Posts by Jimmy2Cows

Amazon's not saying its warehouse staff are dumb... but it feels they need artificial intelligence to understand what 'six feet' means

Re: What does 'six feet' mean?

And charged the quicklime to the hapless employees. And the cost of digging the ditch.

Re: ...unless someone sneezes or coughs directly on you...

Not strictly true.

Recent studies have found that tiny exhaled / coughed up / sneezed droplets can hang in the air for several minutes, and can spread 10s of metres in that time.

Someone doesn't have to cough or sneeze directly on you for you to become infected. Just walk through the cloud they left behind several minutes prior could do it.

Agreed that wearing a mask while driving is generally dumb, unless there are others in the car who need to be isolated, for instance driving someone to a COVID test site.

Bricks and mortar chemists take down Indian contact-tracing website

Re: "Indian law prohibits online medicine sales under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act of 1940"

Speculation... perhaps the law explicitly states that medecines may only be purchased from traditional pharmacies with an actual, physical, bricks-and-mortar* shop. Thus making any other purchase channel automatically illegal, without needing to predict the future.

*Accepting there would not be a need for "bricks-and-mortar" terminology in 1940, as there was no need to differentiate traditional stores from online stores.

Hey is trying a new take on email – but maker complains of 'outrageous' demands after Apple rejects iOS app

Re: Tops vs Bottoms redux

I respectfully disagree. There are times when replying inline can be far more succinct and easy to follow. Copying the "relevant" bits to the top and replying to them there can lead to things being taken out of context, makes it harder to follow if related items are missed or out of sequence, and bloats the mail thread more than replying inline.

At my work, if we reply inline we'll prefix a reply with our initials, and colour-code it so it stands out. Not perfect, but makes it easier to follow and identify who said what.

Personally, the question of inline responses is almost trivial compared to multiple people top-posting replies at the same time to the same email. That gets out of sync real fast. Ability to merge multiple replies into a single master (oops, apparently can't say that any more - well bite me, it's the appropriate term) response would be a massive help here.

As ever, one size never fits all. Sometimes reply inline is a good thing, sometimes not. Context is king, and being dogmatically attached to one way or the other, then flaming anyone who doesn't follow your point of view, seems a rather pointless waste of time.

Whose side you on, Nominet? Registry floods .co.uk owners with begging emails to renew unwanted .uk domains

Re: Is this Fraud?

Protection racket.

Nice .co.uk domain you got there. Be a shame if someone cyber-squatted the equivalent .uk name, ruined your image/reputation/business...

Microsoft disbands three-ring Windows Insider circus and replaces it with 'channels'

Re: Just Maybe ...

It'll be a shallow acknowledgement at best.

Re: what about a channel for...

Easier for the devops teams I guess, never having anything to push there.

Rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Again. Except Win10 doesn't appear to be sinking. Damn.

Wow, Microsoft's Windows 10 always runs Edge on startup? What could cause that? So strange, tut-tuts Microsoft

Good for you. Not that it's really relevant to the problem at hand.

Splunk to junk masters and slaves once a committee figures out replacements

Re: NewSpeak people should consult with someone

The NewSpeak people should consult with someone knowledgeable in languages. I think they are "linguistic racists" because they think about English only ignoring any other language (LOL!)

I fear you're trying to apply logic and reasoning to people who seem incapable of such nuances.

After IBM axed its face-recog tech, the rest of the dominoes fell like a house of cards: Amazon and now Microsoft. Checkmate

Re: Apologies?

Not sure anyone deserves credit for doing the right thing due to political point-scoring, bad optics and potential for consumer backlash. Especially not IBM.

Re: seen that in a film so it must be tru

That was clearly one of those documentaries beamed from the future, disguised as a film.

Re: Ooooo...

Ooooo so you are telling me there is as much crime at Chelsea flower show as Notting hill carnival

Maybe. Maybe not. That's really not the point being made.

The comparison was about detecting/identifying racial bias by applying the tech to what (as you've just eloquently demonstrated) is an inherent, systemic, institutional bias toward certain types of event.

Just because something has a veneer of respectability doesn't mean crimes aren't occuring. Unbiased use of technology would apply it equally to all venues, not selectively based on potentially biased "intelligence".

California bigwigs rule Uber, Lyft dial-a-ride drivers are employees, not contractors

Re: I know many people who work so-called "gig economy" jobs here in California.

Yeah well thought-out laws designed to protect all parties while recognising their different needs is clearly an out-moded concept. If there ever even were such a thing.

Re: I know many people who work so-called "gig economy" jobs here in California.

Perhaps some flexibility in the law is required, to recognise there may be two competing classificaitons needed here and both should be accommodated. I know. How unorthodox.

