Learn how to draw a bunch of cool icons. Terrific post from Marc Edwards. Have an icon you are struggling to recreate? Ping Marc on Twitter.

Ben Lovejoy, 9to5Mac:

Smart bulbs from the market leader Philips start at $25 per bulb for white and $50 for color, a price that soon adds up if you’re looking to fit out your entire home.

But all that is set to change in the summer as Ikea has announced that its smart lighting system will be HomeKit-compatible as of the summer. Ikea’s smart bulbs start at just $11.99.

And:

The existing product line is limited to white bulbs, but once you’ve bought the gateway for $79.99 (which includes two bulbs), you can add smart bulbs at prices ranging from $11.99 for a 1000-lumen E28 bulb, through $14.99 for a 400-lumen E12, $17.99 for a 980-lumen E27 to a $19.99 G10 spotlight. Dimmers and motion sensors are also available at similarly affordable pricing.

Ikea getting in the game brings down prices, legitimizes the sector, and will help popularize the concept of adding smart bulbs to your home.

Follow the link, check out the picture. If you really want to make a statement, you can buy matching footwear. Natch’.

Washington Business Journal:

Apple representatives say their plans for the historic Carnegie Library will respect and improve the building’s historic architecture.

“Some of you may say ‘Apple! I don’t want to see another glass box. We had enough of that with the Spy Museum,'” Apple development lead Michael Brown said of the International Spy Museum’s failed 2014 plan for the Carnegie Library.

And:

Brown, along with reps from architect Beyer Blinder Belle, gave a closer glimpse at Apple’s plans during a National Capital Planning Commission historic preservation meeting last week. Apple has a letter of intent with Events D.C., the District’s sports and convention arm that runs the building, to operate a global flagship store in the 63,000-square-foot building. Apple would take up most of the circa-1903 building, sharing space with the Historical Society of Washington and Events D.C.

I do find it interesting that Apple will be sharing this space. Will the other groups have separate entrances? Will there be any actual shared space?

No matter, Apple’s plans will have to pass muster with the Washington D.C.’s strict Historic Preservation Review Board. When complete, this is going to be a destination Apple Store.

Juli Clover, MacRumors:

For the last few weeks, Apple has been testing its autonomous driving software in three Lexus RX450h SUVs, which have been photographed around the San Francisco Bay Area. This morning, MacRumors reader Andrew was able to capture some video of one of the SUVs, giving us our closest look yet at the vehicles Apple is using to test its system.

Not sure how much we can draw from this. I think it’d be more interesting to get a closeup look at the camera rigging and the computers inside the car. I suspect we’ll eventually have WWDC sessions that focus on self-driving car APIs.

This is a really good page. It’s not a lot of specs and things people don’t necessarily care about, just some good fun.

Letter Opener for macOS

Working together with Windows users shouldn’t be problematic at all. Still, some email messages can not be natively read by the Mac and are packed into Winmail.dat or MSG files that have to be extracted and displayed somehow. Letter Opener for macOS does that with a simple double-click!

Letter Opener for macOS Mail

The plugin to stop the Winmail.dat file flood for good.

If Winmail.dat files are a reoccurring problem, Letter Opener for macOS Mail is the solution. Installed into Mail it opens and displays the files directly inside Apples Mail application, so the user can forget about Winmail.dat files entirely.

Use coupon code ROCKET88 for 30% off Letter Opener for macOS Mail.

A small Boston company, founded by the inventor of a popular corporate encryption technology called RSA SecurID, sued Apple and Visa on Sunday, arguing that the Apple Pay digital payment technology violates its patents.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday tightened rules for where patent lawsuits can be filed in a decision that may make it harder for so-called patent “trolls” to launch sometimes dodgy patent cases in friendly courts, a major irritant for high-tech giants like Apple and Alphabet Inc’s Google.

Anything that gets rid of patent trolls is a good thing, but I’m sure the trolls will try to incorporate in East Texas, where many of the patent cases currently take place.

Update: I misread the ruling. Lawsuits will have to be filed in the jurisdiction of the defendant, which should definitely deal a huge blow to patent trolls.

As with most Apple retail locations, this is just beautiful.

Mental Floss:

A living room featuring this kinetic art table has no need for coffee table books—or a television, for that matter. You can happily entertain yourself for hours just watching the steel ball create patterns in the sand.

If I had the money, I’d buy one of these coffee tables in a heartbeat.

