The king of Twitter

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ReCode:

John Shahidi is the king of Twitter.

Teenagers beg him for retweets, and he appears in Vine videos where friends Justin Bieber and boxer Floyd Mayweather spar in the ring. Everything that Shahidi tweets — and we mean practically everything — is retweeted and favorited thousands of times. If Shahidi mentions you in a tweet, you’ll spend the next two weeks slogging through dozens of notifications every time you open the app.

Independence Day

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Great piece on Microsoft’s new pilot program that combines surround audio and iBeacons to help people with sight loss navigate their world.

Chappie trailer

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[VIDEO] Ever see District 9? If not, I’d urge you to go find it. Absolutely brilliant movie.

District 9 director Neill Blomkamp and lead actor Sharlto Copley are teaming up again in the upcoming Chappie. Watch the trailer below. Dev Patel (big fan), Hugh Jackman, Sigourney Weaver too. Can’t wait for this one.

Apple replaces Samsung as top mobile brand in China

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CNET:

Samsung was replaced by the iPhone maker as No. 1 in China’s mobile sector this year, according to the China Brand Research Center’s 2014 China Brand Power Index ranking report released Tuesday.

CD-loving Japan resists move to online music

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New York Times:

Japan may be one of the world’s perennial early adopters of new technologies, but its continuing attachment to the CD puts it sharply at odds with the rest of the global music industry. While CD sales are falling worldwide, including in Japan, they still account for about 85 percent of sales here, compared with as little as 20 percent in some countries, like Sweden, where online streaming is dominant.

Buy a Disney movie in iTunes, watch it on Android device, and vice versa

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Back in February, Disney launched its Disney Movies Anywhere (DMA) service on iOS. In effect, Disney movies you buy via iTunes are available in your DMA locker for you to stream on your iOS devices. Now, Android has joined the fray, meaning you can watch all those iOS-purchased Disney movies on your Android device and, if you buy movies on an Android device, you can watch them on your iOS device.

Dave Grohl’s incredible gift to music lovers

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Music that touches you at a deep level is a rare delight. Same with a book, a movie, a piece of art or anything that is the result of the creative process. Today I had the good fortune to stumble upon something that did this on several levels.

Sonic Highways is a documentary series on HBO, put together by Dave Grohl and Foo Fighters. The series is an incredible journey, taking you on a deep musical exploration of eight cities, building a song in each city based on the musical foundation found in that city.

The true origins of MCX and CurrentC

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This article appeared back in January 2013, long before CVS and Rite Aid pulled the plug on Apple Pay, and long before Apple Pay was even announced. There’s a lot of detail here that answers many of the current questions about CurrentC and MCX.

Feathers, bowling balls, dropping in the world’s biggest vacuum chamber

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[VIDEO] Aristotle taught that heavy objects fall faster than lighter ones, in direct proportion to weight. It wasn’t until Galileo’s time that the concept of air resistance entered the zeitgeist.

The video embedded below is shot in the world’s biggest vacuum chamber, NASA’s Space Power Facility in Ohio. The money shot starts at about 2:50, but the whole thing is worth watching.

Learn to sing, train your voice

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Have you ever wanted to train your voice, learn to sing in pitch, develop a better ear? The SingTrue app uses a wide range of pitch recognition exercises to develop your sense of pitch.

Honda’s dark side

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I wish I could embed this video, but since I can’t, follow the link to check out Honda’s incredibly clever new marketing campaign video. To me, it’s not at all about the product (the supercharged Honda Civic Type R) or the plot of the video, but about the delivery mechanism.

CurrentC and antitrust implications

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There’s been a lot of discussion about the legal implications of the recent move by CVS and Rite Aid to drop support for Apple Pay. A little more light is shining on this issue.

Apple has a huge TV opportunity thanks to proposed FCC rule change

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Earlier this week, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler proposed a far reaching rule change (detailed in this blog post) that would level the playing field and give non-traditional video suppliers access to programming that is currently only available to cable and satellite providers. This would open up a huge opportunity for Apple.

A tale of three companies

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The quarterly mobile sales numbers from IDC are out and here’s what they say about the top three mobile phone companies.

Tim Cook speaks up

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Tim Cook posted an essay in Bloomberg Businessweek this morning saying, in a nutshell, that he’s proud to be gay and felt it was important to make this public statement.