Posts by Don Dumb 462 publicly visible posts • joined 20 May 2013
Why should Royal Mail have been deprived of one of its assets (i.e. the PAF)
Again, Wrong. It wasn't the Royal Mail's asset, it was The Crown's, they are different.
The government can sell off any body or agency it wants, but that doesn't necessarily mean that all of the Crown owned assets *associated* with that body/agency have to be sold with them. They could have still managed the PAF while not owning it.
Arguably, RM owns that data, the clue is in the name: Postcode Address File. Who do you go to to get a new postcode? Not some organisation in government. You go to Royal Mail.
Wrong. Public information, along with all public IP, may be managed by government departments or private institutions but is owned by The Crown not the particular department. This is a very clear difference.
Royal Mail may have updated and used the data but the data itself had value as IP and was Crown owned. Just because the postcode file is fundamental to their business doesn't mean it should be removed from public ownership and given to them.
And I don't buy the idea that RM isn't responsible for the fact that postcodes are crucial to the business of other public and private organisations. The government as a whole are responsible for this development through years of development (and probably promotion) of use of postcodes. Royal Mail was a part of, and later regulated by, the government and therefore shares that responsibility.
If it was a phone, then surely the child could've also rang a premium rate number and racked up a bill for thousands without any control either
I'm not sure that's still true for a lot of phone contracts:-
Pay As You Go will obviously stop working after the pre-funded value has run out.
Pay monthly by direct debit - The last couple of contracts I've had, worked on a credit limit. The included minutes and texts were paid, however anything outside the allowance (premium numbers, etc), were added as charges to the account to be paid at the next direct debit bill. While they don't advertise the credit limit well (or at all), occassionally I would hit the limit in the month and have to make a payment outside of the usual monthly direct debit to be able to make calls that weren't included. The limit was between £30-£100 depending on the contract. Finding out that your car insurer has a premium (from mobiles) line for making claims and you've run out of credit to call premium lines was a particular annoyance.
I doubt many phone contracts these days just let you rack up a huge bill, without hitting a predefined limit. It isn't really in their interests to generate a bill the customer can't pay.
I'm guessing there's some corporate training packages still using Shockwave plugins. From what I've seen the online training materials are usually never updated updated monstrosities. Now usually Flash or Silverlight based but I seem to remember ours were Shockwave.
What I don't get is why they can't be just HTML based, all they usually do is click through a linear set of information pages and videos and then have a quiz at the end. Rarely do they seem complicated enough to justify putting them into flash.
the market should have decided by 2018, but I think it'll be closer to 2015," John Perzow, VP of market development for the WPC, told The Register.
Man selling product says "don't buy any competing products, they're going to lose, buy mine, we've already won" shocker!. This so harks back to Goerge W Bush on the Aircraft Carrier.
Dear El Reg - It would be helpful if a more independant source could give an opinion, or a reply from the opposition sought. Otherwise this just seems like a lifted WPC press release masquerading as a news article.
Doesn't the IP generally reside with the producer _unless_ the contract explicitly states that it is to be transferred to the client?
UK Government policy is to generally allow the IPR to remain with Industry (the producer) as industry are better placed to exploit the IP and therefore the contract is a more worthwhile investment for the taxpayer.
However, if there is a specific reason to do so, contracts can state that the IPR produced under the contract is owned by the taxpayer. Specifically anything produced under the foreground of such the contract is Crown IPR.
@omnicent - Is text messaging so expensive in the rest of the world?
£12 per month gets you unlimited texts in the UK - factor in international text conversations.
My ex used to WhatsApp her friends in the US, Norway and other places, from the UK, often in 2, 3 and 4-way chats. I wouldn't want to try working out how much that would cost in international text messages.
How far can they push this alleged endless fondness for their tedious franchises that is probably more reliant on people who grew up with them in the 80s and are now *parents* with happy memories than it is on today's kids? (***)
Seriously, Zelda is *old* now:-
But that's just the problem, bring out a good HD console with Mario Kart and I'm interested. Bring out a (properly) new Zelda with good reviews and I'm interested. Hell, remake Ocarina of Time in HD (like they did with Windwaker), I'd buy the console today.
But Nintendo neither have good games out for the Wii U to hook people like me in, nor do they have anything tangible to get people who were already happy with their Wiis and see no reason to upgrade.
@irongut - And, who the hell are Link and Samus Aran? I've been plying computer games since Pong and I've never heard of them.
Oh dear god. You mean you've been playing games for many decades and yet you've never heard of Zelda?
Stop whatever you're doing. Go out. Get yourself a Wii or a Gamecube or even a Wii U. Get a copy of Ocarina of Time and enjoy the best experience a game can give. It might be low def, but it's still perfect.
@AC - There have been several cancer cases all linked to proximity of a mobile phone for long periods e.g. A women who kept a mobile phone in her breast cleavage and had cancer located by the phone antenna RF lobes.
