Posts by mrjohn

Gen Z and Millennials don't know what their colleagues are talking about half the time

Re: I'll Be There

Indeed, and the England 1998 World Cup squad who had a competition to see who could slip the most song titles into interviews, or was it just your imagination?

Warning: Microsoft Teams Free (classic) will be gone in 2 months

Re: Flawless ?

Yes, I've been using computers for the best part of 40 years. I think it is no longer acceptable to expect the end user to find the bugs. That world ended when they opted for the subscription model and the drip drip of constant updates. Same for Adobe, get it right, or get out.

So while Teams is free we can accept it having issues. When it is a paid for service it had better be flawless.

It's your human hubris holding back AI acceptance

I is starting to look a lot like groupthink meets design by committee.

ChatGPT (sigh) the fastest-growing web app in history (sigh) claim analysts

95% of those users are ai--bots

Japan to change laws that require use of floppy disks

Re: It's pervasive.

The pagers and flip phones have better security, much harder for the cops to spy on.

Did you know that everything in Funanabshi beyond the Sobu Line is reclaimed land, you used to be able to see the sea from the platform of Kaijin station.

IBM settles age discrimination case that sought top execs' emails

Re: The direction the US is going, they'll sign up the zygote and fire her when she's born.

"During the height of the covid pandemic, anti-vaxxers were dying at rates well over 1,000/day and they cheered,"

This didn't happen.

RSAC branded a 'super spreader event' as attendees share COVID-19 test results

I'm still waiting for the Taliban to drop dead from covid.

https://whdh.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2021/08/210815-taliban-afghanistan.jpg?resize=768

Adobe apologizes for repeated outages of its Creative Cloud video collaboration service

I've used Adobe products professionally for over 25 years, generally they have been great, but recently they haven't. It's hard to tell if it's the machine, the system, the software or the network that is the problem, or any combination of those elements. What I can say is that at times a ten minute job can take an hour. It would be nice if the paying customer wasn't working for free as a beta tester.

Google splurging cash on UK offices to lure staffers back from the kitchen table

Re: Draconian?

Ask Sergio Aguero.

Radioactive hybrid terror pigs have made themselves a home in Fukushima's exclusion zone

Re: “Re-wilding”

I always wondered about the proximity of Wales and Windscale.

Cyber-IOU notes. Voucher hell on wheels. However you want to define Facebook's Libra, the most ridiculous part is its privacy promise

And so the world becomes completely dependent on lithium.

IBM fired me because I'm not a millennial, says axed cloud sales star in age discrim court row

The plug and play millennials, such an asset.

Engineer crashed mega-corp's electricity billing portal, was promoted

Re: I can forgive 'Matt' for all of his sins...

"Sorry, but literally doesn't literally mean literally any more."

figuratively speaking it does

Twenty years ago today: Windows 98 crashed live on stage with Bill Gates. Let's watch it again...

Re: "That must be why we're not shipping Windows 98 yet," quipped Gates.

Or by pointing out that in the infinite possibilities of the universe, somewhere Tesla turns a profit

Imagine you're having a CT scan and malware alters the radiation levels – it's doable

Don't tell Putin !

Elon Musk invents bus stop, waits for applause, internet LOLs

e long bus ?

Winter is coming for AI. Fortunately, non-sci-fi definitions are actually doing worthwhile stuff

I know some nervous translators and interpreters. The translations may not be good, but they are good enough because they are cheap & quick. Automated transcription is also impressive. It's not perfect, it needs checking, but it does a lot of the drudge work.

SpaceX releases Pythonesque video of rocket failures

I think Kim has the edge when it comes to subduing the Pacific with rocket fire.

Atari shoots sueball at KitKat maker over use of 'Breakout' in ad

Re: @Sub-vulture re. "Breakout"

I think you need the Holy Diver to answer that

Linux-loving lecturer 'lost' email, was actually confused by Outlook

“I paused for effect,” Newt wrote, “and then replied. No. I don't think you're an idiot.” And then he walked away.

That's not nice, we all slip up. People skills are vital in any tech job, and never forget, to the end user 90% of the interface is irrelevant functionality obscuring the tasks they need.

RBS sharpens axe again: 900 IT jobs to go by 2020

You can't cut your way to growth.

Slurping people's info without a warrant? That's OUR JOB, Google, Facebook et al tell US Supreme Court

So does this argument extend to not being filmed every time we walk down the street?

Or being subject to facial recognition software in public & private spaces ( streets & stadiums)?

Or having car number plates tracked?

If internet connectivity is an extension of public space, I can't see how tracking data is any different.

Google's macho memo man fired, say reports

This is Google on unconscious bias

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLjFTHTgEVU

A sarcasm detector bot? That sounds absolutely brilliant. Definitely

Sarcastic computers, that's all we need.

"Have you tried turning me off and on again, no, didn't think so, I'll do it myself, me, brain the size of a planet ...."

Drupal sci-fi sex scandal deepens: Now devs spank Dries over Gor bloke's banishment

Re: It's interesting that some higly disturbed people...

thus the human race is doomed

Dungeons & Dragons finally going digital

Re: Wearing my +2 Rose tinted spectacles of the Marshlands...

You should start again, I played in the 70s & early 80s and came back to it about 6 years ago.

It is great way to relieve stress, because unlike real life, you can fail massively and laugh about it.

WOTC & their players have developed a game which is well paced, well balanced & fun to play. Watch a few videos of Chris Perkins DMing live games on Youtube and you will get an idea of how much better 5E is.

