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* Posts by Mr C

149 publicly visible posts • joined 14 Nov 2007

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IBM committed 'ethical transgressions' to win botched project

Mr C

In some countries this is business as usual

I'm glad this has been found out and now hopefully some justice will be delivered to those responsible.

Regrettably this happens all the time in this country, i used to work in circles and i got to see alot of tenders being custom-designed to specific software so that only 1 company could ever be awarded the project.

Or, there was money to be spend made and persons high up decided to distribute the wealth between themselves, and getting a system that was neither needed nor ever useful the method for spending and siphoning off money.

I can name many more examples of how companies, big and small, were just the instrument of someone else's agenda and its a fine line to walk, because if you don't take the project someone else will.

I would call any company that rejects a project on moral or ethical grounds incredibly remarkable and worthy of special mention.

I just wish that this world was more perfect so that examples like these would not happen but alas, i fear that in my lifetime it will stay as it is.

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Upgraded 3D printed rifle shoots 14 times before breaking

Mr C

whats the point?

I don't get why the author is so rejecting claims of "good" 3D printed guns.

It may be a hoax or it might not, it is irrelevant at this point.

What matters is that the cat is out of the bag, if they can't make it work this week they will find a way to make it work next week.

Instead of wasting energy in rejecting claims made by the creator of the printed gun it would be much wiser to find a way of handling what is going to be a reality, eventually.

Find the root of the problem and cure that instead of trying to cure the symptoms.

Restricting guns in a gun-happy country which allows guns to begin with is what i would call 'the root'

Try and remove people's desires of owning a gun and you might have a good start.

As long as you can't manage that having printed guns or no will not make any difference in the long run

Good luck with that.

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Cyber jihad as Indonesia and Bangladesh hack each other off the web

Mr C
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Re: Ahh

>Trouble is, most of what they are hacking are simply small businesses trying to make a living.

This ^^

I'm just tired to see how innocents get caught in the crossfire.

I guess everyone fights with the tools they have, i would just hope their aim and their judgement was a little bit better.

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AMD's newest chip: Another step toward 'transformation'

Mr C

AMD vs Intel

I've always had a soft-spot for these guys, a remnant from the days when they went head-to-head with Intel after IBM bowed out of the 80386 chip-race and they were the only ones left opposing Intels world domination.

Good thing they didn't back down either or this would be a Intel world now, which means higher prices and slower development due to lack of healthy competition.

Don't really care what they're up to these days (and developments a going too fast for me to follow) but i wish them all the best in whatever they're doing because Intel is still top dog and they're still hot on their trail :)

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Texas students hijack superyacht with GPS-spoofing luggage

Mr C
Joke

android 4.3 will solve your problems.

it allows for location based on WiFi hotspots, without actually connecting to them.

Now then, all we need is to cover the ocean with buoys with WiFi hotspots on them and presto, ships with a Android OS know where they are and everyone has WiFi coverage..

win-win, you can't go wrong with this one :P

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'First' 3D-printed rifle's barrel splits after single shot

Mr C
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Re: Firearm Detected!

"It didn't hear it fall"

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Mr C

obviously no-one would buy a 3D printer for their kid if it could print guns

Hence the gun-detection-technology.

Obvious marketing ploy that will not fool many i suspect.

Without an actual human judging whats printed, and remembering a list of previously printed parts, there is no way to make the software smart enough to keep it from printing anything that can be used as a gun.

The best they can come up with is a dumb checking algorithm like a blacklist of given file-names/CRC/Meta-data or other such simple checks.

It will keep illiterates from printing, but anyone who is really determined will find a way regardless.

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Boffins flip optics to make booster-free superfast fibre

Mr C
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Re: Don't bother with the committee votes...

.."Why hasn't anyone else seen this before .. it's blindingly obvious"..

It's always those why-didn't-i-think-of-that moments that make you slap your forehead.

Yeah, i've had a few of those myself.

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Divers nearly DEVOURED by HUNGRY SEA BEASTS

Mr C

Whale 1: Hey look, some puny humans are chasing us

Whale 2: Lets go have some fun

In the meanwhile in a different universe, the puny human filming this manages 4 mil. youtube views in just 2 weeks.

