* Posts by Triggerfish

2451 publicly visible posts • joined 12 Feb 2010

Another Brexit cliff edge: UK.gov warned over data flows to EU

Triggerfish

Re: @ Dan 55

@ Codejunky

Cheers for that tip about voting

I would say people here have said companies are not going to be just turning up and starting trading immediately and you have been pretty dismissive of the idea that's not possible. I'd refer to your comments to smooth newt several comments back which I quoted from.

"I cannot see hundreds of British companies just rocking up to China on 30 March 2019 and opening hundreds of widget shops or whatever which instantly displaces most of the existing competition selling widgets, and who may have spent decades building up their market share."

I think I am seeing the problem with your view of trade.

"How long do you think it takes to build up significant market share from zero in the face of existing competition and a mature market for your product, because in most cases that is what they will face?"

Yup. Definitely seeing the error of your ways. I am not even sure where to start if your world view is that far wrong.

Likewise your response to me when I said it's not a simple process was to go on about Iceland, like I had said trade would not happen without a voting block, when did I ever say that?

This seems to be twisting my argument, and your argument and now being an accusation that I have created a straw man, whereas I feel there's some obfuscation in your response now to change it to a new argument itself.

I have not said it's impossible, I have said it's tricky will not happen quickly and it's a big risk takes time and investment for a lot of companies, especially if they have no idea how to approach it and it won't be a quick process. Smaller companies especially. Many are going to fail hard, if they lose trade from Europe and have to replace that with China then they may fail even harder.

Also as far as I understand trade deals mainly sort out taxes and tariffs etc, a company that has to make up it's trade short fall has to actually go and do it themselves, the government will help a bit, but those companies for the large part are on their own and have to figure it out themselves, or pay someone to figure it out for them.

the comments

"because we voted Brexit and are now a proud nation that everything will fall in line"

Seems to be an attitude amongst a lot of Brexiters, and some of the attitude our current gov seems to be taking to the table.

"people will try and give us beneficial trade deals that may hurt them but that's how it works right"

OK that was hyperbole based on the prev statement. :)

As for loony fringe, some of the example i have been given for voting Brexit

"I don't like David Cameron"

"You don't understand what it was like in the 70s we should go back to that"

"You do not understand manufacturing, this will be a great boost, doesn't matter if the pounds weakened people will buy more from us"

"I voted Brexit, just to see what would happen, but I thought it wouldn't go through"

"We need to secure our borders against people like the Syrians"

None of these struck me as irrational people, but their arguments for Brexit ... fuck me.

Triggerfish

Re: @ codejunky

@ Dan

Apologies hit down vote when I meant to hit the upvote.

Triggerfish

Re: @ Dan 55

@Codejunky

Listen it's quite simple, you do not turn up to a country and just start selling. It takes time.

You may disagree with this and say we do not know trade, but I can tell you most of the comments about China you have disagreed with actually stand and reflect comments I hear from government advisors and people in chambers of commerce who actually do operate, trade and work out there.

Don't know how much experience you have with dealing with Asia but if you think you just toodle up and a week later you are selling things you are so wrong. It could take you a fair few months just to establish a representative office in any country. Combine that with how things may be done differently in Asia as well and it can get tricky especially if you are so Britain centric you think that's the way things will be done everywhere.

I'll agree you do not need a voting block any company can try it independently in fact many business do just that, and I will say again many fall on their arse because they do not pay attention to all the detail and problems they will face.

There seems to be the idea because we voted Brexit and are now a proud nation that everything will fall in line, people will try and give us beneficial trade deals that may hurt them but that's how it works right? Cos Britain is actually Great Britain. Personally I voted remain because I think that attitude is rubbish and naive.

There's a lot of "you do not understand international trade argument" your giving here, yet no real depth in the counter argument. So if you do think you can just rock up to China and start selling stuff within a matter of say a couple of weeks please tell me how?

Triggerfish

Re: @ Dan 55

Yup. Definitely seeing the error of your ways. I am not even sure where to start if your world view is that far wrong.

