Latest Stories from Jamie
Microsoft offers TikTok US lifeline with potential deal
Microsoft is in advanced discussions over a potential TikTok purchase in the US, as President Trump looks to address the platform’s privacy concerns. After TikTok’s meteoric rise during lockdown saw it become the most downloaded app of 2020, parent company ByteDance and host-nation China were dragged through the mud in the mainstream media. Reports of invasive data collection software within TikTok’s programming sparked global trepidation over Chinese surveillance, with India...
Amazon gains approval to launch internet satellite initiative ‘Project Kupier’
Amazon has just received the long-awaited go ahead to launch Project Kupier, and an initial constellation of internet satellites 578 strong is being readied. After a 12 month wait, Jeff Bezos has finally received approval from the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to launch Amazon’s broadband satellite operation Project Kupier, and the world’s richest man is pledging future investment to the sum of $10bn. Like Starlink, which is headed up by...
Huawei trumps Samsung as top smartphone vendor this quarter
Thanks to a Covid-19 slump from Samsung, China’s smartphone giant Huawei has shipped more handsets than any other vendor in the last quarter. Huawei’s long harboured ambition to trump Samsung to the title of biggest smartphone seller has finally come to fruition, according to a new report from analyst firm Canalys. Like most industries, smartphone manufacturing and sales have been altered drastically by circumstantial conditions imposed by...
Instagram rolls out ‘Personal Fundraisers’ to support small businesses
In response to the economic fallout caused by Covid-19, Instagram has released a crowdfunding feature to keep small businesses afloat. Instagram pumping out updates has become one of the constants of 2020, but the latest feature is far from just another quirky AR addition. Parent company Facebook has already played host to thousands of independent crowdfunding projects in wake of the pandemic, and the next logical step is for Instagram to...
Lisa Jackson is heading up Apple’s roadmap to zero climate by 2030
Reporting the most profitable quarter for any corporation ever, Apple has plotted a roadmap to achieving climate neutrality by 2030. Lisa Jackson is the driving force behind that mission. Growing up in 70s New Orleans, a US hotspot for petrochemical facilities, Lisa Jackson witnessed first-hand the adverse effects of pollution and the disparity it brings to different communities. Today, as the Vice President of Environment, Policy, and Social Initiatives at...
Metacritic combats game ‘review bombing’ with 36-hour delays to user scores
Metacritic, widely renowned as the ultimate review aggregator, is introducing 36-hour delays to user scores on new games in an effort to combat ‘review bombing.’ Metacritic is tightening its defence against premature user scores by implementing 36-hour delays to all new games on its platform. With a view to maintaining its status as the most authentic review aggregator on the web, this precaution aims to prevent players from hastily throwing...
KFC is rolling out lab-produced chicken nuggets
As part of its ‘Meat of the Future’ campaign, KFC is developing laboratory-produced chicken nuggets to roll out in 2020. As the food industry vies for a more regenerative and sustainable future, fast food chains are being pressured to meet growing demands for animal alternatives. On that front, KFC are plotting something potentially ground-breaking for 2020. The fried chicken mecca is opening its chest of secret ingredients and seasonings to a...
Banksy takes to the London Underground with Covid-themed graffiti
Enigmatic British artist Banksy has taken to the London Underground to create a satirical piece about Covid-19. Commuters on London’s Circle Line were shocked on Tuesday to see a man clad in Covid clean-up gear graffitiing all over one of the carriage interiors. Little did they know they had borne witness (hopefully at a two-meter distance) to Britain’s vigilante street artist Banksy at work. Once again, Banksy has chosen to explore...
Is TikTok really an elaborate façade for Chinese spyware?
Cyber-experts are claiming that 2020’s number one app is a shady front for Chinese spyware and mass censorship. Suggestions that ByteDance’s ‘innocuous’ short-bite video app TikTok has all the makings of a totalitarian plot hatched by the Chinese government are looking more plausible by the day. Suffice to say, people are freaked. Months of bad publicity Two months ago, an anonymous software engineer with 15 years of experience claimed he had successfully reverse-engineered TikTok. Within its inner workings, he pointed to...
Clown protests take Read Dead Online by storm
It’s been close to a year since Rockstar meaningfully expanded Red Dead Redemption 2, and players have started populating entire servers with clowns in protest. All is not well in the digital wild west. It’s been seven months since Red Dead Online’s ‘Moonshiners’ expansion dropped, and players are growing frustrated at the game’s lack of longevity. Rockstar revealed at the PlayStation 5 expo that it is currently gearing up to bring...
