Posts by Esskay
506 posts • joined Tuesday 9th August 2011 10:52 GMT
Re: No Refs
Maybe they could also rename the World Cup "So You Think You Can Play Football?" And eliminate a player each week...
Whilst it may work well for people standing in front of a perfectly flat wall, what happens if they are, as mentioned in the article, in "foliage"? or behind flyscreen? I imagine a system that gets a good reflection off clothing would also get some sort of reflection off fine mesh (although I'm happy to stand corrected). Also the dude's belt appears to be playing havoc with the reflections a bit, perhaps this is one occasion where a tinfoil hat may actually have a use?
The tech is extremely cool though.
Unbelievable.
The mere fact that "bounce back" has any bearing on anything in the world at all is depressing, that it affects litigation from one of the world's biggest tech companies against it's rivals is pathetic.
I remember reading books as a kid about "tomorrow's technology", and none of them mentioned any of this useless litigious crap.
Burn them.
Burn them with fire.
FOURONE IP
Was what triggered it...
If the company began with "A" and ended with "E" I probably would have believed it...
University qualifications don't protect you from people taking your comments out of context.
Typical art-lover responses:
Good photo by renowned photographer -
"photo is amazing! He is truly the most wonderful camera button pusher in the universe, I will quote him, order framed prints of his work and generally act all stalkery around his relatives"
Good photo by little known photographer -
...(already skipped past image)
Whilst not a fan of the journo who wrote this piece, I do appreciate "art lovers" going apoplectic over an image which they claim is by their favourite person, whose style they admire, whose images all have a certain character - only to find that the style, image and character all belong to a different, entirely unknown artist - a fact that they, as "art lovers", have completely, utterly failed to realise.
The sad result is that most art critics, in order to save face, will now hold up "new" photographer as the prodigy of who they thought actually took the photo, and try and bring the second photographer up on a pedestal that no-one else will ever reach - until someone else takes a photo, and credit is given to the well known photographer, etc...
Posted in Revealed: Vendors’ worst sales fluff
Another phrase to get rid of:
"Face time". (icon seemed appropriate).
I've got a manager that repeatedly talks of Face Time - not getting enough, needing more, scheduling some in - ironically, usage of the phrase is a good way of ensuring that no-one wants to give him any.
For more phrases that need to be restructured going forward, see "Death Sentences" and "Weasel Words" By Don Watson.
Re: Sony and Samsung invent it...
"200 people can patent wrap-around displays that have the same functionality, and in theory at least they can all be perfectly valid"
But only Apple would try and sue the other 199 patent holders for patent infringement.
Not just a politician
The guy sounds like a person, rather than the typical mayor - I reckon in a lot of western countries, when the destruction hit, the politicians would be the first ones out and the last ones back - no voters in the city = no need to be there.
Great to see this guy cares enough about the city to not just tell people how much good he's doing, whilst glossing over the bad, but actually showing the world what has happened.
Posted in Revealed: Vendors’ worst sales fluff
Unfortunately...
"There buzzwords are out"
is usually a precursor to
"These buzzwords are in".
Waiting to be "positively incorporated" into the next "target-oriented vocabulary" any moment now...
Re: What's good for the goose...
Apple should count themselves lucky - just wait until they take a leaf out of the US's book and start applying local law on a global scale...
Posted in Want faster fibre? Get rid of the glass
Cue The Daily Telegraph headline:
NBN TO BE 30% SLOWER.
Back to reality though, what are the chances of this being mass produced at a decent price? Also the fragiliy of the fibres could be a factor... Sounds promising though, here's hoping something good comes of it.
Anyone thinking about shopping there
Will now probably just wait for the closing down sale.
I can understand some brick and mortar stores getting the shits at people just browsing and going elsewhere, but hasn't that been going on since time immemorial? Nothing stopped people browsing at multiple shops before the rise of the internet (although I'll admit it's a lot easier now). Brick and Mortar stores DO have strengths and advantages over online stores , I can't help but think offering a free sample would encourage people to buy there (out of guilt, if nothing else) more than this sign would. Customer service also goes a long way (but I get the feeling this may be in short supply...).
Ultimately, if people don't buy your wares, putting up what is effectively a paywall to enter is NOT going to change that (in a positive way).
Re: cryptic missive
Oh god.... only a matter of time now before all NASA false colour images are uploaded to instagram with a washed out "vintage" filter, lens flare and a fake polaroid frame...
Re: cryptic missive
I forgot this is the age of 5 second attention spans, where things only get funded if the result is a big explosion or the ability to slap an American flag down somewhere (in the name of Freedom(tm) of course).
