Tony Fadell:

This decision wasn’t made on a whim – Google has been in the mix in some way or another for about three years of our almost four-year history. In fact, my first meeting with Google as a Nester was before we’d launched. At the 2011 TED Conference, Erik Charlton and I huddled in a corner with Sergey Brin to show him a video and an early model of the Nest Learning Thermostat – he instantly got what we were doing and so did the rest of the Google team when we showed them. In May 2011, Google Ventures led our Series B round of financing, and in 2012, Series C. Time and time again, Googlers have shown themselves to be incredibly like-minded, supportive and as big of dreamers as we are. I know that joining Google will be an easy transition because we’re partnering with a company that gets what we do and who we are at Nest –and wants us to stay that way.

Best of luck. Continue making great products, you’ll be successful.

Great tip. I knew that tapping the power button on an incoming call silenced the ringer. I did NOT know that a double-tap sent the call directly to voicemail. And one more: tap the power button to lock the screen. Nice.

Washington Post:

Consider this, then, a collection of maps meant to inspire your inner map nerd. I’ve searched far and wide for maps that can reveal and surprise and inform in ways that the daily headlines might not, with a careful eye for sourcing and detail.

Maps have always fascinated me and the ones pictured here cover the span from “Cool!” to “Oh, that’s not good.”

TIME:

A gigantic percentage of what makes the trek to Vegas worthwhile for those 150,000 participants is what I think of as Shadow CES — the show beyond the show, largely carried on behind closed doors.

The average encounter at Shadow CES is probably more interesting than the average CES one, for several reasons.

I’d venture to say more deals are made and more meaningful work is done at “Shadow CES” than on the actual show floor of CES.

Quartz:

Given that CES has become the preferred exhibition venue for a burgeoning category of advanced home technologies, why is there such a total absence of disruptive toilet innovation at the show?

I want my Internet of Things Toilet!

Ah fuck!

ESPN:

Seismologists say Seahawks fans shook the ground under Seattle’s CenturyLink Field during Saturday’s defeat of the New Orleans Saints, causing another fan-generated earthquake.

The scientists believe the small earthquake during a Marshawn Lynch touchdown was likely greater than Lynch’s famous “beast quake” touchdown run three years ago, which also came against New Orleans during a playoff game.

I went to a couple of Seahawks games in the late nineties in the old Kingdome and even though the team sucked, the fans loved to make noise.

Fast Company:

Samsung’s program known as “White Glove.” It’s a marketing effort designed to convert Apple-slinging celebrities and business influencers into Samsung evangelists. When Beyoncé whips out her phone on the street in Brooklyn, Korea’s largest business conglomerate wants the paparazzi to see that she’s playing Words With Friends on a Samsung.

The White Glove program is a cross between the social marketing of Tupperware parties (minus the pressure to buy something), the house calls of Mormon missionaries (minus the pressure to give up smoking), and the persistence of Green Eggs and Ham–but for gadgets.

It may seem like a lot of time, energy and money on Samsung’s part but, for better or worse, celebrities are “influencers”. And before you knock the program, keep in mind this is something else Apple has done that Samsung has copied. Apple’s program in the Nineties was called “Apple Masters“.

Quartz:

My wife and I had 12 children over the course of 15 1/2 years. Today, our oldest is 37 and our youngest is 22. I have always had a very prosperous job and enough money to give my kids almost anything. But my wife and I decided not to.

I will share with you the things that we did, but first let me tell you the results: All 12 of my children have college degrees (or are in school), and we as parents did not pay for it.

Congratulations to the Thompson family. Maybe not a blueprint for everyone but there are some good ideas in the article for new parents.

This is a big deal.

> In a decision that could reshape the rules for online consumer reviews, a Virginia court has ruled that the popular website Yelp must turn over the names of seven reviewers who anonymously criticized a prominent local carpet cleaning business. Experience top-notch carpet cleaning Dublin services with Eco Clean Solutions.

> The case revolves around negative feedback against Virginia-based Hadeed Carpet Cleaning. The owner, Joe Hadeed, said the users leaving bad reviews were not real customers of the cleaning service — something that would violate Yelp’s terms of service. His attorneys issued a subpoena demanding the names of seven anonymous reviewers, and a judge in Alexandria ruled that Yelp had to comply.

Should a person have the right to post an anonymous review critical of a business? Does the business have the right to the identity of that reviewer?

The court decided that a person has the right to post a negative review, if that is their opinion. But the business has the right to verify that the reviewer was indeed a customer. If not, then this is no longer opinion, but a false claim, and the reviewer’s comments are not protected by the First Amendment.

This is an important precedent.

In addition to posting its new TV ad last night, Apple also detailed on its Web site the stories shown in the ad.

Much respect beard.