So some kit you have to get approved, electronic kit for example, so you have to go through the rigmarole of negotiating the Chinese Bureaucracy, everything will be done in Chinese, all a paperwork etc, you better not just understand Chinese, you better understand "The Chinese" you have to establish a presence and China is huge Shanghai has somewhere like 70m people alone, so that can be a problem, you better worry about IP issues, you are in competition with a major manufacturing country, your products might be priced out of the market depending on what they are. Lots of businesses have rocked up to China and tried to just start selling shit, most fall on their arse doing so.

Security robot falls into pond after failing to spot stairs or water

Triggerfish

Re: Back story?

From the looks of it, portal gun and drop it through a hole.

Triggerfish

Re: A picture tells . . .

"Hey Bill that thing they brought in to replace us is heading for the pond"

"Shall we stop it?"

"Nah lets see if it's waterproof"

The curious case of a Tesla smash, Autopilot blamed, and the driver's next-day U-turn

Triggerfish

Re: Shock news. US drivers actually use safety belts?

Friend had someone drive into him at a rather fast speed on a country road in his car (police were actually behind him and estimated it as somewhere around 70-90 mph), totalled it (as in police, scrappy, fire service all expected a corpse from seeing the wreck), got out with a sore ankle, comment was if he had been in his ten yr older car he probably would be dead. Safety features might make a car heavier to some peoples complaints, but nice when you need them.

Jodie Who-ttaker? The Doctor is in

Triggerfish

Re: This is the BBC making a quota

Reading this thread and thinking of some of the comments about William Hartnell being a great doctor, time traveling grumpy old man, I can't help thinking there should be no problem with a woman playing could you imagine Maggie Smith or Judi Dench doing a Hartnell like doctor, they'd be awesome.

They need to do some work on the storylines though some of them have been pretty poor.

Radiohead hides ZX Spectrum proggie in OK Computer re-release

Triggerfish

Re: C90 cassette, as that medium was the dominant way of storing Speccy programs and data

TBH I used them more for albums, helping home taping kill the msic industry, but only the good albums, the rest went on C90s.

Triggerfish

Re: C90 cassette, as that medium was the dominant way of storing Speccy programs and data

Surely SA90

Passport and binary tree code, please: CompSci quizzes at US border just business as usual

Triggerfish

Re: No issues visiting India

Vietnam: Walk through customs, after being told by airlines that I had no visa and would be refused. Checked at airport with custom, are you from England? Yep. Big smile, welcome to Vietnam you have 15 days. Visa for 3 month renewed by sitting in a coffee shop and sending someone to do it for me.

I will say a British passport is quite handy, along with it being a G8 country, especially to poorer countries, they don't really expect you to be trying to smuggle yourself in as an illegal immigrant (in fact it's often come here spend money), and British terrorism has gone down since the Empire.

Never had any trouble at any border in Asia, and that includes standing with a gentle sway, very bleary eyed at a Malaysian border after a rather heavy night drinking and valium (I was young and stupid), with a big sign saying 'Drug smugglers Will be killed' note killed not shot.

Slower US F-35A purchases piles $27bn onto total fighter jet bill

Triggerfish

@ sawatts

I was sorta thinking that, there's a shit load of little islands in and around the Sea of China many uninhabited, the Chinese hypersonic ship killer is 35ft long, goes on the back of a truck and has a 1100 mile range, the ballistic one 2500 miles maybe, rock up there in an aircraft carrier.

Triggerfish

Re: Sea Gripen

I'm reminded of this comment on the stealth.

"In combat, the back end of the F35 on afterburner is something like 1600 degrees Fahrenheit. In terms of temperature, aluminium combusts at 1100. You are talking about something really, really hot. If you have got a dirty big sensor on the front of your SU35 or your PAK-FA or whatever, it lights up like Christmas lights and there is nothing you can do about it. And the plume, because of the symmetric exhaust, is all over the place. It is not shielded, it is not ducted in any useful way. So from an IRUV point of view, the advantage that the Russians, Chinese, Indians, you name it, can have is that they have a range of different seeker types on their weapons that can engage the aircraft. We are basically limited to medium range with one type of technology. Short range we have an IR missile, the Sidewinder or the ASRAAM, but at the end of the day you cannot get into a position to fire the thing before you are shot by the adversary's weapons. That was the outcome of the analysis of the exercise."

