Posts by IceC0ld

Trump wants to fire quarter of NASA budget into black hole – and not in a good way

One thing sticks out :o)

[quote] In their place, the space agency is expected to lean on commercial alternatives for future lunar ambitions. [/quote]

and by 'commercial' interests, they mean Phoney Stark ?

or others, ARE there others ?

IF it got built by private funds, they will want to get their money back

and more

so if private is the way forward, make it so that the investment is seen as just that, they put money in, nothing else happens, they get no preferential treatment, and zero returns on their costs

this way it would only be the truly magnanimous amongst them who will come forward, and IMHO the option to build privately will be dead in the water :o)

BOFH: The Prints of Darkness pays a visit

LOVE the BofH as always, and trying to get over the coughing that followed the howling with laughter

but for me, the bit that always gets to me is the title - The PRINTS of Darkness LOL

the sheer number of 'accidental' accidents that occur there, you would think that the suppliers, or, at the very least, the bean counters, would have twigged, and avoided annoying the IT Dept. not even talking about them, but that may be how he has managed to work his way through a goodly portion of, whatever city they reside in, that population LOL

DOGE helps Veterans Affairs end IT contract run by service-disabled entrepreneurs

Re: This just keeps getting worse

deride and mock

to remember that he is to be known as Muskolini or Phoney Stark

never forget just how much of a twat he is and keep on pushing him over the edge

Google begs owners of crippled Chromecasts not to hit factory reset

SO, Google :o)

[quote] deliberate attempts by Google to encourage upgrades, there is no evidence to support such claims [/quote]

not really sure how to continue, then re read the above, and realise it doesn't need anything :o)

Microsoft tells abandoned Publisher fans to just use Word and hope for the best

[quote] Anyone who has tried to position items in Word [\quote]

SO, by ANYONE, you mean EVERYONE :o)

Troubled French outsourcer Atos finds pot of gold at the end of UK state bank Rainbow

Re: Rainbow

ooh dear Zip it Zippy :o)

Windows 7 lives! How to keep your favorite fossil running

work is 'forcing' us over to W11

so it will happen, but I am not a fan, the intrusiveness just got worse as the numbers climbed :o(

so for ME, I CAN see Linux Mint being the way to go sooner rather than later

will still use Windows for work

may need to keep a W11 PC on a leash so I can still play the games I like, the way I like

I DO have a dual boot laptop - Mint with Cinnamon desktop / Kali, set up with auto updater to keep it easier for me :o)

I USED to play around with both, but not for a while, so it may be time for a refresher

I DO still yearn for / hanker for the earlier days, when things were simpler

but that is not the way of the world we live in now

for better or worse, we live in the times of changing for changes sake, and WAY more intrusive apps doing anything they want, whether we ask it to or not

as has been noted, here at El Reg, we do have one advantage, basic knowledge, and an apparent surplus of common sense too :o)

but yea, I can see my days as a MS Windows guy grinding to a close, and I should have retired last year, that's the only thing keeping me on MS kit TBH

still could be worse .............

BOFH: Engage Hollywood Protocol – because nonsense always looks legit

OH FFS, right till the very end, and even then it took a minute

absolutely brilliant

Microsoft vet laments a world where even toothbrushes need reboots

yes, the future may be here, but is is certainly an odd one :o)

example, before I take my motorbike out for a run, I have to ensure the HELMET is charged up ...........

so that the link to the phone [ NEVER used whilst riding]

link to the GPS

and the cameras are all up and running

gone are the days of just leaping aboard and feckin off LOL

is it a good thing ?

IMHO it has ups and downs associated to it

in the main it is better, there are the odd outliers that just look, sound, FEEL weird

but we can't push the genie back in the bottle - so best to just get on with it, enjoy the bits you Do like, and try to ignore the mess of stuff not needed, being used

Baguette bandits strike again with ransomware and a side of mockery

just enquiring as to what are the legal ramifications of them attacking a Govt account, and then, said Govt goes looking for, finds, and executes them ?

all under the "clear and present danger " use

and IF this would pass muster in legal terms, why haven't they bothered to do so ?

and yes, I am aware that 'OUR' govt 'probably' wouldn't, or at least wouldn't admit to it anyway

still, makes for pleasant thinking :o)

App stores unconvinced by Trump's TikTok ban pause, which may itself be on shaky legal ground

so they are looking for someone America can trust ? to run Tik Tok for them

paging Muskolini, attention please would Muskolini bring his Swasticar to the front desk please

