I'm slipping....

Can't see a problem with this - even looks like a good idea. (Better re-read & consider at length).

Until of course, knowing the efficiency of Obersturmbahfuhrer Smith's department, the shennanigans start when someone's on the list despite still being highly alive......

Doubtless they will then be despatched, in order to make Jackboot Jacqui look better...

Gummint

A resurrection of Wat Tyler or Jack Cade would be timely...

Strange...

I'm no fan of Microsoft, and I'm not a gamer - but I can't see why Redmond is taking flak over this.

Tilting a console whilst it's running can scratch disks?

Then don't bloody well tilt it!

Why on Earth should anyone want to do so whilst it's running?

Or is this (and the class action) proof that the stereotypical gamer is, indeed, of limited intellectual capacity?

@Alan

The only surprising thing about all of this is that anyone at all is surprised by it.

Alan old son, your idea:-

a) Is practical

b) Is simple

c) Costs nothing to implement

d) Is basic common sense

e) Would have an exceedingly positive effect.

so it MUST be obvious that the powers-that-be would never go for it.

@Mark

"a quantum physical information wave " means it's saying "All your monies are belong to us".

All I can say to it is a word not entirely unlike "Bollards".

Gummint

And some cretin at the MOD will get a knighthood for this..........

Pity his father didn't have one - and use it!

@EvilGav

Succinctly put, old lad:- definitely with you there 100%.

However, as the cretins-in-charge will almost certainly have not ordered enough ammo, might one suggest that the "against the wall" scenario be replaced with the old traditional "rope & a lamppost" operation?

Oh yeah?

And did the survey continue to say that those 55% also believed in the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus?

Or were they prevented from answering further questions by their warders calling them in for their medication?

I resent the implied slur on my intelligence from the Home Office in suggesting that I would give credence to ANY of their statistics.

Any takers?

I bet the seller was a member of Wacky Jacqui's Heimat Abteilung on sabbatical or secondment.....

Old habits die hard....

Mine's the one with Wacky's autobiography - "My Struggle" - in the pocket.

Less is more

I would give more credence to a shortened statement - "Jacqui Smith denies any knowledge".

That would have a certain irrefutability.

What's really scary..

is that JS (Could be Jacqui Smith - could equally be Josef Stalin) will continue to grant ever increasing powers to her tame Chekists & Apparatchiks and yet there will STILL be an astonishing number of seemingly intelligent people - excluding the obvious culprits, such as recipients (public sector/claimants etc.) of the state's munificence with our money - who will continue to vote for them on the misguided grounds that "Labour stands for the working man, innit?".

It doesn't, and hasn't since the late 1920's, when the upper middle class "intellectual socialists" subtly hijacked the party - viewed by some as harmless dilletantes, but in fact as hardline, repressive and authoritarian as any bolshevik.

The image of avuncular socialism has been fostered by keeping on board the occasional genuine prole - usually dim but controllable - who has been pure window dressing, and generally kept as ineffectual as possible. Previous Deputy Prime Minister strike any chords?

They have utter contempt for the genuine working class, where family ties were traditionally strong, and this self-proclaimed "intelligentsia" hates & despises the family unit, believing it to be a bourgeois tradition, diluting the first loyalty which they believe is due to the state and to the party.

The assaults on our liberties are a multi-pronged attack to eliminate the old-fashioned ideas of individuality, (ref: OWNLIFE, 1984) and the (by now) quaintly naive idea that a government exists to serve its electorate. In NuLab's Britain, this idea has of course, been turned around 180 degrees.

And yet they'll STILL get an overwhelming majority in so many benighted constituencies.

Since they have taken "1984" as a training manual/instruction book, perhaps at least they will be honest in one area, and return to Mr Orwell (real name Blair - there's irony) for their next election slogan:-

"If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - forever."

George Orwell

Quelle Surprise.....

A NuLab politician telling porkies? There's a novelty......

@Lee

Congratulations, old son. The concise erudite way in which your comment is expressed earns my utmost admiration.

Upon the assumption that your grasp of computing is as great as your grasp of the English language, I have decided just how much consideration your comment merits.

@Mark

Actually, you can link together as many Macs as you have under Appletalk with the standard OS on each. That's never been a problem.

