Posts by h4rm0ny

Ethnic breakdown

I just tried it out to see properties in the USA and found that estate agents over there list the ethnic breakdown of the area as part of the property details. That's disgusting.

Well below?

Well below the age of consent? Users "as young as fifteen" (a) could just mean that one girl out of hundreds was fifteen and sneaked in there. (b) That isn't "well below the age of consent." She could be a couple of weeks below the age of consent and still be 15. (Your country may vary).

Mines the one where the iPhone's been nicked from the pocket by a dodgy pervert.

What did he expect?

If this guy genuinely thought that people unwilling to pay for other people's work would pay for his, well I genuinely feel sorry for his painful disillusionment, but it's a necessary step toward ridding himself of some stupidity. In fact the only people in this story showing greater stupidity are the company buying the domain for millions. Are they clinically insane? Just what do they think they'll be getting in return?

The problem was that this guy was trying to run a business making money off other people's work. That business model is not sustainable unless you are a government and can back up your business model by threat of physical force. And even then, it has always failed in the long run so far.

Paris - nothing worth having is free. ; )

Life in our solar system?

Could A Man From Mars, really be a Man from Saturn? I notice he's keeping very quiet on this story.

Oh what a country we live in...

...where I approve of the unelected toffs who try to protect me from the elected ministers who want to treat us like cattle.

Paris, because the Lords deserve a treat for their sterling work.

They've got the right idea

Microsoft can't compete with Free software on price and they'd kill themselves if they tried. Their only sensible long-term approach in terms of marketing now is to position themselves as a "Premium" O/S. And with their current market share and userbase familiarity with their products that's something that they are currently in a very good position to do.

Look at Apple - you get more bang for your buck with a normal PC, but people still buy the Apples. WIndows as the Apple of the O/S world? It's their only good option now that Linux is market-ready. But the thing is, Microsoft could actually maintain a decent Operating System that people wanted and were willing to pay an extra $50 for. I'm sure their marketing people have done their research on where to pitch the price to go for that "Premium" quality level. Let's face it - Linux has been the best thing that ever happened to Windows O/S quality.

Paris, because $50 dollars is way cheaper than some things would cost you.

Tony Blair

We need one of Tony Blair grinning that hideous grin of his with the caption: Timing... I Has It.

Poor Gordon, inheritor of a divided, hated party stained with war scandals, bribery corruption and an inner cabal that hates him. Not that he didn't mess things up whilst Chancellor, but El Tony has to take a lot of the blame for the current Labour-hate.

Coat - Gordon's is the one with Hazel Blears going through the pockets.

Lesser evil?

Well if people are disgusted with the main parties (fair enough) then I suppose I'd rather they vote for a bunch of people wanting people to give them their work for free than for a bunch of racist xenophobes. So Sweden comes out ahead there.

But yeah, yesterday's results make me ashamed of this country. If you add the UKIP and the BNP results together into a single "rude xenophobes incapable of running anything" category, then their success dwarfs the Lib Dems and the Greens (the latter usually do quite well in Europe, and our Green MEPs are very well respected in Brussels). and comes close to threatening the Conservatives.

The behaviour of the UKIP MEPs has been disgusting. They've done no work, been disruptive (including standing up and singing the Dad's Army song in a meeting) and generally making the British look like arses.

Though I disagree with the freeloading ideology of the Pirate Party, at least the people voting for them appear to have been voting /for/ something, not just trying to be disruptive, awkward and racist. And at least the Pirate Party has (I have been told) some more sensible views on government intrusion and police powers.

Shame on this country. Real shame.

Paris, because I need /someone/ to put a smile on my face.

If you're sick of the main parties...

...please be careful how you vote. It's gratifying to see the evil cabal fleeing home (even if they are fleeing rather slowly due to being weighed down by heavy pensions bonuses). But historically, governments being routed for corruption in times of economic downturn, tend to be followed by more extreme groups capitalizing on people's disgust with the main parties. Everyone recognizes that the Tories aren't much different and wants an alternative. But groups like UKIP and the BNP are leaping up to be that alternative. I'll probably vote Green because I'm an over-educated idealist. And the pragmatists will probably vote Lib Dem or not at all. But its the people who are disgusted enough to vote in BNP councillors, etc. that concern me.

Smiley - because at least Jaqcui is out.

@all the people...