Trump eyes up to 100% tariffs on foreign semiconductors, TSMC in crosshairs

[quote] The incentive is going to be they're not going to want to pay [/quote]

err, I thought that 'THEY' don't pay the tariffs, the US customer, in this instance, would

UK council selling the farm (and the fire station) to fund ballooning Oracle project

SAGE words indeed

but sadly, the council are SAP's

sorry, not sorry

bit of a dichotomy here - only just :o)

costs mushroom from £2.6 million to around £40 million ($50 million) / so we start HERE

to fund projects that result in ongoing revenue savings / and SOMEHOW they are still saying revenue reduction ........

China's DeepSeek just emitted a free challenger to OpenAI's o1 – here's how to use it on your PC

Re: I considered downloading. . .

well they DO say beware of GEEKS bearing GIF's :o)

Brits must prove their age on adult sites by July, says watchdog

nice try, but they won't be able to keep it up :o)

Amazon worker – struck and shot in New Orleans terror attack – initially denied time off

just heard from my mate Luigi, asking for the location of the CEO ........................

but seriously, this should NEVER happen, worker gets injured, worker get full PTO to recover, you do not need the aggravation of thinking your job is on the line when you are unable to do anything

personal to me, lost a leg in a crash, took govt benefits 6 months to figure out payments, got £400 a month, when mortgage was £1000

l spent a YEAR bedbound, contractor, so no work help, but yea, lost house, marriage, the works

benefits should cover your outgoings, to allow you to get better, take strain away from you, and help get you back into work ASAP

and other fairy tales ffs

How datacenters use water – and why kicking the habit is nearly impossible

just a thought

looks out of window

what do I see

I see the SEA :o)

and I know MS were trialling putting small scale servers into an underwater containment system

just wondering if there will come a time, as in NOW, when they seriously need to consider putting the next gen data barns, if not UNDER water, at the very least right next door

we had Trawsfynydd nuclear power, sat on a lake, it got the water warm enough that the 'local' population of goldfish was the thing on myth and legend :o)

but it was a self contained coolant system, surely there has to be a way to utilise the biggest heat sink on the planet ?

BOFH: Printer's festive bips herald a merry mystery for the Boss's budget

who says they haven't >bip<

I, for one, have been using the screened paper cases for my CC's for a few years now

and I test them regular, by trying to swipe the contactless whilst they are in the case

so far, so good

well, at least I haven't paid for the xmas party yet LOL

BOFH: Don't sell The Boss a firewall. Sell him The Dream

DAMN - right till the last line LOL

classic BofH

still the best <3

Epic coughs up the dirty V-Bucks: Fortnite's 'dark pattern' refunds hit accounts

so, the gaming Co is gaming the gamers playing the game .......................

Open source maintainers are drowning in junk bug reports written by AI

I read about the strain put upon people who ARE volunteers, who are over run, and in dire need of something to help, but I fell back to XKCD instead

https://xkcd.com/2347/

it sort of says it all without words, we WILL have an instance of one crappy AI infused bug report that will keep people away from finding the real issues, and I would take a bet that the real bad guys will already be planning this as a two prong attack, to start utilising the vuln they have figured out, whilst also putting out the bug report to push those that can, away, so that they can 'enjoy' a little space to run their scheme :o(

Boeing busted by employee over plans to surveil workers, quickly reverses course

Not all heroes wear capes :o)

so here at ElReg, we have regomized hm as DaMan :o)

Another 'major cyber incident' at a UK hospital, outpatients asked to stay away

I've worked for several years at most of the major hospitals in my region, inc the two mentioned here :o(

and the teams there work wonders keeping it all up in the air

the main problems are as stated elsewhere in the thread that no one has a handle on both the set up AND the budget

so the CIO / CTO hear about issues that could arise, and the guys that are actually at the rock face, the IT boss, director is too grand a term, and manager doesn't cut it either

so said issues COULD be an issue, but I never seen any instance of where it would filter down, so the team could be made aware, and said team could possibly have had input, I mean, god forbid the peons get involved in anything to esoteric as decisions ffs :o)

not saying that streamlining and removing said CIO / CTO's would help / work, but wouldn't hurt :oP

did work one, smaller hospital, world renowned brain surgeons etc, the IT team there WERE controlled by the one guy, who DID have his hand on the pulse, if not the budget, at least he was privy to what we had left :o)

and he managed to ensure the perm guys were all fully aware, and cyber sec clued up

we still had issues, but nothing as major as this

also, I 'thought' there was a moratorium on attacking health infrastructures ?

but has that all gone now ?

