The Brooks Review

Month: December 2010

  • Apple, App Makers Sued Over User Tracking

    A couple of things stuck out at me in the article.

    1. Don’t you have to agree to allow an app to access your location?
    2. How is Apple profiting from this?

    Here let’s look at this closer, Ryan Singel:

    If an app passes along that number to an advertisers, the advertising company can use it to build up a profile of the user, as well as keep track of which ads it has shown to a user before and which of those ads a user clicked on.

    With browser cookies, however, a user can easily block them or delete them, essentially cutting off the profile. Neither is possible with apps that use UDIDs, since that number can’t be changed.

    I am not sure that this is really that big of a deal — Google does it to you all the time. I do however take stand to the second sentence quoted — in no way do I think that most users think it is easy to block browser cookies. To make such a claim would mean that walking down the street and asking any computer user how to block cookies in their browser I should get more than 50% of people asked telling me how to do that. I dare you to try and actually get that.

    “Apple knew this was an issue,” said Majed Nachawati, one of the lawyers who filed the suit. “They had a duty to warn consumers and at a minimum, if they intend to profit from this, they need to let people know and get their consent.”

    Again how is Apple profiting from this? Is iAds at fault or is this other advertising platforms? If iAds, then sue Apple. Don’t tell me that Apple is profiting because they take a 30% cut — they take that from the sales price of the app, not from revenue derived from ad sales, unless they are iAds.

    This though just made me lose all hope in humanity, I mean who wants to play “Pimple Popper Lite”:

    Other apps named in the suit include Toss It, Text4Plus, The Weather Channel, Talking Tom Cat, and Pimple Popper Lite.

  • Ulysses Holiday Sale

    Ulysses is my favorite writing software and I just found out that it is on sale right now for 50% off. That is a steal. Right now you can grab a copy for EUR 22.49.

  • 300 Million Dollars

    How much did it cost AOL in the 90s to spam us all with AOL install CDs? More than $300 million it would seem.

    Wow.

  • The Best Source for Mac/iPad/iPhone/Windows Backgrounds

    I have been a long time fan of John Carey — his writing is excellent is his photography is superb. Add to that him giving away some of his images for you to use as backgrounds on your devices and you have to love the guy. They are beautiful.

  • PDFs and Notational Velocity

    Adam King on Twitter:

    Select multiple PDF attachments in Mail, drag to Notational Velocity” icon, and presto! 1 note per PDF w/ full, stripped plaintext. Handy.

    Handy indeed.

  • A Thinner iPad Does Not Make a Better iPad

    I love reading rumors — the wishing/hoping/dreaming of what will be included in future gadgets fascinates me. Rumors give you a very clear idea of how far from reality certain people are and how in the “know” others are. The iPad and the iPhone are probably the two most rumored devices on the web, but one rumor about the iPad that has been making the rounds is starting to really bug me.

    Rumors keep saying that the next version (iteration?) of the iPad will result in a thinner device. That rumor bugs me a lot.

    Thin

    Just because a device is thin doesn’t mean that it will be better. ((I realize how stupid this sounds coming from the guy who praises the thinness of the MacBook Air — hang with me for a second.)) Pick up your iPad right now and try to imagine what it would feel like if it were thinner. For me I think the iPad would become far to uncomfortable to hold. In fact I think the iPad should retain its thickness and try to shed a few ounces instead.

    What makes the iPad feel large is not the thickness, or even the footprint, of the device: the fact that it weighs 1.5lbs is what makes the device feel large.

    The iPhone

    The original iPhone was 11.6 mm thick and the current iPhone 4 is only 9.3 mm thick. That is a massive reduction in your hand, and many people would like the iPhone to be even thinner. The problem: the thinner a handheld is device, the harder it is to comfortably hold said device in your hand.

    Go grab your wallet: pull out a few credit cards (3-4 should work). Stack them on top of each other and just hold them. Now pick up your iPhone 4 (if you have one). Which feels better in your hand? If you have an original iPhone go grab that, compared to the iPhone 4 I still prefer the way that the original iPhone feels in my hand.

    The curves of the original iPhone, coupled with the aluminum and the thickness, made it a joy to hold. I am not saying that the iPhone 4 doesn’t feel good in your hand — it just doesn’t feel as good as the original iPhone did.

    MacBook Air

    I love — love — the thinness of the MacBook Air, but if I had to choose between a thin laptop and a lighter laptop, I would choose the lighter one every time. Weight is far more important in laptops than the thickness is (to me). It just so happens that for the most part, thickness and weight go hand in hand.

    One thing that I can tell you about the MacBook Air is that when you carry it — like you would carry a book at your side — you will be holding it so that the thicker side is resting in your palm. The front edge of the Air is just too thin to comfortably hold. Feels like it might sever your hand if you hold it with the front edge in your palm.

