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Fiona Apple cancels tour to care for her dying dog

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Dogster:

Many people might call in sick from work to care for a sick and dying dog. But what if your job was going around to cities and singing heartfelt, cathartic songs in front of thousands of heartfelt, cathartic fans? Would you just stop all that to go home and care for your sick and dying dog?

That’s exactly what Fiona Apple did.

She writes, “I will not be the woman who puts her career ahead of love and friendship. I am the woman who stays home and bakes Tilapia for my dearest, oldest friend.”

Anyone who has loved and known the love of a great pet, especially a dog, completely understands Apple’s decision. You can always go back out on tour.

21 images that sum up the history of SciFi

Written by

io9:

Every era in science fiction’s history has shown us a new vision of the strange and futuristic, and one image can spawn a million reflections in your mind’s eye.Here are 21 unforgettable pictures that showcase the whole history of science fiction.

They really do a very good job of capturing each SciFi era in a single image.

Xbox TV

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Microsoft is building an Xbox set-top box. Multiple sources familiar with Redmond’s plans have confirmed to The Verge that the company plans to introduce a low-cost alternative to its Xbox console, designed to provide access to core entertainment services. The move will allow Microsoft to further increase its presence in the living room, providing consumers with a choice between a set-top box or a full next-generation Xbox console.

Xbox is a strong brand for Microsoft. This is an interesting plan.

Tokens

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Tokens makes it remarkably easy to generate, share, and track promo codes for your iOS and Mac apps.

I don’t believe there is a single Apple developer that wouldn’t find this useful.

Amplified: Conjuring Up Demons

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Jim and Dan discuss the new Apple TV ads, the Microsoft Kin and Surface, the Bruins toaster, Black Friday, the Lufthansa iPad Heist, holiday bundles, AC/DC in iTunes, paying for music, and the Jackson 7-string.

Sponsored by Mailgun use code 5BY5 for 10% off, Shopify, Hover use the code DANSENTME for 10% off, and Shutterstock use code DANSENTME11 for 30% off.

Fake Apple Smart Covers on Amazon

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Something to keep in mind if you’re shopping for an iPad Smart Cover or Smart Case heading in to the holidays: not all of them are created equal, especially on Amazon.com. For many of us, Amazon is a natural place to order an iPad cover or case as a gift this holiday. But as dozens of complaints on the site show, many of the “Apple Smart Covers” or “Apple Smart Cases” for sale on Amazon are not actually sold by Apple and are not the genuine article.

Be careful and be sure what you are buying is the real thing.

“Pile of shit”

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These internal Microsoft videos, provided to Wired by a person who worked on the project, show focus groups testing the ill-fated Kin. According to our source, these are pre-production models that changed very little from the shipping product, although “performance improved some prior to shipping.” Watch them, and you can readily see why the project tanked: Kin phones just weren’t usable. Or, as our source described them, they were a “pile of shit.”

Why should we believe that the latest round of Microsoft products are any better?

Do Twinkies have an indefinite shelf life?

Written by

Snopes:

Claim – Hostess Twinkies have an indefinite shelf life.

Fact – Twinkies have a shelf life of twenty-five days, not seven years, and certainly not fifty years. Even so, twenty-five days is an unusually long time for a baked product to stay fresh. The secret to Twinkies’ longevity is their lack of dairy ingredients: because dairy products are not part of the formula, Twinkies spoil much more slowly than other bakery items.

After the news of the shuttering of the company, this urban legend quickly made its way around Twitter. Like most urban legends, it turns out to have no basis in facts.

How does GPS know where you are?

Written by

Mashable:

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blockquote>We take for granted how easy it is to get around these days. A decade ago, when my friends and I were turning 16 and getting our driver’s licenses, a big, fat Thomas Guide was the gift of choice — I mean, how else would you find your way around the city? Then TomTom, Magellan and Garmin came around. And now, with the proliferation of smartphones, maps of the entire world are in the palm of our hands.

