National Geographic:

Cremation by itself is much better for the environment than embalming, but you can go even further by using cremains to grow a tree or promote marine reefs. The company Coeio has taken ecoburial to a new level by introducing a burial suit that’s lined with spores that decompose the body and grow into mushrooms—from death, life.

As a Nova Scotianer, I’d love to be buried at sea off the coast of my home province. After all the food the ocean has provided me (I’ve eaten hundreds of pounds of lobster), I think it’s only fair I feed the little fishies right back.

Mashable:

Stuttering — a speech characteristic marked by repetitions in sound, prolonged pauses and repeated words. Though stuttering impacts an estimated 70 million people globally, it’s widely misunderstood, leading to widespread stigma.

Often, the person who stutters is seen as lacking intelligence or authority in what they have to say. But, in reality, stuttering is just a variation of “expected” speech.

For many people, stuttering is a lifelong condition, even with treatment like speech therapy.

As a stutterer myself, there is some great advice in this piece if you know anyone who has a stutter. Patience is the key.

Quartz:

Making the connection is the difficult part—a long, vertical line of smoke and then twisting off into a new direction and across the atmosphere.

That’s how you draw letters in the sky with an airplane, and there are only five people on the planet skilled enough to make it their full-time job.

Greg Stinis learned how to pilot one of those planes before he learned how to drive a car. Not surprising for the son of a man who invented a new way to write sentences in the sky, whose plane hangs in a national museum.

I’ve only ever seen skywriting once, when I was a kid, and I distinctly remember being utterly fascinated by it and driving my father nuts with questions.

Ars Technica:

If you’ve ever used a cellphone, hearing aid, or baby monitor, listened to live or recorded music, or recorded anything yourself, you’re indebted to James West.

West is the co-inventor of the electret microphone used in all of those devices and more. It’s estimated that over 90 percent of the microphones in use today are electret mics, and more than 2 billion of these devices are produced worldwide every year.

I’ve never heard of an electret microphone but this is a fascinating story.

The Verge:

LG Innotek today joins Fingerprint Cards in announcing a fingerprint module that can be integrated under the same glass cover as a phone’s display, obviating the need for a button. This will allow smartphone makers to have truly seamless designs while still offering the now-mandatory fingerprint authentication — and both companies expect devices with this new technology before the end of the year.

And:

LG Innotek points out that waterproofing a smartphone becomes significantly easier without a discrete button for the fingerprint reader. Plus the sensor itself is less susceptible to being scratched if it sits under the same tough cover glass as the display. Fingerprint readers have to be particularly robust, by microelectronics standards, because they sit on the exterior of a device.

Imagine if your phone knew who was holding your phone, no matter where your finger made contact. This tech is likely coming to Android. It will be interesting to see if Apple responds in some way.

I’m a big fan of Polygraph’s music chart mechanism. You can pick a specific year at which to start, then start listening. As the week’s go by, you’ll hear the top song on that week’s Billboard chart.

The default starting point is sometime in 1997. Easy to change on the fly. Very fun.

Periodically, PayPal runs a promotion selling iTunes gift cards at a discount. Caveat emptor. That said, I’ve made this purchase before and it’s worked just fine for me. This is available strictly via email.

Hannah Carp, writing for The Wall Street Journal:

Hip-hop star Drake sold more than one million copies of his new album, “Views,” in less than five days when it was available only on Apple Inc.’s iTunes download store and its subscription streaming service, Apple Music — a rare achievement in an age of rapid streaming growth and declining sales of downloads and CDs.

But Apple’s head of content, Larry Jackson, said that Drake was able to rack up such global sales precisely because he used the company’s streaming service to market the album and corral his fans into one place.

Over the past year Drake has hosted 20 episodes of his radio show, OVO Sound, on Apple Music’s free Beats 1 radio station, using the show to announce the album release details and to debut several songs, including his hit “Hotline Bling.” Apple also advertised the album on the iTunes home page and is running TV ads for the album during the National Basketball Association’s playoff games.

The album sold 632,000 copies in the first 24 hours.

The power of Apple’s promotion engine.

From the Netflix blog:

The default setting will enable you to stream about 3 hours of TV shows and movies per gigabyte of data. In terms of bitrates, that currently amounts to about 600 Kilobits per second. Our testing found that, on cellular networks, this setting balances good video quality with lower data usage to help avoid exceeding data caps and incurring overage fees. If you have a mobile data plan with a higher data cap, you can adjust this setting to stream at higher bitrates.

