Posts by Ross K

Google closes briefcase on Italian job: Execs 'not liable' for privacy breach

Re: "They also can lose exemption if they monitor content."

YouTube comments have lots of mindless filth because the average Youtube commentard/troll has a mental age of 8 or 9, and sees "yu0r gay" as an intelligent put-down.

BTW there's no requirement for Google to police the lot, except maybe to respond to complaints about the defamatory or incitive stuff. I'd pity any poor bastard whose job it was to monitor that kind of shit all day long. You'd gouge your eyeballs out with a rusty spoon just to get some release.

What's Up With The Italian Legal System?

Google is an "information society service" as defined by s.17 of Directive 2000/31/EC, providing tools allowing for search, access and retrieval of data. They didn't create the video in question and took it down in a timely manner once alerted - within hours according to the Out-Law article - so I fail to see how they were originally found by a "tribunal" to have liability.

Given the sheer number of videos uploaded to Youtube daily, it would be impossible for Google to monitor every single one for content which any reasonable person would find offensive. Surely any sane person would understand that, but I suppose that illustrates the problem with any legal system run by old white guys with no technical know-how.

Italy is one European country I hope I'm never tried in... Given the levels of corruption I don't know how anybody could expect a fair go. This isn't a stereotype - the recent Transparency International report agrees:

A number of countries in southern Europe – Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain – are shown to have serious deficits in public sector accountability and deep-rooted problems of inefficiency, malpractice and corruption, which are neither sufficiently controlled nor sanctioned.

Mine's the coat with the wad of used bank notes in the pocket...

London's King of Clamps shuts down numberplate camera site

Re: There's been a resurgence

Cool, all I need to do now is find a payphone.

How hard could that be?

Whitehouse has recently recovered from Lyme Disease and has launched a "crusade" against phone phreaking.

Phone phreaking is a problem that needs a "crusade"??

Private pain: Dell layoff bloodbath to hit over 15,000 staffers – insiders

Re: Opportunity here

Ugh, there are so many things wrong with your proposition I don't know where to start...

5000 ex-employees fronting $10k each?

I assume everybody will be working for free for the first couple of years?

Also I dunno whether you noticed or not, but there is no innovation in the PC hardware business in 2014.

There is no magic money-making product for these hypothetical employees to come up with - they could start a services company but why bother? Everybody's in a race to the bottom there.

I'd advise anybody thinking of following your advice to use spend their $10k on something useful instead, like a bag of cocaine or a few Apple certification courses

Cointerra promises free, specced-up boxen for late shipments of first gen miners

Hmm

Cointerra has, however, demurred requests to ship their box with a plain black front panel so that data centre staff can slip it into a rack at work to take advantage of their employer’s power and cooling.

An interesting way to get your P45 if found out...

And probably not a good idea from a legal POV.

FROM MY COLD, DEAD HANDS: Microsoft faces prising XP from Big Biz

Re: Oh come on...

This reads as if you have never worked in "industry", whether banking, telecomms or even something fairly small scale with, e.g. 20 PCs.

Industrial ≠ a bank or call centre

Industrial = oil refinery, chemical plant, power station

I didn't bother reading the rest of your post because, to be frank, somebody like you who doesn't understand what "industrial" means is obviously an idiot.

Just as well you posted anonymously...

Re: Code does not rot

Have you tried using one of the new generation ultra high def screens with XP? The start button on XP is essentially fixed size, so with sufficiently high DPI you won't be able to find it or read the start menu if you do.

I think you're creating a problem that doesn't really exist.

In an enterprise environment, worker bees won't be using ultra high-def monitors with XP boxes. Creative types and the suits on the top floor will have their up-to-date Macs and ultrabooks. Your average Joe doing a bit of Excel and Word wouldn't have a business case for an expensive monitor.

Ditto for the home environment - anybody splashing the cash on a monitor with a crazy resolution is going to have an up-to-date PC.

Re: Oh come on...

The life expectancy of a multi-billion pound industrial installation normally exceeds 5 years. In case this never occurred to you.

You're addressing me with that comment I take it?

If you're a multi-billion pound industrial installation you:

* can afford to spend some money on software development.

* can presumably employ people who have already planned (or are planning) for the demise of XP, or XP Embedded in 2016-2018

* won't have critical systems connected to the internet.

I await your next enlightening comment with bated breath...

Re: Oh come on...

Yet everyone advocates a move to Linux instead. What do you think they would have to do then? Let alone the amount of times certain distros changing interfaces more often than I have hot dinners.

