Posts by I ain't Spartacus

Re: good phone

I'd say that's true of all the high-end phones now.

My friend has a Motorola G, and it's really rather nice. Another has a Galaxy Note 2, and that's also excellent. Can't you pick them up for under £250 now?

If I was paying, my next phone would probably be a mid range Lumia. 725, or whatever they're up to now. But if you don't like that UI, then there's plenty of great 'Droids to choose from at sensible prices. And I just think all the top-end phones over £400 are now a rip-off. One that only works because people aren't actually seeing the phone prices in their contracts, and can avoid noticing they're paying for an expensive hire-purchase with their data contract.

Re: Stats are meaningless

Cyanogenmod is great. But for ordinary users having root access to the device isn't exactly a perfect idea. Although it has its good points as well.

Also from my experience of Cyanogen, now very out of date I admit, it's not always easy. If the manufacturer have cooperated then it's just a download and go. But if they've locked the phone's bootloader you need to jump through all sorts of hoops, that no ordinary user is going to touch with a 20 foot bargepole.

Cyanogenmod is a minority interest for techies. And a very good one. But what matters is everyday users. And for them you get updates on Apple, and are much more likely not to on Android. Due to manufacturers and/or networks, and Google's decision to let them get away with it.

It would also be interesting if Apple users were losing faith in their updates. But this data isn't enough to draw any conclusion like that from.

Re: Strange

Stupid is unfair.

A combination of ingorant and uninterested is more accurate. I know people who really don't want to care about how pooters work. They just want to get on and do stuff. They're intelligent enough to understand them, but just don't want to. I don't really understand that, given how dependent we are on the damned things. But on the other hand, not everyone can understand every area of modern life or technology. There just isn't sufficient time. And people have things to get on with doing.

Re: 46% of how many users?

D@v3,

I've had an iPad hang halfway through the update and have to be hard reset. Can't remember which OS, or even which iPad. I had the 1 and now the 3. So I've tended to do my iPads via iTunes since. It wasn't a problem, I know these things can happen, and I'd backed it up, so it just needed to be done and plugged into Mr Pooter for a recovery. But people are likely to squawk a lot louder if they've just expected everything to work, and not backed up immediately.

Apple can't really complain about that, as they do sell on the 'it just works' idea. So it's then hard to complain when their users don't do basic stuff like backups. Hence having Cloud do it for them.

On the other hand I've got a work iPhone 5, and that's always updated flawlessly over the air. And I never back it up, because all it has is links to the work Exchange server and a few useful apps. It's never been plugged into my computer.

Re: Stats are meaningless

The stats aren't meaningless because they're compared to similar stats from when iOS7 was brought in last year. If I recall correctly that worked on exactly the same devices, the update to 8 is rolling out to the same kit, i.e back to the iPad 2 and iPhone 4.

So what the story is telling us is that Apple stuff is getting updated a bit slower than it used to be. Which is slower than it used to be before the somewhat negative reaction to iOS7. But still much faster than Android.

That change may be random, or down to changing percetptions of Apple's quality control, or just the size of the update and effort required. Or it might even be down to the conspiracy theory I've sometimes heard that they slow older kit down with updates to get you to buy new ones. I don't buy it as it did happen to my iPad 1, but not to my iPad 3, or work iPhone 5.

If you're not interested in that, then don't click on the article. But this is supposed to be a site for techies. I am interested, because at some point I'm going to hit the button on my iOS devices.

I doubt Apple are any buggier than anyone else's new releases. It's just that they seem to often have WiFi and battery bugs on their updates. And have less excuse, given they totally control their hardware and exercise more control than most on the software.

But they usually fix stuff reasonably quickly as well. So iOS 8.01 will probably be out in the next couple of weeks...

I'd forgotten. No timestamps. Anyway that post appeared as soon as I hit submit. So no sweary-filters.

As far as I understand it - El Reg don't do keyword scanning. Certainly I occasionally deploy a swearword or two. It's currently 16:42 and I'm hitting post - so let's fucking test the bastards...

Most Andrew Orlowski articles go on pre-mod. Which means all comments get put in the queue until they get round to it. That's going to be a long time at weekends. When they're mostly in the pub. Even if they've got a Weekend Register, they're probably still publishing the articles from the pub...

They're also likely to put anything legal on pre-mod. If they bother to open comments at all.

However, having been a moderator on the forums of an online game with a million users, I'd like to make a couple of observations. For context El Reg I think has 5-10m readers. We had about 150 volunteer mods to keep the forums in order. Admittedly that was because of the game being global with 30-40 languages. But moderation is expensive and time-consuming. The Register have said they don't have mods, but their subbies and whichever hacks have a minute spare go on the forums to try to keep order. That means the pre-moderation queues will also be longer.

