Passport packed: Australian orders open for BlackBerry Passport
In a world overrun with similarly specced and styled smartphones, BlackBerry dares to rage against the homogeneity with the BlackBerry Passport. And now Australians can decide if it's a battle worth fighting.
BlackBerry today announced that the Passport – a smartphone with rather, er, unique charms – is now available to order in Australia.
Boasting a square touch screen, QWERTY touch-enabled keyboard and BlackBerry's latest 10.3 operating system, the Passport won't be converting iPhone enthusiasts any time soon. But BlackBerry has always focused on the business end of town, and claims that the Passport provides a "wider vision" for business on the go.
Prospective Passport holders will need to pay Optus a visit, where the device is available to order for $899 outright or on a range of 24-month plans.
Hip to be square...
The Passport will certainly get you noticed. Taking its inspiration from actual passports, the device features a 4.5-inch square 1,440 x 1,440 resolution screen, which has it looking unlike any other smartphone.Charging in the office could be a thing of the past, with the Passport's 3450 mAh battery unmatched in the smartphone and phablet arena, while access to the Amazon App Store and BlackBerry World should provide a decent if not exactly outstanding app selection.
Powered by a quad-core 2.2 GHz processor with 3GB RAM, the Passport also boasts a 13MP rear camera with optical image stabilisation – perfect for capturing any incriminating office shenanigans – and 32GB of on board storage.
The BlackBerry Passport is certainly an interesting piece of engineering, but whether it will be snapped up in place of an iPhone 6 or Galaxy Note 4 remains to be seen. We have our doubts. For now we're putting it in the same brave category as the Galaxy Note Edge.
- Did BlackBerry's latest catch your eye? Maybe the white Passport will seal the deal.
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Optical character recognition software: top five on the market
Introduction, Nuance OmniPage and ABBYY FineReader
Optical character recognition (OCR) uses digital imaging devices and software to read text on hard-copy documents or in digital files that are rendered as images. The functionality can then be used to create digital, editable files.The process can be used for a variety of purposes, such as scanning hard-copy forms or making PDFs editable, but it is perhaps most useful for businesses that use a lot of paper documentation or have a lot of historical documentation that needs digitising.
Without OCR, digitising hard-copy documents would be a manual process, with businesses employing individuals to input hard-copy data into a system. Not only is this time consuming and expensive, it has the potential for human error. OCR reduces the amount of human work required and therefore helps to minimise the cost of digitising documents. Over time, it has also become increasingly accurate and capable, meaning that errors are also minimised.
There are a variety of OCR packages available and they are pitched at different levels, and have different purposes. It's important, therefore, that businesses have a good idea of what they require from an OCR package before making any decision.
This article provides an overview of some of the most popular packages on the market. It gives a description of each and should provide a good starting point for businesses looking to purchase an OCR package.
Nuance OmniPage Ultimate
Web: http://www.nuance.co.uk/for-business/by-product/omnipage/ultimate/index.htmPrice: £169.99 (around US$270, AU$310)
Nuance is a provider of voice and language solutions for businesses and consumers. The firm is based in Massachusetts, US, and employs around 12,000 people in over 35 offices across the world. Its Dragon voice recognition software is regarded as the industry leader, and the company also produces voice-based documentation software solutions for the healthcare industry. Nuance also produces the OmniPage suite.
OmniPage Ultimate is a document scanning and conversion package. It is aimed at business professionals, small businesses and workgroups that process, distribute and store paper or PDF documents.
The package provides a means of employing a number of different devices on a network to scan documents to a local computer or central server. It allows users to scan high volumes of documents and turn hard-copy forms, images and PDFs into editable digital files.
Amongst the benefits OmniPage Ultimate offers are a high level of character recognition accuracy, the ability to keep documents formatted exactly as they were, the option to capture text with a digital camera or smartphone camera, recognition of over 120 different languages, and support for a wide range of formats and applications including HTML, Corel, WordPerfect and Microsoft Office.