Jennings Brown, Vocativ:

> When Fu Gui was six, he was abducted on his way home from school in Chongqing, China. He was then trafficked to Quznahou, about 1,000 miles away, where he was sold to foster parents. Now, 27 years after he was taken from his family, he has been reunited with them. And it’s all thanks to the latest cross-age facial recognition technology from Chinese tech giant Baidu.

And:

> In 2009, nearly two decades after Gui was kidnapped after school, he uploaded the earliest photo he had of himself, taken when he was 10, adding it to the database of tens of thousands of images. In January of this year, Gui’s father uploaded a photo of Gui when he was 4. > > Baidu’s AI was capable of matching the two images, taken six years apart.

This is a breathtaking application of facial recognition technology. And this tech, along with faceswapper ai, is becoming more sophisticated, and facial data more ubiquitously available every single day.

Jean-Louis Gassée, Monday Note:

Apple appears to be working on blood glucose monitoring as a way to address Type 2 Diabetes.“Stick it in your ear”. Literally.

This is a detailed, thoughtful piece on Apple’s pursuit of the holy grail of glucose level monitoring, continuous monitoring without drawing blood. Terrific read.

Nicholas Dawidoff:

“A Day in the Life” isn’t a song to sing, as are “Eleanor Rigby” (ideal for both car and karaoke), “Hey Jude” (written to soothe John Lennon’s young son, no lullaby works better at children’s bedtime), or “In My Life” (a perennial at weddings and funerals and, I can’t help mentioning, rock’s analog to Shakespeare’s Sonnet 116). Nor is “A Day in the Life” guided by melody like so many Beatles creations. It’s an elaborate production, filled with sophisticated George Martin and Geoff Emerick musical trickery (distortion, echo, dubbing, reverb). An orchestra plays, and then one singer’s voice gives way to another’s—John’s worldly reflections transitioning to Paul’s sketch of domestic memoir, and then back again—before orchestral cataclysm and a final resting place.

And:

And then, after all the chaos and destruction, what next? George Harrison had suggested a fade to humming. But it didn’t work. Paul thought that the song needed firmer resolution. Three Steinway pianos and a harmonium were rolled into action, and at every keyboard the players were instructed to hit the single chord of E major simultaneously and hard, with the sustain foot pedal down, letting it carry as long as possible. There were nine takes. The tone is so big, so capacious and resonant because Martin and Emerick thought to put the recorder on half speed.

Some terrific writing in this piece. If you are a fan of (or have never heard) A Day in the Life, take a listen.

The Telegraph:

Jennifer Bailey, the head of Apple’s payments business, said over half of contactless payment terminals in the UK are now able to take Apple Pay transactions of any value. Most card readers had previously been restricted to £30, the default upper limit for contactless card transactions.

And:

Contactless card payments are limited to £30 to prevent fraud, since they do not require shoppers to enter a PIN.

Apple Pay transactions, which are made by holding an iPhone or Apple Watch against a card reader, are approved using the iPhone fingerprint scanner or watch’s biometric sensors. The extra security allows Apple Pay to make payments of any value, but retailers have had to embark on a programme of terminal upgrades to support them.

“We think the majority of the contactless terminals [in the UK] are now limitless,” Ms Bailey said.

Slow, but steady, steady growth.

My Modern Met:

While we’ve all seen our fair share of hyperrealistic and photorealistic art, or paintings and sculptures that look amazingly like photographs, it’s not too often that we come across photos that look like paintings. Throughout the five-plus years we’ve been around, we’ve seen these unbelievable photos pop up here and there and today, we decided to give them all one home. Here, then, are ten fascinating photos that look unbelievably like an oil, acrylic or watercolor painting. Enjoy!

These are shot in a style I couldn’t accomplish but I love the look and feel of them.

Digg:

America leads the world in many things (GDP, Olympic medals), and lags behind in many others (math, life expectancy). Here’s something we can add to the “lags behind” column: this super-efficient tow truck replacement spotted in Turkey.

You’ve got to admire the efficiency and speed if nothing else.

Petapixel:

The well-regarded Olympus TG-4 is being replaced by a more powerful model—say hello to the TG-5. Olympus’ latest ‘tough’ camera packs a better sensor, better processor, and 4K video capability into a rough and tumble shell that is waterproof, crushproof, shockproof, freezeproof, and dustproof.

As with the previous tough model, this puppy is waterproof (to 50 feet/15 meters), crushproof (to 220 pounds/100 kilograms), shockproof (from 7 feet/2.1 meters), freezeproof (to 14°F/-10°C), and dustproof.

