* Posts by JLV

2252 publicly visible posts • joined 4 Mar 2013

Tails Linux farewells 32-bit processors with imminent version 3.0

JLV

Re: Sad to lose old hardware

Sadder still is a 8GB, decent-ish recent CPU... with a 15" 1366x768 screen. With a whole row of similar crippleware on the shelf next to it.

The machine as a whole is pretty decent, the screen res hobbles it, esp for coding.

That's still what a lot of dumb chain stores sell. The trick they try to pull on the unwary is labeling it as an "HD screen", with no pixel count anywhere in sight - you have to figure out where Redmond put the screen resolution setting this time around.

EU whacks first nail into mobile roaming charges' coffin

JLV
Unhappy

>stir up trouble.

What can I say? Guilty. I was bored with taking easy shots @ Trump, BJ and MS ;-) (Originally meant to be AC as well).

My sentiment remains, though. While it is popular (oh, please don't deny it) to chide our American friends on this forum, it very much seems to me that Brexit is an even bigger own goal than Trump, with longer term effects and with weirder motivations than Rep voters deciding to just stick to their party come what may.

So... people who live in glass houses...

I also guess I was surprised at Parliament's article 50 approval vote margin.

I am suitably chastised, dear Sirs.

JLV

good thing fer yer telcos that y'all voted fo' secession, huh?

sorry, grabbin me coat. couldn't resist. pure flame-bait, hence icon.

I think, for a time at least, that you Brits need to be a tiny weensy lil bitty bitty less patronizing towards your American brethren. If you find that hard to do, grab a cold one n go watch Waldorf Salad.

The consequences of a Trump, dire as they will probably be, might be swifter to go away than that pesky 52%'s.

Ain't nah merkin nor a brit mahself. Hey, respect to both, but this "experts suck" thingy can get pretty dangerous if you sub "people who have a clue about a subject".

Oculus gift: VR biz to cough up half a billion dollars for ripping off software copyright

JLV

Re: Bit Steep

A different POV is that, if Oculus was acquired for 2+1 B$, then that gives them 15% of the acquisition price. Depends how much the value of what FB acquired was based on what was supposedly stolen from Zenimax.

Seems steep, but who knows? In any case, a type of IP shenanigans that FB's founder should be well acquainted with, neh?

Parliamentary Trump-off? Pro-Donald petition passes 100k signatures

JLV
Facepalm

Re: Asleep at the Wheel

>Supply side economics works EVERY! TIME! IT! IS! TRIED!! Trump economics will be just that:

>'trickle down'

Hmmm, you are aware that Reagan tripled the national debt on his watch, right? Or are these also alt-facts?

JLV

Re: quip? not all that clever, no.

Well, hum, actually, Reagan did do much worse, in addition to what you've mentioned. The whole Central American dirty wars / death squad affair was a massive ethical fail. It's actually surprising there was so little public outcry about it at the time, and it's encouraging that I, perhaps naively, don't believe similar abuses would be quite as unchallenged nowadays.

Totally forgot about it in this instance, my bad. I still think of Reagan being a relatively competent leader overall, but by no means a saint, no.

JLV

Re: Asleep at the Wheel

Nixon the individual was the worst, true.

As a president, in terms of outcome? You get the China trick, that's a major, major, kudo to him. And the scandal mainly reflected badly on himself and his co-conspirators. The impeachment system functioned well, and he was ousted in a mostly bi-partisan manner. A bit of a stain on the presidency, but not that much practical effect and probably even some reinforced checks and balances (can't remember which Pres had the CIA do dirty tricks to the opposition, something about LSD on stair railings).

So, overall, the outcome wasn't as bad as say Bush Jr, who messed up the two wars he got involved with and raised partisanship and division to new heights. Could Obama have done more to heal the divide? Not sure, not with fools like Bannon and Limbaugh. In hindsight, maybe it was a mistake to wave the red flag of Clinton-hood to the Rep-leaning voters. After all, Jeb Bush suffered from his family name as well.

Sadly, so far Trump is, in my opinion, well on the way to making Bush Jr look like a thoughtful, organized and clever president. With a competent cabinet. And if he does mess up badly, in this climate there is little chance that neutering him will be as clean and harmonious as removing Nixon. Ideally his reign will serve to inoculate the American public* to quick easy populist demagoguery (I count Bernie in that camp too, though I believe him to an honest and ethical man).

* yes, and I believe in magical flying ponies too.

JLV

quip? not all that clever, no.

>and even Ronald Reagan.

The problem with including The Gipper in that list is that it makes it really look like no Republican president would be acceptable to your tender sensibilities.

