extract all my domains from the sticky suffocating fingers of EasySpace, that I'd never have anything to do with them or any company associated with them, ever.

Little was I to know, happily ensconsed with Mebourne, who provided a reliable, reasonably priced service, that I'd end up in their clutches once more.

Looks like I'll be moving hosts again - looking for someone just like Melbourne. Someone who concentrates on getting the boring but essential basics right.

Jupiter has the craziest storms seen yet, say boffins

Re: So we've finally found..

>>Next step is pope sponsers...

I read that first as pope sensors. Like we've given up looking for intelligent life on other planets, so now we'll settle for finding the odd extraterrestrial pontiff?

Too many bricks in the wall? Lego slashes inventory

Re: ...

@404

I'm going to be 54 this year

I'm going to be 54 this year, too. How'd that happen?

Hackers create 'ghost' traffic jam to confound smart traffic systems

I despair

Why rely on what a "car" is telling you? A car that can easily be co-opted into telling lies.

Why not use independent sensors that "see" what's really there?

'A sledgehammer to crack a nut': Charities slam UK voter ID trials

@ Voland's right hand - Fail!

minorities also party on Ibiza you know and for that they need a passport (definitely was the case last time I flew there).

A driving licence is for driving. Not all driving licences have a photo. Not everybody can drive.

A passport is for foreign travel. If you don't travel abroad you shouldn't need one.

Swiss see Telly Tax as a Big Plus, vote against scrapping it

Re: This comment section should be good.

You forgot 4) the smug bastards who say they don't own a TV, never have owned a TV and "what is a TV anyway?", all posted with their own innate sense of superiority :-)

You got it. That's me. I am insufferably smug, safe in the knowledge I am avoiding the endless stream of mindless pap pumped out over innumerable channels into British households.

Of course, there's a small niggling doubt, gnawing away, festering in the darkened recesses of my mind, that I might be missing out on something good. Bargain Hunt, anyone?

We all hate Word docs and PDFs, but have they ever led you to being hit with 32 indictments?

Re: There's a worrying implication

My driving licence is paper and I don't have a passport. Guess I'm stuffed, then?

Nobody expects the social media inquisition! OK, everybody did, UK politicos

Re: Again?

"I seem to recall Socrates (much later) saying that he would never write any of his arguments down in a book,"

...you're much older than you look.

Getty load of this: Google to kill off 'View image' button in search

All are equal

Seems odd that Getty gets singular treatment. Surely any infringement against anybody is equally egregious.

All Getty has to do is make sure that the image it offers up to the Google bot has a chuffing big highly visible watermark up it. Otherwise is that not infringing one of the "rules" that says different content shouldn't be offered up on the basis of whether a visitor is a crawler or a regular human browser?

Due to Oracle being Oracle, Eclipse holds poll to rename Java EE (No, it won't be Java McJava Face)

Re: Rosie

Rosie does it for me. Lovely.

Home taping revisited: A mic in each hand, pointing at speakers

C30 C60 C90 Go!

They don't write songs like that anymore.

Dodgy parking firms to be denied access to Brit driver database

Re: Is it just me?

My thoughts exactly. Nominative determinism in action!

User stepped on mouse, complained pedal wasn’t making PC go faster

Re: If somebody does not understand...

>>....should think about a quick carrier change

Like from FedEx to DPD?

Just askin'

Audio tweaked just 0.1% to fool speech recognition engines

So, it's crap?

If a system can be "fooled" in this way, it's probably not doing it right.

Yet another example of AI proving itself to be Artificial Inanity.

Fridge killed my baby? Mag-field radiation from household stuff 'boosts miscarriage risk'

Re: Danger...

I've just opened up my computer and tipped out all the ohms.

They are now homeless. Homeless ohms.

Sounds like a case for the great electrical detective, Sherlock Ohms.

Sorry.

Get ready for laptop-tab-smartphone threesomes from Microsoft, Lenovo, HP, Asus, Qualcomm

Re: "binge watch TV shows for 12 hours straight"

>>Apparently you've never flown over an ocean, or had a delay or layover that's lasted more than a few hours.

I prefer a non-battery dependent paper based entertainment delivery device instead of sitting there drooling whilst infusing whatever mindless pap comes out of the screen directly into my brain.

Bookz Rool!

Investigatory Powers Act: You're not being paranoid. UK.gov really is watching you

Re: Operation haystack...

>>If they can legally keep my entire internet footprint I should make it as legally large as possible

Just imagine if the bots suddenly developed a penchant for visiting websites where Terrible Things™ are displayed. Quelle horreur!

"It wasn't me m'ud, it was my bot wot dunnit."

A legitimate defence if ever I heard one.

Crown Prosecution Service is coming for crooks' cryptocurrency

We're all guilty now

the threshold is about 500 quid in cash where the cops can confiscate the money

Outrageous and utterly predictable. Still this must be the world we want. Thanks to Michael Howard, Jack Straw, David Blunkett, Charles Clarke, John Reid, Jacqui Smith, Alan Johnson, Theresa May, Amber Rudd. A roll call of shame, if ever there was one. Chisellers and oppressors they are to a (wo)man. Is there one decent, uncorrupt name on that list?

