Posts by Pete 2

And they wonder why kids make illegal copies

The underlying story is that the people who so willingly give up their own property rights do so because they don't recognise the worth, or value, of IP. Not just of their own work, but of other peoples'.

Since they attach no value - monetary or otherwise to "stuff", can it come as any surprise that they therefore don't feel there's anything wrong with "stealing" copyrighted material?

As an exercise: did anyone ever actually _read_ the Ts & Cs for El Reg before they signed up? Are there any - I don't know, I never read any conditions, I just click "I agree" - just like everybody else.

Money and mouth: same place or not?

So Google, a company that would have nothing without the internet, wants other people to make it go faster? Amazing! You can see how this guy got to be a veep.

Since Brittin made the observation that the UK was a “world leader” in e-commerce because it spends more per-head online than any other country, maybe "Dave" should return the compliment by saying "Google is a world leader in internet searching because it gets more search queries than other websites". Then they can all stop statin' the bleedin' obvious and get back to doing some useful work.

However, if Brittin was prepared to put up some cash to help get improved fixed and mobile 'net access - rather than merely suggesting that somebody else should do it, that would be an altogether different matter.

Transparent concealment

If you have something you don't want people to see the traditional approach has been to try and hide it. Conceal it behind a sign that says "Nothing to see here", or disguise it as something else.

Alternatively, you can conceal something by making it invisible. When something's invisible you can't see it - you see right through it. It's TRANSPARENT.

So it's not a huge jump to go from using a disguise or concealment to prevent people from seeing what you're up to, to stopping them from seeing it by making it transparent and therefore invisible to view - or scrutiny. Should we therefore be worried that the real motivation behind a government "transparency" initiative is not to reveal to the general public how government works - but to stop us from seeing those workings by making them invisible, yet still present?

Beats having to talk to your date

Excellent idea!

Now, instead of spending a romantic evening (though in an M&B theme-pub? maybe not) each party will be able to prepare themselves for their future lives together by ignoring each other and spending the evening SMS-ing their friends, surfing the dating sites for better prospects or just watching the TV that they'd have otherwise missed by dint of being in the pub.

Many couples attribute the success of their relationships to the simple technique of never talking to each other. It sounds like adding another opportunity for mutual avoidance could even help them stay together.

.horse the before cart the Putting

Before Ofcom can decide whether a given individual is "fit and proper" to own and control a large chunk of british television, don't we need to have had some sort of public debate about what sort of television we want in this country?

(Preferably NOT a debate that is instigated, lead, defined and controlled by the same guy's newspaper empire)

Modern day psychometric testing

I suppose this is the equivalent of filling in "personality tests" at interviews. You know: the ones where you quickly work out what sort of person they want for the job and fill in the little boxes according to the required traits.

As it is, a lot of people (who have active FB accounts) adopt the persona of the person they'd LIKE to be - that outgoing, lively, vivacious, GSOH type that they'd describe themselves as in the lonely hearts ad - instead of the dull and uninteresting saddo who spends all his/her time glued to a screen (TV or computer) as they have no proper friends.

What an FB account, and any/all photos posted, can tell you about a person - to some extent anyway, is whether a potential interviewee harbours any of the attributes that you are not allowed to enquire about during a job interview for equality reasons. So while employers are prevented from selecting for reasons of age, gender, ethnicity it's easy for an immoral boss - or recruitment agent to preselect for interview candidates who volunteer this information in a social forum.

Typically british excuse

> The key to the minor impact, ... was the orientation of the mass ejected from the Sun

So basically: it was the WRONG SORT of solar storm.

Modern vs. Traditional crime

Given the choice between having a baddie persuade a bank to give them several hundred pounds, using _my_ credentials and getting whacked over the head in a mugging - I think I'd prefer the bank to write off a small amount of its profits than for me to end up with a concussion, or worse.

It's Linux, all over again

In the red corner we have a product that is tightly controlled, restricted and expensive.

In the blue corner we have a multiplicity of suppliers, apps available from everywhere and an emphasis on "it's not from 'The Man'"

While there won't be a knockout blow, and the first round or two went to the freetreads (after they turned up, late) the fight seems to be going in favour of the packaged/glossy/easy-to-use product. That people are willing, or maybe even desperate, to choose ease of use over getting their hands dirty - and to pay for the privilege - should come as no surprise to anyone who's seen the previous O/S wars.

Those who don't learn from the mistakes of history ....

Skinner's pigeons

Prof. Skinner was a behavioural scientist who showed how pigeons (and rats, but let's not call advertising targets "rats": "bonkers" is probably derogatory enough) can be conditioned into performing actions for rewards. In his experiments, the pigeons would peck at a disc and be rewarded with a small amount of food. They quickly cottoned on to the action/reward idea and the Prof astounded the world with his discovery.

