Thursday, June 13
Daily News Stuff 13 June 2019
A Page With Slug "Name" Already Exists Edition
A Page With Slug "Name" Already Exists Edition
Tech News
- The race is on between massive traditional media corporations and massive new media corporations to determine who can run out of friends first. (Tech Dirt)
It's almost as if none of them ever talk to anyone outside their respective bubbles.
- Either this guy has a hugely overoptimistic view of AI research, a hugely pessimistic view of humanity, or he is profoundly deaf. (Tech Crunch)
The future, ladies and gentlemen.
- SGopher. You know it makes sense.
- The story of a MacBook Pro that had nothing wrong with it. (ZDNet)
Have you tried not turning it off and back on again?
- Google is having second thoughts about handing the entire browser market to its competitors overnight. (ZDNet)
Actually, in this case, it looks like first thoughts.
- So, does Sydney not suck or does the letter it just signed backing digital rights suck? (ZDNet)
Hmm. The letter is not terrible. I'd have worded it a little differently, but it's arguing for equal access, not equal outcome.
- The story of a MacBook Air that had everything wrong with it. (Thurrott.com)
(It's behind a semi-paywall; if you register for free you can read three premium articles a month.)
Short version: He installed the MacOS Catalina beta on a six month old MacBook Air and the magic smoke escaped. Dead as a doornail.
- Bored. It's been days since anyone radically reinvented computer hardware. Come on, people!
Music Video of the Day Inspired by Jay
Disclaimer: A page with slug "mint" already exists. A page with slug "draft" already exists. A page with slug "_randomsequenceofcharacters234831352" already exists.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at
10:25 PM
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The Floppotron is the current state of the art in computer hardware orchestras. e.g.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q260bjSiyq0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q260bjSiyq0
Posted by: Jay at Thursday, June 13 2019 11:30 PM (mrlXS)
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Thursday, June 13 2019 11:55 PM (PiXy!)
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"Craigslist destroyed print journalism that couldn't compete with free
classified advertising, as this was their primary source of
profitability."
Hmm. That should have a higher profile, as I distinctly remember when CL became popular newspapers ranting about it stealing their ad revenue. So on one level, they've just picked a new bad guy. On another, it raises the question of just why the newspapers have done nothing whatsoever to stay relevant for about 20 years now, instead of just whining about how awful competition is.
Hmm. That should have a higher profile, as I distinctly remember when CL became popular newspapers ranting about it stealing their ad revenue. So on one level, they've just picked a new bad guy. On another, it raises the question of just why the newspapers have done nothing whatsoever to stay relevant for about 20 years now, instead of just whining about how awful competition is.
Posted by: Rick C at Friday, June 14 2019 02:26 AM (Iwkd4)
4
"one recent trend is the rise of mood or activity-based playlists"
I think this is actually an interesting thing and kinda maybe dispute your position here. I like listening to music radio, YT, etc., but I can't do it while working. If someone came up with "background music I could listen to that wouldn't sap my concentration" I'd probably be all over that.
I think this is actually an interesting thing and kinda maybe dispute your position here. I like listening to music radio, YT, etc., but I can't do it while working. If someone came up with "background music I could listen to that wouldn't sap my concentration" I'd probably be all over that.
Posted by: Rick C at Friday, June 14 2019 02:29 AM (Iwkd4)
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Re: macbook: Everyone involved in that except the guy who figured out the problem is an idiot and should switch jobs to something that doesn't involve technology.
Posted by: Rick C at Friday, June 14 2019 02:30 AM (Iwkd4)
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Also: the macbook story points out stupidity in macland. If you wanted to do more or less the same thing in Windows, you'd log in, plug in the external monitor, hit Windows+P to tell it "only display on the external monitor", then change the sleep settings so the laptop stays awake when the lid's closed, and you're done. You don't mess with the brightness because the LCD's off.
The only drawback is that, at least with Dells, you have to open the lid to power it on if you shut it off previously instead of sleeping it.
