Open Culture:

Santa left a new Kindle, iPad, Kindle Fire or other media player under your tree. He did his job. Now we’ll do ours. We’ll tell you how to fill those devices with free intelligent media — great books, movies, courses, and all of the rest. And if you didn’t get a new gadget, fear not. You can access all of these materials on the good old fashioned computer.

I’ve used this site to grab a bunch of the classics of literature. I’ll get around to reading them eventually.

CNN:

Starting Wednesday afternoon, you can watch the controversial Sony Pictures comedy “The Interview” via YouTube, Google Play, the Microsoft Xbox video game console and a special Web site.

The movie will cost $5.99 to rent and $14.99 to buy. Sony said in a statement that it will become available at around 1 p.m. ET on Christmas Eve.

For those of you who absolutely need to see it.

Pixelmator for Mac and Pixelmator for iPad. Two powerful image editing apps that give you everything you need to create, edit, and enhance images. You can work seamlessly between Mac and iPad and even work effortlessly with Photoshop images.

In addition, Pixelmator for iPad is the sole and extremely proud winner of the App of the Year award, as a part of Apple’s Best of App Store 2014 selection.

The Next Web:

Another year, another great set of new apps that hit the iOS store.

Lots of great software in this list.

It’s hard to grasp exactly how big these waves are until the first surfer arrives about 45 seconds in. Then you mouth drops open.

I’ve heard good things about this software. Something to look at if you’re in the market.

Apparently-Amazon-doesn’t-like-hyphens. They-have-since-seen-the-error-of-their-ways-and-let-the-book-back-in.

Auto-Tune is a great app and one that I’ve used for many years. Sometimes it get used improperly, but that’s not the fault of the app.

Reuters:

Apple Inc has pushed out its first-ever automated security update to Macintosh computers to help defend against newly identified bugs that security researchers have warned could enable hackers to gain remote control of machines.

When Apple has released previous security patches, it has done so through its regular software update system, which typically requires user intervention.

When I got to my Macbook Pro this AM, I saw the “Security Update Installed. A new security update was installed on your Mac” message. I understand why Apple did this but, given how much crappy software Apple has released, I’m not happy about the company “reaching into” my computer and installing software without my permission or knowledge.

The Oatmeal:

Human beings are terrible drivers.

We drink. We doze. We text. In the US, 30,000 people die from automobile accidents every year. Traffic crashes are the primary cause of death worldwide for people aged 15-24, and during a crash, 40% of drivers never even hit the brakes. We’re flawed organisms, barreling around at high speeds in vessels covered in glass, metal, distraction, and death. This is one of Google’s “moonshots” — to remove human error from a job which, for the past hundred years, has been entirely human.

I love the idea of self-driving cars. As a motorcycle rider, it would be great to get “all the other half-lucid orangutans on their cell phones” out from behind the steering wheel.

The Verge:

If I had to pick places I’d expect to see rocking chairs, front porches, living rooms, and pretty much anywhere else would rank far above cavernous and stark airport terminals, yet that’s probably where I’m most likely to see them. And while I could imagine an aggressively whimsical designer somewhere throwing a bunch of rocking chairs in a terminal, I had a hard time seeing how they’d sprung up in so many airports across the country. Why rocking chairs? Where did they come from?

I’ve only ever seen these at the Nashville International Airport. I thought they were just a quirky thing specific to the city.

Vox:

The metric system is far superior to the bizarre system of feet, miles, pounds, and gallons used in the United States. The whole rest of the world seems to get this. So why aren’t we doing it, too?

The reasons to go metric are stronger than ever, and it’s time to revive the effort. In our increasingly global economy, America’s bizarre measurement system puts the country at a disadvantage. Popular opinion on the matter seems to be quite positive, and there are some hints of change on the horizon.

I lived in the US for many years and grew up in Canada during the switch from Imperial to Metric so I get both systems. There’s no doubt metric is much easier to do calculations with but, even here in Canada, there is still a lot of confusion due to the mashup of the two systems.

Wired:

Jonathan Coulton loves cruise ships. He loves the weird artificial mall running down the middle, and he loves staring off the back of the ship into infinity. That’s not to say that David Foster Wallace’s famously dark assessment of shipboard vacationing (“There is something about a mass-market Luxury Cruise that’s unbearably sad”) is unfamiliar. The lanyard that holds a laser-cut wooden JoCo Cruise name tag around my neck came printed with the phrase “A supposedly fun thing I’ll never do again.” Inside jokes are the coin of the realm around here.

I’ve been on one cruise and, for various reasons, it was an awful experience.

Angela Ahrendts:

I’ve always tried to focus my comments on simple leadership lessons I’ve learned that might somehow, somewhere, someday help others. I’ll admit, I’ve been struggling recently to find one that’s relevant around the holidays.

On Wednesday, I was listening to the radio on my drive home and I heard an old song that took me back to my childhood. I hadn’t heard it for a while, and wow — in that moment, it really moved me.

I know this is probably just fluff, but I’d love to see more of these kinds of posts from more of Apple’s leadership.

MY thanks to Doxie for sponsoring The Loop’s RSS feed this week. Doxie Go Wi-Fi is the tiny, rechargeable document and receipt scanner that scans anywhere — no computer required — then syncs wirelessly to your Mac, iPhone, and iPad.

Doxie scans your paper: simply and automatically. Battery power, built-in Wi-Fi, and new SmartMemory let you scan anywhere, then tuck Doxie away when you’re not using it.

