Posts by Kiwi 4368 publicly visible posts • joined 26 Sep 2011
If the poor wee mites cannot follow simple instructions and fail the exam as a result of this, then the exam is working as designed.
So a dyslexic person who can perfectly strip and rebuild a car should never be able to pass an automotive exam because they cannot write their name at the top?
Good to know. Just because they can do everything else right, if they miss something irrelevant on an unrelated field they shouldn't be allowed to be employable, no matter how great they are!
</sarc></rant>
I've had no problems with sticks since around 2013 or 14, and I don't exactly look for "premium" brands.
That said, I do treat them as larger versions of write-once DVDs, so if they last more than a few writes that's find. I can't recall when I last lost data on one though.
(Also trying to recall where several are, obviously loaned out to others somewhere).
I recovered one from a dog processed memory stick, a compressed data file with the users only photos of their deceased parents. Stinky but possible, needed two days work but I think it paid some of my karmic debt.
So lucky! I would've given anything for that outcome.
I had the opposite answer. "Sorry, we cannot recover from this".
It's heartbreaking to tell a mother that those pictures are gone.
"What would be nice is to see stations doing .... so we'll put something quite different on."THAT would require originality, creativity and analytical thinking, which are things that have been lacking from TV network management since the outset of TV networks.
Well, they're part way there...
The amazing thing is, people KNOW this going in, but they still gamble it won't happen to them and they'll be the one in a million who doesn't get royally shafted - and then they go and do it AGAIN, over and over, just for a shot at fame and fortune.
Isn't this mentality what keeps casinos/Lotto etc alive? :(
"unless I 'illegally' changed the region code on my DVD."FWIW, unless NZ laws have changed since 1998, it's perfectly legal to change the region code on your DVD player or pay someone to unlock it, or purchase an unlocked one.
ICBW but ISTR there was some law around anything that would 'circumvent' any sort of 'copy protection' or other rights management systems. This was brought in IIRC with the Clarke Labour government (one of those issues where I was a little ashamed to have voted them in) along with several laws around owning software that could be used to harm or remove files in a malicious manner (and yes, Dos/Windows/EE's "delete" functions WOULD qualify under a strict/literal reading!).
It's not under the copyright laws per se, but the 'computer misuse' type laws.
OTOH, at this stage I was doing a lot of stuff involving other countries and copyright laws and my memory may also involve elements of the DMCA or other trash.
"even if its wrong, pirates sometimes give a better service. "Sometimes?
Depends on the type of service you want. If you want to watch movies without issue and relatively little delay then it's the pirates all the way.
But if the service you're after is the type that, well, lets just say 'requires a bit of bull', well....
Half agree/disagree. ITV is 99.9% crap. BBC certainly have a high % of crap, but there are good things. But it's worth noting that in any creative area, the vast majority is crap, or run-of-the-mill tosh that only appeals to people who like that specific niche.
One of the things that put me off live TV (aside from the screamy ads and the stupid ads and ads overtop of other ads and entire shows that are just ads...) was the proliferation of certain types of shows at certain time slots.
So TVNZ plays a cooking show on TV1 between 5pm and 6pm. TV3 sees that this is popular, so also plays one at that time. TVNZ sees 3 is gaining viewers so puts another one on TV2. The owners of 3 sees that is popular so puts another one on another of their channels. Sky sees people are watching this so takes their popular alternative program off and replaces it with more cooking shows.
But now there's a lot of a cooking shows (I think there are 132,775 varieties of "Masterchef" now?) so they themselves aren't attractive (plus they're cooking stuff that few people can do, rather than the shows doing simple but really nice/nutritious stuff). So to make the show popular it needs "controversy" and some git with a reputation of being shouty and sweary suddenly gets popular (once people finally got sick of his shows it seems his restaurants started closing - or are things mis-reported over this way?)
What would be nice is to see stations doing a "Hey look, those two have this type of program on, but we're smart enough to realise that a lot of people don't actually want to watch that, so we'll put something quite different on. They do reality, we do comedy. They do cooking, we do cars (or bikes - when are we ever going to see a decent bike show?) They get one set of viewers, we provide entertainment for a different set of viewers.
People now have Amazon Prime, Netflix, Spotify etc and it has been made easy to "buy" content, so there isn't as much need to pirate.
Actually, as others have pointed out, that may be doing the opposite. If you can get the services without monthly subs and only pay for what you want to watch then it might not be so bad, but I'm still not keen on perhaps having to sign up to a multitude of services just to watch stuff.
But if each needs a regular subscription...
I have been waiting for mine for years, I even had a picture frame ready for it!
Me too!
I have a puny seed box running, only up 1332 days (honestly the actual number, not trying to sound "l33t" or anything! :) ), 13Gb uploaded in the last week but none downloaded (much of my movies etc comes via Popcorn Time or Kodi), and overall 4.6TB down and 9.6TB up (I tend to go for ratios of 5 or higher)
We have a similar thing in NZ but with penalties attached, so first letter is a warning, not sure on 2nd letter, 3rd is cutting your feed. But since they cannot prove who actually downloaded the file, the ISP's seem to have been exceptionally reluctant to send out the letters. And a lot of them probably use some level of NAT anyway, so can't say where the traffic went after it reached them..
