Web & AI Analyst
Richard MacManus In my previous column, I wrote about how the “serverless” trend has abstracted away the infrastructure layer for application developers. Well the same thing is happening to databases, via Database-as-a-Service (DBaaS) solutions like Amazon Aurora, MongoDB Atlas, Azure SQL Database and Redis Cloud Essentials. In its report on DBaaS vendors last year, analyst firm Forrester … Read more
A writer’s role is to build something thoughtful and/or delightful that is of value to people. It should help readers do their jobs, or help them understand the world, or help them cope with the world (by providing entertainment or comfort). Would that qualify as a “builder” in Marc Andreessen’s eyes?
Serverless is a growing trend in cloud computing, and it’s leading to a quiet revolution in how we mix and match data across the internet. The name itself is a misnomer because physical servers still exist (way down the stack, in massive data centers located in places like Nevada and Oregon). But in the serverless … Read more
I’ve been working at The New Stack for five weeks now, and am enjoying it more than any other job I’ve had since ReadWriteWeb. A big part of that is due to the team of people I’m working with, who have been generous with their time and knowledge, and welcoming. But I’m also feeling energized … Read more
In a guest post on The New Stack last week, Spectro Cloud‘s Tina Nolte wrote about the state of cloud computing in the current era of containers and Kubernetes (which she termed “Cloud 2.0”). I found her comments on how applications have changed to be particularly intriguing. In Cloud 2.0: “Your app looks different. It … Read more
Life in a time of pandemic, and updates about my new job and the status of my writing projects.
If the 2000s was when networking evolved on the internet (I called this the read/write era, others named it ‘Web 2.0’), and the 2010s was all about the compute layer, then the 2020s will see a revolution in the data layer. That’s according to DataStax Chief Strategy Officer Sam Ramji, who outlined his vision at … Read more
The big social media companies have rightfully come under immense pressure over the past week, in the wake of the Christchurch terror attack. But one question continues to bother me: why were Facebook and YouTube so ineffective when it came to shutting down the terrorist’s live stream and the dispersal of the video after? Over … Read more
After the tragedy in Christchurch last Friday, serious questions are being asked of the world’s largest social media companies. Why was the killer able to live stream this appalling act on Facebook for 17 minutes? Why couldn’t YouTube and Twitter prevent copies of the video from being propagated on their global networks? Why did Reddit … Read more
The “gig economy” has its drawbacks, as highlighted recently by Newsroom Pro managing editor Bernard Hickey, but it’s also an unavoidable part of today’s employment landscape. Especially for millennials and Generation Z, two generations that grew up in the internet era – and now have to earn a living in it. I’ve questioned aspects of … Read more
Electric scooters have been all the rage in parts of New Zealand over the past six months, with Lime scooters clogging up both footpaths and media headlines. But we could soon be seeing more electric moped bikes on our streets too, if kiwi startup UBCO has its way. UBCO is a rapidly expanding business, and … Read more
A recent Government report into the digital economy has been criticized for focusing too much on global giants like Google and Uber, and barely mentioning New Zealand’s leading tech companies. The report, co-written by the NZ and Australian Productivity Commissions, claims that both NZ and Australia are minor players in the global innovation market. “The … Read more
Digital billboards are now an unlikely arm of the media business, if New Zealand’s own MediaWorks is any indication. Late last year, MediaWorks – which runs the Three tv network and popular radio brands like The Edge and More FM – acquired the New Zealand arm of Australian out-of-home advertising business, QMS Media. It was … Read more
Podcasting is a version of radio optimized for the internet era, but it’s still a relatively small market. The US podcasting industry earned $314 million in revenue in 2017, according to a report from the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PwC. But that pales in comparison to the US radio industry, which earned $22.1 billion … Read more
The NZ Law Commission has just released a DNA Issues Paper, to determine whether our DNA profiling laws need updating. The paper, and accompanying website, is focused on the use of DNA in criminal investigations. But it also raises intriguing questions about consumer safety for kiwis who use – or have used in the past … Read more