Uncategorized

The Winklevoss twins — Tyler and Cameron — have bought tickets on Virgin Galactic using bitcoins, according to a blog on the Winkelvoss Capital website.

Or, to put it another way: Rich twins buy tickets on unproven spaceship using suspect virtual currency.

This has to be the cruelest product ever invented.

A behind the scenes look at Slash recording his new album.

If you’re talking tech with Americans, you may want to avoid using any jargon.

Sweet baby Jesus, this is scary and hilarious.

I missed this the other day, but it’s worth a look.

Interesting to see Media Temple get into this segment of the business. It makes a lot of sense, especially considering how popular WordPress is these days. I started The Loop on Media Temple and it was an absolute disaster, but I’ll keep an eye on this service. Shawn Blanc has some thoughts on the new service too.

I like this better than Google’s offering because it has an onscreen interface. While it doesn’t rely on a smartphone to control the device, it is an option, in addition to the included remote.

An interesting experiment, but apparently it didn’t work.

Good review by Bojan Djordjevic.

Lisa Fleisher for WSJ:

Speaking at the Saïd Business School in Oxford, U.K., Steve Ballmer, who stepped down from Microsoft one month ago, admitted that he would re-do the last ten years if he could.

“We would have a stronger position in the phone market today if I could re-do the last 10 years,” he said. The answer, he said, is to pick up and try to catch the next wave.

It’s good that he admitted something we all knew for a while now.

This is pretty amazing.

A new feature of Eddie’s revamped Web site: Ask Eddie.

And rather than looking like a knockoff of Apple’s MacBook Air done in plastic, as the existing Chromebook does, it’s got a gray case done up in a stitched, leather-like material, a look also seen in other Samsung devices such as the Galaxy Note 3.

Fake leather? Really?

If you are wondering about iOS security, you should read this article by Rich Mogull.

Like millions of other people around the world, I cheered Tim Cook’s comments in response to a question from the National Center for Public Policy Research (NCPPR) at last Friday’s Apple shareholder meeting. The organization asked Cook to commit to only those things that were profitable—Cook refused, saying that Apple made decisions for a variety of reasons.

The strategy today is simple: In order to move fast, build what you can’t buy or risk losing control of your fate and becoming the next Palm, Motorola, or HTC. And if, in the process, you disrupt an Oracle or a Qualcomm? So be it.

This is really interesting. I had no idea Facebook built its own servers, but it makes a lot of sense—if the incumbents can’t do it, build it yourself.

What do you get when you take some of the best Apple dev authors, trainers, and speakers and combine them with the most passionate, engaged developers in a region? You get a learning and networking experience that will not soon be forgotten! You get CocoaConf!

CocoaConf is back this Spring and better than ever! We’ll be bringing the newest and best iOS and Mac developer technology training to five U.S. cities over the next few months:

Since readers of The Loop are just the kind of attendees we’re looking for, we’re offering you a special discount. Register for any CocoaConf event and use the promotional code LOOP to save 20% on your ticket!

Don’t miss out on this exciting opportunity—tickets are going fast!

Note: This article first appeared in The Loop Magazine Issue 17. 867-5309. 911. And… that’s about it. Those two seemingly random strings of digits just so happen to be phone numbers. One is the emergency line for U.S. citizens, established … Continued

Missed the Oscars last night? Tivo on the fritz? Didn’t care enough to watch live? Well, here’s the TL;DR version of last night’s show.

Interesting when you break it all down.

From Volvo integration of CarPlay announced this morning.

Apple on Monday introduced CarPlay, a new way to use the iPhone in your car. CarPlay allows the user to access Maps, Messages, Music, and make phone calls with a touch of the screen in your car. You can even press the voice button in your car to activate Siri. […]

The Guardian:

It sounds like the stuff of science fiction: seven keys, held by individuals from all over the world, that together control security at the core of the web. The reality is rather closer to The Office than The Matrix.

What a bizarre, convoluted system. But it seems to work.

Big hat tip to Nick Arnott for this terrific Reddit resource. Nick suggests the “Collapse all comments & just show parents” bookmarklet to hide the answers from the Reddit riddle page, posted earlier today.

Biblical delivers crushing riffs drenched in cinematic atmosphere.

Yeah, that caught my attention for sure. I previewed to the first couple of singles on iTunes and then pre-ordered the album.

Dave Etchells:

Try to imagine this scenario occurring in the US, or perhaps most any country other than Japan: You leave a camera bag with US$7,000+ of gear in it sitting in a train station. Station personnel may find it that night, or it more likely sits there till morning. The rail line people go looking for it, find it, & forward it to a more convenient location for you to pick it up the next day. When you retrieve & open it, everything is exactly as you left it, all US$7,000+ of gear undisturbed & still inside.

This is a common story in Japan. It’s a generalization but you are more likely to get your gear back in Japan than you are in many other countries.

Lots to enjoy here, especially if you have kids. Some of these are pretty difficult. All are thoughtful.

Vanity Fair:

Just who are those unrecognizable Oscar audience members sandwiched between the stars this Sunday? To get a better understanding of the behind-the-scenes responsibilities of these glammed-up Oscar gophers, we tracked down a seat-filler from last year’s Seth MacFarlane-hosted ceremony.

I’ve read a lot of stories about these people and it always strikes me as so odd. Does anyone watching on TV really care if there’s an empty seat next to Jennifer Lawrence?

Quartz:

The suggestion to mask or obscure email addresses to avoid spam has been around for more than a decade. References to replacing the @ with (at) or .com with (dot) com to reduce spam can be found on online message boards and archives dating back to the 1990s.

But there are two realities here.

Do you agree? Do you still bother to conceal your email address in this way?