Posts by Michael

@ AC 12:00

>>>Because there isn't enough land mass to grow the crops required to make all the cooking oil and alcohol required to run all the cars currently on the roads.

Oh, and I suppose there IS enough coal, oil, etc. to generate enough electricity to recharge all the cars currently on the roads, then?

He's not referring to the efficiency of the fuel. The point he's making is that to use an electric car doesn't eliminate pollution at all - it merely shifts where the pollution is made, from your tailpipe, to the smokestack.

@ AC 09:50

>>>I think you seem to have blurred the lines between "marketing" and other forms of product promotion. Having a logo of your company on the product is not marketing. Having a snappy brand name is not marketing. Having funky packaging is not marketing, nor is describing your products marketing. It's cutting it close, but having bilboard adverts and tv adverts or even internet adverts are not really marketing. If you simply put your product out there and draw attention to it, that's not marketing.

How about I draw YOUR attention to the definition of Marketing:

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/marketing

-the total of activities involved in the transfer of goods from the producer or seller to the consumer or buyer, including advertising, shipping, storing, and selling.

-the commercial processes involved in promoting and selling and distributing a product or service

-The activities of a company associated with buying and selling a product or service. It includes advertising, selling and delivering products to people. People who work in marketing departments of companies try to get the attention of target audiences by using slogans, packaging design, celebrity endorsements and general media exposure. The four 'Ps' of marketing are product, place, price and promotion.

>>>Cold calling, spam, and any other technique that puts pressure on people to buy whatever tat your flogging IS marketing, and that's what's evil.

All advertising puts some amount of pressure on a person to purchase a product. Otherwise it wouldn't work. And if it didn't work, people wouldn't do it. So regardless of whether the pressure is to keep up with the Jones', or whether it's to not drive a 30 year old car, the pressure is there to some degree with all product promotion.

>>>Taking a substandard product

This is an opinion, so I'll ignore it as a valid argument.

>>>that people in their right mind wouldn't chose over the competition and then hiring naive graduates who think your cold calling company is a genuine way to make £££'s

Again, people wouldn't do it if it wasn't profitable. Assuming the consumer is not misled in an unlawful way, irrespective of your opinion on the subject, this method of making money is in fact "genuine".

>>>and getting them to pressure you into buying said substandard product is what people have a problem with and want stopped, not companies promoting their products in a respectable way.

What people want has no bearing on whether or not a given marketing channel is a valid one, and doing something someone else doesn't like certianly doesn't make a person "evil". Besides, clearly there are enough people that don't mind this methodology, because they buy often enough to make it worthwhile.

>>>Marketing people have no respect for privacy, your free will, or anything beyond trying to get their next bonus,

While you claim my definition of Marketing is too broad, yours is far too narrow. You seem to be taking issue with people who call you out of the blue and try to convince you to buy a product. Marketing is so much bigger than that, I find it almost humorous how much you're generalizing.

>>>and that's what people want stopped, not *All* product promotion.

Here's the quote driving my comment: "By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself..." I'll draw your attention to the term "anyone". Any means all.

Or this one: "Actually, extradition to Guantanamo just for having a career in marketing seems reasonable to me." While I observe the tongue being firmly in cheek on the Gitmo part, the underying opinion is still valid, that marketing people are bad. And frankly, that's just tosh, and anyone who actually knows what marketing is knows that. It's only uninformed wankers, who dislike a particular form of marketing that think marketing is bad.

>>>[personal story]

Sounds to me like you were in cold calling. So again, you don't like one form of marketing and generalize that (by means of your crap definition of marketing) to mean all marketing is bad. Bollocks.

>>>Never trust ANYONE who gets paid by percentage!

I expect you to never purchase a home or car. I expect you to never go to a sit down restaurant. I could go on, but really, your penchant for generalization to the point of hilarity just makes me...well...laugh. Taking one thing you don't like, then using a horrible (not to mention flat out wrong) definition to say that all things in that category are bad, is just poor argumentation. I don't like telemarketers myself, but I'm not naive enough to extrapolate that out into saying all marketing is bad.

