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samwwwblack's JournalVarious rants |
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| Jul. 1st, 2009 @ 07:32 pm Back in Lichfield | |||
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Back in Lichfield, joining the "Real World" after 5 years in uni. Trust me to pick the worst economic crisis in modern times to rejoin it. 2:2 in Computer Interactive Systems MEng. No idea how I managed to achieve that, and even less of an idea where I'm going to use my degree with jobs being so competitive. So yes, back in Lichfield, which seems stupidly quiet compared to Brum; just as people move out it seems :) | |||
| Jun. 8th, 2009 @ 12:05 pm EU and local council elections | |||
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Mood:
It's been a while, and I'm still alive. Uni is done, just awaiting results out next Wednesday. relaxedMusic: Muse - Absolution - Endlessly For those wanting to look in on how little I'm doing, you can go to indenti.ca: http://identi.ca/samwwwblack But on to the boring bit of this post; the local council elections and the EU elections, specifically about the BNP. No, I didn't vote for them. Even if it were illegal to vote against the BNP and they were the only party running, I would add a box with "RON" and vote for him. That aside, I think in the long run it will do our democracy a massive service that the BNP have a county council seat and 2 MEPs now, and I hope they adhere to their policies and apply them in the course of their work. This will mean that these actions, policy decisions, voting record and comments whilst in office will be on record, accessible to the public, for years to come. So when the next vote comes around and the BNP are expecting to make gains, the records of their officials can be held up to demonstrate what a vote for the BNP really means; not a protest vote, not a joke vote, but a vote for a racist and immoral organisation that can't even get people to pose for their promotional material or check what squadron a spitfire belongs to. I think our democracy can handle this low if we learn from it and don't repeat it in the future. Moving away from the BNP and to a general election basis, I honestly think that the next parliament will be a hung one, and that the Conservative and Lib Dems would form a coalition government, based on the slightly softer way the Tories and Lib Dems are talking about each other lately. Whilst I would prefer an all out Lib Dem government, having some cabinet positions would vastly improve the percentage of the vote in the elections afterwards. At the moment unfortunately the Lib Dems have enough mass to be noticed but haven't achieved critical mass to erode the other two main parties' proportions significantly. 5 years ago the Lib Dems were seen as the protest vote party, and since then although the vote is predicted to have fallen (from 22.1% in 2005 to ~19% now) its still up on the 2001 and 1997 elections. Like I said, big enough to be noticed, not enough to generate the momentum to take them into office. I live in hope ;-) | |||
| Oct. 17th, 2008 @ 04:45 pm Store cleaner to aisle 3, store cleaner to aisle 3 | |||
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Mood:
Woopsy, the global economy has had a small accident. pessimisticMusic: Oasis - Little By Little By small, I mean a $1 quadrillion ($1,000 trillion) accident. Just don't worry that the gross domestic product (GDP) of the planet was ~$54 trillion last year. Or put it another way, less than 6% of the current outstanding debt. Not to worry, Super Gordon will sort it out. Just like how his Home Secretary Jaqui Smith has made us safer from terrorists by proposing legislation to record every sender and recipient of every phone call, email, instant message and webpage in the UK. Or, after it was thrown out of the Lords, she has repackaged the 42 day anti-terror detention plans. We can trust them not to abuse it. Honest. Like how RIPA isn't abused by local councils or how they don't use anti-terror and serious crime statute to seize Icelandic bank's assets. No sirree, they won't abuse it. Where you need to monitor someone, including their communications, you go get a warrant. You put your evidence in front of an impartial 3rd party (a judge in this case) and request to gather more personal information that may help the investigation. That way it is open, transparent and not open to abuse. You don't dragnet everything, hoping to catch the criminals. As explanation for this "need", Smith pointed out that technology has moved forward and the statute needs to catch up with it. What she seems to have completely missed is that technology is continually moving forward and will always outpace the law. This uberdatabase will not correctly detect and correlate Tor or Freenet traffic (simply, these two current pieces of technology obfuscate what you do on the net). All the database of connections will show is user A connected to user B, and the rest is lost. The other argument floated was that Skype and other VoIP telephony was a massive intelligence blackhole that needed to be filled; considering that Skype's encryption is non-trivial to break and therefore the conversation cannot be recorded; why is this "problem" being used as the overriding cause to implement this Orwellian legislation when it is demonstrably flawed? Don't worry citizen, object that our hard won personal liberties are being blatantly undermined and you are in league with the terrorists. | |||
