Posts by I ain't Spartacus

Re: Sweet Kicks

Apparently Pope John Paul II had special pairs of White DM's made or him.

Steel toe-caps included? For giving heretics a good kicking.

I remember reading about a slightly embarassing conversation when they ordered the Popemobiles - after John Paul II got shot. So they obviously went to an armoured limo company - and got their special bulletproof standy-uppy-wavy bit bolted on. Then the company asked the Vatican if they wanted gun-ports included - so the Swiss Guard could fire back into the crowd...

Re: More proof of address

I went into a bar in Bloominigton Indiana once, where the door staff queried my UK passport and asked if I had any other proof of age. Apparently you can get into the country with it, but drinking is serious! I said the only other ID I had was credit cards and they let me in. But my friend's fiancee (night before their wedding) failed the test, as she only had her driving license - and so left again rather rapidly.

Fortunately someone else let us all in. It's not like we looked like a raucous crowd, as we had both sets of parents with us as well as a few freinds.

I nearly disgraced myself later with an incident involving mistaking a large piece of wasabi for a large piece of sashimi - and downing most of a flask of saki to make the pain stop - but other than that it was a peaceful evening.

Re: Europeans reckoned the agency cost €245 per citizen year. The actual figure is more like €10.

They could pay the whole Apollo budget out of one year of that.

Re: Oh dear!

How dare you! Lamb and mint sauce is a classic combination!

I have nothing to feel baaad about.

Re: Sharing is caring

I'd not noticed this conference before. But it's the first logical outcome of countries getting together to cooperate in this way that came to mind. The Saudis have a firewall, I'm not sure how effective it is mind, but then they've got loadsamoney. Iran have the manpower, and possibly the knowhow, but I'm not sure they have the equipment budget. So I think they operate by disrupting domains they don't like at crucial times and playing games with routing. Russia have the knowhow but are short of cash - but it would probably be too embarrassing to take Chinese help.

It's not like it's easy, as it means routing via China or building outposts of the Great Firewall around the world - but I bet it's nor impossible either.

Re: Make no mistake - their actions promote what they believe and treasure.

I remember having some fascinating online discussions with a Serbian guy. 20 years ago on Hattrick (online footy game where I was a forum Mod). There were some actually pretty polite forums on there - as long as you weren't on at pub kicking out time on a Friday night...

He described himself politically as a liberal and anti-Milosovic. But as far as he was concerned Western media was all just propoganda, the same as Serb media had been until recently. It was interesting because we had some quite long discussions and what was clear was how little we could even understand each others' political positions. I remember him saying that Kosovo couldn't possibly be allowed independence, however bad recent Serb rule had been, because of the Battle of Pristina in 1389 - as this made it sacred Serb soil never to be relinquished.

So while I've seen some pretty obvious trolling, and some of it being so similar that it's obviously organised - I'm also aware that there are some people who are genuinely way more nationalistic than I can easily comprehend. And nuance in online arguments is already at a premium. So if you're an english-speaking Chinese nationalist who believes (and has been taught) that your country has been systematically victimised for 200 years - you might well get a bit troll-y online at any opportunity.

What about the dates that are bad faith estimates though?

Like saying you've got an almost completed console on your Indiegogo and then hiring the person to design the board during it. Not that thhis is an uncommon situation on crowd-funding sites...

Re: "misunderstandings and mischaracterizations of what I have said"

"I was quoted out of context" is an excuse that's as old as the hills.

Although, to be fair, it's also often true. Given that the morals of journalists sometimes fall lower than the morals of the politicians they're supposed to be holding to account - and so they do quote them deliberately out of context in order to try to discredit them, or even just to get the next headline.

So it's always worth considering that someone is telling the truth when they say that.

Re: Le Diable

Surely curry goat?

Re: Fear of missing out

Surely just foldy? To go along with mobe, lappy and desky.

Which means we should probably go back to the El Reg style guide and lengthen mobe to moby.

Re: No thanks, we've already got one...

Shadow Systems,

But are you sure your screen reader isn't using your forum log-ins while you're away from your computer and posting comments all of its own?

I'll join you in fucking CAPTCHA with power tools though. The latest ones which show you images from something like Google Street View and ask you identify traffic lights are particularly annoying. If they were decently sized images - that would at least be a tiny bit less annoying. Though still as annoying as fuck - but given how visually impaired unfriendly they all are, it's amazing that the audio CAPTCHAs that I@ve tried have been totally impossible. And I've got perfect hearing - but am forced to rely on my far from perfect eyesight anyway.

Re: No Meat... No IPO!

Is the cow engaged as a subcontractor is a zero-hours basis?

Nope. Meat production is old skool. The cow has a guaranteed job for life.

It gets healthcare too! But the contract is strangely silent on the pension benefits.