PC Magazine November 2022

A friend and I were chatting recently—via Zoom, since we no longer live in the same city. And the topic arose, as it so often does these days, of how strange and scary the past couple of years have been, and how much our lives have changed. Yes, life is opening up again, in more or less limited ways. We can go shopping, to movies, to parties and celebrations without (or with less of) that awful fear of catching or passing along COVID-19 to friends and family or to those who are most vulnerable. But some of the most vulnerable people are no longer with us because of the pandemic. Other things have changed irrevocably as well. One of those things is the world of work. In early 2020, many of us…

HERE’S WHY CRAIGSLIST STILL LOOKS THE SAME AFTER 25+ YEARS Hurray for Craig’s List staying as it is. There is far too much “modernization” of websites just because it can be done. I can’t count the number of updated sites that have become unrecognizable and therefore unusable due to their being “improved.”—Richard Seaberg My brother and I discuss how things are getting harder and harder to use instead of easier. It’s like those TV remotes with 100 buttons, of which you only use five or six at the most and have no clue about the rest.—Adlai Armundsen Microsoft and others could learn something from craigslist. Keeping the interface the same makes it so much easier to use over time. I find it so annoying that every time Microsoft releases a new operating system,…

When I visited Las Vegas last month, I used my phone to summon a car. But the Kia Niro that met me at the Downtown Container Park featured a few differences from an everyday Uber or Lyft: a trio of puck-shaped antennas on the top, tiny cameras mounted around its exterior, and Nevada autonomous-vehicle license plates. This battery-electric vehicle operated by Halo did not rate as a robotaxi, either. I’d have to do the driving—and the car did not drive itself to me. Instead, it had a remote driver sitting in front of a giant monitor at Halo’s offices, plus a human up front as a safety check, during this startup’s beta-test operations. A better comparison is not autonomous-vehicle operators such as GM’s Cruise or Alphabet’s Waymo, but rather car-sharing services such…

This year marks PCMag’s 40th anniversary, and we’ve got loads of great stories celebrating our nostalgia—an illustrated timeline, an “ode to PCMag” by long-time Editor-in-Chief Michael Miller, an interview with Bill Gates, and many more. Another legacy is our faithful crowd of longtime readers, many of whom have contacted us with kudos and reminiscences. One such reader is also—just maybe—the original tech influencer. Brian Dewey has had a long career in technology: He’s retired now but worked for IBM Global Services, Time Warner Cable, and myriad other companies. In 1987, five years after PC Magazine was founded, young Brian was employed by MONY Financial Services. His title? “PC Brand Specifier.” Brian Dewey’s employer and job title back then are both easy to find by paging through the May 31, 1988 print issue…

What comes before the first chapter in a new book? The prologue, as Honda has aptly named its first electric vehicle, an SUV that will hit dealers in 2024. The Honda Prologue is the first of 30 new battery-electric vehicles (BEVs) the brand aims to launch globally by 2030. By 2040, Honda plans to be a fully electric brand. After the Prologue, Honda will launch an EV version of the Acura SUV later in 2024. Honda has not confirmed pricing or miles of range for the Prologue, although Car & Driver suspects it will land around $45,000 and have 250 to 320 miles of range. What we do know is that it’ll be 8 inches longer and 5 inches wider than the 2023 Honda CR-V. “We see a natural progression for a CR-V…

As much as we like to pretend otherwise, nothing lasts forever. Even works of art meant to outlive mere mortals aren’t immune to fate: Libraries can burn down or close, film strips disintegrate, and Snapchat messages self-destruct. The internet gives nearly everyone access to infinitely more content than has ever been available before, but that hasn’t solved this media preservation problem—and in some ways, it’s making it worse. When it comes to saving online streaming video for upcoming generations, the future looks bleak. But it’s not too late. We have the technology and the power to preserve streaming art, but we have to act now. LOST HORIZON Our world is hostile toward the very idea of art preservation, and now the problem has come for the latest craze: online streaming-video services. Once a…