I know one person who got a first warning and moved to spotify or the like for music (free but occasional ads or so I am told - probably "requires" lots of other access to run), and another who tossed it in the bin and his weekly transfers make my 9tb look lame. I don't know if a 2nd letter ever went out, but I am certain no one in NZ got a 3rd letter.
But I'll keep trying.
When they did the same thing with a third one I stopped giving them any more.
I've found some interesting mixes with charity places. Some know a mum with a newborn and not a lot of cash would be glad to have a suitable cot that has signs of use, know a far-from-home student will be grateful for a couch that needs a sheet over it to look presentable, and they don't mind putting some stuff up for 'free'. Others - "It's a shame this immaculate-looking leather 3-seater with matching lay-z-boy style chairs is worthless to us - we found a strand of cat hair stuck to the bottom so it's not good enough".
I've known a couple that won't take stuff for 'free' because it'll stop someone from buying something in their store. Even though they're supposedly a charity helping those who need some assistance.
So I look to the free sites first, or a suitable site to display something 2nd, before finally sending to the tip if need be.
artists or (as I am) writers [..] don't get paid until they get paid.
You maybe need to have a chat with them about their business models then.
There is some truth behind the "make something seem scarce and you can charge more" concept - but the problem is they're trying to make saltwater appear scarce in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
I've heard of a great show called "The Expanse"[1]. I can think of all sorts of places where I could buy it from, but I'm in the wrong country. I could use a prepay visa card and use a VPN to appear to be from another country - but that would be "piracy" (stupid word for copyright violations!). I'd actually be paying the price you set for your product, but I'd be doing it illegally. Your keepers didn't consider NZ'ers to be worthy of having your product.
Same for stuff like friends wanting to send me gifts of DVD's they'd purchased (even got a couple who have their own IMDB pages though more for crew/extras than any real acting). DVD's that've been sent could be stopped at the border, or wouldn't play on my system unless I 'illegally' changed the region code on my DVD. Sky TV had the rights to the movie but no intention of showing it in NZ. They did the same for quite a bit of stuff - they didn't want to show it but they didn't want any others to show it either, so they brought the rights and locked stuff away. We also used to have ISP's with free VPN services for overseas visitors - so people from the UK could do stuff like use iplayer while here - Sky didn't like the idea of people who'd already paid for content (UK TV license) not also giving them a cut, so they sued the ISP's and made it cheaper for the ISP's to quit a service rather than keep trying to fight Sky. And Sky wonders why they're haemorrhaging viewers.
Anyway.. If you had content I wanted and I could pay for that content I would. But if you make it illegal for me to purchase stuff simply to feed your greed, well, I might not feel too guilty if someone hand's me a thumbdrive and says "You should watch this".[2]
But then, I'm also someone who's been known to borrow books from others, buy second-hand DVD's, games and books, and even commit such horrid acts of piracy as having a couple of friends around to watch a movie I've rented through a proper place. If you buy 2nd hand creative material or borrow any, you're also committing 'acts of piracy'
If your paymasters are making it impossible for me to pay money that you might see a teency bit of, then your gripe is with them not me. They do it for greed, not for the art nor for the makers.
[1] From what I've seen of The Expanse, I'd recommend anyone who can legally get it to legally watch it. And those who're geoblocked etc, well, you know what to do. (I actually haven't recently checked it's availability over this way.)
[2] Guy I know has written quite a number of books and also done radio shows and produced large amounts of quality material on a certain subject field. He did all the work himself so he could completely keep copyright (including giving a small local printing business a reason to expand considerably!). The reason he did that was so that when he'd made his money, he could do with his work as he wished. All but a couple of his books are now in the public domain as is most of his recorded material. If he'd given the radio station the full rights to his material, it'd be locked up in some vault somewhere kept out of the public eye lest someone listen to that rather than listen to their station. He's actually protected his work by making it freely available. He created because he was good at it and because he loved the subject. Money was a lower motivation. He freed his work because of his love of the subject and because he wants others to enjoy it. He's also the guy who introduced me to The Expanse, as well as several 'out of print' TV shows that I will never be allowed to see legally. He also finds the current methods of the rights holders to be repugnant, and has shown for some things you really can do it yourself.
"But telemetry already comes with modern OSes, AV, IDS, etc.Crash report enabling is an example"
I chose to turn that on or off depending on my liking of and trust in the developer. If I think they're OK and want to help them find bugs, I'll turn that on. Or eg with Firefox 'send' a crash report when asked - if I am feeling nice towards them and the crash is happening often enough (which is rare).
If a security update inserts telemetry without asking, then trust is breached. On discovery I'd roll back and prevent future updating, and just use the machine more carefully to protect it (probably from a VM behind a pihole - the stuff I work with is document editing and the odd picture)
And before you speak of losing security by not updating - they've proven that their update is untrustworthy so any claims to security is gone. I deal with sensitive personal data for some people, I can't have my systems infested with "telemetry reporting" that includes open or recently opened files. Perhaps the victim won't care/mind/be capable of comprehending what has happened. Perhaps the other end won't read or store that data. Perhaps unicorns riding 8-legged monkeys will fly out my arse while watching airborne pigs mate with 767s.. Legally I am supposed to protect data, not let it out of my hands without certain restrictions. By using W10 or an updated W7 I am in breach of private data laws.
