Posts by stranger

Boffins find 17,425,170-digit prime number

Re: Here's a fun question for you

3

1+2 = 3 but 1 is not a prime number.

RIM-Moto sketch THIRD nanoSIM design as peace offering

questions

I don't get it, if Apple is concerned with the size of the SIM, wouldn't a tray-less SIM be better for them?

also, does this mean that the new design is meant to make the SIM card hot-swappable?

sorry, haven't been keep track of this news.

Diablo III

Re: always-on-internet-required DRM

gamers should vote with their wallets when they see something they don't like, but alas, this game sold so well that the servers were overloaded!

sorry mate, while I understand that many gamers are complaining about the game's DRM in many forums and blogs. The reality is: the game sold well. Which basically tells the developer that the gamers will still buy the game and those complaining about the DRM are an isolated few gamers.

I intend to play the demo of Diablo III once it comes out next month and I have no intention of buying it due to the DRM. But I honestly doubt that Blizzard will notice that my money is missing from their wallets.

a gamer: a person who will complain a lot about a product but still go ahead and buy it.

GPS rival Beidou will cover Asia Pac by end of the year

Re: enlighten us..

other then the fact that since it is newer, it might be more accurate? then "no" there aren't any technical merits. The reason behind the alternative satnav system is a political one and not a technical one.

'Shame on the register to post wrong informations'

Re: Creationsists

while I do agree with a good part of what you wrote, I will have to point out that you skipped on one important argument that the industry is refusing to address: Regional lock on physical and digital goods.

As someone who live in one of those other countries, I can't buy any digital movies nor music nor some ebooks. I have to take my chance on the blu-ray copy and hope that it will be worth owning!

Apple and Proview in talks to end IPAD dispute

Re: "no-one had a gun to their head." @ AC: 09:22

that is how they are making themselves to appear; not how I think of them. The case is still in court, so you and I will have to wait and see.

To many ACs in this thread

Microsoft mulls touchscreen controller for next-gen Xbox

Re: Thumbsticks are necessary in a console

"Even the 3DS has one stick and possibly the 3DS lite might turn up with 2 when it finally appears."

Nintendo already realize the mistake of having a single thumb stick and have released an add-on to add the 2nd thump stick plus L2 and R2 buttons to the 3DS. The add-on was released late last month, and -if I may add- it is ugly. But hopefully the 3DS lite will have have it built in.

whoever drew that concept art, remind him/her what the biggest complain people had about the PSP (hint, 2 thumb-sticks)

the Wii U is going to use a dumb terminal, on the other hand the PS Vita is going to be a fully functional standalone handheld device that can be used for remote play. The Wii U controller is only useful in the proximity of the console, the PS Vita doesn't need the PS3 for its own games and can run the PS3 games remotely as long as it have a fast internet connection (both ways) or a local WiFi.

Now I wonder, which path the Xbox would take, a standalone WindowsCE 8 based controller or a dumb terminal?

Iran draws veil over secure internet access

Re: I have an idea ..

the problem; the government make a decision to invade the privacy of its people.

Your solution, cut the _people_ off the internet.... to teach the _government_ a lesson? You do realize that the _government_ is the one that wants to build the firewall, not the people? You see, the government have a problem with the _people_ having free (not in free beer) access to the internet, not the other way around.

"never threw up a fuss over HTTPS traffic"

man-in-the-middle-attack is their friend, but the problem with this approach is, it can only catch "live" data. If something haven't been transmitted after they started getting interested in you, then they can't catch it. That is why they want the backdoor access, to catch the _historical_ data that you have had access to.

Sth Korea govt cracks down on blogger blaggers

Re: @stranger

Once I am at my destination, battery life won't matter since I will have a power socket nearby.

for my "on the road" gaming, I have other options (handhelds)

logical and should have been in place a long time ago

many people have too much trust in blogs, believing them to be unbiased and honest. But many of those blogs are updated by "ex-fans", they might have been a fan once, but now, the "fan honesty" that they used to have is gone and replace with "for profit opinion".

such blogs, comments and reviews should be flagged as being sponsored, and therefore, biased. And when I say flagged, I don't mean a declaimer in small font at the end of the page. Instead it should be added in bold text in the first paragraph of the post. Example:

"I was approached by company X and was asked to write something on their product Y, I am writing this post specifically because of this request. I am going to try to be honest on my opinion of product Y, but I can't be _too_ critical of it because I am being paid and would rather not be to offensive."

