ratfox • User • The Register Forums

B&N fans fondleslab flames following Kindle Fire

Monday 7th November 2011 22:21 GMT ratfox

What does it run?

Android or Windows? Ice cream sammich? Mango? QNX?

...Symbian? ........WebOS?

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Google's legal boss is fed up with patent warfare

Monday 7th November 2011 22:19 GMT ratfox

Well, he is biased...

But he is also right.

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Common brain parasite 'can affect host's actions'

Monday 7th November 2011 22:19 GMT ratfox

Brain-infected cat worshippers?

That'll be the Goa'uld then...

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If thine brown eye offend thee, blast it with a laser

Monday 7th November 2011 10:19 GMT ratfox

"What’s to ensure there’s definitely blue pigment underneath?"

And they call that a doctor? There is no blue pigment. Eyes appear to be blue because of funky Rayleigh scattering.

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Hackers mistake French rugby site for German stock exchange

Friday 4th November 2011 17:51 GMT ratfox

How drunk do you have to be?

(body)

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Groupon shares soar, adds $2.7bn in two hours

Friday 4th November 2011 17:51 GMT ratfox

This should be fun to watch

No popcorn icon... I'll have to make do with a beer then.

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Assange loses High Court appeal against extradition to Sweden

Wednesday 2nd November 2011 13:10 GMT ratfox

And then he will appeal, and then the appeal will be rejected, and then he will be extradited, and then he will be judged... Geez.

What I am most curious about is, what is the maximum sentence he risks in Sweden? Very soon, the whole shebang will have lasted longer than if he had started his sentence right after the crime.

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Native Gmail app coming to iPhone, iPad?

Tuesday 1st November 2011 18:29 GMT ratfox

Intentionally inferior?

Do you have examples? (note that the Maps iPhone app uses Google data, but was coded by Apple)

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Sony Tablet S

Tuesday 1st November 2011 17:11 GMT ratfox

Agree

If you want a big screen, buy a laptop, a desktop, or a TV...

"The cool thing with my digital watch is that I can connect it to my 20 inches monitor to display the time in really large letters."

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Facebook's Swedish data centre will be subject to Snoop Law

Monday 31st October 2011 10:41 GMT ratfox

while (<MAIL>) {

if (/surprise sex/) {

&extradite_individual_for_rape();

}

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Stallman: Did I say Jobs was evil? I meant really evil

Friday 28th October 2011 13:30 GMT ratfox

Fatal mistake

You think that "free" means you did not pay for it. For that man, "free" has a very different definition.

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RIM faces legal action following service outages

Thursday 27th October 2011 09:44 GMT ratfox

Great move

Send one of the best companies in your country into massive trouble for $1.25

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Apple gets patent for ‘unlock gesture’

Wednesday 26th October 2011 08:45 GMT ratfox

Correct

This patent only covers a sliding icon. I actually don't think there was prior art for this. Digital pads to enter a code are something different. Also, the android swipe-a-shape is not covered by this either.

In fact, it looks to me like no lawsuits should come out of this. Then again, lawyers are known to be irrational when a big payout is involved.

H6242 — Kill all the lawyers.

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RIM links with Microsoft for cloud services

Tuesday 25th October 2011 20:31 GMT ratfox

Good move

Indeed RIM and Microsoft are ideal partners for pleasing corp customers.

As long as RIM is not sucked dry by Microsoft in the process, that is. I hope Microsoft realize that RIM still has a much better chance in the mobile market than they do.

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Groupon sues ex-sales heads for defection to Google

Tuesday 25th October 2011 16:25 GMT ratfox

$6m isn't cool.

You know what's cool?

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Rockstar officially announces Grand Theft Auto V

Tuesday 25th October 2011 16:24 GMT ratfox

The up-to-now secret title is

The World of GTACraft!

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Microsoft trousers yet more royalties from Android gear

Tuesday 25th October 2011 05:31 GMT ratfox

Rewarding invention

If patents really rewarded invention, that would be good. However, in the current system, when many people independently come up with an idea, only one person gets rewarded by the patent system. All the others get sued or have to pay licenses, and lose all the benefit of their work, even if they did come up with the idea themselves.

This discourages invention, as it is practically impossible to create anything without infringing some patent; to the point that even when an outfit like Google deliberately attempts to create a royalty-free codec, they seem unable to do so.

In a proper system, when people independently come up with an idea, the benefits would be shared between them. Many people having the same idea means the idea is less original, and so should be less rewarded.

Another problem is that fighting a lawsuit is so expensive that even big players like HTC and Samsung have an advantage in licensing a bogus patent rather than fighting it. Never mind small players like Compal Electronics...

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Monday 24th October 2011 14:14 GMT ratfox

Fat lot of choice they had

Pay up or go bankrupt fighting our lawyers...

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Google dumps + from Boolean search tool

Tuesday 25th October 2011 05:28 GMT ratfox

Jeez, people get so intense

Google replaces the + by "", and it's like the end of the world...

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El Reg in email address blunder

Monday 24th October 2011 14:13 GMT ratfox

Quick, lemme check my never-used-crap-web-based-mail...

Shoot. I am not one of the 3,521... Will you notify the 46,524, so that I know I should change to a further crap account, just for safety?

I think my new address will be: "registerlogin1234@hotmail.com"

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World's stealthiest rootkit gets a makeover

Monday 24th October 2011 14:09 GMT ratfox

This should remove the PITA rootkit:

Step 1: browse to ubuntu.com...

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Reg hacks confront really wide Oz load terror

Monday 24th October 2011 14:08 GMT ratfox

Apatosauruses!

The post is required, and must contain letters.

