No they don't. They pass it on to some department or other who sends back a boilerplate reply that shows that no one read the letter at all.
Posts by Magnus_Pym
1112 publicly visible posts • joined 14 Jan 2010
NHS minister's bombshell: I get emails from dead people
Thursday 24th November 2011 11:36 GMT
I didn't vote for my MP because I didn't agree with the policies he supported. I'm in a minority in this constituency so that's OK. My MP's views are not represented in parliament as the Whip's office reduces his role to a rubber stamp for his party. In the end his party did not get enough votes to completely remove the need to ever win a debate by force of argument. Instead an amalgamation of parties formed the Government and made up some new policies on the hoof.
I'm left wondering how my views are taken into account in this democratic process.
Groupon BUSTED for bulging breasts bargain boob
Jamo S 426 HCS 3 home cinema speakers
Tuesday 22nd November 2011 10:26 GMT
Talking about turning down the Sub
What I'm waiting for is separate sound channels for music, effects and dialogue. It has become fashionable in films to make you work to weed out the dialogue from the other sounds. They also like to shock with huge orchestral stabs after whispered conversations. That's OK in the cinema but some of us don't live in splendid isolation in country houses in their own extensive grounds, courtesy for the family and the neighbours is sometimes required.
Late at night I'd like to be able to turn down the helicopters, car crashes and blaring music a bit and still be able to follow the story with resorting to subtitles.
UK nuclear: Walking into darkness with eyes screwed shut
Wednesday 23rd November 2011 10:09 GMT
How many deaths..
..will occur as a result of the return to the dark ages caused by the worldwide power famine that is waiting round the corner. We are not waiting for the Oil to run out only waiting for it to start to run out. If a bit of war in the Middle East can trigger huge price rises imagine what will happen when OPEC says 'By the way we lied about how much oil we had'. Can you afford to live if the price of everything doubles overnight?
It's OK saying 'We don't want nuclear power' but only if you have a viable alternative or a way of living that will support the earth's population with out it.
P.S. There is not enough suitable land for us all to become self-sufficient small holding farmers.
Plans for wave-pay Tube tickets don't convince pols
Engineers seek funds for world’s largest Tesla coil
Gov web boss: Our sites look like bleak council estates
World's first Win 8 malware 'bootkit' to debut next week
Friday 18th November 2011 12:17 GMT
UFEI - car analogy
Of course you won't get joy riders steal your car if you weld your chauffeur into the drivers compartment. Doesn't make the best approach to defeating car crime though does it.
Why not disable the boot sector altogether and have a read-only CD card slot on the MB to boot from. Safe inside the case but available to the user if required.
Swearing doesn’t help pain if you do it too much
Ten... best Blu-ray movies of 2011
Thursday 17th November 2011 12:29 GMT
Agree. In the same way that it became possible to amplify an electric guitar to music hall levels without distortion, doesn't mean it should be done.
Early rock and roll was played that way to fit the playback from a 7 inch vinyl disc. If they new it was going onto a different format the original artist would have done it differently.
Would Wonderful Life be improved by making it less nostalgically old school?
Google opens Android music store in iTunes' face
Thursday 17th November 2011 10:54 GMT
dedupe
I wonder if they will de-duplicate the music storage. This would require only a tiny fraction of the storage especially as so many people will have the same must haves in their collection.
They can already identify a track from a sound sample so perhaps in the future you can play them a clip through your phone and they will link the song to your collection.
Yates of the Yard cleared of misconduct
Tuesday 15th November 2011 11:53 GMT
To be fair
'no evidence had been found to "justify disciplinary proceedings".' Is not exactly the same as 'not guilty of all charges'.
I interpret that as 'yes, he did it but the strongest punishment is less than he has done already'. Expedient but hypercritical in view if the way the police/government went after the 'rioters' and as has been mentioned before an HMRC filing clerk isn't allowed to accept a cup of tea.
Electric car crash leads to battery blaze
Eurozone crisis: We're all dooomed! Here's why
Monday 14th November 2011 09:15 GMT
@Intactable Potsherd
a) I am unbearably pompous IRL.
b) I did say that no blame should be passed down from generation to generation*.
c) I was just pointing out that an economical life style in most western countries is not so much from a global perspective.
