Posts by Matt Hawkins

Dead or alive you are coming with me ...

Robocop was the best thing that ever happened to Detroit.

If they built a Robocop statue people might actually want to visit the place to see it.

The Cloud

"I know cloud based computing and devices are very trendy and are more than possible for static devices but IMO its useless for a mobile device"

Completely disagree. Mobile devices are the reason to jump to cloud services.

The advantage with cloud services is that you store 1 set of data in 1 place.

It doesn't matter if 3G is patchy. At least I only have to maintain my Google calendar in one place and I can view it on multiple devices. Same with contacts. It can sync whenever it can.

If 3G is unavailable you are in no worse situation than having a calendar stored on your phone ... and another one on your pc ... and another one on your laptop ... and another one on your work PC etc. All of which you have to maintain separately.

Ha Ha

If he is any good at IT a 2.2 shouldn't make any difference.

Most people in IT where I work don't have degrees in any IT field.

If you've got it, you've got it. This guy clearly hasn't got anything other than a large bill and lots of egg on his face.

Exactly what "equipment" did he want to take into lectures? All you should need is a brain, some eyes, some paper and a writing implement.

Quote?

James May likened a Mexican sports car to "a lazy, feckless and flatulent oaf with a mustache, leaning against a fence asleep, looking at a cactus with a blanket with a hole in the middle on as a coat".

I think it was Hamster who actually mentioned "a blanket with a hole in the middle on as a coat" rather than James May.

Experts Exchange

Not sure why people don't like Experts Exchange. Just scroll to the bottom for the solution to your problem. Ignore the rubbish in-between. It's not difficult.

People Are Too Stupid

I like the idea of swapping batteries ... however, there are plenty of people who are too stupid to select the correct fuel type for their current cars. I wouldn't fancy their chances with mechanically swapping a battery.

As for cost ... EV cars are never going to be cheap to run. The British people have proved they are happy with a certain level of motoring cost. The Government isn't going to forget that. If the actual cost of motoring drops, tax will compensate.

It isn't going to get any cheaper. Unless you buy a bike.

No Paranoia

"Raw British cynicism at its best! Someone calls to say you've won a prize; we immediately assume that it's a con"

That's because 99.9999999% of the time it is a con. That isn't being paranoid it's just common sense.

I win prizes all the time. Cars, holidays etc I give the caller 3 seconds before hanging up on them.

If Apple want to give someone a credit on iTunes why don't they just credit their account and send them a letter? Why make it difficult?

Men

Even out of Government Labour are still trying to build a national DNA database of everyone by the back door. Obviously we are all potential criminals.

Except women.

Clearly this MP knows who the murderer is because she only wants to DNA test men.

Women never commit crime. Ever. They never murder people. Get in fights. Or molest children. So no need to consider anyone but men. Men, Men, Men.

She either has an irrational hatred of men or isn't getting enough (votes)

Twitter is public you muppet

Twitter is a US site so anyone using it thinking that their information is private is an idiot. Any information held by a US company is available to the US Government whenever they feel like looking at it.

But then MPs aren't exactly the brightest people on the planet when it comes to technology.

Any info you pump into Twitter is public domain. If you are trying to exchange private information via Twitter you are a moron.

She is surprised that the US Government doesn't respect her status as an MP of the Icelandic Parliament. Of course they don't! Doesn't she realise US law applies to the whole planet! The US Government probably doesn't even know Iceland exists.

Obvious

Its fairly obvious he was murdered before he could blow the lid on the secret of the dead birds in the US and Sweden.

Or he might have committed suicide after hearing about the Royal Wedding one too many times.

Paid for doesn't mean better

"Say what you like but I know through personal experience of a number of people who have decided against developing versions of their applications for Android because horror of horrors they want to be able to make return on their investment."

Not going to be quite so easy when Android handsets out number the iPhone.

If you are any good at writing apps you can sell on Market Place just as well as on the App Store.

Some developers might be put off but no-one cares. There are plenty of good developers who will be developing for Android. I haven't bought any Android apps because the free ones are so good. Clearly that isn't the case for iPhone because iPhone developers appear to be raking it in.

