* Posts by Richard 81

1099 publicly visible posts • joined 11 Jun 2009

Scotland's BIG question: Will independence cost me my broadband?

Richard 81

Re: Realism

If faced with a rational argument, spout patriotic poetry. Got it.

Asteroid's DINO KILLING SPREE just bad luck – boffins

Richard 81

Re: Genuine question

I'm sure you mean Yellowstone Park. Jellystone Park is famous for its population of unusually intelligent, but no less greedy, bears.

Cave pits, ideal for human bases, FOUND ON MOON

Richard 81

Try to not land in the soup.

NEW Raspberry Pi B+, NOW with - count them - FOUR USB ports

Richard 81

Bearing in mind it has to be powered from a micro USB and mustn't cost more than £50, what core would you suggest?

Physicist proposes 1,000-foot state-sized walls to stop tornadoes

Richard 81

Re: If we are going to build a wall

"Who is going to do the work?"

How about the unemployed? This could be the new Hoover Dam.

Freeze, Glasshole! Stop spying on me at the ATM

Richard 81

Re: I prefer the infra-red camera trick

Use a PIN with one number repeated.

REVEALED: Reg trails claw along Apple's 'austerity' 21.5-inch iMac

Richard 81

Re: Mac Mini

Thott.

Fearful of the drone-filled skies? Get some protection

Richard 81

Re: This isn't PROtection... it's just DEtection...

"Just combine the damn thing with a signal jammer"

...and you'll find yourself on the wrong side of the law.

Traffic lights, fridges and how they've all got it in for us

Richard 81

Re: Connected fridge - a small subset of first world problem

Mostly agree.

The potential reduction in food wastage could (and should) be achieved by teaching people that just because their carrot is past its Sell By date doesn't mean it's bad, that mouldy cheese can be shaved, milk is only off when it smells/looks/tastes nasty etc.

Being able to detect pathogens and alert the user could save lives and productivity, but the tricky bit detecting them, not Tweeting that they've been detected.

Wolfenstein: The New Order ... BLAM-BLAM! That guard did Nazi that coming

Richard 81

Re: Sir

It's out on PC, PS 3, PS 4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

Motorola Moto E: Brill budget blower with one bothersome blunder

Richard 81

Re: webcam

Me too. I almost never use the larger camera at the back*, but I use the webcam whenever I'm away for business. No webcam means no sale for me.

*I'm not into to taking photos of my dinner at restaurants.

Archos ArcBook: An Android netbook for a measly hundred-and-seventy clams

Richard 81

Re: It's a start

Except that this time we have at least one alternative OS that lots of consumers are happy to use. In the old days your choice was between running a Linux distribution or Windows. Linux failed because... well it wasn't Windows, and Windows failed because it was horribly bloated.

UK's pirate-nagging VCAP scheme WON'T have penalties – report

Richard 81

Re: "and create the best possible customer experience online.”

...or because Sky et al. hold exclusive rights that make it unavailable elsewhere.

Star Wars Episode VII: The Ancient Fear of, er, a cheese-tastic title?

Richard 81

Re: Can we have a little sanity here?

You know, it is possible to not read every article that appears on a news site, paper, or blog etc.

Microsoft Research adds interactivity to Windows 8 Live Tiles

Richard 81

Re: Amazing

Whoosh.

Every little helps: Dirty MOLE BANDITS clean out Tesco ATM from BELOW

Richard 81

Re: Ah for £86k I'd soil myself too....

"...they might have earned more money digging for a road crew than they earned from this."

Maybe, but this will be tax free.

Microsoft DirectX 12 pushes gaming code closer to GPU bare metal

Richard 81

I think you'll find there are quite a few: Wiki

It's a BLOCKBUSTER: Minecraft heads to the silver screen

Richard 81

Re: Why?

Fair enough. Shame the game is a PlayStation exclusive. Minecraft is just about supported on the Xbox 360, but it's largely a PC thing.

Has anyone made a fully programmable computer yet?

Richard 81

Re: Why?

It's Lego and an exploration/survival game.

I've hardly played it at all so you can hardly call me a fanboy, but the things people have done in Minecraft are amazing. Can you make a fully functional copy of Conway's game of life in LittleBigPlanet? You can in Minecraft.

Virgin Media sales flat: Firm bags fewer winter sign-ups than last year

Richard 81

Re: Dear Householder ...

It's (perhaps) even more frustrating for someone who already has broadband, TV, land line and mobile with them to keep receiving their letterbox spam.

BBC, ITV gang up on YouView with 'FreeView Connect'

Richard 81

If you can receive a terrestrial signal, and so can get freeview at all, consider yourself lucky. I don't live the the sticks either; I live in a city in a block of flats with no aerial and signal on portable aerials.

Richard 81

Re: I hate set-top boxes

@dogged: I'm sure it's possible to port YouView to the XBox, but MS would still want you to shell out for a Live Gold account to use it.

Minecraft developer kills Kickstarted Minecraft movie

Richard 81

Re: Idiot film-makers

"Oh - and to the guy complaining about no minecraft on Windows RT... stop trying to make Windows RT happen - it's going into the dustbin of history just like Windows CE."

And Notch is doing his bit to help it into its grave. Good on him!

Friends don't do tech support for friends running Windows XP

Richard 81

Re: I've been helping friends (and businesses) upgrade from XP to ...

CentOS? Blech!

James Dyson plans ROBOT ARMY to take over the world

Richard 81

Re: In the UK?!

"Even a block of Cadbury's Dairy Milk has a hidden mic inside."

The NSA and GCHQ are listening to the inside of your colon as we speak.

Gamers in a flap as Vietnamese dev pulls Flappy Bird

Richard 81

Re: "an open source remake"

Is it OK to rip off Nintendo's art assets though?

