Posts by parlei

To preserve Earth's treasures, digital silence is golden

Re: a black sand beach

We have them on the local lake. A lot of the local rock i slate, so the sand matches in colour.

Elon Musk claims SpaceX was in talks with Apple on iPhone 14 satellite services

Re: Only marginally useful

It's just that the sensible people going off into the beyond already carry a proper PLB. This is definitely better than nothing, but I would never leave my PLB behind because my cellphone may be able to reach a satellite

Re: Only marginally useful

That is typical for any emergency signal: if you call out SAR because your shoelace is broken they will charge you.

Re: Only marginally useful

Not even a good immersion suit. The proper PLB (personal locator beacons) also transmits radio to passing aircraft, are actually submersible and have a battery that is not subject to your social media habits. Also, not all of them have a subscription plan: the arguably best ones do not (the Copas-Sarsat ones you just need to register with some national agency).

So it will assist the "casual" hikers who get hurt, motorists beyond cell reception (etc), but does nothing for the actual expedition (or expedition light) crowd.

Microsoft plans to dig through your Edge Collections to make suggestions

Isn't that the reason for Firefox Focus? No tracking and a convenient "what, no I was just checking my email" button.

Majority of Axon's AI ethics board resigns over CEO's taser drones

Re: This isn't a solution...

Name one more functioning state where anyone can walk into a store and walk out with a semi-auto gun and a pack of high capacity magazines, with no background checks, waiting times or other reasonable safeguards. .

Thinnet cables are no match for director's morning workout

Re: Full names please.......

I had a math professor who pointed out that since "Quincy Edwards Depew" could be abbreviated to QED, all math proofs obviously was attributed to him...

Re: Full names please.......

The US phone book (back when those existed) was illustrative of Ellis Island racism and bigotry: there was a bunch of family names that was ethic slurs.

Re: Full names please.......

Having a surname that lend itself to humour I find most of it rather juvenile. And yes, kids can most certainly be quite cruel.

Amazon warehouse workers in New York unionize in historic win against web giant

Re: Not an unequivocal union fan - but I applaud this

Because MRI machines are not a consumer product?

UK.gov threatens to make adults give credit card details for access to Facebook or TikTok

Re: Idiocy

I tend to use "9800 Savage Rd., Suite 6272. Fort George G. Meade, MD".

Re: Much cheaper plan:

When I worked as a teacher we had an online system where parents could log in a report their child sick. Is anyone here even the slightest bit surprised that some of the little darlings had the password and could report themselves as sick when it suited their needs? So expect a number of teens being able to log in as their parent and approve Internet usage.

Of course, not all of them were smart enough to do this with sufficient moderation as to not cause concerned communications from the school nurse as to the frequent illnesses of the little darling...

Re: Teenagers

EBG13-rapelcgrq, V cerfhzr.

This is a solved problem! Back in the mists of time, when last of the dinosaurs still roamed the server halls, there was a game called "Leisure Suit Larry" that has a "very effective" age verification system. Why reinvent the wheel?

To err is human. To really tmux things up requires an engineer

Re: A good thing

Once upon a time I wrote a small shell script. It takes a filename and makes a copy of that with todays date as a suffix (date+time if date exists: if I ever run it twice in the same second it will complain), or a given suffix ('cpdate file before_I_messed_with_whatever'). Creates messy directories, but that mess has saved my bacon a few times. Yes, keeping everything in git would be an alternative, but...

No, I've not read the screen. Your software must be rubbish

Re: Simples...

MS-DOS something or other, IIRC.

I may have been the version where the question was translated into the local language, but not the routine that interpreted the entered character. I was lucky that the Swedish word for "Yes" (Ja) did not start with an "N"...

Re: Simples...

Yep. Adding e.g. a text label to an image, wanting to perhaps edit the test later, then save in .xcf and export as whatever_label-1.png fits the bill perfectly

Re: Simples...

I started to write "why not use convert for that job", but then remembered that Gimp runs on more platforms than the *nix and that thumbnail may not just be a mini-version but something more selective.

But I agree with your point, there are times when "just save" is destructive indeed.

Brocade wrongly sacked award-winning salesman who depended on company insurance for cancer treatment

Re: A timely reminder

So, better/quicker medical care for the wealthy?

Re: A timely reminder

Just don't eliminate all the support staff. Which is resources beast spent: having an specialist MD fix his own printer issues or employing an admin assistant or IT tech?

Re: A timely reminder

Also: once the well off and influential rely on their private medical insurance they will gradually see less reason to fully fund the public option. Long waiting times will be seen as acceptable since "everyone" has private medical insurance anyway. And the slippery slope got just a little bit steeper and slippier.

