* Posts by Mike Moyle

1715 publicly visible posts • joined 8 Feb 2007

Shelter for internet outcasts Parler slaps Amazon with fresh lawsuit after abandoning first attempt

Mike Moyle

Re: Couldn't happen to a nice bunch of...

More to the point, it WOULDN'T have happened to a nicer bunch.

The Fat iPhone, 11 years on: The iPad's over a decade old and we're still not sure what it's for

Mike Moyle

Re: Seniors

"...and too many websites assume that I'm using an iPhone..."

FWIW, both iCab and Desktop Browser are available for iPad. Both let you set your user agent to pretty much anything you want. I keep st least one set to "Edge browser running on a Windows computer" at all times for sites that don't play well with mobile browsers or insist on sending a phone-sized layout.

Mike Moyle

Re: Phone for the living room

Photo and Designer on iPad and Pencil make going to a client's site, and creating rough sketches and layouts MUCH more convenient than a laptop. IMO, the combo is a godsend for those of us doing freelance graphics.

United States Congress stormed by violent followers of defeated president, Biden win confirmation halted

Mike Moyle

Re: Careful. Slow down and THINK.

It *IS* notable how the arrested/beaten/shot ratios of this group vs the average BLM protest compare.

With luck - not that I expect this, mind you - there will be DC police at every hotel as these thugs check out tomorrow checking bags for guns illegally brought into the city.

OTOH, if at LEAST one law-enforcement agency isn't already filling out subpoena request forms for DC-area cell tower data, I will be EXTREMELY surprised.

Mike Moyle

Re: Careful. Slow down and THINK.

Think of it as "The Capitol Putsch".

A bunch of hyper-thyroid yahoos try to overthrow - or, at least, overrule - the sitting government and are summarily dispatched. Ten years or so later, someone figures out how to do it right.

We, I think, are not so much afraid of THESE doofi as we are of what it could portend when a publicly known and media-hog organizer (if such a term can be used here) of the NEXT group isn't stupid enough to walk around the city that has REALLY stiff gun laws carrying loaded high-capacity ammo magazines and gets arrested the day before the big show.

THAT'S what we're worried about.

Mike Moyle

...and your evidence?

Mike Moyle

Re: I wonder ...

"I wonder ...

... whether Mr Trump will further denigrate the office of President of the USA by pardoning the rioters who stormed the US Houses of Congress."

I raised that among my friends and one smarter than I said "Hold the issuing of charges until January 21st."

Mike Moyle

Re: Careful. Slow down and THINK.

"You don't drink your whiskey by the pint?"

I am today.

Mike Moyle

Re: Unfortunately ...

Yes, the Vice President needs the majority of the cabinet to agree.

HOWEVER -- Ths can only be done by official, Congressionally-confirmed Secretaries. Interim or "acting" Secretaries don't have the authority, and Mousseolini DOES love him some acting Secretaries. I haven't kept track of how many there are right now.

Coincidentally enough, Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao (Mrs. Mitch McConnell, senate majority leader) is apparently considering tendering her resignation.

Intel chief pens congratulatory letter to President-elect Biden urging work on immigration and domestic manufacturing

Mike Moyle

"At least I hope he'll have to be dragged out, it would make for great TV!"

Finally, he'll get those "highest ratings EVER seen" that he's always wishing for!

Election security fears doused with reality: Top officials say Nov 3 'was the most secure in American history.' The end

Mike Moyle

Re: There were a 'nonzero' number of people in the room

"The DA for SDNY will be going after dear donny for tax evasion starting on 21st Jan. He can't get a pardon for a state crime."

If they're smart, they'll file charges on the 19th, and request the court confiscate Trumplethinskin's passport on the grounds that, with his assets like properties owned overseas, he constitutes a flight risk.

(I presume that the various U.S. intelligence agencies would quietly inform the court that they support the request - since the amount of information that he might have accidentally learned despite his reported inattention at his security briefings plus the amount of money he reportedly owes to unnamed lenders could be a volatile combination.)

