* Posts by melts

56 publicly visible posts • joined 17 Jun 2011

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Now Europe wants a four-million-quid AI-powered lie detector at border checkpoints

melts

You're in a desert, walking along in the sand, when all of a sudden...

"You look down and you see a tortoise, Leon. It's crawling towards you."

"You reach down and you flip the tortoise over on its back, Leon."

"The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs, trying to turn itself over but it can't, not without for your help. But you're not helping."

"I mean you're not helping. Why is that Leon?"

maybe they can use this question scenario...

and I'm guessing you're in trouble if they ask you to say only good things you can think of about your mother

Has anyone seen REM lately? No, we mean rare earth minerals

melts

Re: Misinformation abounds on this

the only problem I'm having with your statement DCFusor - the one about fluoride salt reactors being pure fantasy, is the research reactor they had, didn't it run for a year?

I'm not sure what I'm missing between the 70's project with the research reactor, at Oak Ridge National Labs and now, was there's not molten salt? not thorium? or something else inferior?

I'm honestly asking as you seem to be in the industry as you said, and have basically stated it doesn't work at all, but what interested me when I heard the hype was the bit about it already been tested at least in the lab, for close to a year. It made it seem like it wasn't total horse shit. so I'm wondering what their spin was omitting

Ombudsman slams Centrelink debt recovery system

melts
FAIL

Income histories - another fact missed

well the report tries, but they seem to have allowed some issues to be rewritten by DHS anyway

the most glaring of which is that this program went back 5+ years. so people needed to produce fortnightly payment histories for up to 6 years ago. and I think its fair to state people who are landing on the need for help aren't working the same job with a salary at the time, so they are likely to have varied fortnights and from varied companies.

Now the rub is two fold for this;

yes you need to hold your end of year statements for 5 years at least for tax purposes, and this somehow was used to prop up how centerlink could go so far back. However these are the same annual summaries used to generate the bogus debts in the first place

and second, up until December last year centerlinks website stated you only needed to hold the last 6 months of payslips to deal with their compliance requests if you were on payments. This was not so quietly scrubbed from the site when it was pointed out.

this to me should have made it prominently in the report, as it showed they knew it was wrong and they attempted to hide it. however we're used to govt not giving a shit and not being accountable. its sickening and i don't know what will fix that problem.

South Australia blacked out by bad bespoke software, not wind farms

melts

so the wind shut down due to voltage fluctuations, you claim its just a software issue?

those I know with knowledge in the industry said wind in our currently deployed guise is the problem as it doesn't have inertia to stabilise a system, when the frequency starts to shift they need to disconnect.

This is what you're describing, basically, but claim its just a software issue. However the inertia problem is a physical problem manifested by how the AC is created from inversion, as the wind tower doesn't spin at 50Hz, you need to create your 50Hz from electronics, and without large banks of rapid storage and massively overspecced inversion electronics a shift of just a small percentage will fry the otherwise suitable cheaper electronics they have used.

If you haven't gathered, a dip in frequency is due to large loading lagging the network, and so needs a large injection of extra power to stabilise the network. traditional power plants have a big rotating mass that does that instantaneously - the masses inertia will attempt to maintain the frequency.

The same electronics also means you can't start a grid on wind power, I'm sure the AEMO will find a political way of explaining why the wind power that was still spinning didn't allow for a partial grid restart once the loads had been shed.

I'm not against renewables. No I'm against them when implemented poorly. as is this case, cheaply without the ability to synchronise and stabilise the grid. if they are going to be used like that then you need to keep the rest of the parts that can do that work. That or you need to make the wind generators provide synthetic inertia so the grid doesn't collapse when its in a bit of a pickle. Maybe battery backup will come to the rescue in that regard.

Farewell Patch Tuesday fragmentation: from October, MS will roll just one monthly patch

melts

reliability eh?

so does this mean they will be testing patches thoroughly so you don't end up with one of the many rolled up updates breaking something?

after having to manually installing updates after the PC has broken features/dependencies seemingly at random, the one package idea might be less work. On the flip side I am already imagining having to miss out on critical fixes as some not too critical update in the package is broke and affecting the overall result.

I won't even go into what happens when MS want to pull another KB2952644, I guess you get the shit with the updates this way don't you.

Destroying ransomware business models is not your job, so just pay up

melts

Re: Mr. Pauli's Informed Opinion

maybe blinkered by your own experience you assume there is a big factor; the loss of control of data

however for the high volume low value cryptolocker business they don't have the time to try and process your data and do something with it. it would be possible (but no cases confirmed yet) that they would locate files of value based on location or extension, like data from accounting software, and transfer that out while encrypting your data. but the scheme here isn't to steal data, something that would be best done with a rootkit botnet tool, but to encrypt the files and ask for payment.

and if the web is full of reports of the decryption failing / data being tampered when paid then they would see a decrease in payments, as the author noted. Ransomware hasn't shown signs of data siphoning.

i think rather, when thinking about data theft and modification you should be worried about the silent rootkit-botnet that you've had installed for months, which once it has collected your important data then deploys some ransomware to encrypt your photos and what not to squeeze the last cash out of you.

i don't advocate paying ransomware, instead i advocate multiple high quality backups. I'm yet to find the perfect solution for the home user, but third party software backing up to an infrequently connected usb drive usually stored elsewhere generally ticks the boxes, as long as you can afford to lose the data between connections and backups.

that said, most home users I come across don't have any backup, so paying to have a harddrive recovered or a ransom, it's all they can do it get it back.

nbn tries to shift the conversation to future copper upgrades

melts

Re: Chicken & Egg Problem

I like what you had to point out but wanted to address a few things;

> For the interaction to work you need 100Mbps plus, but an elderly person on the pension is unlikely to have chosen a 100Mbps connection because of the extra cost. The impact of this is that they see the options demoed in house the video call quality is poor and so they don't use the system. If they had 100Mbps then they can self limit their video calls in the same way they self limit their electricity usage.

100Mbit is probably correct. and OK its four times the cost (if I recall your maths correctly). How much is it compared to a care worker? This is where you subsidise things, and the company offering the monitoring would be involved in this, as well as service provision really - this is the ultimate in managed services, isn't it. Arguing the price of the connection in a vacuum isn't reflective of the total costs, and looking after someone costs substantially more than a 100Mbit connection

> Currently a small number 16% and falling are demanding a government service but don't care if others can afford that same service. My position is the fast speeds should be available to everyone and if not then people should be expected to pay for their fast internet. The cost of internet services (like other utilities) should be primarily based on usage, not connection fees.

while I agree that everyone should have equal access, ISP's have proven it won't happen. You even stated you need to pay a bit more to get a better service. Whats the point of everyone has 100Mbit if its over saturated and doesn't provide when you want it, ie peak loads

If power and water were managed like bandwidth we'd be in trouble. Ultimately if that was fixed your view would be fine.

