Posts by Fonant

Perhaps they mean "to the spacebar switch"? So when you press SPACE it short-circuits the power supply, with a presumably-satisfying BANG and puff of magic-pixie smoke?

Quite agree. An interview should not be trying to catch someone out, and it shouldn't be a rigid set of questions either. Start with a scenario and see where the conversation goes.

A good interview should discover what the candidate's thought processes are for solving some problem they haven't come across before. What experience do they have of similar problems? How deep is their understanding of the issues? Do they enjoy problem-solving of this kind? Are they willing to make mistakes and then learn from them? Can they communicate effectively in the problem domain? Would they fit in with the existing team?

This is all human judgement, something that "AI" cannot do, even if it ever does become "intelligent".

Re: Facilitating Access to NCII and CSAM

Grok can't do anything that a skilled artist can't already do in photoshop, it just makes it easier for people to do.

Grok makes it easy, and quick, for anyone to generate realistic abusive images of other people. That is the problem.

I think the phrase was "once the IT systems are in place" not "once the IT systems are fully working"...

Re: If only there was a way to run a separate process...

All based on the critical misunderstanding that LLMs have any sort of Artificial Intelligence. They don't, they're expensive pattern matching machines.

Re: So is anyone actually happy with their bank's digital offerings?

Starling have been good for me. Personal and free business banking, with an API that I use for reconciling with my hand-written book-keeping system.

NatWest has a terrible app, and should generally be avoided, IMHO.

Re: Pilots

My son has just taken delivery of a VR headset for flight simulation. The big monitor on his sim rig is potentially going now...

Plus-addressing sometimes works for this:

[email protected] (commonly delivers to [email protected])

Re: declaring DDoS to be a terrorist activity

Terrorism is bad except when it isn't.

One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter (it's usually men).

See: Nelson Mandela, The Suffragettes (OK, they weren't men), etc.

Re: Random money maker for idiots !!!

Or, perhaps even shop at a specialist store (online or IRL) and actually ask a human for advice if you need it.

I will use Amazon as a search engine for "what products are usually available" and "what are they called?", and then will always buy from a different shop. Amazon's near-monopoly does not need to be encouraged. I'm old enough to remember when they only sold books!

There can be no practical reason why Elon Musk (or anyone else, for that matter) NEEDS this amount of money for living and pleasure.

We have a growing problem in the world: the vast majority of monetary wealth is held by just a few ultra-rich people. This causes two major problems:

1) These people have more financial power than whole countries. So they can easily undermine democracy. Then they can change laws so that they can become even richer. This positive feedback loop is very difficult to break.

2) The money the ultra-rich are hoarding is not available to keep countries' economies working. Whole populations are starved of cash that could otherwise be used to pay for public services, and support for those in need. This is why countries are imposing tax rises on populations who have seen living standards fall.

Hybrid Warfare?

I expect Putin is quietly smirking as Russia's only serious enemy destroys itself from within. Helped enormously by Trump and his love of orange and gold.

Re: Face for Radio

The issue is the false positives (and false negatives).

Re: All we need now...

Zack Polanski is pretty impressive. The Green Party are progressive, tolerant, and socialist. Their membership is booming, so there is hope.

Re: "the AI making so many decisions"

I suspect it isn't the "AI" making the decisions, but the websites and services simply applying defaults.

Otherwise, it's all just highly plausible bullshit. I wouldn't trust it to plan an expensive holiday!

Yeah, I'm quite surprised that Ofcom is still making a noise about this. Surely they realise they haven't a hope of extracting any money from 4chan? Would be much better for Ofcom to quietly let this "investigation" get forgotten, and focus on investigations where they do have some legal power.

Major was terrible at media appearances, but actually generated some good policies. That was back in the day when politics was still steered by logic and evidence. Brown also had some good ideas.

The waste-of-space Johnson killed off the use of logic, truth, and consistency, and so killed off the Tory party too. There were still sensible Tories around, but Johnson made sure they all left or got kicked out.

Labour seem to think that it's a Good Idea to pander to noisy idiots, tabloid newspapers, and the ultra-rich. So they've forgotten when they're for. They needed to pump big investments into public services, ASAP, but they're apparently happy to let services crash and burn. Schools, hospitals, GPs, prisons, the legal system, transport, water, power, all struggling to survive. We once were a civilised nation.

I'm sure Farage and his xenophobic fascists will sort it all out! /s

I'm hoping that Zack and the Greens can pull off an election win. He's certainly not afraid of Farage and the right.

Re: "fueled by Windows 11 transition and the need to replace an ageing installed base"

Anecdotally, quite a large number of people are already thinking of switching to Linux. Well, certainly more than zero: I have regular requests now for assistance and advice with going Windows 10 to Linux.

My initial advice is to make a bootable USB stick with Linux Mint, and try it out before installing it. The next steps are more tricky, though. Installing involves dual boot, or careful work with disks and partitions, and that gets fiddly to explain. People tend not to have backups of their documents.

So this could be a Good Thing, as people start to take Linux seriously, and discover that it's at least as workable as Microsoft Windows. Even a shift of 10% of home PCs to Linux would provide some much-needed competition in the market.

Re: When you work for the man, you work for the man

This is why advertising is SO important to Capitalism. Without the indoctrination that we all have to keep buying shiny things, we could all relax a bit, work a bit, and enjoy life.

Stop watching and reading adverts, cut right down on the "news", and life becomes much nicer.

Re: I expect to see a commensurate growth in JLR's profits

Perhaps "once world-leading automotive sector" would be fair?

We do still have Aston Martin, Morgan, Ariel, Briggs, Caterham, McClaren, Ginetta, Noble and Wrightbus with headquarters in the UK.