What? You can't slag off linux on The Reg...

Linux found a cure for cancer last week, and next week it's off to Syria to negotiate a peace treaty.

It's an appropriate solution for all software issues in the enterprise. Didn't you know that? Huh? Huh?

Re: cut off

UAC isn't in XP...

I think that's the point the guy before you was making...

...it was to annoy users

Hardly. You can spend five seconds in the Control Panel turning it off and it won't "annoy" you again.

Re: Oh come on...

"For embedded systems (e.g. industrial control systems) moving to a new OS may well be impossible without scrapping the associated equipment."

Hear hear on that. I once had a blazing row with a rapidly-former supplier: You want me to throw away a fifteen-thousand-pound printer because you can't be f***d to put a f***g fifteen pence Centronics port on your f****g 200 quid computers???

XP Embedded is supported by Microsoft unitl January 2016. If you're running XP Embedded SP3 you have a further two years after that.

If industry can't get its shit together by 2018, something is drastically wrong.

Wait for it, waaiiit for it: We update an Atom tablet to Windows 8.1 Pro

Re: 2hrs 45minutes and still not done !

Boss: I need a desktop with a fresh installation, ASAP, FOR YESTERDAY!

You: Yesterday?? You mean *tomorrow* right?

Boss: Yeah, tomorrow you dont need to come over!

Oh ok, you're talking about a work scenario...

I'd go to the storeroom and get one of the updated PCs I keep for just such an eventuality.

Anything else?

Re: 2hrs 45minutes and still not done !

You are only allowed to "yawn" if the same expedience can be reached than with a standard Linux upgrade.

Can't say that a Windows Update session has ever bothered me. Yeah after a fresh install you've got a 600-700Mb update-fest, but most normal people leave that run overnight instead of sitting there watching a progress bar. After that, it's a few patches a month...

To be honest, I find the constant bleating of the linux fanbois more boring than anything Microsoft can throw at me.

Re: 2hrs 45minutes and still not done !

Don't you just love the windows update mechanism.

Give me Yast, Apt, Yum or anything else please but not the torturously glacial windows update.

*Yawn*

Torrent site isoHunt to close

Goodbye ISOHunt...

...you won't be missed.

As others have noted, it hasn't been relevant in a good long while.

The site admin seems to have more concerned with funding his legal bills with a combination of pop-ups, pop-unders, and "sponsored links".

Even if you could overlook the ads, the search results were shite.

MacBook Air fanbois! Your flash drive may be a data-nuking TIME BOMB

Re: just out of curiosity...

what do you call a female fanboi?

I believe Fangurl is the preferred term.

Re: Interesting

If it wasn't for the memory being full up (256GB), I would keep it.

You're replacing your MacBook Air because the drive is full?

You do know it's cheaper to just buy a bigger drive and clone the old one onto the new one?

Here's a couple of hashtags for you: #unnecessaryspending #brainwashed #cultofjobs

Meh

Wonder who made the SSD's?

On my desk at work I've got a dozen 32Gb SSD's made by K**gston - all of which came in the same batch of machines (from a non-fruity manufacturer), and all of which crapped out within two weeks of each other.

Ireland revisits tax laws to cook Apple

What are you talking about?

Merkins get upset about pumping Ireland full of tax dollars to fund it's health service and welfare policies

The USA funds Ireland's health service?

Riiiiiight.

You've obviously never used the Irish health service - it makes the NHS look well-managed and well-funded.

Every time I pay €50-60 to see a GP for ten minutes I'm funding the health service, not the fuxxing Americans.

Snowden's pal Greenwald QUITS Guardian to launch hush-hush news rival

Wonder if...

...Assange will be his London correspondent?

Turkish TV presenter canned for flashing too much cleavage

Re: Europe & Asia...

Being an American, you can admit or reject EU applicants as needed Doing it because Asia us a different continent from Europe is dumb.

Europe and Asia are ONE continent.

Stop right there. You've just barred yourself from any intelligent discussion on this subject.

Using your logic European countries are on the same continent as India, therefore India should be allowed into the EU.

Maybe you and Matt Bryant need to take a geography class?

Re: Ross K Pong Jefe Cultural

you prefer a bit of anti-Semitic denial instead. Israel is very much "in Europe". Enjoy!

I'm not anti-semitic.

I despise murderous scum, whatever their religious persuasion.

