Re: On actual education
You think they should teach how to drink bleach at school? Hmm... Makes sense.
Posts by wowfood
1232 publicly visible posts • joined 5 Apr 2012
Put the 3 Rs back in British Education: Infographics, Nextification, Chemicals
Curiosity team: Massive collision may have killed Red Planet
Friday 19th July 2013 15:08 GMT
Re: "how did Mars get its atmosphere and water in the first place"
Isn't it obvious?
Millions and millions of eyars ago billions even. Earth was lush, and Mars was Lush, then along came some douchebag moon.
The moon smashed into mars, knocking off its orbit and destroying the ozone completely. Then just to be a prick it crashed into earth as well. This is what killed off the dinosaurs, and created the grand canyon. Lots of dust etc killed off pretty much everything as most of the moon was disintegrated after its second big collision (probably an elderly woman driver)
So finally the moon tries to make a run for it, but gets snagged in earths gravity. Now the moon is our bitch for killing our sister and they all lived happily ever after, except the martian... Because theyr'e dead.
Beijing fanboi in coma after iPhone 4 shock treatment
Friday 19th July 2013 08:26 GMT
Re: I'm No Fan
Just on the point of the 'they have no problem putting a CE label on it" part.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/51/CE_marks.jpg/220px-CE_marks.jpg
The CE on many of thsoe devices is china export, not the europian conformance mark. I kinda wish that they'd change the EU one so it's more distinct, since China won't change theirs.
Premier League boots footie-streaming site off Blighty's interwebs
Thursday 18th July 2013 09:40 GMT
Re: Hang on...
"It is absolutely imperative that content industries are afforded protection under the law if they are to continue investing in the sort of quality talent and facilities that has made them successful and of interest in the first place," a Premier League spokesperson said.
Considering the fact that many footballers make more in a week than most of us will in a decade, I imagine it must be the premiership they're talking about.
Confirmed: Driverless cars to hit actual British roads by end of year
Thursday 18th July 2013 08:45 GMT
We all know where this is going
First semi-autonimous
Then fully automatic
Then when somebody pisses off the government, their car will 'malfunction' straight into a tree.
Although it'll make it much easier to catch hit and run / GTA, a clunk on the bonnet of a certain force? Cut the engine, Guy steals your car? Cut the engine remotely.
Spotify strikes back at Radiohead - but artists are still angry
Thursday 18th July 2013 07:49 GMT
Re: Adapting to the times
On the other hand though, the way the music industry at the top has also changed. No longer do they need to spend millions producing a top notch video, nor do they need to spend that much on advertising. There are a lot of successful people who make their money just by posting music on youtube.
Arguably the amount publishers do for artists today has greatly diminished since ye olde days of records / casettes / cds.
I would honestly argue for a tiered system. For the first $x they make the publisher takes the vast majority until their costs are covered. After that the profits are split on a more even keel, giving the artists a better share after publisher risk has been absolved.
Paypal makes man 1000x as rich as the ENTIRE HUMAN RACE
You, Google. Get back here and bend over again - EU antitrust chief
Wednesday 17th July 2013 15:39 GMT
Re: On the take?
He who shouts loudest is heard. Google have followed the letter of the law and been successful. These other companies have not (been successful that is) and they need a scape goat. As there is a large number (mostly companies nobody has ever heard of, or who haven't updated their websites since the mid 90s) and they're making a large noise, Almunia has to look into it or look like he's on googles take.
Right now he's pushing for reforms. The US has accepted googles original proposal, Almunia has pushed for more, they'll keep on pushing and google will keep on pulling and we'll eventually reach a standstill. Right now that standstill is pretty close.
I doubt google will be fined, because frankly they have broken no laws.
PM writes ISPs' web filter ads for them - and it must say 'default on'
Tuesday 16th July 2013 14:23 GMT
Bah, but I don't want to have to watch my porn through a proxy. Half of the proxies are either stupidly slow, or they charge extra to stream video.
Any other easy way to get past the idiocy once implemented?
And I agree with the masses on this, every other service is opt in, legally you have to opt in to getting spam, you have to opt in to giving away your organs. So why do you have to opt out of filtering?
