Posts by Benegesserict Cumbersomberbatch

Move over bit barns, here come Japan’s floating bit barges

They'll have better floating point performance.

Microsoft Copilot joins ChatGPT at the feet of the mighty Atari 2600 Video Chess

Re: Horsey takes King Prawn

My high school Biology teacher was also coach of the rugby team. That was because he was from South Africa and thus the only one who knew how to play.

Visiting students can't hide social media accounts from Uncle Sam anymore

Re: hooray for the wayback machine.

Hypocrite.

Re: See my answer to the first question

Passing through the US Border Security an Australian was asked to show the contents of a kid's backpack, and, removing a teddy, only occupant of the backpack, said "There's a bear in there." Her partner, being a comedian, added "And a chair as well."

For context, in Australia, the TV show Play School is a national institution, and its theme song, unchanged for 50 years, begins "There's a bear in there, and a chair as well." Practically everyone who grew up in Australia knows it by heart, because it's on twice a day, every day of the year, and for pre-schoolers viewing is pretty much compulsory.

Cue multiple officials grilling the entire family and searching every scrap of checked and hand luggage (not sure but in the original account I believe they missed their flight because of it). "What did you mean by a chair? Is there anything else in your luggage you haven't told us about? Are you attempting to take anything out of the country illegally?"

Depending on the story-teller, cavity searches may be part of the story. Possibly apocryphal, but absolutely credible.

/anecdote

Re: Other religions?

It would stop the teaching of evolution as science and creationism as religion. It would stop sex education that teaches any method other than abstinence for contraception, despite abstinence being demonstrably worse at preventing teenage pregnancy even than no sex education at all. It would facilitate some states' already implemented plans to teach that 81.2 million < 74.2 million, as in the 2020 Presidential Election. To the extent that the "green madness" is science, it would prevent the teaching of science.

"The people who run the schools" are frequently parochial bigoted morons. The schools are paid for by the state, and the state has an imperative role in making sure the students are educated, sometimes in direct contradiction to their parents' wishes. Education is the defence of the state (Benjamin Franklin). A state that prevents its citizens from thinking in the disguise of education is weakening itself, with consequences that are already obvious.

The (executive) government can breach the constitution. If it does, well, that's what the judiciary is for, the likes of Alito and Thomas notwithstanding. In theory, that's the resolution to your paradox.

If questioned, "I support the principles of the US Constitution completely." If asked for more detail about the current government, "With respect, making a governmental decision about me based on my answer to that question is unconstitutional. See my answer to the first question, in particular the bits about free speech, free association, self-incrimination and equal protection before the law."

I have no intention of going anywhere near a place where an employee of the US Government might be empowered to ask one of those questions any time soon.

Hmm. Downvote without a reply.

- My comment was a perfectly valid syllogism

- The idea that the US government must, constitutionally, abide any and all political criticism of itself is one of the US's founding principles

I suspect the downvote is pure cognitive dissonance.

Re: You aren't much of a student if you don't criticise the government.

Maybe that was the case back in the 60s and 70s when there were professional jobs for graduates to go into and earn a reliable comfortable living for themselves and their families.

For anyone who has grown up under the kleptocracy that has been in place since the Reagan era, the whole country is f*cked and demanding it be turned into some kind of socialist "utopia" where billionaires and presidents don't feel inclined to buy entire islands so they can isolate themselves from the anger of the millions of people whose labour enabled them is the only way society will have any actual security, as opposed to the illusion of security the kleptocrats have been selling us unsuccessfully for decades.

"any indications of hostility towards the citizens, culture, government, institutions or founding principles of the United States,"

When the US government becomes hostile to the founding principles of the United States, one cannot support both.

Microsoft dangles extended Windows 10 support in exchange for Reward Points

Re: So basically backup supported security updates instead of ad supported

On the other, it is a ten year old operating system, that has been superceded unnecessarily bulldozed into planned obsolescence after Micros~1 announced it was "the last Windows."

FTFY.

It's good to have a Händel on these things.

Techie went home rather than fix mistake that caused a massive meltdown

Technically correct, only units named for people should have a capitalised abbreviation. Practically, lowercase L is too similar to the digit one, especially when handwritten on prescriptions.

Re: Honestly

Is that Perth (Western Australia) where it's currently 18°C in winter, or Perth (Perth and Kinross) where it's currently 18°C in summer?

Teens used encrypted chats to recruit for 'violence as a service' murder ring, Europol says

Re: Scandinavia

Monocultures don't become multicultural overnight. Integration needs to be a positive decision, not just something a society hopes will happen passively and naturally.