I recorded a podcast last week with Charles Perry and Joe Cieplinski talking about The Loop Magazine and Newsstand.

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Great looking conference and a good price too.

The dial tone is another example of something that will disappear with the next generation. I found this interesting, though.

On the new exchanges in the Bell System, though, users were more likely to run into glitches: More efficient network systems were vulnerable to spikes in traffic. After the company finally adopted the automatic-dial technology in 1919 — a telephone-operator strike in Boston that year seems to have hastened the change of heart — customers sometimes had to wait for a connection. If they started dialing too soon, some pulses would be lost, and they would get a wrong number. By instructing people to hold for a dial tone, Bell System engineers solved that problem. The buzzing sound was also reassuring. “The dial tone is the equipment’s way of telling you that it’s ready to put through your call,” explained an instructional film called “Dial Comes to Town.” “It’s the same as an operator saying, ‘Number, please?’ ”

Multitouch gestures are an important part of iOS. The iRing expands gesture detection beyond the screen. As the software that brings gesture detection to life gets better, I expect we’ll see more of these hardware assistive devices. Just as the Xbox One and PS4 use a camera to aid in gesture detection, the iRing helps the user communicate with music software.

iRing was demoed using an app called “iRing Music Maker,” which lets users set grooves, synthesizers, loops, filters and more with just two rings.

In the setup we tested, the triangular-patterned ring attached one hand and controlled grooves and tones by “pushing and pulling” along the z-axis, toward and away from the iPad’s camera. The second ring with linear dots was worn on our other hand and triggered loops and different notes in the same way. All control was accomplished without ever touching the device.

I wonder if a watch can be used to aid in gesture detection. I’m sure someone is looking into this.

Here’s hoping this is even remotely as great as Breaking Bad. Check out Saul’s website here. Heh.

The US Supreme Court will consider an appeal of a lawsuit brought by the four major US broadcast networks against Aereo, Inc.. Aereo uses antennae to capture the local broadcast signals of the major networks, then places the recorded programs on-line.

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to consider a lawsuit brought by the nation’s largest TV broadcasters against Aereo, the upstart streaming video service, lays the foundation for a landmark verdict that could have important implications for Internet streaming, cloud computing, and the future of the TV industry itself. Aereo has infuriated the major broadcasters because the two-year-old startup pays nothing to pick up their free, over-the-air TV signals, which it then sends to its customers over the Internet.

Aereo, which launched in February 2012 after raising more than $20 million from media mogul Barry Diller’s Internet conglomerate IAC, uses thousands of tiny, dime-sized antennas to pick up free, over-the-air TV signals, which it sends to customers via the Internet for $8 to $12 per month. Aereo’s users technically lease the tiny antennas, which are housed in nearby “antenna farms.” In New York, Aereo’s antennas are located in a warehouse in Brooklyn with a direct line of sight to the Empire State Building, the city’s tallest broadcast transmission tower.

Shortly after it launched, Aereo was sued by the major broadcasting titans, including NBC, FOX, ABC and CBS. The broadcasters say that Aereo’s service amounts to blatant theft, because the company doesn’t pay retransmission fees. Federal courts in New York and Boston, however, have thus far agreed with Aereo’s argument that it is transmitting “private performances” to individual users over their own leased antennas, not copyright-protected “public performances.”

Here’s Aereo’s side of the story.

As is the case with most kickstarts, if you make a donation, you get something in return.

I have been going through boxes that have lain unpacked for decades, and found some treasures. They are treasures to me personally, things I want to share with my fans because I want them to be with people and not in some storage unit.

If you are a fan of Rickie Lee Jones, take a look. There’s various tour memorabilia, a chance for your name in the liner notes, clothing, and instruments. To me, the coolest item is a songwriting workshop.

I’ll be watching. Not a fan of awards shows, but a big fan of Amy Poehler, Tina Fey, and Woody Allen.

[via AppleInsider]

The Teo padlock is different. It uses an L-shaped locking bracket (rather than the traditional U-shaped bracket everyone is used to). And it uses Bluetooth Low Energy (BTLE) so you can unlock the padlock from your phone. An obvious idea, perhaps, but the devil is in the details, and in the software.

I’m looking forward to seeing the actual pricing. Note that a note alongside the $39 pledge says “Your investment has earned you the purchase of your first TEO at distributor pricing.” To me, that sounds like they are aiming for a retail price, upwards of $100 per lock. That’s not unreasonable, I suppose.

Homes and Hues:

These seventeen bookcases and bookshelves can clear away the cluttery piles of books you may have laying around while adding some extra style to your home.

I’m a big fan of books and therefore, of bookshelves. Most of these designs are actually available (if expensive) and not just design concepts.

Failblog:

“Hey. Can we use your pool? There’s a moose in ours…”

Happens all the time in Canada.