Posts by Squander Two

Re: Microsoft account needed for Facebook? ??

The People hub is superb, in all honesty. I'm a complete Facebook addict, yet I've barely been anywhere near the Facebook site or app since I got a Lumia. Everything bar sharing can be done from the phone. Also, carriage returns in comments are no problem.

I understand the Twitter integration is just as good, but I don't use it because Twitter is a monument to banality.

Re: @gnufrontier - Enough with the number of apps

> I also believe one model of Ford car should be fine for most of the American population, they rarely need that diversity.

Very funny, yes, but there is actually some middle ground between one and one million. Most car manufacturers make about six or seven basic models, and that does appear to be plenty of variety. So it's not really clear what point you were trying to make with that analogy.

Whenever I look in an app store, I spend most of the time ploughing through piles of useless dross. In the app stores with more apps, there's even more dross. There are a handful of great things -- especially for music-creation -- on iOS that aren't available elsewhere. Lemur alone is a reason for a serious musician to buy an iPad, and it appears that Instagram is a must-have for some people (people who insist on the right brand name so won't use 6tag). But we're talking about a few dozen apps at most. For the usual stuff you might want on your phone, I don't think the extra hundreds of thousands of apps make a jot of difference, to be honest.

Re: Censorship.

> because Google will apparently be blocking *search terms*, not *search results*.

Nope, I just reread Schmidt's statement, and you're wrong.

"We've fine tuned Google Search to prevent links to child sexual abuse material from appearing in our results. ... these changes have cleaned up the results for over 100,000 queries that might be related to the sexual abuse of kids."

I think you're conflating "target" with "block". Search terms are being targetted; results are being blocked. In just the same way as Google already do for hundreds of other reasons, then, such as spam. Funny how tech people are less outraged about Google blocking spam than about them blocking child porn.

I'll add that I found the piece by googling "google child abuse uk government". The term "child abuse" is clearly not blocked.

Slippery slopes.

> this will inevitably lead to ...

You appear to be under the impression that this is a dictatorship. But it isn't. Slippery-slope arguments don't generally hold here, because we can vote the bastards out, for any given group of bastards.

Plenty of slippery-slope arguments were made about the ID card scheme too (which I certainly opposed), and it looked like a certainty because, while it was being brought in by Labour, it had Tory support and had been proposed by previous governments of both stripes repeatedly, especially by Michael Howard under Major. And yet all those slippery-slope arguments turned out to be bollocks, because even the first step onto the slope didn't happen in the end, because we live in a democracy and politicians are opportunists who will support what the people want if it'll get them votes. And so they did.

So there simply is no inevitability about the things you propose. Right now, the issue is whether to prevent the major search engines, who exercise a massive amount of influence over what people do and don't find on the Web, linking to material that is already illegal -- and the public support that. If, in the future, the issue arises of whether to have people arrested by the police for thought crime if they type "anarchy" into a search engine, I put it to you that any government backing such a move will shed votes like confetti. That issue is not this issue.

This slippery-slope crap can be used to oppose anything. Here's one I didn't even make up: "If we allow schools to opt out of local authority control, it is just a short hop and a skip from that to forcing poor children out of school and into work." It's been over twenty years, and that one still hasn't happened. Funny, that.

Re: Nothing good will come of it

What, all legislation intended to protect children? So you'd oppose the laws that prevent children under the age of twelve being allowed to work as prostitutes, then?

Re: naive

Yes, that would be naive, and that is not what is being addressed here.

Re: Husbands will have to ask their wives...

> Cameron et all don't give a fuck about the abuse of children. They have the resources to tackle it and 'backtrace' it and stop it. Nip it off at source. But no....

Seriously? You're claiming that the British Government put zero resources into tracing and locating child abusers? You're delusional.

> They are as bad as the very people that rape young children to my mind.

Then your mind is not up to much. Asking a search engine provider not to return particular links is as bad as raping children? You didn't have any second thoughts about that one before you hit 'Submit'?

