Posts by Luke Worm

Chrome Web Store warns end is nigh for uBlock Origin

Google is an advertising company. Of course they want to push advertising to everyone everywhere.

Don't be the target of an advertising company. Don't use their products.

PayPal is planning an ad network built off your purchase history

I closed my PayPal account last year, after a couple of decades. No regrets, and now even less.

Research finds electric cars are silent but violent for pedestrians

Maybe it would be advantageous to educate the pedestrians about this changed and changing environment.

EVs are silent and there will be more and more of them. Pedestrians, with everyone else, need to modify their behaviour accordingly.

Ten years ago Microsoft bought Nokia's phone unit – then killed it as a tax write-off

Software updates

One thing Nokia never did, or extremely seldom: software updates to existing phones.

"Why give free updates, when users can buy a new phone", Anssi Vanjoki is claimed to have said.

Fortunately, Apple, for example, does not think like that.

Updates are plenty but fans are few in Windows 11 land

After eleven - Mint

A few weeks ago I deleted Windows 11 from my dualboot home PC, and totally deleted the Windows partition.

Now very happy running only Linux Mint on it.

HCL proves Lotus Notes will never die by showing off beta of lucky Domino 14.0

Sweet nostalgia

Memories, memories ... I set up and administered a Lotus Notes server in the early/mid 1990's. My main job was Finance Manager, so Lotus Notes admin was just a hobby.

A bit later, Lotus Notes was made THE standard of the multinational company and "my server" was moved to the IT department.

Contrary to most of commenters, I liked Lotus Notes, and was running it on OS/2 (more nostalgia). I never liked Microsoft or any of their products. Nowadays, as retiree, I'm in the Apple ecosystem spiced with some Linux and Raspberry Pi.

French parliament says oui to AI surveillance for 2024 Paris Olympics

Re: Between this and the pension "reform" action ...

Macron can't be re-elected anymore. This is his second and last 5-year term.

There was two votes of confidence right after. The opposition lost both of them.

OUI : 59 votes

NON : 14 votes

Out of 577 members of parliament, not many bothered to be present for the vote.

Googlers demand abortion searches ‘never be saved or treated as a crime’

Don't use Google.

Simples.

Windows Subsystem for Android: What's the point?

Subsystems for everyone

Looking forward to "Microsoft OS" based on Linux, with a subsystem for Linux, subsystem for Android, and of course subsystem for Windows to run the Office package.

Apple is about to start scanning iPhone users' devices for banned content, professor warns

What's the news?

Google has been doing this kind of scanning since 2008. Microsoft is doing it too.

UK government resists pressure to hold statutory inquiry into Post Office Horizon scandal

No accountability. Ever. This seems to be the standard mode of operation for this government.

AdGuard names 6,000+ web trackers that use CNAME chicanery: Feel free to feed them into your browser's filter

Use NextDNS

IKEA China and ASUS team on gaming products, resist urge to call them FRÄG

I came here to ask the same question. I'm fluent in Swedish and didn't get the joke.

Linux Mint sticks by Snap decision – meaning store is still disabled by default in 20.1

Old kernel?

If your system needs a newer kernel, go to the Update Manager of Linux Mint and install kernel 5.8. No problem.

I installed this kernel already on Mint 20, before upgrading to 20.1, on my Lenovo Ideapad with AMD CPU. Works perfectly!

The Honor MagicBook Pro looks nice, runs like a dream, and isn't too expensive either. What more could you want?

"What more could you want?"

I want Linux, of course. Would it work?

Worldwide Google services – from GCP to G Suite – hit with the outage stick

Smiley

Aah, the wonders of having your systems running on someone else's computer somewhere.

Smiling face, because I'm self-hosting a Nextcloud server on Raspberry Pi 4.

Not now, Gartner. We've had enough of the future to last a lifetime: Meet 'Formative AI' and 'Algorithmic Trust'

Algorithmic Thrust, maybe. But the trust is lost, everybody now sees "algorithm" as a bad thing, a dirty word.

Remember when Republicans said Dems hacked voting systems to rig Georgia's election? There were no hacks

Re: Move on

Many countries have postal voting. Many states in the US have postal voting.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postal_voting

Accusations without evidence from a Republican? Who would've thought ....

Netflix starts 30-day video data diet at EU's request to ensure network availability during coronavirus crisis

Less bandwidth

According to French news, Netflix will reduce bandwidth, not resolution.

Will lead to more buffering, I suppose.

EU court tells prudish IP office to fack off for balking at 'fack ju' trademark application

Languages

Languages are wonderful. If you want to open a safe deposit box in a bank in Sweden, you simply ask for a "bankfack". The clerk will ask if you want a big fack or a small fack.

Remember when Europe’s entire Galileo satellite system fell over last summer? No you don’t. The official stats reveal it never happened

So in everyday language, the Galileo system can be totally non-functional for a whole week every month and that's completely ok ? Good thing we are exiting this kind of EU systems.

RISC-V business: Tech foundation moving to Switzerland because of geopolitical concerns

Linux, Wikimedia, and others. Please move.