A commercial class server is a different matter - and even the Windows version of that ain't gonna run on standard Vista.

Can't see your point - unless you are confused.....

Philosophers make poor businessmen

as is shown by all the posts saying what a monopoly Apple could have if they opened up OSX to run on any old generic rubbish.

Vista Ultimate costs megabucks. The only (Ultimate) version of OSX costs £84.00 a pop, and doesn't require all the validation, activation etc., which drives so many Windows users to despair.

If Apple tried to continue their computer business based solely on selling £84 boxes of OS, how long would they last, and how much could they invest in R & D?

I'm amazed that some of the commenters are allowed without their Mommy - or at least a carer...

why not?

As an experienced Mac user for over 18 years, I run ClamXAV on my own G5 Tower at home, and on the one at work. I have so many Windows-produced files (Word, Excel, Powerpoint to name but a few) emailed to me on my work email PC - sometimes I forward them home to work on, but the results arew generally emailed to others. I run ClamXAV which has picked up a couple of Windows nasties, and I don't therefore forward the fruits of the ungodly to unsuspecting users.

It's only good manners & polite consideration.

@ Steve Browne

Sir, you are a man after my own heart - with whose discourse I heartily concur.

No doubt you (and I) might miss the forthcoming festivities as we could very well be "going away (involuntarily) for Christmas" to assist Whacqui's little helpers with their enquiries...

Back in 42 days...

@Ray Hartman

As an Englishman, I concur heartily, old son. Never has the need been greater.

More "Neues Arbeites Partei" bollox

They claim "The police are politically neutral...". Would that be why Ian Blair had "Vote Labour" stickers plastered over Met Police vehicle(s) to please his namesake?

Boris was 100% right to get rid of him. I hope he's replaced with an honest-to-goodness old fashioned copper, preferably one who's earned his spurs by rising through the ranks with experience of real coppering, instead of some quasi-social engineer, fast-tracked because he got a "pass" degree in sociology, and who turns out to be as useful as a handbrake on a canoe.

In other words, one who isn't afraid to disregard orders/suggestions from Brown & Smith, and enforce the law as passed by Parliament.

He must not be yet another politically-correct botty-licker for Brown & Smith.

I really cannot understand how those repressive, authoritarian bastards can have any support outside their "bought" client voters (public sector employees & state benefit receivers).

It's been a long time since we had a revolt in England.......

Too long, perhaps?

I'm getting my coat because I'm going out now, and I may be gone for some time.....

(42 days?)

@Mods

Your footnote says "Free Paper - A Practical Guide To Disaster Recovery Planning"

Could I ask if the Disaster refers to MS, MPs or both?

More of the bleedin' obvious.....

Here in the UK, we have a Human Rights Act pushed through by Cherie Blair.

We have no democracy - it's curtailment pushed through by Cherie Blair's consort.

Obviously the two don't co-exist...

@Red Bren & AC (and Karl H)

Not exactly a paradox:- just an example of the inequitable and iniquitous but deliberate machinations of our revered rulers.

Would that it were possible to forcibly and effectively remind them that they have been elected as our employees to administer our country, and not as latter-day feudal lords.

Short of explosions (controlled or otherwise), barricades in the streets and AKs all round, I cannot think of any pragmatic way of achieving this.

Karl H, I also extend my forgiveness to you, but you must promise to never ever do it again. I suppose when you were bombarded with warblings of "Things can only get better" you didn't realise they meant for them, and not for us.

As for things developing into a fairer and better system for us proles, I believe there's a greater likelihood of seeing Ian Paisley celebrating mass in St Peters Basilica.

@AC

So....

Unless you're a mechanic, no Driving Licence.....

Unless you're a TV engineer, no telly/TV licence

Unless you're a pilot and aeronautics engineer, no charter flight holidays.....

Do I need to continue?

All is clear, now......

"Microsoft's live.com system has for some time been supporting an illegal drug sales operation, and Microsoft has known this."

Could this explain the behaviour shown on the multitude of "Monkey Boy" videos on the web?

I'd get my coat, but it's under surveillance...

Fine by me.

