* Posts by JimmyPage

3215 publicly visible posts • joined 5 Mar 2010

It's not you, it's Three. Mobe network goes titsup across UK

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Stop

remember for a lot of people

"the UK" really means "London and the South East"

Ice probe peers at hidden BOTTOMS of oceans from SPAAACE

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Stop

Stop and think.

More people have been to the Moon, than the bottom of the ocean (Mariana Trench).

IRONY ALERT: Former MI6 chief warns of 'mass snooping' - by PAEDOS

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Extraordinary claims

require extraordinary proof ....

Mine Bitcoins with PENCIL and PAPER

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How long till a someone makes a Babbage type Bitcoin mining rig for fun?

in Minecraft.

FBI boss: Apple's iPhone, iPad encryption puts people 'ABOVE THE LAW'

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Big Brother

How to build a trope

before your very eyes.

We're on a tech site here, so have a fairly good grasp of the issues involved. That leaves the other 95% of society (who, for better or for worse have been allowed the vote) who, when pressed, would probably tell you that Encryption is in New Jersey, and no one made salted hashes like Grandma.

If people like Comey raise the "encryption is bad" meme, and use it in proximity to words like "child porn", "paedophiles", "terrorists", "islamist" enough times, he might just get enough support to get his way.

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Happy

PSI Corp (aka "sick" )

Funnily enough MrsPage and I watched (for the first time) "The Men Who Stare at Goats" last night.

Although we had a good chuckle at the "New Age Army", it was hard to forget the films opening statement ... "More of this is true than you would believe".

Top film, btw.

Heatmiser digital thermostat users: For pity's sake, DON'T SWITCH ON the WI-FI

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FAIL

Old school hacking ...

if one of the utility companies surreptitiously turned everyones 'stat up by one degree ....

Apple's new iPhone 6 vulnerable to last year's TouchID fingerprint hack

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Stop

What industry do these guys work in ? Clearly not a tech one.

Furthermore, the process to turn that print into a useable copy is sufficiently complex that it’s highly unlikely to be a threat for anything other than a targeted attack by a sophisticated individual

A process that could be easily devolved to a 3D Printer - which are hardly like rocking horse shit.

If there's an incentive, things will be made simple. Look at the grunts who skim cards, using quite high tech.

Early result from Scots indyref vote? NAW, Jimmy - it's a SCAM

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WTF?

wtf

is a "square sausage sandwich"

Forget bonking, have ONE OFF THE WRIST with Barclaycard's bPay

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WTF?

Gareth Hunt ...

why did I have this memory of Gareth Hunt, offering everyone a coffee ?

Got your NUDE SELFIES in the cloud? Two-factor auth's your best bet for securing them

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FAIL

So we'll all have

a keyring with dozens of TFA token generators to carry around.

I can see the improvement already.

PLEASE STOP with the snooping requests, begs Google as gov data demands skyrocket

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Stop

Maybe if the spooks had to pay

you know, like we do ? £10 a pop ?

Apple CEO Tim Cook: TV is TERRIBLE and stuck in the 1970s

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Boffin

Re: Stick in the seventies?

Here's another "Horizon" I remember ... Prof. Richard Dawkins (yes, that one) demonstrating how evolution could be modelled with simple programs - he even talked the viewer through one he had written. And I'm pretty sure it wasn't HTML ....

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Re: US media domination ?

I was using "cable" as a (admittedly lazy) shorthand for "not network".

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Unhappy

Re: Repetition and paddding

and the content is dumbed down beyond belief.

No one under 40 would believe that I learned about Quarks, and the like from a "Horizon" broadcast in the mid-70s (I was 10) on a Saturday afternoon as an alternative to "Grand(fucking - I hated sport)Stand".

A few weeks later there was another Horizon, about the discoveries of ancient humanoid fossils causing scientists to conclude mankind had been around closer to 12,000,000 in some form, rather than the 2,000,000 they believed up to then.

You just never see anything like this nowadays. However you will see loads of pretty shots of sunsets, or mountain ranges, usually with the pretty boy* presenter (Brian Cox) looking upwards, as the camera crew try out their new spinny gear.

*Exceptions made for Alice Roberts though <swoon>.

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Stop

Re: US media domination ?

ITYM US *network* domination. You know. NBC, CBS, Fox (except "House M.D.").

US cable quality has been growing at a frenetic rate. The Wire, The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, The Shield, House of Cards.

Hell those are the ones the Mrs and I have watched. There's plenty more which aren't to our taste, but which get shedloads of *critical* praise (as opposed to viewing figures).

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Nothing wrong with TV *Tech*

it's as far as it'll go for now.

There's everything wrong with the TV Business though. From risk-averse "executives" through to a desire to monetize everything.

The current car-crash that is BBC license fee, VM subscription, Sky Subscription (even if you have VM,. as "Sky Atlantic" is out of your reach[1]), Netflix, Amazon Prime, Blinkbox, [contd page 92]. With loads of middlemen trying to get at your wallet.

If Apple can deliver a single subscription model, that gives me access to all the content I want - even if it's no cheaper than aggregating the individual packages - then I may become a fanboi.

