Re: Actually old boy,
Treason doth NEVER prosper - what's the reason?
If it doth prosper, none dare call it treason....
Sir John Harrington. 1561-1612
Posts by Dodgy Geezer
1773 publicly visible posts • joined 27 Jul 2007
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MPAA spots a Google Glass guy in cinema, calls HOMELAND SECURITY
German frau reports for liver transplant clutching bottle of vodka
Nearly HALF of South Korea hacked in insider data theft
Monday 20th January 2014 16:38 GMT 
There were 20 million records stolen.
There are 50 million people living there.
I would guess that means that practically each household has at least one hit. I don't know how many kids there are there, but 20 million must be practically ALL economically active adults.
Opportunity there for a tender for complete card replacements for a whole country...
NSA: It's TRUE, we grab 200 MILLION of your text messages A DAY globally
Friday 17th January 2014 19:20 GMT
Re: Even if it were effective...
..."e.g. 'right to bear arms'"...
I really enjoyed the Jasper Fforde series of 'Nursery Crime Division' police stories.
At one point a politician thinks it's unfair that bears should be hunted without any means to defend themselves, and puts through a 'Right to Arm Bears' act...
Boffins: Antarctic glacier in irreversible decline, will raise sea levels by 1cm
DOOMSDAY still just MINUTES AWAY: As it has been since 1947
Wednesday 15th January 2014 20:09 GMT
Re: Only 5 minutes before the hour?
...What I don't understand is what has happened since the break up of the USSR to warrant such a change from 1991...
What has happened is that a lot of people who were employed in the 'scare' industries of the world have found themselves out of a job, and are frantically inventing new scares to get back into employment...
Army spaffed millions up the wall on flawed Capita online recruiting system - report
Tuesday 14th January 2014 23:29 GMT
I remember...
...when the Government had it's own in-house project programming and consulting team. Which had world-class experts on it, and didn't cost them a penny more than standard civil service wages.
It was called CCTA - The Central Computer and Telecommunications Agency. In between supporting government computing projects, it wrote things like ITIL and PRINCE.
It was closed down in the 1990s after the Computer Industry lobbied government to get rid of it. One of the arguments they used was that the Government were unfairly competing with their industry by using government cheap experts.
Chinese Moon rover, lander duo wake up after two-week snooze
Tuesday 14th January 2014 17:19 GMT
Re: I'm surprised that in 2014...
...Perhaps when Britain can put a camera in orbit...
If you're talking about just having a British-built satellite up, that would be 1962, borrowing an American rocket. If you're talking about a complete system, British rocket and satellite, that would be 1971, when a British Black Arrow rocket launched the British Prospero satellite.
It's still up there - no camera, but it does have a tape-recorder...
Staffs Police face data protection probe over 'drink drivers named' Twitter campaign
Monday 13th January 2014 16:25 GMT
Good Lord!
...At the time, the constabulary's Chief Inspector Paul Trevor said the force would use Twitter to name and shame "those who have been caught drink-driving" on a daily basis...
By definition, this means that any person arrested can not receive a fair trial.
Don't the police understand anything about the law? I know that they are above it and they can always get off a charge of murder, but you would think that SOMEONE associated with them would know some legal principles...
Virgin Galactic's supersonic space ship in 71,000-ft record smash
Saturday 11th January 2014 09:35 GMT 
Nice to see....
... the old-fashioned aerodynamics coming back into style.
Back around WW2, model aeroplane builders were just about able to make their rubber powered planes and gliders perform long, high flights - flights high enough to get them caught by thermals. And if that happened, the plane would be carried away, high in the air, like a kite, and probably never seen again.
To address this problem, modelers developed ways of collapsing the lift and getting the model to fall slowly to the ground in a stable configuration after a set period of time. There were several techniques - one common one was to arrange for the tailplane to tilt up 60deg or so, putting the aircraft into a deep stall. Here is an illustration from a modeling magazine in 1948:
You can see that the system is called a 'De-Thermaliser', and is precisely the same as the Virgin Design.
US Navy trials GIANT ROBOTIC SPYBIRD for coastal patrols
Wednesday 8th January 2014 19:14 GMT
I remember...
..starting my career as a bright-eyed idealistic graduate trainee who liked flying radio-controlled aircraft and fiddling with early computers. And applying for a civil service position at Farnborough, because I wanted to work on unmanned drones, which I thought would be the coming thing.
That was back in the late 1970s. And now that I am at the end of my career, people are just starting to use them. That'll teach me to read too much Dan Dare in the 1950s..