In a nutshell, you can now change the quality to:

• Off (don’t use cellular data, meant for WiFi)
• Low (4 hours per GB)
• Medium (2 hours per GB)
• High (1 hour per GB)
• Unlimited (use cellular, meant for unlimited data plan)

To get to this setting, launch the Netflix iOS app, click the hamburger menu (upper left corner), scroll down the sidebar and tap App Settings.

Terrific new setting.

Kyle Wiens, writing for Wired:

Huawei is shamelessly copying Apple here. Yes, it migrated the fingerprint sensor like a flounder’s eye and eliminated the mechanical home button, but the two phones share similar antenna bands, styling, and finish. They even sport the same proprietary star-shaped security screw, in exactly the same spots. After all, if you want your phone to resemble an iPhone, you’ve got to nail the details.

But this screw, called a pentalobe, does more than make the P9 look a bit more like an iPhone. It keeps you from opening your phone and impedes recycling it when you finally toss it. And it offers another reminder that where Apple goes, others follow, even if what’s good for Apple isn’t always good for the orchard.

This is remarkably blatant. Just look at the image.

Late last month, Apple brought seven leading podcast professionals to the company’s campus in Cupertino, Calif., to air their case to a room full of employees, according to two people who were there. The people would speak only on the condition of anonymity because they had signed nondisclosure agreements. The company made no promises, the people said, but several pressing issues for podcasters were discussed in frank terms.

Apple has problems, there’s no question about that. I hope these types of meetings will help, but we’ll see—I have my doubts.

Deadspin:

One image looms above the rest: Ray Lussier’s photograph of Bobby Orr immediately after he scored the Stanley Cup-winning goal for the Boston Bruins in Game 4 of the 1970 Finals. The black-and-white image shows Orr in mid-air, hovering above the ice, as all of Boston Garden—all of New England—erupts.

In honor of the NHL playoffs on now (I’m halfheartedly cheering for Nashville and Pittsburgh – both cities I used to live in), this is a really interesting back story of one of the greatest action photos ever taken.

Apple CEO Tim Cook has been named as one of several tech industry executives that will speak at Startup Fest Europe, a festival geared towards helping startups grow faster, according to the event website.

That would be an interesting talk!

In the iOS 10 Apple Music redesign, the Connect feature will follow Ping’s lead and will be demoted. Apple Music Connect currently exists as its own tab across the Apple Music interface, but multiple sources say that the feature will lose its tab and become integrated into the “For You” recommendations page.

I do hope this is true. Connect is the most useless thing since Ping. However, I hope that “integrated” into For You doesn’t mean that it will be mixed in with my recommendations—that would completely ruin the For You tab for me. Just kill Connect and be done with it.

Immersion, a company which developers haptic feedback technology, has filed its second complaint of the year against Apple. The company claims that 3D Touch on the iPhone 6s and the Force Touch trackpad found on the 12-inch MacBook and recent MacBook Pro models violate a number of Immersion patents.

I wonder how Apple will argue this case.

Ben Lovejoy, writing for 9to5Mac, gets right to some core issues with Apple Music. Great post, well stated.

Steven Sinofsky was President of Microsoft’s Windows’ division from 2009 to 2013. From his blog post about moving to an iPad as his full time machine:

Unlike many “use a product for month” tests this is not an experiment. For me this is a deeply held belief that the rise of smartphones (specifically starting when the iPhone launched) would have a profound impact on the way we all use “computers”.

The transformation spans hardware (thinner, lighter, smaller, cheaper, longer battery life, instant on/off, touch, sensors, connectivity, etc.), operating systems (more: secure, reliable, maintainable, robust, etc.), and app software (refactored, renewed, reimagined, etc.). It is the combination of these attributes, however, causing a change as fundamental as the leap from mainframe to workstation, from character-based to graphical OS, from desktop to laptop, from client/server to web — perhaps equal to all rolled into one shift if for no other reason than the whole planet is involved.

And:

Note: This is not a Mac v. Windows or iOS v. Android discussion, so no snickering please. This is about a shift to a “modern mobile” computing platform from hardware to software and the cultural changes that surround that.

I find it fascinating when folks move to a tablet as their full-time machine. I can’t imagine doing that. A big issue for me is the fact that Xcode only runs on my Mac. Add to that my frequent use of a large screen for both editing (multiple windows open side by side) and for development (side-by-side code listings and complex storyboards).

Sinofsky’s post is compelling and worth reading. Interesting that he made the choice to use an iPad and not a Surface solution.

