Posts by Daniel B.
1939 posts • joined Friday 12th October 2007 19:57 GMT
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Posted in Apple kills 'Get a Mac' ad campaign
I'm a PC... and I'm a fruity PC
The smugness of launching the "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC" campaign right around the time they switched to the same crappy x86 arch used in el-cheapo PCs was astonishing. It also served as a showcase of "look, the Mac dude feels superior!" which has been Apple's attitude as of late. Anyway, good riddance to that campaign, lets see what they'll bring now.
There is no apple
In fact, the apple incident was made up by Newton, upon a reporter's insisting on how he had come upon the whole Gravitational idea. It does make for a nice story, though, and it has permeated as part of common knowledge.
Seen that, actually.
A mobile comms shop mucking with walkie-talkies and CB radio gear kept one of their PCs with win95, because all the software they needed to tinker with their comms gear wasn't NT compatible. Given how MS screwed up with Vista, I wouldn't be surprised if XP still ran in most computers by the cutoff date.
Posted in Bill Gates backs ball-busting ultrasound
Semen-less contraception
While this method doesn't remove semen, I remember reading about a method which in fact inhibited semen as well. Now that one I'd complain on rendering males unable to *come*.
Tamper-proof better
There is specialized hardware that manages to do a better job of preventing something like this, and it is usually known as tamper-*proof* hardware. Some of the crypto chips inside the System z mainframes use it, and most of the DoD uses some type of tamperproof hardware. Mission-Impossible style self-destruct occurs if someone tries to open these babies, thus making the "tamper aware" thingy redundant.
And then again ... few will try to go down the hardware "hack the CPU" approach, and if they are going down this route, you're probably screwed anyway.
Ribbon
... will be the main reason I won't upgrade to anything after Office2003. I hate that stupid interface, and I'm not alone in that one. If Office 2010 doesn't offer a magic "old style" mode, I'm not buying it either.
Crappy list
Pascal I can understand, as its syntax is excellent for data structure concepts.
Delphi... I haven't seen that in at least a decade.
VB should be banned from any course, *especially* VB6!!!!
Java would be the only language on that list that I actually think should be there, and maybe Pascal because of the aforementioned "learning syntax".
Removing C doesn't look so bright, though...
I'd complain more about the "approval" process.
30% doesn't sound excessive, but then I'm paying 40%/year interest rates on my Credit Cards. However, I'm more concerned on the Jobsphere banning apps here and there just because Jobs didn't like a particular app, considers it useless, or whatever His Jobsiness believes is "wrong for you".
I'd also like an App Store that doesn't have those idiotic region locks; it has always been annoying that many shops have some kind of region lock (US only! EU only!) when the whole Internet Commerce idea was based on the premise of a borderless market. Oh and of course ... no "single appstore" lock as well.
Interesting note: 10% of devs use Objective C. No sh*t Sherlock ... only the Appleistas would use a language that looks like the unnatural offspring of C and Smalltalk, instead of Java, C++ or even C#.
Posted in Code-execution bug found in Apple Safari
Whoops!
I 'spose you mean "Moctezuma's Revenge" ;)
Safari is also an adventure that sometimes ends up with you being eaten by lions. Whoopee!!
Posted in EA imposes used games tax
Origin rocked
... and those might have been the only games from an EA subsidiary that I have bought and actually enjoyed. Unfortunately, Origin's dead, and EA now equates with mediocre sports games. Now they're pimping the second-hand games market as well, and I am reaffirmed in not buying EA games again.
Posted in Nokia tops iPhone and BlackBerry (again)
You haven't checked your poor countries well, my friend...
"and of course, Nokia's is usually giving phones away free with contracts - in poorer countries this means that they can easily grab a large market share."
... except, in poorer countries the proles will go down the PAYG road instead of chaining themselves into an 18-month contract. No free phones, and the cheapest smartphones are somewhre around a $300 or $400 price tag.
