Ryan Whitwam, Ars Technica: Like Chromebooks, Googlebooks are guaranteed 10 years of software support. However, the latest Chromebook models won’t get that in the traditional way. Google’s support page says that it plans to continue ChromeOS support through “mid-2034,” so there are already devices with support windows beyond that. […] Rather than get into a […]⌥ Permalink

Echo Wang, Reuters: Anthropic is making a massive bet that AI will transform the global economy more profoundly than ​industrialization, electricity and the internet, according to its IPO prospectus seen by Reuters. But the cost to get there will be staggering. Anthropic reported a net loss of $42 billion in 2025, and plans to spend […]⌥ Permalink

Kashmir Hill, Jesse Drucker, Eli Tan, and Mike Isaac, New York Times: Here’s what Meta is doing: For tax purposes, the company classifies its enormous, multibillion-dollar data centers as “pilot models.” Under a tax credit created in the 1980s to spur innovation, companies can get a rebate for supplies, but only if they are being […]⌥ Permalink

David Pogue sums up his experiences with Apple’s new Siri: As you can see by the Farmer’s Fridge food fail, the new Siri doesn’t always get it right. But overall, it’s an enormous leap in efficiency and precision. It’s a personal assistant, a second brain, a ChatGPT of your own life. You just have to […]⌥ Permalink

Casey Newton, Platformer: “The centerpiece of our vision for what we’re building is Muse,” Zuckerberg said, promoting the app to a central place in the company’s family of apps only a few days after most people first heard of it. “In the coming years, I expect that Muse is going to grow into the personal […]⌥ Permalink

There are some curious subplots in the data centre boom happening now in Alberta that I think go a long way toward explaining why people hate these things. First, even though developers tout their clean electricity bonafides, the fact is the actual power will come from fossil fuels. That is in part because our province […]⌥ Permalink

I think Meta is a perversely interesting company which means this week I watched, as I do every year, its Connect presentation. It is once again a glimpse into what Meta aspires toward — Apple-quality hardware matched with Google-quality services — compared to what it actually does: track users’ digital and physical activities to sell […]⌥ Permalink

If you are uninterested in Apple Intelligence features, Apple has documentation on how to turn them off for Golden Gate, Tahoe, and Sequoia — kind of. While there are more granular controls for individual features in Golden Gate, Apple’s way of limiting access in older versions is only through Screen Time. But there is a […]⌥ Permalink

One of the things I was most looking forward to when Apple announced it was moving to a new connector in the iPhone was the prospect of faster data transfers. It had been years since this new USB specification was finalized, and Apple was already supporting it in its newest computers, so it seemed predestined […]

Rodrigo Ghedin on the Audio Intelligence features in the new Apple Watch models: And… it doesn’t matter. The message that sticks in people’s minds is that the Apple Watch has become a constantly listening device. And although the new feature only works on the just-announced watches (Series 12 and Ultra 4), the distrust extends to […]⌥ Permalink

After agreeing in August with Germany’s competition authority to make changes to the App Tracking Transparency prompt, Apple has now announced the options available to developers. Unfortunately, the post on its Developer News page is terribly brief; here it is in its entirety: As part of agreements with select European competition authorities, Apple is introducing […]⌥ Permalink

Apple is very excited about all its software updates, naturally, but I am particularly appreciative of MacOS 27. While it does not hit the thoughtful design highs of the pre-Yosemite era, Apple has corrected a bunch of problems it introduced in last year’s Tahoe release and, as a matter of fact, from the past decade […]⌥ Permalink

Karl Bode: Earlier this month a 27-year-old who had been employed at Anthropic for all of four months declared he was quitting the software company because he believed that software automation poses an existential risk to humankind. […] The problem is – and shockingly the ad-based clickbait press didn’t do a very good job explaining […]⌥ Permalink

Marcus Werner, of the Breach, put together a video illustrating the persuasion tactics Canadian politicians are using as they argue for greater A.I. data centre development. It is what referred me to the fracking discussion I referenced in the article I published last night, so I wanted to shout it out for that reason. But […]⌥ Permalink

Last month, within a day of each other, two writers published contrasting takes regarding the backlash to artificial intelligence and its infrastructure. I do not think they were knowingly writing in opposition to each other — the second does not reference the first — but they set up the titular question I find intriguing: will […]