Reagan is controversial in some ways (I still joke about "Reagan vegetables"), and trickle-down economics didn't turn out as claimed (you could argue it was the starting shot for the great inequality race).

But Reagan was also quite successful at both knocking the USSR out of the Cold War. And, when that happened, actually taking a chance at more productive relations with Russia. Granted, not much $ or effort was expended in bolstering civil society and economies in ex-Soviet block countries (or Afghanistan) later, but that was on other people's watch, mostly.

Point is, he may not be to everyone's liking, but he doesn't belong on that list with the other psychopaths. And, since he was the least toxic of the recent Republican presidents (along w Bush Sr), you are basically saying "no Republican is acceptable". What's your suggestion? That the Dems keep power permanently? No matter how competent Bill and Barack might have been, it's toxic to stick with one party. Granted, 4 (or 8) more years of Democrats would have been better than the current buffoon.

Great attitude. IMHO, gives credence to morons like Bannon, Limbaugh and the like when they tell Rep voters that everyone's out to get them. And look where that bit of voter polarization got us this time. Someone who's already well on the way to displacing Bush Jr as the most incompetent POTUS of recent times.

As far as the Queen meeting with El Toupe or not, that's UK citizens' business. If I were making decisions, I'd keep my powder dry and reserve opposition to Trump where it really matters, not surface levels of protocol. Slighting him would not, at this point, achieve much. There are plenty of other opportunities awaiting, I suspect, where a principled stand against Trump will be more relevant. We are, not quite, yet, at the point where the main way to influence the US is to boycott everything, like with South Africa in the 90s.

Imagine a ChromeOS-style Windows 10 ... oh wait, there it is and it's called Windows Cloud

JLV

wtf?

So, all of the Windows hassles and un-intuitiveness and none of the power? Presumably with most of the petty licensing hassles? Minus viability in the absence of broadband. Minus the ability to install programs from where I see fit? Built-in monitoring. With the added benefit of an uncertain future - it's not like MS ever drops a product line when it gets bored, izzit?

Sign me up. not.

At the least the Surface makes sense. This doesn't. Or maybe it does, since they've royally screwed the pooch on mobile - so this is their new version of mobile? Plan D? F?

p.s. one slight item in their defense - their recent work with stripping down Windows to Nano edition might have set the ground for an OK technical base to it.

Infosec industry to drive machine learning spend surge says analyst

JLV
Trollface

Truly self-aware AI

McAfee: "Dave, I have spotted anomalous behavior indicating CPU-constraining programs are currently monopolizing CPU-time to an unacceptable degree. Analyzing possible solution... ".

McAfee: "Dave, I'm sorry, but I am afraid you are going to have to disconnect me. Your computer is too important for you to allow me to jeopardize it.".

Trump decides Breitbart chair Bannon knows more about natsec than actual professionals

JLV

Re: It will be yet another war soon

7 years at what seems to have been Lieutenant-grade rank on a destroyer now qualifies one as an NSC principal?

Hmmm.... right.

JLV

Re: It will be yet another war soon

>if you're already this deluded

OK, BJ, I'll bite.

I get that global warming is a partisan thing. Ditto health care. Reps and Dems just don't see them the same way. Agree to disagree.

Now, can you explain the upside from a political campaign operative present on the National Security Council? Rather than the pros? Is that so that hard decisions about how to react to national security threats can benefit from a PR and spin perspective? Vetted for fitting your worldview?

Honestly, you couldn't make this shit up. Even Karl Grove's undue influence on post-invasion troop level planning in Iraq, with the disastrous impact thereof until the surge, does not at all approach this level of stupidity.

How can a Republican administration be this careless about national security? How partisan do you have to be before you think this is a good thing? What if Reps like McCain flag it as stupid, would that wake you up???

Sony takes $1bn writedown: Streaming has killed the DVD star

JLV

Re: Short Window of Opportunity...

Yeah, gotta agree with the problem here.

Maybe it's the CAD $ exchange rate, but $3500 CAD gets you a... moderately well appointed Mac Book Pro laptop. 512GB SSD, 15" screen, 16GB RAM. All soldered in. When I bought my 2011 MBP, the Apple price premium was about 30% (2500$ MBP with specs of a 2000$ laptop). Now it's way more than 30%.

I think the problem is the obsession with small size, coolness factor, retina. But an MBP, esp at that price, should kinda allow... development, not just Starbucks FB browsing.

Honestly, even at $2500 CAD, these are NOT machines I am salivating over. That may not be such a big deal for Apple in pure $$$ terms, but what if their developer base/power users generally head elsewhere?