ABBYY FineReader Professional
Web: http://finereader.abbyy.com/professionalPrice: £99 (around US$160, AU$180)
ABBYY was founded in 1989 as BIT Software, and renamed in 1997. The company creates artificial intelligence technologies, products and services to extract information from sources in which it would be otherwise digitally inaccessible. Amongst its products and services are dictionary tools, translation and business card reading.
ABBYY FineReader Professional converts paper and image documents into editable digital formats, such as DOC and PDF files. The software uses what ABBYY calls Advanced Adaptive Document Recognition Technology to accurately translate a document's formatting and page structure. It is able to pick out text from digital photographs and it also supports the recognition of over 190 different languages, which ABBYY says is more than any other OCR package on the market.
FineReader has built-in text verification and editing tools that are aimed at reducing the amount of editing and number of corrections required after documents have been processed. It is also able to create mobile-friendly versions of documents for use with e-book readers, tablets and smartphones. FineReader has been updated to fit the Windows 8 look and feel, and allows users to easily save output files to cloud services such as Dropbox and Google Drive. It is available for both Windows and Mac.
IRIS Readiris, Creaceed Prizmo and CVision Maestro
IRIS Readiris Pro
Web: http://www.irislink.com/c2-2808-189/Readiris-14---OCR-Software---Scan--convert---manage-documents.aspxPrice: US$129 (around £80, AU$145)
IRIS seeks to help its customers better manage their documents, data and information. The company is owned by Canon and works with a number of technologies, including intelligent document recognition, document, content and process management, and optimised IT infrastructure. IRIS and its products have won a variety of awards and media recommendations.
Readiris Pro is more basic than some of the other OCR packages on the market, aimed simply at providing users with the ability to convert image, paper and PDF files into editable and searchable files. It is designed to work with normal scanners and will output a variety of digital files including DOC, XLS, PDF and HTML. It also provides a simple function that re-renders locked PDFs to be more searchable whilst looking exactly the same, and it boasts the ability to compress document sizes by up to 50 times without reducing their visual quality.
The Readiris Cloud Connector allows users to store and manage their documents in the cloud. Supported services are Evernote, Dropbox, Box and Google Drive. Documents can be automatically exported and then accessed from any device wherever the user is. In addition to these features, Readiris is capable of processing multi-page documents and supports the recognition of over 130 languages.
Creaceed Prizmo
Web: http://www.creaceed.com/prizmoPrice: From $49.95 (around £30, AU$57)
Creaceed is a Belgian company that was founded in 2008. It has a small team of four people and produces a variety of different apps for iOS and Mac. Its iOS apps include a video stabiliser and voice control tool. For Mac the company produces HDR imaging, image and video morphing and video toolbox apps. It also produces Prizmo.
Prizmo aims to provide a universal scanning experience for Mac owners. Users can use scanners, digital cameras or smartphones to take images of the document they need to digitise. If a picture is taken with a device connected to the user's computer, it will be automatically imported into Prizmo. Prizmo then allows users to extract text from hard-copy documents and extract information from business cards. Users can edit outputs to make sure the results are fully accurate.
As well as the multi-page processing, perspective correction, page-curvature correction and text-to-speech features provided by Prizmo, the software also offers additional functionality via its Pro-Pack add-on. The Pro-Pack offers batch processing, automated actions and custom export scripts.
Prizmo comes with support for 10 built-in languages, which are English, French, German, Dutch, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Swedish, Danish and Norwegian. It also offers support for a further 30 languages that are available to download for free.
CVision Maestro
Web: http://www.cvisiontech.com/products/general/maestro-recognition-server.htmlPrice: N/A
CVision Technologies is a provider of document automation solutions. Amongst the software it deals in are file compression, recognition technology, PDF workflow applications, and document automation technology tools. CVision's Maestro provides batch automated OCR with what the company claims are the most accurate results available.
CVision says Maestro offers a number of advanced OCR functionalities, including the ability to identify text within low resolution captured documents, to process documents containing multi-directional text, and documents containing low-contrast colour text.
According to CVision, Maestro can be integrated into existing document and imaging workflows. It can process up to 20 pages per second, supports inputs in 11 different formats and can generate outputs in 10 different formats. Maestro is used by a number of major organisations including Barclays, RBS and Xerox.
