Posts by 45RPM

I've got a brand new combine harvester and I'll give you the API key

@AC - Incidentally, I just spotted the way you spelled ‘plough’. Are you Georg Larschied, or one of his employees, in disguise? You scamp you!

@anonymous coward - something something something a fool and his money are soon parted.

The fact is that third party garages are often just as good as main dealerships, and in many cases (especially for third party specialists) are staffed by people who used to work in, and were trained by, those main dealerships.

And I’m at a loss to imagine how a faulty GPS could ever result in a vehicle being dangerous. Actually, I can think of a way it could be dangerous - but only if the developer / manufacturer of the car were criminally negligent in its design.

My cars are all third party serviced (125k, 250k and 500k miles - a nice sequence, coincidentally, this month) - which I’ll bet is far higher than most (probably more than your Honda) - and which has largely been delivered with the helping hands of a third party servicer. The 500k car wins points for having the most superior design of no electronics except in the radio.

Given how heavily DRM'd John Deere tractors are, to the extent that John Deere even objects to third party servicing of the damn things (ref: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/nothing-drms-like-deere-farmers-cant-fix-tractors/ and https://www.wired.com/2015/04/dmca-ownership-john-deere), it seems to me that their primary use of tech is to screw the farmer.

I wouldn't touch them with a barge pole.

Boffins break Samsung Galaxies with one SMS carrying WAP crap

Further details please so that we can (ahem) verify this for ourselves!

Gimme some skin: Boffins perfect 3D bioprinter that emits slabs of human flesh

I don't need to imagine - Red Dwarf taught us exactly what a printer jam looks like!

Oh, for F...acebook: WhatsApp, critics spar over alleged 'backdoor'

Re: Facebook?

The problem is that most people don’t really understand security. They understand the need to lock their door - but the need to keep their data safe is either a mystery or unimportant to them. So they sign up for Facebook in droves, and use mobile phones without securing* them (i.e. use with the default settings, and with all the manufacturer installed crapware in place).

You can shout about how stupid this state of affairs is until you’re blue in the face, but it won’t make one iota of difference. And, ultimately, (and unless you’re as misanthropic as me) you’ll probably want to stay in touch with them - so you’ll shrug your shoulders and join Facebook too (albeit that you’ll probably take a few sensible precautions, otherwise known as lying about some of your personal data).

I take the hard line - I won’t use this crap, if you want my personal data then you can damn well pay me for it (assuming that I want to sell) - and if you want to contact me then use email.

*insofar as you can ever secure any device - and especially a device with a baseband chip in it. But thats an entirely different kettleful of scary.

Raspberry Pi Foundation releases operating system for PCs, Macs

I was thinking of doing some work this morning, but what the hell. 'Tis the season to be merry. I think I might install Pixel on my old Dell laptop and then go to the pub at lunchtime instead!

Another great effort by the Raspberry Pi foundation while we await the next version of their amazing gizmo. And the Pi really is a Christmas computer because all geeks, whether fanboys for macOS, Windows or Linux can agree that the Pi is a wonderful computer. Brought together in unity by Pi.

Zuckerberg turns his home into Creepy Robot Buddy

Re: Smart toaster?

…well, it could help you fix your computer if it gets computer senility - albeit at the expense of remaining run-time.

Howdy Doodly Doo

I live in a gloriously unsmart house. I have dumb-bulbs, a dumb-kettle, a dumb-fridge, dumb-doors, a dumb-axe for chopping up dumb-wood for the dumb-fire. There’s a dumb-cooker, and dumb-bed (for the dumbo (me) and the dumbo’s wife), and my car has less smarts than a ZX80. And you know what, I like it that way. Private. Homely. Human-sized.

More power to Zuck if he wants a robot house, with a robot girlfriend and so forth. Just as long as he doesn’t try to foist it upon me. I wouldn’t like that one little bit.

'I told him to cut it out' – Obama is convinced Putin's hackers swung the election for Trump

@The little voice inside my head

Is it because the CIA and the media tells you? I know, I know, though I deny it, I'm getting old and a little old fashioned. But yes. Because the media tells me - and, when I say 'The Media' I mean Reuters, The BBC and similar. We've tried the untrustworthy mouthpieces of the alt-right like Fox News, Murdoch's empire, The Express and The Mail, blow-hards on Twitter and Facebook and it didn't work out too well, so I fall back on organisations which are so balanced that they get accused of being biased by both sides.

