FoTW It's a well-known fact that flames are like number 13 buses - you wait ages for one and then a whole load turn up and once.

Yes indeed, following last week's truly exceptional outburst during which certain Reg readers found themselves on the receiving end of some particularly tasty abuse, we have one Aaron Kempf who rather took exception to Chris Williams' piece on counter-terror databases.

Now, we're not even sure that Kempf fully read the article, or even understood it. No matter, that's never been an impediment to an unholy turdspurt. Here's our analyst's first email:

when are you idiots going to discover that there's nothing wrong with a _DATABASE_?

Seriously-- you hippies need to stop smoking pole* and shivering at the though of _ANYONE_ building a database-- for _ANY_ reason.

No wonder Hitler kicked Englands ass in WW2.. until we had to bail you out. You kids are just a bunch of trippers, dude.

Friggin cry babies, oh, no-- the databases are coming, the databases are coming.

You know, I just built a database to keep track of theRegister using fear in order to prevent people from using a database.

I mean.. WTF Is wrong with you guys?

Data Mining is ineffective? THEY ARE NOT USING DATA MINING, THEY NEED SIMPLE REPORTING!!! Data Mining.. Do you even know what it is??

Before we had time to answer, Kempf discharged another email broadside:

Dude seriously-- you dipshits think that anyone building a couple of 'where clauses' in a database is data mining.

It is not.

Run away you little pansy, the databases are coming, the databases are coming!!!

No wonder you guys are no longer a super-power. Super-Powers aren't scared of a fucking database.

Grow some balls kid, and tell your country.. I'm personally tired of my country saving your country, maybe if you weren't scared of a fucking database-- and maybe if you knew what data mining _WAS_ then maybe you'd have a clue.

But building a database does not equate to data mining.

And databases never hurt nobody. Fucking pansy. 'Run away the databases are coming'.

-Aaron

While we're obliged to Kempf for personally storming the beaches of Normandy, thereby ensuring future generations' freedom from the jackboot of Nazi oppression, we can't help feeling he's taking this data mining thing a bit too... Oh shit - did we mention data mining again?

most people use the phrase data mining to 'just about anyone writing a where clause'.

that is not a correct usage of the term.

For the record, I did intrusion detection at Microsoft. We kept track of _ALL_ internet traffic coming in and out of Microsoft global. I single-handedly built datamarts and data mining and olap tiers-- in order to crack down on malware.

Give me a FTP site, and I'll give you a couple of gb of sample data, but it's a couple of years old. I actually really enjoy still looking through this data.

And it would be silly to say that this database didn't help to track down malware.

I spidered a half dozen websites in order to gather information about various processes, and ports, and domains-- how much did it cost MS? Maybe $40k, tops. And it made about 20 security professional about 50 times more powerful.

20 fulltime, 24x7 multiple people deep-- they would sit around and manually type stuff into a database. ANd it took an hour to find anything, before I came in. I came in and built a bunch of SSAS cubes, and things became about 100 times better.

I'm not even sure that it was legal- to track this information- because it is not permitted in certain countries.

Did M$ care? Heck no!!! I've got the smoking gun. LoL.

I came along and built a much much much much better database application. And trying to say carte blanche that 'databases are not helpful in finding terrorists' is just a load of crap.

Maybe if they don't have the correct _CONTENT_ in the database-- that might be a problem.

But uh... blaming the database? Scare-mongering?

It's a database!! Are you really terrified of a database?

You dipshits need to drop your infatada against Relational Database Systems. Fuck you for even trying to make other people scared of _ANY_ database.

And you have the balls to sit there and tell us that this database 'wouldnt' spot terrorists'?

OF COURSE IT WILL SPOT TERRORISTS, MAYBE THE DIPSHITS SHOULD USE MS TOOLS TO BUILD A DATABASE, INSTEAD OF TERADATA OR ORACLE.

Seriously-- what scale of database does a $12bn budget buy?

1,000 database professionals writing mySql for a couple of years, is what the kind of budget will deliver.

So sorry that they weren't able to set decent expectations for a database. So sorry that some kid said 'oh shit, this database isn't solving world peace'.

Maybe if they didn't have fear-mongering to deal with-- then maybe-- just maybe-- they could do their job without getting their schema criticized at every corner.

I just think that the Reg obviously has something against Databases. Databases are the center of most corporations.

Wake up and smell the roses, bitch.

Databases never hurt nobody.

Little pansy reporters-- scared of _ANY_ database--- don't have a lot of credibility when it comes to judging a particular database.

-Aaron

Following this third email, we immediately invoked the Vulture Central nutcase flame protocol - hermetically sealing the building, firing up the newsroom Faraday cage and flagging Kempf emails as spam for immediate diversion into the concrete containment chamber where dangerous outpourings of rage are subjected to a lethal dose of radiation.

In case you're wondering why we refer to Kempf as a "serial" troll, a bit of light investigation showed he's got some previous form. Now, we're not going to spoil readers' fun by providing links demonstrating quite what a net delinquent Kempf is, but check out the rather entertaining story of the cyberstalking charge, the appearance before the beak and the subsequent fine. Happy hunting. ®

Bootnote

*In his defence, Kempf's point about smoking "pole" is a fair one. Rest assured that as of right now, the abuse of pole is strictly prohibited on Vulture Central premises. Mr Williams - consider yourself warned.