Dwayne Phillips ' Day Book

Items I happen to view each day. Science, Techonology, Management, Culture, and of course Writing

This is my day book for this week. I have modeled this after science fiction and computer writer Jerry Pournelle's view, or as he calls it, his Day Book. I encourage you to see Jerry Pournelle's site and subscribe to his services.

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This week: 2-8 January, 2017

Summary of this week:

Monday - Tuesday - Wednesday - Thursday - Friday - Saturday - Sunday

Monday January 2, 2016

CES is coming this week. Here are probable Android announcements. Lots of new gadgets this week.

Sigh. The international airline travel systems are full of security holes whereby ne'er-do-wells hack identities easily.

The top ten most-used smartphone apps of the year. No surprises as Facebook and Google dominate.

Facebook and others try to grow up and realize that people look to them to be adults.

Sometimes a politician shows a firm grasp of the obvious as Trump says no computer is safe. Great qoute, "if you have something really important, write it out and have it delivered by courier."

The photocopier (xerox machine): its a computer with a scanner and has no security.

This is getting serious: German government may fine Facebook $1/2million per fake news story it doesn't delete.

Here are the most-viewed Wikipedia pages of 2016.

Got $8million? Get a ride in your own 13' tall robot.

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Tuesday January 3, 2016

Lenovo creates a new line of gaming computers and shows its own home speaker chat-bot gadget.

Security without Borders: white hat hackers create organization to help travelling dissidents communicate securely.

Dell upgrades it 2-in-1 ultrabook XPS 13 at $1,000.

The NFL signs a deal to livestream games into China.

Amazon jumps into the market of selling used goods from home.

MIT shows how 3,000 ride-sharing cars can replace 13,000 taxis in New York City. I doubt all taxis would disappear.

A look at Qualcomm's upgraded Snapdragon 835 processor.

AI is already replacing Japanese white-collar workers.

Microsoft copied Lotus; Microsoft copied Apple who copied Xerox; Facebook copies Snapchat.

Facebook bans Neptune's statue. Well, the guy is completely N A K E D.

Finland starts a two-year, 2,000-person basic income experiment.

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Wednesday January 4, 2016

Lots of product announcements from CES.

HP redesigns its 34" Envy all-in-one PC. The base is safer and holds most of the computer.

Acer updates its 11" Chromebook with a 12-hour battery life, still at $230.

Amazon releases a TV with its name on it and Fire TV on the inside.

Intel updates its Next Unit of Computing mini PCs (NUC).

HP updates its Sprout Pro PC—better than the Microsoft Studio.

Mr. Zuckerburg goes to America. He promises to visit all 40 (50) states and "talk to people." Perhaps some of the plutocrats learned something from the recent election.

Amazon increased the number of robots in its warehouses by 50% last year.

Here is an early wrap up of CES.

A closer look at Intel's new Kaby Lake processor. Who is creating the names at Intel these days?

Nvidia shows its latest GPUs for laptops: GTX 1050 Ti and GTX 1050.

Seth Godin has a good blog post on the need for intellectual curiosity in the age of eye candy.

ooops, Tesla didn't quite reach its car production goal for 2016.

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Thursday January 5, 2016

CES continues as do the product announcements.

Intel announces a 5G modem before the standard is set.

Lego Boost: a smaller version of the Mindstorm robotics kit is coming late 2017.

GeForce Now: Nividia gaming from the cloud $25 for 20 hours. Widens what a Mac can play.

Samsung updates their entire line of portable computers from high-end to Chromebooks.

LG will put advanced WiFi, cameras, and what not in all its 2017 appliances. Now we can see the mold on the cheese from half a world away.

Medium, a long-blog platform, lays off a third of its staff as the business struggles.

Nvidia updates its Shield Android TV and puts spot microphones all over the house so you can ask Google while doing whatever where ever.

Censorship continues it reign in China as Apple removes the New York Times app from that country.

Our Department of Labor sues Google over audit data. Perhaps Google will drop out of government contracting. Perhaps other goverment agencies will tell the Department of Labor to go away.

UK's National Health Service begins a test of an AI chatbot to help people find a medical service.

Nvidia and Audi join forces and hope to have a self-driving car by 2020.

Processor-heavy Apple Mac users are buy three-year-old Mac Pros because Apple hasn't updated its desktop computers.

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Friday January 6, 2016

CES continues.

Dell shows a $5,000 monitor. Of course it is expensive. Of course it is magnificent.

Dell sort of jumps into competition with Microsoft's Surface Studio.

Dell's XPS 27 all-in-one PC has ten built-in speakers. Turn it up, blow out the windows.

Our FTC files a complaint against D-Link for lax security. Can our FTC file a complaint against the DNC?

Microsoft's Cortanna chatbot will soon be in Nissan and BMW vehicles.

A drone company now owns the majority of camera maker Hasselblad.

The government of California shows that it is really happy to drive jobs to other states (???).

Examining the rise of Nvidia and the importance of those GPUs.

The Microsoft Connected Vehicle Platform in the cloud begins service this year.

Want to make everyone in the meeting envious? Show up with this laptop that has three screens.

The Intel Compute Card: they shrink the single-board computer down to a credit card.

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Saturday January 7, 2016

No Internet viewing today as I was walking about the District of Columbia in bitter cold and snow.

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Sunday January 8, 2017

Someone else finally realizes what it would mean to hack Donald Trump's otherwise unprotected Twitter account.  Barack Obama couldn't understand why he couldn't keep his Blackberry. Trump can't understand why he can't keep his Twitter. The electorate, well, we don't have many choices every four years.

Not to be outdone by the Chinese government, censorship is alive and well in Russia, too.

Nvidia has another teammate in auto driving autos, a little firm called Mercedes-Benz.

More detail on Intel's Compute Card.

No surprise here, the NEC Classic Edition is hacked and new stuff added. Once again, hackers improve things.

Depression, creativity, and writing your way through.

Being a more productive writer.

Marketing shyness. Got to push past it.

Writing when confidence is waning.

Write that book. Now. Not later.

A few small steps to increasing your writing this year. This post makes good sense.

How to write like Stephen King: shut the door, sit in the chair, put your hands on the keys, and write.

A list of literary blogs (note, Bob Dylan isn't in any of these).

Some reasons why outlining your novel is a bad idea.

"Write, despite." Pretty good advice for writers any day of the year.

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