As for the CIA, the FBI seems to agree. So how about that - trusting the CIA and the FBI. Both have gotten up to some seriously bad shit in the past but, until I have solid evidence to the contrary, I have no reason to disbelieve them at the moment. It's down to who has the most to gain. Russia gains from a Trump Presidency. China will likely lose out, so will Iran. Taiwan might gain a little, as (maybe) might North Korea. But Russia will gain most - so yes, balance of probability, Russia. And who can blame them?

I'm not at all happy about a Trump presidency - but it seems to me that the US has been sticking its nose into other countries business for so long, formenting regime change, that it was only a matter of time before it got a dose of its own medicine.

There's not a lot of doubt in my mind that Russia is behind this but, given America's history of meddling in Russian politics, I can't really blame them.

Perhaps, when Trumps time in office is over, the US won't be quite so quick to meddle in future.

If you bought a dildo in Denver, the government must legally be told

Re: Gimme A Break

Trumpmerica! Fuck yeah! Coming again to wreck your motherfuckin' day, yeah!

The whole of a the US has bought a dildo, whether they wanted to or not.

He's called Donald and he reaches the parts that he really shouldn't be reaching.

Pound's plunge opens UK's tech SMBs to foreign buyouts - analyst

My list certainly isn't exhaustive, and neither does it exclude companies which have been sold by their new owners and repurchased. Indeed, you may also be right about EE. My point is that other countries do block the sale of their own businesses to foreign businesses. And good on them for doing so because it's a relatively cheap way of protecting jobs and keeping wealth in the country.

The British way of not interfering is idiotic. I certainly don't advocate the public ownership of businesses - as you rightly point out in the case of British Leyland that was an almighty cock up. But BL, or rather its successor Rover, was in a very healthy, profit making condition when we stupidly sold it to BMW in the 1990s. They kindly let us have it back very cheaply after they'd stripped it and crashed it into a wall.

Ridiculous

It’s ridiculous that we don’t protect our companies from buyouts by foreign businesses. You could argue that permitting buyouts is business-friendly - but it isn’t nation-friendly and it we persist in allowing our assets to be sold in this manner there’ll be no wealth left in the country. Rover (to BMW), Cadburys (to Kraft), Rowntrees and Lyons (to Nestle), Tetley, British Steel, Jaguar and LandRover (to Tata), Apricot (to Fujitsu), Acorn (to Olivetti), ARM (to SoftBank Group), Reuters (to Thomson), Walkers (to PepsiCo), Weetabix (to Bright Food), Thames Water (Macquarie), O2 (Telefònica), EE (Deutsche Telekom and France Telecom), Heathrow (Grupo Ferrovial), The Times (News International), ASDA (Walmart), Boots (Walgreens)… I could go on.

The truth is that successive governments have bled this country dry and lack the patriotic balls to protect this countries interests. We sign up for Brexit, and we lose the last few protections that we have - I mean, at least some of the buyers of our assets are European.

I’d say that we’re at risk of only owning tuppenny-ha’penny businesses that no one else wants, but it seems that that has already happened. Of course the pound has no value. This country has no value anymore.

Microsoft's nerd goggles will run on a toaster

Re: Win95

Yes but, in fairness, an Apple Watch is several orders of magnitude more powerful than the very best PC available at the time of Windows 95's launch. So the feat was only impressive for the sheer pointlessness of it.

Actually, I saw Windows 95 running in 4MB on a 16MHz 386SX. It booted. It ran. It was possibly the slowest computer that I’ve ever seen. Slower even than a 233MHz ‘Bondi’ iMac with 64MB RAM running MacOS X 10.1 - and that was pretty tragic.

I look forward to seeing these gogs running with Linux or macOS. In the new Microsoft, anything’s possible.

Trump hires very best, greatest net neut haters to head FCC transition

Re: Expending Good Will

@thomn8r

What an excellent quote. Pithy. And with, I suspect, more than a grain of truth. But it isn't Steinbeck - Steinbeck said (rather less succinctly) "I guess the trouble was that we didn't have any self-admitted proletarians. Everyone was a temporarily embarrassed capitalist."

