The EU gets it when it comes to fines. Rather than the paltry US$17 million certain US statesâ attorneys-general stung Google with some years ago for hacking Iphones, theyâve now fined the search engine giant âŹ4,340 million, on top of its earlier fine of âŹ2,420 million over anticompetitive behaviour.
That US$17 million, I mentioned at the time, amounted to a few hoursâ income at Google.
As the EUâs competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager noted on Twitter, âFine of âŹ4,34 bn to @Google for 3 types of illegal restrictions on the use of Android. In this way it has cemented the dominance of its search engine. Denying rivals a chance to innovate and compete on the merits. Itâs illegal under EU antitrust rules. @Google now has to stop itâ.
Google forces manufacturers to preinstall Chrome if they want to install Google Play. The EU also notes that virtually all Android devices have Google Search preinstalled, and most users never download competing apps, furthering Googleâs dominance of search. Google pays manufacturers and cellphone networks to preinstall the Google search app on their phones, and prevented manufacturers from installing Google apps if their versions of Android were not approved by Google. DuckDuckGo, my search engine of choice, welcomed the decision. It noted:
Up until just last year, it was impossible to add DuckDuckGo to Chrome on Android, and it is still impossible on Chrome on iOS. We are also not included in the default list of search options like we are in Safari, even though we are among the top search engines in many countries.
Their anti-competitive search behavior isn't limited to Android. Every time we update our Chrome browser extension, all of our users are faced with an official-looking dialogue asking them if they'd like to revert their search settings and disable the entire extension.
Thatâs consumer confusion on top of restrictive contracts that promote market dominance and anti-competitive behaviour.
This is a very petty company, one that shut down Vivaldiâs Adwords accountafter its CEO gave some interviews about privacy.
Of course Iâm biased, and I make no apology for itâand anyone who has followed my journey on this blog from being a Google fan to a Google-sceptic over the last decade and a half will know just how Googleâs own misleading and deceptive conduct helped changed my mind.
Googleâs argument, that many Android manufacturers installed rival apps, clearly fell on deaf ears, and understandably so. While Iâm sure Android experts can think up examples, as a regular person who occasionally looks at phones, even those ones with rival apps still ship with the Google ones. In other words, thereâs simply more bloat. Iâve yet to see one in this country ship without a Chrome default and Google Play installed, often in such a way that you canât delete it, and Google Services, without getting your phone rooted.
I did read this in the Murdoch Press and thought it was a bit of a laugh, but then maybe my own experience isnât typical:
The impact of any changes mandated by the EU decision on Googleâs ability to target ads to usersâand to its profitabilityâis an open question. The two apps targeted in the EU decision, Googleâs search and its Chrome browser, are extremely popular in their own right. Consumers are likely to seek them out from an app store even if they werenât preinstalled on the phone, said Tarun Pathak, an analyst at research firm Counterpoint.
I just donât believe they would, and I made it a point to get a phone that would, happily, have neither. By buying a Chinese Android phone, I escape Googleâs tracking; by seeking out the Firefox browser, I get to surf the way I want. That choice is going to create competition, something that Google is worried about. The Wall Street Journal also states that despite the earlier fine, Googleâs shopping rivals said little or nothing has actually happened.
With all of Googleâs misdeeds uncovered on this blog over the years, Iâm really not surprised.
The EU is, at the very least, forcing some to examine just how intrusive Google is. It might soon discover how uncooperative Google can be.
Via Adeline Chua: I see Elon Musk has apologized to Vernon Unsworth. But it smacks of the apology a child would give after being compelled by his teacher to do so.
Translation: âI wouldn’t have said anything if the Vern didn’t push me. It’s all Vern’s fault.’ Or, ‘Vern made me do it.’ I stand by my earlier blog post.
I also take issue that there were mistruths, having watched the interview. As far as I could tell, Unsworth gave his opinion: I never took his statements for anything but that. And he drew a conclusionâthat it was all a publicity stuntâthat he wasn’t alone in drawing. Musk seems very easily offended by an opinion.
Even if Musk was sincere, and there is no denying that he devoted resources to his rescue submarine idea, how the whole thing played out did feel like a publicity stunt. It wouldn’t hurt to review just how that perception went out, and how communications could have been better.
If he hadn’t burned the bridge with Unsworth, maybe he could have had one extra person to ask.
I find it hard to believe that a South African, someone who described himself as an alpha male once, would actually consider ‘can stick his submarine where it hurts’ to be an actual suggestion he commit a sexual act rather than an insult.
If we really want to pick hairs on mistruths, Musk inferred that Unsworth wasn’t even there because he didn’t see him. That was exactly what he wanted people to think.
I admire Musk for a lot of what he has accomplished, and Lucire was an early supporter of Tesla, but this week’s news has prompted me, and others, to look back at how he has conducted himself.
