Posts by Chet Mannly 683 publicly visible posts • joined 27 Jan 2012
Every web page has tags attached to it (or can have). Eg here at El Reg their website overall would be it-focussed, but if they have a review of a mobile phone they can add tags that advertisers will use to serve up more specific ads related to phones. Takes 2 seconds to do.
If the website doesn't add the tags they get less relevant ads, their ad revenue will suffer and the bosses will tell everyone to add the tags.
Easy peasy, no invasive tracking required.
The OS upgrades aren't really free. MS gets their Windows tax when people buy a new PC. It basically costs nothing to provide that software to others as well. So sure you may get an 'upgrade' (assuming that's the adjective you use to refer to Win 11 lol) gratis, it costs MS nothing at the same time. They'll get their pound of flesh from you next time you buy a new PC.
Your point about the core apps is spot on - I have 6 key apps I use constantly and they are pinned to the task bar. The start menu gets opened maybe 1-2 times a week for out of the ordinary tasks.
+1 for LibreOffice.
Recently got a new PC and after uninstalling from the old laptop MS refused to activate the Office licence on the new one, kept trying to shove a subscription down my throat.
Installed LibreOffice and haven't looked back. It's a little less polished, but can do everything I could in Office, and haven't had compatibility issues with any docs.
That was the view a while back. Actually current estimates have it peaking below the size of the US. Mainly due to falling population. It is predicted to peak lower, and age faster, than before. Plus of course the real/estate construction industry declining faster than anticipated.
Still a very big economy obviously.
"Democrats and Republicans will both be spending many millions to get their important messages in front of social media eyeballs. "
And that sounds to me like the real reason. In the past the way for pollies to reach social media was to get newspaper/TV coverage that then went to social media.
Now the only way to reach them is for pollies/parties to pay Zuck for advertising. So instead of paying newspapers for politicians to reach social media users, the politicians pay him.
?For most people it would make more financial sense to take taxis when public transport doesn't suffice. But that would mean sharing with other people! Communism!?
People in the outer suburbs or rural areas would be staring down the barrel of a $100 taxi ride every time 'public transport doesn't suffice'
I assume you live in the inner city. Both because of the fact you seem unaware of the costs of taxis long distance, and because of the condescending way you sneer 'communism' at people whose circumstances you don't understand...
'I often have to tturn off some of those clever features so the car is driveable.'
Be thankful you still have that option. I had a golf as a hire car the other day and it was impossible to turn off any of the incessant beeping/warnings. Then it locked up the brakes and wouldn't let me move the car because a few strands of long grass blew across the front and rear of the car and triggered the radar...
"People who like having sporty cars seem like they're in for a rough adjustment period."
Well, people who like driving will be in for a rough adjustment period if autonomous cars are all that is available. Even non-autonomous cars will have levels of automation that probably prevent fun driving.
Personally I think sports cars like that will survive as an enthusiast niche, much like horseriding now. There is no logical reason to ride a horse nowadays, but many people spend their weekends doing it. People will still drive (likely classic) cars for fun on country roads, but they will be enthusiasts.
"because advertisers know that their ads is reaching only part of the population so they are less valuable"
...and that they are reaching the less financially valuable users - ads don't reach those those that presumably have more disposable income to spend on the higher-priced subscription.
Barcelona FC already have this - they sell virtual tickets and you can choose where you want to 'sit', including the coach's box, in the goals etc and swap around as you like.
Never tried it and don't know what gear you need, but it sounds like a useful use of the tech. Think concerts would be another good one...
Get ADB, or search for android debloat apps (xedevelopers are a good source of info abd apps). I have everything google related stripped out of mine.
They run on your PC and allow you to uninstall absolutely anything on your phone. Most have a default set of stuff you can safely.uninstall, but you can use them to uninstall anything - so be careful!
Yep, but the problem is that the super hot geothermal cools rapidly when used, so it would crust over quickly, which means you then have to drill deeper or constantly find new sources.
Works in Iceland as it is basically a crust on top of an active volcano, and their low population means they don't need many plants to power everyone.
I assume that is just the test system, and deliberately calibrated that way to avoid the tin foil hatters. I mean those same solar panels deployed on the earth would generate 4x the amount of power if that's the case.
For this to be a viable power generation and delivery method useful to society it will have to be many, many, multiples of solar power, probably orders of magnitude higher to make any difference.
Exactly my first reaction - what happens when one of these things inevitably gets out of alignment and starts microwaving citizens. Because if you wanna get meaningful amounts of energy out of this it will need to be powerful.