[1]No problem of course. You use the big fat VM pipe to <cough> acquire what you need.

Brit telcos warn Scots that voting Yes could lead to hefty bills

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You know all this talk of things being more expensive

after YES, because of all the subsidies from rUK ?

Has anyone got the calculations of the rebate the rUK will get per capita, if there is a YES vote ? You know. All that extra money you told us you were spending in Scotland you are now not ?

Or is it all bullshit ?

Huawei ditches new Windows Phone mobe plans, blames poor sales

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Windows

Just as my phone got 8.1

Which is quite a leap from 8.0 But which adds one thing I have wanted for years.

"WiFi Sense" which effectively automates logging in to the myriad of free WiFi APs you collect after a while that always need your email address when you move to a new one (O2 I'm looking at you).

The *only* downside about WP is lack off apps. It actually pisses all over Android (which *still* hasn't sorted out it's Bluetooth integration yet - 2 years after I complained that it still hadn't sorted it's bluetooth integration out).

In this case, very happy to be a ------------------>

Boffins: Searching for ALIENS is like looking for PIZZA among students

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Boffin

Life ...

anyone heard the term "ignostic" ? John Lloyd mentioned it on a Richard Herring podcast (slight plug).

It's a philosophy which requires terms to be defined, before an answer is given. So in the case of "Do you believe in God ?" terms need to be decided. Beard ? Sandals ? Tall ? Fat ?

Only when terms are defined, can an answer be given. As he put it "you tell me what I don't believe in."

Same with "life". Define terms.

New 'Cosmos' browser surfs the net by TXT alone

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Headmaster

Re: "Minifies"

Well now it's been used, we need to invent a grammar ...

Minify - the verb

Minfied - the adjective

MiniFi - the noun ..

I wonder where that idea was burglarized from ?

Archaeologists and robots on hunt for more Antikythera pieces

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Boffin

Ancient technology ...

On a similar vein - and just as impressive - was the discovery in London, of a machine to provide water to Roman London (I think it was discovered by the Crossrail team).

It was a series of buckets, on an iron chain, driven (presumably) by donkey power.

Completely and utterly unknown anywhere else in the Roman world, which is why they struggled (with modern technology) to recreate a working model.

Anyone know of Trajans bridge ? Parts of which still stand.

It annoysme when people assume that our ancestors were somehow less clever than us. They weren't. As James Burke so eloquently put it "They just knew different things."

Phones 4u slips into administration after EE cuts ties with Brit mobe retailer

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Re: What will become

Well ..............

A lot of P4U shops are (were ?) in malls near a Poundland ....

Cops apologise for leaving EXPLOSIVES in suitcase at airport

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No one has yet spotted the significance of this story.

What if they had used a suitcase going out of the country ? How would the poor passenger explain *that* to the security people at the other end.

And if they are doing it with explosives, you can bet they're doing it with drugs.

If I was executed by one of the more draconian regimes for a half grain of heroin planted in my luggage by OzCop inc. I'd be very cross when I got to heaven, and wouldn't enjoy it.

Uber alles-holes, claims lawsuit: Taxi biz sued by blind passengers

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@cyberelic

The Daily Mail site is thataway ---------->

4th Century GOBLET could REVIVE CORPSE of holographic storage

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Boffin

Made in China

Fabricant Orientalis, surely ?

Don't buy that phone! It ATTRACTS CRIMINALS, UK.gov will tell people

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Stop

Alternatively

You could keep your phone out of sight, and just use a bluetooth headset ?

LOHAN gets laughing gear round promotional mug

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Pint

Beer glass - excellent idea ...

especially if twice the price of the coffee mugs ...

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Alert

Re:stuffing Lester's thong with fivers!

MInd bleach to aisle 5 please

Brainboxes caught opening Bitcoin fraud emails. Seriously, guys?

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Pint

Re: Huh ?

Ah, thanks for that. I set it up, and assumed it was compulsory.

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Stop

Huh ?

Blockchain certainly have a 2-factor authentication process. When you enter your ID, it sends a code to the email address associated with the wallet.

So a simple phishing attack won't work.

Carbon tetrachloride releases still too high, says NASA

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Headmaster

Pedant alert

ISTR the proper name is now tetrachloromethane. Certainly was when I did chemistry (A level) back in 1984.

Also used in fire extinguishers IIRC.

LOHAN packs bags for SPACEPORT AMERICA!

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Drifting slightly ...

ISTR when Richard "the Hamster" Hammond (he's not a real hamster) did a prog about "could the gunpowder plot have succeeded"[1], they couldn't - for whatever reason - buy enough gunpowder in the UK. Ironically[2] it had to come from Spain. *Very* secretly.

[1]Oh yes, and then some !!!!

[2] Because Guy Fawkes learned his gunpowder skills in Spain.

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Flame

**** the European badge

Why should you celebrate Europe if they can't ****ing well support you ?

I'll have a *US* patch, please. £20 ?