FWIW, IMHO NHS attacks are not just about fiscal rewards, I believe they are being used to test out attacks, so the lower ranks, as it were, can have a go, and be watched to see how they progress, the bite back from a trust is comparatively toothless compared to say, going after anything financial / military ?

hoping the guys get the wheels back on their truck quickly though, as the next round is surely coming :o(

Public developer spats put bcachefs at risk in Linux

Re: Are we reaching a monolithic limit?

[quote]but that's largely down to there being one man at the centre who understands how pretty much all of it works[/quote]

which leads us to THE question ?

how much longer can he go on, we are but mortal, and he may well feel he deserves a retirement

rather than the infinitely sadder work till you drop option

so who IS there out there that could actually come close to filling a pair of rather generously over sized boots ?

I will assume there are already plans in place, and moves afoot to allow for a seamless transition

BUT, maybe when 'HE' is no longer available, maybe the entire ethos of the Linux setup will be shook up and dropped to see where it lands ?

as posited, it is already only maintaining because one man understands where it all needs to be, and what it needs to do

Datacenters could blow up your electric bill thanks to AI

Re: So send the bill to the datacenters

I can see the dichotomy here

energy prices go UP because of AI

make the Data Centres pay more as they are the cause of the rise in energy usage

BUT

it is US using more data, using PC's more that is using more energy ..............

no easy solution, but MAYBE, have it built into the construction contract, that this project is SELF SUFFICIENT in energy needs

and come the day when it is no longer true / viable

either increase power supply / lower power demand

CLOSE said DC build new one that DOES meet that standard

Volunteer DEF CON hackers dive into America's leaky water infrastructure

always thought this was the way to go TBH

even if there is no fiscal reward, sometimes, just being allowed to get inside infrastructure WITH BLESSINGS is reward enough

stop sniggering at the back ffs, serious talk going on here :o)

but anyway, I also couldn't imagine this a few short years back, when EVERYONE with any interest in Cyber Sec was considered a threat

but also, again, I know, so much vacillation going on :o)

my mind going over the obvious issues this could give rise to, what if they find a multitude of issues, and give out the fix to MOST, but the ones that look to be 'interesting' are not notified, nor fixed.

OR

finds a vuln that isn't on the list, makes a note for future reference, as maybe not all who offer assistance should be trusted

TL/DR

whatever the out come, it HAS to be tried, but it also opens up a box that even Pandora would be jealous of :o)

AI Jesus is ready to dispense advice from a booth in historic Swiss church

Re: Ascended already?

[quote]The Mephistophelean transaction offering the temptation of an eternal "existence" in a silicon heaven would likely seduce most of the population.[/quote]

pops on his best Sheldon voice :o)

no need to sell me on this, I'm already a fan.

Billionaire food app CEO wants you to pay for the privilege of working with him

Re: Wow! Just, Wow!

well, it IS proven that shit floats :o)

AI hiring bias? Men with Anglo-Saxon names score lower in tech interviews

[quote]rated men less favorably – particularly those with Anglo-Saxon names, according to recent research. The goal of the study, conducted by [U]Celeste De Nadai[/U] [/quote]

can't just be me seeing this :o)

and I tend to agree, there does appear to be some form of over compensation going on

maybe, just maybe, let the beast out the bag in it's ORIGINAL form, see how it stacks up against todays lardy beast with the same queries ?

T - oday

I - m

T - hinking

S - omething

U - tterly

P - rescient

DoJ wants Google to sell off Chrome and ban it from paying to be search default

Re: My choice

your 'data' is not that which you believe it to be, Google take EVERYTHING they can, and use the computer to do what computers do best, they crunch the numbers to find connections, and THIS is what they use to make their money :o(

so, in short, but not exhaustive, they will have your IP, times you were active, duration of times you were active, IP's of sites you visited / passed through, details of any interaction on any of these sites, again, duration and times of said interactions, they do not need any actual details of where / when / what you were doing, they will be able to build a map of your actions that is just as useful to them and way more insightful than anything you may have thought of

remember, the first wave of PC's were used to create better PC's :o(

and 'they' have gotten pretty good at it by now

Arecibo telescope might have failed because of weak sockets

Re: Failure in 3,2,1...

