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* Posts by Cpt Blue Bear

485 publicly visible posts • joined 2 Aug 2010

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Computer prices down 8.1% per year … since 1984

Cpt Blue Bear

I can't believe that's the actual conclusion of the report

Now I haven't read the bugger (and probably won't find the time) but the "perceptions of higher living costs" are mostly down to it costing more to live. It doesn't matter if you're lifestyle has changed or you've taken up an expensive drug habit - it costs more to live.

Let's see, in 1984 (or close enough to) I was paying a half share of $120 a week rent, petrol cost 60c a litre, a schooner of beer cost under $2 and I was making about $350 in hand a week. In 2012 that same house would rent for just under $500 a week, petrol costs $1.50 a litre, a schooner is around $5 and someone in my position then would be doing well if they take home $600 a week. But hey, it all works out even 'cause mobile phones and big TVs are cheaper...

I think I just spotted the problem here - the report was authored by AMP rather than any sort of credible source. For those not familiar with the Australian retail investment market, these guys are probably the biggest financial services company in Aus. I can well imagine that the price of German sedans, Japanese electronics and Colombian cocaine is of more concern to them than rent or food.

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Cpt Blue Bear
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Re: lies, damned lies and ....

Sure, for sufficiently low values of "true"

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Ex-army bloke, 2 other bods cuffed after News Corp tip-off

Cpt Blue Bear
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Re: Have I Got This Right?

More like throwing some minor lackeys to the pursuing pack of wolves. Hopefully this will have the unintended consequence of showing current and former employees and associates exactly how much loyalty they can expect from Newscorp. I look forward to a spate of suspects turning witness in an effort not to be left holding the bag when the music stops.

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MPs: Border Agency's own staff don't trust airport-scanner tech

Cpt Blue Bear
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Re: IRIS is great but...

Well you could, but you never seem to hear of anyone doing so...

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US Trade Rep criticises tech trade barriers in Oz, NZ

Cpt Blue Bear
WTF?

I'll take what you say seriously Mr USTR when the America Inc doesn't have to be dragged through the courts to pay for other peoples IP and you start allowing Aussie agricultural products into the US market.

Seriously, hypocritical arsehole or lying cocksucker (thank you Mojo Nixon) - you chose.

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Lucy in 3.4 million-year-old cross-species cave tryst

Cpt Blue Bear
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Trollface

Re: Wait for the creationists...

Well played, Sir! Not quite ranty and a little to coherent for my taste. The second paragraph change of subject is particularly good.

We really need a "polite applause" icon

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Goldman Sachs in email muppet hunt

Cpt Blue Bear
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Re: Audit?

Sorbaines-Oxely is US law. Near as I can tell from the article, this is about the UK operation.

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Cpt Blue Bear
Trollface

That word you keep using...

Meetings and correspondence with Mr Allinghon must be hilarious. Aside from sounding like a high school dropout trying to write a business letter (ie like most executives) he must drop some fabulous clangers if this is anything to go by:

“The recent climate of Big Data and virtualisation has only extrapolated the issue of controlling the data deluge common to most corporate environments.

Extrapolated? Er, that word you keep using, I do not think it means what you think it means.

As for Mr Smith, I have only one question: exactly where were you when this toxic culture developed?

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Dutch birdman admits flight was filmic fantasy

Cpt Blue Bear
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Back of a fag packet calculations

I think you'll find your wing loadings are off by about an order of magnitude. My back of a fag packet calculations based on the weight and wingspan of a bustard (because it was the bird that appeared to have the highest wing loading in the first table I found) suggests that to lift 300ib you'll need a wing span of about 100ft...

Most people don't get just how light birds are.

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So, what IS the worst film ever made?

Cpt Blue Bear
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Re: worst movies

Raiders was a classic of my generation, the sequels were just awful. The Terminator suffers from this as well right up to the execrable TV series (which might have worked on it's own rather than tacked onto the end of the franchise, but I doubt it).

Twilight Saga - a mate dates the end of his marriage to about halfway through this and the realisation that his wife liked it. That was the beginning of the end so beware.

Driver - this is the Ryan O'Neil flick with the scene in the carpark where he systematically destroys a Mercedes? It's a product of it's time and I can still enjoy it as such like the Dirty Harry films, Blue Thunder and Bullit.