Source Parliamentary Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade

07/02/2012

Department of Defence annual report 2010-11

http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;db=COMMITTEES;id=committees%2Fcommjnt%2Faef69d01-ae91-41f7-9aab-04d2781b21c8%2F0001;query=Id%3A%22committees%2Fcommjnt%2Faef69d01-ae91-41f7-9aab-04d2781b21c8%2F0000%22

Triggerfish

Re: "you'd have to pay development costs..but I'm sure that wouldn't cost loads and take forever..."

The way he worded it I assumed he was very familiar with that. :)

Triggerfish

Re: How many hospitals is that ?

I would pull out of everywhere and leave other countries to progress at their own rhythm. It may be despicable to see the Taliban reign on Afghanistan, but until its own people understand how wrong it is, we cannot expect them to understand simply because we tell them.

I think half the problem is telling, why couldn't we talk instead? I wonder where Afghanistan would be now if we had spent more time trading with it, and helping with its development and less time using it as a piece in the great game, or bombing the crap out of it. By we I mean not just us in the West, Afghanistan has been getting variously fucked up for years one way or another.

Got a Windows Phone 8 mobe? It's now officially obsolete. Here's why...

Triggerfish

Re: Microsoft's big mistake was in not filling their app store.

Yup we got some for work for field engineers, and the Nokia phones were nice, typical build quality you'd expect, good phone reasonable price.

Now if MS had gone and put some effort into it integrating really well with 0365 and such added a few decent apps, they probably would have had a killer business mid level smart phone.

European MPs push for right to repair rules

Triggerfish

Re: Why Just Smartphones....???

Screw on seal with an o ring will do it. That's pretty common on a lot of dive torches.

Microsoft boasted it had rebuilt Skype 'from the ground up'. Instead, it should have buried it

Triggerfish

Re: Market research @ Hollerithevo

Yeah slightly tongue in cheek, although that is what stage to of my plan is, they get the chance to say why they made it and why it might be good. :) They just better be right.

A sensible dev* will actually figure out requirements, talk to users, even sit down and maybe try some of the damn job for a little while to understand it. That way they avoid lumps. They may come up with innovation, but it will be born of understanding and maybe having the ability to know what they can do with their skills to do that.

The stupid and concussed just put in what they think is funky and then tell the secretary she is wrong and doesn't know her job even though they have never tried to understand what their user does really.

*I may be using dev wrong, take it I mean the people who design the UI and such

Triggerfish

Re: Market research

I've said it before about MS UI changes.

1. You sit the dev next to a stressed secretary with a demanding boss and rubber tent peg mallet.

2. Everytime something comes up that upsets her workflow the dev gets to explain why it's better.

3. If the secretary disagrees, (say she doesn't agree that a word list changing its fecking formatting halfway through the bloody list is an improvement), she gets to use the comment mallet.

El Reg partners with Action for Children to give IT industry an uncomfortable night

Triggerfish

Re: Action Man?

had at least two trips to A&E after treading on nails.

I trod on a nail in plimsolls as a kid, my mum merely stod on the plank and pulled my foot off, asked if I could wiggle my toes and when I said yes, commented "you'll be fine then, you've had your tetanus".

First time I had an accident and it was deemed important enough to go to A&E I thought I was dying. :)

Triggerfish

Have done something like this quite a few years ago. Anyone doing it wrap up warm, even London streets in summer get bloody cold at night, I had trouble sleeping from the cold.

El reg you should note that on that link you can just make a plain donation as well, for those of us who can't join in the sleepover. :)

Triggerfish

Re: Not interested

You didn't have to click on it you miserable git. (Who obviously doesn't understand the word unsolicited).

You even less had to take the time to comment.

Think of your downvotes as the functioning part of humanity judging you, I think you'll be found wanting.

