This is shambolic

And this time Apple have to take the blame.

I got the original iPhone back in November and getting that working was less smooth than it should be. I assumed they would have noticed the long delays in getting to iTunes last year and geared up accordingly. But no, today's upgrade to 2.0 is even worse.

@ Ioannis above. Good point I wonder if they'll refund people who can't use their paid-for service because of this shambles.

@ Kenny above. Yup .Mac/Mobile Me/Me is up, down, up, down, up, down. Mail is still working, but nothing else.

Next time guys - stagger these events. Firmware release BEFORE a new product launch to keep existing customers happy. And don't bugger round with a vital service at the same time.

Thank God the Reg is still working, it'd be like the 19th Century here if I didn't know everyone else was watching the iPhones go out one by one.

Spitting

If the Chinese do solve the problem of voluminous expectoration, can they share the secret so that we can do the same to younger people in this country.

Mine's the one with 'Bah! Humbug' on the back marked out in Werther's Original wrappers.

Oh to be a fly on the wall at O2

When their MD gets a well-deserved Jobsian bollocking for screwing up one of the highest profile product launches of the year.

Something tells me O2 can forget getting the rights to the next phone. 3 years exclusivity will be out the window when O2 have shown themselves to be manifestly incapable of selling the product.

Must be a first

"It is simply unacceptable that consumers are being misled by these screen-scrapers into paying 'handling charges' for Ryanair’s flights when they can purchase the same flights with no handling charge on www.ryanair.com,"

RyanAir complaining about people having to pay unwarranted charges???

Taking it to the logical Blearsian conclusion

Offer them money if they vote the right way.

Either that or a chance to win a passion-filled night with New Labour's Poison Dwarf.

Great idea...

...now will the Japanese government fund my purchase of a 40W 40" OLED TV?

Bliss

Part of me likes to think that Jacqui Smith is in her office sacking the bright-young-thing who came up with to the idea of this site. But a much larger part of me hopes she remains blissfully unaware for a bit longer.

As spin-doctoring operations go mylifemyid is a John Redwood / Mae Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau moment.

Can we look forward to daily 'best-of's?

@Anonymous Coward

'Ah well, when the oil drought hits aviation fuel a bit harder, Ryanair will be first against the wall -- their target market will be the first to stop flying.'

Sadly, for all sorts of reasons - environmental and moral - RyanAir will be one of the last companies to hit the wall. They've got a modern fleet that sips less fuel, they run at very high load values and they aren't tied into the expensive major hubs so they can switch routes easily enough. Not to mention their scamtastic marketing suckers people into buying flights with them when the final cost is only a little less than flying with an airline which gives a damn* and takes you where you want to go and not a tin shed in the wrong time zone.

The ones that are going to go are the heavily indebted fleets with archaic business practices, protected by anti-competitve legislation, massive pension commitments and total reliance on big airports. Which is pretty much the whole of the American airline industry with the possible exception of SouthWest.

* SAS if you must know - no not the blokes in balaclavas.

BBC education programming

'For example, a close reading of the production figures shows BBC2 has reduced its education programming by almost half – from 1374 to 785 hours. No doubt this change has some underlying significance.'

A good part of this is because the Open University has lost its late-night BBC2 'Learning Zone' broadcasting slot; instead the BBC switches over to the wondrous rolling car crash of fluffed links, missing captions and wrong clips that is BBC News.

Just think, generations of British youth will no longer discover the wonders of geology, organic chemistry and pure mathematics simply because they've staggered home in the wee small hours and just flicked on the TV - this is a cultural tragedy.

@Adrian Esdaile

'Combine Tennis, Foxhunting, Waterpolo and Target Shooting and make a sport that is actually worth watching.'

Now that mate - is genius.

Actually...

The simplest way to reduce food costs and supply enough to feed the population is to stop feeding grain and soya to animals in feedlots. The US could support three or four times its current population by switching its grain harvest from animals to humans.

This doesn't mean a veggie world, it means meat becoming relatively more expensive; but the meat we would get would be tastier.

@ blackworx

A far more interesting question about tongue is:

'Can it taste you eating it?'

Here's one

Plotting MPs' second homes on Google Maps. Then they can use that info to find their nearest John Lewis store.

Hmmm...

The perspex bit at the bottom is there simply because Asus couldn't be bothered to design a proper stand. It also means I wouldn't be able to tuck my keyboard underneath to retrieve a bit of desk space - something I do like about the iMac / CinemaDisplay monitors.

I like my Eee a lot, but increasingly Asus are looking like headless chickens frantically hoping to strike gold a second time.

