Posts by steogede397 posts • joined Wednesday 28th November 2007 16:52 GMT
>> as P.J.O'Rourke succinctly put, "to punish success and reward failure"
That would be true if those earning £20,000 paid 10% tax (take home £18,000), £50,000 65% (£17,500) and £100,000 83% (£17,000). That would punish success and reward failure - if earning £20,000 PA were considered failure.
Any scheme where the percentage of tax increases and the amount take home still increases is more akin to 'lessening the harm of failure by reducing the rewards of success'.
Where I take issue with it is, if everyone were to pay a fixed amount (i.e. cost of public expenditure divided by number of public) then someone on minimum wage would probably come home broke after working 70 hours a week at minimum wage. Okay, perhaps I'm plucking exaggerated figures from the air... but the point stands that I reckon companies can only get away with paying only minimum wage because they are subsidised by the tax system.
> his own money at a very risky and uncertain time
A whole 1,000USD of it - he probably drinks that much in a single night now
> a business which now employs 1000+ people and will continue to employ more into the future
Not to mention all the people gainfully employed due to the inefficiency created by other people using FB at work
"It seems impossible these days to mention smoking without some smug arse having to chip in about the healthiness of the activity."
One day you will give up smoking and become that smug arse.
>> ... at least once every 3 months for the past 4+ years
Given the transfer rate of Bluetooth I'd be surprised if you could manage to transfer more than one file every 3 months.
>> ... at least once every 3 months for the past 4+ years
With the transfer rate of Bluetooth I'd be surprised if you could manage to transfer more than one file every 3 months.
>> 30% is absurd.
It's a lot more generous than a bricks and mortar would be with their suppliers. You should see the charges that Tesco demands from their suppliers for the privilege of letting them use Tesco shelf space - and that's before you start talking profit margin.
I have a Panasonic BluRay player with VieraCast and thought I might look into writing an app. for it, they want £x00's/year before they will let you even use the SDK.
> AppGoo
I prefer Goople, but yours is more descriptive.
>> Come on, you do all realise that Google don't actually do any mapping? That they buy the maps? You do, right?
I just wish TeleAtlas or Google bought their maps from OS
Do they seriously expect us to trust their sums? This is the same agency who spent most of last year issuing corrections for tax miscalculated over a five year period. Until I see evidence to the contrary, I'm inclined to believe they made an error in their favour.
>> they taste like camels arses.
Camel's Arses? Why would Camel come up with an unflattering product name?
Wasn't one of the big features of Win 7 the tiling and placement features? What makes more sense than getting rid of all that and calling it new and improved?
>> That means that you don't get concrete, shit, dirt, diesel, whatever on your shiny shiny phone screen and make it unusable.
Yeah, because buttons work so well when caked in the aformentioned. Surely better to wash your hands/take your gloves of and ring them back.
Yes it is.
>> and lets face it, these guys aren't soldering the components, it's fitting together parts into the ipad casing. so you can probably build 10, 20, 30 a day? once you get used to it, I think 20 a day should be easy. so that's quite a good wage then, by comparison.
I would be very surprised if they are assembling a complete iPad. They will be perhaps 1 of (say) 25 cogs in a wheel. Assuming all 25 cogs are the same size, 20 a day would mean repeating their task 500. Sounds reasonable. $160/day seems like a reasonable wage.
The only way to come to this figure is to make a lot of assumptions - as many others have pointed out, the article is lacking on details. But even without the efficiencies of a production line, I reckon I could build 20 iPads/day if I were doing it day in day out (and I'm a stubby fingered westerner). It would be one every 30 minutes on a ten hour shift.
Ofcourse when they say $8 per iPad per worker does that equal take home pay per assembly worker? Or are there overheads which need to be paid out of that $8 first e.g. power costs, admin/support/cleaning staff, robot maintenance... - so, tell us how much per hour the assembly workers are getting, and maybe then we can comment on it.
>>The Recording Industry Association of America and other music industry groups are backing a proposal for a highly regulated ".music" top-level domain.