Still, I prefer the Ronald Wright version (your version) - so have an upvote!

Re: Expending Good Will

@Cris E and AC

Coal has had it, and natural gas and oil are next on the list. Clinton was offering retraining for sustainable jobs (i.e. a future). Granted, Clinton's offer may have been a pack of lies too - but, looking at the analytics, lyin' Hillary was a lot more honest and a lot less inclined to exaggeration and bullshit than the president elect.

And let's face it, Trump is no stranger to offshoring in order to prop up his own bank balance. Hell, even when Trump does employ American labour he's been known to declare bankruptcy in order to avoid paying his workers. He's an abusin', lyin', cheatin', racist, misogynist bully - and he still got the vote?

What a weird world we live in. Turkeys voting for Christmas.

Re: Expending Good Will

@redpawn

I’m not an American, and I don’t know much about American politics - but it seems to me that with initiatives like Obamacare and a reduced deficit (looking at the figures, reduced deficits seem to come with Democrat presidents, increased deficits with Republican presidents), middle America (and poorest America) was benefitting from a Democrat, liberal, government. The problem is that less well educated people don’t seem to percieve benefit unless it’s a big flashy change like a new car on their drive, a big house, and a brand new TV - things that no government can provide, so they might as well wish for unicorns. Ol’ Trumpy seemed quite happy to infer that he could provide though, simply by driving out all them for’ners, muzlims and rapis mex’cans, and putting the niggra back to work (yee-haw), and by doing that all the wealth would go to those who deserve it. The poor, downtrodden, white male. Those with an education know that this is just a racist pipe-dream. Ironically, the people who will probably suffer the second-most (after those he will outright opress - black men, asians, women, hispanics, lgbt, anyone who disagrees with him) are the people who voted him in in the first place.

All of which is a long way of saying that I disagree. The status-quo, whether Democrat or centrist Republican, did help middle-America. But it did it quietly, and honestly. The new status quo, the status quo of Trump, Pence, Farage, Le Pen, Putin and so forth is to shaft anyone who stands in their way whilst shouting loudly about how you’re really better off.

Apple unplugs its home LAN biz, allegedly

Re: Apple reportedly exiting home LAN biz

@Dave 126

Cost comparison - Sonos vs. Airport Express? And Chromecast, whilst cheap, is Google - and some people would rather keep Google out of their houses. You might disagree, and Google might be an excellent fit for you, but some people do still value their privacy - and that’s a valid choice too.

If you have suggestions for multi-room audio as cheaply and securely as Airport I’d love to know - my wallet is now open!

Re: Also, discovered penicillin.

Who was outselling Apple in wifi in 1999? In fact, how many consumer laptops even had wifi before the iBook was launched by Apple? None. iBook was the first.

Re: Apple reportedly exiting home LAN biz

Not really. When setting up a wireless network for the technologically unaccomplished I always use Airport because it's simple to configure as a mesh and simple to maintain - so I end up fielding fewer phone calls.

It's not ideal kit for techies, not least because it doesn't have the sort of advanced options (like SNMP) that techies require. But for everyone else it's perfect and it's loss will be felt.

Pythons Idle and Cleese pen anti-selfie screed

Re: Shouting at clouds

Ditto. Fuck selfies. If you want a picture of yourself get someone else to take it. Or prop your camera on something and use the timer function. Or, and here's a radical idea, live in the moment, realise that you don't need photographic evidence of everything, and use your memory. Besides, many celebrities are celebrities because they achieved something significant - they aren't eye candy to be gawped at. Perhaps you could try chatting with them?

Brexflation: Lenovo, HPE and Walkers crisps all set for double-digit hike

Re: You know the joke meme about how do you confuse a blonde ?

"I'd like to see unilateral free trade, lower taxes and an end to subsidies."

I'd like to be able to get fit by eating pies and drinking beer. Oh, and since we're talking about unrealistic daydreams, I'd like a pet dragon called Ralph too.

@m0rt

How can that be? I didn't use any brobdingnagian locutions.

Damn.