And lets face it, it's targetting the masses, when it's only aimed at a certain market. "Stop your children seeing smut" 23.6 million households in the uk. And only 12 million families with or without children (taken from 2011) so they're blocking content for the majority when it's targetting the minority.
If anyone finds a "Don't autoban our porn" petition let me know about it.
Dear Linus, STOP SHOUTING and play nice - says Linux kernel dev
Tuesday 16th July 2013 14:34 GMT
It's a bit like a kitchen
Now firstly has anyone here worked in a busy kitchen?
You have the ehad chef, in charge of the menu, organising things, keeping order, hands in all the pies etc. It's a high stress job because you have goals of time and quality.
Below him are the various lower chefs, pastry, sous, fish etc etc.
In a resteraunt kitchen if you fuck up (adding sugar instead of salt) you won't get a polite "everyone makes mistakes" or a "we can just remove it and try again" that meal took 15 minutes to cook, you messed up and now the customer is waiting another 15 minutes. You'll get reemed.
I think Linus manages the kernel like a head chef manages a kitchen.
T-Rex tooth find shows dino may have been a pussy
Acer silences Thunderbolt
Tuesday 16th July 2013 07:19 GMT
I think part of the problem aswell for non-mac users is the avaliability of devices which use the technology. There aren't that many.
There are a fiar few for mac, and I can see mac sticking with it because well, they're apple, they like being different. but why should I buy an expensive thunderbolt device when all my mice / usb sticks / microphones / speakers / portable disk drives / lots of other bits already make use of USB.
I think if they'd first focused on a niche where thunderbolt is clearly a winner (portable disk drives perhaps) and then worked on pushing outwards they might have had more success.
But hunderbolt just hasn't had that much of a push outside apple. Apple launched thunderbolt with very few thiings making use of it, but they touted claims of how superior it was. PC on the otherhand has just kind've jumped on board. "Oh yeah, we have thunderbolt also, so y'know if you wanna use a few of the mac bits here go for it." and then left it.
I guess what I'm saying is Thunderbolt was more a markettting failure than technological.
JPL wants to fire a laser at MARS!
Man sues Apple for allowing him to become addicted to porn
Monday 15th July 2013 13:24 GMT
I concur
This smut must be banned from all devices everywhere. In fact, why is he stopping his lawsuit at apple? Apple block porn where they can from the app store, the only way he found it was through the internet, a product which doesn't belong to apple. He should be suing the makers of the internet, or perhaps his ISP for allowing him access.
And waht about suing facebook? It was their url he was searching for at the time, so it must be part their fault, although how he could have put u rather than a, and k rather than e when they're on different sides of the keyboard to one another is beyond me, he still has a legal case dammit.
Asperger's and IT
Friday 12th July 2013 09:25 GMT
Re: Interviewing an Aspergers
I have that same problem. If I'm asked a question I tend to answer honestly. Although in some cases I see my honest answers as good points. In the end since I knew I was terrible at interviews from the get go, I printed off a shieet with god knows how many standard interview questions, answered them all as best as I could, then sent the answers off to family members to scrutinize. Then I'd redo the answers again, and get a friend (who had experience interviewing employees) interview me to help with bodylanguage bits. (Biggest problem was slumping forwards / looking at the ground etc)
Got advice from him, and then never really had a real interview. Instead they read my CV, gave me a technical interview over the phone, then in the main interview I was asked a few very basic questions, had another technical test. (one was designing and writing a simple application, the other was finding errors in a code snippet) and then got the job. All that effort preparing for interview questions and none of it was needed.
The moral of the story is whatever you prepare for, the interviewer will do the exact opposite.
As a final Aspergers note, it's a pain in the ass getting onto the employment ladder. Most starter jobs are retail, front facing positions etc. Effectively the jobs people with aspergers are least suited to. Made it a major pain getting my first job. Dropped my CV into every store in town. Of the interviews I had I failed miserably. Eventually got a job though, a friend (the same one who gave me the test interviews later down the line) was working, and said they had a job opening and he'd put in a good word for me.
Got down there, and the interview was along the lines of "here's the front area, here's the back area where you'll be starting out, this is the kitchen, what size will you need for the uniform"
I have quite literally never gotten a job where a real interview was involved. Each job I've had I've managed to somehow skip the interview process in one way or another.
