Posts by Shardik

UK immigration rules hit science just as it rejoins €100B Horizon program

Re: We are overdue an adult conversation about immigration

> And since UK nurses and junior doctors are not paid enough to recoup the cost of that degree, not many people want to study nursing.

My daughter completed her Nursing degree earlier this year.

Throughout, she received 450/month bursary, she also had her fees paid throughout the 3 year degree and has walked straight into a full-time job with the NHS.

In contrast my other daughter did an unrelated degree over 3 years, came out with a First, is 38k in student loan debt and still hunting for employment a year on.

I have no experience or knowledge of the process for Doctors, but please tell me how this is stopping people wanting to do Nursing?

(I will not deny that the job is not one I would want, intense, terrible shifts, long hours, physically demanding, under appreciated and under paid (long-term) but the cost of the degree is not a factor for nursing)

About ducking time: Apple fixes up autocorrect in iOS 17

Now please can they fix the continual annoyance of replacing correctly spelled words with other correctly spelled words? So tired of it changing ‘if’ to ‘of’ and ‘in’ to ‘on’ and ‘as’ to ‘is’ etc… I finally disabled autocorrect entirely and now only have my own fingers to blame when nothing I say makes sense,

Honor moving team out of India for 'obvious reasons,' says CEO

Euphemistically Speaking

“Moving team out of” = “sacking team in”?

One conjure up images of plane tickets and workers returning home, the other not so much…

Netflix to crack down on account sharing, offer ad-laden cheaper options

Re: GREEEEEED

2FA doesn’t help in the slightest. If my kids are out of the house using Netflix and I, as the account holder, get a 2FA ping for a Netflix login, of course I’ll let them log in.

Not sure what problem you’re trying to solve with 2FA when the account holder is most likely collaborating in the sharing.

Apple announces lossless HD audio at no extra cost, then Amazon Music does too. The ball is now in Spotify's court

Re: Yay!

Mind you, actual Music Lovers would like to see the Artist getting a decent share of the streaming revenue.

What this has really done is removed another selling point of the CD - better than streaming quality for those artists you Really Love. And that means lower income for artists.

So yes, on one hand it’s good for the consumer and hard to compete with, but on the other hand it’s a cynical move to drive down the value in the music industry as a whole by a company that can afford to. They make better returns in ancillary hardware sales rather than paying the content creators.

Third time's a harm? Microsoft tries to get twice-rejected encoding patent past skeptical examiners

Re: Jpg xl?

You’ll find it in the CCTV arena - notably Avigilon use it extensively.

BT's Wi-Fi Disc ads banned because there's no evidence the things work

Re: Standby for downvotes!

You can have an upvote from me. Been through many many routers, extenders, access points and powerline adapters over the past many years. Netgears, Drayteks, ISPs, TP-Links, etc... Moved house and succumbed to the WholeHome 3-disc bundle just to try mesh as the new place was too big with thick walls and I was going to need to buy new kit anyway.

Been one of the best purchases I've made. Five of us in the house, one virgin router in the living room plugged straight to the first disc, second in the hallway and third on the upstairs landing and the entire place is covered. Had a few initial problems with earlier firmware but has been totally solid for the last 6+ months. Think I've had to reboot 1 disc once and nobody is complaining about speeds or accidental disconnections and eating up their data plans by accident. It just works. If I did want a performance boost I could wire the backhaul, but it's been totally unnecessary, even with 3 kids regularly streaming netflix / iplayer etc..

I don't care if you can implement it all with a mixture of repeaters and access points and tweaking this that and the other to get a couple more Mb. I care that it works out of the box, life's too short to be spending evenings poking settings and nobody is moaning at me about speed and connectivity.

Not call, dude: UK govt says guaranteed surcharge-free EU roaming will end after Brexit transition period. Brits left at the mercy of networks

Bankers

Ahh yes, just like the Banks when they were told to sort out the overdraft charges and now everybody has a 40% overdraft interest rate.

It only takes a couple of big-players to club together re-introducing roaming charges and then they can all start milking that cash cow again.

But hey, don't look that direction, over here is a shiny 50p and Le Blue Passport!

Stiff upper lip time, Brits: After bullying France to drop its digital tax on Silicon Valley, Trump's coming for you next

Re: Trump is great for Europe

You say all this as if something that's good for Europe will be good for the UK.