Re: won't this make it harder to find the endangered children?

> I think it will make it harder for the people who are trying to locate these children who are being abused

What, the police? Yeah, they can't work without Google.

> I think that there should be a toll free anonymous international reporting line for people who come across this vulger content to report these sites

Well, we have 999 and most other countries have their own versions of the same. Will that do?

Wow, that's a lot of downvotes for pointing out the extremely obvious.

> in some places filtering out the keywords is could be said to be illegal

Which places? Seriously, name one.

Freedom of speech simply does not mean what you are implying it means.

How on Earth could this infringe on freedom of speech? And which countries provide legal protection for the right to have the link to your child porn returned by a search engine?

Re: Harm ?

Er, Google already mess with search results. Firstly, they've had personalised search for years, so they don't give you & me the same results for the same search string. Secondly, you are aware that different search engines give different results, yes? There isn't some magical ideal search result that must be returned according to some universal law; there are just results returned by firms who've done a load of tinkering with them according to a million criteria.

I personally am glad that Google distort reality by messing with their search results. That is in fact what makes their service useful.

Re: OMG Zombie keeps rising @ NomNomNom

It would probably help matters if you could decide what you're talking about. You keep sliding between the theory that humans affect the climate and the theory that CO2 is a greenhouse gas and the theory that humans' affect on the climate is severe as if they're the same theory. Which is disingenuous.

So I point out that there is good laboratory evidence that the Sun affects the climate, and that I believe lab evidence trumps models any day. And you respond by saying that the evidence for solar influence is "weaker than CO2". Weaker than CO2 what? Weaker than the evidence that CO2 is a greenhouse gas? Well, yes, duh -- and of course CO2 has been shown in physical experiments to be a greenhouse gas, so that wouldn't contradict my point anyway. Or weaker than the evidence that current levels of CO2 will damn humanity to fiery graves? Or something inbetween? You don't say.

Since you ask, the lab experiment concerned is the Danish SKY experiment. And, before you go off on one, I didn't say it was any sort of proof. I said it was a good laboratory result, which it is.

Re: "Climate denial, creationists, anti vaxxers ...."

At least my comment made sense.

Idiot.

Re: OMG Zombie keeps rising @ NomNomNom

> The theory that humans affect the climate is made to jump through extra hoops just so it can't succeed.

The only hoop I ask the theory to jump through is that it make consistently correct predictions. Since that's the exact same hoop I expect every other scientific theory to jump through, I fail to see what's "extra" about it.

You are right, though, that the theory has failed to make it through the hoop.

As for the Sun, there is good laboratory experimental data to back up the theory that it affects the climate. Far from conclusive, the climate being as complicated as it is, but far better than a statistical computer model, which merely throws back at you whatever you put into it. Personally, I'm really looking forward to seeing the various theories get either proven or disproven over the next few decades. I just think it's a shame that so many climatologists have become so political and have developed such a ridiculous siege mentality that they'll refuse to acknowledge the evidence when it comes along and slaps them in the face. That's your selective doubt right there.

"Climate denial, creationists, anti vaxxers ...."

> Climate denial, creationists, anti vaxxers, all use the same techniques you do.

In the climate debate, I don't think you can honestly bring up the techniques that people use without opening the Pandora's Box that is the UEA emails.

"oil company propaganda" @42

> those that ignore the science and push the oil company propaganda

"Anyone who disagrees with me is being bribed! It's the only explanation!" So popular in Interweb messageboard fights, and so depressing to see how it's been embraced by climatologists in recent years.

I personally believe that we should cut fossil-fuel emissions as much as feasible (not through draconian economy-crippling tax systems but by inventing better stuff) for various reasons: acid rain, emphysema, everyone sitting on a source of oil seems to be a murdering bastard for some reason. I also believe that climatology, in its current state, is dreadful. And I agree with Richard Feynman that basing predictions on models is unscientific bollocks. Seems like pretty unlikely oil company propaganda.

