* Posts by James

178 publicly visible posts • joined 8 May 2007

Page:

Ballmer deploys greenery in CeBIT charm offensive

James
Gates Halo

Not 33% less....

The article actually reads "he claimed that Vista's idle mode consumes 33 times less power than XP's"

If my calculations are correct that means it consumes about 3% what XP does in idle mode. This is a staggering level - must mean that the power supply effectively switches off.

Great stuff - keep it up Stevie. We'll soon have PCs that consume almost no power (hey - we could call them IBM PCs and run them with 60 Watt power supplies!!).

Confidential Home Office data turns up in laptop on eBay

James
Happy

Of course...

.. it could be a wind-up! Lets face it - who in the Home Office would have the knowledge to hide a disk UNDER the keyboard. I can believe a forgotten disc in the drive but.....

When they decrypt it it'll probably be the complete "Third Policeman" by Flann O'Brien!

I suspect there'll be thousands of "Property of Home Office - Confidential" disks appearing from everywhere in the coming months.

In fact, it'd be a good line in CD labels.... for those of an entrepreneurial bent.

Swisscom chills to the sound of whalesong

James

CLOTHES EMPEROR NEW

Rearrange to form a familiar phrase...

Why do companies keep falling for this pretentious claptrap ?

Quake rocks Britain

James
Joke

Must be Al Quaeda...

..obviously an attack like this must be terrorist in nature. Something that can have such a widespread effect and place people in a state of fear and alarm or, indeed, terror (=terrorist caused).

When can we expect the government to announce a clampdown on all earthquakes, those conspiring to cause earthquakes (God? Can we expect Gods representatives to be arrested in a series of dawn raids on cathedrals, churches etc).

Just what are the anti-terrorist squads doing to prevent further earthquakes? (which have much greater potential for damage and loss of life than so-called terrorist activities).

UK data watchdogs drop Facebook probe

James
Flame

Narcissic...

"It's just a shame such a small concession to the people it is hoping to build its alleged business on took Facebook so long, really"

People like Zuckerberg (Sugar Mountain?) are narcissic - they feel that the world should conform to them and that anything they do is legitimate just because they do it. So, they just set up their operations based on the "If I do it it must be legal" approach - then get all upset when someone tells them they can't.

I'll bet when the ICO first approached him he would have thrown a "wobbly" where he asked "What the f**k do these jumped up bureaucrats think they're doing telling ME (the great I AM) what to do!". That's why it took so long.

Just declare him as an undesirable alien and make sure he never gets into the UK instead of lauding him as some kind of Web 2.0 hero (whatever Web 2.0 is???).

Or better still: ignore him, ignore Faceplook, get a life and maybe they'll vanish into oblivion.

CLOTHES, NEW, EMPEROR

Solicitors fined under Data Protection Act

James
Happy

Lawyers ...

.. that don't understand the law...

Well, I'm sure they'll have clients flocking to them now!

MS + Yahoo! = Microhoo! - Official!

James
Coat

be careful now....

remember the Australia Santa that was sacked for saying Ho Ho Ho.... (seemingly a word of disrepute for our North American friends).

Not sure that MicroHoo wouldn't fall into the same category.

Now where's my MicroCoat...

Consumer group slams 'unfair' software licenses

James
Happy

About time....

as has previously been mentioned on the Register how can you purchase a license for software without knowing what the terms are (i.e. the EULA).

Hopefully, this will result in clearer guidelines for licenses and software sales.

Suggest that if a EULA is more than 1 A4 sheet of 12 pt Times New Roman at 1.5 line spacing then the drafting lawyers should automatically face £1m fines or the product can not be sold in the UK. That should focus their attention!

Coat at ready...

Piscine killer menaces UK rivers

James
Thumb Down

Word for word from the Sun

This report is taken almost word for word from the Sun. Where is the independent journalistic research to add to the story?

There are too many stories being "lifted" from external sources without checking and separate verification.

Maybe it's true, maybe it's not (the Sun must get some facts right some time!) ...

FBI issues prosthetic pregnant belly bomb alert

James
Pirate

Oh for gods sake...

Enough already.

In Hitch hikers Guide to the Galaxy I remember there were the 3 space ships into which one planet packed all their "entirely" useless members of society. Is there any reason we can't do this with all the "fear-mongers" and "TerrorIndustry" moguls that come out with this rubbish?