Re: Pong Jefe Cultural

Actually, Israel is an associated state of the European Union under the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP), the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership, and the Union for the Mediterranean.

Wow, I'm impressed. You typed "Is Israel in Europe?" into Google and copy/pasted the Wikipedia entry on Israel-EU relations.

They're still not in Europe, physically or mentally. Nor will they be any time soon...

Re: Cultural

>why Israel isn't in both NATO and the European Common Market

You think they would trust either? Or want to be in either?

You think they would be trusted by either? Or be wanted in either?

They're dangerous lunatics with nuclear weapons.

Oh wait, on second thoughts they'd fit right in at NATO.

Scottish leader splurged £20k appealing disclosure of EU membership legal bungle

Re: As an English Taxpayer

Only a portion of North Sea oil is in what would become Scottish Territorial waters

Learn to read.

I actually wrote "Do the Scots get to keep their North Sea oil...?",

not ""Do the Scots get to keep ALL OF THE North Sea oil...?"

There is a difference you know.

Re: As an English Taxpayer

It depends. Do the Scots get to keep their North Sea oil in your scenario?

The walrus-like Scottish National Party (SNP) leader...

"Walrus-like"?

Starting your article with a pointless insult just shows the difference between bloggers and journalists...

British support for fracking largely unmoved by knowledge of downsides

Re: Simple

So fracking's cool because it gives us access to cheap "gas".

I suppose it is cheaper to frack the crap out of the US or UK than to invade countries in the Middle East...

HGST hoiks out Death Valley-proof hi-cap HDD

Remember The DeathStar Drive?

I wouldn't use an IBM/HGST hard disk if you were giving them away for free.

The *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *CLONK* *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *CLONK* *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *scratch* *CLONK* soundtrack is still lodged in my brain.

Online bookies must keep punters' cash in separate account

Re: My definition of Gambling

If they go insolvent at least you won't get hooked on playing more

You should go to a Gambler's Anonymous meeting sometime - people with a gambling problem would bet on two flies going up a wall. The closure of one website wouldn't bother a person with a gambling problem.

Apple slugs Australia with iPhone tax

No S#%t Sherlock

Stuff is more expensive in Australia?

Didn't we go over this recently re. Adobe and MS products?

New iPhones: C certainly DOESN'T stand for 'Cheap'

Re: It is affordable and useful

I am buying a 5S because it has functions I want like a better camera and better processor. I maintain Semiconductor processing equipment and I use my phone constantly for work. Be it videos of how a tool is running, pictures of equipment failure, documentation and procedures.

You're full of shit.

I've worked in a lot of fabs. If you were found using anything resembling a phone in a fab, security would beat the shit out of you with it and shove it up your ass on the way out.

What a fucking moron...

Pair of complete tits sorry for pervy app

Those Guys....

...were lucky that 'Dongle-gate' fuckwit Adria Richards wasn't there.

She would have called for their castration, or something along those lines.

Peugeot 208 GTi: The original hot hatch makes a comeback

I thought that was the photocopier saleman in the Audi A4 TDI

Re: The engine

Cars should be sold with a full size spare as a point of law after all its on the MOT..

A spare wheel isn't a requirement for an MOT.

If one is present though, it must be roadworthy.

You can't use a space-saver as a road wheel for the test either.

Re: The engine

If you have to let a turbocharger cool down before switching the car off not doing so is hardly the fault of the owner, who is never told this, rather than the fault of the designers who didn't make sure that the car continues to cool itself after the ignition is switched off.

If you RTFM of any turbo'd car, it tells you to allow the turbo to idle for 20-30 seconds before switching off.

It's hardly the manufacturer's fault that shit-for-brains owners can't read a manual, is it?

I've owned three cars, all non-turbocharged all at least 20 years old

You've owned three non-turbocharged cars, so you're an expert on the way turbos should work? You should send your CV to Peugeot...

Re: The engine

You'd have to ask yourself how many of the turbo problems are down to the owners not allowing the turbo to cool down before switching off the ignition.

No offense to BMW Mini drivers but most of them work in the hairdressing industry, and wouldn't have a clue what mechanical sympathy is...

Paris icon because she's the archetypal BMW Mini owner.

Re: @OP

Still, some things never change, and as with the original GTis this is proof that if you put a big enough engine on a rollerskate people with no taste will buy it and no doubt add their own fluffy dice.

WHOOSH

That was the sound of a point going right over your head.