So smartphone users are weeded out to those who do have the money to buy 'em, or those who actually want to get into a contract; Blackberries, iPhones and even the Nokia smartphones are on par over here. Yet most people are flocking for Nokias and Blackberries... and I've seen *THREE* of my friends with an iPhone. One of 'em is a 2G, the other two 3G. No 3GSs here, and one of them lost her iPhone ... she hasn't replaced it.
If any smartphone is gaining traction over here, it seems to be the Blackberries.
By the way, comparing Apple gear to Porsches isn't quite right. They're Hummers ... expensive, rich status symbols but ultimately just an expensive toy doing the same stuff that other vehicles do. A Porsche actually runs real fast... the iPhone doesn't even multitask in the real sense of the word. And it still won't do it with OS4!
Posted in 3TB Seagate disk drive ahoy
Real TBs or "fake" TBs?
'Coz I suppose they're still pulling off the 1TB = 1000GB, 1GB = 1000MB, 1MB = 1000KB, 1KB = 1000 byte scam.
Posted in Jobs: One million iPads sold
Hm...
Am I the only one seeing Jobs sitting in Dr. Evil's chair, saying...
ONE MILLION IPADS!!!
Meh. There are other tablets out there, though I'd wonder how they are doing. I remember seeing one in 2005; actually a small laptop but with a 180° rotating screen, so you could twist the thing and have only the screen showing. Oh, it also had handwriting recognition...
Posted in Sony sued for dropping Linux from PS3
Fair-rights use
Copying for personal purposes is legal - there was a huge battle over this back in the 80's. That's the main reason you can tape Dr. House or whatever show you want from TV without being a "copyright infringer". This is supposed to apply to all media, even DVDs and Blu-Ray, so you can have personal copies for, say, your mp3 player or watching on your mobile device. Some DRM schemes have actually enabled features like this.
Sony PS3 games are overpriced, but then *all* the frickin' games are overpriced, not just the PS3 ones. I've bought every single game, and the PS3 games are uncrackable because of technical limitations; we don't have the "special hardware" to write the encryption keys for BD. Get it? it is FUCKING IMPOSSIBLE to make a workable ISO for a Blu-Ray disc. There are not going to be pirate games for a long time. OtherOS isn't going to "break" the protection scheme, and those of us who want to use it aren't "freetards" wanting everything for nothing. All I want is to use the CellBE processor to do experimental stuff, I don't want to run shady ISOs of pirated games (which don't exist) or cracking Blu-Rays (which is useless, AACS changes keys and you should know this).
Stop trolling dude. Not every guy who knows how to program more than your average PC/Mac user is an "evil hacker" or a "freetard".
Just borging competition
I doubt it had anything to do with adding services, and more with destroying competition. Kill iTunes competition! Destroy! Destroy!
@Pirate Dave: I remember a similar argument being made against CDs when compared with vinyl. Most human beings won't notice the difference between a vinyl record, CD or MP3 recording, unless the MP3 is encoded ad a stupidly low bitrate. However, I do like to have CDs, as they have the full audio thingy and encode 'em to whatever bitrate I want to.
Most of the N and E phones, I'd say.
There are a lot of N and E series phones that would quallify as smartphones. And they're damn good as well!
Posted in Sony sued for dropping Linux from PS3
Yeah, right.
The ones who are pissed off at Sony are the dual Linux/gamer users that both use the PS3 Linux install to do some number crunching, but then switch over to the GameOS and play games. The irony is that the OtherOS removal hits exactly the kind of demographic that is actually giving Sony profits, because they are actually buying games for their PS3. Or *were* buying games; I am definitely not amused at this and have halted my PS3 game purchases for now.
I've been pondering on buying one of the first-model PS3s with full PS2 BC, and get that PS3 to update to the "OtherOS-less" firmware, but I'm not quite sure about doing that. I would still be giving Sony my $$$...
Applies to Apple as well
How many of those "new handsets" are actually iPhone 2G owners swapping 'em for iPhone 3GSs? Most of the people who wanted an iPhone have one at this point, so most sales will be replacement phones. Which is ensured by Apple killing support on older versions of the handset.