Oh For Fuck's Sake - Yes, because no woman ever had breast cancer in the breast cleavage before the mobile phone came along. The incident rate for breast cancer in the UK is 1 in 8 during a female's lifetime. I'm suprised there's only been one case of absolutely coincidental cancer. Your anecdote is almost evidence that modible phones reduce cancer risk as you have only one example.
Your comment is proof that no matter how much something is studied, science is still no match for anecdotal evidence. Coincident is expected when dealing with things as prevalent as mobile phones and cancer. That's why you have to do studies with large sample sizes.
My grandfather took an anecdote every day for 60 years and he lived till his late 80s.
@Terry 6 - ...... the ones who want to believe that Wifi/mobile phones/MMR/Fluoride etc. are somehow unnatural and dangerous. And anything "natural" is good.
Depressing isn't it? And the most annoying thing is their definition of 'natural', not the same as a physicist's definition I'm sure.
Friend of mine recently posted a story on Facebook about people having problems with vaccinations, it had senior medical leaders (many immunology Profs), being quoted as saying "vaccine x has y problems". They were clearly having concerns with particular aspects of specific vaccinations or aspects of a particular country's vaccination policy. None were saying "vaccination is wrong".
Nonetheless my friend (who naturally administers homeopathic medicine) considered this justification to give the comment "vaccination - seems to be you either believe in it or don't". Of course, the truth was that he doesn't believe in it and was hoping to turn it into a 'religious' debate rather than that admit that there isn't any doubt about vaccination working.
As Prof Brian Cox says, the danger of apparently 'harmless' beliefs like astrology or homeopathy are that they drive people to doubt science and to spurn proper medical advice.
I thought it couldn't just be me. I always put it down to iOS7 being more power hungry and me running a 4S (smaller memory size). Either way it's pretty awful OS engineering as something like the fixed state of a webpage should be easily stored without having to refresh every time I return to the page. Doesn't iOS shift background apps to something akin to moving background apps to swapfile.
This is definitely worth some digging by El Reg. iOS7 has had so many problems.
Shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, motherfucker and tits are all valid here. This is an adult forum. Get used to the idea ... or maybe you should fuck-off back to nanny-ville ...
Well, you clearly *are* an adult.
I'm quite happy with swearing and I will sometimes in posts. But I don't always feel the need to and being an adult I know when its appropriate and when it isn't. I used the term 'BS' rather than 'Bullshit' as I'm guessing The Reg would probably use the former if they actually did introduce an icon. Notice they don't have a "What The Fuck?" icon.
Only a 5 year old thinks tits and piss are swearwords.
A couple of requests:-
I've made the point in a recent comment to an article, but as this is the proper place to make suggestions:-
I think a 'BS' (we all know what that means) icon would be helpful. Many of the less useful comments are simply made up opinion stated as fact. It would be fair to highlight such perceived nonsence with a Bu**Sh*t (if that helps) icon. Nothing else seems to be appropriate.
I also agree that it is time to retire the Paris icon. as - a) it is only surving to boost such celebrity and b) it does seem to be an unfair targetting of someone none of us have likely ever met.
My other suggestion would be to have an identifier to the parent comment within a reply comment, perhaps something like "In reply to <username> <subject title> posted <date-time>" in the comment header. That way we could work out what the reply is responding to when there is nothing to work that out from. Particularly when there are so many levels of comment that one reply doesn't directly follow the original comment.
@Steven Roper - "To which end, wouldn't they be better off building it somewhere flat (like the Australian outback for example)"
Not only would those affects be minimised but if they putting it somewhere flat and uninhabited (like Australia) they wouldn't have to dig at all would they? Just lay the ring on the ground - that would be an awful lot cheaper.
If they need some earthly protection above the tube then they could cover it with spoil from a local mining operation (which is vast in Oz I beleive). Either way it would be a hell of a lot cheaper and simpler to lay a ring on the ground and cover it than drilling down 100m under France and Switzerland.
Doesn't the EU already have observatories and space vehicle launching sites outside of the EU? If so, then why couldn't they also build their collider outside.
@Winkypop People READ the reviews on YouTube?
That's like sorting through a garbage can.
I guess some people do that too.
Well, Adam Buxton has managed to build a large part of his BUG music video comedy show around reading out some of the Youtube comments, its incredibly funny. I've seen it several times live and the TV show is now on Youtube itself, certainly worth a view - http://www.bugvideos.co.uk/home/adam-buxton-s-bug-tv-series-now-on-youtube-.go
@localzuk - government departments don't have to pay attention to this edict. Only the department of the Minister in question does.
Errr, nope. This is the Cabinet Office, the department effectively in charge of how all government departments are run. That's why the government standards hub is part of the Cabinent Office. At the moment, it is only a 'recommendation' and doesn't *have* to be followed. However, if the Cabinent Office *mandate* something, all government departments do have to adopt such a mandate.