And not only weaponisation by governments etc - what about hacking?
Think you need to read the actual report. It says 30-40 minutes to warm up the battery pack. The issue appears to be if you don't have 30-40 minutes of charge left then you've got a problem.
Complicating factor is that when warm a battery will show a decent amount of range, but when exposed to cold like this the range can drop dramatically. So you may park the thing with it saying it has sufficient range, but next frigid morning that range may be bugger all.
The fact that batteries don't cope with these types of temperatures is nothing new at all, and has precisely zero to do with your level of belief.
We are talking about extreme temperatures here, for most people this will not be a problem - if you do live in this type of environment you need to take additional measures. Just because an article doesn't say everything is rainbows and puppies with EVs doesn't mean it's big oil mate - put the tinfoil away...
"If EV's start to have 400mi range as standard"
My current car has a range of well over 800km, and it's not an ecomobile.
Cars are about freedom. When I'm on holiday I just wanna get out there and drive and see what takes my fancy out in the countryside where there is often no electricial grid, let alone superchargers.
Not everyone is like you and wants to spend their time on holidays carefully planning out every km and being tethered to a certain route because the car dies if they don't follow it. If that's your bag then fine, but please don't inflict it on the rest of us...
"Governments WILL start taxing them when they have finished stamping out ICE vehicle production."
Already being proposed in Australia - they propose to (are? still have an ICE myself) charging per km driven, calculated annually. If you report false (ie low) kms you get smashed when you sell the car as the roadworthy cert and changeover papers record the odometer.
"This statement, although parroted extensively, is false."
No it isn't. Fast charging an EV requires massive network capacity. In layman's terms the network 'pipe' has to be massive to supply a charger fast enough to charge a car rapidly and big pipes are very very expensive. There is no way any network in the world right now could handle all that load. They can of course be built to handle it, but it will be enourmously expensive - the fee you are paying now at fast charging points will have to massively higher to cover the costs of beefing up the grid to that point.
"Evs are charged at night. There is plenty of electrical bandwidth for trickle charging."
Firstly I see EVs being charged during the day all the time. Secondly you do realise peak electricity usage, when spare network capacity is almost non-existent, is at night when people get home from work right?
And the article talks exclusively about fast charging, not trickle charging...
I have to disagree that they have 'cleaned things up' or 'standardise' they hove done the exact opposite.
I use a spanish keyboard with english as the system language. In Win 11 half the windows apps are in spanish, including notepad, despite the fact the system language is english. Some entries in system settings are in spanish while others are in english. The menus are all over the place - the context menu in windows explorer literally has a mix of spanish and english menu items in it!
Zero such problems in any version of windows prior to Win 11 - Win 11 is an absolute dog's breakfast, it is anything but standardised.
"You could say the same of nerve gas, or domestic abuse"
Complete false equivalence - there are no positive uses for nerve gas or domestic abuse, eliminating them would make the world a better place.
Not so with technology. While people like to focus on the negatives (as that's what gets eyeballs) there are all manner of positive things enabled by social networks.
"The original rights holders might be more upset, and inclined to sue, if the AI operator was giving content away for free rather then charging for it."
I'd have thought that someone else making money off what they consider to be copyright infringement would anger them more not less.
Sets up an argument that they should get a cut of whatever you built using their IP. Could end up like Spotify where the service throw a few crumbs the way of the creators while making out like bandits themselves.
The name of the law is the GDPR. "there may not be a lawful basis' means the Italian Authorities are 99% certain that Open AI is breaking the law but haven't provded it in court.
That language is necessary for the presumption of innocence, not some ambit claim against general freedoms mate.
Same here. I woke in the morning to a flurry of skype message notifications from clippy v2.0. What worries me is you can block the messages, but can't stop the thing.
Overall it seems to be utterly useless. One of it's suggested things it could help me with is to 'find a vegan restaraunt in Cambridge'
Firstly I don't live in the UK.
Secondly all my friends know that if I am seen in a vegan restaraunt I am being held hostage...
I think there have been problems all along and people were too enamoured with Elon to complain. Like how Steve Jobs got away with saying there was nothing wrong with the iPhone it was that users were holding it wrong.
But now Elon is p*ssing off all the left-wingers on Twitter people aren't so forgiving...
"Fed print isn’t inflationary per se, it’s an expression of global desire for a share in the centre of the financial universe. "
As a professional economist I can confidently say that is the biggest load of utter horse manure I have read in years.
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