I'm longing to see some big government organisations get taken for using Windows and breaching data laws. (Don't tell me MS will never 'accidentally' sneak telemetry into the enterprise versions!)
Lots and lots of cars idling, many trying to top off their battery after just starting, few even close to normal operating temps..
I'd suggest a few in the desert adding some time to a battery bank would produce far less fuel fumes or hydrogen vapour than the equivalent area of a motorway/main road at peak times :)
But the decline - assuming that graph is correct - started around the turn of the 20th century and has continued at a fairly constant rate since.
I'd suggest the biggest thing for that is better water handling - better overall hygiene, better handling of sewerage, and of course relatively clean drinking/washing water. Better food probably helps a lot :)
Advances in medicine go a long way, but clean and readily available water (esp hot water) makes one hell of a difference.
The same type of claims that not too long ago were being uttered against homosexuals - that they were "corrupting children" "coercing quiet boys into homosexuality" "abusing kids through propaganda" "Gay rights activits are pushing an agenda onto innocent kids"
Well they got at least some of that wrong.. I was a quiet boy, but believe me I didn't need any 'coercing'. Probably I was so quiet because I feared being noticed - already had enough abuse from those who thought I was different.
That said, I'm not exactly comfortable with the way boys who show effiminate traits or wish to 'experiment a bit' are still talked into believing they must be gay. Or the pressure of "If you haven't tried it how can you know you won't like it?" that has often been used (including by a younger stupider and much more selfish version of myself :( ).
Some people may be born gay, many are made gay (I count myself amongst that lot - largely by my own choices), some are totally straight but are pressured into being gay. Guy I knew had 4 sisters and no father, grew up on an arts farm. About as effeminate as you can get, yet 100% straight. People expected him to want to wear dresses and kept trying to put him in that box, but he wanted nothing to do with it.
Just like my wife cannot separate the Mists of Avalon book series (which she used to love) from the Author Marion Zimmer Bradley, who with her husband perpetrated some incredibly heinous abuse on their own children.
I learned this week who Anne Perry was (by "was" I mean who she was born as, not who she is now). She took part in a violent murder when she was a teenage girl. Some people are apparently upset to find out the subject of her books. What she did I won't defend, but I won't judge her on it as under the same circumstances I may have done the same or worse - I didn't live her life so I don't know what choices led to her issues. Knowing what she has done - the bad and the good - won't change how I view the work. What matters most to me is how she is living today, not what she did in the past.
People are people, and us people are generally capable of monstrous things with justifications that, to us, make it seem perfectly OK to behave in a certain way yet to others (or when times change) are quite bad. Some would say my parents loved me too much, others say not enough, but when I was a child what my parents "should" have done - under the mores of the day - is had me locked up in an asylum on the suspicion of being a poof. They didn't, but that was the right thing to do. The asylum would've rightfully given me electric shock treatments, massive amounts of psychoactive drugs, possibly even talked about a lobotomy or other alterations.
Today we have a very different view on what is right, yet many of the people who were behind those things honestly believed what they were doing was for the good of others. I don't defend or justify their actions, but I don't hold those actions against them where the training and literature of the day taught them to believe they were doing the best thing.
Look at the heart, not the deed.
They just tutted sternly over the telephone and then forcefully hung up.
One of the many dying arts in this modern world. I only know one person today who has a "proper" phone, and only a handful who have and use a landline.
There is an alternative to the old-style of slamming a phone down, but it can get expensive as it tends to destroy the cellphone thrown violently against the wall.
(Not that I've lost a any phones in this manner.... :) )
Worked out that if you covered one of the pins in the new-fangled BT modular jacks with sticky tape, then when the phone rang, and was answered, it not only didn't answer, but kept on ringing!M
I used to do something like that - but with the phase pin of various extension leads or power leads.
The leads always seemed to work perfectly for me, but for the boss it'd never work. Carefully trim it right and the tape becomes quite invisible unless you look close enough.
Used to be one of my favourite shows, till it turned out Graham Linehan (one of the forces behind Father Ted) is a royal twonk and some might say a bigot spreading the same lines that were used against homosexuals in the not too distant past against trans rights activists...
It is his right to say what he believes to be true.
It was a battle lost sometime early after the milennium. its game over man.
I beg to differ.
I had a 2nd hand Spectrum when I was a kid. The previous owner had emblazoned "NO HACKING" across the top of it, and the Spectrum was the result of his trying to do things with his C64 and modem (nice parents who punish you by giving you a not-as-nice computer vs the ones like mine, where you lost it for a period of weeks to months (except my game watch, never saw that again after the 3rd time I got caught playing with it after 'bedtime').
This was in '86 or '87, so 'hacking' as a term for illegal computer access (and trying to break into remote systems) was already pretty well established. When I was involved with Fidonet in the late 90's we were also having the "we're not trekkies, we're Trekkers!", sorry I mean "They're not hackers, they're crackers" arguments quite often as well.
The war was over by '95. Just a few lost soldiers surviving in the jungle who haven't yet been given the news who're still trying to fight.
(Joe, if you're reading, thanks for the hand-me-down that probably kept me from a life of crime! :) )
The best one was when we had to bring up an old server in 2016 from an acquisition years before I started with the company. A Novell 3.11 server with the acquired company's financials.