Disclaimer, this evening I will unleash flesh golems possessed by revenants on an unsuspecting party on a desert road.

The point here is the digital tools are being launched for 5E. There were digital tools for 4E.

The rules for 5E were a result of play testing by thousands of players, with the beta versions distributed online, and feedback given online, the participation and response rates were phenomenal.

The game is enjoying a huge surge in popularity right now, globally. It's come a long way since the days of "door on the left, door on the right, door straight ahead"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvhSNadJalU

In D&D flame wars are green flame wars.

Stop the press: Journos not happy losing jobs to journo bots, say journos

Just so long as they can insert the phrase "fears that" into every headline all will be fine.

How Google.org stole the Christmas Spirit

Re: A possible solution for getting the basic supplies

Possibly illegal.

Definitely time consuming.

Uber's self-driving cars can't handle bike lanes, forcing drivers to kill autonomous mode

Meanwhile in the real world Uber is losing billions of dollars

http://www.businessinsider.com/uber-lost-800-million-in-third-quarter-2016-2016-12

Great business model, borrow cheap money, drive legitimate companies out of business, clean up on IPO, leave trail of destruction behind.

Brexit judgment could be hit for six by those crazy Supreme Court judges, says barrister

Re: Should I Stay or Should I Go?

You might ask why the same Parliament passed such a poorly thought out bill to hold the referendum in the first place. Was it deliberate that the bill gave no mechanism to follow through on the result?

Makes you wonder about other legislation.

Re: Parliament must vote

But in the scenario of a general election which party gets to put "cancel Brexit" on its manifesto?

Mysterious algorithms, black-box AI recruiters are binning our résumés

So it's not what you know, or who you know, it's 101011101000101

HSBC: How will we verify business banking customers? Selfies!

You can change a password, you can't change your biometric data.

Sex is bad for older men, and even worse when it's good

But married men live longer than unmarried men .........

EU verdict: Apple received €13bn in illegal tax benefits from Ireland

I think compulsive tax evasion/avoidance should be treated as a mental health issue.

Apple squeezes its suppliers and squirms at the thought of paying tax, if a corporation is a human they are the whiny teenager.

Adblock Plus blocks Facebook's ad-blocker buster: It's a block party!

Are you advertising Ad Block Plus?

OMG: HPE gobbles SGI for HPC. WTF?

the purple ones were faster

40 years ago today the US govt sent a taxpayer-funded robot to invade an alien hostile world

Next time I mess up at work I'll tell myself at least I didn't mess up on another planet too.

HR botches redundancy so chap scores year-long paid holiday

Re: January 1st?

When I was a student in the 80s I had a holiday job taking surveys in sports clubs in Edinburgh and Glasgow, "hangover cure" was frequent reason for using the facilities in the morning.

Lovely friendly people as I recall.

5% of drivers want Nigel Farage to be their in-car robo butler

Re: No Tomtom Baker?

Ask Mr Baker to narrate at your own peril

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQeTIjD0T_4

Not a man who suffers fools lightly

IBM invents printer that checks for copyrights

Gee, wouldn't it be amazing if a company could put technology in place to protect musicians from having their work stolen and people gleaning advertising revenue from it on a popular internet video web site.............

Apple man found dead at Cupertino HQ, gun discovered nearby

"When the police arrived, an Hispanic Apple worker was found dead in a conference room with a gun nearby."

Is "Hispanic" code for "cleaner"

Why is the person's ethnicity relevant?

Google Loon balloon crash lands in Chile

Re: Well

That's the one day I would change for a Monday

Boaty McBoatface 'wins'

The world needs to get back its sense of humour

Boaty McBoatface it is

You won't believe this, but… nothing useful found on Farook iPhone

The dog that doesn't bark

"Regardless, the FBI used the existence of the phone and the shocking nature of the crime to wage a public war with Apple over encryption and access to electronic goods. "

And if they hadn't made every effort to unlock the phone you would be criticising them for not following every lead.

"Just shows how lame they are they can't even hack a phone" would have been the tenor of the conversation from the almighty enlightened tech savants

What's next? FBI telling us to turn iPhones into pocket spy bugs? It'll happen, says Apple exec

So now we see what really worries Apple, having tried to make their device the centre of people's lives they realise people might decide this is not a good option.

We survived a five-hour butt-numbing Congress hearing on FBI-Apple ... so you don't have to

Trey

"You can go into people's bodies and remove bullets but you can't go into a dead person's iPhone and remove the data? I'm just amazed by that.

You're not the only person who was amazed, Trey."

I think you are deliberately missing the point. It is starting to sound like tech is a sacred cow which must remain inviolate, however we accept the need to cut open a corpse, irrespective of the distress this might cause the bereaved, for evidence. It's an emotional stance perhaps, not a logical comparison, but humans generally make decisions based on emotion, not logic.

If my assumption is correct I see where he is coming from, smart phones, and the data they contain and access are considered the priority, perhaps even the much vaunted privacy is beginning to play second fiddle to the preeminence of the technical achievement that ensures this privacy. The value is not the information, but the fact Apple have made a clever way of keeping it.

What keeps Tim Cook awake is the possible realisation by the general public that analog alternatives have their plus side. Maybe the US will see a spike in sales of fireproof safes, same as Japan has seen this year.

Apple fans take iPhone unlock protest to FBI HQ

Re: RIPA

in this case the guy that knows the password is dead