As part of my MSc, I fell down a research rabbit-hole of 1980s "Office Of THE FUTURE!!" articles. Ultimately, I couldn't find a way to include it in my research - so you're getting my cast offs. So, I present to you some choice predictions from "Technology and the office of the future" by B. W. Manley. Low cost computers (VDU) - yup! Data storage - the article talks about storing "the entire…
I've had a Nest smoke alarm for about 7 years. It connects to my WiFi network and occasionally pings a message to my phone that I've burnt my toast. Nifty! But, due to planned obsolescence regulatory requirements, it needs to be replaced. Back in 2014, the Nest cost £100. In the exciting world of 2021, it costs... £100! WTAF? Surely a combination of market capitalism and Moore's Law means t…
I know exactly what I was doing on 9th April 2020. I was worrying about open-sourcing the NHS Covid Tracing app. I was worrying about tech standards for booking test slots. I was worrying if I'd ever see my family and friends again. I was worrying if the NHS websites would contain enough semantic HTML to be useful. I was worrying if the security of 3rd party sites was up to snuff. I was worrying…
Messaging app Signal is launching a payment service in the UK. This will allow users to send each other money cryptocurrency. Many people have written about why this is a daft idea. But they've mostly talked about why cryptocoins corrupt everything they touch. I want to talk about why this is a shitty idea from a product perspective. It all comes down to user needs. What pain point are you…
This is an excellent and illuminating documentary of the state of algorithmic bias. If you've read recent books like Algorithms of Oppression and Race After Technology - you probably won't find anything new. But it is nice seeing academics in their natural habitats. It really helps to personalise the problems by placing them in social context. Some of the arguments are simplified a little for…
I'm about a billion years late to this review. But that's OK, sometimes it is nice to wait until all the bugs have been squashed and all the walkthroughs written up. TWA is a lovely little puzzler. Move blocks around until they fit in the right holes. It is the sort of game which could have been written for the ZX81 back in the day. I played it with the Director's Commentary switched on.…
Everyone has heard of the Gameshouse. But few know all its secrets. It is the place where fortunes can be made and lost though chess, backgammon – every game under the sun. But those whom fortune favours may be invited to compete in the higher league where the games played are of politics and nations, of economics and kings. It is a contest where Capture the Castle involves real castles and w…
An idle thought on a long weekend. Is it possible to create an executable binary which is a palindrome? It's trivial to create a palindromic program in, say, Python: print("hello") # )"olleh"(tnirp Save that as test.py and then run cat test.py | rev | python3 and it'll work. But that's boring! You could do the same by reversing the bits, rather than the characters: …
When it comes to racial justice, how do we transform demonstrations of support into real and meaningful change? With intellectual rigour and razor-sharp wit, Emma Dabiri cuts through the haze of online discourse to offer clear advice. This was a refreshing and necessary book to read. Refreshing because so much of the discourse on race is driven by the USA's cultural hegemony - whereas this…
We live at a time when billions have access to unbelievably powerful technology. The most extraordinary tool that has been invented in the last century, the smartphone, is forcing radical changes in the way we live and work - and unlike previous technologies it is in the hands of just about everyone. Coupled with the rise of social media, this has ushered in a new era of deeply personal…
This is a Bad Book. It is probably the most profoundly disturbing book I've read about the misuse of personal data. Not because it exposes the horrors of algorithmic harassment and discrimination, but because it joyfully revels in them. The book's central thesis is that slurping up personal data, without explicit permission, and using that information to target people is a good thing. While…
1794, London: Camille and Al are desperately hunting Olympe's kidnapper. From the glamorous excesses of the Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens to the city's seedy underbelly, they are caught in a dangerous game of lies and deceit. And a terrible new enemy lies in wait with designs more monstrous than they could ever imagine... Can Camille play on to the end or will she be forced to show her hand? This…
