I’m officially retired! Yesterday I bought sticky notes.
Month: January 2020
2019 Tweets of the year
Eric Zorn of the Chicago Tribune runs a weekly contest for Tweet of the Week. And we need something funny between the more serious posts. He has posted his 40 favorite tweets of 2019 here. Some samples:
- A day without coffee is like — just kidding, I have no idea (various users).
- If buying new underwear is evidence of an affair, my husband has been faithful for at least nine years (@nerdreign).
- Never ever tell yourself, “my idea isn’t good enough.” The entire premise of Marmaduke is, “What if a dog was big?” And that nonsense has been going for more than 60 years (@_AlexHirsch).
How to protect yourself from Google’s surveillance program
Why yes, everyone is spying on you. Or at least Google is:
It’s a scary thought: You and your friends are marching for gun control, climate action or social justice when a crime happens a mile or two away. Now you and the thousands of people who attended are suspects. And guess who turned you in: Google.
That’s because Google knows where you are right now, even if location tracking on your Google apps is turned off. And the company is handing over your location information to law enforcement agencies.
Google calls this program “Sensorvault” and its use by law enforcement for nearly 10 years was a well-kept secret until the New York Times recently exposed Google’s operation.
Note. I have started using duckduckgo.com for most of my searches instead of Google, because they promise that they are protecting my privacy. Search results seem to be roughly as good as Google. You should be able to set this as your preferred search engine somewhere in “Preferences” for your web browser (Firefox, Safari, Chrome etc).
How to turn off smart TV snooping features
A technology called automatic content recognition, or ACR, attempts to identify every show you play—including those you get via cable, over-the-air broadcasts, streaming services, and even DVDs and Blu-ray discs. The data is transmitted to the TV maker, one of its business partners, or both.
ACR helps the TV recommend other shows you might want to watch. But the data can also used for targeting ads to you and your family, and for other marketing purposes. You can’t easily review or delete this data later.
https://www.consumerreports.org/privacy/how-to-turn-off-smart-tv-snooping-features/