It now seems that advertisers have caught up with the research and are now attempting to train people to do similar things for even less tangible rewards. Who says the human race isn't progressing? Maybe we're evolving into well-trained pigeons.

Old problem - old solution

ISTR there's (at least one) a small road leading from Cheddar Gorge with a small, old sign warning potential drivers: Not Suitable for Charabancs. It's been nigh-on 30 years since I frequented the area but the problem does seem to pre-date the Satnav era and the solution seems to be simple to implement.

Why not just put up a few more signs?

A more accurate SF prediction

Sadly, the future will probably turn out more like Incompetnece [sic] by Rob Grant.

Paying off your student loan is the worst idea possible

New loan-takers get an extremely generous deal on their student loans. The interest rate is guaranteed *never* to be above the rate of inflation and currently stands at base-rate + 1%. if you have savings you can beat that easily with an ordinary savings account.

So if these guys are making money from daubs on their faces (do students still never wash?) then they should be putting the cash into a savings account - not paying off their incredibly cheap debts.

Presumably they're not economics students.

Buying beer from a disgruntled workforce

... sounds risky.

Too many opportunities for new "additives" to find their way into the mix.

"All the beer from this brewery has been passed by the workers"

Tons, metric tons and tonnes

To all intents and purposes they're all the same. Let's forgive the odd 35-and a-bit lbs (in obsolete units) and just call a ton a ton

Damned if they do ...

Councils get a kicking for not having easy to use websites. I'm sure they can live with the pain, when it would be compared with the fulminating tabloid headlines if they went out and engaged a "high priced external consultant". You know; one of those people who actually KNOWS how to design websites.

"Enough with the firmware updates, while you're at it."

Actually, some firmware updates would be lovely.

Since we got our "smart" Toshiba a year ago (simply plug in TV, HDMI and network, switch on, scan DTV, assign names to inputs, enable wired IP - and done in < 5 minutes, easily) there have been no updates, ever. Not OTA updates, not IP updates, nada.

What would be better is if the TV manufacturers opened up their specs. I can see the TV runs Linux and I doubt it's harder to hack than a Dreambox, so why not let the users create their own apps - maybe even have a TV "app store" if the control freaks insist on micromanaging things.

A donkey among asses?

> what his future role at the SPB might be...

You could always lend him to a journalist in return for lots of highly favourable reportage

A watchdog with no teeth ...

... nothing sucks more

From their own website:

"The ASA is a non-statutory body so we do not have the power to fine or take advertisers to court."

You've got to wonder, just what is the point of them.

What's sauce for the goose

> the hacking attack... ended up making the company stronger and more effective.

So presumably the hackers will be able to invoice the company for the services provided. After all, if companies can claim damages for adverse effects of hacks, surely they should be made to pay for benefits, too.

The new latin

Coding in a language

as dead as dead can be

it killed the ancient programmers

and now it's killing me

Being polite

I assume the phrases "post something they regret" , "young men are the most impetuous" and "men to be the least privacy-conscious people online, and the most likely to make a gaffe" are merely roundabout ways of saying that (young) men are more likely to post something while out of their skulls on <chemical of choice>.

Failing that, maybe it's simply down to the sorts of people that social networks attract? Not "men" or "women" in general, just the fraction who actually spend their time posting stuff.

A team effort

We're fortunate that there are very few people in the world who wish to cause harm - and even fewer in positions of trust and with the ability to do so. Luckily (!) most of the attacks we've heard about have either been from external forces - limited by their ability to insert bad stuff accurately, or by lone insiders acting out a personal vendetta. Whether the situation of a concerted inside-job by a focused team will remain a fiction, or whether it will be targeted as the "soft underbelly" of the whole computer industry, remains to be seen. However, it would be incredibly easy to do[1] given the time and inclination of those involved.

Afterthought: Given the amount of mis-management, overruns, over-costs, poor implementations and buggy products - maybe this sort of sabotage has, actually, been happening for years - or decades.

[1] Scenario: An HR person with a particular "outlook" preferentially recruits techies with the same outlook. As part of a slow-burning plan, they all gravitate towards working on the same vulnerable system and from that position of self-supervision are free to implement whatever bugs, backdoors, weaknesses, logic-bombs or espionage they please. How many people? A team leader, couple of coders, a tester. Maybe half a dozen: tops. How long? Maybe a year or two.

Remembering a password is no harder than remembering a phone number

It must be so difficult, living in modern times. Apart from having to remember your address - or getting lost 'cos you've forgotten where you live. Or your registration number and wandering the neighbourhood attempting to get into every vehicle you come across (at least that's what I told the nice officer). Or what channel your favourite programmes were on. Or your spouse's name (not one you want to get wrong!) or any of the other gazillions of pieces of information you need to recall just to live your daily live.

