Author: Newley

Hi. I'm Newley Purnell. I cover technology and business for The Wall Street Journal, based in Hong Kong. I use this site to share my stories and often blog about the books I'm reading, tech trends, sports, travel, and our dog Ginger. For updates, get my weekly email newsletter.

Newley's Notes

NN272: Histrionic Huskies

Post author By Newley
Post date July 19, 2021
No Comments on NN272: Histrionic Huskies

Me with Giorgio Chiellini

Sent as an email newsletter July 18, 2021. Want in? Join my email list.

👋 Hi friends,

Welcome to the latest edition of Newley’s Notes, a weekly newsletter containing my recent Wall Street Journal stories, must-read links on tech and life, and funny dog videos.

⚽ 🇮🇹 Image of the week, above: that time in 2015 I bumped into the great Giorgio Chiellini in Jakarta. Chiellini, you may have seen, just captained Italy in their Euro 2020 championship win over England. I still can’t believe I actually have a photo with him 🙂 More on the Azzurri’s success below…

🚨 ✍️ Programming note: NN will be on summer holiday beginning next week. It’ll be back in your inbox in mid-August!

Here are 10 items worth your time this week:

1) 🏆 🧤 Italy beat England to win Euro 2020. Defender Chiellini, pictured with yours truly above, was outstanding, as usual. But goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma was out of this world: He made the winning penalty save and was named player of the tournament – a first for a goalkeeper. Epic. And he’s only 22!

2) 🇭🇰 The Biden administration issued an advisory cautioning U.S. businesses in Hong Kong that the “new legal landscape” here could “adversely affect businesses and individuals” as Beijing asserts control.

3) 🧭 “Roadrunner,” the new documentary about Anthony Bourdain, has just come out – and features an AI speaking in Bourdain’s voice.

4) 🚀 Richard Branson flew into space. Is a new era of private spaceflight upon us?

5) 💻 Longread of the week: Cal Newport on making remote work last.

6) 🎥 Here is a lovely collection of old movie posters.

7) 📎 Microsoft is bringing Clippy back.

8) 🧸 Toys based on dead startups.

9) 📻 Radiooooo is a “musical time machine” that spans the globe. Super cool.

10) 🔉 Emergency alarm sounds from around the world, rated.

•••

🦴 Dog-related video of the week:

Just like kids.

•••

💡 Quote of the week:

“Enjoy the little things, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things.” – Robert Brault

•••

👊 Fist bump from Hong Kong,

Newley

Newley's Notes

NN271: Buoyant Beagles

👋 Hi friends,

Welcome to the latest edition of Newley’s Notes, a weekly newsletter containing my recent Wall Street Journal stories, must-read links on tech and life, and funny dog videos.

If you like NN, please share this link so others can subscribe.

👉 Image of the week, above: a personalized license plate spotted here in Hong Kong. (Thanks, A!)

Here are 10 items worth your time this week:

1) 🆕 My latest: an exclusive out Monday. The lede:

Facebook Inc., Twitter Inc. and Alphabet Inc.’s Google have privately warned the Hong Kong government that they could stop offering their services in the city if authorities proceed with planned changes to data-protection laws that could make them liable for the malicious sharing of individuals’ information online.

The story was followed by The New York Times, Reuters, The Guardian, the South China Morning Post, and others. It was also mentioned in newsletters like Axios AM and CNN’s Reliable Sources.

And for the latest, see a follow-up I wrote on Tuesday: Hong Kong Tries to Ease Big Tech’s Concerns Over Data Law.

2) 💰 An important investigation by my WSJ colleagues Melissa Korn and Andrea Fuller: ‘Financially Hobbled for Life’: The Elite Master’s Degrees That Don’t Pay Off.

3) 👉 A statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee has been taken down in Charlottesville, Virginia.

4) ⚖️ Longread of the week: On Britney Spears’s life under a conservatorship.

5) ☕ Michael Pollan: Should we quit caffeine?

6) ⭐ Why Houston, Texas is better than Austin.

7) 📖 Fourteen-year-old Zaila Avant-garde became the first Black American to triumph in the Scripps National Spelling Bee.

8) 👖 Jorts – jean shorts – are cool now.

9) 💬 On Twitter addiction.