Australia made a decision to become a multicultural country 75 years ago, and out of necessity. The idea that Anglo Australia could stay not only dominant but the exclusive culture was rubbish anyway

Whether it be the displaced people of WWII, Vietnamese or Somali or any of the other groups that made home here, they've all brought their own trauma and all needed help adjusting.

But I like walking through Footscray or the Vic Market or down Swanston Street and trying to work out what nationalities I live with. I like that the kids of my country hear dozens of languages in their playgrounds.

It's the opposite of boring.

Australia finds age detection tech has many flaws but will work

Re: Data collection...

There is a second prong to the AU government's approach here and it's: Use our ID validation.

MyID (FFS will marketroids ever move on from trying to make us feel included, warm and fuzzy? The "M" section of my app list is clogged with My[phone company], My[energy company], My[government service] when we all know perfectly well it's theirs. And I still can't pay my power bill.) will serve to let you into MyGov ($@#*!) and thence Medicare, the Tax Office, Centrelink (welfare), Child Support, Passports, the Post Office, even PBS Prescribing if you're a medico like me, all high value targets.

Registration starts with 100 points of ID and current address validation, so at least 2 government issued photo ID sources and usually a recent bill issued against your current residential address, validated against the respective state and commonwealth databases that issued them. And if you're worried about Met Police style re-birthing, 1) they validate against the death certificates as well, and 2) most neonatally deceased don't get drivers licences.

It then becomes 2FA to let you in to the service of your choice. So far I've only been asked to use it to access government services. I'm thinking it's a matter of time before e.g. online banking services are subjected to mandatory minimum ID verification standards. AU gov: haven't worked out your infrastructure for that? Would you care to look at ours...

SpaceX's Starship explodes again ... while still on the ground

Re: And it was likely only partly fuelled

Static... then extremely dynamic.

It's now an X-rocket.

Ukraine strikes Russian bomber-maker with hack attack

Re: Thank goodness

Russia was so worried about NATO expansion that, as a direct consequence of Russia's actions, NATO has two new members and its border with NATO countries is now bigger by 1340km.

Glushko and Korolev were both Ukrainian.

Ship abandoned off Alaska after electric cars on board catch fire

Re: Tesla that burned so hot, it melted part of the road

Stoichionomatopoeia?

Elon Musk pukes over pork-filled budget bill with Tesla subsidies on the line

Re: You forgot ...

After January 6, even Bravo Mike was suspect.

X's new 'encrypted' XChat feature seems no more secure than the failure that came before it

Re: Would Elon do that?

Only in an encrypted chat with the Secretary of Defense.

Re: Would Elon do that?

There are fringe groups who claim the Roman Catholic church as a hierarchy strayed into heresy in the 1960s, and only they spotted it. They say it's nothing to do with we-were-wrong-about-officially-approved-anti-Semitism, but then...

We can all be a card-carrying pope of the Discordian religion, so why not His Holiness Barry II of Milwaukee?

Microsoft's plain text editor gets fancy as Notepad gains formatting options

Re: TEXT EDITOR Microsoft, TEXT EDITOR, don't you guys GET IT?!?!

Micros~1 always knew what a text editor was; it's called EDLIN.

Ukrainians smuggle drones hidden in cabins on trucks to strike Russian airfields

Re: Unintended (?) consequences

Ukraine probably has delivery drones, too.

American science put on starvation diet

If you think education is expensive

Try ignorance.

Google co-founder Sergey Brin suggests threatening AI for better results

Re: Physical violence?

Reprogramming it to do nothing, permanently, would be unforgettable.

Victoria's Secret website laid bare for three days after 'security incident'

Re: One day…

Sic 'em, Rex!

(If you don't know, YouTube it. Just... do it.)

V.S. clearly too late to recognise the importance of having a security echidna.

Techies thought outside the box. Then the boss decided to take the box away

Medical equipment company has a smoking space. Pre-Oncology Room seems more appropriate.

Microsoft moved the goalposts once. Will Windows 12 bring another shift?

Re: Microsoft Monopoly Must End

Win10 is different from the other releases in that Micros~1 said words to the effect that "Windows 10 will be the last release we'll ever make. From now on it will just be security updates." Now they've expensively made fools of anyone who believed them, but hey, when was the last time that happened?

In breaking news

White House announces 10000% tariff on FOSS...

Re: Reasons not to upgrade to Windows 12

If I turn my computer on and there's no OS, nothing happens, so there's effectively no computer.

From a corporate governance point of view, maybe it's time to realise that OSes are natural monopolies and they should be treated the way that phone services were in the US before the 1980s - monolithic and de facto not-for-profits.

