* Posts by Gilbert Wham

408 publicly visible posts • joined 6 Apr 2007

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British teachers' pensions set to be released from Capita's grasp after nearly 30 years

Gilbert Wham

Ooh! Ooh!

Can we sack them from Primary Care Support England next? Pleeeeeaaaase! That would make my job orders of magnitude better.

Jim Westwood, home micro revolutionary

Gilbert Wham

I had one of those pocket TVs

A device badly crippled by its choice of battery; a flat Li job that was almost entirely unobtainable, and cost a bastard fortune.

Anonymous smites Orlando after charity arrests

Gilbert Wham

Ineresting points...

...very well made. Thanks for that.

Ten... festival survival gadgets

Gilbert Wham

Alarms? ALARMS?!

Being as I have been mugged at Glastonbury by a bunch of scousers, whilst hundreds looked gormlessly on, I don't think a piddly electronic alarm will do any good, as no-one will give a shit.

What to take: money, drugs, spare pair of pants. That's it. Anything else is a waste of time.

Feds seize $15m from scareware monger's Swiss account

Gilbert Wham

Nope.

Got to go elsewhere for that, now. Been that way for a while.

iTunes Match is iPiracy, claims loopy Oz industry troll

Gilbert Wham

Quality

Any torrent site worth its salt will have a range of formats far superior to 256kb AAC available...

Britain mounted secret 2010 cyberwarfare attack on al-Q

Gilbert Wham
Mushroom

For relative values of 'better'...

There's a public safety issue there, though. Personally, I'd prefer it if wannabe terrorists of any stripe didn't blow themselves up, you know, downstairs or whatnot.

Rumbled benefits cheats offer sensational excuses

Gilbert Wham

No.

No, you don't. This is the same horseshit that is trotted out *every* time.

Gilbert Wham

Not another one...

You REALLY think it's easier to live on housing benefit and JSA? REALLY? As opposed to minimum wage (~£200 after tax, PLUS ~$50 a week working tax credits)? Really? That's what you think? And your unemployed 'friends' would rather do that would they? If they were real people?

Cloud in 2011: A bright new dawn...

Gilbert Wham

"Why have malware on your server if you can do it in the cloud?”

Why indeed? Let's get it out there, where EVERYONE can share it!

Desktop Linux: the final frontier

Gilbert Wham
WTF?

Horseshite

"Download it legally for free."

don't kid yourself pal.

What? Linux IS downloadable for free. All over the bloody place. WTF are you on about?

"Run it on a clapped out old PC"

ever heard of something call Windows for Legancy (sic) PC?

No, I hadn't, but upon googling it, it's hardly a fully-fledged OS now is it? I can think of at least three distros I'd rather use (you can get ones that will cheerfully run on a 486/dx266)

No, I haven't as

"Give it to my kids without worrying they might break it."

suppose you don't run Linux as root, then Windows only does it better if you don't run it as Administrator.

That's the *whole point*; Windows is hardly ever run as anything but Admin for home users, cos it's too much of a pain in the arse for them to use like that.

If your argument was, 'You can't run high-end games on it' then I might kind of agree (there's no reason it COULDN'T, it's more to do with a dearth of money for development, as the market is admittedly tiny). Or, '[specific software 'X'] doesn't work on it'. Again, fair enough, but your counters to the above arguments make very little sense.

Apple to support reps: Don't confirm Mac infections

Gilbert Wham

"I suggest a basic UNIX course"

I second that. Not because I think it would help (it won't, most people are fucking stupid whether they know UNIX or not), but because I am a misanthrope, and I know it'll most likely make them deeply unhappy. I'd mandate it by law if I could...

/Slips off into happy reverie/

One thumb up for Facebook security improvements

Gilbert Wham

"two factor authentication"

Or, a way of ensuring they've managed to extract a working mobile number from you to add to their data pool...

Google infringes copyright by displaying and linking to news site content

Gilbert Wham

"free access to paid-for content"

Hang on a minute, how is that possible? Surely if it was *paid-for* content, it would be behind a paywall a la Murdoch, and therefore all Google would be doing was driving traffic to their door (assuming you wanted Belgian new written in French that is)? Or am I missing something? I'll admit I rarely if ever look at Google News.

Granted, if it's on a freely accessible website then they're going to lose ad revenue if Google reproduce the article verbatim on their own news site. However, if they're linking to the actual site (which they generally do), that's an even larger crock, more replete with horseshit than their 'paid content' claim.

Royal Weddings, PCs and Cameron's brass balls

Gilbert Wham

'Twas Ever Thus.

