Tencent’s announcement yesterday that they intended to take palm scanning mainstream has early adopters swooning about convenience and late adopters frowning about security risks and surveillance. The tech itself was deployed by Kodak forty years ago and companies that use it today include Amazon and duty free retailers in some US airports. But now China-based […]
John Smeddle
Microsoft dethroned Apple last week as the richest company in the world as per market capitalization. Many assumed it was because of Apple slipping on a banana peel called China, with competition from Huawei and Xiaomi causing their tentpole product, iPhone 15, to lag behind in sales projections. (Even their freshly announced $70 discount is […]
It’s been an awful last seven days for Boeing. Yes, it could have been worse if there had been loss of life on Alaska Airlines flight 1282. But the media fodder of another stumbling industry giant has contributed enormously to triggering the alarm to prospective passengers and investors. The former are scrambling to find seats […]
In three days’ time on January 12th, a project that’s overdue by only about 55 years will take flight. A NASA project by the name of QUESST, an acronym for quiet supersonic transport, will provide the first demonstration of a sonic boom-less flight. The aircraft that will cruise through the sound barrier with barely a […]
Alaska Airlines sustained a near calamitous midflight incident on Friday. A portion of fuselage was torn from one of its aircraft, leaving a gaping hole in its side. Astonishingly, the flight crew were able to turn back to Portland, Oregon, and land safely. Less astonishing was the fact that the aircraft in question was a […]
This first week of January was, amongst other things, notable for the official inclusion of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt, Ethiopia and Iran into the Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa consortium known as BRICS. This puts the ink into the agreement pencilled in Johannesburg last year. Not to put a damper on things, but […]
With the epitome of trash journalism, The National Enquirer, leading the charge, America was treated to thousands of ‘sightings’ of the King for years after his untimely death 47 years ago. If it wasn’t a 7Eleven in Joliet Illinois, it was a quickie wedding chapel in Las Vegas. Name any town in America where people […]
The imminent threat of AI going rogue. Weaponry with freshly demonic kill power. Untrammelled illegal data collection. Wouldn’t it be nice to draw a line through 2023, and sigh with relief that it’s over? Well, the number of bad tech thresholds we crossed last year rules that out. Tightly fastened seatbelts would seem to be […]
So we had a look at our 50 most popular articles of 2023. We think we’re getting to know you and what you like to read but when we looked at the numbers, there were quite a few surprises. Love that, by the way. And we hope you continue to surprise us in 2024. The […]
Don’t you find that sometimes, you don’t have to have any connection to events you read in the news to feel personally involved? We looked back on the last year’s stories to remind ourselves of those moments when the news stirred our hearts, evoked our anger, filled us with pride, darkened us with dread or […]