Pat Pilcher

Editor at Witchdoctor

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Articles

Will banning kids from social media really work?

1 week ago | witchdoctor.co.nz | Pat Pilcher

National MP Catherine Wedd has announced a Members’ Bill to see kids under 16 banned from social media platforms in New Zealand. Like all legislation, Wedd’s bill starts with good intentions. Wedd (Hawkes Bay MP for the Tukituki electorate) said, “Right now, we aren’t managing the risks for our young people well”. The PM, Chris Luxon, also commented that the bill would help prevent online bullying and keep inappropriate content away from Kiwi kids.
Ecovax Deebot X8 Pro Omni: The next step in robot cleaning?

2 weeks ago | witchdoctor.co.nz | Pat Pilcher

Summary The evolution of robot vacuum cleaners is happening at an incredible pace. My first unit in the early 2000s was more of a battery-powered dodgem that sometimes picked stuff up off the floor but, more often than not, got into serious trouble when it encountered a sock or any other object small enough to get tangled up in its innards.
Cracking the pizza code

4 weeks ago | witchdoctor.co.nz | Pat Pilcher

When I got my hands on the rather amazing Ninja Woodfire Outdoor Oven, I realised I had to up my pizza-making game, even though I’d been cooking pizzas for years. While making an okay-ish pizza at home isn’t difficult, making incredible pizzas takes practice and patience. Here are some tricks I picked up on my pizza-crafting journey. Hopefully, they’ll help you, our beloved reader, craft killer pizzas!The secret to Italian food is letting the ingredients speak and not getting too fussy.
Ninja Woodfire Outdoor Oven reviewed

4 weeks ago | witchdoctor.co.nz | Pat Pilcher

Summary Sometimes, a gadget is so well executed that you wonder how you ever lived without it. This was the case with the Ninja Woodfire Outdoor Oven, which is now a regular part of my cooking repertoire. The oven feels solidly built and is crafted from stainless and enamelled steel. It has a distinctive terracotta-coloured hood, the front fascia housing a digital display with dials for selecting specific cooking presets.
JBL SoundGear Audio Frames: Sound and vision

1 month ago | witchdoctor.co.nz | Pat Pilcher

Summary I’ve reviewed my fair share of ear gear over the years, but never a pair of audio glasses. They may sound like an audiophile oxymoron (I mean audio glasses?), but being able to stream audio through a pair of goggles proved surprisingly handy. Besides the obvious advantages of ear-friendly sunglasses (namely keeping the sun out of my peepers), how good are they? Looks-wise, they are a little Joe 90, but also kinda stylee.
Samsung Galaxy A56 5G: Bang-for-buck best in class

1 month ago | witchdoctor.co.nz | Pat Pilcher

Summary Choosing the right smartphone has always been tricky. Challenging economic conditions and a bewildering array of brands covering an improbable number of price points make choosing a decent smartphone even tougher. While flagship phones from most manufacturers are a simple buy, what if your budget only allows for a mid-range smartphone? Mid-range smartphones have long been considered a step down from their flagship counterparts.
Cooking without gas: Ninja's Woodfire Electric BBQ Grill reviewed

1 month ago | witchdoctor.co.nz | Pat Pilcher

Summary For years, BBQ cooking in NZ meant throwing some snags and steaks on a hotplate and nudging them around while sipping a cold beer as they charred. That might be a tried-and-tested approach, but Ninja reckons they’ve invented a better way with the Woodfire Electric BBQ Grill. As its name suggests, it’s powered by electricity instead of gas. It also has a smoker box that burns wood pellets to add delicious, smoky BBQ flavour to food.
Sennheiser Profile Wireless Mics: Super sound for wannabe YouTubers

1 month ago | witchdoctor.co.nz | Pat Pilcher

Summary It seems that an endless number of people are setting up their own YouTube channels nowadays. With a good smartphone camera, some intelligent scripting and story ideas, there’s plenty to like. However, shoddy audio can completely ruin a YouTube video and cause viewers to switch off. The Mic on your smartphone might be good, but it can’t work miracles. Suppose you’re filming someone at any appreciable distance from your phone.
Enshitification: How tech companies are crapping in their own nest

1 month ago | witchdoctor.co.nz | Pat Pilcher

I got into home computing back in the heyday of 8-bit machines. It was an exciting and heady time where anything seemed possible as innovation after innovation rolled out to the glee of excited geeks. Now we have computers that can understand our speech, create photorealistic images and videos, and use AI, which until recently was the stuff of science fiction. I should be super excited, right? But instead, I find myself becoming increasingly pissed off with big tech as they embrace enshitification.
Cricut Maker 4 - the best crafting gizmo yet

2 months ago | witchdoctor.co.nz | Pat Pilcher

Summary Cricut (as in Jiminy Cricket) is one of those cool gadgets you already know if crafting is your thing. As a long-time Cricut fan, I was chomping to get my hands on their newest machine, the Maker 4. So just what is a Cricut? And why was I literally fizzing at the bung to get my hands on one? Cricut machines might resemble old-school computer printers, but they’re very precise digital cutting machines.