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Industry voice: Don't let administrative tasks ruin entrepreneurial spirit
A recent survey by OfficeMax shows that small business owners want to spend three hours more each week on activities that will help grow their companies – but they just don't have the time. So what are they spending those three hours doing instead?
Workers in small and medium-sized businesses (SMB) spend half the work day on necessary, yetunproductive tasks, including routine communications and filtering incoming information and correspondence, according to a report from Fonality and Webtorials. These unproductive tasks aren't helping entrepreneurs move their companies forward, and what's worse is that 41% of small business owners say administrative tasks drain their passion and energy for running their companies. This wasted time is unnecessary.
To combat entrepreneurial brain drain, check out these productivity hacks for small business owners:
Simplify back-end processes and streamline communication
Consider using websites such as Torpio or Zapier to automate tedious dual data entry. Using application programming interface (API) technology, employees and business owners can automate data retrieval and modification, freeing up valuable time for more important activities, such as brainstorming the next product upgrade or business expansion plan.It's clear that email is at the core of small businesses' customer interactions, and many people have multiple inboxes, making it even more of a challenge to keep all those messages straight. Since we're constantly using infinite combinations of phone, fax, text messages and video conferencing to stay in touch, bringing all of these methods into one streamlined communication plan will ensure clear messages are received by all and turned directly into workflows.
By combining all of their communications into one central location, teams can better communicate and share information, allowing for faster access to important details across the company.
Improve collaboration methods
The majority (two-thirds) of respondents to an Aberdeen survey identified improving collaborationacross the business as the top goal for their organizations' communications plans.There is a plethora of collaborative software available to support teams' goals.Especially for off-site employees, for example, try using Google Hangouts for face-to-face meetings andYammer, a social network for businesses, for employee collaboration when videoconferencing isn't necessary. Additionally, have a place where employees can openly discuss and brainstorm what's working and what's not; this is what makes the business stronger.
Redirect saved time to rebuilding entrepreneurial spirit
All of this improved collaboration, and streamlined communication and processes undoubtedly make for more successful and efficient employees, and ultimately a happier work environment. Business owners who cut down on the time they spend on unnecessary processes can direct those new-found hours to collaborating and brainstorming with their employees. A happier team can re-infuse passion and spirit back into the business, boosting the founder's spirit and efficacy, as well.Administrative tasks and processes may seem small, but they can add up to larger issues. By addressing and simplifying each task, entrepreneurs can actually solve more abstract issues, such as losing passion for their business. Back-end processes will always be a part of running a business, but they should not be the reason why business owners feel they can't move their companies in the direction they envision.
- Anthony Smith is the CEO and Founder of Insightly
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In Depth: E3 2015: What we want to see
E3 2015 is just around the corner. OK so maybe it's not, but we're preparing our wishlist anyway.
By the time E3 2015 rolls around players will be a year and a half into the new console title, so publishers, developers and platform creators need to bring their A-game to LA.
Here's what we'd like to see – and believe us when we tell you, this is simply a starting point for an ever-growing list:
Consoles
We don't expect to see very much in the way of hardware at the 2015 expo. Both Sony and Microsoft will have gaming platforms in the market that are under two years old and if Nintendo's past form is anything to go by, it's doubtful it's ready to throw in the towel on the Wii U just yet.3DS sales are enough to ensure that Nintendo probably won't be showing off a new handheld, and Sony continues to support the PS Vita platform, even though there was nary a mention of any new titles for it at this year's Gamescom expo in Cologne.
That said, the notion of a slimmer, more svelte Xbox One wouldn't be unappreciated. On the other hand, if the PS4 loses any more weight it may disappear under your television altogether.
What's more likely is that both Microsoft and Sony will make attempts to better utilise their mobile device gaming platforms. A price cut for any of the home consoles wouldn't be completely unexpected either.
An area of hardware we do expect to see plenty of is virtual reality. The Oculus Rift is expected to touch down midway through next year, though initially in a limited rollout, so we'd expect it to be at the LA expo with guns blazing.
We currently don't expect Sony's Project Morpheus probably to be on shelves by that point, but there's every chance that we could get a confirmed release date and price for the headset at E3.