10) 🐶 Elmo is adopting a puppy named Tango. (Thanks, PB)

•••

🦴 Dog-related video of the week:

🐕 Happiness.

•••

💡 Quote of the week:

“My working habits are simple: long periods of thinking, short periods of writing." – Ernest Hemingway

•••

👊 Fist bump from Hong Kong,

Newley

Facebook, Twitter, Google Threaten to Quit Hong Kong Over Proposed Data Laws

Post author By Newley
Post date July 7, 2021
No Comments on Facebook, Twitter, Google Threaten to Quit Hong Kong Over Proposed Data Laws

That was the headline on an exclusive I had out Monday. It begins:

HONG KONG–Facebook Inc., Twitter Inc. and Alphabet Inc.’s Google have privately warned the Hong Kong government that they could stop offering their services in the city if authorities proceed with planned changes to data-protection laws that could make them liable for the malicious sharing of individuals’ information online.

A letter sent by an industry group that includes the internet firms said companies are concerned that the planned rules to address doxing could put their staff at risk of criminal investigations or prosecutions related to what the firms’ users post online. Doxing refers to the practice of putting people’s personal information online so they can be harassed by others.

Hong Kong’s Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Bureau in May proposed amendments to the city’s data-protection laws that it said were needed to combat doxing, a practice that was prevalent during 2019 protests in the city. The proposals call for punishments of up to 1 million Hong Kong dollars, the equivalent of about $128,800, and up to five years’ imprisonment.

“The only way to avoid these sanctions for technology companies would be to refrain from investing and offering the services in Hong Kong,” said the previously unreported June 25 letter from the Singapore-based Asia Internet Coalition, which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.

Click through to read the rest.

Newley's Notes

NN270: Cunning Canines

👋 Hi friends,

Welcome to the latest edition of Newley’s Notes, a weekly newsletter containing my recent Wall Street Journal stories, must-read links on tech and life, and funny dog videos.

If you like NN, please share this link so others can subscribe.

👉 Image of the week, above: yours truly on an epic hike – up to Kowloon Peak – with friends recently.

Here are 10 items worth your time this week:

1) 🇺🇸 Happy Fourth of July! Here is an oral history of “Independence Day,” released 25 years ago this weekend. [Hollywood Reporter]

2) 💰 The Trump Organization and its chief financial officer were charged with tax-related crimes. [WSJ]

3) ✉️ Facebook launched a newsletter service (think Substack) called Bulletin. [The Verge]

4) 🪑 Want something nicer than Ikea, but don’t want to pay for designer furniture? “Ikea hacking” may be for you. [The Hustle]

5) 📺 The long tail is for real: big TV hits are going away. [Washington Post]

6) 🍴 QR code menus are the worst. [Slate]

7) 💻 “The Internet is rotting” [The Atlantic]

8) 🌏 Maps of countries’ colors, based on satellite images. [Data Stuff]

9) 🧨 Enjoy these English-language advertisements for Japanese fireworks from the 19th century. [Public Domain Review]

10) 🤖 AI-generated art is getting super interesting. [Charlie Snell]

•••

🦴 Dog-related video of the week:

🐶 “Nice and easy now” [Imgur]

•••

💡 Quote of the week:

“Who sees all beings in his own Self, and his own Self in all beings, loses all fear…When a sage sees this great Unity and his Self has become all beings, what delusion and what sorry can ever be near him?” – Upanishads

•••

👊 Fist bump from Hong Kong,

Newley

Newley's Notes

NN269: Vivacious Vizslas

Final Apple Daily front page

👋 Hi friends,

Welcome to the latest edition of Newley’s Notes, a weekly newsletter containing my recent Wall Street Journal stories, must-read links on tech and life, and funny dog videos.

If you like NN, please share this link so others can subscribe.

👉 Image of the week, above: The final issue of Hong Kong’s pro-democracy Apple Daily newspaper. The headline says, “Hong Kongers Bid a Painful Farewell in the Rain.” More details below.

🚨 Correction: In last week’s NN I shared a photo of an adorable puppy from a shelter here in Hong Kong. I said his name was Lucas, but I’m told that it is actually Edmund. I regret the error!

Here are 10 items worth your time this week:

1) 🇭🇰 Apple Daily printed its last paper, “ending an era of unfettered reporting critical of Beijing in the city’s mainstream print scene.” [WSJ]

2) 👉 A condo near Miami collapsed Thursday, killing nine people – and another 152 people are unaccounted for. [NPR]

3) 🔥 The U.S. Pacific Northwest is seeing record-breaking sweltering weather. [AP]

4) 💻 John McAfee, creator of the well-known antivirus company, died in a jail cell in Spain, where he had been ordered extradited to the U.S. on criminal charges. [WSJ]

5) 🛸 The U.S. government officially cannot explain what’s behind the many UFO – make that unidentified aerial phenomena – sightings stretching back to 2004, according to a new report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. [New York Times; DNI dot gov]

6) 👏 Headline of the week: “When an Eel Climbs a Ramp to Eat Squid From a Clamp, That’s a Moray.” [New York Times]

7) ⛳ Paul McBeth, a professional disc golfer, landed a $10 million endorsement deal. [The Ringer]

8) 📆 Want a new perspective on time? View your life in weeks. [Coruscant Consulting]

9) 😄 Podcast of the week: Patricia Corby, Associate Professor of Oral Medicine and Associate Dean of Translational Research at Penn Dental Medicine, goes deep with Peter Attia on the importance of oral health as we age. [Peter Attia MD]

10) 📺 “The 21 Best Comedies of the 21st Century (So Far)” [New York Times]

•••

🦴 Dog-related video of the week:

🐶 “Dogs are gonna dog.” [Imgur]

•••

💡 Quote of the week:

"Do not seek to have events happen as you want them to, but instead want them to happen as they do happen, and your life will go well.” – Epictetus

•••

👊 Fist bump from Hong Kong,

Newley

Newley's Notes

NN268: Playful Puppies

Newley stray dogs Hong Kong

👋 Hi friends,

Welcome to the latest edition of Newley’s Notes, a weekly newsletter containing my recent Wall Street Journal stories, must-read links on tech and life, and funny dog videos.

👉 Image of the week, above: I recently participated in a work-organized volunteer outing at the Sai Kung Stray Friends Foundation shelter here in Hong Kong. The fine folks at that group are looking after more than 100 dogs. Among them is this handsome fellow, named Lucas. Click through to their website to find out how to support the organization.

Here are 10 items worth your time this week:

1) 👉 Juneteenth – June 19 – is now a U.S. federal holiday. People across the country gathered Saturday to commemorate the date. [The Guardian]

2) 🏈 Carl Nassib, of the Las Vegas Raiders, became the first active NFL player to announce he is gay. [ESPN]

3) 💰 Someone in tiny Lonaconing, Maryland, population 1,200, won $731 million in a state Powerball lottery in January – but no one knows who. [Washington Post]

4) 🔫 File under “the world in 2021”: Hand-held anti-drone weapons are a thing. [The Drive]

5) 🎵 Joni Mitchell’s “Blue” was released 50 years ago this week; musicians reflect on the album’s greatness. [New York Times]

6) 🎬 Steven Spielberg has signed up to make movies for Netflix. [WSJ]

7) 🔥 Art-related story of the week: “Scientists Recreate Stone Age Lamps and Torches to See How Ancient Artists Illuminated Caves.” [Inside Science]

8) ✏️ On the culture of documents and meetings at Amazon. [Justin Garrison]

9) 💻 How inexpensive netbooks for students in Argentina empowered a generation of musicians. [Rest of World]

10) 📺 Just out: the season two trailer for “Ted Lasso.” [YouTube]

•••

🦴 Dog-related video of the week:

🐕 “There are two types of dog.” [Imgur]

•••

💡 Quote of the week:

“We must not allow the ignoble to injure the noble, or the smaller to injure the greater. Those who nourish the smaller parts will become small men. Those who nourish the greater parts will become great men.” – Meng Tzu

•••

👊 Fist bump from Hong Kong,

Newley

Newley's Notes

NN267: Dunkin’ Doggos

Sent as a newsletter on June 13, 2021. Want in? Join my email list.

👋 Hi friends,

Welcome to the latest edition of Newley’s Notes, a weekly newsletter containing my recent Wall Street Journal stories, must-read links on tech and life, and funny dog videos.

👉 Image of the week, above: a watercolor, done from a photo I took on a recent trip to Hong Kong’s Lamma Island.

Here are 10 items worth your time this week:

1) 💰 “ProPublica has obtained a vast cache of IRS information showing how billionaires like Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk and Warren Buffett pay little in income tax compared to their massive wealth – sometimes, even nothing.” [ProPublica]

2) 🦠 A Covid–19 report from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California says the Chinese lableak hypothesis is plausable. [WSJ]

3) 🚀 Jeff Bezos will be on his space company Blue Origin’s first flight carrying people to the edge of space. [TechCrunch]

4) 🍎 New Apple updates are coming this fall: FaceTime gets Zoom-like features, Macs get a low-power mode, Safari gets tab grouping, and more. [WSJ]

5) 💬 Authorities around the world busted hundreds of suspected criminals by secretly gaining access to an encrypted messaging platform used on mobile devices. [WSJ]

6) ⚽ Euro 2020 – that is, the 2020 UEFA European Football Championship, being played a year late due to Covid – has kicked off! Favorites include Belgium, Italy, Portugal and – my pick to win – France. [Wikipedia]

7) 👀 End-times-related video of the week: a tour of a survivalist community living in underground bunkers in South Dakota. [Laughing Squid]

8) 🌲 Now out: winners of the BigPicture natural world photography contest; my favorite is number five, “Facing Reality.” [The Atlantic]

9) 💊 Longread of the week, by Erika Fry: “How Amazon, JPMorgan, and Berkshire Hathaway took on America’s health care system – and lost.” [Fortune]

10) 😢 Dog-related tearjerker of the week: An eight-year-old-boy in Virginia set up a stand to sell his Pokemon cards to fund treatment for his sick puppy, Bruce. Once word got out, people all over the country pitched in – and Bruce is now on the mend. [Washington Post]

•••

🦴 Dog-related video of the week:

🏀 “This dog can dunk.” [Reddit]

•••

💡 Quote of the week:

“No one can live happily who has regard to himself alone and transforms everything into a question of his own utility; you must live for your neighbor, if you would live for yourself.” – Seneca

•••

👊 Fist bump from Hong Kong,

Newley

Newley's Notes

NN266: Compassionate Corgis

Post author By Newley
Post date June 7, 2021
No Comments on NN266: Compassionate Corgis

Sent as a newsletter on June 6,2021. Didn’t arrive in your inbox? Join my email list.

👋 Hi friends,

Welcome to the latest edition of Newley’s Notes, a weekly newsletter containing my recent Wall Street Journal stories, must-read links on tech and life, and funny dog videos.

👉 Image of the week, above: another amazing Hong Kong vanity plate. Spotted by A.

Here are 10 items worth your time this week:

1) 🇭🇰 Thousands of people here in Hong Kong marked the anniversary Friday of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre despite massive numbers of police on the streets [WSJ]

2) 🚨 Facebook said its suspension of Donald Trump’s accounts will run at least until January 2023. [WSJ]

3) 💻 Facing the prospect returning to the office, some workers in the U.S. are quitting instead. [Bloomberg]

4) 👀 Bigger pupils = higher intelligence? [Scientific American]

5) 🗣 Eunoia is a new website cataloging more than 500 untranslatable words from various languages. [Eunoia dot world]

6) 🌋 Mario David García Mansilla bakes a special kind of pizza: cooked on a volcano in Guatemala. [Atlas Obscura]

7) #️⃣ #Hashtags were cool, then they were uncool, and now young influencers are bringing ’em back. [LA Times]

8) ❓ Ask Reddit: “What is a simple, painful fact that people need to just get over and accept?” [Reddit]

9) 📹 Please enjoy this compendium of the best dumb internet videos of all time. [Polygon]

10) 🍴 “Roadrunner” is a new documentary about Anthony Bourdain out July 16. [YouTube]

•••

🦴 Dog-related video of the week:

🐕 “A hug is worth a thousand words.” [YouTube]

•••

📺 What I’ve Been Reading:

I’ve had a copy of Jonathan Haidt’s “The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom” kicking around the house for some time, but had never opened it. I’m so glad I finally did. I’m not even finished and it already ranks among my favorite books about happiness – and what makes for a fulfilling life – that I’ve encountered. It is beautifully written, deeply researched, sharply argued, and highly comforting. More soon on its lessons, I’m sure.

