The Inquirer
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This article is about the British technology news website. For other uses, see Inquirer (disambiguation).
The Inquirer
URL www.theinquirer.net/
Alexa rank ~7000
Commercial? yes
Type of site technology tabloid
Registration no
Available language(s) Dutch
English
French
German
Italian
Spanish
Owner Incisive Media Investments Ltd.
Created by Mike Magee
Launched 2001
Current status active

The Inquirer is a British technology tabloid website founded by Mike Magee after his departure from The Register (of which he was one of the founding members) in 2001.

The magazine is entirely Internet based with its journalists living all over the world and filing copy online,[1] and with Mike Magee as the overall editor. In addition to the English site, as of 19 June 2006 following its acquisition by VNU Business Publication Europe, The Inquirer has editions localized for Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, and Spain.[2]

Contents

Writing style

The site hews to The Register's slogan, "Biting the hand that feeds IT", and is known for its early access to industry news based on insider sources. When served with "cease and desist" orders, the website sometimes publishes them in full, with commentary.[3] It has also recently started publishing information regarding hardware available in the UK, USA, France and other countries.[4]

The Inquirer's articles are written in a subjective and opinionated tone, with much the same style of reporting common in British tabloid newspapers.[5] In the English version of the site, slang terms, particularly those common to Great Britain, are used. On each visit to the main page of the website, The Inquirer shows a random comment or quote (usually sarcastic) at the top of the page.

The Inquirer has a diverse writing staff coming from many different countries, with Paul Hales being the news editor and Mike Magee the overall editor. Some people[6] suggest that several of The Inquirer's writers are actually pseudonyms. Among these are Adamson Rust, an anagram of Nostradamus, and Eva Glass, an anagram of Las Vegas suggesting that these names are really pseudonyms of other staff members. Inquirer writer Charlie Demerjian, who uses the nickname Groo_ on the Ace's Hardware messageboard, more or less confirms this in one of his posts there.[1]

'Everywhere Girl'

The Inquirer has run a series of stories about the "Everywhere Girl", a model thus referred to by the publication due to stock photos of her appearing in a large number of different advertisements, particularly advertisements of technology companies.[7]

Scoops

Despite getting scoops, some of the reporters for The Inquirer have a policy against signing non-disclosure agreements.[8] The publication has various connections with the industry; Intel in particular has acknowledged that its staff have a tendency to send details of meetings to The Inquirer.[9]

Some of The Inquirer's articles include information unconfirmed by official sources within the companies they report on. When dealing with such information, they typically preface the article with a statement such as the following, "We've heard an odd, but strong whisper on the grapevine . . ."[10] These articles lack official confirmation and they can be considered as rumor or speculation.

Playstation 3 Graphics Processor

As is the case with most publications, some stories published by The Inquirer cause controversy, such as a 31 August 2005 story about a claim that PlayStation 3's GPU is less powerful than the GeForce 7800.[11] NVIDIA, manufacturer of GeForce, responded to this claim[12] by stating that the Playstation 3's RSX (which NVIDIA worked on) is faster than the GeForce 7800. While technically true, since the RSX have a higher clock speed than the Nvidia 7800GTX but the RSX have other downgraded features (128-bit memory bus and 256MB memory) that ultimately makes it a less powerful card than the 7800GTX.

Sony Laptop Battery Scandal

One of The Inquirer's greatest scoops has been its reporting during 2006 of 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's report[13] and dramatic photographs of a Dell notebook PC exploding in flames at a conference in Japan attracted global media attention. Many renowned publications, such as The New York Times, reprinted The Inquirer's photographs.[2] The Inquirer was also the first publication to report Dell's subsequent decision to recall all 4.1 million of the 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.[14]

Rydermark

In July 2006, The Inquirer posted images to show cheating by NVIDIA Windows device drivers in Rydermark 2006.[15] The images were alleged to be fake by a number of sources.[16] The Inquirer denied any wrongdoing and quoted the maker of Rydermark calling the allegations against them "irresponsible".[17] About 8 months after the original Rydermark article, The Inquirer ran another article claiming that Rydermark was still being developed, but was near release.[18] 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.[19]

Independent verification that RyderMark was genuine, first appeared in TweakTown in May 2007.[20] RyderMark developer Ajith Ram denied ever sending the Inquirer NVIDIA cheating allegations. [21]

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."[22] ATI responded by stating that its license had not been revoked and that they continue to ship Intel chipsets under license.[23] On 23 August 2006, ATI showed its chipset roadmap to motherboard vendors which showed that next-generation chipsets for the Intel platform are cancelled as X-bit Labs reported. On March 1, 2007, AMD said that they will continue developing chipsets for Intel platforms.[24]