Those that want to be recognised as employees can choose to be so.

Those that want the flexibility of being external contractors can choose to be so, with all the personal and finanicial risk that entails.

Oh and the employer is legally barred from pressuring their workers to choose "contractor".

Just a thought.

Legal complaint lodged with UK data watchdog over claims coronavirus Test and Trace programme flouts GDPR

Re: Conspiracy time?

You sound incapable of critical thinking, with a tendancy for strawman arguments and to conflate unrelated issues.

How about, instead of selfishness, perhaps they just don't feel inclined to provide all their contacts (and recursively their contacts' contacts) to an privacy-be-damned, ineffective programme which seems to really exist just to:

a) look like the government is doing something

b) harvest data and give it to Palantir

Repair store faces hefty legal bill after losing David and Goliath fight with Apple over replacement iPhone screens

Re: If Apple had their way then any scratch would require the owner to buy a new unit.

As would pretty much any other manufacturer. For all their other questionable attitudes, this particular attitude isn't unique to Apple.

Re: You kill our right to repair, we'll stop buying your over priced tat.

A few might stop buying. Many millions more won't.

Net impact to Apple tends to zero. Consumer activism can't fix this. Only right-to-repair legislation can.

All-electric plane makes first flight – while lugging 2 tons of batteries aloft

Re: Enough for ... a not overly large dog

But does the dog get a 'chute?

-----> The one with the inbuilt flying squirrel glide-flaps and parachute please.

After 30 years of searching, astroboffins finally detect the universe's 'missing matter' – using fast radio bursts

Re: Astroboffins. Really?

Much to learn, you still have.

Re: I can lend you a tape measure if you like.

Only if said measure uses El Reg-approved standard units. We'll have none of that archaic metric or imperial malarky, thank you very much.

Boeing brings back the 737 Max but also lays off thousands

Re: Is that so hard?

Sadly, for Boeing exec's, yes.

Those dozen+ initiatives are way cheaper than getting recertified as safe to fly. Thus they'll focus on what they have (apparently) done, definitely not on what they want to avoid at all costs. As a bonus they think it will sound good.

Combine with regulatory capture and a general loss of critical-thinking ability across the board, and I fear a lot of people will buy into this. Even those who really, really shouldn't.

Re: "more than a dozen initiatives focused on enhancing workplace safety and product quality"

Umm... because they're desparate to restart production before the product implodes completely?

Boeing haven't openly proclaimed there've been "yes" responses to all those questions. Had all answers been "yes" I'd expect a very public, very excited announcement to that effect.

Therefore, my money's on the answers to all being firmly "no".

HPE's Black Thursday: Staff face pay cuts or the ax, office closures to save $1bn+ after coronavirus slams IT titan

Re: dual monitors

Only two...? Pfft. Amatuer. Real WFH men* have at least 3.

[Sets himself up for similar disparaging remarks about only having 3 monitors...]

*Yes, and women, and whatever non-binary gender one may happen to assume at the time. But that wouldn't fit the meme, would it.

Stop tracking me, Google: Austrian citizen files GDPR legal complaint over Android Advertising ID

Android may be royalty-free, but licenses for Google services (Google Play, Play Store etc.) certainly are not, they cost manufacturers a lot of money. You can always, er, Google it.

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Spacecraft with graphene sails powered by starlight and lasers

graphene is part of the solution

...The fabrication is relatively simple and could be easily scaled up to squared kilometres...

ORLY? Guess I missed the breakthroughs that have enabled this easy fabrication of kilometre-square graphene sheets. Guess we all missed them.

DBA locked in police-guarded COVID-19-quarantine hotel for the last week shares his story with The Register

Re: What a shit hole

That seems to be exactly what they're doing. All the while hiding behing the science and the data so they can point fingers if it doesn't go as they hope. I won't say as they plan, because clearly there is no plan.

O2 be a fly on the wall during BT and Vodafone's video calls: Telefónica's UK biz, Virgin Media officially merge

combined 46 million subscribers ...?

34m + 14m + 3.3m doesn't equal 46m in any maths I know of. I get 51.3m. Am I missing something? Or do they expect 10% to say "fuck off" and defect (escape) to other services while the getting's good (i.e. new org, significant contract change, contract and exit fees don't apply)?

UK IT contractors slipping back into old ways of working now IR35 tax reforms delayed

Re: but you don't "deserve" to pay less tax.

Ego has fuck all to do with disagreeing with you. There are a few chancers, sure, same as any other sphere, but mostly not. You do realise dividend tax was increased in 2017, so PAYE and contractors pretty much pay the same amount of tax overall, on the same gross income?

