Posts by Jon

@ Tidelocked

"Dusty material spiralling in from outer Moons hits Iapetus head-on, and causes the forward-facing side of Iapetus to look different than the rest of the Moon."

Hmm.. This comment would seem to suggest that the moon is indeed tidelocked to Saturn, with the dark side leading the orbit.

All sides of the moon are exposed to equal amounts of Solar radiation, however dark matter (As opposed to "Dark Matter") absorbs heat faster than lighter coloured matter, suggesting that the dark side of the moon (roll over Pink Floyd) has a greater temperature fluctuation than the lighter spots, meaning that over the billions of years of the moons existance, water gets vapourised to a greater extent on the dark side, and slowly over time, that side of the moon gets darker and the trailing edge gets lighter (Ice?) in a sort of global warming catastrophe. More Ice accumulates on the trailing edge, more dark matter accumulates on the leading edge until it gets to the point where, despite the temperature fluctuations brought about by exposure and lack of exposure to sunlight ice cannot form on the leading edge because it's always too warm and does not melt on the trailing edge because it's always too cold.. Closest example I can come up with on earth is a Glacier in the Alps that does not melt in the summer months to the point that it dissappears entirely, compared to regions of a similar latitude where Ice almost never forms (Death Valley California?)

@ Daniel van Niekerk way up top...

Do you really mean that? Are Europeans really so stoopid for not wanting to furnish someone elses pockets for something they don't want or need??

I am a Linux user for a simple reason.. I don't need Windoze in my life.. I work with SAP and Sun servers, so using a windoze machine is not only painful, it's confusing too.. So why must I be forced to buy a laptop with an operating system that I will never use, just because Bill Gates tells me I should.. who is he anyhow?? Noone to me.

Then there's my friend who is an MSDN subscriber, he has OS's coming out of his ears.. Why should he pay for one more??

Well done the French!

Bah...

She's an ugly munter, and with those barins they should have shot her anyway and done her a favour!!

I mean, how can you defend going into an airport with something that "LOOKS" like a home made bomb.. A circuit board with flashing lights and a gob of Playdoh is exactly what you see in films like "Speed" when they're trying to make a "this is the man with the bomb" moment, I'm an electronics engineer, and excuse me for not being able to tell the difference.. The police DID NOT over react.. Her actions were pretty much the same as going into an airport and Yelling "I've got a bomb" at the top of your voice.. Expect to be handcuffed at the very least, and possibly dead!!

All the English yelling about American over reaction should remember a young Brazillian man who got dead for fare avoidance!! Yes but that was just after the underground bombings.. And this ain't so long after some idiots drove two jumbo jets into the World Trade Centre.. Apparently they took over the planes using Stanley knives and toe clippers!

If you're going to blame anyone apart from this idiot for not being able to walk into airports wearing what looks like a bomb at first glance, blame the Islamist fundimentalists.. Otherwise SHUT the F**K up and let the police do the best they can at protecting you and me from nutters and loons!

What a pain...

UK Customers only :-( Looks like I'll have to wait 3 months and pick up one of the cheap ones on ebay when the glut strikes!

@ Everyone

My my how the troll population is growing!! (OK, that's been said before) but it does make me laugh.. You're a SUCH troll.. No you're a retarded troll.. Nah nicky nah nah... Grow up kiddies..

On the dolphin front.. Why are we worried? If the dolphin is flying at M6 10m above C level, it may be unhappy, but then it's going to an untimely death in the explosion 90 seconds later anyhow..

And I'm sure that the Chinese wouldn't be as cruel to Dolphins as the British would be to Australians! After, it's a bit much to put them on a 2 hour flight back down under and then blow them up when they get there.. Did Tony ever get round to suing or was he put on the fist Beta phase test flight that was running Windows for Missiles?? That'll be the one that has just booted up and then immediatly crashes.. Oh, hang on, that's all of them!! Or more likely the Chinese misslie developers are open source developers and so long as you agree not to use the missiles for profit, they'll let you have the blue prints..

Oh god, these jokes(?) are getting too geeky.. Time to stop.

You're a big fat troll.. No, you're a republican troll, not you're a democrat troll and the reason why everythings horrid.. No, you're a big.... Oh SHUT UP!!!