The only drawback is that, at least with Dells, you have to open the lid to power it on if you shut it off previously instead of sleeping it.
Posted by: Rick C at Friday, June 14 2019 02:34 AM (Iwkd4)
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"Google says the new API is better in terms of privacy, but also speed,
as Chrome's highly optimized code handles all the web request filtering,
instead of leaving this operation to an extension's slow JavaScript
code."
Uh, no. First off, if JS is slow, fix your engine, Google. Second, since so many sites use so many trackers and ads now--seriously, look at the cookie settings of most "news" sites; if you drill down, they have links to well over 100 separate ad networks they use--that adblocking drastically speeds up page load times. I just checked: with uBlock Origin, Instapundit's site has 54 requests for 1.07MB over 659 ms. Turn both it and Firefox's content blocking off, and the page balloons to 332 request for 5.88MB over 39s. Cnet: blocking on, 84/4MB/1.5s vs 365/14.85/17s.
Uh, no. First off, if JS is slow, fix your engine, Google. Second, since so many sites use so many trackers and ads now--seriously, look at the cookie settings of most "news" sites; if you drill down, they have links to well over 100 separate ad networks they use--that adblocking drastically speeds up page load times. I just checked: with uBlock Origin, Instapundit's site has 54 requests for 1.07MB over 659 ms. Turn both it and Firefox's content blocking off, and the page balloons to 332 request for 5.88MB over 39s. Cnet: blocking on, 84/4MB/1.5s vs 365/14.85/17s.
Posted by: Rick C at Friday, June 14 2019 02:40 AM (Iwkd4)
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PSA, re Thurrott: temp-mail.org creates disposable email addresses and isn't blocked like Mailinator.
Posted by: Rick C at Friday, June 14 2019 02:44 AM (Iwkd4)
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The Mac story is as much about the idiot user as about the idiot Geniuses and the idiot OS developers. The brightness setting wouldn't survive the motherboard replacement, the second motherboard replacement, or the complete laptop replacement. Which means that he kept deliberately turning the brightness down after each "repair", and forgetting that he'd done it.
I actually ran into a similar problem with my sister's work MacBook Pro, where the screen got cooked when it woke up in her bag; it wouldn't display anything on an external monitor, and none of the usual magic key combinations worked to reset things. Turned out her IT department had it locked down to prevent use of magic keys, and it just didn't like my little portable monitor; it was booting up just fine, and once I plugged in a different monitor, she was able to work. Clearly I should have charged $10,000 for the service...
(And why did the magnetic latch fail in the first place? Because one of her company's little trade-show giveaways was a webcam privacy shield like this one, with their logo on it)
-j
I actually ran into a similar problem with my sister's work MacBook Pro, where the screen got cooked when it woke up in her bag; it wouldn't display anything on an external monitor, and none of the usual magic key combinations worked to reset things. Turned out her IT department had it locked down to prevent use of magic keys, and it just didn't like my little portable monitor; it was booting up just fine, and once I plugged in a different monitor, she was able to work. Clearly I should have charged $10,000 for the service...
(And why did the magnetic latch fail in the first place? Because one of her company's little trade-show giveaways was a webcam privacy shield like this one, with their logo on it)
-j
Posted by: J Greely at Friday, June 14 2019 04:24 AM (ZlYZd)
10
If I didn't make it clear that the customer was an idiot as well, yeah, he was. But again, you wouldn't even do that in the Windows world (if you weren't an idiot) because there's no need, unless he was doing something weirder than the description suggests.
As far as the privacy shield goes, I guess that's why a sticker is better (unless you want to sometimes use the camera, of course.) I'm guessing the thickness of the shield kept the magnet just too far away to work?
As far as the privacy shield goes, I guess that's why a sticker is better (unless you want to sometimes use the camera, of course.) I'm guessing the thickness of the shield kept the magnet just too far away to work?
Posted by: Rick C at Friday, June 14 2019 05:52 AM (Iwkd4)
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