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Cpt Blue Bear
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Facepalm

Vertical Limit

Worst film ever.

From the opening scene it should have been obvious. I should have gone straight to demand my money back then. Clearly the lead actors couldn't convey any sort of tension or feeling (they're only a thousand or so feet up a cliff waiting for their father to fall to his death) so they resort to shouting over each other to compensate. This technique is extensively used throughout.

The characters are clearly meant to be "flawed" but end up being so unlikeable or pathetic that you start to think the villain has a valid point. The plot has holes you can drive a bus through (apparently nitro glycerine is only highly unstable if you know about it...). The script is distinctly average. It was shot it in the Southern Alps of New Zealand and the scenery is average so they even screwed that up. But the crown is the editing! I assume some executive producer had read the there was an optimal length for exciting action scenes and decreed that every one be cut to that length. You can set your watch by it.

It make Cliffhanger look like quality. If this was a no budget, first film from unknowns I'd cut it some slack, but it's not. It's a big budget Hollywood action adventure so I'd rather cut the rope that it's hanging from and let it fall to its death like the actor in the opening scene. IT should be shown to film students as a terrible warning.

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Cpt Blue Bear
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Worst Connery movie ever?

First Knight.

Not even Connery could overcome the suckage that was that script and balance out the non-entity that is Geer (although my Mum says he has nice legs). I actually laughed several times in the cinema, including during the funeral scene

At least Entrapment had Catherine Zeta-Jones' arse (although not enough of it) to redeem it.

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Cpt Blue Bear
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Charlie's Angels!

Dear God! I haven't seen the sequel but the first has to be a candidate. It's so bad that if I never see Cameron Diaz's arse, Drew Barrymore's tits or any of Lucy Lu again it will be a million years too soon. Bill Murray phoned his performance in (from an all night bar by the look). Fortunately, I saw it on a free ticket or I'd have been really pissed.

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Cpt Blue Bear
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Re: Worst! Film! Ever!

"I once punched a man in the face for saying that Hawk the Slayer was rubbish"

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Cpt Blue Bear
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Only in numbers. Big budget atrocity reaches far more people. Besides, I'm willing to cut small timers some slack but not when you are supposed to be the best and spent the GDP of a central African republic make the turkey.

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Court rejects Tesla’s latest libel spat with Top Gear

Cpt Blue Bear
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Re: Re: I guess Tesla are operating on the US damage control model.

Clarkson: Why isn't understeering!?

Mark Weber: It's something called throttle control.

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Proview wins new Chinese IPAD ruling as Apple threatens to sue

Cpt Blue Bear

Monitors! That's why I know the name Proview

Let me tell you a tale...

Some years ago, back when a 17" TFT was something to brag about, same appeared on the market here under the name Proview/CMV. They got rave reviews and were significantly cheaper than the competition. Customers came asking for the damn things and we sent maybe 50 out the door before the proverbial hit the rotating device.

Proview's QC was basically non-existent. It seems the local importers carefully chose the demos they sent for review. Or, if you believe the rumours about a certain prominent local computing mag, just sent a cheque for advertising and the glowing review was written without benefit of ever actually seeing the product. It wasn't just the local press who were guilty / fooled 'cause I remember one customer coming in waiving a copy of PC Power.

If you got a good one all well and good otherwise send it back and take another lucky dip. Rinse and repeat until the customer is satisfied. We bounced two thirds of them back to our suppliers as DOA or faulty out of the box. It got so bad that at one point there was a sign at the returns desk to the effect that they would no longer accept returns of these pieces of crap for replacement and we'd have to send them to the importer in Sydney (that's 1000km give or take). Then there was the moving goal posts of what constitutes faulty. They got told in no uncertain terms not to try that on with me 'cause we still had a half dozen returns unresolved. I have some sympathy 'cause the poor bastards lost half their container load to warranty replacements. The last few we ended up replacing with another brand after three rounds of the Proview lucky dip.

I think we still have two in use. Like I said: if you got a good one...

So in this fight I'm with Apple purely because of the weeks of aggravation Proview caused me all those years ago. I must go take a shower 'cause I feel dirty now.

