Posts by AbelSoul

Age verification biz claims no-payment model for 40% of Brits ahead of July pr0n ban

Who watches the watchers?

Oll ur wanx r belong to us!

SpaceX Crew Dragon: Launched and docked. Now, about that splashdown...

Re: Wonder if they will go for the triple?

They went for it the last time and almost pulled off all three.

'They took away our Cup-a-Soup!' Share your tales of bleak breakout areas with us

Re: You had hands!!!

You lucky, lucky, bastards.....

Techie in need of a doorstop picks up 'chunk of metal' – only to find out it's rather pricey

Re: Have you ever heard a story about something you did told second-hand?

Go and DuckDuckGo the origins of the phrase Cock and Bull story. The Cock and The Bull were two pubs on The Great North Road.

I had a peek and apparently the claim that's where the phrase originated is a bit of a cock and bull story itself.

I helped catch Silk Road boss Ross Ulbricht: Undercover agent tells all

Interesting postscript to this long running tale.

When's the movie out?

Amazon's self-driving AI robo-car – THE TRUTH (it's a few inches in size)

Re: where is the BOFH?

He's been busy repurposing an AI robo-car.

NASA has Mars InSight as latest lander due to arrive today

Re: "On the ground"??

I took that to mean the mass remaining after the parachutes, heat-shield and the rest of the en-route gubbins have been jettisoned.

InSight

... drilling through the dance floor

Oh man, look at that lander go

It's the freakiest show....

BT: We're stocking warehouses with kit ahead of Brexit to avoid shortages

Re: A timely reminder...

"adding another crate of single malt to my post-Brexit stash"

Any excuse for a bit of shameless advertising of my own single malt.

One of only 248 ever produced.*

*sort of. ;-)

Fast food, slow user – techie tears hair out over crashed drive-thru till

Re: Ahhh, memories...

So, it was you I spoke to earlier....

Police block roads to stop tech support chap 'robbing a bank'

Re: at least they turned up...

Indeed. Having spent five years living in "the Govanhill area of Glasgow" I'm mildly surprised the Rozzers appeared at all.

TSB outage, day 5: What do you mean you can't log in? Our systems are up and running. Up and running, we say!

Still humped

Been trying to get in all afternoon.

Finally got in a couple of minutes ago and second stage of 2 factor authentication crashed.

Tried again and finally got to see a list of my accounts, tried to access one and was greeted with a "Thank you! You have successfully logged out of your account." message.

Omnishambles springs to mind.

User asked why CTRL-ALT-DEL restarted PC instead of opening apps

Re: Feeling Old...

Kids these days don't understand that we used to have to buy a card specifically to get sound out of a computer

To be fair, having grown up using a Commodore16 then eventually an Amiga, on encountering an "IBM Compatible" for the first time, I didn't understand that either; "What do you mean, it can only go beep?"

Half the world warned 'Chinese space station will fall on you'

Chicken Licken

For some reason this has reminded me of an occasion in the early 90s, leaving the arena of a music festival in a several thousand strong throng of revellers in various states of intoxication. One particularly inebriated young chap suddenly decided to serenade a WPC with the unforgettable verse:

All my life I've been lickin'

Your fanny lips cause they taste like chicken

Oh boy

Ahh.... what a time to be alive that was... nostalgia sure ain't what it used to be... etc, etc.

Home taping revisited: A mic in each hand, pointing at speakers

Re: C30 C60 C90 Go!

"Try looking for that on Spotify…"

UK's iconic Jodrell Bank Observatory nominated as World Heritage Site

Re: Look again at that dot...

Well, if the last two years are anything to go by, you won't be disappointed.

Look again at that dot...

It has hosted the Bluedot festival for the last two years and is doing so again this year. This event combines music and science and is tailor-made for a tune-loving-nerd such as myself. Professor David Nutt's presentation in the inaugural year was a personal highlight. I've yet to miss it.

Staying on site for the weekend also solves your transport issues.

Scotland, now is your time… to launch Brexit Britain into SPAAAACE!

Scotch pie...

... in the sky.

Forget Sesame Street, scientists pretty much watched Big Bird evolve on Galápagos island

Pfffffttt!

Not having it!

Evolution is just a theory, after all.

Alexa, please cause the cops to raid my home

Re: So is Alexa now the.....

Sinead O' Sarah Connor?

Boss put chocolate cake on aircon controller, to stop people using it

Re: have their cake and heat it!

Bravo Paul, bravo sir!

Your data will get hacked anyway so you might as well give up protecting it

Walt Disney does it...

Naw he disney.

Red (Planet) alert: Future astro-heroes face shocking adventures on Martian moon Phobos

Re: rate of change of puns with respect to time

Yes, people can be quite resistant to that.

Super Cali's futuristic robo-cars in focus – even though watchdogs say they're something quite atrocious

Re: never mind the content, brilliant headline!

Yes, I haven't even read the article yet but came straight here to see if anyone had offered congratulations on such a wonderfully creative demonstration of headlinery goodness.

I wasn't disappointed.

Bravo folks, bravo.

Support team discovers 'official' vendor paper doesn't rob you blind

Re: What have you fixed with sticky tape?

Tape.

I used to fix tape with tape.

More specifically, back in the mists of time when home taping was killing music, I was an enthusiastic home taper.

Some of these cassettes became quite precious.

Occasionally such a cassette would suffer from snapped tape.

A little scalpel blade and a few well-placed millimetres of (possibly the same frosted type of) Scotch tape could resurrect them with only a split second of distorted wobble to belie the repair job.

Ahh, nostalgia. Even after all these years it still aint what it used to be.