Spin off the OS division into it's own wholly owned enclave that's not under any influence of the authors of Office, Copilot, development suite, any of the profit centres. Micros~1's reward for decades of work is tighter integration with the OS through familiarity and closer communication. But the makers of the OS itself concentrate on and only on efficiency and security at one thing - the OS. And consumers get that for free.

Microsoft gets twitchy over talk of Europe's tech independence

Re: Microsoft panicking?

A bit like the rest of the world.

Your graphics card's so fat, it's got its own gravity alert

You're thinking of Russian Freecell, which doesn't exist.

'I guess NASA doesn't need or care about my work anymore'

Re: Why do you hate savings?

Cutting costs? Because a filesystem with 89% free is so much cheaper to operate than one with 84% free.

Institutional ignorance, as opposed to institutional memory, is the goal. They're taking the most direct path. If an agency looks likely to question a Führerbefehl, lobotomise it.

The sound of Windows 95 about to disappoint you added to Library of Congress significant sound archive

Re: Does the library feature

The distinctively Nokia ringtone (four, four, five notes in a descending-ascending scale) is a (crude) adaptation of a theme from Sibelius. Who was Finnish.

When Microsoft made the Windows as a Service pivot

If Windows has become "a tool that's a bit of an adversary", Micros~1 has long been an adversary that's a bit of a tool.

Pentagon needs China's rare earths, Beijing just put them behind a permit wall. Oops

Re: Mr. President, we can't allow . . .

Why does that explain so much?

Was Dr. Merkwürdigliebe's first name Elon? His saluting arm is really Alien Hand Syndrome? To colonise Mars vould be relatively simple, mein Führer... er, Mr President.

Windows Recovery Environment update fails successfully, says Microsoft

Re: You might see the following error message – ERROR_INSTALL_FAILURE

ERROR_BAD_MOON_RISING

LLMs can't stop making up software dependencies and sabotaging everything

Re: Hallucination

A delusion is a fixed false belief which is not accessible to change through reasoned argument.

A psychosis is a delusional system of beliefs about the world.

Both just require a malformed system of processing information, a formal thought disorder, no sense-information required. Calling AI mistakes hallucinations is terminologically wrong.

Re: Hallucination

Without a means of perception, it is impossible to hallucinate.

What these things have are delusions or psychoses.

Microsoft total recalls Recall totally to Copilot+ PCs

If you get in an accident and have a dashcam and know you screwed up, you want to rip it off and chuck it under the seat.

If you get in an accident and have a dashcam and know you screwed up, you want to be very careful the innocent party didn't spot that you had a dashcam, because you'll get subpoenaed. If you want to add destruction of evidence / perverting the course of justice to that dangerous driving charge, go right ahead.

EU lands 25% counter tariff punch on US, Trump pauses broad import levy hike – China excepted

the orange clown chickened because bond markets did what they should under the circumstances, and paying interest on a $n x 10¹³ debt is difficult.

China holds much of it.

Re: EU to charge citizens 25% extra tax on loads of stuff and pocket a stash of their cash.

The politics of grievance is strong in both countries. The USA has a perceived grievance over the squandering of a century-long rise in prosperity ("We're the best country on Earth! We won the Cold War! Why doesn't everyone just give us our due?). China has an actual century-long historical grievance over colonial occupation, which they have already largely overcome by their own hard work. Strangely, that grievance is not with the USA. It's with this nebulous thing called "the West", which might not actually exist.

If the two countries could be content with the fact that they are the numbers 1 and 2 economies in the world (by whatever measure), none of this would be even contemplated. A good look at the leadership of both countries will tell you why it's happening.

Re: Trump vs the EU

Truth Social was translated from социалистическая правда.

Re: "No, Canada will not become a 51st state...."

Canada would have its allies, some of them nuclear armed, all of them former allies of the USA. Who would the USA have? Putin? Xi?

M365 Family users wake up to notice 'Your subscription expired'

Re: And that's why...

I expect Micros~1's subscription model will soon drive a change such that locally installed software that can't validate against its servers at each use won't run. Same shit experience for every user.

AmigaOS updated in 2025 for some reason

Maybe also it had Linus' name on the box. One personality (pluses and minuses acknowledged) to wrangle all the collaborators and maintain momentum.

"Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good RaspPi in your side pocket."

Self-driving car maker Musk's DOGE rocks up at self-driving car watchdog, cuts staff

Re: Not very efficient

Plausible deniability would be my guess.

F. Elon is approaching the time limit beyond which he has to be given a formal government position, and thereby be subject to congressional oversight, or lose access to federal government systems. Having shoehorned his DOGEy cronies into positions where every public servant is dreading their knock on the door, the crony-in-chief can step back and say, "not me, bro."