| Aug. 11th, 2008 @ 03:53 pm My timing is always off | |||
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Mood:
I wrote a post over two years ago outlining what I thought would happen as the easily accessible crude oil started to run out. If current events are anything to go by, I was optimistic with my 4-5 years to the crunch. contemplativeMusic: Stereophonics - Last Of The Big Time Drinkers It could happen next week. With crude oil recently pushing $150/barrel (up from $85/barrel 12 months ago), various parts of society started to groan under the pressure. Even though crude has dropped to ~$120/barrel, essentials such as eggs, bread, milk and utilities (gas, electricity, water) haven't gone down in price. Whilst the price of crude isn't the only factor in these costs being high (booming demand from the Far East), it affects and motivates all areas of any society. Including the highest levels of government. The recent invasion of Georgia by Russia could be a case in point. The worlds second longest oil pipeline runs through it (thanks Dermot at Idleworm). I mentioned securing oil being the main motivator for war; Russia knows that NATO's members aren't exactly in the strongest position (with America and Britain heavily committed in their own This could easily lead to escalation. The US is a major proponent of the Ukraine (who have warned Russia about its warships in the Black Sea) and Georgia (into whom the US have "invested" a lot of military kit) joining NATO before this conflict reached the boil. Whilst the US don't have the manpower to goto Georgia immediately, it isn't beyond Bush 'n' Co to whip the masses up about their old enemy the Commies. It wouldn't be that hard to frame the Russian invasion of Georgia (if it heads further south that the South Ossetia border) as an aggressive act against Turkey, a NATO member. This could indeed either mobilise or split NATO; Europe relies on gas and oil from Russia, so it is going to be hesitant about charging to Turkey's or Georgia's defence, especially if this conflict goes on into the autumn and winter months. I seriously think Russia is toying with NATO. Moscow knows it has a lot of the European members by the proverbials and it wants to see how fair it can push before NATO reacts. Having Europe dependant on Russia is an ironic reversal when Russia was dependant on NATO states for money after the collapse of the Soviet government, and how Russia had to put up with the outside pressure because it needed the money. I do wonder how much pressure NATO can withstand before it reacts or breaks. Neither is an appealing prospect. | |||
| Jun. 2nd, 2008 @ 08:52 am Exams are over | |||
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Mood:
Exams are over for my third year. Just an induction on wednesday, then nothing till september/october (hopefully ;-) cheerfulMusic: Stereophonics - Is Yesterday, Tomorrow, Today? So, the summer to work on Lapwing-Linux 2008 and other assorted coding projects. Excellent :) Yeah, thats all, must get shopping and stuff done for BBQ later. Breakfast first though... | |||
| Mar. 12th, 2008 @ 10:08 pm This happens? | |||
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http://ocmb.xenu.net/ocmb/viewtopic.p angryMusic: Muse - Screenager I say no more. | |||
| Feb. 22nd, 2008 @ 06:07 pm Microsoft opens as the UK closes | |||
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Mood:
pessimisticMusic: Queen - Under Pressure Microsoft has made a step (ish, sorta) to providing interoperability documentation available, and supporting standards. Whilst MS finally getting its backside into gear (its only taken them 4 years to start to adhere to the EC's ruling) is good, many many people have noted they've said this before, and the EC in particular remains sceptical (he Commission notes that today's announcement follows at least four similar statements by Microsoft in the past on the importance of interoperability). I'd be happy if MS actually released useful documentation. I'd be even more happy if they follow through with adhering to standards; not MS defined de facto standards, but ISO standards. W3C standards. The ones everyone else in the computing field have agreed to and use. Whilst this possibly good news happened, possibly bad news occurred here. Our government is suggesting that legislation be brought in to force ISPs to cooperate with the MAFIAA, err, sorry, "creative content industry". Argh. The music/film industries' current model is broken. The government should in no way, shape or form be supporting it. This bleating about "lost sales due to piracy! WAAGHH!" is bullshit. For example, Joe Public spent, in the past, £100 a month on movies and CDs. Joe Public now has a Wii. He enjoys playing Wii games with his kids, and so buys more games. He still only has £100 a month to spend on entertainment, so he'll have to cut back on the CDs and DVDs. Net result? The movie/music industries see lower sales. Do they just not see that? People enjoy games more. They therefore spend more money on games, not buying as many CD/DVDs as before. Thats simple economics. People have also woken up to the fact that most of the "content" the industries put out isn't worth it any more. The money either goes to the wrong people (the middleman rather than the creative person) or its so bad and bland it just simply isn't worth the cost any more. I look forward to the first disconnection. I also look forward to the ensuing legal battle for the wide variety of offenses caused by the ISP/BPI/HMG. | |||