The crux of the problem with the RIAA and their partners is that they think they own all music. Why don't they register .air and .water whilst they are at it. As others have already said, .riaa or .mafiaa would be much more fitting.
For a 1TB 2.5" externable HDD, you'll be lucky. You may get the 512MB version if you are lucky.
>> if their software runs on Windows or Mac-operated-by-attractive-blonde.
Since Apple jumped ship to Intel, many Macs operated by attractive blondes have been running Windows.
Something that the naysayers don't seem to have considered, is that for all they know this laptop might have been running Vista.
BTW, regarding "deadly weapons" - he could have put it in the bath tub and that would still have been a potentially deadly weapon (only takes an inch and a half).
What difference does it make that he used a gun? If he had used a hammer, would that be a reason for some people not owning hammers? What if he had sold it on eBay? What if he had confiscated it and stored it in a safe?
If you think what he did was wrong (and I'm haven't made my mind up) - surely that is more of a reason why some people should not be allowed to 'own' children.
>> not because of his nationality but the clothes he was wearing, heavy coat in summer
Yes, so much better, because he was wearing a heavy coat in "summer" in the UK.
>> Perhaps you could tell us all when an incident occurred prior to that, there hasn't been one since.
You mean there hasn't been one since yet. We won't count Mark Duggan, because he might not have been entirely innocent.
>> One of the biggest complaints neophytes have with command line interfaces is they are NOT very discoverable
A neophyte discovers a command by typing in what they think it might be called or what they want to do - so long as the command is sensible named and they show it in its context (i.e. the breadcrumb/hierarchy) I should be easy to find, find as you type goes a long way to helping with this. Failing that, I am sure the menu will be there for those who need it.
Presently a neo-phyte, thinks what they want to do, then they think about what heading it might be under and what the command might be called, then they search for it. "HUD" allows them to do the same thing, except it searches for them.
"HUD" reflects the way that I already use my web browser (vimperator/penta-dactyl), search engine, and the unity desktop search. I have been wanting to be able to do this with desktop applications for years. There is nothing more annoying than know what you want to do, having a good idea what the command might be called and not being able to find it without searching for ages.
The details of this man's previous conviction (18 months previous) for GBH on his partner, who was then raped by his accomplice, were published in the local paper (probably along with his photo). It is in the public domain, you can't expect jurors to be unaware. She shouldn't have researched him (and she claims she didn't, directly) and she shouldn't have told the other juror's what she found - but could the judge have really have been so niave as to presume that non of the jurors were aware of his previous (quite high profile, in the locality) conviction.
I think that the principal of not making jurors aware of previous convictions is a sound one ,they should be judge solely on the evidence related to the case at hand - though if the defence attempt to bring in character witnesses, then past convictions should be (IMHO) revealed.
Finally, if they don't want jurors to be influenced by past convictions, why are the papers allowed to print the details of convictions and (concluded) trials? Now that this case has been published nationally, can either of them ever be tried fairly again?
>> What needs to be stressed is that Tieto's DR processes were dreadfully inadequate and obviously untested for the eventuality of such a failure. Lawsuits over data loss and business interruptions at Tieto's affected customers are bound to follow. ®
I suspect that they are probably better at writing disclaimers than they are at developing DR plans.
>> Unlikely. She died during post-production of the last Star Trek film...
Would that be an obstacle for the almighty Google?
>> my handy lump hammer here will do a great job of cracking open a nut... I'd need to keep replacing the dining room table after each nut...
A lump hammer (used with a chopping board) can be quite a careful tool for cracking nuts. A better analogy might be a pneumatic drill/jackhammer.
He's teaching computing not English. You might be forgiven for expecting impeccable English from all teachers whose first language is English. When the teacher has already stated that he(?) is based in the Netherlands and English probably isn't his first language, it seems a little unreasonable.
That said, most people who learn English outside of the English speaking world seem to get a better education in the language.
She's insured her breasts against any injury/malfunction which prevents her from working? Isn't that a bit like insuring your car tyres, incase you have a tyre related problem which causes you to have an accident or prevents you from getting to work?
