Huawei without Google: isn’t that a good thing?

I see Google’s going to stop supporting Huawei as a developer. How is this a bad thing?    First, Huawei can still get the public parts of Android, since they’re open-source. Secondly, if they don’t get updates ahead of time, so what? When have western software companies rolled out bug-free updates? Based on my own […]

Read More… from Huawei without Google: isn’t that a good thing?



Spoiler alert: The Avengers’ endgame

I’m hearing the young people talk about this lately. But we already know how The Avengers ends.    Then they come back with some new cast members years later. John Steed (Patrick Macnee) and Tara King (Linda Thorson) on board a rocket. You may also like Not quite a remake, but similar Is your favourite […]

Read More… from Spoiler alert: The Avengers’ endgame



Navigating the Julian Assange arrest

I find it disturbing that some of the talking heads here we’ve seen are giving the Julian Assange story the same bias that much of the US mainstream media are. To me, it’s dangerous territory: it either shows that our media wish to be complicit with Anglo-American interests, that they do little more than repeat […]

Read More… from Navigating the Julian Assange arrest



YouTube tracks you even when you’ve signed out and blocked their cookies

Of course YouTube lies. Say you’ve paused your search and watch history on YouTube. And you block all youtube.com cookies. YouTube won’t track you, right? You’ve made it quite clear you don’t want a record of what you’ve done, so YouTube shouldn’t keep one.    Wrong.    As with Big Tech, what you expect given […]

Read More… from YouTube tracks you even when you’ve signed out and blocked their cookies



Autocade hits 14,000,000 page views, and we start a YouTube channel

Above: Behind the scenes of the Škoda Karoq road test for Autocade. I hadn’t kept track of Autocade’s statistics for a while, and was pleasantly surprised to see it had crossed 14,000,000 page views (in fact, it’s on 14,140,072 at the time of writing). Using some basic mathematics, and assuming it hit 13,000,000 on May […]

Read More… from Autocade hits 14,000,000 page views, and we start a YouTube channel



In line with what I discovered in 2011: Google tracks your location even after opting out

The Associated Press had an exclusive this week: Google does not obey your opt-out preferences.    I could have told you that in 2011. Oh wait, I did. And I pointed out other instances where Google ignored your request to pause your history, continuing to track you either through its main site or its properties […]

Read More… from In line with what I discovered in 2011: Google tracks your location even after opting out



The decline continues: Facebook pages no longer accept YouTube links

Many of you know that I no longer use Facebook for my personal stuff. However, there are still work things to do, although I’ve noticed Facebook pages get more and more useless by the day. Here are the stats for my Facebook page:    Strangely, I can see the stats on a page that’s not […]

Read More… from The decline continues: Facebook pages no longer accept YouTube links



It can’t be that hard to rank media meritoriously, if only the big players had the will

US Department of Defense   Keen to be seen as the establishment, and that means working with the military–industrial complex, Google is making software to help the Pentagon analyse drone footage, and not everyone’s happy with this development.   The World Economic Forum’s ‘This is the future of the internet’ makes for interesting reading. It’s […]

Read More… from It can’t be that hard to rank media meritoriously, if only the big players had the will



YouTube under fire for child exploitation videos—with ‘three unpaid volunteers’ monitoring reports

The Murdoch Press has rightly kept its pressure up on Google, with a cover story in The Times, ‘Adverts fund paedophile habits’ on November 24 (the online version, behind a paywall, is here).    Say what you will about its proprietor, but Murdochs have been happy to go after the misdeeds of Google: the earlier […]

Read More… from YouTube under fire for child exploitation videos—with ‘three unpaid volunteers’ monitoring reports



All I really know is who I won’t vote for

One thing I love about New Zealand is that we’re not mired in an election cycle years before the event. We’re three weeks or so out from our General Election, and only now am I feeling things are heating up.    It’s not that we haven’t had drama. Weeks ago, Metiria Turei was co-leader of […]

Read More… from All I really know is who I won’t vote for