Now add on top of all that, three or four (or even 10 or more) passwords. It must be pure hell.

In fact, recalling data that you use on a daily basis is no big deal - we do it thousands of times every day. So, provided you pay attention when you set the password and use it regularly, it's as easy as remembering to get dressed before you leave the house. The big problem only comes when one of the stooopid "security" systems insists you change a perfectly good password on a regular, or frequent basis. Now that IS dumb.

A spot of wind

Aside from the question of balance, the design needs to be able to withstand high winds. ISTR that PARIS encountered some blowage at height and the extra stress of balloons wanting to go in different directions (a phenomenon some readers may be familiar with) could exceed the design loading of the truss.

Money, money, money

> they were doing all kinds of things to try to retain and attract Linux talent

All kinds of things ... except paying enough to attract recruits, it seems.

If you really, REALLY want to fill a Linux position, simply offer a salary that will attract applicants. Not getting any applicants? then your headline salary is too low. Getting applicants who are crap? Then your recruitment agency needs a kick for not screening properly. Getting applicants who turn down your offers? Then look inside at your company - the work, the conditions and (most important) whether the boss is an idiot.

The problem is that in a lot of large organisations: multinationals, government departments, utilities and the like, all regard IT workers as the same. I've seen instances where the HR people and the IT senior managers were seriously saying "but they're all support staff, why not just get the Windows team to do it?" With no understanding - or even awareness - that the skills are different. When you start with that level of ignorance, it's no surprise that the so-called "perks" listed in the article fail to attract.

Beer and broadband

Just imagine if Tesco (or, TBF any other supermarket) sold beer the same way they sell broadband.

Beer: quantity UNLIMITED (subject to contents of bottle). ABV: up to 4.5% and then noticing that the bottle top doesn't come off, and you can't get the stuff out at more than a trickle.

What he meant to say was:

> these discussions have evolved into a potential go-forward framework that is currently in the government's review process,

If we're lucky the government might bung some sympathy work our way. If that does happen, and our shares get back to anything like last year's level you won't see me (or the rest of the board) for dust.

Now where did I leave my golden parachute?

I bet he gets *no* IT bug reports

Once word of his novel approach to dealing with problems becomes common knowledge, I'd be surprised if anybody would issue a bug report against any of his software, in case he applies his special remedy for "fixing" their IT problems.

It would be interesting to see his staff appraisals, too. I can imagine a somewhat shakily (hand)written assessment along the lines of " ... some scope for improving customer-facing skills"

Ignorance is bliss

> Ignorance prevented people participating in important debates, he added.

If only that was true. The biggest problem (he said, not knowing if it's true or not) with public debate on science and technology - or finance & economics - is that people who don't know the facts still feel they have a right to say what they think. We see this every day, not just in scientific debates but whenever a TV news programme needs some cheap filler and goes out on a trawl for vox-pops. Once an opinion gets onto our TV screens it assumes greater importance - as if being broadcast (and being chosen to be broadcast by an equally techno-illiterate studio-person) somehow turns fiction into fact: "Well someone on telly said ... " and is well on the way to becoming accepted wisdom. After that, no matter how many white-coated, bespectacled, bearded, geeks you put up against "what everybody knows" you're on a loser.

Maybe the first question that Paxo, or any other TV presenter should ask, when opening a conversation with an interviewee should be: "What, exactly are your credentials?" and we should be reminded, frequently, whether the individual speaking does so from a position of knowledge. It could result in much shorter TV debates.

Only human

... and of course all doctors are fine, upstanding, conscientious and talented.

The main reason for people "hiding" behind an anonymous posting is to avoid the possibility of retribution - or even of a practice deciding they don't want whingeing patients on their books. You can just imagine a situation, moments before the doctor says "cough, please" when they decide to raise the topic of your last, critical, posting of their bedside manner.

The moral of the story ...

... is to make the users do all the work themselves.

Whether the alternative - either for the helpdesk or the checkout - is one that involves lots of waiting, having to deal with barely-trained & disgruntled employees, having to beg for the most basic services (or carrier bags), trying not to appear too annoyed ... w h i l e ... t h e y ... w o r k ... a t ... t h e i r ... o w n ... g l a c i a l .. p a c e ... or suddenly decide to change shifts and stop everything for 5 minutes.

Faced with that, it's no wonder employees want to bring in their own kit and operate "self-service"

Really getting wired

> a weak current, which runs between the buds, is broken.

Now that could add an extra dimension to the music. I can just imagine some over zealous royalties enforcer requiring a chip in all new players that turns this current up to 11 if the requisite DRM checks don't pass.

On the matter of detecting which orifice an earbud is inserted into, wouldn't it just be easier to colour-code them?