Most Commented Technology Blogs (217)

.. because eYe really want to know...

The Wall. } P Floyd.
.thick as a brick. } Tull...
Off the Wall. } Jackson

Sounds like The Don's gearing up to campaign in the '22 Mid-Terms ... And '24??

I grew up in the era of Black & White TV and times when something electronic wasn't working correctly, it would require banging the side of the console to magically get things working again.

Solid state technology changed all that... or did it?

I turned the computer on this morning and got an error message the power supply fan isn't working. Huh? I've got a few computers with spare parts here and could change out a fan if need be. Turning it off and on 2 more times got the same message. The computer would not boot.

I banged it a few times, opened the case and when I powered up air was coming from the power supply fan.

Fixed... just like the old days!

Here are two recently true stories involving human and technology and it not ending well for a human.

First story has to do with 2 people...a son and a father with two different first names and both of them have cable tv from the same provider. The employees plug in the payment received data in the wrong account where the son for a period of time is being credited with his father's payments until the father begins getting bills in amounts that are double the usual.

The father calls the cable company and they spot the error and it is quickly fixed for the father. However, the cable company's computer system that generates the billing statements does not provide the son who has been incorrectly being credited with his monthly bill for two months. The son being a busy guy only recognizes he never got a bill for one month and figures he will pay next month when the current bill comes in. It does not work that way. By the time the next month rolls around, the son's cable has been turned off by the the cable company's computer system. In addition, his account has been hammered with late fees and rehook-up fees. A bill that was suppose to be a little over $200 is now nearly $600 and if he wants his tv back on, he is to pay that amount. The son paid that and now his tv only works half of the time. Now that the son understands what is going on...he is in the process of getting things straightened out. He has been on the phone for hours and all of the cable company's employees are not sure how to fix the problem yet. Who knows how it will all end...but nearly a week without tv and possibly out about $350.

Second story. A huge online company allows people to sell on their venue. Everything that happens on their site is part of a computer system. In this case, a recent seller was penalized an increase in seller fees of 40% that could lead to expenses for the seller raising over $10,000 per year. This selling venue allows returns to be freely done and unquestioned. In many cases, the seller that would get a refund would relist the item exactly as previously described and as pictured...nothing changed. The new buyer would leave a positive feedback and very pleased with the purchase. However, the selling venue's computer system only weighs in on the fact the item was returned for a refund. When the seller contacts the venue and asks the question...who is right here...the first buyer returning it for a refund and blaming it on the seller for them returning it....or the second buyer who buys it exactly as it was sold the first time around and is very satisfied with their purchase. No real answer becomes of that question. Because...there is nothing they can do, the computer system recognizes what is was designed to do. The seller is left with an increased expense of $10,000.

A friend once said....sometimes you can be the dolphin that gets caught in the tuna net.

...lets hope as we become more and more technology dependent and driven...not too many dolphins get caught in the net.

On April 10, 1790 the federal government of the United States enacted the fist patent statute. It was a concise law defining the subject matter of a U.S. patent as "any useful art, manufacture, engine, machine, or device, or any improvement there on not known or used. It granted the applicant 'sole and exclusive right and liberty of making, constructing and vending to others to be used' of his inventions.
Simply put... if you invented something unique and had it patented, no one could legally copy, sell or infringe on your patent rights.

History records inventor Thomas A. Edison had a few thousand patents to his credit. You can also find that many claim some of his patents were stolen from his workers and colleagues. That's the case with many scientists and engineers who work for large corporations and are required to sign contracts, especially ones with non-compete agreements.

I met a man who claimed to have been working for General Electric and invented the rheostat... it's common name was a light dimmer. They got the patent, he got a paycheck.

Someone told me a story of the the guy who invented the intermittent windshield wiper control. He went around to a few car manufacturers looking for someone to buy his idea. He couldn't afford the patent. None of them showed any interest and a few months later, one manufacturer had a similar yet improved device was added to their newest model.

Jonas Salk was a medical researcher who discovered and developed one of the first successful polio vaccines in 1953. He never patented his discovery believing, like the sun, a vaccine for polio belonged to the people.

Some 200 years of patents and long ago it was recorded by one of the clerks in the patent office, that everything that could be patented already was!

I could see he was a man of vision... less than two feet from his nose.

I've always been impressed with some of the more simple inventions...
Amazed how the 2 liter bottle that Coke-a-Cola is made and more impressed who designed the slots on the threads so a pressurized cap doesn't harm someone when when unscrew it!

