Posts by QuinnDexter

'Yeah, I'm like, SO backing Microsoft over Google, YAH'

Bark-ing up the wrong tree if you think The Reg won't stick to its decision

Cable thieves hang up on BT, cause MAJOR outage

You're assuming that legacy installations have chemical or molecular signatures that are recorded

Ten top tech toys to interface with a techie’s Christmas stocking

"It’s the perfect way to find something to do around 3pm on Christmas Day when there’s sweet FA on the telly."

Er... I think you'll find that's when Betty is on most channels... So perhaps from 3:20 we can play with tech gizzets. How about a round-up of christmas-dinner tech? Is there a wifi thermometer that tells you when your turkey is done?

Shouldn't we have self calibrating Y-fronts and smart bog roll by now?

Re: IET.........

iET - lets you phone home. If you hold it the right way.

Your leisure, is my pleasure

Sweaty palm time at Qualcomm after Beijing launches probe

Why wouldn't...

...the PRC just ban Qualcomm from selling within their boundries until they prove they don't assist the NSA / US Government with spying? That's the done thing these days, isn't it?

Carl Icahn broadcasts his $150bn Apple shakedown effort to world+dog

Re: Slightly confused

It all depends on what Tim Cook's been set as objectives by the board. Is he to raise the number of iThings being bought, or is he to maximise the share price? Increasing the share price by either allowing the value to rise naturally to its should-be level and increasing it through a buy-back are not two seperate ends of the spectrum on a one or the other deal. The two could happen in conjunction, and what iCahn is saying is take advantage now of an unrealistically low share price, the share price willin time increase of its own accord to reflect what it should be AND the price will also increase due to the increased interest in the market, albeit self-fabricated interest.

Apple owning more of its own shares means that it owns more of its own assets - such as the massive the cash reserve it's got. Limiting the amount of shares on the market means that the board's controlling stake increases as a percentage, and the value of that stock increases.

Saying all that, iCahn is a scrote. A rich scrote, but a scrote all the same.

Re: Yup. Undervalued my backside.

Actually, regardless of whether buying shares back is sensible or not, borrowing the cash to do it isn't so stupid. With huge reserves of cash in the bank, Apple can command miniscule interest rates on borrowed money - and it's likely they would borrow this money from their own major shareholders, not banks.

The shareholders agree a valuer of interest that gives them more than they would receive if the money was in a bank somewhere - a win for shareholders.

This also means Apple pay the interest, not the capital, back to the investors, not the bank. So officially no dividend is paid out, but Apple still give money out. Another win for the shareholders, at a better taxable level than dividends.

This money then comes out of that column in the ledger that counts up how much of Apple's money is liable to be taxed - a win for Apple, though not the IRS. The cash reserves continue to grow and the share price increases further.

And Apple buy up shares with the borrowed money, thus increasing the value of the shares and making the shareholders richer.

So yeah, it sounds like borrowing money to inflate the share price might sound stupid, but actually the rich get richer.

Rorschach test suggested as CAPTCHA replacement

Did I get it right?

It's the grumpy faun from Pan's Labyrinth wearing clown make-up.

NSA: Yes, some of our spooks DID snoop on overseas lovers

"This is false and misleading ; According to NSA's independent Inspector General there have been only 12 substantiated cases of willful violations over 10 years, essentially one per year."

So, am I the first to call "bollocks" on this? Perhaps there are only 12 cases the NSA will tell us about cos all those people have already left, most likely just cos people leave their jobs and go to different ones. The others who have done this will be fine and nothing will happen. In the past the Met Police (and Merseyside Police and most likely every other UK Police agency) have had massives problem with this, and have had to work very hard to clamp down on officers carrying out PNC checks on prospective partners / neighbours / people who annoy them in traffic. Suggesting that a US Agency, where breaking the law is secondary in nature, has no problem and never has had is complete bollocks.

Headmaster calls cops, tries to dash pupil's uni dreams - over a BLOG

Re: Twas ever thus

@AC 13:23

How does he come across as someone who wants the state to provide everything to him? He's going to be payng a hell of a lot for the rest of his life to study mathematics...