It's not just the beancounters though - "I'm sorry Mrs Smith, you can't have your pacemaker because we are paying for an upgrade to the computer system"
Imagine what that would do when Mrs Smith goes to the press - the trusts have difficult desicions to make, especially when their budgets are getting cut.
@Phil O'Sohpical - "And you think that emaiing company information to a private gmail account is better?!."
No I don't, and I entirely agree with your point. The places I know take information very seriously. We don't allow use of email (or messaging of any kind) through any non-company service or netowrk, unless of course it is specifically intended to another organisation.
I was just replying the the fairly loose idea that the problem could be solved by simply using a USB stick. I agree, until people see IT failures as important as fraud (it is when it's personal data) then people (and mgnt) won[t take this seriously.
Your housemate (and presumably yourself) haven't heard of usb pen drives then?
I have, they are a gigantic security hole and a useful way to store information that can be easily lost and isn't backed up.
Thus there are very strict limits and rules on how they are used in some places I know. IT rules aren't just there to make IT's life easier but also to protect the business.
@DijitulSupport- What the hell are you on about?
"I get the whole "i've made a backup of my music collection" I really do"
No you don't because that isn't what I'm doing, it is nothing to do with backup, where did you even get that idea? I have my music originally stored on my computer and also wish it to be listened to where I am, hence on my phone. Why would you even think I'm talking about backup when I said nothing of the sort.
Why on earth would you see "being able to carry over XXGb of music" ever be the primary concern when buying a smartphone?
Firstly I didn't say it was a primary concern but why wouldn't storage be a factor with a *smart*phone (aka computer phone). If you were just making calls with your phone, you wouldn't need a smartphone at all. I happen to want the same music I own on my phone as it doubles as my iPod.
@cambsukguy - I don't think you bothered to fully read my comment.
I know I can't hear the difference between lossless (in this case Apple Lossless) and a decent lossy bitrate, especially when played back through a phone. The lossless music on my computer is reencoded to a lossy bitrate (by iTunes) when synced to my phone. I'd just rather have a bit more storage and not even bother needing to convert, just have everything in lossless and keep it simple.
Not quite. Some Android devices do have a micro SD slot, you know.
I know some Androids come with SD slots, but I did qualify my point by saying those 'I might consider', the Nexus line in particular don't. I would mainly consider jumping from an iPhone to a Nexus phone but they have very limited storage.
The fact that SD cards (and almost every other storage medium) store so much is why I'm perplexed that phones have stopped increasing in capacity.
Funny when you mention that disk space isn't a premium while complaining that you are suffering from 64Gb.
Yes, I did think that when writing but hoped people would understand I meant that hard disc space (computers and stuff) doesn't have a storage premium but storage on the phone is very limited. It is also why I don't fully understand why phones have not increased in capacity much over the last few years, I would have thought it would be a simple headline improvement for manufacturers in competition.
Usually I don't but basically every few weeks (after iOS7 of course) the sync messes up losing the music on the phone and I have to then resync the music onto the phone. This means a reenode (which iTunes does automatically) as the files are passed from computer to phone and this takes ages. I have thought of trying to have different collections but I ultimately just want simplicity. Music stored in one form and synced to the phone. My gripe is that the max storage in iPhones has plateaued since the 4S, an increase in storage would make life just a little bit simpler.
Will it have more than 64Gb of storage?
I'm using a (now) suffering 64Gb. I also use my phone as my ipod and if they released a phone one with at least 80Gb then I wouldn't have to downgrade all of my music just to get it onto the phone*. Not usually a problem but syncing has become really flaky lately, I have to resync the whole phone generally once a month. It takes all night as the music files get re-encoded before being sent to the phone.
I know this is more a problem with iTunes 11, iOS7 and crapy syncing with the iPhone but I'd still rather just have a phone big enough to store everything. I'm happy with sticking to iPhones, although I see little need to upgrade at the moment. In any case Android seem to be keeping the rivals I might consider (Nexus) with limited storage as they'd rather have people use the cloud for everything but in the real world we move around where bandwidth and effective bandwidth rarely enable such activities.
And while we are at it get rid of that connector - either 30pin (the one everyone has a dock for) or the proper standard micro-USB.
* - The reason is that I keep all my music (ripped from CDs) in lossless, not because I think I can hear the difference between that and 192Kbps but because I don't see any reason to rip CDs into lossy formats. Disc space isn't a premium so why choose a lower quality format for the source? I'd rather have the equipment limit the sound quality rather than the data itself and I don't have to worry about reencoding, with lossless I have a music collection that I can keep forever without re-ripping and re-encoding fine if needs be.
@Lars - Are people forced to call you by your name?