Just my personal opinion, but if someone does start a blog post like the above, I'll be more inclined to read it. Sometimes I just want a product description to be more descriptive then what the vender's website will show. An example of this:

I am planing to buy a new gaming notebook, I found an HP notebook that comes with the AMD A6 APU processor. Now, the HP page says that the notebook comes with "Radeon HD 6755G2 _Dual_ Graphics". So when I read the specs I do find that they are listing a 2nd GPU under the graphics line. So I do understand that they notebook will come with 2 GPUs, one in the APU and another dedicated. But this doesn't tell me much as a gamer! Do those GPUs work the same way as CrossFire works on the desktop, when connecting 2 separate video cards to get better performance? Or am I only going to be able to use 1 of them at time, in which case it would be better for me to get another notebook that have an Intel i7 processor that comes with AMD Radeon HD 6850M.

So in the example above (a honest one by the way, if some knows the answer then please post a reply), the venders website have skipped an important detail that, me as a gamer, need to know to be able to make a decision on the purchase. A paid blogger who happened to be a gamer would _cover_ this skipped piece of information. So paid blogger isn't such a bad thing (some times)..... as long as s/he says that they are being paid in the 1st paragraph.

sorry for the long rant

PlayStation Network credit cards protected by encryption

Re: PSN

not sure if the email is sent by region or not. But so far, I have received the email on my US account, I am still to receive it on my (newer) UK account.

@ Re: Hmm

Update:

wow, I received the email less then 5 minutes after I made my post!.... should I be worried?

Quote:

Although we are still investigating the details of this incident,

we believe that an unauthorized person has obtained the following

information that you provided: name, address (city, state, zip), country,

email address, birthdate, PlayStation Network/Qriocity password and login,

and handle/PSN online ID. It is also possible that your profile data,

including purchase history and billing address (city, state, zip),

and your PlayStation Network/Qriocity password security answers may

have been obtained. If you have authorized a sub-account for your

dependent, the same data with respect to your dependent may have

been obtained. While there is no evidence at this time that credit

card data was taken, we cannot rule out the possibility. If you have

provided your credit card data through PlayStation Network or Qriocity,

out of an abundance of caution we are advising you that your credit

card number (excluding security code) and expiration date may have

been obtained.

Re:Hmm

I have 2 accounts (PSN is regional locked) and just like you, I haven't received an email on either of them!

Microsoft inks Nokia deal with phones set to fly in 2012

Re: I've said it before...

I keep wandering, what is the chances that Microsoft is doing to Nokia what it did to Sega.

They will take the phone OS know-how from Nokia, and sale the improved OS to other phones!

Sony buries hatchet with GeoHot in PS3 modding case

Re: This is all very interesting.

I don't know if it is this key or the key released by the other group. But the answer to your 1st question is yes, and to the 2nd is yes until Sony released an update that changed the key and rendered it useless (for future games). You can still find some of the older game images of the PS3 floating around news groups and torrent sites.

you see, what happened is that someone made a homebrew application which is basically an image loader. At first the image loader required that the original disc be in the bay for the game to load. But as it turned out, many people had a damaged bay that can't read discs any more (shocking, I know). So a new version of the image loader was released to no longer required the disc check and would work fully with a game image on the harddisk.

The key itself is harmless, homebrew is harmless, the problem is with the homebrew that worked as an image loader. Such homebrews is what give the other homebrews a really bad name and render the support to homebrew as a support to piracy!

Re: WTF?!

one of the main customers that console makers have, and the everyone seem to forget about, is the game _DEVELOPER_. The DRM is there to protect the game developer _from_ the end consumer who would like to pirate their games instead of paying for them.

I understand that DRM does harm guanine consumers in the same way that regional lock only harm paying consumers, while pirates enjoy a lot of freedom without paying for anything but their bandwidth. But without the DRM.... piracy will be a bigger problem.

Sony (as well as Microsoft and Nintendo) need to convince developers that they can make money on their console with little fear of piracy. And the DRM is one of the way that they do this.

Without game developers, the console is doomed to fail.

Without the end consumer, the developer will go out of business.

finding the balance that make everyone happy is the tricky part. I believe that Sony had done a good job on keeping the balance on the PS3. Had the PS3 never had the the OtherOS option from day one, this mess wouldn't have been as big as it is now.

P.S. I am not sure about this, but should someone manage to prove that the OtherOS is a core functionality of the PS3, wouldn't this mean that Sony can claim tons of money from US and EU because the console is also a computer?!

I'll get my coat, since I know that people will hate what I wrote.

Google preps identity spotter app

where have I seen this before?!

oh ya.... the "Eden of the East" anime, take a picture of an object or person, and it will tell you what or who that person is.

Men at Work lose Down Under plagiarism appeal

just my 2 cents

for those who are wandering why did they file the lawsuit many donkey years after the song was out: They are humans, they might have even enjoyed the song and always listened to it. But they never realized that it stepped on their copyright (?) until someone pointed it out.

you can't really expect them to memorize every one of the tunes that they have the rights too, and also expect them the play every release track just to see if it used their track! Unless someone* point it out, they will never know!

