Author Archives: Jonathan

Jason Fried from Basecamp on advice they got from Jeff Bezos: People who were right a lot of the time were people who often changed their minds. He doesn’t think consistency of thought is a particularly positive trait. It’s perfectly healthy — encouraged, even — to have an idea tomorrow that contradicted your idea today. ∞Permalink

It might surprise some to learn that the world’s second-oldest airline is actually Colombia’s Avianca. It was founded as SCADTA, or Sociedad Colombo Alemana de Transporte Aéreo and its first flight was from Barranquilla to Puerto Berrio in September 1920. The airline changed its name to Avianca – an acronym of Aerovías Nacionales de Colombia …

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Bloomberg: The third-largest U.S. wireless carrier unveiled what it claims is a patented customer-service program on Wednesday called Team of Experts. Subscribers who call or message for assistance will be assigned a group of employees to fix the issue. This might sound like a corporate joke, but the few times I’ve had to interact with …

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WSJ reporting: The social media giant has asked large U.S. banks to share detailed financial information about their customers, including card transactions and checking account balances, as part of an effort to offer new services to users. This sounds like an all-around bad idea. Glad to hear some banks are walking away from these conversations. …

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Good article from Mike Wuerthele, writing for AppleInsider. For those that worry too much: If you’re still worried about it, don’t sit on your router, and use your speaker function on your iPhone. You can always buy tons of tin foil. ∞Permalink

Kate Conger reporting for Gizmodo: Google’s unofficial motto has long been the simple phrase “don’t be evil.” But that’s over, according to the code of conduct that Google distributes to its employees. The phrase was removed sometime in late April or early May, archives hosted by the Wayback Machine show. Being evil is now encouraged at …

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Isaiah Sarju’s post on HackerNoon: VPNs are for everyone. This is why. Yes. End of story. Stop reading and get one. Do it. Now. Summarizes in relatively simple terms why you do need a VPN, especially if you use any type public Wifi. ∞Permalink

The researchers suggest, for example, that graphene could now be used to create new types of superconducting quantum devices for high-speed computing. Intriguingly, it might also be used to prove the existence of a mysterious form of superconductivity known as “p-wave” superconductivity, which academics have been struggling to verify for more than 20 years. It …

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Developing an in-house OS is fine as a bargaining chip during Android contract negotiations, but a new OS with no apps won’t resonate with customers when Android is available from every other OEM. Tizen hasn’t been able to compete with Android on smartphones, but Samsung has used it almost exclusively on smartphones and other “smart” electronics that don’t have …

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