    Back to the iPad

    There are a lot more things than thinness and less weight that I want out of the iPad first; to name a few:

    • More RAM
    • Longer battery life
    • High resolution screen
    • Faster processor
    • FaceTime camera

    With devices like the iPhone and iPad changing physical dimensions is way more involved than just ratcheting down the specs. If you change the overall thickest point by -1 mm then you have changed the entire curvature on the back of the iPad. In doing that small change you have also changed the entire way it fits and feels in the users hand.

    I honestly believe that a thinner iPad will be much less comfortable to hold. Especially one with a flat back.

    Flat

    There is another rumor that has circled talking about another thin iPad that has a flat back instead of a curved back. This is the last thing I want to see in the iPad. When the iPhone went from the original to 3G models and then to the 4 the iPhone backs changed as well: flat with curved sides, curved back, flat angular surfaces. The first iPhone feels the best in your hand and the 3G models feel the smallest. The 4 is the smallest iPhone yet, but it harder feels like it.

    This is what happens when you flatten out the back, the tactile response is completely changed.

    There is one problem though: using the iPad on the flat surface without a case/stand of some sort is impossible because the back is not flat. A flat back would make it far easier to take notes, in say a meeting, then the curved back does. (That wobbling effect the iPad does when you try to type with it laid flat on a table is far from “fun”.)

    So the question becomes: do you make the back flat so that people can create content on the device without a case or stand — or do you keep the curvature of the back to make the device a delight to hold?

    I don’t know if a happy medium exists here.

    A great example of this is the iPod touch — I am reluctant to mention it because I think it is the weight that is more impressive than the size — it too is massively thin and has a some what flat back and I don’t think it is more comfortable to hold than the iPhone is.

    Bottom Line

    To get at the heart of the matter: changing the thickness of a handheld device is not as simple as trying to make the case as small as possible. Changing the physical dimensions of the iPad in the slightest will result in a massive redesign in the shape and feel of the case.

    The original iPhone was aluminum on the back, the 3G and 3GS (both the same size) were plastic on the back, the iPhone 4 is glass and metal. Each size change drastically changed the materials used to make the device — the same will hold true for the iPad. You are fooling yourself if you think Apple will release an iPad of a different size that looks the same as the original iPad.

    If someone says the iPad is just going to get a bigger battery and be a little thinner then you need to be asking yourself how in the hell they are going to make it thinner. That, and you need to ask yourself if it really makes sense to the make the device thinner.

    Is Apple focused on making the iPad 2 a very thin svelte version of the original? Or, like with the iPhone is Apple focused on making the internal hardware specs the best they can and only when they are able to are they going to make it thinner?

    I think the internal hardware will change on the iPad — I don’t think that the external hardware will necessarily be thinner. I think a lighter iPad addresses far more complaints that a thinner iPad would. I have never heard someone pick up an iPad and say: “Wow this thing is thick.” I have heard many pick up an iPad and say: “Wow this is kind of heavy.”

    It just seems too soon to be worrying about a very good form factor when there are so many other obvious upgrades to be done. Other hardware manufacturers have yet to even come close to matching the form factor of the iPad — they can’t even make a tablet bigger than seven inches it would seem.

    Yes — Apple wants the best physical experience, but do they need it before they need to upgrade the internal hardware specs?

  • The worsening journalistic disgrace at Wired

    Glenn Greenwald on Wired’s Senior Editor Kevin Poulsen and his relationship with Adrian Lamo and the WikiLeaks scandal:

    This has long ago left the realm of mere journalistic failure and stands as one of the most egregious examples of active truth-hiding by a “journalist” I’ve ever seen.

    Can’t wait to see how Wired responds.

  • Facebook and The Washington Post

    It is a bit much.

  • Your Smartphone’s Battery Gauge is Lying to You (and it’s not such a bad thing)

    A fascinating post by “Byron G” on how modern cellphones actually charge. Unlike old cellphones they charge to 100% then cut power and only try to maintain something above 90% for the period they are plugged in. Battery gauges on phones are programmed to be inaccurate and report 100% charges. Now his data is only for Android phones, but one could assume that the iPhone is very similar.

    Interestingly ‘bump charging’ gives you an extra 10-15% of battery power — at the cost of less battery health. (Bump charging is turning off your device and charging until the device reads 100%, then unplugging and replugging in the charger and repeating 5-6 times.)

    The advice at the end of the post is the best — keep your phone charged when you can, topping it off is the best use case — most importantly just use your damned phone and stop worrying about the battery.