Dough! Jobs microsite for UK's data watchdog set hundreds of cookies without visitors' consent

It's not _that_ bad, according to this test https://webtest.app/?url=https://microsites.hays.co.uk/jobs/ico/

Deepfakes, quantum computing cracking codes, ransomware... Find out what's really freaking out Uncle Sam

Re: Tiny, invisible spies and saboteurs?

"Pretty soon every country and alliance that can self-source its high tech will do so."

I'm sure the Americans are already using all these technologies themselves, to maintain "world leadership".

Facebook's Libra is a terrorist's best friend, thunders US Treasury: Crypto-coins dubbed 'national security risk'

Bitcoin, Ethereum and others are ok then?

The best and worst of GitHub: Repos wiped without notice, quickly restored – but why?

It's again the 'mericans showing who's the boss.

Introducing 'freedom gas' – a bit like the 2003 deep-fried potato variety, only even worse for you

Re: Freedom gas needs big ships

Communist? That's a long time ago. Nowadays they are more like extreme right.

Skype for Web arrives to bring the world together. As long as the world is on Chrome and... Edge?

Stopped using Skype the day Microsoft announced buying it. No regrets.

You're on a Huawei to Hell, US Sec State Pompeo warns allies: Buy Beijing's boxes, no more intelligence for you

"... we won’t even be able to co-locate American resources, an American embassy and American military outpost.”

A convenient way of getting rid of the 'mericans ;-)

Furious Apple revokes Facebook's enty app cert after Zuck's crew abused it to slurp private data

Did Facebook have an app like that for Android also? If yes, what is Google doing about it?

Apparently Google has a similar data slurping iOS app !

https://www.macrumors.com/2019/01/30/google-exploiting-apple-enterprise-certificate/

The lighter side of HMRC: We want your money, but we also want to make you laugh

Re: too short to reach the post box

"The union first started its campaign to raise the level of letterboxes in 1958 and, while it was agreed by the British Standards Agency, it was never enshrined into building standards law. “

1958 !! Long before the EU then.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-46895002

Fake news? More like ache news. Grandma, grampa 'more likely' to share made-up articles during US election

“Senior Americans aged 65 years and older” … like Donald J. Trump

US Homeland Security installs AI cameras at the White House, Google tries to make translation less sexist

AI in Oval Office

.. was my first thought: Finally some I even if it’s AI

Huawei MateBook Pro X: PC makers look out, the phone guys are here

Beautiful machine! Does it run Linux?

Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg can't remember smear firm, but 'some of their work' crossed her desk

Nothing to see here

Leaving anyway, takes the blame, gets a couple of million $ as “consolation”.

Zip it! 3 more reasons to be glad you didn't jump on Windows 10 1809

3 more reasons that make me glad I totally dumped Windows after version 7 and never went to 10.

Very satisfied with Linux Mint and macOS.

Yes, someone had to say it.

Google cracks down on dodgy tech support ads

I’m sure one president will say that Google is against innovation, blocking “fine people" and censoring free speech.

WPA3 is the magic number? Protocol refresh promises tighter Wi-Fi security

New hardware needed?

Does WPA3 need new hardware or not?

Noticed lately that plenty of routers/repeaters are sold with big discounts… more to come, I suppose.

Great news, cask beer fans: UK shortage of CO2 menaces fizzy crap taking up tap space

Irony?

Normally we read about how there is too much CO2 in the world, causing global warming and all. Can’t it be bottled somehow?

Why the 'feudal' tech monopolies run rings around competition watchdogs

Actions, not only talk

At least someone is doing something. Follow https://qwant.com and https://eelo.io

Priceless: The cost to BT for bothering you with spam? 1.5 UK pence per email

Minimum fine for spam should be the value of one stamp per email.

Meet the Frenchman masterminding a Google-free Android

Big Data

Personalised ads, tracking of everything … that’s the details. What we’re talking about is Big Data, all the stuff all the apps collect about us. Here in Europe we’re much more safe compared with the US, where all kinds of data and databases are common merchandising.

But anyway, I have already supported https://eelo.io in Kickstarter. Now they have a Foundation set up.

By the way, as an European alternative, try Qwant.com as your search engine. Qwant is made in France, and I have it as default search engine since a year already.

Qwant Music was announced recently, and Qwant Maps is coming soon …

Microsoft gives users options for Office data slurpage – Basic or Full

Re: It's a subtle plan

I can upvote only once, what a pity.

The Sun will blow up into a huge, glowing bubble of gas during its death

Re: Disappointed

Exactly my thoughts when I read the headline in my RSS reader :-D

Yes, Assange, we'll still nick you for skipping bail, rules court

Re: What would happen if Assange stepped out ?

I think the US / CIA would just send over one of their private jets to pick him up, with help from their British friends, and take him to Guantanamo. Quick and easy, no due process needed.

Wileyfox goes TITSUP*: Smartmobe maker calls in the administrators

What a pity, indeed. We have two Swifts, and on my recommendation there are two more Swifts and one Swift 2x in the neighbourhood. I was already thinking to upgrade to a Swift 2x (or “Swift 3") ...

Now, maybe Nokia 6 (2018) or 7 will be my next one.

Schrems can't throw collective sueball at Facebook but individual action OK

A class action is possible only country by country, not EU wide?

Or did I misunderstand ?