* Posts by breakfast

1556 publicly visible posts • joined 24 May 2007

DARPA drops another HTV-2

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Happy

Quick R&D turnaround?

"The US Air Force is hoping that it can develop the high-speed platform as a “global strike” capability that could reach any location on the planet within a few minutes."

Given that it's a year since the last trial and they lost that as well, suggesting they can develop this high speed platform within a few minutes seems a trifle ambitious.

LOHAN team buried under ballockets

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Mushroom

Close but...

I was liking this right up until the "no hydrogen" part.

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Paris Hilton

Sounds a bit dodgy

I think "Lohan's Ring" sounds a bit innuendo laden.

We should keep it classy and use the latin instead.

Sony distribution centre engulfed by fire

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That list of labels in full

So in addition to Sony the following labels who are less able to soak the damage also held stock there:

1234, 2020 Vision, Accidental, Ad Altiora, Adventures Close to home , Alberts , All City , Alt Delete, Ambush Reality, Angular, Ark, ATC, Atic, Atlantic Jaxx, Azuli, B Unique, Backyard, Bad Sneakers, Bandstock, Banquet, Beggars, Big Chill, Big Dada, Big Life / Nul / Sindy Stroker, Boombox, Border Community, Boysnoize, Brille, Bronzerat, Brownswood, Buzzin Fly, Can You Feel It, Catskills, ChannelFly, Chemikal Underground, City Rockers, Counter, D Cypher, Dance To The Radio, Deceptive, Def Jux, Dirtee Stank, Divine Comedy, Domino, Drag City, Drive Thru, Drowned in Sound, Duophonic, Eat Sleep / Sorepoint, Electric Toaster, Emfire, F. Comm, Fabric, Faith And Hope, Fantastic Plastic, Fargo, FatCat, Feraltone, Finders Keepers / Twisted Nerve, Fingerlickin', Flock, Free Range, From The Basement, Full Time Hobby, Goldsoul, Gronland, Groove Attack, Halftime, Hassle ,Heron. Hum&Haw, Independiente, Info UK, Join Us, Kartel, Kensaltown, Kitsune, Kompakt, Laughing Stock, Leftroom, Lex, Lo Max, Loose, Love Box, Lowlife, Lucky Number, Marquis Cha Cha, Memphis Industry, Merok, Metroline, Mute, Naïve, Nation, Navigator. New World, Ninja Tune, Nuclear Blast ,One Little Indian, Output / People in the Sky / Process, Pale Blue, Palm, Peacefrog, PIAS Recordings, PIP 555 Productions, Play To Work, Powerhouse (T2), Propaganda / Ho Hum, Raw Canvas, Red Grape, Red Telephone Box, Rekids, Renaissance, Respect Productions (PES digital), Reveal Records, SMG, Rock Action, Roots, Rough Trade, Rough Trade Comps, Rubyworks, Ruffa Lane, Search And Destroy, Secret Sundaze, Secretly Canadian / Jagjaguwar / Dead Oceans, Sell Yourself, Setanta, Shatterproof, Sideone Dummy, Slam Dunk, Smalltown, Soma, Something In Construction, Sonar Kollectiv, Soul Jazz, Southern Fried, Stranded Soldier, Subliminal, Sunday Best, TARGO, Taste, Ten Worlds, Thrill Jockey, Total Fitness, Touch And Go, Track And Field, TriTone, Trouble, Try Harder, Turk, Turnstile, Twenty 20, Underworld, Union Square, Urban Torque, Vagrant, Vice, Victory, Wagram , Wall Of Sound, Warp, Wi45 , Wonky Atlas, Word And Sound, Xtra Mile, You Are Here.

( from here: http://thefourohfive.com/news/article/pias-warehouse-destroyed-in-london-riots-pias-fundraiser-event-details )

Apple sued over Mac OS X 'quick boot'

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Mushroom

If they win

If a patent troll wins and charges for lost profits, presumably the judge can just award them nothing as they are a patent troll and would never have used the patent to make anything, so there are no potential profits for them to lose.

Can you handle LOHAN's substantial globes?

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Mushroom

Two ways around

I like the idea of three balloons with a simple pipe between the three of them, up which the rocket is launched.

Alternatively could one performe some kind of hack involving a guidance wire attached to the outside of the balloon ( or even not attached, just long enough that it is displaced as the balloon expands, and set up so it doesn't pierce the side ) that the rocket plane could simply travel along during it's initial launch?