Next year's Apprentice

'...they'll be working for no-nonsense entrepreneur Alan Sugar who controls a property empire worth more than £800.'

@ Mark

Ummmm what would ditching HRA do in this case?

The UK is a founding member of the European Convention on Human Rights and the European Court of Human Rights is the ultimate arbiter of that convention. All HRA did was incorporate the majority of the Convention into UK Law meaning that citizens had redress for breaches of their rights in the UK courts rather than having to appeal their case all the way to the court in Strasbourg, a process that cost tens of thousands of Pounds and many years.

Dumping HRA would just make things worse for people whose rights have been infringed, delay justice and allow governments to get away with greater abuses.

If anything HRA needs to be strengthened. It's not possible for a judge to strike down a law that conflicts with the Convention, nor can they refuse to sentence someone who broke such a law. to remain on the statute book, whereas they should be repealed. The strongest action a court can take is to issue a declaration of incompatibility with the Convention, but they cannot fine the government for breaching the Convention. The reason is down to the self-importance of Parliament which considers itself the sole arbiter of UK law. So anyone hoping that ID Cards could be declared illegal under HRA are in for a nasty surprise.

The sooner we have a modern constitution (we could do a whole lot worse than to plagiarise the one written by a bunch of traitors in 1787) the better.

There can only be one actor for the role

I speak of Tom Cruise - he talks to real aliens every day.

If David Hasselhoff could do the soundtrack that would be awesome.

Tech angle???

Couldn't you at least have told us how much the inkjet cartridges cost to do an entire cake?

@Graham Wood

Sorry, your chemist friend is wrong. (But just think how much fun you can have telling him)

The internationally agreed name for element number 13 is 'aluminium', with 'aluminum' being an acceptable alternative.

The problem goes all the way back to Humphry Davy who made the first attempts at separating the raw metal from pure aluminium oxide - alumina. He called the then hypothetical element 'alumium' at first before settling on 'aluminum' where it remained for a few more years before becoming 'aluminium' to fit in better with the majority of metal names.

However, the Brits didn't get it all their own way, the internationally agreed spelling for element 16 is 'sulfur'. Tragically, it is now also the recommended spelling in the UK according to the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority. Presumably the precious little snowflakes in today's schools can't be expected to spell 'sulphur'.

Now I'm confused

It would have cost billions; it would have crushed a few more rights; it'd have employed more people in peaked hats and big boots; it have been hopelessly unreliable, inconvenient and infuriating; and most of all - IT WOULDN'T HAVE WORKED...

...and the government is abandoning it?

What (as they say) gives?

Did I say Tony McNulty - I meant Liam Byrne

But the same sentiment applies.

Is it just me, or does Liam Byrne look like he'd get off on any opportunity to wear a black uniform with silver piping, jack boots and wire-frame glasses?

Isn't collective punishment illegal?

The closest analogy in existing law is when a suspect is bailed over for a later court appearance. If the bailee fails to answer the bail conditions, the person who put up the assurance isn't jailed they merely lose their money.

So why are perfectly innocent people going to be criminalised if an immigrant does a runner?

The repulsive Tony McNulty really is the lowest of the low in New Labour (and that's up against some pretty stiff competition); by building a career hard man image by picking on the weakest and most disadvantaged in society.

The sooner he and his cronies are thrown out of power the better.

Makes sense

Most 360 owners have been hardened through multiple bereavements as their precious boxes have RRoDed time after (three and counting) bloody time.

Easy way to see if CERN are telling the truth

If they honestly think the LHC is going to spit out all sorts of subatomic weirdness they won't have bought the extended warranty.

I had assumed...

...his users found the iPhone's lack of keyboard made it easier to wipe clean.

Oh terrific

I need to post a letter and the queue in front already contains a family claiming a wheelbarrow load of benefits; a semi-literate teenager completing a passport application at the desk so that he can spend his gap year contracting some of Southern Europe's most exciting sexually-transmitted diseases; a Sun reader changing five billion Vietnamese Dong into Sterling one Dong at a time whilst recounting their nights of bliss at the Hanoi Hilton Happy Slapper LadyBoy Passion Parlour to anyone within earshot; someone whose actually bought one of those 'you've never heard of this movie' DVDs for £1.99 - in copper; three Lottery players trying to pick their almost certainly unlucky numbers, and a Patagonian waiter looking to send a 1/2 tonne box complete with air holes to one of the lesser-travelled parts of the Andes - and now they're going to be scanning people's eyeballs???

