Posts by Mark 85

Taking an artsy selfie in Stockholm? You might need to pay royalities

Re: no

So, all Wikimedia have to do is to claim that their collection of images provides the same service as a guidebook?

I know a lot of people use Wikipedia/media to research holiday destinations, so it's not entirely unreasonable.

I think you've touched on the big problem with all this. If no photographs of a given town or area that is dependent on tourism are permitted (with or with out a fee), then tourism will dry up. This seems to be more about revenue generation than licensing and compensating the artists.

There's oil in that thar … Chinese space probe?

Re: it's not fuel oil compressed..

To be followed soon by curry sellers, fast-food joints, and possibly a pub at some point. Sounds like a great way to encourage space travel.

It does have a certain look.. like maybe from a James Bond movie.

Hacking Team's export authorisation hacked by Italian government

Interesting list..

What's even more interesting is who's not on the list... notably Venezuela, Ukraine, Russia and China.

Congressman called out for $1,300 video game binge

Re: What a tool

Once upon a time, I remember when Republican scandals were about money, Democratic scandals were about sex. My how times have changed.

Re: What a tool

You make assumptions that the people who elect these people do so wisely and that only the intelligent, unbiased, and unblemished run for office.

Every person in Congress lately seems to be involved in a scandal waiting to hit the front pages.

Devs, skill up and help teach Alexa new tricks

Re: Can't let you do that Dave

Considering that they will more than likely make this a "service" with a monthly bill that you pay for the privilege of whatever they want to do with your "data" while you're not walking across the room to the light switch, I think the best answer is "none of the above... ever".

Nest has killed off one of it's wonder IoT of things and there's bound to be a lot of angry people running around so there is that to consider... What happens when they decide to kill the service or make it available only for upgraded devices?

Turbo-charged quantum crypto? You'll need Cambridge laser boffins for that

Ah... I'm still having a bit of a fit grasping this stuff. That clears it up. So Charlie is the cat and in or maybe not in the box that may or may not exist at this moment?

So do we ask Charlie if there's a cat in there?

Bezos defends Amazon culture in letter to shareholders

Re: Seen it -- "the beatings will continue until morale improves"

I think a lot of us have been there with you. Things start off well and over time, deteriorate. We sit there and hang on through the management temper tantrums, the bean counter bloodlettings, and the various re-purposing of departments that goes on with the management scheme of the day: silos, competency centers, Agile, feely good stuff like Act One, and now Dev Ops.

Morale is a tenuous thing and once lost, it's almost impossible to regain though it may come back in the form of the "bunker mentality".

At some point, we say "screw it, I've had enough" and then we're labeled as "not a team player". But deep down, there's a realization that we should have bailed out earlier. The abuse just isn't worth the paycheck.

And no... I'm not a masochist so my morale will not improve with additional beatings.

Hubble spies supermassive black hole in surprising spot

The metaphors don't bother me. These guys aren't English majors. But the discoveries of late are just impressive.

Nest bricks Revolv home automation hubs, because evolution

What would have been better would have been if they'd published an API for the devices, allowing people to choose to run their own servers, or pay for the convenience of having Google do it for them.

Publishing the API or even hand delivering to most (almost all, maybe?) of their customers wouldn't do squat as they have no clue. Now if Google had stepped up and offered to keep their devices running for $X per month/annum that would be a different deal. I think more than a few would do that IF the price were reasonable.

And I have friends (who are angry with me) and relatives (who are angry with me) because I won't touch IoT (in addition to Win10). I've been warning them that this stuff all is worthless when Company X decides to pull the plug, sell out, goes under or changes the EULA/T&C. So far I've had one... just one person call and tell me I was right out of about 10 who are playing with the IoT shiny. Which is fine with me... my phone rings a lot less and I have more free-time to myself.

Open-source vuln db closes – plenty of taking and not a lot of giving

Re: Ah, McAfee...

Would you expect anything less from a company who tries to bundle their product with Flash?

Facebook censors Scunthorpe band

I hope the birdwatcher groups can still discuss the titmouse or do they have to call it something else like boobmouse?

Florida weed suspect cuffed after hoverboard pursuit

Re: Weed

More and more states are legalizing it. The catch is that via Presidential Order, the users/growers in those states can legally do this, unless the next President changes the Order. However, one can still not transport it across state lines even if the state you're going into has legalized it. The Feds still consider that a crime.

Somewhat of a tangled mess still, but the states who have legalized are seeing a drop in drug crimes and a huge increase in tax revenues as they tax the crap out of it... unless you have a medical pot card. The big worry is what will the next guy in the White House do?