> > So what you say s to adopt the current ADSL priceing where people getting 1Mbps paying the same as people getting 15Mbps.

> Your focus is on speed, whereas it should be on data. Both people are paying to access the same amount of data.

problem being the person on 1Mbps can't consume the same amount of data. a lot of data services are throughput constrained. even if the connection was free and they only paid for data the 1Mbps person is going to be very unhappy as he can never stream anything past a radio channel, no netflix for him.

FTTP means you *can* get the same link speeds, and you can pay more for a better link (like you can bond ADSL connections, if you so desire, except, reliable and affordable). then you do battle for your congested bit of data.

removing the tiers would be fine if the ISP's could handle the demand, they can't at the moment, so asking people to either pay more (AVC would need to go up to be universal, surely) to get a poorer service, or those already paying more to have maybe a drop in AVC price, but get a much degraded service, seems a bit harsh.

at least I like the idea of fairness.

melts

Re: Chicken & Egg Problem

firstly, thanks for the figures, possibly my lack of keywords but I didn't find that via Google earlier.

> NBNCo require a fixed sum of money to build the network and maintain it. NBNCo delivering a return on investment is heavily dependant on ARPU rising to over $100/month, and the growth strategy is total CVC revenue increasing.

While I would argue about the financial model and how to fund it, it'd be off topic. Assuming we want to aim for that figure to meet their requirements, you're plan is reasonably well thought out, except it relies on ISP's to manage the contention. If it wasn't for that I'd agree that a lower fixed connection price would be better to drive demand.

> At the current drop in 100Mbps users (down 3% in 12 months) the percentage may well fall below single digits based on the current trend.

(down from 19% to 16%)

I honestly don't know why the 100mbit group are going down, but I can imagine its because ISP's everywhere are struggling to deliver it in peak periods, that is what I hear being in an area going FTTP. It makes me sad really, as people associate FTTP with bad service, unable to pinpoint their problems on their shitty ISP. I don't see that being fixed by abandoning tiers though, if anything I think like a congested DSLAM it'll just make the problem worse on peak

> It has worked brilliantly compared with Telstra's model of charging for speed tiers and also having quotas. As with everything you do need to pay a little more for quality.

it hasn't though, as the sales pitch never explains you need to pay more for quality. its not what the ISP's selling their wares are going to explain. I'm not sure what Telstra model you're referring to, but I am aware of ISP's over selling their capacity and never explaining contention. What is it I'm missing?

> GPON2.5 will support ~78Mbps with 32 users. If so much data was being downloaded, then NBNCo would be rolling in cash and the upgrade to GPON10 would be trivial to justify to the bean counters.

and I agree, I don't see that being over subscribed at that level. (and as someone indicated it wasn't even 32 due to future proofing etc) I was simply highlighting there is that bottleneck and we don't look like we'll be approaching it any time soon. Unlike FTTN.

> I can tell you my car is capable of 350km/hr, but that is meaningless if the speed limit is 25km/hr. Continuing the car analogy, Labor's financial model is to build a freeway with toll charges based on the speed limit on the lane you select. The price for the 100x faster lane is only 4x the price but only a handful of drivers can justify the prices.

I'm confused why its an issue, you pay to get more, seems ok to me. But to go on the car analogy, I used max speed to show what the infrastructure is capable of. It doesn't have any upto asterisks on the speed limits, unlike other technologies in play. Could you imagine a FTTN freeway where you can't actually provide the speeds the cars will travel at until they give it a go, and yet will charge them the same amount to use it? Wouldn't work.

If it was a multi lane freeway and I paid more, but not too much more, to go faster, I would. If I was told I should pay almost as much as my car to get the top speed I'd have to re-evaluate my choices (oh but its not too much if you own a house I've heard you state, quoting cost of house vs FoD, it's a bit of a hollow argument. Like saying you only need to get a good job to get a house in the first place)

On top of that to use the new car you have to pay more, kind of sounds like a car really haha, but I'd rather tiers than a single risky option as a nation rollout.

Labor's prediction is that in 2026 1% of customers will be connected at 1Gbps. Currently I'm not aware of RSPs offering a plan faster than 100Mbps, because it simply isn't financially viable.

2026 is ten years away. ten years ago the iPhone didn't exist and mobile data was a luxury. Things change and as usage increases the plans will come online. Its not a large number so I'm not sure why you think it's not going to happen, unless you assume like I do ISP's would struggle to deliver 1Gbps to anyone. Even I think it'll be offered for enterprise in limited forms before the end of the decade.

> I'm suggesting that AVC prices should be cut to a single speed tier and CVC prices should fall slightly slower than predicted in the NBNCo Corporate Plan.

sounds great, but as I've said before I think you cripple user experience via the ISP then. I'd rather it be a little more expensive to get a faster link and force some form of speed controls on the network than let ISP's do it.

> If 79% of customers are connecting at 25Mbps or slower then the choice of technology doesn't make a perceptible difference. The small minority who want fast speeds have the option of moving to a FTTP area or fibre on demand.

My argument is that 79% can pay at any time to go to faster, put them on FTTN and they can't. Even if they are rolling in cash they need to go through the protracted process of getting FoD installed, and I've seen it being quoted far more than the $5000 figure stated my Turnbull.

You might believe its fine to move to a FTTP area, or pony up 20k to get FoD, but as one of the 30% of Australian's renting, moving isn't fun and I can't magic up 20k for a rental property improvement. Rentals don't get these kinds of improvements. It's a new digital divide and I don't see why it has to be perpetuated.

If getting rid of speed tiers would see the back of this larger divide I'd get on board and let the ISP's mangle away with contention. I know it won't though, as those upset by it at the moment are the small minority.

I think that is the bigger problem and arguing that current use of FTTP justifies rolling out FTTN is not good long term thinking. I don't think rejigging the CVC and removing AVC choice will overly affect FTTP uptake - as much as I'd like to see it increase, it'll just make it look like we have faster connections, while giving us more contention.

melts

Re: Chicken & Egg Problem

I'm going to be upfront, initially your view just annoyed me, as usually it appears to be coupled with an argument against fibre to the premise as a solution

on pondering though, I thought well if you're argument is simply against the speed tiers, then I can understand that. problem is I think its better to have than not have, connection charges being factored in the same - lets assume that the price of CVC wouldn't change in a single tier mode and to offer a gigabit connection the AVC was at the 100mbit price if not more, and it'd be the only AVC available.

I like tiered plans, as when it works you get what you pay for. and I don't see any reason to deny users choice.