Also, most of us are more interested in how to launch the Vulture 2 aircraft from beneath HYDROGEN-filled funbags. Hence the icon...

Reg readers ponder LOHAN's substantial globes

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Go

Swing til you're winning

Could you use the release timing so that the rocket swings around the balloon and the balloon's inertia can be used to orient it to a more vertical angle before releasing it?

I know nothing about rocketry or physics, but in my imagination this works perfectly and I believe hard enough that I think it just could work...

Chrome 13: Google uncloaks search click prediction engine

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FAIL

Just upgraded

I just tried the upgrade and it hasn't fixed the problem I was having where Chrome locks up completely when it can't open the page on one tab ( so where is the benefit of using separate threads the whole time? ) and can't open a whole lot of Google sites. In my experience it has proved to be shockingly and consistently unreliable as a browser.

Fortunately Opera appear to have sorted out the abysmal performance that their 10.* versions so I have switched back to that, which apparently also makes me more intelligent, so I guess that's a win all round really.

It's official: IE users are dumb as a bag of hammers

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Megaphone

Careful...

That now tells us more about you than you might have wanted to let on...

Sci/tech MPs want peer review, not pal review

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Facepalm

A problem of scale

Peer review was designed for a time when there were few enough papers published that other researchers could look at a paper and actually reproduce the results for themselves. With so much research and so much data available now, how often does this actually happen and what are the incentives for it to be done? Especially when most research scientists seem to be judged by the papers they have published rather than those they have rigorously reviewed.

LiveJournal groans under 'immense' DDos attack

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Megaphone

This

In Russia LJ is the major blogging service and there are a lot of political journals, making it a major centre of free speech. As dissent is practically ( if not theoretically ) frowned on there, it seems to attract a lot of attacks from those who would prefer the actions of the government to go unquestioned.

Market rationalist pigs get the best choice of totty

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Holmes

We see through the filter of our ideas

I don't think most people inclined to the left of Mussolini/Mr Worstall actually do dislike the notion of markets. We just tend to think that they are not the only model that fits every single element of life and that even in some cases where the idea of a market can be jammed in as a model in some circumstances doesn't mean it is the only model that fits and certainly doesn't imply it is the best one.

We all see things in terms of our own reference points and understanding. When all you have is free-market theory then every problem looks like it can be solved by free markets. Like most ideas that we commit ourselves strongly to there is probably more religion than rationality to that.

Now Paris, there is a lady who understands how love and markets intersect...

Sorry, time travelers, you’re still just fiction

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Coat

Indeed?

And that is why I never trust senior military officers to explain anything.

'There's too much climate change denial on the BBC'

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Nail on the head

That is how it works. Now go and talk to some climatologists about data and models and get the view from real scientists working with real data about what is happening. If you understand the scientific method and you can follow the maths then you'll get a lot more out of that than reading endless articles of loose interpretation from either side.

The simple fact is that the evidence points in one direction. The real scientific evidence, not the cherry-picked lobbyist pseudo-data. In highly complex disciplines like this, you rarely hit datapoint for datapoint, but trends are predictable and the underlying physics is fairly simple. The people with the truth are rarely the people making the most noise.

The simple fact is that although most of us who work in a specialised field are aware of the complexities of our own area of specialisation, apparently any mook with a pipe and an armchair knows more about climate science than any of the people who have been studying it full time over decades.

Murdochs won't talk to MPs over phone-hacking scandal

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That gives me an idea

There must be a lot of people trying to follow this story who are perhaps getting confused by the complexities of it.

If only the Reg had a handy reporter on hand with a camera to capture the events as they unfold. Or at least, to recreate them using Playmobil...

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WTF?

Good point

That has done a great job of preventing Murdoch from undermining your media, hasn't it?

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Holmes

Send in the Serjeant at Arms

So apparently they sent the deputy Serjeant at Arms to ask for their presence.

I have high hopes that after his request was rejected they will next send in the actual Serjeant at Arms who will proceed to totally flip out with his halberd.

I'm not an expert on constitutional affairs, but I assume this is the kind of thing that usually happens in this kind of situation.

Triceratops horn find supports meteor extinction theory

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Not well researched

The K-Y layer has proved a slippery customer as far as geologists are concerned, it's exact location is hard to put your finger on.

'Unconvincing' Met top cop Yates: My phone was hacked

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Mushroom

You would think that...