Serves them right
They were the 'internet for dummies' ISP of the 90s. Then they started charging craploads for their service, which was the worst of the "extra value networks" (Compuserve, Prodigy and such). It only survived as much because most of the rural US didn't have broadband... as soon as broadband came, AOL users left in droves.
Oh, and don't forget their 'free trials', where you would be unable to cancel and your credit card would get charged on day 31.
Posted in Sony sued for dropping Linux from PS3
Missing the point
The feature removal itself affects *all* fat PS3 owners, regardless of their usage of OtherOS. Thus, the millions of fat PS3s and their owners are the ones being hit by this, and are at least within their right to ask for a partial refund. In fact, some PS3 owners have succeeded in doing this in the UK.
Posted in Sony sued for dropping Linux from PS3
Hey, what took them so long?
I've been expecting this since, well, the 3.21 FW "downgrade" was released. Come on "hackers" ... give 'em hell!!!
OS5 for mah BoldBerry
I know OS5 is out there for my Bold, but I'd rather wait for my carrier's version to come out. I would definitely like to keep my warranty, and using a non-carrier-locked update might screw up my warranty if my 'berry breaks down. At least I know my carrier will release it; they actually released 4.5 a year after it came out for my previous 8300.
About OS6... can they PLEASE make it so that memory doesn't fill up during regular use, and enters the "pacman" mode? (Pac-Man mode: when available memory goes 0 bytes, the OS starts deleting all messages and appointments like Pacman eating power pellets.)
Point (1)
The point on (1) also adds up that BES does that over an secure link; also the BES will push e-mails to your 'berry, instead of your iPhone polling Exchange to check "is there any new mail?"
Also, the same BES encrypted link will protect any browsing you do from your 'berry, even while using public WiFi hotspots. :)
Posted in Symantec buys PGP and GuardianEdge too
Start the Darth Vader scream
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!
Network Associates nearly killed it, Symantec might well kill it for sure.
I really hope they'll honor my "lifetime license", as I really don't need all those upgrades they're offering. And something tells me that I won't need them at all, as they will be bloatware.
Crap.
Posted in HP agrees to buy Palm for $1.2bn
Dump iPAQs, keep Palmphones with webOS
I'd like to see HP dumping the crappy WinMo stuff. Especially now that Windows Phone 7 is coming, which sucks donkey balls.
WebOS at the very least has PalmOS/GarnetOS backwards compatiblity, and there are still some apps out there for that OS.
Palm should live on, it wasn't that bad, was it?
Re: Open Source
At least it is a widely used language with C++, and not some Smalltalk wannabe like Objective-C.
Do you realize?
That most Adobe apps were frickin' *born* in the Mac? The only reason the dev cycle reversed from Mac -> windows to windows -> mac was for market share reasons.
Posted in Nokia's lost weekend ends with N8?
Yeah
Maemo seems to be a better option. Though they ditched that, and turned it into MeeGo (who the hell gave it that name? Sounds like a kid's toy!). Though it seems that MeeGo is more Maemo than Moblin, so that would be nice to try.
Non-removable battery sounds like a deal-braker, though.
Simple solution
Don't sleep with your backlit-LCD devices turned on. Very simple, indeed.
Posted in RIM unwraps the BlackBerry Pearl 3G
Flip 3G?
I'd like to see a Flip 3G. That is the only one that I'd consider to use, considering that I'd lose the full-blown QWERTY keyboard.
I hate the "candybar" factor, unless it gives me a QWERTY keyboard. Still, I'd like to see a slidking BB...
What would Ridley Scott do?
It could be that it will be more similar in style to the first Alien movie, as that one is the only one he did.
I disliked the third movie; Dark Horse Comics' "Aliens: Earth War" was much better than the tripe we were given with Alien3. Hell, even Alien 4 looks better than Alien3!
A prequel might actually work... The Company already knew about LV426, that's why the Nostromo had that return route plotted. It could be that they knew because somebody had already found the thing. So it's workable...
