• Why we hate the modern mobile phone

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    Brendon McLean wrote to me with such a succinct summary of mobile phone angst, I invited him to elaborate. Read the result, How the mobile phone biz lost the plot, here.… Read More

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  • Paid video has look and feel of dead duck

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    Forrester Research has predicted that video download services such as iTunes will peak this year, unless consumers change their habits. Forrester analyst James McQuivey calls them a “temporary flash” but a “dead end”. He forecasts a sharp ramp in revenue this year, from $98m to $279m, powered by what he calls “media addicts”. But these…

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  • Govt IT 2.0: self-nominated for glory

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    Although the New Statesman magazine’s annual New Media Awards (NMA) don’t quite match up to the EFF’s annual Nepotism Award – nothing quite does – they’re still a rich source of humour and embarrassment. Getting an NMA is the equivalent of getting an orange at half time from the coach of your village football team,…

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  • Free music has never looked so cheap

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    For the major record labels, yesterday’s deal between EMI and Apple doesn’t herald a new beginning, but the beginning of the end. From next month, EMI will distribute much of its repertoire without DRM through Apple’s iTunes store. Independent labels have been distributing DRM-free songs for three years, avoiding the lock-ins created by competing hardware…

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  • ‘Please read this important email: you are being shot’

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    These days, no major tragedy is complete without ambulance-chasing technology boosters muscling in on the aftermath. The Asian tsunami and the London 7/7 attacks both provided a tasteless excuse for evangelists to hype their favourite cause: instant real-time communications in general, and blogging in particular. But with the Virginia Tech massacre, the reliance on technology…

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  • Widget-fiddling at Nokia

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    When one looks at the prime assets of the Nokia of five years ago, it’s alarming to see how many have been discarded. At the turn of the decade, the Finnish giant boasted a formidable reputation for reliability, security and ease of use. Now it’s thrown all three out of the window, with security being…

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