This is an app I’ve had on my iPhone since the very first version. It was just updated a couple of days ago and is still great.

One of the things missing out of AC/DC coming to iTunes was their concert videos. They are now available.

Jim and Dan discuss the iPad and iPad Mini sales, their favorite text editors, the great London beer flood of 1814 and more.

Definitely worth a read.

This would be great to see in 2013.

Cecilia Kang, The Washington Post:

The federal government on Wednesday announced a landmark update to child online privacy laws, establishing guidelines that make it harder to track a gadget-obsessed generation with constant access to the Web.

The FTC’s announcement makes changes to the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), which was passed in 1998 and obviously needs to be radically altered to fit the generational changes that have happened with technology use since then.

According to the report, new amendments require firms to seek permission from parents to collect information about their children, including photos, videos, and geolocation info. The intent is to close loopholes that have heretofore allowed social media services to collect personal information about children without a parental notice.

James Brightman, GamesIndustry:

The Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences (AIAS) announced today that Infocom co-founders Dave Lebling and Marc Blank will be receiving the 2013 AIAS Pioneer Award, presented to them by Steve Meretzky, vice president of game design at Playdom, during the 16th DICE Awards on Thursday, Feb. 7, 2013 at The Joint in the Hard Rock Resort and Casino Las Vegas.

Zork introduced adventure gaming to the first generation of personal computer owners, and Infocom, the company that published it, built a business out of the now nearly forgotten computer genre of interactive fiction: games that eschew graphics in favor of the written word.

I dearly loved Zork and the many other games Infocom published – funny, challenging and wonderfully immersive games that emphasized using your creativity, imagination and puzzle-solving skills to win. It’s great to see Lebling and Blank receive this industry honor.

By the way, if you’re a fan of interactive fiction and you haven’t already seen it, check out Get Lamp, a wonderful documentary about this very subject.

Asbury & Asbury:

But there’s a writing angle to the whole thing that needs some airing. The whole story is already being co-opted as a case study in the importance of clear communication and getting the tone right. This worries me, because that’s exactly what it isn’t, at least not in the way that’s being suggested.

A writerly breakdown of Instagram’s recent communications that should give pause to anyone watching this story.

A little history on Jenny from Wikipedia:

“867-5309/Jenny” is a song written by Alex Call and Jim Keller and performed by Tommy Tutone that was released on the album Tommy Tutone 2, on the Columbia Records label. It peaked at #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and #1 on the Billboard Top Tracks chart in 1982 (see 1982 in music). Co-writer Call came up with both “Jenny” and the telephone number and completed the song with Keller.

The song caused a fad of people dialing 867-5309 and asking for “Jenny”.

Now some people got the famous Jenny phone number and are recording the messages that come in.

This is an article from earlier this year, but it’s also something I’ve talked about on Amplified. The cabinet speaker is a very important part of your tone. It’s an interesting read.

Mark Zuckerberg at Facebook and Andrew Mason at Groupon almost made the list, but escaped.

GamePolitics:

Blizzard has banned “several thousand” Diablo III players for using bots, according to this Battle.net forum thread. In announcing the bans, Blizzard said that these kinds of acts (using cheats and exploits) are “undermining the spirit of fair play,” and that the company plans to release new tools in the early part of 2013 that make it easier for players to report bad player behavior and cheating to Blizzard.

Good news for Diablo III players who are frustrated by other gamers who are clearly taking advantage.

Apple Inc. (AAPL)’s iPhone didn’t violate patent rights owned by Google Inc. (GOOG)’s Motorola Mobility for a sensor that prevents accidental hang-ups, a U.S. International Trade Commission judge said today.

Faruk Ateş:

Furthermore, once you sell to a frequently-criticized juggernaut like Facebook, users’ expectations change from supportive to skeptic, and, especially because of Facebook’s long history of privacy-related mishaps, you may very well lose all benefit of the doubt amongst some of your users.

It’s amazing that Instagram would allow the language in the privacy policy to go through. That’s just plain stupid.

Kevin Systrom, the co-founder of Instagram, posted his thoughts on the recent privacy policy changes and promises the company is listening.

Nilay Patel takes a look at the privacy policies of some of our favorite online services.

The Verge:

Hollywood insider Franklin Leonard this week released his annual Black List — a collection of the year’s best unproduced screenplays. Compiled based on insights from more than 290 film executives, this year’s list includes plenty of time-bending, apocalyptic, and sci-fi scripts.

The Publisher of The Loop hates “Best of…” lists but I find this one fascinating. As the compiler of the list says, “The Black List is not a “best of ” list. It is, at best, a “most liked” list.” It will be interesting to see which of these get turned into full fledged movies.

