Posts by jonathan keith

Tesla sues Swedish government after worker rebellion cripples car biz

TLDR

I was going to write a long and vitriolic screed about all this, but after stepping back for a moment and taking a couple of deep breaths, I realised that what I wanted to say would condense down to:

"Just Fuck Off, Elon Musk."

Arm grabs a slice of Raspberry Pi to sweeten relationship with IoT devs

Re: No! No! No! No! No!

One of my 'Yes!'s is that ARM could offer its design to Raspberry Pi for a reduced fee or even free, keeping the board price down. Indeed, ARM could consider this discount / free license a marketing cost, as Raspberry Pi's very existence as a powerful computer that needs little electricity because it uses ARM is quite the marketing message.

Not now ARM has shareholder interests to prioritise. By which I obviously mean short-term shareholder interests, which invariably results in the business being squeezed for as much profit as possible as quickly as possible.

Europe bans Meta from using personal data to target ads

Re: And nothing was lost

I'm with Bill Hicks on this one.

Regulator delays Adobe's $20B buy of Figma, derails deal deadline

The full quote* from Field was "This won't happen... until after my Adobe shares have vested."

* not really

Millions of smart meters will brick it when 2G and 3G turns off

The legal definition of 'future-proof' is 'obsolete at the moment of end-user purchase or installation.'

Apple finds another use for USB-C – a cheaper Pencil

Re: And will they ....

Nice gag, but f you study the accompanying photo carefully, you'll notice that the stylus tip is actually rounded, to complement the device's corners. (And no doubt Apple have tried to patent the tip design, despite decades of prior art.)

Japan cruises ahead with drive-thru EV charging trial

Re: Very clever, but there is a problem.

By sheer coincidence I ran across this in my YouTube feed yesterday:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AdBcTMHG0Q

Go ahead, let the unknowable security risks of Windows Copilot onto your PC fleet

... wanna buy some pegs, Dave?

New information physics theory is evidence 'we're living in a simulation,' says author

"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

Mozilla's midlife crisis has taken it from web pioneer to Google's weird neighbor

Yup.

Same here. If I absolutely *must* load a webpage that FireFox / NoScript / Ghostery throws a fit over, then it's Vivaldi that gets the shit jobs.

European Commission hits Intel with new fine over antitrust findings

Punitive damages?

The EU should also be imposing hefty punitive damage fines on top of the basic financial penalties in all these cases against giant tech companies of whatever stripe, for whom a €350 million fine is pocket change.

Something like €10 billion to start with, and a sliding upwards scale from there on. After all, it seems to be the only language these people understand.

'Small monthly payment' only thing that stands between X and bot chaos, says Musk

There's always a silver lining

In this case, it's that the skip-fire which TwiX has become will keep my popcorn popping while I sit back in my deckchair to watch.

Google exec: Microsoft Teams concession 'too little, too late'

Re: Just... no

Yes, but this is in an area of business that Google doesn't monopolise, so they're entitled to complain about another's monopolistic behaviour. You see?

Microsoft's Surface Duo phone hangs up, drops out of support

And they killed the Courier for it.

*sigh*

Australian court orders Meta subsidiaries to pay $14 million over data use

.. and years of guaranteed jail time for top-level senior execs. No plea bargains.

Funnily enough, AI models must follow privacy law – including right to be forgotten

Re: a clear disconnect here between law and technical reality

For 'well-meaning', read 'bought and paid for'.

Forget these apps and AI, where's my flying car? Ah, here's one with an FAA license

Re: Flying cars

Also, at least when a conventional, non-flying car runs out of juice, it just stops moving.

So does this one. Eventually.

So it's a flying car, but only for jockeys?

I may be wrong, but I'd guess that's rather a limited market.

Strike three: FTC says Meta still failing to protect user privacy

Fine them in to the ground.

Then do it again, to make the point.

Then send the senior execs to prison.

Barring a nuke from orbit, it's about the only way to be sure.

IT phone home: How to run up a $20K bill in two days and get away with it by blaming Cisco

Re: Mobile dongle and ISDN

I don't think it's been invented here.

Elon Musk yearns for AI devs to build 'anti-woke' rival ChatGPT bot

Because what the world needs now...

