* Posts by Narlaquin

48 publicly visible posts • joined 28 Aug 2008

NASA's Opportunity rover celebrates 10 years on Mars with a FILTHY selfie

Narlaquin
Flame

Where's the obligatory post to 695?

I am shocked, shocked to discover that no one has posted a link to xkcd #695 yet. Admittedly it's about Spirit, not Opportunity, but still....

Douglas Adams was RIGHT! TINY ALIENS are invading Earth, say boffins

Narlaquin

Re: Right with you there

Phil Plait is not exactly enamoured with the report neither

http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/09/20/et_claims_of_alien_life_in_earth_s_atmosphere_are_unfounded.html

LOHAN hero playmonaut STRANDED on Spanish mountain

Narlaquin

Once is an accident. Twice is coincidence. Three times is an enemy action.

First the Original Playmonaut "lost at Sea".

Then CASSiE, the space hedgehog "lost" "somewhere" in Oxfordshire or Warwickshire.

Now the LOHAN Playmonaut, "STRANDED" on Spanish "Mountain"

As I said here: http://forums.theregister.co.uk/forum/1/2013/03/28/space_hedgehog/#c_1776781

"I hope she isn't in a cell with the Playmonaut, inside a miniature Baking Soda and Vinegar volcano, and that they find her safe and well. But I'm still going for the "someone is stealing our toy astronauts a la You Only Live Twice" theory."

Wake up and smell the coffee, sheeple!!

Once is an accident. Twice is coincidence. Three times is an enemy action.

Someone is stealing our toy astronauts a la "You Only Live Twice"

Five SECRET products Apple won't show today

Narlaquin

Re: Next

Well, if it's got the Apple hipsterness, then surely "Fap-ably Appley"

400 million Chinese people can't speak Chinese: Official

Narlaquin

也許中國的防火牆長城不會讓他們嗎?

PayPal and SETI aim to go galactic with off-planet currency system

Narlaquin
Headmaster

Just a quick nitpick...

As part of Apollo 17, Harrison Schmitt was the last person to arrive on the moon - Eugene Cernan got out of the LM first, but as they loaded in reverse order, Schmitt entered first, and Cernan followed, meaning that Cernan was the last person to walk on the moon.

Boffins create tabletop ANTIMATTER GUN

Narlaquin
Boffin

Re: It needs a room sized laser?

You're going to need a bigger Shark !

BBC boffins ponder abstruse Ikea-style way of transmitting telly

Narlaquin
Unhappy

Re: Justification

We were supposed to have this with DVDs and the multi-angle feature. All the early players supported it, none of the DVDs contained any multi-angle stuff. 15 years later I own precisely one (1) DVD that has multi-camera shots. (A documentary on Apollo 8, with launch sequences) but I have to open a menu and select change camera angle on my DVD player, since the manufacturers decided (correctly IMHO) that multi-angle didn't need to be on the remote because nothing supported it.

Does anyone else know of any other mult-angle DVDs?

Yahoo 'won't screw Tumblr'? Then Tumblr will screw its balance sheet

Narlaquin
WTF?

Wot! No! Exclamation! Marks!

I am shocked, shocked I say, to see an El Reg Yahoo! story without excessive Exclamation Marks.

Dark blue side of the Force used to quell Star Wars nerd clash

Narlaquin
Alien

Re: As a life-long DW fan, can I ask...

He's played a Cyberman in "Earthshock" & "The Five Doctors"; The Melkur in "The Keeper of Traken" and PC Tony Stamp in The Bill. Also Countdown

Coke? Windows 8 is Microsoft's 'Vista moment'. Again

Narlaquin
Facepalm

Re: telemetry - just stats and stats are what you lie with

I think you have a very good point.

Isn't the telemetry the "Allow Microsoft to capture data to improve Windows" stuff that we techies all switch off when setting up a machine? If so, then the telemetry is mostly collected from people who've had to figure it all out by themselves. How do you get on the internet? "Well, I press the start button and type in INTERNET and press that big button with the arrow." Hey Presto! Internet Explorer opens. "I type in word prosessorator and press the button" Voila! Word opens.

So Sinofsky came up with an interface that worked against the way that most of us actually worked, but he didn't know, because we techies were all hiding from Microsoft's prying eyes.

Thousands rally behind teen girl cuffed, expelled in harmless 'explosion'

Narlaquin
Thumb Up

Have an upvote on me!

That link was just awesome!

<goes hunting on eBay for a Gilbert Atomic Energy Lab>

Narlaquin
WTF?

By all means let the 5 year old off. He is a minor, he didn't know any better. He doesn't understand what he's done, or why his baby sister isn't around anymore.