Games
It's hard to predict at this stage what developers and publishers will have in store for the E3 shop floor. But there are a ton of titles in 2015's pipeline we desperately want to see more of.Mirror's Edge 2, for example, has been teased in two expos on the bounce and it's doubtful DICE can keep interest high if it doesn't at least have a demo to show off at E3 2015. Similarly, the Warner Bros Mad Max game was one of the belle's of the E3 2013 ball but we saw neither hide nor hair of it at E3 in 2014. We'd like to see how far along it is. Are you listening, Warner Bros?
One publisher we're hoping will recapture some of its E3 glisten is Bethesda. The publisher's E3 2014 showing was tepid to say the least; showcasing The Evil Within and BattleCry failed to set the world alight. We'd be quite pleased with a sequel to Dishonored, or if there was any news about the undeniably intriguing Prey 2. But on the very top of our wish list is an announcement about Fallout 4. If that happened we'd be over the moon.
Elsewhere, it'll be interesting to see if Activision has more in store for the world than another Call Of Duty, another Skylanders or more bolt-on parts to Destiny. The normally reserved publisher introduced one of this year's biggest and best new IPs. We'd love to see them repeat that trick – even if the odds on it happening are slim.
Square Enix could do with some regrouping. Aside from Final Fantasy XV, which is receiving a mixed reception at best, and the upcoming sequel to the Tomb Raider reboot (which is still under wraps at this stage) Square doesn't really have much beyond games with niche appeal. Why is this? This is the publisher that holds the rights to both the Hitman and Deus Ex franchises.
There are also rumours that United Front is working on a new Sleeping Dogs title and we'd love to see that.
Oh, and Sony could 'fess up and tell us whether we'll ever see The Last Guardian in this lifetime.
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Updated: Which is the best mirrorless compact system camera for you?
For a long time the digital SLR (D-SLR) has been the camera of choice for keen photographers and professionals, but a new breed of mirrorless compact system cameras is challenging the status quo.
But the range of types and brands is confusing. Digital SLRs are broadly similar in their design, and you just need to choose one that matches your budget and your needs. Mirrorless compact system cameras, however, are very diverse.
So we've produced this guide to explain how mirrorless compact system cameras work and how to choose the right one for you. Our camera home page will keep you up to date with all the latest camera reviews, but here's where we explain what you need to look for.
If you already know the kind you're looking for, you can go straight to our top 5 lists:
- Best mirrorless compact system cameras for beginners
- Best mid-range mirrorless compact system camera
- Best advanced mirrorless compact system camera
Compact system cameras vs D-SLRs
The big appeal of compact system cameras (CSCs) is that you can also change lenses and enjoy cutting-edge imaging performance, but with a much smaller and lighter camera body. So they offer SLR-like versatility in a more streamlined and discreet package.
CSCs are also known as mirrorless cameras because they don't have the reflex mirror and optical pentaprism or pentamirror viewfinder of SLRs. Instead, the live image captured by the image sensor is fed to the LCD display, just as it is with a compact digital camera.
Faster focusing
In the past this has meant that compact system cameras have had to rely on contrast-detection autofocus systems which are very precise but slower than the phase-detection autofocus systems used on digital SLRs. Recently, though, manufacturers like Fuji, Sony and Olympus have been adding phase-detection capability to their camera sensors, so the gap in autofocus performance is closing rapidly.Electronic viewfinders
It's not always easy to see an LCD screen in bright light, however, which is why many compact system cameras also have electronic viewfinders (EVFs). These are miniature LCD screens which you view through an eyepiece. You find EVFs on more advanced compact system cameras.
Otherwise, compact system cameras offer the same buying decisions as digital SLRs. The key factors are the user level (novice, enthusiast, expert), the sensor size and resolution and the lens fitting. Each manufacturer uses its own bespoke lens mount, so it's a good idea to check to range and cost of the lenses available before choosing a camera.
Sensor size
As with other types of camera, the sensor size is the most important factor for image quality, followed by the resolution (in megapixels).Until recently, most compact system cameras uses either Micro Four Thirds sensors or APS-C sensors.
