* Posts by Toastan Buttar

806 publicly visible posts • joined 4 Jul 2008

Kodak's moment: Camera biz files for bankruptcy

Toastan Buttar
FAIL

Demise of Marconi

Blame falls squarely on the shoulders of George Simpson.

MIT boffins devise faster Fast Fourier transform

Toastan Buttar

Isn't the village of Wainscotting in Ethics?

Windows Phone to overtake iOS in 2015

Toastan Buttar
WTF?

Predictions out to 2015?

They just pulled numbers out their butts.

"Why Speculate?" by Michael Crichton:

http://www.wbsi.org/ilfdigest/commentaries_mar_04.htm

SOPA is dead. Are you happy now?

Toastan Buttar
Thumb Up

A well argued post

Even if I didn't agree with everything you said.

Toastan Buttar

A & R

"Artists" and "Repertoire". It used to be the case that there were people employed by record companies who had an ear for a hit. They would choose the songs that they thought had a chance of selling well, and picked the group or singer who was the best fit for that song. This was necessary because record companies had to create a carefully calculated run of pressings, ship them out to retail outlets, and promote them (through means legal and illegal) in order to make a profit. This worked well for the record companies, the artists and the fans.

Home taping did not kill music.

Steve Jobs was a visionary (not a particularly pleasant one, but that's irrelevant) in that he saw that people wanted to be honest and wanted to actually "own" a song, album, or collection. IMHO, the price per track on ITMS is ludicrously high, for the simple reason that there is no longer any risk associated with getting music to the record-buying public; there is no longer a role for the A&R guy. Make each track on ITMS 5 cents and the world will become honest again. Keep charging the grossly inflated "old school" prices where genuine skill, instinct and risk was involved and you're taking the piss. It costs next to nothing for Apple to transfer a file to your computer when you've decided you want it, and even 1 cent to the artist/composer per download would make the world of difference.

Toastan Buttar
Paris Hilton

PIPA

The word "PIPA" in UK English means "shapely rear".

Spam-squirting hole found in McAfee antivirus kit

Toastan Buttar
Thumb Up

Use MS free products

With Windows 7, Windows Firewall and MSE knock spots off ZoneAlarm and AVG. The latter apps used to be essential add-ons for Windows, but are no longer relevant.

Number cruncher charts rise of the personal computer...

Toastan Buttar
Boffin

Amiga was great in its day

However, it would need a FAR more robust and abstraction-layered OS to be useful in today's internet-centric home computer experience. And that would unfortunately negate a lot of the very clever tricks that they were able to pull in the days of stand-alone machines talking directly to the chips.

Toastan Buttar
Thumb Down

iPad depends on having PC / Mac, too.

Due to its dependence on the Apple connector and iTunes, lack of removable memory, etc, etc, you'd be mad to *replace* a desktop / laptop with an iPad. It only makes sense as a second computer.

Teen net addicts pee in bottles to stay glued to WoW

Toastan Buttar
Terminator

Texas Catheter

As employed by Case in Neuromancer when "jacking-in" for hours on end.

Toastan Buttar
Unhappy

...and what did you do with it once you'd taken it out of him?

Symantec 'fesses up: 'Code theft worse than we thought'

Toastan Buttar
Thumb Up

Free (as in beer) AV

I've found MSE to be a very good free solution to AV, and recommend it to friends and family.

Phages: The powerful new bio-ammo in superbug war

Toastan Buttar
Black Helicopters

I remember that

I remember watching a documentary yeeeeeears ago about phage research in the former USSR. It seemed like an incredibly promising technology, especially in the light of increasingly antibiotic-resitant organisms. There seemed to be barriers to exporting the technology to the West, but can't recall which side was making it difficult.

Motorola Xoom 2 Media Edition Android tablet

Toastan Buttar
Paris Hilton

One-handed surfing

Ability to hold in one hand for long periods without tiring? Check!

Splash - resistant screen? Check!

Woz praises Android, blasts iPhone limitations

Toastan Buttar
Thumb Up

axe gravy soup

Good to see Apple has provided us with a fresh batch of "Newton" jokes for the new millenium.

