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

Microsoft Lumia phones top customer ‘delight’ ratings as US smartphone demand falls dramatically, according to new report

It seems consumers in the US aren’t splashing out and buying new phones this year, according to a report by Argus Insights, Inc., a Silicon Valley-based market intelligence company. The report, compiled with data from around 622,000 reviews, shows that from June 2014 to June 2015 smartphone demand is down by 8 percent in the ...

There’s life in Windows Phone yet, according to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella

There’s been a lot of talk concerning what Microsoft is going to do with its encumbered phone business following the huge layoffs last week.  And now on the back of the news that Microsoft is releasing a new build of Windows Phone, Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, has come out to state his commitment to ...

Bring it on: How Microsoft plans to make Windows 10 launch something special

There’s only a couple of weeks to go until Microsoft officially launches Windows 10, and seeing that the OS is a landmark release in the company’s long history it’s not surprising that Windows fans and curious onlookers are going to be treated to something special. This includes launch events (invites firstly going to Windows Insiders) ...

Hacking series ‘Mr. Robot’ could be the show of our times

It’s only three episodes in, but USA Network’s hacker series Mr. Robot has already gained widespread plaudits from critics and viewers. And for good reason; it’s eminently likable. Its paranoid vision of the cyber world; the struggle we all have in keeping things private; and not falling prey to consuming too much while living so ...

Microsoft Office 2016 officially released for Mac, with a promise of better support in the future

Office 2016 is out of preview (the largest beta ever of Office for Mac) and officially available for Mac users, although the fine-tuned productivity suite is for the time being only available for Office 365 subscribers. At the moment Mac users with Office 365 Home, Personal Business, Business Premium, E3 or ProPlus can get their hands ...

Next likely steps for Microsoft mobile

After announcing a layoff of up to 7,800 employees (a massive 7% of workforce) at Microsoft, most of which will affect employees working in the company’s phone business, we might wonder what happens next. In a bid to what CEO Satya Nadella calls ‘restructuring’ the smartphone business, which entails the writing off $7.6 billion as ...

Microsoft looking to academics to take HoloLens into the future

Microsoft is looking to the world of academia to try and find out what its augmented reality headset, HoloLens, might best be used for. Redmond announced recently that a total of five $100,000 grants will be awarded, as well as two HoloLens development kits for each recipient, to universities and non-profit researchers that meet the ...

Final edition of Windows 10 will be with PC makers by the end of the week

Microsoft is making history with Windows 10, the operating system that we’ve been told is the last in a long line due to the fact this OS will receive ongoing constant updates. Windows chief Terry Myerson talking about Windows as a service reiterated this last week, saying “we will never be done” concerning upgrades. But ...

The future is now: Four sci-fi writers that predicted the future of tech

Thirty years ago this month the first film in the Back to the Future franchise hit the screens when director Robert Zemeckis sent Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) back to 1955. Time travel, and its myriad implications, is usually difficult to grasp and full of migraine-inflicting paradoxes – the brilliant sci-fi film primer claims to ...

Microsoft and Kyocera make up, agree to cross-licensing deal

Back in March Microsoft and Japanese electronics company Kyocera Corporation came head to head when Microsoft sued the latter for violating seven patents on three of its products: Duraforce, Hydro, and Brigadier Android smartphones. At the time Microsoft asked a Seattle court for a sales injunction of the said phones, stating that Kyocera had infringed ...