Happy 4th of July: Norks tests another missile

Triggerfish

Re: Oy!

That is a fair point. :)

Triggerfish

Re: Oy!

I'd prefer it, but one players got fingers so fat he can't tweet coverage, the other has a bad haircut, they're both petulant and terrible losers. It's buckets of sunshine either way.

Triggerfish

Re: @Triggerfish

A fair enough point, although they have already asked ( some of the tests were near their border and they were a bit miffed with that). Not sure if Kim really listens fully though. His family have made a living out of being just dangerous to leave alone and keep happy with food aid, and coal buying. Think of some of the help the US has given Israel and how much influence they really have.

We could stop the food aid, China could stop buying coal, more people can starve, Kim wont mind he's putting on weight nicely. If it gets to much he'll kick off and shell someone, I don't think we are dealing with a rational person.

How far do you go with the threat, will you carry it out? Cos if you have to back down from someone like that all bets are off.

Would say I suspect there's also the part of the great game, NK makes a nice buffer.

Really not sure some border shelling and skirmishing is all that will happen though, and can you be sure it will be? Surely that's a large risk to take, also the skirmishes will happen in SK they may have an opinion.

Triggerfish

Extra note, thats only those I have talked to, and so not a great sample size, anecdotal evidence only, and you don't start many conversations with "So what's it like being repressed?". :)

Triggerfish

China is absolutely happy with the brutal repression of the Nork population

Sorry but what are you expecting them to do? Roll over the border in tanks? Bring peace and justice like has worked so well in Afghanistan and Iraq?

Plus I have the feeling rolling over that border is going to be more than insurgency attacks, that's going to be a big ol' fight, Fat Boy Kim may even just fire artillery at Seoul as well to make it a total party.

Even if you win you now have the problem of dealing with 25 million people, most of whom were probably starving before you got there and probably haven't done any better since the little war started. 25 Million refugees basically.

Evidence around the world indicates that you can't keep a lid on the democratic aspirations of an increasingly wealthy population in the longer term.

Also I thought that, buts some conversations with people who actually live in these places make me wonder. Quite a few seemed reasonably sanguine about a lack of party choice as long as they were OK, one described it to me as moving to a communist heirachy was a natural feeling as they went from hierarchy of family, to hierarchy of government, so culturally they were adapted to it, unlike us Europeans who had loads of revolutions. As long as they have their immediate freedoms some of them did not seem to be bothered by the right to vote, or freedom of speech, one even said it was a bit insult for us to look down on them as having no freedom because of that.

I am reminded of Juvenals bread and circuses comment.

Please note there are also people getting banged up for exercising what we would expect as our right over here, so YMMV, but it was quite interesting to me a lot didn't feel they were being repressed.

Also note if you have enough money then sometimes, that 'repression' can work for you, nothing like a bit of corruption when you have money, and the person annoying you doesn't.

Virus (cough, cough, Petya) goes postal at FedEx, shares halted

Triggerfish

Re: Today of all days

"single floor building, no open windows or elevator shafts to play with either"

You need a better working environment.

It seems the office chair when it rolled back severed the wire, and as you know metal frames and electricity......

Triggerfish

Re: Well, MAYBE this will get their attention

"LUSERS, LUSERS EVERYWHERE!"

Mike Andrews in A.S.R.

And not a cattle prod in hand.

Although after dealing with them 'not a drop to drink' works just as well. :)

Tesco Online IT meltdown: Fails to deliver thousands of grocery orders

Triggerfish

Re: @ Triggerfish

So, you are claiming that someone who has money at the beginning of the week have it tougher than I did when I had no money at the beginning of the week. For three weeks running.

I'm saying that they might have, plus 3 weeks sorry that's bad but there's definetly worse, and yes some people could have money at the beginning of the week and still be worse of after all in the long run, some peoples problems last longer than three weeks. I also never claimed you said you had it tougher than anyone. What I said is you are looking at your situation and thinking I solved it everyone elses problem must therefore be equally as solvable. It's unrealistic.

