Ad-tech regulation

The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority has released its final report on online platforms and digital advertising. This started as a preliminary look at possibly monopolistic practices by Google and Facebook, who collectively earn about 80% of UK digital-marketing spend. Parts of the UK press are already saying the report doesn’t go far enough, and that … Continue reading “Ad-tech regulation”

George Soros to force RFID chips on everyone (or, when truth is stranger than fiction)

Some of the craziest conspiracy theories out there involve George Soros / Bill Gates / [random rich person] doing something to force / sneak embedded RFID chips into everyone. The natural response of any moderately educated and moderately sane person is to discard this nonsense out of hand. OK. Fair enough. So why has the … Continue reading “George Soros to force RFID chips on everyone (or, when truth is stranger than fiction)”

The ongoing evolution of Asia

China continues to pursue its ambition of being not just one of the world’s largest economies, but one of its largest powers. The passing of the new Hong Kong security law — which happened in secret, bypassing Hong Kong’s own legislature, and the content of which was only revealed one day before it went into effect (absolutely … Continue reading “The ongoing evolution of Asia”

WWDC and privacy

Apple’s World Wide Developer Conference was last week. As expected, one of the biggest announcements was that they’re moving away from Intel and to their own chips. And, although it wasn’t front and center, it was mentioned enough that I’m sticking with my prediction that this is all about “AI”, and we’re going to see … Continue reading “WWDC and privacy”

Mixer -> Facebook gaming

Perhaps you haven’t heard, but e-gaming is big business ($68 billion in 2018, growing by various estimates from 10% to 20% CAGR). Alongside e-gaming has come video-game streaming. The numbers have spiked somewhat during the global lockdown, but they were big even before — in 2019 there are about 12.5 billion hours watched across the four biggest … Continue reading “Mixer -> Facebook gaming”