Posts by Doctor Syntax

Ex-UK comms minister's constituents plagued by wonky broadband over ... wireless radio link?

""We're sorry to hear about..." is another of those phrases like "we take.....very seriously". It's just rolled out without thinking and almost certainly without intending it to mean anything.

Nevertheless it strikes the ear as indicating that the query was the first they'd heard about the problem but this belies the present tense in "we're doing all we can" which implies ongoing action. If they've only just heard the only thing they can be doing at the time is looking at what action they can take.

It would make more sense if they said they were aware of it and were doing all they could or if they said they were sorry to hear about it and will examine the problem (preferably urgently). As it is this bit of boilerplate is about as unreassuring as they could be short of simply coming out and saying what they really mean which is probably along the lines of "So what do you expect us to do about it?".

You want how much?! Israel opts not to renew its Office 365 vows

Re: Opening Remarks

"For any organization to say "no" to MS subscription would essentially mean having to be ready, in short order, to remove their dependency on MS, something that would likely cost a lot more than whatever the licensing costs are."

Hmmm. At any one time, maybe. Over a longer period of time those subs add up as a comment a little way up the thread points out. The real problem that prevents a proper consideration is short-termism. For once Trump seems to have the right idea.

Re: We've definitely hit 'Peak Bullshit'. - Have we hit 'Peak Subscription' yet?

"We've definitely hit 'Peak Bullshit'."

If only.

Re: Libreoffice is free and just fine.

It boiled down to "our buzzword scanner only understands .doc"

That may be the case with HR. With pimps agencies there's a suspicion that they want to be able to edit the CV and don't know how to do that with PDF.

Re: Libreoffice is free and just fine.

"And PDF is supposed to be a standard format."

I'v been taking a few PDFs prepared for printers and reformating them for putting on a web site, with a bit of editing of the copy in one case. I'm starting to realise that while PDF is a standard container format what's hidden inside can be as mad as a box of frogs.

Re: £££££££££££

"I can see the advantages for smaller org's that don't have the muscle to sort out the infrastructure for themselves"

OTOH a small org might not have the cash flow to pay the subs reliably. If a bad month means you can't pay the sub and get cut off from an essential service the next month is going to be a whole lot worse.

"I wish the UK goverment had this capibility."

The only capability needed seems to be common sense. I see what you mean.

Elders of internet hash out standards to grant encrypted message security for world+dog

I have to agree, Lee. Perhaps this protocol could be generalised to fit mail as well as group messaging.

Texas ISP slams music biz for trying to turn it into a 'copyright cop'

Grande should offer the publishers a cheap takedown service - one that only costs pennies. The first of the day costs a cent. The next doubles up to two cents, the next to four cents etc. Only pocket change. They should have no problem accepting it.

Use Debian? Want Intel's latest CPU patch? Small print sparks big problem

Re: Weasel

"Of course, what he's specifically NOT addressing is the fact that Debian *won't* distribute the package."

And addressing why they won't is very strictly off-limits.

"It wouldn't be Linux if it wasn't inconsistent and interminable bickering over licensing terms and conditions."

We FOSS folk take this stuff seriously because we can. It must be awful just having to put up with whatever rapacious T&Cs proprietary S/W vendors impose. But perhaps you're used to having to bend over.

Fire chief says Verizon throttled department's data in the middle of massive Cali wildfires

Re: What do you expect?

"This is a state emergency. We are now comandeering your premises for the duration of the emergency. We will return it to you when the emergency is over."

In the interim we will be conducting firefighter training exercises in it.

Re: A contract means what it says it means, not what you wish it means.

"A good salesman gives the punter the best product for their requirements not the best product for the salesman's commission."

Sadly, these days a good salesman is one who sells the best product for the his commission.

Re: What do you expect?

"users get an unlimited amount of data but speeds are reduced when they exceed their allotment "

What sort of contorted language can equate having an allotment of data with "unlimited". Apart from anything else, depending on the speed with which the allotment was exceeded the total amount of data that could be transmitted would approach a limit, that of the amount transmittable at the throttled rate over the period of a billing cycle.

We hear endless complaints about "up to" data rates; limited "unlimited" deals are far more reprehensibly misleading - the first involves the laws of physics, the second a deliberate action by the vendor.