... is an even more bigoted chatbot.

Signal says it'll shut down in UK if Online Safety Bill approved

Absolutely. I mean, just how the bloody hell has a filthy pinko like Suella Braverman managed to wangle her way into the big chair at the Home Department? It's intolerable!

Microsoft begs you not to ditch Edge on Google's own Chrome download page

Re: When a product is better, people will naturally switch to it

Chrome isn't the world's most-used browser because it's 'better' though. Chrome is in the position it is due solely to Google's flagrant abuse of its monopoly in search.

Best time to prepare to leave an Oracle ULA? The day after it starts, say licensing gurus

But... why?

Frankly I'm astounded that anyone is still doing business with Oracle.

Belarus legalizes piracy – but citizens will have to pay for it

There really are top legal minds working for Lukashenko's government.

... Who?

Top. Legal. Minds.

After roasting Nvidia for overheating issues AMD now has its own

Re: der8auer

Don't forget that wonderful overarching analogue ambience that you simply can't get from cold, sterile digital.

Ireland fines Meta $414m for using personal data without asking

Re: A very Liberal attitude..

You reminded me of this, which was written in 1961 by a sociologist, and references an old but timeless joke (attributed variously and incorrectly to George Bernard Shaw, Winston Churchill, Groucho Marx, Mark Twain, W.C. Fields, Bertrand Russell, H.G. Wells, Woodrow Wilson and others):

To put this in a different way, all our actions have a price. It is we who decide at what point we agree to be bought. As in the story of a conversation between a very sophisticated gentleman and a very respectable lady at a party. They are talking about prostitution, “Well,” says the gentleman, “just for the sake of our argument, suppose I offered you $1000—would you spend the night with me?” The lady, smiling coquettishly: “Who knows—I might very well!” The gentleman: “Now suppose I offer you $10 for the night?” The lady: “But what do you think I am?” The gentleman: “We’ve already established what you are. Now we’re just haggling over the price.”

Let a thousand and one conspiracy theories BLOOM!

... although I'd genuinely love to know the full, unvarnished truth behind the Irish DPC's attitude and decisions concerning Zuckerberg and all his little shit-weasels.

Hopefully in due time a (team of) plucky investigative reporter(s) will uncover and publish the facts - and also before any relevant statues of limitation expire.

BOFH: We're an industry leader … in employing idiot managers

Re: Industry Leaders

*Definitely* not stoned. Possibly bombed on amphetamines, possibly very, very angry, possibly both. But absolutely not stoned.

Evernote's fall from grace is complete, with sale to Italian app maker

Re: *Why* the "thermocline" is so sudden... the network effect breaking

... see also 'tipping point' and 'cascade effect'.

Twitter engineer calls out Elon Musk for technical BS in unusual career move

Re: Q) How did Musk become a Millionaire?

The important point is that a lot of that pocket money was lent to him by other people.

Unless the principal condition of the loans was "Musk, you've got one month to permanently destroy Twitter's value, userbase and ability to function as an ongoing business", I imagine that Musk's secretaries are rather busy at the moment answering the phonecalls of some very angry bankers and oil sheikhs.

Re: So what happened to this freedom of speech thing then?

It seems that a large number of people believe that 'Freedom Of Speech' also magically comes with 'Freedom From Consequences'. *

The realisation that it doesn't can often be somewhat of a surprise...

* (edit - not that I am in any way defending Musk's actions. The man's a tool.)

Re: If you thought Twitter was toxic before...

I'll be surprised if Twitter lasts six months at this rate. The vast debt that Musk has now saddled the business with and the haemorrhaging income stream that only looks set to get worse by the week may well result in a queue of angry bankers stripping the company for parts.

Still, the silver lining of Musk being sued to pennilessness by shareholders for destroying their investments will be an entertaining spectacle.

Laugh all you want. There will be a year of the Linux desktop

Re: DAW of choice?

As does REAPER, my DAW of choice. My big problem with DAWs on Linux is the lack of linux-native instrument and FX plugins.

BOFH: It's Friday, it's time to RTFM

Re: Where is my beloved "SFTW" chronicle?

"FLAs"? My understanding is that the correct technical terminology is "ETLAs"...