It’s the record of a privileged man who hasn’t endeared himself to others, as this blogger notes. One might add this link, about a Twitter-based cult that will attack those who go after him (especially if you’re a woman, it seems).
Just another day on the playground we call Twitter, then.
I have often said that each new technology often goes downhill when unsavoury parts of our society get to it. Email was fine before spammers, Wikipedia was fine without sociopaths, Blogger was fine without Google ownership, and Google was fine without an NYSE listing.
But what does one make of Twitter? Once upon a time, it was a decent place to hang out. Ask Stephen Fry.
Today, however, with all sorts of people on it, the post-spammer, post-sociopath stage appears to be: watch the rich lose it.
Those who don’t like President Trump might think I’m thinking of him, but it was actually Elon Musk, whose efforts on so many fronts I have publicly admired, who seems to be the latest in turning his corner of Twitter into an angry man’s rant record.
Not long ago, I saw Musk argue with a Tweeter about economics and blocking him. Of course it’s everyone’s prerogative to block as they see fit, but I always remember what my parents told me when I was a child: the really powerful see the big picture. They don’t sweat the small stuff. And this seems like someone sweating the small stuff. Even if he is the 53rd richest person in the world. From Techcrunch (hat tip to Adeline Chua):
Just goes to show that u may own a space exploration company, run an automobile business, be 53rd richest person in the world but still spend time bickering on social media like everyone else. A monumental idiot indeed.
I’m not sure what Musk intends with all of these Tweets, but I’m losing respect for the man. He probably wouldn’t care what I think, but then, going on the earlier Tweets, he probably does.
As someone who leads a much, much smaller bunch of companies, I know the boss’s public statements do impact on the rest of the team, and how your firm’s perceived.
If we look at the rich, Sir Richard Branson is a great ambassador for his ventures and is careful about what he says. His brands are tied in with his personal image, and he’s well aware of that. Elon Musk is not an exception: his personality and announcements are keeping Tesla’s faithful invested in the brand, for instance.
On the one hand, it’s great that Twitter is a great leveller. But with that comes other risks. If it is a leveller, bringing everyone to the level of the village merchant, then we can make a choice about whom we deal with.
In a real-life village, when we walk round, we may choose to buy from certain people and not others, because of how we’re treated or what their reputation’s like.
In this virtual village, we have one of the wealthiest players ranting in the corner.
And therein lies the risk for Tesla and SpaceX. Maybe he’s so confident at his lead that, with or without him, his dreams can come true. It would be great if we did have more electric cars and more affordable space exploration. However, while the founder is still young, alive and kicking, I’m afraid these ventures are still very much tied to how we perceive him. I’m not sure that being a rich, angry Tweeter who calls a rescuer a ‘pedo’ is the image that a Tesla buyer, for instance, wants to be associated with.
Frankly, if we’re going to remember anyone in the whole Thai cave rescue, let it be Saman Kunan, the former Thai navy SEAL diver who lost his life.
I really enjoy Yakov Smirnoff’s old jokes about the Soviet Union, and the Russian reversal that is often associated with him. In the 21st century, I’ve used the odd one, such as, ‘In Russia, Olympics game you!’ and ‘In America, internet watch you!’. I’m sure I’ve done wittier ones, but I’ve yet to post, ‘In America, president Tweet you!’
Today on Twitter, Anton Troynikov, while not doing exactly the above, had a bunch of Tweets about how similar the USSR was to Silicon Valley today. Although he’s not pointing out opposites, it’s humour in the same spirit. In Tweeting, he outdid the few modernized Russian reversals I’ve used over the years.
Things that happen in Silicon Valley and also the Soviet Union:
– waiting years to receive a car you ordered, to find that it's of poor workmanship and quality
– promises of colonizing the solar system while you toil in drudgery day in, day out
It appears my friend Justin was spot on: I probably was part of a test group trialling longer Instagram videos since April.
Today, Instagram announced that people could upload 10-minute videos, and an hour for those with big followings. This news article (hat tip to Cachalot Sang on Twitter) says thereâll be a new app called IGTV, although Iâve always just uploaded mine via regular Instagram. I havenât cracked nine minutes yet, but Iâve uploaded videos in the high eights. Regular Instagram seemed to balk at doing anything too large. Also bear in mindâarguably from someone who has had more experience of this than anyone in Instagram-landâthat these uploads take ages and can sometimes fail.
Donât be disappointed if your views are low, since Instagram only counts full views. I have videos still saying they have had zero views, yet I have likes and, in some cases, comments. Not everyoneâs going to sit back and watch these in full.