Et tu, Brute? Then fail, Caesars: When it's hotel staff, not the hackers, invading folks' privacy

Re: "Et tu Bruté"

"Are you sure? I think OP was going for "assured"."

Whatever it was, much hilarity ensured.

Re: Infamy! Infamy!

"Rank stupidity!"

I thought that involved a gong.

Re: "Et tu Bruté"

"If you're going to make comments like that, make sure you're not making a fool of yourself while doing so."

Given the gist of the comment a little confusion between near homonyms doesn't add much to the folly.

Re: NEUKlearer HyperRadioProACTive IT Weapons Systems ... Not a Foe for Fights ...

"Troll, troll, troll, troll."

You must be new here. Are you the same A/C who didn't know French (and other languages) have a capital initial?

Re: "Et tu Bruté"

Kids!

What do they teach in schools these days?

Do we reckon revenge will be taken silently over the next few months?

Re: NEUKlearer HyperRadioProACTive IT Weapons Systems ... Not a Foe for Fights ...

"we haven't worked out yet which."

Sometimes I worry about AMFM1. A few weeks ago there was a post which was more or less intelligible.

Re: Mandatory Room inspections??? - How to turn a Hotel into a Hospital...

"That said, they should still knock first..."

And ring before they knock.

Re: Caesars have proven themselves incompetent

"Hotel staff opening your door with a keycard is fairly different from that sort of forceable entry."

DEF CON attendees probably don't assume that unlocking the door requires official sanction. If there's a next year they'll probably ensure the locks only open for their own keys.

Re: Caesars have proven themselves incompetent

"That naked lady in the shower would have been legally able to shoot both of those guys. Might have lost her room deposit though."

And a surcharge for cleaning the blood off the carpet.

Security MadLibs: Your IoT electrical outlet can now pwn your smart TV

No problem. Those are two of the many devices I wouldn't have been buying anyway.

Big Tech turns saboteur to cripple new California privacy law in private

The obvious strike back here is for a new ballot with the original measures to be put forward - and for it to be made clear to the corporations that it will not be withdrawn this time under any circumstances and that if they don't like it they have only themselves to blame.

Connected car data handover headache: There's no quick fix... and it's NOT just Land Rovers

"If you jump into the world of electric cars ...and let's face it, they are coming for all of you"

Maybe not for this guy and his neighbours: https://www.examiner.co.uk/news/west-yorkshire-news/health-safety-row-electric-car-14552658

Re: let's go back to the good old days... oh wait!

you can make a copy of the key before you sell your car (or house for that matter...)

Car is driven off very unlikely never to be seen again. Unless you have access to a tracker in it (which, in part, is what this is about) your key does nothing for you.

With a house you can, and should, change the locks when you move in. You never know who the previous owner might have given a key to - and even that owner might have forgotten. A few years ago my daughter bought a house. The owner said she'd handed over all the keys. The day daughter moved in, or maybe the next day, one of the neighbours turned up to hand over their copy of the key the previous owner's forgotten about.

Re: NOT TO BE SOLD SEPARATELY

"So why hasn't the labeling been challenged on exhaustion grounds?"

Has a manufacturer of fizzy sugar solutions actually tried to enforce that term? In absence of that it's probably not worth anyone's while to launch their own challenge.

"we consider the previous owner to be responsible for the removal of the vehicle from the account, this is also agreed upon in our terms of use"

So a Merc is subject to terms of use. In that case, who actually owns the vehicle, the person who thinks they bought it or the manufacturer?

Microsoft: We busted Russian Fancy Bear disinfo websites

Re: Why

that is too complex a distinction for the news PR dept.

Re: How things have changed

"Russia is the new Evil Empire rather than Microsoft."

It's OK, you can have more than one and arrange them as appropriate. Axis of Evil & all that.

Bloke hurls sueball over Google's 'is it off yet?' location data slurping

Re: Android user here

"... sorry."

So you should be. This is an almost new laptop.

Re: Bots on el-reg

"Every post that criticises Microsoft gets at least one downvote even if it was a clear FootGun moment."

I suppose it's a living.

Re: Bots on el-reg

"I noticed a couple of times that there seems to be a series on downvotes on commentards, just the odd one or two on *all* the posts. Which suggests that someone who takes a weird dislike to a particular set of articles or a bot that attempts to alter the appearence of consensus."

I think it works like this:

A posts something egregiously wrong.

B points it out.