Apple offers cash for old kit

Toastan Buttar

Sorry for the earworm, but...

We buy any cack dot com.

X Prize: Build a Star Trek 'tricorder' and win $10m

Toastan Buttar
Joke

Weedly weep

"This entire planet is made out of weedley-weep!"

Raspberry Pi Linux micro machine enters mass production

Toastan Buttar
FAIL

ratio arse-about-tit ?

HIGHEST bang to buck, shurely???

Firm pitches tech trio powered by portable processor

Toastan Buttar
Unhappy

Awful name

The worst name since "That's" tapes.

Oz skeptic offers prize if Rossi’s E-cat works

Toastan Buttar
WTF?

There was an outfit offering broadband rates over dial-up in the UK called Juice Boosted.

http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/52121

Such fun!

Banana war: Velvet Underground shoots holes in Apple bag

Toastan Buttar
Headmaster

Jobsian Grammar

“Incase for Andy Warhol is a fitting tribute to the artist who continues to inspire us to think differently.”

"Think Different", surely?

Microsoft schedules Kinect for Windows launch

Toastan Buttar
Stop

Mouse fan, here

You'll take my mouse (and my cursor, SHIFT and CNTL keys) when you prise my cold, dead fingers from them. Touchscreens (or anything which requires you to lift your arms constantly) make for really bad ergonomics. Industrial Design 101.

Amazon says soz for foisting mag sub onto Kindle-touchers

Toastan Buttar
Facepalm

How hard can it be?

"You are receiving a copy of our free e-magazine for a trial period of 14 days. You will never be charged for this magazine, but if you do not wish to receive further copies, please let us know by unsubscribing."

Arctic freshening not due to ice melt after all, says NASA

Toastan Buttar

Vulture

Birds don't have teeth. Talons on the other hand (or leg...)

BlackBerry PlayBook in US price plummet

Toastan Buttar
Unhappy

Useful apps?

I've never heard Angry Birds described as "useful" before.

Facebook shoves your face into creepy 'sponsored stories' in 2012

Toastan Buttar
Happy

I wish there were more DL Smiths in this world

It must be great to be you. Or to be someone who knows you. You're so great there should be a compulsary DL Smith 101 class in every high school in the country. Then everyone would be living kick-ass lives.

Creepy photo-tagging tech slotted into Google+

Toastan Buttar
Paris Hilton

"butter-fingered handling of data online"

Would that be butter-fingered like in Last Tango In Paris?

Cops target climate-sceptic bloggers in three countries

Toastan Buttar
Thumb Down

72 times zeroes???

No business (or govt body) claims to be able to recover even a one-time overwritten file on a hard drive.

God particle hunt breakthrough expected TODAY

Toastan Buttar
Stop

Aaaaaaargh!

Enough with this "God Particle" nonsense!

Alec Baldwin kicked off plane for playing with his phone

Toastan Buttar
FAIL

You just wrote it in your title, Herr Lieberman.

New Turing petition calls for criminal pardon

Toastan Buttar
Thumb Up

Apologising for what other people did in the past?

Useless.

Making sure our children and our peers _never forget_ man's inhumanity to man through the ages?

Priceless.

I won't be signing the e-petition, but I have made sure my kids were exposed to Schindler's List, Roots and Holocaust. And there's a much-thumbed copy of Alan Turing: The Enigma on the bookshelf if they feel up to it.

China gets 64 quid Android 4.0 tablet

Toastan Buttar
Paris Hilton

Ainol Ice Cream Sandwich?

Two girls one tablet.

Ubuntu team questions Distrowatch share slide figures

Toastan Buttar
Stop

"As I became more experienced in using Linux distributions I ventured to the more challenging ones."

Do you hit yourself with progressively bigger hammers because it feels even better each time you stop? Each to their own, but I can't imagine trying out 'more challenging' OSs is a particularly rewarding way to spend your free time.

US boffins unleash piezoelectric insect cyborg

Toastan Buttar
Linux

Tethered flight?

I had images of a beetle flying round the room like a falcon on a leash.