This whole "pay less tax" thing is bollocks these days. And no, I'm not a contractor.

All this does is create conditions whereby people can be fired then rehired (or not) on "inside IR35" terms - no rights, no sick/holiday/pension pay, no employment protection.

UK COVID-19 contact-tracing app data may be kept for 'research' after crisis ends, MPs told

Seems like a serious GDPR breach before it's even released. Except it's the government and GDPR gets in the way, so they'll just bypass all that by saying it's "lawful purposes". But they still need to ensure it's secure and protected.

Be interesting to see if that can be challenged.

Spyware slinger NSO to Facebook: Pretty funny you're suing us in California when we have no US presence and use no American IT services...

Re: Class action suit?

Fuck no.

As Brit cyber-spies drop 'whitelist' and 'blacklist', tech boss says: If you’re thinking about getting in touch saying this is political correctness gone mad, don’t bother

Re: They're only terrorists if...

Pretty sure that's totally not the argument being made. I see nothing about denying women's rights. I do see factual statements about Pankhurst and her group.

NASA signs deals to put a rocket under Artemis flights until 2029

Re: They

Gotta ride that leftovers gravy train! Making new stuff really gets in the way of profit.

Browse mode: We're not goofing off on the Sidebar of Shame and online shopping sites, says UK's Ministry of Defence

world's biggest English-language news website

Really...!?! Daily Mail is the world's biggest English-language news website? Well if that's not a damning indictment of the world we live in, I don't know what is.

Brit magistrates' courts turn to video conferencing to keep wheels of justice turning

Re: The elephant in the crown court

My tinfoil might be slipping a bit, but... citations...? It's a bold claim, after all.

Re: Misreading

You're not the only one.

Bezos to the Moon: Blue Origin joins SpaceX and Dynetics in a three-horse lunar lander race

Res: SpaceX lift

Some kind of backup ladder seems appropriate. Maybe rungs that emerge from the hull like a Tesla door handle.

Microsoft! Please, put down the rebrandogun. No one else needs to get hurt... But it's too late for Visual Studio Online

Maybe Gitpod didn't want to sell out, so MS found they had no choice but to try and... I can hardly bring myself to say it... compete.

[Shudder]

"MS" and "compete" in the same sentence, and with positive connotations. I feel dirty now.

Re: Safe option

Yeah, but... somehow their "work" has a recurring tendancy to leak and infest the real world.

International space station connects 100Mbps symmetric space laser ethernet using Sony optical disc tech

Re: sharks with fickin' "lasers"

Better find some megalodon DNA. Show me a modern shark that can take a 1m telescope assembly...

Re: What's the Wi-Fi speed of a unladen ISS?

African or European?

Re: Nice technology

Agreed, though earth to anywhere still has to get out of the atmosphere.

Radio link to a satellite relay station to minimise disruptions from weather, with tight-beam laser link to moon/Mars/wherever seems a better choice. Allowing for chance occlusions by passing satellite/debris/asteroids/etc.

But what do I know? I'm no ---->

What's worse than an annoying internet filter? How about one with a pre-auth remote-command execution hole and there's no patch?

Re: your!=you're

If your* replying to Prst. V.Jeltz, given the overall tone of the comment that might be intentional...

*Yeah I went their**

**Went there twice

Uber trials fixed-price hourly rentals for visits to the butcher, the baker and the candlestick-maker

Re: The urban transport solution for coronavirus and afterwards

When your only tool's a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

Square peg of modem won't fit into round hole of PC? I saw to it, bloke tells horrified mate

Re: the picture in the article

Guard schmuard. I find the angle grinder guard just gets in the way of optimal grinding. So far I still have all my digits and haven't set fire to myself. Yet.

ICANN finally halts $1.1bn sale of .org registry, says it's 'the right thing to do' after months of controversy

Re: Now charities are doomed to never turn a profit.

If that was the OP's intent I'm struggling to see it.

Re: Now charities are doomed to never turn a profit.

Ok yes I do take your point.

Let me revise my original comment to say all charities are supposed to return all proceeds to their beneficiaries, minus their operating costs which they are generally expected to minimise.

Agreed some certainly seem to reach a point where one might question how much is actually distributed vs. how much is spent on "operating costs" such as overly glamourous HQs and questionable fact-finding missions to exotic locales.

Re: Note to ICANN board: In future, clean house before trying to pull shady shit

Ooops. Lose. Not loose. The shame! I bow apologetically before the commentariat.

Note to ICANN board: In future, clean house before trying to pull shady shit

Highly plausible the only reason they did their job properly is to head off being subpoena'd by the Cali AG. More to loose there than gained by allowing the sale.

Watch for this to be back on again once the shedders have stopped whirring.