But even when maps go awry, we tend to take the technology for granted. Here’s an explanation of how GPS navigation works — so you can appreciate it a little more the next time it gets you where you need to be.

It really is a wondrous and remarkable piece of technology.

Apple Specialist Sam Sung

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The Loop reader sent me this business card today. Sam Sung was helping his wife’s aunt. […]

Igloo’s Fall update, Q, is here

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Many thanks to Igloo Software for sponsoring this week’s feed on The Loop.

Q brings over 25 new features ­installed, tested and managed ­as a free platform update to all Igloo customers.

Igloo users can now post blogs, wiki articles, documents and status updates right from their email. Igloo has also developed a brand-new calendar that integrates with your intranet and your desktop calendar applications. Q also adds a smart search that finds relevant content and displays it instantly and inline. Igloo has also introduced the ability to find and @mention users from any content entry field.

Igloo is trying to make work a better place. A recent IDC report states “… Igloo had the best overall solution capability rating from respondents.” IDC placed Igloo in the Major Players category for enterprise social software. You can download a complimentary copy of the report from Igloo.

Get an intranet you’ll actually like. Try Igloo.

More than you ever need to know about razors

Written by

The Wirecutter:

To make my picks, I spoke with experts who have been through every razor fad and tried every setup, including beard-trimmers. I then personally tested widely available non-disposable razors on the market. I asked several women test out “women’s” razors and cartridge men’s razors on their legs, bikini lines, and underarms, then got their takes.

I wish I had the skill (read “courage”) to try an use a straight razor.

The cost of a click

Written by

Horace Dediu:

The bottom line is that an individual click is not as valuable as it used to be. Would a larger volume of mobile usage be a reason? Google won’t say.

With operating margins falling, Google must be very concerned.

No need for patent system overhaul, says Microsoft

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Bart Eppenauer, Microsoft’s chief patent counsel:

“There are a lot headlines about the patent system being out of control and major changes being needed,” Eppenauer says. “While certainly there are areas for improvement in the patent system — in terms of what the U.S. Patent [& Trademark] Office can do and what the courts can do and what companies can do — this doesn’t mean you need, at least from our point of view, some sort of radical overhaul of the system or a complete change in the approach to certain technologies.”

Why am I not surprised.

Tattoo for cancer

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TechCrunch’s Drew Olanoff recently celebrated his 33rd birthday (Happy Birthday brother), but instead of getting gifts, he asked people to donate to help fund research on children’s cancer. In exchange, he did some unique — I’ll let you read for yourself.

Much respect Drew.

A trophy of design and a failure of engineering

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Shawn Blanc on his new Hidden Radio:

The device is little more than a giant volume knob with a speaker inside, and yet, ironically, it’s the most difficult-to-use volume knob in my home.

Great review of a kickstarter project he backed last year. Reading the review, I felt bad for Shawn because he didn’t seem to have any unreasonable expectations for the device, but yet it still failed.

vjay for iPhone

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vjay transforms your iPhone or iPod touch into a cutting-edge mashup machine, directly integrated with the media libraries on your iPhone or iPod touch.

Another great looking app from Algoriddim. They have an iPad version too.

Sweden has rednecks too

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What happens when you take a Volvo engine and drop it in a tractor chassis? You get a lot of mud and torn up fields, that’s what.

The best job in the world

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I laughed repeatedly when reading this comic. The part about the guy and his pants reminded me so much of Peter Cohen. Kind of frightening really.

HP: Surface is ‘slow’ and ‘kludgey’

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Todd Bradley, the head of HP’s PC business:

“I’d hardly call Surface competition,” Bradley said in an interview with IDG Enterprise. He listed several reasons, “One, very limited distribution. It tends to be slow and a little kludgey as you use it …. It’s expensive. Holistically, the press has made a bigger deal out of Surface than what the world has chosen to believe.”

This coming from one of Microsoft’s partners.