Brit accused of spying on 772 people via webcam CCTV software tells court he'd end his life if extradited to US

Mike Moyle

Re: "I'll kill myself if you extradite me"

@Kabukiwookie

"Cruel and unusual punishment" is not a doctrine that punishment shouldn't be cruel or unusual (It's rather hard to come up with something that its an actual punishment that would NOT be considered cruel or unusual in relation to the accused's likely daily life in freedom!). It's intended to mean that a specific punishment (or range of punishments) for a specific crime must be applied evenly across the board. The phrase might better be "MORE cruel than the norm and unusual in relation to that norm in that locality," but the term as it stands has been in use for a long time and is a, legally, well-understood phrase.

Former antivirus baron John McAfee collared, faces extradition to America on tax evasion, securities allegations

Mike Moyle

Honestly, I think he turned himself in for the publicity.

I mean, Assange was in the news in the past week; I think John was feeling left out.

Windows to become emulation layer atop Linux kernel, predicts Eric Raymond

Mike Moyle

Re: Sadly... this is the beginning of the end

I will admit that I am not a Linux expert, so I'm asking in all seriousness: To all the posters saying there are plenty of distros that don't use systemd -- how many of them are ones that you'd be happy to give to your non-techy parents or your great-aunt Lucy? Because, as I've said before, Linux won't be mainstream until those people can just sit down and do the things they want to do. Ignoring for the moment the stories we all know of people who are completely atechnical ("Point and click? What's that?"), most people who learn to use Windows once can - for the most part - go anywhere else, sit down at a computer, and do their thing. With a plethora of distros, desktops, etc., Linux doesn't have that, if you will, enforced simplicity.

Now, if -- and I stress *IF* MS were to be able to use its well-known "embrace, extend, and extinguish" strategy to, as has been suggested, create a familiar shell that, e.g., uses systemd, the fact that it acts like the Windows that average users (Hi, Aunt Lucy!) are used to implies that it will become the default distro for new computers sold to private consumers, businesses, libraries, etc. This puts other distros where they have always been; as also-rans used primarily by the techy/enthusiast markets.

And, as we have seen multiple times in living memory, the user interface - the look and feel -- are cooyrightable, limiting how closely the Winux interface could be imitated.

Which puts us back where we started, only this time with a Windows-branded Linux as the proverbial 800-pound gorilla for the consumer market and numerous (relatively) little-used forks sweeping up the leftovers.

What am I missing?

Elecrow CrowPi2: Neat way to get your boffins-to-be hooked on Linux from an early age and tinkering in no time

Mike Moyle

Re: "The kiddiwonks won't even know they're learning"

I fear we cheated a bit on the food training. At one point the young'un refused to try something new -- I forget now what it was, some casserole thing or other, I expect. I just looked at her in surprise and said "But you LIKE Chinese food!" She got the "Oh, right!" look on her face and started happily shoveling it in.

'A guy in a jetpack' seen flying at 3,000ft within few hundred yards of passenger jet landing at LA airport

Mike Moyle

OTOH...

I wouldn't be at all surprised to find out that it was something like this and the pilots just extrapolated a jet pack because how ELSE would he be up there?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgACwfl6FBI

Um, almost the entire Scots Wikipedia was written by someone with no idea of the language – 10,000s of articles

Mike Moyle

Re: International Recognition

"Which "English" are they keen to learn? You should of made it clearer."

The one where people say "You should have made it clearer."

Mike Moyle

Re: "Ach ay tha noo"

I'm rather partial to the version by Sol. K. Bright -- "The Hawaiian Scotsman" -- and his Hollywaiians:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhp7BkYFENw

Facebook apologizes to users, businesses for Apple’s monstrous efforts to protect its customers' privacy

Mike Moyle
Pint

Kudos, Mr. McCarthy

This is at least the second time that I've had cause to post on The Register to compliment Mr. McCarthy on his skill at writing articles which are simultaneously informative and wonderfully snark-filled. Honestly, he may be, at the moment, the premier writer on the site at combining both of El Reg's defining characteristics into one immensely satisfying article.

Well done, Sir! Well. Done. Indeed.

(And no; I'm not getting paid by Mr. McCarthy for writing such fulsome praise.)