My Brothers-in-Law, both doctors, have been making this point for bloody years. It's all very well going private for elective surgery, but if you've got something seriously wrong with you, all they'll do is pay to use the NHS's resources to fix you anyway.

Behind Apple's record sales are signs of desperation

Gilbert Wham
Headmaster

Pony

It's 'one trick pony'.

Opera uncloaks Gmail challenger from Down Under

Gilbert Wham

Too late

Remember when people (well, idiots) were paying money for Gmail invites? Not going to happen here.

Teens who listen to music a lot are at high risk of depression

Gilbert Wham

Wais, what?

I was frequently ecstatically happy listening to music. Or maybe that was the ecstasy?

Stop sexing up IT and give Civil Servants Macs, says gov tech boss

Gilbert Wham

Why...

...must this degenerate into *yet another* Mac Vs PC debate, when we really should be reaching a consensus that killing every last MP and senior civil servant and starting from scratch would be easier, cheaper, and infinitely more satisfying?

We could have kangaroo courts, where they are asked simple questions about what they purport to be their purview, and then hang them when their answers are irredeemably stupid.

Bowers and Wilkins Zeppelin Air speakers

Gilbert Wham

Lossless + ipod?

I understood it that the DACs in Ipods weren't up to spec for playing lossless anyway? Mind you, I do like B&W (except for this weird-looking egg thing); I got given a pair of '70s era B&Ws about 15 years ago and have loved them dearly ever since.

Irish cop child abuse image plan attracts data protection ire

Gilbert Wham

Yes, yes you are.

There's a thing called 'due process', which includes something called 'trial by jury', where things called 'evidence' are presented, for the perusal of the presiding judge and the assembled jurors. It's been around for a while now, so one assumes that it's generally though of as a 'good thing'.

Whereas giving police carte blanche to shoot people because they suspect they may be about to do, or may have done, something reprehensible comes under the heading of 'a fucking stupid idea'.

MPs now free to surf and tweet

Gilbert Wham

Debate Unattractive?

Don't 'debates' tend to be mainly the (now two) factions of the house booing, catcalling and insulting each other? Followed shortly thereafter by the party with the majority doing whatever the fuck they like anyway?

Shame they're not allowing laptops as well. At least then there's always the faint chance of one of the buggers electrocuting himself plugging the charger in.

Apple bashes 'gay cure' app

Gilbert Wham

!= doesn't equal letters and/or digits

"Christian B&B, Christian Florists, Church Ads, Christian foster carers all being told what they can do and cant do"

I've always found such headlines, on further inspection, turn out that what the poor, downtrodden christians are told they *can't* do, is be absolute arseholes to everyone else *all the time*. Telling other people what they can do and cant do and what they are and are not allowed to think or have opinions on being something of which they seem inordinately fond.

And 'struggle with their sexuality'? And an app produced by those wackadoodles is going to help, is it? With the struggle seeming to be worrying that massive swathes of the population are going to be irredeemably awful to them expressly because of their sexuality, a thing that makes their fucking TELEPHONE give them shit for it as well seems like overkill.

As an aside, El Reg, can we not at least have BB Code on here? It's *very* hard to emphasise *exactly* how much of a dick someone is being without the use of italics. I'd have thought you'd have *noticed* this by now, you *utter* swines.

Channel Islands VAT loophole shut, petrol prices cut

Gilbert Wham

a useless cnut with no idea of economics...

I thought that was de rigeur for a Chancellor of the Exchequer?

Firefox 4 debuts: The last kitchen sink release

Gilbert Wham

Minimalist!?

Oh, God, they're not hiding buttons like everyone else, are they? I hate it when they hide the buttons. Why does 'UI Design' = 'Spitefully hiding things' so often?

AT&T ends illicit handset tethering

Gilbert Wham

Weird.

My last two Droids here in the UK have done this out of the box, with no extra fees. Data plan is shit, mind.

Vince Cable to cut training and flexible work rules

Gilbert Wham

Well...

Arguably, it's the employer's fault for not being capable of weeding out fuckwits at the interview process?

York Uni exposes students' private info

Gilbert Wham

versiunity

Since I have seen similar vulnerabilities exposed with no more than a bit of URL hacking on my university's website (a university which offers a degree in pen-testing, I might add), I'll wager this will happen again.

Second explosion rocks Japanese nuke plant

Gilbert Wham

Hmmmmm.

Being as you get your yearly dose of background radiation anyway, what they're *actually* saying is you're getting an extra 9 months on top of that. Clever bit of figure massaging though.

Microsoft rallies IE6 death squads

Gilbert Wham

IE6?!?!

I've worked in banks (Regal Scottish ones), that are still using IE4...