The handset adoption rates speak for themselves.

Recycling electronics sucks

A working PC is easy to donate to charity ... except charities won't accept PCs that are "too old". By "too old" they mean 2 to 3 years. Sorry but I don't replace my entire, working PC every 2 years.

If you've got an old PC with a broken motherboard you've not got much choice but throw it in the bin. or that bag of old ISA/PCI cards and misc pcbs.

Our local waste centre recycles "electrical items with a 3 pin plug" but anything else they aren't interested in. The old computer speakers I placed in the "electrical items" bin got removed and thrown in the general rubbish.

I thought the council was bound by the WEEE regulations but obviously not. Rather than drive my stuff to the tip only for it to be thrown in land fill I just chuck it in the wheelie bin and save myself the petrol.

Justice

Completely agree with "thecakeis(not)alie"

Standback and watch this criminal get a tiny punishment on a completely different scale to someone who downloaded a few songs from eDonkey. If they spent £500K of stolen money the fine should be a minimum of £500K before they even think about a punishment. Thats the same as downloading a few crap songs according to the RIAA.

But then punishments rarely fit the crime. The people with the money decide.

These days downloading a few songs is more of a crime than actually robbing somene in the street at knife point.

Love the recent news that the UK music industry lost £1 billion due to downloads. Because we all know a download equates to a lost sale. Numpties.

FAX

"Is there an alternative which equals or betters fax machines for each of those three points?"

Yes its called email.

It's quick - fill in (online!) order form,

All you need is the email address - no usernames or passwords

Confirmation - it says "sent" whether it was sent or not

Windoze Phone

Still puzzled why anyone would buy a Microsoft phone when they could have an Android device.

ADSL?

ADSL 2? Wow. He's really pushing the boat out.

I'm glad I've got something even Alan Sugar hasn't.

Cable.

Book Industry

If you are an author why would you involve a publisher or agent? Why not just type the words and sell an eBook via an online retailer?

Why pay huge chunks of the book price to a bunch of suited freeloaders?

Seems the book industry is as outdated as the music industry. Full of useless middlemen who generate their own work by what amounts to price fixing. In the old days you needed them to shift your product ... now you can sell to the World from the comfort of your own house.

Won't be long before the book industry will be moaning about piracy killing authors blah blah blah

Police Powers

"But the second trilogy balances that out by the spectacle of Jar-Jar Binks giving the seminal speech that convinces the Senate to introduce police powers"

To be fair this is the most realistic bit in the film.

A flimsy argument by someone the whole planet hates, resulting in draconian police powers being enforced on the civilian population.

Happened in at least two countries I can think of !

Fiat?

"Wonder how many of their blueprints where on the laptop and now in the hands of Ford.

And Fiat etc. (i mean Fiat blueprints also on the seized laptop)"

You would have to be mental to want Fiat blueprints! It would be like stealing details of the rust proofing system on an Austin Metro.

iTitle

1 in 4 ? Doubt it. But then the Government is well practised at making up stats.

I got one of these calls on Saturday. The guy was clearly in a foreign call centre and could barely pronounce my surname.

I hung up on him as he broke my 5 second rule. That is, when you ring me up you've 5 seconds to explain why I want to talk to you. After 4.9 seconds he had only managed to explain that he had noticed my PC was "running slow". He said some other stuff but I couldn't understand what he said.

Obviously after the event you always think of funny stuff you could have said. I hope he rings back!

Email? I thought that was dead?

Facebook-fanboys keep telling me Facebook has replaced email.

So why is Facebook creating its own email system? Sort of looks like Facebook hasn't replaced email after all !

Android

No one has mentioned Android.

Android = iPhone + working clock + working antenna

Oh come on. Someone had to!

Train

So we can look forward to this data ending up on a train or a land fill site when the drives were "lost" on their way to the shredder.

Yawn

Wax cylinders are killing music!

Audio tapes are killing music!

VHS is killing movies!

CD-R is killing music!

DVD-R is killing movies!

Meanwhile the music and movie industry are earning more than ever. Not bad considering they have to compete for your money with lots of other activities.