Australian wasps threaten another passenger plane, with help from COVID-19

Re: There's a simpler solution....

Who needs windows?

https://cdn.airplane-pictures.net/images/uploaded-images/2016/10/18/795406.jpg

Malaysian Airlines Flight 134, 2018

This is an excellent and highly instructive video about the problems the wasps cause, how the Brisbane Airport authorities decided to manage those problems, how standard procedures can still be flawed and can cause horrendous subsequent difficulties with aircraft, and how excellently-trained flight crew can save the day (and the lives of the aircraft's passengers and crew).

Mentour Pilot | Malaysian Airlines Flight 134

Mouse hiding in cable tray cheesed off its bemused user

Re: We used to do this...

Out of interest, what's the policy threshold for 'too much' porn?

... Asking for a f̶r̶i̶e̶n̶d̶ colleague. Obviously.

The sins of OneDrive as Microsoft's cloud storage service turns 15

Gripe #1

My biggest issue with OneDrive happens to also be a magnificent example of the frankly insane thinking that occasionally crawls into the light at micros~1.

Let's say that your current OneDrive content is perilously close to your storage limit. One obvious way of reducing this is to stop syncing unneccesary folders - for example in my case, all the VST subfolders sitting inside my Documents folder.

Yet OneDrive's behaviour on deselecting folders to sync is to keep the files in the Cloud and delete the folders on your PC.

I can see that under certain circumstances taking that approach makes sense, but I also believe that the alternative method is the one that the vast majority of customers would choose to use, but which isn't even a possibility according to the big brains in Redmond.

NASA's Lunar Orbiter spots comfortably warm 'pits' all over the Moon

Re: Not Lava Tubes

I have a vague memory of the aircraft in question being a B-17, if we're both thinking about the same quality publication.

And here's the story, although the aeroplane is simply described as an 'American World War 2 bomber'.

If, somehow, I managed to miss the astounding news of a Lancaster being found on the Moon as well, I'll be profoundly grateful for any links to the full story.

Martin Shkreli, out of prison for running a Ponzi scheme, now pushes Web3 thing

Re: "after serving much of his seven-year prison sentence"

Many. Many of the MPs etc.

Getting that syncing feeling after an Exchange restore

Re: That syncing feeling ...

Entirely Apple's fault.*

* in this instance. Other megacorps are equally guilty, just under different circumstances.

EU makes USB-C common charging port for most electronic devices

What, something like charging your phone from a three-phase supply?

Ex-Googlers take a stab at building 'general intelligence' that makes software do what you tell it

Re: Pizza

I'm suggesting that sixty-five million dollars' worth of pizza might not be very good for one's physical wellbeing.

However, I'm not a medical professional or an academic specialist, and obviously therefore not entitled whatsoever to an opinion.

Re: Pizza

As its closing trick, the AI will be able to diagnose your colon cancer.

Brave, DuckDuckGo to unplug Google's AMP where possible

TRY THIS ONE CRAZY HACK TO MASSIVELY CUT *YOUR* PAGE LOAD TIMES!!!

Install NoScript.

The Register gets up close and personal with ESA's JUICE spacecraft

Re: Life resembling art again?

Also this:

"We have developed the spacecraft and the onboard software in particular to be able to detect failures, to isolate failures and to reconfigure them from failures," explains Cavel.

Expect JUICE to send this message at some point during Jupiter approach:

"I just picked up a fault in the AE-35 Unit."

Russia scrambles to bootstrap HPC clusters with native tech

"In Soviet Union..."

I'm reminded of a tale I heard many years ago, from an entirely unreliable source, and about which I can find absolutely no evidence.

Nevertheless, the story goes that Khrushchev was giving his leader's speech to the Party Congress, and illustrating the vanguard of Soviet technology.

"Comrades," he concluded, "why should these computers of the decadent western imperialists concern us, when it is the Soviet Union that produces the largest microchips in the world?"

File suffixes: Who needs them? Well, this guy did

Competition time!

I honestly can't think of a good reason for hiding file extensions in the first place. Not one.

A pint of --> for anybody who can.

D-Wave to go public after $1.2 billion merger deal with SPAC

Re: I can't decide.....

You just need to wait for the advent of the Quantum Blockchain.