| Feb. 16th, 2008 @ 11:44 am ISP's to watch the Net for the RIAA? Hahahahahahaha | |||
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Mood:
The Government white paper on disconnecting P2P users from the Net. One news outlet correctly described the proposal; toilet paper. okayMusic: Muse - Recess http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7 The 2 major points in this; its illegal for ISPs to monitor what traffic is going to a user without a warrant, and there are many many legal uses of P2P (BBC iPlayer Its similar to asking the Highways Agency to stop bad drivers from using the roads. Why would they do that? They just build and maintain the roads, its up to the law and police to catch the wrongdoers. Herein lies the problem. It shouldn't be the ISP's job to monitor P2P and enforce summary judgement on a user; what if someone else used their wireless? What about places that provide internet access, like, I dunno, libraries? Schools? Universities? Cafes? You going to disconnect all of them? Is the ban in place on a house? Person? Given the current amount of data going "missing", I wouldn't trust the government with holding a blacklist of users. If the ban is on a house, how long for? A student area has a really high turnover of tenants, and a really high need for the Net. Finally, would ISPs cut off their customers? £15 a month, 12 months a year is £180. Cut off even 10,000 users and the ISPs have lost £1.8million. £1.8million. Thats assuming that everyone they cut off is using the basic tariff only; no higher ones at all. So, are the Government going to refund this money to the ISPs? I know, how about the BPI paying them, you know the people who would really want this white paper to be passed into law. The Government should have turned around to the BPI and said, basically, get lost. It isn't our job to help you prop up an outdated business model; you already have the tools (copyright law) to sue offenders. The BPI, IFPI and RIAA should; 1) Not rip off the artist with < 10% royalties, 2) Not rip off the customer with stupid prices instead of lobbying for a draconian and effectively unimplementable "solution". You're not making any friends in the british public, BPI et al. We can spot bollocks when we see it. EDIT From el reg; http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/0 | |||
| Jan. 19th, 2008 @ 11:53 am samwagon is no more | |||
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... or it won't be in a few days. tiredMusic: Queen - I Was Born To Love You The tatters just been to take it away, and I have a pile of stuff in the corner of my room that was in the car. I can't think how I managed to get it into the boot. But yes, the samwagon is no more. I've adapted a plugin for Quod Libet, its here if you want it. New computer arrived, on which I've been playing the portal demo Valve released for nVidia card owners. I want. It is so mind-bendingly fun. One portal on the wall, one portal in front of it on the floor, and Wheeeeeeeee! Or on opposite walls of a room .... I can see myself, myself, myself, myself, myself ... Thats pretty much it. | |||
| Jan. 5th, 2008 @ 03:41 pm samwagon is dead. Long live the samcycle? | |||
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Mood:
It happened. The samwagon must've heard me talking about scrapping it and decided to die on me. frustratedMusic: Feeder - Shatter The alternator didn't sound too good on sunday coming back from chase, but I put it down to cold (it was fsckin freezing). Batteries dead by Wednesday, so recharge it, get it started and drive to Harbourne. 20 minutes later I'm walking back as the battery is flatter than a pancake. Cue last night (in the pouring rain) with eric coming to assist with jump leads, got it going again. Half way down the hill approaching Sainsbury's, everything dies. Battery was completely dead this time, a cell must've gone or something. Anyhoo, eric had lent me a spare, with which we managed to coax the car back home. Thinking it was just the old battery being an arse, I checked on the car today to find it all dead again. I think the alternator is shot, or possibly some of the wiring. Checking the wiring for any obvious signs of wear or loose connections, I spotted something more troubling; the master brake cylinder is starting to rust and (slightly) coming apart. Eeeek. Needless to say, I'm not going to be driving the car any more, and I'll have to arrange for the scrap men to come fetch it in the next few weeks. I should probably get an Austin 7 or something with a crank handle next time around. Or a bicycle. No more alternator worries for me ... I mentioned about not using PCWorld if you have a modicum of IT knowledge. Don't. Ever. Rude and clueless doesn't adequately describe their response to me asking about refunds on Windows Vista as stated in the EULA. The response was "Well, I suggest talking to your solicitor and suing us for the refund." Ne'er mind, I bought a computer from a company online. Balls to em. I think I've finished venting. Oh, if you get the chance, go find a DVD of Nightwatch and Daywatch. Good films. Now to do actually fix the chaserail site. Last thing I do on it :-) | |||