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Planetary paparazzi snap candid pics of Earth, Moon from space

Mr C
Alien

In space no-one can hear you scream

I have it from a reliable source that aliens also snap mobile phone pics when they do a flyby during their summer holiday.

Shuuurely if we ask nicely the NSA will share some nice pics they got from interstellar alien snooping?

Srsly, awesome accomplishment :)

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Mobe SIM crypto hijack threatens millions: Here's HOW IT WORKS

Mr C

The food you eat

Another day another secret revealed.

Don't tell me no-one knew of this. I don't buy it.

Engineers for mobile companies would know of this as it would be another trick in their book.

I have a hunch if you dig deep enough you'd find memo's written by engineers about this specific vulnerability that no-one bothered to follow up on, or it was simply swept under the rug along with more of these types of holes.

When they are discovered public opinion forces big companies to act on them, while saying "see how good i am for protecting you" - gotta love em

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SIM crypto cracked by a single text, mobes stuffed with spyware

Mr C
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Re: Like I said a million times.

Right.

i can not get over how there's people that don't have a problem with this.

Imagine having a government dude sitting in your bedroom listening and watching all that you do there in the name of wider security, some perceived threat, because, hey, if you have nothing to hide you don't have to worry about anything right?

But if you refuse to allow them in then you're hiding something.

Don't there have to be limits to what is allowed? Where do you draw the line?

Some seem to think that allowing the government to snoop on bytes that you produce is okay, well i don't agree with them.

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Rap for rap chap in crap rap app flap: Jay-Z blasted by privacy bods

Mr C

Tried drinking 10 shots and saying it 10x real fast

Rapper chap rapped in crap rap app flap

Rapper chap crap rap app flap

chap rapped in rap app flap

in crap rap app flap

crap crap crap crap crap

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Unmasked: Euro ISPs raided in downloads strangle probe

Mr C

Tiered internet?

Can't help but think this is the beginning of tiered internet?

The US was busy trying to make it legal some time ago, i don't recall how (if) that ended, while over here it's illegal and they managed to catch some ISPs doing it anyways.

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US Navy robot stealth fighter in first unmanned carrier landings

Mr C

The tech going into making this work is amazing.

I know a few things about robotics, sensors, and more stuff thats needed and they achieved something extraordinary.

Question is if this technology will be used for the greater good or if its kept back for a tactical advantage, if its the latter i pity the wasted creative hours spend by engineers which could've been put to good use elsewhere.

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MSX: The Japanese are coming! The Japanese are coming!

Mr C
Happy

Memories are made of this

MSX was my 1st computer and while other kids where playing games i was making little basic programs.

Everything i discovered i did on my own, just experimenting. No books, nothing.

Just alot of friends with similar interest and huge phonebills from calling each other for hours and talking about new stuff we found out.

I must've taken my machine over to friends houses countless times in what was then the predecessors of lan parties, except that there was no lan or any other kind of networking. Just sitting next to each other doing cool stuff.

And then i grew up, had a family, and now think back with nostalgia to those years which, if i could them all over again, i would.

The smiley can't begin to convey the host of emotions i feel every time if think of those years.

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Chinese 'nauts return to Earth after vigorous space coupling

Mr C
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Re: You came in that thing?

She may not look like much, but she's got it where it counts, kid. I've made a lot of special modifications myself.

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A backdoor into Skype for the Feds? You're joking...

Mr C
Black Helicopters

In the name of the big and bad terrorism threat, where each and every foreign state is perceived as potential (future) threat, all is permitted.

Everyone opposing this is not very patriotic and must therefore be a terrorist.

Its a case of 'if you're not with us, you're against us', simple really.

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You want to put 3D gun designs on the web? You'll need a 2D printer

Mr C

ironic is my middle name

It's a bit ironic considering that we're talking about a country that's doing everything it can to sell as many guns as possible to its citizens, while at the same time trying to keep em from overflowing over the borders.

nice reporting, i enjoyed reading it.

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Lego quad-copter: your ultimate drone nightmare

Mr C

does the lego actually contribute to something?

Besides looking cool and being the platform that holds it all together, do they actually do anything lego-specific? Did they use any cogs, weels, axles, anything that warranted using lego?

I know their previous model was based on mindstorms and had some cogwheels in it - dunno about this one though, if not then they could've used something lighter and stronger like metal or plastics as platform.

