Posts by DavCrav

Re: The next U-Turn?

"Well they are trying. The EU says that if we want the same trading relationship (zero tarrifs, etc.) then we need to follow the same rules on, e.g. product safety, not screwing over workers, destroying the environment or using government funds to prop up otherwise unprofitable businesses. It's up to the UK, whether we are willing to accept that."

As is absolutely clear, what the negotiations are is as follows:

"You must follow our rules if you want complete access to the single market."

"We won't follow your rules. So can we move on and talk about what we can agree on?"

"No, we will sit here until you agree to follow our rules."

Barnier himself has stated that that is the EU position. Concurrent negotiations means that until the UK agrees to the EU position on fisheries, they won't talk about anything else at all. The UK is negotiating badly, but there is blame on both sides.

Re: Monopolistic behaviour

"but BMW won't let you attach any old shit to their cars either."

Yes they do! You don't have to buy BMW car tyres, or mats, or paint, or any of a number of different things.

Re: in the most expensive Trump Hotel reservations

I meant that the head of government should not be immune from prosecution, or for that matter be able to pardon anyone, let alone his friends.

And whether the president has committed a crime is a decision for a jury, like any other citizen.

Re: "Spying on me would be of no interest to the Chinese."

"I too would rather be spied on by the Chinese than by the US."

No problem as long as you love Big Brother. But once you start to be a dissident, you had better hope your employer has no relationship with China, for example. And you don't want to travel anywhere within kidnapping distance of China.

Re: facial recognition

"In the UK the police can hold you without charge for a period (24 hours minimum, more in relation to some crimes) and have no obligation to tell you why, or to answer your questions."

True, but they have to have, when challenged, good reason to believe the person has committed a crime. If you arrest some guy who doesn't look like a picture, even if an eyewitness pretends it is them, that doesn't =count. Look at the photo, look at the person standing in front of you.

The same is true in the US. Hence the lawsuit.

(IANAL, etc.)

Re: I remember

"(and Amanda's, his wife)"

Melinda.

Re: Engagement

"Sure, companies could take a principled stand and say that they won’t be doing business with Russia, China, etc. but that won’t actually diminish repression."

If I don't rob you, someone else will, so I might as well.

Re: I feel left out

"One day someone will actually read the GDPR before attempting to "comply" with it."

It turns out that, since the sky didn't fall in when Nominet didn't get the updated e-mail address, perhaps it isn't necessary and they don't actually have a legitimate interest?

"Well, when the question is "What is your internet speed", then obviously there is no point in asking those who don't have any internet access."

Sure, except Internet is a utility. When asking 'what is the water pressure in your area?', you are perfectly entitlted to answer '0' if they haven't bothered to connect you up.

Re: Get on with it, we'd be better without you

Exactly. I am getting fed up of video versions of things that are absolutely unnecessary.

The written word is one of the most important inventions in human history, because it allowed remote information sharing, and was also much faster than speech to process. We seem to be going backwards. I don't need a video of someone reading out a piece of paper. Show me the paper and I can read it myself in a fifth of the time.

Re: The whole thing is a mess

"However I do believe that western democracies need to practice what they preach and stand on moral high ground."

Why should we take the moral high ground? And in any case, what is the moral high ground? Enabling a government that conducts medical experiments and organ harvesting on prisoners? That kidnaps people to use for diplomatic purposes?

The only 'moral' position is complete disengagement. Anything else can only be described in some grey terms. So banning social media apps but still buying children's toys from China is a mess, but allowing both is more of a mess.

There's also the question of data. It is a reasonable position to allow China to export footballs, as there's little to concern us about that. It's vastly more questionable to allow a country known for pursuing its critics abroad (anyone critical of China's HK stance anywhere in the world commits an offence in China now) to have access to huge troves of data about citizens outside of China. Ideally all Internet cables connecting China to World minus China would be severed, to minimize the chance of them amassing such data, but that's unlikely to happen.

TikTok, viewed in these terms, is nothing but a mass data-gathering operation, in the hands of an authoritarian, Orwellian dystopia that is increasingly externally aggressive and willing to inflict punishment on countries and peoples for even minor slights. Democratic governments should ban TikTok, WeChat, and any other Chinese apps as a basic act of protection for their citizens.

This is distinct from Trump's ridiculous mafia-esque attempt to force Bytedance to sell off TikTok, with a hefty commission to the US Government, and his ludicrous acts with regards Huawei. Banning TikTok is a morally reasonable thing to do. Forcing it to sell off to a US company is not. And wanting a backhander to boot shows it for what it is: a shakedown, in broad daylight. That he feels confident enough to commit extortion in full view of the world's media is deeply concerning.