(Although... I'm not actually AVERSE to the idea, mind you, if Mr. McCarthy is interested in a partnership!)

Mike Moyle

Has Zuck tried restarting...

...while pressing command-option-p-r?

Whoa-o BlackBerry, bam-ba-lam: QWERTY phone had a child. 5G thing's newly styled

Mike Moyle
Pint

Re: A beer for the headline alone.

Absolutely... +1 to the headitor for that one!

Anti-5G-vaxx pressure group sues Zuckerberg, Facebook, fact checkers for daring to suggest it might be wrong

Mike Moyle

Am I the only one...

...who keeps reading the group's abbreviation as "CHUD"?

Where there's a .mil, there's Huawei: Pentagon allowed to keep using Chinese tech deemed too dangerous for everyone else – report

Mike Moyle

Re: "That hasn't however, stopped the US and other nations . . ."

THAT money is for planes/tanks/missiles/ships built by generous campaign donors or stationed in various congressional home districts. Comms gear/base /infrastructure/family housing/schools/medical services (VA) doesn't see the big numbers and have to beg for the scraps.

Donald Trump thought-bubbles an Alibaba ban as Chinese clouds clam up about Clean Cloud plan

Mike Moyle

A friend of mine used to be a reporter in Miami, Florida. There are certain words that some folks in the Deep South have trouble pronouncing and sometimes there would be a game among the reporters at politicians' press conferences to see who could get the politician on the record using one of the problematic words. My friend won big one night by getting the pol in question to talk about the threats to the "Amurrican Nucular Bidness".

Steve Wozniak at 70: Here's to the bloke behind Apple who wasn't a complete... turtleneck

Mike Moyle

Re: Apple

"Put annother way, jobs was only able to sell to creatives and the gullible, the scientists, business people and engineers saw through his flim flam"

Not according to Larry Tessler:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOF-j6Nxm04

Mike Moyle

Re: Apple

"... tech writers in the cult of apple like to ignore all the ideas of the UI from xerox that Apple were given in exchange for company stock..."

FTFY

That's how we roll: OWC savagely undercuts Apple's $699 Mac Pro wheels with bargain $199 alternative

Mike Moyle

Re: There's 360˚ of rotation

Back in the late '80s - early '90s, when the family was exiled out in Los Angeles, all of the grocery store chains supplied carts on which all four wheels were steerable. It took a short time to get used to but the convenience of being able to just pull the cart 90º to the side when some obliviot was barreling down the aisle in one's direction made one an instant convert.

Having to settle for the old, less-maneuverable style of cart was the hardest adjustment to make on moving back to the east coast. I have to assume that the extra couple of dollars' cost of installing two extra swiveling casters is the reason that they seem never to have caught on out here, but I DO miss having them.

USA decides to cleanse local networks of anything Chinese under new five-point national data security plan

Mike Moyle

Re: Short lived policy

"In a way we're lucky, most Republicans this far behind would have invaded somewhere"

They are. Only this time, instead of sending troops to invade some other country, they're sending them to states and cities with Democratic administrations - vis. Portland, Oregon. They escalate mostly-peaceful protests into armed (on their part) conflicts and make sure that there's plenty of nice red meat for the 24-hour news feeds (and their party's base) in the two blocks that get the coverage, while ignoring that -- for the majority of the time in the vast majority of the city -- people go about their business undisturbed by the protesters.

It's quicker and cheaper than sending troops overseas and there are no embarrassing body bags to fly home afterwards, but you still get the "Amurrican troops defending Freedumb!" effect.

Microsoft to Cortana: You’re not going out dressed in iOS or Android, young lady!

Mike Moyle

Re: "Alexa...

...with extreme prejudice.

For Apple's latest trick, the iCockroach – allowing it to survive while the smartphone sector faces a nuclear winter

Mike Moyle

Re: Actually...

They probably won't survive us by much, IIRC; they've become too well adapted to living in our metaphorical and/or physical walls to survive in such large numbers once our dead carcasses and readily-available pantry items are consumed.

In the market for a second-hand phone? Check it's still supported by the vendor – almost a third sold are not

Mike Moyle

Re: 3 years from when?