Next we'll have cops shooting pregnant women on the tube......... as well as people listening to MP3 players, using Mobile phones, listening to "Londons Burning", carrying dodgy looking CDs (in pairs as supplied by HMG Departments), carrying more than 100ml of liquid, carrying a wooden chair leg (oh - I forgot they'd already done that), using a GPS, using a 4 X 4 (could be going to ram the local airport), buying gas for the barbie, etc. etc.

BSA sinks teeth into US dentists and door makers

James
Thumb Up

@ Geoff Mac

Totally agree. Time to download Open Office - they could train a good number of people for the $92K they've shelled out.

If SpecSavers can run their entire business on Open Source then surely any other business can.

If the French Gendarmes can save 70 million Euros a year, then surely other organisations can make huge savings.

If the US armed forces trusts open source systems over Microsofts offerings then surely business should show the same trust.

I often wonder why businesses that are otherwise "on-the-ball" when it comes to money and cost savings seem to be unable to decide between:

Paid for systems :

Cost a huge amount of money to implement and support

Have major, costly upgrades every couple of years which involve costly hardware upgrades and staff re-training.

Open source

Free and widely available

Usually better than equivalents above

Upgraded as required

Some training needed, I guess but not a huge amount.

I am missing something or is this a no-brainer ?

Veggies a 'perversion of nature': Official

James
Linux

Ho hum

been a vegetarian for over 20 years. Didn't realise that I had a low boiling point - thanks to those great purveyors of truth Pravda for pointing it out. Also glad to see that they refute corrupt western medical evidence that Vegetarians are healthier and tend to live longer than non-vegetarians.

Haven't indulged in arm waving, frothing at the mouth etc., since I caught salmonella from a rotten chicken served at a university function years ago.

I wonder if the Russian Business Network has moved from Phishing into Animal Farming and now needs to get customers.

They forgot to mention that we have no sense of humour.

Well, I'd better go out on my daily 6 km run, in preparation for my 25 km hill walk this weekend, then along to the climbing wall for a two hour work out. Glad Pravda has shown me how unhealthy I am !!

I just wonder what Russian carnivores do for their daily exercise: I guess it must be swim the Black Sea, run across Asia and climb Everest all in the morning before they start their work at 9.

Apple ships Air

James
Flame

Someone at Apple can't do the maths !!

"The 1.6GHz, 80GB Air costs £1199 in the UK and $1799 in the US. The 1.8GHz, 64GB SSD model costs £2028/$3098."

Today exchange rate = 1.99

$1799 / 1.99 = £905 (Difference = £295)

$ 3098 / 1.99 = £1557 ( Difference = £471)

Even allowing for the slight vagaries of the exchange rate this seems like a VERY HIGH UK premium! And yes, my company does (and has been) importing stuff from the US for over 20 years. We couldn't justify this type of mark-up and there is NO REASON for this from an organisation the size of Apple - oh apart from Greed, of course. DON'T LET APPLE GET AWAY WITH THIS. They're just treating UK customers with complete contempt!

IPFI chief says it's time to hose down the networks

James
Happy

Consume Music ??

I always believed that you LISTENED to music. You don't consume it. What's this guy doing? Eating Vinyl or CDs?

Or has he started to believe his own marketing departments super-crap jargon.

To repeat, Boyo, YOU LISTEN TO MUSIC, YOU CONSUME CORNFLAKES!

I'd be more inclined to be sympathetic to the industry IF the fatboy directors of the recording industry were earning £20 K or less and the truly artistic musicians (by that I don't mean the rubbish generated by EX-Factor and Pap Idol) were earning 90% plus of the income generated by the sales of their music.

'Dangerously alluring' Ukrainian joins Bond 22

James
Paris Hilton

Wot no photo ?

Thought this would be another excellent photo opportunity! Ahh - there's no ASUS eeeK machine involved!

Why Borland trashed its spreadsheet

James
Black Helicopters

But then there is Foobar ...

which appears in almost every programming book on the market.

I'm led to believe that it's from the acronym FUBAR or Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition.

Just wait till Windows Foobar is released - I believe it's the version after Vista.

I've never used profanities in user visible log files or error messages (though variable names have occasionally succumbed!).

When Commodore ruled the world

James

The PET

I remember the PET (32 Kbyte memory and tape drive) 1981? The long wait whilst programmes became permanent on the tape drive!

