Posts by David

Excess of cola floors Oz ostrich farmer

@ Steve Foster

"I don't have USG to cup size conversion data, so I can't put that into Jubs."

You could try asking Wolfram Alpha

Wolfram Alpha - a new kind of Fail

Well at least...

...typing Wolfram Alpha into Wolfram Alpha doesn't break the internet.

Safari, Opera browsers patch-shy, says study

Largely unnoticed??

"Both Chrome and Firefox offer autoupdates that go largely unnoticed by users."

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

Firefox is installing your updates - this may take several years....

It's really not that hard to upgrade to new versions of Opera, and current versions already check for updates on a regular basis. You can even adjust how often. For some daft reason, though, you have to dig around in the config to do that. Oh yeah, and my install insists on continuously resetting the interval to several million days. :o(

Ho-hum - I guess none of them are perfect.

Firefox 3.0 ekes ahead of Internet Explorer 7 in Europe

@AC 16:04

"The only thing I got from that whole comment was that you think you are awesome

[...]

I DO NOT read through the sourcecode."

Apparently you don't read through the comments you reply to either. Yes, to claim that "[t]he only thing Firefox actually has going for it, is that it's open source" is completely overstating things, but there are a number of other valid and pertinent points there that you've completely ignored, instead latching on to a slight to your darling browser as if it were a personal insult.

Firefox is fine if you like it, but there's no need to be a prick over it.

Superfast-charging batteries? Whoa there, MIT

@jake

"What I did was go to a thrift store and dig thru' the bucket of phones until I found a phone powered by the same battery. I found three identical to mine, and snapped 'em up at 50 cents each"

That kind of thing gets you locked up as a terrorist these days.

Apple's latest patent brilliance: the iGlove

@fnordianslip

Why? How is May Day relevant to this story? Something to do with freedom of the workers from cold fingers while operating their iPods?

Queen's speech targets bankers, unemployed, and immigrants

"bringing together the customers and border security"

Presumably the customers would be what we used to call 'travellers'?

Microsoft breaks IE8 interoperability promise

Broken page mode

[Entirely uninformed, since I've not seen it in action, but] it seems to me that if this is a button, then the logic is sound - "click the broken page to go to broken page mode". The same way a button with a magnifying glass and a + means "make this big", not "this is big, make it small".

BBC fixes BT Home Hub auto-vomit bug

@AC

"...the most popular single home router in the country..."

The most populous, possibly, but in many quarters, far from popular.

The return of Killer Chlorine

@ James Bassett

Nice strawman you've got there. Where did it say anything about 'physically makes someone a poorer cyclist'? Causality is no less real for being psychological.

Actually, though, a helmet can physically make a cyclist less safe (though it would be a stretch to say 'most cyclists'). Damaged or weakened helmets (of which there are a substantial number on the road) can concentrate an impact to a greater degree than it would have been with no protection, and so cause more severe injuries.

BAA 'invented green superjumbo' to OK Heathrow plans

Meta-pedantry [@Alan]

"I'm pretty sure that BAA never stated that flights to and from Heathrow would be made by non-existent green superjumbos that will never be built. That would have been silly. Doesn't matter where you put the quote marks."

Very good. Except that you conveniently ignored the phrase at the beginning of that sentence that said that the characterisation was "According to early reports". So quote marks or no, it's still correct, assuming those words were in the report.

Jeremy Clarkson tilts at windmills

@ Mick Sheppard

"road works with cameras have more personal injury accidents in them, per km driven, that road works without cameras."

But presumably the road works with cameras are so policed because the risk of accidents is considered to be higher. So the comparison is pretty much worthless.

Pluto awarded celestial consolation prize

eh?

"has cleared the neighbourhood around its orbit."

Doesn't that disqualify anything with a moon from being a planet?

Amazon.com's US site KO'd!

Not Sadie

...it's sad IE - the dog's just disappointed in the choice of browser.

Organised crime law crushes animal rights duo

@Pete James

"The work of so-called animal rights bodies ranges from disturbing to disgraceful."

Really? Where on this scale does the RSPCA fall then?

The missing five-minute Linux manual for morons

Hourglass

'Hour' being the operative word. Try timing eggs by one of those and they'd be inedible.

IBM hopes to patent 'dealing with chaos'

Endless Loop

Judging by that diagram, 'as long as it takes' would be forever, since whatever happens it just keeps looping back on round.

Yahoo! Flickr video play sparks online revolt

How many?

"The group mentioned in the first post now has over 18,000 members. The 2 others, between them, have over 15,000.

That's 32,000 people"

Unlikely. More like 18,000 people, most of whom have joined 3 groups.

Computer system suspected in Heathrow 777 crash

Limited Engine Mode

Flydows Geniune Advantage has detected that your installation of Flydows is not authentic. As a result, you have been switched to 'Limited Engine Mode'. Please contact support to activate your Flydows installation.

Pentagon in $75m electropulse blast-ray programme

Hera

"Hera's main sanctuary was at Argos"

So we can get hold of one of these just by typing in the right seven digit code?

HPM Device - 2 left in stock

Software firm bills council over high website traffic

@AC

"councils charge their council tax payers for the provision of libraries they are therefore profiting from them."

By that logic, no-one would be able to use the free calculator - someone always has to pay for internet access, therefore someone is always 'profiting from it'. Maybe entitledto should be firing off invoices to ISPs while they're at it?

Will Murdoch swap MySpace for Yahoo! stake?

Censored to death

MySpace censored to death.... nope - can't see how that's a bad thing.

AT&T sued by poor man's Formula 1

The World

"You know the world surely - those annoying bits of land to the left and right, and south of you?"

Where're the Canadians jumping all over this one?

Anti-hacking laws 'can hobble net security'

Intent matters

If it were a journalist checking for unlocked doors at the bank, or testing their security checks, then bringing it up with the bank and publishing it if they refused to acknowledge it, I doubt there'd be many people, apart from the bank, who'd be criticising the journalist for the situation.

140mph YouTube boy racer facing jail

Title

"MkII MR2 Turbot"?? That's some seriously fast fish!

Exams, contracts, and nuclear research: stupid, stupid, stupid

What evacuation?

Surely the correct response is "What do you mean, there are people down a mine?"

>>if it takes ten seconds to unload/load ten people, then it'll only take one second to load one person - right?

Nope. Cos the 10 mins is to open the rusty cage doors which haven't been used in 20 years.

Britney's new album title - can you help?

Barry's suggestion

"I'll get me coat" sounds like a good suggestion to me.

Oz boffins to polish perfect pair of balls

Re: Yardstick ?

Nothing wrong with mixing your units on a Friday afternoon.

Pluto demoted again

No definition needed

Actually, I suspect most people couldn't care less what things are called, whether everyone agrees or not. Mercury is not like Venus is not lie Earth is not Mars... etc. so any grouping is essentially meaningless.