The Micro Four Thirds format was developed jointly by Olympus and Panasonic and is used in all their compact system cameras. It's a little smaller than APS-C, but the image quality is still very high and it does mean that the cameras and lenses are more compact.
Compact system cameras with APS-C sensors are more common, however, and deliver images with the same quality as APS-C digital SLRs. Samsung, Sony and Fuji use APS-C sensors.
There are now compact system cameras with both smaller and larger sensors than this, though. Pentax started this trend with the Pentax Q series, which has 1/2.3-inch or 1/1/7-inch sensors – too close to those in regular compact cameras to be taken seriously, maybe. But the 1-inch sensors used by the Nikon 1 and now the Samsung NX Mini offer an interesting compromise between size and quality.
At the other end of the scale, the Sony A7 series uses full-frame sensors. Compact system cameras are now starting to rival digital SLRs in every area of the market, not just 'amateur' cameras.
Compact system camera types
Many makers are designing compact system cameras for photographers who want better image quality than they can get from a regular compact camera, but with the same automatic functions and ease of use and the ability to change lenses.
This means there is a good selection of low-cost compact system cameras, easy-to-use models aimed at novices and compact cameras small enough to slide into a jacket pocket or a small bag, and you can check our list of top mirrorless compact system cameras for beginners.
There are plenty of more advanced models too, aimed at photographers who already know the basics and want to step up to a camera that offers better quality and more photographic options and control than they can get from a compact camera.
Some of these mid-range mirrorless compact system cameras have electronic viewfinders, some don't. A few can accept clip-on viewfinders that connect to the camera electronically, though these have to be bought separately.
But compact system cameras are also starting to rival digital SLRs in a very direct sense, copying the D-SLR design with a viewfinder and 'pentaprism' shape on the top of the camera, but using an electronic viewfinder rather than the optical sort.
This type offers the look and feel of a digital SLR, but with lower weight, smaller dimensions and fewer moving parts. If you're currently thinking of getting a digital SLR, it's definitely worth checking out our list of advanced mirrorless compact system cameras too.
Five mirrorless CSC features to look for
Sensor size/resolution: Physically larger sensors tend to produce less noise at higher ISOs and produce stronger depth of field effects – it's easier to isolate your subjects against defocused backgrounds. Full-frame sensors are the biggest, followed by APS-C, Micro Four Thirds and 1-inch sensors. The resolution (megapixels) plays a part too, though most compact system cameras start at 16 megapixels, which is enough for all but the most demanding uses.Lens range: Some CSC manufacturers give you a wider choice of lenses than others. This may not matter if you plan to use only the standard 'kit' lens supplied with the camera, but if you want to use telephotos, super-wide angle lenses or other specialised optics, it's a good idea to check the range (and price) of the lenses offered by each maker. As the longest-established format, Micro Four Thirds CSCs from Olympus and Panasonic offer the widest choice, though other makers like Samsung and Sony are working hard to catch up.
Electronic viewfinder: It's not essential for casual use, but an electronic viewfinder can be a major advantage if you intend to shoot a wide range of subjects in challenging conditions.
Phase-detection autofocus: CSC autofocus systems have got a lot faster in recent times, but conventional contrast-detection autofocus systems can struggle to keep up with rapid action. Increasingly, however, makers are introducing new, sensor-based phase-detection autofocus systems to speed things up considerably and approach or even exceed D-SLR focus speeds.
Articulating/touchscreens: Many photographers were sceptical about touchscreens when they started appearing on cameras, but they come in handy for quickly setting autofocus points, for example. Articulated touchscreens are doubly useful if you're shooting movies, macro subjects or any kind of low-angle shot.
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MacFormat: Apple's latest thinnovations have scanty appeal
Apple, dear heart, I love you tremendously but you fetishise thinness worse than a dreadful old woman-hating fashion designer – and you have to stop it.
When computers were heavier than a neutron star and thicker than a lazy footballer stereotype, thinness was a laudable goal; of course you wanted to slim down the chunkiness of a laptop computer you could barely hold with one hand. Until I used a PowerBook G3 recently I genuinely had forgotten quite what lunking great slabs laptops used to be.
