The Inquirer

Scoops

Sony laptop battery scandal

In 2006 The Inquirer reported laptop battery problems that affected Dell, Sony and Apple as of September 2006, with rumours of problems at Toshiba and Lenovo. In June 2006, The Inquirer published photographs of a Dell notebook PC bursting into flames at a conference in Japan; The New York Times reprinted *The Inquirer'''s photographs. The Inquirer was also the first publication to report Dell's subsequent decision to recall faulty batteries, according to *BusinessWeek''.

The Inquirer's successful reporting of the story relied on information supplied by readers and later by a confidential source at Dell. "I attribute being on top of the story to old-fashioned print journalism standards – cultivating, and, if you'll excuse the pun, not burning such contacts," The Inquirer's founder, Mike Magee, told BusinessWeek.

Rydermark

In July 2006, The Inquirer posted images to show cheating by Nvidia Windows device drivers in Rydermark 2006. The images were alleged to be fake by a number of sources. The Inquirer denied any wrongdoing and quoted the maker of Rydermark calling the allegations against them "irresponsible". About 8 months after the original Rydermark article, The Inquirer ran another article claiming that Rydermark was still being developed, but was near release. In response, one of its critics offered $1,000 to a charity of the Rydermark articles author's choosing if he could produce (breaching his NDA) a version of Rydermark that showed the alleged screenshots in full-motion video before a set deadline (which gave the author 10 and a half hours, beginning at 6:30PM UK time). No one produced the program before the deadline passed.

Independent verification that RyderMark was genuine, first appeared in TweakTown in May 2007. RyderMark developer Ajith Ram denied ever sending the Inquirer Nvidia cheating allegations.

ATI Intel front side bus license revocation

On 24 July 2006, The Inquirer wrote that, in response to AMD's announced intent to purchase ATI, "ATI had its chipset license pulled, or at least not renewed by Intel." ATI responded by stating that its license had not been revoked and that they continue to ship Intel chipsets under license. On 23 August 2006, ATI showed its chipset roadmap to motherboard vendors which showed that next-generation chipsets for the Intel platform are cancelled. On 1 March 2007, AMD said that they would continue developing chipsets for Intel platforms.

Windows 10 Technical Preview eavesdropping

On 3 October 2014, The Inquirer reported on the privacy policy for the Technical Preview the upcoming Microsoft Windows 10 operating system. In the report, it pointed out that the permissions included the ability for Microsoft to monitor individual keystrokes as well as file content from users. The story was picked up by news media around the world causing Microsoft to admit that monitoring was a necessary part of the process, but denying use of a keylogger.

Ed Bott, writing for ZDNet, accused the site of being "a tech tabloid known for its breathless headlines and factually challenged prose" and said of writer Chris Merriman, "there's little evidence that the author has enough background in computer science or security to tell a keylogger from a key lime pie."

References

References

1. Bobbie Johnson. (26 January 2006). "VNU buys into tabloid news". The Guardian.
2. (2 August 2006). "All journalism will be Indian journalism one day". The Inquirer.
3. (12 May 2014). "The Effect of the Internet of Things on User Privacy: Part 1". Intel.
4. (19 December 2019). "The INQUIRER reaches end-of-life".
5. Tobitt, Charlotte. (19 December 2019). "Tech news website The Inquirer ceases publishing as ad revenues struggle despite 'healthy' audience". Press Gazette.
6. (21 June 2006). "Dell laptop explodes at Japanese conference". The Inquirer.
7. Darlin, Damon. (10 July 2006). "Dell's Exploding Computer and Other Image Problems". The New York Times.
8. (30 August 2006). "The Battery Recall: A Win for the Web".
9. [https://archive.today/20130901222117/http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1011446/rydermark-screenshots-back-california-graphics-fudge The Inquirer, 18 July 2006: ''Rydermark screenshots back California graphics fudge''] (cited 4 February 2007)
10. [http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=3400 DailyTech, 19 July 2006: ''"Rydermark" Cheating Allegations Discredited''] (cited 23 August 2006)
11. Damien. (19 July 2006). "The Inquirer accuses Nvidia of cheating". BeHardware.
12. [https://web.archive.org/web/20060722010351/http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=33131 The Inquirer, 19 July 2006: ''Rydermark maker labels hoax allegations 'irresponsible' ''] (cited 23 August 2006)
13. [https://archive.today/20130901222116/http://uk.theinquirer.net/?article=37716 The Inquirer, 19 February 2007: ''Rydermark benchmark lives. It's almost done''] (cited 28 February 2007)
14. Kristopher Kubicki. "DailyTech Digest: RyderMark, My take on RyderMark's newest incarnation".
15. Lars Göran Nilsson. (16 May 2007). "TweakTown: RyderMark Beta 2 Preview - Emerging competition for Futuremark?". TweakTown.
16. Kristopher Kubicki. "RyderMark Developer: We Never Said NVIDIA Cheated". DailyTech.
17. (24 July 2006). "Intel pulls ATI bus licence". The Inquirer.
18. (26 July 2006). "AMD & ATI Answers to Rumormongering". H Enthusiast.
19. "News - Thursday, August 28, 2008". xbitlabs.com.
20. (1 March 2007). "AMD keeping open platform strategy: Q&A with sales and marketing vice president Jochen Polster". DigiTimes.
21. Chris Merriman. (3 October 2014). "Microsoft's Windows 10 Preview has permission to watch your every move". The Inquirer.
22. Ed Bott. (23 October 2014). "Windows 10: You've Got Questions, I've Got Answers". ZDNet.