...who are arguing that prostitution should be legalised... it is. At least in the UK. What is illegal is profiting from another's prostitution and a few decency constraints such as not being allowed to solicit on the street. It is right that someone shouldn't be able to directly profit from another person selling sex. But if a woman or man wants to do so for their own gain rather than for someone else's, then they're legally free to do so, put an ad up on adultwork.co.uk, etc.

Now Ireland might be a different matter, but a lot of the comments here seem to think they're talking about the UK.

Paris - because some people are smarter about profiting from sex than others.

Lower the bar...

I have the same problem with this that I do with tasers. Because it is non-lethal, it is presented to people as okay to use. It's just another means for people to physically hurt you with less consequence to themselves. "Pain compliance" as the police call it: hurt someone until they obey.

Paris, because I need someone to make me smile with stories like this.

All hail the new king...

...same as the old king.

Every month, I see more and more data handed over to remote third parties through the medium of web apps. And every month, I see the client side of these web-apps become larger and heavier to compensate. You only have to look at conceptually borked models such as AJAX and all the increasingly passionate talk about Javascript and its flexiblility to see this.

We're going to end up with "web apps" that are as heavy on the client side as old-fashioned local programs with the sole difference being that they store their data off-site. The only remaining differences are whether you have to install the software to use it and whether you can access your data when you're not connected.

Oh wait, we are now starting to see web apps that you have to install, and with caching, we are now seeing our data kept locally. It seems to me that all that will be achieved is the sharing of your personal data with third party companies you have no control over.

Paris - because at least she knows when she's been fucked, unlike all the Google enthusiasts.

If he needs legal funds, I'll chip in if others do...

Win or lose, this guy has brightened my day just by trying. And I bet he feels better about himself than if he'd given up before he started. I wish him luck. Who knows, by the time this comes back to court, Wacki Jacki might have fallen from favour and be a little less protected. Here's to seeing her prosecuted.

Paris, because this chap has earned himself a good time. :)

Tony Blair

We're not done with you yet, mate. One day we'll see you charged for lying to parliament and to the people for bringing this country into war.

Thumbs down to the Ex-PM in a very gladitorial sense.

Fair enough...

It's really annoying when you miss a flight.

Paris, because you can't spend your whole life worrying about what you do showing up on YouTube,

Sad day...

I'd like to say rest in peace, but I kind of like the idea of him charging round Heaven demanding to see "Number One". He was so much more than an actor. I'm alarmed to hear that someone is remaking The Prisoner, but I'll give it a fair shot. If they keep the same message and idealism from the original, then hopefully it's something PM would have approved of.

Farewell - you were always a free man,

(I should have put a sad face for a sad event, but I can't help but smile as I remember that series).

Pimps

I have met a few pimps in the UK in real life. The most unpleasant people I have ever met. Yes, that's anecdotal evidence, but whilst I applaud the principle of looking beyond the numbers and seeing exactly how they are arrived at, the Register skipped doing so on its own research on this element of the article. The reason why some women may prefer to work with a pimp is probably not because it is better for them per se, but because it may be better for them in a society where prostitution is criminalised and they have no protection from the police. Be very careful of extrapolating from some small sample in one US state, analysed by one sensationalist statistician, and taking it as a basis for comparison in the UK.

Broadly speaking, the Home Secretary is right in saying that Prostitution is not a job that most people engage in willingly (if we can avoid people arguing that circumstances short of rape can still count as not a free choice). However, the current laws do pretty much cover the circumstances where it would be right to intervene and if there are any issues, then they are local ones of enforcement and police resourcing. The current efforts at legislation are publicity driven and probably harmful.

Paris, because some people *do* want to make money with their bodies.

Always beast slow and correct?

"This is the same lesson that Debian hasn't yet learned from Ubuntu: fast and good-enough always beats slow and correct."

No, it really doesn't. It's just that MySQL is *already* the fast and good enough database app. Those who want "correct" are already using Oracle or, if they want free and open source, the very excellent PostgreSQL. MySQL does not exist in isolation and its users have already made the choice of ease over reliability so its no surprise some continue in that vein. (I use the word ease instead of fast because benchmarks don't put MySQL ahead of its competitors and its best to avoid confusion over what we mean with "fast" - in this case release cycles, not performance).

Anyway, just because some people are eating a slice of SUN's pie, doesn't mean that they made a poor decision. I'd say that the pie itself is considerably larger than it would have been had SUN kept things under lock and key. All of a small pie or a fat slice of a large one? SUN has decided to try for the latter with MySQL and people need to realise that rather than focus on a distorted picture. I'd say it's actually working out okay for them, though only a few more years will tell.