Also, if he's not selling it anymore, how is he being ripped off?

Apple in bid to turn MORE and MORE humans into iPhone-stroking fanbois

Richard 81

Hope

Maybe this means they'll finally lower their prices! Right? Maybe?

Asus unveils dirt-cheap Chromebox desktops with Haswell chips

Richard 81

Re: 16GB, really?

Hell, with USB 3.0 you could sit an external HDD on top of it and have as much storage as you like.

Chaps propose free global WiFi delivered FROM SPAAAACE

Richard 81

They've presumably ensured that these disposable satellites burn up completely before they hit the ground, right?

'I had a rare Twitter handle... I was extorted into giving it up'

Richard 81

"I’ve been offered as much as $50,000 for it."

Then why didn't you bloody well sell it?!?

Stephen Fry rewrites computer history again: This time it's serious

Richard 81

Re: he sort of reminds me of a polished Boris

Apologies for the down vote. I kept reading the comment and realised the "[sic]" was correct.

Pay-as-you-GONE: Help! T Mobile's swiped my phone credit – customers

Richard 81

Three exclamation marks

"Multiple exclamation marks, are a sure sign of a diseased mind."

Apple coughs up 7 hours of profit to refund kids' $32.5m app spend spree

Richard 81

Re: "Dumb Parents"

...and what are the default settings? In the same way that forgetting to un-tick a tickbox should not be considered giving consent, neither should this.

Consumers should be allowed a little negligence. Companies should not.

Google stabs Wikipedia in the front

Richard 81

Re: Is it?

In favour of what? Honest question.

Richard 81

Oh no, I'm not suggesting they shouldn't ask for money, but a huge add that covers most of the screen is never forgiveable, no matter who does it.

Richard 81

If the top third of my browser is taken up with the information I'm looking for, that's great. If it's taken up by a big banner by Wikipedia begging for more money, that's not so great.

Richard 81

Agreed. Providing that information is correct and isn't littered with corporate spam, of course.

Coffee a memory enhancing drug, say boffins

Richard 81

A statistically significant improvement in a good-sized sample group won't help you if your memory is crap anyway. It might be a tiny bit less crap, but are you likely to notice?

Richard 81

"Sick people. 10 different studies can be done 10 different ways to prove or contradict this."

Unless it was a good scientific study, in which case you can believe the findings. I can't tell you if it was a good one without buying the paper.

"Someone wants to sell more coffee."

Not according to the author affiliations. Of course the research could have been funded by Nestle, but that should be made clear in the "Competing financial interests" bit.

Enraged by lengthy Sky broadband outage? Blame BT Openreach cable thieves

Richard 81

Re: Suggested reply.

It does if you pronounce them both correctly.

RIP Comet ISON: ???-2013. We hardly knew ye

Richard 81

That all happened in a pocket universe inside some guy's office anyway, so don't get too up yourself.

WTF is the Internet of Things and how insurers will use it against you

Richard 81

Re: Reality check

Bang on. I live in the UK, which is allegedly part of the first world, yet I don't even have double glazing. Why on Earth would I need an networked light switch, oven, fish tank, toilet brush etc???

Boffins: Bonkless Brits fondling slabs, not each other

Richard 81

No reported standard deviation though. I know of a few very prolific individuals who'll no doubt push the mean up.

Our Sun menaces comet 'of the century' ISON with FIERY DESTRUCTION

Richard 81

I keep reading its name as JSON.

Kiss goodbye to quiet skies: Now FCC ready to OK in-flight cellphone use

Richard 81

Re: I'll be opening...

An EM noise generator on a plane. What could possibly go wrong?

Bitcoin price soars after US Senate hearing on 'legit' currency

Richard 81

Good

I hate paying taxes as much as the next man, but if people are going to use it as currency it needs to be legally established as such. That means it's taxable, as well as falling under all the other laws regarding money.

Sony scoffs at the Microsoft EX-BOX: A MILLION PS4s sell in ONE day

Richard 81

Re: "how laughably partisan gamers still are"

Quite true, although gamers seem to more frequently say things like "I hope [game X] doesn't come out on [platform I don't use]" for obvious reason beyond than spite. It may be because, other than the games that are exclusive to each platform, there really isn't much of a difference between them.

If you play your games on the PC (like me) you get rather used to this nonsense.

Smartphone addicts go floppy under the sheets, warns DOCTOR WANG

Richard 81

"Too much time spent texting, gaming and surfing the web can lead to a degeneration of the right side of the brain, affecting memory and attention span, the medics said."

Bollocks. Well maybe if we're talking about stupidly excessive use.

Spend all day on your phone, never doing anything active outside and not sleeping properly, and you'll probably start to see some negative effects on your health. Such negative effects will manifest in all sorts of ways, up to and including unwanted droopiness.

Microsoft's EAT-your-OWN-YOUNG management system AXED

Richard 81

Um, no.

"What do they think will happen, some socialist system where all are paid equally?"

Perhaps they'll just be paid based on their seniority within the company, moderated by what the market usually pays for someone of their specialisation. Or is that too socialist for you?

"They made it clear that there are no changes to the overall compensation budget and that managers have to manage salaries within their budgets. How does anyone think this will happen without some kind of ranking going on, explicit or implicit."

That's true, there will be a sort of ranking that goes on in the managers head. He/she will reward his/her team based on their contribution to the team's goals. If everyone does well, they'll share it equally. Of course this means that teams working under different managers will have different rewards. All they have to do is have a system in place whereby action can be taken if they think they're being treated unfairly.

Chinese Bitcoin exchange disappears, along with £2.5m

Richard 81

Re: Backups ?

So can you ever actually turn it into real money? The kind you can actually buy a pint with?