I think what he was expecting as someone who has finished his secondry level education, and therefore assumedly an adult, what the freedom of speech. Which is open to everyone. There shouldn't be gratitude that he called Gove a c*nt, but he has the freedom to express his opinion should he so wish. He has not broken the law, though the headmaster has decided he could exclude him (which could well be within his gift) and report him to the poilce, which is an arrogant nonsense.

Re: Truth or consequences

I assume you're not a manager. All the references that are asked of someone these days is confirmation of the position a person held and the dates within which they worked. Should I point out that the member of staff was late every day, left early, stole million s of post-it notes, then I could be in danger of being sued. The worst I can really do if asked for a reference - my refusing to give one is good enough signal.

It is not this headmaster's duty to point out to a potential University that one of his ex-students thinks Michael Gove is a c*nt. It's just bad grapes that one of his ex-students was not properly engaged enough in school to write a positive review. That headmaster sounds like a c*nt. Raising the matter with the police is ridiculous, and this has hopefully pulled an Eye of Sauron type spotlight onto his record and OFSTED results to see how much of a c*nt he is or not.

Samsung stakes claim to smartwatch market with Galaxy Gear

Re: This is why Apple wait rather than innovate

Of course, should the iWatch be announced next week then Apple will have had loads of time to change the production, battery life, etc etc on the back of Samsung's delivery yesterday...

WIN a RockBLOCK Iridium satellite comms module

SELINA GOMEZ

Satelite

Enabled

Liberation

Instrument

Nominally

Avoids

Going

Over

Meatsacks'

Existance

Zone

Netflix dares UK freetards: Watch new Breaking Bad NOW or torrent it?

Re: I doubt it'll stop the hardcore torrenters...

E.G. Why cant the BBC, ITV, C4, 5 all have every programme they output accross their channels on catch up? And why are some shows available for longer than others?

Blimey. The BBC's been about for a long time, and currently has six or seven channels. Granted, they're not all 24hrs and don't all run original content when they are on. And then there are the radio shows too. But the amount of data they generate and have generated since they started broadcasting is quantified in the FUCKLOADS category, if not closing in on at least a megafuckload. Hosting all that and making an episode of The Archers from the 70's, or Eastenders from May 1994, available on request might cost them a fuckload of cash that they can't afford. When BBC / ITV buy the rights to show a film or TV series they do so for that instance. Repeat showing and making it available for download all costs them money in terms of storage, infrastructure, fees to the distributer etc etc..

The BBC do have a program (not programme) in place to digitise all their content. Making it available to all of use licence fee payers will no doubt come along, but it won't be cheap and it won't be fast.

Also, the BBC make a load of cash from DVDs. Remove that income source and you'll suddenly loose the money to pay for something else

PHWOAR! Huh! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing, Prime Minister

Justification

Previous posts such as Ian 62's, Dazed and Confused, and Lost All Faith's and others have asked who controls the blocked list, asked what's on it now, suggested dad will switch it off cos dads like porn, discussed the boundaries of what is pornographic and what is educational, where does LGBT fit, and a plethora of other questions and statements that I would echo, but won't, due to echoes being annoying.

An issue I have is HOW this is being done. I had the pleasure of driving from Glasgow to Manchester yesterday and heard all the spin coming from the Prime Minister's Adviser on the Commercialisation and Sexualisation of Childhood. (I assume she is anti- these things, and not advising on how to make them more efficient). So there were two thing being brought in yesterday - a clamp down with an unavoidable opt-out family filter which limits access to adult material, regardless of its pornographic content or not. And also, a cracking of the whip at Google et al to ensure that access to any rape-related pornography is stopped, but the Government has stopped short of actually legislating on the second one, and have left Google et-al to be our moral compasses, whilst giving the Government the opportunity in the future to beat them up more about not doing enough about it. ("We're only bringing these new restrictive laws in because Google didn't do a good enough job when we asked them to"). I am actually more comfortable with Google et al being moral compasses over UK Politicians.

Anyway, the Prime Minister's Advisor on Corrupting Kids didn't start talking about either of these things. She first talked at length about child porn, *not* children accessing porn. She described the work CEOP was doing and the fact that every image is a crime scene and how any limits and changes and restrictions being brought in is all being done for the safety of British children and keeping our British children safe and making sure they weren't caught up in child pornography, because they are British and need to be safe. She stated that pornography on the internet was only two clicks away from child pornography.

