Posts by SimonL

Apple shrugs off BBC complaint with promise to 'further clarify' AI content

What's AI for???

Surely, if this is the case about fact checking, then AI (used in this way) is utterly pointless?

Microsoft trying to stop Copilot generating fake Putin comments on Navalny's death

Why?

If you have to check all the 'facts' that AI/CoPilot comes up with, what's the point?

Should it be made clear that AI is only useful for producing fiction?

Amazon Ring sounds death knell for surveillance as a service

I find it slightly odd. Maybe US/International laws are different to UK.

Police have always been able to ask for evidence without a warrant, and often do by way of either signs by the road or via media. A request isn't legally binding, the owner can ignore it if they choose.

Is the issue the Police using an app to email people directly? Is that different to a knock on the door? Do Police need a warrant to do door-to-door enquiries?

I support the concept of Police not being able to have access directly to footage without a warrant, but not sure this is the case here?

Can someone cleverer than me verify exactly what the issue is?

Elizabeth Holmes is going to prison – with a $500m bill

Re: Insufficient Evidence?

B0llocks isn't it.

Typical of how money works.

The corporation who put $10m in can afford to lose it, but can claim it all back.

The guy who scrapes 10 bucks together in the hope of making his life a little better, entitled to bugger all back.

The irony being, that as said, it's unlikely the big boys will get much back, but I bet there will be plenty available that could have paid back the small guys first.

Military helicopter crash blamed on failure to apply software patch

Re: Inevitable, given current standards

"Interesting then that a 'patch' was needed. ideally, the machine should not have been released capable of hot starts at all"

I came to say something similar. Either "Wow" the engine was released without the safety interlocks inplace to prevent a hot start - OR during development it was not tested enough to discover hot starts were a ..errr... non-starter.

Signal says it'll shut down in UK if Online Safety Bill approved

Back to sticking things in envelopes and sending 1st class then....

Here's how to remotely take over a Ferrari...account, that is

To justify cars 'phoning home', manufacturers will probably argue that you don't truely outright own the vehicle. A bit like the way Microsoft is doing Windows.

Yes, you pay a single up-front payment and you never have to give it back, but you never really own it.

Oh, no: The electric cars at CES are getting all emotional

I'm all for new fangled things and love my tech, but for driving I also like to have simplicity.

Minimum number of actual physical controls to get the job done.

Why can't we have both? Proper tactile controls for the common functions, but also have a touchscreen for all the data nonsense that you only occasionally need to access, and would be stationary to do so anyway.

Also keeping systems seperate, but connected would be ideal. So when it all goes horribly wrong you can still safely drive the car.

Big brands urged to pause Twitter ads until Elon's learned how this all works

Respected?!?!

"Twitter aspires to be the most respected advertising platform in the world that strengthens your brand and grows your enterprise"

Methinks television and radio is a teeny weeny bit higher up the respected list......

I don't use Twitter but have an account to see what the fuss is about. Last time I logged in, in the first 35 tweets or so, about 4 were from accounts I follow.

Yeah, f****n' dreadful platform that force feeds you cr@p you didn't ask for and keeps you away from what you might actually want to see, like, for example, the accounts you follow!

Water pipes hold flood of untapped electricity potential

Re: Grammar, please...

"Where's your grammar?"

"She's upstairs havin a nap."

Ay?

But physics says No. Unless Gravity is involved, then it's a Yeah but no but, maybe.

A word to the Wyse: Smoking cigars in the office is very bad for you... and your monitor

Tar coated CRTs

Only experienced a couple myself, but ask any TV repairman about CRT TVs from a smokers house.

You pretty much had to chisel the tar off - very carefully of course!

This scumbag stole and traded victims' nude pics and vids after guessing their passwords, security answers

Re: John Kettley is a weatherman

I came to the comments to see this exact comment :)

Server won't boot? Forgot to make that backup? Have no fear, just blame Microsoft

My confession....

....is kinda in line with the article title.

I was IT tech. in a school looking after one division that had it's own server, an old RM CC3 server!

It regularly crashed and burned and had to be rebooted pretty much every morning, whichh could take anything from 5 to 20 minutes.