Sandwiched between gangster capitalism to the west and just plain gangsters to the east, the UK is in a bit of a pickle right now.

Re: No China results?

Did you know that Wuhan has a bioterror lab*?

* This is one of those verbs that conjugate: I have a biosecurity lab, you have a dual-use facility, he has a bioterror lab.

Re: "We rather regard any resort to the privilege against self-incrimination as a black mark."

"Wow, just wow."

The UK has a right to silence, but if people ask you all sorts of questions and you refuse to answer, any reasonable person would infer something from that. The UK version of Miranda is:

“You do not have to say anything. But, it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.”

Re: Keeping it local

"Is the logical follow on from this, that the Chinese government can oblige American multinationals to sell off their profitable Chinese operations to Chinese companies whenever the Chinese government wishes?"

I was under the impression that that was already the case. All foreign companies need a local 'partner' that takes all of the technology and 51% of the venture. Or am I wrong about that? It's supposed to be one of the main issues that World minus China has with China.

Re: So...we'll be stripping out all that Cisco kit......

Are you amazingly surprised that the UK Government is less concerned about network kit that they themselves can access, and more about network kit that one of their enemies can access?

You actually said:

"We realized that Bridgefy's security model was appropriate for a small startup,"

No it wasn't, of course. Unless Bridgefy was originally designed as a hideously insecure mess, in which case, yeah sure. A secure messging system should be secure regardless of how many people use it.

Re: 28 days ?

"Isn't that a bit long for "advance notice of algorithm changes" ?"

It's about right to be notified, read it, understand it, realize it is bad, write down why it's bad, send it to legal, get a formal objection written up, submit it to a court, and for the court to hear the arguments and grant an injunction.

It's easier to stop a change than reverse one. These 'move fast and break things' companies know that very well.

Re: Serve at the pleasure of King Jobs

"That kind of "monopoly" is called a "natural monopoly" "

No it isn't. It's definitely not a natural monopoly. A natural monopoly is one where, by the nature of the market, it is likely that one player is an optimum outcome. Examples of natural monopolies are water supply, electricity supply and postal services, because having two of these networks would be hideous wastage, and also likely impossible for space reasons in the case of water and sewerage. Apple's monopoly on iOS apps is purely because they have a switch labelled 'allow 3rd party installs', and they turn it to 'off'. It's the exact opposite of natural.

At any rate, it is considered standard that natural monopolies are heavily regulated so as to avoid abnormal profits (hello Apple!). Apple will want to make damned sure they are not considered a natural monopoly.

Re: IANAL...

"I read it as PayPal have paid the seller making the buyer in debt to paypal."

I would like to see any contract like that. You win a bid on eBay, form a promise with the seller (explicitly not a contract) and then what? PayPal just hands over money to someone, and then tries to get it off someone else? Still no contract has been formed, as no consideration has been made. PayPal will try to come up with promissory estoppel here, if they did pay the seller assuming that the buyer would come forward. But I personally think that PayPal handing £19k to someone would not be considered 'reasonable' by any magistrate, and that's an important part of estoppel, whether the actions causing consequential loss are reasonable.

Obligatory Simpsons.

Re: I think it would be hilarious

"I predict Donald Trump will be willing to shill for anyone and anything willing to pay him around the third week of January, thus completing his downfall to cheap carnival huckster."

He's already done steaks. I guess the next thing is for him to put his name on a grill.

Re: Kids these days

"...and their own phone (or yours) so they can video chat with their friends because, they will swear to you, everybody else has one."

It has to be true. If everyone else doesn't have a phone, how could your child chat to them on theirs/yours?

"1 thumb down"

Hi Boris.

I was not making those up. The new honours list includes Charles Moore (who employed BoJo) Michael Spencer (who gave £2m to the Tories), Jo Johnson (BJ's brother) and Evgeny Lebedev (paid for BJ's holidays in Italy).

Re: Paying El Reg

Ah, so no tracking apart from essential tracking. Sure, my comment was more flippant. But if it's a subscriber log in, they more or less have to shred server logs in order not to collect data about which pages you visit, since they must be tied to you.

"Ironic that the company that has made a reputation for buying up exclusive PC rights to popular games, forcing people to buy them from the Epic store or go without, are now whining about another company having a monopoly on their own platform."

If only I could somehow install another game platform on my PC, so I didn't need to use Epic.

Your argument just ran out of Steam.

"nationalise any American company doing business in China."

China holds $1.1trn in US government paper. Cancel that in response. See what tit-for-tat on gross stupidity does?