Wouldn't it make sense to have a more rounded policy that offered broader protection incase of lose of earnings? Surely an injury to her leg or back etc. would result in the same loss of earning. Or do her breasts require an additional coverage because they aren't original equipment?
>> it's considered "not on" to be looking at titties on chargeable time.
But it's okay to read nonsense redtop websites (no offence to El Reg) on chargeable time, because no-one will notice?
Shirley this is just a twist on the brick on the laptop bag scam - i.e. meet someone in a pub (or other busy place) selling a laptop. Takes the laptop out, shows it working, puts it back in the bag, switches for a phony in a matching bag and hands over the phony.
Nice twist putting the apple sticker on it though. Now the story is famous (published on a few geek sites, at least), she should sell it on e-bay. Better idea, I'll download a picture of a hot 24yo, get a chopping board and apple sticker and sell 'it' on e-bay myself.
Perhaps he was doing 35MPH on the motorway.
>> Apple is missing the killer design feature that would attract even more discerning consumers. I'm amazed they haven't added a mirror finish to it!
There's an app. for that.
Next your going to tell me that people who live longer spend an even more staggering amount on booze.
BTW I wonder if the £58,000 figure takes into account tax rises and inflation. I haven't done the maths, but; I wouldn't be surprised if you extrapolated the rising costs of fuel, a tank of diesel would probably work out about that much in my life time (if there is any left when I die). ** okay, done some rough maths and I reckon I'd have to reach 125 - which given the rate of increase in life expectancy, might not be to unrealistic
With regard to free traffic updates on TomTom, afaik TomTom only offers free traffic updates for Traffic Message Channel (TMC) traffic updates. These aren't provided by TomTom (or the highways agency), they are broadcast free over the air on FM radio and I believe that people who make develop TMC compatible devices pay a royalty fee which largely pays for the service.
Other forms of traffic updates on TomTom (e.g. via a bluetooth connected mobile) are charged on a subscription basis AFAIK. I am pretty sure that TomTom are not the only sat. nav. provider that uses TMC, I don't know if any of the smart phone sat. nav. apps provide TMC, but I imagine it would require FM support and head phones (antenna) plugged in.
I am quite surprised that this is not allowed - it must challenge the speed limit for the most broken rule/law. My telly even has a feature to level the volume of ad breaks, but it doesn't work very well. Besides which many adverts are too annoying at any volume level (e.g. anything to do with insurance or loan sharks or cash for gold or banking or no win no fee). I will always reach for the mute button if I am watching live TV.
The worst thing is that the channels with the most adverts (i.e. subscription channels) tend to be the ones which get the lowest percentage of their income from adverts. I suspect the only reason they show adverts it to stretch the programming out and save costs (rather than actively make money).
>> no the basic fact is that women make less claims and cost insurance companies less money because , basicly, they dont drive like knobheads
Do all men drive like knobheads or is it that most knobheads are men? If it is the former then charging men more isn't unfairly discriminatory, however if it is the latter, then the vast majority of men are being penalised because they happen to be of the same gender as most knobheads - which is unfairly discriminatory. Unless insurance companies publish their figures and statistics, we will never know - of course they won't (unless they are forced to).
Personally I think there is a strong argument for charging everyone the same for car insurance - perhaps using monitoring to charge more for driving more and/or at risky times of day, and drivers of more expensive cars more to cover the greater expense of repairs. The only other fair option I can see, would be for insurers to open their books and prove that they aren't being unfairly discriminatory.
The EUR400 TV is the cheapest, but still full price. The EUR500 with 10% off is cheaper but still more expensive.
The full price one might be the cheaper of the two, but only the discounted one is cheaper (than it was) - the full price one is by definition no cheaper*.
* just to play Devil's advocate (or should that be accountant)
Indeed, the worst thing about spreadsheets is that people use them for functions much better served by databases - i.e. "handling shed loads of data". Copying the data to a spreadsheet and then processing there is the equivalent of printing a 'table' of data from a spreadsheet, cutting and pasting it (with glue and scissors) to sort it, then getting a calculator out to do the sums.
