Interference Wars
Today in Tedium: As you may or may not know, I have no deep love for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), the Republican senator who once forced a government shutdown days before I was about to go on a honeymoon to...
View ArticleAn Incomplete Picture
As I pointed out in a recent post, good investigative commentary can be had on YouTube if you know where to look—something that Hbomberguy’s recent video on plagiarism I felt delivered in spades with...
View ArticleWaking Up The Regulators
Epic Games winning its antitrust case against Google was mildly surprising. But the real shock was learning that the Federal Trade Commission was trying to lock Adobe into a consent decree. After...
View ArticleGive Up? Gift Up
Today in Tedium: So, it’s pretty funny that I’m writing the ninth edition of my last-minute-gift-guide-but-actually-really-a-year-in-review post, despite the fact that there are probably more...
View ArticleSelf-Checkout Game Theory
As a consumer of goods, I think a lot about the nature of self-checkout, one of the most important grocery-store innovations of the last 20 years. As we close in on the most consumerist holiday of the...
View ArticleFall Of The Mouse House
I have snarked on many occasions about the public domain status of Mickey Mouse. I mean any creator like me is basically required to. I pointed out, for example, that there is evidence that Steamboat...
View ArticleFake Festive Vs. Real Thing
Today in Tedium: Imagine this newsletter has just four readers. (It doesn’t, at least I hope it doesn’t, but just stick with me for a second.) Based on a statistical breakdown I just pulled up from a...
View ArticleThe Great YouTube Epic
For the last couple of years, we’ve done an annual MidRange awards. While MidRange is no longer active, I’ve decided to translate those awards to Tedium. So this week I’ll be celebrating the 2023...
View ArticleNot The Name That You Call Me With
For the last couple of years, we’ve done an annual MidRange awards. While MidRange is no longer active, I’ve decided to translate those awards to Tedium. So this week I’ll be celebrating the 2023...
View ArticleThe Open Letter Still Works
For the last couple of years, we’ve done an annual MidRange awards. While MidRange is no longer active, I’ve decided to translate those awards to Tedium. So this week I’ll be celebrating the 2023...
View Article2024: Live Another Day
Today in Tedium: Okay, we’ve made it to year nine. That’s pretty wild to me. Not quite a decade, but long enough that when I started this, I had way fewer gray hairs, and I was somewhat hipper. (But,...
View ArticleWe Beat The Machine
The world loves an underdog story, especially when that underdog seemingly comes out of nowhere. And there’s nothing quite as elegant as an underdog that comes with the goods right away, beating...
View ArticleThe Gator Bites Back
In a world where even the less technical among us have an awareness that their data is being used and abused for marketing purposes, it means that avenues once relied upon by tech giants are now...
View ArticleSnapping The Cable
Today in Tedium: So, I have to start this somewhere, so let’s try this: The cable industry is pretty screwed, isn’t it? There are a lot of potential reasons to come to this conclusion, including the...
View ArticleMac All The Keyboards
I’m sure the calculus is a little different for everyone when it comes to writing, and maybe I’m just a very distinct kind of nerd, but to me, the best keyboard layout in the world of technology is...
View ArticleBarely Minimum
It’s hard to look at the state of affairs Substack has put itself in and not think that they’ve made a bet that most of their users just don’t care. I mean, it sure seems like that’s what they’ve been...
View ArticleWhat Was ISDN?
Today in Tedium: If you live in the United Kingdom and still rely on traditional copper lines to get telephone calls or get on the internet, we have some bad news for you. In 2025, British Telecom...
View ArticleMaking My Linux Move
The year of Linux on the desktop is probably never going to happen. But the year of Linux on my desktop recently kicked off in earnest. The journey started last fall when, after getting sick of the...
View ArticleOut With The Pitchforks
It was a small change in the midst of a day of bigger changes, but it accented it ever so succinctly: Yesterday was the first day I ever ran into a registration wall on Pitchfork, a site I’ve read...
View ArticleCounterfeit Computing
Today in Tedium: You probably haven’t thought about it lately, but we’re closing in on the 20th anniversary of one of the greatest scam-busting incidents of the early internet era. It happened on the...
View Article