*excepting where reparation of stolen assets is possible but not conceded , although I feel the Greeks claim to their marbles may be reduced of late.
Friday 11th November 2011 14:12 GMT
While a agree generally there is a similarity with home finance: Borrowing money is cheap so long as you don't need it. If you need it it suddenly becomes very expensive.
I quite like the circular logic that the banks use and hope to find an application in salary calculation.
10. because the likelihood of default has increased we have to increase the interest rate.
20. because the interest rate has increased cost have risen
30. because cost have risen the likelihood of default has increased
40 rub hands gleefully
50. goto 10
I'm not sure about line 40 but I think it is quite safe to assume.
Friday 11th November 2011 09:54 GMT
I am presuming that you live in a western first world nation. If that is true you cannot help be be in the top 5% of the worlds wealthy and profligate. Your 'quite life of simple virtue' is living like a king to most of the worlds population. The roof over your head and the food on your table is subsidised by a cruel and bloody history that set up the favoured institutions that support your nation.
Yes there are those who have taken and wasted far more that was their fair share and I don't expect you to do penance for those that came before you but to pretend that history didn't happen and that everything you have you would have no matter where you happened to be born is just crass.
Friday 11th November 2011 09:27 GMT 
We should break away now while we can.
I would like to see us independent from our new overlords. Able to make our own decisions for our own benefit not for the benefit of those few individuals who say they represent us but are in fact unelected, unaware, uninterested.
Yes, I say we should break away from central control and go back to the old borders and the old independent trading states. Let the new battle cry ring out - 'FREEDOM for MERCIA'. Fuck you Westminster and your parochial attitudes. You have taken us for granted for too long.
Friday 11th November 2011 09:25 GMT
"Good job we don't have to import any raw materials for our non-existent industry though."
Who do think is keeping Britain's financial head above the water (just)? Education? Tourism? Banking FFS? We are and always have been a major manufacturing nation. Despite what successive governments have tried to make us believe we are still the sixth largest in the world. Stuff is designed in this country and it is still in this country and a lot of that stuff is pretty good.
US doctors demand right to advise on gun ownership
Mexican drug runners torture and decapitate blogger
Thursday 10th November 2011 13:58 GMT
illegal is as illegal does.
The thing about illegal cartels is they never have to prove their assertions. They say they killed this guy because of what he posted. Where they right? Do they even have the skills to find out who says what where? who will ever know if they are wrong?
No. When I buy my drugs I make sure I buy them from a reputable dealer and that they are ethically sourced and fair trade if poss.
UK to big brands: Get off our Facebook, mate!
Honda upgrades humanoid robot to SERVE BEER
Compact Disc death foretold for 2012
Monday 7th November 2011 17:01 GMT
Maybe that's why they don't want to sell them any more.
They have finally realised, after years of being told by everybody else, that downloads are good for the industry. Physical formats can be easily converted/updated and profit is diverted to manufacturers, distributors and retailers. They can make more money out of cheap digital downloads because they can sell them over and over again without ever losing control of the product and the distribution channel is dirt cheap.
Bill Gates strangled Microsoft's 'tablet for creatives'
Open-sourcers suggest Linux secure boot block workarounds
Tuesday 1st November 2011 10:03 GMT
What's the attack we are trying to thwart here?
Windows XP.
(or any other version of any OS other than the version of windows Microsoft are currently pushing)
This is not an attack on Linux. It's an attack on the ability of users who don't want to drink the latest Microsoft kool-aid. How will users be able to stick with XP when new PC's come out with this and Win8 pre installed. No keys no load.
A few years later when win 9 is released new pc's will not have the old win8 keys built into the bios. Oh no. You want a new PC you will do as you are damn well told.
Apple gets patent for ‘unlock gesture’
Wednesday 26th October 2011 09:25 GMT
"so any unlock method which doesn't actually involve a single specific icon on the screen which moves when you slide it is probably fine."
So what you are saying is that a manufacturer should take the risk of a malicious multi million dollar legal circus preventing import of a device to the US for years because it will 'probably' be all right in the end.