Re: don't for get the Chocolate 'repackaging'

Although, from my point of view, perhaps smaller snack packs is an advantage - for the country's waistline if nothing else. I don't want a 60g bag of crisps - 25g, as used to be the standard size, is quite sufficient for me to snack on. Similarly, on the rare occasions that I have a fizzy pop, 330ml is quite sufficient - I don't need a 500ml 'fat boy' bottle. It seems to me that the smaller sizes are getting rarer and harder to get hold of.

Incidentally, is it just me or do the small mars bars taste better than the big ones?

Brexit is an annoyance to me, as a good European, but I’m in the fortunate position of being able to weather the financial storm. I may well get caught in the Brexit inspired rounds of redundancies, but I reckon I can weather that too - although it will be rather annoying.

The people I feel genuinely sorry for are those people who are less well off than me who can’t afford to weather the turbulence around Brexit (which will most likely be long-lasting), and who voted to remain. This isn’t their fault, and they’re genuinely suffering for it. It’s not enough, but I will continue to support the food-banks so that (at least, and I hope) these people won’t suffer.

Anyone who voted for Brexit and who is now suffering? I’m sorry (and I’m aware of how heartless and cruel I am), but screw 'em. They voted to shoot their feet off, and I’m not going to give them a lift to the hospital. It’s unfortunate that I can’t mark my food bank donations ‘Remainers Only’ and expect my wishes to be honoured, so I end up accidentally supporting the dullards too, but that’s just the way it has to be if I want to keep supporting the deserving poor.

I implore you all, make a donation to your local food bank every week if you can afford to. It’s more important now than ever - and don’t forget the toiletries and sanitary products too. And if you are in desperate need of help (particularly if you didn’t vote for this mess), please don’t be too proud to visit a food bank.

Living with the Pixel XL – Google's attempt at a high-end phone

Re: Not worth reading.

@Chet Mannly Actually no, they don't. And they make a big point about not collecting data for the purposes of monetisation. There are a few edge cases where data is used for the purposes of providing the service - but it is heavily anonymised and discarded as soon as possible.

If you know otherwise, and can provide evidence, then you have the scoop of the decade - a scoop that could conceivably bring down Apple (and which would make fascinating reading for everyone else). Otherwise you are just regurgitating the shite that your mate Dave told you down the pub, along with other tall tales of how wifi causes cancer and the moon landings were faked. At best, this claim is bullshit, tinfoil hat wearing Trumpism.

I guess you have an Android phone. Excellent and good for you. I genuinely hope that it does all you want (and I suspect it probably does). Android is an excellent OS - but it isn't the right choice for everyone. One day, when the haters (of any OS based religion) grow up, they might realise that (in computing at least) platform wars are so 1980s - and you and fans of competing systems can both be right (as long as your choice does what is required of it)

Computing ecosystems are at their healthiest when there's plenty of choice. And I love playing with operating systems of all varieties. This is a great time for computer users everywhere.

Re: Not worth reading.

Personally, I'm quite happy to pay the idiot tax - mainly because I'm not happy about giving away all my data and personal information to Google so that they can troll me with advertising.

Don't get me wrong - I'm delighted for Android to exist (a healthy, competitive, ecosystem benefits us all). But I'm also old enough, and hopefully wise enough, to realise that what works for one doesn't work for all - so isn't it great that you can pay a little extra for iOS if you want a little privacy? Or pay a little less, for Android, if you're the sharing type.

On a separate note, I'm not a fan of freemium. I'd rather pay developers for their efforts upfront - but once you start doing that the prices rise dramatically. Which is one reason that iOS costs more out of the box. I also have a clear understanding of what these devices cost - and bear in mind that the cheap devices are either/both made at a loss or/and made in sweatshop conditions beyond the worst that Apple has ever been accused of.

What should the Red Arrows' new aircraft be?

I’d be prepared to bet that the only option is a newer Hawk. After all, there’s no point in having a supersonic aircraft (and the RAF already did that with the Lightning display team) because it isn’t going to be able to go supersonic in a display. The plane needs to be relatively cheap, and yet powerful enough to get itself into virtually any position. The Hawk ticks all the boxes, so the sensible replacement is another Hawk.

