Posts by bluest.one 232 publicly visible posts • joined 16 Jun 2009
I use UK Online and have had near faultless service from them for many years. HUGE data allowances (much more than I can use) for very good value.
Can anyone else tell me where I can get a good quality ISP paying £20 a month for 8MB broadband with a (theoretical) 750GB cap? I definitely don't want to be forced to sign up for SKY's expensive and shit TV.
But Android is an 'open' operating system. I'm puzzled as to how Vodafone is stopping anyone from uninstalling its crapware.
If carriers have such godlike control over Android phones, Android's major selling point over the locked-down iPhone (to me at least) becomes non-existent.
For all that I dislike the authoritarianism Apple exerts over its users, I'd rather have Jobs as my oppressor than these scummy mobile phone operators.
Another post decrying the advert-ridden interface.
I wrote to pasnasonic and got a similarly non-comprehending response.
So listen up Panasonic: I WILL NOT BUY YOUR GEAR WHILE YOU PUSH ADS AT ME. NO DISCUSSION. NO "VIEWPOINT INTERCHANGE".
My money stays in my pocket or goes to Sony, etc, instead of you, you dumb, dim-witted advert hawking fools.
in private browsing mode will still save a list of saved items to the 'recent' section of the Firefox icon's jump list.
Firefox may say you're in a private browsing session but it will still rat you out to Windows Explorer (who, as everyone knows is a loose lipped gossip & loose legged whore of the first order).
A tab is a loaded webpage = memory usage. A bookmark is virtually memory free.
Why not make the same feature but for bookmarks - or an option to have the feature use one or the other or either depending on your preference.
I don;t need that many tabs open, ever, but have a great many bookmarks. Being able to order my bookmarks in the same spatial manner would be a definite plus.
It seems to me Apple can ban apps for all sorts of petty, trivial or arbitrary reasons - so it has the power to ban these clearly dodgy apps.
No one would knowingly dial a premium rate number to 'support' these app makers - so they rely on amassing money by taking advantage of people'sunwitting behaviour.
Apple seems to be saying they're fine with that and that whilst they will protect app users from tiny cartoon penises and naughty words, they will look the other way when app makers are helping themselves to people's cash without their informed consent.
Is the $800K figure subject to any scrutiny by the UK courts before they accept this figure? You know - to make sure it isn't being falsely inflated by the US authorities in order to simply get their hands on someone they want?
We all know the figure of damages is bogus and that in such matters the US authorities figure the damages to be the cost of putting their house in order, rather than simply covering what was damaged/destroyed.
Surely the UK courts should examine the validity of the US's claims before accepting them on faith.
I have been put off buying a new Panasonic because of the ad-laden guide.
A little research yielded the interesting bit of info that if you do a factory reset, and select 'shop' rather than 'home' as the location NO ads display. I can't vouch for the truth of this, not being either rich or reckless enough to plump down a few hundred quid on the offchance that it's true, but if it is, it strikes me as a terrible act of deceit on the part of Panasonic (in addition to the painful infliction of more adverts on their customers) that potential customers would see one thing in the store displaying the Panasonic gear and experience another thing once they got the device home.
Anyone giving it a go (reset and selecting 'shop') let us all know if it's true and maybe the Register can do a follow-up asking Panasonic about the need for two different settings and different viewer experiences based upon whether the viewer has put cash in their hands or not.
"That elements of society have become so disenfranchised from the police that they'll actually support, and label a legend, someone who was out to kill officers."
Moat was relentlessly persecuted by the police once he got out of jail and worked on building up a small gardening business, according to his brother and others (I've heard it was because they believed he knew the identity of a murderer but couldn't get the information out of him) . Hundreds of stops of his vehicle, getting it impounded on trumped-up charges and the like.
The repeatedly poked a bear with a stick. And then the bear went apeshit.
I think thats one of the reasons people have greater sympathy for Moat than would otherwise be the case, and it's interesting to see the mainstream news reports that repeatedly fail to mention the police harassment and the part it might have played in the eventual murder and rampage, albeit by an already violent and unstable individual.
I've just been playing about with Linux Mint and Ubuntu on a USB stick and it's a mixed bag from my mostly Windows background.
Running an OS off a USB key (particularly a fast one) seems pretty damn neat to me and with the writiable drive function both performs faster than a live cd/dvd and you can install unpates and drivers to it. Excellent - it's exactly how every OS should be - totally portable and swappable.
My major problem comes from the fact that neither mint or ubuntu will recognise my second monitor (running from an nvidia 240gt via the hdmi port).
Also, trying to install the non-free nvidia driver (in the reccommended list of drivers that's helpfully displayed) for 3D acceleration results in a total failure to install (on both distros) and ... Googling results in reading about other people experiencing the same issue with no real answers forthcoming (just lots of complicated, best-guesses involving the command line, stopping servers and lots of other stuff well above my ability, none of which are reported to fix the issue).
