Posts by jonathan1

Beam me up, PM: Digital secretary expected to give Tory conference speech as hologram

Re: Hologram you say?

You owe me a new keyboard :)

1.5 BEEELLION sensitive files found exposed online dwarf Panama Papers leak

Re: Just goes to prove

You also have to remember that with GDPR prison and a criminal record will be possible and the ICO can go after you personally if you are a processor not just the firm you happen to work for at the time.

Two million customer records pillaged in IT souk CeX hack attack

Re: Karma

You were lucky and right.

To my shame - I had completely forgotten I had used them many moons ago and at the time they wanted to pay the money for my stuff direct into my bank account. Which I foolishly gave them. I recieved the email this morning.

Had no idea I even had an online account with them (which I have never used). I reset my password so I could log in and rather frightening event though my address information isn't there my bank details are! I don't remember giving them permission to put that information online...

Bollocks is all I can say.

How the CIA, Comcast can snoop on your sleep patterns, sex toy usage

I want to "own" my smart home...

Hi all,

Quick question - would you guys use the technology if it didn't dial out over the web and was a closed loop? (Putting phone remote control to one side for the moment). If you could buy a "magic controller box" and install it where all the commands / requests stay there and which all of the various devices hook into would that be acceptable?

I'd be much happier if that was the case. I want a home with a Jarvis like in Iron Man but I want it to be my Jarvis not some else's which I'm renting at best / or paying for through my personal data being sold. Its funny how we've gotten to the point where we pay for things and but we don't own them or we pay twice.

I bought an Echo out of curiosity during prime day. Must confess I've stopped using it except to play music. Turning the lights on is still easier by pressing the light switch. I found I don't have to repeat the action :)

Game of Pwns: Hackers invade HBO, 'leak Game of Thrones script'

Re: Game of Thrones?

But but you took the time to comment...on an article you didn't read...

Mind is blown...

Fatal genetic conditions could return in some 'three-parent' babies

Re: why

I don't disagree with you sentiment about children that could do with help but parenting is a complex issue both biologically,emotionally and socially. Its not case of simple substitution of the biological withe adopted.

I think its a sign of progress that we are able to do this. In the same way that any medical advance can improves the life of an individual. Just before Christmas, a statement was made in the news that there are more women now with narrower pelvises having children; which means natural birth is more difficult/unlikely. It was even followed up with most women in this category would die in childbirth. Whilst these things maybe true...I'd rather not have folks die if we have the means to save them.

I do disagree with the notion we have "far too many people in the world". I haven't seen any evidence for that. I mean how many is too few or too many? The only fact we can see is that we have more people alive than we have in the past and its possible to make the hypothesis that populations aren't distributed in the most effective and efficient manner uniformly across the world. I.e. high population density in some areas causing a strain on available resources or low density in other areas the same albeit in a different manner.

Bong: Let me talk to Trump

Awesome!

Oh that was very enjoyable, thanks for this light relief.

"Government money is ambient crowdsourcing" is utter genius.

Topless in-car selfie attempt climaxes with rear-end bonking

Re: Don't get it....

Yes...That's exactly what happened :o)

It's ALIVE: Juno back online after reboot

Re: Safe Mode?

Thanks, both gave me a laugh.

Just pictured an operator in NASA desperately spamming the F8 key...darn I missed it. Have to wait another 43.2 minutes* to try again.

*I borrowed that from Google. Not sure of accuracy.

Hitler ‘ransomware’ offers to sell you back access to your files – but just deletes them

Re: Das ist ein Test

Interesting. Test data does get boring. I changed my job title to 'Moose Thrower' on our CRM system once during some testing then forgot. Caused a few chuckles.

Who is this phantom downvoter?

MIT's chip fires frikkin' laser at qubits

Well its evolved over the last thirty years...has there been a revolution though?

I mean smaller, faster, more cores, more bits, greater efficiency and few to no jumper setting. (Goodness that was fun/ball ache). The move to local power from mainframes and now in certain situations its becoming distributed again.

A move to quantum computing would be a leap... Sorry I'll get my coat.

Mars' 'little green men' buried alive by merciless meteorites – new theory

This is what the lizard people want you to believe...nothing to see here move along...

15 million tech-fried Brits have tried giving themselves a 'digital detox'

Taking a break from the internet, browsing the web or from social media?