Let's enjoy him squirming

This was an on-the-record interview and he's a former spindoctor, Burnham knew what he was doing when he mentioned Chakrabarti. Bringing her into the conversation was not necessary to make a point, but he did it anyway. he should apologise.

Maybe she shouldn't have risen to the bait, but hell it's an opportunity to embarrass one of the government's more greasy members.

What's especially revealing is that Burnham can't get it into his head that people can agree on some things and not others. Such is the android level of conformity in new Labour he fails to see that it's possible for Liberty and Davis to agree on surveillance and disagree on the death penalty. People like Burnham who have no opinions that haven't been put their by the whips shouldn't be allowed into the House of Commons as they do all of us a disservice.

Uranium economy

The HUGE problem with nuclear power is political - not the lentil knitters, but international politics. As the report points out, uranium reserves are pretty limited if the World decided that fission was the way forward (and it is increasingly looking that way).

Thorium is in some way an even bigger problem than uranium since it needs to be transmuted into U233 before it can be used as a fuel. The Indians, who have some of the largest thorium reserves, have long experience in doing this. BUT U233 is an excellent material for bomb making. It can be used in a uranium cannon bomb (unlike plutonium), a much simpler, cheaper way of becoming a nuclear power as it doesn't need anything like the same level of expertise - the design of Little Boy dropped on Hiroshima didn't need to be tested and the South Africans assembled a number of similar weapons without ever testing their designs.

The way to extend uranium reserves is through reprocessing and recycling U235 for further use and either blending in Pu239 to make MOX or to embark on a real fast breeder program using Pu239 as the fuel and U238 as the breeding blanket. This would mean a huge commitment to reprocessing - an economic disaster in the UK which is the only country to have ever gone wholeheartedly for the process, and something of an environment nightmare as it means finding repositories for spent actinides. Could any government make such a commitment?

BUT the monster in this is the plutonium economy. Such a programme would require hundreds of tonnes of plutonium, all suitable for bomb making, to be shipped around the World on a continuous basis. It would mean providing countries with whom we have awkward, if not hostile, relationships with plutonium. Bearing in mind the fracas we're currently having with Iran over its uranium program does anyone countenance the US or Israel permitting Iran to receive plutonium shipments?

Okay, we could avoid trans-shipments and say that everyone has a reprocessing program of their own. The technology is from the 1940s and is accessible to anyone with a supply of concrete, kerosene and some 1st year degree chemistry. Is the World ready for 200 odd reprocessing programmes all with the potential to divert plutonium into bomb programs?

Or the US and the rest of the Security Council could say that all new nuclear economies must sign up to receive fuel from their enrichment and processing plants and return spent fuel to them. This hasn't worked too well in the past - India's successful civilian and military programs are a direct protest at trying to impose similar rules through the Non Proliferation Treaty, and Iran's current intransigence is in part down to the fact that under the Treaty every country is permitted to have their own civilian nuclear programs - including a complete fuel cycle. The West demanding that Iran must accept fuel from outside is not grounded in law.

So can the readers of this mighty organ see how to get round these problems?

No Linux, no lovely

What's happened to the Eee's curvaceous best friend?

A suggestion

Perhaps the government could have a site where we could see images of what is, and, what is not, legal. Maybe add some forums where we can post images and have senior judges, politicians and members of the public decide if they are eye-wateringly illegal.

WTF???

"We could not anticipate a determined thief who was prepared to force open a filing cabinet and locked drawers," said Chief Executive David Astley.

OMG! Breaking news from London - locks don't stop thieves!

Home Office speak

"The Home Office refused to disclose further details of who was present at the August 2007 meeting with Phorm, how it was arranged, or what was discussed, saying that the information remained the subject of an ongoing FOI inquiry."

At the end of the FOI inquiry the information will not be released because it will be 'commercially confidential', when the appeal is granted, the discussions will be censored on the grounds of national security.

And I'm with the others above. You should name the spokesdroid.

Prank

Imagine the hilarity if every El Reg burned a CD filled with random data, labelled it with things like 'For Hazel B - URGENT!' and left them on trains and buses across the nation.

Okay I admit they'd be hard to find amongst copies of the Metro and all the legitimate government CDs that have been left behind, but it'd be amusing to see the PM standing in the Commons trying to work out if the disk called 'Iran Battle Plan' found on the 08:25 to Grimsby was genuine or not.

Just think...

...there's a country filled with liberal politicians who value the privacy of the citizen. As a bonus, it's rich, clean and apparently peopled by well-educated, multilingual supermodels.

What a contrast to New Labour's image of Britain.

I really have to learn Swedish...

Oooh dear, bad day to say...