Secondly that also means you're not likely to get an explanation as to why your post was nuked. They'll just go on gut feeling as to allow/kill, and move on to the next thing.

Thirdly this is a pretty damned lenient forum. You can get away with swearing and quite a bit of off-topicness. As well as general silliness and a bit of good-natured abuse.

They've got their house-rules at the top of the comment box. Have a read of them. I don't know what your offending post said, but if you were having a good old go at the hack what wrote an article, what did you expect? It's their website, and their forums. Try arguing the points, and not the man. Start calling authors shils or idiots, and you're liable to get modded. If it's not that, were you losing it a bit with other commentards? What do you mean by "the odd angry post"?

My advice from my moderating days was, go away and read another piece after you've written that angry post. Then come back after a minute or two and re-read it before hitting submit. Or edit/delete if it's OTT. You have to work at it to get modded on here.

Re: More of a hostile takeover target

That's true. But the share price would rise during the take-over process. Particularly if the reason the market is valuing the company so low is that they think the management suck. If new management look to be coming in, the price will rise.

This is particularly so when the assets are obvious. If a take-over is done becasue management think there are two complementary bits of the two businesses, that'll become a lot stronger when working together, then it's harder to convince people of the value. When the shares are worth less than the total cash on hand, it's a lot easier.

Although perhaps now is the time for Microsoft to make another offer? I can't remember if we decided on here last time. Was it going to be YaSoft!, or Microhoo!? Given the piratical nature of take-overs, I think Yarrrsoft! might be better...

Re: Will the German government be sensible?

Is that state rather than federal law?

It also depends on the legal jurisdiction of the original contract. I would expect it to be under Irish law, if the contract is with MS Ireland for example. So that wouldn't apply. Also the companies in question are subject to European Data Protection regulations whatever happens, and can't get out of it. So even if they cock up and agree to a contract under a foreign legal jurisdiction, they can't get out from under their own legal obligations.

Certainly when I worked for a US multi-national we were legally barred from exporting our German payroll data outside the EU. In fact, I think it might have even have been outside Germany.

A law that even European level management were quite pissed off with, and seriously discussed breaking.

Re: My favorite has been mentioned!

Oh, is it a funnel? I always thought that filter icon was a pair of old style underpants...

Re: Well deserving of an Ig Nobel prize!

Surely if you shove a whole tomato up someone's nose, there'll be no more room in there for any blood to come out? Then you throw the lettuce in the bin, and eat the bacon sarnie. Job done.

Re: No law against asking somone a question is there?

I think part of the reason for exit polling is to give the pollsters more information for when it comes to their next 4 years of polls. So they're trying to track what they've missed out, and this is their best chance to get at a large sample of actual voters, who they actually know have turned up. Who're also less likely to lie or forget who they voted for.

Referenda tend to be far apart, erratic, and all different. So refining their polling models would be pointless.

Re: Vote Yes

I'm no fan of Laphroaig either. Although I had the 20 year old many years ago, and that was rather delcious. You get more of a 'hint of tar', rather than being whacked in the face by a sack of it.

The one I really dislike is Caol Ila. Which makes Laphroaig taste like water.

Re: Curiosities

Scotland has its own legal system already. They never got rid of it after the union. Education was also always different. They don't even have thee same exams as the rest of the country.

Unlike most countries, we never sat down and designed our system. It just sort of happened. And bits got changed as and when we got round to it.

Bit like redecorating really... So for example the last government ripped all the wallpaper off the House of Lords, and took the curtains to the dump. The carpets went to a shallow hole dug in the woods, with the odd hereditary peer bundled inside, BOfH style. Then they fell to squabbling about what colour to repaint it. Hint of democracy, or bright will of the people. Ten years later it's still in the same mess, with all the constitutional suitcases piled up in the corner - and no-one's worked out what to do.

Re: Vote Yes

BlartVersenwaldIII,

I believe the word you are groping for is 'expressions'.

My current tipple of choice is the Balvenie. But I've still not tried them all, and am working my way through. It's proving to be a long job...

I believe you can get one of the Japanese whiskies in Sainsbury's, and I was going to try it, but it was £45 for a ten year old. And for that money I can get a 15 year old. I'll get round to it sometime. There's also an English Whisky Company who're selling a 10 y.o. in Morrisons.

Haven't tried a Glenfarclas yet.

Re: If it's a Yes vote....

Yes - imagine if they have their own currency. No one will accept it south of the border. Oh wait - it's like that already with Scottish 'Pound Notes'...

A 'friend' who'd just been to the Edinburgh festival paid me back with a Scottish fiver the other day. I was worried I'd never get rid of the bugger. But the first place I asked took it, with no trouble. So that's not entirely true.

It was a Greggs. Don't judge me... I was buying a bacon roll and a belgian bun. And they were both delicious.