Not for now....
I will only say "Remember SONY". They also said that they would never remove OtherOS from fat PS3s. They did so about a month before they removed it.
Jobs has turned around so many times, everyone is used to this.
- G4 is "teh best processor"! Intel Sucks!
- The iPhone will NEVER have third-party native apps! Webapps r teh shiznit!
- Multitasking? Who needs that?
- Cut & Paste? Who needs that?
- MMS isn't supported because nobody uses it
Posted in HP: last Itanium man standing
HP killed PA-RISC
HP did the idiotic decision of killing PA-RISC. I'll never forgive them for that.
As much as I loathe Intel, I would like to see the Itanium fare better, if only to get RISC stuff to take over the x86/64 market. But that doesn't seem to be happening anytime soon.
Maybe HP should revive PA-RISC, or even try to chime in with SPARC. Bring back the real processors!
Incorrect label = WIN!
Actually, in the US you *can* buy something for what the product has been mis-labelled for. They will only check the mis-labelled price tag, and then proceed to sell it to you for that exact price. I think that the "transaction refusal" may also fall under discrimination laws as well, so I doubt that they'd be able to do this as well.
However, I've seen "quotas" on big events, like concerts and such so I'm not quite sure if quotas are also legal on things that aren't really that finite. You can always buy an iPad, but there is a finite amount of tickets for your standard Metallica concert, so quotas do make sense in the latter case.
except this isn't a concert ticket
Concert tickets are very finite; you'll have something like 20k tickets per event, and you can't quite fabricate more tickets for those. iPads can be manufactured, and if you want to buy a zillion of them, you should be able to do so.
Limits on products sounds more like the USSR brand of 'socialism' than luxury product sales policies. BTW, luxury stuff is bought on stores, someone stockpiling on luxury products is just wasting his/her time, as those who are interested won't buy them from a "shady guy" selling it at twice the price.
Use for unsupported iPhones?
So his Jobsiness decided to completely cut off the 2G iPhone, and ban the 3G from having true multitasking ... at least down the official route.
Now you can keep your iPhone updated ... with ANOTHER OS! hahahahaha!
I doubt Apple will be amused by this. It means that their artificially obsoleted iPhones can be actually upgraded and kept everything but obsolete. This hack works only on 'older' iPhones, so whoever wants to run this will buy a used iPhone. Apple doesn't get any cash on used iPhones. Whooops!!!
Nothing to worry?
Well, given that Caller ID in Mexico doesn't send the owner's name (only the phone number), it seems this doesn't affect me.
Cell tracking isn't very accurate, so they'll be able to pinpoint me ... within a 500 meter range. Meh.
Posted in 'Gossips' say Apple will acquire ARM
DON'T.
Apple would only have two motivations to buy ARM:
- It wants a stranglehold on the predominant chip, so it will hog it and make it an Apple exclusive. That would screw up all other mobile producers real good.
- It is still allied with Intel, and plans to murder ARM so that Intel will reign supreme with its crappy Atom chip.
None of those options look good. I hope this is just a stupid rumor, similar to the AMD switch from last week. Otherwise, I'm going to be pretty mad!
McAfee?
I ceased to use McAffee in 1994, when it successfully destroyed NATAS. .. only to curl up and die because of an "unknown" virus. That "unknown" was DIR II.
I reverted to MS Antivirus back then (remember CPAV? MS bought them!), and later to Norton. I'm currently using avast!, though I had a brush with ZoneAlarm/Checkpoint... until they also brought upon me a bad false positive. Whoops!
Posted in First among SQLs
SQuirreL!
I've seen worse abominations than pronouncing SQL as Sequel: One "IT guru" claimed that he was a "seequa server" expert. Huh?
Posted in First among SQLs
If you ever feel like SQL is bad...
You should check something called MUMPS. Now *that* is absolute terror!
Even more embarassing...
The fact that the "hack" surely began when the aforementioned employee clicked on one of those oh-so-common links that botnets send, like "WATCH MY NUDE PICS!" or "TSUNAMI HITS! WATCH VIDEO!".
