April 24, 2023 Memos - "Big Media's Big Shakeup," Linux, and Manifest v3.

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"Big Media's Big Shakeup" - Carlson's out at Fox, Lemon's out at CNN, and the ending impact of social media.

If you've seen the Drudge Report today, you're likely aware that Tucker Carlson's been ousted by Fox News, which, while it makes sense in the wake of the Dominion Voting Systems settlement, its also as-if Fox is attempting to annihlate their viewerbase and push them towards competitors (such as Newsmax and One-America [OAN]), since Carlson dominated the 8PM Eastern timeslot among viewers aged 25-54 (according to the trade publication Adweek/TVNewser, at least); meanwhile, CNN has also ousted Don Lemon, who has been suffering ratings-wise, following alleged insensitive and tone-deaf comments... either that or the average American would rather watch their local morning news program ("cord-cutting" is still on the rise, after-all).

Politics aside, I think that the so-called "old media" is due for a wakeup call, especially as people may be less likely to want to pay for a subscription to read a publication such as the New York Times, or people may not want to pay for a cable or expensive streaming subscription just to watch news. Alternatives to paid media exist, such as MSN, which aggregates many paid articles for free, non-mainstream news networks, such as Newsmax, which often let you watch them for free, or even bypass tools like 12ft.io, which help you gain access to paywalled information for free.

And for those who haven't heard, Buzzfeed is shutting down their news operation, which is a likely side-effect of more people moving away from social media as a news-aggregation service. Personally, I think that social media as a whole is likely to see a decline in use, since people are (entirely speculating here) probably starting to feel burnt-out on the stimulation (and distraction) and algorithm-fed content pushed by platforms such as Twitter and Facebook.

Econobox_'s adventures with Linux (Mint)

Having begun to feel burnt-out with the mess that is Windows 11, I've decided to give Linux another shot (article incoming), I decided to attempt to run a dual-boot configuration with Windows 11 and Linux Mint (running the "Cinnamon" desktop environment). Windows seemed to slow to a crawl after a few days of uptime, with RAM usage at idle sitting around 50 (of 8GB total); meanwhile, Linux seems to only consume at most ~5GB of RAM, even with moderate web browsing (in a Chromium-based browser). Hopefully, this time around, I can abandon Windows for most tasks.

Manifest v3 - the nail in the coffin for Chromium-based browsers

As of late 2022, Google's proposed Manifest v3 extension framework has been postponed; basically keeping adblockers functional for Chromium-based browsers. This might simply be to stave off the downfall of Chromium (or Google's own Chrome browser).

Copyright 2023, Econobox_ (d.b.a konat.neocities.org)