Quicksilver

I cannot take this list seriously as it does not include Quicksilver. I put it at number one. It is quite brilliant and has completely changed how I use my mac. I ignore the Dock and have no desktop icons. I can open any file, program, address, mail recipient or just about anything else with half a dozen keystrokes.

If you have a Mac install it now and soend a few hours playing with it and learning. If you have Ubuntu 10.4 there is a very passable clone.

Gee, thanks

@Gregory Kohs

I had never thought of searching wikipedia for free porn.

Full price

So they pay "the full price excluding tax and surcharges". I hope that means that they get a second meal and doubles all round.

"other countries wanted to maintain secrecy."

Huh! I wonder if the UK is one of the "other countries" The Minister should name names and tell us which countries want to keep the negotiations secret.

Paralysis and death?

That is what happends to people who go on strike in communist countries.

It is open source

So fork it. Or copy the Ubuntu/Debian model. If you don't like what Google is doing: do it better yourself. That is the whole point of free software.

@Brian Miller

Have you actually seen a Linux desktop that is less than five years old? Your ignorance is breathtaking. Download Ubuntu, burn a CD, boot it up and take a tour. I promise you will not have to do any compiling or use sed, awk, grep etc.

My 85 year old non techie mother can do that so I guess you can.

Infection control

If the NHS cannot keep hospitals clean it is not surprising that their computers are also infected.

The price?

The article says "we firmly believe that, at £125, it's damn good value." But the header says the suggested price is £150 and Online Price from £162.15

It would be far more relevant if the author gave his opinion of those prices.

Apple ........ is apparently less moralistic about casino cheating

I do not see how this can be cheating. It may be against the law but that is another matter. It sounds like fair play to me.

Che

Does that mean I am going to have to retire my Che Guevara t-shirt? I suppose I will have to buy the el reg bofh shirt to show that I am still a rebel.

Hollywood

I am waiting for the movie where, no doubt, Wellington will be an American

Easy Soution?

>>Force the driver to pay fines for moving violations before they're allowed to drive away.

That is exactly what they do in Spain - and you get a 30% discount. The alternative is to have the car impounded while you fight the case. Of course this will not work in the future when the fines are issued and collected by computers and their cameras rather than by men in blue.

Tax credit mistakes cost Joe Public £1bn a year

Is that a typo in the heading? Surely it should read

Tax credit mistakes give Joe Public £1bn a year

And can you think of anyone who can spend that money any better?

What happens to The Register's Yahoo! headlines?

¡Like the world of Microsoft they will all be upside down¡¡¡

Properly authorised phone taps should be considered admissible evidence in the courts.

The Government and security forces bitterly resist that idea. The statement is superficially attractive until you consider the other side of the coin. If the wire taps are admissible in court the defence will be entitled to have access to them.

The results of a wire tap could provide evidence of innocence as well as guilt. More importantly the security forces prefer to keep the existence of wire taps secret as it could give a lot of information as to what they know and who they are watching.

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

They have not given up ...

... as computer is called un ordenador and it is very unusual to hear computadora. think that might be a dodgy South Americanism.

violation of policy?

More likely he did use Vista. Surely no serious company permits its staff to use it.

@ Jim Booth

Are you suggesting that "one shred of evidence that someone is up to no good" Is all the police should need to charge a suspect. That would be even more illiberal that what is being suggested!

If El Reg were authoritative

Lester would have tried it out for himself and fed us the facts ... or should that be faces?)

Selecting advantageous measurements

It has always amazed me that the monitor manufacturers stick to the diagonal measurement rather than the more useful surface area.

The difference between 15" and 17" does not sound much and would be much more descriptive if it were in square inches ... reaches for sliderule ... thinks about Pythagoras ... too difficult :))

Show Trial?

Did I miss it or did they forget a trick. Maybe he was in a psychiatric camp instead.

Too predictable

In a place like Cardiff you tend to expect that sort of thing. The headline would have been much better (if less accurate) if it read:

Cops coax half-naked Czech wolfman from Godalming tree

The object of the tax

The idea was to screw the city wheelers and dealers who manipulate their earnings to produce very lowly taxed income, less than his office cleaner one bragged. They have had this route cut off (the poor buggers would now have to pay 18% on their millions). I say "would have to pay" as I am sure that their overpriced lawyers are working on the next dodgy scheme.

The genuine investors in startups will be caught in the crossfire but that is OK, the Government does not care much about them. There will be a windfall for owners of second homes, buy to let investors and all the other needy types so loved by New Labour.

The rest of us who are not paupers will just have to smile and hand over 40% tax.

It won't affect me

I will not go there. For five years I have refused to humiliate myself by going through the US bureaucratic nightmare and deal with gimlet faced thugs who treat every foreigner like a tourist.

I had to pay extra to fly to South America via Madrid rather than change flights in Miami. Maybe I will visit again one day, after they have come to their senses. Could be a long wait!

Crap connectors

".... suggested to make way for a model with a more rugged, resilient MagSafe connector"

And they don't sell replacement connectors. You are supposed to pay £59 for a new power supply each time the crappy connector breaks or the cable burns.

The comments on the device at UK Apple store show the disgraceful quality of the device.