Maybe the next rover should incorporate an automated tweeting service to splurt inane crap every five seconds?
"OMG wheelz r so drty LOL #newshoes"
And thanks to the average twatter intelligence level, garbled, corrupted messages won't even get noticed.
"Orlowski is a twat"
It sounds like one of those statements on QI where it's so obvious that you expect the klaxon to go off....
But it doesn't.
Posted in NBN collapses* into chaos*
Re: The delay is rather large
How long ago was the roll-out started? 34% might sound like a lot, but as has already been said, this early in the roll-out, 34% of not much is still not much - the marathon runner analogy applies just as well here, claiming his speed is 34% less than what it needs to be 100m into the race, and getting an "expert" to extrapolate that as taking hours longer to complete the race is only "logical" if you're a young liberal.
Contractor issues are real, not dreamed up - the issues with Syntheo not hitting targets have been reported repeatedly, so going on to claim that it's "either bad budgeting or bad management, but I would say both" is ignoring the stated facts.
Re - manpower, the main benefit during rollout is job creation, something of great benefit during a global financial crisis.
A little bit I don't mind
As long as it's used to substitute TV ads, rather than simply in addition to them, I don't mind, and as long as it's not obvious or intrusive (the pickup truck in the video was obvious, the fake TV behind the stand up guy was intrusive).
It's also ironic that a lot of producers are required to pay ridiculous amounts of money/jump through hoops to get clearance to use or even make reference to brands in movies, but now they're spending money trying to get their products back in to the movies...
And what happens if (for example) Ford paid huge sums of money to get their cars into a movie, and the film then airs on TV with GM ads and billboards everywhere? I'm fairly certain Ford won't be too happy, unless there are guarantees that can be made about the types/brands that are used in the ads, I can see traditional product placement disappearing - in effect, nothing changes, and no extra money is made.
Re: @Amorous Cowherder (was: We are born, we live for a while, we die.)
Amazing that someone who "harvests seeds from last year's crop for next year's crop" is unable to see the irony in claiming that "the next century is out of his hands".
The seeds planted today will guarantee survival of your descendants.
Re: Yes the Rothschild Bank and the US Federal Reserve....
I believe the "blow it up into little bits" principle was attempted in a rather well documented clean up of a beached sperm whale.
IIRC, in hindsight, it was generally decided that it wasn't one of mankind's greatest moments.
Posted in NBN collapses* into chaos*
Re: Bye, bye copper!
I've priced NBN plans as being cheaper than cable in some instances, allowing for either an increase in usage cap with a similar speed, or increased speed and a slight downgrade in usage (but still very high).
ADSL2+ is great for those who live near the exchange, for everyone else it's balls. At least fibre speeds will increase with only a backhaul upgrade necessary in the future, and distance won't be an issue.
Possible additions
Send to>
-Home
-Documents
-Gulag
Or maybe a Gimp editor where you can erase people from photos...as well as newspapers, books, history, etc.
Ask the rights holders
And I wonder what they'll say? Isn't their Association set up so that they don't have to deal with difficult questions?
Whilst Apple is bad, the Steam store is worse - 2K Games regularly slap a $89.99 US price on goods in the Aussie store, whilst the US store gets the same digital download for $49.99 US.
Posted in NBN collapses* into chaos*
Re: Nice spin
The estimates are unrealistic at the beginning of the project, as any are - I don't think any massive infrastructure project has ever met zero delays, particularly when the timeframe being discussed is one of many years, and particularly when the plan has the opposition roadblocking it at every step. It's like someone tripping a marathon runner in the first 100m and telling all the spectators how that person is definitely going to lose now. This early in the project, a delay is more of a political hiccup than anything that will affect the final timeframe.
Not to mention the fact that as the rollout ramps up, it's entirely feasible that the targets will be exceeded - the idea that this is as good as it's going to get is incredibly short-sighted.
The 457 visa issue only has an impact if the skilled labourers currently coming to Australia under those visas are moving into the telecommunications industry, and are certified cablers. As it happens, I believe a great deal of 457 visas go to people who take up jobs in the mining industry over in WA.
Posted in NBN collapses* into chaos*
Re: Brownfields? Greenfields?
A quick net-search explains that Brown fields and Greenfields refers to parts of the rollout map which are earmarked for NBN connection within certain timeframes. They're colour-coded to make at-a-glance viewing easier on the interested public.
Advanced Boffinry
At what point does boffinry become advanced?
Posted in Review: Sony Xperia Z
@Dave 126
Undoubtedly, it's a case of horses for courses - waterproofing is high up on some people's lists, with good reason - it comes down to how we use our phones. But after having Xenon flash on a phone 5 or so years ago, going back to LED is kind of annoying (athough I'll admit the torch feature of the LED is valuable in it's own right).
