Posts by Jeffrey Nonken

Re: Pedant alert

Wait. Pedants? This is the reader forum of an IT rag. How many people here are NOT pedants? Show of hands, please. Yes, both of you. Thank you.

Re: Let the lawsuits begin

Blaming the victim always works!

Re: Being blessed with a body honed by sitting at a desk all day...

Your tongue-in-cheek detector wants calibrating, I think.

Re: 5 eyes will not be happy

I've been thinking about Iceland, myself, but I'm also starting from the 'States. Don't know if that's relevant or not.

Re: A few thoughts...

Already been done. Just fix up Hadrian's Wall and you're good.

Re: second person plural

Correct. Second person plural would be "all y'all."

Scarier than your surgeon saying "Oops!"?

Re: Suspenders?

I was wondering what this thread was all about. I couldn't see the cartoon on the mobile site. Now I'm at my computer at work, I can slack off AND see the illustrations.

What you call "suspenders" we call "garters" in the US. Your braces are our suspenders. I have no idea what "garters" are to you, so I don't know what word we use for it.

Sometimes I think our forebears changed some word usage and certain symbols just to be spiteful. We WERE a bit ticked off at you back in the late 1700s.

I expect the cartoon was drawn by an American artist. Sometimes American culture manages to get out and pollute your information stream. It's worse than a cholera outbreak!

Is he, then?

Re: Best security practice

No true Scotsman?

Re: i say we take off and nuke the site from orbit....

"Something may survive a nuke, you don't know..."

The cockroaches, no doubt.

Meters, not feet. There is a non-trivial difference.

Re: Posturing, more than likely

"It would be nice if they would pass some law to actually HELP the public, such as requiring all areas to have at least two carriers for people to choose between..."

Needs to be more than just that. I get to choose between AT&T and Comcast, which is like choosing between having your left nut cut off or your right nut cut off. It's not really a choice.

Re: Conversation-based ads

In other words, "There may be problems, so it can't be done." Why is there always somebody who sees potential problems with an idea and assumes they are unsolvable?

Re: Double barb

Yeah, that's pretty much the kind of thing that makes our country great.

Re: Dead

Apple hasn't updated my iPhone 3GS in quite a while. Those dastards.

...I know, I know. Just sayin'. :)

Re: How?

Patterns, people. Think patterns.

Just because the main computation is at gigahertz frequencies doesn't mean there are no related patterns to be found at lower frequencies.

Re: Very simple

"Do you still refer to your desktop as a microcomputer?"

Not generally. Not important. It's a personal computer; its actual internal makeup isn't important to me in most contexts.

"And who actually talks about minicomputers these days?"

I do if my conversation is in a context where the difference matters. But hardly anybody uses them any more.

"Language changes. Especially in the technology field. Why would you think a definition made 25 years ago holds any weight today?"

True dat, though plenty of words only 25 years old mean the same thing they did then. Even the ones that look different. (The chain printer on the IBM 360 at university looks -- and sounds -- a heckuva lot different from the inkjet on my desk, but you'd recognize both as "computer printers".) OTOH, "computer" used to mean a person who specialized in doing rapid calculations. More than 25 years ago, though. :)

If not all the horses have left, it still makes sense to close the barn door. I'm afraid quoting that metaphor suggests that it's too late to fix the problem and TV shouldn't bother.

I haven't been hacked yet and I'd just as soon not be. Please close the barn door before any other houses escape. Thank you.

Re: "the UK's first plastic banknote"

From your link: "It is releasing the limited edition notes a year before the Bank of England puts plastic banknotes in general circulation."

So I guess it depends on how fine you want to split hairs. It's not the first, but it's the first "in general circulation".

An argument could be made either way. Just sayin'.

Disorientated Verbing

https://www.topatoco.com/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=QC-SCIENCEVERB

TBH I winced at "effectuated" too, though I was polite enough not to mention it. And yet obnoxious enough to speak up now the subject has been broached.

Just put it down to me being a pale stale US male on the autism spectrum, everybody knows we're uncivilized louts. Also, we don't speak proper English.

(Some of these words are giving my spell chucker [sic] absolute fits. It's almost fun, kicking it in the balls repeatedly. For instance, it insisted that "effectuated" should be "accentuated" until I beat it into submission.)

Re: Disk death: Three-quarters of PCs will run SSDs by 2020

I remember when 2000 was that, and many excellent science fiction stories are now badly dated because of it. So a looming 2020 is less of a culture shock for me. :)

Why the downvote? Zip disks were horrible. I would explain why except out it would likely turn into a rant. With foaming at the mouth.

Rats make good pets, but the males especially tend to wee on you. I'll bet your hair smells WONDERFUL.

Re: Reason #349187 to block ads...

Easier to yell at people and accuse them of stealing than to fix a problem. Or even admit they have one.

Re: A parabolic transmitting antenna and a parabolic receiving antenna

I assume you meant "pairabolics"and gave you an upvote. For thinking of it first. You rat. :)

Though I'd have said "pair-a-parabolics" but the pun works either way.

Re: My opinion on this?

MY opinion on this

Re: Adieu != Ado

Much Adieu About Nothing?

Re: ComCast slapped for taxes?

I'd give you an extra thumbs up for the alliteration but El Reg is parsimonious with them. :)