The land beyond Facebook

14.06.2011/09.53

Stowe Boyd wrote (and I re-Tumbled) the big drop in US and Canadian Facebook trafﬁc this week: Most prominently, the United States lost nearly 6 million users, falling from 155.2 million at the start of May to 149.4 million at the end of it. This is the ﬁrst time the country has lost users in […]

Facebook hates The Scotsman, and other xenophobic bugs

08.06.2011/05.47

Some very interesting errors on the internet today. Facebook blocked an innocent link about the price of electricity in Scotland, from The Scotsman, because it was deemed ‘abusive or spammy’. Maybe Scottish accents don’t go down well in California. Hang on, didn’t they import Craig Ferguson? I am told by Colvin Inglis on […]

Google Ads Preferences Manager issue conﬁrmed by NAI

05.05.2011/00.38

I’ve now had conﬁrmation from the Network Advertising Initiative that Google has, indeed, been dodgy about its Ads Preferences Manager. Thank you for bringing this issue to our attention. We were able to reproduce the issues you saw and have been working with Google for the last week to address them. I am happy […]

One year on, the same issues remain pressing

23.04.2011/00.13

In 2011, the issues that I spoke about during my campaign remain as pressing as they always did. We still need better, wider and earlier consultation, whether we streamline current processes or create new ones for citizen engagement. We still need to build a city-wide wiﬁ network, one which exists but needs a […]

It’s nice to be believed

21.04.2011/07.15

The bug I wrote about a few days ago that’s emerging when I use Autocade is now ﬁled with Telstra Clear—and it’s been escalated. For years I would report various faults, including with Telstra Clear, and I would not be believed. What a difference now that I am believed. For around two years, […]

Facebook resets email preferences, after it removes gay photo as ‘abusive’

20.04.2011/00.31

Not only does Google Ads Preferences Manager reset on a regular basis and bugger what your preferences are, Facebook has today reset (at least for myself and one other friend) email settings. ‘Set emails to spam.’ Why Facebook does this regularly, I have no idea—but this is relatively minor compared to their removal of […]

National thinks the internet is ‘Skynet’ as copyright amendments pass second reading

13.04.2011/13.10

This would be humorous if the implications of the copyright amendments were not so serious: Also speaking in favour of the bill, National MP Jonathan Young compared the internet to Skynet, the ﬁctional artiﬁcial intelligence network in the Terminator movies that tried to destroy mankind. That was in the National Business Review. I believe […]

Errors abound in the New Zealand internet as government ﬂip-ﬂops again

/12.42

This one hasn’t happened for a while (over a year), and, the last time I blogged about it, I managed to solve the issue—after putting up with it for years prior to that. (The solution before December 2009 was to wait for the computer’s foul mood to pass—hardly scientiﬁc.) Unfortunately, this ﬁx no longer […]

It’s about content, especially when reality is more appealing than reality TV

10.04.2011/01.55

It’s shows like The Apprentice that have kept me away from watching TV. I was surprised to learn, in conversation last week, that TV viewership is up, while print is down. Shows you can’t base too much of what the general public does on your own experience. I estimate my magazine and book […]

The new Honda goes at over 400 mph

07.04.2011/01.01

I have to hand it to Honda. The next new model from the Japanese ﬁrm is faster than the NSX and its old Formula 1 cars. It goes at Mach 0·72. The simpliﬁed version of Honda’s history goes something like this. Once upon a time, Mr Honda wanted to make cars. He wasn’t […]