A a passionate German philologist and historian, Sven Krumrey, born 1973, was introduced to the computer age early by his Commodore C64 and later turned his hobby into a profession. He is equally intrigued by gadgets, good software, hypes surrounding the Internet and the contradictions of the digital age.
I recently had the pleasure of enjoying a classic movie with a bunch of merry friends from all walks of life, all of them in their forties. We watched "Suspiria", an Italian horror classic from 1977. We had loads of snacks, drinks and comfy seats, so everything was set for a nice movie night. But, unbeknownst to my friends, I would also use this night to find out whether twelve people were able to focus on the screen for 90 minutes straight in the age of the internet.
Imagine your PC or laptop had a port with a myriad of connection options and lots of raw power but you didn't even know it existed! That's what many computer owners must feel like these days. Purchasing a computer usually involves a welter of technical terms that are hard to sort out. And honestly, whose interest would spike if, along with disk size, RAM, processor and graphics card, the term Thunderbolt was suddenly thrown around? What is almost considered old hat in the Apple world is still a rarity among Windows users.
There's hardly another software that is as controversial as Steam, even 15 years after its debut. Some gamers refuse to buy games that require activation through steam while others rejoice at the opportunity to manage all their software in a single place and never tire of praising the various additional features. Whichever side you're on, Valve has definitely pioneered online software distribution. But what exactly is Steam, why does it matter and what are its strengths and weaknesses?
2011 was a year of hope for Google. Their biggest prestige project, Google+, was to be made public in the middle of that year. It was supposed to upend the world of social networks, dethrone Facebook and, naturally, collect a plethora of user data. Whatever site users visited, they were inundated with ads for the new platform. But what could have been a record-breaking launch, was soon marred by glitches and growing disenchantment, which is why the once bleeding-edge network will now shut down permanently.
Every month, several thousand apps are published. Most target a niche market, many are clones of existing popular programs, seldom does a new app make a splash these days. When WhatsApp launched, ten years ago, it got barely noticed and messengers were still considered PC-only. For text messages, there was SMS, for everything else, there were phone calls. Read on to learn why Facebook's rejection really got the app off the ground and why 2019 will be a decisive year for WhatsApp!