Yeah.. B.lls..t!

My wife works in intensive care here in Switzerland.. She is hands on to the most sensitive instruments in the hospital.. She also texts me every night and occasionally calls me..

The hospitals only have phone bans on the ward for visitors and insist that the patients have their phones switched to silent because it disturbs the other patients. However there has never been a single instance of equipment failure in the whole time my wife has worked there.. 13 years.. that can be traced to mobile phone use..

Obviously nobody is allowed within 3cm of the equipment without being properly trained because that's just daft, and leaving a phone on top of the ventilator is just criminal, but a ventilator failing from 3 metres is a reason to ban that poorly designed ventilator rather than a reason to ban mobile phones.

There's more than a few dodgy handshakes and palms being greased here I do believe!

@ Alex

On each of your points(?)..

Very easily..

If my pay was off by 12.5% I'd be a bit miffed (or maybe not if we were talking + rather than -)

What if we don't want to "Study a bit of classical mechanics"?? What are you going to do about it huh.. Wanna step outside? ;-)

The paper in front of me is blank.. What are you talking about?

Aww.. please do.. More cannon fodder!

Although I studied Applied Physics at Uni, I don't consciously use it in my day to day life. Physicists have a reputation of being boring, so I tell them I studied gynacology, which raises a few eyebrows (sadly that's all!), and with good reason if this is anything to go by, there's guesstimate science, which this article obviously was, but you've come straight in with the usual nit-picking that goes on.. This was an interesting aticle.. Chris was expressing a personal opinion (and he has a point) about something that he's entitled .. If you don't like that, go and live in Iran where you aren't allowed one.

OK, This is getting really obscure

I understand what you might be trying to say Adrian, and you could hardly call me a noob after 15 years in IT, but The Reg is the first place I've come accross comments with that signature, I've come accross lots of other trolls, but never this one, maybe I have not been paying enough attention to inane comments, I don't know..

amanfromMars ismost likely more than one individual.. Probably started out as one person who liked just winding people up, and now other people are trying to ride the wave (I'm Brian and so's me wife!) so I'm not gonna bother googling them 'cos I really have better things to do, honest.. So the rest of your comments have completely gone over my head..

What's with SPAM bot's anyhow.. Having spent a good few hours tweaking mail filters, you can imagine how many SPAM emails I've seen.. I still don't get their point.. Yes, I understand the concept of selling off the percentages, and buying shares, sending millions of SPAM saying these shares are about to hit the roof, and waiting for the shares to rise, but honestly, what's the point of sending an email with an embedded picture and some random text at the end.. How's that going to earn anyone any money? I really am lost in this world where people do seemingly random things just because they can.. SPAM-bots.. Evil pointless things.. Yes, if you're a SPAMmer, you should realise that you're universally hated, that nobody likes you and you have no friends, that your £ or $ or € is tainted and that really you should go and throw yourself off the nearest high precipice!

Die Old or Die Happy

Quite frankly, it's not bulls..t that drinking kills.. But so does old age.. Take your choice, drink yourself to oblivion and die a few years younger, or don't drink, get altzheimers, or arthritis or a miriad of other horrible things that happen to us when we're old, live a few years in an old peoples home feeling lonely and miserable watching the world go by..

Come on, old people have earned the right to choose the easier way out.. Personally, the moment someone tells me that I have to retire, I'm gonna crack open the gin and start smoking cannibis, 'cos anything has to be better than having no purpose to life and sitting back and watching your body go into slow decline.. You'll find me sitting in the corner of the old people's home giggling silly to myself and anyone that will listen.. An yes, I do know what it's like to be a relative of someone who died of lung cancer, my mum did, I'd much rather she'd kicked the bucket while she was pissed or stoned.. And I'm sure she would have too!

@Anon re @John A B

If you'd read his comment rather than blatently thinking you know everything, you'd have realised that he had a valid point.. Or at least though he had.. There's a HUGE difference between paying for a road taxes and paying for some prat to put a 20 year old piece of tat into orbit just because some nerds think it might be cool. I hate "know it all's"

However, that said, if NASA actually start to make a profit, from selling space on the space shuttle to people with space in their heads and space in their wallet who want to get some space in their closets by sending things into space, I'll make some room for them! (Yeah, I was going to put space in there again but my space bar was getting worn out!)