UK Home Secretary Priti Patel green-lights Mike Lynch's extradition to US to face Autonomy fraud charges

Re: It seems simple to me

Re journalists and unreliable sources.

I suspect that all good journalists have encountered more and less reliable sources. Part of the profession is to evaluate the reliability of sources.

US DoD staffer with top-secret clearance stole identities from work systems to apply for loans

I keep being disappointed, but no longer surprised, that people who presumably are fairly intelligent think that a significant chance of ruining your life is an ok risk to take for money that is by no means even near to "spend the rest of your days in the style you want to be accustomed to, with a well built bomb proof new identity".

Court papers indicate text messages from HMRC's 60886 number could snoop on Brit taxpayers' locations

The code was to be send by registered mail, but due to cost savings a postcard was used instead?

Software engineer jailed for 2 years after using RATs and crypters to steal underage victims' intimate pics

Re: That Mugshot

While I agree that there is a risk in taking and sharing such pictures, what is the difference between "having such a fancy phone/watch/car is asking for someone to nick it" and "if you take such a picture you are asking for someone to nick them"?

Better systems to catch the criminals, more education as to how to send material safely, etc is a good thing. Telling females to lock themselves up or it is THEIR fault is annoying to say the least.

Ransomware puts New Mexico prison in lockdown: Cameras, doors go offline

Re: Wait, what?!

Isn't this the nation where their naval ships talk to the Internet? Hopefully not all the way into weapons and command, but one can only hope.

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/to-nobodys-surprise-ships-are-just-as-easy-to-hack-as-anything-else/

AI surveillance software increasingly used to make sure contract lawyers are doing their jobs at home

Re: People

At least the ones without mercury amalgam fillings. Those has to be sorted as hazardous waste.

Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes found guilty of fraud: Blood-testing machines were vapourware after all

Re: Sentencing will be interesting

She defrauded rich people! Totally unacceptable and Must Be Punished Severely.

Tesla disables in-car gaming feature that allowed play while MuskMobiles were in motion

Re: Removing distraction = good

That -- 100 km/h traffic circles -- sounds like someone asked "how can we make it worse?". IIRC from Sweden roundabout sometimes *increase* traffic accidents, but almost all of them are minor, which is the idea: a bunch of slightly broken cars are better than some seriously harmed people.

Re: Back to horse-drawn buggies please!

IIRC the haze of finely powdered horse manure in e.g. summertime New York was a real problem.

Re: Back to horse-drawn buggies please!

Is that an pro or a con?

UK National Crime Agency finds 225 million previously unexposed passwords

Re: Sadly, HIBP is only a partial resource

Quick math

95 possible characters in a "line-noise" password of say 10 characters: 95^10 = 6E19 possible passwords

171476 words in English, say five words: 171476^5 = 1.5E26

Assuming a more limited vocabulary: 20000^5 = 3E21

So even assuming that all the word salad passwords are based on English we have quite a bit more of them. Now when I use "Korrekt hevonen akkumulator staple" it becomes a rather large pool of possible passwords.

But yes, 95^15 = 5E29, but then we are in password manager+copy pasta territory and can go wild with 10 words in <mumble> languages.

James Webb Telescope launch delayed again, this time by weather

https://www.windy.com/5.216/-52.774?4.592,-52.774,8 indicates less gusty wind, which to me sounds like an advantage

US nuclear submarine bumps into unidentified underwater object in South China Sea

Re: Other scenarios

Someone described the concept of "political tourette". You know, when superlatives and catchphrases gets added to otherwise perfectly normal sentences. The perfectly reasonable sentence "we want to improve the school system" get the words "greatest", "for the children", "world-leading", etc (and in certain cases "immigrants") added to it and turns into something meaningless destined for sound-bites.

Ransomware-hit law firm secures High Court judgment against unknown criminals

Re: Sigh...

Propagander: propane fueled gander

If it were possible to evade facial-recognition systems using just subtle makeup, it might look something like this

Re: Makeup detection

And even if the face is covered (full face mask with suitable holographic image?) there is walking pattern, physical stats (length, wide/narrow shoulders, etc) that can be used.

Arms race. All the way

Technology has the potential to close the education divide. Key word: Potential

I have seen data (from Sweden) that supports your first *and* second contention. The strongest predictor for success in school/academia is parents education (IIRC more the mother than father: probably reflecting unequal time spent with the children). But well trained teachers (from day-care/kindergarten and onwards) is just about the only thing that can even begin compensating for that. Reflecting this latter insight Sweden has implemented a school system where for-profit school corporations can hire teachers with no or little training, "select" the easiest students[1] and then give them artificially high grades to ensure university entry. No, of course I'm not bitter, what on earth gave you that idea?

The Internet has the potential to deliver well written and researched texts and videos on a variety of subjects and to point the reader to be most high quality ones. Instead we mostly got FB and YT.