  • “2011: The Year Android Explodes! Killing Innocent Women, Children, And iPhone Users”

    MG Siegler:

    Say what you will about the iPhone/AT&T deal, it’s clear that Apple is in control there. And say what you will about Apple — at least they’re not the carriers. With Android, it’s a different story. That’s why the “open” argument is such a bullshit red herring. Android is so open that it gives the carriers (and now apparently the government) freedom to screw us — openly.

    This is an excellent analysis of the market — I agree 100%.

  • TSA status

    Your Airport may have those Backscatter machines, but do they use them?

  • The Mighty Eagle Soars

    Last week Angry Birds for iOS got a huge update — I mean huge. They introduced “The Mighty Eagle” — a new bird in the game that can be purchased, in-app, for $0.99 and can only used once an hour. What makes this new bird such a big update has nothing to do with what it means for the game play — the big deal is the once an hour aspect.

    Initially I thought that the Eagle would only be available for every hour you played the game — meaning I would rarely get to use it. I used the Eagle to pass a level I had been stuck on for a while (on my iPhone, for whatever reason I passed the level on the iPad). Then I put away the phone and headed out for Christmas festivities — an hour later I got a push notification to tell me the ‘Mighty Eagle’ was once again ready to fly.

    What the hell?

    Sure enough the Mighty Eagle is available once every hour, no matter if you are playing the game or now. I immediately thought: “this is a game changer.”

    Game Changer

    Some of you still may not get why this is a game changing move by Angry Birds, so let me explain.

    How often do you play iOS games? If you are anything like me then you usually only play these games when you are bored and waiting for something else to happen. You play these games to waste small infrequent spots of time. Occasionally you grab your device with the decision that what you want to do right now is to play some games — mostly though iOS games are just time killers. ((Again this is true for me and most iOS users that I know — I am not saying that it is true for everyone.))

    When you get busy you forget about playing iOS games and just keep working.

    What happens though when an hour after you were ‘killing time’ your phone buzzes to remind you about your Angry Birds process? Of course that would be annoying, so Angry Birds has disguised this action as a notification that the Mighty Eagle is back to soar. ((And cleverly they charge you $0.99 for that reminder.))

    How cool is that? A genius move I’d say.

    I typically don’t play iOS games much— because I forget about them and because I am not really that ‘engaged’ in the game play. Here’s the thing though, over the course of Christmas day Angry Birds kept telling me the Eagle was ready and I kept flipping open the app to play for a bit — even though I rarely used the Eagle. Essentially Angry Birds reminded me of its fun and I kept getting pulled back in.

    Amazing.

    Now, I have since turned off notifications from Angry Birds, but I have to say this is a pretty clever feature on their part. Pretty clever indeed.

    Hidden Agenda

    I don’t know if this was the developers intention, but this update is truly impressive. Most iOS users only use a handful of the apps they download — especially with games. These apps are so cheap that most users will download apps, use them for a week and then forget about them for quite a while. With the Mighty Eagle update Angry Birds is taking a huge leap in making sure that iOS users will not forget how angry these damn birds are.

    This seems like a pretty good way to subtly remind your users that your app exists.

    [Updated: 12/27/10 at 6:08 AM] I am told you can use the Mighty Eagle continuously if achieve the ‘Total Destruction Feather’.

  • Quote of the Day: Seth Godin

    “You can spend your entire day consuming media and never encounter a thought you don’t agree with, don’t like or don’t want to see.”

    Please don’t do that — my favorite reader emails are ones that challenge what I think. People who think differently than me don’t scare me — they intrigue me.

  • “The Special Relationship”

    Andy Ihnatko on Apple:

    I recently read something about Walt Disney that seemed very familiar. A man who worked with him said (I’m paraphrasing) Walt wanted to make sure that if you came to Disney World, you would have a fantastic time. And he succeeded. But he also wanted to make sure that you wouldn’t even have the option of having a bad time.

    He goes on to say that Apple is the same way — I tend to agree.

  • 20% Off Keyboard Maestro

    Want to go get yourself a copy of the excellent Keyboard Maestro, but you don’t have the $36.00 needed to purchase it? Well if you have $28.80 then you are in luck — use the link to get the 20% off. Sweet.

  • Banks and WikiLeaks

    A New York Times Editorial:

    What would happen if a clutch of big banks decided that a particularly irksome blogger or other organization was “too risky”? What if they decided — one by one — to shut down financial access to a newspaper that was about to reveal irksome truths about their operations? This decision should not be left solely up to business-as-usual among the banks.

