Nice to see someone mention this. I thought I'd been zapped in from an alternative universe where everybody knew there were 2 (Yeah, count 'em, 2!) movies in the 70's: Spiderman and Spiderman Strikes Back. I've not seen in any media about this film anything about the originals, only the usual crap about "comic books"...
I also remember Kenny Everett (gay ex-Radio 1 DJ turned comic, now dead) doing a sketch around that time where he (as Spiderman) climbs in a 20 storey window into a gents and then discovers he has no flies (geddit!) and subsequently wets his costume.
Ahh, happy memories, when Mars Bars cost less than 10p...
I pay for several channels (some of which I can't even receive) which have ZERO commercials, apart from their own "watch this programme on Friday" type. I don't have a choice in paying, it's the law. As a "benefit" of that payment I can receive two other channels (out of the three available) that DO have advertising, but never watch the ads anyway. Zero money goes from me to the advertisers. Why would they go out of business? Only if they are relying on the ad revenue. Channels that charge for content AND shove ads in your face are the worst. They're getting a double slice of the pie for no perceived benefit to the consumer and should be stamped out.
Noone is saying "I want everything for free". Paying for content is a good idea. Paying to be told what you can and cannot watch is not. Paying for shit and then told you don't have a say in it is not.
P.S. There's also the "Off" button. How many ads are watched when the TV is off? None. Fuck 'em. It's the consumer's choice to increase their electricity bill. Not the broadcasters.
Define a "machine". I've got an official copy of Windows 95 that I originally had on a 486DX4-100. I upgraded it to a P233, changing the case while I was at it. The only thing that remained of the original was the hard drives and monitor. I then donated it to a school when I upgraded further. I paid for Windows, I'm keeping it. The school didn't want it, they already had loads of copies. They just wanted hardware. Having a finely tuned Win95 installation (oxymoron I know) was icing on the cake for them. Did I break this "legal requirement"? No. It was mine to do what I liked with and fsck off M$ if they think differently.
Whatever. I can't get digital anyway as the local transmitter is fucked (no, I don't want a satellite dish on my house, it would blow away in the next light breeze) and they can't be arsed to upgrade it so I'm paying a premium for channels I can't receive in the first place.
...do you think all british TVs are encoded
with some viewing control chip?
With the utter failure of ITV Digital, what is to stop the Govt. getting together with the BBC and PAL TV manufacturers to have exactly this hardware inside all TVs / digiboxen and then ensure the original digiboxen don't work with the new system? It's all about control.
£100 quid a year? Yeah that really breaks the bank doesn't it.
Yes it does, especially as it's £115 per year for the privilege of watching two crap channels. Oh, and other digital channels from the BBC have a subscription charge as well. Not to mention that you get an oh-so-generous discount of about £20 if you're registered blind.
Only watch videos but haven't desoldered the RF (you connect through it rather than using a SCART, if you have one)? Tough. Cough up. You can receive transmission therefore you pay. That is what sucks about the fee. Consider that there is a subscription to Sky, say £15 a month for a reasonable amount of channels (i.e. more than 4; Channel Snow doesn't count). Total to look at an electronic device in the corner of your room a year is nearly £300. How happy are you now?
Not at all. It already happens (both ways) and the trade is protected by obfuscation between the corporations that are allied to DoD and the government that wants to keep the trade going, no matter what the cost to the sweatshop workers in the Third World country may be. The UK is good at doing this too (to counteract any "US hater!" posts). Read Private Eye and enjoy...
Used that for ages. Note carefully how this retard site redirects to: http://www.nytimes.com// upon successful login (maybe because it looks symmetrical).
My installation of Win95 outlived my PC (motherboard fritzed). I'd juggled the registry tons of times, tweaked it to be fast as f*** for a 486 DX4-100 (until I installed IE4 with Active Desktop, then it ran like a sloth in jam) and NEVER had to rebuild it from first installation. Not bad for an M$ OS to not need a reinstall for 5 years considering Win98 is a heap of shit. Oh, and I had shedloads of s/w installed and running (normally simultaneously) through multiple desktop software and USB to top it off and the only thing that seemed slow was downloading anything through dial-up, apart from obvious stuff like rendering.