What you seem to imply though is a FTTP user at 12mbit is stifling innovation. What I see is there is nothing on offer for the user to upgrade. The early adopters are already on 100/40 and it isn't like that group are a single digit percentage. If you have an innovative product they'll be the first to use it and talk about it anyway. (I can't verify your figures as I can't find them, and as I can't find any I won't quote any. Feel free to source me though.)

Why I like tiers is it helps plan for congestion and lets those who only need a basic connection have it. Sure I'd of got rid of the 12mbit plan as its not IEEE defined broadband but otherwise I'd fine with it.

Letting ISP's have a full speed AVC and them manage like you propose hasn't worked well for ADSL and I don't see it working well for faster links. People believe these companies when they say they offer unlimited whatever, and don't understand contention or QoS. Making it one big pipe and asking ISP's to manage it when they instead can just state the peaks as the connection seems like it'd drivethe cost up for a poorer experience. Especially as the current FTTP GPON won't do a full 32 active 100 mbit connections without contention at the delivery level. (but hey at least it can be upgraded...)

I don't see why you obsess over the current connection speed at all really. I don't know a single ISP who won't let a customer go to a higher plan mid contract. if they have FTTP they know they can do it too. Maybe if if instead of saying massive percentage of FTTP customers are connecting at slow speed x, we say all FTTP customers are gigabit capable. Does that whet your thirst for speeds?

If you're saying it should be single speed for uniform pricing you're really saying the price should go up for those who don't need the same speeds, or do I misunderstand your thoughts on removing tiering?

Data retention has started in Australia, but carriers aren't ready

melts

Can they name names?

be interested to find out who is ready and who is not

I'm guessing we are to assume telstra, optus and iinet/tpg are already compliant. I just don't off the top of my head know who the other 6 would be

IPv6 is great, says Facebook. For us. And for you a bit, too

melts

Re: Nat as a security measure

I'm curious, can you provide a link showing the spec where every TCP session or UDP packet uses a unique IPv6 address?

I have previously been told this privacy function allows you to discard the old address on a whim, and its often cited as daily. I can't imagine the network stack doing it per connection, but if so I'd like to read about the spec.

My impression is if the privacy extensions work as I've previously seen explained, you'd see your address change say a few times a day, say every 8 hours. So for 8 hours you have a unique and new IP.

My thoughts are, as soon as you log onto facebook with that, your unique IP is suddenly identified with you, and facebooks advertising system can then track you for that 8 hours or whatever till the IP is renewed.

Now if every connection uses its own IP then you'd wreck that. I just didn't think one IP per connection would be helpful for routing tables and more so arp tables and the like.

Config file wipe blunder caused deadly Airbus A400M crash – claim

melts

Re: I would not store critical configuration data in a config file.

i think irrespective of the method of storing the values, testing should have determined they were indeed missing

I've done, albeit as a hobby, work with car ECU's, and although you can start a car with a variety of settings missing or misconfigured, you certainly can't take it past the failsafe region without seeing obvious issues. IE miscalibrate/configure the airflow sensor and you'll be able to start the engine and it'll idle, take the revs above 3,000 rpm (or whatever your limp home values are) and you'll see it enter limp home mode as soon as the other sensors data diverges from airflow.

I'm sure they had a more complex fault than that, simply as they had enough power to get into the air.

would very much like to see more info on what happened, as I can only speculate that it was something like a cloning of the settings from the running engine to the others that put a sensor just out of bounds as altitude increased, but what sensor would read like that is a curiosity to me.

Science teacher jammed his school kids' phones, gets week suspension

melts

Re: What?

if your LAND LINE (why the caps i don't know) is overloaded, are you really saying the mobile network stayed up. From what i recall mobile networks fall over first.

also they can be jammed easier than wires can be cut. if someone is cutting your landlines i'd expect them to have a jammer too - or they are idiots. cutting copper would be hard in a school where it would be terminated into an MDF. jamming would be flicking a switch in a device in your backpack...

NBN must limit downloads to 12 Mbps downloads until copper handover

melts

Re: Coalition could fix the speed issue quickly

I read your post, i see figures, but don't get the info you're trying to convey.

people are choosing to pay less for less bandwidth, but having that choice is bad?

or is it more than 25% of people are choosing speeds higher than guaranteed* under the lib MTM FTTN build? (now not a promise, but it was only an election promise, not something serious...)

or that 63% of people are choosing speeds that won't be available for the first 2-4 years on FTTN?

or are you saying that by removing speed tiers - and assuming capitalism doesn't let me down here - forcing 12Mbit users to pay more for an upto 25Mbit service, or worse pay the same as a 100Mbit user if you remove all tiers, this is somehow better, because they won't be on guaranteed 12Mbit speeds anymore?

I'm not sure what to take away from your post, as it appears to suggest that tiered pricing is bad just so we get better rankings somewhere, while ignoring that **up to speeds aren't a reliable indicator - & that is with a double asterisk as they need to blame the copper as well as the remote servers, internet pipes, contention, etc. FTTN upto speeds mean you are restricted at your door, you can't go faster by going to a local server as the data from your house is the slow point. Thats a bad situation to be in.

I'd rather tiered speeds and reliable fibre that can support 100Mbit now, 1Gbit/sec shortly and beyond as central components get updated, rather than FTTN that we already know is going to be FTTP in their 'beyond' planning, I doubt they'll even roll out G.fast before converting FTTN to FTTP.

I'm also fine with people picking the speed they need. unless you want to pay for anyone on a low income (or government allowances) to get a free upgrade to upto** 100mbit, why not just let them pay less for 12mbit. Then allow those who want it pay more and get more. as your average upto figure is, even without restrictions going to be around 25-30mbit, BT already showed this, so why pretend its upto** 100mbit.

TPG ups offer for iiNet to AU$1.56bn, includes clever cash kicker

melts

yay for markets...

well I guess this is just the magic of markets and capitalism, being able to buy out companies just because...

iinet have track record doing it themselves, I was a westnet customer who ended up in iinets clutches, and although support was pretty reasonable initially I've watched it slide and my last move was far from reasonable as there seemed to be a lack of information on their part, I got different answers about service availability over 3 calls, and this was for my business account.

I assume tpg will see this kind of customer service decline to continue, but I'd rather see tpg over m2, they are deliberately horrible - my only determination after dealing with them.

problem I have going forward is who to move over to, I guess for now I'll see how it pans out, surely they won't have issues delivering non contended ADSL2 for a while after the buyout...