A customer brought me a machine that needed to run to get at the data. A 486DX CPU, and finding a HD that I could use to copy the data to - IIRC in the end I created a 200MB partition on a much larger drive that the machine could see, IIRC I searched far and wide before finding an old computer in one of my own closests that had a 4G HDD that the 486 could actually talk to.
Strangest thing was the machine was absolutely pristine in condition, looked as if it'd just come out of the showroom. Amazing mechanical keyboard as well. No App Menu key (aka 'Windows key') nor right-mousey keys though. It was part of a control system in a local factory but talked via serial or parallel ports so wasn't hard to replicate stuff into a VM - but getting the old data out of the propriety database took some effort (licensed to mobo...)
This was in 2013 BTW, and until it started failing the machine was in daily use.
[Still cannot get over how clean it was....]
EDIT I also have a VM image that started life as another customer's machine. HW finally dieing, she had her financials, recipes and other things in some nicely laid out DOS stuff including a reasonably done menu.. Brought back memories of when doing that was the high point of home computing (and much of business computing for that manner). The personal data was deleted but I kept the image in case I ever actually needed a working DOS VM...
* You have a personal tracing device in your pocket RIGHT NOW (your phone).
Nope, often leave the phone at home, or in the car, or...
* You have listening devices in your home RIGHT NOW (Smart TV, digital assistant, games console...)
No game console, no TV, no "digital assistant".
* You have behaviour monitoring devices RIGHT NOW (activity tracker, internet connect fridge, home automation...)
Basic fridge, any "activity tracker" would die of boredom/lack of exercise, and I don't do enough to warrant "home automation".
* You are using facial recognition RIGHT NOW (Facebook, Windows, Apple...)
Linux, no social media (except El Reg), basic dumbphone
* You are happy to be tracked RIGHT NOW (advertising)
Adblockers, privacy tools and noscript.
Oh whoops, it's a false positive. Big deal. 30 seconds out of your day to provide ID and carry on.
Nope, doesn't work like that. 1) You're working on the assumption that the target is identified - what if you fit the description of a 'suspect' but where there is no identification, IE a person fitting your description was involved in a crime somewhere in your local area? That ain't gonna be 30 seconds. If the crime is serious enough and you cannot prove with absolute certainty where you were at the time (and bear in mind the pigs can change when the crime was committed on a whim, just to make sure they get you if they've taken a dislike to you -"yes, the CCTV timestamp says it was at 11:05 and the recorder's time is correct now, but since he can prove he was elsewhere at that time maybe he himself hacked it and changed it then changed it back". You're accused of a crime, think the jury will believe your claims that you couldn't possible have made such a hack? You're already guilty.
So if you're accused of a crime you didn't commit and cannot prove instantly that you didn't do it - and your only chance of that is if they get someone who looks enough like you and confesses - then you might find yourself spending a few days or even months in prison awaiting trial. All coz the computer said you matched the description.
But even if they're after an identified person, until the police test your fingerprints and perhaps DNA, you ID - assuming you're carrying at the time - isn't proof. I've got a decent scanner, and a laminator, I reckon I could probably whip up a passable fake ID in a fairly quick time (I've never tried it so maybe not). Maybe it's bloody hard to do and I'd need equipment far beyond even what Bill Gates can buy, but the coppers are going to believe that fake ID is trivial and arrest you on the chance that it's fake. Again, you're at least spending the night in pokey till they can verify your ID, or get the person they're after. Sucks to be you if you're someone who works with stuff that destroys fingerprints, as even a small amount of damage means you'll be suspected of trying to hide your prints so they'll make extra sure they have the right person before releasing them.
But never mind. So what if an innocent person spends months in jail over a computer error? That'll make the rest of the world safer. I just hope you're the next innocent person to have to spend time in prison, you might think otherwise.
If anything it will IMPROVE matters massively for those affected by the racist stop-and-search policies as the AI system won't have the inherent biases of the prejudicial police officers.
Have you considered who the system is being tested/designed by?
More importantly, it will help prevent the police from wasting their time and innocent people who happen to be "the wrong colour".
And yet the evidence from the world over says otherwise.
A bit late to the party, but anyway...
I often do that myself, so all is forgiven :) -> Grab one of these and join the fun!
Most people (including myself) seem to want a combination of the best of capitalism and socialism - that is to say, the ability to compete and strive to better yourself and improve your children's chances, but not at the cost of destroying the lives of others - therefore a progressive tax system and a decent (not lip-service) safety net in the form of free healthcare and minimum living standards appears to be a reasonable balance.
Yup, that'd be me. I do love the benefits of the modern age and living in a free country. And I love that I could start and grow a business (and have several plans in the works). Hate the piles of waste and 'entitlement' I see around me though, and the sheer mind-killing stupidity like those who'd rather pay $9.99 to Ali Express than $10 to a local shop!
The problem with some on the far right / 50% of America is that any suggestion of a safety net for others, that might just come from their taxes, is instantly and ignorantly (or manipulatively) condemned as full-throated socialism.It's not. Grow up.
Have another beer. Wish I could give you another upvote or few.