Have you *seen* the clear-up rates for crime in this country?

If a criminal doesn't find themselves overwhelmed with morality and turn themselves in or actually leave their phone or full name and address at the scene of a crime, the chances of them being apprehended are so close to zero as to be indistinguishable for all practical purposes.

Of course, News International did involve known criminals comitting clear and easy to follow up crimes and the Guardian had already found all the evidence for him when he refused to reopen the case, so it's not excuse in this case...

Can Liam Fox break the power of British Army, Navy, RAF chiefs?

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Mushroom

Why services plural at all?

Why do we even need two services? Could we not have a single defence force with a single leadership role that provides an umbrella for sea, land and air endeavours?

Pissed-off elves bombard Icelandic town with rocks

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Holmes

An asset to inncompetent engineers...

Sounds like a great excuse for dodgy civil engineers: "Explosive charges of the wrong power in the wrong locations? Not at all! It was ... erm... Elves! That's right, it was Elves! No liability on our part!"

Earth orbit for £1,000? You must be joking

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Mushroom

I was thinking this too

It's not like you benefit from lack of flammability in Helium given that you have a rocket strapped to it. Perhaps there would be a way to harness the Hydrogen as extra fuel or blow the balloon up to provide an initial boost to the rocket. In fact it would be fair to say that there is NO WAY this could POSSIBLY go wrong.

Kiwi gals swig shots of horse semen

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Coat

Brave equines

You've got to admire the stallions working at this bulk provision. They must really have balls.

BioWare blows brains with intro cinematics for Star Wars MMO

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Meh

Good start

So it begins like this and you're all like "WHOA! This is going to be amazing!"

Then the game proper starts and you're a mook on Tatooine with some dude who wants you to kill ten wamprats, then fifteen wamprats, then twenty greater wamprats...

Sandi Toksvig puts the 'n' into cuts - on the Beeb

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Happy

Yes, but...

The true master of the game was Lionel Blair...

Google pits C++ against Java, Scala, and Go

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Happy

Too verbose in Java?

Are there any techniques that are *not* too verbose in Java?

I've used it often enough, but if there was ever a language designed for people who *really* like typing, it's that one.

Verity Stob and the super subjunction

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Health issue?

I had always assumed this was raising the tone from a question about mere physical bodies to a discussion of the moral character of the questionee.

Robot air fleet can launch mid-air from cargo plane's ramp

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Mushroom

Combat wasps

I seem to recall Peter Hamilton having remote armed vehicles as the mainstays of space combat in his "Night's Dawn" trilogy. It always seemed an entirely plausible idea to me.

Remastered 4K, 3D Titanic steams towards cinemas

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Happy

Wherever you are...

Maybe they can shift that awful Celine Dion song as it should be possible for viewers of a 3D version to judge whether people are near, far...

US admiral reveals safety plan for Zombie Apocalypse

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Stop

Starting when?

I'm pretty sure my tribulations started some time ago...

Welshman attempts to board train with pony

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Good idea

They could have something like one of those fairground style "must be under this height to ride ( if you are an animal )" type signs. Of course, how you would put that in terms that animals would be able to understand is another question entirely...

Would putting all the climate scientists in a room solve global warming...

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Grenade

Terminology

I believe the correct term is "scientists."

Use of Weapons declared best sci-fi film never made

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Stop

So that book you've never read...

Would you say this book you have never read is better or worse than the other books you have never read?

I sometimes think partial ignorance is worse than total ignorance when it comes to making ill-informed statements about artistic endeavours.

So, what's the best sci-fi film never made?

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Another neat quality of the Culture

It would be great seeing any film in which anyone was trying to actually pronounce the names Banks comes up with for his Culture characters.

Sex Party's down-under struggles with dominant Catholic priests

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@Blake St. Claire

Ten points for a totally sweet reference that most people will probably miss...

Wind power: Even worse than you thought

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Energy cost of a wind turbine

At this level of utilisation it sounds as though the amount of energy generated by a wind turbine over it's lifetime could be dangerously close to the energy cost entailed in building it...

It's not unclear that we need to go nuclear as far as we can- even some parts of the green lobby are starting to appreciate this.

I just hope that ITER or something parallel with it gives us workable fusion. That still seems like our best hope long term.

Hollywood eyes Blade Runner replicants

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Troll

I'll tell you about my relationship with the franchise...

