How audio engineers tweak music for the iPod age

Written by

Ars Technica:

To highlight work done to improve the sound of compressed music files, Apple recently launched a “Mastered for iTunes” section on the iTunes Store.

How does this work? Ars spoke with Masterdisk Chief Engineer Andy VanDette, who recently completed a project remastering the bulk of Rush’s back catalogue. As part of the process, VanDette created special versions of each song specifically for uploading to the iTunes Store.

I bet you didn’t realize the effort that goes into creating music for the iTunes store.

Foxconn, Apple, and the Fair Labor Association respond to ABC News

Written by

ABC News:

Last night’s special edition of Nightline expanded upon that original report, and included footage from inside the factory, interviews with the workers, and even a visit to a local village.

Since ABC News’ original report, Apple, Foxconn, and the Fair Labor Association have sent statements explaining a few sentences in the original report.

What happens when you hit a mountain at 120mph?

Written by


Gizmodo:

Jeb Corliss hit the side of Table Mountain while attempting a wingsuit jump. Now, the footage from the cameras mounted to his helmet is available—and it looks terrifying.

I love these wingsuit videos but this guy was asking for trouble “flying” so low, trying to grab the balloons!

Apple defends rights to iPad name in Shanghai court

Written by

New York Times:

Apple Inc. defended itself in a local court here Wednesday against allegations that it does not own rights to the iPad trademark in China, a challenge that threatens to prevent the company from selling one of its most popular products in one of its fastest growing markets.

The heated, four-hour session at the Shanghai Pudong New Area People’s Court ended, though, without the local district judge issuing any ruling or giving any public indication of how the case would be resolved.

What we learned from the ‘Nightline’ report on Foxconn factories

Written by

The Verge:

Nightline has aired its report from Foxconn’s factories on ABC. In the report, host Bill Weir speaks directly to factory workers as well as their managers. You would think that this “unprecedented” look inside Apple factories would reveal much we didn’t know, but the show was relatively light on information.

We’ve compiled a list of the most interesting facts in bullet points, but we’re left feeling like there wasn’t much meat on the bones of the 30-minute report.

i hope no one was expecting some kind of Mike Wallace “60 Minutes” explosive, rip-the-lid-off-the-industry kind of expose.

Flickr getting a major makeover

Written by

Betabeat:

Markus Spiering, senior product manager for Flickr, is very happy to be making extensive changes to the Flickr interface, the first of which will roll out next week, as he explained in a meeting with Betabeat, Yahoo’s Jason Khoury, and Flickr.com, looking pretty on Mr. Spiering’s Macbook Air.

The new photo view will hit on Feb. 28, Mr. Spiering said, and with it comes a new upload interface. Flickr’s uploading page now looks more like an app than a website. Goodbye, retro blue links. Hello, swoopy drag-and-drop.

I’ve used Flickr for years and am looking forward to the revamp. The interface is definitely long in the tooth.

Facial recognition billboard for women only

Written by

Mashable:

A new kind of outdoor advertisement is being tested on Oxford Street in London’s West End. The interactive advertisement uses a high-definition camera to scan pedestrians and identify their gender before showing a specific ad. The built-in system has a 90% accuracy rate in analyzing a person’s facial features and determining if they’re male or female.

Males won’t be able to see the full ad and will be directed to Plan UK’s website instead. The purpose of this was to show men “a glimpse of what it’s like to have basic choices taken away.”

This is the tip of the focused advertisement iceberg.

The curious case of (cr)apps that make money

Written by

PandoDaily:

Apple has a serious problem on their hands, and it is one they need to fix it as soon as possible. This is an issue that Apple’s biggest ally – iOS developers – are complaining about, one that hurts the user, and one that could end up damaging the iOS ecosystem more than any set of labor issues ever could.

The issue we are facing, is the proliferation of scamming apps. Apple needs to take better care of its walled garden.

Best. Technical College. Ad. Ever.

Written by


Gizmodo:

What begins as a seemingly cheesy commercial for the Central Institute of Technology in Australia quickly devolves into a morass of extremely dark silliness. But yes, it’s actually a real ad for a real school. Very creative, twisted, and funny.

Utterly demented video.

Keyboard jeans are true “laptop”

Written by


Discovery News:

They’re a pair of jeans with a set of speakers, a wireless mouse and a keyboard embedded into the upper thigh regions. Imagine typing — literally — on your lap and you get the picture.

The jeans were designed to “combine fashion and technology”.

If you wear these, don’t be surprised if someone punches you in the FGHJ.

Six legal things you should know about social media

Written by

The Wall:

Whether it is uploading photos, that we then allow another entity to have control of, or granting access to our Facebook or Twitter account to a third party – we are, often unknowingly, giving away data, and, in certain instances, giving away certain privacy rights associated with that data.

