Yearly Archives: 2015

All I had to do to turn my phone into a stealth Google Photos uploader was to turn on the backup sync, then uninstall the app. Whereas one might reasonably believe uninstalling the app from the phone would stop photos from uploading automatically to Google Photos, the device still does it even in the app’s absence. Since making this discovery, I have re-created the issue multiple times in multiple settings on my Galaxy S5.

So, you delete Google Photos and it continues to upload your photos without your consent. Perfect.

Thanks to Hullo for sponsoring The Loop this week. Have you ever slept on a buckwheat pillow? It’s kind of like a beanbag for your head. The hull fill supports your head and neck in a way that can’t be matched by traditional pillows.

Hullo’s features include:

• Quality construction & organic materials
• Breathable fill that provides cool comfort all night long. No more flipping to the cool side in the middle of the night!
• American-made craftsmanship
• Free shipping
• 60-night money-back guarantee

Drop what you’re doing—go and check out Hullo. Try it for 60 nights. If it’s not your favorite pillow, return it for a refund. You can’t lose!

Have you heard about HTC lately? 2015 is shaping up to be an awful year for the company. In March the company had a market cap of $4.06 billion, and today—only a few months later—it’s worth less than half of that. The stock price, at about two bucks a share, is at a 10-year low. HTC just wrapped up the second quarter of 2015, where it posted a net loss of $258 million. And the trend is downwards—year over year, HTC’s monthly revenue was down 38% in April, 48% in May, and 60% in June.

I feel bad for HTC. They have tried to make some good products, but Samsung’s tactics have pushed them down.

Some good advice here from Apple, especially heading into summer for much of the world.

Due as a part of El Capitan this fall, and available right now as a public beta is the first major update to Photos for Mac, the replacement for iPhoto and Aperture that Apple launched earlier this year.

Here are the major additions you can expect to see in Photos when 1.1 arrives this fall (or when you install the public beta, depending on your enthusiasm):

I always enjoy reading Jason’s look at software.

Editor’s Note: This story was written by Dan Sokol about his experience with Comcast.

Some Background…

Comcast is my ISP. Like most of us in the US we have no real choice if we want fast internet in our homes.

iMore mentioned that some people that signed up for the iOS 9 beta have been notified that it’s available to download. Mac Rumors says that OS X El Capitan will also be available to day. You can sign-up on Apple’s site to test both versions.

The new version for the Mac is here. I haven’t tried the Mac version, but I’m really impressed with what they’ve done with the iOS version of the apps.

Bad ads on the Internet are a real problem, even on some of our favorite sites. Rene Ritchie has been very open about addressing this issue with iMore, and I commend him for that.

A great compressor plug-in from Universal Audio. I always like watching the videos they publish for little tips and tricks on how to use them.

Clearly this isn’t going to be for everyone, but if you love your Les Paul, you may want to have a look at these.

Dan and Jim talk about Apple Music, changing tastes in music, and the future of radio.

Brought to you by lynda (Visit the link to get free 10 day trial access to their 3,000+ courses).

There are some nice looking guitars here.

Techcrunch:

Many companies have best practices and the Hacking Team, the “computer security experts” who sold hacking tools to various federal and state agencies around the world, are no exception. Their database of information includes a number of interesting hacking tips, including mention of a 0-day, unpatched hole in Adobe Flash that the company is currently closing.

It’s long past time that Adobe should do the right thing and stop developing Flash and web site creators should stop using it.

Black Sabbath with Ronnie James Dio. This is legendary.

The Sweet Setup:

In the read-it-later space, the two dominant players have long been Instapaper and Pocket. Each app has its own strengths and weaknesses, and Pocket has some features that could make it the ideal app for some use cases, but Instapaper is our favorite app for actually reading the best writing on the web … later.

I was an original user of Instapaper but switched to Pocket (when it was still named Read It Later). After reading this article, I’m going to at least give Instapaper another shot.

The linked images are graphic and really give a sense of the risks of riding a bike at high speed as part of a tightly packed group of competitors.