We continue our look back at 2015’s news and subsequent developments with July and August. Numerous subreddits were hidden from public view by administrators as a protest against both the firing of employee Victoria ‘chooter’ Taylor and the failure to fill her role as organizer and administrator of Reddit’s ‘Ask Me Anything’ sessions. The protests […]
We continue our look back at 2015’s news and subsequent developments with May. The makers of Oculus Rift said the virtual reality device — already available in a primitive developer form — would be on public sale in 2016. It later confirmed a first quarter public release with a price confirmed only as being more than […]
We continue our look back at 2015’s news and subsequent developments with March when Sony revealed that its virtual reality helmet codenamed Project Morpheus would be released in the first half of 2016. Sadly there’s little more in the way of firm details to report, other than that the finished product will be known simple […]
The man behind the controversial Megaupload site has come one step closer to an American courtroom. A judge in New Zealand has ruled that Kim Dotcom (originally known as Kim Schmitz) should be extradited to the US to stand trial on numerous charges relating to copyright infringement. Dotcom was originally arrested by New Zealand police […]
The Federal Communications Commission is asking major broadband carriers to explain their policies on exempting some content from data caps. The commission is looking at the thorny issue of whether such policies violate net neutrality rules. The letters have gone to Comcast, AT&T and T-Mobile, which all offer Internet plans (cable for Comcast, mobile for […]
An insurer is offering its customers troll insurance. The “cyberbulling cover” will pay out only in specific circumstances. The cover is from the UK wing of the Chubb insurance group. It won’t be a standalone policy but instead will be available as part of personal (householder) insurance policies renewed after January 1st. To qualify for […]
A survey showing 21 percent of Americans are online “almost constantly” is undermined by a lack of clear definition. Indeed, the more surprising stat may be the 13 percent who say they don’t use the Internet at all. The figures come from the Pew Research Center, which regularly runs surveys on tech and Internet use. […]
Google boss Eric Schmidt has called for “spell-checkers for hate” on social media accounts. The call has created some confusion over exactly what forms of censorship, and by whom, Schmidt supports. The comments come in an opinion piece in the New York Times in which Schmidt addresses the role of the Internet in general, and […]
Wikipedia is adopting a new artificial intelligence tool to weed out potentially low-quality edits. However, human users will retain the power to decide which edits remain active on the site. Previous attempts to automatically rank edits and highlight possible malicious activity haven’t worked well, according to the Wikimedia Foundation. It says such tools have placed […]
A man who claimed Facebook was refusing to recognize his legal name of “Phuc Dat Bich” has admitted it was a long-running prank that got out of hand. The man, believed to be Australian and of Vietnamese origin, had been using the name on Facebook since last year. In January this year he posted to […]