The Computer Graphics Society:
In the summer of 2004, IKEA decided to change the way they produced their product images. They made the first tentative moves toward CG rendered, rather than photographic, images.
Wow. I figured the catalog images were “photoshopped” but I had no idea so many of them were straight up CGI.
Three things:
That water’s got to come from somewhere.
Contact Center is from the same people that developed Launch Center Pro. I had a look at the video on the Web site and this looks like a solid app. Great idea bringing what they learned in Launch Center over to this new app.
With 100 icons available in multiple colors and resolutions, our set will let you add a touch of personality to your OmniFocus 2 custom perspectives. Whether it’s for work or play, team management or that trip to Italy you need to organize, Perspective Icons 2 has the right icon for the right context.
These look really well done and the price is definitely right.
For many people the Flint Center for the Performing Arts is not a familiar venue for Apple events, but Apple has held previous events at this location.
In fact, Apple has held three events at the venue over the years and they have been huge.
The first event was when Steve Jobs introduced the original Mac in 1984—certainly a seminal event for Apple and the computing world in general. Apple held its annual shareholders meeting at the Flint Center, which is where the Mac was first shown—if those shareholders could have foreseen where Apple would be today.
The last event Apple held at the Flint Center was the launch of the Bondi Blue iMac in 1998, shortly after Jobs came back to Apple. The iMac was the first device that Jobs introduced, turning the company’s fortunes around.
In October 1999, Jobs introduced the iMac SE at the Flint Center, which is the last time Apple used the venue for an event.
Apple will hold its Sept. 9 event at the Flint Center.
Here are a couple of pictures from the Bondi Blue iMac introduction.
Update: Clarified the three events held at the Flint Center.
When I saw that Apple was going to hold their Sept. 9 event at the Flint Center for Performing Arts, I thought I would take a drive over and see if anything was happening. To be honest, I didn’t expect much because all of the work would be going on inside—I was wrong.
Apple is constructing its own building on the Flint Center grounds as part of the event. It seems to me that this could be the hands-on area that Apple typically has for attendees after the event. A towering crane on-site signals just how significant and ambitious this project might be.
Here are a few pictures. As you can imagine, security is very tight around the construction. Discover the Kubota lineup of compact tractors designed for efficiency in small to mid-size projects.
Apple on Thursday sent out invitations to a special event being held on Sept. 9, 2014 at 10:00 am.
Typically Apple’s events are held either at the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco or at the company’s campus, but this year is a bit different. Apple said in the invitation that the event will be held at the Flint Center for the Performing Arts in Cupertino, the city where Apple’s corporate headquarters is located.
It’s widely expected that Apple will introduce new iPhones at the event, which makes perfect sense—Apple has used the September event to launch new iPhones for a number of years now. Getting new products out in the fall sets the company up for a solid holiday shopping season, the busiest time of the year for consumers.
I will be at the event and will bring you coverage as it happens.
I’ve always like this app—nice interface and easy to use.
The Tapdaq blog:
We asked a group of independent developers the question, what frustrates you most about developing on iOS?
Their answers were thought provoking and encouraged us to write about them in detail.
Inconsistent app rejections, flagging developer accounts, long app review times and not being able to update your metadata without a new app update were all discussed.
While the focus of this article is a relatively small (50) group of developers, and the presentation is a bit scattered, there are more than a few grains of truth here to process, a collection of complaints accompanied by links to anecdotes that make the case.
Netflix lawyers just delivered this document to the FCC, arguing against Comcast’s proposed acquisition of Time Warner Cable. From the document:
Netflix attempted to address congested routes into Comcast by purchasing all available transit capacity from transit providers that did not pay access fees to Comcast—which involved agreements with Cogent, Level 3, NTT, TeliaSonera, Tata, and X0 Communications. Although all six of those providers sold transit to the entire Internet, only three of them—Cogent, Level 3, and Tata—had direct connections to Comcast’s network.
In 2013, congestion on Cogent’s and Level 3’s routes into Comcast’s network steadily increased, reaching a level where it began to affect the performance of Netflix streaming for Comcast’s subscribers. When Netflix approached Comcast regarding the lack of uncongested settlement-free routes available to its network, Comcast suggested that Netflix return to using CDNs, which Comcast could charge access fees that would then be passed on to Netflix, or use a Tier 1 network like which charged its own access fees. Comcast made clear that Netflix would have to pay Comcast an access fee if Netflix wanted to directly connect with Comcast or use third-party CDNs. In essence, Comcast sought to meter Netflix traffic requested by Comcast’s broadband subscribers.
Is it any wonder Comcast and Time Warner are the most hated companies in the US?
Shawn King fills in for Dan, Jim talks 13” iPads, The iTunes Festival and his favorite headphones!