Thought we'd decided that isn't how we want things to work in future?

And an EU-wide tech tax just as we leave the EU. Guess the Bully will leave us alone now, certainly won't be picking on the little guy standing on his own.

Two years ago, 123-Reg and NamesCo decided to register millions of .uk domains for customers without asking them. They just got the renewal reminders...

Really? Are we sure?

Hmmm I had the renewal mail last month and similarly had overlooked it. However I've just visited my 123-reg control panel and my <domain>.uk domain auto-renew is already set to OFF.

I have the original mail from 2 years ago with the link I had to click to activate the free 2-years. So either 123-reg saw this article and quickly corrected some peoples accounts or more people don't remember clicking activate 2 years ago, or I'm just special...

New UK Home Sec invokes infosec nerd rage by calling for an end to end-to-end encryption

Jba'g Fbzrobql Guvax Bs Gur Puvyqera!

Trump: Huawei ban will be lifted!
US Commerce Dept.: Yeah, about that…

But... But... Security

But.... But... Chinese snooping... I mean, that was what this was all about wasn't it? but all of a sudden that's not an issue cos... trade...

I just don't get how anybody can be bothered reporting the Orange Goblins ravings (in a factual way, not El. Reg style :)), believing it, or allowing it to be used to influence other 'allies' when the reasoning behind it couldn't even be described as tenuous. How much more obvious does protectionism have to be before somebody stands up and calls them on it?

And we want to be #1 trading partners with these guys??? Ok, no trading relationship is perfect but why would we trade trade stability for an unpredictable agreement with a willy waiver?

Let 15 July forever be known as P-Day: When UK's smut fans started being asked for their age

It's obvious, they're going to solve it using 'technology' :)

Frickin idiots. Which one of them has shares in a VPN provider?

But they're not going to apply it to Twitter, cos nobody ever posts pr0n on twitter... and the kids wouldn't know how to get it from there...

Untold levels of stupidity. But good job we're not letting un-elected representatives set our laws. Oh no. That would never do....

The most annoying British export since Piers Morgan: 'Drones' halt US airport flights

Re: 500g Drone vs 100 ton airliner

Expensive repair bills? Is that all they're worrying about? If we're saying it's not about life safety, then quite honestly just 'get on with it' and let them fly.

What is 'expensive' in comparison to the £15m bill EasyJet just reported for the Gatwick disturbance (and that's only one airline). Not to mention the invisible costs to all those who's plans were disrupted.

I'd be wondering what's the excess on their windscreen insurance policy and how much does an engine cost?

Screw you, Brits, says Google: We are ABOVE UK privacy law

Re: You could try 1and1

Don't think the private Firefox window makes damn all difference when your mail is stored on a server in the US...

1and1 looked good, until I read www.whoishostingthis.com/hosting-reviews/1and1/ and seems a few users with cancellation issues.

Oh well. Still looking. I have a domain and a mailbox hosted through 123-reg, but it's reasonably costly when compared with a free gmail account, or even a 1and1 account.

Len, GMX looks interesting... May give that a go. I'm surprised there's not an obvious UK alternative to gmail given the current level of interest in getting data off US soil.

Options?

So the article got me thinking again that it's about time I detached from gmail, and for that matter, any other US based webmail service. Has anyone any recommendations for alternatives? Searching the web doesn't seem to give me many options as practically every free mail host I can find is US based. Even helpfully "uk" named sites like uk.inbox.com appear to be based in the wilds of Boca Raton (err, Shropshire, obviously).

Come on El Reg, sounds like an idea for an article here...

Ofcom: Parents, here's how to keep grubby tots from buying Smurfberries

Not just kids...

Stuff the entire KID aspect of this. When is it acceptable or desirable, from a customer perspective, for a single press on an advert to phone a premium rate number?

I can't think of one LEGITIMATE use of such a thing, it is a scam, pure and simple, aimed at those either too young to read, or too digitally encumbered to retain control of their fingers.

They should be banned outright. No problem with an advert that leads to a webpage or redirects through to the AppStore to an application, but to dial a premium number is never acceptable.

Google+ architect: What was so great about Reader anyway?

Re: That G+ thread is quite clearly epic fail

Maybe it's the Cretins that can't actually see what other people get from the service that they can't get elsewhere.