| Dec. 4th, 2007 @ 06:19 pm MPAA breaking copyright ... again | |||
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Mood:
The MPAA got caught with it's copyright trousers down ... again. energeticMusic: Queen - Hammer To Fall This time it was for violating the GNU GPL with their It appears that, again the massive amount of MPAA lawyers can't read software licences. Or adhere to copyright law. I hope the FSF takes the MPAA to task over this. University work is proceeding apace for finding radio transmitters hidden about campus. My interface (written in Java) is taking shape, and we should have 50-60% of the overall system built for next wednesday, the demo "field test". Outside. Fun. I'm looking forward to christmas, relax a little, and help my brother and sister settle into their flat. Car will be going middle of january, I worked out I'm spending ~£1500 a year on it. Waaaayyy too much for what I use it for. Just isn't worth the money now, especially with petrol pushing £1/ltr and Chasewater isn't where I want to be spending my free time any more, I've more projects than I can shake a stick at that give me more pleasure and a feeling of achievement than trying for the millionth time to justify our signalling decisions, having funding requests denied until something bad happens then they expect you to have done it yesterday with no money. Balls to it, it isn't fun anymore. So, you're all up to date now :-P | |||
| Nov. 21st, 2007 @ 04:47 pm Give up on Vista | |||
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http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRAUlK8_2 happyMusic: Faithless - Love Lives On My Street Much as I dislike apple, I admire the balls to pull this advert off, and its actually funny ;-) Nothing else happening, move along, nothing to see here ... | |||
| Oct. 12th, 2007 @ 03:46 pm Radiohead | |||
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Mood:
Yes, my last.fm profile is filled with Radiohead's new album, In Rainbows. happyMusic: Radiohead - 15 Step Go, get their album: www.inrainbows.com, it's available for download, legally, for free. Just put £0.00 for the price you are willing to pay. I'm gonna go back later and give them some money for this excellent album, and more importantly excellent way of distributing music. Oasis, Jamiroquai and Madonna are ready to jump ship, while the Nine Inch Nails are already free agents. I'm really hoping that 2008 heralds the death knell for the RIAA, either by bands walking out on them or the RIAA beating themselves to death. Picking on single mothers earning < £18,000 a year doesn't really help your image or cause. Artists now know that they can sell their music on the internet for a far higher personal gain than using the greedy RIAA members, whilst actually treating their fans as the reason they can keep making music, instead of cash cows to be milked for all they're worth. Now, if only we could get a similar revolution spinning in the Western world as a whole on climate change, poverty, AIDs and the environment. | |||
| Sep. 17th, 2007 @ 09:56 pm La la la la | |||
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Mood:
Don't shop at PC World if you have a modicum of IT knowledge (like how to turn the computer on): they think replacing Windows with Linux causes the hinges to spontaneously disintegrate invalidating the warranty. Not to fear! Head Office are always in contact with their stores to let them know whats going on ... boredMusic: Queen - Too Much Love Will Kill You "I know of at least one person who was refused a job there (PCW) for being over qualified for the position. He was a uni student too." Hell, my hamster is overqualified for PCW. He's me thinking I could of got a summer job with them ... Xorg 7.3 is compiled and ready to go, just gotta move stuff about for the updated packages. (No more mucking about with xorg.conf files ... ;-) Hmm, someone also stole the cover from the door bell. Not the unit, just the cover. I suppose it was sorta shiny and looked "hi-tech" or expensive. Never mind. So, Lapwing-Linux for the rest of the month. :-) | |||
| Sep. 10th, 2007 @ 03:05 pm Holidays now | |||
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Mood:
