Great tip from Gabe Weatherhead. I didn’t know you could do this.

I like Native Instruments’ products, so there is no reason not to give it a try. I downloaded it.

STOP IT! Pay the money and go away you thieving bastards.

The iPhone 5s came in in third place overall, behind Nelson Mandela and Paul Walker. Among smartphones, though, Apple’s iPhone 5s took the top spot, beating out the Galaxy S4 for the most searched-for handset. The iPhone 5c took third place, followed by the HTC One and Google’s Nexus 5.

Impressive.

I hate when companies do stuff like this.

Dustin Curtis:

The best way to predict the future is to think about desire. The problem with desire is that it tends to be bounded by what’s actually possible; as we grow older, our imaginations seem to develop artificial caps that limit our ideas to things that are reasonably achievable in the short term. But who cares about what is reasonable? Here’s what I want.

Yes, far fetched, but if you’re going to dream, dream big.

Samsung is said to be planning its own Apple-like retail push across the U.S., as the company recently hired an ex-Apple senior store designer, according to a new report.

Why the fuck not, they copied everything else Apple did.

Steven Aquino:

From a pure design perspective, aesthetically speaking, it’s perfectly reasonable to criticize the new shapes. They are indeed ugly, but the overall importance of this new addition trumps the way in which they’re presented. That is to say, regardless of how the buttons look, the sheer fact that they add a level of desprately-needed contrast makes the buttons a huge usability win, and likely — rightfully — will garner much praise from the visually impaired segment of the accessibility community.

Designers need to remember this when criticizing the new button shapes.

This looks like a nice stand. It’s inexpensive too.

Anthony Stauffer:

I created the Slight Return lessons to share what I’ve learned from this song over the past 18 years. I’ve taken the major themes that Stevie used when he played it, and distilled it into three different solos – beginner, intermediate, and advanced. These lessons will allow you to start working on this style of soloing, no matter what skill level you’re at.

I really like Anthony’s lessons. This is a paid lesson, but there are plenty of free videos available too.

The Loop Magazine 2.1 was released today with a few significant changes including:

• Push notifications for new issues including background download
• App now remembers your previous location
• Improved sharing
• Cover art will change with each issue on your device
• Bug fixes

The update is free and is available from the App Store.

Looking Up:

There’s something special about the quality of sound when it snows. Those who live in parts of the world that experience snowfall know it well — an eerie, muted stillness that you hear from your bed, which betrays the season’s first snowflakes before you fling open the curtains in excitement.

Thos of us lucky enough to live where it snows are familiar with this phenomenon. Knowing why it happens doesn’t detract from the wonder of it. Thanks to Jeff Carlson for the link.

The Verge:

“At Target we focus on offering our guests a wide assortment of physical CDs, and when a new album is available digitally before it is available physically, it impacts demand and sales projections.” a spokesperson said to Billboard.

Waah…

Buzzfeed:

In early 2014, a series of devastating catastrophes bring about Armageddon. Papers of record like the New York Times soberly report this news.

Utterly hilarious. Thanks to Ian Betteridge for the link.

Apple released its “Best of 2013” list this morning, naming the top apps, music, podcasts, TV shows and movies in the App Store. I’m very proud to say that The Loop Magazine was chosen as one of the top magazines in Newsstand.

Thank you.

This is a pretty big deal.

“A quarter of a million people traverse Market Street every day, from all walks of life,” Mayor Ed Lee said of the new Wi-Fi service. “Now they can access information, find out when their next bus is coming, or peruse local job listings, all for free. This is a significant first step in my vision of connectivity for our city.”

If San Francisco somehow achieves its goals of free wi-fi for the entire city, cable and phone companies that serve the city will no doubt take a huge hit. I suspect that the rate of cord-cutting (people who drop cable and get the majority of their media-related services from the net) will increase dramatically. Cell phone data plans will become unnecessary. Free alternatives to for-pay cell and land-line phone, TV, and, of course, internet will be available.

I can only imagine the gnashing of teeth going on inside Comcast headquarters as they read this news.

The term Genetically Modified Food (or GMO) often produces a knee-jerk reaction in people. There are certainly causes for concern about the impact the foods have on our systems and on the farming ecosystem. But this article from MiT Technology Review focuses on the need for GMOs to feed the coming generations. Fascinating article.

Infographics are all the rage these days. If you’re looking for a great way to go viral through social media, you can’t do much better than an entertaining infographic. Our friends at MightyDeals are having an awesome deal for 35 infographic templates which you can download and customize as needed. Discounted over 50% for a limited time only. See the templates here.

Dylan Seeger put more into rethinking BlackBerry than the company has. This is certainly worth a read.

A directory of direct links to delete your account from web services.

Great idea.

Monday Note:

Randall Stephenson, AT&T’s CEO, predicts the end of subsidies because “wireless operators can no longer afford to suck up the costs of customers’ devices”.

I don’t know if Stephenson is speaking out of cultural deafness or cynicism, but he’s obscuring the point: There is no subsidy. Carriers extend a loan that users pay back as part of the monthly service payment. Like any loan shark, the carrier likes its subscriber to stay indefinitely in debt, to always come back for more, for a new phone and its ever-revolving payments stream.

Lots of interesting tidbits in this piece and it’s interesting to see how many media outlets unquestioningly repeated Stephenson stupid “end of subsidies” comment.

Boston Bruins’ Milan Lucic attacked in his hometown of Vancouver:

“That’s one of the worst parts, it’s in my hometown,” he said. “Going back to the spray painting of the church and my grandparents and parents and family getting harassed during the [Stanley Cup] finals against the Canucks in 2011, and now it’s escalated to a point where I get attacked for just minding my own business. I have no reason left to defend my city and then the people of my city. I’m just disgusted and outraged that it had to come to something like that. As far as that goes, other than being at Rogers Arena, no one will ever see me in downtown Vancouver ever again.”

Vancouver is just crazy. They riot when they lose the Stanley Cup and now they attack one of their hometown hockey players. The city is an embarrassment.

Update: I mistakenly said that the city rioted after the Olympics, but they didn’t.

Mental Floss:

“Yes, Sir, this is Colonel Shoup,” he barked.

Nothing but silence in response.

“Sir? This is Colonel Shoup,” he said.

Silence again.

“Sir? Can you read me alright?”

Finally, a soft voice on the other end.

“Are you really Santa Claus?” a little girl asked.

I love this story and delighted in telling it to my “new” 12 year old. She knew NORAD tracked Santa but she didn’t know why.

Macworld:

I left Facebook nearly four years ago because of its casual attitude toward its users’ privacy and nothing I’ve seen since has convinced me that this was a mistake. So, I sympathise. Fortunately, it’s easy to leave.

How much you want to bet we find out at some point in the future Facebook hasn’t actually deleted your account – they’ve just made it so you can’t see it any more?

There’s no guarantee this will work, but sometimes it’s the last thing you think of that works.

If you ever wanted to know how to do something with Safari on iOS, you should read Rene Ritchie’s guide.

I’ll admit, I haven’t even heard of some of these.

An interesting path to low cost housing. Only question that leaps to mind is, where would we build them? Still, an idea worth exploring.