David Smith on Mastodon: The eve of iPhone 18 Pro pre-orders seems a good time to look back at the iPhone 17 family’s adoption. Here’s the 17 family data as a percentage of overall usage for Widgetsmith. Generally they followed the usual adoption pattern, and overall did very well ending at around 20% of total […]⌥ Permalink

Brian X. Chen, New York Times: But even though they’ve been around for years, foldable phones aren’t particularly popular. They’re expensive, awkward and not as durable as regular smartphones. So why did Apple build one? […] Foldable phones, which account for less than 2 percent of the handset market, may be the only part of […]⌥ Permalink

Apple held its annual September major product rollout today announcing, among other things, updated Apple Watch models with “Audio Intelligence” features. One of those features is “Live Rewind”: A double press of the Digital Crown shows the previous 15 seconds of a conversation as a text snippet, so the user can catch something they may […]⌥ Permalink

Michael Crider, PCWorld: […] So somebody at LG decided that, in addition to the basic monitor driver and management app delivered to its users via Windows Update, it would slip in an additional program, “LG Monitor App Installer.” This extra bit of software includes McAfee, or an ad for it — as if there was […]⌥ Permalink

Heather Burns: I cannot tell you how much it disgusts me that so much of the archival footage from September 11 has now been age-gated and restricted as “mature” or “sensitive or adult” content, as in this example from this Reddit film archive. It’s history. It’s archival footage of history. It’s a thing that happened. […]⌥ Permalink

Aaron Vegh and Ben Rice McCarthy have been steadily updating Indigo since they launched it in May. In the latest version, you can now swipe between different filtered timelines, the scroll position is synced between devices, and there is a new lower price point if you use it exclusively for a single network. As for […]⌥ Permalink

Brian Krebs: A new identity theft service launched on the dark web this week is selling digital scans of more than 153 million drivers licenses from people in the United States and Canada. Based on interviews with individuals whose licenses are available for purchase on this service, it appears to be siphoning images collected by […]⌥ Permalink

Dan Luu, after finding one wrong prediction after another made by Ed Zitron, comparing him to mediocre futurists, and exploring his writing style: That last sentence really sums up Zitron’s position. “There are so many guys to be mad at the moment”. In this talk, he throws in this jab at Andreesen and blames Andreesen […]⌥ Permalink

William Bishop of Pew Research: Between scrolling, notifications, and messages, smartphones can be hard to put down. Just over half of U.S. adults say they spend too much time on their smartphone, according to a Pew Research Center survey from May and June 2026. About a third of adults say their smartphone use is about […]⌥ Permalink

Kalley Huang, New York Times (gift link) John Ternus became Apple’s chief executive on Tuesday, succeeding Tim Cook, the company’s leader for the last 15 years. The long-anticipated handoff, Mr. Cook has said, will be “perfectly smooth.” […] This summer, Apple hired Nate Gatten from American Airlines to lead government affairs, replacing Kate Adams, who […]⌥ Permalink

Joel Dryden, in a CBC News article with the headline “On the Road With Pro-Independence Albertans, One Small Town at a Time”: The restaurant owner, who gained prominence during the COVID-19 pandemic, has hit the road this summer to talk independence, travelling with a group of people who also support the idea of Alberta becoming […]⌥ Permalink

Here is a list of headlines; perhaps you will spot a theme: “Six new Apple products will launch early this year, here’s what’s coming” “Apple has five all-new products launching this year, here’s what’s coming” “Apple will launch 20+ new products this year, here’s what’s coming” “Apple has rare updates coming soon for these three […]⌥ Permalink

Alex Skopic, at Current Affairs, wrote about the functional use and abuse of stimulants by people who are overworked. I stumbled upon it by way of the latest issue of Web Curios, and I think the general thrust of the article is something I find noteworthy enough to link to it. Alas, it is sloppy […]⌥ Permalink

An un-bylined Canadian Press report: U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday to change the name of Lake Ontario to “Lake America” as tensions with Canada worsen. Elect stupid people and get stupid policies. This report contains a good explanation of the name’s history, and also has a deliciously petty map illustrating […]⌥ Permalink

Apple, after previously saying it would move Hide My Email to the private.icloud.com subdomain: After further consideration and reviewing community feedback, iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com. The whole point of an email address like this is that it can be used anywhere someone does not want to provide an address that can be tied […]⌥ Permalink