Predicting their own demise because of new technology is, well, predictable. New technology earns them more money year after year. Once the old timers have died the industry might hopefully be run by some people with a bit of common sense.

They will never be happy until they can simply tax people at source. You dreamed you were at a concert? Well you need to pay up. You whistled a tune in the shower? You're a copyright terrorist and should be fined! Your toddler danced to an MTV video? You owe someone £20.

Why oh why?

Anyone still using IE deserves everything they get.

Don't they learn?

Firefox Mobile Bloatware v4

As a Firefox user/fan I went to install this yesterday as I liked the idea of sharing bookmarks with my phone and desktop.

It wanted 32Mb of storage space. 32Mb !!! WTF?

The Portable version on my desktop is only 20Mb. How the hell can you take something that's 20Mb, create a "mobile" version of it and end up with 32Mb?

As Gary F said, when it's under 10Mb let me know and I'll give it a try.

OpenOffice or LibreOffice?

I currently use OpenOffice at home. I could use MS Office 2010 which I can get for £8 through work ... but why waste £8? OpenOffice does everything I need without that irritating ribbon.

I'm waiting to see who releases the best version. I don't care less about their management structure. For 99.9% of users the proof is in the pudding. Performance and features matter not Foundations and focus groups.

Libre or Open I don't care. Just create the best product and I will download that.

Waste of money

So this cable-free system still requires you to plug something into your phone? In some cases a large lump of plastic that I presume you have to lug around with you just to save the 2 seconds it takes to charge in the old fashion way.

Why wouldn't I just save £90 and plug, for the sake of argument, a phone charger into my phone?

With new phones/devices using micro-USB you are going to be spoilt for choice for normal charging points in any house/office within 12 months.

On Dragons Den this product would get chewed and spat out. It identifies a problem and fails to solve it without much change from £100 vs £5 for a normal charger.

Mobile Linux?

"Give it another few years and Android will be replaced by a mobile Linux version"

@Michelle Knight, yeah just like Linux has replaced all other desktop operating systems. As predicted every year, year after year. Only it hasn't.

I haven't got a problem with Linux it's just my time is too valuable these days to spend it at a command prompt trying to install anything ... a mobile version of Linux would just be irritating.

1001 Ways To Hold Your iPhone

How are you meant to hold an iPhone these days? I keep losing track. There must be a special Apple "grip" placing specific fingers on specific parts of the phone.

Luckily my HTC Desire lets me hold it however I like. It just sort of ... well ... works!

Some times I even swap hands during a call.

Jump To LibreOffice?

At the moment I'm running OpenOffice 3.2. I won't download LibreOffice until it is better than OO.

The race is on ...

Easy Solution

We shouldn't import anything that is made by workers who are denied basic rights.

Problem solved. Any company that doesn't meet those standards doesn't get to ship goods to the west.

Unfortunately the powers that be don't really give a stuff about people so would never consider this idea. Instead they will waffle on about "free markets" etc etc while lining their own pockets and the pockets of their rich industry friends.

Con-Lab-Lib-Others : They often talk-the-talk but rarely walk-the-walk.

Open Source?

"Social networks already provide an extensive open source intelligence gathering tool"

Since when is Facebook "open source"? I suspect the person who wrote that knows nothing about technology and is just using some words he found on the internet.

CCTV Is Not Good

"I hate to say this as a staunch Civil Libertarian but I feel frankly put, there have been so many crimes, murders, rapes, major serious crimes solved by CCTV in pubic areas that we should leave it be"

Take the total cost of CCTV and divide by number of crimes solved by it.

Now spend the money on real policing and see how many crimes you solve with that.

I think you will find CCTV is a huge, over-hyped waste of money. Of course CCTV solves *some* crimes but the vast majority of cameras don't solve jack shit.

Mobile Ban Nonsense

All we need now is for Petrol stations to get rid of those stupid no-mobile-phone signs.

ICO - Toothless not even ruthless.

I wouldn't bother with the Information Commissioner's Office if I was them.

By their own admission the Information Commissioner's Office doesn't do anything other than help the offender not make the same mistake in the future.

They do not prosecute. Even if the law has been broken.

They are toothless and should be on the list of useless Government organisations to be scrapped.