Bad choice of words?

Of course we don't give out your data to advertisers. The data we've collected about you isn't YOUR data. Its OUR data. And we do with it whatever the hell we want.

Opposite effect for directions

When you're calling someone who's giving you directions, or you passenger is using a phone for GPS, I think the phone is more likely to increase safety. A driver who knows where he's going is less dangerous than one who is lost...

Repository?

I have to wonder why this journalist would refer to a website that keeps no archives as a "repository" of anything.

Hmmm

I'm glad they won, but I can't help but be bothered at the obvious fact that Amazon is only protecting its interests of helping its customers evade sales taxes. Not that I'm a fan of adding more taxes to anyone's lives, but I do appreciate it when businesses have to play fair with each other - And surely Amazon gains a significant advantage over other retailers by offering goods "tax-free" (since the customer will never report online purchases to the IRS).

What's the problem?

I really don't understand. If you are actively broadcasting your password such that anyone listening can receive it, what expectation of privacy did you have?

re: 18 months??

It's US federal court. They're lucky they didn't get their hands cut off.

Stunning

So, it's a panel widget that shows the top n files in a directory sorted by modified date.

Why did I have to wach a video to discover that?

ICANN loves money

They know that porn site operators have money and are willing to spend it on domain names. This proposal does absolutely nothing for the internet (unless they intend it as a stepping-stone to banning porn from other domains). All it means is that the owner of fucksluts18.com, .net, .org, .biz, and .ca now needs to register fucksluts18.xxx too. It doesn't help parental controls, because little Timmy can just change xxx to com and probably get the same website.

"Browsers absolutely should not be able to connect to ports unrelated to HTTP"???

Every port is related to HTTP if you run HTTP services on it. This bit of wisdom is coming from a "web security expert"?

The real irony...

If intent is irrelevant, and any nude depiction of a minor is unlawful, then looking at photographs becomes more illegal than looking at the real children. Because surely parents need to look at their kids from time to time - but to look at a photo of the same thing is forbidden!

If it's illegal, it's illegal...

"Had I recorded an officer saving someone’s life," he said. "I almost guarantee you that they wouldn’t have come up to me and say, 'Hey, you just recorded me saving that person’s life. You’re under arrest.'"

Yeah, that's because if the cop saved someone's life, you'd probably have two-party consent. It's not hypocrisy - it's the intent of the law. If someone videotaped YOU saving someone's life, you probably wouldn't complain either - but if someone showed up at your office and started filming you while you work, you might very well call the police.

"hopes that shoppers will buy Windows 7 Home Premium"

Wtf offtopic, but... If I were ever in the market to purchase an operating system, I think I would baulk at these titles. "Home premium"? What the shit is that supposed to mean? It's good enough for the "home" but not the office? What is "premium" about it?

Microsoft, do yourself a favor and start naming your versions after animals like everybody else. It's SOFTWARE, for god's sake, it deserves a capricious naming scheme.

WinNuke indeed

This all sounds so very familiar.

Nothing new

I started using ubuntu with Gutsy, and have tried a couple upgrades over the last 2 years. Never again. I have three machines running three different ubuntu versions, but I won't consider trying to upgrade any of them. When I need a newer version, I'll reinstall rather than go through that hell.

I don't blame them for not having a good upgrade procedure... it's probably a really hard problem. I just wish they would be honest and advertise it as something that probably won't work well.

What's this percentage in total number of machines?

And how does it compare to the number of boxes running Conficker?

"Transfer rights..."

...are not something you can just decide take away from your customers. Unless you're an airline, I suppose.

Oh god

I just threw up in my mouth a little.

Licenses, yes

Like driving, you should need a permit to operate a machine as root if that machine is going on the internet.

Has nothing to do with identification, though.

Yep, an eee is my "second machine"

And it's served gloriously for all of my portable computing needs for over a year now.

What's your point, Mike?

Holy crap, FINALLY

I've always been impressed with how Google made a website whose purpose is document sharing, and got away with giving it such terrible sharing controls. One of my many complaints is that whenever I'm sharing one document, there will probably be several others that I'm going to want to share with the same people. And you can't actually see a list of the email addresses that you've invited, so I have to ask everyone for their email address again... For all of Google's power, I am astonished by the fail that creeps in.

"Will we ever use our legs again?"

How are we supposed to stay on our unicycles?

I don't suppose they considered...

... maybe to stop pretending their application is an old-style calculator and just use a sensible fixed-pitch font which, when turned upside-down, just looks like upside-down numbers.

Mp3 player

So if it supports ogg vorbis, is it free from this retarded legislation?

The game...

... that everyone hates because it takes hours to finish, now has a sequel that takes, what, years?

Try "disguising" them

Around Atlanta we had some people complaining about towers, and the "solution" was to put some shoddy decorations on them to make them "look like trees" - resulting in something far uglier than the towers had been.

http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WM5CE9

Serves those whiners right. Electronics scattered about is just part of the modern landscape, particularly in a city.

Perspective

I just tried to get some Internet service from Comcast in the States. We spent 2 weeks, 4 appointments (two of them missed), and innumerable phone calls before establishing that they are either unable or unwilling to providing working service.

Standards? NXDOMAIN? Dziuba is right (as always) - I'm angry at Virgin Media in principle, but don't give a shit in practice. I would be more than happy with Virgin Media service, because what I've been dealing with is remotely competent ISP that can't serve me anything.

Where's the 32-bit version?

I guess I haven't cared enough to look very hard, but I still can't find a chromium .deb ...

Cats are the scourge of the earth

I'm not at all surprised the poor man's cat was using his credit card. Cats are lazy freeloaders, all of them. And now pedophiles to boot.

http://www.picturesforsadchildren.com/index.php?comicID=162

ENOUGH SPECIFIC LAWS

Tired of all this shit. Laws only give cops things to charge you with (How can we fuck with the black guy sitting at that red light... oh shit! He's texting, arrest him!) How is anyone actually going to enforce this by noticing you texting where it's dangerous, like while people are driving? Anyway, texting is not the problem. People driving without paying attention is the problem, and you can do that no matter what else you're also doing. The way this is generally enforced is that if you drive without regard for the safety of others, you're also driving without regard for your own safety, which most people aren't willing to do. If you are a moron who is willing to kill himself on the highway, then no manner of laws dictating what exactly you can and cannot do with your cellular telephone is going to prevent you from killing you and somebody else on the highway.

as long as they're alive...

"... 30,000 yuan ($4,385) every year as long as either of them remains alive."

I'd be wary to give this company any reason to want me dead.

@windywoo

"Apple's marketing team will have to pull a very big rabbit out of its hat."

Not really - they just need to call it "the world's first Apple touchscreen". The fanbois will eagerly forget that touchscreens have existed for years, because they've never been put into expensive aluminum cases before.