Posts by Piers

Drugs, vodka, Volvo: The Scandinavian answer to Britain's future new border

Re: And this tackles people who cycle or walk past ...

Well, bar codes on people will become mandatory...

Facebook, Google and Instagram 'worse than drugs' says Miley Cyrus

...they fall on the wrong side of an emerging digital divide...

..but would apparently, according to the research, be happier (have a better value of 'life satisfaction').

Evidence during FOI disputes can be provided in SECRET

Clearly...

Mr. Browning is asking the right questions!

Google spaffs $50 MILLION on 'get girls coding' campaign

"Coding touches every field a girl could work in, from medicine to race-car driving."

er - yeah, but like me, they'd probably *prefer* to be a Doctor, or racing car Driver....

Privacy International probes GCHQ's mouse fetish

Re: Won't someone think of the mice?

> What information can a mouse retain?

Well, since you ask, if it is a USB mouse, anything you like. You fit a USB hub and a memory stick in the case. Mouse still works, but it's a storage device as well.

http://lifehacker.com/5653115/put-a-usb-dongle-inside-your-mouse-for-hidden-storage

123-reg shrugs off customer complaints over stealth domain transfer charges

So...

"This change to our product is not directly customer impacting, and the fees involved in this service are equal to those charged by the registry concerned for the same service."

I'll be paying that to Nominet instead then, so 123 won't get a penny as I shift all the domains I look after away from their "service".

Review of UK data protection: Should fines go OVER HALF A MIL?

No no no...

We don't need to fine council's and such huge amounts of money. They don't care - it isn't theirs. No - what we need is to fine the *people* responsible (operators, CEO's etc) much *smaller* amounts of money, so they actually feel it personally. Mind you, trying to find out who *is* responsible in a council is nigh on impossible these days....

Triple-headed NHS privacy scare after hospital data reach marketers, Google

Sysadmins...

> "that no Google staff would be able to access the data"...

This just goes to show that they *really* have no idea what they're talking about. Of *courrse* Google staff have access. They have access to *all* data on their servers! Not all staff, but the sysadmins do.

Gene boffins: Yes, you. Staring at the screen. You're a NEANDERTHAL

Re: Disgusting!

Er - I hate to say this, but it looks like we ARE the children...

Snowden's pal Greenwald QUITS Guardian to launch hush-hush news rival

My role, aside from reporting and writing for it...

...is to make a shedload?

Radar gremlins GROUND FLIGHTS across southern Blighty

Poor Amy-Kate Robinson...

...is #boredboredbored

Although this may be a bit better than her hitting another aircraft in flight...

Sergey Brin emasculated after HORROR smartphone disaster

Brin's remedy for the manhood-stripping mobes...

"Brin's remedy for the manhood-stripping mobes, of course, was Google's own augmented reality glasses - Google Glass - which has tiny computers bolted onto its frame and leaves your hands free."

Which will make you totally look like a techno-nerd (to ordinary folks, anyway).

So that's really going to help, yes?

EU: We'll force power plants, Apple and pals to admit hack attacks

Cecilia Malmström

Cecilia Malmström = Cecilia "BadStorm"?

Fantastic.

Axe falls on Directgov as GOV.UK launches

Useless...

There used to be some really good information on the Business Link site.

Business Link has now been subsumed.

If I try to use the so-called navigation, I can't see where this information (eg An example of the terms and conditions of your website which covers the content and usage of your website.) has gone.

If I search for text that was on the page "An example of the terms and conditions of your website which covers the content and usage of your website." I can't find anything remotely related.

Very disappointing.

Apple lobs pocket change to Proview, ending Chinese IPAD name row

No more Proview...

Actually, there is no Proview - it's the Chinese banks trying to get their money back *from* Proview who will syphon off the 60mil. Apparently they will still be out of pocket, however.

Multimillion-pound hoard of 50BC GOLD PIECES found in Jersey

Re: Searching over the same field for 30 years?

Apparently farmers had been finding the odd coin in the area for some time - so they kept going over it in case there was a larger stash there somewhere. And so there was...

