Recent articles in tech (page 5 of 10)

1. Nov 17, 2007 Apple Service Rating Harms Customer Service

   Streetwise is my local Apple retailer. It's where I bought my MacBook laptop and my Epson printer, and it's where I was planning to buy a lot of other computery things in the near future. Unfortunately, my MacBook is in need of a little in-warranty TLC (a crack has a developed in the casing, a common defect). So today I dropped by Streetwise, an Authorised Apple Service Centre, to get it looked after. I discovered that, in an effort to gain the highest possible "service rating" from Apple, Streetwise has decided to make it really inconvenient to get a minor problem with your MacBook fixed. I therefore walked right back out with my cracked MacBook in hand.

2. Oct 29, 2007 Workaround: Mac OS X Leopard Docked Folder Icon Madness

   My copy of the newly-released Mac OS X Leopard arrived on my desk on launch day before I even got to work. I resisted installing it until I could update my system back-up that night, but at this point I've been using the new operating system for a full 48 hours. Aside from a couple of apps needing updates, the upgrade has been a blissfully uneventful experience. Thanks to the pervasive tweaks to the user experience in Leopard, using my Mac is a more uniformly pleasant experience … with one major exception: the display of docked folders (now called "Stacks"). Thankfully, I've found a work-around.

3. Oct 6, 2007 Going DRM-Free Digital

   Having one too many dusty CDs taking up shelf space, I’ve decided not to buy music in physical form any more. I don’t care how many exclusive, special edition DVDs and fancy-pants packaging they dangle out there—it’s time to move past the physical disc.

4. Jul 20, 2007 Cat Out of the Bag

5. Jun 26, 2007 Irresponsible Technology Blogging

   Though it has been a long time since I received anything truly worthwhile from them, I have somehow managed to remain subscribed to the Web Development Zone newsletter of TechRepublic.com. Its content has remained consistently unremarkable for at least the past year, which, I suppose, is why it has failed to attract enough attention for me to consider unsubscribing … until now.