Posts by sbt

Pack your bags – we may have found the first planet outside of our galaxy

Re: What are the chances...

Does your calculation account for other rotations such as those of the Milky Way and Messier 51? Or relative galactic motion?

What are the chances...

...we're still lined up enough with this star's planetary orbital plane for dimming 70 years hence?

Zuckerberg wants to create a make-believe world in which you can hide from all the damage Facebook has done

"If this is the future you want to see..."

No, it is not.

Technologies like the Internet should be tools for making the real world a better place, not a replacement for it; and certainly not one run by a corporation, particularly an untrustworthy and rapacious one like Facebook.

Every virtual surface will be a billboard for advertising, sold by FB, of course. Just, no.

Sovereignty? We've heard of it. UK government gives contract to store MI5, MI6 and GCHQ's data to AWS

Re: "David Blunkett signed a treaty with the US"

I can't speak to the military or defence related claims here, but their credibility seems a bit questionable given the apparent weakness of the extradition treaty claim, as evidenced by recent high-profile court cases for Assange and that fellow from Autonomy - neither demonstrate the automatic, unscrutinised 'slam-dunk' extradition arrangement Banks claims was made.

Facebook posts job ad for 10,000 'high-skilled' roles to 'build the metaverse' – and they'll all be based in the EU

Brit political has-been ... Nick Clegg

Uh, I think you meant "never-was".

Mine's the one with the Lib-dem manifesto (doubles as a handy drinks coaster!) in the pocket.

Missouri governor demands prosecution of reporter for 'decoding HTML source code' and reporting a data breach

Re: He's probably got a secretary to ...

... also print out Web pages for him; maybe he's never used a Web browser himself, let alone pressed F12.

Facebook far too consumed by greed to make itself less harmful to society, whistleblower tells Congress

One thing Facebook management will certainly change ...

... is how easy it is to walk out with internal docs, or blow the whistle. They'll put some security controls on internal info (security of information goes against the grain for them) and get their high-power legal team on wording NDAs and employment contracts to void whistleblower protections to the greatest possible extent.

Sort-of Epic win as judge kills Apple ban on apps linking to outside payment systems

I’m sure they’ll be looking for ways to skirt this judgement.

Stand by for a massive increase in developer program membership costs and no more free access to Xcode or other tooling needed to create apps.

Japan's bullet trains replace smoking rooms with Zooming rooms

"zzz..."

TIL that Japanese folks snore in english.

Google Sites blight: Over 100,000 web pages for business form searches overrun with backdoor RATs

The Web should be for content, not code

This also applies to e-mail links; if we could transition away from executable code being downloadable by web browsers, this vector would go away. Applies to scripts as well.

We'd need effective non-browser native apps for software retreival and installation; they could deal with code signing and attribution issues. Most platforms already have such apps like app stores. Or CLI tools like port, apt , brew, etc. As long as the OS/hardware maker doesn't get a monopoly on the app store or whatever software delivery mechanism like Apple has (for example), this would be an improvement.

At a minimum, browser makers should be picking up on these malware techniques and blocking dodgy redirects and mismatches between reported and detected mime types on downloads.

Who'd have thought the US senator who fist pumped Jan 6 insurrectionists would propose totally unworkable anti-Big Tech law?

"A small group of woke mega-corporations"

It's amazing how a single word like "woke" can reveal the true motivations behind a legislative push.

Don't get me wrong, monopolies are a massive issue as I've commented elsewhere. But this guy is hurting the cause for anti-trust reform with this obviously disingeneous and politicised approach.

'Chinese wall'? Who uses 'Chinese wall'? Well, IBM did, and it actually means 'firewall'

Re: The term for actual grandfathers...

...isn't being scrapped. They seem to be acknowledging the origins of using 'grandfathering' to mean an exemption for pre-existing situations/clients/privileges, as in the original grandfather clause.

Context matters; this appears to be too close to the bone.

Re: Racist?

I wondered the same thing when this last came up. TIL the concept of the 'grandfather clause' has origins in the United States that seem pretty racist:

From late 19th-century legislation and constitutional amendments passed by a number of U.S. Southern states, which created new literacy and property restrictions on voting, but exempted those whose grandfathers had the right to vote before the Civil War. The intent and effect of such rules was to prevent poor and illiterate African American former slaves and their descendants from voting, but without denying poor and illiterate whites the right to vote.

Fair enough

Not sure why it's offensive; effective walls are Chinese = good, yes?

When they came for the Chinese walls, I said nothing, because I'm not Chinese.

When they came for the Damascus steel, I said nothing, because I'm not Damascian.

When they came for the French toast, I opened a café.

