Yearly Archives: 2012

Bullshit

Written by

Nathan Brookwood:

Android and iOS tablets do a yeoman’s job when it comes to consuming content, but lack the software tools and hardware features needed to create content. Windows-based tablets, which have been around since 2002, have always included the features needed for content creation, but lacked the easy to use interfaces needed for content consumption. The Metro User Interface in Windows 8 supplies these missing elements, and thus positions Win 8-based tablets as the only ones suitable for those who want to both create and consume content on a single device.

Bullshit.

Apple’s Flashback lesson

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Because it’s Apple, I think a lot of security companies tried to make the most of it, but users and Apple certainly have to be more aware in the future. This day has been coming for many, many years.

DropKey makes file encryption easy on the Mac

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Public-Key Cryptography, created in the 1970s, is a matched-pair encryption/decryption standard. Using this method, the sender and recipient share public encryption keys, thereby establishing a relationship of trust. After that occurs, files can be encrypted by one and decrypted by the other without using passwords. While Public-Key Cryptography can use a variety of levels of security, DropKey uses the 256-bit method, a well-established industry standard.

I talked to DropKey’s CEO Ian Schray, and what impresses me about the app is that it only takes one extra click to encrypt a file and send it in an email, then it does if you didn’t encrypt the file. I’ve tried file encryption software in the past and it was a real pain, but this looks really good.

Dolly Drive bills itself as Time Machine in the cloud

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Time Machine in the cloud and so much more. Extra space, file sharing, & all-in-one backup for people who love their Mac.

This looks really cool. Syncing, backup, cloning capabilities for a few dollars a month. It’ll be interesting to see how this does.

The most ridiculous slow motion footage ever

Written by

The Next Web:

This video is from the Danish TV show Dumt & Farligt. It takes a Phantom Flex, a camera that can run anywhere from $50k-$150k, and applies it to some of the silliest and most awesome 2500 Frames-per-second slow-motion footage I’ve seen.

Talk about “fun with explosives and a high speed camera”!

Apple wants a trial on e-Book pricing allegations

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Apple Inc wants to go to trial to defend itself against U.S. government allegations that it conspired with publishers to raise prices of electronic books, a lawyer for the Silicon Valley giant said in court on Wednesday.

Apple Stores have 17 times better performance than the average retailer

Written by

Asymco:

RetailSails compiled a table of the top 20 chains by sales per square foot. Annual store sales in the range of $300 per square foot is considered respectable in the US. The US national average for regional malls is $341. The average for specialty apparel retailers is $400 per square foot. The average for jewelers is in the range of $600 per square foot. The median for the best 20 US retailers is $787/sq. ft.The data shows Apple leading by a significant margin. It’s more than twice as efficient as the second place Tiffany and Co. It’s also more than seven times the median of the top 20 and seventeen times better than the average mall retail space.

By any measure, the Apple Retail Stores are a remarkable success story.

Fotopedia offers National Parks iOS app for free

Written by

TUAW:

Since it’s almost National Parks Week in the US(April 21-29), we’re seeing some iOS apps offered for free that normally have a cost to them. I’ve already mentioned the Chimani series of National Parks guides, and now I want to call your attention to Fotopedia National Parks, a universal iOS app that contains almost 3000 superb images taken by renowned photographer Quang-Tuan Luong.This app is not a detailed guide to the National Parks, but rather the equivalent of a coffee table book filled with dazzling photographs.

This app is two of my favorite things – free and about National Parks.

The lost Steve Jobs tapes

Written by

Fast Company:

If Steve Jobs’s life were staged as an opera, it would be a tragedy in three acts. And the titles would go something like this: Act I–The Founding of Apple Computer and the Invention of the PC Industry; Act II–The Wilderness Years; and Act III–A Triumphant Return and Tragic Demise.Rummaging through the storage shed, I discovered some three dozen tapes holding recordings of extended interviews–some lasting as long as three hours–that I’d conducted with him periodically over the past 25 years. (Snippets are scattered throughout this story.) Many I had never replayed–a couple hadn’t even been transcribed before now.

Austrian village to vote on name change

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The Telegraph:

The 104 residents of the village will cast their votes later this week on whether to alter the name.“People are now willing to discuss changes to the spelling of the name,” Franz Meindl, the village’s mayor, said in a television interview. “But first all Fuckingers have to agree on whether want to change it or not.” For centuries the tiny village in northern Austria lived life in happy obscurity, but life changed when US troops, stationed in the area at the end of the Second World War, discovered it, and since then the village’s name has been a constant source of amusement for tourists and irritation for locals.At least 13 £250 road signs bearing the village’s name have been stolen, and the sight of semi-naked women posing for photographs beside signs has become a common sight.

Brings to mind the “interestingly” named Canadian town of Dildo.

Blogsy for iPad adds Tumblr, Vimeo support

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I’ve been using this app for a little while now and the changes in this version make it even more useful. Support for featured images and custom fields are especially nice for me.

Apple vs Greenpeace

Written by

Josh Ong for AppleInsider:

In the report, the organization dismissed Apple’s renewable energy efforts for its Maiden, N.C., server farm as providing just 10 percent of “their total generation.”The Cupertino, Calif., company quickly responded in a statement, according to NPR.“Our data center in North Carolina will draw about 20 megawatts at full capacity, and we are on track to supply more than 60 percent of that power on-site from renewable sources including a solar farm and fuel cell installation which will each be the largest of their kind in the country,” said spokeswoman Kristin Huguet. “We believe this industry-leading project will make Maiden the greenest data center ever built, and it will be joined next year by our new facility in Oregon running on 100 percent renewable energy.”

And then Greenpeace responded. I’d like to see Greenpeace actually do something about the companies that are making no or little effort at all.

Apple, Samsung CEOs to discuss patent lawsuits

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Reuters:

Apple Inc and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd agreed that their chief executives would participate in settlement talks to try to resolve a patent lawsuit over smartphone and tablet technology, according to a court filing.

11 “modern antiques” today’s kids have probably never seen

Written by

Mental Floss:

Even though I’m fairly ancient, I’ve never seen a Model T outside of a classic auto show. So I realize that there are many things that have been obsolete since the elastic waistband was invented and would confound anyone under age 70. But what about some common items that have come and gone within the last 30 or so years? See how many of these you recognize, and how many of them would puzzle your kids or grandkids.

Interestingly, while I have heard about all of them, five of them I’ve never actually seen in real life (#2, 4, 6, 8, 10). How about you? And which ones would your kids not be able to recognize?

The “Coca-Cola Hug Machine” takes hugs instead of money

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NY Daily News:

This vending machine cares more about love than money.A new Coca-Cola machine at the National University of Singapore dispenses free beverages in exchange for hugs. The red-and-white machine has the word “Hug Me” written across the front in Coke’s signature font.The machine is programmed to dispense a Coke when a person wraps their arm around it.

The video accompanying the story is very sweet but it’s hard not to be cynical and think there’s no way this campaign would work in the US.

Crazy expensive audio gear from The New York Audio & AV Show

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[caption id="attachment_22903" align="alignnone" width="470" caption="This is what a $28,000 turntable looks like"][/caption] Cool Material:

Every year, unbeknownst to most of the public, the most outrageous and amazing pieces of audio equipment are tossed (see: very carefully placed) into one hotel for The New York Audio & AV Show.This is not the kinda stuff you get at Best Buy or hook up to the turntable you bought from Urban Outfitters. This is the stuff for the hardcore audio fan who happens to have deep pockets.

“Deep pockets” and maybe a pathological need to spend insane amounts of money on audio gear. Some of it is really cool looking though.