Facebook’s $100 billion IPO

Written by

WSJ: The social networking firm is now targeting a time frame of April to June 2012 for an initial public offering, said people familiar with the matter. The company is exploring raising $10 billion in its IPO—what would be one … Continued

iPhone 4S dominates sales in the UK

Written by

The release of iPhone 4S was enough to propel Apple into the smartphone sales lead in the UK for October. According to data from market research company Kantar, Apple’s iPhone sales accounted for 42.8 percent of sales during October. Apple’s … Continued

∞ Copycats

Written by

Matt Gemmell: There’s an entire spectrum of terms available besides ‘copied’, ranging from “inspired by” to “plagiarised”, and it’s not necessarily a bad thing to be influenced by the work of others. The key is to ensure that you’re consciously … Continued

∞ Elvis Costello: Steal this record

Written by

Elvis Costello on the pricing of his new box set: Unfortunately, we at www.elviscostello.com find ourselves unable to recommend this lovely item to you as the price appears to be either a misprint or a satire. All our attempts to … Continued

∞ Fantastical [Sponsor]

Written by

Fantastical is the Mac calendar you’ll actually enjoy. Create events with simple sentences like “Go to lunch with John on Tuesday” or “Summer vacation 6/9-6/16.” Easily locate and search for your events with Fantastical’s beautiful and easy to navigate calendar. … Continued

∞ My Living Desktop

Written by

I’d like to thank My Living Desktop for sponsoring this week’s RSS feed on The Loop.

Time to bring your desktop to life. Since 2005 My Living Desktop has been bringing a unique cross between a Video Desktop (moving wallpaper) and a traditional screensaver to your Macintosh. My Living Desktop adds a whole new dimension to your computing experience by turning your Mac’s desktop into a beautiful, moving environment… complete with soothing sounds.

My Living Desktop provides a wide array of stunning, relaxing high definition video scenes shot from all over the world that you can use on your desktop and as a screensaver. You can even import your own movie segments to create a truly personal and unique desktop environment.

∞ Returning the Jawbone UP

Written by

Michael Surtees: Ultimately I really liked the concept of collecting information without having to do much at the time of it being on. Up hasn’t gone far enough with creating options for the person using the device to start slicing … Continued

∞ TellMe vs. Siri

Written by

Remember when Microsoft said they’ve had Siri technology for more than a year? I wonder if they actually tried it.

∞ RIM offers free PlayBooks

Written by

If you’re an IT manager considering whether to update your organization to BlackBerry Enterprise Server v5.0, you may want to act now. If you upgrade to BlackBerry Enterprise Server v5.0 before December 31st, 2011, you’ll receive a free BlackBerry PlayBook tablet

Because $300 off just wasn’t enough.

∞ AT&T withdraws FCC application for T-Mobile merger

Written by

BGR: AT&T said Thursday that it has withdrawn its application from the Federal Communications Commission to acquire T-Mobile USA. AT&T and Deutsche Telekom said they will instead focus on fighting an antitrust lawsuit brought against the proposed $39 billion merger … Continued

∞ The problem with Stamped

Written by

The problem with Stamped is that it correlates popularity of your stamps to quality. It makes the assumption that because you like something – and use up one of your “limited stamps” to demonstrate this as a showing of quality – that others will be inclined to agree or incited to try out whatever you stamped. I don’t think that could be further from the truth.

I agree.

∞ Five ingredients for a great WordPress theme

Written by

Aravind Ajith:

In order to save some time the next time you go hunting for WordPress themes be sure to note these five essential ingredients that make up a great WordPress theme – for any type of website.

The Loop uses WordPress, but we used a custom designed theme.

∞ More on readable news sites

Written by

Rian van der Merwe: I’m worried that the wells of attention are being drilled to depletion by linkbait headlines, ad-infested pages, “jumps” and random pagination, and content that is engineered to be “consumed” in 1 minute or less of quick … Continued

∞ Reading the unreadable on a news site

Written by

Brent Simmons on trying to read a news story: I was there because I just wanted to read something. Words. Black text on a white background, more-or-less. And what I saw — at a professional publication, a site with the … Continued

∞ Pictures, video from Apple's Grand Central store

Written by

The Loop reader Mike DeFrancesco took a couple of pictures and iPhone video from Apple’s Grand Central store earlier today. Rumors had the story opening sometime this week, but that seems unlikely at this point.

∞ No promo codes for iBookstore

Written by

Steven Sande for TUAW: iBooks publishers looking to send ebooks to reviewers, or who want to stir up interest in a new title through a giveaway contest, are out of luck. Unlike the App Store, publishers cannot create promo codes … Continued

∞ 80% of people will skip stores on Black Friday

Written by

Nielsen:

Recent weekly Nielsen surveys of shoppers show that, much like in 2010, the majority of consumers (80%) are avoiding in-store Black Friday shopping. While increased Black Friday promotions appeal to consumer’s desire for “hot deals,” as a shopping event, Black Friday is becoming less relevant in the retail world as online shopping grows and holiday promotions begin earlier and earlier in the year. In fact, 35 percent of those recently survey cited they’ve already started their holiday shopping.

∞ 30 sleek fonts

Written by

One of the most essential elements in a minimalist design is typography. Let’s face it, you can’t do justice to minimalism with pre-installed fonts like Arial, Century Gothic, Georgia, Verdana, Times New Roman, and etc. But frown no more! Here are 30 sleek fonts you can download for free that could fit perfectly on your minimalist designs.

I like Satellite.

∞ Capo 1.2 for iOS

Written by

Capo helps you learn to play the music in your iPod library. The new version adds mono re-mixing, equalizer, and vocal reduction effects.

I love this app.

∞ Letters to Steve: Inside the E-mail Inbox of Apple's Steve Jobs

Written by

Mark Milian, a technology writer for CNN, has reviewed more than a hundred of these e-mails, compiled from those posted by fans to blogs and online message boards. Some never-before-published e-mails from Jobs were shared exclusively for this book. As a whole, these correspondences provide a behind-the-scenes and inside-the-mind account of Jobs’ final and most triumphant years.

This is a Kindle Edition book.

∞ Adobe responds to Creative Suite pricing criticism

Written by

Following criticism of its pricing for future versions of Creative Suite, Adobe responded on Monday with a statement sent to The Loop. “Our aggressive subscription price for Adobe Creative Cloud – $49 per month for every Adobe Creative Suite application, … Continued