I'm more than a bit hacked off with spammers pushing dubious super willy aids, mucky films, etc. Some of the subject lines are not just explicit, but crudely so - and it must be mortifying for people who have a "family" email address, to have this garbage appear where children can be exposed to it.

I'm no prude - I'm 58 & grew up (as much as I ever did) in the 60's so I've probably BTDTGTTS and am fairly unshockable.

I just don't like 5-12 yr olds being exposed to this dross.

Fine these ungodly spamming wretches huge amounts, bankrupt them and totally dispossess them - and if the authorities find they have even one undeclared cent - 50 years in the slammer.

@Kebabster

You must give me the name of your English tutor:- it has long been my ambition to be able to express myself as eloquently as you.

Silly glitch

Apple are renowned for "leading the pack". So when they drop a bollock, it's inevitably going to be a pack-leader of a dropped bollock.

Yes, I'm a Mac fan, but this descendant testis should certainly have been foreseen and strangled prior to release.

@Michael Ortman

"....greedy two bit lawyers..."

That's tautology, old son.

It's a dangerous drift.....

The frightening thing is the number of professions for which BNP membership is forbidden, upon pain of dismissal.

Why?

The BNP is NOT a proscribed organisation, and until it is, prohibiting membership seems suspiciously like censorship of free speech/freedom of thought, and such prohibition is probably a breach of Mrs Blair's beloved Human Rights Act.

There are teachers, lecturers who are activists within the SWP - a group renowned for their less-than-law-abiding demo's and desire to violently change our society. Yet they are neither censured nor censored.

There is Islam, whose preachers we hear daily calling for death & destruction of the infidel and western society - yet we (or at least, our "enlightened" rulers) positively bend over backwards to accommodate them - and we had the recent unsavoury episode where a muslim member of the Metropolitan Police refused to obey orders to guard the Israeli embassy because of his politico-religious beliefs - and he was indulged!

Please do not misunderstand this comment - I am neither a BNP supporter or a member, but I find the insidious manner of action against what is a legal political organisation is both perturbing and dangerous.

This has to be viewed in the context that the "enlightened rulers" do NOT specifically discourage membership of proscribed organisations, and many organisations which are not proscribed, but surely should be due to their overt advocacy of violence and intolerance.

However, intolerance and insidious underhand methods seem to have become de rigeur for the authorities since 1997.

Gotta ask

75mm.....

Radius, diameter, circumference or depth?

Whatever next?

Common sense from a judge?

That's something I never expected to see in MY lifetime.......

@s Cheap OS

MacOS does NOT have to be licensed once a year!!!

There is NOT an upgrade annually which is chargeable.

Vista Ultimate £230.00 (PC World - 2 mins ago)

Mac OSX 10.5 £85.00 (Computer Warehouse - 1.75 mins ago)

That makes Vista 2.7 times more expensive than Leopard.

Vista (over 5 years) works out at £46 pa.

Even if you pay full price for MacOS 10.6 in three years that comes to £28.34 pa.

When I went to school (in pre-calculator days) £28.34 was less than £46.00.

Although I accept that after 10 yrs of Brownian maths now continued by his Darling, and the same period of "Truth a la Campbell" - this premise may no longer be true.

The c@ s@ on the M@ (Bryant)

1) So why buy a Cube & immediately try to rebuild it? If you did so, without checking/researching then you bought the wrong machine for the wrong reasons. You might have made yourself a sucker, but your failings aren't everyone's - and neither are they Apple's responsibility. My old G4 had a 1.5GHz CPU upgrade, I changed the PSU to support a Radeon9800 Pro, I added a USB 2 card, I added a SIIG SATA card, replaced the CD with a Pioneer 109 D/L DVD-RW and it STILL works well even today. Good God, Man, whatever are you complaining about?

2) Longevity? We're STILL using 8yr old G4s usefully here at work (OS 10.4.11, Xpress 7) - but no PCs are kept beyond 4 yrs - and even then they aren't a lot of use.

@AC

I admire you Sir for both your perspicacity and for putting principles ahead of a bribe.

Good man.

@Eddie Edwards

But not at the same time, I bet!

Just a thought

As those who "can't wait to get an ID card" are no doubt, in a comfortable little room (padded of course), and have nice-but-big "carers" in white suits, will there be any point to this trial as they don't usually get out much?