Kebab and pizza shop owner jailed for hiding £179k from the taxman

Re: Sub heading should read

Well, he has to earn a crust somehow.

Fruit flies' brains at work: Decision-making? They use their eyes

Re: "scalpel-fodder" ?

Yes, you need a laser to make a scalpel that tiny.

Robocall scumbags already target Hurricane Harvey victims

Re: If I was in any way religious...

spent their time waiting to be rescued praising God

But not praising the actual rescuers?

James Webb Telescope will be infatuated with Europa and Enceladus

Re: Microbial life?

... live is life.

NA NA, NANA NA!

San Franciscans unite to smite alt-right with minefield of doggy shite

Re: Question...

What exactly is the IT angle in this story?

Not this kiech again - it's bootnotes.

Bootnotes.

Bootnotes!

BOOTNOTES!!

US engineer in the clink for wrecking ex-bosses' smart meter radio masts with Pink Floyd lyrics

Re: Well, at least he has good taste in music

Plans that either come to nought....

Varjo promises Oculus-killing VR/AR, but is it the next Magic Leap?

Impressive

That is a huge difference in perceived quality.

Hopefully this sees production and helps lead to overall improvements in VR/AR.

Bye bye MP3: You sucked the life out of music. But vinyl is just as warped

Re: you do notice the difference.

Dae ye, aye?

Man nicked trying to 'save' beer from burning building

Re: Minnehaha

From the article:

.. a resting place that sounds more pleasant than it probably is..

Squirrel sinks teeth into SAN cabling, drives Netadmin nuts

Re: Best traps

It might not surprise you (given my posting name) that I've never lived in a house with a mouse problem. Or a rat problem.

I never had a mouse problem or a rat problem until I got my cat. He was already about a year and a half old and has a habit of catching various creatures and bringing them home, usually (although by no means always) in pretty rude health. Everything from mice, voles and shrews, through frogs and newts, to rats and birds, but mostly mice.

Last summer he was sometimes bringing in three or four critters a night. This makes for some "hilarious" late night escapades, trying to catch and release the wee beasties.

I live in the city centre, about half a mile from the nearest water course and had no idea there was so much wildlife outside my back door.

Decapitating Rockall: How a 1970s Navy expedition blasted the top off the Atlantic islet

Re: It's 90 miles closer to Donegal than it is to Britain

Let's not get ahead of ourselves.

Scotland (the nearest permanently inhabited place is North Uist) is still part of Britain.

Google Maps' Street View can now lead you into a bubbling lava lake

Dirt bags

Perhaps it's the scale that has me fooled but, if you zoom out until you're POV is from the top of the crater, the abseiling gear appears to be anchored by two sleeping bag sized sacks of soil.

YIKES!

NASA swerves serious cash cuts – but Earth climate probes, asteroid snatcher face axe

Re: as too are plans for a lander on Europa

Pah!

This was the mission I was most excited about. (2010's "ATTEMPT NO LANDINGS THERE" notwithstanding.)

Now it looks like I'll be long gone before anything lands there. SAD! (aherm)

If fast radio bursts really are revving up interstellar sailcraft, here's the maths

Re: Dyson sphere in my pocket.

Or you're just REALLY pleased to see me...

Move over, Bernie Ecclestone. Scientists unearth Earth's oldest fossil yet: 4bn years old

Re: 'seeded' from the same extrasolar source

@Hans 1:

Upvoted purely for "yumans" - brought a nostalgic smile to my face.

Low-key Samsung: Psst. We've got new Galaxy tablets and new Gear VR

Gear VR

Apart from the addition of a controller, are there any improvements to the Gear VR?

Sysadmin's sole client was his wife – and she queried his bill

RE: memories of hibs gone bad (1st para)

Yeah, they were relegated a few seasons ago but appear to be on their way back.

Soon only Ticketmaster will rip you off: Concert scalper bots face US ban

Re: Even email delivery costs money

Yes. I have grudgingly paid £2.50 to TicketBastard on more than one occasion for the "privilege" of printing out my own ticket.

Come the revolution, first order of business:

Ticket prices will be all-inclusive by law.

If a gig is advertised at twenty squids, then all you should pay is twenty squids, including standard delivery.

50 years on, the Soviet-era Soyuz rocket is still our favorite space truck

Korolev Cross

Excellent footage and a sight to behold. Cheers.

Married man arrives at A&E with wedding ring stuck on todger

Re: difficulty pulling it off

I see what you did there.

Now that you've gone..

All that's left is a band of gold,

All that's left of the dreams I ho-old....

Robot solves Rubik's Cubes in 637 milliseconds

Re: ....considered a P or NP problem?

P or NP?

Aaaaarrrgggghhhh.......... </runs screaming from the room>

Put Firefox DE and Chromium in blender. Devs... Is it pure Blisk?

Cheers for the head's up...

I'd never heard of Blisk but am downloading now for a nosey.

20 years to get Amiga Workbench 3.1 update, and only a fortnight to get first patch

Re: Atari is better because it has MIDI

Ah, that takes me back. I got a 1200 in 1993 and started mucking around with OctaMED and 8-bit samples. Pretty soon I wanted MIDI but it was too late/expensive to switch to Atari by then.

So.... I started acquiring more and more Amiga audio and MIDI accessories as my music hobby refused to die. Still have loads of this, now redundant, Amiga audio gear, gathering dust.

Alas, for the last decade or so, I have pursued this hobby without having to switch on an Amiga.

Nonetheless, I still own two A1200s, an Amiga1 and a Pegasos1 (PPC Amiga clone).

One day, when I have time, etc, etc........

Job ad asks for 'detrimental' sysadmin

Re: what Freud was doing while wearing a slip...

Apparently he was just checking himself out.