Pluck-filled platter-stuff: Bold disk drive makers fatten up

Re: Heee haw

@Olaf

To make the disks dance, you needed to spin them up and spin them down - and then you could get them to walk (or play tunes). If they were out of balance then they’d shatter when they got spun up - so you can be sure that they were properly balanced in the factory. Of course, I don’t know anything about pre-1987 big iron (so things might have been different in deep pre-history) - and I’ve only ever seen disks shatter once (on a VAX).

@Natalie Gritpants

Doesn't it depend on how fast the platters are spun up? If it gets spun up slowly then it won't cause the PC to fall over - and, in fact, might make it more stable once it's at full speed owing to the gyroscopic effects of the disk. Of course, it all depends on how they're oriented in the case…

I’ve got a 2inch tall 3.5 inch SCSI drive somewhere. It stores, enormous for its time, a little over 40MB! That’s MB - not GB. The computer I had before, a 4.77MHz 8086 Compaq Deskpro, had a 5MB 5.25 inch hard disk. So these sizes don’t seem desperately alien or surprising to me.

I have to say that reliability of these devices is a concern. The MTBF figures are meaningless - I’m responsible for a system which can ruin disks very quickly. It has 50 of them - and we have about six failures a year. I’ll take a little less capacity in return for bulletproof reliability.

Incidentally, that old 40MB drive, a Connor, still works perfectly.

Hell desk thought PC fire report was a first-day-on-the-job prank

Re: @ DropBear Respect in the tech sector isn't assumed - it's earned.

@Phil W

I can't remember which wrist and, judging by the fact that he wasn't hospitalised (just shocked) I guess he tickled something at somewhat less than 230V / 3A.

As to the lasting effects, I'd say that the client bore those - which is why we cleared it with him first. I imagine that he was probably still finding dispersed packing chips for a while afterward, but he didn't hold it against us.

Re: @ DropBear Respect in the tech sector isn't assumed - it's earned.

@sabroni

If I can write solid code and communicate effectively with the people I need to why the fuck should I have to dress like you?

You shouldn’t. I don’t. But, equally, you should be able to take a bit of ribbing without having a hissy fit. But, in PFY’s case, he:

couldn’t write solid code (no biggie - we were paid to install and service, not code)

couldn’t service and could barely install properly

couldn’t communicate without boasting about his prowess in his many fields of expertise

…and, after all that, really was most deserving of a piss-taking. Frankly, he was lucky not to lose his job.

Re: @ DropBear Respect in the tech sector isn't assumed - it's earned.

@sabroni "This had nothing to do with technical ability, it was about someone dressing too smartly for the cool kids and being a briefcase wanker.”

Cool kids? You flatter us.

Briefcase wanker? Yes, that’s right - because taking the piss out of his technical ability would have been pointless. He did that all on his own through sheer ineptitude. This is, after all, a man who cattle-prodded himself by attempting to service a PSU (I’d have thrown it away and replaced it with a new one, as per the service manual) - with the computer still plugged in and, astonishingly, whilst wearing an anti-static strap (which, as any fule no, is for operating on low voltage transistorised / microelectronic circuits only).

You seem to be taking this a bit too much to heart though - I wonder, are you really Willsy?

@Chris King - we were pranking the PFY - not the client, who was a jolly good sport.

Re: This is a man's army with no room for cissies (or women or the ethnic persuasion).

@Robert Carnegie “This is a man's army with no room for cissies (or women or the ethnic persuasion).”

Remarkably, for the nineties, we had several women doing support and repair work - and they were amongst the best in the business. One was into extreme sports, and so definitely not a cissie, and another floored a bloke for pinching her bottom (so ditto). I sometimes wonder what they’re up to now - whatever it is they’ll be doing it hugely successfully.

I don’t remember any ethic minorities, unfortunately, unless you count the scouser and the pole.

Re: so..

@sabroni

What is pranking if not taking the piss out of someone for something? If we’d beaten him up regularly, or picked on him endlessly then I’d see your point - but we didn’t, and so I think that you’re being rather oversensitive. Yes, he was (is) a bit of a tool in my opinion - but I’m sure that many think the same of me (and, equally, many hold me in rather higher regard).