Jordan Golson:

Brazilian electronics maker IGB Electronica SA has announced a new line of Android phones under the IPHONE brand, a trademark that was originally applied for in Brazil in 2000.

Bartley now models Amazon selling just 6 million units this quarter of the Fire, down from 8 million previously, and 10.5 million for all of 2013, down from 12.5 million previously. While his investigation of the supply chain last month suggest component orders had risen for both October and November by double digits, he now thinks total Q4 component orders fell by more than 20%.

And

Writes Bartley, “Although weak Kindle Fire de- mand is potentially positive for profitability, it does imply that Amazon is still struggling to compete against Apple (AAPL), and may even be seeing competition from Google.

Amazon is selling its products at cost or even below cost. The more products they sell, the more money they lose. I’ve said it before — I don’t believe this is a sustainable or a wise strategy.

Seriously love this piece of software. In fact, I’m writing this post using MarsEdit and I never have to look at the WordPress backend.

The Posse Monitor System is a hard-wired headphone amplifier system that incorporates multiple inputs, and various additional features, for musicians to hear themselves while performing.

A hard-wired system is more cost-effective and, for more stationary players (drummers, keyboardists, etc.), the less wireless – the better. It is simply not necessary to go wireless if you don’t have to.

A Quick Rundown of the Concept

For musicians, the use of both custom-molded and universal fit in-the-ear type personal monitors (sometimes called “IEM” or “PMS” systems) is now mainstream for performing live on every level. They allow the performers to hear themselves, the other musicians, any loops or click tracks, and even the audience in some cases.

With high-quality earphones, you also need some type of headphone amplifier – wireless or hard-wired – to get the audio from the sound mixer to the performers’ personal monitors. Enter the Posse Monitor System. For me, as with all audio, the sound quality was my first concern. In this case, the product does a good job sonically, but has a few minor issues in other areas that could stand improvement in order to make this device more appealing.

How Is Posse Different?

The Posse Monitor System does several things that other headphone amplifiers do not. The package includes all of the essential items to get your monitors up and running right out of the box – even a basic set of generic ear buds – but a bit of finesse is required to make proper use of it all. The amp section, satellite mixer, line and mic level inputs, and belt-pack attenuator (for volume to the earphones and their connector) are relatively small, like most headphone amps. A nice extra feature is the on-board tuner at the top of the satellite mixer.

Whether you have a mono, stereo, or no feed at all from your monitor or front of house mixer, you can make use of the Posse system. However, for all of its features, finding the best mix involves allowing yourself the necessary setup time over and above a regular sound check. The Posse also has both a set of stereo condenser mics on the satellite controller as well as an additional mini-gooseneck mono condenser microphone.

While these mics sound surprisingly good, too much level on either or both of these is nothing more than a lot of noise. While the idea of having ambience is one of personal preference, it may add more noise and only clutter your mix while affecting the equalization, as well. Use them sparingly, if at all. Those performers using multiple drivers in their earphones may find the gooseneck mic especially bright and harsh, but it can be very nice with warmer instruments like an acoustic piano.

In Use

I used the Posse Monitor System while performing several shows in venues ranging from a local music club to a full sized amphitheater. I also discussed the product with two touring artists who’ve used this system; singer/songwriter Maia Sharp (who did a video testimonial for Posse that conveys her thoughts), and Matt Crowning who plays drums for country artist, Amber Leigh, to get their thoughts.

Both Matt and I felt the best results came from only listening to the stereo mix from the dual XLR inputs. A good mix sounds clean and has very low distortion. The headroom is there for even 32-Ohm dynamic drivers that we both use from our custom Future Sonics Ear Monitors. Having the satellite controller clipped to a short microphone stand offered plenty of control and smooth old-school style rotary knobs.

What is especially nice about this system is how well it migrates from the big stage to the small club so easily. In particular, vocalists at the front of the stage can split their instrument and voice before it goes to the P.A. mixer by connecting directly in the Posse’s inputs on the belt box and satellite mixer. This lets you send those to your mix, on their own control knobs, while still allowing the signal to get to the main mixing console(s). While this is great for some situations, having a great monitor mix first is still a better option.

What Could Improve?

The biggest source of frustration with the Posse Monitor System is its lack of tactile appeal. In particular, the power and tuner buttons are flimsy and the opposite configuration of what you might expect in that “out” is the on position. The construction seems solid, but not rugged enough for serious road dog life. In addition, there is a conspicuous lack of any level metering and, on a larger production situation, what the monitor mixer sends can easily distort if you do not know what you’re doing. Luckily for me, I do, and the sound was very good quality.