Regardless of the fact that legal multi-billion pound porn business needs to do everything it can to distance itself from illegal porn, she is actually very accurate, in that one click will take you to a search engine and another click will take you to child porn.

The unproportional reaction, this over emotional, inflamed melodramatic response to a real issue, and not just linking it intrinsically but intertwining it with a much more serious issue, building the fear of repercussions, because if we don't put this in place this will only end in British children being used in child pornography. "Don't agree with the web filter? Well then you must be FOR child porn. And if that's the case then you should be on a register." It is that which sticks in my stomach. The temperature of the water has been increased a couple of degrees and the frog is asking for the loofer - people, including reporters, feel awkward in questioning her reasoning - the last thing a BBC reporter wants is to be tarred with a brush that aligns them in any way with Jimmy Saville in the eyes of the Daily Mail or the sheep who accept these restrictions openly unquestioning.

The author wrote: -

"Honestly, though, Everyone knows one should educate one's children, teach them proportional reactions and try to prepare them for a time when one won't be around to help them deal with the world, but just as we feel confident sitting them in front of the TV before nine so we should be able to log them onto the internet without having to look over their shoulder the whole time (which limits their freedom in other ways, and becomes impractical as the number of children increases). Right now that's technically possible, but too complicated for millions of users."

If it's too complicated for one to raise ones kids properly, or if one is too lazy to put effort into raising ones kids, then one should not have kids. Instead of combating the ignorance (and I do not mean that in the pejorative sense) of some, the whole population should not have restrictions put in place over them. Perhaps address the problem rather than creating a workaround? The first step should be to remove the ignorance.

If three months after its launch and 70% of the population have opted out of the filter (This filter will remain in place in most houses right up to the point where dad needs to exercise his wrists or mum needs an online bingo fix) will more stringent restrictions be put in place because people ignored this one?

"The government is actually quite a bad regulator of the internet"

Claire Perry MP

Prime Minister's Adviser on the Commercialisation and Sexualisation of Childhood

31st May 2013

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gbc_8XMfII

Three's Irish network goes titsup

Negative, negative...

You people are all so negtive at the slightest encouragement. Perhaps having recognised a weakness, no doubt put in place due to risk analysis committee, Three are buying O2 so that they can also expact their redundancy, which only just coincidently goes titsup?

Snowden: 'Hey, Assange, any more room on Ecuador's sofa?'

Re: Not good

Hadn't Wikileaks moved themselves away from Assange (TM)?

@murph

I *kinda* see what you're saying, but I think the ends most definitely justify the means, and your view is perhaps affected by the US Gov decision to do him for treason or whatever. Here is a guy who has let the world know that the US Gov spy on EVERYONE, their own citizens and everyone else in the world who happens to come into any contact with technology. What a lot of b0ll0cks that PRISM does not keep the same info on it's own citizens. Someone mentioned boiling a frog on the previous topic, and Facebook, MS, Google etc have been lining up to show the public what has been requested of them. Still no word from the telcos / ISPs who actually move the information from / to the far end. Would that not be the place to get the full info?

This fella is running scared and who can blame him. The Chinese spy on everyone, the US spies on everyone, the UK uses US tech to spy on everyone and so the US most likey have access to all and every system of spying the UK has, and all the information they create. These may be secretive solutions, but the fact that they exist is not a secret - what do you think the CIA / FBI / MI5 / MI6 do? And all the methods of spying are likely to be equivalent. The bluster in news reports of the US accusing China of spying, and then later stating that Snowden works for China is all smoke and mirrors.

What Snowden has done in saying the US spies on China is buy himself some column inches, kept himself in the headlines, and bought himself some time to get to a friendlier nation where the chances of him being dissappeared are lessened. (But not negated.) China knows the US spies on them, just as the US knows China spies on them. If China or Russis thought for a second that Snowden had any relevant information to pass on to them he would most likely either be sipping down a Maotai or Vodka, rather that stuffinf his face full of complimentary in-flight peanuts. As it is, they are choosing to allow his safe passage to a country where he will be protected for his human rights rather than the information he has to offer up.