TechCrunch:

Apple today launched a new plan to boost subscribers to its streaming music service and competitor to Spotify, SoundCloud, Tidal and others. It’s introducing an Apple Music student plan which will discount the service by 50 percent for those who are enrolled in an eligible college or university.

That means in the U.S., where an individual membership to Apple Music costs $9.99 per month, the student membership will be $4.99 per month instead.

The option isn’t just arriving in the U.S., though. Students in other countries, including the U.K., Germany, Denmark, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand, will also be able to take advantage of the new membership option.

However, because Apple Music is priced slightly differently in other markets, the cost of the student membership will vary. But in all markets, it will be 50 percent off the standard subscription price.

That’s the price difference between the solo plan and the family plan.

Reuters:

Apple Inc (AAPL.O) Chief Executive Tim Cook plans to visit Beijing later this month to meet high-level government officials, at a time when it is facing some setbacks in its most important overseas market, a source familiar with the matter said.

And:

During his China visit, Cook plans to meet senior government and Communist Party leaders – including officials in charge of propaganda, said the source, who declined to be named as the plan is not public yet.

Travel safe, Tim.

Wall Street Journal:

Apple Inc., Google parent Alphabet Inc. and several car makers are seeking large expanses of real estate in the San Francisco Bay Area for their autonomous-car operations, a top landlord in the area said Thursday, illustrating Silicon Valley’s growing importance in the auto industry.

Victor Coleman, chief executive of Hudson Pacific Properties Inc., told analysts that “we are seeing a definitive movement” from autonomous-car research-and-development facilities, which “seem to be a hot demand item.”

“We’re seeing the Toyotas of the world, the Teslas of the world, BMWs, Mercedes. Ford now is out in the marketplace looking for space,” he said on the landlord’s quarterly investor call. “I haven’t even mentioned the 400,000 square feet that Google’s looking to take down and the 800,000 square feet that Apple’s looking to take down for their autonomous cars as well.”

Seems to me, someone could make a killing creating a massive setup that allowed manufacturers to bring their vehicles in and test against all the California and federal regulations.

Jordan Golson, writing for The Verge:

Tesla is selling a car with an “upgradable” battery. Only it’s not upgradable in the take-it-to-the-dealer-and-they’ll-swap-out-some-hardware sense. Instead, you give Tesla thousands of dollars to “unlock” hardware that’s already included in your car with an over-the-air software update. The Model S 70 includes a 70kWh battery pack that’s good for around 240 miles of range. For $3,000 more, there’s a Model S 75 with a 75kWh battery pack that gives an additional 19 miles of range from the extra 5kWh of energy storage. But both models use the exact same battery for logistics and manufacturing purposes.

To make this crystal clear, Tesla sells a battery that is artificially limited to 240 miles of range. Pay $3,000 more, you get 259 miles.

Two things leap to mind here:

First, this is the auto industry’s version of in-app purchase, the definitive upsell.

Second, can I make this purchase if I am on the road and run out of battery?

Solid review. Be sure to watch the video towards the top of the post, Lauren Goode comparing the 2016 MacBook to the MacBook Air. Lauren is back to her “twinning” tricks. Keep your eye on the version of Lauren not speaking. Very entertaining.

One recurring point:

You can buy a more powerful, 13-inch MacBook Air with a 2.2ghz dual-core Intel Core i7 and TurboBoost up to 3.2ghz for $1,149 — less than the starting price of the MacBook.

As to battery life:

The new MacBook is said to have one more hour of battery life than last year’s MacBook. In an official Verge test, which involves turning off all power-saving settings, setting the display to around 65 percent brightness, and running a loop of web pages, the new MacBook lasted me exactly 10 hours.

While this is much better than my three-and-a-half-year-old MacBook Pro, it’s still not as impressive as the battery life on a 13-inch MacBook Air.

And you’ll likely end up spending a bit more for adapters, since the MacBook only comes with a single port. The price of thin and, if it’s your thing, the price of pink.

Another successful launch and landing. The video below is the hosted version, with hosts explaining each step in the launch and landing sequence and employees cheering raucously in the background.

If your time is limited, jump to about 29:30 for the last bit of the countdown and liftoff, then to 36:59 for the landing. The landing video was not as dramatic as the previous launch, with the first stage suddenly appearing on the drone pad, the excellently named Of Course I Still Love You. The cost of a close up view of the pad.

Fantastic result.

This looks pretty cool. All done from the menubar.

SAP, whose business software runs inside 87 percent of the world’s 2,000 biggest companies, said it would work with Apple to develop mobile business apps for iPhones and iPads that run on its HANA database software.

Another good move for Apple and its customers in the corporate world.