Posts by VinceH

Re: Directly from Microsoft

"some .... but how many?"

Don't panic!

It will have only affected "a small number" of their users.

Re: Errors, we've had a few, but then again, too few to mention...

"The errors in the advert were caused by a DDOS attack, Talk Talk are the victims here...."

No, that's definitely a sequential attack: Someone put one wrong number in after another.

I suspect that bit should refer to visiting pages on third party sites that include Facebook buttons [for registered Facebook users] to do those things - but the presence of which also plonks cookies on non-users' computers.

Re: Content and delivery

"And why the fuck are their UIs and content discovery mechanisms so varied and utter shit, even within the same service across different devices?"

FTFY

I'm looking at you, Amazon Prime, in particular. Why is there no option to view all the films in a particular genre in alphabetical order?

Oh, wait - I think I know. I frequently notice the same title popping up more than once at different points in the list. If they were listed alphabetically, the two instances would be side by side - and more people might notice and wonder if your claims of having x movies is exaggerated by duplicated listings.

Re: That is not verbal evisceration

"That is "I do not know who the F*** you are, but you are not even worthy of a proper verbal evisceration"."

Indeed - but as to the reason; neither the El Reg article nor the linked article is clear as to what actually prompted it. Indeed, the PageSix article itself even says it's unclear what Butterfield said to spark De Niro's response. The only thing quoted sounds like Butterfield expressing that he enjoyed a particular part of a particularly good film.

I find myself baffled.

Bunch of coxwombles.

Re: The beginning of the end...hopefully.

And for many of us, those days are still here.

"Nice bit of cyber bullying."

It may have been intended as a joke, and it may well be fair to call it cyber bullying - but what's the real outcome? A nice bit of additional publicity for his comeback.

Re: Nonsense

As it turns out... this corporation.

It did change back after I commented yesterday, but I think I've now got my preference - check for updates, but let me decide whether to install them - to stick.

The problem was everybody's favourite update: KB3038853, the Win10 nagware 'GWX' update.

I originally let that one install before knowing the data slurping plans, forced updates, etc., with Windows 10 - on the basis that I might at some point have opted to upgrade. (Which is obviously no longer the case).

It appears that GWX was periodically resetting my Windows Update settings - which is behaviour I don't think I've seen mentioned anywhere before (or at least if it's been mentioned somewhere I read, I must have missed it).

I killed it and buried its corpse from my system yesterday, and that seems to have done the trick.

Tut fucking tut, Microsoft.

Re: Corporate tax, or VAT?

"way up" ? Weigh up, you pillock! I'd downvote you if El Reg would let me!

Re: Undoing all the hard work in trustworthy computing...

"and my current policy is now to disable updates entirely on machines I have, so I can take control back"

You - and anyone else that does this - might want to double check that on occasion.

I now do similar; I let it check for updates automatically, and sometimes take articles like this one as a prompt to wander off to Windows Update to see if there is anything there to either ignore (and hide) or install.

The first thing I saw on the main Windows Update screen was:

"You're set to automatically install updates"

Which is completely different the "You're set to automatically check for updates" that should be there.

And looking at my update history, I see an update on 20th October (KB3105216 - relating to Flash, which I don't even have installed). The last time I installed updates was the 16th October.

Obviously, I've now changed it back to automatic checking, so that I can manually install or not.

Re: Stock android

"How about a Wiley Fox, the Storm is just about to be launched?"

That's what I thought, too - but I've just spotted an email from them with the subject "Wileyfox Storm Sold Out" ^*

Where the hell was the email to say it was now available - which was the reason I signed up to their list in the first place!

However, reading it, it says the first batch sold out from Amazon, Clove and Ebuyer, but that Argos and Expansys still have some. I've now ordered one - Argos had no stock, and Expansys had 22; that was ten or so minutes ago.

^{* Or this could be a clever marketing ploy and I've been duped - but I wanted one anyway.}

"Ah, no - those are just the crop duster attachments..."

No, they're where they'll attach the frikin' las... no, silly me, there are no sharks involved; it's where they'll attach the missiles.

Re: You had me at fabulaous

I didn't even notice the spelling. I was too busy thinking "No, it isn't" in response to the sentence itself.

No - they'd leave us with ROT13, and we'd use double-ROT13 to confuse the buggers.

Re: Never

Yeah, same boat. I think I may have to start making my list a real thing, rather than keeping it my head. I'm getting too old for all this remembering shit.

Re: Four out of five stars.

Given the praise throughout the review, I got to the end thinking because the Apple keyboard got four out of five for such a crap review, this would be getting forty out of five.

Unfortunately, though, because it was found and dealt with before anyone lost anything significant - privacy of account contents notwithstanding - it will be looked upon as exactly the opposite.

The logic being that flaw like that existing in the first place is a major fuck up, but they fixed it before anything happened that made it Big News^tm, so Joe Public (other than technical and security types) didn't get to hear about it. and that's a huge success. Fat bonuses all round.

"I prefer to do the job with well established, boring tools that work and that I know will not cause any disaster. If someone invents a new tool or process that does the job better I evaluate it, and if I am satisfied I will use it. Otherwise he can put it where the sun doesn't shine."

Yes, the magic phrase that the author of this article seems to have forgotten is "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."

Re: If companies had to pay for their mal-ware, Adobe would be in debtor's prison

The money angle is from the other side - creating Flash files; Adobe sell products to do that. There are other products that can do it as well, but the commercial offerings probably involve a licence fee being paid to them.

Kill the player, and that sales line is also gone.