The Governments don't care about this - they are not surprised, and do the same thing themselves. With hindsight, and in no way to excuse the actions of any Government, who on these forums is surprised by anything Snowden has yet had to say?

NSA PRISM snoop-gate: Won't someone think of the children, wails Apple

Local Vs Foreign

I thought PRISM was only used against us foreigners, and not good, law-abiding (or not) US citizens. Therefore, none of what is being discussed about robberies, local sheriffs finding local kids and whatever else does not fall into the reported remit of PRISM. Does that mean the remit is being over-reported, or perhaps the news from Apple, Microsoft et al isn't the full picture, but only shows attempts from them to just show it has nothing to do with them?

Have AT&T and Verizon said anything?

The authorities were obviously very concerned about that patient with Alzheimers, and that suicidal person to put in so many requests about them.

What do you mean WHY is Sony PS4 so pricey in Oz?

To the author!

Tim,

Is there a reason why on your Forbes story you go through PS4 and XboxOne as both being a lot more expensive in Oz, but commit your Reg article to only the PS4? That tied with the very belated PS4 E3 story, highlighting minor foibles as show-stoppers, and giving MicroSoft an advertising opportunity as an update to that PS4 story, I'd suggest that the Reg isn't being particularly fair in its coverage. In the air of transparency, does The Register take any form of contribution from MicroSoft or its subsidiaries?

If I'm starting to sound like Eadon, please someone shoot me...

Sony sucker-punches Xbox on price, specs, DRM-free gaming

Re: "a slight catch"

Hmmm. I agree totally. I have both PS3 and XBox360 in my home... and no Kinect. That catch means sweet Fanny Adams to me.

So the XBox One was heralded by The Register as soon as they possibly could, with news up on the front page almost as quickly as the BBC and other news outlets. The E3 PS4 showboating happens, and I was eagerly awaiting the opinion of The Register who finally get round to letting us know their thoughts a couple of days later. Saying there is a catch. And then also giving MicroSoft an additional opportunity for a sales pitch as an update to the PS4 story. WTF is that about?

Chances are, I'll buy a PS4, cos it's a sensible choice and my son will buy an XBoxOne for his room cos he's a MineCraft fanboy.

NSA PRISM deepthroat VANISHES as pole-dance lover cries into keyboard

Re: Bingo

@AC - 12:43

Ok... so assuming you are a male AC and pretending you have a wife, she has decided that because her first boyfirend when she was nine kissed another girl she is therefore allowed and within her rights to, behind your back and under a veil of secrecy, check your phone calls, review your text message, scan your emails, search your Facebook / Twitter and whatever else she sees fit basically spy on you. Whether or not you have nothing to hide, how does that make you feel? Is that a wife you could be with?

And you mentioned a word there, that, surprisingly, no-one else has mentioned that I am aware of. Business. Is the government keeping tabs on all correspondence that happens between businesses? There's no software that will pre-emptively highight whether someone is going to suddenly become a terrorist (they can only show after the fact who the terrorist spoke to prior to whatever act they completed, and assumes the terrorists don't use PAYG phones, and change them often. But why would a terrorist do that?!?) but perhaps there is algorityhms that could be written to show how often companies are contacting one another and cross-referenced with rumour milss could strengthen when mergers are going to happen, when stock prices could change, yadda yadda yadda... That informaton could make someone a lot of money, whereas the opportunites for saving lives and protecting freedom are few.

Cold, dead hands of Steve Jobs slip from iPhones: The Cult of Ive is upon us

Re: Lowercase keyboard?

Are you sure you have an iPhone 5? And do most people indeed press caps lock a lot on a phone? Have a look at the iPhone keyboard and you will see you cannot hit caps lock, as there isn't one. You have to double-tap the shift key for caps lock.

For personal preference, and having used keyboards for the last twenty-something years (ZX Spectrum +2, with built in Datacorder FTW), I know what letters sit where, on a Qwerty keyboard anyway. My previous physical keyboard had many of the letters rubbed off the keys due to overuse. I don't need to see what is written on the keys, couldnt care which font they are in, or whether they are upper or lower case. As long as I can make out that there is a key clearly destinguisable from those around it and the background I can generally string a sentence together.