So you wanna be a Wall Street techie? Or anyway, get paid a lot

...you do need to be willing to pay your soul up front...

...and that's just for the interview.

Hold on, Booker prize judges - Stob's penned a steampunk hit

Episode 2...

...next week?

And the week after....

and the week after...

...

Ultrabook price vice prised open by flash-disk half-breeds

VICE...

...is how we spell it this side of the pond. Unless you're making a pun I don't understand : )

Apple won't rule out all singing, all dancing iBooks on Kindle

The Nett Book Agreement...

...is what it used to be called - and that may be what you're thinking about.

Russia and NASA plan to COLONISE the Moon

broken arm 1977...

No way - me too!

Those were the days...

NHS fined £375k after stolen patient data flogged on eBay

Sack someone. As close to the top as you can.

Someone is responsible, and sacking the manager/person in charge is going to send a way stronger signal than squeezing their budget further.

Sadly the ICO probably doesn't have that power...

'Mobiles bake men's balls' bog ad is cobblers - new ruling

My baby daughter...

...disagrees with their 'experts'.

Stallman: Jobs exerted 'malign influence' on computing

> The open-source movement can only challenge this by

> coming up with compelling ideas that count rather than

> polemics.

And maybe a way of making a sustainable ROI might also help -

the creators of content tend to be a bit keen on that bit, one way

or another.

Should your system offer Mr, Ms ... and Mx?

And the Sheep cried 'Two sexes GOOD, Three sexes BETTER'...

Feds crack multi-million scareware ring

$72m ($45m) - Grauniad much?

"About 960,000 machines were infected with the scareware and $72m ($45m) extracted from worried users."

iCloud Communications sues Apple for 'irreparable injury' to trademark

http://geticloud.com/products.html

"Market-Tested VoIP Technologies

Whether you are looking at Hosted PBX or SIP Trunking service, chances are your business will need some VoIP products to run the service at peak performance. Choose from the following technologies:

IP phones are used with hosted PBX service to provide feature rich desk phones

Wireless IP phones provide total flexibility and are used with our Hosted PBX service

VoIP gateways are adapters used to connect non-IP devices such as fax, credit card, or modem devices to a VoIP phone line. They are also used to connect existing non-IP PBX phone systems to SIP trunking VoIP service.

iCloud customers benefit from full configuration and support on these products with our hosted PBX or SIP trunking services."

errrr.... and the 'cloud' element of this is what exactly? Far more likely that they'll get a bunch of hits they wouldn't have had.

Microsoft becoming Apple with Windows 8 control freakery?

Historical accuracy...

"Way back when, Apple was ahead in user-friendliness, having *licensed* the mouse-meets-GUI paradigm from Xerox PARC Alto workstation."

There. Fixed that for you.

CEOP announces 'record results' in child protection battle

BRAND?!?

"...we know that we will go into that future with our *brand*, purpose and operating model intact."

WTF has a "brand" got to do with it? You're not selling soap. Reality detachment getting worse by any chance? You keep concentrating to "purpose" before you forget what it is. Or means.

</rant>

Group-buying deal for £99 iPhone 4 may have breached consumer laws

If it looks to good to be true...

..etc, etc...

Apple: iTunes ascends to the heavens this spring

Err...

>There are also persistent rumblings about a MobileMe upgrade

>that would include the ability for devices to cloudify not only their

>contacts, calendars, email and a relatively small amount of files,

>but also make all their videos, movies, music, and files available

>from anywhere and any device.

Actually it does this already. Although not automatically, it's true

and not with unlimited storage.

Russian hacker avoids jail over WorldPay heist

@thefix0r - from a Dictionary

mis·cre·ant/ˈmiskrēənt/

Noun: A person who behaves badly or in a way that breaks the law.

Adjective: (of a person) Behaving badly or breaking a law.

Steve Jobs unveils 30% subs model for ... everything

@ Alex Rose

Your condescension is appreciated.

Hang on...