Let's not forget the launch of the MacBook Air (nor forget that the original model was actually a little portly by comparison to today's); this was the ur-ultrabook, and it took the PC industry months even to realise it had to catch up, never mind start producing laptops that did. This was also when Apple gifted the world "thinnovation", a word of which it was apparently so proud that it filed a trademark, despite the rest of the world just finding it thinane.
The MacBook Air was and is an impressively slim laptop, and I use "impressively" quite deliberately. It's arrestingly, perplexingly, beguilingly thin. Once you touch one, even if you've hitherto used Windows, can't afford one, or think Apple users are a herd of slavish, sycophantic sheeple, you will forever after compare other laptops to it. 'Thin' is a big part of that, and Apple's in the business of making us flat-out want the things it makes.
But there does, there really does, come a point where things are thin enough. Now, there's a danger that this stance comes off as reactionary – that I'm the equivalent of a gruff old man in the corner of a pub telling you that a hole in the ground was perfectly good as a toilet when 'e were a lad and why did they have to fancy-up a perfectly good waste disposal solution with 'indoors' and 'drainage' and 'eradicating cholera'.
It's not that kind of transformative change I'm talking about, though. Getting a computer down from four centimetres thick to two makes a huge difference, but getting it from 20mm to 18mm is just willy-waving.
Like all willy-waving, it's designed to distract and impress and yet rarely does – and it's usually done for the wrong reasons. When Apple introduced the iPhone 6, it had a bigger footprint and weighed more than an iPhone 5s, but Apple shouted 'thin!' in the hope we wouldn't notice.
What we did notice is that at least initially it feels a little uncomfortably thin in the hand. What we did notice is that if they'd made it thicker – or even just 'the same thickness as the model it succeeded' – it would have had more space for a bigger battery. What we did notice is that thinner objects can be empirically less robust.
My point is that there are lots of good ergonomic and marketing reasons to make technology slimmer when it's unwieldy, but once a particular slimness is achieved it can actually be detrimental or at least unnecessary to make it thinner still.
I'm sure Apple is much smarter than I am, and I don't doubt that it has very good data and instincts that tell it people really will respond to a thinner-still iPad. But when you brag one year that the iPad Air can hide behind a pencil, and brag the next year that the iPad Air 2 can hide behind a pencil you've laser-shaved a bit off, it does smell a bit like you're struggling to differentiate the new model.
An obsession with thinness isn't healthy, whether it's in technology or in life. In technology it's merely a silly distraction, but that's not behaviour becoming of Apple.
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Opinion: Has our right to privacy been forgotten?
Has our right to privacy been forgotten? It sometimes seems so. Theresa May and other authoritarians seem to want to ensure that everything is remembered, whilst Google often seem aggrieved that it should be possible for anything to be forgotten. Our privacy - our privacy rights - seem to be the only thing that is forgotten.
And yet, right now, both Google and what might loosely be called the intelligence community are (at least at the surface level) consulting over how best to take privacy into account. Both, however, are doing so very much on their own terms, and the level to which they are really "consulting" with the people needs to be taken with a pinch of salt.
For Google, the main current issue is the misleadingly named "right to be forgotten," insofar as that right emerged from the ruling of the European Court of Justice ruling in the Google Spain case. Google's reaction to the ruling has been swift but far from uncontested. Indeed, many have suggested that Google has been deliberately overreacting in order to make it look as though the ruling is absurd, authoritarian or unworkable - or even all three.
Stories of what look like obviously inappropriate delistings have been appearing in the press - criminals hiding their crimes and so forth. Journalists have been outraged that their stories can apparently no longer be found - though very often the stories about these delisted stories are not quite to be what they seem.
What's more, now that Google has released data about the kinds of URLs that have been delisted, it really doesn't look as though journalistic stories are the main point. Top of the list of sites for which URLs have been removed is Facebook, whilst second is profileengine.com, a site which among other things archives old social media profiles, including Facebook profiles which the users believe they have actually deleted.
Given that one of the drivers of the original idea of a right to be forgotten on the internet, as pushed by European Commissioner Viviane Reding in 2010, was how difficult it was to delete your social media accounts, it looks on the face of it as though it might actually be working.
