* Posts by Swoop

79 publicly visible posts • joined 1 Apr 2010

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Oklahoma cops rake ashes of 'spontaneous combustion' victim

Swoop

Re: I thought this kind of thing had been explained as a 'wick effect'?

Yep, the wick effect is so well documented I'm surprised SHC is still treated as a big mystery.

Satanic Renault takes hapless French bloke on 200km/h joyride

Swoop

"Stop the car, Hal."

"I'm sorry, Dave. I can't do that."

White House rejects Death Star petition: '$850qn too pricey'

Swoop
Alert

Re: This @ dssf

"The Death Star on the other hand has already been built and is hidden in orbit behind the moon"

That's no moon...

Swoop
Joke

Re: Chinese Death Star

But half an hour later you get the urge to build another one...

Frack me! UK shale gas bonanza 'bigger than North Sea oil'

Swoop

Re: Just heard the embargo on fracking has been lifted.

I hear the crew of Battlestar Galactica are celebrating.

Swoop
WTF?

Ludicrously low safety threshold

0.5 is equivalent to the energy released by a large hand grenade

If the 0.5 rule were to be applied to the mining industry per se there would be no more blasting and therefore not a lot of mining going on.

Australian State launches IBM probe

Swoop

Of course, it's no significance whatsoever that a Microsoft Dynamics ad appears slap in the middle of an article about SAP.

Iran draws veil over lolcats, launches local YouTube knock-off

Swoop
FAIL

Site now up

The site is now up, although it's loading very, very slooooowly. Guess it must be hosted on a desktop in someone's office at the Ministry of Whatever.

2020AD: Space tourists will be FOUND ON MOON

Swoop

Re: Needs a rethink

Oh, and the 1.5 second (each way) time lag on that tech support call will seem more like 1.5 years when it's panic stations.

Swoop
Alert

Needs a rethink

Great, if they can make it work commercially. However, I think the plan to have the nearest available technical expertise 240,000 miles away needs a bit of a rethink. As Lee mentioned above, things can, and will, go wrong, and when they do the end result will be an untrained passenger fumbling around trying to make sense of the instructions radio'd to him/her from Mother Earth. Suddenly people's lives hang on the end of a tech support call.

I predict the potential market for this idea will demand on-board technical skill.

'Build us a Death Star, President Obama' demand thousands

Swoop

Re: Just one question...

No, their design is rectangular with round corners.

Moon riven by colossal cracks

Swoop

Re: "thin crust, no cheese"

On the contrary, the Wallace and Gromit mission of 1989 proved conclusively that the crust is indeed made of cheese.

US and UK spooks alerted over massive Swiss data leak

Swoop

Re: 15 years in the pen should sort his head out

...and when he finally gets out he will doubtless immediately be extradited to the States to face an even longer sentence.

Voyager 1 arrives on ‘magnetic highway for charged particles’

Swoop

Re: Awesome

As you say, Tom, it will be the first man made object to venture beyond the Heliopause. Will that qualify it as our first starship?

Swoop
Pint

Awesome

Just pause a moment to consider...

Launched 35 years ago. Still functioning. 17 light hours from Earth. I mean, 17 light hours!!

Bloody well done, the Voyager team!

Swoop
Alien

Re: Vogons?

With a handle like Zaphod Beeblebrox you should worry not. Just fire up the Infinite Improbability Drive...

European Space Agency clears SABRE orbital engines

Swoop
Go

Re: Newquay as a spaceport?

As a Kentish lad, can I suggest Boris Island? If Mr Johnson's backers can provide the £40 billion (or whatever the current estimate is) for an airport in the Thames Estuary I'm sure they could be persuaded to spend a little more on the required upgrade for Skylon. And they might even bung a bit of cash at the Skylon project itself.

Oh, and it would get the naysayers even more upset, which would be a bonus.

Boffin claims Bigfoot DNA reveals BESTIAL BONKING

Swoop
Coat

This would explain ZZ Top

BOFH: Tenacious B and the Printer of Destiny

Swoop

Thumbs up for that, Lee.

I totally agree - bring back the LaserJet 4. Wish I'd never got rid of ours. Seems hardly a day goes by that I don't get squawked at by our MD's PA because her desktop Brother has just chewed up another envelope.

USAF declassifies ‘flying saucer’ design

Swoop

Reverse engineered from Roswell

In a secret hangar in Area 51, of course.

The truth is out there.

NASA funds sexy, stealthy, sideways supersonic flying wing

Swoop
Trollface

Ahem...

...note to the designers - make sure the undercarriage is aligned with the subsonic flight configuration, not the supersonic, yeah?

Just making sure...

BIG BOOBS banished from Linux kernel

Swoop
Happy

58008618

OK, hands up who just fished that dusty old calculator out of their drawer and typed in 58008618 for old time's sake. (I did!)

Oracle staffer accused of sex-for-favours in Singapore

Swoop
Paris Hilton

Re: Pun alert

Actually, she got the wrong end of the stick (or the right end, depending which way you look at it) when the client said "Let's 'get down' to business."

Olympic Wenlock plod cops condemnation from Amazon wags

Swoop
Alert

Don't turn your back, don't look away, and DON'T BLINK!

</dr who>

iPad subsidies axed for Microsoft S&M fanbois

Swoop
Facepalm

S&M fanbois

D'oh - sales and marketing! And there was I, thinking of a rather different S&M.