UK MPs tell Google: Get back here and bring your auditors with you

"You, Google, YOU came and based businesses in the UK and Europe and took advantage of our tax laws, which we wrote, designed to benefit large multi-national corporations, meaning that you pay next to no tax in the UK, and very little else in the rest of the Eurpoe."

"Correct. Is that everything?"

"Right...er... yes, that's all"

Why are the relatively new global companies the only ones being investigated? Shirley BP and companies of that ilk are doing the same kinda thing, and if not they need to slap their accountants? Why would anyone pay more tax than they have to? If it's currently such a terrible tax solution then perhaps the PAC should move to change the laws rather than attempt to embarrass companies into paying more when they don't have to.

Maybe there should be an icon of Kent Brockman to choose from, seeing as the words "tax avoision" are becoming part of the English language - I even heard it on the Beeb, so it must be proper English

Don't use Google+? Tough, Google Glass will inject it INTO YOUR EYES

Re: World Travel...

#1 As it will need cellualr coverage make sure you buy a suitable roaming tarif in advance. On that note, why would operators not want to subsidise this kit? They would be properly data hungry...

#2 I'd tend to agree that you are not likely going to use this as the primary source for holiday snaps, unless you are uploading them directly to Google+ or FaceBook. Dont know what storage they've got so this will probably be the standard.

#3 I don't think anyone knows, including those morons ready to "punch someone in the face if they are wearing these near me" (who assume that Google will happily force a FUCKING MASSIVE phone bill on you by having every second of every day of your life uploaded to their servers. Next their complaint will be "won't someone think of the children - bans these in public places"). Myself, I'm not sure. Before it was realeased I wanted an iPad because the same morons targetting this said "Why would you want one? It's just like a big iPod". Yes. It's just like a big iPod. That's why I want one! Glass - I'm not sure what I would use it for, and the scaremongering privacy concerns aren't actually a concern.

Huawei: 'We're not interested in US market'

You make it sound like they are leaving the potential $5bn willingly, whereas it is political pressure which is making it not worth their time.

Fight the battles you can win. If they spend $6bn chasing a potential $5bn then that does not make good sense. Huawei have the financial clout to take a hit on their profits to make their targets, but not that much. Huawei are hardcore - on the TFL bid for phone coverage on London Underground they said they would supply all hardware for free, providing the capability for all operators to link into their own networks, and they would charge industry standards for the manpower required to install of the network. They don't have posters of "Employee of the Moth". They have posters of "Worst performer of the month".

Also, just because a business doesn't crack the USAofA doesn't mean it will roll over and die... China's population is 1.3bn, there are nearly 500 million EU citizens, and just over 300 million yanks, who still have the ability to buy Huawei kit.

Nudge nudge, wink wink interface may drive Google Glass

Re: I had to read the last word in the first sentence twice

Unless the non-Google_Glass bloke doesn't know of their existence, and somehow thinks the aforementioned winker has a Fox Glacier Mint glued to his forehead, then he's probably safe... :)

Google Glass to carry 'Made in USA' label

Thick ass yanks?

" because that kind of manufacturing was too complicated to be done Stateside."

Is the story saying that Muricans are stee-you-pid or something?!? Shirley a factory is a factory and can be built anywhere, and the assembly can be done by under-paid drones of whatever nationality.

To Lightnight - two issues, the first being minimum wage restrictions that aren't as expensive in other parts of the world, thus meaning either a reduced cost to us, the buyers (haha!), or lower overheads for the company (a lot more likely).

Secondly, the US and UK have the same issue. Many people now think that any form of manual labour is beneath them, and don't feel that they should drop their standards to take a job in McD's / cleaning / etc, but are happy to drop their standards just enough to pick up their benefit / welfare. This then leaves the job opportunites at the less enticing end of the scale to immigrants who are less picky and more keen to actually work for a living, but who then get lambasted for "coming over 'ere and stealing our jobs!"

Freeview telly channels face £240m-A-YEAR shakedown by Ofcom

Re: Freeview is a public service

BBC (and part of Channel 4) are a public service. QVC less so.