Mind you, I upgraded to a 1GHz machine with 2KServer so it all became moot...
PLEASE signup to BTOpenwoe, we need better competition in this country, and I for one won't mourn the loss of a massively overcharging crap company with naff customer support. It's easier to find out what's wrong with the BT ADSL network by going to ADSLGuide rather than calling BT directly.
Latest quote (after they had admitted before to port throttling) to customer enquiring if pcAnywhere ports were disabled / throttled: "Erm, we believe that they are not throttled". They daren't admit it or they'd get hit with litigation, but do it all the same and lose you in the system and charge you £40 a month for the privilege.
"It's (SMS) a lot less intrusive than a phone call since it doesn't demand the receivers attention RIGHT NOW. It's quiet and more private, you can write and read SMS's anywhere without disturbing other people or other people disturbing you"
Been on a bus / train lately? SMS is BLOODY intrusive as most clueless Joe Sixpacks (we call them kids here) have their volume set to max and that annoying pseudo-Morse beeping by default. Even worse, they have to LOOK at it to realise it is a message (duh, the thing's beeping in a particular manner, wtf do you think it is) for the entirety of the sodding beeping. Get that 20 times in 5 minutes and you'll find you alter your perspective of what intrusive is. BIPBIPBIP BEEP BEEP BIPBIPBIP
BIPBIPBIP BEEP BEEP BIPBIPBIP (press the button, THAT button, THE GREEN ONE YOU IDIOT, AAAAAAAGGGHHHHH PRESS IT NOW!!!)
As to writing SMS without disturbing ppl the same annoyance remains: Button beeps bloody loudly every time it's pressed (and, it seems, twice as loud for the backspace). This has got to be worse than the "I'm just passing Gatwick, darling" crowd...
I'll third that. Biggest bonus is that they use euros (plus they now do.info domains) so the exchange rate is fantastic:
12 euros = 10 dollars (approx)
10 dollars = 8 pounds sterling
8 pounds for a domain? When others are charging 30 pounds+ for one? And it's totally yours? And they don't spam you? Can't be bad.
Any store that refuses to redeem any software (media) that I buy from them that I return for whatever reason with the seal broken (incorrect packaging, crappy copy, incomprehensible or offensive / unagreed EULA etc) is liable to a major legal kicking. I had to open the thing to discover the fault and now I don't get a comeback? Uh-uh. Not happening.
If they can shrinkwrap a returned CD they can put plastic round a cardboard box. I'm not saying they should refund my money as they don't have to do that, just a credit note so I can then pick out another item for equivalent (or greater) value (and pay the difference, should there be any) so I can do this again.
Reread "1984" and understand that the political state portrayed therein was brought about by (war|security issues|terrorism). The people wanted to have some security, they got it, there was a press for more security until the Big Brother continual surveillance no privacy thoughtcrime society was created. Once this had happened, there was no way to revert without those in power wishing to relinquish their control. Surprise surprise, they didn't want to.
Allowing this to occur in the real world after such a dire warning (and this was from over 50 years ago) is a sure sign that the human race is fucked. What the majority wants is normally not what the majority needs, but what the majority has been indoctrinated to believe that they want, and any dissenters are considered the enemy.
Plus a million microbes wouldn't take up much room, or much time to create (little bleeders breed like rabbits), so a simple mash tun with billions of the critters inside could be cost effective quite quickly. Maybe Budweiser can lend me one as they seem to have enough already.
As I see it, it can't as there they have made no promises that the data will be securely held, will not be sold on without permission etc. They can attempt to claim "Oh, your information is being held in UK, but we'll transfer it to US 'cos our servers are better there" because that will mean the information is then subject to all the happy marketing scams that DPA was designed to protect against with no recourse. If Microsoft wants my information they can bloody well pay me for it. I still won't give it though (unless it was a non-zeo integer followed by several zeros before the decimal point amount and the currency was sterling).
Who needs a passport anyway? What fantastic net-related content is available to these enlightened (l)users who have one? Is it similar to the bonus shit I can receive just because I have ADSL ("Watch this video of someone you don't care about singing a corporate created song that is utter shite at a higher resolution than those poxy 56K modem users")? I don't want it anyway...
