Prose Hacking

Reporting, writing and analysis about consumer-tech issues by Rob Pegoraro. Because I like to play with the English language, not just random gadgets.

[robpegoraro]

Weekly output: Pope Leo XIV on AI, American Airlines + Starlink, Taara photonics, New Glenn explosion, way less Waymo

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[robpegoraro]

Bruce Springsteen's work has been a part of my life for 40-plus years, but I keep finding new angles to it--like Wednesday at Nats Park in D.C., when songs I've known for decades hit different because of the troubled state of the United States.

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[robpegoraro]

Weekly output: AT&T's mass-market plans, digital transformations, ROI of AI, AI in Android and Chrome development, Firefox as anti-Chrome, AT&T's Build-A-Plan, DeepMind CEO on AGI, Starship v3 launch

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"Shut up and take the customer's money" is sound CX advice that many transit agencies across the U.S. are finally following after years of requiring their own stored-value fare cards or mobile apps.

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[robpegoraro]

Weekly output: WiFi hotspots, Android 17 + Gemini Intelligence, earning trust in AI, staying IRL in an AI world, AI image generation, photonics + data centers, Bill Gross on AI

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Did I need to take an hour and change out of a busy conference schedule to fly on a cramped and noisy airplane just to return to where we took off? No. Did I do that anyway? Yes.

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[robpegoraro]

Weekly output: Google I/O teaser, satellite-to-phone services, passkeys, connected-home considerations, Matter

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Newspaper withdrawal at the breakfast table

Mornings haven’t been quite the same around the house since Feb. 26–the last one that started with a print copy of the Washington Post landing somewhere near our front walk, making less of a thud than it once did, sometime before dawn. That marked the end of a streak of Post home delivery that had run decades, going back to my first apartments out of college in Arlington and D.C. The wanton…

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[robpegoraro]

Weekly output: inflight WiFi, Visible's prepaid Verizon home 5G, Uber's travel ambitions, AT&T emergency response

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[robpegoraro]

Taxes are the price of civilization, and I don't mind paying them. I do, however, object to a levy that dings me a second time on something I already paid taxes on--and which requires me to maintain an extra spreadsheet every year.

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[robpegoraro]

Weekly output: tech for creators, Xfinity Mobile plans, how 1Password eyes AI, cheaper NextGen TV tuners

This coming week will not be like the last six and change because my calendar has me sleeping in my own bed every night. That is an exciting prospect after a string of trips that took me to Austin, L.A., Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, San Jose and Las Vegas… but this workweek isn’t free of travel, as I’m taking a day trip to NYC for Uber’s Go-Get press event Wednesday. 4/21/2026: Out and About…

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[robpegoraro]

So many Vegas visits, still so few for fun

Landing at Dulles Wednesday evening closed out my 45th work trip to Las Vegas. That number alone is not something to take pride in and probably constitutes evidence of some character defect, but what’s even more disturbing is that since my first trip to Vegas in 1998–for CES, of course–I have still only been there three times for fun. This lifestyle long ago rendered me incapable of dealing with…

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[robpegoraro]

Weekly output: Internet Archive, Roblox parental controls, Google travel-search tools, T-Mobile yanks free WiFi from United flights, Mark Vena podcast, talking to local user groups, AST SpaceMobile

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One thing that 15 years of full-time freelancing has taught me is resilience. Another thing: that tax day is properly thought of as tax-extension-filing day.

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[robpegoraro]

Weekly output: AI compliance risks, Mint Mobile bundle, AI vulnerability detection, AI driving logistics, Al Gore on AI

I was in the Bay Area for work this week… and I’ll be back there starting Tuesday for NTT Research’s Upgrade conference (as like last year, the organizers are covering my travel expenses). I did not set out to spend this much of April propping up commercial aviation, but once again multiple travel opportunities lined up. Patreon readers got a bonus post from me Thursday about one of those trips:…

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[robpegoraro]

San Francisco has always been one of my favorite places to visit, but then I went six years without work taking me there. That unfortunate streak ended last year, and now the city also looks like it's changing for the better. Good; please continue.

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[robpegoraro]

Weekly output: AT&T OneConnect, federal privacy fears, Artemis II, better inflight WiFi, 6G

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