M2 drops on knee, offers scrip ring for iiNet's hand

melts

oh god no

from the useless muppets that brought you commander....

i can't imagine how iinet could survive being bought by m2 long term. i dread dealing with any of our customers who were sneakily promised the world and received the 'commander experience'. random disconnections, clueless operators and stupid and useless 'security' put between anyone with a clue and commander so you can't get any idea what the problem is... woeful all round. if even a fraction of these issues creep into iinet i'd despair, and hope it costs them a large portion of their customer base.

Telstra's NBN boondoggle nearly set in stone: reports

melts

Re: Is this now more expensive than the FTTP alternative?

> Restricting access to high speeds is firstly bad for the country because it limits what people can do with the network. If you only have a 12/1Mbps connection then eHealth, HD video conferencing, etc. are out. Secondly it makes a mockery of what Labor promised, because only a very limited few would ever experience the benefits.

the FTTN network restricts access to high speeds by being not fit for purpose. until I know upload speeds FTTN is just as bad as 12/1, or worse when in reality it drops out in bad weather.

that non-withstanding, if you need to offer ehealth you subsidise the faster plans with the savings of ehealth delivery. but that would be clever thinking...

lastly, 50% opt for higher than 12/1. yet you say only a very limited few will get the benefits? is that like saying only a very limited few will opt for 12/1?

if FTTP 100/40 is cheaper NOW than luck of the draw ADSL2 then it is cheaper overall (download quotas the same, naturally). the fact that people can be even cheaper and pay even less to have 12/1 is their choice, if they have no need for ehealth and so on then they are better off overall. you have to be arguing the worst off should pay more so the bottom rung is more equal? while the middle classes (like say myself as you identified) are worse off as we don't get to choose anymore. Sure when i'm upper middle class and own property maybe i'll give less fucks, but right now i see FTTN as a way a lot of people will get screwed over, including myself as a renter.

melts

Re: NBN Woes

you went with Telstra? well thats your mistake, can't blame anyone but yourself for that.

iiNet had me live within 2 hours of NBN tech leaving site, spent most of that waiting for the NBNCo to acknowledge the installer had finished his work...

melts

Re: Is this now more expensive than the FTTP alternative?

I'm trying to figure out how offering a choice in speed somehow discolours labors network.

sure their bull headed drive to remove ADSL type services from rural townships would have been stupid, but they didn't get that far with it. Don't think VDSL would have worked there without large investment though. Of the number of rural centers I've been through and worked in their density would work against FTTN VDSL.

That aside, you're argument is that only those who can afford it will be early adopters of higher speeds. Ok so you're saying its a bad thing that it costs so much? it's like you haven't compared it to anything else and just called it expensive. At least its available with FTTP NBN without retrofit. If I want 1Gbps with FTTN what do I do? not get it, and if VDSL ever gets that good, oh, just replace all the cabinets...

But compare NBN Gbps with anything offering even say 400Mbps. Sure I can go e-line but that'd run more than a million a year. I guess if NBN 1000/400 costs are compared to a ferrari then eline 1000/1000 is a death star? or US war machine at least.

I'm moving away from an NBN enabled house as the house is crap and the wife is over it. If I wanted to keep any kind of upload speed - which is what I like, esp for work - I don't have a single option that costs less than a tenth my current plan. Try to get the reliability of fibre and suddenly I'm installing.. fibre as eline or ATM. the install cost alone would pay for my plan for NBN 15 years.

so to me the NBN isn't expensive (actually I forgot another obvious point - I'll be moving to offnet ADSL2 with iiNet and it will, thanks to line rental, cost $15 a month more than my 100/40 plan with the same download limits) and people pay for what they need. Giving people the option is capitalism, does that make FTTN communist junk? (answer, no just junk will do)

if you want to address reliability next feel free.

NBN Co, Turnbull, issue contradictory broadband speed promises

melts

Re: Labor predicted 50% at 12Mbps

you must be an economist the way you use figures.

FTTP gives everyone the same choice, and as you point out, 50% will choose 12/1

this MTM is going to ensure you can get 25/? - anything else is luck

so the other 50% who want more than a bottom rung, essentially lose that choice without a hefty bill (assuming fibre direct ever happens). And sure less than 1% of a house cost so if you buy a house, you'd get that done. but i can't see any landlords going for it. and as renters aren't the most affluent it's unlikely they'll be able to afford to do it - and honestly, unless you had very good terms you couldn't unless you paid it outright.

I don't agree with a some of the ways labor went about their NBN, but this is purely vindictive. The revised build costs for FTTP have been coming down, and the FTTN costs have been going up. That gets ignored. Yes moving ADSL users off that network for fixed wireless is terrible, but the copper was an issue, only small scale deals would have fixed that. FTTN isn't going to help the guy on good ADSL in the country, he isn't going to get a FTTN node any time soon, or ever, so all he might win is getting to keep the ADSL. LNP is still rolling out fixed wireless so it'll probably mean the guy loses his ADSL anyway.

We already know HFC is not fit for purpose, even when it was overpriced I watched HFC networks peak out and serious users swap to ADSL. Why is buying one terrible system and building another terrible system on top of a falling apart system still going ahead. Its vindictive.

just because when offered 50% of people will choose price over performance doesn't mean the other 50% want to lose their options to choose because its better than the bottom rung. I'm sure 25/? Mbps FTTN will cost more than the 12/1 FTTP so really everyone loses, either paying more or getting less. Not to mention anything of reliability or uploads just finalises how terrible this is.

but fuck yea team australia, maybe abbott's head is turnbulls suppository of wisdom these days.

Chipmaker FTDI bricking counterfeit kit

melts

Re: life support?

aaaaand...

they plug it in and they can't download said logs.

kit is otherwise unaffected.

that is the scope of these changes.

yes its annoying, but far better than having the counterfeit goods seized, they provide a tool to flip the bit back.

i wonder if people would be so up in arms if they tried to use a feature of their chips that clones didn't do properly and it did cause physical destruction - like say an instruction that the clone chip gets stuck on, draws too much current, cooks another interface.. would you be up in arms that FTDI didn't do something to flag these chips. I wonder

everyone likes to blame other people, but the fact is counterfeit goods are always punter loses. you have to seek redress from the seller. all the important things people have said this chip might be in will have sellers standing behind them. yea some stuff from ebay etc will be affected, but you'll either follow instructions and fix it or move on. if i had licensed a VID i wouldn't want others to be using it, or piggybacking my drivers from illegally using the VID. Not sure why so many think punters should be able to benefit from it, do you tell the cops you didn't know you were speeding too?

(and now i feel dirty for saying that, as i hate the police focus on speed and generally think in things civil, companies should be on their own dealing with it, but this is that isn't it.