It's a shame the sequels won't live. But then, who does?

Asian soup peril menaces bionic shark

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Coat

So...

So what you're saying is: Man eating shark endangered by man eating shark?

Boffins demand: Cull bogus A-Levels, hire brainier teachers

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Troll

Would be easy to make science more appealing at university level

One thing that would perhaps be useful to stimulate the study of useful scientific things at a university level would be to drop the tuition fees for those subjects. We don't really need more English Literature graduates after all, so ramp up the fees for the fluffy subjects a little further and they can subsidise useful science, engineering, maths and other degrees that require harder work but everyone assures us make a larger difference to the economy. Given how much the government seems to want to screw around with tuition fees anyway, they might as well take things a step further at this point as everyone already hates them so why not do something worthwhile among all the contemptible weaselling.

With that to attract people towards science subjects there would be more demand for science teaching on the way up to there, which might set things up in that part of the jobs market to attract better teachers.

HTML5 kicked into 2014

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FAIL

Just think

If it had taken this long between each version of the specification we would be looking forward to HTML 2.0.

Radiohead goes out on a limb with 'newspaper album'

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Go

Funny you should mention it...

Hay is really expensive this winter because yields were very low last year and carthorses eat a whole lot of it. So hold the CD and I'll just take the hay.

No 'tipping point' for Arctic sea ice - latest science

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FAIL

Re: Re: But...

Whereas the Creationists are famous for rejecting all evidence that doesn't fit their theories and then, in classic "big lie" style, accusing the people they are disputing ( typically using emotive and anti-rational arguments rather than anything that stands up to even cursory scientific examination ) with of doing precisely the thing that the Creationists are doing with the whole cherrypicked evidence thing. You will not find a single detail-based argument anywhere in the Creationist lexicon that does not go back to cherry picked data. That is why they have to go over to emotive anti-scientific and anti-rational stuff- it sounds good to people who don't know how to think through a problem and there aren't enough people who do, or who are prepared to examine evidence, for their voices to make a big difference.

The fact that papers like this get published and discussed in the climate science community is a marker that they are ready to take on evidence as it arises and use it. That is what science does.

Wii Countdown conundrum brands family 'SH*THEADS'

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Go

B.O.L.L.O.C.S.K

"Well, lets hope no-one calls this program is a load of old 'sloblock!'"

Unions and small biz doubt Osborne's bank promises

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Joke

Slightly off topic but

Apparently the new Labour shadow chancellor didn't come off too well at his first Prime Minister's Questions.

No surprise really. If there was anyone you would expect to be expert in handling Balls it would be a bunch of old Etonians.

Official: PhD in 'Essential Oils' or 'Natural Toiletries' = 'a Scientist'

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I like the way Tim Minchin tells it

If you haven't heard the song "Storm" by Tim Minchin seek it out. It features the line ( possibly misquoted but sentiments apply ) "There is a word for Alternative Medicines that actually work- it's 'Medicines.'"

The future is analog (at least part of it)

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Slight problem with this article

I don't have a strong opinion on the content of this article, however, it can make you look quite bad when you happen to be reading it, your boss comes over and so you minimise the browser and realise after your conversation, where you were showing them some other things on your screen, that the browser on the start bar has just had the first three and a half words of the title of this piece on show.

Facebook system messages subverted by French pranksters

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Go

Lucky escape

I'm glad to say I've avoided any such problems by having "English (pirate)" as my default language.

I have no idea what is going on half the time, but at least I know there are no ridiculous comments dropped into my pages, just good old fashioned deck swabbin' and flag hoistin'.

Mid-Atlantic Ocean temperatures peaked in 1998

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Flame

The missing piece of the puzzle

I lived in Wales in the Nineties and I used to go surfing quite a lot. I guess '98 was about the last year I did much of that.

Clearly I actually am so hot I raised the temperature of the whole damn ocean.

IPTV UK: failure to launch?

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WTF?

Unfortunate

"Unfortunately, the output of the BBC and ITV remain among the most-watched programming in the country"

Why is that unfortunate? Surely that's good work on the part of the BBC and ITV? Organisations make good TV and people watch it. I thought consumer choice was how markets work?

Raygun dreadnought project reports 'remarkable breakthrough'

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A great leveller

So with this to work against missiles and planes, ship-to-ship combat goes back to, effectively, cannons?

I for one welcome our new old-fashioned swashbuckling navies.