June 29, 2012
Puppy food comas ∞
You have to love these pups.
iPhone turns 5: Here are the naysayers
Everyone is writing about the iPhone’s birthday today and how much it changed the industry. That’s all true, but I thought I’d take a different approach and look at some of the iPhone naysayers so we could make fun of them together. This list was actually compiled in 2008 by MacDailyNews, but here are a few of my favorites.
November 16, 2006, Palm CEO, Ed Colligan
“We’ve learned and struggled for a few years here figuring out how to make a decent phone. PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They’re not going to just walk in.”
December 07, 2006, CNET, Michael Kanellos
“Apple is slated to come out with a new phone… And it will largely fail…. Sales for the phone will skyrocket initially. However, things will calm down, and the Apple phone will take its place on the shelves with the random video cameras, cell phones, wireless routers and other would-be hits… When the iPod emerged in late 2001, it solved some major problems with MP3 players. Unfortunately for Apple, problems like that don’t exist in the handset business. Cell phones aren’t clunky, inadequate devices. Instead, they are pretty good. Really good.”
December 08, 2006, Morningstar analyst, Rod Bare
“The economics of something like [an Apple iPhone] aren’t that compelling.”
January 15, 2007, Bloomberg, Matthew Lynn
“The iPhone is nothing more than a luxury bauble that will appeal to a few gadget freaks. In terms of its impact on the industry, the iPhone is less relevant… Apple is unlikely to make much of an impact on this market… Apple will sell a few to its fans, but the iPhone won’t make a long-term mark on the industry.”
January 17, 2007, Microsoft CEO, Steve Ballmer
“[Apple’s iPhone] is the most expensive phone in the world and it doesn’t appeal to business customers because it doesn’t have a keyboard which makes it not a very good email machine… So, I, I kinda look at that and I say, well, I like our strategy. I like it a lot.”
January 18, 2007, Microsoft Senior Marketing Director, Richard Sprague
“I can’t believe the hype being given to iPhone… I just have to wonder who will want one of these things (other than the religious faithful)… So please mark this post and come back in two years to see the results of my prediction: I predict they will not sell anywhere near the 10M Jobs predicts for 2008.”
Indev email tools ∞
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BlackBerry ASP falls 17 percent in 90 days ∞
Matt Richman takes a look at how far the average selling price (ASP) has fallen.
June 28, 2012
Bob Mansfield, Apple’s Senior Vice President of Hardware Engineering, to retire ∞
Apple:
Apple today announced that Bob Mansfield, Apple’s senior vice president of Hardware Engineering, will retire and the role will be transitioned to Dan Riccio, Apple’s vice president of iPad Hardware Engineering, over several months. The entire hardware engineering team will continue to report to Mansfield until his departure.“Bob has been an instrumental part of our executive team, leading the hardware engineering organization and overseeing the team that has delivered dozens of breakthrough products over the years,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “We are very sad to have him leave and hope he enjoys every day of his retirement.”
Valedictorian lawsuit ∞
Elisha Marquez has been accepted to Ivy League schools and is on her way to Stanford in the fall. The 18-year-old has already nabbed an engineering internship at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and earned a scholarship through the Gates Millennium Scholars program.
But her GPA wasn’t high enough and she got beat. These parents need to chill out.
RIM is screwed ∞
Revenue for the first quarter of fiscal 2013 was $2.8 billion, down 33% from $4.2 billion in the previous quarter and down 43% from $4.9 billion in the same quarter of fiscal 2012. The revenue breakdown for the quarter was approximately 59% for hardware, 36% for service and 5% for software and other revenue. During the quarter, RIM shipped 7.8 million BlackBerry smartphones and approximately 260,000 BlackBerry PlayBook tablets.
Just brutal.
Chrome and Google Drive on iOS ∞
Google on Thursday announced that its Chrome browser will launch in the App Store for iPhone and iPad, as well as a native iOS application connected to the Google Drive service.
Part of what makes Safari so fast on iOS is the Nitro engine. I wonder how Chrome will compete with that.
Every product Billy Mays ever pitched ∞
I loved Billy Mays.
The negatives of Apple’s Podcast app ∞
TJ Draper:
I can see how this is a major improvement if you have been using iTunes to manage podcasts and syncing them from iTunes to your iDevice. But while this is a major improvement over that scenario, this is by no means a good app.
Call of Duty: Black Ops coming to the Mac ∞
Great news from Aspyr. I love Call of Duty.
Run Android apps on your Mac ∞
At the heart of BlueStacks is a multi-OS runtime with breakthrough virtualization technology. Apps developed for different operating systems can execute simultaneously, side-by-side, on the same computer.
The return of Mosspuppet ∞
There is a kickstarter-like page allowing people to donate to have Mosspuppet come out of retirement. He’s a funny little man.