Hooray, I can use google..

At the risk of getting all anal about this(!), according to this web site:

http://www.godchecker.com/pantheon/greek-mythology.php?deity=URANUS

the Greek god is pronounced Ur-a-Nus, which from what I can work out, is as close to the evocative pronounciation as I can imagine, however I have no Greek preople in the viscinity to ask, so I'm off to get a kebab to see it I can gather any corroborrating evidence!

Anyhow, no matter how it's pronounced in other parts of the world, I like the British way, if only because it brings a silly schoolby grin accross my face every time!

My vote goes to the Futurama reference above, despite the fact that I haven't got the slightest clue what the reference made regarding amanfrommars and crack pipes is referring to..

Well somebody had to get upset about Wales!

Of course, this entire article was written to put Welsh people down and the humourist is wearing a white cowl and a pointy hat and burning people on crosses... Not!!

Comeon guys, I get it that labelling people in a derogatory way when you don't like them is bad, but Wales is a neighbour, and what's the world coming to if you can't have a friendly rib at your neighbours?? We call the French Frogs, and they call us Rostbef and can't work out why the English don't find this insulting.. We call the Scots Jocks, which is not my favourite piece of sports wear, but if a cricket ball is heading in the general direction of my nether regions, I'll be glad if I'm wearing one.. We take the mick out of the Irish, call the Dutch Potheads, and complain that all the Germans run out and put their towels round the pool before dawn.. All of them.. Even when they're at home.. Wales has a lot of wide open spaces, inhabited by sheep and coal mines.. The coalmines were all closed by Thatcher so that's probably a bit of a sore point, which leaves the sheep.. Comon guys, stop bleating about how being labled just because the english can't think about anything cleverer than Sheep intimacy.. It's only because we're jealous.. We've got a sense of humour you know.. if a Welsh person actually say something funny to insult the English with, rather than just "English arrogance and lack of respect" then perhaps we'd laugh with you too! We're not trying to hurt anyone with this sense of humour, it's just the way we are.. If we didn't talk about the Welsh like this, we wouldn't talk about Wales at all!

You gets what you pays for...

The idea that individuals and corporate users take what is essentially a free service infrastructure with paid for add ons for granted and put expectations on that service in the same way as you would put expectations on a Telco company that provides you with a service you pay for is ridiculous! It's inconvenient to say the least when a service like this goes down.

Anyone that has been using Skype as an essential part of their work is asking for trouble.. It's useful, but it's free, therefore should be treated with caution.. The weather is free, but I don't expect it to be sunny just because I want to make a barbeque! We take precautions and have backup plans and in the UK, usually everyone ends up eating indoors (especially this summer!) So why do people not have backup plans for when Skype goes down.. It's just pure stupidity not to!

How does "20 mins" make a difference..

to a glue that reaches full strength in 10 seconds? And if he's done this so many times before, then surely he knew how to apply it properly.. He just wanted a pretty Scottish nurse to fiddle with his privates! Hope he got an ogre instead.. or worse.. A male nurse!

Brings a new meaning to getting hard! Ouch! :-)

Theft

What stupid comments "Hacking in of itself shouldn't be a very serious crime either".. why??? You're trying to legitimise what you see as being cool like a grafitti artist saying he was only painting pictures, and then you want to throw the book at theives.

In every sense of the word, hacking is theft and should be treated as such. In any country that's illegal and has been for centries, in Iran you'll get hung for it, so why is anyone surprised that this guy, who broke into "something" and "stole" something that didn't belong to him. In this instance, the thing that was stolen was information.. And in todays world we SHOULD be treating cyber crime with as much force as we do off-net crimes.. Companies lose millions each year through cybercrime, and you don't think it's the fat cats at the top that lose their bonuses over it do you? No, they're off to play golf because that's "real work" to them, it's us poor guys in the IT department that lose ourjobs, see ourworkload double and have to work longer hours because some idiot wants to make a quick buck..

Come on guys, treat other people with the respect you'd like to be treated with, punish theives as theives, and maybe, just maybe, this world will survive long enough to make it to the end of this century without descending into anarchy..