Can't wait. However they would have to pass through _someone's_ territorial waters:
(lets say it's British waters)
British radio operator: Identify yourself and state your business, unidentified vessel.
Chinese radio operator: Oh, we just going for little cruise, just passing through, no need to worry.
B: I say again, identify yourself and state your business.
C: We Chinese military vessel on official manoevres
B: Here?
C: Yes
B: In our waters?
C:...Yes
B: Did you ask first?
C:...Yes?
B: Who?
C: Err, the Queen? <wincing sound>
B: A likely story
C: Yeah, honest, she said it okay. She fine lady
B: You're after that Sealand place aren't you? Just because they have a site that says Mao Tse Tung is a twat. Well, I'm sorry, you're not allowed through.
C: Chairman Mao is no twat British dog! You rue the day you impugn the glorious leader! Now we at war!
Now they'll have to worry about someone cutting off their power
They make their own.
their data lines
Yeah, us Brits are so dumb we didn't think of that one. This is a MILITARY bunker not some "lets keep the bureaucrats safe" hole. Communications are paramount.
their cable TV
Now you're trolling deliberately
their phones
See above
and they'll also have to worry about Islamic militants hired to work on the plumbing and flooding them out
Or maybe the contractors who built the thing would have been checked out by MoD before they were allowed within 5 miles of the place...
Modding this "Insightful" is like calling Houston dry.
It may come as a surprise to most/.ers but not everyone has to live by US laws. As far as I am concerned DCMA can fuck off. No way is that a fair way of dealing with potential "violations". This is a classic example of "guilty until proven innocent". If I get annoying mails/call from some dickweed shyster claiming to represent some company's interest and that I am undermining the "wholesome" image of that company by having a inflammatory article/post on my website then they can also fuck off. Any toilet dweller that gets my site taken down without MY authorisation will receive a summons from me pretty sharpish. My freedom of speech is not limited by corporate controlled legislation or anything as contentious as the First Amendment. If I want to say something, I say something. If people have a problem with it, that is _their_ problem, not mine. I am beholden to certain discretions, so I wouldn't go around bandying them to all and sundry on an open forum but that is my choice. Freedom of speech means just that. Three words. Not "except where it pisses a conglomerate off, or on the third Tuesday of the month when the wind is from the north-north-west" or whatever other bollocks people come up with.
Slashdot Mirror
Nice to see someone mention this. I thought I'd been zapped in from an alternative universe where everybody knew there were 2 (Yeah, count 'em, 2!) movies in the 70's: Spiderman and Spiderman Strikes Back. I've not seen in any media about this film anything about the originals, only the usual crap about "comic books"...
I also remember Kenny Everett (gay ex-Radio 1 DJ turned comic, now dead) doing a sketch around that time where he (as Spiderman) climbs in a 20 storey window into a gents and then discovers he has no flies (geddit!) and subsequently wets his costume.
Ahh, happy memories, when Mars Bars cost less than 10p...
Bullshit.
Total fscking bullshit
I pay for several channels (some of which I can't even receive) which have ZERO commercials, apart from their own "watch this programme on Friday" type. I don't have a choice in paying, it's the law. As a "benefit" of that payment I can receive two other channels (out of the three available) that DO have advertising, but never watch the ads anyway. Zero money goes from me to the advertisers. Why would they go out of business? Only if they are relying on the ad revenue. Channels that charge for content AND shove ads in your face are the worst. They're getting a double slice of the pie for no perceived benefit to the consumer and should be stamped out.
Noone is saying "I want everything for free". Paying for content is a good idea. Paying to be told what you can and cannot watch is not. Paying for shit and then told you don't have a say in it is not.
P.S. There's also the "Off" button. How many ads are watched when the TV is off? None. Fuck 'em. It's the consumer's choice to increase their electricity bill. Not the broadcasters.
Indeed. Just a shame that the renders aren't publicly available...
Define a "machine". I've got an official copy of Windows 95 that I originally had on a 486DX4-100. I upgraded it to a P233, changing the case while I was at it. The only thing that remained of the original was the hard drives and monitor. I then donated it to a school when I upgraded further. I paid for Windows, I'm keeping it. The school didn't want it, they already had loads of copies. They just wanted hardware. Having a finely tuned Win95 installation (oxymoron I know) was icing on the cake for them. Did I break this "legal requirement"? No. It was mine to do what I liked with and fsck off M$ if they think differently.