If you genuinely think that logos, brand names and flashy descriptions aren't marketing, then clearly, you need to go back to that school you attended. Or maybe...a better one??

@ Kevin McMurtie

>>>Must no threshold be met before a recording can be protected under copyright as a work of art?

Technically, you possess the copyright to a work the moment you create it. If you record yourself singing some made up tune, you possess the copyright to that recording, whether you do anything with it or not.

What's funny, though, is that not a whole lot is going to happen. It's pretty tough to prove damages when the infringed work isn't purchasable (particularly when it's not even evident that the work will EVER be released).

Oracle... PULL!! ...... *bang*

>>>And the database just isn't that good.

No, it really isn't. You have to do so much work to it (in painfully non-intuitive interfaces) to even get it to a usable place, it's just not worth the effort. For all but the most demanding of massive enterprises, SQL Server works just bloody lovely.

Wait a minute...

So let me get this right...

It's ok for Apple to require that you use their hardware if you're going to use their software.

But it's NOT ok for Microsoft to bundle IE with Windows.

Got it.

What a steaming pile...

RE: Annexing

Differences between the US's action in Iraq and Russia's action in Georgia:

-Georgia is a democracy, Iraq was a dictatorship.

-Iraq gassed the Kurds (hence we know they had WMD - so either they used them all up, they hid them really well, or they offloaded them to someone else). The people claiming Georgia was ethnically cleansing S.O. and Abkhazia are the Russians.

-Iraq has a functioning government and the US intends to remove itself (over time). S.O. and Abkhazia do not really have functioning governments, and it's a safe bet Russia intends to absorb them, rather than make their their own country a la Kosovo.

I don't know how many times I need to say this before people pull their heads out of their collective asses. Even if the US Government knew there were no WMD in Iraq, that doesn't change that there was more than enough reason to go in there. Not being told the REAL reason doesn't mean that no valid reason exists. The fact is that Saddam Hussein was a genocidal whack job that retained power through fear and force. WMDs or not, the US action in Iraq was justified.

@ Steven Swenson

>>>If Linux is such crap, why can't it catch viruses?

It's not that Linux can't get STD's, it's that it's not having any sex.

No one wants to write a virus whose target is so miniscule.

Well, yes

While it's true that if you have physical access to a machine, you can break into it, there's an important clause missing: "given enough time". It takes time to break into a password protected motorola Q, or palm treo. And/or specific equipment to hack it quickly. The problem with the iPhone is it does not take any specialized knowledge or equipment, and doesn't take much time. Less than two seconds with a device and you're in? Try that with other smartphones.

Saying that "physical access of course means the device will be compromised" does jack diddly squat to mitigate the fact that this is a painfully easy iPhone hack. I venture to say if this were a windows problem, the mac fanboys would be all over it like white on rice... Let's not be hypocritical now...

@ AC 12:11

That'd be "demand outstrips supply", not the other way around.

If supply outstrips demand, then there is energy surplus.

When demand outstrips supply, the need arises to either increase supply (expand) or decrease demand (throttle).

If you're going to try to sound smart, at least put some effort in...

@ Adam Foxton

>>>...These fibres would then be aimed so that the emergent laser light was concentrated on a single spot...

"That blast came from the Death Star! That thing's operational!"

@ cor

"Ehuum, does sea-level vary outside the british isles?"

Technically, yes. The sea level of the Pacific is about 20cm higher than the Atlantic.

@ Pierre

Unless the starting player makes a mistake. Strictly speaking, it's impossible to win tic-tac-toe at all unless a player makes a mistake.

@ AC 21:56 and FInnibar

People vote by what they use (just like how you vote for your favorite soda brand by purchasing it). It's pure semantic jockeying to say that something isn't he most popular, it's only the most used. In most every circle, most used defines most popular. The most popular album on the Billboard top 100 is the one that sells the most.