Google's dream city isn't a new idea

The earliest feasible idea was Buckminster Fuller's for a geodesic dome over.... East St. Louis*. As I recall this was the original concept for Epcot.

It's a pity that he and Google can't get together on this. Once all the Oompa Loompas are in place, including all the management, etc., we lock the doors from the outside. A week later we disconnect the power.

*That was his dream. He did dream big at times.

We bet your firm doesn't stick to half of these 10 top IT admin tips

Re: 1) is a tad unrealistic

Where I was working, we in IT did accept passwords and log on credentials for repair. However, when the PC/Laptop/Mobile was handed back, the user had to call into the Security Helldesk for new passwords. All to them, not just the one for the PC.

However, after one IT lad decided to look where he shouldn't have looked, that policy did change. No handing over credentials/passwords. Firing offence even if it was senior management's equipment and they didn't want to hang around. Lots of pressure for us to ignore it until a junior VP was canned for pushing and demanding we fix his box without his being there to login.

Re: Nice Theory - but

You won't get much profit, growth or senior management convenience if you have a leak from the air conditioning in the electronically-locked Boardroom which fails, and kills everyone senior.

Allow me to snark a bit.... Profit would go up since no senior management bonuses would need to be paid out. Growth might increase without senior management sticking their noses in where they have no knowledge or expertise. Hmm... maybe a change in management might be beneficial in many companies as long as they don't hire someone else's flotsam/jetsam.

Adobe preps emergency Flash patch for bug hackers are exploiting

Seems a lot of news sites are changing the way they look and feel to "improve the user experience" yet all their videos still need Flash. I guess they haven't received the news that HTML5 is better because.... well... no Flash?

And no.. a thousand times no... I will not ever install Flash...

PayPal freezes 400-job expansion in North Carolina over bonkers religious freedom law

Puzzling legislation.

I know we're all nuts here in the States, but tying in a minimum wage lock into this bill defies logic.. WTF?

Their paranoia over their so called freedoms is one thing in that it restricts others freedoms. I expect a Supreme Court case over this. Constitutionality and all that.....

I swear, we're all batshit crazy these days... just a glance at the front runners for President proves that point.

Re: America

We are. And your point is?

Twitter spends $10m on rights to cover Thursday-night NFL games

Re: Spot on

It depends. Is spinning round in circles going "AAAAHHHH!!!" a strategy?

Only if they are waving their hands in the air while doing it. Otherwise it's just spinning place. Attach an oil well drilling bit to their chair and they can make a deeper hole.

Iceland prime minister falls on sword over Panama Papers email leak

Re: Didn't realize there were more data dumps to come

Delaware does very nicely as does the Caymans. A quick look at Apple and other corporates makes this point.

And it might very well be that the small fish are being exposed first. Why waste all your press and readership by exposing the big guys first?

Brits rattle tin for 'revolutionary' hydrogen-powered car

That's just not in the UK either. It applies here in the States as well. Even the "normal" garage at a home would be hard-pressed to manage gull-wing doors.

OTOH, gull wings are cool. Especially if you remember the Mercedes-Benz racing cars from the mid-50's. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_300_SL

Truly crap exhibition dumped on Isle of Wight

Re: Er, what?

Training cats is comparatively easy once you've figured out how to herd them. And if you can herd cats, I have some management types I'd like you work with on herding them into the elevator shaft.

Surprise! Magic Kinder app could let hackers send vids to your kids

Re: say what?

based on this crappy photo?

http://bit.ly/1MbdjJl

PS your boss may feel thats NSFW

Thanks for that. Now I'll spend the rest of the day looking for mind bleach.. I know I had some around here left over from following a different link on El Reg....

Icon... if I can't find the mind bleach.. I'll try fire --------------->

Re: What a crock!

Not having seen the app, I'll bet it's loaded with "product placement", etc... Today's kids are consumers. Tomorrow it's their kids. The customer base builds.....

Three million satellite snaps now free for all

Re: Finally......

Maybe his neighbors keep shooting his drones down?

'Panama papers' came from email server hack at Mossack Fonseca

Re: No coverage in the US

I've been seeing this for a few days. I think that we're not hearing much here in the States is because the "right people for a good headline" haven't been involved yet. If a Trump, Clinton, Obama, etc. were involved, the appropriate news orgs* would be screaming headlines at us.

*appropriate in the sense that a conservative news org would be screaming for Clinton or Obama's head and a liberal news org would be screaming for Trump's head.