Maybe it's the reason that most RSS feed readers on mobile devices sync to google reader.

Grow up mate, just because you can't see what it did, and over 50,000 people CAN, it doesn't make them a bunch of cretins.

Official: Sky to buy O2 and BE's home broadband product in £200m deal

Oh bollocks

Please don't break it.

Please don't break it.

Please don't break it.

Please don't break it.

Having been on O2 (the BE part) for 4 years, for the money, it's been unbeatable. With mobile phone discount, I've been paying about 7 quid a month for 20Mb, totally unlimited, un-traffic-shaped, reliable internet.

Will people on 12-month tie-ins be allowed to walk if it goes to shit?

Apple 'slashes iPhone 5 screen orders', tight-fisted fanbois blamed

Re: Problems

1. You're confusing iOS 6 and iPhone 5. Two different things.

2. Honestly haven't noticed. It's a camera-phone. Get over it.

Now, what were those major problems about the iPhone 5 you were gonna tell us about?

Yeah, it's "fine", but it's not great. I want a row of number buttons. I can't have it. Despite the 5 having a taller screen, I still can't have a taller keyboard?!?

I want better auto-correct, maybe multiple word suggestions... can't have that either.

Apple is "fine", but it's not flexible and that's where it's losing out. And this is from someone who had a 3G, then a 4 and resisted a 5 for a long time as it offered nothing new for the upgrade money and the pain of the damn lightning connector.

* I have a 5, but I have a 5 because CPW and Quidco were giving so much cashback it essentially cost nothing upfront to change. Perhaps because they couldn't find enough fanbois to cough up the initial handset price - I don't recall that being the case with any of the earlier ones...

Coming soon to a theme park near you: Shocking ANTI-PIRACY NAG ADS

Worse than pointless

The only way I can get to watch a film NOW is if I have a pirate copy of it and don't have to sit through pointless FBI Warnings and scaremongering You-Are-Funding-Genocide-And-Murder-Puppies style adverts. Not to mention the reels of trailers for movies I don't want to see.

If I go to the cinema, I get subjected to similar levels of brainwashing fired at me - when I went to see Skyfall a few weeks ago, I paid to sit through 35 minutes of trailers and advertising?!?! And this is the great big-screen experience? It's resembling late night Channel 4. How long before we get mid-way through movies and get hit with another "word from our sponsors"? *I* am your frickin' sponsor, I just paid to see the movie! Get that into your head Big Content!

If I am watching YouTube, the best way to watch a video or listen to a song is to do so NOT on the official channel. Otherwise I have to sit through advertising.

It used to be that piracy would be "poor quality", now they make those who ARE paying them money sit through adverts aimed at those who are not paying them money.

Major fail to alienate your entire audience dontcha think? no?

Apple extends fail-prone Seagate HDD swap scheme

Website failure...

That link is the one I tried yesterday, told me my 2010-purchased 27" iMac with 1TB Seagate drive was NOT eligible for replacement.

I phoned the Apple Store, they checked my Serial Number and said yes, it was covered. They asked if I'd checked it on a US site.... so looks like this site is not correct for UK machines. If it says you are ineligible and you know you have a 1TB Seagate drive, give Apple a call...

Incompatible IT systems blamed for bank sale collapse

Bank of Ulster??

That'll be The Ulster Bank then? SBR and WestNat must be laughing...

Griffin StompBox iOS pedalboard review

Background?

Does the software have a background mode? It's all well and good being able to play from the iPod's collection of mp3's, but sometimes it's handy to be able to, say, alter the speed or tuning of a song, something Robick does really well, or play along to midi squeaks and a Tab using Tab Toolkit.

So much more useful if the app runs background like AmpKit, then you can accompany anything at all.

Apple iPhone 5 review

Drool drool slabber

wow, sycophantic review or what.

As an iPhone 4 user, confirmed Apple Fanboi with a large number of iOS devices and iMac's scattered around the house, I am certainly NOT in the queue for the 5. Why? Because there's nothing worth getting excited about in it. It's got a bit more speed, so what, it's a phone. I have yet to meet a game I want to play that challenges the iPhone 4's processor. It's got a bit more screen. So what. I don't want to watch movies on a pokey 4" screen. What else does it have?

What it has got is a shit new connector that obsoletes all my current docks and breaks the "just works" philosophy for absolutely NO good reason. Absolute fail.