Must be just me...

Russia and NASA plan to COLONISE the Moon

Swoop

"All the plans will be put on display at your local planning office in Alpha Centauri"

...in a locked filing cabinet in a dark cellar with a sign on the door saying "beware of the leopard"

Ten... mono laser printers

Swoop

Thanks AC

Yeah, we tried various different types of envelope to no avail. I guess a printer with a straight-through paper path is probably the way to go.

Swoop
Unhappy

Envelope printing

Ah, but will any of them print on DL (220mm x 110mm) self-seal envelopes without rucking them? The MD's PA is forever complaining about this, and I have tried many makes and models but without success, despite the specs saying acceptable media types include envelopes.

And yes, I have suggested she use window envelopes, but apparently these do not look "professional" enough.

Google report reveals YouTube takedown requests... by country

Swoop
Black Helicopters

Oh no! Government criticism! Silence the filthy seditionist!

Yep, welcome to the United Soviet States of America.

Microsoft trousers yet more royalties from Android gear

Swoop
Facepalm

Oh dear, Fog Alert. You forgot to click on "post anonymously".

Reebok used 'very fit woman' in buttock-related deception

Swoop
Coat

Reebok have made an ass of themselves, and will shoe-ly be the butt of a few jokes.

French officials: 'Don't worry about fatal nuclear explosion'

Swoop

Hmm...looks like the whole article has been amended since I cut & pasted that quote. The last paragraph (where the quote originally was) has definitely changed.

Swoop
Facepalm

Er...no, actually.

See my earlier post below.

Swoop
Thumb Down

Wrong!

'"It shows once again that France has not learnt any lessons from Fukushima," said a spokesman at Greenpeace.' - from The Wall Street Journal

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904353504576566323236433558.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Probably the first of many...

Swoop
Linux

You beat me to it!

Yes, you can rest assured that even as I type this the journos and the green lobby are busy attaching the word "nuclear" to the word "disaster", as per usual.

Penguin, in the absence of a Chicken Little icon.

Hey Commentards! [This title is optional]

Swoop
WTF?

Wot, no title?

What is the world coming to?!

This would *NEVER* have been allowed under the reign of Sarah Bee!

Dawn creeps closer to Clanger homeworld Vesta

Swoop
Angel

Iron Chicken

If Dawn discovers a moon orbiting Vesta, who do we have to petition to have it named "Iron Chicken"?

News leech loses appeal on High Court copyright case

Swoop
Alert

News International

"...pitched against all the UK's major newspaper groups except News International"

Guess they've got other, more pressing, issues to deal with currently!

Mega-colossal space raincloud found at moist black hole

Swoop
Go

Am I the only one...

...or did anyone else get Soundgarden lyrics running through their head on reading the title?

"Black hole sun, won't you come,

and wash away the rain..."

Phone-hack backlash BBC in embarrassing headline gaffes

Swoop
Headmaster

Tut-tut, Auntie

Well, who'd of thought it?

Python orgy menaces Yorkeys Knob canoes

Swoop
Coat

Re: Nagini

No wonder the "snake removal" specialist failed twice - obviously one would need the Sword of Gryffindor to vanquish such a beast.

Coat? Yes please, and the hat. The Sorting Hat, of course...

El Reg to unleash rocket-powered spaceplane

Swoop
Paris Hilton

LINDSAY

Why not continue in the tradition of PARIS and use first names? I'll have a stab...

L.I.N.D.S.A.Y. - Launched Ionospheric Nerd-Dream Sub-orbital Air Yacht (although I'm not convinced about "air yacht" - can anyone think of something better?)

3D printer produces working house keys

Swoop
Pirate

@AC 10:56

I sincerely hope you don't let your victims drink the resulting brew. Lead and cadmium? Yummy!

Daleks given a well-earned break

Swoop
Alien

Fendahl

Bring back the Fendahl (and the fendahleen, of course). I remember having nightmares for ages after watching that particular story - something even the daleks never succeeded in doing!

Swiss jetwing backpack-birdman flies the Grand Canyon

Swoop
Coffee/keyboard

Thank you, Lewis

"Strap-on thrust equipment conquers mighty cleft"

Made my day.

NASA restores Pluto to league of planets

Swoop

New Horizons

It's worth noting that NASA's New Horizons Pluto spacecraft was launched in 2006 - same year that Pluto was demoted. Perhaps a bit of chagrin at NASA that a mission costing $700 million is now going to a mere 'minor planet'?

New tech lets you drink exhaust fumes

Swoop

Re: missed opportunity

Unfortunately, only the water content is collected. All the CO2 and other trace gases will still be belched out into the atmosphere.

Swoop
Boffin

Chemistry fail

Um, the equation doesn't add back, and also you have to double up on the amount of dodecane to prevent having to split an O2 molecule. I think you'll find it's...

2C12H26 + 37O2 -> 24CO2 + 26H2O

Menorcan politician flashes substantial chesticles

Swoop
Coat

Don't see a problem...

...just a bit of harmless titillation, nothing uncons-tit-utional.

OK, I'm going!

MYSTERY of huge Canadian chicken-shed EXPLOSION

Swoop

Re: Foul play

But then again, the article says foul (fowl?) play is not suspected. Not surprisingly, since the shed was empty at the time.

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