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Comment Re:I was in the same situation once (Score 1) 282

I was in the same situation once. Laid off by Northern Telecom in the late '80s, I started work as a contractor at their head office three weeks later for double what I'd been paid as an employee. :)

I was once part of a site closure, which resulted in some employees (unfortunately, not me) getting both early retirement (pension payments) and re-hired as contractors at significantly higher rates than their salaries had been.

Comment Re:Just another reason not to fly..... (Score 1) 217

My wife and I decided, the next day that, short of an emergency situation, we were done flying commercial. If we couldn't drive to get there, we didn't need to go. It's not because we were afraid of terrorists, but we saw what a hassle and invasion of privacy it would became.

Some of us have families the other sides of oceans. It's not so easy to give up flying.

Submission + - Drone Search and Rescue Operation Wins Fight Against FAA (arstechnica.com) 1

An anonymous reader writes: Back in February, officials at the Federal Aviation Administration told a Texas search-and-rescue team that they couldn't use drones help locate missions persons. The team, which is called EquuSearch, challenged the FAA in court. On Friday, the court ruled (PDF) in favor of EquuSearch, saying the FAA's directive was "not a formal cease-and-desist letter representing the agency’s final conclusion." EquuSearch intends to resume using the drones immediately. This puts the FAA in the position of having to either initiate formal proceedings against EquuSearch, which is clearly operating to the benefit of society (as opposed to commercial drone use), or to revisit and finalize its rules for small aircraft entirely. The latter would be a lengthy process because "Congress has delegated rule making powers to its agencies, but the Administrative Procedures Act requires the agencies to provide a public notice and comment period first."

Submission + - Enraged Verizon FiOS Customer Seemingly Demonstrates Netflix Throttling (hothardware.com) 1

MojoKid writes: The ongoing battle between Netflix and ISPs that can't seem to handle the streaming video service's traffic boiled over to an infuriating level for Colin Nederkoon, a startup CEO who resides in New York City. Rather than accept excuses and finger pointing from either side, Nederkoon did a little investigating into why he was receiving such slow Netflix streams on his Verizon FiOS connection, and what he discovered is that there appears to be a clear culprit. Nederkoon pays for Internet service that promises 75Mbps downstream and 35Mbps upstream through his FiOS connection. However, his Netflix video streams were limping along at just 375kbps (0.375mbps), equivalent to 0.5 percent of the speed he's paying for. On a hunch, he decided to connect to a VPN service, which in theory should actually make things slower since it's adding extra hops. Speeds didn't get slower, they got much faster. After connecting to VyprVPN, his Netflix connection suddenly jumped to 3000kbps, the fastest the streaming service allows and around 10 times faster than when connecting directly with Verizon. Verizon may have a different explanation as to why Nederkoon's Netflix streams suddenly sped up, but in the meantime, it would appear that throttling shenanigans are taking place. It seems that by using a VPN, Verizon simply doesn't know which packets to throttle, hence the gross disparity in speed.

Submission + - Comcast Is Astroturfing the Net Neutrality Issue (esquire.com)

An anonymous reader writes: By its own admission, Comcast is working with think tanks like the American Enterprise Institute. Fellows at the Institute are printing op-eds all throughout the media in support of killing Net neutrality--without disclosing the think tank's ties to Comcast

Comment Re:Are they forgetting that this is the UK? (Score 3, Informative) 44

The UK Parliament can pass a law that directly contradicts a treaty. A judge faced with a law that also gives clear direction that the intention was to override European law should have no choice but to interpret it so, rather than assume as now that the intention is to remain in accord with Europe given the prior acts Parliament have passed that speak to exactly that.

Once again, No

And yes you're right, how could anyone not love a massive command-based supranational state with poor democratic issues, endemic corruption, and a legal code largely directed at controlling behaviour rather than respecting individual rights. Worked out really fucking well last time.

The EU has its problems. But for the UK, pulling out would be worse. In order to trade with EU members, the UK would still have to follow many EU requirements, but without any influence over the setting of those requirements. Those car factories in the UK? Likely closed, like so many other businesses as exporting to EU countries becomes difficult.

Comment Re:Are they forgetting that this is the UK? (Score 4, Informative) 44

Parliament is the supreme law-making body: its Acts are the highest source of English law.

Unlike in other countries such as the US, there is no such thing as an unconstitutional law, or an act of parliament being "illegal" if properly passed, because there is no constitution in the UK, and an act of the parliament duly passed is supreme.

No. It isn't. UK law must be in accordance with EU treaty requirements.

I am beginning to suspect that they whole anti-EU campaign is not really an astroturfing (and use of the useful idiots) by the 1%ers to get rid of those pesky EU laws that are preventing unrestrained wealth acquisition by the rich at the expense of the poor.

Comment Re:LMAO (Score 4, Insightful) 91

With the exception of the smashwords issue, all of those articles relate to Amazon fighting with publishers. Not one of those articles alleges (apart from the smashwords issue) that Amazon is forcing up the prices at other retailers.What does Wallmart do every day: negotiate with suppliers to get the best deal for itself. What is Amazon doing here?

Yes, there is a risk that Amazon may be so dominant that it can push up prices, but that is mostly a theoretical risk (smashwords excepted).

So, perhaps an investigation is warranted, but, in no way does that mean the Apple should not be fined for its actions.

Comment Re:Unsafe at any speed (above 100 MPH)... (Score 1) 443

get what you're saying, but if the "high speeds" were "nearly" 100MPH it's not unreasonable to wonder just how the car got literally ripped in half.

Last year in a town in California, someone who was not being chased, managed to split a compact car completely in half by hitting a tree. The two parts of the car ended up quite a distance from each other. He wasn't driving on a freeway, or a sidestreet, but was on a street with a 35 or 40mph speed limit. Reports said the speed was "up to 100mph"

Submission + - Layoffs coming at Microsoft? (theregister.co.uk)

whoever57 writes: Shaun Nichols at The Register interpets Satya Nadella's open letter as "prepare for layoffs". The letter suggests radical changes are coming to Microsoft and, combined with duplication of functions because of the Nokia handset business acquisition, he thinks that layoffs are highly likely. Wes Miller, research vice-president at Directions on Microsoft, says that Microsoft is shifting from the Windows-everywhere approach, towards supporting productivity applications on different platforms. More details will be forthcoming from Microsoft on July 22.

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