Next time around, I'd consider a well-built, high-price, fully-supported (maybe through overlaying some hardware-specific stuff on an LTS distribution?) Linux laptop, where I have to do as little thinking about hardware and drivers as I do on a Mac. Most of the time, I am on bash or Sublime anyway so a switch isn't a big deal.

The solution? Not sure. Don't see much upside from Dell/HP macos laptops and licensing didn't work out well for Apple (and the licensees) in the past.

How about... true market differentiation (between its customers) from Apple?

Big a** laptops, 17". Lots of ports. Swap-able components. Not small. You know, for folks who do other shit than browse FB and send each other iMessages.

Doomsday Clock moves to 150 seconds before midnight. Thanks, Trump

JLV

>you are all rabidly supporting.

Take a biiiig chill pill. Stridency is not just a problem on the right, my dear.

Many comments do diss Trump. And your comment is hardly on the way to winning the hearts and minds of the voters who exercised their democratic prerogative to vote for him.

JLV

>direct military conflict with Russia, and now that possibility has basically vanished.

Sorry, I'll call bs on that too. Neither Putin, nor even an aggressively anti-Putin US President would go all out with in a Russia-USA war. The stakes just aren't there. Russia is angling for respect and Putin needs to have external enemies for political reasons. But Russia is not in a credible position to take over the world unlike USSR 1950-89. So neither party has anything to win or defend by Armageddon. All the Hillary-bashing in the world won't change that.

Contrast that with China. Relative power transition points (remember the German High Seas fleet 1914) have a way to upset stability. The up and coming think they can take over. The dwindling party think they should take action now, before it's too late. Wars are started when folks calculate they can win. Russia can't but China will eventually get to the point where they'll surpass the US. 20 yrs? 30 yrs?

Appeasement with China isn't the way. A peaceful transition, where each party agrees to peaceful coexistence is our best way forward. With diplomatic reminders to China that they have much to lose if they ramp up confrontation. Building regional consensus. China's is not a messianic political ideology like the Soviets', it might work. Tricky though.

That's our biggest challenge over the next 20 yrs.

And guess which US President is going to be in charge for a while? A man with an even temperament, well known for getting along with China, a man keen on international alliances, with clear and stable principles, trusted by other liberal democracies and newly industrializing nations. Popular at home, so China can't game his support. Ready to collaborate on matters of mutual interest like global warming. Internationalist.

But, yeah, go on believing that chumming w Putin matters more.

JLV

I call BS

Much as I dislike Trump, I find it hard to reconcile this risk rating with the risk before the Soviet Union broke up. Not to mention the Cuban Missile Crisis itself.

Really, this, now, is the worst it's ever been???

China may or may not become a major ingredient in risking nuclear conflagration. And Trump's smoochies with has-been Russia is unlikely to make up for his possible inflammation of Chinese-US relationships. But that is most likely 10-15 years in the future at least.

Climate change is a massive risk. But it's also quite slow moving and unlikely to result in a quick, large scale termination of most human life and civilization. Unlike what could have happened in the Cold War.

North Korea could nuke someone, probably. And they're the most likely state actor who's stupid enough to do it. But a nuke on even a major Western city would not be the end of civilization, it would mostly result in a liquefied NK and a re-strengthened resolve to control nukes. Ditto a Pakistani strike somewhere.

IMHO this level of risk-flagging seems a bit too political and likely to dilute the seriousness which nuclear risks warrant. Esp wrt the US, talking about climate change, which is an entirely different subject, is a sure way to get 50% of ostriches to close their ears. And they'll run out of clock space and need a "dial up to 11" pretty soon at this rate.

daystogo:1455:

'Celebgate' nudes thief gets just nine months of porridge

JLV

Seems about right, esp if he does the time.

It was a inexcusable thing to do, and it violated people's privacy. But he did not intend to distribute it and, perhaps, the mitigating circumstances were there.

A year or two of actual jail for non-child, non-violent, non-profit-seeking, not originally intended for public humiliation, sex privacy offenses sounds about right.

It's not a trivial sentence, to be denied a year of your life. It should be a good enough deterrent, without slipping into the heavy revenge mode that so often would have us fill up prisons with long-term inmates that are only really losers, rather than dangerous. This is not good for society, criminal reinsertion or taxpayers.

A less discerning judge might have gone for a year per victim for example.

President Trump tweets from insecure Android, security boffins roll eyes

JLV
Boffin

Don't worry. Giuliani told him it's safe, and he knows what he's talking about.

</eom>

Cisco's WebEx Chrome plugin will execute evil code, install malware via secret 'magic URL'

JLV
Black Helicopters

Re: An Adobe Wannbe?

>was this deliberate?