I suppose we could all drive a base-model silver VW Golf with the alloy wheel upgrade package. Oh wait...

Canadian family gives up modern tech to live like it's 1986

Re: irregardless

Goldmember, irregardless is in the Oxford English Dictionary...

Yes, the OED does include bastardised words - usually with the disclaimer that they're 'dialectal'.

All 'dialectal' that means is that there's a sizeable group of morons using the word, much like twerking or sexting...

Re: Can anyone explain

I can't for the life of me make sense of this particular double negative.

Used by stupid people, particularly Americans.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StJ-OK4jiSY&noredirect=1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhCir0E0dxI

Re: I feel sorry for the kids

How do they keep up with current affairs if they don't have a TV?

Re: iPhone and iPad?

Who buys an iPhone and iPad for a two year old? I didn't even get Lego until I was six.

And why no CDs? CDs are are 70s development.

Why so dramatic? Obviously the two-year old hasn't taken out a 18-month contract on an iPhone...

Kids are naturally curious - they see mum and dad using gadgets and learn by osmosis. Big deal.

Schoolkids are carrying their schoolbooks in ebook format on tablets these days, so you're pretty out of touch if you think you can shelter them from technology.

Re: I feel sorry for the kids

if the parents were really that gung-ho they would move in with an Omish family.

The Omish? Who are they, people who don't believe in Ohm's Law?

Indian spooks snooping without ISP knowledge

Re: Because to a true data fetishist there is *no* such thing as "enough"

And given India's less that Stirling track record on government corruption does anyone think that with 9 agencies involved this information has not been misused by now?

Corrupt? You could say they learned everything they know from their former colonists.

Stirling's a town in Scotland BTW.

Doctors face tribunal over claims of plagiarism in iPhone app

Re: @Ross K Does Striking Off Serve Any Purpose?

YESSSS Let's DESTROY them!!! Make it so they can NEVER threaten human civilisation in this way again!! Plagiarism is EXACTLY THE SAME as murdering 250 people like Shipman did!!!

Except wait, it's not the same thing at all, is it. Silly me.

Bit of a logic fail on your behalf.

Doctors are quite rightly held to a much much higher moral standard than the rest of us mere mortals, and quite rightly so.

If some fucker's willing to write fake reviews (and pass off somebody else's work as his own) in the pursuit of money, what's to say he wouldn't accept money from your wife to smother you with a pillow next time you're in hospital?

Does Striking Off Serve Any Purpose?

If these three fine upstanding British gentlemen are struck off, they can just pack their bags, move to Ireland or Holland and apply to practice medicine there. Job's a good 'un.

The EU needs a pan-european database of medical practitioners to prevent jokers like these from practicing medicine in any EU country.

US military: 'Help us build the ROBO-WARFIGHTER OF THE FUTURE'

Re: could they start by

My father took one in the Backside from a US soldier in France about a week after D-Day 1944.

Did the aforementioned yank buy him dinner and some flowers before the assault on his tradesman's entrance?

Furious Frenchies tell Apple to bubble off: Bling iPhone isn't 'champagne'

Ross think you need to learn a little about trademarks etc.

Hey anonymous 'tard, why not use your real name?

Apple Records vs Apple Computers - both in the business of selling music. This dispute is famous - you might want to google it.

Cisco Systems vs Apple Computers - both selling a product called 'iphone'. Apple settled and both parties now use the 'iphone' name.

Proview Technology vs Apple Computers - Apple thought they had exclusive rights to the 'ipad' name in China, but they didn't. Apple had to pay up.

You appear to know fuck all about trademark law, or the story behind some of Apple's cases.

Your examples are bullshit and don't apply to the article. Yeah you could open a Cisco chip shop, but try making your own Cisco routers and let me know how you get on...

I'm not sure about international agreements. The protected status works inside the EU...

There's a list of treaties and international laws as long as my arm that the US doesn't believe it needs to abide by. That doesn't mean the treaties or laws aren't valid.

The WTO TRIPs agreement (articles 22 and 23 in particular) is one of the many frameworks that protects geographical status, so you're totally wrong to say that champagne or stilton chese is only protected inside the EU.

the US refused to recognise the protected status of the term, and so any old Californian fizzy white will say Champagne on the label

Wrong again. Some Californian wineries are using the 'champagne' description, but only when the label says 'Californian champagne'. The US now acknowledges the exclusivity of the word champagne, and has banned its use on new wines since March 2006 - have a read of 26 USC § 5388 if you don't believe me.