Jeff Johnson (Hacker News):
Note below how Safari says “Search Google” and “Google Search”, even though I’m supposed to be using Kagi.
[…]
Safari connects to Kagi only after connecting to Google.
[…]
An unfortunate consequence is that Safari always sends your search to your default search engine, Google for example, before it sends your search to your custom search engine! Is that what you wanted? If you’re trying to protect your privacy, well… you’re failing. Another unfortunate consequence is that you can’t use your default search engine in Safari—if you want to check Google occasionally and compare to Kagi—because the Safari extension will always redirect your searches.
Unique among major browsers, Safari doesn’t let users select a custom search engine. The built-in choices include subpar offerings like Yahoo and the failed Ecosia but not newer, better entrants such as Kagi and Brave. Safari extensions are a hacky substitute that offers a bad user experience.
Even though Chrome is made by Google, it lets you pick another search engine. Even though Edge is made by Microsoft, it doesn’t lock you into Bing, and you can add any search URL template that you want. Apple is not encumbered with its own search engine to push, yet it seems to be constrained by its desire for revenue sharing, so Safari users get stuck with fewer choices that are arguably lower quality and less private.
Previously:
Brave Google Search Kagi Little Snitch Mac macOS 15 Sequoia Privacy Safari Safari Extensions Search Strategy Tax
TikTok:
We’re enhancing ways for our community to continue using TikTok by making Android Package Kits available at TikTok.com/download so that our U.S. Android users can download our app and create, discover, and connect on TikTok.
Via John Gruber:
I suspect something is going to give on this standoff. Either (a) China relents and actually sells to a U.S. company, and TikTok comes back to the App Store and Play Store; or (b) Trump’s extralegal extension expires with no sale and Oracle and Akamai are forced to pull the plug on ByteDance’s cloud services in the US.
[…]
If I’m wrong and TikTok remains in this half-zombie state in the US — unavailable in the App Store or Play Store, but operational if you have the app installed on your phone — it’ll be interesting if TikTok is the app that makes the mass market actually care about the lack of sideloading on iOS. It’ll be interesting too if sideloading on Android goes mainstream because of this.
Does app vs. Web make that much difference if you’re just consuming the videos?
Previously:
Android Android App App Store iOS iOS 18 iOS App Sideloading TikTok
Anton Shilov:
SemiAnalysis reports that the company behind DeepSeek incurred $1.6 billion in hardware costs and has a fleet of 50,000 Nvidia Hopper GPUs, a finding that undermines the idea that DeepSeek reinvented AI training and inference with dramatically lower investments than the leaders of the AI industry.
DeepSeek operates an extensive computing infrastructure with approximately 50,000 Hopper GPUs, the report claims. This includes 10,000 H800s and 10,000 H100s, with additional purchases of H20 units, according to SemiAnalysis. These resources are distributed across multiple locations and serve purposes such as AI training, research, and financial modeling. The company’s total capital investment in servers is around $1.6 billion, with an estimated $944 million spent on operating costs, according to SemiAnalysis.
Yazhou Sun and Tom Mackenzie:
The notion that China’s DeepSeek spent under $6 million to develop its artificial intelligence system is “exaggerated and a little bit misleading,” according Google DeepMind boss Demis Hassabis.
[…]
DeepSeek “seems to have only reported the cost of the final training round, which is a fraction of the total cost.”
Previously:
Artificial Intelligence DeepSeek NVIDIA Web
James Killick (via Adam Chandler):
In 2018 Bill [Kilday] wrote a book about their travails. It is the definitive, insider story of Google Maps. The book is called “Never Lost Again” and I can’t recommend it enough. Among other places it’s available on Amazon and Apple Books.
[…]
I recently had the privilege of chatting with Bill and I told him about my plans for this post. We both agreed that the timing should coincide with the 20th anniversary of Google Maps.
So, with that in mind, here we go!
It remains one of my favorite Web sites. If I could only keep three Google products, they would probably be YouTube, Maps, and Translate.
Silas Valentino:
After presenting a dynamic map — now compatible with the web — Where 2 Technologies was acquired by Google for an undisclosed sum in October 2004. At the same time, Google also scooped up the satellite imagery service Keyhole, a critical component for developing Google Maps, since it opened access to scores of satellite images. In the ensuing months, Where 2 Technologies and Keyhole fused their products together, building a digital map made of satellite tiles.
[…]
Maps debuted on Feb. 8, 2005, and Lars remembers it immediately disrupted the entire Google system.
“It actually almost destroyed Google’s data centers,” he said in the podcast. “Rather, it clogged the pipes with all of those tiles of mapping images flying back and forth, almost used all of Google’s bandwidth. It was amazing. It was a huge hit from day one.”
Stephen Hutcheon:
Now, on the eve of Google Maps’ 20th anniversary, the 54-year-old Australian software engineer [Stephen Ma] has had a change of heart. He wants to write himself back into the foundation story – as well as acknowledge others whose contributions have been overlooked or undersold.
Previously:
Anniversary Google Maps History Maps Web
