Showing 1 - 10 of 10
Manipulating populations is very easy
Life, James Hein, Published on 25/10/2023
» Have you ever heard of the term SEME, or Search Engine Manipulation Effect? The term was coined back in 2014 by the psychologist Robert Epstein, in his paper "The Search Engine Manipulation Effect (SEME) And Its Possible Impact On The Outcomes Of Elections".
Apple sets sights on VR market
Life, James Hein, Published on 21/06/2023
» The biggest announcement of the past week or two was the Apple Vision Pro VR system. There has been so much on this recently. The quick summary is -- two 4K eyepieces, no controllers required and it can replace your TV and computer monitors. I was more interested in the battery life being two hours, or if you were using them, not enough for the full Apple presentation. The price is also an amazing US$3,500 in America so out of the range of most people. One argument is that by the time you don't need to pay for a TV upgrade or new monitors it is worth the investment. My counter is if you have a four-person household that price becomes $14,000, a lot more than the cost of a new TV. Oh, and you can mostly only use it with Apple kit which really limits options.
Reddit trumps Google search
Life, James Hein, Published on 15/02/2023
» Since my last column Twitter has had a number of technical issues, but I also found out that many of the problems I wrote about last time stem from the Content Management Head, not from Elon himself. Musk is putting in some very long days to try and get things sorted out at Twitter so it looks like he is nothing like the old boss in that respect. There remain a lot of traps in the code he inherited that will take time to sort out and may need a complete rewrite to address.
Protect yourself when online
Life, James Hein, Published on 03/08/2022
» A friend of mine, let's call him Dave, wrote to me recently about identity theft. He told me that all of his identifying information like phone numbers, email addresses, old passwords and his usual security questions, were all available on the dark web. He also had a number of notifications of personal information breaches that resulted in fraudulent charges, the need to replace credit cards and attempts to set up fake bank accounts in his name. The latter is used if a hacker is planning to get into your other accounts so they can transfer funds to themselves under your name.
Alternative social platforms can be expensive
Life, James Hein, Published on 10/11/2021
» The alternative social media platform Rumble recently bought out another platform for creators called Locals. Rumble is a YouTube-like platform and Locals is aimed more at the alternative blogging community, including names like Scott Adams and Dan Bongino. I don't think this will be a long-term successful merger for a simple reason, and that is money. To be fair Locals is an alternative to Patreon, a platform that will nuke your account if it doesn't like your politics as evidenced by a long list of conservative commentators being axed without warning.
Always check your sources
Life, James Hein, Published on 15/09/2021
» At the dawning of the internet age the aim was to provide a platform to share information, initially between higher education facilities. It was a golden age of what was essentially a library of information shared across the United States and later the world. The early fact checkers were academics interested in facts, data and a robust discussion.
Don't get caught out on camera
Life, James Hein, Published on 21/07/2021
» - In the new Covid world, office workers are now regularly in meetings from home. Many of these meetings these days now also include a video feed. The first thing others in the call do when someone pops up, is to check the background and immediately zoom in, mentally or physically, on anything that seems out of place in the background. Last night's dishes, haphazardly discarded clothing and even a pot plant seemingly out of place will be the object of interest. Some use a green screen behind them and have an image placed on that by software.
Chinese tech companies are at it again
Life, James Hein, Published on 12/05/2021
» A reminder on the importance of both scalable systems and load testing. The recent Philippines' attempt to expand its national ID programme had a number of issues when they introduced a two-factor authentication system. PhilSys, as it is known, started out just fine when registrations began in 2020, when paper forms were still used. This in itself was a little strange as the purpose of the new system was to do away with the need to present physical documents when interacting with government agencies. PhilSys the digital ID system was marketed as such and promised transformation and other buzzwords including easier opening of bank accounts. All of this would also help everyone involved during Covid times. After 28 million paper applications, the digital system was turned on and in the first hour 40,000 people tried to register. The system promptly fell over due to the load and inability to scale quickly. Most IT people will admit to a similar experience in their past, but by 2021 there are surely enough historical examples of what will happen if you don't do sufficient load testing before a major release like this.
The fight for a freer web continues
Life, James Hein, Published on 17/03/2021
» The social media platform Telegram has over 500 million users with over 55 million active every day. Unlike other platforms such as Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and others, you are free to express your opinion there without being cancelled, shadow banned or throttled in searches.
Diminishing returns
Life, James Hein, Published on 05/06/2019
» The first three months of 2019 saw Apple and Samsung collectively selling 17.5 million fewer smartphones globally compared to last year. As I've previously noted, we have market saturation and a lack of yearly upgrades for many users. I upgrade with roughly every third model, for example. The premium end of the market also continues to move out of the reach of many, meaning fewer people can upgrade as often. The innovation jump in successive models is also diminishing, so they lack the wow factor that drove earlier upgrades. These figures do not include the impact of the latest Samsung S10 range which shipped at the end of the quarter. The top three remain Samsung, Huawei and Apple. This may change with the recent US Huawei bans, or at least reduce any growth. Even after price cuts, Apple's sales fell 17.6% in the quarter leaving Samsung as the one least likely to lose their position in the next few months. Oppo and Viva rounded out the top five in sales with Xiaomi nibbling at their heels.