What's that fresh, zesty fragrance? Oh, Linux Mint 18.3 has landed

Re: No KDE = No Mint for me

Ya mean where it says "As the distro announced in October, it also contains the last KDE edition of the project."?

I did and read the word "last" and that means when there ain't no more KDE in Mint, I'll be gone. KDE was the only reason for my initial dalliance.

Actually, distro tart that I am, I already left. Straight into the lizardy embrace of SuSe

No KDE = No Mint for me

Prolly have to move back to Slack

Seven years on, Spain rattles tin cup at Google over Street View slurp

When I move house...

Google was recording the locations of routers to make it easier for Android phones to find out where they are when they detect the same WiFi network, and this is something relatively uncontroversial which iPhones also do.

...taking my router with me that will make a mockery of that particularly obnoxious freeloading means of location.

Patch your WordPress plugins: Scum are right now hijacking blogs

Re: Oh Joy?

>> a complete list of user names can be exposed simply by poking the URL:

Yikes!! Sometimes I wonder why I bother, I really do. What a POS.

Guntree v Gumtree: Nominet orders gun ads site must lose domain

Wrigley's spearmint anyone?

I mean, when was the last time you asked for a packet of chewing gum and mistakenly received a mouthful of Colt 45?

Scared of that new-fangled 'cloud'? Office 2019 to the rescue!

Re: And everything will ether have a GUI update or functions removed.

BB >> sigs are pointless

Too right. My email signature includes both landline and mobile numbers. Nobody notices. People still ask me for them.

Why Uber isn't the poster child for capitalism you wanted

Re: @Loyal Commenter "It is bad for everyone else..........."

>>Uber is an example of predatory bandit capitalism at its very worst. They are no example of freedom, they do not enter a market to disrupt it, they enter it to destroy it and impose their own interests on the remains.

What you said. For one shining naive moment back when t'internet was taking off I truly thought it was going to put consumers directly (ish) in contact with producers. Now it's increasingly a market place dominated by big money and thuggish middlemen.

Brit broke anti-terror law by refusing to cough up passwords to cops

Re: Damn it, 1984 was not a How To Guide!

It's about time people stopped using this line.

I think I first spotted a variant of it last century. It ain't original and its utterance marks you out as a failed wannabe wag.

How Apple is taming the ad biz. Just don't expect Google or Zuck to follow

What about...

Only allowing cookies from the page domain - that which is displayed in the browser address bar?

I've probably said something extremely stupid there, haven't I.

Boffins fear we might be running out of ideas

So, what is new?

All the basic everyday "magic" was sorted by the end of the 20th C. Photography, telephony, radio, television, audio and video recording, computers, internal combustion engines, etc. What we have now are the results of incremental improvements to those.

It's not surprising that as the "optimum" is approached, the graph of improvement over time starts to level out. All the low hanging fruit gets taken. The law of diminishing returns kicks in.

Unless something completely new, akin to the discovery of electromagnetic radiation, comes along then I guess it's just shaving a bit off here, adding a bit there and getting marketing to call the result revolutionary for the next few years.

What's your flava? Ooo, tell me what's your flava... of Ubuntu

Re: I must be missing something ...

For me it was KDE 3.5 or thereabouts that hit perfection. Everything was so easy to use. Even Kontact email / calendaring worked great. It's just about getting back to somewhere near now in KDE 5 but the devs seem still to be antagonistic to the idea of a good user experience.

Microsoft's fix for web graphics going AWOL? Disable your antivirus

Who'd be a web designer?

...because though it might be MS's fault, it's our problem.

Daily Stormer booted off internet again, this time by Namecheap

Re: RIP Voltaire

Down the echo chamber of my mind comes the phrase, "I agree with Nick."

That's all.

How to build your own DIY makeshift levitation machine at home

Re: Like the idea, but...

Look at it this way. In the olden days a square wave would be generated with discrete components, transistors, resistors, capacitors, diodes, etc (talk about unnecessary complexity...)

Those "olden days" of which you speak, they're my days, they are...

</wipes rheumy eye>

I fully get the point about ease, convenience and all the rest. It just strikes me as ironic that as a result of progress, it now takes millions of transistors to do the work of two.

Like the idea, but...

...using an Arduino just to generate square waves? That's a fully fledged computational device doing the job of a simple astable multivibrator.

Everything these days seems to have an extra layer of unnecessary complexity. I must be getting old.

Taken a while but finally here's the first proper smart-home gizmo

Re: firmware update

Light bulbs with firmware? FFS!

Re: One day I will perhaps understand

When I was younger, how I laughed at those further along life's highway than I with their craving for 150W lightbulbs. Now, as presbyopia sets in and a wide open iris results in unfocused images, I too seek out ever brighter illumination...

Re: Smart things need smart solutions!

Or even make the light switch the clever thing...