The article talks about the internet but I think its missing context. The web, internet and social media are often used interchangably in common parlance.

I mean someone may have responded they cut themselves off but then watch something on Netflix...

Ban ISPs from 'speeding up' the internet: Ex-Obama tech guru

Slightly overblown news story

Andrew - Phil's reponse has three likes and the thread has like four responses. Hardly a twitter storm.

Fair point that regulation/law shouldn't be driven by rhetoric however it always is sadly.

Graphene is actually self-folding origami, proclaim physicists

Hmm...

Google says otherwise...

http://www.graphene.manchester.ac.uk/explore/what-can-graphene-do/

LIke all things it takes a while for it to trickly down into daily life.

UK gov says new Home Sec will have powers to ban end-to-end encryption

Re: A Proposal

How about...

"Government bill exposes your children to paedophiles and ISIS/Deash will steal your bank details"

That ticks all the fear boxs right?

Jonny

PM resigns as Britain votes to leave EU

RE: Nigel Farage...

Yup regardless of how you feel about leave or remain that man... The idea that he supposedly speaks as the voice of the people...

Apple pollutes data about you to protect your privacy. But it might not be enough

I share a similar sentiment. We compromise for convience. With Google I know I'm the product. But maps is sooo handy. Still quite scary to see that location graph of everywhere I've been for the last few years even if its not paticularly exciting.

Where it gets tricky however and what a lot of talk skims over this - we all give our data quite willingly to our family and friends to communicate with them. I went out to Regent's Park on Sunday with the parents for father's day. Mum went straight on FB and checked the family in. *sigh*.

She is a silver haired social media queen. Happily installed and using Twitter, Facebook apps et al. All of which have kindly vacuumed out her contacts. I have tried informing her about what it all means but you get that distant look...As is thats nice but so what.

Oh my brother runs Owncloud too. Looks cool. Doesn't help that his little brother, mother and father have kindly compromised him to stay in touch.

Lester Haines: RIP

Shit...

'Windows 10 nagware: You can't click X. Make a date OR ELSE'

Re: Windows 10 Pondering

Haha yeah, I could have worded the question better. I love you guys.

Windows 10 Pondering

This a comment and question for my fellow Commentards... Warning rambling ahead...

Why the windows 10 update annoys...

Putting Mac's to one side for the moment, with PCs we buy the hardware. Now, the hardware may come with a pre-installed OS or not. We have the option of using that OS or replacing it if we choose.

This is unlike most electronic products we buy where the software and hardware come hand in hand. E.g. set top boxes, we don't expect Pace to let us put other brand firmware on the device.

MS are trying to take ownership of hardware that isn't theirs. I haven't bought a "Microsoft PC", I bought a PC that I chose to run Windows on unlike say an Xbox One where you've bought a product and bought into an ecosystem.

Which leads me to my other main grievance. Forcing an ecosystem upon us. Its not about buying an operating system anymore, its about my data being the resellable product to an ever increasingly data hungry marketing machine. I already have that with Google.

How do you guys feel about it?

Facebook CSO slams RSA Conf for repping 'the worst parts of the security industry'

Re: This doesn't make sense.

Well it does,

What you're refering to is privacy, not security. Individuals offer FB this data up. The tricky bit is when an individual not only offers their own personal data up but also those of their peers.

The product FB sells is the data and the advertising space, the service it provides is a personal data collection tool offered for free which many consumers want to participate in. FB have a massive interest in keeping people's data secure as that is their product which they sell in various forms.

* Please note this post isn't about the pro's and cons of FB's business model. Thats a whole other kettle of fish.

UK cyber-spy law takes Snowden's revelations of mass surveillance – and sets them in stone

Re: Not that big a deal encryption wise

That would be terrible if that were the case, for those of us that run vpns then. Gosh its all deeply upsetting.

Especially the paradox of "we want good strong encryption which is to keep our citizens safe but we must be able to unlock it with a skeleton key".

Cops must get a warrant before raiding phones, email, etc (in California)

You know in Britain, a mobile phone can be seized and searched without a warrent as well right? There are a couple of acts which could be used: PACE, RIPA and the Terrorism Act. Between the three of those the police just need reasonable suspicion.