Apologies about any offence caused by the arthritis my friend holds down a full time job as well, but I know it's not always fun, stopped him joining the police force for example. However you seemed to have missed the point somewhat in my example.

Triggerfish

Re: @ Triggerfish

OK so I will absolutely agree that many people do not know how to balance a budget, and that a lot of people do spend beyond their means.

However there are still people in the country who do not have money left over full stop even if they do try and balance their budget not because they are bad at it, but because there is no money left at the end not spent on TV,s not spent on holidays, just no money, and there are people who have come from real shitty situations, far worse than yours or I and to judge them by yours I would say is still an unfair judgement. There's a lot of people who have started out poorer than you described, probably with more odds stacked against them as well.

To take it to an extreme (*) would it be fair if I based some of your situation on my own experiences? And said well I don't see why you can't make the effort of walking a mile or two? That's me looking at my own life and basing my judgement of you on that.

It would be totally unfair of me to do so, and somewhat shitty as well, so I wouldn't but this is the sort of thing that you need to take into account. Making a subjective judgement on your own life and assuming that because you have had it tough, therefore others can't have had it tougher is to me not the right way to think about it.

*I'd like to say I really do not mean this, I have a friend who has suffered from early onset arthritis of the knee since his twenties so I know it can actually be more than a little debilitating.

Triggerfish

Re: How far do you want to wind things back?

Sorry have to disagree, I have seen plenty who are struggling on benefits, have been one myself, the myth everyone on benefits owns big TV's and goes on holidays is just that. Plus thirty years in the same location? Nice but I moved house several times, and maybe you are a good landlord, I have had to live in some right slums when on the dole. Carrying a huge bag of salt round for thirty years seems somewhat unrealistic to me. Especially if you can only move by shanks pony or lifts.

There's a lot of people living in the UK on about 60 quid a week, that is to cover bills, food, clothing, looking for work. I can tell you money management doesn't come into it for a lot of them, they could consider themselves lucky if they have a quid left at the end of the week.

Of course some people might also have nice things I had a computer I bought it when working before losing my job, you are looking at a small subset and making an assumption all live like that.

What you need to do is look at how bad it can be for some people and base your judgement on that.

So housebound, not enough earnings for money management, maybe card meters which used to be a shocking tax on the poor, ever run out of electricity two days before you next get paid? Hows your freezer bank, (which obviously the av benefit tenant can run) going to do then?

Poor don't get to do money management most of the time that's why they are poor, there's also a big difference between officially poor and poor.

Triggerfish

Re: How far do you want to wind things back?

. It's possible to go for many weeks between food deliveries if you plan ahead.

And you have the money to do it

Triggerfish

You can move to America and find out, where we don't have things like this...

All we can do is rub hands in glee when they break (only half joking...)

Surprising you don't really considering things like this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_desert

Triggerfish

It makes you wonder how ever did people survive before internet shopping?

Same way people used to get about before cars, you could do it but it was more work.

Progress, it's a good thing yes?

Triggerfish

Re: A bit mean!

Doesn't even have to be that, where I lived without a car it would be more expensive and take a while journeying to do it by bus, it was easier to just order online and get it dropped off.

Conservative manifesto disappears offline – then mysteriously reappears

Triggerfish

Re: @ Triggerfish

A fair response I have no argument, have an upvote. :)

Triggerfish

Re: @ Triggerfish

Ok tbh I thought it took that into account it seemed to say so at the bottom, but there have been other articles I have read that also seem to do so and show the conservatives have been just as responsible for building the debt pile as Labour.

I'm willing to say that economics wise I could do with some more schooling, and I am willing to say that some of that rise is also due to the change in economy.

However I would also say my point if badly shown was that to say labour have been the only ones spending and putting us in debt, whilst the conservatives have been wonderfully fiscally responsible and taking us out of debt is a bit of a misnomer.

Question would this stand better? Admittedly from a blog and could be biased.

http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2016/03/13/the-conservatives-have-been-the-biggest-borrowers-over-the-last-70-years/

Triggerfish

Re: So what part of your taxes has been buying warfare in the Middle East?