Thursday 11th July 2013 07:40 GMT
Re: On line test
I'd like to ask, were you actually diagnosed with aspergers? Or did you just take the test and decide it on yoru own. I'm not trying to be rude here but, there are plenty 'normal' people who could fail that test, just because they might be shy etc. An online test is no subsitute for body language and reactionary responses that would be picked up by a psychiatrist.
Far too many people take these online tests and diagnose themselves as having problems when they really don't.
For instance according to similar online tests, I ave ADD, Potentially a sociopath etc etc. (I have been professionally diagnosed as having aspergers however. And although I think I might have ADD it's undiagnosed and I don't see much point getting it diagnosed now, hence why I will never claim to have it)
I think those tests are a good way of confirming that you might have it, but really think people should get diagnosed professionally before they start to say they have it.
Also just took that test and scored 45 / 50
Thursday 11th July 2013 07:36 GMT
Getting Diagnosed
I think one of the problems with aspergers though, is it's a very broad disorder.
There are some people who are, well lets say full on aspergers. Socailly detached, cannot function at all in large groups or people but they're fine on their own. They're probably a 10 on the "how bad is it doc" scale.
Then there are other people with aspergers who aren't quite as bad. Whether it's due to upbringing (I grew up in a very sarcastic household, with very outgoing friends who prety much forced me to socialize) or it just doesn't affect them as badly. In general day to day activities you may not realize these people have aspergers until you get to know them.
But the thing is, with all of these people it's built in to them, hardwired. We didn't choose not to be social, it's just how we're made.
However, Aspergers has become the go to diagnosis (formerly ADHD) so many parents are self diagnosing their children as having aspergers syndrome because it gives a label to why thier child behaves oddly. Some of those children might have aspergers, most do not. The problem is, once these children have been 'diagnosed' they have an excuse. Lets face it, as a kid if you had an excuse to do something, you'd do it. Aspergers gave them an excuse not to be social, not to play nice etc. So rather than people who Aspergers who can't really create social connections, they just choose not to and let their social abilities suffer.
Eventually it becomes hard to tell if they actually have aspergers or not because they simply haven't exercised their social abilities at all.
But on the other side of it, people who are 'diagnosed' by their parents who actually do have aspergers get the help they need much sooner.
I was only diagnosed by accident (well pretty much)
I have terrible eyesight, so I had a teaching assistant at school to help with stuff on the whiteboard etc. Go mid way through senior school and by that point I'd gotten bored of most classes. I'd finish reading lists for English in one lesson, and then complain that I had nothing to do while the rest of the class was barely half way through the first book etc. I'd randomly switch off in lessons because frankly, I had nothing better to do. When I switched off though, it was pretty much sleeping with my eyes open. Fully aware etc, but unresponsive to anything until somebody bought me out of it.
Teaching assistant thought I might have something called petit mal. (look it up on wikipedia, his guess would actually make a lot of sense)
So he called my parents and advised about it, said they might want to ge tme checked for epilepsy. Went to the hospital for epliepsy tests, and nothing. But the nurse who was doing the test noticed a few of my 'quirks' I guess and advised I see a psychiatrist to see if I had something called 'Aspergers' so I went to the psychiatrist, they spoke to me. Then they spoke to my parents seperately. I think they also spoke to my teaching assistant. Then they came back with the diagnosis.
It was entirely luck that I was diagnosed at all, otherwise I wouldn't know about it even now.
What I'm getting at is, right now there are hundered if not thousands of self diagnosed children with 'aspergers' of thsoe children maybe 5% actually have the disorder. But those are the ones actually being diagnosed to a degree. On the other side of the coin, there are thousands more children teens and adults who go undiagnosed. And this isn't just Aspergers, things like ADD, ADHD... Other stuff.
It would be nice if, once per year, or perhaps throughout the year there were school psychiatrists who would be there to give an actual diagnosis to these children when they're younger and it can actually make a bigger difference to them. Right now children rely on either a poor diagnosis by parents who don't really care to get an official diagnosis, or they occasionally have it spotted by a doctor looking for something else, or a teacher. But so many children who could actually do with the help are overlooked.
And as an addendum to this. I really wish they'd stop trying to use this as a legal defence.
"Bob stabbed 3 of his classmates before he was arrested. Apparently he has aspergers" great, good for bob. Aspergers has nothing to do with him stabbing people though, it was still his own choice. The same with McKinnon, the same with the vast majority of news reports where aspergers is mentioned.