Smooth criminals spared the clink for hacking Sony's Jacko archive

Smooth Criminals

How good is it that common sense has seen these two blokes, who stole and were likely to distribute (though actually hadn't yet), unheard MJ tracks (pretty big news) got community service for their crime. If they had been in America they would have been shipped off to Guantanamo Bay and fined a few million dollars. Wonder how Sony feel about that...

Disney buys Lucasfilm, new Star Wars trilogy planned

Hallowe'en

Any kids that turn up trick-or-treating will automatically get double sweets. Extra credit for character with less than 10 minutes screen time

I think this is a good thing. Take the stories away from Lucas and give them to a good director / producer like Disney have done with Marvel and we're on to a winner. Admiral Thrawn, anyone?

EARTH was a BAKING LIFELESS DESERT for 5 MILLION years

Tatooine

A long time ago in a galaxy not very far away at all

Why James Bond's Aston Martin Top Trumps the rest

Re: The DB5

Looks like the number plate still rotates as well :)

Craig, Connery or ... Dalton? Vote now for the ultimate James Bond

Hmmm

The recent Bond movies are the betters ones, IMHO. Gritty and animalisitc type Bond - the scene in Casino Royal when he's tied to the chair and being tickled with the rope can't exactly be compared with the laser beam closing in on his nads in Goldfinger, but shows how the characters have changed over the years along with expectation of the audience. Connery's Bond is the most agressive of the rest of the pack, but in comparison with Craig he's still cool, a measured quick thinking officer and deals with it as such. Craig's Bond is an ex-SAS hardnut who becomes a caged tiger. I've not read the books yet but JimmyPage above suggests this is what Bond should be.

I saw Roger Moore first cos that's the generation I'm from. Live and Let Die, For Your Eyes Only and Diamonds are forever were almost wiped from my memory when I watched Goldfinger and then Dr No and saw the cool viciousness of Connery.

Moon was formed when PLANET SMASHED INTO EARTH

"The second study, by Robin Canup at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, also backs the impact theory, but she reckons that the Earth and the planet that hit it were each around half of the Earth's current mass."

The maths doesn't work for this unless her assumption of each Proto-Eath and Theia has a tolerance range of half a moon each, which is a kinda hefty tolerance...

@ Local G

Perhaps the matter that makes up the numerous moons coalesced seperately to the gas giants and then got dragged into orbit around them as the big fellas were on their little trek around the sun

Slideshow: A History of the Smartphone in 20 Handsets

Wow - the Ericsson R380s - I used to work in Cable & Wireless in Warrington and used to get the same train as those who worked at Ericsson in Birchwood, and they all had these. There I was with my T18 with removable covers and programmable ring tones thinking I was the canine's conkers. Then suddenly there was this, this think of full-frontal monochrome beauty with a STYLUS and everything.

Vote NOW for the vilest Bond villain

Goldfinger

He was the villain that echoed all that was good about Connery as Bond. Iconic

Very close second should be Kananga - "Names is for tombstones, baby"

The tips stop here: Starbucks to take Square Wallet payments

15%

When paying for a meal by card last week when I was given the chip and pin machine it was on a screen giving me the option of 10%, 15% and 20%. Strangely, on reflection, it didn't offer 0%...

New Zealand Prime Minister apologizes for Dotcom spying

Re: Going direct to music buyers? That already exists..

Eardish? What's that? Dotcom has loads of free publicity going on at the minute though...

Google promises autonomous cars for all within five years

Re: I bet the lawyers will be ready

Risky - the level of arrogant luddism on this thread is phenomenal. Arrogant, specifically in terms of presumptive insolence, rather than any lack of knowledge, but maybe that's worthy of mention too.

The presumption that the two minutes of thought you have put into an opportunity such as this, will come up with something unique, that thousands of previous man-hours of effort from everyone involved (so within Google, the out of the box thinkers who came up with the concepts, the techs, the engineers, and not to mention Google's lawyers, and then State or National law-makers, and probably most importantly insurance companies and lawyers who would be for and against Google, and those who look at it not including Google etc) haven't been able to uncover or comprehend, something as simple as who would be to blame when the car is involved with an accident, is staggering.

