Posts by Ken Moorhouse

Google’s Gemini refuses to play Chess against the mighty Atari 2600 after realizing it can't match ancient console

re: Atari Stella emulator

Wait, AI has cracked the taste of lager?

Standard chess openings

I would imagine that the way to truly assess chess computers is to open with non-standard moves which means there is no reliance on anything stored in its memory bank. All moves it makes must therefore be by sheer look-ahead slog. The interesting thing to surmise about this approach is that the AI might generate a killer opening sequence that gets inducted into chess literature.

After a few dozen of these revelations however, chess literature might have something to say about AI dross polluting games in a way that a true master would never contemplate. I think the phrase is that they lack elegance.

Ordnance Survey digs deep to prevent costly cable strikes

Re: I would be very concerned if an unfriendly power...

I worry more about the other utility companies e.g., BT or Thames Water (Cryptosporidium anyone?).

Would they be put in charge of a Kings' Burial Register too?

To cover situations such as Richard III.

(At least it should be a simple table - mind you some medieval types were a bit keen on hanging, drawing and quartering of victims).

Game, set, botch: AI umpiring at Wimbledon goes long

Re: Not switched on

Now transfer this kind of scenario to self-driving cars.

Ingram Micro confirms ransomware behind multi-day outage

Re: World's second largest IT distributor

The hardware/software sold by these companies is commoditised to the hilt - manifested by wafer-thin margins. The Value Added component is, or should be security, but who takes that into account when doing their sales pitch? If the end-user wants "best price" above all else then this sort of event is going to continue.

Microsoft Windows Firewall complains about Microsoft code

"related to a feature that is currently under development and not fully implemented"

Oh, so are we talking about the whole of Windows 11 then?

AIs have a favorite number, and it's not 42

guess a number between 1 and 50

What's wrong with choosing eg, 30.56?

Think about it. You ask an "intelligent" person to "guess a number between 1 and 50", how many of those people will (because they want to appear "super-intelligent") pick holes in your question, just to be contrary, and give an answer that answers the question, but does not answer the question that you intended to ask, which is likely to have been "guess an integer between 1 and 50".

So AI is not yet at the point where it is behaving like a smart-arse intelligent person.

23andMe's new owner says your DNA is safe this time

Re: California-based (not the one in Norfolk).

My point was that this means they are not bound by the data protection laws of this country.

TTAM Research Institute: #1 red flag

California-based (not the one in Norfolk).

MethaneSAT 'likely not recoverable' after losing contact with Earth

Re: The can visually pinpoint manmade sources

Hmm, I wonder if there is any demand for a lost cattle service... The company could be called Cowlocation Services.

"likely not recoverable"

Come back here tomorrow for a refund.

Last time I did that, and I reordered, the original items turned up. Contacted Amazon to tell them so, citing heaviness of items as reason for not returning them, and they told me to keep them. Anyone want some free fence spikes in West London and can collect, let me know...

Microsoft kicks off new fiscal year with more layoffs

Cull de Sac

Seems appropriate here.

Frozen foods supermarket chain deploys facial recognition tech

Re: Iceland is better value for low quality frozen food.

Here's a complaint I made last year about their 99% Aberdeen Angus Burgers where they changed the recipe without changing the packaging:-

I wrote the following review of Iceland's Luxury 4 Ultimate Aberdeen Angus Quarter Pounders 454g earlier this week. My comment has apparently failed moderation, yet I note that I am not the only person to complain. The company has not been in touch with me about my review. See reviews (232 of them) here:-

https://www.iceland.co.uk/p/iceland-luxury-4-ultimate-aberdeen-angus-quarter-pounders-454g/66934.html

My review:-

"I've been buying these in-store since the pandemic because there's no onion in them and the meat content is high.

"Not any more. Been feeling quite sick since opening a new pack and finding the unmistakeable taste of onion. Yukh!

"Why does everyone insist on adding onions to burgers?

"And I swear the meat content used to be higher than 90%.

"Edit: This was the ingredients list for the burgers I have bought previously:-

Ingredients. icon. 3 ingredients. Aberdeen Angus Beef (99%), Salt, Ground Black Pepper.

"Anyone else feel that companies should alert customers with a change of packaging when ingredients change? Particularly where allergens not in the original product have now been included (wheat and barley in this instance)."

Current ingredients are:-

"Aberdeen Angus Beef (90%), Water, Onion, Wheat Flour (Wheat Flour, Calcium Carbonate, Iron, Niacin, Thiamin), Rice Flour, Salt, Yeast Extract (contains Barley), Dextrose, Black Pepper, Black Pepper Extract."

The reason I am writing is that surely food companies should alert consumers if they change the allergens in their products without notifying us with some kind of change to the packaging, apart from the ingredients list? For the record I am mildly gluten intolerant and suffer the consequences if my intake goes above a certain level.

