January 2012
5 posts
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Don't call it an ultrabook →
Latest editorial for Engadget.
Every year at CES, the tech-watching masses engage in a bit of trendspotting — an attempt to identify the one or two big themes of the show that may or may not come to define the year in technology. Some years those are easy to spot (tablets and 3D TV were two big ones recently), and other times they involve a bit of guesswork. This year, one of the most...
“Such is the power of his prose that when I glanced up from the pages of this...”
– Pagan Kennedy on William Gibson’s “Distrust That Particular Flavor,” The New York Times.
December 2011
4 posts
2 tags
“But is The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo a cyberpunk story? If you think of...”
– Annalee Newitz on Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo for io9.
November 2011
3 posts
1 tag
Demystifying McLuhan →
The winning videos from CBC’s McLuhan mashup contest.
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The problem with bad product names and what we can... →
Product names generally fall into one of four different categories: good, safe, meaningless and bad. There may be better categories to group them in, but we’ll use these for the purpose of this editorial. In the first category I’d put something like Kindle, arguably one of the best new product names of the last ten years. iPhone and iPad, and their subsequent suffixed versions, are...
June 2011
1 post
May 2011
5 posts
3 tags
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Vincenzo Natali’s Neuromancer →
I’m still a bit cautiously optimistic about the whole thing given the history, but Natali could really nail this.
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A less tactile future, and how to avoid it
For the past few weeks, I’ve been doing most of my typing on a Matias Tactile Pro 3 — a mechanical keyboard that’s much like the original Apple Extended or IBM Model M keyboards, in function, if not appearance. If you’re not old enough to remember those, that means it relies on mechanical key switches instead of the rubber membrane used by most keyboards these days....
April 2011
6 posts
2 tags
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Editorial: RIM, we've been here before →
A few thoughts on RIM, and the state of things from Espoo to Waterloo.
By now you’ve no doubt read or at least heard about the New York Times interview where RIM’s co-CEOs wound up asking most of the questions and challenged conventional wisdom about the company, or seen the BBC interview that Mike Lazaridis put an abrupt end to (see below, if you haven’t). Those both offer...
Sidney Lumet
Lots of Sidney Lumet’s movies need no introduction, but there’s an underrated gem for every (rightfully) acknowledged classic. Highly recommend Q&A, with Nick Nolte and Timothy Hutton, for starters.
March 2011
2 posts
3 tags
WatchClickety Clack
So I finally took the plunge on a mechanical keyboard — a Matias Tactile Pro 3. It definitely takes a bit of getting used to, but going back to anything else already feels a bit weird, and the sound grows on you pretty quickly as well. It sounds like work getting done.
Anyone else using one?
January 2011
1 post
October 2010
1 post
September 2010
1 post
August 2010
1 post
WikiLeaks posts huge encrypted file to Web →
AP: Online whistle-blower WikiLeaks has posted a huge encrypted file named “Insurance” to its website, sparking speculation that those behind the organization may be prepared to release more classified information if authorities interfere with them.
[via The Globe and Mail]
July 2010
3 posts
Tech Zeitgeist
The only tech-related things non-tech people have asked me about in the last week or two:
Kindle price drop
iPhone 4 reception issues
June 2010
6 posts
Newly released GCHQ files: UKUSA Agreement →
Some light reading for the weekend.
The files contain details of the recently avowed UKUSA Agreement - the top secret, post-war arrangement for sharing intelligence between the United States and the UK. Signed by representatives of the London Signals Intelligence Board and its American counterpart in March 1946, the UKUSA Agreement is without parallel in the Western intelligence world and formed...
Trying out something different.
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As a flurry of Google Alerts informed me this week, Square-Enix has announced a new video game that has the same name as my old site, Mindjack. That also reminded me that the site wasn’t much to look at in its current state, so I spent a bit of time reorganizing things to highlight some of the best content Mindjack produced during its run. There’s still a lot of broken elements on...
May 2010
1 post
March 2010
2 posts
February 2010
1 post
December 2009
1 post
November 2009
1 post
October 2009
1 post
June 2009
2 posts
April 2009
3 posts