I had a close friend in the US - he'd done very well for himself, quite well off, family home etc all paid off. Then he had an accident that stopped him working. Medical bills came in. Insurance ran out. Savings ran out. Sold the home. That money ran out. Still unable to work. Once the money ran out that was it. Joel died in the gutter, abandoned and literally tossed out on the street because he'd become too poor. He'd become poor by having outrageously high medical bills - things that in NZ I can get over the counter for the price of a cheap chocolate bar are beyond the GPD of small nations on the Far Side of the Pacific (or so I hear).
Me? I'm on duty tonight here in NZ. I'm at the house of a person who was a basic labourer. In her late 50's she got sick and stopped working and has been on taxpayer-funded care the last few years. She doesn't exactly need round-the-clock care but she can have sudden and severe problems, plus she's not as mobile as she'd like to be. I've cooked us dinner, cleaned some of the house (I do kitchen and lounge, the other carer does BnB), and so long as the wrong 'beeps' don't occur I'm free to do whatever I want so long as it's on the property, which is also state-funded. As is her medical alarm. She never was a big earner, never had private insurance, never had any real wealth, but is a great person with something of a social life (when she can) and lots of friends around and she does contribute to the community.
That's our horrible socialist health care system with our no-fault no-sue accident compensation system. Our poor get cared for, their 'rich' can wind up dying in the gutter.
While you're at it, read the parable of the good Samaritan. You know, the one Jesus told.
One I sometimes like to remind others of.... As well as the whole "Love your neighbour' bit - which means showing compassion for others. "Pure religion is just this: to greet the widow with a kiss,
Feed the orphan, love the poor..." (Rez, ""Land of Stolen Breath" - maybe something similar in James as well...)
I have to go, work calls.... :( (not an alarm thankfully)
Impossible to implement without Fascism and fails over the reality of Human Nature.
I'd love to hear why you believe the first part of that sentence.
I partly agree on the 2nd part - I've actually grown up around partial community-based applications of it, eg farming communities that share resources (thus the workers also own the means of production quite literally) and communities (especially 'deep rural') that work together to deal with a lot of issues. There's been the likes of community centres that build community gardens and deal with the needs of the community as well - volunteer-run places that exist to see the whole area improved. Most of these have done very well.
But in many cases egos get in the way - so while it can be done (maybe) it is hard, especially being rid of the wrong sorts of ego and pride. The early church managed to do it for a time, but the modern church I doubt would get even close - too many people demanding their 'rights' and 'blessings' and rejecting the idea that they should 'work' to improve things :(
When the means of production belong to the State, the dictatorship comes inevitably.
Shall we compare the "Free"[cough] USA with that statement - and have a good look at how things are turning out over there or...?
As for “the workers controlling means of production” it is a lie. The reality is that under Socialism the means of production are controlled by the State bureaucracy.
I'm yet to be convinced any large nation has actually implemented an actual socialist system. Many have claimed it, and a number perhaps have tried but corruption and ego have destroyed things, most pretending to live under it are run by corrupt evil people.
If it was ever to be properly implemented, it'd probably be quite close to anarchy as well (I mean proper anarchy of course). The idea of people working to benefit their community (which of course benefits each member by making the whole stronger) - that's been around at least a couple of thousand years. I mean the early Christian church worked like that for a start, people did what they could to support the community and make sure there were no poor or orphans amongst them. Israel did that too in her early days, although they kinda screwed that up not too long afterwards :(
I'd love to see true socialism given a decent go somewhere. Sure as hell can't carry on with capitalism much longer, the greedy people running that are sure making one hell of a mess of this world! All the garbage we pour into the oceans is making a mess of things, and the way we're wrecking the land. Yeah nah I don't think Capitalism is exactly the best thing for us to be following right now, at least not as we know it. Lets try something else and clean up after ourselves a bit eh? Your 'free market' isn't exactly going to look so shiny when you're struggling for the next breath and clean air is anything but 'free' :(
(of course, most so-called 'socialist' implementations thus far haven't exactly been bastions of good housekeeping either :( )
Had a friend who kept telling people about how great I was with computers, getting me to fix other people's stuff and so on.
On day I started to hype up some "secret knowledge" to him - there was this one sheet of paper that could teach you how to fix every computer problem in existence, but mere users weren't supposed to know the secret codes. Why, the entire repair industry could collapse over night if this got out!
He wanted in, but I kept him at bay for a while. Special knowledge, only a few people supposed to know, is what gave me my success in computing though.
Eventually I caved, and invited him out to a special lunch where he would be checked by others, and if approved told what was what. That day, over lunch, I introduced him to the some real computer knowledge, and brought him into the world of being able to fix any fault himself.
I gave him this 'cheat sheet'.
a backup over 30 days old is not a backup, it is an ancient archive - back up and back up frequently! I might use many different forms of backup, but I also use them often.
That would depend on the "rate of change" of your important data though.
I know a lot of people where a one-off backup covers their OS/software needs (set up the machine, image the disk, repeat in a couple of years) and their price lists (if provided) are basically static, as is their web page (sorry Google but no, sites don't need to be changing every bloody minute to be useful!), so there's only the months accounts to back up and that is done already by the simple fact that it gets sent off to the "accountant" automatically at the end of each week.