>when the publisher brings an existing or new subscriber to the app,

>the publisher keeps 100 per cent and Apple earns nothing...

So what they're *actually* saying is you can:

A) Use the iTunes infrastructure and pay 30% for the privilege

- OR -

B) Build your own payment/security/etc infrastructure and keep 100% yourself

I fail to see what the problem is with this - you can have it either way.

Your article seems to suggest that *only* A) is available.

In defence of Comic Sans

Brilliant Verity...

...as always, thank you!

However, as any designer worth his salt will attest, the reason we don't like Comic Sans is that to our eyes, it does (for a whole catalogue of reasons I won't bore you with) look f**k ugly. If anyone reading this disagrees, that's OK. Carry on using it by all means.

But as an example everyone might warm to, it has a visual effect on some of us similar to the one people get just before they ask the question "you call THAT music"?

Assange relishes US banks 'squirming' over 'megaleak'

Why do I think this...

"Well," Assange said, "when you see abusive organizations suffer their consequences as a result of their abuse and you see victims elevated, yes, that's a very pleasurable activity to be involved in."

...will come back to haunt him?

Alcatel-Lucent pays to shut down US bribery probe

Was it ever thus...

"We take responsibility for and regret what happened and have implemented policies and procedures to prevent these violations from happening again..."

BOSS: Look guys, can you be a little more discrete with that, k?

STAFF: OK.

Gawker rooted by anonymous hackers

Probly...

..how you open his house then...

Maude: Gov contracts 'made my eyes water'

We want as a government to create what we've called a power shift...

"We want as a government to create what we've called a power shift and move power and control decisively from elites in Westminster to individuals, neighbourhoods and communities."

er... the Right are the New Left?!?

Sweden to issue international arrest warrant for Assange

..to be subjected to another media circus that she will orchestrate...

Right - only wants to be subjected to another media circus that HE will orchestrate. I see.

LIDL punts circular saw blades to innocent kiddies

Sadly gone!

Must be a SAW III movie tie in I spose...

Ofcom sets out mega-auction timetable

Auction. Nice...

So we'll be paying for that then will we? And it differs from 'TAX' how, exactly?

/cynic

Apple adds Ping kill switch to iTunes

Does Yoko's latest tweet offer any hints?

um... no. I don't think so. Maybe I'm the wrong generation. Or something....

Apple, Oracle air-kiss their way to OpenJDK deal for Mac OS X

hmmm... no surprise there.

I'm sure I'm not the only one not surprised by this.

With my most cynical hat on, I see Oracle manoeuvring another company on-side in its spat with Google....

Where's the Evil Larry icon when you need it?!?

iPhone glitch gets US fanbois up on wrong side of bed

UK seems OK now....

Checked my recurring alarms yesterday and all back to normal now, here in the UK at least. "Something" is clearly tied to the US DST, since they were all screwed *before* the US change to DST.

Clive Sinclair unveils 'X-1' battery pedalo bubble-bike

Why write something like "unsuccessful electric kart promoter and balding sugar-daddy"?

'cause this is theRegister combined with the lewisPage.

Apple coughs to time zone problems

it's nice to know...

... that once a problem affects those living in Cupertino Apple is quick to react, even if it reminds us just how important we are.

Oh yes.

iPhone alarm bug: now it's the UK's turn

From the Apple Forums...

Re: Daylight savings change and alarm issue

Posted: Nov 2, 2010 4:57 AM in response to: efcop

efcop wrote:

I just changed the date to November 8th i.e. after the US changes the time and presto it works. So it seems that although the phone's time changes correctly the alarm time seems to be linked to the US DST

I just tried doing this (I'm in the UK) and it works for me too. Looks like your analysis is correct.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2594030&start=156&tstart=0

So it looks like they did ALL their testing using the US daylight saving time zone and (hopefully) these problems will go away on the 8th. Except for those of us who have worked around this by setting our alarms back an hour!

Phone 7: Another Vista or another XP?

Microsoft innovating?

Whoda thunk it! Nice to see them actually going for it. It'll be interesting to see if the general public take to it.