Unless of course, the wacqui witch of the west has such delightful accommodation in mind for all of us...

Yeah, right!

Isn't "We have plenty of additional cool features we are going to keep up our sleeves a little longer." Microsoft-speak for either "We haven't got a clue how to make it work" or "We've seen it in someone else's product, but haven't yet managed to steal it or bully it from them"?

@Shakje

Well, good for you.

Remember though, there are many enthusiasts who enjoy building their own cars - from kits, or basic components producing hybrids etc. They will NEVER be mainstream motorists.

The same principles apply to computers.

I have (after reaching the end of the road with my much-modified 1999 G4) just "moved up" to a 3-yr old G5 (courtesy of eBay) which runs all the Adobe CS3 quite happily. Although I don't play games - never saw the appeal, really - I don't castigate those who do.

Also there are those who will construct their own FrankenPC, and install MacOS 10.5 thereon. I know it, & Apple know it - but because it's only going to be the odd techie enthusiast here & there, it's never going to be mainstream or commercial, so who cares?

You have to admit that at £80 a pop, for the all-singing version of MacOS, it beats the hell out of Vista's multiple options & expensive price structure.

I like Macs, & wouldn't use anything else - but I accept others have a right to differ, and I don't resort to personal abuse.

PS

I happy to use my Motorola KRZR (free with my Orange contract). It does what I need (calls, texts, alarms). I do like the iPhone, but I'm happy with Orange, and have no need of the twiddly bits and beyond an initial playing period, I doubt I'd use them. When I renew my contract, I'll get something nice but which above all else, comes free with contract

Cameras are of little interest in a phone - I have two Nikon F4s bodies, an F801 and an F50 - I still prefer Fujichrome above all else, and bought a Nikon LS50 film scanner a couple of years ago. I have a small Olympus digi-compact, but give me reversal film for quality any time.

I accept you & others might not agree with me, but that's your prerogative: the last thing we need is a whole regiment of Webster Phreakies** spitting bile everywhere.

**One Webster is an amusing diversion, two would be tiresome, and three would just be akin to a ruptured haemorrhoid

Paris? She stays free & easy.....(well, maybe not free...)

@Cretins!

In the meantime, if you are the recipient of phishing emails, or unsolicited offers to supply stolen credit card details, kiddieporn pictures or any of a plethora of nasties, just try contacting your local Plod, or even London Plod concerning this & they haven't a clue.

Funnily enough, as these things tend to be international, passing the matter on to the FBI DOES produce an apparent result.

The EU is little more that a refuge for (unelected) failures-in-just-about-everything-they've-tried.

A pox on them and a plague on their houses!

@Matt Bryant

Love the way you call me "Mactard" - if ever proof were needed that personal abuse is the last resort of those with no coherent or valid argument, then you Sir, personify that proof.

When, in the early 1980's, IBM introduced their desktop machine - with the Chaplin advertising campaign, IBM's System 36 mini-computer was one of the most widely found small & medium business computers. Very few companies had any form of IT professional, and it was (too) often the bean-counter - or very occasionally, someone with a nascent interest in early hobby machines who became the specifier.

It was virtually axiomatic in those days that "no-one ever got fired for buying IBM", the IBM PC became ubiquitous, first as an executive toy/status symbol.

Other systems with an O/S from Digital Research, or Convergent Technology, inter alia, slowly died the death of a thousand cuts.

IBM thought they had DOS (bought in from Gates - who'd bought it in from elsewhere) exclusively but as history shows, they were wrong - and with the immediate advent of cheap (and sometimes very nasty) IBM "compatibles", the presence of DOS machines began to trickle down to the hoi-polloi.

With their ever-increasing presence, early developers concentrated their efforts on what was the largest market for simple economic reasons which should be apparent to even you.

The subsequent omnipresence of PCs is based in the 1980's mini/mainframe wars and has absolutely nothing to do with the relative merits or demerits of any particular platform. I would also remind you that greater numbers do not necessarily denote superiority - cockroaches outnumber humans by many thousands or even millions to 1.

Apple were never "out-competed" by Microsoft who never offered hardware:- It was the old adage quoted earlier, plus cheaper offerings from Compaq, Toshiba and many others who offered cheap machines.