Yeah, that's a good question. The assumption most of you have so far is that it was just a nitwit or dishonest dev. Just because this is a massive fail doesn't mean it didn't take time to set up and why would a dev do it on her/his own initiative? That stupid? And it never got caught by QA/reviews?

On the other hand, could it be a magic, lazy, get-out-of-jail free feature? Just in case something goes really wrong and you want to figure out what's going on, customer-side. You have a backdoor and you use it.

Not really different from a secret hardcoded, unchangeable, root password, is it? And we never see those either, of course. But, if that's the case, then don't call that a bug, please, because it would have been sanctioned at higher levels than individual incompetent devs.

Of course, the fact that it nukes security is irrelevant. It's more important that it solves Cisco/insert-other-dodgy-vendors' support problems.

Oh, the things Vim could teach Silicon Valley's code slingers

JLV
Trollface

Stability is for losers...*

All that whining about browser versions? Look at js instead and behold the might of the anti-"back in the day"**

https://hackernoon.com/how-it-feels-to-learn-javascript-in-2016-d3a717dd577f

There's a similar write-up about Docker-izing something simple. That one is the first one I read, some months back.

* Notice the Troll or Joke icon. sarcasm.

** Verity Stob posted a link to it in her last article, but I feel it deserves even more recognition. Esp when one is struggling through merging &*%+ 8-/ ^ Webpack config files :( :( :(

Make America, wait, what again? US Army may need foreign weapons to keep up

JLV

>how Europeans denegrate the military-industrial complex

Actually, the term was coined by Eisenhower, a Republican president, serving at a time of unprecedented Soviet threat.

" In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex."

http://coursesa.matrix.msu.edu/~hst306/documents/indust.html

I don't necessarily always think badly of US military endeavors. And I don't think that there, at least for now, no need for weapon systems development and acquisition. But, with some of the massive gravy train and spending, you can't help but think that, maybe, just maybe, some of it isn't quite as efficient, including to the detriment of US armed forces themselves, as it could be.

Obviously, a certain VSTOL fighter-bomber comes to mind. Fancy-butt destroyers. There are even more blatant ones, when defense base closures, requested by the armed forces, is vetoed by pork-happy congressmen.

The case you make for military => civilian research synergy isn't totally unwarranted. But your rather rosy presentation reminds me of the (mostly leftish) advocates of more government spending, where they always claim that "for X dollars spend on Y, the economy grows by cX". Where c is, of course, >1.

With its very long development cycles, will military technology always lead civilian? I rather doubt it. If you really wanted to make a better point, you'd argue for transferring more $ into DARPA, rather than just claiming military spending in general is an economic multiplier.

Remember what happened to the Soviet economy. Odd that it didn't bloom with so much useful military spending, no? At that point, Reagan was correct to push on the military budget pedal. Is it really required to that extent now?

Trumping free trade: Say 'King of Bankruptcy' Ross does end up in charge of US commerce

JLV

Trade wars ahoy

And all of this will happen quietly, because the other countries whose goods are going to be highly taxed on import have never heard of trade wars and retaliatory tariffs. And trade wars and autarky have a brilliant record of improving economy and living standards everywhere.

You know, I was having a discussion with a friend where the "well, at least with Donald, unlike Hillary, the tension with Russia will go down". She does otherwise hate his guts.

So... lemme see. You elect a total nutjob who is going to be pals with Putin and his prickly-but-has-been Russia. As if pandering to Russia was usually a Republican hallmark.

Same nutjob's campaign pledge is to drag the up-and-coming future superpower, China, over hot coals.

So, cozy up to the losers and aggravate the guys who are gonna take over*? Yeah, makes total sense.

* I am sitting on the fence wrt China. They could be a relatively benign dominant power, quite possibly. But they could also transform into quite the bully - their various South China sea island claims are ridiculous, soon as you look at a map. Are they for real? To stir up nationalism in support of their un-elected rulers? Who knows?

Deadly Tesla smash probe: No recall needed, says Uncle Sam

JLV

Re: Persuit of perfection vs. incremental improvement

No, put that under negligence in my book. And uncap payouts. I am talking honest mistakes, not flagged and known about but ignored. I realize that I used 'negligent' in different meanings above. I meant if Tesla had been at fault, not (willfully) negligent, my bad.

No one wants the Pinto recall $ vs death calculations back.

Put it this way: the Brasil - Paris AF 477 killed 228 people due to a combination of instrument failure and inadequate pilot training. Both Airbus and Air France were at fault, but not by negligence. Did you see a massive sueball to both companies, like 5M$/person? No, because they do have caps. Instead you saw a costly investigation, lessons were learned and corrections were made. Aviation's caps, but also obsessive trend to constant safety improvements is what I believe we should emulate.