("accountant" in quotes because these days many firms do little more than let automated software automatically run on their automated servers, automatically getting the data from the client and automatically sending the automatically-generated reports back to the customer and the automatically generated tax returns to Inland Revenue etc - all said "accountant" usually needs to do is make sure the automatic systems are still in automatic mode).
Someone will be along soon with a tale of the racks and racks of religiously taken backups that turned out to be completely useless the first time they were needed in anger because no one had ever thought to test them
Most of my time spent doing backups has been an utter waste of time.
Thankfully.
And a few times, the utter waste was where I didn't have decent backups and had to employ recovery softtware. And dealing with the output of that.. A word processor and other such software often saves automatically every 5 minutes. Every 5 minutes there is a new version of the document you're working on while the old one is deleted. If you have a lot of space, then a large document may have many copies of it on disk. Also, you may have other things creating multiple copies of said file (eg the cache where windows keeps new/changed files before sending off to MS to make sure they're not causing your computer to crash). Sometimes finding the correct version after a crash can be a nightmare.
And that will, of course, only happen when you've had an inspired weekend and spent the entire time awake and working on $project, with auto-saves to a disk and a broken save-to-cloud feature that you've been too inspired and in too much of a flow to stop and check. Only when you finish the masterpiece of a lifetime and go to do that final save do you realise that your disk is toast..
Or you save it fine, but somehow it's corrupted by the time you get it to your backup, and by the time you find out it's corrupted you've rotated through your entire backup stock.
and the build-up of tobacco by-products on the heads of the two 360K 5.25" drives in each PC.
Urgh. Just before bloody dinner time as well, ya bastard!
I used to make a point of showing smokers what the insides of their machines looked like, before suggesting successful ways of stopping (what worked for me was Alan Car's "Only way to stop smoking permanently" book - also good evidence for the effectiveness of various forms of brainwashing and de-programming (aka the other side also brainwashing)
It did help lead a couple to a place where they stopped smoking, but they were held under the spell of the pro-smoking propaganda from the likes of ASH (yes, they're pro-smoking - if everyone stopped there goes their existence, and by promoting the myth that quitting is hard they make it so much harder for smokers to quit!)
And that 8086 would still be sufficient for most of the guys I’ve worked with over the years to run a simple editor to edit hand coded html and php and not test it before going live...
Given most of my computer time these days is spent reading, I could probably use that just as effectively as I use this. I have a 46" screen as my monitor - I can also use a 10" tablet at 1/4 the distance for the same portion of my eyespace (though I may not be able to keep as much of the screen in focus at one time)
If you have one of those lamps with the rotating shade with cats engraved on it, you'll also get rid of most people's need for faster hardware.... (Or just get a real cat - though if you piss it off you'll quickly learn just how 'cheap' a $5,000 video card can be by comparison... :) )
https://climateandcapitalism.com/2008/08/25/debunking-the-tragedy-of-the-commons/
That author quoted Marx, therefore is a vile piece of garbage who warrants not a moment's more thought, other than how to dispose of his mangled corpse....
All kidding aside, thank you very much for posting that link. I've learned a lot today, and am the better for it!
Again, thanks to you and to the original author!
If only we can channel that 'more' into intellectual pursuits or creativity rather than one upping neighbours.
Yup . I've been loving learning to do more with less. Less waste, less resources used, more enjoyable life, better health, better/warmer home etc. ]
It can be done, but I still don't know how to deal with other people's egos. A lot of us working together for the good of all can do a hell of a lot, but one egotistical person can screw up a years work in a matter of days! :( They can destroy months of work building a decent harmony in a matter of minutes as well.
Thank heaven for free speech & private firearms, still the best tools to push back against murderous lying Marxists.
Sadly with what you quote also leads to severe educational malnutrition - and your " led to the death of 10 to 100 million bloody carcasses - unless you're in a Zombie Utopia "bloody carcasses: are, by definition, dead and therefore cannot suffer death.
The numbers may not match, but the US certainly kills a lot of people. You still have state execution, have some pretty high murder rates, and then there's the number of people who die from exposure or from not being able to afford medical care. Many in the US consider NZ to be a despicable socialist or communist country as we have health care for all - and that makes us nasty. Us terrible Kiwi's don't have people freely dying in the street from lack of affordable health care.
Yup, Stalin et al did some pretty nasty stuff and were utterly evil people, but until you clean up your own back yard you really have nothing to complain about. Why are you proud of your nation (which isn't anywhere near as 'free' as you try to claim!) when all you should do is be hiding in the corner crying in shame over how your nation treats it's weakest people?
Most of you yanks utterly disgust me. Those who waffle on about imagined 'free speech' and the gun laws that lead to so many of your children dying violent deaths are absolutely beyond contempt.
Your attitudes are why you live in the most oppressed and most despised nation in the world. You have nothing of value, and the sooner your twat of a president wipes you all out the better. I'll lose some good friends, but the world itself will be a much nicer place.
If you didn't live in the US I'd suggest you get an education - but the sort of country that voted in chump is obviously far too dumb to learn.
Yep that last one will have them shacking in their boots.
IIRC Capone wasn't done for the guns, murders, drugs/alcohol or other crimes. He was done because he screwed up his income tax return or something like that.
How many people are rotting in jail on very long sentences for relatively minor computer crimes?