A seperate flash unit would be great, but then it's another thing to carry around. Still, it's a good way to deliver it to people who want it :)
Posted in Review: Sony Xperia Z
Icon says it all
As much as I'd love to see Sony pump out some beaut phones, their flagships seem to always be almost-but-not-quite as good as the competition. They've come to be the phone that people have in their top four but knock it out of the running first.
Plus the features seem haphazard - a special camera mode, waterproof, custom menu - their phones just appear...lost.
And I share the author's lament of the absence of xenon flash on the Xperia (and, to be fair, every handset out there from every manufacturer). My 3.2Mp Sony Ericsson K800i which I have sitting in a desk drawer somewhere still manages to put new "flagship" handsets to shame in nighttime flash shooting, thanks to the Xenon flash - sure, it takes up valuable internal room, and probably drinks battery, but If Sony were looking for a way to *truly* differentiate their phones (and add value to the "cybershot" brand) that would be the way to do it IMO.
Posted in Paying a TV tax makes you happy - BBC
I spent a couple of weeks in the UK
And If I lived there I'd gladly spend a bit to get a TV network without those god-awful Go-compare ads, or a fucking meerkat that talked shite.
Spin baby, spin!
"After the offer expires it is likely that an EA/Maxis bean-counter will run the numbers on the games people chose and come up with a number representing either lost or missed revenue."
Also likely is that the titles people choose will be included in EA's "sales" figures for the quarter, painting a rosy picture to cover the sudden reversal of SimCity sales.
I made the mistake of purchasing SimCity. I also made the mistake of purchasing it through a new online vendor offering a low price... Still waiting for my copy to arrive, will be mighty pissed if it arrives after the 25th...
Re: Hmmmmm...
Maybe this is their crack cyber security team getting revenge...
Re: Tabloid hyperbole FAIL
yeah, serves me right for El Reg'ing after half a bottle of red.
Carry on
Re: Tested a drivers skill...
Another issue here is how do you define drink driving? One beer? One standard drink? Over the legal limit? Incapable of speech? Did they adjust for body weight? fat content? gender? "drink driving" is such a broad term, and the effects of alcohol so diverse, that it simply isn't possible to say that it's "the equivalent" of such and such behaviour - it is what it is.
Whilst I understand the study's purpose is (possibly) to raise the point that we can't get too hung up on demonising one issue to the point that it's legislated into absurdity, making blanket claims does nothing to further the credibility of either the researchers or the study.
Re: Title
Well his old man was supposedly a lover of Hollywood movies, with one of the largest collections in the world.
Oh the iro-
oh.
Re: The real story.
It's not really a blog, its just an old CRT monitor that someone's written on with a whiteboard marker.
Re: Just a reminder.
As a big city-builder fan, I purchased the game (tried to refund it, but it shipped before I changed my mind and I'm just going to live with it). I haven't had a chance to play it yet, but it seems a few of the early issues are getting sorted. Having said that, it's a massive fuckup from EA - I reckon a lot of other devs will be looking at this experience and thinking twice about an online-only model, and chances are it's one of the last EA games I'll buy (pretty sure the last one I bought was Sims 2, or something for $5 off steam).
I'd love nothing more than to see EA go down, but it's a shame they swallowed so many teams and well-loved franchises beforehand - becoming "EA-ified" is now one of my greatest fears for any franchise I enjoy. It's like watching a game contract alzheimers, and suddenly think everyone is a 5 year old who can be tricked and lied to.
Posted in Boeing outlines fix for 787 batteries
If only Lucas had this PR team
Then the electrics on my mini could be said to perform a "safety venting procedure" every time I triy to use the headlights and the wipers when it starts raining.
APPLE DOES THING
Thing may take time for some people
Puts the people of North Korea in a difficult position
On the one hand, this action from the American capitalist pig-dogs should obviously be condemned by all as a violation of their rights, and anyone who doesn't show their support for the glorious leader is an elitist bourgeois imperialist sympathiser -
But on the other hand, anyone with knowledge of the internet, who claims to have been affected by the outage, or knowledge of what this attack actually signifies would also essentially be an elitist bourgeois imperialist sympathiser.
Forget starvation, it's dilemmas like these that make life in North Korea so difficult.
In my house
shift+3 before a word usually results in a punch in the face. particularly when people use it in an entirely twitter-free context.