Then in Germany in 1983 selling accessories for the BBC micro - very, very popular with buyers from the european "communist" countries at the time (before the wall came down).

The VIC20 was hastily renamed the VC20 in Germany. V is pronounced F - work it out!

NASA Mars droid in ET life discovery shock

James
Happy

I knew it wasn't the Gobi desert...

it was really the Jerboas they discovered on Mars:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7130484.stm

NZ police cuff teenage botnet mastermind suspect

James
Stop

More than 2 in 3 (65%)

Another Register article today reported the less than brilliant performance of students in science in the UK.

"More than 2 in 3" = 2/3rds = 66.6666 repeating %. 65% is, therefore, less than 2 in 3 !

Back to school....

Balls blames parents, computers for English literacy slide

James
Happy

Why are we worried?

Why are we worried about this? After all, as the advert says: "The Clever - Stupid balance is restored".

All those kids in Africa and China and other parts of the world that are clamouring for education, education, education will get it and learn faster and better than our wannabe obese kids.

I'm sure they'll treat us all kindly when we're slaving away in large call centres to serve their markets.

Carphone slated over iPhone porkies claim

James
Alert

Consultants ?

CFW statement:

"Because of the unique nature of the iPhone and its replacement process there could, despite detailed training, be some element of confusion among an isolated number of sales consultants."

I trust that Carphone Warehouse are paying these people a salary commensurate with their job title. A consultant would probably expect £50K to £100K per annum (I'm probably being a bit conservative here !! ).

Also: Why are these poor people "isolated"? What have they done that no one will communicate with them?

Can we not get rid of marketing doublespeak from these companies once and for all? A case for the Campaign for Plain English, I think!

Will Darling's data giveaway kill off ID cards?

James
Unhappy

But they're secure....

... because they contain biometric data (according to Mr. Darling on the BBC news this morning). But even that looked like a fudge.....

I'm not sure why he believes that biometric data would make an ID card database more secure. Do politicians live in a parallel universe where technical reality rarely intrudes?

Hopefully this whole issue will focus on the entire spectrum of security of personal data held in any large database, anywhere by anyone.

I don't trust any organisation to be able to make personal data secure. I now expect that my data WILL be lost, leaked, stolen at some point.

Sigh ! !

Facebook promises stronger safeguards

James

Why don't they learn...

.. to make security and complaints procedures a priority BEFORE they set up the sites. Security and handling complaints rapidly and efficiently should be inbuilt at the initial design stage of the site NOT as an afterthought when legal gaze has been brought upon the site.

This has happened with almost every "new" social web area since it began.

For the thickos out there that are thinking of setting up "uncontrolled" social networking sites:

Experience shows that you are going to get criminals, fraudsters, hackers, groomers, predators, and other scum using your system.

BEFORE YOU GO LIVE MAKE SURE YOU HAVE THE TECHNOLOGY, STAFF, FINANCE AND LEGALS IN PLACE AND TESTED TO REMOVE THE SCUM IMMEDIATELY THEY APPEAR. OTHERWISE DON'T PUBLISH YOUR SITE!

SIMPLE AS THAT !

Direct Line squashes esure's mouse on wheels

James

Re: Err... RBoS = HBOS NO!

richard

No, Royal Bank is not part of Halifax/Bank of Scotland!

On original topic: Don't see why the fuss about rounded boxes on wheels....

Boffins demo wireless electricity

James

Electric toothbrushes do this - so what's new?

Electric toothbrushes use this principle to get charged (wireless) - so all that's new here is the scale and separation.

But just think of the field day (no pun intended) all those panicking about wireless networks will have when they find out about Wireless mains power !!

2012 Olympics logo debuts to whalesong

James

What is it?

It looks like a bent old person with a walking stick....

What is it meant to be?

As a design it's fragmented, uncohesive and meaningless. How much did they pay for this?

James

Clothes, New and Emperor

Having looked at the pretenscious rubbish on the Wolff Olins site I'm more inclined to think of the Emperors new clothes with everyone falling over themselves to say how wonderful the Logo is. When it's a total mess.

Suggest El Reg gives a prize to the most original description of what it looks like.

I'll go for random bird poo .... (even if a bit more colourful).

EU postpones roaming cap decision

James

Missing word..

There seems to be a word missing in final paragraph...

"so the cap won't reduce their costs and could even increase them as operators seek to maintain their *obscene* profits"

Page: