The claim is that unknown, unpatched faults have been used in this hack. (One of them is enough.)

However, it only requires that the victim hasn't installed the latest patches for the Reader.

(Since usually this obliges them to reboot the PC, they may hesitate.)

I've seen office computers still using Adobe Reader 8. That's pretty dumb. It isn't even supported any more. The latest bugs will -never- be fixed on version 8.

The "Don't look" comment was a tiny humorous reference to the well-known science fiction story [The Day of the Triffids], in which carnivorous plants terrorise a population... that was mostly blinded by, well:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_of_the_Triffids

"The narrative begins with Bill Masen in hospital, his eyes bandaged after having been splashed with droplets of triffid venom in a lab accident. During his convalescence he is told of the unexpected and beautiful green meteor shower that the entire world is watching. He awakes the next morning to a silent hospital and learns that the light from the unusual display has rendered any who watched it completely blind." Perhaps not straight away, or you'd stop. "Later on in the book Masen again theorises that both the 'meteor shower' and subsequent plague may have been an orbiting government weapons' system that was triggered accidentally." But, remember, he's a triffid farmer - or was - anyway, what does he know?

Windows 8 is still ages away.

I have in fact ordered a Dell Latitude ST, a Windows 7 tablet with SSD - they actually warn you that the standaard-issue drive, 32 GB, is not big enough for, well, anything.

It will be the latest in a series of Windows tablet devices that I use because RSI means I can't use a keyboard for more than a minute or two. Instead I do my "typing" using a program called Fitaly. Speech recognition is possible as well.

doesn't Windows itself depend on some of those features? Hard links for the WinSXS folder, or am I mistaken?

would be uneasy to be referred to as a "drone unit".

I think they're saying that

(1) the image is a trademark of their own.

(2) In case there -might- be an argument that with Warhol's copyright, Velvet Underground's right to the image is limited, they argue that the image is public domain and not copyrighted. Only in applying it to, say, a music audio and video playing appliance, is their trademark trespassed on.

I'm not a lawyer but... I suspect that before Warhol had the image, it wasn't coloured yellow. Would that be enough to establish a new copyright? Conveniently, we can look at the legal status of his portraits of soup cans and Marilyn Monroe, to get an idea.

Re expansion of space: I'm no expert, but I believe that is the story. Distant objects in the universe are getting farther away even if they are not moving, because space is getting bigger. That's probably the wrong way to say it.

If it's free, why are they putting it on your credit card?

Sale of Goods Act mainly relates to your contract with the retailer, dealer, not necessarily the manufacturer.

I think I've seen a claim that Luna isn't a proper satellite either. Something about it not being pulled backwards relative to Earth's orbit around the Sun, and therefore it's properly a binary companion. Is that so?

However

http://www.universetoday.com/15019/how-many-moons-does-earth-have/

as of June 2008, admits Luna and excludes Cruithne and 2002 AA-29.

My Bluetoooth mouse (Kesa Electricals) goes for several weeks on a couple of long-life NiMH AA rechargeables, and I have spare batteries to swap in. But it does go to sleep - sensibly - after a minute or two idle, and needs to be prodded to work again, after a few seconds. It also occasionally loses contact, and usually restores itself in about 10 seconds, but sometimes "needs" to be switched off and on to work again. And I'm using it ON the underside of the laptop. Bluetooth is kinda flaky, or Bluetooth plus 802.11 is, because don't they share the 29/12/20112.4 GHz space (badly)? - that's in the U.K.

On the other hand, there was the fellow who bought a dongle wireless keyboard, and so did his neighbour, and what do you suppose happened...

It seems that taking an existing common product and writing "mobile phone" in front of line one counts as invention. There are many cell phone patents - I think - that merely duplicate things that have already been done on desktop PCs.

Also all the lemons were in the hands of Napoleon, I heard on "QI".

I'm not saying that the BBC licence isn't a tax on owning and operating a broadcast-television receiving device, which now includes a PC if you use it that way - they're taking a view that watching live broadcast TV online still counts, but only if it is broadcast material and is live.

But it's an annual charge that is still under 40 pence a day - I calculate that it's US $0.62. For that, they create all BBC TV, radio, and online services.

If you choose not to use TV services, that's fine.

since release 3.4 doesn't significantly change the content, it is just about synchronising the code base with Apache licensing (more closely) and replacing parts where that isn't possible.

I figured that the simultaneous outbreak of spontaneous independent protest might be the work of about twenty teams of CIA agents in various locations. If the U.S. had the money. Well, I suppose somebody is getting cash from shipping drugs through Mexico, and the U.S. has used the drugs trade for money laundering in the past. Or something.

I also figure that they prefer military dictatorships who have a clear and simple view of how the world works. Which is why putting the military in charge in Egypt this year was good for them, but did not look good to people preferring democracy who actually thought about what was happening. Which appears to be just me. And I live in Scotland. Fortunately.

according to the Symantec article, it explicitly uses "Services that cost you money". Android is safe for good Christians to use.

"if I don't want to pay for the BBC, I can't watch live television without breaking the law."

At home, that is. You can go out, to the pub for instance.

And Microsoft did try it. They're still trying it. There were deals where Microsoft got a cut on each computer a manufacturer sold, whether you bought Microsoft software or not. And now when you buy an Android phone, with no Microsoft product in it, you're probably paying a Microsoft tax.

Wherein Harry Hill spends a half hour making fun of X Factor and Downton Abbey.

That slip could have been nasty for some.

I thought I detected coyness that usually means it's not fixed yet, so, well done that it is. I'm not sure about Mac and Linux users being safe though, just because there weren't attacks reported, but Adobe and those users know their business best.

Am I straight about Adobe Reader 8 being a really bad idea now?

"Subsection (2)(a) provides that there is no free agreement where the conduct takes place at a time where the complainer is incapable, because of the effect of alcohol or any other substance, of consenting to it. The effect of this subsection is not to provide that a person cannot consent to sexual activity after consuming any alcohol or taking any intoxicating substance. A person may have consumed alcohol (or any other intoxicating substance), and may even be quite drunk, without having lost the capacity to consent. However at the point where he or she is so intoxicated as to lose the capacity to choose whether to participate in sexual activity, any sexual activity that takes place, does so without the complainer’s consent."

So I'm not sure.

Another puzzle initially: "Subsection (2)(e) provides that there is no free agreement where the complainer agrees or submits to conduct because the accused induces the complainer to agree or submit to the conduct by impersonating a person known personally to the complainer." On reflection, this possibly covers situations when there isn't a light on, as well as if the complainer is blind, or you sneak up behind them and go "It's me" and they go "Oh all right then", and it isn't you. I mean, you aren't who it's supposed to be. Although in some cases you weren't to know that, probably.

If the other person is asleep, I'm afraid it's right out. At least here in Scotland.

I don't think much of this wi-fi plan, though.

YOU CAN use your PC, XBox, or Wii to fly an ACTUAL "Predator" drone from Afghanistan to Pakistan for a unilateral strike on Islamabad.

Well, I hope YOU in fact can't. But THEY can.

Recently all their PCs got viruses, remember...

So, maybe that video game SHOULD have a drop-down Geneva Conventions cheat sheet.

seems to me that you were approaching the light too fast in the first place. You should always be prepared for the light changing as you approach. Advanced drivers will also consider that the yellow lamp may be busted and you go straight to red.

with your name and address, so that the tax man can give the charity a bonus out of your previously paid tax.

This is either a stupid, stupid, stupid idea, or a moderately clever wheeze by bank robbers. I also expect to see it in advance-fee fraud (419) spam e-mails beginning probably yesterday. Or maybe that's what it IS.