New features
I think most importantly for the S 4 is that it no longer feels like they're playing catch-up to Apple - the features they've crammed in are impressive, and even if somewhat gimmicky it's the type of stuff that Apple would have come up with first (or claimed to) just a few years back. The difference between then and now is that a few years ago no-one would care that samsung had put face tracking on a phone - because it was just a Samsung. I've no doubt that had Apple done it, it would be a bullet point on the box, and the first round loaded into the chamber of the Fanboi FUDgun. But after god knows how many lawsuits, patent disputes and copyright claims, Samsung have been flung repeatedly into the limelight by Apple, to the point where the Galaxy S series of phones are, ironically, now one of the most watched series of phones being made.
I've no interest in getting an S 4 (just got a Nexus 4 a few months ago) but It's great to see that technology isn't stopping - we've gone beyond "colour screens! look at pictures! take photos! play movies!" into the realm of doing all of that stuff as effortlessly as possible, in the most convenient way imaginable, in high definition, streamed from the net.
Ironic
That the same pay-TV service that has been slowly stealing content away from Free-to-Air channels for years, is now crying foul when someone does it to them. The difference, of course, is that when the content is stolen *by* Foxtel, it then costs $50 a month to see it. When it gets stolen *from* Foxtel, it's made avaliable for free.
Posted in New nuke could POWER WORLD UNTIL 2083
Re: What about the oil barons??
I can see Texans sweating over this long term... But short term, the U.S seems to be more focused on reducing reliance on foreign oil - something I'm sure the US oil Co's would see as being good for business. In any case, I'm sure there will be coal/oil/gas plants for many years to come, and cars won't be running on nuclear reactors any time soon anyway.
Assuming it's through Toyota's credit/finance arm, a subsidiary of Toyota, it could easily be a Lexus. Makes a bit more sense.
The bigger question is why a Hilton heiress needs to take out a loan at all? Tax purposes?
Ultraviolet?
Was this not around the time ultraviolet started to ramp up?
I've got a few Blu-Rays at home with "ultraviolet" digital versions of the movie (which I've never bothered with, as my PC doesn't have a Blu-Ray drive and it's easier/preferable to visit pirate bay for a digital copy of my legally acquired movie than give all my private info to a movie studio) and these seem to have become prevalent around the same time as mega went down - do these "physical - digital" copies count in the study? simply bundling a digital copy with the physical copy could easily account for a bump in "digital sales".
With all this MPAA FUD floating around, I think it's time El Reg implemented a "sceptic" icon...
Posted in Bacon sarnies can kill: Official
Did Findus fund this report?
Just waiting for the new line of "Horcon" meat products.
But -
Who will the fanbois blame for a negative Apple story now?
In any case, good luck with the future, may the spirit (parasite?) of El Reg live on inside you.
Re: Long term implications
The main cost of FTTH as opposed to FTTN is not in the fibre, but in the labour of putting it in the ground - unless that labour cost is eliminated, a FTTH upgrade will not cost considerably less in the future than it does now - and if nodes need to be upgraded to deal with fibre from the node to the home, the cost will possibly be even greater.
The cost to the consumer is dependent on uptake. Right now, the number of people opting for high speed NBN plans (100Mbps) is much greater than anticipated. The higher the uptake, the quicker the return, and the better the investment. Based on current trends (and admittedly it's still early days) the uptake is better than even the government predicted.
Whilst technology will undoubtedly improve, I doubt wireless will be a viable alternative to fibre on a cost/performance basis in any reasonable timeframe. That leaves fibre as the best option (and easily capable of upgrading to Gbps speeds without any extra cable needing to be laid).
Regarding no competition in the wholesale market - we already have a dearth of competition in the wholesale market. The difference is that under the current NBN, the wholesale market will be effectively government controlled, with prices for all ISP's guaranteed. Without the NBN, Telstra were effectively the biggest wholesaler by a massive margin, with shareholders to satisfy and profits to increase, the only thing restraining Telstra from having massive advantage in the industry was massive regulation. A government owned company isn't subject to the same shareholder pressure to return quick profits at the expense of subscribers.
My understanding of "White Elephant"
is something that is gifted to another, with the ongoing costs effectively ruining them.
Fibre can hardly be more different, with up-front costs for infrastructure being high (but covered through subscriptions, not to mention any benefits to GDP that the network may bring as an added bonus) with ongoing maintenance being quite low.
Copper, on the other hand, may be cheaper in the short term, but needs ongoing replacement, maintenance, not to mention, in a FTTN setup, the need to negotiate with Telstra, who know full well that they've got the coalition by the balls. An upgrade from FTTN => FTTH (which will be crucial within the next decade, IMO) will then be more expensive than going straight to FTTH in the first place.
If the government's plan is a white elephant, the coalition's must be a Moby Dick...