At the very least, I think that software upgrade support should cover five years from the date that a product becomes generally available or three years from the date that the product goes off the market, whichever is greater. This should be required of the manufacturer and, if sold through a network provider, of that provider IF they alter or in any way change the manufacturer's software installation. That is: If $PhoneCompany makes their own installation of Android + bloatware (and/or "recommendation" popups suggesting that the user install their cruft), they are required to fully support their full software installation -- including their Android installation -- for the mandated time. Of course, if they DON'T make any changes from the stock Android install and don't require adding any bits and bobs later "to get the full $PhoneCompany experience", then they're off the hook and the responsibility falls back to the manufacturer.

Don't strain yourself, Zuck, only democracy at stake... Facebook makes half-hearted effort to flag election lies by President Trump

Mike Moyle

Re: If he does lose

"With the Dems cheating their asses off and going cray about it for four more years.

"No one's interested in facts, just personal attacks and conspiracy theories."

Case in point...

Mike Moyle

Re: The mistake you're making

"Their influence doesn't stop at the federal level."

Correct. Honestly, the smartest thing that the Republicans did in 2010 was to divert a lot of their resources to winning state races. The decennial census tells the states how many residents they have, which translates into how many congressional districts they have. It's then up to the states (within certain broad requirements) to draw up the districts however they want. In states where a bipartisan - or, ideally, NONpartisan - committee has that responsibility, districts are generally distributed so that they match the overall voting characteristics. In states where districts are drawn by, say, a committee hand-picked by the head of a legislative house, where it can be packed with members of the dominant party, the districts can be warped and stretched so that it becomes virtually impossible for all but the most heavily-concentrated opposition areas to elect anyone but the party in power's candidates. (Software that can identify voting patterns down to individual precincts and draw districts that best meet whatever criteria one chooses have made this process MUCH more efficient in recent years.)

Add to that the fact that, once a party gets that sort of a hammerlock on the electoral process, they are in a better position to ALSO limit the number of polling places and otherwise disenfranchise voters in the areas that they can't outright gerrymander out of existence, and it gets even uglier

My life as a criminal cookie clearer: Register vulture writes Chrome extension, realizes it probably breaks US law

Mike Moyle

My understanding is that, supposedly, intent counts when providing a tool or service. To use your example, a licensed firearm manufacturer may advertise a a shotgun, say, for hunting. If someone buys that model of shotgun and uses it to rob a bank, the manufacturer is not liable because the purpose for which the gun was used is out of bounds of the intended and advertised use. OTOH if someone offers to sell you a shotgun with a 15" barrel, a pistol grip instead of a shoulder stock and the serial number filed off, and tells you that "those stupid bank guards will never see you coming," that seller IS liable, since the whole intent of the sale is to enable an illegal use.

Motorola Moto G 5G Plus: It won't blow your mind, but at £300 we're struggling to find much to grumble about

Mike Moyle

I don't know how old you are but as I approached my current sixty-mumble years, my thoughts along this lines changed dramatically. Big screens are a Good Thing™!

Apple: Don't close MacBooks with a webcam cover on, you might damage the display

Mike Moyle

Re: Vinyl overlays.

Just guessing here that the overlays are:

A - Softer because they're designed to be flexible enough not to press several keys at a time, and;

B - Spreading any pressure over a wider area than a half-inch piece of hard plastic that sits right at the edge of a thin sheet of glass.

Never mind rail and ports, let's help DPD... and, er, Amazon: UK gov and ESA call for ways to slap logistics with 5G stick

Mike Moyle

Re: For those of us on the wrong side of the pond...

oh. Okay. Thanks.

Mike Moyle

For those of us on the wrong side of the pond...

What's the "DPD" mentioned in the title? It doesn't seem to be defined in the article and I didn't see anything that could be abbreviated down to it.

Captain, the computer has identified 250 alien stars that infiltrated our galaxy – actual science, not science-fiction

Mike Moyle

We're gonna build a wall around the galaxy...

...and the Small Magellanic Cloud is gonna pay for it!

(Yes, I know others have done the wall joke, but *I* included a source of funding, making me a stabler genius than them!)