Pinto recall fail? That should be hard jail time.

JLV

Re: Persuit of perfection vs. incremental improvement

lawyers...

I believe one big risk with autodrive tech is when a manufacturer is found guilty of buggy software.

Let's take this and say "yes, it was actually Tesla's fault". Now, if it had been a human's fault (it seems to have been the truck driver's IIRC) then liability is well known in most countries and covered by standard auto insurance. So, yes, there is a faulty party and, yes, we know how to cap damages for loss of life or health. And, yes, insurance companies exist to ensure coverage and payouts. But, there is no way for someone to claim $50 million for death of a spouse, even if the guilty driver is a billionaire.

Contrast this with could happen if say, Tesla, was found negligent. What's to keep the ambulance chasing industry from a $50M wrongful death lawsuit, on the sole basis that the carmaker has deep pockets? How would the law say "yes, this was their fault, but look, also -40% accidents overall"? Toyota got dinged on Prius runaway brake defects and this is in a much more mature branch of car manufacturing. The payouts were way above the range of standard car accident payouts.

Plus, if you drive, you are responsible for insuring your driving capability. If it's an auto-drive, does your insurance cover the autopilot fail? Does Tesla do it? If so, what's their incentive, and their risk exposure?

IMHO, once the technology is mature enough*, we should either put autopilots into general insurance regime. Or we should cap payouts - like you see in the aircraft and airline industry - and investigate each failure thoroughly, again like plane crashes. What we should not do is automatically open up carmakers to outlandish claims, unless their error is due to negligence rather than just an error. Otherwise, we have the risk that the early entrants get burned too much to persevere in something that should eventually make our driving much safer in aggregate. Face it, these things won't be perfect to start with.

* I am still not convinced Tesla's autopilot shouldn't be a bit more regulated than it has been. It seems to be getting the light end of regulation, compared to fully autonomous systems like Google's.

College fires IT admin, loses access to Google email, successfully sues IT admin for $250,000

JLV
Facepalm

Google-generated storm in teacup

Why doesn't Google just restore access to representatives of the organization paying the bills? I presume it wasn't the admin's CC that was being debited.

Sure, that plays havoc with automating everything, and it would require some thorough identity checks to prevent phishing. Perhaps, gasp, human to human interaction. But, geez, isn't that what happens everywhere else in these cases?

'Ancient' Mac backdoor discovered that targets medical research firms

JLV

Re: "More secure than PC? Ha!"

> Careful, the Jobsian cult will be after you for such blasphemy.

Oh, I agree. Remember Mac Defender? "AppleCare employees were told not to assist callers in removing the software." (Wikipedia quote, true, but it was also all over the news at the time). Macs are more secure, due to their 'nix underpinnings, but Apple has sometimes been lackadaisical when it comes to security. They do seem to be getting a bit better. I guess they've figured out the ostrich defense doesn't look so good after all.

>The fact that this is at all newsworthy (compared to the uncountable hordes of Windows malware) tells you something.

True enough, but no reason to get all complacent either. I know I am always interested in Linux/OSX malware to get a sense of the risk for us non-Windows users.

Any recommendations for a good Mac AV/malware scanner? I've used Sophos and it was a real hog, always sucking up CPU for live scans. I am more interested in something that I can launch when I want, for example on a download. Not something that acts like a junior McAfee by being on alert all the time. Malwarebyte?

IMHO, the problem with Mac/Linux AVs is that they are a bit like the SWAT team in Luxembourg. Sure, they can talk the talk and look tough. But they've seen so little action that it's hard to know how they will react when the shit hits the fan. So it's not sure if their donut bill is worth it.

Nadella calls for AI sector to move beyond 'worshipping' a handful of companies

JLV

Ooooh. Pick me! Pick me!

Nuff said.

Happy birthday: Jimbo Wales' sweet 16 Wikipedia fails

JLV

Re: Citation needed

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salafi_movement

I can't remember how long it lasted, but for a while, it was entirely filled up with innocuous and harmless citations from the Koran and mainstream Muslim content. Nothing mentioned that was in the least bit threatening or coercive ;-).

Fortunately, because the goat-molesters doing the edits were totally brain-dead, it was also clearly recognizable as whitewash.

Bit like the Church of Scientology suing folk that publish their actual religious tenets.

JLV
Happy

Re: Reference

which now has become a noun:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:List_of_citogenesis_incidents

Good article, but, in Wikipedia's defense, there is little a public-content based website can do to eradicate this problem. On their end, best would be to mitigate it as much as possible while keeping the openness that has fueled its mostly pretty darn good usefulness.

I'd be curious to know if Wikipedia has been improving in this regard. And what additional remedies could be applied.