If you can’t find someone’s foible then you can’t take the piss out of them / prank them - luckily everyone has a foible to pick at. One of my foibles is my fondness for my classic cars (or, as my colleagues would have it, old bangers). This weakness of mine has been used to prank me, although none to any particularly great extent since I don’t mind having the piss taken* (on the contrary, I’d be worried if the piss wasn’t taken - I’d hate to have made so little impact that I was ignored). And since I’m not prone to throwing tantrums, or overreacting, I’m not a very entertaining target for a prank.

* I went to boarding school. Can ya tell? You develop a thick skin quite quickly.

Yes, I have been involved in a PFY pranking. The PFY concerned was one of the suit, tie and briefcase type (opposed to the rest of us in jeans and t-shirt) and he was very proud of his company issue Rover 214 (which, in his mind, was very sporty). He'd turn up with a glint in his eye and a snap in his heel, the epitome of bright eyed and bushy tailed. Where the rest of us just grabbed a toolkit (necessary screwdrivers, install CDs, Floppys, spares and so forth), he'd carefully decant the bits he needed into his briefcase (a wholly unsuitable receptacle for the job). Had it been me, I'd have opened that case in a slovenly, can't be arsed, listery kind of fashion - but he always opened his case quickly and smartly like a door to door salesman.

We thought it'd be a damn good idea to booby trap his case and then send him out on a job with a tame, and thoroughly briefed, client. The booby trapping consisted of strong elastic rigged to snap his case shut again just as quickly as he opened it, and the briefcase then filled with packing chips. Nice.

A few hours later the client (Hello, Nige!) rang with a fit of the giggles. The plan had gone off without a hitch. PFY had turned up smartly, smarmed his way up to the supposedly ailing computer and (before checking to see if anything was really wrong with it - and nothing was) whipped open his briefcase- which snapped shut again in a blast of packing chips.

We didn't see the briefcase very often afterwards.

Basic income after automation? That’s not how capitalism works

@Loyal Commenter

3. - Not a problem. There are enough sprogs being born right now to deal with the short term. In the longer term, robotics is advancing at such a pace that decent human simulacra will be available thereafter. In fact, I wouldn't bet against such androids being available before the babies born now reach working age - and that's the real problem. Oversupply of humans for a dwindling number of jobs, which will result in societal unrest caused by bored, unemployed, humans. As to the pension funds, the cost of living will likely continue to drop as 'cheap' robots replace 'expensive' humans in many roles.

4. - Immigration isn't the problem and never has been, despite the whinging of the brexiteers. The vast majority of the UK workforce was born here (surprise surprise), but (alas) many of us Britishers seem to have a peculiar sense of entitlement and want to land in a well paid plum job from the off, rather than working their way up to it. And if the plum ain't available from the start then they'd rather claim benefits. So it isn't really surprising that less entitled, more willing, bodies from other parts of the globe should be employed in, let's say, more menial roles whilst the lazy Britishers lie on the sofa, watching Jeremy Kyle, and screwing the pooch with their Brexit votes. That said, I do feel that anyone immigrating to the UK should be subject to the same rules on child count as everyone else - so don't come to my dystopia (a dystopia being the practical implication of a utopian dream - it never quite works out!) with more than two kids unless you can afford to pay child tax, or have no objections to being sterilised.

5. ¿¿¿!!!???

6. We never lost it.

Alternatively, either:

1. Don’t automate (so that there are plenty of jobs for all). This is an obviously silly idea since it results in the sort of shitty build quality and strikes that the seventies were famous for.

2. Automate everything that can be automated and incentivise people not to have children - thereby reducing the population and hence the demand for jobs. Get the population of the UK down to 30 million or so and we could be self-sufficient (if necessary), and a lot greener. We might even build up some eco-credits so that we can continue to enjoy eating meat and driving cars and doing all the fun things that we’re occasionally told we have to give up for the good of the planet. Personally, I agree that we need to fix the planet - but the easiest and best way of doing that is to stop polluting the world with more of us. More than two children? Punitive tax (or sterilisation for those who can’t afford the tax). No children by the time you reach retirement age? Fat bonus in your pension. And with increased automation we don’t even need to worry about a shrinking workforce - because that’s one of the objectives that we should be seeking to acheive.

Mercedes answers autonomous car moral dilemma: Yeah, we'll just run over pedestrians

It depends on the situation surely? After all, the occupants of the car are effectively wearing a tough suit of armour. It might well be worth dinging the car a bit in order to protect the squishy pedestrian or cyclist - no matter how daftly they might be behaving.

