James Farrell

James Farrell is the former editor-in-chief of Chiang Mai CityNews, where he wrote and managed daily news, features, op-eds and blogs on a diverse range of topics. Prior to this, in the same city of Northern Thailand where he lives, he was the longstanding deputy editor of the monthly magazine Citylife. He has written on culture, politics, travel, tech, business, human rights, for local, national, and international news services and magazines. He has a keen interest in the role technology is playing in the transformation of society, culture and politics, especially in developing nations. This is reflected in his not-so-successful first novel.

Latest from James Farrell

Sony and Amazon join other tech firms in shutting down operations in Russia

POLICY - BY JAMES FARRELL - 4 YEARS AGO

Sony Corp. today joined the parade of other large tech companies in pausing some of its businesses in Russia following the invasion of Ukraine. The arm of the company that takes care of the Playstation business, Sony Interactive Entertainment, said today that it’s halting all hardware shipments to the country and will for now not ...

Amazon launches Amp, a Clubhouse competitor that turns people into DJs

APPS - BY JAMES FARRELL - 4 YEARS AGO

After a long period of testing, Amazon.com Inc. announced today that it’s launching its social audio app Amp. The company said for now it will only be available to a limited number of people in the U.S. as a beta version for Apple Inc.’s iOS such as iPhones. The app, which is comparable to the ...

To fight misinformation, Twitter expands crowdsourced fact-checking tool Birdwatch

POLICY - BY JAMES FARRELL - 4 YEARS AGO

Twitter Inc. said today that some of its users will start seeing notes under their posts telling them that they’ve been flagged by members of the public for sharing dubious information. The program started last year as part of a program called “Birdwatch,” although during the trial stage it was made available only to 10,000 ...

Amazon announces it’s closing 68 brick-and-mortar stores in US and UK

EMERGING TECH - BY JAMES FARRELL - 4 YEARS AGO

Amazon.com Inc. said today that it’s streamlining its physical stores, closing 68 Amazon Books, 4-Star and Pop Up stores in the U.S. and the U.K. That will lead to a large number of employees being left without a job, although Amazon said it will try to find work for those people somewhere in its other ...

Joining rest of big tech, Apple halts all sales in Russia and limits services

POLICY - BY JAMES FARRELL - 4 YEARS AGO

Apple Inc. announced today that it’s halting all product sales in Russia, a move in line with various measures big technology companies have taken against the country since the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The move comes about a week after Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine Mykhailo Fedorov sent a letter to Apple in which he called ...

In line with sanctions, computer chip industry halts sales to Russia

POLICY - BY JAMES FARRELL - 4 YEARS AGO

President Joe Biden’s sanctions against Russia will soon hit the country with a shortage of computer chips, a move designed to paralyze Russia’s tech manufacturing industry. Last week, Biden announced an embargo that will include selling chips to Russia, something he said will “impair their ability to compete in the 21st-century economy.” The loss might ...

Reddit gets a makeover that should make using the platform less frustrating

APPS - BY JAMES FARRELL - 5 YEARS AGO

Reddit Inc. today announced some major changes to its platform, including a new Discover Tab, that should make life easier for its users. In the past, users looked for communities, or so-called subreddits, by seeing what’s popular on the platform or by searching various topics. The problem with finding new things to read is that ...

Twitter admits to accidentally taking down posts showing Russia-Ukraine conflict

POLICY - BY JAMES FARRELL - 5 YEARS AGO

Twitter Inc. said today that this week it had mistakenly removed content from its platform and suspended users who had been tracking the conflict between Ukraine and Russia. Such users had been accessing satellite images that showed Russian movement along the Ukraine border, sharing the important images on social media platforms. This type of open-source ...

Meta launches TikTok lookalike ‘Facebook Reels’ in 150 countries

APPS - BY JAMES FARRELL - 5 YEARS AGO

Meta Platforms Inc. today announced that it’s launching Facebook Reels around the world with a raft of features to enable people to make money. For some years now, the company has been talking about creating a competitor to ByteDance Ltd.-owned TikTok, and now it’s finally here. Reels had previously been released for Instagram and to ...

Donald Trump’s social media app Truth Social debuts today in rocky start

APPS - BY JAMES FARRELL - 5 YEARS AGO

Former President Donald Trump’s social media app was made available today in Apple Inc.’s App Store, but it got off to a rocky start. Truth Social has been in the pipeline for some time now, ever since Trump (pictured) was kicked off Twitter Inc. and Facebook Inc. for repeated violations of policy. His Twitter account alone ...