Wednesday 26th October 2011 09:25 GMT
US protectionism
It's just another form of trade protectionism. All you will get are special US versions of everything with all the good bits taken out. The US consumer sees this and thinks that the rest of the world is lagging so far behind US tech and feels smug.
Years later, when it is too late, reality floods in and swamps them. Look at what happened to the US motor industry.
Leaked Nokia WinMobes ready for midrange scrum
Can the iPad save newspapers?
Monday 24th October 2011 09:50 GMT
Reducing asset
For a long while Newspapers (and I use the term loosely) have been buying content. That is to say, paying for leaked secrets, paying for kiss-and-tell and printing lies then settling out of court. The size of their bank balance and therefore their legal clout protects them and, more importantly their contributors. As the market reduces, the profit reduces and with it the ability to buy content and protect contributors. The 'quality' of the scoops inevitably falls and the public interest is not piqued, advertisers move away, profits fall. It's a vicious cycle and I hope it is one that quickly overtakes the lot of 'em.
'Occupy Wherever' movement goes transgalactic
Monday 24th October 2011 09:53 GMT
Poli-speak
The problem is that politicians always characterise what they want as 'what the public wants'. With no real forum for public thought they can get away with saying anything. Look at how the current cabal tell us 'what we want' when clearly the election showed that we where that enamoured of any of them.
People on the street making vague demands at least forms a kid of public forum. It may not be great but what is the alternative? Writing to your MP? <fades to black as laughter becomes ever more psychotic/>
Microsoft reports record revenue, lackluster Windows sales
Ballmer disses Android as cheap and complex
Wednesday 19th October 2011 10:46 GMT
Yes but what is the point of 'another' competent phone OS? What is it's unique sell point? Will people buy one because it is 'as good' as the one they already have but a little more expensive?
Microsoft play catch up while the competition is moving on. MS can't compete with Android on price because they have to make a profit . They can't compete with Apple on 'cool', they've failed on that so many times. Blackberry have the business (MS office) user sewn up and look how much good it is doing them. They can't compete on apps, They are too late to the market. Zune player built in? Bing Maps built in? Bing search built in? Quite nice but so what, They are all so last decade. Maybe it will have have Skype built in but the ability to make calls over WiFi without paying the mobile service provider is not going to make them any friends unless they charge for skype and pass some of the profits on. Charge for Skype-to-skype call and you kill skype.
It may be nice but really what is the point?
Man 'drinks 2 pizzas' before skidding off road
Groupon IPO could be as soon as Monday
It's official: Microsoft, Skype marriage consummated
Monday 17th October 2011 09:56 GMT
Why MS might have bought Skype
Scenario 1. Telcos make money from calls or data Skype can increase the data usage but not if it is through WiFi. So in order to keep the Telcos happy MS would need to block Skype over IP on your winphone and take a cut from the Telco.
Scenario 2. MS could make the phone default to WiFi to increase the total capacity of the networks perhaps making hotspot deals with shops and restaurants then using profit sharing to sweeten the Telcos.
Scenario 3. MS could be hoping to sell winphones to out of town USA where the cell network infrastructure is patchy.
Can't see any of these working myself though.
Deduplication: a power-hungry way to streamline storage
Friday 7th October 2011 10:12 GMT
Dedup word documents.
I theorise that a lot of corporate disk storage is used in storage of word documents. Most of these are boilerplate derived corporate crap. Surely it would it be worthwhile to store these documents as a set of links to often used phases and only save the unique content with the document on some kind of 'doc server' instead of each as a separate document on a file server. This could be much cheaper to achieve than block level dedupe.
Prang finder site reveals accident blackspots
Apotheker severance outrage: $2.4m 'bonus'
Friday 30th September 2011 11:33 GMT
That's nothing!!
In the banking sector just destroying the company is small beer indeed. Ex Northern Rock CEO Applegarth got £2.6 million and he brought a whole business sector to it's knees and nearly the whole country with it.
I don't see how anyone could have done a worse job. They could have used employed a headless chicken as CEO and still have been better off.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
