Yearly Archives: 2012

70 years – at the same job

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Cockpit Chronicles:

Al “Blacky” Blackman has reached a milestone few can claim. He has worked for 70 years as a mechanic for American Airlines based in New York, starting when he was only 17 years old.Surprisingly, he has no plans to retire. “I don’t consider this work. It’s being able to do what you like and getting paid for it.”

Al celebrated his milestone in a way suitable to his amazing employment longevity – with a flight around New York City in an original American Airlines DC-3, the oldest DC-3 still flying.

Flock brings friend’s iPhone photos together in one album

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Flock finds the photos you take together with friends and family and magically brings all the photos from each person’s phone together into a single shared album.No more nagging friends to email or post their photos after a night out. No more missing out on that great shot that someone else took. No more taking the same group photo on multiple phones.

Downloaded. This looks really cool.

Subscribe to feed Safari Extension

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Daniel Jalkut:

My beta-quality, more-or-less unsupported Subscribe to Feed extension adds a handy button to the toolbar that, when a page offers RSS or Atom feeds, can be clicked to easily open the feed:// link, which should automatically open your favorite news reader.

Mac App Store relevance

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Marco Arment:

But now, I’ve lost all confidence that the apps I buy in the App Store today will still be there next month or next year. The advantages of buying from the App Store are mostly gone now. My confidence in the App Store, as a customer, has evaporated.

Marco brings up many good points in his article. I’ll admit, I’m not at the same point of frustration that he is, but I can see where he’s going with the argument. I’ve talk to a number of developers that removed their apps from the Mac App Store and none of them wanted to do it, but they felt it was their only choice.

The vast majority of people will go where the apps are and where it’s most convenient for them. Currently, that’s the Mac App Store. However, if Apple forces developers to leave that could change quickly.

Google Fiber

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Google Fiber is 100 times faster than today’s average broadband. No more buffering. No more loading. No more waiting. Gigabit speeds will get rid of these pesky, archaic problems and open up new opportunities for the web. Imagine: instantaneous sharing; truly global education; medical appointments with 3D imaging; even new industries that we haven’t even dreamed of, powered by a gig.

Hackers are loving Android

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Hacking experts have demonstrated ways to attack Android smartphones using methods they said work on virtually all such devices in use today, despite recent efforts by search engine giant Google to boost protection.

Open wins.

Nintendo reports $132 million loss

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Wii sales have dropped significantly, and gamers are now awaiting the launch of the Japanese company’s Wii U game console, which is expected to arrive later this year. The results show the peril of long transitions from one product generation to the next.

Brutal.

Zynga insiders who cashed out

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In April, Zynga conducted a “secondary stock offering” in which insiders dumped 43 million shares of stock at $12 a share, raking in about $516 million.Yesterday, four months later, Zynga reported a horrible quarter, and the stock plunged to $3.

Ouch.

iPhone-based automated, connected homes

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Neil Hughes, AppleInsider: A new, extensive patent application details how a new iPhone model with a near-field communications chip could serve as the connected centerpiece of an automated digitally connected home. I don’t normally mention patents because they are just … Continued

iCloud account sharing

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Sam Radford makes a case for Apple to allow some type of sharing between iCloud accounts.

Dream Theater’s Jordan Rudess releases new iOS music app

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Most instruments only allow you to play one sound at a time, but with Tachyon, you can seamlessly blend between any two sounds as you slide your fingers up and down the screen.

Jordan is not only a friend, but also one of the most talented musicians I’ve ever had the pleasure to know. It is really amazing to watch him sit down with an instrument, whether that’s a keyboard or an iPad, and play.

Understand Steve Jobs’ ‘One More Thing’

Written by

Michael Lopp:

The best stories, the ones we love, have a surprise ending. Since Steve returned to Apple, an essential part of the keynote was the anticipation of the unexpected, and that means aggressive and invasive secrecy. Not because they don’t want you to know, but because they want to tell you a great story.

Another great piece from Michael.

The reason for the iPad Mini

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Ryan Jones makes a great argument (one I’ve also used) and even better charts to illustrate his point.

Apple updates Podcasts app for iOS

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According to Apple the following changes have been made to its Podcasts app:

  • Significant improvements to performance and stability
  • Podcasts in your library now show the number of unplayed episodes
  • Top Stations now show the podcast title if artwork is missing
  • Playback speed is now remembered when playing the next episode
  • Fix for a problem where the Subscribe button is inactive
  • Resolution of an issue where Top Stations artwork may not appear

Google warned Samsung not to copy Apple

Written by

John Paczkowski:

In February 2010, Google told Samsung that Samsung’s “P1” and “P3” tablets (Galaxy Tab and Galaxy Tab 10.1) were “too similar” to the iPad and demanded “distinguishable design vis-à-vis the iPad for the P3.”

Oopsie.

Pro Tools and Mountain Lion

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Avid have posted a knowledge base article on Pro Tools compatibility with Apple’s OS X Mountain Lion. While the article talks about Gatekeeper, it doesn’t say that Pro Tools will not work with the new operating system.

I’ll be installing Pro Tools on Retina MacBook this weekend to see how it works.

Apple TV outsells Xbox

Written by

Todd Bishop:

Apple sold 1.3 million Apple TV devices during the June quarter, an increase of 170 percent over the same quarter a year ago.That still qualifies as a “hobby,” according to Apple CEO Tim Cook, who disclosed the number in response to an analyst’s question on the company’s earnings conference call. But here’s an interesting data point: Microsoft sold 1.1 million Xbox 360s worldwide during the same time period.

Doesn’t mean anything, but still interesting.

The rise and fall of 38 Studios

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The rise and fall of video game maker 38 Studios has been extensively documented in an in-depth piece published by Boston magazine.