I know in the real world, at least for now, there'd be enough physical evidence to still catch the creep
Don't be to sure on the physical evidence. If I can walk in to the databases through the back doors, what's to say I can't change the DNA or fingerprint records to suit myself?
Like with the "deepfake video" stuff, once this door is opened I doubt it can ever be closed again, and all a defence lawyer has to do is question if the records can be trusted (of course, that also assumes a judge and/or jury with 2 functional brain cells)
You get a prize for the most egregious use of the slippery slope fallacy of the day.Whatever your opinions on euthanasia (which are undoubtedly, far, far off-topic), the (overwhelming) evidence from the coutries where it has been legalised shows that what you are railing against doesn't happen.
Yeah. No government would ever give the public what they're asking for!
I think a part of my thinking comes from reading an article in a Doctor's waiting room some time back, one of the earlier appearances of it in NZ. A woman was talking about how her 11yo son had epilepsy and would sometimes have several seizures in a week. She wanted the right to have him euthanasia.
I asked my mom about this as I didn't know what the word meant, and my dad also had seizures from time to time. I was only around 9 or 10 and while I knew the practice I didn't know the term. I remember being disgusted that a mother could be so selfish she wanted to end the life of her son, and that she would treat her kid like a food animal.
I also do see this from time to time with those I care for. Loving kids (adults often in their 30s, some in their 20s) who, not realising I'm following them out of the properly for whatever reason, talk about how much their parent is a burden and they really should just "hurry the fuck up and die" and "mum should stop being a selfish old bitch and quit hanging on to life".
This is why you find a lot of people who care for the elderly are against and dread such laws, because yes the scope does widen. And it's not like anyone in this world has ever been talked into faking pain for another's gain before. I know elderly people who signed all the paperwork to stop getting the care we provide, and in many cases I've gone in for a friendly visit a few days later and found that no-one is taking care of them, and it turns out the children pressured them to give up the care but the children themselves are not going to be there. In one case it'd been 2 or 3 days since the patient had eaten, or been changed (thankfully we have some 'elder abuse' laws coming in that may help with some of this stuff).
I also understand chronic pain, being born as one of those whose genes conspire, from an early age, to cause various deformities or faults in the body that lead to severe pain. I've seen many brands of strong painkillers come and go in my time. Very fortunate to live in a place like NZ where preschoolers can be given decent pain medication (yes, no hope of my condition improving - but my parents taught me there is so much more to life).
the real estate industry also has a vested industry in not scaring off potentials mugs customers from sea-front properties in an area that is expected to see higher than average rises in sea level.
You mean mugs like Al Gore?
(Although if he is buying up beach-front property and runs mansions with exceptionally large "carbon footprints" - does he not believe what he sells??....)
Have an upvote for the 2nd paragram though :)
(El Reg - can I get a scratched-to-buggery record icon? :) )
Frankly, a long-term analysis would probably show humans aren't cut out for large-scale government, period.
When one looks at how well we do at managing our lives... Well...
(You an I agreeing on something though.. Perhaps there is hope for humanity after all? Or is this simply one of those events that destroys universes?)
The three preferred methods of suicide in the Far East (where guns aren't available) are vehicle encounters, self-defenestration, and poison/overdose. Of those, the first is usually pretty certain, especially if the vehicle in question is a train. For the second, a flat or head-first landing from at least 10 stories tends to assure results. The third is usually the choice of the infirm and elderly. Remember, they have much worse rates so they must know how to make it stick (South Korea is second worst in the world, INCLUDING the Third World).
NZ is pretty much at the worst for youth suicide (according to our media/officials, but we're 53rd overall according to wikipedia), and I've spent my life in the at-risk populations (I mean being poor, white, male and gay - all our traditional suicide values).
Vehicle encounters esp trains - From what I know it's rare in NZ but perhaps not unheard of, and perhaps a few 'accidents' weren't. However, in most countries trains run to a schedule and not exactly every minute although a busy line may only get a minute or two between trains. That does give a waiting time, and a waiting time is sometimes all it takes to change the mind.
Self-defenestration - I'll consider jumping off a cliff to be pretty damned close to the same thing, after all it requires the same desire to overcome any fear of heights. It's also what I have personal experience with. Again, there is getting to the site (not so hard if you work in a 20 story building, bit harder if you live in an area with only 1-2 story buildings and no significant cliff for some distance) which gives time to think it over. In my case the cliff was a 10 minute drive and a 1 minute walk. The railway station and bridges over the tracks were closer, but I'd have had to wait for the trains so maybe the same amount of time. Our argument was later in the evening though, so perhaps I'd have had closer to an hour's wait. If I had've thought of jumping in front of a train then and the schedule was right, well maybe we wouldn't be talking now.
Anyway.. I drove in a state mixed both between anger and upset. Something happened along the way to delay me which I won't go into here, but I still arrived at the cliff edge in a state where I was determined that I would die that night. I did take some time to decide if the cliff was high enough or not (probably wouldn't have been), or if I'd have enough damage done that I'd be taken by the next tide (I nearly drowned in a primary school pool accident - the idea absolutely terrifies me!), and this afforded me some thinking time.