'Brown said that citizens were not alarmed by the government's demands for biometric data, saying this was proved by the fact that “many people now have laptops activated by finger-scans.”'

Did Hazel???

Couldn't happen to a nicer person

'The BBC however reported that “the machine contained a combination of constituency and government information which should not have been held on it". These included “sensitive documents relating to defence and extremism,” the Beeb said.'

So Hazel's been using her computer in breach of her conditions of employment - I say a nice light firing is in order.

Easy answer

If the Labour Party apparachiks won't debate Davis in this election, then let's have some interviews with him conducted by the Reg.

You could even ask the readers to submit questions, and after you've weeded the ones out about Paris, the relative benefits of Mac versus Windows and whether Blu-ray is a crock you should have - ummmm - well like I said, we could have some interviews with him conducted by the Reg.

Hmmmm

These figures are misleading (I think).

The vast majority of Blu-ray players out there are PS3s which may or may not be being used to play the overpriced disks.

But at the comparable point in the uptake of DVD, the PS2 had not yet been launched. For many people the PS2 was their first taste of DVD and the format exploded in popularity from then on.

So I suspect in the near future we'll see the rate of Blu-ray adoption drop below the rate DVD was adopted.

What a great idea!

After all, charging people to receive calls has made the American mobile market what it is today - backward, patchy, clunky and a place where using a Motorola is still considered acceptable in polite company.

Where can I get one?

Do they make right-hand drive mongrel munchers?

Perhaps the most shocking thing is...

...that this is a savage critique of state of decor on our privatised rail system.

Such are the horrific colour schemes chosen by the various water companies/banks and market traders running the railways that it is possible for a bright orange folder emblazoned with TOP SECRET to be lost amongst the velour.

Yes SouthWest Trains I'm looking at you...

@KenBW2

'I wish everyone would stop pointing out that new laptops run the newest incarnation of the world's most popular Operating System.'

I like this approach to talking about problems. You could spin almost everything this way. F'rinstance:

'I wish everyone would stop pointing out that prostitutes carry the newest incarnation of the world's most popular sexually transmitted disease.'

The Mighty Reg

Once again the Register triumphs over the forces of evil!

Don't suppose you fancy a go at the Home Office do you?

Legal question

Since Murdoch is neither a UK citizen nor domiciled here for tax purposes, can he contribute to a political campaign?

Come on Tony McNulty

Home Office minister Tony McNulty should stand down from his seat; immediately announce he's the Labour candidate and will also be fighting the campaign on the 42-day issue. Then we can see how the arguments really stack up.

The prospect of seeing McNulty (a man with the face and personality of a cat's slapped arse) being bulldozed by David Davis would be a pleasure.

Labour is screwed on this one.

Today was going to be the first day of the PM's fightback, but now it's dominated by DD and the botched vote over 42-days.

And it doesn't get much better for them. If Labour choose to fight the election; they will lose (they came third at the last general election) AND they face the prospect of having 42 days in the news *every* day (Guido is reporting that the Labour candidate for the seat opposes 42-day detention, so that'd be fun).

If they don't fight then the Tories will make hay about Gordon Brown being afraid to face the voters.

Jeez, I'm living in a World where I'm wishing all the best to a Eurosceptic Tory.

Help!

Just tell me Paris is still beautiful.

@David

The clearing refers to a planet having cleared its region of space of planetismals during the planet-forming period of the Solar System. Satellites are gravitationally bound to a planet so they don't count.

The problem with the current definition is that it means that planets - particularly Neptune fall foul of this clause. Neptune binds a large number of objects in the Kuiper belt and therefore technically has not cleared its orbit. Jupiter also does not have a clear orbit since it is associated with the Trojan asteroids and even Earth has a number of co-orbiting asteroids.

The new definition sucks.

This will come back to haunt him

"It should be up to the person you're calling to make sure you're who you say you are."

Royce Brisbane better have his lawyer on speed dial the first time the Daily Mail reports his service has been used by a stalker or an unwanted ex to make someone's life hell.

Honestly, can anyone think of a legitimate use for this business that can't be done through other, better, entirely legal means?

@Ian Ferguson

'The blurb says that your location can be found with GPS or triangulating using Wi-Fi spots and GSM towers; why would they need to do the latter if the GPS is fully-featured? Sounds a bit dodgy to me.'

Actually it makes perfect sense. Using cell and WiFi locations is faster than GPS and uses much less power. It also works indoors and in urban canyons where satellite signals are weak or non-existent. The precision varies, but it can be as good as GPS where there are plenty of towers and known WiFi base station locations.