* the someone can be a staff member or a member of the public.

Go Daddy CEO under fire for 'elephant snuff film'

"many die each year from starvation"

where? In the village you were visiting? or a 1000 km way? or are you just another white American who think that Africa is a single country where everyone is poor and starving?

what I find surprising about those "problem animals", is that they seem to appear right when some businessman feel like hunting.... and by pure coincidence those "problem animals" happened to be what the businessman wanted to hunt!

FBI asks for help to crack mystery code in 12-year-old murder case

Re: Of course ....

or at the very least give us a high resolution scan to look at!

Sony Ericsson sanctions smartphone boot loader unlocking

question

will this be enough for someone to try to put webOS on a Sony phone and see how it will turn out?

MeeGo or MS? Nokia ponders tablet OS

and have developer target 2 different platforms?

if Nokia wish to have its/the developers use the same application across the phones and tables, without any extra work, then they might need to stick to one OS.

Apple 'gay-cure' app severely slapped

sorry mates, I have to disagree

I understand that people find this application to be offensive, but removing it without any legal ground is not the right way ahead. Supporting free speech means allowing for things that you dislike or find offensive to exist. Supporting free speech means that there is no one moral to be above the others and attempt to rule them.

if is is legal for the application to exist, then it should exist. Demanding for it to be remove for no other reason then the fact that it offended you is an anti-free speech move.

that been said, Apple can remove or allow applications in its store as it sees fit. I do recall them removing a game because it involved killing baby seals! Why was that game removed and this application allowed?

ya, I'll go away now

Anonymous collective begins leaking Bank of America emails

but can the leaked information be used?

there is no way of knowing if the information is true or not. The bank will defiantly not admit if the information is true or not. The only thing that can happen is that the (in)justice system will try to use this information.

But can the (in)justice system _real_ use it? Just because Anonymous said that it is true doesn't guarantee that it is! So how can the (in)justice system make use of this information?

HP lays cuckoo egg in Microsoft nest

Re: I do not buy HP hardware.

you left out the fact that they release yesterday's hardware to the rest of the world while releasing the latest to the USofA market. The rest of the world have to wait for sometime before getting the new processors or options.

allow piracy?!

no really, allow people to pirate WebOS and try to get on as many machine as you can. Even go farther and allow piracy on WebOS 2. Don't even begin to fight piracy until WebOS 3. For now, getting it on as many lowend desktops, netbooks and tablets should be the primary goal.

many people have low end desktops that they do _NOT_ need to upgrade and many are stuck with Windows Starter Edition on the other devices. If those people mostly use their machines for the Internet and/or to store their pictures and videos. This new OS will allow them to upgrade their OS without having to buy a new machine. And if they can pirate it, then there is a higher chance that they will byte.

any way, it is also time for HP to invest in porting OpenOffice/LibreOffice to WebOS or they could pay IBM to port Lotus Symphony for them.

P.S. I believe that one of the things that helped Microsoft become what it is today is the piracy that disturbed MS/DOS, Windows 3.1/95/98 and NT and put them on almost every machine in the past 20 years. Also the piracy of MS Office is that made everyone use it. If Windows and Office weren't pirated, Microsoft wouldn't be where it is now.

I'll get my coat, I am sure that people will hate my argument that somehow ended up looking like it supported piracy.

Nintendo readies iTunes-like app store for 3DS

it will be regional locked, right?

they already hinted that the 3DS is going to be regional locked, so it won't surprise me if the digital store is regional locked as well.

the strange thing is.... publishers/developers are the ones who want the device to be regional locked! why don't they want my money?!

P.S. yes, I currently live in one of those _other_ regions, so this is important for me.

Apple T&C upsets philanthropic developers

Re: Apple PR fails again

the problem is, charities will have to register with Apple, Apple will face a bigger PR problem when other type of _LEGAL_ charities want to register so that they can receive charities from developers (ex. raising funds to a charity that donate to an anti-gay organisation)

Health experts flip over McD's burger-flip toy

looks more like a minion training set

then like an advertisement set!

PlayStation hacker defiantly posts 'bible' following police raid

Re: Egorenkov: shoefly don't bother me

Sir,

Microsoft did mind the Xbox hack and is doing something to try to stop people using modded consoles from connecting to XBL. As for the Kinect, the Kinect was never hacked, someone made a driver for it that allowed PC/Mac user to take advantage of the device. The device is _not_ hacked, the driver was a hack job (ie. not official).

did everyone miss the news about Nintendo R4 seller and Xbox mod sellers being charged and taken to court? (all were lost cases but they did happen).