I remember the old style pay phones and maybe you do too.
They had a coin slot at the top and it was ten cents to make a local call.
This was more than 40 years before they invented caller ID.
Doing so, made it easy to be in informant of illegal activity and not having the call traced.
A simple call to the Police to let them know of some suspicious activity and hang up.
That's where the term 'Drop a Dime' came from.

Pay phones have become a thing of the past.
Hopefully, no one reading my blog has money in a pay phone company.
I knew of a guy was was on the front technology for phone cards that offered low cost long distance service. That lasted a generation and all the competition made rich men poor men if they didn't get out when 'everyone and their grandmother' was selling phone cards.

Soon after, low price cellphone plans put the 'kibosh' on calling cards.



I still see pay phones everywhere I go.
Unfortunately, if I didn't have a cellphone, it would be a long walk to find a pay phone that actually worked!

There's everyday people, and then there's gorgeous.

Gorgeous can be really gorgeous, but it also can be someone *else's* gorgeousness, and being used as a hook to reel you in.

A handy little online tool (and there are many similar) is ReverseImageSearch.





For example, this one profile caught my eye.



Gorgeous, to be sure. Curious, I right-clicked on the image and "copy image location."

This is what you copy, to paste into the URL box at the ReverseImageSearch utility.

You might get a CAPTCHA challenge on some of these pages and a selection of search engines. I find that Bing, Google and Baidu are pretty much useless.

Yandex, however, a Russian search utility, seems to have good results.

What did you find using the sample profile, hmmm?

Your results may vary, but this resulted in reaching a Russian website, actually, at least two. One to Yulia's photos, and another to My Photos. Not England.

I got a call this afternoon informing me there was an attack on a gas pipeline creating a shortage. My response was: "I didn't know we were pumping gasoline through pipelines"
Checking online there is conflicting information but Florida Governor Ron DeSantis declared a state of emergence following a temporary shutdown of the Colonial Pipeline - a major US fuel pipeline operator.

One news story stated it was a cyber attack that forced Colonial to shut down operations.
It also reports this is affecting the Northern part of Florida... 8 hours drive from here.

Gas is available in South Florida but panic buying has already this area and people are hoarding gasoline creating a shortage. Some stations being reported for gouging where average prices were $2.85 now jumping over $4 a gallon.

I'm headed to Miami on appointment Wednesday morning and filled my tank before sundown Tuesday. That should get me nearly 300 miles and get me into the weekend.

Cyber attack? Obviously, Colonial got short-changed on internet security.

I should heed my own advice about changing out old computer parts. Two computers failed last month and are being replaced. The good thing is the hard drives are intact and I'm able to save most of the data contained on them.

Unfortunately, some licensed programs I got free cannot be replaced or would now require payment.

I found a 2gig spare video card and installed into a spare computer I haven't used in a while and now, it's giving error messages. The drivers are updated but I'm unable to troubleshoot... for lack of time. It's quicker to remove the video card and revert back to the onboard video.

I tried removing 4 gigs of RAM from a dead computer and put into a computer with 4gigs expecting 8 gigs... it won't boot now, so I reverted back to a working computer with 4 gigs.

If it's not broken... don't (try to) fix it.

Okay, Okay... no more swapping parts and upgrades... for today.
Tomorrow is a different story!

Apple Helps Chinese Communists Suppress Protests – Removes Crucial Tool of Dissent on iPhones and Does Not Tell Mainland Users.

Sadly, the freedom protesters were not able to use AirDrop, a file-sharing feature on iPhones that allows users to share content in authoritarian states.

Apple removed the feature in their latest update in China and did not notify users.

Apple is working with the communists now.

Anti-government protests flared in several Chinese cities and on college campuses over the weekend. But the country’s most widespread show of public dissent in decades will have to manage without a crucial communication tool, because Apple restricted its use in China earlier this month.

AirDrop, the file-sharing feature on iPhones and other Apple devices, has helped protestors in many authoritarian countries evade censorship. That’s because AirDrop relies on direct connections between phones, forming a local network of devices that don’t need the internet to communicate. People can opt into receiving AirDrops from anyone else with an iPhone nearby.

That changed on Nov. 9, when Apple released a new version of its mobile operating system, iOS 16.1.1, to customers worldwide. Rather than listing new features, as it often does, the company simply said, “This update includes bug fixes and security updates and is recommended for all users.”

Hidden in the update was a change that only applies to iPhones sold in mainland China: AirDrop can only be set to receive messages from everyone for 10 minutes, before switching off. There’s no longer a way to keep the “everyone” setting on permanently on Chinese iPhones. The change, first noticed by Chinese readers of 9to5Mac, doesn’t apply anywhere else.