Posts by O RLY 374 publicly visible posts • joined 15 Dec 2010
Unrelated to the article itself, why did El Reg choose a picture of a judge hammering an Echo/Alexa device for the main page's teaser image?
https://regmedia.co.uk/2018/11/14/shutterstock_amazon-judge.jpg
Onto the article, it sure seems less and less like anyone made an honest billion in crypto.
"No one has died"
___
Narrator: A new car built by my company leaves somewhere traveling at 60 mph. The rear differential locks up. The car crashes and burns with everyone trapped inside. Now, should we initiate a recall? Take the number of vehicles in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one.
Woman on Plane: Are there a lot of these kinds of accidents?
Narrator: You wouldn't believe.
Woman on Plane: Which car company do you work for?
Narrator: A major one.
I have purchased my last three smartphones via the carrier for these reasons:
1. I can buy on credit without interest as part of my bill
2. My bill is reimbursed by my employer up to $AMOUNT which can include my phone payment only if it is part of the provider's bill. That amount tends to be higher than my service, so my phone fee fits nicely.
3. I've never had an issue from that provider when asking to unlock the phone early.
If any of those changes, but especially the second, I might change my process.
Sure, that makes sense. The North Koreans still use a date system based on the birth of Kim Il Sung.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juche_calendar
Yes, they have. There used to be several virtual assistants until Apple bought what became Siri, for example, but then they were banned for replicating iOS functions. Time-based blue light reduction apps existed until Apple added Night Shift. One of those app makers, F.lux, pushed hard to be reinstated and insinuated their IP was stolen.
We can dissemble about browsers, but all browsers on iOS devices are reskinned WebKit at their core. Are they really "third party?"
For a fun read about FOOF, here's Derek Lowe, PhD, discussing why he will never work with it.
https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/things-i-won-t-work-dioxygen-difluoride
https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/things-i-won-t-work-dioxygen-difluoride
Amazon the store: Don't use it.
AWS: well, odds are good that many of the entities who get your custom or with whom you interact have some services in AWS. Just refer to the list of things that go down when AWS loses a region.
Same thing with Microsoft and Azure, Google and Captchas
Machiavellian and Microsoft? Yup. Too many people today (not here) have forgotten BillG's old ways because he retired from Microsoft, gives to charity, and participates in Reddit's secret santa, but his actions definitely earned him his original reputation as an exceptionally ruthless cutthroat in a field full of ruthless cutthroats.
The image rehabilitation he's had over the last 20 years is unfortunate.
A version of Iteration 3 happened in real life already in Arizona in 2018 when an Uber autonomous car killed a pedestrian while the human operator was not paying attention. El Reg reported the human may have been streaming TV:
https://www.theregister.com/2018/06/22/uber_fatal_crash_driver_distracted_police_report/
Crash story:
https://www.theregister.com/2018/03/19/uber_self_driving_car_fatal_crash/
Prosecutors charged the human, not Uber, with homicide, but the case appears to be unresolved:
https://www.theregister.com/2020/09/16/self_driving_uber_homicide_charge/
https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/uber-self-driving-crash-arizona-vasquez-wrongfully-charged-motion-11583771
I had a LaserJet Series II that finally kicked the bucket after more than 1 million pages (came from my office) and I couldn't find a replacement drum. Its SCSI interface ran to an old Mac Clone since the last PC I had with a parallel printer died well before the printer.
Loved that thing, except for its power usage and noise :)
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