Microsoft: We plan to CLEAN UP this here Windows Store town

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FAIL

Is MS staffed by muppets ?

on what planet would spaffing $100 a pop generate decent apps that people WANT.

Why didn't they give Nationwide [UK building society] £10,000 to develop a windows version of their mobile banking app (which they have no plans to develop any time soon. I have that in writing from their IT director).

Or anyone of the commercial apps that *companies* aren't offering on WP ?

RealVNC distances itself from factories, power plants, PCs hooked up to password-less VNC

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Re: VNC and RDP

you may be interested in guacamole.

Not, not that this

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WTF?

Legality ?

For anyone wondering about the legality of the research, Tentler insisted: "It isn’t [illegal]. Yahoo, Google, Microsoft, Websense, every antivirus vendor in the world, and Shodan – they all do similar scans."

Never heard that one in court before. He might, just might, want to pay for legal advice right now. He could save an awful lot later ....

Need a green traffic light all the way home? Easy with insecure street signals, say researchers

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Go

Alternatively, just phase the lights --->

There used to be a time (I bet they've fucked it up now) on the A4, from Hounslow to the Chiswick roundabout, where if you got your timing right, you could sail through *every* light on green.

The trick was to start at a red light. And as you set of, accelerate steadily, until you got to 35. Then hold it (the speed limit was 40). If you did this, you'd see every light go green as you approached it. In off-peak conditions I could get from Hounslow to Kensington in 20 minutes.

It took a bit of nerve though, as it meant driving towards a red light at speed, and not slowing down. If you did, you'd start to fall behind, and eventually get caught.

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Re:Buses

It's the bus stops they place (deliberately) opposite traffic islands that irk me. I once followed a bus from Horsefair for a mile, with about 10 stops where I had to sit behind and wait each time. Took 15 minutes. I could have walked faster (as could the bus passengers).

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If they did that in Brum

they'd probably double the average traffic speed.

Hear ye, young cyber warriors of the realm: GCHQ wants you

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Stop

Nominative determinism or in-joke. You decide.

Chris Ensor is deputy director for the National Technical Authority for Information Assurance

So his post is addressed C.Ensor ?

Really ?

Citrix drizzles lightly and briefly on VMware's parade with Xen update

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@Dr. Mouse

Maybe you need a boss like this ?

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HTML5 RDP ...

noticed quite a few projects are starting to deliver this ... using a browser to replace terminal services, and all the other proprietary remote-access protocols.

The metamorphosis of the PC, back into dumb terminal is almost complete.

Where's my VT100 ?

Kate Bush: Don't make me HAVE CONTACT with your iPHONE

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Drifting OT, but "iPhone" ...

wasn't there a court case a while back where Hoover effectively lost their exclusivity of branding, as it was judged that "Hoover" was synonymous with "vacuum cleaner" ?

Similar to "Blu-Tak" and "Sellotape" ?

Maybe the same is happening to "iPhone" becoming a generic term, rather than a brand.

And although I know it will attract a slew of downvotes, I do find it interesting this phenomenon seems to apply to things which suck or stick.

Rubber Ub' hub: Uber test-drives condoms, gift card, soap etc deliveries

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FAIL

9 *am* to 9 *pm* ?

Surely the other way round would be of more use ?

Microsoft and HTC are M8s again: New One mobe sports WinPhone

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Facepalm

MS are paying the wrong people ..

sod phone manufacturers ... you could have wall to wall Windows phones in every store. Until you have enough *apps* to offer, no-one who can choose their phone will go Windows.

If MS invested a few million to develop, say, 50% of the top 50 apps that are lacking a Windows port, they'd have a much better chance of getting Joe Soap to buy one.

What happened to the Citrix story ?

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What happened to the Citrix story ?

Has El Reg been Geugled ?

I know it existed, as I commented on it ... Now I get a nasty Apache error ..

Gone

The requested resource

/forum/1/2014/08/19/citrix_xen_app_and_desktop_update/

is no longer available on this server and there is no forwarding address. Please remove all references to this resource.

Apache/2.2.22 (Debian) Server at forums.theregister.co.uk Port 80

e-Borders fiasco: Brits stung for £224m after US IT giant sues UK govt

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HS2

makes no difference if it's "worthwhile" or not. It will be done badly - if at all - because the political will which started it will wane as it goes on.

Concorde was more a marvel of political will than technology.

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Holmes

5 year plans ....

The reason these megacorps inflate their prices so much is they damn well know, the bigger (i.e. *longer*) a project is, the more likely it will fall between two political camps.

The government that ordered it.

and

The successive government which on balance of probabilities didn't want it.

As soon as the latter happens, then the project will be reviewed, the specification (as was) will be revised to account for the new political reality, and from that point, the project will slowly wither and die.

Look as HS2 .. all the dithering. What sane CEO is going to take any part of that project, without a damn good padding to cover themselves over the potential 2 (and it will over run, so we may have 3 or 4) changes of government ?

I don't know what the answer is, but the problem is politics.

Take the shame: Microsofties ADMIT to playing Internet Explorer name-change game

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I'd call it "Spinal Tap"

because it goes all the way up to 11