But the parents? Letting an unsupervised child play with a loaded rifle? That is a crime.

Narlaquin
Facepalm

Re: Values

Just in case anyone isn't aware of what Andres is referring to here:

http://news.sky.com/story/1085554/boy-5-kills-sister-2-with-childrens-rifle

and the manufacturers website:

http://www.crickett.com/shop_by_brand.php?manufacturers_id=27

And for the full British tut-tut:

http://www.crickett.com/crickett_kidscorner.php?osCsid=vkf2vpqgjovo0963q2f7f7hrf7

Why next iPhone screen could be made of SAPPHIRE - and a steal...

Narlaquin
Unhappy

Re: But remember...

Did you come here for a picture of Joanna Lumley too? I'm upset now.

Norkoshop: How Pyongyang well and truly forked Adobe

Narlaquin

Re: Topic? What's a topic?

We of the No Badge club laugh as you all try to outdo yourselves ingratiating yourselves with the Imperialist Running Dogs. We True Followers care not for such shiny trappings. We are content to remain silent, safe in the knowledge that our strength encourages Mother Vulture.

Rocket boffinry in pictures: Gulp the Devil's venom and light a match

Narlaquin
Facepalm

Re: Obligatory

Dagnabbit, beaten by David Given

Narlaquin
Mushroom

Re: Obligatory

The book itself is long out of print. However, a pdf is available:

http://library.sciencemadness.org/library/books/ignition.pdf

Lost CASSiE search moves up a gear

Narlaquin
Mushroom

How very dare you, sir? How very dare you? She's a heroine, not a commie traitor! A heroine I tell you, a heroine!

One day, when your grandchildren graduate from "The CASSiE School of Rocket Boffinry", I hope you take a moment to remember your doubt and regret it. And donate a saucer of the Lactose free milk to the poor earthbound hedgehogs, or something.

Narlaquin
Black Helicopters

I hope I'm wrong...

I hope she isn't in a cell with the Playmonaut, inside a miniature Baking Soda and Vinegar volcano, and that they find her safe and well. But I'm still going for the "someone is stealing our toy astronauts a la You Only Live Twice" theory.

Are you in charge of a lot of biz computers? Got Java on them?

Narlaquin
Pint

Re: Updates

Worse yet, it can get in a state where it can't download the update, so just prompts and prompts.

And "hiding" the Ask Toolbar in the installer to trip up the parental types who have been told^H^H^H^H trained to always update Java whenever it asks, to prevent a recurrence of last years embarrassing outbreak of Browser hijacking with porn links.

Watch the skies: SPACE HEDGEHOG plunges to Earth in Oxfordshire

Narlaquin
Black Helicopters

First the Playmonaut, and now CASSiE. I think someone, or SOMETHING, is kidnapping the cream of Dear Old Blighty's Astronauts, in a sort of low budget, toy based but real life version of You Only Live Twice.

Ofcom: Fancy running a temporary HD Freeview TV channel?

Narlaquin
Boffin

Here's what I want to see

What would it take to have a Feeview HD channel dedicated to Science and Quality Documentaries? Surely the BBC could open their archives properly:

Striping Life on Earth and the rest of the Attenborough Classics, Ken Clarke's Civilization, Cosmos, Horizon, The Ascent of Man, Old Open University content, Anything by James Burke. Throw in NASA TV rocket launches, Crystal Maze, Black Adder, The Great Egg Race, and the complete works of Oliver Postgate & Peter Firmin.

Original Content would be Tomorrow's World footage, with a retrospective from 30 years later.

Admittedly the adverts would have be the same as everything else - Are Online Bingo and Compensation Lawyers really that lucrative that they can subside every single TV channel?

Microsoft licence cops kick in TWICE as many customers' doors as rivals

Narlaquin
Facepalm

Re: Install Linux and let 'em come

Where I work, Excel is for those who don't know what the "Word" icon looks like.

Pasadena to party hardy as Martian landing looms

Narlaquin
Alien

Re: UK TV?

Have a look at Phil Plait's Bad Astronomy site for webby links. I'll be doing the same at 6am

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2012/08/05/reminder-curiosity-lands-tonight/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+BadAstronomyBlog+%28Bad+Astronomy%29

is a linkfest.

<----- Just because

Google Maps takes shelter from the British summer

Narlaquin
Coat

Liberty 7

Liberty 7? ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercury-Redstone_4 )

I don't think we're in Kansas (Cosmosphere and Space Center ) any more, Toto.

Mine's the one with the Ruby Slippers.