Admit it, when that long, boring box of detailed legal information pops up when you download an app or sign up to a website, you just hit “I Agree” and don’t actually read it, don’t you? Well maybe there are a few things you should be paying attention to.

While some of the information may be location (UK) specific, the article does serve as a reminder that the “social media” space can be scary and have real word consequences. Thanks to Colin Crawford for the heads up.

Norman Seeff releases Steve Jobs collectible lithograph

Written by


iPhone Savior:

Each lithograph will retail for $75 and then Norman intends to sign the back of the initial run of 300 and sell them for $125 each — the dimensions measure 26 x 34 inches. For this piece Seeff added color to the Apple rainbow logo on the front of the Mac. It’s a wonderful bit of detailing that adds a special quality to the black and white image.

Make sure you read the story of the image’s creation.

Top 10 downloads to enhance Mac OS X

Written by

Lifehacker:

Mac OS X has a ton of great features, but there’s always room for improvement. Many developers have felt the same and created a bunch of great apps to enhance OS X’s capabilities. Here are our top 10 apps that can power up your Mac to the next level.

A brief history of (what you think is) Presidents’ Day

Written by


TIME:

To set the record straight, today isn’t actually Presidents’ Day. It is still known as Washington’s Birthday, according to the federal government and section 6103(a) of title 5 of the U.S. Code.

20 beautiful private and personal libraries

Written by


Flavorwire:

We’ve taken a look at gorgeous bookstores and amazing college libraries, so we thought it was time to bring you a little inspiration for the home library — though we admit, not too many of these designs would fit in our own NYC apartments. Click through to check out our collection of beautiful private and personal libraries from all over the world

It’s hard to believe some of these beautiful libraries are found in someone’s home. Then again, some of these homes are probably as big as your high school.

What’s the difference between Single Malt and Blended Scotch?

Written by


Serious Eats:

Consumers and even some bartenders have a misconception that single-malt Scotch is not a blended whisky, but this is a myth. Single-malt scotch is a blend, but it’s a very specific type of blend. In fact, nearly all whiskies on the market today are blends—bourbons, ryes, Tennessees, scotches, etc.—although in this article I’ll focus on Scotch.

This article and its follow up, “The Serious Eats Guide to Single Malt Scotch”, are well written and really interesting examinations and explanations of what Scotch is. It’s an acquired taste but once you acquire it, you’ll enjoy it!

Nightline goes inside Apple China factories

Written by

ABC News:

Apple has given “Nightline” anchor Bill Weir exclusive access to their suppliers’ factories in China, amid reports of safety problems, hazardous conditions and underage workers. Weir is the first journalist go inside the factories to see these life changing gadgets get made. He traveled to Shenzhen China to see firsthand what life is like for factory workers, most of whom have never used an iPod, iPhone or Apple computer.

Weir’s report airs on a special edition of “Nightline” Tuesday, February 21 at 11:35 p.m. ET on the ABC television network.

The world’s most bizarre beers

Written by


Cool Material:

We’ll try any beer we can get our greedy hands on. If a friend says he just picked up a sixer of something crazy, we’d expect some craft brew that’s hopped out of its mind or an imported stout that tastes like biting into chocolate cake, and we’d gladly partake.

We’re all big fans of beer here but most of these brews would make us think twice about reaching for the bottle opener.

White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army” performed on things found in a laboratory

Written by

BoingBoing:

The Blast Lab at Imperial College, London, is a place where scientists study how explosions affect the human skeleton, and try to find ways to mitigate some of those effects. As you can imagine, this involves blowing stuff up fairly regularly and The Blast Lab is a pretty loud place.

But the team of students behind PLoS’ Inside Knowledge blog noticed something cool about that. The sounds in The Blast Lab weren’t just loud noises, they were loud notes. Edit them together, and you could reproduce a whole song, using nothing but sounds recorded in a working scientific laboratory.

Apple posts guide to “Start Developing iOS Apps”

Written by


The Next Web:

If there is one aspect of Apple’s iDevice ecosystem that deserves a ton of credit for both growing and cementing its user base, it has to be the way developers flock to it. Apple wants developers on that line, Apple needs developers on that line.

That’s why it’s not surprising, but still pleasant, to see Apple making an effort to onboard new developers with a beautiful and simple new introductory document called “Start Developing iOS Apps Today“.

Proview to Apple: You owe us $2 billion

Written by

AllThingsD:

Proview, the foundering Chinese company battling with Apple over the iPad trademark, originally wanted millions of dollars for the rights to the mark in China. Now it wants billions.