Well if we did that then that would mean the military industrial complex would have to slow down and we can't have those poor souls going broke, plus with a sudden onset of peace there would be no need for restrictive surveillance and government control.

I mean what politician wants the people to that much liberty and freedom? :)

Triggerfish

Re: "if..going to invest in infrastructure..

Which will net the companies involved 600-700% profits over the course of the contracts.

It's called investing in the future, you need a position on a board somewhere when you lose you seat.

Triggerfish

Labour debt pile, do you think the Tories haven't? They have made it worse.

https://fullfact.org/economy/labour-and-conservative-records-national-debt/

Triggerfish

Re: fossils?

more like Coelacanths. They were long thought to be extinct, but still lurk in dark places

But that doesn't quite cover how I feel abut them, lurking like weaponised anthrax in a disused lab would be closer to my feelings for them at the moment, nasty, unpleasant and something you wish was locked up somewhere properly.

Hotheaded Brussels civil servants issued with cool warning: Leak

Triggerfish

Re: What a Bunch of Softies!

Oh man I used to share the bathroom with a large bird eating spider in Thailand, it used to sit in the corner of the bathroom doing it's best to cover an eight inch floor tile, sometimes it would sit on top off the cistern which was about about groin height and stare at me during my morning pee.

Triggerfish

Re: That's not hot. This is hot.

"The heats OK, but combined with the humidity it's a killer."

That can be literal.

As someone who travelled over from Yorkshire a few months back, I am not suprised, an hour out just walking about and I was needing a lie down in a cool room because I'd start feeling out of sorts, felt like you was operating permanently at the edge of heatstroke. :)

Triggerfish

Re: That's not hot. This is hot.

I'll see your Aussie temps and give you Vietnam. Has been hitting 40+ here although dropping to 32 av now, real feel in the Saigon coupla weeks ago was peaking at 49C, with upto 90% humidity.

The heats OK, but combined with the humidity it's a killer. Not only for sapping strength but once you start sweating it can't evaporate off, so you just drip.

Teen girl who texted boyfriend to kill himself guilty of manslaughter

Triggerfish

Re: Stupid but?

They were both sick and neither one was getting the medical attention that they needed

People who commit suicide are often quite good at hiding their intentions from people, or hide the reasons why they contemplate it. There's a good chance he may not have gotten help because no one else realised he needed it.

Likewise her bit of pscyhopathy is unique there may never have been a reason for people to suspect.

BAE accused of flogging mass-spying toolkits to assh*le autocrats

Triggerfish

Re: "It works with keywords"

Not only that but other data could be combined, know his likes and cross reference etc.

Facebook tried teaching bots art of negotiation – so the AI learned to lie

Triggerfish

That's it piss em off, that's how skynet starts y'know.

Labour says it will vote against DUP's proposed TV Licence reforms

Triggerfish

Um. So if you think that chopping down trees on the other side of the planet, machining them down into pellets and then shipping them all the way across the sodding planet to burn in our green and environmentally friendly biomass (ex coal) plants is not:-

1) Green in any way shape or form.

2) Environmentally sustainable.

3) Likely to reduce CO2 emissions.

4) something which should qualify for renewable subsidies (which lest we forget were sold to the public as being required to reduce CO2 emissions to save the planet from downing when the ice caps melt!)

Then your a flat earth nut?

I'd like to point out you can be an environmentalist and also think that shit is stupid. Using examples like that is fair enough, but to say that is all it is about or all think is wrong. Would be the same as saying you are a consumer and then taking some really daft example of fanboyism applying it to all consumers and assuming you must be a complete sucker.

Triggerfish

No other job in the world can you get away with saying you'll do something, not do it for four years, and then get re-hired on the basis of promising to do it "this time around".

Hell one of 'em lost his seat, and then went bitching about only 35K redundancy.

Lost seat = Fired for being incompetent, and still gets redundancy? and then whinges at an amount that's more than the average wage.

As my friend used to say.

Shithouses the lot of them.