Paris, because fast and easy isn't always best.

Jerry Yang?

Is that really fair? For a start, Microsoft were offering a stock exchange, rather than cold hard cash. If they'd accepted, then they'd have received a lot less in cash value than your headline suggests because the value of MSFT stock has also dropped quite badly over the last six months. And he was pilloried for his decision by stock holders because they were interested in immediate returns on selling their Yahoo stock when it was inflated by a bid from Microsoft, not the long term interests of the company which it is a supportable argument that they are best served by not letting themselves get eaten by Microsoft.

Devil Gates, lest we forget!

@shockabsorber.

That's... it's just... I mean... that's hilarious. And really impressive. And hilarious again. And... just... wow!

Paris Hilton - do we need a reason?

Ha ha!

It's not often I say this, but Microsoft have a point. Interesting to see if this segues into pressure on Google and Yahoo.

Halo Bill Gates just for the novelty value.

Copyright?

Can I just copyright or patent my DNA sequence? It's mine after all. Then I can do them for unauthorised reproduction if they try it.

Paris - because the only way the UK police force is going to get me to willingly give a DNA sample is if they get her working for them.

Rich-Poor not Black-White

And let the sad disillusionment of Obama-adherants begin... The last time I saw a politician with a campaign as slick as that, campaigning on soundbites of "hope" and "change" it was a guy called Tony Blair. And Obama *should* have had a slick campaign, it did after all cost over a billion US dollars. A couple of million to Google, US$40 budgeted to "win Florida", it all added up. It was a neat trick to present oneself as the underdog and the radical whilst at the same time outspending his opponent by millions in marketing.

So very much discussion of what he represents, what he believes, what he feels and so little fucking discussion of stated policies. On critical matters such as Israel, Iraq, national debt, there was nothing much to choose between them. But few people seem to have noticed amidst the soundbites of hope and change and photos of a confident male.

As to the issue of his being part-black, does it really matter the colour of the president's skin? It IS a good thing that there is a positive role-model for young black people, (though he's not the first ever successful and intelligent black person, so let's not ignore everyone else). But it's a bad thing that people assume that they have some connection with him because of a shared ethnicity. Rich and poor are the natural divisions of commonality in the US, not black and white. A higher percentage of black people are in poverty in the US than with white people and that should change. But a poor black person has more in common with a poor white person than they do with a rich black person. There should be no confusion on that.

Paris - because I'd genuinely have preferred it if she won.

WTF?

What the fuck? We actually won one? Quick, everybody start lobbying to kill the ID card scheme! I smell blood! :D

A smiley face because we don't get to use them enough.

What is this? Restore my faith in government month?

I'm seeing a number of positive initiatives recently - patent workers on strike demanding they be allowed to do a better job, US judges coming down against RIAA snooping and now this! It's playing havoc with my cynicism. Okay, this isn't perfect but it's good to see some MEPs care enough about this to try and do *something*. Anyone know the names of those responsible? They deserve some good publicity, I'd guess.

Paris - because she cares deeply about privacy, too.

Wait...

I think I'm missing something. Why was he suspended from his job? Was he sockpuppeting on behalf of government actions or doing this using work resources? Surely this is a legal matter between him and the offended parties if they wish to take it so far. Or can someone just call my employers now and ask to have me removed from my work.

Paris, because I'm really her.

Anyone else...

*sigh* I bought 4GB of RAM when the prices came down... and then they came down even more! I suppose I should get some whilst it's still cheap. Anyone else compulsively buy far more RAM than they need? I just like looking at the big numbers on my screen, but I'm still trying to find ways to max it out so I can justify some more.... :(

A stop sign, because I should.

Not exactly price fixing...

Or at least not on the basis of that last paragraph. It sounds more like they agreed to co-operate on best marketing terms for their sector. Something more ethically weird. But I guess marketing is inherently evil anyway...

A penguin, because we have the new Open Source friendly AMD to thank for breaking this collusion, by the looks of things.

Privacy too!

I tried to buy a printer from there once. They only had the display one left so I had them package it all up for me and had a fistful of cash ready to give them. And then they demanded my name and address. I refused. I asked why they wanted it, they said they wouldn't contact me if I didn't want them to. I said I didn't so they wouldn't need it. But they wouldn't sell it to me without so I went down the road and bought one from Argos twenty minutes later.

Idiots.

An empty coat pocket, because that's all Dixons shareholders will be left with.