Two white dwarfs and superdense star. Yup, IDEAL for gravity lab in the sky - boffins
Tuesday 7th January 2014 21:56 GMT
I forsee an interstellar legal battle here...
"This triple system gives us a natural cosmic laboratory far better than anything found before for learning exactly how such three-body systems work ...
Have they considered the possibility that it IS a cosmic laboratory, but that it ISN'T natural?
If someone else has put that together to demo three-body mathematics, they might be a bit pissed off at us using it on the side, and come after us for part of the set-up costs.
Then again, if it's just some junior grade alien's homework, maybe we can fob them off with some Earth-specific teenage present. Perhaps a night out in Cardiff with Justin Bieber or Momoiro Clover Z, or both, according to choice...
Scientists discover supervolcano trigger that could herald humanity's doom
Tuesday 7th January 2014 14:15 GMT
Great!!!
...European scientists think they've found the trigger mechanism for the eruption of supervolcanoes, the most violent and dangerous natural disasters on Earth...
What I want to know is:
1 - How can I tax people and get them to change their behaviour to minimise the chance of this happening?
2 - How can I show that the Koch brothers are funding a hidden multi-billion fund for supervolcano denial?
3 - How can I use this as a justification for a holiday trip for me and my mates to somewhere exotic?
Pervy TOILET CAMERA disguised as 'flash drive' sparks BOMB SCARE on Boeing 767
NHS carelessly slings out care.data plans to 26.5 million Brits
Monday 6th January 2014 15:45 GMT
I will be opting out....
..NHS England has confirmed that the Better Information Means Better Care leaflet would be posted to 26.5 million household over the next four weeks...
Because I have found that when large databases of this type are made available to researchers, they do not examine them to find out useful general trends, but instead subject them to 'data dredges' designed to provide statistical justification for the current medical fads.
This is how we get central directives to lower salt in foods, ban 'second-hand' smoke, enforce a standard body shape across the country and prescribe everyone over the age of 60 statins. Doctors no longer treat individual patients - they earn bonuses depending on their constituencies level of adherence to NHS norms.
Time travellers outsmart the NSA
Monday 6th January 2014 12:39 GMT
Re: Could we please just close them down?
...Can't we just shut down the NSA and the rest of those secret services?...
Yes, we could, quite easily. The work that they do could easily be done (and SHOULD be done) by the police.
The key point about 'secret services' is that you have them in time of war, when you suspend the requirement for your actions to be legal. The key point about the police is that they police in society, and have to create cases and justify their actions in an open court. There is no reason why the police should not 'do intelligence' - indeed they regularly do so.
What we do NOT need is an uncontrollable secretive organisation with an ethos of ignoring rules. These organisations were set up during war scares to address perceived national threats of overwhelming force which justified the suspension of the rule of law, and they should be closed down when we are not fighting for our lives
Monday 6th January 2014 12:22 GMT
Re: Personally I'd of hoped
Hmm.
Given that language changes over time, I'd've thought that 'I'd've' might change to 'iduv' as a specific conditional perfect construction in the English language.
So we could use a search for 'iduv' as another method of finding out if there are any persons from the future living amongst us, and who may not be completely fluent in 20th Century English.
Unfortunately, IDUV appears to be a currently existing type of film. So bang goes that idea....
Antarctic ice shelf melt 'lowest ever recorded, global warming is not eroding it'
Sunday 5th January 2014 21:24 GMT
Re: Point 3
...2) Considering how the average numpty deals with radioactive objects[1] this would not be wise. In addition, have you really considered how much material is needed to go critical for useful output, and what the total power of that would be in terms of heat? That should answer your point...
Er... I considered it. I couldn't see any problems. In principle you can make a perfectly safe reactor just a few feet across - lots of universities have them. If you wanted a full power station - with steam turbine, cooling tanks and electrical switchgear, you're probably talking about the size of a garden rather than a shed, but such an installation could power 10,000 to 20,000 homes. Quite safely. If you actually wanted to buy one as part of a group of, say, 10,500 homes it would cost each house about £1000 at 2008 prices. It would come ready fueled for 10 years and would be perfectly safe from tampering by the 'average numpty' (being buried in a block of concrete underground). The biggest danger would be the associated electrical sub-station.
Such reactors have been designed, and are in the process of being marketed by several companies. The anti-nuclear brigade have managed to suppress any knowledge of them for a long time, but I can't see that continuing.
Here is a Wiki for one such design... Hyperion reactor
Saturday 4th January 2014 06:05 GMT
Re: Point 3
...As for nuclear power plants, if they are so safe why can't we all have one in our homes?
Er... you can. Garden Shed Nuclear Power Station refers.
The environmentalists in the UK won't let you have one, but there's no safety reason why you shouldn't...