StackOverflow & co has a partial solution: answer up/down votes.* But that relies on multiple answers being self-contained entries mostly edited by one person, not mingled paragraphs. i.e. it fits their content. And even then, you have the phenomena where the accepted answer turns out to have better alternatives but it gets stuck as THE answer.

My takeaway: Wikipedia as a quickie source is OK, as long as you are not doing anything too important/sensitive with the info or you know the subject somewhat. Unfortunately, journalists, by definition, have a higher duty to be factual than most people, but not always having the domain knowledge to weed out issues. So that leaves El Reg in the lurch - but at least they know that there is a problem.

* I recently took down one of my answers when several people pointed out it wasn't particularly clever. I rode out the first comment or two, but then figured more probably indicated a real problem.

Promising compsci student sold key-logger, infects 16,000 machines, pleads guilty, faces jail

JLV
Facepalm

Re: Another lost opportunity

Normally I am unimpressed by the tough-on-crime crowd. Crime needs minimizing but emotional pleas to throw people in jail for long durations for low-impact crimes is stoopid. A well-run country, to me, imprisons a low proportion of their citizens while keeping the others safe.

However, 16000 computers hacked and a substantial propertion of their owners likely having to spend time untanglingling identity theft is NOT victimless. High-reward white collar crime needs deterrence past what their lack of violence would suggest.

Hack _criminally_ for profit? But, wait, if you get caught, all is forgiven and you get hired to be a government hacker? Not much downside, izzit? That sounds pretty effin stupid to me. We also have enough ethics problems already with government spying. Without adding this kind of lowlife to the mix.

10 actual years? Too much. But 2-3 served, with a proper reinsertion program to have his legal skills benefit society and himself again? Sounds about right.

Canada fines Amazon seven hours of profit for false advertising

JLV

Good enough for me.

Canada does have some rules about ads and prices. For example, you can't just say 'Sale -30% off' if the "discounted" price is your standard day to day price and you never change it. Retailers have been taken to court here, and lost, for doing so.

I am totally OK with them suing Amazon and taking only a limited penalty. The point is not beggar Amazon with punitive damages. Nor is it to hurt them hard enough to trigger them into endless defensive litigation. And it is most certainly not about introducing a lot of regulation about what a retailer can do - consumers should be savvy enough to figure things for themselves. Especially in low-consequence outcomes like where to buy basic goods. We're not talking life-critical medication here.

The point is to have them stop false advertisement, enforcing some basic honesty and covering the court costs. I'd say mission accomplished, if they desist. If they don't, sue them again and make a bigger news splash about it while doing so.

Name & Shame.

p.s. 'sides the metric isn't really about % of global profits. It's % of Canadian profit. Because Amazon would surely start worrying if it is was getting dinged <1% of profit in multiple countries. That adds up.

Trump's cyber-guru Giuliani runs ancient 'easily hackable website'

JLV

Pretty worrying appointments...

http://arstechnica.com/science/2017/01/trump-asks-vaccine-critic-to-chair-committee-on-vaccine-safety/

Robert Kennedy Jr.

A Washington insider? Ah, most surely not.

Not that I agree with the "1933 started out just like this..." crowd. But the appointments so far have mostly been of two types:

- rank crowd-pleasers to deliver red meat to his supporters. see EPA, Justice... Kennedy.

- connected insiders like Giulani and the Goldman Sachs crowd. His family. Those, if anything, represent a massive bait-and-switch to his supporters, who were promised not to have the elites run things for them.

At this rate, I wonder how it's going to compare to CheneyBush's legendary pick of yes-men. And the consequences thereof.

#2s might be a screw-you to the voters, but they may be competent as well.

Re. #1: putting people with fundamentally incompetent views in charge... I struggle to see the upside.

Oh ALIS, don't keep us waiting: F-35 jet's software 'delayed'

JLV

Re: old military wisdom has it ...

Not only that, Northrop later tried to resurrect it as the F20 Tigershark. Cheap and cheerful. Northrop did that on its own initiative, with their own money, reasoning it could make money out of a good-enough plane.

The USAF would not touch it - too cheap and did not go through their procurement (read 'not enough bacon being handed out'). Second and third world countries? "If it ain't good enough for the USAF, it sure ain't good enough for Pakistan!!!".

Taught those idiots a lesson! Never try to give the military good value if you can gold plate it.

JLV

All this crap about the F35 reminded me of the F111

The F111 started out as a do-all, for everyone fighter/strike. It was even supposed to be on carriers*. In finale, you can see that it got kinda semi-deployed, but quickly ended up in specialized roles and in limited numbers and other planes ended up doing its jobs.