And as to iOS 6? Give me 5 back PLEASE. I liked YouTube and google maps

Apple: I love to hate, and hate to love thee

Re: An opposing viewpoint!

<shrug> Doesn't make a lot of difference what the fine-print is regarding contractual retailer, we are talking about out-of-warranty Customer Service for Apple hardware. The original article is not talking about in-warranty CS, it is specifically referring to gratis CS issues

Interesting stories...

What I find really interesting about these posts is the huge range of experiences here.

What is the deciding factor on whether Apple are helpful or not? I don't believe it's customer attitude (at least, not in my case anyway, I went in to see what they could do, not to shout at them, and got shown how to enable the on-screen home button replacement... yeah, we just thought we'd write a replacement for the home button, y'know, just in case people have problems with it... errr, not that anyone would have problems of course, cos we don't have a manufacturing defect there at all ... ;)).

Yet we see total opposites on whether a non-warranty repair is handled FOC or not.

Consistency... oh hang on, that would imply transparency, something Apple are notoriously devoid of... seems to be the issue here. Is it simply the sales target for the day? The "genius" that you speak to? The store you go in to? If anyone can shed any light on this I'd love to hear it.

The AC who got his 27" iMac hard drive replaced, Paul 181 who got his 4 year old macbook fixed FOC

as opposed to ...

sproot's 18 month old Macbook Air with the faulty screen, my iMac HDD and iPhone home button, Peter Johnston with his 13 month old iMac and laptop troubles.

Doesn't seem to be cost of the repair, or the age of the hardware, so what is the deciding factor?

Re: An opposing viewpoint!

It's not that confusing... I bought it from the Apple Store on launch day and signed up for a 2 year O2 contract in-store at the time of purchase. I didn't say it was purchased "outright", but the purchase was made in the Apple Store.

Besides, the objection here is that the article implies Apple go above and beyond in the Customer Service. They do. SOMETIMES. I know people who've gone in with old iPods they bought as non-working off eBay and the Apple Store have fixed them for free. But don't EXPECT it's going to happen. For a while I thought it may have been based on customer profile, but it doesn't appear to be that either (over the years I've bought multiple iMac's, iPads, iPhones, iPods, Apple TV, Airport Express, surely a good "profile"). Maybe if I change my career to "Journalist" in my Apple profile it'd make a difference... ;)

Re: An opposing viewpoint!

The retailer? I purchased it from the Apple Store. The same one I went back to...

Re: An opposing viewpoint!

That is true, but UK consumer law states a device should last a "reasonable" amount of time. A "reasonable" amount of time for a mobile phone is the length of the contract that you purchased the phone with. I believe (from lots of reading around at the time) that this has actually been tested in law.

Would you honestly not expect a "quality" item that has absolutely no marks on it and has been well treated for 20 months to still be working? Funnily enough, I would. I wouldn't have thought I was setting my expectations too high.

I am offering an opposing view of the "going beyond their obligations" kind of CS that is being touted in this article, it certainly is not the way Apple treat all their customers. It's very much luck of the draw.

An opposing viewpoint!

I have an iPhone 4, had it 20 months and the home button got gradually less and less responsive. I know LOTS of other people with this same problem and the forums are full of complaints, so this is not my mis-treatment of a device (as opposed to dropping it and cracking screens, flushing it down the toilet, etc etc...)

I went to the Apple Store and they told me, sure they'd fix it, £139 for a replacement refurbished phone! :-o Excuse me, I'm within my 2 year contract, Goods in the UK should last a REASONABLE amount of time, please fix your shoddy manufacturing fault. No sir, we can't do that.

O2 volunteered to fix it for free, but they'd have to send the handset away. At least they know their legal responsibilities. So I ended up with a kid down the road who runs a repair business fixing it for £17 quid while I waited.

Oh and my (coincidentally) 20 month old 27" iMac with 1TB Seagate driver started showing signs of drive failure with messages in the log on regular intervals. Apple have a recall for this exact same drive in the 6 month newer model. My one? No. They want me to cart a huge iMac back to the Apple Store, then estimate £200+ to replace the hard drive, and are unable to tell me how long they need it, whether they have a replacement in stock or any of that malarky until I've physically lugged the most unportable machine imaginable on a 10 mile journey. What double-galls me is I could replace it myself if they hadn't changed the pesky drive firmware for their own temperature monitoring (What? Is SMART not enough of a standard for you guys to follow?).