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Home Sec splits Border Agency after passport checks fiasco

Cpt Blue Bear
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FAIL

Yeah, that'll make sure that no one in charge ever dares to use their initiative to solve a problem.

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Damn it, where’s our NBN scandal?

Cpt Blue Bear
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Re: must be coming soon

Took a Telstra sales call yesterday at work (masquerading as customer service) from some muppet trying to sell us their new "digital" service. This sounds like an ADSL2+ and VOIP to me although said muppet swore blind it wasn't VOIP. The interesting part was that part of the $125 a month package is a router with an NBN "port". He's probably have got a sale now that Internode have been taken over by IINet, but he couldn't tell me what that last thing is...

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Qld council gets crafty with mobile data mining

Cpt Blue Bear
Facepalm

Holy Style Guide, Badtman!

My god parts of that were badly written.

So awful that it smacked of cut and paste from a press release.

Let's see what Mr Google turns up. Two hits: El Reg and this

http://prwire.com.au/pr/27229/logan-city-council-rolls-out-blinkmobile-interactive-following-successful-field-inspections-pilot

Which is (surprise!) a press release from (golly!) BlinkMobile in something called PRWire. I'll leave it for fellow readers and El Reg Subs to play spot the phrases common to both.

Bad Natalie! Write out 100 time: If I'm going to rewrite press releases I must do more than just cut and paste.

Bad Reg Subeditors! I expect better from you guys.

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Space: 1999 returning to TV?

Cpt Blue Bear
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Don't even joke about it.

I'm pretty sure Channel 9 has already played something that was pretty much a remake of Chopper Squad. I can't find anything on the net (what the hell do you search for?) but my (beer clouded) recollection is it had the Maori bloke from Waterrats in it.

Patrol Boat: The Next Generation (AKA Sea Patrol) has already run longer than the original series...

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Airport bomb Twitter joker in second fine appeal bid

Cpt Blue Bear
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FAIL

re Border Control

That nicely illustrates the kind of security industry thinking that makes the rest of us alternately shake our heads in amazement and facepalm,

Even assuming it was the same cast, is your mate figuring that if this fella told the truth once he must have been telling the truth the second time? Again, assuming it was the same cast, it obviously wasn't full of drugs 'cause you wouldn't unpack that on a secure site.

Mind you, it would make a nice distraction if the bloke BEHIND him in the queue was smuggling:

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2020: A Press Odyssey – reporter licensing explained

Cpt Blue Bear
FAIL

I think what Andrew is suggesting* is that the current backlash against getter journalism will result in "official" journalism becoming emasculated republishing of press releases and official statements and "unofficial" journalism becoming disconnected from the events it claim to report because no one official will talk to them. In the dialogue (in the literary sense) he throws in a couple of topical references, slightly distorted for effect. The final punchline is supposed to shock I guess (it's the usual form of this style) but I doubt you'll find too many kids today who know what a haberdasher is (most would probably equate mason with Freemason) so the gag falls flat.

Like so many of Andrew's recent pieces if degenerates into a straw man argument. The bald fact is that the you're hard pressed to find anything but "rubbishy newspapers" and that has more to do with events in the 1980s than people refusing to pay for news twenty years later. In this case I fear that Andrew is confusing cause and effect because it suits his ideological purpose. Frankly I agree with a lot of what he writes (when I can figure out what what it's about) but advancing easily deflected straw men and false dichotomies does your cause no good at all.

*it's becoming harder to tell as he sinks deeper into trying to be clever and ironic. What happened Andrew? You used to write quite clearly back when you were based in SF.

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Why O2 shared your mobile number with the world

Cpt Blue Bear
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Headmaster

Basic networking. You can't use an IP for billing purposes if it is dynamically assigned because:

1 it won't always belong to the same person.

2 public IPs only identify the router not the source and destination of the packets

3 you need to be authenticated before an IP can be assigned.

Multiple punctuation (personal peeve of mine) makes you look like an excitable fruitcake!!!111!

General Comment not aimed at Mr Carnegie: El Reg needs an Assumed Knowledge section. Maybe a series of icons on stories linking to background / technical / how-it-works info required to understand the article.