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Nvidia admits forums hacked, user data swiped

Mr C

hashed and salted

im curious to see if these hashed and salted pwd's will find their way on the web.

it should give good protection and give the hackers a run for their money to figure them out ;

it *is* bad that it took nvidia a week to notify ppl about it though..

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LinkedIn dials 911 on password mega-leak hackers

Mr C
Flame

we still dont know if they actually fixed the leak

Well, it doesn't say anywhere that they actually found the leak and plugged it, meaning that the infiltrator(s) might still have access to their DB.

So, until they get around to finally salting those hashes it might be prudent to give the LinkedIn site a different password than you would give all other sites you frequent.

Just saying this because *Obviously* all of you slackers too laze to make up a different password for each site, have now changed your passwords everywhere :P

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Flying Dutchman creates dead cat quadcopter

Mr C
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@Stoneshop: Re: his own cat? is that even legal?

Ok, so maybe its not illegal and it may not be a endangered species, but i can think of better ways of honoring your cat than turning it into a freakshow.

I mean, really, do you have to descecrate the poor animal by tying it to a flyingmachine under the pretext that it can now continue to hunt birds?? really??

If i ever catch my son doing that to our cat (either dead or alive) i would 1st think up of a suitable punishment, then sit down and think hard where i went wrong in educating him and making him care and respect any loved household pet.

6 3
Mr C
Unhappy

his own cat? is that even legal?

Ofc this is a 'real' dead cat (if we are to believe him), but still, am i the only one finding this lacking of taste..?

12 3

UPS death in Pulsant data centre knocks out websites

Mr C

UPS for the UPS?

maybe they should get a UPS for the UPS?

Oxymoron indeed

Why does this remind me of customers who do faithful nightly backups of their data, without actually having tried if the restore procedure works?

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How to keep your money safe if the euro implodes

Mr C
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Unhappy

Re: Making a drachma out of a crisis

".... sees Greece turn (back) into a third world country in the space of a week - possibly followed by the traditional Coup d'Etat, ..."

I live in greece, and i am one of the few who actually see this sad scenario becoming reality.

Greeks have the tendency to stick their head in the sand and *wish* for the best. Wishing isn't worth squad, obviously, but try telling my fellow countrymen that.

Even now when we're at the brink ppl are still thinking its all doomsay from politicians to win votes by putting fear in our hearts, and as such dont put much stock in it...

Too bad really that this time these same politicians are *not* lying for once, but this is the classic tale of the boy who cried wolf. No-one believes them or takes them serious anymore.

Me thinks now is not such a bad time to get my papers in order for me and my family to get out of this country while we still can

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Yahoo! leaks! private! key! in! Axis! Chrome! debut!

Mr C
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Thumb Up

hahaha wouldn't that be a neat trick :D

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Mr C
Facepalm

uh-oh.. bad career move

i wouldn't want to be standing in the shoes of the developer that forgot to take out that key :P

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Vodafone's cash mountain rocked by eurozone emergency

Mr C
WTF?

aren't they the ones funneling money ?

wasn't Vodaphone one fo those companies thats funneling money out of 'poor' countries into rich ones?

and still problems? wow..

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SpaceX Dragon, first private ship to the ISS, launched successfully

Mr C
Thumb Up

Good going guys! If this works out then it'll be a great step forward for the private space industry.

The IIS accepting a privatly build spacecraft will open the door to competition which in turn will spurn a whole range of new possibilities not least of which would be cheaper prices and technological advances.

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Behind the lens of NASA's self-adapting ISS space telescope

Mr C
Paris Hilton

sophisticated..

"When a NASA engineer describes a computer as "high performance" or flight software as "sophisticated", you know they mean it."

my mother thinks operating a VCR is sophisticated.. i guess its all in the eye of the beholder :P

Paris, because she thinks anyone rubbing his goatee and making 'hmmm' sounds while contemplating what position to choose is sophisticated too

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Boffins crack on with ultimate roboass

Mr C
WTF?

whats the use?

I honestly can not think of a single *useful* application for this invention.

Besides making something that ppl would like to post on their facebook page to have fun with, i'm wondering what the use is.

The team behind this obviously have talents in a wide variety of fields, couldn't they spend their time,money, brainpower and effort doing more useful research?

..sigh..

