Posts by Doctor Syntax

Re: Shurely ...

'Pitching to who? The US Govt's claim that it owned control was weak enough in 1998 and is even weaker now. That's the wrong model. The correct model is "setting up their own nonprofit and DOING THE JOB themselves."'

From the sidebar of TFA: 'The US government contracts non-profit ICANN to run the so-called IANA functions' Whatever you may argue about the US government's claim the de facto situation is that it's the USG/ICANN contract that's the basis for the existing administration of IANA and it would need to be a USG/ANOther contract to replace that. What mechanism do you suggest for ANOther to simply shoulder ICANN out of the way (desirable though that may be) and take over?

Re: FttDP

I had the same problem with the terminology.

If distribution point is equivalent to cabinet, as in FTTC, then the amount of ventilation in the existing cabinets indicates a good deal more power is required than could reasonably be sucked down a few hundred yards of telephone copper and on the whole cabinets do seem to be located where power is readily available.

On that basis I assume they're thinking of something else. There's a BT manhole in the road opposite the end of my garden. My own phone line comes underground from that and the adjacent pole feeds about half a dozen neighbouring houses by overhead wires. Maybe that's what they mean by distribution point.

If the idea is to pull a single fibre to that they'll be pulling it through a duct which already contains a multi-pair cable which will be being made redundant so they could take as many pairs as necessary from that to feed power. Alternatively the fibre itself can be bundled with power lines.

And if they plan to run a bundle of fibres to that distribution point, one for each house then powering each house's box individually then power down the existing copper is probably feasible.

Re: Victims?

"And we made a formal declaration of war on ISIS when exactly?"

Maybe not legally a war but they were certainly in a battle-zone. As far as one can tell they were there of their own volition and it was a battle-zone created by themselves and their fellows. And in a battle-zone people get killed.

Re: The BBC threatening to help Osborne, sounds implausible

"Don't forget the Tories hate the BBC with a passion"

Actually any incumbent government hates the BBC with a passion.

"Needless to say, I spoke to MANY people at their customer services department that day"

Why didn't you mention the words "small claims court"?

Re: That's it!

"There's no possible way in 2015 for someone with a fully functional brain to code this."

For development purposes there is. But there's no way for someone with a fully functional brain to release it to production with the development snapshot still in place. Blame marketing.

"I saw IT providing great gains in productivity"

There is, of course, the argument that a lot of IT has reduced productivity, Powerpoint addiction being one such example.

"I CAN see that working out well."

So you'd be prepared to hand out a large wodge of your own cash to someone who's declared himself a crook?

Re: currently carries a maximum of 10 years' imprisonment in the UK

"high level appointment with the Foreign Office"

Send her as ambassador to Brazil and let her talk her way out of that.

"What you have described is the old view of computing that computers are in control of people. The revolution of Silicon Valley, Doug Englebart and others was that people are in control of computers"

That's old hat. The new view is that the people who make the computers are in charge of the people who have them.

Re: Shared personal information

"Why is this not considered as theft ?"

Because it isn't. Theft is taking something away in such a way as to permanently deprive the owner. For instance taking a car & then dumping it elsewhere isn't theft because the owner can recover it - the offence is taking and driving away. Acquiring data doesn't deprive the owner of it. And giving something away, even if misguidedly, isn't theft so it would be difficult to argue that although privacy cannot be restored it hasn't been stolen. Even if a court would consider something as intangible as something that could be stolen.

It's a situation which is novel in terms of the traditional legal framework of theft & maybe also of fraud & needs its own legislation. Possibly the DPA (or equivalent in other jurisdictions) will cover it; maybe there might be something under legislation relating to children. If not something new might be needed.

Re: Good luck, with some devices embedded management servers...

"start complaining to manufacturers that their firmware is shit"

Manufacturers aren't going to be interested if the product is EOLed. And the manufacturers themselves may have been EOLed. Meanwhile, in the real world, the bean-counters aren't going to be impressed with arguments that a million quid piece of kit has to be replaced because Google, Mozilla & Microsoft stopped supporting RC4.

Re: oooooooh!

"something 'Completely Different'"

Not Metro & Not Slurping. Will those do for a start?

Re: I was just musing the other day that M$ might do this and low and behold!

"You're going to milk this for all it's worth, aren't you?"

Enough with the cheesy jokes!

Re: @swineherd ...

"ut the interesting thing... it could explain why there are new talks between Sweden and Ecuador.

Seems they want to get rid of him too. ;-)"

Time for a fire drill at the Ecuadoran embassy.

Re: Parties and judges

"The MAN is a frigging judge, he should have some semblance of intellect"

I assume that because you're hanging around here you work in IT & therefore should have some semblance of intellect. Would you care to give us your summary of the law of tort?

Re: Not so much public ownership but public wealth creation

Antibiotics not significant to general medicine? You learn something everyday.

"Hang on, that's not the right metaphor..."

Any storm in a teacup? No...

Who's next?

Re: THIS

"bypassing the opaque/distorted layers some sites use to force collection of personal info/permission before granting access"

But that means you miss out on the opportunity to lie to them.