Spec comparison: iPad, Surface, Nexus, Kindle ∞
If you’re the type who likes specs, check out this comparison chart from Bryan Chaffin.
A kickstand for the beard ∞
Justin Michael made this incredible illustration after I joked on Amplified 12 that I wanted a kickstand on everything I owned.
Google vs everyone ∞
Om Malik:
However, when you stand back from all the announcements made by Google today and increase the periphery, you start to notice that this is a company that is fighting a lot of battles on many fronts. In some places it is winning, but most places it is trench warfare.
Killing a wildly successful product ∞
Michael Lopp:
One of my favorite Apple product announcements happened on September 7, 2005. In an Apple music event announcement, Steve Jobs got on stage, gave the usual state of the business update, and then he did something I’d never seen before. He killed a wildly successful product.
I often use this as an example of how Apple beat its competition and drove them crazy trying to catch up. Who would kill a product as successful as the iPod mini? Steve Jobs would.
June 27, 2012
Podcast app: A UI breakdown ∞
Chris Armstrong takes a look at Apple’s new Podcast app. Personally I love the tape deck.
Retina MacBook Pro display ghosting ∞
It doesn’t just happen to Retina displays, but I’d be pissed if this happened to me.
The Google Nexus ∞
Here it is.
Amplified: Uncle Tim’s lunch money ∞
Jim and Dan discuss the Podcasts app for iOS and the implications it has for both existing podcast applications as well as for podcasting as a whole, Sirius and the Google TV, Epic games success on iOS, when Apple fanboys attack, Orbitz, the Retina MacBook Pro’s financial affect on Apple, and more. Jim also offers his advice for getting back into the guitar by practicing Megadeth.
Sponsored by Shopify (use code 5BY5 for 3 months free), Igloo Software (they’re giving away an Aeropress to a B&A listener), and MailChimp’s new Mandrill email service.
Infinity Blade for iOS is Epic’s most profitable game ever ∞
That’s impressive.
Understanding HTML5 and CSS3 for Web design ∞
When I redesigned The Loop, HTML5 and CSS3 were high on my list. I didn’t care so much about supporting older or non-compliant browsers.
Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 banned in the U.S. ∞
Apple finally made it happen.
June 26, 2012
iOS crushes Android in app retention
According to a new report from Localytics, app retention is increasing in the mobile market as developers move away from focusing just on downloads. The report says that the iPhone and iPad is crushing Android in app retention.
“But not all apps are created equally,” according to Localytics. “Delving deeper into the retention and user metrics, iPhone and iPad users are 52% more loyal to their apps than Android users. A healthy 35% of Apple iOS users launched an app more than 10 times after downloading, compared to 23% of Android users. The average Android app also suffers from 24% one-time usage rate compared to just 21% one-time usage rate for iPhone and iPad.”
The report noted that as users continue to purchase apps, they are becoming more educated and discerning about the choices they make.
iTunes Store opens in 12 countries ∞
Apple is bringing the iTunes Store to music fans in Brunei, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Cambodia, Laos, Macau, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, Sri Lanka and Vietnam.
Hilarious letters from kids ∞
The one to Uncle Bryan is funny.
Heineken’s New York offices ∞
Where the hell is the beer?
Preparing to relearn Megadeth songs
There was a time when I could play a lot of Megadeth songs without even thinking about it, but if you don’t keep it up, eventually you lose your edge. It happens to all us — life gets in the way sometimes.
I decided a couple of weeks ago to relearn a lot of the songs that I used to play a lot. I went into my studio, picked up the guitar and played what I could remember — it wasn’t pretty. I decided I needed to do some preparation before learning the songs.
With many bands, getting back into playing songs is easy. The songs really aren’t that tough to play, but Megadeth is different.
Dave Mustaine is the master of chord progressions, so learning to play those songs takes a little bit more planning. Here are a few things I did to prepare.
First I watched many of the Megadeth concerts I have on DVD and on my Apple TV. I watch concerts differently than most people — I don’t just watch the band play, I watch the guitarist and where he is playing the chords. There are many ways to play each chord, but there is a reason the guitar player chose to play it a particular way. That’s the type of detail I try to pick out.
Guitarists like Mustaine have a lot of cool notes in their songs that aren’t always easy to pick out on your own. I often go to YouTube and search for a song to see if anyone was able to get it — many times they do. That’s another great detail to pick out.
Keep in mind that I still haven’t picked up my guitar yet.
The last thing I did was to look at tabs to refresh my thoughts on how to play the songs. This is usually the last step before I begin to play.
This whole process takes a couple of weeks. It may seem like a lot just to relearn some songs, but when I picked up my guitar yesterday I was able to rip off a few songs right away. It felt good too.
The main point of doing so much preparation is to reduce the frustration of relearning songs you used to know how to play.