PC shipments slump in Q3, thanks to free Windows 10

Re: I blame the four Norsemen with Paperclips

I agree,

Tablets/phones are good enough for a lot of people. Email/Web browsing and social media. Why do you need a computer for home use unless you have a need to do something other than above etc. My mother in law had a laptop, couldn't stand it because she found it too difficult. She recieved an iPad (she has an Android phone too) a couple of Christmases ago and she loves it.

The second thing, is computer hardware from a performance point of view hasn't dramatically improved over the last five years - Unless you're into 4k. I have a really crappy laptop from 2010 that is able to run windows 10. Imagine trying to put XP or Vista on hardware that was five years old when they came out...

I remember my early days of the 486...the changes seemed more dramatic back then. It has gotten much more energy efficient though which is good as I;m now older and a bill payer. :o)

Would it be fair to say computers have reached the washing machine/microwave commodity plateu?

'ALIEN INVADERS OBSERVED': OFFICIAL ESA announcement

We're waiting for you Earthlings...*Ahem* I mean to say I bet they're waiting for us Earthlings to show a bit more maturity...Nothing to see here move along...

GCHQ wants to set your passwords. In a good way

I have to agree with the grumble about maximum password length on being imposed by sites.

Especially after reading that XKCD thing on password length being more important that complexity. It inspired me to read a pretty good (its explained entrophy to me and I understood it) blog post on it which I think someone here linked.

NASA wants to send HEDGEHOGS to Mars

Damn...

I thought they're sending actual hedgehogs to mars...

My first questions was going to be why hedgehogs

Prof Hawking cracks riddle of black holes – which may be portals to other universes

I thought that was funny....

and topical. Not sure why folks are down voting you...seems there is a down vote monster...I'm going to get downvoted now aren't I?

Spotify now officially even worse than the NSA

Re: Bit shit.

Twitter client does this aswell; lots of friends have come on Twitter and I recieved emails letting me know x is now on twitter...do you want to follow.

I guess most social media & contected companies with social media aspirations have realised that the direct tap into a person's phone gives the richest data for building a more accurate web of who is really connected with whom. I assumed this is why FB bought Whatsapp. Plenty of people on my FB who I don't actually talk with or see which generates noise.

Giant Facebook SOLAR LASER DRONE to FEED interwebs into YOUR FACE

Preperation H!

The Breakfast (Table) of Champions: Micro Machines

Agree, hours of fun and frustration was had...I remember arguing with my older brother about who got to be Spyder. He made me be Dwane..Older brothers are cruel at times...Still I beat him at it...

The Mega Drive was an amazing system...or most likely I'm now old...and just remembering it fondly with rose tinted glasses. :o)

Beaten blokes hate the women who frag them in online games

Depends...on when people noticed the debate...

Truthfully I missed it, I don't know where I was at the time...it passed me by completely.

So from my point of view...it seems Gamergate whilst it may have started off about corruption it got conflated with lots of social issues, such as how certain people can behave on the net to one another. i.e. pretty damn vile.

Problem is whilst some folk were trying to discuss corruption/ethics, other folk* where threatening to rape/kill women. Didn't help the orginal debate at all.

Which is why Gamergate has many meanings depending on who you speak to.

*The same folk who did that are probably the same sort who think its funny/acceptable to call SWAT teams on those that they lose to in video games.

Anyway, above is entirely my opinion based on something I've tried to interpret. Either way, the whole thing from what I read didn't seem when taken collectively a shining example of rational human debate. But then its the internet, most things on it aren't rational ;o)

Evil NSA runs on saintly Linux, Apache, MySQL

LAMP

Brings a new meaning to LAMP...

Listening, Aggregating, Menacing, Processes?

Its early but open floor to others to do do better :o)

Dormant ALIEN SLIME LIFE frozen in SPEEDING comet will AWAKEN - boffins

Wait...I'm seen the film Species...

The alien slime results in horny alien hybrids bent on breeding a new species of life on the planet. They tend to kill those that get in their way.

Nuke them from orbit its the only way to be sure*...

I'm aware that quote is from a different 'Alien' film ;o).

WikiLeaks spaffs files showing NSA spied on French presidents

Should watch Spooks

Reminds me of Spooks. I'm sure in one of the episodes, Harry tells Tom after he starts having a fling with US agent "End it, you know there are no allies in this game."

Not saying its right, but echoing others here, its natural. Spying is what spy agencies do. Citizens, allies and corporates, everything is a potential threat. 'Threat' is broadly defined after all.

