"Don't be evil."

This kind of thoughtless, evidence-free garbage undermines everything else in the post.

After yet another clogged inkjet which might print again if I buy a full set of inks for more than the replacement cost of the printer, I’m shopping for a small laser printer.

If something happens to the provider, or they decide they don't like you or your files, your data is gone. Worse than gone, because you still have the empty proxies -- the husks of your files.

I personally know of more than one instance where seemingly innocuous data triggered some automated system at Dropbox and the user was locked out of their files without recourse.

If you're using cloud storage, make *absolutely certain* you have it set to download all files. If your cloud storage exceeds the drive space of a laptop (small businesses, etc), get a cheap dedicated PC and a big drive, then set up at least one dedicated cloud mirror.

Local-first cloud storage is great, but the potential for catastrophic data-loss is not even remotely close to zero.

   > The good thing is that, after 5 years of 
   > construction, a beautiful new mall stan… just kidding!
   >
   > This is Canada. The place where construction
   > has to stop because you’re not allowed to uproot
   > a tree on your own property. Or a vindictive neighbour
   > holds up your project in Committee of Adjustments, until
   > you build them a new deck as a bribe. Or construction
   > is blocked by a surprise Heritage Listing on your
   > building. I could keep going!

Google, Facebook and now Amazon realized the big money is in brokering ads. As brokers, they know everything and control everything, exploiting both the viewers and advertisers.

I’m going to start leaving those files on every system I touch. Thank you Nikita.

No.

Today, I've got two laptops stuck behind an Apple Business Manager MDM error. Thankfully I'm not in a hurry, but several hours have already been burned trying to get these past the Remote Management setup screen.

I was asked to help a woman who worked as a housekeeper. She had been given a used iPad as a Christmas present by a previous employer, but the previous owner did not remove it from her iCloud account. Months had passed and the new owner was no longer working for the giver, and reluctant to ask (language barrier) so the iPad was a paperweight.

My daughter recently lost her iPhone in a big city. iCloud lock allowed us to remote-lock it, send messages and see its last location on the map, but the device was never returned. We sent a remote-wipe command, but I assume it was smashed for fun, since it was useless thanks to Activation lock.