All the same, I'm glad that I'm not responsible for coding that software!

My best mate bought himself a brand new Mercedes SLK. It rusted. This announcement just demonstrates that, not only can Mercedes not be bothered to build their cars properly, they can't be bothered to put the effort into considering complex ethical problems fully and designing their software accordingly.

Buy a Mercedes? Not if you paid me.

For what it's worth though, I understand that their commercials vehicles are rather good.

Smell burning? Samsung’s 'Death Note 7' could still cause a contagion

Re: Time to Think Different(ly)?

@Rainer You're probably right. I didn't mean that Samsung should do those things though - I was merely suggesting things that are different. I don't know what Samsung's 'Different' should look like - just that I think it needs to stop following the pack and strike out with its own, radically original, idea. Get everyone copying it for a change.

Time to Think Different(ly)?

It has been said that the Note 7 shipped when it did just to steal a march on Apple. One pundit even went so far as to blame these failings on insufficient testing necessitated by the hurried release. Probably bollocks. Certainly smells like bollocks to me. But I'd venture to suggest that Samsung might benefit from stepping back and thinking differently.

Whether you like it or not, Apple's products sell because they are different. They differentiate themselves by their design (a phone without a keyboard? A computer which can slip into an envelope and has no removable storage? A workstation which looks like a miniature dustbin? Say it ain't so!) and by running a bespoke OS rather than the same OS as their competitors.

Perhaps Samsung could do with some of this different sauce. I'm not advocating that they build their own OS (if anything, I'd advocate that they don't fiddle around here - the radical move would be to ship a device with the OS exactly as Microsoft or Google intended it to be). Perhaps though they could try building a device which is entirely, and easily, repairable and recyclable. Perhaps the components could be interchangeable so that a degree of upgradability could be ensured. Even more radically, perhaps they could build their next devices out of recycled components.

In any event, I argue that Samsungs best strategy isn't to be a Korean Apple. It's to be Samsung - and have the whole world envy it just for being that. So, a new niche Samsung? What's it to be?

Apple to automatically cram macOS Sierra into Macs – 'cos that worked well for Windows 10

Re: Good.

@Andy Taylor

Agreed. Professionals who require an older OS, for whatever reason, will either not have Automatic Updates turned on, or will choose to decline the OS install when prompted. For everyone else this is a good way of ensuring that Macs have the latest patches - even for clueless users who wouldn't think to check the App Store, or understand the significance of a new OS if they did (Hi Mum!)

My only proviso is that the update doesn't get pushed out to Macs which aren't able to use it.

EU turns screws on Android – report

Re: Typical EU

@Planty

Microsoft and Apple are way more anti-consumer than Google

Quite right. Because it's in the consumer's best interests to mine their data for information and then sell it to advertisers. You might not care about this of course, and accept it as a fair price for a cheap device and a free operating system (which will probably never get updated on non-Google hardware), but I'd argue that such practices are not in the consumer's best interests. But then that depends on how 'consumers best interests' is defined - and your definition is unlikely to be the same as mine.

My definition of 'consumers best interests' demands that my data isn't sold to advertisers, that the app store I use is free from malware, and that I receive OS updates for as long as possible (ideally for four years or more).

Google does pretty well on the 'free from malware' score, but security on Android still doesn't match up to the level iOS attains - and this is mostly down the fact that only a small percentage of devices are able to update to the very latest software, with its attendant security updates.

On the other hand though, and whilst I think that the EU is being a little silly on this, the many commenters who write that Microsoft and Apple aren't in the spotlight because they don't have a monopoly have a very good point. There are certain responsibilities that attend the front runners which don't apply to those at the back of the pack. I don't believe, for example, that Robin owners have ever been much troubled by motorway speed limits - but, unlike Android owners, I don't remember the possessors of faster cars complaining that they were being unfairly penalised vs. Robin drivers.

Shit - that was a bad analogy even by my standards!

Ladies in tech, have you considered not letting us know you're female?

Re: What a load of old bollocks

@AC nobody knows if Action Man is well endowed or not. He could be hung like a rogue elephant. But we can’t get his plastic pants off to find out.