I’ve always been a big fan of Olympus’ “Tough” line and recommend it particularly for those who are hard on their gear, want to shoot in “adverse” conditions or want a good camera to give to a child. I’ve used my old Tough point and shoot mounted to my motorcycle, in the snow, underwater – places I’d never take my DSLR or iPhone.

The Outline:

This week, Wired dropped a glossy cover story on Apple’s massive new campus, which will be known as Apple Park. The approximately 6,000-word story mentions a specially-designed pizza box that enables Apple employees to take a pizza from the company’s posh food court, Caffè Macs, back to their desk area, or pod, without the pie getting soggy.

The Cupertino company patented the box seven years ago and it’s already been in use at Apple offices. The box is just coming into the public consciousness now, however, so The Outline obtained one — sent by a source directly from one of Apple’s California campuses — in order to conduct a hands-on review. Here are our first impressions.

Levy is understandably a little miffed at the attention the box is getting but it’s weirdly interesting and another testament to Apple’s attention to details.

Clark:

For whatever reason, smartphones have caused people to let their guard down — and scammers are taking advantage of the fact that many people will open just any text or email they receive on their phone.

But as these scams continue to evolve, criminals are still finding effective ways to target consumers using many of the same old tactics that have been around for a whole lot longer than smartphones.

After a recent attack targeted Apple users via text message, scammers are now going after them in a different way.

According to a recent report, criminals are calling Apple iCloud users and claiming that their account has been hacked.

As always, never click on links you weren’t expecting. Always go to the source and don’t trust links sent to you that you didn’t specifically ask for from the company. Thanks to Ted Landau for the heads up.

CNET:

A recently published survey by Morgan Stanley shows that 92 percent of iPhone users are “somewhat likely” or “extremely likely” to upgrade their phone in the next 12 months plan on getting another iPhone. The research note was distributed on Wednesday and later picked up by CNET.

In comparison, the same Morgan Stanley survey found that Samsung had a 77 percent retention rate, while LG had 59 percent and Motorola had 56 percent.

Put me in the “extremely likely” camp.

BBC:

For 21 years, the king of the Netherlands has flown twice a month as co-pilot while his passengers were in the dark, he has told a Dutch newspaper.

He told De Telegraaf that he never used his name when addressing passengers and was rarely recognised in uniform and wearing his KLM cap. However, he admitted that some passengers had recognised his voice.

Can you imagine sitting on a plane and hearing the pilot over the intercom, “Welcome to the flight, ladies and gentlemen…” And thinking to yourself, “Huh – that sounds like….naw…couldn’t be!”

Graham Cochrane has some nice tips for Mastering a song you’ve recorded. I especially liked his comments on the loudness wars and how streaming services are making that less of an issue these days.

Great story. Much respect to Google CEO Sundar Pichai for encouraging the girl.

Petapixel:

In A Taste of New York, Thomas Pöcksteiner and Peter Jablonowski of Austrian film production company FilmSpektakel take the viewer on a whirlwind tour of the city from the air, ground, and water. Zipping between locations with creative cuts and zooms, the hustle of NYC is matched by the editing style.

This video puts the “hyper” in hyperlapse but it certainly captures the energy of New York City.

Mentalfloss:

Regularly changing your online passwords should be as routine as spring cleaning or a dentist appointment (and just as fun), but many people usually don’t get around to it until it’s too late. You won’t want to make that same mistake this time: According to internet security researchers, more than 560 million passwords have been compromised and posted to an online database. The leaks involve email passwords and login credentials for a number of different online services, all of which have been hacked in the past few years.

The leak was first discovered by Kromtech Security Center earlier in the month, and according to Gizmodo, the claim was backed up by Troy Hunt, creator of the site Have I Been Pwned, which helps people find out whether or not any of their online accounts could have been breached. This leak database is hosted on a cloud-based IP from an unknown user that has been nicknamed “Eddie.”

Using the Have I Been Pwned site, I found a number of places where my main email address has been compromised in a data breach.

AP News:

While the show goes on in other circuses around the world, Ringling is special. The size, the spectacle and the history — stretching back to P.T. Barnum and his traveling museum in the 1800s — set it apart.

One of Ringling’s two traveling circuses is scheduled to perform its final show Sunday in New York. The other closed this month in Providence, and with it, the end to a way of life few others have experienced. The Associated Press was allowed to observe it extensively.

I agree with the decision to shutter the circus, given what we know of the animals and how they are treated but I will still shed a nostalgic virtual tear for the disappearance of the circus. I fondly remember seeing a circus as a ten-year-old in the Halifax Forum. It was the first time I’d ever seen “wild” animals and it was a magical experience.

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