And the reason something is the most used is not relevant to whether or not it is the most popular. If there's one candidate in an election, that candidate wins, and was the most popular. The fact that people don't realize they can write someone else's name in doesn't mean anything. Ignorance is not an excuse, they still voted the way they did. Obviously, most people don't dislike IE enough to go see if there are any alternatives, so your argument is more or less moot.

@ Ian Bonham

>>>TBH, the USA can't throw stones, because of the disgusting way the ppl of New Orleans have been treated.

You're right, it's absolutely disgusting that the federal government dumped millions of tax dollars into a city that is below sea level next to the ocean, just to cover for the people that didn't have flood insurance.

Yup, it's completely disgusting.

The people of New Orleans should have packed up and moved to higher ground - ground that was kept dry by nature, rather than by old, poorly maintained STATE operated levees. The STATE government should have done something with the millions of dollars of relief materials the federal government put at their disposal, but they didn't.

But that's right, it's all the federal government's fault - it's all Bush's fault that the state and local governments didn't do their jobs. I forgot, it's hip to blame Bush. You go girl!

Mmmmm, cereal...

>>>If people want to buy something, why won't MS sell it to them?

Because if you sell it, people will expect you to support it.

To put it in perspective, I own Kellogg (the breakfast cereal company). In addition to making Rice Krispies, I decide to begin making a new cereal called "Rice Crunchies". One day, I decide I want to stop making and selling Rice Krispies. I have every right to do that. I'm even being nice enough that if you buy Premium Rice Crunchies, I'll give you Premium Rice Krispies if you really want it.

I also have a deal with the Dairy company that says you get a box of Rice Crunchies with every gallon of milk. This deal used to be for the Krispies variant, but as I don't make that anymore, you now get Crunchies. The Dairy company could have said no to my agreement to supply their customers with cereal at the same time as milk, but their customers value not needing to go out and get their own cereal, so it benefits the Dairy and most cereal eaters to have this deal.

Sure, some cereal eaters want Cocoa Puffs instead of any kind of Rice cereal, but they're a small minority, and of course, they could still go get their own cereal. Perhaps the Dairy company should offer milk with no cereal at all, but that's really up to them, and economies of scale may make it an unprofitable move.

If customers don't want Rice Crunchies, they can take advantage of the option to get Premium Rice Crunchies (and the deal to get Premium Rice Krispies instead), they can buy "standalone" milk, with no included cereal, or they can go get some cows and "build" their own milk from scratch and put whatever cereal into it they prefer, even if it's original Rice Krispies. We don't really care what milk you put our cereal in. Just be aware that as we don't make Rice Krispies anymore, we can't help you with your complaints that it doesn't snap, crackle, and pop in quite the right way.

Naturally, we suggest you avail yourself of our newer Rice Crunchies product.

See, folks, if it's anything but software, it sounds ridiculous to suggest that a company must sell (and therefore support) a product forever. And before you say "but I don't mean FOREVER!" then where's the line?? At what point is it acceptable to stop selling and supporting an OS? Should MS still support 3.1? Should Apple still support you on your ][e? It's a silly expectation, and if the expectation isn't justified, then suing them for punting their current offering instead of their old one is just idiotic.

Idiotic

Re: molotov cocktail kids, taxi thieves

A kid who's going to be a whackjob is going to be a whackjob regardless of what video game he played. I'm sure no one threw a petrol-bomb or stole a taxi before GTA came out. Ever. If the logic is true that GTA makes kids more likely to do stupid sh*t, then it would follow that watching a documentary about the Texas Tower Sniper would make kids more likely to scale a building with a high powered rifle and start mowing people down.

If a violent environment does in fact breed violence, then it's awfully narrow-minded to blame it on GTA.

How about we address the graphic violence in movies and TV?

How about we address the explicit depictions of illegal acts in much of modern music (I'm looking at you, (c)rap!)??

How about we look at rampant domestic violence and child abuse coming from parents that never played a video game in their lives?