Parallel to these, in more ways than one, the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament - the body with oversight over MI5, MI6 and GCHQ - has been running its own Privacy and Security Inquiry, and after taking written evidence early this year, has begun its own hearings: both formal hearings with some That, however, is not how it appears in the press, and neither, on the surface, is it how Google seems to want it to appear - and why their own consultative process is well under way.
Squeezed on both sides
The European tour of the Advisory Council to Google on the Right to be Forgotten rumbled into London this week, with a public meeting on the October 16. It's the sixth of seven meetings: it's already been to Madrid, Rome, Paris, Warsaw and Berlin, and after London it will finish the tour, appropriately enough, in Brussels. The hearings have been precisely set up, orchestrated even. The Advisory Council was carefully selected, as, it appears, have been the speakers at the meetings and the terms upon which they speak. It is easy, however, to be too cynical about this - it might be that Google is genuinely trying to find an appropriate balance here. Only time will tell.Parallel to these, in more ways than one, the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament - the body with oversight over MI5, MI6 and GCHQ - has been running its own Privacy and Security Inquiry, and after taking written evidence early this year, has begun its own hearings: both formal hearings with some witnesses and 'round table discussions' with others. Though on the surface very different, there are some strong similarities. Carefully selected committees, supposedly independent of the bodies about which they report, taking evidence from a screened set of experts, on terms set out by the committees, with purely advisory capabilities - and the distinct sense that there's an overall unspoken agenda.
It feels very much as though the most desirable result for Google would be a removal of the whole "right to be forgotten," and that the intelligence services would really like us to just trust them to get on with it, and what they mostly want is to rebuild any lost trust. The result is that we - and our privacy - are still being squeezed. It's easy to see why: both businesses and governments benefit (or at least believe that they benefit) from having as much of our data as possible. They also know it - and know how to play the game, as the orchestration of the various hearings demonstrates.
Snooper's delight
They know how to use each other for their own benefit too. As far back as 2007, Google's Peter Fleischer was using the now-defunct Data Retention Directive as a bargaining tool in Google's battle with the Article 29 Working party over the length that Google could hold search logs. In a round table event, David Bickford, former legal director of MI5 and MI6 made the converse and complimentary argument that if corporations like Google could gather, retain and analyse all this data, it would be perverse to place more restrictions and controls over the way that the intelligence services gather, retain and analyse data.On the intelligence side, the squeeze is really on, driven in part by the current anxiety over the so-called Islamic State. Fresh from her success in driving through the Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Act - with the aid of the authoritarian wings of both Labour and the Liberal Democrats - Home Secretary Theresa May has now announced her plan to bring back the unlamented Communications Data Bill - better known as the Snoopers' Charter.
So we have Google trying to persuade people to surrender the so-called right to be forgotten, while the intelligence services seek ever more freedom to gather and hold data. Privacy is being squeezed from both directions. However, both sides are at least trying to make it look as though privacy is being considered. A few years ago, neither would have done so. That much is progress - but it is only a small step, and we need much more.
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Amazon's Fresh grocery delivery service makes its way to the Big Apple
Amazon began its grocery delivery service AmazonFresh waaay back in 2007, and it's finally launching for the first time on the east coast.
AmazonFresh deliveries in New York City start today, the company confirmed to Re/code.
Unfortunately for most residents of the Big Apple the service for now is only available in Brooklyn, beginning in Park Slope and eventually expanding outward.
New York customers at this time will also need to be Amazon Prime subscribers. They'll get deliveries free through the end of 2014, but next year will have to upgrade to a $299 "Prime Fresh" membership.
Special delivery
Think about how long ago 2007 was. The iPhone was brand new, and people would have looked at you funny if you told them to "snap chat" you.AmazonFresh has so far operated in California and Seattle, so it's nice to finally see it head east after all this time.
Orders placed before 10am will be delivered the same day, and orders made after that will arrive the following day.
In addition Fresh is not limited to just groceries, and customers can have electronics and other items delivered too.
Whether Amazon can compete with the wealth of other grocery delivery services that have emerged in New York in its absence will be fun to watch.
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