Apple, Google mobe encryption good news... for TERRORISTS – EU top cop

melts

hits the nail on the head, did he not realise

Troels Oerting actually identified the problem this move is for so clearly - "In any democratic society we need to provide law enforcement with a right to obtain information authorised by a judge, based on a clear suspicion, in cases involving serious crime or terrorism"

the part about about being authorised by a judge, and being based on a clear suspicion. These veils of 'national security' have abolished that, this is the reaction.

as long as laws exist that allow for sweeping - unmonitored or monitored in secret - spying on people, these technologies should exist, and be widely used.

terrorism is so overblown its fucking pathetic it gets air time let alone the ability to mold policy. call it what it is, cowards attacking your way of life and stand tall, rather than huddling in fear like they want you to. don't see why its so hard to do.

Turnbull: NBN won't turn your town into Silicon Valley

melts

Re: extra costs

god you have no idea

"The cost of "keeping up the copper network", as you say, are nothing compared to the costs of ripping out all that working cable and replacing it with fibre."

so remediation works for copper, which will be ongoing as copper ages, is what but wasted money if your end game is FTTP? Telstra are doing what they need to do as a public company and bending the Govt over for access to copper that will be ditched in 10-15 years. Why you could possibly support this is fucking nuts - or you're a Telstra shareholder. Between gaining access and the ongoing upkeep cost which hasn't been reported at all - but hey lets have another report on labors FTTP - this copper network is going to be the most expensive part of the MTM, eclipsing all only to be binned in a decade.

Turnbull has already admitted FTTP is the end game, and this MTM is to get things up and running faster. However as someone in an area that is getting NBN this political bullshit has stalled the rollout. There are locations that are NBN enabled that can't get the lead-ins down for 4,5,6 months, and I've been told it's the uncertainly for jobs thinning staffing, so noone on the ground do the work.

So MTM is doing nothing positive. NOTHING. NOT A DAMN THING. but you'll act as though you're saving money, even though labor underwrote FTTP with bonds, taking it off the budget and meaning not a damn cent of our taxes were paying for it, if it got to making a profit at least. Now though we are destined to pay Telstra for a copper network they were largely gifted from the govt, its almost as if this whole thing has been a corporate welfare scheme. I'm sure MTM won't run at a profit so this will come out of the budget in coming years too. BUT THE BIG SCARY NUMBERS ARE LESS BIG IF YOU LISTEN TO MALCOM, right?

The NBN questions Malcolm Turnbull won't answer

melts
Meh

guaranteed speeds?

one thing that stands out to me is actual connection speeds, and I think Malcolm should be called out on it.

what is the minimum line speed that will be guaranteed under their FTTN proposal. From my reading of their announcement its no better than the current Telstra agreement, namely, you have sync so you have a working internets.

Currently as many may know once you have sync and any speed at all the line is considered good and you live with what you get. Even if like me you sync at 10/1 in summer and 5/0.7 in winter you can't fault the line even though its obvious water is getting in somewhere and causing problems.

I see this VDSL as a clear extension of that otherwise they'd be delivering not up to 25mbit but an actual 25mbit. To me this is the real rub as they should be frank about it. If you have bad ADSL now you'll get bad VDSL under the liberal plan.

Does BT have stats on aggregate connection speeds for their rollout? I can't imagine everyone gets perfect speeds while re-using copper, and if I'm wrong then I'd love to see the stats to back it up.

Stallman: Ubuntu spyware makes it JUST AS BAD as Windows

melts
WTF?

Re: Bearded man has informed opinion

"If I use the modem provided by my broadband provider, they can log on to it, all for maintenance and service reasons for the good of their customers."

you let your ISP log onto your CPE? really?

Or do you not own it and plug a router into said device?

every ISP here offers the router with a modem built in device here that you pay for up front at some 'discounted' rate when you join up. Then you get a branded box with stuff pre-loaded, but its yours and they won't go logging into it.

Fair game if its their kit but I'd never let any ISP touch my gear, for optimisations or otherwise. If they feel the need to optimise they can drop me a line, they have my email address after all.

Google finds MORE slurped Street View data down under

melts
WTF?

i really don't see what the fuss is about

unencrypted wifi should be treated like shouting, ie updating your facebook status on an unencrypted wifi network should be the same as opening a window and shouting your status at everyone within earshot.

just because a google car came past at the same time as you shouting doesn't mean they did anything wrong.

I don't see how this is any different, except people apparently have no understanding of what it means to be running an unencrypted network and demand hand holding and legal protection for their stupidity.

on top of that unencrypted networks are rare these days, and i'd say most people who think they are affected aren't, and anyone here who was should understand they were broadcasting their data and not expect it not to be accessible to others.

anyway, that'd be my thoughts on it. roll on the govt plans to capture your data even if you don't want it captured then the populace can complain.

World's power-grid cyber breach traced to notorious Chinese crew

melts
Go

Re: Ignoramuses

having seen parts of a power control network, I think they have a few tricks up their sleeves that you haven't considered, although in other areas you take it to the logical extreme that they aren't willing to do.

but shielding is not required when you use fibre for everything, and they use that for electrical isolation as well for security.

actually maybe their designs could be considered shielding, as site to site fibre comms has the fibre embedded in the high voltage wire, effectively shielding the fibre optics from miscreants with 115kV.

still nothing is perfect and they still run around with laptops to deal with the control grid and these devices still connect to the main corporate intranet and the internet i'm sure. still don't think it'd be trivial to attack remotely though.

'Amazon can't do what we do': Twitter-miner's BYO data centre heresy

melts
WTF?

so...

i read the article and couldn't fathom what these people do that makes it worth paying for.

sorry but collating twitter is like collating turds. only twitter shit can't be used to fertilise anything.

i guess i just don't follow why so many web companies are worth more than the hardware they own and a few cents per user. and then you have companies like autodesk that make products that build cities, and they are worth pocket change to these new media monkeys. unless facebook start charging to connect people they'll never approach a hundredth of the value they have been given. as it is i don't see how they could be worth 5 billion with every user on the planet connected. but thats just me

The most dangerous job in America: Keeping iPhones connected

melts
Facepalm

Re: Blame game....

maybe you should watch the documentary hot coffee.

covers what you think is 'where it all started', and will hopefully clear up a few things for you.

frankly i believe sub contractors only exist to get out of taking responsibility, one way or the other. having been there and done that and all.

i won't go into the political/governmental points raised, expect to say it looks like to me a bit of a characterisation of those who disagree with your views to paint them in a negative light.

