* Posts by Wonder Warthog

5 publicly visible posts • joined 18 Oct 2013

This is the end, Windows 7 and 8 friends: Microsoft drops support this week

Wonder Warthog

The hollow threat

In all my experience with Microsoft from DOS 2.0 on up, I've never seen anything but the most newsworthy problems addressed. There are always dozens of issues with the OS after an update, and in many cases many more, having been added to by the supposed update itself. The continual threat of loss of support is a red herring. Unaddressed, legacy vulnerabilities and bugs continue to exist even in the most recent Windows iterations. So what, exactly, does one lose when so-called 'support' is dropped, aside from the joy of trying to get previously stable programs to run on the new release?

Stand up who HASN'T been hit in the Equifax mega-hack – whoa, whoa, sit down everyone

Wonder Warthog

Appears Indigenous

In a possibly unrelated irony, attemps to view the Equifax page set up to inform you if your data was compromised, www.equifaxsecurity2017.com, shows it has an invalid https certificate, and is even blocked by OpenDNS as being a phishing site. Guess when you handle millions of people's personal info, you naturally have the best data security practices money can buy.

Facebook to forcefeed you web ads, whether you like it or not: Ad blocker? Get the Zuck out!

Wonder Warthog

Pay to be harassed

Though I'm not sure how the business model works if inserted ads are not subsequently clicked (do you convince advertisers that the 'potential' for clicking exists, and that they should therefore pay to have the ad displayed?), until/unless the sites injecting the ads into of the content I actually want to see pay me for the bandwidth they consume from my data plan, I'll block all ads all the time from everyone with any method available.

This utter waste of my money has been estimated at between 25% and 40% of my data usage (http://venturebeat.com/2015/07/08/blocking-ads-can-cut-network-traffic-25-to-40-study-shows/). I don't care if some business 'relies' on web advertising...the data I pay for monthly is not theirs to use. Pay me or find another income method. But stop griping about 'your' loss when I'm footing the bill.

Samsung appeals to Supreme Court to bring patent law into 21st century

Wonder Warthog

We don't need no steeking prior art!

Never fails to amuse that the pinnacle of Apple patents is the same "design" as my dining room table - a rectangle with rounded corners.

Windows 8.1: Read this BEFORE updating - especially you, IT admins

Wonder Warthog

Common Mistake

Once again, the semantic difference between a software "upgrade" and "just a newer version" rears its ugly head. I've yet to discover the rationale behind why anyone would decide to go through this sort of grief just to have the biggest numbered version available. Does the newer version guarantee to save more time in speed, safety, or error-free operation than the time it takes to install? Or is basically cosmetic, and if so, what is the incentive? There'll be an even bigger number available in a couple months.