Linux kernel coders propose inclusive terminology coding guidelines, note: 'Arguments about why people should not be offended do not scale'

Mike Moyle

Re: "freedom is slavery"

"freedom is slavery"

"ignorance is strength"

Throw in a couple of "bigly"s and you've written a Trump speech. Congratulations, I suppose"

Mike Moyle

Re: Thin end of the wedge?

"For example, grepping the linux kernel headers (just the headers, which all have API compatibility implications) there are 1645 lines containing the word "master" and 1550 lines containing the word "slave". Think of all the code reviews needed to expunge just two banned terms arising from today's moral panic. What about all the others, and what about tomorrow's moral panic?"

I think this was referenced in TFA:

"The proposal has allowed for exceptions when maintaining a userspace API or when updating a code for a specification that mandates those terms. "

The internet becomes trademarkable, sort of, with near-unanimous Supreme Court ruling on Booking.com

Mike Moyle

Note to self:

Trademark "USSupremeCourt.gov", then set up a "USSupremeCourt.gov.org" website.

Hijinks ensue. (Yes, yes... I know, I'd need to register "gov.org" first... Work with me, here!)

Fasten your seat belts: Brave Reg hack spends a week eating airline food grounded by coronavirus crash

Mike Moyle

Re: As a child of the 1970s, I have a fear of savoury dishes involving fruit...

"on one occasion most tables returned their meatballs untouched."

This reminds me of my college days -- We had all of the usual complaints about the school's food service, which was often pretty dire (Speaking personally, I was apparently one of the ones who didn't check under the gravy one Friday night, so didn't discover that the roast beef had an iridescent sheen to it and so was part of the one-third of residence students who came down with varying degrees of food poisoning that weekend!).

One day, the lunch menu included something new called "Piccadilly Circles". Well, I mean, it was something new and not the usual "Spaghetti with a side of mashed potatoes, wasn't it? So I took the plate and found a table to sit at. I took one bite and realized that, apparently the food service had gotten an AMAZING deal on english muffins, imitation bacon bits, and Cheez Whiz. I put the horrible thing down and went back up to the serving line to get the spaghetti (Hold the mashed!).

On busing my tray up to the receiving window at the end of my meal, I saw that a good 80% of the trays contained two entree plates, one of which held three Piccadilly Circles, ONE of which had a single bite taken out of it.

They never served them again but, starting about a month later, and for the remainder of the school year, the salad bar had these quite acceptable bacon-cheddar-ish croutons as add-ins, so that was nice!

Section 230 authors despair of Trump, Barr, Biden, US Congress’ aggressive ignorance of critical tech law

Mike Moyle

Re: Time...

"Take that full pension and pop off to your first or second holiday home/yacht and relax."

Why is it that, apparently, every Boomer except I -- and everyone I know -- has all these things?

It's a conspiracy, I tells ya! A CONSPI-I-I-I-I-I-I-IRACY!!!

China's internet watchdog freezes 10 too-trashy online video services before they undermine socialism

Mike Moyle

Re: Vulgar content

"Vulgar content and scantily clad presenters..."

Huh... That made me do a quick search -- turns out Naked News *IS* still around.

Maybe there is hope for 2020: AI that 'predicts criminality' from faces with '80% accuracy, no bias' gets in the sea

Mike Moyle

Re: 5 violent burglars on a BBC one programme yesterday and they all had "the look@

To be fair, I've known guys who could drive a woman to become a lesbian.

Mike Moyle

Re: Very dodgy subject

I've been told that some people had referred my as "that guy with the shifty eyes".

Yes -- It's called a nystagmus, it's uncontrollable and besides making me look nervous it makes it really hard to look people in the eye when I'm talking to them. The stereotypical " criminal look" is exactly that: a stereotype.

Belief in 5G conspiracy theories goes hand-in-hand with small explosions of rage, paranoia and violence, researchers claim

Mike Moyle

Re: Be careful about definitions Reg.

So it's only paranoia if the machete is silent? Good to know.

Mike Moyle

Re: So basically ...

"'It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so.' —Samuel Langhorne Clemens"

Case in point: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2018/11/18/know-trouble/