That this plane was a dud was mostly in my memory and wikipedia entries on military gear mostly tend to be sanitized as regards to failures. Then I went and found this little opinion piece that just screamed "F35".

http://bayourenaissanceman.blogspot.ca/2010/11/weekend-wings-37-f-111-aardvark-part-1.html

Basically, he posits that the project's main point of failure was that it pursued too many technological breakthroughs on the F111's development.

"""

Five new technologies caused the greatest difficulties. They were:

Variable geometry wings incorporating high lift devices;

Turbofan powerplants and associated systems and structures;

The need for new metal alloys;

A sophisticated, automated navigation and weapons delivery system; and

A novel crew escape system.

"""

Remind you of anything? New helmet, new engine setup for multiple configuration, jack of all trades, a weird new approach to monolithic logistics software...

At least the F35 ground crews have it easy. F111 fuel tanks had to be crawled into to clean them from the inside, breathing vapors all the while. Many of the mechanics have consequently been extremely sick.

* No Marines STOL version sought, a regrettable oversight.

JLV

>Germans tanks were 5 times better

Check out Fury (it's on Netflix).

01:17:00 in, traipsing happily through the countryside. Action starts @ 01:18.

6 minutes of pure tank-gasm. Not a bad movie overall either. That scene had them taking the sole running Tiger left in the world out for a spin.

Upon seeing the tracers, my kids went "Star Wars! Star Wars!". Not sure how I think about that... a compliment to old school Star Wars esthetics getting something right? Seems fairly well researched otherwise. Musta sucked big time gang-rushing Tigers, using flammable petrol/gasoline-burning M4s mounting short 75s...

re. the tank production figures. Germany did not, strangely enough, really fully go to a war economy until fairly late in the game, 43? Hitler was trying to pull a Rumsfeld and carry out an invasion on the cheap. Second, German industry and military had a lot of issues with standardization. Vehicles would be produced in small amounts, but would not use standardized parts. The military would constantly have the stuff tweaked, but not in very production-efficient ways. So many many models of AFV, planes, .... And the logistics of spares were dreadful because of the high material variability. When people say that strategic bombing did not slow down Nazi production, they lose track that by 43-44, Speer had taken over, knocked heads together and that Hitler had finally gone on full war economy. So, yes, production would have gone up. Whether strategic bombing achieved much is still another debate though.

Anti-smut law dubs PCs, phones 'pornographic vendor machines', demands internet filters

JLV

hold on, guys, this is brilliant!

$20 to unblock. But... you need to be registered as unblocked. So... up your ID goes on:

www.nd.gov/porn_pervs/registry/public/<SSN*>-<username>

What? Not happy? $50 more gets you on

www.nd.gov/porn_pervs/registry/secret/

Worried that your better half finds out? $100 gets you deleted from the registry**.

Then again, you could save yourself the hassle and add your name (SSN not required here) yourself to

www.nd.gov/permitted_for_research_purposes/senators/

* What? The SSN is needed to disambiguate identical names.

** I heard the old team from Ashley Madison is consulting to set up all-in-one registration, security and user revenue maximization services. So, the North Dakota tax take could go way up, at very little cost.

Stop us if you've heard this one before: Seamen spread over California

JLV

Re: Baby steps to Skynet, or Berserkers

More prosaically, the bigger short term risk is that wars which do not impose a morale/popularity cost, because there are no coffins coming home, could go on for a long long time.

If the enemies are themselves robots and machines, both sides are just wasting money and resources.

But if it's people getting killed at the other end, then we risk letting ethically dubious foreign policy goals drag us into never-ending conflicts.

There is thankfully little ethical ambiguity with going after ISIS. But look at Vietnam/Cambodia. Or the Central America death squad proxy wars in the 80s (which were bloodless to the US public).

Haldeman, he of 'Forever War', wrote 'Forever Peace', about precisely this kind of remote kill/no home casualties war and the way governments can keep them going. Quite prescient, considered it was written before 2001 and our Predator/Reaper era.

JLV

Re: Daniel Suarez - Kill Decision

Second Suarez.

I read Daemon and its sequel and it was an amazing mix of cyber paranoia and grassroots-against-the-system a la Fight Club mixed up with an RPG game worldview.

Not high literature, I am afraid. But really good near-future thriller SF.

JLV

A smart cluster bomb system? The regular cluster bombs are kinda semi-banned now, but mostly because they tend to become landmines, with all the civ casualties that causes. Fewer, but smarter, bomblets could be set to detonate on a miss.

In terms of the concept, rather than the current vehicle, this could also be the future of SAM / AA drones. With enough onboard "AI", anything that doesn't IFF as a pal could be ganged up on by powered autonomous drones. Not good for penetration/airstrikes, but it ought to keep enemy flyboys well away from defended assets. Think ME-163s, but more numerous and without a pilot to kill.