Whatever. I can't get digital anyway as the local transmitter is fucked (no, I don't want a satellite dish on my house, it would blow away in the next light breeze) and they can't be arsed to upgrade it so I'm paying a premium for channels I can't receive in the first place.
Nah, I use the free paper that gets shoved through my letterbox. My plumbers fees are a bit high though...
...do you think all british TVs are encoded with some viewing control chip?
With the utter failure of ITV Digital, what is to stop the Govt. getting together with the BBC and PAL TV manufacturers to have exactly this hardware inside all TVs / digiboxen and then ensure the original digiboxen don't work with the new system? It's all about control.
£100 quid a year? Yeah that really breaks the bank doesn't it.
Yes it does, especially as it's £115 per year for the privilege of watching two crap channels. Oh, and other digital channels from the BBC have a subscription charge as well. Not to mention that you get an oh-so-generous discount of about £20 if you're registered blind.
Only watch videos but haven't desoldered the RF (you connect through it rather than using a SCART, if you have one)? Tough. Cough up. You can receive transmission therefore you pay. That is what sucks about the fee. Consider that there is a subscription to Sky, say £15 a month for a reasonable amount of channels (i.e. more than 4; Channel Snow doesn't count). Total to look at an electronic device in the corner of your room a year is nearly £300. How happy are you now?
Okay, rather extreme example...
Not at all. It already happens (both ways) and the trade is protected by obfuscation between the corporations that are allied to DoD and the government that wants to keep the trade going, no matter what the cost to the sweatshop workers in the Third World country may be. The UK is good at doing this too (to counteract any "US hater!" posts). Read Private Eye and enjoy...
Or even:
user: slashdot_effect
pass: slashdot
Used that for ages. Note carefully how this retard site redirects to:
http://www.nytimes.com//
upon successful login (maybe because it looks symmetrical).
Mind you, I upgraded to a 1GHz machine with 2KServer so it all became moot...
Latest quote (after they had admitted before to port throttling) to customer enquiring if pcAnywhere ports were disabled / throttled: "Erm, we believe that they are not throttled".
They daren't admit it or they'd get hit with litigation, but do it all the same and lose you in the system and charge you £40 a month for the privilege.
"It's (SMS) a lot less intrusive than a phone call since it doesn't demand the receivers attention RIGHT NOW. It's quiet and more private, you can write and read SMS's anywhere without disturbing other people or other people disturbing you"
Been on a bus / train lately? SMS is BLOODY intrusive as most clueless Joe Sixpacks (we call them kids here) have their volume set to max and that annoying pseudo-Morse beeping by default. Even worse, they have to LOOK at it to realise it is a message (duh, the thing's beeping in a particular manner, wtf do you think it is) for the entirety of the sodding beeping. Get that 20 times in 5 minutes and you'll find you alter your perspective of what intrusive is.
BIPBIPBIP BEEP BEEP BIPBIPBIP
BIPBIPBIP BEEP BEEP BIPBIPBIP (press the button, THAT button, THE GREEN ONE YOU IDIOT, AAAAAAAGGGHHHHH PRESS IT NOW!!!)
As to writing SMS without disturbing ppl the same annoyance remains: Button beeps bloody loudly every time it's pressed (and, it seems, twice as loud for the backspace). This has got to be worse than the "I'm just passing Gatwick, darling" crowd...
I'll third that. Biggest bonus is that they use euros (plus they now do .info domains) so the exchange rate is fantastic:
12 euros = 10 dollars (approx)
10 dollars = 8 pounds sterling
8 pounds for a domain? When others are charging 30 pounds+ for one? And it's totally yours? And they don't spam you? Can't be bad.
Does anyone know what the "-W" means?
Widescreen - so you can frag in letterbox format
Any store that refuses to redeem any software (media) that I buy from them that I return for whatever reason with the seal broken (incorrect packaging, crappy copy, incomprehensible or offensive / unagreed EULA etc) is liable to a major legal kicking. I had to open the thing to discover the fault and now I don't get a comeback? Uh-uh. Not happening.