De-centralized power generation would make sense. But "big business" would not want that and the government like to have the option to switch us all off if we get shirty with them.
Hmm. It's just that central generation gets huge economies of scale, so it would be cheaper. If it were run as a non-profit making process. Of course, if a business runs it, the price will be whatever the market will bear...
Coming in 2014: Scary super-soldier exoskeleton suits from the US military
Thursday 2nd January 2014 00:51 GMT
I suggest...
...and have the battle armor ready for deployment in whichever war the US is going to be fighting in 2018...
...that they pick their country to fight quite early - now would not be too soon, given the need to pick a quarrel, escalate it through the UN, and do all the logistics.
To give it a good first outing, you probably need a country in a temperate zone - no dust or sand - lots of flat land - good communications with a major port - conveniently close to the US... I suggest Ireland. But watch out for the bogs...
Gay hero super-boffin Turing 'may have been murdered by MI5'
Wednesday 1st January 2014 11:32 GMT
Re: Militant P.C. Agenda is wearing thin...
...Please stop telling everyone that we have to "atone for the sins of the fathers"....
'Atoning for the sins of the fathers' is a critical theological requirement if you are to explain the 'Problem of Pain' - that is, why, if God is all-powerful and all-loving and runs the Earth, we still have unhappiness.
Myself, I wonder why, if blame passing down through generations is a theological requirement for the Christian religion, the Godhead is primarily known as 'God the Father'...
Wednesday 1st January 2014 11:18 GMT
Re: Security Risks
...Britain has a very long history of overlooking any behavior, no matter how atrocious, as long as it benefits the Crown....
ALL COUNTRIES have a very long history of overlooking any behavior, no matter how atrocious, as long as it benefits the PEOPLE IN POWER.
There, fixed that for you...
Britain's costliest mistake? Lord Stern defends his climate maths
Tuesday 31st December 2013 22:57 GMT
Re: one small problem : "both halves of the debate"
"...How could anyone downvote the statement that "The number of adherents does not in itself give credence to any particular philosophy"? It's obviously true, and worth saying repeatedly...."
It is, indeed, obviously true, at a logical level.
However, in human society, it is NOT necessarily true. If a lot of people, the vast majority, think one way and you do not, then you have a BIG problem. Throughout recorded history, such a dichotomy has been responsible for many deaths. In such a situation, if you do not quickly persuade yourself that the majority belief is true, then you may not live long. You will certainly suffer some disadvantage.
Just saying. No pressure...
Monday 30th December 2013 17:50 GMT
"...wouldn't the most expensive be Income Tax...?"
I'm not sure what counts as 'expensive'. Income tax has a big turnover, but it also enables useful things to happen, so you could argue that it has a positive cost-benefit ratio.
If you interpret 'expensive' to mean 'waste of money', I think a good contender would be that part of the 1911 Parliament Act which introduced the idea of salaries for MPs...
Blame Silicon Valley for the NSA's data slurp... and what to do about it
Tuesday 31st December 2013 20:21 GMT
So what's to be done?
Er.... two things.
1 - Actually start to gather a language and a set of rules so that we can talk about the balance between freedom and state power. Political philosophers and Constitutional theorists will help us here, but I see no sign that anyone wants to start up this technical debate. Nonetheless, it's essential to have proper foundations before you start to set up rules.
2 - Close down the First World's intelligence infrastructure. There is NO NEED for it. There WAS a need, back in 1943, when all the major countries were fighting a no-holds-barred world war. It may be reasonable to have extra-legal and dictatorial rules in such a situation. But we are NOT in such a situation now - no matter how hard NSA/GCHQ tries to pretend otherwise. People may certainly try to let off bombs or shoot people - this should be dealt with using normal police procedures, and the police should be given what support they need in doing this. But the critical difference is that the police have to build a legal case and have it examined in open court. And so long as the intelligence community do not do this, they will remain a danger to social liberty...
How the NSA hacks PCs, phones, routers, hard disks 'at speed of light': Spy tech catalog leaks
Tuesday 31st December 2013 10:38 GMT
...angry words between the NSA, manufacturers and hardware customers – the latter likely to be searching for more secure products....
If you want to avoid NSA/GCHQ reading your transmissions....
1 - run like Obama did and don't use computers, use messengers.
2 - use an old BBC micro that you keep physically secured. Encrypt messages on it using a one-time pad. Only connect to the Internet when you are sending messages, using a separate machine from the one you used for encryption....
What is the difference between a drone, a model and a light plane?
Monday 30th December 2013 17:24 GMT
Propeller avoidance for speed.