💡 Quote of the week:

“Well done is better than well said.” – Benjamin Franklin

•••

👊 Fist bump from Hong Kong,

Newley

Newley's Notes

NN265: Dancing Dogs

Sent as a newsletter on May 30,2021. Didn’t arrive in your inbox? Join my email list.

👋 Hi friends,

Welcome to the latest edition of Newley’s Notes, a weekly newsletter containing my recent Wall Street Journal stories, must-read links on tech and life, and funny dog videos.

🎨 Image of the week, above: a recent watercolor from a Hong Kong waterfront.

Here are 10 items worth your time this week:

1) 🆕 I had three stories out this week. On Tuesday: Indian Police Visit Twitter’s Office After Politician’s Tweet Is Labeled as Misleading. The lede:

Indian police visited Twitter Inc.’s office in New Delhi to investigate the company’s labeling of tweets from a ruling party spokesman as misleading, the government’s latest move against U.S. tech platforms amid criticism over its handling of the pandemic.

2) 💬 On Wednesday: WhatsApp Says It Filed Suit in India to Prevent Tracing of Encrypted Messages. It began:

Facebook Inc.’s WhatsApp said it filed a lawsuit in India to stop new government rules that would require the company to trace users’ encrypted messages, escalating a battle over online speech between American tech firms and the South Asian nation’s ruling party.

3) 🦠 And on Thursday: Facebook Ends Ban on Posts Asserting Covid–19 Was Man-Made. The lede:

Facebook Inc. has ended its ban on posts asserting Covid–19 was man-made or manufactured, a policy shift that reflects a deepening debate over the origins of the pandemic that was first identified in Wuhan, China, almost 18 months ago.

The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that three researchers from China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology became sick enough in November 2019 that they sought hospital care, according to a previously undisclosed U.S. intelligence report.

4) 🇨🇳 Separately, a Covid-related must-read from my WSJ colleagues that contains deep and powerful reporting: The Wuhan Lab Leak Question: A Disused Chinese Mine Takes Center Stage.

5) 👉 People gathered Tuesday to mark one year since George Floyd died. [AP]

6) 🎬 In a move likely to strengthen its Prime Video service, Amazon is acquiring Hollywood studio MGM in a roughly $8.5 billion deal, its second-biggest acquisition after Whole Foods. [WSJ]

7) ⚽ Chelsea beat Manchester City in the Champion’s League final – and Hershey, Pennsylvania native Christian Pulisic became the first American man to play in and win the world’s most prestigious club tournament. [CBS Sports]

8) 📺 The 90s called, part 1: Here are the best parts of “Friends: The Reunion.” [AV Club]

9) 💥 The 90s called, part 2: “Johnny Knoxville’s Last Rodeo.” [GQ]

10) 🌝 Enjoy a collection of the best “super blood moon” photos. [The Guardian]

•••

🦴 Dog-related video of the week:

♥️ “Dog asks for dance with owner at his own wedding!” [Reddit/aww]

•••

📺 What I’ve Been Watching:

We recently went to a screening of “Minari,” an acclaimed film out last year about a Korean family that moves to Arkansas. Highly recommended. The trailer is here.

💡 Quote of the week:

“Things won are done; joy’s soul lies in the doing.” – William Shakespeare, “Troilus and Cressida.”

•••

🤗 What’s new with you? Hit reply to send me tips, queries, random comments, and videos of sweet dogs who just wanna join in dances.

👊 Fist bump from Hong Kong,

Newley

India Journalism Tech

Facebook Ends Ban on Posts Asserting Covid-19 Was Man-Made

Post author By Newley
Post date May 30, 2021
No Comments on Facebook Ends Ban on Posts Asserting Covid-19 Was Man-Made

That’s the headline on a story I wrote that ran Thursday. It begins:

Facebook Inc. has ended its ban on posts asserting Covid-19 was man-made or manufactured, a policy shift that reflects a deepening debate over the origins of the pandemic that was first identified in Wuhan, China, almost 18 months ago.

The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that three researchers from China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology became sick enough in November 2019 that they sought hospital care, according to a previously undisclosed U.S. intelligence report.

“In light of ongoing investigations into the origin of COVID-19 and in consultation with public health experts, we will no longer remove the claim that COVID-19 is man-made or manufactured from our apps,” Facebook said in a statement on its website Wednesday.

Click through to read the rest.

Tags Covid-19, facebook