Re: Why is it...

It'll be even more fun watching his face when I pay it back into the account 10 minutes later :).

But do go to the bank next door and convert that to small bills and use those to pay it back. :)

Re: Given the scarcity of items on our cousins in the material released...

Since the reporters are "international" and given the volume of data, I'm sure they'll find some USA types in this. Unless, of course, the USA types used a different law firm. Or NSA go to the info first (which seems unlikely).

But so far, it does make me wonder... where are the US types hiding the cash?

George Bush naked selfie hacker Guccifer gets his day in US court

Re: Unequality before justice

I think that doesn't just apply to "Romanian politicians". There must be some catch-all name since the US , UK, EU, ad infinitum, etc. would apply. Might better if we could name the governments not corrupt and sniveling.

Re: Hold on, just need to fix something here....

That's true. I note that not one of the ransomware types who generally hit the "little people" have been arrested or charged. Just the few who have got the big political or celeb types.

Equal justice for all... meh....

What's all this? Welcome to The Register's News Bytes

Nah....

From what I've seen so far, this is for the Twitterati. No meat to sink one's teeth into or feed the brain. Just a quick dirty filler. If I want a quick and dirty headline and few lines of text, I'd use Twitter. Forget this and stick to articles with substance and information.

WhatsApp straps on full end-to-end crypto for 1bn peeps

Re: Your move, FBI

That seems to be the idea... these things are just clickbait. Sort of like a cookie or biscuit: little substance.

Trump carded again: Hotel security aced

Re: Picture

Hmm... I do wonder though if maybe IBM is paying him a royalty for "You're fired"? But then, maybe IBM is using "You're redundant"? Either way, same result. One gloating boss who didn't get the pink slip for himself and a grumbling employee (or hundreds) headed for the door.

Re: Sigh...

The "H" in this case stands for "Head" not "Hair".....

Re: Not a fan but

Pretty soon there will be list of those who haven't been hacked yet. It will be the shorter list.

I daresay that it probably all ready is shorter. Seems the time between the attack starting, being carried out, and finally discovered is growing. It's the discovery part that is getting deeply troubling as I'm sure there's lot of companies that will at some point pop their heads up and go..."oh... we got attacked, but we do take security seriously" and that will be a few years after the attackers and come and rode off into the sunset with the goods. Clueless they are and more are joining those ranks everyday in the name of profit and ignorance.

JAXA confirms ASTRO-H breakup

Re: That's three now

Hmm... maybe someone doesn't really want an X-Ray telescope out there because they don't want to be found?

'Devastating' bug pops secure doors at airports, hospitals

Re: Odd.

I can't find any airlines that fly to the Southern Ohio Medical Centre......

They would but the runway on the roof is a bit limited in run-out for landing and take-offs.

Re: Popping door access controlled doors is easier than you think ...

Exactly... why the hell a door system needs to be web-facing or even connected to a corporate LAN is beyond me. Same goes for such critters as HVAC.

Your pointy-haired boss 'bought a cloud' with his credit card. Now what?

Re: Fair enough

He was spouting about having quality, low costs and rapid delivery.

Isn't that now called DevOps this year? It seems that before that it was called "Agile".

Re: Missing the real point

No downvote from here. This is exactly how the PC got into many engineering departments. IT was unwilling to write mainframe programs or modify them for engineers. Along came Lotus 123, some public programs for maths, publishing, etc. and world changed.

Waiting for your Oculus to arrive? Yeah, it's going to be some time

Upvote for the "Outer Limits" opening. Pity we can't have the music also.

Just how close are Obama and Google? You won’t believe the answer

Malice or Incompetence?

As far as the un-redacted info that led to this revelation are concerned... I think it could go either way. It's either a pissed-off staffer or an incompetent staffer.

On the other hand, government officials and agencies in the back pocket of corporates.... like this is something new?

Did hacktivists really just expose half of Turkey's entire population to ID theft?

Re: It was only 18 months ago that the same thing happened to South Korea

I'm still waiting for the SS Admin here in the States to be hit. There is one massively juicy database.

Re: Is there a battle raging on the astral plane ?

There's another biggie happening at the moment... look at "Mossack Fonseca".

Re: Nothing to hide, nothing to fear

George Carlin was bang on the money: “Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.”

Here in the States, the electorate is showing proof of that.

Spies rejoice! Gmail, Facebook Messenger BREACHed once again

If you are using a public free email service the Internet , I would automatically consider it compromised

FTFY