[1] The messaging says that here we are able to do the work with no assistance, and wording that codes away the poor. Also waiting lists, since mainly certain groups of parents will put their child on such lists early.

The unit of measure for fatbergs is not hippopotami, even if the operator of an Australian sewer says so

Re: Am I the only one

The unit of mass must be a "pope".

I'm feeling lucky: Google, Facebook say workers must be vaccinated before they return to offices

Re: Acid test

We are already seeing that in parts of the world that never really shut down, in industries that could not do WFH. A small number of break-through infections (expected), and a much milder disease (likely, and hoped for)

Re: Knowingly

Just so I understand you, AC: you equate requiring vaccination with killing?

Despite there being a ton of data saying that the vaccines are reasonably safe[1]? And as the number of vaccinated increases fatalities and ICU admission drop, giving evidence to the advantages of vaccination?

I'm impressed, but not in a good way.

[1] Nothing is 100% safe, including taking a shower or having sex with the only person that loves you. Even the AstraZeneca vaccine is safer than riding a bicycle to work...

Scam-baiting YouTube channel Tech Support Scams taken offline by tech support scam

Re: My first thought was “Google actually provide support?”

You misspelled "product".

BOFH: You say goodbye and I say halon

Re: Royal Institution lecture

IIRC they sometimes use a lower O2 concentration on submaries, for that reason. And if http://bowlofstew.com/everest-oxygen-concentration and my memory is correct halving the O2 content would "just" but you a bit over the Mt Everst Base camp (around 6000 m). Perfectly survivable for most people, at least short term.

Re: missed a trick

My first thought was "CO2, that would be exiting with certain kinds of fires". Classic chemistry teacher demo: show that a match is extinguished in a flask filled with CO2, then insert a piece of burning magnesium. There is more oxygen in CO2 than in the paltry 20-ish% atmosphere.

Science bonus is then showing the black spots on the inside of the flask, and asking (a) what are they, and (b) where did it come from.

Jackie 'You have no authority here' Weaver: We need more 50-somethings in UK tech

Re: It is not skills..

It would be trivial(ish) to determine the normal distribution of such subpopulations in employee pools larger than n, and then write the specs to match (e.g. within 95% interval, perhaps a sliding scale of tax bonus/malus). Update every <mumble> year.

Problem is that you would then make it mandatory for employers to track their staffs sexual preferences[1] (if that was included). Age and ethnicity sounds more reasonable.

[1] Imagine seeing the job ad: "we are looking for a female LGBT+ in the age-bracket 45-60...". And some tax inspector asking for proof of sexual preferences.

Funny how Sir Tim Berners-Lee, famous for hyperlinks, is into NFTs, glorified hyperlinks

Re: Nothing Fecking There

But giving someone a small piece of the moon *can* be used as a romantic-funny gift if presented in the proper way. At most worth the paper it is printed on, sure, but still.

Then, if someone in the future builds a gigant shopping mall just on *my* acre of the moon my decendants will have it made.

Deluded medics fail to show Ohio lawmakers that COVID vaccines magnetise patients

Re: Struck off?

"Doctor" is problematic as a title/honorific.

Is someone with a Ph.D. in quantum physics or English literature a doctor? Is someone who has finished medical school and obtained the required license (but done no independent research on par with that of the Ph.D.) a doctor in that sense, even if the official title is "Medical Doctor"? And then there is the subpopulation of M.D.s that has obtained a Ph.D. in medicine as well...

Some jurisdictions does not officially use the title "doctor" for all physicians, reserving it for the scientific research degree. Personally I think this is sound, and allows for stringent rules on who can claim to be a physician (or whatever equivalent term is used). Judging the relative merits of a Ph.D. from Oxford, MIT or Shithole University of Outer Bumfuck is then a separate task, one which the relevant employers are fairly well versed in.

There was a crooked man who bought a crooked M1 iMac, and we presume they lived together in a little crooked house

Re: Units error

I propose Indiana radians: 2*3 Indiana radians makes a circle.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiana_Pi_Bill

There are a lot of people out there who'd like to fire Jeff Bezos into space – but he's doing the honours himself

Re: Over to you, Jeff

Two reasons why not

1. That would require that that he saw other people as both important and real.

2. How would he personally and directly benefit from others having a better life?

And don't come with silly things like everyone benefits from a better world: he can afford to make his litlte bubble better for *him*, for his lifetime. I strongly suspect that nothing else matters to him.

The policy of truth: As ransomware claims rise, what's a cyber insurer to do?

Re: What about theft?

Actually I think that happens. For things like unique and precious works of art.

Man found dead inside model dinosaur after climbing in to retrieve phone

Re: First kill

Not even close to first, since birds are dinosaurs.