Japanese company using mee-AI-ow to detect stressed cats

Re: Sounds daft to me.

Time for Tamagotchi to make a comeback.

Brit politicians question Fujitsu's continued role in public sector contracts

Maybe the way bids are scored needs to change...

Let anyone bid that wants to bid, but weight scoring criteria such that the bad grapefruit are locked out.

Maybe this is already the case, which highlights the motleyness of the other contenders?

EDIT: I see Dan 55 has posted what should be the relevant link.

Psylo browser tries to obscure digital fingerprints by giving every tab its own IP address

Gambling Websites will prob be keeping an eye on this

A long time ago, one of my clients, who enjoys a flutter, was speculating whether he could 'sit' on the same gaming table using two separate browser sessions, thereby increasing his odds of winning something.

US patent office wants an AI to scan for prior art, but doesn't want to pay for it

Re: You did work for, [] to a royal household, and instead of getting paid in actual money

The FAQ's suggest otherwise...

Do Royal Warrant holders provide their products or services for free?

No. All business is conducted on a commercial basis.

"The selected vendor must be willing to receive consideration that is primarily non-monetary,"

"Benefits to the vendor include its ability to display and market its capabilities, and the ability to fulfill a critical US Government technology gap on the world stage."

Yes, but is the taxman going to accept that it is tax-free?

Where is the can of worms icon?

UK students flock to AI to help them cheat

Re: I'm almost 55 and I've only ever seen a slide rule in a museum.

We used them extensively in the degree I did (Electrical Engineering), until we were allowed to use calculators in exams. There were a few hold-outs in our class who used to use log tables, but they were slow to get the same results as us, and their ability to keep pace with the rest of the class was impaired as a result.

Advantages of a slide rule were that you were forced to think whether the result you were getting was of the right magnitude. With calculators and computers there is a tendency to treat results as gospel, regardless of how ridiculous they may seem. Slide rules also ensure you didn't go mad with the significant figures in the answer. Then there's the issue that Floating Point calculations can be extremely inaccurate if they are computed in the wrong way. Also, it educates one as to the visualisation of the number space. A good example of that is Benford's Law, which is self-evident when looking on a slide rule at the extent that the 1 to 2 markings take up.

Gauss

If he were at school today would he be accused of cheating...?

https://www.americanscientist.org/article/gausss-day-of-reckoning

(Interesting discussion about this well-known story).

A classic crash from Classic Outlook when opening or creating emails

For corporate use...

For corporate use, a lot of email functionality should be instigated through a program that manages the business (one of those Enterprise thingamejigs). I've written many of these incorporating email client functionality, parsing data from messages that contain standardised data, and sending reports out in various formats looking as if it is a normal email. I use Delphi/XE for this and it works fine. I also am in touch with another Delphi dev who likes to drive Outlook using MAPI. Oh the anguish in making sure of the Outlook being used, integration with Anti Virus software and bloated pst's. Being completely isolated from mail client dependancy suits me just fine.

Attack on Oxford City Council exposes 21 years of election worker data

Re: Why the hell are streetlights centrally controlled?

Because when Reform get in this functionality will be needed for the Curfew.

Microsoft 365 brings the shutters down on legacy protocols

Re: .doc and .xls also at the funeral parlour

LibreOffice still supports xls and doc without seeming to be a hot potato, kind of demonstrating that it's not the file format that is the issue, it is the program/app you load it into that is the problem.

Glazed and confused: Hole lotta highly sensitive data nicked from Krispy Kreme

Hackers that did their homework

https://www.facebook.com/realratedred/posts/yes-krispy-kreme-really-does-give-out-free-doughnuts-for-good-grades-but-there-a/1070025341826867/

...and took away a lot more than free donuts.

Microsoft broke DHCP for Windows Server last Patch Tuesday

You've heard the expression: I wouldn't trust them to run a bath

Well, same goes with a pool of IP addresses.

Meta offered one AI researcher at least $10,000,000 to join up

Re: a stationer's shop

My goodness, that takes me back to my youth. Who remembers this place, with its candy coloured paper bags when you purchased something...?

https://www.francisfrith.com/uk/harrow/universal-stationers_memory-167291

Bad day for humanity

Continually incentivising AI progress with a monetary motive does not auger well for civilisation's future.

(So, if I were offered the job, would I take it? No, not unless there is a chance of embedding something deep in the bowels of AI that returns "um, er, my brain hurts" every time a question is asked).

Google outfoxed by crafty squatters in $1B London HQ's rooftop garden

Re: ...and usually go slimey in the fridge before they get used

Yes, but at least they don't take up much room.

(Where's the Basil Brush icon?)