I was reading that trying to spot the acronym :o)

then, upon discovering no such thing, MY mind went instantly to the ElReg acronym of choice - T.I.T.S.U.P.

T - elescope

I - n

T - he

S - and

U - nusual

P - ractice

=====

T - he

I - nternational

T - elescope

S - topped

U - ploading

P - ictures

Ransomware forces hospital to turn away ambulances

sadly, it isn't just the intake of the patient that is impacted, the patient requires a bed, meds, treatment, from staff, all of whom have to be 'nominated' and assigned to that task, to the outside eyes, it is 'just' accepting the patient, and I would hope in extremis, the hospital would revert to pen and paper, but for the day to day stuff, EVERYTHING goes into the system, and in US there are costs to be kept up with too :o(

in UK, although free at point of contact with patient, we still need to account for everything associated to the patients needs

did around 7 years support to the major hospitals in my region, we never had to go through this, but the D/B was a beast, glad to say not my responsibility, but the DB Admins earned their pay :o)

Public Wi-Fi operator investigating cyberattack at UK's busiest train stations

Re: Still offline?

read this once, it clicked, now howling with laughter LOL well played Sir <3

rarely disappointed with the comments here TBH, but that one was golden :o)

Elon Musk’s Starlink won't block Elon Musk’s X in Brazil, as required by court order

Re: Tantrum boy

since posting the Ugly Truckling comment

I have now come across the Deplorean LOL :o)

anyone else have any other options for this awful machine

and, as of the end of September 2024, still not seen a single one in UK, we Do see the odd Tesla though, not for me either, apart from high cost to purchase, the fire catching ability, the inability to sell as second hand if mileage is anywhere near average, due to the prohibitive cost of replacing the battery pack, recharging taking ages, when fuel is pumped in and you have moved on within 10 minutes of arriving at the station, and the fact that the battery life is NOWHERE near the basic standard for the ICE, my old Volvo V40, over 150 000 miles, still going strong, when I had to sell due to illness :o( was snapped up

have had bikes with excess of 100 000 miles and still running sweet, the ethos of the EV is not lost on me, just the ability it has to be able to actually do it

Re: Tantrum boy

ah yes, the new cyber truck, henceforth to be called the UGLY TRUCKLING

XEETING :o)

how TF do you pronounce THAT

May I suggest we try to keep his preferred X in there, and call it X-Creeting

seems appropriate

Chinese boffins advocate nuking nearby asteroids – it’s the only way to be sure

[quote]what about a body that doesn't cause extinction, but is just really bad? [/quote]

and what if this non totally lethal object was going to impact, say, China, would the West still push the launch button to save them ?

what if the impact zone was North America / Canada, and the optimum launch date would be for Russia / China to do the good deed, can we trust them to do so ?

would anyone actually care if the target was South Africa ........................

I truly believe that even in our darkest moments, humanity WOULD work to solve the crisis, but am also afraid that HUMANS would still put their personal beliefs in front of the consequences :o(

maybe we would need an international overseer, a body that controls ALL space launched missiles, and I can also see that NOT getting off the launch pad as it were :o(

as a last thought, maybe we need to REMOVE this from the control of people with MONEY, as they NEVER have the best interests of all at heart

Video game actors strike because they fear an attack of the AI clones

Re: Do the work, get paid, move on

[quote]What if the performance advocates for something that the real actor strongly disagrees with?[/quote]

methinks that the likes of a certain Ms Swift v Trump comes to mind, she is a known supporter of Democrats, yet Trump running AI to show Swifties for Trump at his rallies

she has the funds to take him to the cleaners, and I would imagine her legal advice team are looking into this right now

Re: Do the work, get paid, move on

[QUOTE]I strongly advised my son not to make a career in software for this reason[/QUOE]

Daughter graduated last year - 23 - in Video and Gaming Animation, and has already seen the advance of AI into this :o(

and her amigos in the same class, all have found getting work in their preferred field to be next to impossible now

no surprise really, when a Co can get the same work done faster and in some cases, better, why carry a meatsack on the payroll :o(

BOFH: The true gravity of the Boss and the 3-coffee problem

Re: Coffee? Kindergarten?

err, I did NOT know this, just assumed I was 'different' as I too, like a strong cup of Joe before bed, it helps me relax

just the one though, deffo not three, and eight, never going to happen, or if it did, I would assume sleep would be come history :o)

BOFH: Well, we did tell you to keep the BitLocker keys safe

do not read BofH when eating ffs :o)

[quote]but stealing them off his desk later that evening was just the belts and braces approach of a true professional...[/quote]

that one little sentence, out of SO many that made me LOL until it hurt, true class :o)

also +1 for Belgium, country about the size of Wales, has around 400 breweries, and makes beer out of anything LOL

was there on a bike rally, a mate got slightly tipsy on what was euphemistically call fruit salad ...........