All this has done, is to illustrate (I'm was going to say prove) what a lot of people already asssume to be going on.

Facebook and Twitter queen Taylor Swift: Facebook and Twitter are RUBBISH

Upvoted - I felt compelled to upvote you... like reverse psychology or something. Please don't make a comment that you need a donation.

Cortana threatens to blow away ESC key

Vince,

Wow thanks for the PSA, I did not know about Ctrl-Shift-Esc combo! I alway right-clicked on the task bar...

Love you guys. Always new things to learn :o).

Nude celeb iCloud hack: Feds seize Chicago man's computers

Fink,

Thanks for the put down, it has left me feeling enriched for it. So have a cookie.

I do confess however you are quite correct in pulling me up over that comment. It was rushed and generally not very good. I hereby so apologise to you all. I've let myself down, my family down and all of you.

I am concerned however that the message of the PSA you so graciously provided is wrong. It should be "Kids, here's why you need to spend more time on the comments that you post. If you rush them or otherwise not put adequate effort in, a fellow commentard will rip it to shreds along with your self-esteem at the first opportunity.

I do like it that I'm not the least bit sensitive*.

Jonny

*I do say above in good fun and have taken your comment with good humour. It was legit.

Wow, from his own home? Obviously never watched the film Hackers.

To quote Phreak and Cereal:

"What are you, stoned or stupid?

You don't hack a bank across state lines from your house, you'll get nailed by the FBI.

Where are your brains, in your ass? Don't you know anything?"

"Stupid, man. It's universally stupid"

If its true that all those accounts were accessed from one place..One wonders why that level of activity didn't trigger some sort of flag.

It's FREE WINDOWS 10 time: 29 July is D-Day, yells Microsoft

Re: Signed up!

Erm,

<begin snark>

Well, I pin the apps I want to use regularly, in either the start menu or the task bar. I mean who repeatedly searches for the same thing...

</end snark>

Everyone has their own way of doing something, all because you do it one way doesn't mean all other ways are less valid or wrong. Besides if you've been using the start menu since Windows 95...old habits die hard and all that. I was that guy who used to to turn off Aero just to make it 'classic' looking. I don't like change - he sobs rocking in the corner.. :o(. I've got over that now with a lot of love and theorapy.

If IT isn’t careful, marketing will soon be telling us what to do

Re: Huh?

I guess the difference now is that the Sales and Marketing department can if has its own budget go off and get some cloudy service without the involvement of those of us in IT.

Well until they want it integrated...

Stripped to the core and full of Xfce: Xubuntu Linux loses it

Re: Get with the times

You're trolling right?

The only thing in the dark ages are fan wars over the different OSs. All have their charms or quirks.

Right tool for the job and all that.

Russia delays ISS crew mission over Progress launch safety fears

Re: Russia is crumbling...

hmm strong...

The good thing about the space programme is that it brings folk together even if there are issues on the ground.

I do like how scientific endeveurs are more often that not multi-cultural - bringing folk together, it gives me hope.

NSA domestic dragnet NOT authorised by Patriot Act, rules US Appeals Court

Re: impliedly?

Hi Johnny,

Ignore the harsh commentard, I also didn't think it was a real word. So I looked it up. Words are cool.

I'll admit I havent cross checked this but according to http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/impliedly

It means:

involved, indicated, or suggested without being directly or explicitly stated; tacitly understood

So yes it is indeed a real word, one that is also quite old too; goes back to the 1500s.

Jonny

Torvalds turns to Sir Mix-A-Lot for Linux versioning debate

Re: I hate to be a whining prude...

My boss wandered past...that was awkward.

Not only that, its just a bit unneccessary.

Interesting article...not sure about the picture...

Big Data, empty bellies: How supermarkets tweak prices just for the sake of YOUR LOVE

Re: More neutral language please

Hi Zog,

I see what you mean but "discounters" in this context is actually considered a legitmate retailing channel by the Food and Grocery industry. In the same way Online is. Its not meant as a pejorative or slight.

Example given here: http://ra.igd.com/Hub.aspx?id=113&tid=11

Horrifying iPhone sales bring Apple $18bn profit A QUARTER

Re: Whoosh

"Nothing goes over my head! My reflexes are too fast. I would catch it." I love that film.