Tag: Tim Cook

Donald Trump, Tim Cook and Apple

…Declined To Comment. by Patrick LaRoque (laroquephoto.com)

I get it: Trump is a loaded gun ready to blow at every moment. He’s always one tweet away from another unhinged catastrophe. So you either tell him he’s the very bestest leader in all the world and get something out of it, or you fight and suffer reprisals. Cue Jeff Bezos. And I understand a company deciding NOT to fight. Because tariffs, because shareholders, because, because, because.

But if you stand next to Trump while he attacks the free press and say nothing, you are now complicit. If you stand next to Trump while he boasts of being solely responsible for a brand new Apple plant, when it is NOT EVEN an Apple-owned plant, and when it has in fact been making Mac Pros since 2013, you are now complicit. You are complicit in the destruction of truth, facts and reality. In the end, of decency and sanity.

And when Trump tweets about that very same “opening” and releases a video of it implying he made it all happen; when you provide him with the very words he immediately uses to lie again; when journalists reach out to you about this nonsense and you still decline to comment or to set the record straight...fuck me, but you’re now beyond complicit. Let’s not even start discussing China, Taiwan or Hong Kong.

I don’t want to play the What Steve Jobs Would’ve Done game. But every cell in my body tells me his belief system would’ve held, despite the folly of a mad king or any oppressive regime. That he would’ve recognized the moment and acted with the courage needed. He may have been many things but a coward wasn't one of them.

So yeah I get it: all those words truly are now utterly empty.

Donald Trump, Tim Cook and Apple

…Declined To Comment. by Patrick LaRoque (laroquephoto.com)

I get it: Trump is a loaded gun ready to blow at every moment. He’s always one tweet away from another unhinged catastrophe. So you either tell him he’s the very bestest leader in all the world and get something out of it, or you fight and suffer reprisals. Cue Jeff Bezos. And I understand a company deciding NOT to fight. Because tariffs, because shareholders, because, because, because.

But if you stand next to Trump while he attacks the free press and say nothing, you are now complicit. If you stand next to Trump while he boasts of being solely responsible for a brand new Apple plant, when it is NOT EVEN an Apple-owned plant, and when it has in fact been making Mac Pros since 2013, you are now complicit. You are complicit in the destruction of truth, facts and reality. In the end, of decency and sanity.

And when Trump tweets about that very same “opening” and releases a video of it implying he made it all happen; when you provide him with the very words he immediately uses to lie again; when journalists reach out to you about this nonsense and you still decline to comment or to set the record straight...fuck me, but you’re now beyond complicit. Let’s not even start discussing China, Taiwan or Hong Kong.

I don’t want to play the What Steve Jobs Would’ve Done game. But every cell in my body tells me his belief system would’ve held, despite the folly of a mad king or any oppressive regime. That he would’ve recognized the moment and acted with the courage needed. He may have been many things but a coward wasn't one of them.

So yeah I get it: all those words truly are now utterly empty.

Tim Cook calls for Data Privacy Legislation

It's Time for Action on Privacy, Says Apple's CEO Tim Cook by Tim Cook (Time)

One of the biggest challenges in protecting privacy is that many of the violations are invisible. For example, you might have bought a product from an online retailer—something most of us have done. But what the retailer doesn’t tell you is that it then turned around and sold or transferred information about your purchase to a “data broker”—a company that exists purely to collect your information, package it and sell it to yet another buyer.

The trail disappears before you even know there is a trail. Right now, all of these secondary markets for your information exist in a shadow economy that’s largely unchecked—out of sight of consumers, regulators and lawmakers.

Let’s be clear: you never signed up for that. We think every user should have the chance to say, “Wait a minute. That’s my information that you’re selling, and I didn’t consent.”

Image from flickr.

Woot! Best thing I’ve read all month! I fully support this. The EU GDPR document was a not a riveting read but is a punch to the groin for data aggregators and brokers. And it put in place fines, 4% of revenue, for violations. We need similar legislation here.

Sunday Paper - Brain Training Games, Ansel Adams, Tim Cook

Every Saturday, I share a list of inspiring or interesting articles that I read during the week. Here’s what I read this week.

The government has used tracking technology in printed documents to unmask anonymous writers.

Not all printers' tracking information is readily visible. Some of the documents we obtained about this technology showed that there is a subsequent generation of tracking technology, which apparently works by slightly rearranging dots that the printer is expected to print, rather than by adding new dots. Anyone using a color laser printer should assume that it uses some kind of tracking mechanism, whether or not tracking dots are visible in its output.deeplinks

The new iPad Pro.

There are also ergonomic issues: To use two-handed gestures, your iPad can’t be in your hands. So these are gestures primarily intended for iPads that are on a table, in a case, in a lap, or otherwise someplace where you’ve got both hands free to manipulate data. That’s limiting, but it’s also freeing—these large devices are far more likely to be put into situations like that, and if you consider a future with even larger iOS devices, two-handed gestures should become an even bigger part of the interface story.Jason Snell

Apple CEO, Tim Cook on technology.

While he calls AI “profound” and increasingly capable of doing unbelievable things, on matters that require judgment he’s not comfortable with automating the human entirely out of the equation. “When technological advancement can go up so exponentially I do think there’s a risk of losing sight of the fact that tech should serve humanity, not the other way around.”MIT Technology Review

Apparently, memory boosting games are a crock of shit.

All isn’t lost though; where specialised brain training games failed, regular games, inclusive of Mario Kart-style experiences and more conventional hobbies like blackjack and bridge, succeeded. Alzheimer’s Research UK, while stopping short of linking stimulating hobbies to the prevention or cure of degenerative brain disorders, notes that people who play card games have better cognitive abilities and even larger brains.High50

The HomePod is $350.

It’s really meant to be a “smart” music listening device that you can get answers from… that’s it.Nuclear Bits

Photography trends.

The great 20th-century American landscape photographer Ansel Adams, when asked what camera he used, famously answered: "The biggest one I can carry!"The Online Photographer

Every Saturday, I share a list of inspiring or interesting articles that I read during the week. Here’s what I read this week.