That is one of the reasons my missus doesn't have an Admin account on my home PC ... her defunct laptop used to get hit by those links. Mind you, I blame those annoying "Tap to Click" trackpads, too easy to click when you don't want to click.
Posted in Newtonian Rock shop leaks iPad prices
Newton a tablet?
I was under the impression the Newton was a PDA, not a tablet PC. However, the name did bring a couple of giggles...
Posted in Should all hard drives be encrypted?
You haven't used PKI, have you?
The "password" isn't just there for verification reasons. The harddrive key isn't stored "in the clear" at all, it is also encrypted itself using *noather* key, which is derived from the aforementioned "password". So either you guess the password, or engage on brute-force cracking the HD key. Good luck with that!
OTOH, there are those nifty solutions involving freezing the RAM sticks and dumping its contents... but that would take a determined hacker with physical access to the laptop while it is still running.
Posted in Should all hard drives be encrypted?
One password to rule them all
I wouldn't put my passwords on a standard mobile phone ... but some smartphones have a "password vault" app which securely stores your passwords. My Blackberry has such an app, and if I ever lose the thing, not only will the other user be unable to read my passwords, my backup can be easily restored unto another BB and I will be able to get my password store as well!
Oh yes, the passwords are encrypted, even when backed up. :)
The Daily WTF
I think I know what this can be used for. The now-famous TDWTF BOOL implementation:
TRUE
FALSE
FILE_NOT_FOUND
can now be represented at the register level!!!
Posted in India boasts more mobes than bogs
Squat toilet
I doubt any Indians will be using their mobes while on the toilet, given the fact that they use the "squat" variant of the toilet. They don't quite sit on them .... the position required to use those "toilets" means that losing any concentration will end up into said user going down into ... well, you get the idea.
And may God help you if you have to use one of these while suffering diarrhea!!!
innoDB
My question would be: are they planning on implementing something like InnoDB? MySQL by itself isn't very useful thanks to Monty's "we don't need no steeeeenkin' transactions" mentality, thus MyISAM lacks transactions.
If any fork wants to free intself from Oracle, it should implement a transactional engine as well. Otherwise, it will remain at the mercy of Oracle.
It was Sony
The Sixaxis claim of prior art comes from the Playstation's DualShock controller. Which would've looked even weirder in Nintendo HQ: "Hey guys, our main competitor made the thing before!"
Granted that the "Sixaxis" controller as such came with the PS3, but the concept might have been patented by Sony well in advance of the actual accelerometer being added; also you might claim that the dual analog sticks give six-axis movement capabilities.
Anyway, good for Nintendo. Troll icon, though I'd like to use a 'dead troll' one.
Posted in Steve Jobs: 'Pad? That's my word'
I predict a double whammy
With the current trend of Jobsism, I can predict that this attitude will lead to a never before seen scenario, something I'll call the "Atari/Nintendo crash". Everyone knows about the Videogame Crash of 1983/84, and how Nintendo got the gaming companies to flock en masse to the PSX. Jobs will bring BOTH things to Apple:
- Pissing off the developers over idiotic stuff will not bring any friends to Apple. If they manage to piss off the big devs (the ones doing the good apps), they will leave en masse to either the Blackberry appworld, or the growing Android platform. I wish they went to Palm, but it doesn't seem to be so appealing right now. Anyway, this would be the "Playstation" effect.
- The remaining devs will be either the Jobs fanbois, or the lazy iFart suckers that churn a lot of useless apps. These guys will saturate the AppStore such that it will reach critical mass, and people will just stop buying apps. This happened with all the Atari crap games on clearance, triggering the Crash.
Eventually, the well will go dry, and the whole "... there's an app for that!" marketing campaign will backfire, as the "selling point" will no longer be valid. Users with lapsing contracts will switch to Android or Blackberry, and the fall of the almighty iPhone will be complete.
Sadly, this seems to be the only way that Apple will ever understand that Jobs' attitude is hurting them.