Rebooted one day and got "no operating system". I had a feeling it would happen one day.....

I left it like that waiting for someone paid more than me to deal with - 2 days it stayed like that, with no teaching network available in 20 odd clasrooms and 3 IT rooms.

Day three I decided to try a reboot again and noticed a USB stick I'd left in.

You can guess what happened.

Never did own up to that, managed to 'deflect' the truth by saying the server just decided to start working again and it was a real wake-up call that it should be replaced ASAP. Was another year before it got replaced!

Google is a 'publisher' says Aussie court as it hands £20k damages to gangland lawyer

Re: Can easily find the article

Presumably Bing will receive the same fine?

I hate Google as much as the next person, but agree they should not be held responsible unless they specifically went against a court ruling.

Surely any search engine that shows the article in their results should receive the fine??

Dyson celebrates 'shock' EU Court win over flawed energy tests

Re: I hate those airblade dryers.

I too have a V6 Animal. Great at suction but the battery life is awful.

A Dyson really does suck, but Dyson really sucks at battery technology...... lol

Researchers take the piss with pee-powered liquid energy project

Better Solution

Just charge your phone before you go out...... :D lol

I want to launch thousands of drones, says Facebook's flying Wi-Fi router chief

What's wrong with better use of satellites?

Oh wait, presumably these drones do uplink and downlink?

The big wi-fi in the sky :) LOL

Oi, Apple fanbois. Your beloved Jesus Phones are pisspoor for disabled users

*shakes head*

My late mother having had mobility issues in her latter years, I fully appreciate the issues faced by the disabled and fully support the notion of providing solutions to all their problems.

However, this article has me getting a bit grumpy with some people!

When you have issues to overcome you select the right tool for the job. Money can also be tight for many disabled, especially when they are relying on benefits to help.

So why on earth would they spend a premium on something that doesn't quite do the job they require? It honestly beggers belief that some are so darn brainwashed by brands like Apple that they are prepared to buy something that doesn't fill their needs (they are of course inteligent enough to check first, right?) then complain.

Accessible/disabled friendly can tend to be more expensive, in the case of phones, it would appear the better option is probably the cheaper option!

Why is this even an article? A paragraph in disabled media alerting fanbois that Apple products may not do everything would be all that's needed............

Is this what the world is coming to? Vanity before well-being?

Height of stupidity: Heathrow airliner buzzed by drone at 7,000ft

Let's hope....

....that these morons flying where they should - regardless of what it is they are flying - DO post their ill-gotten gains to YouTube.

At least then the Police stand half a chance at getting the b******s.

Milk IN the teapot: Innovation or abomination?

Re: Anyone who puts the milk in tea whilst the bag is still in the cup

"Tea, Earl Grey"

Second only to "Engage!"

:D

French duck-crushing device sells for €40k

Re: I hope the new owner donates the thing ...

But will it blend? :)

ZX Printer's American cousin still in use, 34 years after purchase

The article is slightly wrong - Dan 55 has picked up on it.

The printer pictured most definately was not a version of the ZX Printer, it was - as Dan 55 points out - an Alphacom 32 printer in the UK.

The paper was different for a start, whoever wrote the article did not do enough research (Unlike Sinclair ;) lol). The Alphacom 32 and the one pictured uses a white coloured paper and the result looks a lot like a modern cash register receipt. The smaller ZX printer used the silver faced printer the article mentions.

They were two different printers, available at the same time IIRC?

Surprise! That blood-pressure app doesn't measure blood pressure

The way I read their 'attack' on the tests basically told me they were admitting that their app was just some novelty rubbish that should not be taken seriously or for that matter has any real-life use!

This business of it does not display outside 'whatever' range is worrying.

From what the tests discovered, if your blood pressure is particularly high, rather than the machine saying "It's too high, outside of my range, go and see a doctor" it just makes up a reading!!! :o

Why a detachable cabin probably won’t save your life in a plane crash

"Only thing which might be of value could be the ability to jettison a burning engine, leaving the rest of the aircraft intact - but I expect in reality even that would be of minimal use"

Especially when said burning engine lands on a school or shopping mall killing more people than if the plane had just carried on in to the field the pilot was aiming for - even though he knew he would certainly die.