Nominet chooses civil war over compromise by rejecting ex-BBC Trust chairman

Was the legal validity of refusing to put the second motion to the EGM...

...ever resolved? If they'd fought that one a bit harder, maybe we'd not be here.

Board seems to be delaying the inevitable.

NASA writes software update for Ingenuity helicopter to enable first Mars flight

Be careful, folks!

If your watchdog keeps expiring before the system initialises to the point where it starts resetting the timer, you'll be stuck in a boot loop. Had the same problem on my BlueTooth CD changer impersonator.

FSF doubles down on Richard Stallman's return: Sure, he is 'troubling for some' but we need him, says org

"he is essential to its mission"

No one is indispensible. Booch (via quoted tweet) is right.

It is 60 years since the first cosmonaut reached orbit and 40 years since the Shuttle first left the launchpad

Pints/shots all round

Ваше здоровье! and Cheers!

Let's hope the Russians can sort out their contributions to international programmes like the ISS that help keep the peace.

Bless you: Yep, it's IBM's new name for tech services spinoff and totally not a hayfever medicine

"forever* to be known as Kyndryl"

Tell me again, how long did ISSC last?

This seems so pointless. For some silly customers, the IBM name was the only reason to use them. Now why would they?

FreeBSD gives ARM64 green light for production over x86 alternative's 'growth trajectory'

What is PC98?

NEC's take on the PC in the '80-'90s, not IBM compatible.

Also covers Raspberry Pi 3+ and 4.

Nice one. Happy Daemon. --->

Wormhole encrypted file transfer app reboots Firefox Send after Mozilla fled

Re: CPU usage

Yes. Also bear in mind the original CPU complaint was just in connecting to the homepage; observed here as well. No file, network or encryption transactions on foot just to show the home page, unless and until you interact with it by loading up a file or folder.

I agree with the other posters blaming the wormhole animation.

Re: CPU usage

Noticed similar CPU behaviour. Hope there's not a cryptominer lurking within all that WebPack'd js.

Firefox 78.9.0esr.

Could be adaptable to self-hosting, maybe?

If the encryption/decryption is done on the client side, then I would assume it could be hosted from another domain with a simple upload API. Be interesting to see what licence they open access to the source under.

Looking at their homepage, they're not just betting on JavaScript, but also WebAssembly. Assembly! The snake has eaten itself.

Fire up that Macintosh II: Retro techhead gives the web a Netscape 1.1 makeover

We could argue all day over...

Seem like a short day to me.

Good morning! Sites made entirely of JS can die in a fire. There, the sun has set.

Satellite collision anticipated by EU space agency fails to materialize... for now at least

Re: It's not a uniquely Chinese problem

Yes, every country that has deliberately blown things up in space leaving debris should get on and clean it up. It's not like only the Chinese caused debris will hit something eventually.

Re: the 2007 Fengyun-1C anti-satellite missile test

Get them to de-orbit any large chunks they've been able to identify and keep track of, as well as an equivalent mass in the same orbit of bits they haven't.

Time for Mega-Maid!

the 2007 Fengyun-1C anti-satellite missile test

Given that was deliberate, the CCP really should be made to clean it up.

Lenovo's latest gaming monster: Eight cores, 3.2GHz, giant heat sink, two fans. Oh, and it has a phone bolted on

really want to play Minesweeper

Not recommended; if you find a mine the wrong way the haptic feedback will rip your arms off.

How do we stamp out the ransomware business model? Ban insurance payouts for one, says ex-GCHQ director

Re: the ban needs to be on the payouts themselves

I see what you're saying, but there's a fundamental issue with banning the payout rather than the insurance; bans will just push the problem undercover and hurt disclosure, which ultimately will hurt the customers of the victims whose data has been lost or disclosed.

Wholesale bans lead to things like speakeasies, drug barons and the use of coathangers as surgical equipment; not to be enacted lightly.

Re: bring the problem back into cyberspace

Great idea, but I fear there's an immaturity in assessing the risk on the underwriting side and a fatal lack of qualified and experienced professionals to take on the claims assessor/adjuster roles. It's taken decades to establish and mature the premises insurance underwriting/claim model and deal with fraud issues, assess losses and costs, etc.

Brought to you by The Crimson Permanent Assurance. -->

sending emails with embedded links

A thumb up, but I think that's just too compelling a feature for legitimate use cases for organisations to give up. Tackle it via solving the lack of authentication for e-mail, and then links can be deleted from any unautheticated e-mails. Give people easy to use white-listing tools for trusted suppliers.

Charge a fee per e-mail.

Folks got used to tossing the junk mail that arrived through the post. While they still fall for bogus letters, the postage cost vs return rate from victims there is not good enough to support the kind of volumes we see via e-mail.