How about we just ban everything that's not on the "approved list" of acceptable entertainment?? We can have a really big bonfire in the capital rotunda where we burn all unacceptable books, movies, audio recordings, games. And while we're at it, we might as well burn the constitution, as it won't mean much at that point anyway. Oh, and all those PEOPLE not on the "approved list"... well, nevermind them...

Sieg heil?

A necessary evil...

Pandora's biggest flaw is that they try to support themselves by serving visual ads on an auditory service. I'm not looking at Pandora while it's going, so the ad is pointless, doesn't generate clicks, and hence, doesn't fetch a big price from the advertiser.

I hate to say it, but Pandora should intersperse audio ads with the music. As much as I love the commercial free "radio", I'd much rather have commercials every three songs than lose the service entirely.

I would, of course, prefer the RIAA et al pull their heads out of their asses, but that's not likely to happen, so in the interest of keeping the service alive, gimme some audio ads, Tim!!

Therein lies the rub...

"In defence of its right to poke into individual private lives, it asks its readers whether they would not wish to know what their children’s teachers get up to at the weekend."

The crucial flaw: The Desire to know does not imply the Right to know.

I desire coitus with any number of supermodels. I am not, however, entitled to such delights (sadly). Likewise, wanting something is not a sufficient condition for establishing that one has a right to it.

I predict a rash of sexual misconduct allegations, aimed mainly at teachers who are more difficult (honest, realistic) scorers. Perhaps the gov will realize their error when there are no teachers left in the classrooms...

@ And Clover

>>>where's the tech angle?

Did you miss the part where they used sattelites and counted pixels??

@ AC 13:11

>>>If it's money woes, I'd expect the more expensive consoles to take the hit first.

Perhaps not, though. Considering more PS3 and 360 buyers are more "dedicated" gamers, they're more likely to continue purchasing in spite of economic hardship, whereas the less expensive Wii, appealing to families more than the other consoles, will take more of a hit because families tend to be more conscientious of spending than your typical gamer fanatic.

To what degree this actually occurs, I don't know, but it's certainly not just down to how expensive it is, but also the demographic of who purchases each console.

@ Tony

The most entertaining thing about your comment is the three different spellings of the word "Emporer"...

Cheers!

Yahoo! Still! Sucks!

>>>Equally disturbing, he found someone had cracked open his Yahoo! Mail account and aired sensitive documents he filed with the Internal Revenue Service.

More disturbing, a security researcher used Yahoo! Mail to file documents with the IRS??? He should be fired!!

Church & State?

In all fairness, this equates to the state telling private christian schools what they can and can't teach. They may not be doing it explicitly, but by refusing to accept a history class with a religious slant, they're effectively dictating curriculum, and meddling in the affairs of the religious organization. By this same reasoning, most biology classes should be ignored by the University because they (the classes) consider the THEORY of evolution to be infallible fact, when in truth, it's unproven - but is still taken as fact which "fail[s] to adequately teach critical thinking and modern [scientific] analytic methods."

I should have expected this, however, because apparently, separation of church and state only applies when the government wants to HELP a religious organization, not when they want to kick one in the groin.

What concerns me is that the state university bases their objection on the notion that this history class is slanted in its world view. The problem with this ruling is that it sets a dangerous precedent wherein publicly funded state universities have the power to decide that any or all religious group or groups' students cannot pursue higher education unless they go to a religious school, which would further entrench the slanted world view the university is concerned about. Does it make any sense to say that a university will only teach those who already know? Certainly not! As an institution of "higher" learning, perhaps the impetus should on the university to take these students in, and EDUCATE them in a balanced world view, rather that telling them to bugger off to a christian university, only to further slant them so they can experience their rude awakening in the much less tolerant "real world". Denying admission because of a biased history class will only serve to further bias those students toward their skewed view of the world, when what they need is to have their world view balanced out by an institution willing to teach them.