>> Had never watched pron? At her age? Nah, don't believe it.
If you had heard the documentary, you might change your mind. Her level of ignorance is staggering, though hardly surprising if you saw what a waste of space she was as Home Secretary (she is clearly ignorant of many (most?) things).
There is a point where she says that one of the things which surprised her most was the amount of material that was available for free, and therefore without enforcible age restrictions. That was the part where I realised that she was as ignorant as she making out - I bet she was really kicking herself about her husband's charges to her expense account. In case you have forgotten; he watched porn, the tax payer paid, she got into trouble and it all (except the first bit) could have been avoided if he had just used the web to do what it does best.
>> Didn't see the documentary, but might have to watch it so I can see what the fuss is about.
That sounds like an impressive radio you have got there (okay to be fair the article didn't mention it was on radio).
>> Why post a vid that predisposes everyone to hate you as you make them watch your wasted attempts to get it to play the correct song?! It's not like you have to call in George Lucas - just crop the first half out!
Heck, she could have just primed the dog before turning the camera on, it's not like the order ever changes on these toys.
>> given how much safer by design cars are today over 10 years ago, the roughly static RTA figures would indicate that the standard of driving is getting worse
Not really, much of the 'safer by design' you speak of is only safer for the occupants of the car. Most RTA fatalities are not occupants of cars (they are pedestrians, cyclists, motorcyclists). Also don't forget that the roads are getting busier, so a static figure is actually a reduction.
>> Every time china bans something from the west, the west should ban something from china.
I nominate... the iPhone.
>> It is irrelevant whether the thief has a gun.
You beat me to it. While I'm here, I should point out that many of the toy guns that reg. readers would have owned when they were a child, would now probably be considered a realistic imitation firearm and possession in a public place would probably land you in a great deal of trouble (for possession of a firearm). Infact even the ones which weren't realistic would probably still be considered imitation firearms.
>> I really think that in order to be "mislead" by those ads you would have you would have to be so brain dead that you would have difficulty walking and breathing at the same time, let alone have any idea what a pc was.
Sounds like the perfect description of the average PC World Customer (or staffer for that matter). Perhaps that is what PC stands for, *P*C World *C*ustomer
Microsoft implied that recording telly on on your PC is a new feature only possible with Windows 7. Only 8 people complained, but I bet more than 8 idiots went out and bought Windows 7 because they wanted to record telly. The other 999,992 idiots are still trying to install Windows 7 or work out why they can't record record telly with TV tuner or work out why their DVD Player won't read the DVD.
BTW, with regard to the point someone made about TV licenses and buying a TV card, when you buy any hardware capable of receiving broadcast television, the supplier is required to pass on your details - however you aren't (AFAIK) required to give the correct details to the retailer (or even any details).
Also BTW, if you buy a telly at Tesco and use a clubcard, they won't ask you for your address, they'll take it from their database.
>> Jim Totten... said... 600 person-years (from the article)
Give them a break, they are only reporting what the person said.
>> Remember "Man" is a generic term including both sexes "Male" and "Female". Just like we use "Ovine" or "Porcine" to describe Sheep or Pigs in general.
Do you? I just use "pigs" or "sheep", if I am referring to a particular sex I might use "sow" or "boar" or "ewe" or "ram".
106 down, 599,894 to go (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10457352).
£850,000 / 106 * 600,000 = £4.8bn, i suppose that is reasonable value for money.
>> The mac is more than capable of running GTA4 style. Assuming there is a rough parity between the processing power required for the PC version.
Don't you mean the MS-Windows version? The Mac is capable of running GTA4 already, you just need to install MS-Windows. Porting these games to the iPad or iPhone4 (anyone seen Unreal Citadel) or Android for that matter, makes some sense. Not sure why they would bother porting to MacOS X
Boot from the SD? Why not just use virtual machine, no need to reboot the main operating system.
> and imagine instead that he's looking for smut: it's almost amusing.
Isn't that the point of the advert?
I.e. a the minds of all the husbands watching suddenly get transfixed thinking of pron, and the wives' get transfixed thinking of presents.