I'd love to be able to use Linux for general computer use but it doesn't seem to be happening yet.
How difficult/easy are these devices to detect before a rape?
If these become commonplace and widely known about, rapists may default to using the anus.
What's to stop a woman with a grudge, luring her victim into having sex with her while she wears one of these and then crying rape, using the device as 'proof' that she did not and would not have engaged in consensual sex?
One of the key component of a netbook is portability and that means battery life (as well as form factor). That's why they have (relatively) poor processors. But this gets under 2 hours?
I like the design and don't find it ugly, but with that battery (and the ludicrous pricetag) this is a major fail.
It seems to me, this is Apples modus operandi. A friend with a Mac uses iPhoto for all her images. Lots of them. And when something else was required to use those images (other than iPhoto) she was exporting them all the time - all the while her photos were sequestered away by iPhoto.
I tried to sort it out for her (being unfamiliar with this magical 'just works' computer system) and was stumped until I discovered that in order to breach iPhotos protective wall (wherein all the images were locked) I had to create an 'alias' (in PC terms a dynamic shortcut) and through that she could directly access all her files and use them with other apps, without constantly exporting them, constantly duplicating them.
The reasoning behind the horrible set-up seems to be 'don't worry your pretty little head about all this 'files' stuff, let Uncle Mac take care of it all!'. And then you discover your kindly uncle is really a rather possesive sort, who not only treats you like a dummy, but wants to stay firmly in control.
Same with iTunes, same with the iPod squirreling away your music in a non-directly accessible manner, etc.
It's almost like the security vs freedom argument: those who desire 'it just works' over their freedom, deserve (and get) neither.
These people set up (or rather failed to set up) their access points so that their data was spewing out in public space. And someone came along and happened to record it.
It's a little like walking along a public street, with your fly open and your johnson hanging out and then complaining to the police about all the voyeurs and peeping toms.
At least the UK/Irish govt.s have a sensible policy: delete it. I dunno about you, but even if it wasn't a mistake (and why would Google even publicly announce it if it was done with full knowledge) then the last thing I'd want is for the government to then also have access to that data.
There were a large number of native goats on that island.
They found that some of the goats had nicked ears. The ones that he killed and ate never had nicks on their ears.
They summised that he was fucking some and marking them so he could distinguish between his 'lovers' and his 'food'.
It has been said that raw steak makes a passable substitute for the female lady-part. How many pieces do you have to chop a dead animal up into before you can fuck it, lawfully?
It seems so simple to say: "Animals: Kill them. Don't Fuck Them!" but nothing's ever really as uncomplicated as that, is it.
The police have these great powers to use against teh evil terroristas and they're just itching to use them - you know: have a bit of good ol' argy bargy, cracking a few skulls, wins for the team kicking Al' Qaeda's arse and all that.
The only problem is, they're all revved up to go and there's no bleedin' terrorists.
"But we wus promised a good bita skull crackin' guv!"
Photographers are toys dangling on a bit of string: a soft target the pigs can get their claws into (mixing my metaphors there a bit) and practice their fight-the-good-fight, play at being part of the war on terror and add a bit of excitement to a routine and boring day, with no real risk to themselves (by tackling a real terrorist).
Can't feel like you have power unless you use it.
That's why the police need to be restrained. They think Peel's laws on policing are something to do with their lunch-time fruit portion and they're in it for the adrenaline and the testosterone hit they get when they exercise their authoritay.
A vote for any party other than the Conservative or Labour party counts for so much less under the First Past the Post electoral system. I think the figures are that to elect one LibDem MP, 120,000 votes are required compared to around 30,000 for the so-called 'main two'.
Citizens of the UK who support parties other than Labour/Conservative are effectively disenfranchised. This is unconscionable in a country that claims to be a democracy, rather than a stitch-up by an incumbent oligarchy.
People who don't vote Con/Lab need to have their voice heard, need to have their votes count for as much as anyone else's. That is the principle of a demcratic system.
Voting Reform Now.
Let me know how it works out when the item breaks down, because by all accounts, that's when you realise the huge mistake of buying from PCWorld (and other DSG clones) - they'll take your money, but once they have it you're persona non grata.
For a damaged laptop power supply, under warranty, a friend was told he had to send in the whole laptop! No laptop, no service! Other friends have had huge issues trying to get items repaired after the warranty ran out (even just by a day or two) - despite the sale of goods act saying a warranty is in addition to your rights to purchase goods of durable quality.
I would never buy anything more substantial than a USB stick from them - and I wouldn't buy one of those unless I was desperate, as their prices are a ripoff.