Two nice additions would be a simple: a basic variable low-pass filter to avoid the bite of too much high end frequencies from the ambient mics and a bass boost for use with armature loaded earphones for more low-end response. Perhaps a more upscale edition of the Posse could offer some refinements that would make the “weekend warrior” musicians feel like they might come closer to winning the battle of the monitors more often.

How’s It Stand Up to The Competition?

In comparison to other hard-wired headphone amplifiers including a Whirlwind PA-1, Shure FP22, Shure P6HW, Rolls PM55, and the headphone output of a small Mackie mixer tested, the Posse sounded fuller with far more headroom, and had a lower noise floor. The Posse system has far more configuration options for both input and output.

The Encore

At the start, this is a good sounding headphone amplifier. For a solo, duo, or band with a great monitor engineer, this is a great option for that purpose. If you are on your own and need some ambience, or aren’t sure about the condition of the traditional monitors in a venue, having so much ability in a compact system like this is fantastic, but be sure you have the time to build your basic mix first. Get that right before adding yourself, your instrument, or the ambient mics into your mix and you will find that less is more. You’ll have great results no matter what the venue.

It’s interesting to see what other people use to get their work done. Patrick Rhone posted some of his favorites.

Jordan Koschei for The Industry:

Social media is not a public utility. Using Instagram is not a right. When you begin using these services, you enter a legally binding contact with them, defined in the Terms of Service. Clicking “I agree” without reading that document is insanely irresponsible — you could be selling your soul without even realizing it. In the cases of Facebook and Instagram, you already have.

If you don’t read the terms of service before starting your legal relationship with a website, that’s fine. But you forfeit your ability to complain about the terms — the contract under whose authority you’ve voluntarily placed yourself — without sounding completely foolish.

Civic education is in a sorry state, not only in the United States but in democratic societies around the world. The fact that anyone thinks they can copy-and-paste a paragraph of legalese to their Facebook status and thus alter their legal standing on Facebook indicates we have a lot of work to do.

My friend and Angry Mac Bastards podcasting cohost John C. Welch boils it down to this:

When using a service, ask yourself two questions:

1) How am I paying for this

2) What’s the product

If the answer to 1 is “nothing”, then the answer to 2 tends to be “you”.

(Hat tip to Jared Erondu for the link.)

Neil Hughes for AppleInsider:

However, the poll did indicate that the iPad mini is currently attracting slightly fewer new users than the full-size 9.7-inch iPad. While 47 percent of iPad mini buyers said they were new to the platform, 56 percent of those buying a 9.7-inch iPad were new customers.

Huberty said these numbers show her that the cannibalization risk Apple faces with the iPad mini is “manageable.”

Morgan Stanley polled 1,000 U.S. consumers to come up with the data.

Other interesting info suggests that Apple’s still got the strongest retention rate in the tablet business – 81 percent of iPad customers plan to stay with Apple.

FOSS Patents:

Judge Lucy Koh, the federal judge presiding over the Apple v. Samsung litigation in the Northern District of California, just entered two important post-trial orders. Within minutes of each other, the first order denied Apple a permanent injunction against Samsung despite a multiplicity of infringement findings by a federal jury in August and the second order denied Samsung a new trial on the grounds of alleged jury misconduct (the court won’t even hold an evidentiary hearing on that issue, which most observers considered a long shot).

Paul Mozur for the Wall Street Journal:

But more than 15 workers on the Shenzhen campus said in interviews that they work more than the legal limit of nine overtime hours a week. A majority said they work 10 to 15 overtime hours and would prefer more, having left their distant homes to make money in this southern Chinese boomtown on the border of Hong Kong.

“More than 15” makes me scratch my head: Any two-digit number is an insignificant percentage of Foxconn’s estimated one million employees. But there’s no denying that left to their own devices, some Hon Hai employees would undoubtedly prefer to work more overtime and get more pay. They’re coming from far away for the opportunity to sock money away for their future life.

The rest of the article shows that Hon Hai is starting to have the same problems that American manufacturers have coped with for decades: needing to accommodate workers interested in a better work/life balance; needing to accommodate the customs of ethnic minorities and offering better benefits to keep their skilled workers.

David Sparks:

Imagine yourself making a presentation with nothing but your iPad in hand. You’re not chained to the podium or sitting behind a desk. You are roaming like a lion, and you are awesome. For the cost of an Apple TV and an AirPort Express (just 200 bucks), you too can get some lion-like tendencies.