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Cpt Blue Bear
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Facepalm

No that's not what he's saying at all

In fact you've answered your own question if you think about if for a moment.

The fixed line service cannot identify the computer you are using. That's why you have to authenticate using a login and password in order to, say, post on El Reg. That's why every service you are billed for by a third party requires some form of authentication. You have provided that information by programming your router.

In the case of a mobile you don't need to put that password because the network can authenticate the device from it's SIM. Thus services that can read the header info can also authenticate you for billing purposes.

Both use an authentication mechanism: the former a login and password, the latter the unique identifier for the SIM.

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NBN Co unclogs sign-up pipeline

Cpt Blue Bear
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The word Ban has connotations

If implies that some higher authority has ordered a cease in trading, with an added hint of implied wrong doing. This situation is more like if you were a shop keeper with no stock. Would you be happy with the description "ban on sales" then?

I'm not inclined to ascribe the local presses use of the word to bias or being a part of the local established media's attempt to undermine the NBN simply because I don't think they are bright enough to do so. I've met a representative sample and I think they've just chosen the shortest word.

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Vodafail riles ACMA again

Cpt Blue Bear
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"And how do you separate an approved dealer from a rogue one."

By their behavior.

The cop out is allowing companies / governments / whatever to claim "it wasn't us it was the contractor". They do the work in your name, you can take the rap.

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Bah, humbug! Virgin Media censors Charles D**kens

Cpt Blue Bear
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Happy

Please tell me you mean QC not QA...

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Apple's Galaxy Tab ban was best advertising ever - Samsung

Cpt Blue Bear
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Your dealing with someone who works in corporate communications.. You can't expect him to express himself in a clear, concise and logical manner.

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How digital audio ate itself ... and the music biz

Cpt Blue Bear
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Agreed. A really good article, but reading the first I got the feeling that there was a logical three parter here. The first was really good, the second seemed like a rush to get to the end. Maybe that is because the first covered what is history for me, the second what I lived through.

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Groupon shares plunge: Drain in sight

Cpt Blue Bear

Three words

Pump and dump

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Cpt Blue Bear
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But that is the premise of managing investment funds: the manager does not need to understand what he (and it's pretty much universally a he) invests in, he simply needs to look at "the numbers". He has his metrics, most of the time he doesn't even understand how they are calculated, that's a "backroom" job, he just compares them to those of other similar investments.

Any mathematician, and about eight out of ten tech geeks, will tell you straight away that this is a recipe for being taken. Any such system open to being optomised (or gamed) to produce the results that are wanted. Especially where there are very large sums of money at stake on the one hand and penalties for failing to "maximise shareholder value" on the other. I've come across it often enough when looking at business performance metrics from a management rather than investment point of view that I'm convinced it's SOP.

Then we have the issue of what businesses are similar and comparible...

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Hard disk famine shaping up as predicted after floods

Cpt Blue Bear
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Very if my experience selling HDDs is anything to go by. The price difference is negligible and you don't have to wait two days for them to turn so you can send them back 'cause they're the wrong ones. Plus, you can deal with DOAs instantly.

What I want to know is why people buying ten or more are buying retail. Just don't know any better, I guess.

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Cpt Blue Bear
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Neither

Your are seeing just how short big retail run their inventory.

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Can the iPad save newspapers?

Cpt Blue Bear
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Bingo

On both counts.

Plus (in the spirit of Freetard and Paytard) Slabtards are self selecting as both able and willing to spend cash on toys. I'm so hip, I read the Guardian / Times / Daily Fascist on my iPad. But what happens when the novelty wears off and it's got to sell on content alone?

Not saved the industry, just given the dead cat to bounce off.

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Facebook comes out swinging

Cpt Blue Bear
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Nice suggestion, but misses the point: if you don't sign up to Facebook, they are still profiling you by linking all the people who gave them your real email address...

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World's stealthiest rootkit gets a makeover

Cpt Blue Bear
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@Hidden partition

We already thought of that and it's been SOP for several years.

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Hundreds of Mr A N OTHERs discovered on payrolls

Cpt Blue Bear
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Happy

The most famous fantasy geek crime evah

I knew someone who claimed to have contemplated implementing this particular scam at an Aussie bank in the early 80s when the smaller ones were computerising. The fly in the ointment was getting the money out of the system without anyone noticing. Plus a quick calculation of just how much money the scam would generate would make it kind of stand out at a small regional bank in those days - today I guess you could hide it as a regular EFT to the tax office or the Chairman's green fees.