A is upset at being caught out. As it was clearly wrong he can't really contradict B.

At this point most people would say the equivalent of "fair cop, guv", either publicly or, more usualy, to themselves and move on. A can't do this.

A now shifts the blame for the damage to self-image to B and goes through B's posts, sometimes systematically, sometimes not, and downvotes them irrespective of what they said.

Wear your stalker's downvotes with pride. It means that you were right and somebody hasn't forgotten.

Re: Googles choice is going to be

"If it's not they'll pay the fine and find a way to keep on slurping up the info."

It's not just going to be a question of one fine (actually this is a civil suit so it's going to be damages); this is going to come up across multiple lines of business and multiple legislations. ISTR that this is already under attack in the EU in addition to a previous Schrems suit. India (India!!) is getting in on the act as well. You may think any of these are small in relation to the size of Google but cumulatively they're going to cut into profits unless advertising prices are raised. If advertising prices are raised maybe some advertisers are going to start looking more carefully at what they get for their money.

US tech circles wagons as India reviews data protection proposals

Chickens coming home to roost.

The US is gradually having to accept that t doesn't actually legislate for the rest of the world - and, in some cases, that there actually is a rest of the world.

Internet overseer continues wall-punching legal campaign

What's German lawyer-speak for "We've got a right mug here."?

Re: Doesn't bode well for a UK out of the EU then ?

"Looks like we'll be following EU law for quite a while,"

Yes, because, apart from the fact that GDPR, like all EU law, becomes part of UK law unil Parliament says otherwises, the current DPA is based on it more or less - that more or less bit is the wriggle room HMG has given itself. Because, unlike ICANN, we have a vested interest in doing business with the EU (not that some people realise that) the wriggle room is going to give us problems because I doubt the EU is going to be so daft as to give us a Privacy Figleaf as they did with the US.

London's Gatwick Airport flies back to the future as screens fail

Re: SPOF

"design review, network 3rd party assurance (their design and review processes)"

The management view: These reviewers, they're so negative about things. If we ever took notice of them we'd never get anything done.

Re: Cost

"when travel insurers start turning up wanting their pound of flesh for payouts caused by this kind of cockup."

Travel insurers, payout. Does that sort of thing happen?

Re: Best Airport information infrastructure is at...

"Mulu International airport"

The army helipad in S Armagh used to be styled Bessbrook International Airport. I'm not sure they were supposed to be international on a regular basis.

"The only redundancy they now have is the moron who failed to QA before pressing the big green 'go' button."

No way. Have you any idea how many senior managers would insist on getting their names on the sign-off of a new big shiny? They're going nowhere.

Prenda lawyer pleads guilty to moneyshot honeypot scheme

Re: "criminal fines of up to $750,000 when he is sentenced later this year."

"Too bad the victims of his scheme aren't going to see a single dime of that money"

Not according to the report on the Beeb: "It also includes clauses that will see cash gathered by Prenda, and potentially more in damages, returned to the people who paid up."

Re: One of the 98% that give the 2% a bad name

"As in the UK, if the court decides that the bankruptcy was to avoid a court judgement, then it merely exacerbates the penalties."

And judges really don't like people trying to take the piss out them.

Gartner's Great Vanishing: Some of 2017's emerging techs just disappeared

advancing nearer reality – but still "more than 10 years away"

Stuff can be 10 years away for decades.

And what happened to "serverless"? Gone TITSUP? [Tottering into total silence under pressure]

climb the "Peak of Inflated Expectations" before falling into the Slough of Despond, or as Gartner calls it, the "Trough of Disillusionment". There, after shaking off the Mud of Mockery or the Dust of Derision

I'm sorry, I haven't a clue.

Beam me up, PM: Digital secretary expected to give Tory conference speech as hologram

Are you sure it was Matt Hancock? I'd have expected him to appear by app. Everyone turns on their phone and watches him on that.

UK.gov told data-sharing plans need vendor buy-in

Re: 9 per cent

"As in all surveys, the outcome depends more on who s believed to be asking the question, the context that the question is asked in, and the precise wording."

It would help if reporters given the results of such surveys insisted on getting and publishing not only the precise wording of the question but also of the entire survey - previous questions can influence this.

"Congratulations, Bernard. You are a perfect balanced sample."

"efforts have been hampered by a litany of ethical, legal and technical issues."

I think you'll find only one of these categories is taken seriously.