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Hot For Teacher, I’m the One, The Full Bug, Ice Cream Man—all classics in the Van Halen catalog. Strap a jet engine to the tried-and-true blues shuffle and you get an uptempo sprint that defines the Van Halen sound. The fast and furious pace make these some of the most challenging rock songs to play on the guitar—unless you know the secrets!
Alex Vollmer is a great guitarist and I really like his lessons—they’re professional, explained clearly and very detailed. You can preview and purchase this lesson on his Web site.
REmatrix combines five individual IRs to create dense, complex and unique spaces. The reverb is then processed with an effects chain designed to add liveliness, create warmth, or even completely reshape decay and create a reverb character that cannot be obtained with any other tool.
TextExpander is a great app and the folks at Smile are among my favorite developers. If you want to help beta test the new version, you can contact them directly.
Re/code:
August Smart Lock, an electronic lock that provides keyless entry into the home, started shipping in limited quantities this week to consumers who placed orders on the company’s website.The device…lets people unlock their doors using a smartphone app (instead of a key).
The electronic lock replaces the interior portion of an existing deadbolt lock and opens whenever you, a house guest or the cleaner approaches with the right virtual key stored in the smartphone app.
The second to last sentence in the piece might be even more important/interesting and I think it is the future of any Apple wearable.
Comics Alliance:
Ever since Bloom County became a sensation in the early ’80s, Berkeley Breathed has had an incredibly varied career. He followed Bloom County‘s initial success with two more popular comic strips, Outland and Opus; he won the 1987 Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartooning; he wrote and illustrated best-selling children’s books; he adapted his own stories into a pair of animated TV specials, and he provided art for various environmental and animal-welfare charities.…and last month, he made a rare convention appearance, playing to a packed room at San Diego Comic-Con. ComicsAlliance spoke with Breathed about his career in cartooning, his work in other media, and his upcoming projects.
Along with Gary Larson of The Far Side, I devoured everything Breathed did and loved all of it. I miss Opus.
Kirk McElhearn wrote a nice little rant on the limited organization options iTunes give you when it comes to apps.
There are a few ways to view apps in iTunes. You can view in a list, or see only those apps that work on an iPhone or iPad. But that’s it; you can’t view them grouped by genre (though you can sort them by name, date, genre, etc.), or by any other way. You just get one big grid of apps.
I agree. The problem is, apps and music are two very different beasts. Music, like books, have several different handles we can use to find them. We can organize music and books by artist/author, genre, title, and purchase date, all of which work for us at one time or another.
Apps are not quite the same. One of the basic handles used for organizing apps is the icon. This works for a small collection, but is not so much for a large one. Imagine if your thousands of songs were only sortable as a big grid. Not so useful, right?
In iTunes, you can currently sort your apps by name, kind, category, date and size, the types of handles you’d expect to see in the Finder. But apps are not simply files, and they are not quite the same as music or books. For example, you likely don’t know the names of the companies that created most of your apps.
How about smart playlists for apps? You could have a playlist of apps you’ve downloaded in the past month; another for games; another for apps that you’ve rated with a certain star rating (because, hey, while I’m at it, star ratings, as for other types of media in iTunes, would be useful too), and more.
I totally agree with this. I’d also like the ability to retire apps that I purchased but know I will never use again. This one step would significantly reduce my iTunes app clutter.
Hey, where did Jim go?
The Washington Post ran this video showing a series of seven iPhone shooting tricks. Some of them were just OK, but I found a few of them to be brilliant.
Did you know you can use your headphone switch to take a picture? Combine that one with a water glass and you have a clever, albeit slightly risky way to take some underwater shots. I wonder if you could achieve the same thing with a very tall baggie.
Last week, Walmart knocked down the price of the iPhone 5c (to 97 cents – Yes, 97 cents) and the iPhone 5s ($79 with a new contract). Now T-Mobile has joined the fray, though it’s unclear if the value is the same.
Apple iPhone enthusiasts will be excited to learn several iPhones will be discounted up to $50 off Device Only pricing, for a limited time only at participating locations, beginning August 27!
Not clear what “Device Only pricing” means, though it seems likely this is to make it clear that the discount applies to the cost of the phone and not the service plan. But the discount starts today.
The Sweet Setup:
For Mac and iOS users, what are the options? We want to use free WiFi when it is available, but how do we stay secure? There are so many VPN services to help ensure your browsing is secure, but I’m going to focus on 3 for the purposes of this article.
I’ve used Cloak in the past but, for the most part, avoid doing any “serious work” on public WiFi.
The Verge:
Uber is arming teams of independent contractors with burner phones and credit cards as part of its sophisticated effort to undermine Lyft and other competitors.Interviews with current and former contractors, along with internal documents obtained by The Verge, outline the company’s evolving methods. Using contractors it calls “brand ambassadors,” Uber requests rides from Lyft and other competitors, recruits their drivers, and takes multiple precautions to avoid detection. The effort, which Uber appears to be rolling out nationally, has already resulted in thousands of canceled Lyft rides and made it more difficult for its rival to gain a foothold in new markets.