Seriously, DSG (Dixons, Currys, PCWorld) - AVOID. Google for due dilligence and recoil in horror.
... that allows me to connect, through a standardised port, the newest low-powered tech which comes along, that will do all the processing and content delivery, and can be replaced with the next, better thing, without disposing of my perfectly good dumb display, as and when I see fit.
If the internet and it's newfangled ways of sharing and linking are too much of a bother to the Dirty Digger, he could always take his newspapers off the internet entirely. Nothing says he HAS to have an online presence.
At least that way, he can live happily in the past and pretend that the world is still one where he can maintain dominance over the news media.
Yes - I think the wording is that it's OK if you're married or in a 'stable long-term relationship'.
Effectively, they're legislating morality and human relationships - which sexual relationships will let you evade the law and which will get you banged up (but not in the good way)
Draw or photograph your 16 or 17 year-old lover and so long as you're married to them or can prove you're in a stable relationship with them, then the state will offer you dispensation to go about your business; but if it's a 'sordid' non-government approved relationship, then you are a dirty sex-criminal.
Aren't we supposed to live in a liberal democracy where the state keeps it's fucking nose out of our private lives and relationships?
Next up, the creation of the Junior Anti-Sex League.
They have ads in the EPG?
I was seriously ONLY looking at a Panasonic HD Freesat/Freeview set as my option for getting a new TV, but if you're saying I'd have to put up with spamevery time I want to check out what's on next, then furgeddaboudit.
What a crazy way to ruin your prestige piece of home entertainment tech.
I thought that computer manufacturers were legally forbidden from bundling Windows on a PC without the option of a refund because Windows was a monopoly OS and the bundling allowed shady back-room deals from Microsoft and prevented healthy competition.
I though that was why the line about returning the OS for a refund was in the EULA.
Anyone know for sure?
When a new technology comes along that turfs out the serfs and smashes their ploughshares, replacing them with GPS controlled super-tractors, then 'that's the price of progress'.
When a new technology comes along that replaces a monopolistic stranglehold on the production, reproduction and distribution of media with a zero-cost destruction of the previously practiced artificial scarcity that threatens to turf out the rich and powerful middlemen then the 'sky is falling!' and the government is lobbied to protect their interests with ever more draconian powers.
Fuck these Barons and the way they use their power and wealth to undermine the democratic process and buy laws that benefit themselves at the expense of progress and the people as a whole. And fuck the politicians who abrogate their responsibilities as supposedly democratic representatives and engage in what should be called treason.
Fuck 'em all.
(Non-literally, obviously).
It was this unique identifier that made me quickly uninstall Chrome a year ago, after I found out about it. It would seem, from the article that the identifier is used and then re-issued and is solely to do with updates, but it always came accross as marking Chrome out as 'spyware' - something which it hasn't really shaken off until I read this.
This is the right decision for Goggle, I think, but they should have addressed it, or the perception that existed around it, a long time ago.
Of course I'm not using Chrome or any other browser that doesn't have an adblocker that strips out horrible bloated flash adverts BEFORE they're downloaded and prevents delays in the time it takes to load pages, so ... I'm not really all that fussed at the moment about what is happening with Chrome, or Opera or Internet Assploder.
I think what this clarifies is that Steve Jobs' claim that this is the new, better version of the 'crappy' netbook is bunkum: the iPad is a computer add-on not a stand-alone device.
So you need to replace the non-user-replaceable battery? Suppose your netbook was similarly designed - before sending it off to the maker, you'd back up its data to a USB hard-drive or something. With the iPad, you NEED a second personal computer running iTunes or ... you're screwed.
Maybe that's not a big deal to some people, but it does mean that the iPad is not suitable for everyone who wants to buy a slick Apple device instead of a Windows-running netbook, which is what Jobs seemed to be touting the iPad as when he launched it.
iPredict: moderate initial success from all the must-have-it Applecolytes (sorry) but long-term failure and abandonment/neglect (like Apple TV). And all those businesses hailing it as their saviour - like the online newspaper businesses? Oh dear! Hope they didn't burn any bridges! :(
Jesus, and I thought John Birt was a shithead of a controller.
Apparently it's not too late, and the BBC Trust has to approve this cack-headded decision.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/consultations/departments/bbc/bbc-strategy-review/consultation/consult_view
(which appears to be down at the moment of posting.)
Theres also an email (gleaned from http://www.forfolkssake.com/features/3730/save-6-music-your-letters-to-the-bbc-trustees )
SRconsultation *at* bbc.co.uk
I get most of my value from the license fee from four main sources, two of which are being destroyed by this decision: comedy shows on the two main BBC TV channels, the BBC website, radio in the form of 5live and 6music, and the iplayer for stuff I miss.
What the BBC seems to define as its core service (ie BBC 1 and 2) makes up only a small part of what I use it for.
