Posts by EricB123

Be a hater all you want, AI's here to stay

I live in "that part of the world", where people work 6 days a week to earn $300 a month. I'm retired, and even my small pension is larger than that. Quite the learning experience.

$1K laser mosquito zapper promises precision strikes as backers itch for answers

Re: Do not look into LASER with remaining eye.

I like my stereo vision!

Re: Do not look into LASER with remaining eye.

Wow! Not a single downvote (yet).

Part didn't fit so techie got out his screwdriver. Then something flew off the motherboard

My last desktop had a Model T sized radiator on top of the cpu, with a giant fan blowing into it just to be sure. Had to be murder on the motherboard.

Passwords stored in public Google Doc then showed up in search results

It's Lines of Code, Stupid!

When some of the IT dept.got let go, I was fired over the other peogrammer. When I asked the manager why I was fired over the other programmer, he said the other guy wrote 3x the lines of code I wrote in the same amount of time.

"But that is because I thoroughly test my code before releasing it for basic security ".

"But the other guy writes 3x more code" was the manager's reply.

"I need some coffee" I said and walked out.

So glad I'm retired from this corporate bullshit.

NASA puts astronauts’ lives in the hands of Tesla’s flaky Cybertruck

Really?

I prefer rivets and welds over glue.

SpaceX to try its luck again with Starship Flight 13 after engines and weather say no

"You said how many data centers in space?"

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought I heard a million space based data centers were in the (moonshot) plans?

Good news. We all live in the shade, and the Earth cools.

Bad news. Crops can't grow, and we all starve.About those solar panels you put on your roof...

LG kills McAfee pop-up after Windows boss steps in

Re: Good grief

Đang, I'm old enough to have experienced the first virus at my company at the time. A coworker gave me the phone number of a guy named Mr McAfee. I called Mr McAfee, and he asked me the nature of my problem. He said he has a cure on a PC running in his basement, and hold the line.

The next morning I was handed a FedEx package with a floppy in it. Inserted the floppy, followed the hand written instructions and minutes later my problem was gone. No charge from Mr McAfee.

I really miss those days... tech was fun back then.

Flock cameras go up in flames as cops hunt suspected firebugs

Re: To quote the famouns line in Porky's II

Always amazed at how easily money flows to this tech crap , while chunks of concrete fall off bridges with rusty rebar in full view.

Veterans Affairs signs $1.6B deal for an army of Salesforce AI agents

Is Brooker planning any new episodes? Tired of rewatching the rude solar dog.

Latest Musk merch drop runs entirely on child labor

Re: Not what I expect

Me too!

Researcher poisons open-weight AI model for under $100

Re: Provide a malicious copy

I think a kid on a Reddit comment was responsible for the putting glue on pizza factoid.

EU forces Google to share its toys with the other AI and search kids

How useless

"The Chamber of Progress, which speaks as a voice for the tech industry and is funded in part by Google"

Sounds about as useful as a hemmorid

Photovoltaics are still running after a year under Swiss trains

A Rediculous Comment Follows

Amtrak?

You were forewarned.

California passes bill declaring death-by-algorithm to 3D-printed ghost guns

Re: ridiculous

"It is trivial to cast bullets - it's easier than 3D printing, a computer isn't even needed - lead is melted and poured into a cast - or ball bearings, or even scrap metal can be used."

Cool, can I have your email address please :}

LLMs are closer to religion than they appear. Watch out for those who like it that way

Re: Fostering friendship

Wow, came here to keep up to date with I.T., and instead advance my carnal knowledge. That's what's great with British rags, you never know exactly what you're about to read.

I'll go watch a Monty Python episode, then resume reading my email suggested El Reg articles.

Blue Origin's New Glenn makes a crater-sized dent in Artemis plans

Re: Minor Misstep

Oh no, are you one of those old fashioned business people who want ROI to be expressed as an actual number?

Russian oligarch's financial network crashed thanks to a crank and a cleaner

Or just follow the rule that if you speak loudly enough, they'll understand any language.

US Army goes green-ish, wants soldiers munching on plant proteins

Re: Real men need sauce

I was hoping for Gordon Ramsey myself.

Re: Semi-camouflaged food

Someone suddenly started knocking at my door...

Brit mathematician lets AI agent loose with credit card – cue password leaks, CAPTCHA chaos and more

Let me guess... you are British.

Manuel?

Microsoft ships VS Code weekly, adds Autopilot mode so AI can wreak havoc without bothering you

uh oh

"We added a one-click experience for creating test plans from feature request issues,"

Many years ago, I made a minor change (Visual Basic) to the production software in my cubicle. Within seconds all my phones were ringing, angry managers came running into my cubicle. The "one click" feature apparently meant every factory in the world got instantly updated without a second thought.

Would obe additional mouse click before that happened be so terribly inconvenient?

