Author Archive

The $800 Million ebook

Jun 19, 2014 No Comments by

No one forces anyone to buy a book, whether it’s digitally rendered or paper and print. If Apple had set their prices too high, a lack of sales would have suggested their error. And there are always alternatives for the consumer such as libraries and those dusty repositories known as ‘book shops’

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Et tu, Apple?

Jun 10, 2014 No Comments by

This isn’t so much built in obsolescence we’re talking about here, rather a deliberate and unnecessary removal of functionality from an otherwise perfectly serviceable device. That we paid good money for. And is now worthless, in every sense.

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Reebok Checklight

Jan 10, 2014 No Comments by

This bit of kit is integrated into a skull cap (a headband version is in the works) and displays the force sustained by head impacts on an LED display that sits at the back of the neck.

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Panasonic

Jan 10, 2014 No Comments by

That’s what happens when you eavesdrop on conversations about subjects of which you know nothing. You find that the person upon whose eaves you were dropping doesn’t know anything either.

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CES Unveiled

Jan 09, 2014 No Comments by

At 4pm the seething hordes of the geek media were let in to swarm around buffet tables groaning with free food and bars serving equally free booze. Somewhere amidst the platters of shrimp and beef skewers there were selected brands showing their products at very many small stands.

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CES. Oh Yes.

Jan 05, 2014 No Comments by

CES is now a curious circus, notable as much for some of the biggest names in tech that choose to be absent: Apple, Google, Amazon.

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Bitcoin

Jul 24, 2013 No Comments by

There is plenty written about the digital world that is mildly diverting, in a ‘what will they think of next?’ kind of way, while being unlikely to impinge on the lives of thee and me. Such is Bitcoin.

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PRINTER WOE (continued)

Jul 14, 2013 No Comments by

The HP website assures us that Windows 7 is pre-loaded with the driver that will make it and the 7690 sing sweet printerly music together. They are lying. And that lie is compounded by the fact that the driver we need cannot be downloaded from the HP website.

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Here’s Looking At You

Jul 04, 2013 No Comments by

If you don’t like what’s being done with your online burblings, go offline, go analogue. Or just shut up.

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The Predictable Consequence of Predicting Predictability

Jun 18, 2013 No Comments by

These fruity geek love-ins are the only occasions (aside from cock-ups such as their mapping software debacle) Apple speaks. The rest of the time they keep very quiet. A spokesperson for Apple is never available for comment. It’s a sensible, productive strategy but somewhat ironic, given that Apple products are designed to facilitate our being social media blabbermouths.

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