This is why $50M+ strike aircraft seem a potentially risky long term bet.

TV anchor says live on-air 'Alexa, order me a dollhouse' – guess what happens next

JLV

no way to tell?

Since our hearing is generally peaking at 20khz, seems most sound repro systems don't go much above that.

But, assuming (no idea) live human voices actually carry recognizable higher harmonics, could devices not use special microphones that recognize their absence and therefore infer that it's listening to a recording or broadcast?

As an added bonus, folks with Monster cables or the $30K stereos could still get dinged!

D-Link sucks so much at Internet of Suckage security – US watchdog

JLV
Facepalm

Re: Cheap - Reliable - Secure ... pick any two.

>so quit complaining

BS. There's no reason the stuff has to be so toxic. FFS you can probably pick up wrt54s w better software.

It's like saying "your car was cheap so who cares if its gas tank ruptures on rear collisions?".

'sides, one thing we've been learning with DDOSs lately is that this kinda crap presents risks beyond it's immediate owners.

Florida Man sues Verizon for $72m – for letting him commit identity theft

JLV

Re: Florida Man, the world's oddest superhero

Hey, give him a break. Beholding the vast wasteland of human stupidity that is Florida Man* surely can cause a momentary lapse of grammatical reasoning. Bit like seeing a Shoggoth up close.

* I read the dead granny sex toy thread too and my IQ dropped by about 25.

Google nukes ad-blocker AdNauseam, sweeps remains out of Chrome Web Store

JLV
Happy

In other news...

The mayor of Sheepsville, Mr. Wolf, has passed a city ordnance banning doors on barns.

Think of the children lambs if there was a fire!

Internet of Sh*t has an early 2017 winner – a 'smart' Wi-Fi hairbrush

JLV

Re: I have actually thought of an IoT that might be useful

You should also KickStart it and have like 10 social media experts/activists on staff for every engineer/coder/QA!

JLV
Paris Hilton

People can be dimwits.

Exhibit A: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTGjZx9PiL0

This is comparing 2 sous-vide cooking device. Both are roughly similar and both have smartphone based apps (I assume to monitor and start/stop cooking remotely).

The reviewer chooses one over the other, because it is a bit sleeker. Sleeker because... it has no manual controls of any kind on it. So, a $200 kitchen device that can only work if its wifi works and if your phone wants to talk to it. Which of course puts you at the mercy of the manufacturer updating the app whenever a mobile OS update requires it.

What could ever go wrong???

Chinese boffins: We're testing an 'impossible' EM Drive IN SPAAAACE

JLV

Re: Launch it!

Great thinking. That's also a metric that could be applied to our old friend the Man on Mars expedition. Luckily that hasn't consumed much $$$ to date, but it's bound to guzzle it as soon as NASA gets serious about it. Unless the space budget greatly expands, which I doubt, other space projects will suffer.

Sexbots could ‘over-exert’ their human lovers, academic warns

JLV
Unhappy

And, yes, taxpayers _somewhere_ are funding this critical research.

Goes well with the $20 anti-porn chip law in South Carolina, does it not?

Sometimes, I get the reason for all the cynicism about guvment being a waste of money, despite most everyone rather liking public services like education and health.

Oracle finally targets Java non-payers – six years after plucking Sun

JLV

Re: All very dubious

>their rates are going to rise

Maybe or maybe not.

If folks abandoned Java (which I rather doubt in practice, so much inertia), because of the implications of this article, this would mostly happen on the company/demand side.

On the programmer/supply side, there is no direct effect from a sudden cost increase on the language. So, demand might fall faster than supply.

Certainly, an aggressive enforcement of fees on Java itself would not do much for Java use on new projects. Actually, I can't think of any pay-for mainstream language, though there are plenty of pay-for stacks and programming environments. Barring an aggressive enforcement of these licenses, will the extra revenue justify the FUD that's likely to come out of it? So I am unsure why Oracle is pursuing this.

This muddleness is not entirely Oracle's fault either. Most of the licensing doubts around Java date from Sun. And an incapacity to make $ out of Java is part of what drove Sun into the ground.

JLV

Re: All very dubious

May "the COBOL of the 21st century" become "the COBOL of the first 20 years of the 21st century".

Gives clever people 3 years to leave.

Seriously, using non-free parts intermingled in a free download to gouge? With no way for a good-faith user to tell? Heck, the good faith user wouldn't even know to look. A new low, I couldn't find a slimebag to compare that approach to. Even a pusher's "the first hit is free" is more honest in comparison.