That, and Gates' willingness to license DOS to any manufacturer/assembler is what gave rise to the PC dominance which was continued up to the present day by Microsoft's (alleged) dirty and illegal business practices, and their (alleged) theft of software from others, if they thought it could be valuable.

As someone who lived through those times as a software engineer for Burroughs, I do have an inkling of what I'm talking about - and yes, I have upgraded the Graphics card in a cube - which I agree was overpriced. But the cube was discontinued in July 2001 - over seven years ago!

I have found that the G3, G4, G5 and now MacPro towers are unbeatable for working upon, but if you really wish to continue with your "I'm so clever that I can use cheap generic" boasts, please remember that very few BMW, Lexus or Jaguar owners have been converted by owners of the admittedly much cheaper Yugo cars.

@AC 01:28

Sir,

A MacPro is no more expensive (and frequently cheaper) than a similarly-configured PC. It also has superb build quality, consistency of components (Dells vary in their content according to whatever's cheapest during the day/week of construction), reliability and a solid secure OS which is produced by the manufacturer of the hardware, so they're effectively symbiotic.

You however, are championing (with sophistry) items which are frequently cheap, inconsistent, shoddy, unstable and unreliable.

Could it be it's like attracting like?

Paris, so you can have an example of an IQ to which you can only evidently aspire.

Timely reminder

My contract's due for renewal:- time to ditch EDGE & go for 3G, methinks.

ANYTHING to generally obstruct, irritate, confuse & annoy our jailers...

Cue Webster.....

<rant><gibber><dribble>...............

@AC the first:- A correction

"It's none of their business, innocent people do not have to answer to the police."

Oh dear. Where have you been for the last 11.5 years?

That was certainly true in those halcyon days of freedom (before Summer 1997), but since then, the current Gestapo Reichsfuhrer Whacky Jacqui has decided there are NO innocent people - there are convicts and those whose crimes** have yet to be uncovered.....

**"Crimes" involve:-

wheelie-bin offences of a non-sexual nature,

dissent (shortly to be a capital offence),

owning/using a mobile phone, computer etc., without letting the stalwart guardians of our precious freedoms sweep it at least once a day,

and

any other thing which she/it deems or will deem to be un-NuLab....

Just as the SA were Adolf's little enforcers, we now have Plod as the enforcers for Whacky Jacqui & Clown Brown...

@bmucknock

"Seriously."

Unfortunately it is, otherwise it would be a laughing matter

"Where is your right of free speech."

Rapidly vanishing, under the diktat of Die Neues Arbeites Partei

"Where is your right of living anonymous."

See answer above

"Where the hell did you put all the books by your most famous author, George Orwell..."

They appear to have been used as training manuals for political apparatchiks and Volkspolizei

Doubleplusungood!

Must be wrong

This simply cannot be true: after all, Ed "Talking" Balls has assured us that educational standards have risen exponentially and inexorably ever since NuLab took charge of education in this country.

I simply cannot believe that a government minister could be so wrong; and to suggest that they are sophists, or deliberately telling us untruths is blatantly an act of treason.

To be expected

Most governments accept that they have a responsibility to their own citizens: Except Blair, whose whole approach was to drop his pants & bend over for Bush - because he had his/Cherie's eye on post-premiership income in true socialist manner.

To their shame, the rest of the NuLab zombies have continued with this supine approach, with the rest of us being utterly expendable in the interests of them maintaining their own position at the trough.

Paris, 'cos she knows what it's like to be shafted...

@Spam etc.,

And when the little b'stards get out after ten years - or those who survive until their release date - they should be condemned to forever use only the version of Windows that was current at the time of their incarceration.

Deterrent, or what?

Paris, 'cos... - well, just 'cos.

Good news...

"...cutting any features that aren't working and that might mutate into delays..."

That'll mean that what's left will fit on a floppy or two, then...

Oh the irony of it

when we Brits are being told "Ve gif ze orders" by Obergruppenfuhrer Smith, that a German court curbs the state and protects freedom & privacy.

If Churchill were alive today, he'd be spinning in his grave.....

Unlike NuLab who are spinning just about everywhere...