If I'd had a gun available, I would've gone to my room and used it. I have no doubt of that. He would've heard me tell him to fuck off out of my life, heard the door slam, then heard the bang. It also would've been done to hurt him (I can say that with some certainty given where I drove to).
I've known a couple of people who've killed themselves and known others who have tried, some by hanging some by pills. Those who have failed have generally realised it was a bad idea - a moments upset would lead to the end of their life when issues can be overcome, or survived (I get chronic pain - but I'll pay that price that as being alive gives me time to enjoy with people I love - and yes the only way to end the pain completely is to end my life, I have considered that on many sleepless nights!).
Guns are instant. The damage a bullet does if used right seldom leaves any room for ambiguity. Pills - minutes or hours to save a life. Hanging? Unless they break their neck, you've got a few minutes, and it takes a bit to get the rope, set it up and so on. Jumping? Instant death when they hit the ground perhaps, but there is the whole getting into position which takes time. Cutting/stabbing? Painful, takes some real desperation. Drowning? Lets not go there thanks!
I can get upset, take some pills, maybe go to sleep in a few minutes or maybe longer, maybe die maybe not. I can walk/climb high enough to jump - but then I may not be upset any more. I can plan to jump in front of a train, but 2 minutes is enough to change a mind. I might think of someone out of the blue and realise there's other options. Cars are less likely to kill but more readily available, but I still have to get out to a road and psych myself up for it.
A gun I can grab in anger and a second after touching it be dead, no time even to stop the semi automatic muscle movements I might've kicked off while my brain is raging and not thinking.
Some stats I noted in the search results I glanced over before posting this (but didn't grab the link to - find it on DDG looking for "suicide stats") - in the USA suicide is now the leading cause of death (or one of them - but then that also depends on how tightly you break down cause of death stats) and over 50% of those use guns.
I know more than I want to about suicide. My first real desire to try it was before my 9th birthday. I've lost friends to it, helped families of people I love clean up afterwards, and talked people out of it, some more than once.
Yup - Kiwi born and bred.
Not far from Wellington, in fact I was twice past the Trades Hall just this last week - never even knew where it was till a newspaper article on it a few days back (stuff.co.nz if you wanna look more into it - I think they had pictures of a copy of the bomb on there as well - I block their BS JS so only going by captions)
We're only at the level of what is (or at least used to be) taught in the school science and home-economics classes (eg "don't mix bleach and other cleaners"), accentuated by a little experience (SHIT! Mixing up those PSU cables[1] made that little cap give off one hell of a shower of sparks!) and a little too much thinking :)
[1] I had 2 computers, one with 2x IIRC 4 pin PSU cables (back in the pre-ATX days when you had 2 cables that were identical in plug shape) and one 5pin+3pin cable. One computer had it's PSU disconnected for some reason, and so I reasoned that the other one probably matched it - all the black or all the red wires in the middle. One of the two machines had a NEC board in it. Suffice to say I was wrong, and my first ever PSU connection on a PC resulted in my getting an education about just how energetically a tiny little blue ceramic capacitor (roughly the size of those bright plastic pin heads) could explode. Imagine if I'd just given the board a quick clean with IPA and it was still wet in that area... (ok maybe not enough to cause a fire, but the flare would've been at least equivalent of 4 or 5 Bryant & May match heads going off at once)
Dude, you're the one that suggested the OS wasn't doing a good job
Those with very basic English comprehension skills would realise that you equated throwing out perfectly working tools that had "family heirloom" status with most people using a 32 bit OS where the world has generally moved on.
But thanks for the ad hominum. And for tarring 330,000,000ish people with the same brush. I think that explains your actual problem.
You who has often resorted to ad hominem (I assume that's the word you meant?) attacks on others, especially when they're sick of your bull and call you on it.. Getting a bit hypocritical there ain't ya?
But hey, if the shoe fits 'n all.. The rest of the world wouldn't hate your nation so much if you actually acted like decent people instead of scared little bullies all the time y'know. You do have it in you to be decent people, but you resort to being selfish thugs too readily.
Have you ever heard the term "projection"?
Any one who's ever read your posts is probably well familiar with it.... :)
Just rephrasing your point:
Yup, been there a few times.
The most fun I've had is with some door-door types who wouldn't take 'no' for an answer.
"You need this new vacuum cleaner!"
"How much?"
"Both your first born son and daugher"
"Sorry, no kids"
"But you need this vacuum! And for only the price of your kids, you can't afford to miss it!"
"I have no kids. Go away"
"But this is our best model! Surely you have some spare kids somewhere. Have you checked behind the couch?"
"Quite certain I have no kids anywhere. I don't want or need your vacuum even if I could pay for it".
"But you'll never be offered it at this price again! YOU HAVE TO BUY IT NOW!"
"I cannot afford it and I don't want it. Why is that so hard for you?"
Ok, slightly paraphrased but you get the gist. I also often ring the "as seen on TV" shops just to check the price on something. They'll say "We have to read the script first", I'll say "I'm already interested in the product so you don't need the script. How much is this thing". If they start reading the script I hang up and ring back, try a different person. Happens less because so far I've rung up about an item I'd happily pay $50 for, and buy it at $70 - but you might as well add another 0 to that figure before doubling it and then trippling it - well above what it'd cost me to get an engineering firm to make me a couple of the items, or import one from somewhere else.
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