Apple Customer Service? I don't think so.

I came to Apple 6 years ago after many years of Windows ownership. I find their attitude to customers appalling and if it wasn't for MS shooting themselves in the face with Windows 8, I'd be outta here.

Just another perspective, YMMV as they say.

Snap suggests Apple out to 'screw' hardware hackers

Does it matter?

Yes it frickin well does matter when Apple have shitty warranties and refuse to repair devices for realistic prices. (no, I'm not paying even more for AppleCare, I paid a premium for the device, I EXPECT it to be built well)

My iPhone 4 home button gradually died (common problem), after 20 months into a 2 year contract, Apple didn't want to know and wanted to charge me £130 for a replacement refurb'd iPhone. Only alternative was a back-street fixit guy who replaced it for £17 and it's worked ever since.

My iMac's Seagate hard drive died after a similar amount of time, do Apple care? Noooo, Apple want £200+ to put in a new 1TB drive. That's a 300% mark up on the price of 1TB 3.5" internal SATA drives. Because they changed the firmware on the drive it's hard to do independently without incurring the case fans spinning up.

So YES, it does matter. Enough of this proprietary bullshit. Someone lend me a Galaxy S3 please, cos iPhone 5 is looking less likely by the day, it wouldn't take much to convince me...

Apple unveils tightened Mountain Lion requirements

Yes, you can take out the HDD, but if you happen to have a post '09 iMac, you can't put a replacement HDD in it unless it's Apple supplied thanks to them arseing around proprietary firmware on the drive.

Either that, or live with full-speed fans (no, a software solution is not acceptable!)

Get real Apple, HDD's fail. You even have a recall for some of them. No, I don't want to pay you £200 for a 1TB SATA HDD, I live in the real world.

Carriers, prepare to bleed: EU pops a cap on data roaming

Customers Prepare to Bleed

Yeah, like the Carriers are gonna pick up the tab for this aren't they. They aren't going to take up the price of EVERYTHING else to make sure they still get the same profits. Oh no, not at all.

Thanks EU! Something that affected a minority will now cost everyone equally :)

550,000-strong army of Mac zombies spreads across world

Oh rilly

Just shows Mac users have the same level of stupidity as PC users. So what's new...

"Users that have been visiting a site with the malware will first be asked for an administrator/root password, if the users decides to enter the password the Flash Trojan will be installed in the application folder. "

D'uh... what if I just enter my password here...

Ofcom calls for end to 0800 charges on mobiles

Thanks Ofcom!

So let's guess, if they can't make money from roaming data charges, and they can't make money from ripping off freephone numbers, where are they going to make money?

Oh yeah, from ALL of us in increased contract charges. Nice one Offcom. One way 99% of us can avoid the charges, now 100% of us will be lumbered with the charges. But good to see we've got a regulator

Fans fly to forums to signal iPad 3 Wi-Fi woes

Slow news day El Reg?

Only about 2 weeks behind the ball, and regurgitating the ooooh my pad gets a little bit warm when I use it. Sad sad sad

New driver-snooping satnav could push down UK insurance premiums

Push down premiums? Nah, this will INCREASE premiums to all those people who don't want to be snooped on 24/7 by a GPS device designed to provide a superficial risk assessment based on faulty assumptions?

Seriously... When was the last time an insurance company pushed DOWN premiums? Who believes this stuff?

Online Christmas orders from retailers go titsup

Sainsburys & Tesco same backend??

I had the same delivery slot vanishing problems with Tesco grocery shopping last week. Along with earlier not being able to get in to the site, or get the iPhone app to authenticate.

I complained... And got a 10 quid eVoucher... For a service that doesn't work and has no slots available anyway! Thanks Tesco! Every little helps apparently...

Lovefilm dumps Flash, BLINDS Linux fans with Silverlight

Never ever ever...

Wow... Just... Wow... How long before the industry "get" it?

If I want to pirate it, I'll download it from one of any number of sources that they will never kill off in the ongoing game of whack-a-mole.

If I want to purchase it, I'll purchase it.

It's a moral decision that's not going to be changed by placing DRM on a feed. All they do is knee legitimate customers in the balls and expect them to keep taking it.