I downloaded this tonight and really like it.

Apple and Google are both bitter competitors and sometime partners in the smartphone business, but that hasn’t stopped the search giant from looking to the computer company’s legendary and late cofounder for inspiration.

How is it that Google feels its entitled to steal elements of Java and get away with it. No matter how you look at it, that’s an asshole move.

AB InBev routinely adds extra water to its finished products to produce malt beverages with significantly less alcohol content than displayed on its labels, Thomas and Gerald Greenberg said in a complaint filed yesterday in federal court in Philadelphia. The company’s exaggeration of the alcohol content violates Pennsylvania’s consumer protection statutes, according to the complaint.

It’s about time.

I don’t think Yahoo’s primary problem is with remote workers – I think it’s with craptastic managers.

Google’s Andy Rubin denies his company is working on its own retail stores:

A few years ago, consumers needed to touch and feel devices, but these days they can often get the information they need to make a purchase decision by talking to friends and reading reviews.

“They don’t have to go in the store and feel it anymore,” Rubin said, during a roundtable with reporters at Mobile World Congress on Tuesday.

That’s absolutely true. Nobody goes to Apple retail stores to get some time with the new products, nobody at all. Those stores are basically empty all the time. Rubin is TOTALLY right.

Moron.

“Apple has [become] more flexible, paying more attention to everyone else, probably a little less arrogant than they used to be,” France Telecom-Orange CEO Stephane Richard said during a dinner with reporters in Barcelona on Monday. Characterizing today’s Apple with the same company under Steve Jobs, Richard said, “I think they are probably a little more under pressure, and it is quite nice.”

If you like the sound of Orange amplifiers, this collection is a must-have.

This quarter’s report showed a clear preference for iOS devices, which accounted for 77 percent of all activations and captured eight of the top ten spots on the most popular device list this quarter. While Android activations dropped 6.3 percent as compared to Q4 2011, they still accounted for 22.7 percent of all activations for the quarter, which were primarily driven by Android tablets. Windows Phone devices came in a distant third for the quarter, capturing just 0.5 percent of overall activations.

The iPhone 5 was the most popular device activated in Q4 2012.

Perhaps I’m biased but I believe the only cure for discouragement is dissatisfaction. That it is a key ingredient, perhaps the key ingredient, to success.

Great views from Patrick Rhone. I agree.

Apple is catching up with iMac demand.

Rene Ritchie compares six podcast apps for iPhone users. Personally, I use Apple’s podcast app.

With another 2 billion people hooking up to the Internet in the next five years, there’s plenty of room for another mobile operating system, Mozilla Chief Executive Gary Kovacs said today in a sales pitch for his new Firefox OS.

Mozilla’s lined up a dozen and a half carriers and handset makes including LG and Huawei to build devices based on the Firefox OS.

Marco is doing a great job with The Magazine.

Two of my favorite things in the world when I was a kid were video games and the illustrator Edward Gorey. Gorey’s surrealistic and gothic illustrations and books combined humor and dark subjects. If you’re not familiar with his published works, but you’re of a certain age, you may remember the opening animation he made for PBS’s “Mystery” series.

One of Gorey’s most famous works is the Gashlycrumb Tinies, an alphabet book that tells the story of how 26 children met their untimely end, in couplets. It’s ghoulish and hilarious. (“A is for Amy, who fell down the stairs. B is for Basil, assaulted by bears.”)

It’s also the inspiration for a series of illustrations created by Brentalfloss, Dan Roth and Andrew Dobson called “The Game Over Tinies.” It’s equally hilarious, but instead of children, it’s characters from video games ranging from Super Mario Bros. to Street Fighter. The entire set is available for pre-order as a poster, too.

(Special thanks to my favorite person in the world, my wife Bonnie, for finding this.)

This is really cool. Great tools.

This is the first in a series of articles Bryan Chaffin is doing looking at Apple’s board members and what they bring to the company.

Om Malik:

Apple is enamored with China — and rightfully so. However, in not paying attention to India, it has allowed world’s second-largest mobile market to become a mostly Android phenomenon, leaving upper end of the market to Samsung. Wrong strategy, if you ask me.

The difference between the first exploit and this one is how it can make the iPhone screen go black, allowing an attacker to plug the device into a computer via USB and access the user’s data without having their PIN or passcode credentials.

I don’t know how they find this stuff, but Apple has to get this fixed.

Although App.net has had only paid account tiers thus far, we initially conceived of App.net as a freemium service. It took some time to get to this point, but we are now ready to make this vision a reality.

I admit that the charm of App.net has passed me by; I’ve never subscribed, because I just didn’t see the point. But I know that price was holding some people back. So if you don’t mind living with the limitations (“free” users can only follow 40 users and have limits on storage and upload rates), now may be the time. Only one catch: You have to get an invite from a paid App.net user.

Speaking of Joy of Tech, this is priceless.

“This business has not been in a state of transition like it is right now since the video game crash of the ’80s,” Bleszinski said. “I really think we’re in a massive state of turmoil.”

Cliff Bleszinski is formerly the design director for Epic Games. He’s been influential in the design and development of the Unreal franchise as well as Gears of War.

CaptureNotes 2 for iPad is the full featured notetaking and audio recording application that provides users with the ability to write, type, Flag audio with markers and annotate PDFs during classes or meetings. Launching soon, CaptureAudio delivers more than a simple voice recording app, bringing the unique Flag marking feature of CaptureNotes to the iPhone. Notebooks are easily shared among team members. Likewise, recorded audio sessions can conveniently be shared between the two Apps, supporting both iPhone and iPad users!

CaptureNotes 2 & CaptureAudio are brought to you by G8R Software.

Another funny comic from The Joy of Tech.

Twitter says its users like the ad experience. Ben Brooks doesn’t agree.

I’ve been using Shazam since it first came out and love it. The company also said a new version for the iPad would be available in the coming weeks with an improved layout.

Harry Marks takes on John Siracusa and his recent comments about watching Netflix’s “House of Cards.”

Horace Dediu takes an interesting look at Apple’s retail openings as it relates to the company’s sales and growth.

LG now claims complete ownership of the webOS source code, its documentation and webOS websites. It has obtained HP licenses, as well as the patents that Palm transferred to its owner when it was acquired in 2010.

LG will use the OS for its smart TVs.