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Samsung offers Apple TOP-SECRET peace deal in Australia

Cpt Blue Bear
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Nice tablet you've got there, Mr Samsung

Be a real shame if something happened to it...

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More job losses on the way as Tata picks up Telstra back office

Cpt Blue Bear
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FAIL

Obviously a non-Aussie post

I could ask the same of the UK and American posters here.

Given that the story (you did read that didn't you?) is about Telstra, I think we can let that one go. From context I think you should be able to figure out that Westnet are a telco of some kind. The poster is expressing, rather childishly IMO, his dislike of Telstra and that he uses another company.

Fail, for primary school level reading comprehension.

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Skype: Microsoft's $8.5 billion identity tool

Cpt Blue Bear
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Thumb Up

Agreed

Whenever I read blanket statements like that I want to beat the author until he the terms used. So, Matt, please define fraudulent as used in this piece.

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Gov removes 'general appeal' rights for accused freetards

Cpt Blue Bear
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FAIL

Well done Mr Herring

Speaking of poisson rouge, I see you have made the common mistake of conflating criminal and civil matters.

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Oz bookseller fires back in online battle

Cpt Blue Bear
FAIL

More like just inept management

Can't you just imagine the meeting that hatched this? Yeah! Vanity publishing: that'll save us!

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Mr Bean prangs £650k McLaren

Cpt Blue Bear
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Nick Mason...

...does both.

(But he can afford it)

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Sun compo entrants' privates exposed in public

Cpt Blue Bear
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FAIL

You must be new around here

I assume you meant creative headline writing (please correct me if I'm wrong), which has been a game at The Reg for years. I think there was even an article recounting some of the editor's favourites...

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Booze for wrinklies: Good or bad?

Cpt Blue Bear

Actually no...

From your example it seems that their mileage barely varied at all (I think we can assume the 12 months difference is within the margin for error rather than conclude that drinking cocktails will get you an extra year).

My Granddad was told to lay off the red wine and strong cheese "for his health" in his mid 80s. He said "thank you, but we all have to die sometime and those are among the few pleasures left at my age". He was too much of a gentleman to tell the doctor a third his age to piss off. He died in his sleep ten years later having seen the millennium in and outlived Don Bradman. Right up to his death I used to share a scotch or two with him when i could (straight up, perhaps ice or a little water strictly for medicinal purposes). I had to bring it 'cause the staff at the home weren't allowed to either buy alcohol for residents or take them shopping for it. Laphroaig was his favourite in later years 'cause apparently Johnnie Walker "isn't what it was" since they started bottling locally. RIP

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PARIS team to tackle the ultimate post-pint snack

Cpt Blue Bear
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Thumb Up

South Aussie parmy to be exact

I was under the impression that this was a South Australian thing. The rest of the country regarding us as "schnitzel eating freaks" to quote a bar manager of my aquantaince who hailed from New South Wales. Mind you, the last time I was in Melbourne I spotted a sign outside a pub advertising "parmas" so it may be spreading. The same pub advertised Coopers on tap.

If you are in Adelaide, get yourself to the Earl of Leicester Hotel in Parkside. They do one of the best in town. Don't order a liar size unless you are mad - one of those fed three of us.

Oh, and don't use bacon, use ham.

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Porn found in Osama bin Laden compound

Cpt Blue Bear
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Agreed

Anyone wanting to understand the "Irish Problem" should start with The Cattle Raid of Cu Chulainn....

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Police ordered to disclose ANPR camera sites

Cpt Blue Bear
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The Oo Argh A?

I thought they packing it in when his wife got pregnant?

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Japanese gov makes Fukushima evac zone compulsory

Cpt Blue Bear
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Can we get a missed-the-point icon please?

WTF does this have to do with radioactive hot springs in Iran or background radiation in Madras?

Simple: the naturally occurring radiation exposure in those locations is higher than at Fukushima but no one is being evacuated from there. Oh, I forgot that's "natural" radiation so it's alright.[/SARCASM]

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