Monthly Archives: March 2008

KLM misses Hyderabad landing through airport confusion

Posted on March 25, 2008 | 2 Comments

IT WAS ONLY a nib in the Times of London,  but it was a good nib (news in brief), if not a great NIB. It’s so small it’s not on Times Online.

A KLM fright, according to The Thunderer today,  couldn’t figure out where to land in Hyderabad because it didn’t know where the airport was. Heck, when we were in Bengaluru a few weeks ago, this was the burning question of the day.

This is the situation. Apparently Sonia “Mother of India and Italy” Gandhi opened the new Hyderabad airport only for it to be closed the day after because everything wasn’t quite ready. In rival South Indian city Bangalore, the airport was supposed to open on the 31st of March but it won’t open until the 11th of May because there are some things like connections to sort out yet.

According to apocryphal reports from Inverness, a Dan Dair pilot once landed his jet on what used to be the Inverness airport, only to find itself bogged down in a field. These things happen. I still maintain, however, that compared to Heathrow, Mumbai International is a dream place to fry out of. The domestic airport is fine too – it’s the transit system between domestic and international that’s bogged up. At least you don’t get thrown into a communal shopping area, a la Terminal Five, ‘Eefrow. ♥

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Nvidia, Via in unholy alliance

Posted on March 25, 2008 | 1 Comment

SEEN this yet?

We had some inklings something like this was going to happen.  It’s a case of unlikely bedfellows.

There was never any likelihood that Nvidia would buy Via, as Charlie D points out - that was Digitimes froth, of course.  They did chat about licences and that a year or two back, but that wasn’t a goer.

Intel might resort to the legal stick, Charlie reckons – but if it does, it’s not entirely clear how that would work out. Larrabee and discrete graphic cards could alter the legal picture for Nvidia, we guess. Will be interested to see how this all works out. ♣

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Iceland leads the way in democracy

Posted on March 24, 2008 | Leave a comment

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HOW RE-ASSURING is this? This picture above shows where the first democratic parliament – the Althingi to all men and their dogs,  was set up, in Iceland, slap bang between the tectonic plates of Europe and America -  separating by about a metre (whatever that is), a year.  

They must have talked a heap of hot air to keep warm in this frozen, treeless climate, there’s no doubt about that! No wonder the average temperature in London, home to the “Mother of All Parliaments”, is higher than the average temperature anywhere else in Blightyland. Much hot air is exhaled.

The lone figure in the Icelandic picture above is probably, or possibly,  a representative of Alcoa, the aluminium firm.  Heck, we all need aluminium ladders, init?

We only mention this because Bhutan, a kingly state, decided to become a democracy yesterday, despite the wishes of its subjects.  Whatever happened to Sikkim? Or Pondicherry, for that matter, which oddly describes itself as the IT hardware capital of India? We were there last year. If Pondicherry means “no scalpel” vasectomy  is hardware – see pic below –  then we’re with it 1112.23% ♥

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Fake gelatine fingerprints might defy BAA

Posted on March 24, 2008 | 2 Comments

IN ONE OF THOSE STRANGE coincidences that makes our little universe that more interesting, nikkei.net has an interesting article about fingerprinting frauds today, that might well bamboozle Spanish firm BAA, which wants to fingerprint us all so it can extend its shopping franchise.

Nikkei.net, for it is they, ran a story about how NT&T can detect “fake fingerprints”. You wouldn’t Adam and Eve it, but fingerprints can be reproduced on gelatine and presented to computers and authorities as verification of a person’s identity. This has been a problem for some years. Japanese boffs have developed systems that recognise “veins” that contain real blood, as well as the familiar whorls and coils on fingers and presumably fake fingers too.

The major problem, according to Nikkei, is “distinguishing a real finger from a fake one made of silicon or gelatin.”

Boffins at NT&T have come up with a fingerprint recognition device that detects if there is an electrical current behind the “fake fingers”. It’s just occurred to us. Maybe BAA could authorise a fingerprint scanner at Terminal Five which not only reads fingers, but analyses the sweat on fingers and creates a “temporary DNA record” which can then be transferred to a Harrods Loyalty Card.

Nikkei is here, but you gotta pay to read it. ♥

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BAA wants to fingerprint everybody

Posted on March 24, 2008 | 2 Comments

AS IF HEATHROW AIRPORT ISN’T HORRID enough already, when Terminal Five opens this later this week the British Airports Authority (BAA) as was – now it’s owned by a Spanish company, wants to take our fingerprints if we tip up in its cavernous hall.

The problem is that domestic and international travellers will mingle with each other in the shopping areas of Term Five – and BAA claims it wants to prevent the possibility of an international passenger meeting a domestic passenger when they meet in Harrods or another grocer emporium in the airport and swap boarding cards.

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Yeah, well this has caused quite a bit of a stink here in Compliant Blighty. The Information Commissioner has said BAA has got no right to go fingerprinting anyone it wants to, while BAA has said it consulted with the Immigration Department and this is what it recommended.

BAA reckons that it will get rid of the fingerprints within 24 hours and they’ll be encrypted, but it misses the fundamental point that it’s a commercial outfit, and no one has granted it any rights to take dabs apart from itself. The Information Commissioner reckons that any passengers facing finger printing should just say no to the insecurity guys. Yeah right. Why are domestic passengers mingling with international passengers? Yeah – it’s so they can take advantage of the fantastic “shops” it appears and also pop into a pub for a pint of traditional British ale at more than it costs even in the heart of throbbing Soho.

The InfoComm office has got legal powers which it can exercise to sanction BAA for the creeping “surveillance society’ it’s always rabbiting on about.  But if you’re a passenger in Term Five this time next week and the “insecurity officers” stop you boarding a fright because you won’t give your dabs over to a fly-by-night corporation like BAA, will that help you a jot? You could try calling the Information Commissioner on his phone – between 9AM to 5PM Monday to Friday - here, or drop him a postcard, and see if he’ll come down and help you out in office hours.

What’s next, DNA on your blinking Tesco loyalty card?  ♥

* BOGGARD More at the Thunderer, here.

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AMD layoff saga continues, overegged

Posted on March 24, 2008 | Leave a comment

I SEE Fudo at Fudzilla  is egging up the AMD story the INQster ran the other week about massive layoffs at the chip firm. While Charlie reckoned five per cent of the staff were about to go, Fudo reckons 10 per cent are for the chip-chop.

A five per cent layoff was described by the INQ as “massive”, so a 10 per cent layoff would then be “ginormous”.  We’ve never really had an adequate definition from Hector Ruiz, AMD’s CEO, what “asset lite” means, have we?

Generally speaking, when times are tough, the marketing people are first to be “pruned”. The sales people are last to go.  AMD’s hired a new marketing geezer to replace Henri “I got flamboyant ties” Richard, and it’s certainly fair to say that over the last 18 months or so, Chimpzilla hasn’t shown much flamboyance at all.

In the olde daze, a rash of logos was enough to stir up the world and its little doggie, but these days something more is required from AMD, we think. AMD has lashed out at some hacks, which was never what it did in the past, in the days when we used to paint hard boiled eggs and roll them down some distant hill every Easter Monday.

Fudzilla can be found to the right of this story, as too is the INQster.  ♦

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