    That is the way capitalism works (I write this knowing full well my inbox is going to be full), should a business decide not to want to transact with someone/something that is their right. This type of argument means that banks would need to approve a loan to anyone who asks. Banking for large companies is about so much more than having a convenient place to store their cash — banking is about also having a line of credit to pay the bills when cash flow becomes inconsistent. Forcing Bank of America to do business with someone who has their stolen property is no different from forcing a home owner to bail out the guy who just robbed their house.

    This is a stupid argument by the NYT.

    Capitalism was brought about to stop this. All this type of behavior (from banks) does is opens the door for a new bank to come about and swoop up that unwanted business. Don’t give me this crap that a business should be forced to transact with any being that is not deemed illegal by the government. By those standards banks must continue to work with drug dealers until such a point that they are proven guilty — or have we forgotten that our legal system is based on the notion that we are “innocent until proven guilty”?

    I just don’t see how anybody can blame an independent body for deciding not to do business with an entity — especially when:

    – That entity wants to harm them.
    – People are free to decide whether to keep doing business with the bank.

    If you really are pissed about this then it would be unacceptable for you to continue to bank with these institutions — to do otherwise would brand you a hypocrite.

  • MacBook Air Is Om’s Gadget Of The Year

    Om Malik picks the MacBook Air 13″ model as his gadget of the year for 2010. I can’t say that it is a bad choice, but I would be hard pressed to pick it over the iPad. I think long term that laptops will become more MacBook Air like — at the same time though I think the computers people use the most will become more iPad like.

    (Now there is some claim chowder for ya.)

  • Coding Robots

    My thanks to Coding Robots for sponsoring the RSS feed this week to promote their iPhone app NoteTask. NoteTask is a great little app that uses the excellent Simplenote syncing service to create task lists using plain text. A great simple system.

    Be sure to check out the other great apps by Coding Robots — I particularly like MarkdownNote which allows you to write in Markdown and copy out the HTML code for that text on the iPad.

  • An iPhone Lover’s Take On Windows Phone

    MG Siegler on Windows Phone 7:

    That said, the web browser on Windows Phone is an abomination. It’s hard to describe how bad it is. It’s sort of like IE6, but worse. Nearly every page I’ve visited over the past several weeks has been broken in the browser in some way. It’s usually just small style issues, but still — Microsoft should be ashamed of this. The browser is arguably the most important feature of any smartphone. And on Windows Phone, quite frankly, it sucks.

    Overall he thinks the phone is a pretty decent offering — in the short amount of time I have had to spend with some of them I have rather liked them. He does note the keyboard is pretty good and that seems to be the same impression I got after typing on one.

    [Updated: 12/24/10 at 10:18 AM] I think when the holidays are over I am going to try and get a Windows Phone 7 to try out…hopefully I can.

  • Support versus Workarounds

    You can either support a Mac or you can offer a workaround for Mac users. These are incredibly different concepts that seem to be utterly lost on my bank: Umpqua Bank (the self described “World’s Greatest Bank”). I have been inquiring with Umpqua about getting a remote checking deposit system in place for my Property Management company.

    I asked them to provide me with two bits of information:

    1. How much will it cost me?
    2. Is the system Mac compatible?

    The representative that I was speaking with said she would send that information over — that she too was a Mac user (personally) and was very interested in the answer to the second question. Neat.

    I then received an email today, that said ((I am paraphrasing here because I don’t want to get anyone in trouble, mostly me.)) “We support Macs as long as they have Internet Explorer, the system doesn’t work with Safari.”

    What I read is: “we don’t support Macs.”

    The last shipping version of Internet Explorer for Macs (yes they used to make it) was version 5.2.3 and Microsoft announced in 2003 they would not be making any more versions. Most websites require at least version 5.5 to be compatible with modern security standards.

    What she really should have told me is that the system doesn’t support Safari and only runs on Internet Explorer — this statement would have at least been accurate. Instead she clearly stated that the software is Mac compatible. Semantics really.

    So I responded: That this was indeed not Mac support since Microsoft had not made a version of IE for Macs since 2003.

    If left at that I would have been fine — truth be told I would prefer to change banks anyways. This representative could not leave well enough alone and decided to challenge me on my technical understand of Macs and on semantics.

    She responded something to like this: “I have a Mac and use Boot Camp with Windows, allowing access to IE. So you can use IE on a Mac if you want.”

    You are kidding me right?

    So I responded: “I am not trying to pick a fight, but being able to run Windows on a Mac so that something works — in no way means that Macs are supported.”

    Frankly I won’t see what she responds to that as I have flagged her as a SPAM sender — I don’t have time for this crap.

    The problem here is not isolated to Umpqua — most large companies lack full Mac support and instead offer workarounds for Mac users. A workaround is not the same as supporting something. Support means it works without hassle — though admittedly with that definition you could argue that a great many companies don’t support Windows.