They talk about adapting to the changing landscape, but surely, if anything, people like me are part of that changed landscape - we don't just rely on the two main TV channels for our value and instead have migrated to the newer, more innovative offerings the BBC has put out and which the 'core services' simply don't - and never have catered to.
This decision can only be to appease the Murdoch-arse-licking Conservatives and their other big-media friends. It certainly isn't in the interest of license fee payers or the British public as a whole.
I knew I got my wires crossed somehow, but couldn't figure it out.
Anyhow, Huey is a fine (not-so-young-anymore) DJ, and 6music is showing it's got the sort of integrity many other stations lack by employing real musicians (as opposed to just rent-a-gob-professional-DJs) who want to share their love of music with their listeners.
Guy Garvey's another good example.
Sunday afternoons on 6Music are brilliant.
Huey Morgan (of the Fine Young Criminals) playing New York-esque chilled-out stoner music, followed by Jarvis Cocker doing his, er, thing, followed by Stuart Maconie's Freak Zone (plz change the name though) playing a sort of avante-garde version of the John Peel show.
6Music is precisely what the BBC should be funding, and should be on FM as another poster has mentioned.
No commercial operator produces anything like it, or ever probably will - the commercial operator who said they'd buy it up lock stock and barrel should put up or shut up and start their own 6music-like station. There's nothing stopping them but their own realisation that they couldn't really make a go of it and would end up sacrificing everything the sation stands for to the demands of their advertisers, turning it into yet another commercial Radio 1 clone.
What's the use of having authority and power if you can't exercise it?
If there aren't enough jihadists running around, what better way to feel powerful than to deliberately and purposefully misconstrue the seriousness of a throwaway joke and pound down hard on a soft target.
Get's the testosterone flowing, so it does! Almost as good as sex!
Flashmob retweet, anyone? Or are we all too scared? (I am)
Remind me, who are the terrorists again?
I usually end up defending Google to some extent, especially here it seems after a ridiculously biased Orlowski article, but I'm so pissed off with wheat seems like a breach of trust with Buzz, that I may forever have my view of Google tarnished, and leave them to be the pinyata to a bunch of Orlowski-ites from now on.
I have a Twitter account and only a very few people know that I am the person whose pseudonym relates to that account. I judged the implications and limits of the possible affect it could have on my privacy and decided that I was OK with it and use it in a controlled manner.
I have a few seperate email accounts, one I have for people who know me in person, one as a more general pseudonym and others for spamtraps and more-restricted privacy. I knew when I first discovered the internet that the potential for abuse and privacy invasion was implicit, and took steps to control my privacy exposure; not perfect ones of course, but since I'm not engaged in anything illegal (other than the occasional torrenting of LOST or House) that privacy doesn't have to be iron-clad, just workable, and fairly robust enough for my purposes.
I like Gmail. I moved my accounts from Yahoo some time ago now and did so because I felt I understood the risks involved in using Google for both my emails and my searches.
Over time my concern about what Google is not telling us about all the information that it is holding on us (that it doesn't mention in Google Dashboard, like searches from logged-in users and non-logged in persons that come from the same IP address and whether it ties them together) have grown, but as of just recently I still felt generally positively toward the company.
And then: Buzz, which broke, or attempted to break down the walls of privacy that Gmail seemed to have around it.
It did what Facebook has made part of its core identitly - and why i don't have an account there - rearranging the walls of it's house so that one minute you think you're taking a private dump and the next thing you know, you're sitting on the shitter and where there was previously a wall, there's now a shop window and a group of highly amused passers-by.
It's not, if I can be blunt, a reason I ever felt would come up in getting a fucking email account.
And that's why I feel like Google's betrayed me with Buzz. and why I may never feel positively toward them again, regardless of what they do to open-source this or use open protocols with that.
What they did, with Gmail and Buzz, feels like a very personal attack - a switcheroo with no asking, borne out of their desire for a Twitter clone and using us Gmail users for that entirely self-serving purpose.
Yeah ... nice way to treat people, that.
Maybe this is what Apple realises in its attempt to turn its devices into appliances like the iPad.
They approve all the apps to keep it simple and don't allow multitasking because some people aren't capable or inclined to learn anything more complicated than a TV remote control or more than the barest of barest of minimums they need to in their rush to use the device for what they really want to do - in this case, engage in social inanities with their mates.
Some people don't really want to understand what they're doing, they just want to do it. NOW!
No multitasking.
So I wouldn't be able to listen to Spotify while I browse the internet, or to my locally streamed audio while doing something else, like writing my emails.
Uh-oh.
And locked down tight so I'm limited to using what the crack-addled monkeys at App Store approval department say is blessed.
Apple have a track record of scre-ups for all their insightful wins and this is such a fail.
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