Doxie’s elegant Mac and iOS apps handle any workflow — save scans to your desktop, share with your favorite apps, or send to cloud services like Evernote and Dropbox. Doxie’s new open developer API lets you build Doxie support into your service, software, or personal paperless workflow.

The Loop readers get free U.S. shipping and Guaranteed Christmas Delivery for all orders placed through December 21st. Order your Doxie today and give the gift of paperless.

Hall & Oates is one of those bands that are consistently underrated, even ridiculed. Jennifer Boeder makes her case for why Hall & Oates deserve their place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and our respect.

By the age of 17, Daryl Hall was already singing on Philly street corners with the likes of the Delphonics and the Stylistics. He and Oates ran with Smokey Robinson, the Temptations, and many other top soul singers and producers of the 60s (H&O inducted the Temptations into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1985). People don’t realize that Hall & Oates’s song “She’s Gone” made little headway on the charts until the legendary Lou Rawls and Tavares decided to cover it. Consider that, haters: maybe you don’t respect Hall & Oates, but the Temptations and Lou Rawls totally did.

A terrific read.

From the press release for luxury skincare brand Erno Laszlo:

“iPhone 6 Plus was instrumental in helping us achieve our creative vision for this project—and do it in a brilliantly fast and effective way,” said Kenan Aktulun, founder of Truth NYC. “It opened up possibilities by allowing us to explore the life and energy of the holiday season in New York, in a truly mobile way.”

Made In Space is a startup whose goal was to build the first 3D printer designed specifically for the rigors of space travel and for use in zero-G.

My colleagues and I just 3D-printed a ratcheting socket wrench on the International Space Station by typing some commands on our computer in California.

We had overheard ISS Commander Barry Wilmore (who goes by “Butch”) mention over the radio that he needed one, so we designed one in CAD and sent it up to him faster than a rocket ever could have. This is the first time we’ve ever “emailed” hardware to space.

The ability to print replacement parts will be critical for long space voyages (to Mars, for example). Not sure how useful a plastic socket wrench will be in the real world. I wonder if there is a plan to bridge that gap, to create a hardened wrench, for example, that will withstand real-world torque.

[hat tip to John Kordyback]

More cowbell!

The Mac firewall is designed to block incoming connections. This article digs into the process of working with a firewall and explains why the Mac firewall is not necessary for most users.

Folks out there with firewall experience, do you agree with this take?

ITG Research:

Apple Pay could pose a major threat to market leader PayPal’s current dominance of the Mobile Payment space, according to Steve Weinstein, Senior Internet Analyst at ITG Investment Research. Citing PayPal’s significant infrastructure barriers (a challenging relationship with payment counterparties and the lack of biometric capability) in comparison to Apple Pay’s compelling mobile payment solution, Weinstein believes that it will be difficult for PayPal to match the ease of use and consumer appeal of the Apple solution.

Key research findings:

• 60% of new Apple Pay customers used Apple Pay on multiple days through November, suggesting strong customer engagement. In comparison, New PayPal customers used the service on multiple days during the same time period just 20% of the time.
• Apple Pay customers used the service roughly 1.4 times per week and used Apple Pay at the same merchant for future transactions roughly 66% of the time.
• Upon adoption of Apple Pay, the average consumer uses the service for approximately 5.3% of all future card transactions and 2.3% of all future card dollars spent.

Apply Pay just keeps on chugging along. [via 9to5mac]

National Geographic:

More than 9,200 entries were submitted from over 150 countries, with professional photographers and amateur photo enthusiasts across the globe participating.The Grand Prize Winner will receive $10,000 and a trip to National Geographic headquarters in Washington, D.C., to participate in the annual National Geographic Photography Seminar in January 2015.

Check out the winner and let us know what you think. It’s not the usual photo that comes to mind when you think of National Geographic.

Jason Snell and Dan Moren of Six Colors put together a list of their favorite iOS games. The usual suspects are there, but there are plenty of games that were new to me. A nice little list.

The Telegraph:

The BBC’s Panorama programme sent undercover reporters to Pegatron factories on the outskirts of Shanghai, where it claims to have uncovered poor treatment of workers and a breach of standards on workers’ hours.

In an email to around 5,000 staff across the UK, Apple senior vice president of operations Jeff Williams said both himself and the chief executive were “deeply offended by the suggestion that Apple would break a promise to the workers in our supply chain or mislead our customers in any way”.

“Panorama’s report implied that Apple isn’t improving working conditions,” he continued. “Let me tell you, nothing could be further from the truth.”

A core part of the allegations center on Apple’s use of tin from Indonesia. Apple cannot control the sourcing of this tin at a fine enough level to guarantee that that part of the supply chain is completely clean.

“Apple has publicly stated that tin from Indonesia ends up in our products, and some of that tin likely comes from illegal mines,” Williams countered.

“Tens of thousands of artisanal miners are selling tin through many middlemen to the smelters who supply to component suppliers who sell to the world. The government is not addressing the issue, and there is widespread corruption in the undeveloped supply chain. Our team visited the same parts of Indonesia visited by the BBC, and of course we are appalled by what’s going on there.

“Apple has two choices: We could make sure all of our suppliers buy tin from smelters outside of Indonesia, which would probably be the easiest thing for us to do and would certainly shield us from criticism. But it would be the lazy and cowardly path, because it would do nothing to improve the situation for Indonesian workers or the environment since Apple consumes a tiny fraction of the tin mined there. We chose the second path, which is to stay engaged and try to drive a collective solution.”

Seems to me that the Panorama program was very selective in their reporting, that they were determined to paint Apple as a villain, rather than tell both sides of the story. Follow the headline link to read the full text of Jeff Williams’ letter.