Nicknames and terminology

 Lists of miscellaneous information should be avoided. Please relocate any relevant information into appropriate sections or articles. (March 2008)

Following the standards Mike Magee set at his previous publications, The Inquirer uses nicknames for many IT firms and persons:

“

Many believe that using Microsoft software helps feed a Giant Vole currently kept in a secure basement in the Seattle area. Once the Vole reaches critical mass it could devour half the western world, many fear. [29]

 „

Other nicknames are available in The Inquirer guide to Inquirer jargon.[30]

In talking about Wikipedia or Whackypedia, The Inquirer once referred to it as an "Internet comic". [31]

References

  1. ^ The Inquirer, 2 August 2006: All journalism will be Indian journalism one day (cited 23 August 2006)
  2. ^ The Inquirer, 19 June 2006: Euro INQUIRERS burst forth (cited 23 August 2006)
  3. ^ The Inquirer, 10 September 2003: US Republican Party threatens to sue the INQUIRER (cited 23 August 2006)
  4. ^ The Inquirer, 25 June 2006: Mio C710 will tell you where you are (cited 23 August 2006)
  5. ^ The Inquirer, 7 December 2003: Last week's top INQUIRER stories (cited 23 August 2006)
  6. ^ For example 2CPU.com forum, 11 April 2003: Serverworks and Supermicro to Support AMD Opteron! (cited 5 February 2007)
  7. ^ The Inquirer, 10 August 2004: Everywhere Dell girl appears in Germany (cited 29 January 2007)
  8. ^ The Inquirer, 5 March 2002: The INQUIRER, Intel, embargoes and NDAs (cited 23 August 2006)
  9. ^ The Inquirer, 2 December 2004: Intel wonders how INQUIRER gets leaks so fast (cited 23 August 2006)
  10. ^ The Inquirer, 12 July 2006: New iPods to use OLED displays (cited 23 August 2006)
  11. ^ The Inquirer, 31 August 2005: Playstation 3 GPU "slightly less powerful than GeForce 7800" (cited 23 August 2006)
  12. ^ Team Xbox, 31 August 2005: PlayStation 3 GPU More Powerful than GeForce 7800! (cited 23 August 2006)
  13. ^ The Inquirer, 21 June 2006: Dell laptop explodes at Japanese conference (cited 2 September 2006)
  14. ^ BusinessWeek, 30 August 2006: The Battery Recall: A Win for the Web (cited 2 September 2006)
  15. ^ The Inquirer, 18 July 2006: Rydermark screenshots back California graphics fudge (cited 4 February 2007)
  16. ^ Such as DailyTech, 19 July 2006: "Rydermark" Cheating Allegations Discredited (cited 23 August 2006), or BeHardware, 19 July 2006: The Inquirer accuses Nvidia of cheating (cited 23 August 2006)
  17. ^ The Inquirer, 19 July 2006: Rydermark maker labels hoax allegations 'irresponsible' (cited 23 August 2006)
  18. ^ The Inquirer, 19 February 2007: Rydermark benchmark lives. It's almost done (cited 28 February 2007)
  19. ^ Kubicki, Kristopher. "DailyTech Digest: RyderMark, My take on RyderMark's newest incarnation". 
  20. ^ 16 May 2007: TweakTown: RyderMark Beta 2 Preview - Emerging competition for Futuremark? (cited 17 May 2007)
  21. ^ Kubicki, Kristopher. "RyderMark Developer: We Never Said NVIDIA Cheated", DailyTech. Retrieved on 2007-06-11. 
  22. ^ The Inquirer, 24 July 2006: Intel pulls ATI bus licence (cited 23 August 2006)
  23. ^ H Enthusiast, 26 July 2006: AMD & ATI Answers to Rumormongering (cited 23 August 2006)
  24. ^ DigiTimes, 1 March 2007: AMD keeping open platform strategy: Q&A with sales and marketing vice president Jochen Polster (cited 3 March 2007)
  25. ^ The Register: Chipzilla becomes Gorgonzilla
  26. ^ The Inquirer, 31 July 2006: ATI/AMD monster dubbed DAAMIT (cited 4 February 2007)
  27. ^ The Inquirer, 15 October 2006: Voodoo HP nickname coined (cited 4 February 2007)
  28. ^ Nintendo, wee have a problem - The INQUIRER
  29. ^ The Inquirer, 7 September 2007: Possible explanation for The Vole terminology
  30. ^ The Inquirer, 2 March 2003: The INQUIRER guide to INQUIRER jargon (cited 23 August 2006)
  31. ^ "Anonymous Wikipedia editors caught red handed", The Inquirer (2007-08-15). 

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