Uber calls the program “SLOG,” and it’s a previously unreported aspect of the company’s ruthless efforts to undermine its competitors.
If true, and there’s no reason to believe it’s not given previous Uber tactics, this is, at the very least embarrassing to Uber. It’s definitely sleazy.
Columbia Journalism Review’s Chris Ip interviews John Siracusa, one of the industries most respected writers. John’s OS reviews are simply epic in length and detail, but it’s also nice to see what motivates Siracusa in his reviews.
Wired:
Using clever algorithm processing, Hyperlapse makes it easy to use your phone to create tracking shots and fast, time-lapse videos that look as if they’re shot by Scorsese or Michael Mann. What was once only possible with a Steadicam or a $15,000 tracking rig is now possible on your iPhone, for free. And that’s all thanks to some clever engineering and an elegantly pared-down interaction design.
I don’t know if Hyperlapse will encourage me to shoot more video but anything that can help the queasy-inducing shake of most handheld iPhone video is a good thing.
Trend Micro:
A survey of the top 50 free apps available for download in Google Play revealed that almost 80% of the samples had fake versions. These apps span a wide range of categories in Google Play, including Business, Media & Video, and Games.
Of roughly the top 10 apps in each category in Google Play, fake versions of the following were available:
• 100% of the apps categorized under Widgets, Media & Video, and Finance
• 90% of the apps categorized under Business, Music & Audio, and Weather
• Approximately 70% of the apps categorized under Games, Books and Reference, and Live Wallpapers
Typically, a fake version of an app is created by copying the .apk file and inserting code, with the possible goal of creating malware. While there are certainly knock-offs that have made their way onto Apple’s app store, there’s a review process to prevent this sort of malware factory.
Re/code:
The tablet is doomed. It was a fad. Who needs one, anyway?At least that’s the conventional wisdom forming around the iPad and other tablets in the wake of some recent negative sales news. Apple’s iPad sales have been down in the last couple of quarters. Samsung says demand for its tablets has grown “sluggish.” Microsoft’s Surface tablet line has failed to take off.
Many commentators…argue that the tablet boom is over, and that their makers are out of ideas. Others say the tablet was supposed to replace the PC, but has failed to do so.
Maybe so. The recent sales troubles for big-name tablets are undeniable. But I think the conclusions that are being drawn from them are wrong.
I think the tablet is a terrific device.
I agree with Mossberg. I use my iPad dozens of times a day, even with a Macbook Pro within reach. And, when it comes to traveling, whether on public transit or a plane, I’m more likely to pull out the iPad than the MBP or even my iPhone.
Seattle Met:
Since the pumpkin spice latte’s inception 11 years ago, customers have ordered more than 200 million, each topped with whipped cream and a parting shake of spices. It arrives while the summer sun still beats down hot over most of the country, but a combination of masterful marketing and a fan base with the kind of obsession usually reserved for pop stars has transformed this drink into a national harbinger of fall.
Like the Mcdonald’s McRib, this is another one of those things that mystify me about the foods we eat and crave. Granted, I’ve never had a Pumpkin Spice Latte. I prefer my coffee to simply be coffee flavoured. But the excitement of so many for this drink’s arrival is fascinating. Is it marketing generated though?
Beloit College:
Students heading into their first year of college this year were generally born in 1996.Among those who have never been alive in their lifetime are Tupac Shakur, JonBenet Ramsey, Carl Sagan, and Tiny Tim.
Do not read this story unless you want to feel old.
Marco Arment:
My criteria for this review is what someone seeking good headphones today probably wants:Semi-portable, over-ear headphones — not pocketable, but should fit comfortably in a small bag; suitable for listening at your desk and bringing on an airplane, or maybe wearing outside
Closed-back design with at least moderate isolation
A straight, short cable with a 3-button clicker
The hard price cap is $400, but ideally, these should be under $300.
I’ve been thinking about new studio headphones so Marco’s review was of interest for the variety he tested if nothing else.
The Sound Blaster Roar is the epitome of audio quality, features and great looks combined into one device.
Musicality, accurate timbre, tonality, with deep, tight bass within a portable Bluetooth wireless speaker shouldn’t be a pipe dream. Creative Labs boasts of defying these laws of acoustic engineering with their Sound Blaster Roar.
Through their innovative acoustic chamber design with an impressive 5-driver speaker setup consisting of 2 amplifiers and 1 built-in subwoofer, the Roar proves that it is possible to have powerful, balanced, and well-defined sound with heart-thumping bass from a device no larger than a booklet. All this, without sacrificing battery performance.
Not just a wireless speaker, the Roar also comes integrated with a whole host of useful features:
The #1 Amazon bestselling Sound Blaster Roar has received consistent 5-star reviews on Amazon since its launch. Now available, at an attractive price of $149.99 via Creative.com and Amazon.com.