By the same logic, ejecting the cabin anywhere near population and it hitting a populated building (and probably being destroyed by the impact) would result in say 1000 deaths instead of the 300 who were on the plane heading for the field mentioned above...... Hmm...

Man sparks controversy, fined $120 for enjoying wristjob while driving

What life?

"This is my life," he said. "Its products have really helped me."

What a sad, sad ,sad world we live in.

A gold MacBook with just ONE USB port? Apple, you're DRUNK

If the new machine doesn't do what you need it to do, don't buy the darn thing!!!

If non of the Apple range do what you want for a price you can afford, then don't buy an Apple.....

Apple being better than PC blah blah is just nonsense, they all have their strengths and weaknesses.

Anyone who claims Apple are better build quality than PC is just plain naive - the Toughbook has already been mentioned. You can virtually drive your car over a Toughbook and throw it in a river, I wonder which of the Apple range could survive that?

On the other hand, the Toughbook is (arguably) a pig ugly lump and would make your living room look like a garage, where as an Apple is quite pretty.

Sadly there are millions of brainwashed fanbois who will blindly pay significantly more for something that does not do what they want than something that does, simply because it's new and from Apple and looks pretty.

Disaster roster: OMG, are YOU SAFE? I dunno. Check Facebook

Re: Here's a Thought

"Why doesn't every Facebook user simply update their status with whatever they're doing a few dozen times every day? That way when we notice they've stopped updating we'll know they're in trouble."

Because of the FB algorithm. You know, that social engineering they do.... ;-)

If someone is posting regularly, FB will probably decide they are too happy or too boring and stop showing their statuses on your timeline. After all, FB are far better at deciding what we want to see on our timelines.....

It's even GRIMMER up North after MEGA SKY BROADBAND OUTAGE

I can't work out the heck this report is on about. It talks of a broadband outage but only mentions Sky. So was it just Sky customers or all ADSL customers?

Thankfully I'm on Virgin/NTL/Cable & Wireless/Nynex/whatever they are called today!!

VMware's new VDI play is self-destructing virtual desktops

Re: I guess it's neat that they "self destruct"

Maybe they will only run on systems that use roaming profiles / folder redirects?

George Clooney, WikiLeaks' lawyer wife hand out burner phones to wedding guests

Eh?

Is it just me trying to figure out why anyone would need phones at a wedding that can't communicate with the outside world?

For pictures/video then point'n'shoot handed out and collected at the end would be easy and very secure.

Or maybe weddings have now become pop concerts where the guests are simply there to sit and poke meaninglessly at a 4" screen and not socialise or participate in the proceedings?

Click on a Facebook ad on your mobe, then buy a thing on your PC ... Facebook remembers

Re: How?

So when they say "annonymised" (is that how you spell it!) it isn't truely if they can track between devices....

Scary stuff :(

Oh yeah, I also get bombared with ads for stuff I've just bought......

When PR backfires: Google 'forgets' BBC TV man's banker blog post

Get a grip!!!

I just wish the world would get a grip and accept that Google doesn't run the planet or own the internet. They cannot 'break' the internet. If Google vanished overnight the internet would carry on as before....

Personally I have as little to do with Google as possible and avoid 'Googling' at all costs, I use Yahoo! and am very happy.

I just see a constant stream of news about Google and it just makes me cringe at how they have managed to brain wash such a HUGE part of the world.

If there was ever a monopoly......

Tesco exec brands UltraViolet 'too complicated' for Brits

Personally I don't get the obsesion with downloading everything.... broadband provision is bad enough in this country without clogging it with potentially unecessary downloading.

I have some DVD's that came with a 'file' version on disk. What's wrong with that? To save on media just create a disk that can be both played by a 'player' and contains a 'file' version.

If I want a copy on my portable device I don't want to have to get online and wait three hours for it download something which then tells me it's corrupt and has to do it again......

Drag'n'drop from the disk will do nicely thank you!