How iiNet beat Big Content

melts
Meh

Re: Blank media tax

seems like a good idea, but we in Australia tried that and it was declared unconstitutional.

funnily enough its in action in the US and people still get sued. who'dathunkit but the studios want to triple/quadruple/++ dip.

good to see the judgement put this to bed. I feel though that our politicians are the target now and I doubt either of the 2 majors are going to take a stand, may as well keep trying to vote in labour so they can finish the nbn since I'm sure both parties will bend to international pressure to adopt disconnection (from the shiny new nbn no doubt) as a legal measure.. after all none of our politicians actually have stones... just a back stabbing ranga and a racist sexist budgie smuggler

Social networks breeding spatial junk

melts
Flame

sounds like they are bloody lazy

Jonathan Barouch aka a freeloading twit & founder of augmented reality service Roamz....

doesn't actually state why he needed to know where all the 'moms kitchens' are, one would assume it was some form of paid work, else it wouldn't matter. so why didn't he ask them for their list of locations? too hard to convert street addresses to gps? or did he just want to complain?

i can add roamz to the list of crap i don't want to use in any way shape or form - like most things crowdsourced - i don't give a fuck. and any place using the name moms kitchen to link themselves to the idea of home cooking deserves all the spatial problems you get by naming yourself so badly.

same goes for pubs naming themselves the local pub or a cafe the cafe. name yourself generically and you deserve the problems you get.

Telstra tips assets into NBN Co

melts
Meh

Re: Oh Goody

tilting at firewalls eh. pretty sure its dead and buried...

i don't think the infrastructure matters, especially the last mile infrastructure, like the NBN... after all any govt would want the ISP to pay for the filtering

US entertainment lawyer casts doubt on Megaupload case

melts
WTF?

oh Aggellos

other than your title being terribly worded and all, i thought i'd point out a few things; *caveat - i don't completely agree with the quote about piracy under no circumstances blah blah blah.

first - if people can't afford something they won't buy it, but they might pirate it.

second - people are reluctant to pay for something that is essentially an unknown quantity, only after ripping you off might they think it was worth paying for it and do just that.

third - stealing is different to breaching copyright simply because you aren't depriving anyone of the original object.

the problem with tying making a copy of something to income is this, if you sell 1 or a million copies, you've first put in the same amount of effort. essentially these days the copying/distribution is free. so any sale is a good outcome. you want to assume that anyone that illegally copies your work was going to pay for it, and that's just not true.

and now, lastly, here in Australia at least, EMI etc are taking, sorry, *stealing* some of my hard earned every time i buy a blank cd/dvd. yep there's a levy on them that the copyright holders get, even if i'm burning a linux distribution, the latest copy of our Sophos toolkit or a backup. they have weevilled their way into tax collection on a basis that i'm a pirate, regardless of the truth of it, so why should i give a single toss what they say. they are pretty much green lighting the activity with these kind of antics.

Smart meter SSL screw-up exposes punters' TV habits

melts
WTF?

electo-smog(tm)

i think you need to lay off the drugs

seriously you're sitting infront of a pc, no doubt own a phone, and you aren't on an island in a faraday cage.

because you can only blame yourself for these problems you casually disregard them to whine about a meter that sits in cell standby like your phone and beams out some data at some scheduled interval.

and a silver shielding cloth? copper will work just fine. use lead if you want something more hazardous than the meter around...

Microsoft de-cloaks Windows 8 push-button lifesaver

melts

well i think its great

just need to sell home users some sort of home server to store their stuff and then you'll have a neato solution.

bonus points if oem's/support can add applications to the reset somewhat similar to MDT, and offers users a screen with these apps, just tick the checkboxes. Personally I see it being really popular with small business types, you know, the ones that don't need SBS but with a samba box in the corner and a bit of setup work they'd be much better off then how they are now.

its nice to see more features from corporate land tumble down into the home/small biz market. while I wouldn't want the complexities of SCCM for small biz, MDT without a server would be great, and I hope this has some options like it

melts
Stop

oh yea

coz the reset windows button will be that easy to access and have no warnings or instructions.

thats a daft comment but i assume you know that. i hope you make that mistake and post about it so we can have a laugh

iOS 5's iMessage chops carrier SMS routing traffic

melts
FAIL

others lack totally?

I guess thats why I've been using gtalk on my galaxy since the day I got it, sending messages to anyone logged into gtalk on PC or Android on my data plan, and it even swaps to WiFi if i'm on it.

yep imessage is late to the party, except for its 'seamless' interfacing into the sms/messaging client, while I have to open one or the other... The big thing here is it switches on automagically for the iplebs who can't download whatsapp or a gtalk client to join in the data driven messages.

and gtalk works in the browser, apparently not so for imessage :p

No winner in Android v iPhone 2011 marathon

melts

as a developer...

you see apple customers used to paying for apps, while android customers are more accustomed to advert-supported free apps.

or yes the semi savvy can easily enough pirate most android apps, while both platforms need rather a lot more savvy to root, the android platform's lack of walled garden makes copying easier.

or i'm sure i could draw some tenuous link to more [young folk, IT folk, pirate folk] using android and therefore being more experienced pirates or something like that too.

anyway my point is willing to pay isn't always related to disposable income, i'd wager its more often not when one of the other options is 'free', especially the guilt free advertised kind.

i can only talk for myself but I've only bought one app on android and it's a decent music player for my on public transit or driving tractor moments, so i thought it was worth it. everything else so far i've found the advert copy is ok or another guy has an app doing the same thing for free. the unknown source app i've installed is one of my brothers games when he sent me a testing copy. I'm not poor, I just have a life to spend my money on that isn't based around my damn phone :)

Google's Schmidt strikes Carrier IQ off Xmas card list

melts

i'm lost, CIQ has also been used on iOS in some form, android is the most receptive to scrutiny being open source, so I don't see why you'd dislike the platform. You'll only be able to trust the device as much as you bother to scrutinise the software on it, if you don't want to read all the source and compile it and install it all yourself then you need to trust other people, but its an option. other platforms aren't so forthcoming.

as for software you install yourself, i don't see how android fare any worse than apple, or do you really place that much faith in apple's scrutiny of apps? i guess you could argue some scrutiny is better than none, and for most people that's correct, but its still overstating things a bit... the android market still takes down apps and the like...

Amazon set to build Aus data centre

melts

the data center is probably just to crunch the numbers on how much the Australian public are willing to bear. Just sample all the retail outlets and what not and compute a price just fractionally cheaper so they think they are getting a good deal... haha

Punters hate copyright, says Steelie Neelie

melts
FAIL

seriously? (again)

cute example, but what intrinsic right do you have to be forever rewarded for one action you do?