Strawberry beer

raspberry beer

gooseberry beer

blackberry beer

the list went on, as did his head ache LOL

Sam Altman sues builder over $27M flooded, sewage-hit 'lemon' of a mega-mansion

I'm sort of hoping the OP was intending to say that he doesn't want gypsum walls / ceilings in a $27 MILLION house - because for that amount of wonga, I, personally would want solid marble at least :o) some fancy opals, maybe even my own personal gold bearing rock strata, but definitely not gypsum

Avast secretly gave DoNex ransomware decryptors to victims before crims vanished

err Russia's economy is less than that of Texas, which in turn is less than that of California

As of 2024, the top ten largest economies in the world are:

United States

China

Germany

Japan

India

United Kingdom

France

Brazil

Italy

Canada

Devs claim Apple is banning VPNs in Russia 'more effectively' than Putin

nothing to add :o)

Just here to say, your Copy Write REALLY deserves a raise

but that's the way the Cook, he crumbles

I mean, just read that again, slowly LOL an absolute gem

AI Octopus predicts results of Euro 2024: It isn't looking good for England

Re: Of course we're going to lose against Germany..

err, mate of mine, working hospitality many DECADES past, was invited to a room to watch THE game of the year, Scotland v England, he's English, they were Scots, England stuffed Scotland, they stuffed him :o)

BOFH: An 'AI PC' for an Acutely Ignorant user

Newest best line from BofH EVER :o)

[quote] "So what's the point of Recall?"

"Realistically? About the same as an ejector seat for a helicopter" [/quote]

OMG, that got me right in the feels :o)

I'd LIKE to ask HOW Simon gets all the ideas, but, being honest, I'm scared he might actually tell me, and then I've got to carry that burden until I get to a sufficient height, and close enough to a decent sized window :o)

AI smartphones must balance promise against hype and privacy concerns

having read the article - color me surprised :o) - Sorry Alien - but I still can't see why they would even bother ? maybe it's just me, but all I require a phone to do is, well make and receive calls, the addition of text was useful, and I even admit to watching videos on that there TikTok thingy, my phone is an old Google Pixel 3, several years held now, still works, won't replace until it fails, and even then, will not go to the all singing, all dancing top of the range Super Max variants :o)

I fear that nowadays the race to have the latest and greatest may be over, and model update fatigue has set in, as people realised that the new phone was literally the same item, new name, maybe a smidge more ability in various things, but it also had a thinner profile, so a smaller capacity battery, I DO like the later screens, fill the top up, the quality cameras, and the reliability of said devices too, but that's it, there is no more next new thing coming, unless they are to implant the damn things INTO us.

SO, in reflection, phones are here to stay, they will get more expensive, and do not much more than the model before, and we will always bitch over them as well

the fan bois will still claim theirs is SO much better, Android fanz will say they had THAT feature years back, and so it will roll on :o)

How Apple Wi-Fi Positioning System can be abused to track people around the globe

Re: Please, harvest some more from me......

the more I think about it, the more it annoys me now

someone HAD to have had input when they were designing the beast, to add it in to do what it does, it cannot just happen, the real question, therefore, is why ? and as a quick stab at that answer, I will suppose MONEY to be in there, quite high in the tree, if not actually the main reason :o(

Re: Please, harvest some more from me......

[quote]Why do the various manufacturers require all this geo location information? (Rhetorical question!)[/quote]

I am more concerned to think that they have deliberately built this ability into the device, it COULD be 'ghosts in the machine' but I seriously think they are just out to see just how far they can push boundary's before they get pulled back, although, from previous experiences, even when they ARE caught, and 'forced' to rein it in, the fines slapped on them are pitiful, massive to the man in the street, a few minutes of profit to these grubby types :o(