Elasticity

The problem is how inelastic demand for petroleum is. It's so critical to our daily lives that the price can increase by insane amounts, and it will only marginally affect how much people use. The same is true with water consumption, which is one of the reasons most water districts are government chartered, privately operated monopolies.

As much as I like free markets, they don't work for public utilty goods like water, power, and gasoline. I honestly think the government should charter and regulate a gasoline monopoly with (relatively) fixed prices.

Isn't that what it USED to be

Didn't XPS start off as a sub brand? I bought a Dell Dimension XPS 710 in 2000, before I every saw a Dell XPS <insert incomprehensible nonsense model name here>. So this appears to be a return to the roots.

@ AC 15:21

>>>I agree. The Reg's hyperfocus/obsession/hard-on concerning Wikipedia is past the point of ridiculous.

Thus spake the Anonymous Coward...

@ Tony Hoyle

>>>A landlord can be held responsible if they persistently allow criminal activity on their land - I know of one local case where someone was prosecuted for it (turning a blind eye to a canabis cafe in their premises).

Yes, but to be such an accomplice, the landlord must know precisely what is happening, and precisely who is doing it. Your argument actually supports the lower court's ruling.

>>>Primary responsibility lies with the tenant of course.. just as in ebay primary responsibility lies with the seller. OTOH in ebays case they're just pretending that this stuff doesn't go on *and* profiting from it (profiting from crime is itself a crime btw.) then yes they need to sort it out.

Trademark infringement is a civil offense, not a criminal one. There is no crime here.

>>>It is never the responsibility of the victim (tiffany's) to investigate crimes against, themselves, as the previous judge seemed to believe.

But as there is no criminal offense occuring, the only issue is that of Trademark violation, which is entirely the Trademark holder's responsiblity to enforce.

@ Charlie

>>>Pete - you seem to have missed the quite crucial fact that she was convicted, so it's clearly not a case of "legal until told otherwise".

You don't get convicted in civil suits. And you're not found guilty of anything. A judgment is handed down against you.

@ Steven Raith

>>>Beta, to me, doesn't strike me as meaning 100% uptime.

>>>Why the 'outrage' then?

Could it be that it's been a "beta" for years?? Face it, slapping a "beta" jpg on the site does not a beta make. There comes a point where whether you call it a beta or not, it's in production use, and you have to take that responsibility seriously.

Too many places call things "betas" just so they have a fallback position when they almost inevitably break stuff. It's a byproduct of, and a crutch for the "deploy it now, test it later" development culture that web 2.0 has thrust us into. If gmail is a beta, we should have to pay for it by having ads displayed.

Once you start making commercial gain from a product, you can't really call it a beta anymore.

A fool and his money are soon parted...

When you try to do dodgy stuff, the chances that the person you're dealing with is himself a dodgy individual increase dramatically. I have precisely zero sympathy for people that do dodgy stuff and get screwed in the end. When you gamble, you eventually lose.

Responses

@ michael:

"well we are of to a fine start by my reconong we are due the first drugs scandle any time now!"

Apparently, you haven't paid attention, an American swimmer was already removed for doping (prior to competing).

In other news, it rained today in Britain.

@ Anonymous Coward:

"Umm, since when did the Chinese have an alphabet?"

What NBC *actually* said is that because China has no alphabet, the countries would enter based on the number of strokes needed to write the characters making up the name.

I think it's funny how people go nuts at the idea that NBC *might* have changed stuff. Umm, hello?! Let's start with China being 12 hours ahead of New York. NBC didn't show it as it happened!! OMG!! And wait!! You mean that when they show the Gymnastics prelims, it actually happened at some other time?! That's just unbelievable and irresponsible!!!

It's funny that while people demand to be entertained ("I want my gymnastics to be on when I can watch it, dammit!"), they complain that NBC takes measures to make sure they're entertained...

Apparently, people have forgotten that the REASON NBC has the exclusive US rights to broadcast the Olympics is so they can make money, and that if it wasn't a money maker or if they couldn't MAKE it a money maker, the Olympics wouldn't be televised at all.