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Google! mulling! Yahoo! slurp! claims! insider!

Monday 24th October 2011 14:05 GMT ratfox

What in the world would Google want to buy Yahoo for??

Oooh, YHOO is up 3% in pre-market today... What a coincidence...

I am reminded of the weekly rumors about Palm being on the verge of being bought by RIM, Nokia, Microsoft, etc. with an bump in the stock every time... And when it was finally bought by HP, nobody saw it coming.

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This just in: Brussels shatters CRT cartel

Friday 21st October 2011 13:22 GMT ratfox

cartel of videotape makers just four years ago

You owe me a new keyboard!

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As US sinks, Apple sees a glorious future in China

Thursday 20th October 2011 11:14 GMT ratfox

@Underpants

"Thus far Apple don't seem to have cared much about the Chinese market"

...Sorry, what? Apple started selling the iPhone there in 2009. It is already their second biggest market! You can bet your sweet underpants that they have cared about it.

The reason they care more about the Galaxy Tab than about the iPed is that the Galaxy Tab is actually a comparable product in quality. Nobody would think that of an iPed.

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Wednesday 19th October 2011 12:08 GMT ratfox

@Exactly: Well, duh

How much do you think is the loss of market share to the iPed and aPad, compared to the Galaxy Tab?

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Euro fraud cops crush garlic tax evaders

Thursday 20th October 2011 11:13 GMT ratfox

I'm curious

Why is there a specific duty of €1,200 per tonne on garlic??

@David Pollard: I am no specialist, but distinguishing two closely related species might be significantly harder than detecting completely unrelated species...

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RIM lifts skirt, flashes 'new' OS at devs

Wednesday 19th October 2011 14:27 GMT ratfox

Poor BBM

So fast up, down so quick. It 's like nobody thinks they have a chance anymore.

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Robot resolves Rubik's Cube in record time

Tuesday 18th October 2011 20:26 GMT ratfox

Could be even faster, actually

The first 1.2 seconds is spent just turning the cube around, probably to catch all six sides in a single camera... with properly placed mirrors, this could be shaved off!

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Apple iPhone 4S

Tuesday 18th October 2011 08:57 GMT ratfox

So what?

You think web sites have to pick a side, and declare their everlasting allegiance to one cult?

The Reg has many contributors, who undoubtedly have very different opinions. I for one prefer it if the editors do not enforce purity of dogma across the board, thankyouverymuch.

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4chan founder bashes Facebook, Google+ on identity

Tuesday 18th October 2011 08:38 GMT ratfox

Partially agree

I am not certain that complete anonymity is important, but having distinct, separate identities does matter to me, e.g. for business and friends.

I want to be able to post pictures of my holidays in a place that is not side-by-side with my business messages. Google+ circles is only the first step towards this; for instance, it does not (yet) allow to put different profile pictures for different circles.

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Dell signals Windows 8 fondleslab range

Monday 17th October 2011 11:29 GMT ratfox

Yeah, that'll work...

How about giving the money back to the shareholders, Michael?

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Samsung takes another hit in patent punch-up

Monday 17th October 2011 11:28 GMT ratfox

Indeedy indeed

People who are commissioned by Microsoft to conduct a study on patents can hardly claim to be independent anymore...

...Not that his previous attacks on Google left much doubt.

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ICANN rescues time zone database

Sunday 16th October 2011 23:01 GMT ratfox

Good

It is sad that you need to be an organization such as ICANN to dare take the bluff of such a ridiculous lawsuit.

H2646 – Kill all the lawyers.

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Wall Street protest app Vibe is secure enough, cries dev

Wednesday 12th October 2011 20:12 GMT ratfox

Not in Switzerland

A group used to follow the police around and place themselves 50 meters before with large signs...

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Virus infects killer US air drone fleet

Monday 10th October 2011 18:55 GMT ratfox

Disappointing

Is this the best that the US can do? "We have viruses on our top-notch weapons and we can't get rid of them"?

I assume they have been cutting corners on security measures in the rush to bring drones to combat, but still...

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Biker gang plunders Covent Garden Apple Store

Monday 10th October 2011 14:05 GMT ratfox

Right actor, wrong movie...

Pulp Fiction

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Microsoft gets trademark for retail store plans

Saturday 8th October 2011 21:13 GMT ratfox

First thing is to trademark it

We lose money for a few years, then some schmuck will build a store that looks like ours... Then we can sue him for millions! Millions! Muhahaha!!

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Google hits the boozer with own brand of beer

Friday 7th October 2011 15:06 GMT ratfox

Better than Carlsberg?

Not taking risks, are you?

Anyway, TGIF! I'm off.

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Intellectual Ventures wages patent war on Motorola

Friday 7th October 2011 08:41 GMT ratfox

Funny...

How 500 M$ patents bring 2 G$... There is a 75% chance that the courts will invalidate them, I guess...

H6242 — Kill all the lawyers.

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Samsung seeks bans on the iPhone 4S

Wednesday 5th October 2011 12:27 GMT ratfox

More money to the wrong people...

H6242 – Kill all the lawyers

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iPhone 5 a no-show at Apple's 'Let's talk iPhone' event

Tuesday 4th October 2011 21:20 GMT ratfox

So what have we learned today?

Pundits predicting Apple announcements are shit. I wonder if they feel ashamed of their naked linkbaiting.

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Google open sources JavaScript testing tools

Monday 3rd October 2011 10:22 GMT ratfox

"Deflecting attention"?

For the life of me, I can't see what media would be distracted from whatever they are doing by something as obscure as the open sourcing of JavaScript testing tools. Seriously, about 1% of the population understands what this is about, and a much smaller percentage actually cares.

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