Posts by Andy The Hat

Re: In summary then ...

"He did but they too were accidentally thrown out with his collection of Napoleon memorabilia."

I see, and was that was next to his extensive slide collection of 20th century telegraph poles?

Re: Censorship

Knock out the sensor first - that's what happened to SID on UFO when the alien invasion was planned ... Just look out for women in silver costumes with bright purple hair and green people wandering the streets ...

Re: Will this ruling apply in the UK ?

UK has committed to follow EU data protection policies. In simple terms, means your answer is no - we'll have a squabble with the EU over UK data sovereignty and our lovey-doveyness with the US and allowing giga-corps to suck us dry of data for free, then we'll cave in a bit until the next EU fan starts rotating.

I agree that it's outlived it's expected lifespan however a significant duststorm could have happened a week into the mission ... Off the top of my head, the ability to pull a simple rubber/carbon fibre/whatever cord across the surface of the panel to remove, say, 30% of mission-threatening build up and restore significant power levels would be simple, cheap and light with (potentially) mission saving abilities ... even if you could only do it once. Heck, if they can transport the mass of a hammer drill to Mars that even a numpty like me predicted wouldn't work except in perfect conditions, they can afford transport a tiny motor and a piece of string ...

Re: "Interxion have still failed to share any information and refuse to answer the telephone"

Have a look ... bet you'll see a Cityfibre team laying cables in the ground* outside the site.

*I won't use the term "install" as that infers some sort of skill, care and being concerned enough to at least attempt to not disrupt other services.

Re: Good vs. bad screen usage

" When you see it next to Windows 11 it's pretty jarring."

Said in jest? Surely it cannot show Windows 11 to be that bad ...

Re: W_T_F ?

I'm sorry Dave, which communist channel do you want me to open?

Alexa I said communications, the bloody communications

I'm sorry Dave I don't have anything by The Bloody Communards. But here are some similarly bad albums I didn't find for sale on the internet as I'm obviously not connected to it ...

...

I'm sorry Dave, according to not-the-Internet you cannot do that with a banana, even in space ...

That's ok then ... if you are a crypto-scammer you may lose the accumulation of stuff that was worthless when you obtained it if you get caught. That sounds much like if you raid a bank and get caught you'll have to give back what you stole.

I wonder how they compute the energy efficiency as "900 times more efficient than a visa payment"? Perhaps they are privvy to the internal operating procedures, software and hardware systems of the VISA system? Or perhaps they are actually using their own referenced figures which appear to show that a Bitcoin transaction is about 1200000x the cost of a single VISA ... So allowing for a 99.95% energy reduction that means it's still 6000x less efficient than VISA. Or am I not seeing something?

Re: Very interesting, but not RISC-V?

The poster misunderstands and is simply comparing a.n.other RISC architecture with the RISC-V "standard" ... Seems people think RISC means RISC-V and it's all a bright and shiny new thing but we were working on RISC architectures in the 80's. The "open source model" is really the new feature but with (essential in my view) big company backing, from the likes of Google, how long will it be before it's driven and controlled by big companies, the likes of ... ?

have you seen the bloat on a Sammy tv lately? It's not just like having a DAB radio but towing an entire Currys store complete with their advertising hordings ...

Re: Aren’t most weapons brain controlled…

Pan Book of Horror? "Lamb Amirstan" was my favourite tale ... about eleventy million years ago!

Re: None at all @John Robson

"Do some stuff. Waffle waffle... IT... world-beating... exponential... fight this battle... crush the enemy..."

I believe that was actually

"Do some stuff. Hic ego dico stercore anserem integrum. IT... world-beating expenditure... exponential financial outlay... fight this battle and privatise ... crush the people ..."

That's true - Eon find it so difficult to supply they've changed their supply name to Eon Next Energy or some other twaddle ... :-(

It's the energy brokers that are finding it difficult - the generators and suppliers are raking it in, the brokers are betting on the outcome ... If it was indeed a fair and open market, the "green energy" suppliers would not have had a price hike when oil prices went up ...

Re: Pointless

Dark background, light text does not cause the pupil to contract too much as it's predominantly dark - vice versa causes immediate contraction of the pupil resulting in dim, hard to read text for those with retinal problems which is why dark+light text conforms to the UK DDA requirements. Helpfully I'm currently typing this into a well formatted, white page with dark text web page which I can't alter ... so much for DDA ...