Web smut oglers accosted by bogus pop-up plod fines

Toastan Buttar
Holmes

Thir's been a shufflerrrrrr

"Yes, sir. You have contacted DCI Taggart of Strathclyde Police. Our HQ is by Loch Big Ben, next door to Sean Connery's flat".

Pirated software hard drive on display as art

Toastan Buttar
Happy

It's art because an 'artist' and an 'art gallery' say it is.

Exactly right. It's then up to the audience/critics to consider whether it is 'good art' or 'bad art'.

“The most important thing in art is the frame. For painting: literally; for other arts: figuratively - because, without this humble appliance, you can't know where The Art stops and The Real World begins. You have to put a "box" around it because otherwise, what is that shit on the wall?” - Frank Zappa.

Beware the software security scare silly season

Toastan Buttar
Windows

I know it's a scam and I do have Windows on my computer. Any Reg reader who doesn't know it's a scam should hang their head in shame.

Rock star physicist Cox: Neutrinos won't help us cheat time

Toastan Buttar
FAIL

The wrong definition of "Rock Star"

People have decribed Shigeru Miyamoto as a "rockstar games designer" but no-one is claiming that Wii Music is a "rock music" game.

Shimples.

Toastan Buttar
FAIL

Crackpot bloggers have no clue (about physics, computers, experimental evidence...)

"Truth is, if physicists really had a clue about the nature of motion, they would know that the speed of light is not just the fastest speed in the universe but the *only* speed in the universe. Nothing can move faster or slower."

Physicists do indeed know that everything in the universe travels through space-time at exactly the speed of C. This was beautifully explained in the popular-science book "Why Does E=MC2 (and Why Should We Care)?" written by.......oh, that'd be rockstar physicist Brian Cox. No need for a series of quantum jumps, either.

So much fail in so short a post.

It's Friday afternoon. If you fancy wasting a few hours before hitting the pub, google "Louis Savain". YOUR HEAD ASPLODE.

Just trolling: It's OK to poke fun at Christians, says ASA

Toastan Buttar
Thumb Up

Inclusive Offense

Actually, by replacing "Christian" with "Believer", they've now made it offensive to Christians, Jews AND Muslims. They all believe in the same G_d, after all.

Jim Westwood, home micro revolutionary

Toastan Buttar
Boffin

We're not worthy!!!

That is all.

Voyager 2 finally agrees to a long hard thrust

Toastan Buttar

Outer Limits of the Solar System

We control the vertical (thrusters...)

We control the horizontal (thrusters...)

Facebook boss-lady is up the pole on the glass ceiling

Toastan Buttar
Headmaster

Sexy, Sexier, .....

"So providing anything to encourage more women to work, is by definition, sexiest."

The concept doesn't really give me wood.

Lego movie greenlighted by Warner Bros

Toastan Buttar
Headmaster

"Have"

Toastan Buttar
Unhappy

What was wrong with the mix, then?

Toastan Buttar
Thumb Up

Only Roger Rabbit?

I thought they pulled off the live action-CGI mix really well with Alvin and the Chipmunks.

Can 24/7 porn rescue Google TV?

Toastan Buttar
Headmaster

Not WoW

"Avenue Q", the puppet show.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avenue_Q

Google gets fresh with search algorithm tweak

Toastan Buttar
Thumb Up

Really???

Bing is nearly at a third of all searches? That's pretty damned impressive.

LG seeks cash to save its smartphone biz

Toastan Buttar
Unhappy

Good 'smartish' phones for tweens

For a couple of years LG made good cheap transitional phones between simple handsets and smartphones. My daughters loved the real QWERTY of the KS-360 and the resistive touch screen (with virtual QWERTY) of the GD510 'Pop'. Friends had the Cookie, etc.

Great battery life and very useful as a phone (I 'inherited' the Pop when one of them upgraded to an Orange San Fran). Not very fashionable, though. I think that cheap-ish middle market will disappear pronto.

Crime-fighting Seattle superhero unmasked, fired

Toastan Buttar
Facepalm

Thanks, Captain Obvious!