Seriously now, you write a song, a movie script, a goddamn 14 hour play, and then you want to say, well yep, if anyone wants any part of it (and that is factual, copyright is for all or part) i deserve to be compensated, and the government should enforce this.

so the first problem, you want to work once, get compensated forever. So if I build a building, I should get compensated for as long as it stands? Elsewhere we haven't even entertained the idea of perpetual compensation, but with copyright we decided that works that could be relatively easily copied should be afforded some protection to give the creators a reason to publish and make money. Without protection a published work may quickly be copied by the unscrupulous for their profit, depriving the artisan. This isn't perpetual compensation, but to encourage the creative to publish in an otherwise hostile environment. Why is it that 14 years is not enough for this? It seems excessively long in this consumer culture, actually. You get a few years to make sales on your work, maybe copyright should exist for only as long as it took you to generate the work? Would be far more inline with say the builder who erected your house.

Now secondly, ok you have this protection, the government are supplying it. What are you paying for it, eh? Oh yes, the agreement was to benefit the people, (far more relevant when then government worked for the people) as the government said they would protect your works and enforce this protection in exchange for your works being released into the public domain. You know, the Government offering to do something for you so you do something for them, sounds reasonable to expect something in return for some effort, no?

So now you should see it. The oh-snap moment. I'll point it out anyway... complaining about people freeloading copyright material while bemoaning your own freeloading of the back of the copyright system 'coz you don't want to hold up your end of the deal... What, do you expect the government to enforce your perpetual right to a work for nothing? oh right of course you do, you're one of those government is my sock puppet types, only working for corporate interests because hey people are pathetic thieving scum that are holding you down, amirite?

So yea, whining about the length of copyright while calling people freetards is ironic.

And I don't care how you want to twist it, wanting longer and longer copyright is just 'I want my idea to be completely mine forever, all the while getting paid for it', which sounds familiar to 'I want to hear/see everything, and not pay for it ever'. Both are bullshit over-entitlements and can be neatly solved by; a) keeping your damn ideas to yourself, noone can take it and you can't get paid. And b) only hearing/seeing whatever you produce, then you don't have to pay yourself, obviously.

If you don't like playing with yourself, then learn to share, and since we're in a capitalist society that involves a level of paying. The creator pays the system with giving their works away at some point, and consumers pay to enjoy anything relevant to the times.

The problem, consumers are currently getting hit multiple times for their enjoyment payments, while artists are getting less in return. The middlemen have their business savvy and are now working hard to ensure everyone gets screwed to maintain their status quo. Seems like a recurring theme.

melts
Facepalm

seriously?

It might not of been the most articulate clump of words to ever come out of a politicians mouth, but it seemed pretty reasonable.

I'm not sure exactly what google and co are doing to earn your ire but if its to do with them trying to document and index everything then I don't see why it ties you in knots, indexing is fair use, without indexes how do you find things?

I think the context she was referring to was artists getting paid, as opposed to middle men.

You might not of heard anyone clamoring for anything, but why would you have? She's a minister dealing with these issues, and I'm sure 'the public' can make their voices heard by say emailing or posting her office. I'm sorry 'the public' aren't beating a path to your door with their copyright complaints or compliments, but you chose not to be a public representative, and that doesn't give you a strong position to talk about 'the public'.

I don't know what studies you are referring to, but as you say, people do feel that copyright should be enforced, and quite possibly they are referring to the clause stating that after a period of 28 years works become public domain, shocking no? That or they support the consistent extension of copyright beyond its original purpose and believe no individual should be allowed to own their works based on the fact that the middle men need more money, again shocking, no?

Without the study there isn't a chance I can agree or disagree with you. All I can say is I haven't read a single study that supports criminal punishments for individuals breaching copyright laws for personal use, something that your post gives me the impression you support.

Your complete rework of the punish and withhold vs recognise and reward bit is daft. So there's a legal requirement to pay for merchandise before you leave the store. Punish and withhold in that sense would be increase punishment for non payment and restrict use of goods to scenarios approved by the merchant - ie you need milk? Buy it or shoplift it and face 30 years jail and/or $1,000 per mL fine, oh and to use the milk you need a merchant milk pouring system that meters milk out at 250ml per hour and requires the milk you purchase to come from an approved list of regions for the pouring system.

A recognise and reward system may possibly work as a farmers market where the farmer is offered a far more reasonable return per liter and the punters get to buy the milk in any arrangement of quantities they can sort with the stall owner.

Funnily enough I was going to say I was being hyperbolic with the punishment and restrictions side of it, but it turns out that was based on the system for dvd's, where you're forced through screens of bullshit in order to watch a movie, all region'ised for no good reason. The fines too are a leaf out of the music industries book.

And hey the milk scenario is actual theft, where merchants are being physically deprived of goods without payment, vs a dvd, where even modifying your own equipment to skip their bullshit on a disc you supposedly own is illegal.

While I believe copyright should exist as a mechanism to ensure an artist is rewarded, I believe the middlemen shouldn't be rewarded for the work of others. Compensated yes, but only based on the risk they took with the artist and not particularly further. In all instances copyright should only for a general release period, 14 years even seems rather long in this consumer culture but that would be fine. You can renew it if its still a valuable work. This should apply to patents too, for good measure. If you only have one idea in your life you'll get at best 28 years from it, sounds more than reasonable.

Oh and lastly, thanks to this copyright idea, there exists a duty on all CD/DVD media I can buy in Australia. Essentially I'm being called a copyright non conformist every time I buy media, and this duty is supposed to reward the artists who are having their works unjustly copied. So why do I need to pay them via any other means? Of course its the middle men pocketing the loot and using that to pay their way to get more agreements to further protect their business.

Telstra targets SMEs in next cloud push

melts
WTF?

what are you faffing about

the NBN is coming along as scheduled, ah but of course just having announcements, conceptual and trial networks should drive the price down IMEEDIATELY (spelling mistake to highlight how you'd pronounce it) and everyone should be getting faster cheaper internet, right?

since your logic seems to preclude the idea of having infrastructure to drive the price down. Instead just magical pixie dust and the open market should drive it down, right? The open market of which seems to be a flawed mechanism in the case of govt built and sold off infrastructure as the idea of a level playing field. Maybe if everyone was paying the same price to access said infrastructure, oh wait this is what the NBN promises to be.

But hey lets assume the costs of our current infrastructure, owned by a company driven by greed (as is any share holder company) will decrease the moment they realise their monopoly has a finite life. If yo uask me it'd be exactly when they start to ramp up prices to eek the last drops of profit out of infrastructure that'll be decommissioned in the next ten years.

Sure I don't agree with government bureaucracy but for critical infrastructure I don't really see how giving it to a company constrained by shareholders would be a good at all. If only a government-lite edition could exist for all these things, mm wishlist...