As for allegations that Proview is breaching its iPad trademark deal to squeeze Apple for more money, Proview CEO Yang Rongshan says that’s not the case at all. “We own the iPad trademark in China,” Yang said. “If you were in my position … you would try to protect your rights.”

Apple, however, argues that it’s not Proview’s rights that need to be protected.

Mac OS X 10.8 requirements omit more Intel Macs

Written by

CNET’s MacFixIt:

If you’ve taken a look at Apple’s sneak peek of its upcoming revision to OS X, you might wonder if your system will be able to run the operating system. In recent versions of OS X, some requirements have resulted in older hardware no longer working properly, including the drop of PowerPC support in Snow Leopard, and Lion not installing on some of the earliest Intel-based Mac systems.

Unfortunately Apple has not yet officially released the system requirements for the new OS, but the developer release that is being issued to members of its Mac development community does contain a list of supported devices.

“I was a Mac user when Apple was doomed.” t-shirt

Written by


Diesel Sweeties:

You remember the dark times. Back when having to learn 90s Linux or Windows 95 was a very scary possibility. When it was possible to sit in a Starbucks for twenty whole minutes and not see an Apple logo. If you told me Apple would get this huge back in the beleaguered era, I’d ask if you were a time traveler from an alternate future.

Image is about nine inches wide and professionally silk screened in white ink on 100% cotton black shirts.

You know you want one.

Feds propose ban on in-car dialing, texting, surfing

Written by

PC Mag:

The Department of Transportation has proposed guidelines that would block all in-vehicle communications by a driver, including texting, dialing, Internet browsing, and even entering a GPS address by hand.

The regulations, if imposed and enforced, could dramatically alter the future of connected vehicles within the United States, as well as how U.S. drivers use devices like GPS navigation systems and cell phones.

As a motorcyclist, I’m all for anything that forces drivers to focus and pay attention to actually driving and eliminating as many distractions as possible.

“Insanely Simple” is a new insider book about Jobs and Apple

Written by


The Next Web:

Ken Segall served as Apple’s agency creative director under Steve Jobs from the NeXT years on through, including some years under John Sculley’s disastrous reign. Now he’s written a book, called Insanely Simple: The Obsession That Drives Apple’s Success.

If you’re unfamiliar with Segall, he runs an excellent personal blog Observatory, the parody site Scoopertino and was the guy who came up with the name iMac. He was also involved in the seminal Think Different ad campaign. So yeah, he knows a few things about Apple and the way that Steve Jobs worked.

“Insanely Simple” will be available April 26th and you can pre-order at iBooks, Amazon, Barnes & Noble and others.

About Gatekeeper

Written by

Panic Software:

As Mac users, we’ve mostly enjoyed a life free of the worry that has followed Windows users for years. Mac OS X is pretty damn secure. But it could be more secure. As Macs enjoy increased popularity, they become a more attractive target to identity thieves and other criminals. Sooner or later, bad people ruin every nice thing. It’s an immutable law of humanity.

So, what to do about this? Code-signing, although it can’t single-handedly fix the problem forever, is a vital weapon in the fight against malware. But many folks are unclear on how it works, or how it helps. Let me try to explain in as close to plain English as I can.

You can read and get more details on Gatekeeper from security expert Rich Mogull on TidBITS and Securosis.

Horizontal Shower

Written by


Dornbracht:

At Swissbau 2012, kitchen and bathroom fittings manufacturer Dornbracht presented an expansion of the groundbreaking shower technology Ambiance Tuning Technique with the addition of a new application: the Horizontal Shower.

With the Horizontal Shower, showering with the Ambiance Tuning Technique can be enjoyed lying down.

Wait, what? How lazy do you need to be that you have to shower lying down? It does look kind of cool though.

Objects come to life with photographer’s “Bent” sense of humor

Written by


Wired’s Raw File:

With some well-placed wire, creative lighting and a provocative sense of visual puns, sculptor and photographer Terry Border has given life to everything from peanuts to pill bottles. His cleverly cartoonish scenes are often viral hits on the internet and they’ve brought his blog, Bent Objects, a global audience.

“I don’t mean for everything to be funny,” says Border, who lives in Indianapolis. “We all have different perspectives and my perspective happens to be kind of strange and twisted.”

“Strange and twisted” in a hilarious way. Be sure to read the article to get the link to his more NSFW stuff, “Really Bent”.

Adobe shows off Photoshop CS6′s content-aware move

Written by


Photoshop Content Aware Sneak Peak:

Adobe is previewing CS6 features prior to release. In a video posted to its YouTube channel, Adobe demonstrated an update to the CS5 content-aware fill tool but the cool comes with “content-aware move”. It adds the ability to move any piece of a photo with little disturbance to the pixels around it and replaces the background in a very natural way.