I've now finished work and looking forward to having time off till the start of term in October. aggravatedMusic: The Goo Goo Dolls - Hate This Place Lapwing-Linux work Wednesday onward, tomorrow is my brothers graduation ceremony (with pub lunch ... ;-) Now, chasewater. I have had enough of the Chief Ape and his 3 wise monkeys. They seem to think that, as they are directors, they can treat other working members who aren't directors as employees; shouting at them for getting things wrong, shouting at them when the monkey has made an error, taking out their anger on them when things don't go their way, and they expect us to put up with it; it does not work that way. There are a growing number of members who have had enough of this childish behaviour and won't tolerate it any more. Roll on the next AGM, there won't be a monkey left on the board. | |||
| Aug. 31st, 2007 @ 08:06 pm I love paydays | |||
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Mood:
I got paid this morning, which eases my money situation right out. I can afford the rent for September and October and still have enough to live on from this pay cheque {including some Grolsch, £5 off because of the crappy weather ;-) }. Hopefully the next will do some debt clearing (assuming no emergency expenditure occurs) happyMusic: Green Day - Whatsername Such as my car, which is on it's last legs now, rust is beginning to appear pretty much everywhere. Still, not bad for a car over 14 years old (it was an import registered in 94) Lapwing-Linux was mentioned in DistroWatch as on the waiting list, which gave a flurry of downloads (logs show 50GB of bandwidth used :-S) and some queries. After I finish work I'll spend a fair amount of time working on it to bring it up to some sort of scratch. On a side note, this equated to about 60 downloads of the ISOs. I'm quite proud :-) More when things happen :-P | |||
| Aug. 6th, 2007 @ 03:01 pm Christianity and God are British inventions | |||
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http://www.nexusmagazine.com/articles/N amusedMusic: Nice To Be Out - Stereophonics "Workshop of the World" indeed ;-) Do you think its too late to get intellectual property rights on Christianity? Send a cease and desist letter to the americans on using Christianity (TM)(R) ? Maybe not, just think of the claims for compensation for all the wars that are/have been conducted in the name of Christianity. Sorry, I just think this is hilarious. :-D | |||
| Jul. 21st, 2007 @ 09:15 pm August 11th | |||
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Mood:
Can someone please tell me why I have august 11th stuck in my head as an important date? confusedMusic: My Chemical Romance - Helena Jess' party is around then, as is nessie's birthday, but neither are the 11th. I think I may have gotten confused with my brothers graduation ceremony, which is in september. Yeah, must be that. Yay for bad memory. What was I talking about again? | |||
| Jul. 18th, 2007 @ 08:28 pm Work work | |||
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Mood:
If people suddenly find me offline for the whole day, its because I have a job. :-) tiredMusic: Queen - One Vision Its basic monkey work at a clothes warehouse. I think I'll have picked up what I need to know by the weekend. Speaking of which, theres a bigwig from the Heritage Rail Association coming down to chase on saturday. He's come to have a look at our signalboxes, neither of which are "finished" externally because of the weather and the general manager throwing a wobbly. I've had some good news back from HMRI about the signalling, so we can hopefully go forward on that. I managed to lock myself outta my house on sunday. Landlord agents weren't in to answer the phone, locksmith wouldn't be able to gain entry without the landlord's permission and the police aren't allowed to break in. So I had to do it. With a shovel. I dunno whether to be grateful or worried about that. (Don't panic ben, theres no damage) Ern yeah, thats everything samwise. Have fun until the next instalment :-) | |||
| Jul. 9th, 2007 @ 07:59 pm lapwing.org lives! | |||
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lapwing.org is back up!! gratefulMusic: Oasis - Up In The Sky Anyway, just finished watching SiCKO for the 3rd time (it takes a while for it all to sink in) Theres just a few things I can't get my head round; 1; You got a child who's just had a seizure in your hospital; how on earth can you not render aid? (She died because of lack of treatment) 2; An elderly lady was dumped outside a hospice; doing that to anyone in need is callous, but what struck me was the half dozen people who walked past her without asking if she was OK (she was walking down the middle of the road into oncoming traffic) 3; One woman was working 3 jobs (three!!?!?) and the most she got was a pat on the back and a stupid joke from the president. I can't imagine a British prime minister doing anything other than trying to assist legislatively. 4; The reason that private health care gives you small waiting times is because there aren't as many people using the system as public health care. Why do the proponents of private health care never point the fact that people with pre-existing conditions can't (or rarely) get private health care? It also makes me really grateful for the NHS. I thoroughly recommend watching SiCKO, even if you think Moore is just in it for his ego. | |||