Re: OMG Zombie keeps rising

> 97% of scientists agree that climate change is happening and we're the cause. It's the economists* who dreamed up cap-n-trade. It's the politicians and greenies** who dreamed up subsidised windmills.

What absolute tripe. A large part of the problem with climatology -- probably the biggest problem -- is that so many scientists have so enthusiastically hurled themselves from the scientific debate about what is happening into the political debate about what to do about it. Having entered the political arena, they then get upset when faced with political argument and throw hissy fits that people are daring to disagree with them when they're scientists.

"companies weren't allowed to deforest vast swaths of land"

I would just like to say that I initially misread "deforest" as "defrost".

That is all.

Palin an acceptable substitute for Clinton.

> They were foolish for thinking anyone who supported Hillary would think Palin is an acceptable substitute.

You've obviously never followed Hillbuzz.org.

Whenever people gnash their teeth about species being driven to extinction, they never mention smallpox.

Re: Terry 14 There is no innocence

Why assume that the only way a lorry can become worthless is by turning into scrap? I can think of lots of ways it could become worthless. For a start, if it was out of action for twelve months, the company will have had to replace it. Once they've had to pay for a replacement for a year, getting the original back is near-enough worthless. Especially if that payment significantly affected their viability.

"All spoken evidence is hearsay "

> All spoken evidence is hearsay unless there are verifiable facts which can be proven using a scientific & repeatable process, which would mean things would be presented & seen.

> Hence not really evidence, mearly 'well he said...' & then 'she said...' Which is ? For those not following, it would be hearsay.

You appear now to be conflating spoken evidence with evidence of speech. When a police officer stands up in the witness box and tells the court that he saw you entering the premises in question at 11:20pm, that's not hearsay. And he doesn't have to somehow prove it using a scientific and repeatable process before it qualifies as evidence.

"There is an exception for people who are married / living together"

Ian 55,

Thanks for that. I live and learn.

Does that mean the legal photos become illegal if they divorce, though?

Re: "Talking to the nice policemen"

You are conflating a word's origin with its meaning. They're not the same thing. There certainly is such a thing as spoken evidence, and "sinister" doesn't mean "left-handed".

More to the point, it's illegal for married sixteen-year-old parents to see photos of each other naked.

Re: Surface does not make sense

> RT is windows with its legs broke ... £700 is laughable.

That's not the price of the RT version, though, is it?

Re: Wrong way round

I never subscribed to the ridiculous Elop conspiracy theories that are so popular round these parts, but I did think he was displaying a marked lack of imagination. "Hmm, we need an OS. I know! How about my old employers'?" I liked Maemo and loved Series 80 and thought Symbian was unfairly maligned, and Windows Mobile was utter shite, so I was front of the queue to slag Elop off.

Then I got a Lumia. And I love it.

In retrospect, I simply think that Elop, having been inside Microsoft, had seen early prototypes of Windows Phone and knew just how damn good it was going to be. Can't fault his decision, frankly.

Hey, we can be downvoted together.

Re: "... features they already had and average users couldn't find."

You are probably right, but your point is slightly undermined by containing a rival OS's spelling fuck-up.

Re: Still not enough

> And on the odd occasions you are looking to launch a less-used program you don't have pinned, the last thing you need when you go looking for it is flashing tiles showing you that some bloke has been deliberately losing snooker matches or whatever.

True, but you could of course deliberately hit the Windows key in order to see updates. Then you hit it again to hide them. I don't see that that's much different from swiping down to see notifications in iOS then swiping back up to hide them again.

I see your point about wanting notifications to pop up and disturb you when you're in the middle of something. I know some people like to work that way (Terry Pratchett, for instance, somehow managed to concentrate on writing novels while having six or eight screens of crap open in front of him). But not everyone. Personally, I like not seeing notifications unless I ask for them.