I had noticed that in the last week, my videos, all of which are over a minute, have successfully uploadedâup from the one in two ratio that I experienced when Instagram first gave me the ability to upload videos longer than one minute in April. No wonder, if the official announcement was made today: they probably began allowing all the big ones through.
As the one user (that I know of) who has publicly been uploading videos of over a minute for nearly two months, welcome to the club. I hope youâll enjoy it.
If you were one of the people caught up with âThe Russians are coming! The Russians are coming!â and a selection of Cold War paranoia resurrected by politicians and the media, then surely recent news would make you start to think that this was a fake-news narrative? Ian56 on Twitter was recently named by the UK Government as a Russian bot, and Twitter temporarily suspended his account.
He recently fronted up to the Murdoch Press’s Sky News, which a bot actually couldnât.
To be a Russian bot, you need to be (a) Russian and (b) a bot. The clueâs in the title.
If the British Government would like to understand what a bot looks like, I can log in to my Facebook and send them a dozen to investigate. They are remarkably easy to find.
It would be easy to identify bots on Twitter, but Twitter doesnât like getting shown up. But Ian56 has never been caught up in that, because he’s human.
His only âcrimeâ, as far as I can see, is thinking for himself. Then he used his right to free speech to share those thoughts.
Heâs also British, and proud of his countryâwhich is why he calls out what he sees are lies by his own government.
And if there is hyperbole on his Twitter account, the ones which the Sky News talking heads tried to zing him with, it’s no worse than what you see on there every day by private citizens. If that’s all they could find out of Ian56âs 157,000 Tweets, then he’s actually doing better than the rest of us.
We seem to be reaching an era where the establishment is upset that people have the right to free speech, but that is what all this technology has offered: democratization of communication. Something that certain media talking heads seem to get very offended by, too.
Ianâs not alone, because Murdoch’s The Times is also peddling the Russian narrative and named a Finnish grandmother as a âRussian trollâ and part of a Russian disinformation machine.
Iâve followed Citizen Halo for a long time, and sheâs been perfectly open about her history. Her account was set up nine years ago, long before some of the Internet Research Agencyâs social media activity was reported to have begun. Sheâs been anti-war since Vietnam, and her Tweets reflect that.
While she sees no insult in being labelled Russian (she openly admits to some Russian ancestry) she takes exception at being called a troll, which she, again, isnât. She also wasnât âmobilisedâ as The Times claims to spread news about the air strikes in Syria. She and Ian questioned the veracity of mainstream media views, and they certainly werenât the only ones. They just happen to be very good at social media. That doesnât make you part of a Russian disinformation machine.
As a result of The Timesâs article, Citizen Halo has gained a couple of thousand followers.
Meanwhile, Craig Murray, who ‘went from being Britainâs youngest ambassador to being sacked for opposing the use of intelligence from torture’ also sees similar attacks in the UK, again through The Times.
It headlined, ‘Apologists for Assad working in universities’. Murray adds:
Inside there was a further two page attack on named academics who have the temerity to ask for evidence of government claims over Syria, including distinguished Professors Tim Hayward, Paul McKeigue and Piers Robinson. The Times also attacked named journalists and bloggers and, to top it off, finished with a column alleging collusion between Scottish nationalists and the Russian state.
The net goes wider, says Murray, with the BBC and The Guardian joining in the narrative. On Ian, Murray noted:
The government then issued a ridiculous press release branding decent people as âRussian botsâ just for opposing British policy in Syria. In a piece of McCarthyism so macabre I cannot believe this is really happening, an apparently pleasant and normal man called Ian was grilled live on Murdochâs Sky News, having been named by his own government as a Russian bot.
The Guardian published the government line without question.
It does appear that in 2018, all you need to do is think independently and exercise your right to free speech for the UK Government and the media to sell a conspiracy theory.
That, if anything, begins weakening the official narrative.
Like most people, I do take in some of the news that I get fed. Yet this activity is having the opposite effect of what the establishment wants, forcing tenuous links usually associated with gossip sites and tabloids. If you had trust in these institutions before, you may now rightly be questioning why.
You have to wonder if the online census this year has been intentionally bad so that the powers that be can call it a flop and use it as an excuse to delay online voting, thereby disenfranchising younger voters.
Itâs the Sunday before the census and I await my access code: none was delivered, and I have three addresses at which this could be received (two entries to one dwelling, and a PO box). If itâs not at any of these, then thatâs pretty poor. I have been giving them a chance on the expectation it would arrive, but now this is highly unlikely.
And when you go to the website, they claim my browserâs incompatible. I disagree, since Iâm within the parameters they state.
This screen shot was taken after I filled out a request for the access code yesterday. Statistics NZ tells me the code will now take a week to arrive, four days after census night. Frankly, thatâs not good enough.