If they can shrinkwrap a returned CD they can put plastic round a cardboard box. I'm not saying they should refund my money as they don't have to do that, just a credit note so I can then pick out another item for equivalent (or greater) value (and pay the difference, should there be any) so I can do this again.
Reread "1984" and understand that the political state portrayed therein was brought about by (war|security issues|terrorism). The people wanted to have some security, they got it, there was a press for more security until the Big Brother continual surveillance no privacy thoughtcrime society was created. Once this had happened, there was no way to revert without those in power wishing to relinquish their control. Surprise surprise, they didn't want to.
Allowing this to occur in the real world after such a dire warning (and this was from over 50 years ago) is a sure sign that the human race is fucked. What the majority wants is normally not what the majority needs, but what the majority has been indoctrinated to believe that they want, and any dissenters are considered the enemy.
Therefore, I am the enemy.
Plus a million microbes wouldn't take up much room, or much time to create (little bleeders breed like rabbits), so a simple mash tun with billions of the critters inside could be cost effective quite quickly. Maybe Budweiser can lend me one as they seem to have enough already.
As I see it, it can't as there they have made no promises that the data will be securely held, will not be sold on without permission etc. They can attempt to claim "Oh, your information is being held in UK, but we'll transfer it to US 'cos our servers are better there" because that will mean the information is then subject to all the happy marketing scams that DPA was designed to protect against with no recourse. If Microsoft wants my information they can bloody well pay me for it. I still won't give it though (unless it was a non-zeo integer followed by several zeros before the decimal point amount and the currency was sterling).
Who needs a passport anyway? What fantastic net-related content is available to these enlightened (l)users who have one? Is it similar to the bonus shit I can receive just because I have ADSL ("Watch this video of someone you don't care about singing a corporate created song that is utter shite at a higher resolution than those poxy 56K modem users")? I don't want it anyway...
British radio operator: Identify yourself and state your business, unidentified vessel. ...Yes ...Yes?
Chinese radio operator: Oh, we just going for little cruise, just passing through, no need to worry.
B: I say again, identify yourself and state your business.
C: We Chinese military vessel on official manoevres
B: Here?
C: Yes
B: In our waters?
C:
B: Did you ask first?
C:
B: Who?
C: Err, the Queen? <wincing sound>
B: A likely story
C: Yeah, honest, she said it okay. She fine lady
B: You're after that Sealand place aren't you? Just because they have a site that says Mao Tse Tung is a twat. Well, I'm sorry, you're not allowed through.
C: Chairman Mao is no twat British dog! You rue the day you impugn the glorious leader! Now we at war!
etc.,etc.
Perhaps you mean Weekly World News. News of the World is a gutterpress red-top from Blighty out on Sundays.
Now they'll have to worry about someone cutting off their power
They make their own.
their data lines
Yeah, us Brits are so dumb we didn't think of that one. This is a MILITARY bunker not some "lets keep the bureaucrats safe" hole. Communications are paramount.
their cable TV
Now you're trolling deliberately
their phones
See above
and they'll also have to worry about Islamic militants hired to work on the plumbing and flooding them out
Or maybe the contractors who built the thing would have been checked out by MoD before they were allowed within 5 miles of the place...
Modding this "Insightful" is like calling Houston dry.
It may come as a surprise to most /.ers but not everyone has to live by US laws. As far as I am concerned DCMA can fuck off. No way is that a fair way of dealing with potential "violations". This is a classic example of "guilty until proven innocent". If I get annoying mails/call from some dickweed shyster claiming to represent some company's interest and that I am undermining the "wholesome" image of that company by having a inflammatory article/post on my website then they can also fuck off. Any toilet dweller that gets my site taken down without MY authorisation will receive a summons from me pretty sharpish. My freedom of speech is not limited by corporate controlled legislation or anything as contentious as the First Amendment. If I want to say something, I say something. If people have a problem with it, that is _their_ problem, not mine. I am beholden to certain discretions, so I wouldn't go around bandying them to all and sundry on an open forum but that is my choice. Freedom of speech means just that. Three words. Not "except where it pisses a conglomerate off, or on the third Tuesday of the month when the wind is from the north-north-west" or whatever other bollocks people come up with.