Wednesday 10th July 2013 16:07 GMT
Re: There's a reason why this is anonymous
This reminds me of something at school. In infant school actually I used to read a lot. I'd read pretty much every book in class.
Anyway we had the usual science question. "Do plants move"
Yes they do. To which my teacher said I was wrong. I was not wrong, I was correct, and I proved it to her. Got up in the middle of class, walked up to a book on botany I'd read the day before, opened it up and read out loud. "Many plants move their stems, leaves and flowers in order to capture more or less sunlight as they require" the teacher argued that they meant moving as in changing location. I then argued that she hadn't defined that she meant moving location, only movement, where I was again correct and she was incorrect. That teacher didn't like me.
And again, different teacher the question of. "If I drop 1 ton of feathers, and 1 ton of lead, which will hit the ground first." The answer is lead. No you're wrong, they weigh the same amount and will hit the ground at the same time. I argued that although they weigh the same, the wind resistance on the feathers would cause them to seperate and drift gradually to the ground, while the lead would have less air resistance and plummet straight down. Apparently I was wrong, I continued arguing with the teacher...
And my most loved / hated lesson. Maths, more notably, simultanious equations.
a+2b= -4
2a+b= 1
a = 2
b = -3
I'd then get the "how did you work it out?" Quite simply I didn't. I saw the equation, and I knew the answers. She then tried to argue that I wouldn't be able to do that for more difficult questions. She then put up on the whiteboard a question (i forget what exactly) where a=0.125 and b=-0.5. I got the answer before she had a chance to turn around and ask me to work it out.
In spite of getting every question right, I failed class tests on simultanious equations because I didn't show my working out. I was also accused of copying other peoples work, in spite of finishing the test before most had finished the first two questions, of cheating somehow (still not sure on this). If they didn't require working out I'd have probably gotten an A* on my GCSEs rather than the B I wound up with due to lack of workings out (seriously dont' understand how people found maths hard)
It was actually quite entertaining, my sister was, at the time, doing A level maths. She had one of the mock tests with her and was stuck on a simultainous equation. I answered it after looking at it for a few seconds. Her response was along the lines of "How the **** " to which I just shrugged.
Oh please, PLEASE bring back Xbox One's hated DRM - say Xbox loyalists
Thursday 11th July 2013 14:03 GMT
I agree wholeheartedly
DRM can only be a good thing. Look at Ubisoft, look at EA, look how amazingly their DRM turned out. We need that kind of high quality DRM on the xbox also.
Lets face it, game companies are implementing their own DRM anyway, whether it be in a form of actual DRM (EA and origin) or DRM as in "buy our game and get this free DLC whcih is basically half the game.... FUCK YOU SECOND HAND MARKET!!!"
I'd actually like to point out, I agree with the 'fuck the second hand market' stateent. Especiall here in the UK.
Buy a game for £40, next day trade it in because it was so damn short. Get £10 back, go in the next day, my game is on sale for £38. £2 less than retail.
You don't see a used car going on sale for 5% less than the new model, so why is it that way with games? Especially when a lot of games these days you're losing out on the 'free' DLC.
I also kind of think Microsoft was a little childish about the whole matter. "Okay we'll remove the DRM you hate... But we're also removing all the good bits you wanted like sharing stuff over the webz because we didn't get what we want, you don't get what you want."
Which has kind've shot them in the foot since now Sony are delivering the content Microsoft removed (pretty much) without the DRM restriction Microsoft said they needed to make it happen.
http://www.techradar.com/news/gaming/consoles/ps4-users-will-be-able-to-access-game-library-from-any-console-1165098
Eww! What have you done to the layout?
Thursday 11th July 2013 13:39 GMT
May have been brought up already
Since the change to the new layout, I cannot give up/down votes when using IE9 (what we're stuck with at work) might just be a problem from work computers, I'm not sure, just thought it woudl be worth raising.
Also can't click into the password box sometimes, so I have to tab through to get to the right box so I can comment.
Look, can we just forget about Snowden for sec... US-China cyber talks held
Texas teen jailed for four months over sarcastic Facebook comment
Tuesday 9th July 2013 08:53 GMT
Re: This is Texas
Are you talking Room Temperature as measured in C, or in F.