@John D Mcelhaney

Yes, the bible says the earth will end at a time and place of God's choosing. It did not, however, say that anyone would be alive to witness it.

And who are we to say that the LHC isn't God's method of choice?

@ Andras

The problem is when, after walking into the cream-pie-tossing room, one determines that they are *obligated* to tell the participants that what they're doing is gross.

It's simple really. If a joke isn't funny to you, don't laugh. I don't see why it's a neccessity to comment about how it's not funny (to you). Just seems like flamebait, if you ask me.

@ AC

Knights of the Round Table != Knights Templar

you're welcome to try again, though.

@ Martin

>>>...but each week for two years, he downloads 20,000 customer details. Call that a hundred weeks. He sells these 20,000 customer details for $500. So I make that $50,000 raised by this scam.

>>>Where do the prosecution get $70,000 from?

20,000 names per week

$500 per sale

The figure you're missing is sales per week. If he sells the list to two people one week, he's made $1,000. Rinse. Repeat.

Owned by the USAF

When I got hired at my company, part of my contract is that anything I create, even in my spare time, that uses the proprietary knowledge I have gained by working here, belongs to the company. It's a near certainty that the author drew on his proprietary knowledge of USAF systems in building his software, so it's very likely that the USAF is the legal owner of the software.

@ Gary F

>>>Very nice! Would be even better if they offered a solid state drive. OCZ have a brand new 64GB drive that reads at 120GB/sec. Low power, blisteringly fast, and deadly silent.

Actually, in a comparison against a notebook HDD, SSD's perform WORSE on the power consumption scale. This is because SSDs don't have an idle power-down mode, so they run at full power all the time, whereas most of the energy an HDD consumes is from spinning up the disk initially and moving the actuator arm for reads and writes. And HDDs not in use can be powered down to reduce consumption. Not so with today's SSDs.

More here: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-hdd-battery,1955.html

@ Lee

>>>In the Addidas example it would be absurd for Google to also show your advert when people searched for slippers, but it would be beneficial if they searched for trainers, sneakers, running shoes, spotswear etc. etc.

The flaw in your logic is that you, as an advertiser, will most likely already be advertising on keywords like "trainers", "sneakers", "running shoes" and "sportswear" specifically. (otherwise, shame on you!) As a result, automatch is likely to result in your ad being displayed on only tangentially related keywords, which aren't terribly likely to result in increased sales, but will certainly result in increased ad spend.

The other side of this is that I know some advertisers deliberately set a maximum budget, so they don't have to manage that side at all, and can focus entirely on keyword management, rather than overall campaign-level management. If Google defaults automatch to be enabled, there will be a whole bunch of advertisers getting hosed until they realize what's happening.

So Google, offer the service, but don't go defaulting it to ON - that's just slimy...

Not so much...

The man wasn't charged for shooting his mower. He was charged for "possession of a short-barreled shotgun or rifle and disorderly conduct". In most areas, it's illegal to possess a sawed-off shotgun, under the notion that desiring the increase in the spread would only be useful in an anti-personnel capacity. As for the disorderly conduct, he was probably shouting obscenities and generally disturbing the peace.

The government isn't saying you can't shoot your lawnmower. They're saying you can't do it with an illegal gun, and you can't be a nuisance to others. Only newsworthy for the humor of a man "putting down" his lawn equipment, and not for the "damned government stripping us of our rights" wackos.

@Ian Michael Gumby

>>>When I read the headline, it said US Bank then the article talks about US Banks.

>>>As in multiple financial institutions. There is a bank called US Bank, so you can see why there is a little bit of confusion.

"US bank" != "US Bank"

The headline says "75% of US bank websites..." Note the lack of capitalisation on the word "bank", indicating that it is not part of a proper noun.

Capitalisation matters!!

"I helped my Uncle Jack off a horse"

"I helped my uncle jack off a horse"

QED

Only in China...er...the UK!!

I find it amusing that someone advocating having less children would proceed to use those same children as the justification for combatting climate change...