Filtering Communications So They Don’t Drive Us Mad

A dear friend was supposed to drop something off around 11 pm last night. I turn in around that time, so I just nodded off. Luckily I didn’t hear her SMS come in around 1 am. But I could have. I consider the phone the primary communications device–if someone has an emergency, that’s how they’re … Read more

Who Needs Enemies When You Have Facebook Friends?

It might be time to remove a) all your data and b) all third party apps from your Facebook profile. Here’s why. Add a Facebook app — SuperPoke, all that kind of stuff — and you’re required to agree to “allow this application to…know who I am and access my information.” Disagree and you can’t … Read more

Stumbling Into the Future

Listening to Mark Anderson’s predictions for the coming year on the BBC World Service with Peter Day. A lot of his stuff is spot on, and what I’ve been thinking (a lot less coherently): Small portable computers — he’s talking about the Samsung Q1, but he could also be talking about the Nokia N95 of … Read more

Meet Veronica, Sexy Skype Spammer

Maybe this is commonplace for others, but I’ve just got my first sex-chat-spam on Skype. It’s from someone called Veronica Sexy, whose profile indicates that it’s unlikely to be someone I’ve met and just forgotten about (as if I would): Just in case you can’t read that last bit, it reads: can’t wait to get … Read more

What’s Up With My Data, Doc?

I can’t find the original article on the IHT website, but there’s a great piece in today’s edition on how pharmaceutical companies push their drugs by funding — I would say bribing — doctors. It’s written by Daniel Carlat, who writes a blog and publishes the Carlat Psychiatry Report. The most interesting part of the … Read more