Download the logs from the Google Car and it will tell you exactly what happened when, thus clearing Google from the opportunity of being sued for defective software or algorithms. You can be 100% certain that before the slightest bit of code was touched with the mindset of self-driving cars a risk assessment was carried out and this grew and grew, and Google would not release these into the wild until their lawyers have practically signed in blood to say that everything is covered for Google as far as can be expected in terms of economically viability.

Re: Scary stories from the Chocolate Factory

STOP EVERYTHING, GOOGLE! MachDiamond doesn't know what you're doing so it must be wrong, unsafe, and not very well thought through!

Re: More reading time

Perhaps with that mindset we should ban anyone who is not local from driving on roads.

Perhaps the system will be smarter than a mindless automaton who follows direction like some meatsacks do wtih TomTom and end up in the sea. Perhaps if you bought one it would be able to register the shock of the first time it goes over a pot-hole and knows where it is for future use. Just like a local would...

Samsung's appeal gaffe keeps Galaxy Tab 10.1 banned in US

How much do Samsung pay their lawyers?

Google offers tool to bridge Android and iOS app dev

Re: *Whoosh* as the point flies over your head

@Richard12

I completely agree. Have Google done this to make sure a competitor benefits? No. They haven't spent a fortune developing this for others, it's because they need it for their benefit.

iPhone 5 adaptors goldrush begins

Hmmm. I was holding out to upgrade. I've got a 3GS so not exactly tantalised by every shiny shiny that comes along. Was hoping for more, but all I can see is meh. Thing is, I've invested in loads of apps and have an iPad 2 so am I gonna re-buy apps on another phone, buy this iPhone 4SXL or stick with the 3GS until the next update?

Dutch unleash intelligent robot bins: No ID, no rubbish

Re: What's the new part?

@JDX - you already do in the UK, and we don't get charged directly for each bin which is emptied. We currently have four different coloured wheelie bins for different waste, and the local council have to be pretty fascist about what goes in which.

Say I decide to put glass bottles in the paper bin, then that bin load I have put out for collection is contaminated. Once the binmen showve it all in the back of their truck then that whole truckload is counted as contaminated and cannot be recycled, meaning the company that collects the waste does not make the money they were forecasting on the refuse contract. So they, rightly, will work to find repeat offenders.

It has been described to me as they are able to work out which part of which street the offending contamination came from, narrowed down to a select few houses. Those few will be monitored and if it happens again and they find the culprit they get a nice letter through their door warning them of their actions and potential for the culprit to receive a bill for that waste which has been contamiated.

Valve puts Steam on the TV

Perhaps it's more likely that Valve could be given access to the walled gardens of Apple, Sony and Microsoft etc so the apps appear on that hardware and the companies who provide the consoles / devices get a cut...

Climate sceptic becomes UK Environment Secretary

Re: Misnomer

I've not really got a strong opinion on climate change. Due to the fact that I have a lot in my life to cram in (and not cos I'm just too lazy) I'm part of a generation where peeling an orange is too much effort for not enough gain, and leading to the drop in orange purchases. Apples are easy, cos you just rub them a bit and bite. If you can be bothered to rub. Bearing that in mind, when my eyes passed over your statement "These are sophisticated models and one day, we will produce accurate ones" I actually read:- "we will produce ones that justify our stance."

Full accurate evidence doesn't exist at the minute for either stance, so it doesn't concern me too much, until someone shows that having a shower every day kills one polar bear and three penguins each year. My electricty and bills do concern me more, and anything that can be done to lower those is good, and if that has an impact on my CO2 emmissions, whether relevant in the grand scheme of things or not, doesn't really affect me. So no evidence to prove either arguement exist, but anyone who suggests that you are wrong are denialists?

Sony slims down 3D headset, cooks up eye candy

Re: VR

Anyone know if there has been any widespread reports of dizziness or nausea this with the Sony headsets? Maybe it's a lag thing, if the old VR stuff had a lag between recognising your head morvement and turning that into a change to the visible projection then that would cause nausea, but does the modern kit suffer the same way? Will Google Glass's AR elements take so long to catch up with your head movement as to have the default setting be 'off' unless you've locked your own head in a vice...