While Iâve seen some TV commercials for the census, Iâve seen no online advertising for it, and nothing in social media. My other half has seen no TVCs for it.
Going up to the census people at the Newtown Fair today, I was handed a card with their telephone number and asked to call them tomorrow.
Youâd think theyâd have people there at the weekend when weâre thinking about these things. Letâs hope I remember tomorrow.
And I’m someone who cares about my civic duty here. What about all those who don’t? Are we going to see a record population drop?
I’m not alone in this.
Same friends feeling disenfranchised for not having a computer. I understand reasons for online census but I think organisation and comms around it leave somewhat to be desired.
So how many people on NZ Twitter have or haven't received their letter yet for Tuesday's Census?
— Sarah Hendrica Bickerton 👩🏻💻 (@sarahhbickerton) March 3, 2018
and there are a lot of people among her circles, myself included, who donât have the access code. Kat’s story is particularly interesting (edited for brevity):
Third call to Census NZ about getting a form for another dwelling on the property. This is specifically a question they talk about on the letter we got with our code, but operators are unable to issue extra codes. The request goes up to the supervisor.
When a field officer called around to give you a form, they sorted out issues like a second dwelling at the time, right there. They had authority to do so. They answered questions, and made sure you knew what you needed to do.
And I can't help but surmise that low socioeconomic communities are going to be the ones who: a) most likely won't have the time or inclination to fill in another bloody form for the government, let alone proactively pursue it b) need to be represented in the stats for funding
Online systems are robust and can be successful.
Itâs just that they need to be backed up by people with a will to make things succeed, not people who are so intent on making them fail.
Speaking for myself (which won’t affect Snap’s valuation at all), I could never get it to run. It said it needed Google Services, something which I don’t have and don’t want. Who wants Google tracking them all day longâwhile using up your own phone’s battery power?
As Sarah points out in a Tweet, this is why ‘you don’t build a $30b co off one generation’s fads’. Twitter should heed this make their experience better rather than have double standards, keeping one particular user on because they know they’re getting attention. (On that note, why is Twitter search so broken today?)
On February 14, 2008, my cousin Paul’s son Harold was shot and injured at a school shooting at Northern Illinois University. From memory, it was the fifth that week. Today, he wrote a letter to survivors and students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., who endured their day of horror on February 14, 2018, the 18th school shooting this year.
He has given me permission to share the below. My apologies for the size of the files: they are the ones I have access to.
Transcribed, it reads:
To fellow students and survivors,
I wish this letter was written under better circumstances. I wish this letter was written as purely formal, as rainbows and unicorns show up in the sky. But alas, the sad truth is I am writing this as now we are part of a family, that should never have been.
Before explaining and encouraging further, let me explain who I am first.
My name is Harold Ng, on 02/14/2008, I was at Northern Illinois University, in Cole Hall, when a mass shooting occured at 3pm. I was sitting in the back row, when shots were fired. On my way out of Cole Hall, was when I was hit by scrapnel and pellets. I survived and have been coping with the tragedy since. Your incident happened approximately one hour before ours, on our 10th year anniversary. And as I once like you; together we have to comprehend the horror. I am know reaching out to you to teach you from one survivor to another to learn together and teach you all what I have acquired over the years of how to cope with this tragedy.
And together we can become stronger.
Side note; Florida my 2nd home, I left IL and stayed with you for six years before; moving back my heart mourned when the Pulse nightclub shooting and now it mourns for you as well.
I know how hard this can be, but keep your head up; each day we live another day, and know that we can make a difference. Each dawning moment, each breath, live it like it’s your last.
I know that sounds bad, but the truth it should be taken as the strongest form of encouragement ever. Think of it as a chance to step out of the comfort zone and be who you really want to be, forget what the world and your parents want, but do what you want. By being yourself, you grow stronger and create a legacy, because they (the victims) weren’t able to.
Over time I have learned a lot of things and I would like to share them, so that we can overcome this chaos together.
1) Bond together as one, even though I am a whole generation ahead of you, together we will fight the fight.
2) Never forget who you are; and as survivors we shall not let a tragedy define who we are; define the school; or define the location.
3) LIVE. INSPIRE, and create a legacy.
The thing that worked for me was being around the people you love; I also took time to blog, and journal about how why? when? what? this will help cycle through all emotions and feelings and each specific moment; from journaling and blogging I have been able to write a book about my experience. I also started making YouTube videos which has some comedic stuff, but also some serious Vlogs as well. Do things you may never have done or thought about doing. Find a hobby; hobbies are always good when coping with tragedy.
One last thing to note: Please give yourself adequate time to heal; it varies from person to person, and for some it could be a long time, but do not rush it by all means.
If you wish to talk further I extend my resources to you. The best way to reach me would be through Facebook and twitter. I will provide you with all my links below.