Antennagate Redux: Consumer Reports condemns Verizon iPhone 4

Gilbert Wham
Welcome

Ahem

'Favour' has a 'U' in it over here on the righ side of the pond...

Jester claims credit for knocking Westboro Baptist Church offline

Gilbert Wham

Ah...

RT'ing the f'in A might have been a good idea. Well, there you go. Funny video though.

Gilbert Wham

Did he really?

Anon say it was them. Hmmmm.

http://www.boingboing.net/2011/02/24/anonymous-hacks-west.html

Microsoft bricking lesson bodes badly for Elop's Brave New Nokia

Gilbert Wham

Fields of green...

lot of 'turf in here....

Samsung Wave II Bada OS smartphone

Gilbert Wham

one day...

the wrong person's going to walk past as you're taking yet another picture of that post box, panic, & report you to the Old Bill as a terrorist. You mark my words.

Capita to get fat on govt cuts

Gilbert Wham

"not all costs are linear"

Not when bloody Capita's involved they're not, no.

German Foreign Office kills desktop Linux, hugs Windows XP

Gilbert Wham

Good

Keep changing their desktop from KDE to Gnome & back at least once a week. And try to swap out any productivity software at least as often. Keep 'em on their toes, the fuckers.

What sealed Nokia's fate?

Gilbert Wham

IOS/'Droid/Symbian/WinMob:

My choice with these four was simple (WP7 I ain't tried yet): the one that connected seamlessly to *whatever computer I happened to be at*, without making me install idiotic software so it could 'sync' (god, how I hate that word) and/or make me want to punch myself in the face with frustration throughout the entire process, and I am looking VERY HARD in your direction here, WinMob.

I used to love Nokias, till they became buggy, unusable blobs. I'll reserve judgement on WP7 till I've had a go of someone else's whose been crazy enough to gamble on one.

English Defence League site pulled offline after defacement

Gilbert Wham

"The Socialists of the 1930s would be proud of you"

What, the people who kicked the shit out of the fascists at Cable St.? The people who had the courage to stand up to Franco, and went through hell for it? The strikers Churchill ordered troops to fire on? I doubt I, or any of the others here who (quite rightly) think you and your ilk are dicks, could hold a candle to them. Fuck, if I managed to do things that would gain their accolades, I'd be proud of myself. Crawl back under your rock, eh? There's a good chap.

TERRORISTS IN SUBMARINES menace the Free World!

Gilbert Wham

Let's just see...

Cocaine with a nice, friendly, Fairtrade label on it for sale cheaply in the chemist. Then, no bugger will be building submarines.

Dutch get wound up over invisible SMS

Gilbert Wham

Bad tradecraft.

Phone, sim & battery should be kept in separate pockets, only being reassembled when messages need to be sent.

ROBOT COP scatters LIVE GRENADES in San Francisco STREET

Gilbert Wham
Happy

LP4FOT?

Yeah, but who wants to deal with the backlash from Andrew's wildly inflammatory articles?

Aussie advertisers call for more bloat in web ads

Gilbert Wham

What is it?

With the Australians' propensity for doing stupid shit with the Internet?

ICO drops BT, ACS Law probe

Gilbert Wham

I...but...bheheheh...

I had to read that article three times to figure out EXACTLY how fucking stupid they were. It's so completely wrong in every respect, it simply skims over the brain on first perusal.

MozyHome stiffs unlimited users

Gilbert Wham

$(X),or £(X)/month...

...seems like money that could usefully be set aside for your own backup architecture, ,surely? Given, as people have pointed out, the time it takes to upload a HDD full of data, I'd rather mirror it at home.

Virgin Media kills 20Mb broadband service

Gilbert Wham

Laying Cable?

You've got no chance. Maybe if they got another round of handouts.

Boots punts over-the-counter paternity test

Gilbert Wham

Well...

As off-topic racist screeds go, that was very well constructed (a rare occurrence, I'm sure you'll admit). Top points for grammar, but an 'F' for generally being a dick, I'm afraid. "little Mo, the clever one out of a family of knuckledraggers"? Fucking hell.

In defence of Comic Sans

Gilbert Wham

TMT

Oh, you'd be surprised.

Mac daddy predicts all-knowing, all-seeing UI

Gilbert Wham

Seems a little complex

Why not just divorce his wife & marry a younger one with a better memory? Then we won't all need to be borged into some kind of world-spanning Mac interface.

China plans city 'twice the size of Wales'

Gilbert Wham

Stuck in the past...

You need a *modern* unit of measurement, for, as any fule kno, the Bronto has now been replaced by the Apatosaurus. If you carry on like tah, all our spaceprobes will crash...

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