They're probably the same people who signed off the switches I bought. The same switches that conveniently changed into a hub* after a couple of months. Maybe they expected them to be rebooted constantly.

* Entries weren't being added to the ARP table, probably because of a timestamp overflow.

Why wouldn't they:

It's clearly the obvious way to define time.

I'm a little disappointed that they even ask about filtering - obviously it's something they've been forced to do, which is shit because having to have the ability to filter connections adds to their costs.

I might log onto IRC and ask if they can provide what percentage of customers actually ask for a filtered connection.

Well, the stories the tell are loaded with sex and violence, and sometimes they even mix the two together - somebody should tell the Tories & Daily Mail readers, I bet they'd be furious.

You can do it online, but it's much more satisfying calling them up and asking them to turn on porn on your mobile phone contract. Added points if you put on a creepy voice when doing so.

Same with a colleague - BMW run a premium rate line to check the specification and service history - and he uses his mobile to do so - it's a business expense. He received a call from Vodafone asking if he knew he was calling a lot of premium rate numbers. His answer? "Oh yes, I like calling those numbers". He's also brilliant when answering cold callers:
* Hello, I'm calling from [company] are you a homeowner?
* Are you calling me a homo - how dare you...

Just use a decent ISP - at the risk of sounding like a shill/employee/investor - Andrews & Arnold are pretty good, plus they provide native IPv6.

Thanks for that - found it and added it to my favourites.

They don't know everything - they just know whether you prefer Burger King or McDonalds, and that you lied to your friends about how pretty your girlfriend is.

I don't often bump a comment, in fact I never have - please tell me why I shouldn't "place too much faith in FlightRadar24"? Explain what to look out for so that I can use an educated opinion as to whether the data is valid or not.

Not educating me just means that I will continue to use the data as given as you've not supported your opinion.

How so? Are the points often grossly inaccurate (out by 10s of km), are the timestamps invalid, do they simply make up data? If you can tell me why the data shouldn't be relied upon (or at least believed), I'm willing to listen.

The reason I'm pushing FlightRadar24 is because the data is there. I also am "trusting" that their data is real because they show gaps in the data as opposed to filling estimated positions in the track between known points. This means that people are less likely to jump to conclusions because they don't realise they're looking at an estimated great circle track.

I've seen no kinks in the tracks to imply that the data is jumping around, or that the points are collected out of order. What I've read about ADS-B gives me no reason to think that the positions and data shouldn't be accurate - otherwise Australia, the US and EU wouldn't be requiring it for some aircraft.

So we're left with the receiving stations - is it possible that amateur receivers are pushing corrupt data to the website, though from what I've read:

so receivers shouldn't be doing that.

So, as far as I can tell, we're left with purposely corrupted data, which I'd like to think wouldn't happen, or if it did would be picked up by users.

Bit late, but to put in my 2p worth:

They're not mutually exclusive - if I run somebody over while drink driving, it was an accident - I didn't mean to do it - but it was still a crime.

The Korean Aviation and Railway Accident Investigation Board (ARAIB) helped take part in the Asiana 214 investigation

While distressing, it's [to be blunt] irrelevant. Just because other terrible things are going on in the world, doesn't mean that we can't discuss the handling of this accident.

Actually, I kind of agree with this - the speed at which Ukraine, the US and the western media jumped at blaming Russia may have been a mistake - it could have been better to keep calm until the facts were in. It's quite possible that the Pro-Russian rebels would have provided better access. However It's also quite possible that - with no criticism - that the rebels would have been even less willing to provide access to the site. Blocking access to investigators was an appalling act.

The other question I have of the theory that an SU-25 shot MH17 down with a R-60 missile is this - it's a IR guided missile with a 3kg warhead. This means that it will home in on the engines before detonating - meaning that the engine should take the brunt of the explosion. Reading the wikipedia entry, it cites a BAe-125 being hit by one and causing the engine to fall off. The twin engined (not any more it wasn't) business jet managed to make a successful emergency landing. I don't know what altitude this happened, so the pressure difference may not have been too great, but keep in mind that the BAe-125 has a service ceiling of 41,000ft

Compare this to KAL 007 which was shot down by a radar guided K-8 missile which has a 40kg warhead - that's over 13 times the mass of an R-60 warhead. The 747 continued to fly for 12 minutes.

In my mind, a radar guided missile show target the fuselage (the largest radar return), which is what happened with KAL 007 - The co-pilot reported to Captain Chun twice during the flight after the missile's detonation, "Engines normal, sir.", which is more likely cause explosive decompression (MH17 and KAL007 were at similar altitudes).

We are being expected to believe that a IR guided warhead less than 1/10 of that which allowed KAL007 to continue flying downed MH17. It seems far more likely that a BUK radar guided SAM (with a 70kg warhead) was the cause.

Finally, the competing theories are:
1. Accidentally shot down with a BUK missile (either Ukraine or Pro-Russian)
2. Purposefully shot down with a Ukraine R-60 launched from a ground attack aircraft.

I struggle to understand the logic required to even consider #2, regardless of who one believes was responsible.

Fair point - they do have that timestamps, etc - however they don't use their hi-res data when rendering the track - they also insist on draw points that are unknown - hence the utter confusion being caused (especially with those with an axe to grind*).

* I've been called a shill, but nowhere have I made an assumption over who was responsible - MH17 appears to have been shot down (there's evidence of shrapnel in multiple photos). Whether it was a SAM or AAM, I don't know. I do however get pissed of when people don't think about the information they're looking at, and post it without considering how valid it may be.

Also, you'll notice from the 16th July data pretty much the whole flight from the Poland-Ukraine border to India is estimated (great circle between two known ASD-B points). The FlightRadar24 data has ADS-B data all the way from Amsterdam to Turkmenistan - then they have a gap in their data (which they don't draw, as drawing points you don't know is bad practice) until Pakistan. From what I can tell, FlightRadar24's coverage is far better.

I've also watched [on Russia Today's youtube channel] the Kremlin's presentation on how MH17 was diverted. That diversion wasn't reflected the ADS-B data (although Russian military's should be more accurate**) - it'll be interesting to see what the FDR comes back with.

** What I'm struggling with is the orientation of the chart shown - if it's North-Up, then they're saying MH17 was flying due west when it was directed out of the corridor, where as the ADS-B data show it flying a "fairly" consistent 118 deg.

Um, where in my post did I say who was responsible? All I did was give my reasons for not believing that MH17 was "over 500km from its usual path", and providing data to support my reasoning. You continue to solely use FlightAware as supporting evidence, even though I have demonstrated that their data [as provided in their basic maps] is not accurate enough to jump to conclusion that MH17 was off it's usual flight path.

At least explain to me why the FlightRadar24 data (with a 1 minute resolution) doesn't agree with your assertations?

Again with the altitude - please explain why you would need to reduce the altitude of civilian airliner by 600m, even though it was flying at less than half the maximum altitude of an SA-11

Oh, and why have I been "accused" of being an American?