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Boffins baking big-data single chip architecture

Mr C
Thumb Up

This has 'revolutionary' written all over it.

I wish the team doing the research well, and i enjoy seeing research done by other teams being shared and re-used for the greater good.

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ARM creators Sophie Wilson and Steve Furber

Mr C
Thumb Up

Nice informative article.

If this article had anything resembling a "like" button, i'd press it now.

GJ

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Twelve... classic 1980s 8-bit micros

Mr C
Unhappy

what, MSX isnt good enough for ya?

I expected this one in the list - i grew up with a few of these.

Z80 processor, so well in line with all those that *did* get a mention, though i can't say i know all of those.

It was a huge success in most of europe, japan and even brazil.

There's still a steady fangroup which actually managed to make a 'msx-on-a-chip' board.

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Hacking contest offers $10,000 for iPhone exploit

Mr C
Paris Hilton

smart hackers stay away anyway

There are 2 types of hackers, the good ones and the wannabe's.

Good hackers are those who are not bragging and surely not giving away their secrets.

Its those who can get in, pwn the system as if it was their own, leave without a trace, and most importantly, are not bragging or telling anyone about it.

They are most valuable int his contest but wont show up.

And rest assured that they are the ones with the best chances at winning if they wanted to.

Paris because she too will stay away from this contest

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HP breaks Japanese excessive packaging record

Mr C
Paris Hilton

i want to be their trucking company

i lolled at this

at least some trucking company will be happy at how many trucks per day they need to ship their items

Paris, because she too is wrapped in an impressive looking package

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North Korea photoshops stroke from Kim Jong Il

Mr C

why not use a lookalike?

i dont know why they couldnt get a lookalike and put him there

surely a much easier, cheaper and less risky move than this bungling

hmm.. i'll stop giving them ideas now

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Group Test: electronic book readers

Mr C
Thumb Up

happy with my prs505

I have had a prs505 for almost a year now

on average i read 3 hours daily

I read all kinds of formats on it, most books are in PDF, others are other formats, but they all show absolutely fine (with latest firmware)

My reader has seen all corners of the world, night or day, inside or outside, hot and cold, even at the beach 3 feet from the water with kids running about - its very sturdy and reliable.

The battery doesn't seem to be suffering at all.

I love how it takes 2 cards, so thats a combined grand total of 16Gb of storagespace.

On occasions I've actually used my player as storage device as well, imagine that.

I have nothing but good things to say about it.

Unfortunately i had to get my player from the US, it took them WAAAAY to long to release them in the UK, and not in the rest of europe for that matter.

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School to hand out e-textbooks

Mr C
Thumb Up

eBook readers are perfect here

This is the time for an eBook reader. God i wish i was a student at that school right now.

This is what i expected (and certainly hoped) would happen

finally getting rid of those heavy, big, clunky and wood-consuming books.

Its a lot better for everybody.

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S'kiddies light-up LHC website

Mr C
Flame

why is this even possible?

Me and my dumb brain would expect that one the most advanced and modern facilities playing with black holes to be completely isolated from the internet.

Am i wrong?

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Sony e-book reader to debut in UK tomorrow

Mr C
Thumb Up

RE: Only for XP & Vista users

"Sony's FAQ state explicitly that it only supports XP & Vista, so tough luck for users of Mac-OS, Linux, Windows 2000, 98 and the rest of us refuseniks."

Not exactly. Sony's software works only on Vista and XP

The eBook itself shows up a mass-storage device. Even in Win2K and i know because i'm working Win2K

More precisely, it shows up as 3 mass storage devices, (yes thats right, 3 more drive letters) - one for the internal ~300mb memory, one for the SD card and one for the MemoryStick

Also, there's opensource software out there thats as good as sony's and WILL work on Win2K

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Sikorsky announces first flight of 'X2' triplex supercopter

Mr C
Paris Hilton

Lewis, still here?

Hi Lewis, im pleasantly surprised to see you still posting stories.

Does that mean you're sticking around with El'Reg ?

Paris, because she too is all over the place

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Kindle fails to set light to unsold e-book pile

Mr C
Thumb Up

future

i think these little books will be huge in the future.

granted, the amazon one is immensely ugly, i wouldnt wanted to be seen dead with it.