It's time to end the Windows Wait

melts
Flame

what drivel was that about non-volatile

'ssd's pretending to be a disk, they arent, they are non-volatile for a start' ???

err harddrives are non volatile too...

last i checked its ram thats volatile, and its ram that stores your precious waffle before you hit the save button, just swapping in a ssd doesn't mean you can pull the plug on your pc and get your typing back. changing autosave to every single second would do about that. whether that works with an ssd, idk, surely seems like a way to burn through your precious cell writes.

In fact i'd of been more interested in hearing about why the stats on these ssd's seem to have ever shrinking process size for their chips and that seems to have ever shrinking writes before failure count. maybe i'm reading it wrong, but I saw this in a recent spec browsing adventure. ie this from Kingstons site on their new HyperX;

'Intel® 25nm Compute-Quality MLC NAND (5k P/E Cycles)'

thats 5,000 program/erase cycles, and thats bad, surely.

I'm sure when the drives first came out they had 100,000 writes per cell, and I thought that'd be dandy for my system disk.

it seems to be based on the move from SLC to MLC, I don't know a lot about it but I see it as a problem, talking about that and what to do about it would of been far more interesting than this.

I'm pretty sure 4 ssd's in raid0 would make a single ssd look a bit silly, but just as moving hdd to ssd, its all about money. helping people learn about what is a good investment would of been meaningful, compared to the drivel that boils down to computers with more expensive components are better. (you may as well of said everyone should have 128gb of ram so you can load your entire environment to ram, and i guess your logic will be use ssds so you don't need to save anything either, just pull the plug, right?)

iOS update woes prompt gnashing of teeth for Apple fans

melts
Happy

datacenter moves? seriously?

thats crazy talk. that or they are terrible at planning.

i mean you don't do major works before a major release, why ever would you?

and Microsoft have a lot of experience dealing with update services. After all their schedule coined the phrase patch Tuesday. Heck I've seen companies plan releases around patch Tuesday for the sake of the tech staff their customers have, and I've seen another company freeze out all changes because bad weather was expected in the next 48 hours, planning isn't hard.

Overall a weak excuse, if its true then i imagine MS put more planning in a quiet patch Tuesday than Apple put into a major iOS release, let alone comparing MS releasing a service pack :p

Oz tech retailer threatens parallel import strategy

melts
Meh

free trade agreements?

i thought we'd signed away a whole bunch of protectionism to get into a global marketplace. I know we've had this price gap problem for a long time, why is it this is still happening after we signed these agreements and became part of the 'global economy'?

I don't particularly get it, maybe someone who is a lawyer or economic expert could accurately explain what it is we are part of and the pro's and con's. I was under the impression one of the pro's for it was getting rid of regional market price fixing, obviously not.

I don't even know what we lost to sign up. Some seem to be spinning it as doom and gloom though, foreign interests buying assets from farms to roads over here, I don't know if its really a problem but I do wonder if we're getting the shaft, we've been the lucky country for a while so being the shafted country seems to be next, karma wise. ho hum

Pay Jobs due respect - by crushing the empire he created

melts
Happy

incompatible?

so buy a device that requires you to set up windows via bootcamp with all that extra cost to run all those apps that are simply incompatible with OSX, win!

just as for Linux the virus's and so such are making an appearance on OSX too, soon enough they'll be just as annoying unfortunately

melts
Happy

err what

what computers have that poor of a build quality? price based i can't think of any shoddy laptop in the same price range as a macbook, maybe thats simply 'coz i don't buy my laptops from the fisho?

most of the folk I've seen buying apple are buying based on either recommendation or the 5 minute shiny experience, and using the price as a backstop in an argument (literally 'its not a cheap laptop so it must be good')

personally I wouldn't recommend a mac to anyone on the F&F SLA (thats the Family and Friends SLA) since they might not break often but generally do break big. The sealed units aren't DR friendly. Saying that I know people who get the recommendation from others who like their mac and don't care about support issues, or quite possibly have never experienced any particular problems. good for them.

I don't know anyone after a general purpose laptop that doesn't buy a HP/Acer/Dell/etc laptop because its not mechanically as resistant to hazards as a toughbook (and i'll assume you're thinking of something like a cf-19 for ratings). I also can't think of anyone in the market for a mil-spec resistance device thinking a macbook is fit for purpose. Happy to prove it by beating your macbook to pieces with my cf-19 and then using said cf-19 to post about it :)

and also, my hp dv6 feels as nicely built as a cf-52, and is better in every aspect bar the lack of a serial port and the glossy screen. my wife's little hp netbook has been vomited on and is still fine after taking out the keyboard and giving it a rinse, like to see a macbook do that. i could keep going but you get the point :)

Virus infects killer US air drone fleet

melts

go go windows for weapons 3.11

hard to tell if its something thats supposed to be there or not, but you'd expect the maintainers to have some idea, surely it would be an action against a direct order to remove software that mr 3 star general said had to be installed..

i just laugh thinking that they are sure its not phoning home yet don't know where its coming from.

'we dont know where you came from but you're surely not phoning back to that unknown place'

on second thought it sounds terrible and scary, hopefully it doesn't escalate.

Ten... Androids to outshine the iPhone 4S

melts
Devil

coxster vs 911

isn't that like buying an iphone 4 instead of a 4s?

anyway all these phones have pro's and con's that make it right for some not others. I've never had to ask for support with any phone I've owned, and I do kind of wonder what kind of problems people hit that get them on the phone/email/blog/twit/socialcrap/face-to-face with someone to help. honestly if you expect the good old 5 nines uptime on a phone and won't restart it when it does some stupid crap then maybe you need to get your head examined. i'm somewhat sick of this current trend of don't think just have a whinge, i'm unsurprised tech support dumbs down to power cycling equipment when whinger 10^9+5 rings up about the obvious. doubtless there exists people who don't get it and well I'd give a hall pass in regard to seeking tech support for basic problems, but they are the elderly, and thats about it.

yes things don't just magically keep running perfectly, yes you might need to use your noggin to get the most out of your purchase, yes if you want it to be better than you bought it you need to pay for it.

a perfect synonym for it is your 911

yes cars need to be serviced to keep working, yes you need a big pair of brass balls to push the car as fast as it can go on the track, and yes if you want a better tune, better seats, a different coat of paint you will pay for it.

and most 911 owners lack the brass balls to get the most out of their car, another fact that shows that people buy shit they can't use because of the cool factor.

oh and lastly, what about unimog syndrome, last i checked they were more than your porsche, could drive over it and generally drive most anywhere. or be really silly and say everyone that doesn't by a Komatsu PC8000 (or maybe a CAT 793c?) for their travel needs are obviously buying inferior products. pff

price isn't a particularly good way of judging things at all and people who care how much you pay for something come across as shallow... style over substance and all that guff

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