Don't have to ban the payouts...

...just the insurance coverage. It's simple economics. At least then orgs will assess the risks more appropriately; why spend £££ on prevention when you can spend £ on a policy? Instead of comparing the prevention costs to the premium, they'll need to compare to the potential losses/disruption costs.

Airline software super-bug: Flight loads miscalculated because women using 'Miss' were treated as children

Re: I've checked

Nice one; you can't beat real data. Still no sense of why TUI were trying to synthesise some kind of weight class from the passenger titles.

Re: primary concern

They've just copied that from a Boeing press release they found in a drawer.

Re: duvets

Yeah, it's like the average height of the population hasn't changed in a century or something. Don't get me started on airline seat leg room (on topic) or car space widths vs. new cars (off topic).

Re: requires full passport info to be provided

Thanks, John. I have flown out of the UK internationally a number of times, but have never booked the ticket from within the UK, so apologies if this is a standard UK arrangement. I really don't recall giving this info when booking elsewhere for international travel, but it's been a while.

I'd imagine the airline approach to determining passenger weight, if based on age, would need to be standard if they also flew domestically and passports didn't figure; that's not to say TUI couldn't rely on this if all the pieces of the puzzle are there. If they are, why even look at passenger titles?

Re: "using DOB to calculate"

No thumb, because it's a reasonable question. I don't think that information is provided by passengers. The fare code used for children under a certain age that travel free "on lap" might be applicable, but only covers the very small.

W3C Technical Architecture Group slaps down Google's proposal to treat multiple domains as same origin

Re: They give the browser away for free, how can you stop that?

Separate the browser business from the advertising business. Then they'd have to look at how their business model as a browser vendor supports giving it away. Like the others do.

Tell me again why it's OK that ...

... the dominant advertising broker is also the dominant browser developer?

De-verticalise big tech now!

Don't be fooled, these aren't walled gardens, they're prisons.

‘Can COVID-19 vaccines connect me to the internet?’

Re: removal will be quite lucrative in a few years time

You're behind the times (or perhaps above the behind; are you a tramp stamp?). Not sure where "around there" is, but around here, it's been quite lucrative for a good few years already.

A little from column A and a little from column B

People have always been prepared to believe the most far-fetched ideas. What constitutes "far-fetched" just changes over time as the sum of human knowledge expands, but there will always be a frontier. Proper critical thinking skills should be resistant to the idea/conspiracy de jour.

Re: cyborgs always online and able to have information instantly reaching the mind

Sounds like a person glued to their smartphone. Are we there yet?

For blinkenlights sake.... RTFM! Yes. Read The Front of the Machine

Re: I turned to pick up a tea towel and put my back out!

That's what we in the camel game call 'the final straw'. It's not for nothing that cliché relates to the back and not say, the final cup of tea and the side table.

How to ensure your tech predictions catch on in a flash? Do the mash

In a realistic, mashed-up future, they generally do not bother to hollow out volcanos

True; I believe the volcano thing was 75 million years ago with DC 3 and nuclear bombs. Now that's a mash-up.

Mine's the one with the PartyBen box set in the pocket. --->

Apple's pending privacy clampdown drives desperate marketers to overwhelm domain database

Re: internet advertising was rendered ineffective

No thumb as I think this is different issue. Trackingless advertising wouldn't be ineffective, it just wouldn't be personally targetted. Advertisers could still choose sites based on contextual content, e.g. wool vendors could place their ads on sites with knitting patterns. If this didn't work, commercial tv wouldn't exist, either. It still works, just not with a privacy problem.

The benefits of personalised advertising are doubtful, particularly when so many of the anecdotes are along the lines of "I just bought a fridge, why do I keep seeing adverts for fridges?"

Start-ups don't necessarily rely on advertising. Some dominant players with advertising revenues crowd out alternative services, including from start-ups. Who's going to fund a FB or Google killer now?

re: easier for advertisers if everyone just gave up on privacy

You know what would be even easier for everyone? If advertisers just gave up on tracking.

South Africa's state-owned energy firm to appeal after court rules Oracle does not have to support its software

Re: R7.3bn down to R400m

It does rather question the credibility and quality of their software audit software. They must be eating their own dog food.

tubes of KY

They're on the invoice somewhere.

e.g. "Acceptance Facilitation" or "Bulk Load Assistance"

DoorDash delivery drivers try to manipulate the food biz's payment algorithm to earn a living wage in gig economy

Is a tip decided in advance...

.. (e.g. before the quality/speed of the service) really a tip?

I get why tipping incentivises service professionals to give good service, but where's the incentive here, if the tip amount is decided beforehand but hidden from the server?