John Gruber: More on the EU’s Market Might: If they follow through with a demand that Photos be completely un-installable (not just hidable from the Home Screen, as it is now), this would constitute another way that the EC is standing in as the designer of how operating systems s … | Continue reading
Currently holed up in Suffolk. And I almost got away without mentioning Apple… 1. The Atlantic gets it AI “will change the way people find us, it will change all the architecture of the media business, and we’ve got to figure out how to continue to succeed in it,” says Nick Thomp … | Continue reading
BOY that was a week. You might have noticed that I didn’t write a weeknote last weekend… well there’s lots of things going on at the moment that I can’t really talk about too much. I’ll no doubt have more to say about that some time soon, but in the meantime it just means that [… … | Continue reading
Over on Threads, Walt Mossberg has commented on the Apple/DOJ case. First up, if you do not respect Walt’s opinions, you’re a fool. Walt is one of my tech journalism heroes. That said, I think he’s missing a couple of points here. Walt is correct that the vertically integrated mo … | Continue reading
From 1995 through to about 2008, I made my living from technology journalism (we called it “computer journalism” then, because technology really was computer). That means my career almost exactly spans the period of the biggest technology antitrust trials of the lot: United State … | Continue reading
First up, apologies that there’s been no long form post this week. I’ve had some family stuff which had to take priority over writing. Normal service should be resumed from next week. And now on to the good stuff… 1. The last refuge of the desperate media Ahh, low rent native ads … | Continue reading
Last week we went to see Dune. It’s a pretty amazing film, the kind that you just let wash over you and experience rather than trying too hard to intellectualise. You definitely need to have seen the first part, though. I have some news about work which I will be able to share wi … | Continue reading
It’s FRIDAY! 1. Substack now has three million paid subscribers I left Substack because I didn’t want to stay on a platform which lied about its status as a social network (mates, you have algorithmic recommendations – you’re a social network) or which was relaxed about out-and-o … | Continue reading
This week, rather than focus on a single topic, I thought I would look at a couple of different things – and also point you in the direction of some other great articles I’ve read this week. First, though, something that’s a bit of a theme for me: the long-term unsustainability o … | Continue reading
I’m a little bit tired: a two hour journey back from Folkestone this morning (thank you farmers, tractor convoys in a mediaeval walled city are fun) and several pints last night make me want a nap. It was a friend’s birthday, and there was pizza. I narrowly avoided dad dancing. T … | Continue reading
1. Oh, WordPress! Not content with their CEO getting into a stupid public spat with a user and apparently revealing information about them which should have remained private, WordPress announced it was doing deals to give access to their customers’ posts and content to train “sel … | Continue reading
“Personally, I don’t want the perception in a few years to be, ‘Those old school web ranking types just got steamrolled and somehow never saw it comin’…’” Google engineer Eric Lehman, from an internal email in 2018, titled “AI is a serious risk to our business” I should, of cours … | Continue reading
It’s been a gloomy week. Sorry. 1. Surprise! Apple’s sync stuff is entirely cryptic The magnificent Howard Oakley, who knows more about the technology in the Mac than any man has a right to know, has been digging into the way iCloud sync works, and found it imposes some completel … | Continue reading
You might have noticed a post from HouseFresh doing the rounds, especially if you have anything to do with creating content intended to generate affiliate revenue. It’s caused quite a stir, particularly among publishers. My background is in product testing. My first job in publis … | Continue reading
The good thing about not writing a weeknote for a week is you have plenty of things to write about. The bad thing is that you have plenty of things to write about. We’ve managed to fit in two movies in the past fortnight: All of us strangers, and The zone of interest. What a […] | Continue reading
I like links. You like links. Everyone likes links! 1. The dirty fight of “return to office” I’ve written before that if you can’t lead teams remotely, that’s your problem, not your team’s. Of course, getting some face-to-face time is useful and valuable, but mandating a set numb … | Continue reading
I spent Monday and Tuesday working on a short story submission. The workshop that I went to last week at the Barbican on horror was the last one a series run by Good Bad Books over the summer — I hadn’t known about it till the last one, otherwise I would have been to all […] | Continue reading
At long last, I have some news. After six years, I’m leaving Bauer and moving got to pastures new – or at least to allow myself some time to do some more creative work. I haven’t really talked much about work here as I prefer to compartmentalise it, and because the actual amount … | Continue reading
I suspect that the Venn diagram of people who own both an M1 Mac and a Surface Pro X is small. I fall into that section in the middle, so I thought it was worth summarizing how the two compare. I s… | Continue reading