Satyam, and other remote services...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satyam_scandal
Sometimes the headline price does not represent a bargain. By being beyond arms reach, fraud becomes so much easier
1822 publicly visible posts • joined 14 Apr 2007
This is superb news. John Le Carré is without question one of the most rounded and important writers working in the world today. What he does well is to combine rip-roaring adventure stories with great character studies.
Lots of people write in the genre, but most gloss over peoples motivations. JLC's work and strength is a deep understanding of motivation (and not assuming it is James Bond/for king and country stuff - it is always VERY ambiguous and murky). And the fact it'll work its way online eventually is hugely exciting!
We do not pay to receive calls over here, so the cost of mobile delivery has to be picked up by someone. I can buy a SIM card for 99p and receive calls for free on it only paying for calls I make. As to whether the companies have paid of the capital investment or paid dividends to shareholders is down to the company involved, and some have higher termination charges than others. But seeing as just about every country but the USA users the caller pays model, I can't imagine the EU racing to change the whole charging infrastructure for European telecommunications just to suit the USA.
Scammers just love 070 redirect/ personal numbers as many services will terminate the call in any country you please, yet it gives the appearance of being a UK mobile number. They are massively popular with West African (prominently) scammers, especially th gumtree/ Craig list room for rent/ pet scammers.
So it 'popped' and exploded something into his ear. Well, ok, maybe something got a bit warm and popped, and in a remarkable twist of unluckiness maybe it pushed out a little grille bit covering the earpiece, and maybe that scratched/cut the poor bloke's ear. Certainly somewhat unfortunate, but *the phone still works* so it's clearly not a battery dying, or anything major.
This isn't about who played on what by whom, it's about a contractual breach if a material term wasn't honoured. Don't think 'ahhh poor little guy' about a games publishing company, they should still honour their agreements, they didn't, so the other party sues. Nothing to see here - just because it's music makes it no different than (say) Mickey Mouse image rights.
Lojban? A language designed to be completely unambiguous. It's the language of choice for anyone who has ever tried to write a programme in C
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lojban
It's like a programming language for communicating with others, for instance...
.oiro'o bu'onai pei
[physical pain!] [end emotion] [?]
Are you no longer in pain?
le cukta be'u cu zvati ma
that-which-is-described-as book [need!] is-at what
I need the book! Where is it?
Give it a try, you'll love it, even if you can't be arsed learning it.
Great advice I had in the past...
6P's - Proper Planning Prevents Piss-Poor Performance
Mythical phases - the business always needs to tinker with a project whilst you've got the development team committed to a particular architecture, any shifting ground will cost the project time and money, for which the PM gets it in the neck. Instead, agree with the business about how fabulous those suggestions are (soft skills), then suggest they belong in phase2 (or 3 or 4). The business feels listened to, and you don't have to spend time unpicking the bones of the system at a critical stage.
Plan your user test plans upfront in agreement with the business - if it passes those tests, it's accepted, so you don't get the project signoff held to ransom over some enhancements someone decides they want.
And the best one ever... "If you ever see the planners leaving a company - RUN!" - As the project office see both the budgets and schedules, they get first wind of trouble ahead. My ex-boss told me this the week before he quit, it turned out the MD was fraudulently massaging the books for a company sell-off, and ended up doing prison time. Luckily I'd also jumped before it hit the fan!
If you do a little looking into this class of scams, you'll see that straight greed is no longer the only attack vector. People are lured in by...
* Romance scams (falling in love is the motivation, but still ends up losing money)
* Puppy/Pet scams (wanting to get a family pet for the kids)
* Hitman scams (straightforward demanding money with menaces)
* Room for Rent scams (prove you have funds by sending a deposit to yourself by Western Union, scammer picks up the transfer before you can collect your own money)
* Work from Home scams (processing cheques, you bank them, deduct a processing fee, then send the rest on [before the fake cheques bounce] - or in a new variant, you have to pay for the timekeeping software/whatever before you can start - with an endless list)
* Fake orphanage scams (real charities websites abused by scammers to solicit donations into fake accounts)
Greed doesn't really come into any of those, not really, not like the 'son of a prince' rubbish you normally see. Before sweeping opinions, read up and educate yourself about the bigger picture, you'll have a lot more understanding and compassion for the victims.
A good resource if you're interested is the forums at 419eater.com.
Paperless meetings do not work. This is a very stupid idea. Each counsellor has to be seen to be doing something, making notes, action points, etc for the meetings. Seeing as typing on an iPad adds about a day to any short meeting, they'll make notes with pens and paper. And as opposed to trying to remember which cases those notes related to, and copying text from the screen, from week 2 people will start turning up with paper copies they printed.
How do I know this? Because before it was iPads it was notebooks, then laptops, etc - and between them they have **INCREASED** the amount of paper used in the average office. This is a criminally stupid waste of money - tell you what I'll match every pound it saves over the promised £90k if the 'techie type' who wrote the report will match every pound it wastes for charity.
My predictable comment? Well predicted! You predicted the future, I expect you used a magical and revolutionary device of some kind to do so.
Except it's not all about the iPhone4 antenna, it's also about a very public spat with Google, and another with Adobe, HTC, Motorola, etc..., where <strike>he picks bizarre fights with companies</strike> the courageous SJ speaks his mind in public. But even if it were all about the iPhone4 antenna, slinging crap at everyone else instead of saying 'whoops' looks a bit <strike>unhinged</strike> courageous and standing up for the small guy by making enemies.
Why make yourself a target on purpose? Why attempt to stir up fights you must ultimately suffer for? Companies which up until that point had just been benign competition now have an interest in damaging you. It makes it personal. It's not rational. I'm sure he's not malign, so must be a little <strike>bonkers</strike> out of touch. I haven't met and chatted with him, perhaps you have and can correct me from experience, but from the outside, looking at the evidence...I feel awful for him.
Apple's share price is high compared with their profits. Extremely high. I'm sure that'll correct itself presently. I feel awful for him.
SJ has been becoming more and more unhinged - the poor fellow is clearly unwell, and he's certainly talking like a man with little to lose. It's sad, because he did a great job rekindling a dying Apple and creating a cult around a bunch of perfectly decent yet hardly magical or revolutionary computers. Now it's just a bit like watching a slow-motion crash, and I feel awful for him, poor bugger.
As for Apple, frankly I'd be surprised if their share price doesn't lose 30% at least when we do finally lose SJ, he is the cult, he is the brand.
I've not seen this with phishing kits, but seeing as the massmailer php scripts leaked out to spammers often contain a line or so of mysterious base64, which you can decode to find the page phoning home with a big old list of email addresses to add to the script supplier's own private spam lists, I'm far from shocked.