Because that makes a pretty big difference. Well, either way the IQ would go up, just depends on how much.
As for the deletion of the anti-texan comments, it's probably the el reg way of protecting us. They see a comment that will get us arrested in texas (like saying marrying first cousins is disgusting) and they remove it so we don't get arrested
It's for our own good.
Irish gov refuses to haul Google, Apple into MPs' tax inquiry
Apple back in court as Shanghai firm takes offence at Siri
Thursday 4th July 2013 07:19 GMT
Bit of a double standard isn't it?
For its part, Apple’s lawyers are apparently maintaining that although the two products are designed to perform similar tasks they do so thanks to different underlying technology.
Isn't that the defence Samsung normally uses which Apple claim isn't a defence at all?
IT bloke inadvertently broadcasts smut on vast public screen
Fitbit Flex wristband: What to wear out when wearing yourself out
Wednesday 3rd July 2013 12:42 GMT
Re: Why?
And while we're at it, what's the point of articles on cars? My eyesight is terrible so I'll never get to drive, so what's the point in cars? /endsarcasm
And on the actual device. The diet side of things I don't see the point of, I mean I see the point of it, but not as part of this product. I can record my calories in many other ways, in fact I do record my calories already so having that information isn't overly useful to me.
Likewise the lack of a heartrate monitor etc is kind've annoying too, it's one of the things I'd actually quite like to track.
The only real useful parts of this are the pedometer (lets face it that's what it is) and the sleep monitor. I actually find the idea of a sleep monitor quite interesting since I'm pretty sure my sleep quality is terrible. But I don't think I'm willing to spend £80 on one.
If they could get a heartrate monitor built into the thing I might be interested, but without it the idea seems kinda meh. I already have a load of items that do the individual jobs for a fraction of the cost, the only real benefit of this device is the sleep monitor, and the online ap. And the online app you can also get equivalents for free online.
Modern-day Frankenstein invents CURE for BEHEADING
Ubisoft admits major hacking breach, advises password change
Wednesday 3rd July 2013 07:03 GMT
Why can't we just
Have a univeral login system for all our shit these days. (I know why not but still) I get sick and tired of all these different usernames and all these different passwords I have floating about.
Go to register on a forum, oh #Username is already being used, I must've signed up to this site a few years back lets see...
was this my password? Nope, this? Nope, thise? Nope, odd... Maybe it was this... nope, what about this one... nope. Oh I know perhaps it was this... no.... bah stupid machine! "sends forgotten password request" was my email this? No... this? no... did I use my work email? No.... OH I must have used this email "password sent"
Why couldn't they just have some kind of single user database somewhere designed purely to store usernames and passwords in a secure manner, with an API which allows other sites to interface with it.
That way at least when something is hacked I don't need to go around and change my password on 20 other sites "just in case"
And yes I understand this is starting to happen with the whole "login with facebook" stuff, but I kinda wish more sites would make use of that.
Dubya: I introduced PRISM and I think it's pretty swell
Firefox OS mobilises HTML5, without the added Steve Jobs
'The Apprentice' is a load of old codswallop, says biz prof
Tuesday 2nd July 2013 07:14 GMT 
Can't stand the show
I've watched a few eps from each season and honestly I woudln't hire a single on of the morongs they have on that show. If I were to launch a product, put together a team and say "you decide who's in charge" and then find out the product was a failure. I do not want to see a group of adults shouting and screaming over the top of each other trying to place the blame. "It's not my fault it was a great idea HE just didn't push it hard enough!" blah blah blah. They act like a bunch of kindergarteners.
I'd much rather see a bunch of people who can behave like adults, people who will say "I put forward the idea and we all agreed on it, it was a market none of us really understood and we could have done with more time to research the demographic. I felt boris didn't put his full effort into the product, but he disagreed with the original idea anyway"
Of course actually seeing people behave like adults would never work for entertainment.
The one thing I do love, for comedy more than anything, is their taglines when they introduce themselves.
"Hi my names Danny and I'm an entrepeneur. I may be short, but I'm large of mad skillz"
I'd like to see one of them on there with this tagline
"Hi my names Boris, and I have the nose of a bluebottle, I can smell shit from a mile away."