Approaching space object 'artificial, not asteroid' says NASA

Narlaquin
Alien

Not the first time, HOPEFULLY won't be the last

Article from 2002 about Apollo 12 (from 1969) booster in orbit after 30+ years. T

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn2790-orbit-shows-second-moon-may-be-apollo-junk.html

Pretty spirograph-esque animation of Apollo 12's orbit:

http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/j002e3/j002e3.mpg

Apollo Boosters were also sent into orbits that would cause them to hit the moon, a couple of them missed. Any other launch vehicle booster could still be out there from one of the many satellite launches we've had in the last 50 years.

Want nips like church coat pegs? Click here

Narlaquin
Coat

Church Coat Pegs?

Surely "Chapel Hat Pegs"? Church Coat Pegs are used for the icon

Scareware scams ride the back of killer whale tragedy

Narlaquin
Unhappy

Not the first time

Having a QI kind of moment:

Despite the name there are no verified reports of a Killer Whale deliberately killing a human in the wild (Yeah, Yeah, Kayakers may have come too close in the wild, and be hit (accidentally) or caught in the turbulence as the Orca dived / breached. In captivity however... This is the fourth report I've heard of: This whale has actually killed before, in Canada.

At least one of the other killings was (anecdotally) following a "rehearsal": One whale breaching in the back (larger, non display) tank and landing on another. This is not natural behaviour.

It would be interesting to know if any "rehearsal" took place for this, and whether anything in the whales training / husbandry / daily interactions with Mrs Brancheau had caused it to develop animosity towards her.

These magnificent creatures are Intelligent: They can plan; they can also abort pregnancies spontaneously if they percieve the tank to be too crowded: They can also choose an Orca to commit suicide (not the correct word) if another adult is added to an already crowded tank.

Wrists playing up? You're shagging too much

Narlaquin
Go

@ AC - Cure

I believe that permission is known as the Starfish, allegedly very orgasmic for the lady. It's also a rollover from / to the spoons positions.

Could any member of the "Scarlet" team provide confirmation ?

Reg hack beats 'Belle de Jour' sex rap

Narlaquin
Welcome

Oblig

I am now posting a comment to an article by Andrew Orlowski.

Dammit. Do I get half an Internet Point for it being about Andrew Orlowski?

Wikipedia sued for publishing convicted murderer's name

Narlaquin
Joke

@AC - oh, wah, wah

>> I murdered someone and now i want my privacy back. well, yeah, it was some years ago, and i'm not denying i did it, but what the hey;

You are Glenn Beck and I claim my £5

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/11/10/beck_domain/

Google music search thingy revealed

Narlaquin
Megaphone

@AC: Classic.

>> dum du du du du da du dum di da dum da da da dom

That's "Ode to Joy" from Beethoven's Ninth.

Blizzard: Game designers aren't Shakespeare

Narlaquin
Pirate

Boon or Bane?

>> Another was sloppy collection quests — something that's too often the boon of gamers.

Surely that should be the bane of gamers?

I recently completed the Green Hills of Stranglethorn quest. At level 80. It's a level 30 quest: to collect a dozen or so pages of a book. The pages come from dead humanoids all over the area. It's not uncommon for a player to have stacks and stacks of pages and have one missing.

I bought all mine from the Auction Houses, figuring that spending 10 gold to collect the pages was a better investment of my time and money than slaughtering every single NPC I came across.

It was quite a fun read though. And I bet there aren't more than 100 people on any given server who've taken the time to read the damn thing.

Pirate flag for the Bloodsail Admiral.

McKinnon suffers further legal setback in extradition fight

Narlaquin
Thumb Down

In the interests of fairness...

Could we have a comment from a USian please? I think that Aaron "Data Mein" Kempf should be actively solicited for his opinion on this matter.

Wal-Mart pressured into tune keys life support

Narlaquin
Pirate

This is excellent.

Paradoxically, I think that Wal-Marts decision is the correct one. This is making DRM into a burden for the retailer, as well as the extant burden on the poor deluded fools that bought this music.

Defeating the DRM is trivial to do; I think we're all in agreement over that. It's also illegal to do so under the DMCA. This is an unpopular law that has criminalised something that should never have been a crime. If Wal-Mart were to advise their customers to circumvent the copy-protection, they would be encouraging their customers to commit a crime. That's clearly wrong.

Those servers should remain up and running, and remain an obvious burden for ever. Like a corpse in a gibbet at the crossroads at midnight; This is what happens if you play with DRM: you have to keep supporting it for ever.

mu-wa-ha-ha-ha-ha. <Crash of Thunder>

Dial 'M' for Microsoft's new programming language

Narlaquin
Joke

Oslo?

How's Oslo pronounced? Like Oh-Slow ?