Your datacenter's power architecture called. It's not happy

Re: Toasty

No worries, mate! This will happen in space, where everything is infinite.

Waymo launching China-made van that won't fail in rain, snow, or gloom of night

Re: A Guy Instead

Having lived in Manila, and having driven a motorcycle there, I can attest that it is only 1 step from suicide.

Some widened roads still have utility poles and trees in the outer lanes. Cheaper than moving them I guess.

NASA taps Claude to conjure Mars rover's travel plan

It's nice to hear a good use for machine learning for a change. It certainly has some uses, just not the kind Mr Altman spews out daily

US regulator tells GM to hit the brakes on customer tracking

Re: Privacy respecting safe driving or economical driving app?

"Please use impulse power, Scotty".

ATM takes a kicking yet keeps on ticking

Re: It's my age

I'm thinking 20mA current loop myself.

Dead batteries cough up lithium after a bath in CO₂ and water, boffins say

Re: lithium metal

I used to love to file down old magnesium lawnmower bodies and light the flashpowder. Broke the ice at parties.

But then, at 12 in my jr mad scientist phase I also made dynamite and nitro glycerin, the latter of which blew up in my "lab".

CES 2026 worst in show: AI girlfriends, a fridge that won't open unless you talk to it, and more

Re: 1978!!

My first experience was with an empty light bulb socket.

Welcome to Wendy's! Before your order can be taken, you must first reset this kiosk

Re: "they've decided now is the time to expand"

"their home planet is imploding ?"

More like imploded!

Imagine there's no AI. It's easy if you try

Re: Structural Batteries

Not to mention road salt in colder climates.

Sam Altman is willing to pay somebody $555,000 a year to keep ChatGPT in line

Re: 555

Rather ironic that in Thailand, "555" stands for "ha, ha, ha".

Micron says memory shortages are here for the foreseeable future

Re: Me

Ah,so you're the one to blame!

US freezes $42B trade pact with UK over digital tax row

This American agrees with you.

US Navy pledges $448 million to test if Palantir is seaworthy

I thought "definition of the requirements " was the very last step

Welcome to America - now show us your last five years of social media posts

Maybe It's the Water?

I'm an American expat living in SE Asia. The last time I was there was 8 years ago.

I wanted to re-open my Uber account at that time, and "all that was required to reopen my account" was a description of my last 10 rides in descending order.

Let's see, several different countries, some were motorbike taxis in Asia and some were car taxis..

Lyft simply said "welcome". Guess which company I choose?

Vibe coding will deliver a wonderful proliferation of personalized software

Re: Job losses

Well, you start by taking out an enormous student loan, and then hope you beat the enormous odds of finding a junior level position.

French and vibe coding

I got down voted for using the French expression "C'est la vie". Oh wait. I wasn't replying to a vibe coding article.

Datacenters are hoarding grid power just in case, says Uptime Institute

Bozo filter time?

As a longtime El Reg reader, I think it's time to increase moderation of posts. I don't mind some political posts, heck, I I've submitted a few myself.

But I'm beginning to see nasty posts, apparently intended to insult another reader's intelligence. Some posts apparently are being generated by bots.

Someone, please make it stop. I don't want to see a techie version of Facebook.

Cloudflare suffers second outage in as many months during routine maintenance

Time machine time

Carrier pigeons - full stop.

Anthropic's Claude is learning Excel so you don't have to

Re: Scale? More like Hide...

C'est la vie?

Google says reports of a Gmail breach have been greatly exaggerated

Re: Mild

Or Tylenol, as we call it in the states.

Oh,wait, I heard that causes autism! Maybe I should just tolerate the headache then.

Blockchain just became an utterly mainstream part of the global financial system

Re: "promise to bake it into international payment infrastructure"

"Some of them don't even have a mathematic at all."

Hey, I heard that!

Terminators: AI-driven robot war machines on the march

Re: Maverick won't be able to beat VENOM AI-equipped F16s fighter planes

What would Mr. Greenjeans have done?

McDonald's not lovin' it when hacker exposes nuggets of rotten security

What airports do you frequent?

Lyft and Baidu plan Eurobocab launch, starting in UK and Germany next year

Re: Good luck

You guys drive on the left, correct?

$10 billion, 10 year US Army contract elevates Palantir to defense contracting royalty

Re: This EA ($10MM) is just a stepping stone to much more

You mean that's not already the way it's being done?

Long live the nub: ThinkPad designer David Hill spills secrets, designs that never made it

Re: While I love my thinkpad, I really can't use the nub

Thanks for posting that. I have the same problem, my palms activate the trackpad when I use my mouse. Fortunately, my laptop BIOS ( UEFI?) allows switching to either or both.

Lethal Cambodia-Thailand border clash linked to cyber-scam slave camps

Re: SouthEast Asia

Thanks. I liked the song but couldn't make out the lyrics.