Re: Cash Is King

Cash is king? I tend to agree from the point of security. The sudden plethora of 'card machines' that don't look like card machines ...

"Just bonk your card please ... sorry, can you insert your card as we have successfully taken a photo of your signature and a cvv and just need to skim the other information ..."

Re: Share price??

Is 3.14cm the average circumference of a raspberry? Is the raspberry an El Reg officially sanctioned unit?

I must admit that if you're "successfully" working on one technology why would you also be working on another system that has (basically) already been done, dusted and proved in multiple ways? Smells of smoke, mirrors and financial wizardry to me.

Re: Why is Google not liable for damages?

I would suggest a slightly different opinion. An optional upgrade that *you* choose to apply which fails could *possibly* be deemed your problem (I don't agree with that point of view but hear me out ...)

If however the supplier insists that your device, for continued operation, is automatically updated by that supplier, then I would suggest the full and continued operation of that device is the responsibility of the supplier. In the UK at least, I believe consumer law still decrees that goods should continue to be fit for purpose for a reasonable lifetime - electrical equipment used to be ten years from purchase - otherwise there was a reasonable case to claim recompense from the manufacturer/supplier. I'm not sure whether Brexit has changed that rule but I don't believe so.

In this case, a device being bricked by the supplier when only three years old (deliberately or otherwise) certainly contravenes the 'reasonable lifetime' clause ...

I'll have to look into the depths of the consumer regulations but I'm sure suggested reasonable lifetimes are still there.

Re: Compost Heap

That is a valid statistic however the majority of the fusion takes place within a very small proportion of it's volume so it is a misleading statistic when it comes to power generation.

Re: Can you opt out of the data collection on smart TVs?

Wasn't there a ruling (many moons ago) that MS Windows licence was unenforceable as you had to open the product seal before you read that "opening the seal implies acceptance of the licence"? Isn't this a similar situation - you have to open and install the unit before finding that you are implicitly accepting the terms of data collection? That (in cookie terms) would certainly be illegal as you are not being given the clear option to decide what data can be collected before it is collected.

However that is one of two points here which have been muddled, data collection is one part (not the primary target of the article), the second being advertising on the (in my experience) Freeview EPG. Now, as the EPG is part of the Freeview service which declares itself free to all users, isn't this advert injection unfairly "charging" some users with additional advertising overhead? Interesting to hear Freeview's take on this ... or perhaps they also take a cut ...

Re: Metrological data

but perhaps it's Chinese weather detailing the words "smog" and "pollution"? Perhaps cargo manifests listed "cheap tat for the UK Christmas buying muppets" or "iPhone clones", or airline manifests detailing "holiday jaunts for the autocracy"?

None of them are "security issues" in Western eyes but all would be 'sensitive information' for the Chinese authorities.

Re: Ten billion images in its databases

They will ideally have multiple images as part of the training - ten images of hypothetical person Malcolm X would make identification of that face more accurate from less than ideal photos. How many images could they scrape from Average Joe's social media presence, 10? 100? These are not just those posted by Average Joe but also those shared with Average Joe. The numbers rapidly add up. I suspect the whole of Alabama (for instance) could probably give 1bn training pictures for "id" delivery to the local law enforcement ... not inferring anything, just a totally random state you understand. Even His Trumpyness' historic media presence would probably generate tens of thousands of shared hits ...

I wonder how they associate id with any photograph - I would assume that any "image X is heavily associated with Profile Y" to allow further investigation rather than putting a name to a face ...

Re: JWST is not a new HST

So a "cheap 6.5m lightweight monolithic mirror" was launching in a 5.4m diameter Ariane5 fairing? Something not quite right there ...

Re: There's still the old problem

Here is one of the big problems - the focus has moved from a semi-objective "man on the Clapham omnibus" to a subjective "ooh, that upset me".

Actually I believe it has all to often moved another step to "ohh, that may have upset someone else". That is where the mission-creep needs to be watched. Allowing people to take offence by proxy can potentially result in a stick to beat all and sundry.

Re: Bald Tony - What a twat!

keep on the lookout for shady characters dipping chips in mayonnaise ...

Re: I'm confused...

"How large is the snapshot and does the machine have room for it? (Consider especially old laptops.)"

You are joking? I don't believe "Windows 11" and "old laptops" are allowed to be used in the same sentence excepting possibly "Why would anyone bother installing Windows 11 on old laptops?"