Posts by 97browng

Poetic justice: Mum funnels £100 into claw machine to win single Dumbo teddy for her kid

Was this a game of chance or skill?

I will agree that putting this much money into the machine which is clearly rigged is idiotic. However are we not missing the point a bit, I assume this game was being sold as a game of skill not chance.

These claw machines are generally sold as a game of skill where if you are good enough you should be able to win a prize. Yes we know all the games are rigged but it seems in this case that without complaining there was 0% chance of anyone ever winning anything. I assume that this was no information on the box clearly stating that the chance of winning was X%.

Of course most of us would have stopped at some point far short of this, and not put in even more money after seeing the switch changed. But still I would have thought there are some regulations to not allow a 0% chance of winning.

You can't compare this to betting on a horse, playing the lottery or a gambler. All of these are either a game of change or odds. In fact gamblers have to state what their payout rate is and if you read the notices on them many will say 'No matter what option you chose on certain turns you will always lose' (well perhaps not in these exact words). With this information you should know exactly what the likelihood of winning is and then be able to make an informed decision on how much you put in or not.

It's alive! Hands on with Microsoft's Chromium Edge browser

I thought the same at first. However I can see how it might work, in the corporate world.

We like many others are currently stuck with IE11 as a default browser (as well as Edge). The company does not allow Chrome or Firefox :(

I assume the new Edge will be wrapped up in Windows with 'easily' manageable tools so the company will have no reason/choice other than to allow it. So now (unlike with old Edge) you have a reasonable browser that people can use in work and at home.

Jingle bells, disk drives sell not so well from today. Oh what fun it is to ride on a one-horse open array...

Re: Easy to mitigate

A much better response would have been, Do YOU know it's Christmas time at all :)

NHS could have 'fended off' WannaCry by taking 'simple steps' – report

Re: Easy to mitigate

How simple it is, I dont know why it has not been done.

Apart form you have a piece of software that has not been updated for years because it is vitally important yet nobody has the money to upgrade it.

You cannot put the latest patches for other software/OS on because it will break this very important piece of software. You tell the relevant people you need to update the software and OS to stop a potential security breach but this will break the software. The answer you always get back is 'if it stops working a child might die'.

And that is where the argument ends, a potential security breach VS a child dying. Yes we all know that the potential security breach could in turn mean all systems are down and more risk to people but it never works.

Testing in a sandbox is so easy. Ohh wait we support 700+ applications, who is going to test them all, with all possible iterations. It is not possible.

Add to this that a lot of the software used is very niche and only ever made by one company and you are caught by the short and curlys. You know it is not 'secure' yet it is the only thing that can do what you need.

Why not make your own software then? Ok we will just hire some more staff to do it (with the imaginary money tree) and then find out that it cannot integrate with what everyone else is using so it is no use.

I don't work for the NHS (or in the security team) but local government and we get it all the time. People working for either small companies or those that use a very limited amount of applications and need little integration with anyone else have no idea. Try working for the government or NHS where ICT has very little power or budget and has to support hundreds of critical applications that are made by a plethora of suppliers.

England just not windy enough for wind farms, admits renewables boss

Is England not windy enough or the whole of the UK

Reading this article, I am not sure if they are talking about England or the UK as a whole. The title of the article is England yet the UK is mentioned several times as if they are interchangeable.

We can see that the head of a UK body states that it is ‘England’. However, the article then talks about the UK as a whole so which one is it? Saying England is not windy enough is not the same thing as saying the UK is not windy enough.

I am not being pedantic this is a serious question. It could well be that wind energy is England is not a viable option anymore but elsewhere in the UK it is.