It's a good idea not to have a prop sticking into the airstream if you want to go really fast. In fact, it's a good idea not to have anything sticking into the airstream - including air intakes.
That why the FASTEST model aircraft are gliders. Here's one capturing the World Speed Record, at 468 mph. Yup - Miles per hour - not kilometers:
Friday 27th December 2013 23:52 GMT
If anyone here...
...wants to introduce their children/grandchildren to the hobby of building and operating models, I run a website which carries all the plans for the old Keil Kraft EeZeBilt series of starter model boats. And they're free...
These are simple little models - between 1 ft and 2 ft long - that are suitable for a starter in the field and intended to let a kid actually make a working model themselves. Just download the plans, spend a couple of quid on balsa wood and glue, and you may be looking at a budding modeller of the future...
http://eezebilt.hobby-site.com/ refers...
El Reg's contraptions confessional no.5: The Sinclair Sovereign
How much did NSA pay to put a backdoor in RSA crypto? Try $10m – report
Oi, bank manager. Only you've got my email address - where're these TROJANS coming from?
Bizarre Tolkien-inspired GCHQ Xmas card CAN'T BE READ by us PLEBS
Cheap 3D printer works with steel
How UK air traffic control system was caught asleep on the job
Monday 9th December 2013 16:53 GMT
Surely...
...we should be talking to Security Service and GCHQ about this?
After all, they have justified a sizable chunk of their budget by saying that they will now be the authority responsible for defending the UK's Critical Infrastructure. Which means looking after its Confidentiality, Integrity and AVAILABILITY.
They took the money - now's the time to ask them what they did with it.
And no getting off with "I'm afraid that's classified information..."...
Radio amateurs fret over G.fast interference
Monday 9th December 2013 15:41 GMT
Re: Not Just Hams
Indeed.
I'd like to point out a small and insignificant user of various spots around 27Mhz, 35Mhz, 40Mhz, 459Mhz and 2.4Ghz. It's the radio-controlled models allocation.
These originally used 27Mhz alone. Then CB came and camped on that illegally, and the Home Office Radio Regulatory Board (as was) proved completely ineffectual (and uninterested) in doing anything about it, in spite of the fact that R/C modelers paid a license fee to use the slot.
Nowadays modelers might be flying jet turbine models capable of several hundred miles an hour, or FPV drones at several miles from their operators. Interference could be quite dangerous, in spite of the precautions which are routinely taken...
MINING in SPAAAACE! Asteroid-scoopers? Nah - consumers will be the real winners
Saturday 7th December 2013 22:09 GMT 
Space Marines?
...And absent any governments setting up the Space Marines, there will be bugger-all anyone can do about it....
The Western powers - basically, the ones who won WW2 - have kept their armies and military capability LOOONG after it was conceivably needed.
There's a reason for this. The Military-industrial complex had become very big and profitable, and it didn't want to be closed down. That's why, after the Russians stopped being a valid excuse, we started a succession of pointless wars to give ourselves a new enemy to justify the military spend.
Who here thinks that the US won't immediately start up a Space Marine unit? Of course they will. Don't you remember their military's attempts to control the Legrange points? And once they have such a unit, they will need to start up space territorial disputes in order to justify the expense. Just like at the moment...
Mexican Cobalt-60 robbers are DEAD MEN, say authorities
Saturday 7th December 2013 20:33 GMT
Re: slow death...
How about considering their time line?
This happened Wednesday 4 Dec. The authorities say that exposure to the unshielded source will provide a fatal dose if the criminals were close enough, and estimate that a period of a few minutes to an hour would be needed for this. Assuming that they got a lowish fatal dose, my look-up chart reckons that they will be vomiting by 11 Dec, losing hair by 18 Dec, and dead by 25 Dec.
Happy Christmas....
Women crap at parking: Official
Wednesday 4th December 2013 13:09 GMT
Re: Parking
...Yesterday, in traffic, I sat watching a woman attempt to park her car on the side of the road, one-handed, while having a conversation on her mobile, held to her ear with the other hand. Traffic was stopped, so I had a good opportunity to watch as she went back and forth, back and forth, never really making much progress.
It was only when she finished her conversation and directed all her attention to the task at hand, that she successfully got her vehicle parked. I felt bad for the cars in the lane she was blocking during the course of her attempt, but they also had a red light, so not much harm done, I suppose.
So your anecdote illustrates:
1) the tendency of women to multi-task and indulge in social activity
2) the requirement for concentrated spacial awareness during parking maneuvers
3) the ability of women to intuitively balance multiple group needs and take actions which result in 'not much harm done'...
Biting the hand that feeds IT