Facebook restricts ads running next to dodgy posts
What's the difference between GEEKS and NERDS?
Flippin' Equus! Unfeasibly old horse bone DNA triumph
Korean doctors: Smartphones really ARE doing your head in
Think you're streaming Superman? Think again, punk
Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo: The big three slug it out at E3
Wednesday 26th June 2013 07:40 GMT
Re: Is the 8th gen needed?
the whole 'massive problems from multi-platofrom' thing shouldn't be such a problem this gen, what with the ps4 and Xone having similar architecures. It isn't like before where you had to code i na vastly different way to get stuff working on the ps3, it's the same code on the same architecture. The difference is probbably going to be texture size, draw distance and on some very high end games perhaps framerate.
It's not like the Xone limitations will hamstring PS4 because the difference just isn't that big.
I'm guessing that third party games will be either identicle on the 2 consoles, or superior by a small degree on the PS4, while the major difference will be in first party titles where PS4 will win hands down.
It's why I always say buy the console with the first party titles you want. Since the rest you'll get either way.
Wednesday 26th June 2013 07:35 GMT
Re: Will the 'Xbox 180' and 'PS4' be the greatest gaming experience ever?
The hollywood era of gaming can't last, and it probably won't last. Lets fae it, there are companies selling millions of copies of their games and still only just breaking even, or worse losing money. Look at THQ (or what used to be THQ) then look at these smaller devs, telltale games, the minecraft guy, somebody else I can't think of right now.
They spend a few thousand making games (okay more than that) and by the end of it they may not sell millions, but they're making a far healthier profit margin.
Wednesday 26th June 2013 07:20 GMT
Re: Not really
But generally the 'vast improvements' seen on PC have little to do with the resolution (which is what is being pushed as the sales poing of gen 8) and more to do with advanced lighting, physics and getting a better frame rate. Not to say that the new consoles don't give all of those too, giving 4k of current graphics could probably give us normal HD with the lighting / physics / frame rate we want.
And as my example of the advanced lighting engines. Most mods I've found for PC games which make the biggest difference aren't the texture packs, nor are they the improved models (although some of those are nice) it's normally the advanced lighting features.
I still stand by my assessment though, that future games need to get a higher focus on physics if they want them to be truely immersive.
Windows 8 hype has hurt PC makers and distributors - Gartner
Tuesday 25th June 2013 14:59 GMT 
I don't think the problem is just windows 8 (although that might be a small part of it) people just don't need to upgrade right now.
Lets face it, everybody stuck with xp through thick and thin, 2000, ME, Vista some other one I'm sure I forgot, none of them really made a dent on the XP market share until Windows 7. Windows 7 brought with it a lot of usability, security, gaming and various other benefits.
Before that shift thanks to OS it was a shift thanks to hardware. Back in ye olden days having the latest hardware meant something. a year between graphics cars was the difference between playing a game at 30fps, and cringing at a game running at 10fps. Nowadays hardware is jumping ahead by leaps and bounds still, but software hasn't kept up. I have a 260gtx in my PC, I can still play the vast majority of the newest games on it.
Basically what I'm getting at is this. There are two reasons people may want to upgrade. They need new hardware, or the new OS is a vast improvement over the old (and it'll only run on new hardware)
The amounot of grunt software uses these days doesn't push hardware enough to warrant an upgrade for the average user, and Windows 8 isn't that big a jump over windows 6.1 so there's no need to upgrade from that either.
Effectively the only people who are really upgrading their rigs at the moment are hardcore gamers, but in this case they aren't buying pre-packaged systems, they're just buying a new CPU or a new graphics card for their existing windows 7 system.
Unless software begins to use up more grunt (not simply by installing bloatware) there really is no need for the average user to upgrade their system anymore.
Beer because people are still buying it.
Freed LulzSec hacker banned from contacting Anons, wiping data
PRISM leaker strands hacks on booze-free flight
Tuesday 25th June 2013 07:23 GMT
Unconfirmed claim that he's in iceland?
Do you think they're trying the "I am Sparticus" technique to defend him?
Apply for asylum in several places, book flights to several locations, have several other locations claim that he's already there / been there and left. By the end of it all NSA wouldn't have a clue where to look while he's chillaxing in the ecuadorian embassy with asange.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