"The tip was later confirmed by Google"

I wonder how many pages they had to scroll through in order to find them.

ChatGPT users wake to find it's even more wrong, slower than usual

It appears OpenAI services are experiencing a variety of issues.

It was that night down the pub with all the other AI systems in town last night that did it.

M&S online ordering system operational 46 days after cyber shutdown

More haste, less speed

M&S could learn a thing or two from Primark.

Ship abandoned off Alaska after electric cars on board catch fire

Re: the revs jump to 4000 rpm

This brings a whole new perspective to that question of "if Microsoft made cars".

I am glad that Microsoft don't make cars. Can you imagine what could go wrong?

Bain launches datacenter biz for Euros worried about climate change and Trump

Re: European data centres should be wholly owned by an absolutely European subsidiary.

Until they get acquired by some American company.

What's needed are effective poison pill techniques to reduce the chances of that happening.

Datacenter biz wants to turn heat and carbon waste into biomass for sale

Brings a whole new meaning to...

Algaerithms

Builder.ai coded itself into a corner – now it's bankrupt

Just a reminder that Intelligence is one of those words...

...where it is assumed that its casual usage refers to an attribute at the upper level of the scale.

Compare it with Quality.

UK government overrules local council’s datacenter refusal on Green Belt land

Re: a plan to create a country park the size of 25 football pitches

Hmm, I wonder if they had ever considered that some cynic (such as me) would point out that that represents 100 goalposts waiting to be surreptitiously rearranged according to the whims of the developer.

Unending ransomware attacks are a symptom, not the sickness

Re: One of the major findings of the audit was that there were too many doors into the building.

What about the number of pc's with Windows on them?

Bosses weren’t being paranoid: Remote workers more likely to start own biz

LinkedIn

I haven't visited this site for a long time. Tried to go into it, succeeded, but what a dog's dinner. The list of people in my network is scrunched up against the left margin. Never mind. Just on a quick inspection, at least two of the people on my list are deceased for certain*, another person appears twice (once with her maiden name, the other her married name). There are so many more out of date entries on there. My point is that this cannot be considered a reliable dataset to glean useful information from.

*Edit: Make that three - sad to hear "Mr Airfix" (Ralph Ehrmann) passed away in early 2023 RIP.

Marks & Spencer admits cybercrooks made off with customer info

Re: arse-covering is M&S's fundamental business.

Give that commentard one of these - - >

As US vuln-tracking falters, EU enters with its own security bug database

EUVD

They could have chosen a better abbreviation. I suppose that the connotations of disclosure are similar though.

OS-busting bug so bad that Microsoft blocks Windows Insider release

Re: HOW DID IT GET MERGED INTO THE TREE AT ALL?

There are such things as green canaries.

UK's smaller broadband operators face tough road ahead, consolidation possible

Re: The telephone Network

Ah I remember the GPO, where one had to buy a* telephone extension socket from them, and had to wait six weeks for it to be installed.

* With the cost involved, you probably wouldn't be ordering more than one.

Re: Enshittification of Everything

I see what you did there.

As ChatGPT scores B- in engineering, professors scramble to update courses

Re: Those are all implemented using + - / × as well.

Without refreshing my study of this kind of thing, I would say that everything can be done using + (with or without carry), left shift and right shift. In terms of the underlying hardware logic components, everything can be built using either NAND or NOR gates. The TTL system's basic component is the 7400, which consists of four two-input NAND gates in one package. In addition (damn the pun) a system-wide gating pulse is needed to give the system some kind of memory.

https://www.electronics-tutorials.ws/sequential/seq_2.html

one professor likens AI to the arrival of the calculator in the classroom

IIRC when I did the WordPerfect Certified Trainer course there was a trick question regarding the use of WordPerfect for calculation in tables where, if you blindly followed the instructions, you got an invalid answer due to arithmetic overflow of some sort. The candidate had to use their brain to figure out that the result was nonsense, and how to adjust the method to give the meaningful answer that was required.

I remember when decent calculators cost around £100. Who remembers Metyclean in Victoria Street which had all the latest gadgets? Sinclair (of C5 fame) arrived on the scene and started flogging Scientific calculators at a fraction of the cost. Only problem was that it would give a supposedly valid answer to say, doing the arcsine of, say 1.5, or the tan of 90 degrees, whereas the more expensive ones would throw an exception. Savvy lecturers could, of course, build such traps into their homework questions.

Dentists sue ex-contractor for holding web domains hostage in biz fight

and they owe him $400K

That's a lot of molar.

Where it Hertz: Customer data driven off in Cleo attacks

Customer data driven off in Cleo attacks

Other cars are available instead.

This is not just any 'cyber incident' … this is an M&S 'cyber incident'

Click & Collect

As in: Click a Link, Collect Malware.