I have the Sony one and am very very pleased with it.

i honestly tried reading ebooks (or articles) on big laptops, small laptops, even my mobile phone but for me its just not working. My eyes hurt from LCD screens, and if there's too much daylight i squint, or batteries run out too fast.

Cant read from a screen at my desk because my neck hurts from looking forward, the list goes on.

I like paper books, but i feel bad for the trees which need to be killed for it.

Also, they're bulky and heavy.

I think if these books were given more attention in mainstream media that they would catch on faster. The technology is amazing. You wouldnt believe the surprised looks i get on the subway from people who've never seen an eBook reader never mind could image something like that existed. Most people get enthusiastic and ask me where to get one.

I think its a missed opportunity sofar.

As for the DRM issue - if you dont like it, dont buy it. Or go get free books as they're plentiful. There's no way you can get me to believe that DRM is the cause of the bad selling, most ppl simply dont give a hoot.

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Amazon Kindle set to go massive

Mr C
Thumb Up

i love ebooks

FOR ALL THOSE COMPLAINING about eye-strain problems - have you ever seen one of these ebooks in real life? Its not your average mobile phone/PDS/Laptop LCD display!

Im reading a good 3 hours per day on my Sony eBook and have yet to experience the slightest hint of eye-strain

FOR ALL THOSE COMPLAINING that they cant read books electronically - i was one of these people until i got my eBook - you really forget that its not a paper book you're holding. Try it. really.

FOR ALL THOSE COMPLAINING that you cant take it with you to a beach - think again, i just had it at the beach and relaxed wonderfully in the shade reading a good novel while having a nice coctail and one of em umbrella in it.

FOR ALL THOSE COMPLAINING that you cant share books - well, you can mail them to your friends if they're free - there's plenty of very well known free books out there.

FOR ALL THOSE COMPLAINING about battery life - its not your average mobile device/laptop - Fully charging my sony takes 2 hours, and i can read about 2 months @ 3 hours per day on a single charge

I heard nobody mention that you save a LOT of tree's with eBooks.

Get rid of your prejudice and go and see one in the flesh - im convinced they will be the future

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Scientists warn on climatic 'tipping points'

Mr C

dont make me laugh

i've been in the US and what strikes me is when talking to most US residents they seem to think that there's nothing wrong with the climate and that its all a natural phenomenon.

On the other side of the world (EU) people are genuinely afraid.

I know i'm afraid - not for myself but for my kids and their kids.

i really believe scientists are doing a good job with the data at hand.

We've never been in this predicament before so i can understand the sceptiscism about not knowing how to accurately read & interpret the signs available to us.

BUT i really hope that Bush gets his head out of his ass and stops thinking about the economy (not ratifying the Kyoto protocol because "its bad for the economy" , or "lets undo the ban that Clinton put in place against building a road right through 43 milion acres of national forest") and instead starts thinking about the future of his little corner of the world

There's just no changing the mind of US ppl, for each argument you have they have 2 more against it.

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Will Microsoft parachute Windows 7 in early?

Mr C

cant unbloat Vista now

as the title says - MS cant unbloat Vista now because ppl would accuse them of either bad programming or intentional bloating.

And so, they're forced to creating something 'new' and call it "innocative" and "reprogrammed from the ground up"

i'm betting it'll be running a whole lot smoother with less memory requirements than todays vista

If vista wasnt so bloated it would probably have been somewhat of a success story since XP is old and ppl really do want new stuff once in a while.

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World of Warcraft spykit gets encrypted

Mr C

why not include Warden into WoW ?

i appreciate that Blizzard is trying to make WoW a better place for honest players.

I do not appreciate that its doing this by scanning a pc and sending back information.

But why did all this controversy happen in the first place?

Its because they used a separate process "the warden" to do the scanning-and-sending back.

Who knows what happens inside of the client-side WoW game itself? What does that send back?

Would we be having this conversation if the warden was integrated within the game?

Then nobody would know what it would be doing and what info it was sending back, now would we?

Makes you wonder who else is doing stuff like that that we don't know about

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Dutch teen swipes furniture from virtual hotel

Mr C

moderators??

i've said this before in other similar articles,

dont these games have admins / moderators?

how about copy & pasting the lost "property" back and banning the offender.

i think the police have enough to do without busying themselves on silly cases like these

and imagine having "virtual theft" being added to your official police record - now thats just silly isn't it??

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