Channel 4 in Heathrow Playmobil reconstruction shocker

Narlaquin
Pirate

I'm not quite following the story...

I'm not quite following the story: I think a Playmobil reconstruction of Channel 4 editors meeting Advert Creating wonks and the latter demonstrating a story board of the advert would help.

And the crew of the Good Ship Navratilova would have to be there at the lunchtime pitch in the Ivy.

And Optimus Prime, the Devil Dog and Ms Hilton, naturally.

Serial troll bitchslaps Reg hack

Narlaquin
Go

Hmmmm

That's 33 comments AToW, Hitler mentioned in the FotW, and not one person has called him "Data Mein Kempf".

Nor has any one responded to the "We saved your asses in WWII" comment with: "If we hadn't taught Squanto to speak English, you guys would have starved to death a long time ago..."

Shameful work there by my fellow commententatorators. Do doubt you're all waiting for the Playmobil piccy of Aaron and his Spitfire at the Battle of Britain. I know that I am.

Judge Dredd smartshell shotguns to hit Iraq in '09

Narlaquin

@Tom Paine / Lewis Page

You're both right. The Schematic of the Lawgiver did show that Heat-Seekers were attached to the barrel, and propelled by the standard GP shell, but in practice this was never shown: all Joe needed to do was shout "Heatseeker!" and the bullet was a Heatseeker.

Lazy Art Droids.

Google takes aim at drunken messaging

Narlaquin
Alien

Not a problem for me...

I don't have the "embarrassing posts to ElReg when drunk" problem. I simply change my username to "amanfromMars" and I'm good to go.

Hammer Films has risen from the grave

Narlaquin
Unhappy

Quatermass Experiment

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Quatermass-Experiment-Brian-Donlevy/dp/B00008IAUZ

It's out of print (or whatever the DVD equivalent is).

Royal Society says goodbye to creationism row vicar

Narlaquin
Paris Hilton

Wrong Result

The Royal Society should have refused his resignation.

His choice of language was poor, and there was much confusion as to what he meant, but IMHO he was advocating that teachers should address the matter of creationism, and demonstrate why it isn't good science (or even science). This would have helped stimulate critical thinking, debate, the different standards of evidence, and the full implications of what accepting creationism means in terms of physics, biology, chemistry, geology and all the rest.

As it is now, his resignation becomes "Proof" (Proofiness?) that science hates religion.

Christianity <> Creationism. Any battles of Science v Religion are wrong, they are being described as such in order to appeal to base instincts; Neither side can win, but both sides can be harmed. The actual battle is Creationism v Science. This is one that should be trivial to win, or even to avoid.

The other thing to bear in mind is that Evolution is not addressing how life was created initially, which Creationism is. Don't let the debate turn into that. Technically it is possible (IMHO for small values of "technically") that God created the universe 15 billion years ago, the earth about 6 billion years ago, and then natural selection took over.

Welcome back, Paris Icon.

Ubuntu zoo preps for new arrival

Narlaquin
Linux

15.10 was inspired by Linus

That should be the W*nking Walrus release that Mr Torvalds alluded to when describing Diggers. I assume it's Winking.

Taiwanese firm to sue over armed raid at IFA

Narlaquin
Paris Hilton

Shocked and Horrified

... by the choice of picture. I seem to recall that the Reg photo archives contain a slightly hotter Customs Officer than dear old Hans (pictured). This lady is the Bird on the Beach for all articles of this ilk.

Please rectify the situation. Have a Paris pic while we wait.

Big and bendy e-ink displays on way

Narlaquin
Thumb Up

Nerd-gasm!

Oh gosh, that's cute. It looks like a 1980's chopping board, doesn't have a price, but by 'eck, I want one.

Customs raids tech trade show

Narlaquin
Paris Hilton

Not wishing to tamper with a winning formula, but...

I think blacked-out-eyes customs lady would make a fantastic character for our regular Playmobil Friday cast. I reckon she'd be able to handle Optimus Prime with skill and flair.

Without wishing to make any sort of slight upon her character, but if there were a mutiny aboard the HMS Martina Navratilova, she would end up their new captain. Or nemesis.

Of course El-Reg readers will now leap forward to strike down my ideas as being so wrong. Just watch.

And can we have a Playmobil Friday icon too please? Although Paris is pretty close to being plastic.

Blu Christmas coming, format fans forecast

Narlaquin
Go

@Jodo Kast

Did we really choose HD-DVD over Blu-Ray? I personally decided not to bother, but have you got any links to this great lack of apathy?

I'm happy to bash Sony<spit> with the rest of them, so if you've got some great gossip, then 'fess up.