I assume you are in the US and the US isn't any different.
Remember, Lords and Ladys are the members of the upper house of the legislature. Don't Congressmen and Congresswomen get the title Congressman or Congresswoman? and Senators get the title 'Senator', Governors get the title 'Governor' and so on. The UK actually has less of this as our Members of Parlimament don't have titles other than Mr, Mrs & Dr. ALthough Cabinent members do get addressed as 'The Right Honorable'.
The likes to think it has no class system but it seems like the US is in big denial.
@c:\boot.ini - "Anything that accepts the "sir" title is scum, period."
Whoa, that's a pretty sweeping statement -
Winston Churchill, David Attenborough, Edmund Hilary, Paul McCartney, Tim Berners-Lee, Terry Pratchett, Ernest Rutherford, Steven Hawking, Isacc Newton, Tanni Grey-Thompson, Ernest Shakleton - I could go on for ages of Knights and Dames that are very deserving. You say they are all "scum"?
Accepting a Knighthood doesn't mean you're posh. I know many people who are posh do get them but unlike a peerage (Lord, Lady, Baron, etc) the Knighthood is given by the British state for things done or acheived, they aren't a birthright.
Lots of countries have state honours, they might not have the same names as the UK, nor does anyone else seem to give out titles but that doesn't change that it is the state's way of showing gratitute for something that has perceivied to be of benefit to the nation.
For christ-sakes Nelson Mandela had an honourary Knighthood, he was hardly posh was he?
If accepting Knighthoods makes you scum them so would accepting the Nobel prize?
Not a fair analogy -
Gates and Ballmer both *voluntarily* moved from the CEO position . Gates after he had built Microsoft to the biggest computing company in the world, Ballmer has been less successful but still the company hasn't exactly collapsed. Gates in particular has a right to influence the appointment of CEO.
Basile on the other hand was *terminated*, by the board, from Violin after it lost 60% of its value. He is hardly going to have the best interests of the company in mind when it has just fired him.
I have to say I'm not sure how I feel about this. My daily train commute of 30-50min, goes out of coverage for about half the journey and I have never come across Wifi on any train I've used. Lack of coverage when I'm sitting still and could listen to internet radio or watch the cricket or something is certainly annoying and it would be great to get good coverage.
However, on the downside - almost everything modern rolled out on the National network is awful, especially in the FGW areas as I am (TheCloud station wifi is almost pointless). Crap technology investment has been seen by the rail companies as a way to show 'improvements' to the network to mask the lack of any new rolling stock and a poor train service.
So I guess if there is money to invest, some more trains would be preferable. That and I'm happy that people don't try and make phonecalls that often.
To be fair I didn't say that everyone didn't deserve it as I don't know who people like Kitty Kelly are and therefore whether they do somehow deserve a good hack. As a rule, there isn't any justification, public people have a right to a private life as well, but Clarkson's "posting bank details isn't important" was one exception.
Many of these people hacked are simply well known, not politicians or even politically active. I can see no defence for their hacking. Being in the public eye doesn't mean you have no privacy. Hypcritically, Guccifer seems to value his (or her) privacy.
If the Smoking Gun has any credibility they will destroy the documents, but I somehow doubt they will.
else every grumpy Yorkshireman is going to be going on about how they power the world...
Is that not already ths case? As they already seem to think they are the only ones with "bloody common sense".
I notice a particular ISP isn't advertising itself on the basis that it is from Yorkshire anymore - why they didn't realise that everyone else has a less positive opinion of the Yorkshire stereotype than those in Yorkshire have of the Yorkshire stereotype is beyond me, but then I'm from the south and don't have that mythical common sense.
@Cliff - my first thoughts exactly. Now we have something useful to do with Rhubarb rather than try and put it in food. It tastes horrible and I'm naturally intolerant to anything that Geoffrey Boycott goes on about. Why people try and ruin a good dessert with something like Rhubarb is beyond me.
"Otherwise you risk ending up with a 148, which is clearly cheating."
I hate to do this, but the maximum score in Snooker can be higher than the 147 maximum break.
From wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximum_break#Breaks_exceeding_147 - "A break higher than 147 can be achieved when an opponent fouls and leaves the incoming player snookered on all 15 reds. The player can nominate one of the other colours as a red, known as a "free ball", which carries the same value as a red for just that shot. By potting the free ball followed by a colour, then the reds with colours and the colours up to the pink or black, the player can compile a break of more than 147."
I now need to wash the revolting pedantry off, as I clearly have too much.
"In that case, I suggest a window would be a cheaper option."
Depends on the wall perhaps, load bearing walls in large buildings might be a little pricely. I can genuinely see this being attractive to those with internal walls (block of flats maybe). Have a 4K webcam stream from somewhere nice, project onto the wall. Although in a few price generations maybe. It's a bit silly but still looks cool.
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