Month: January 2011
Member Content:
Newsletter:
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Unexpected SMS From Mobile Carrier
Ryan Singel: The would-be suicide bomber was planning to detonate a suicide belt bomb near Red Square, a plan that was foiled when her wireless carrier sent her an SMS while she was still at a safe house, setting off the bomb and killing her. Death is never funny, but…well I guess thank God for…
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Quote of the Day: Bill Keller
“…a secretive cadre of antisecrecy vigilantes…” — Bill Keller That is pure gold. [via DF]
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Perfect Place to Write
E.B. White: A hotel room is the perfect place to write. You’re cut off from all the routine and is so convenient, the way they’ll send you anything you want. I could not agree more with this. When I was in Miami I got a ton of stuff done sitting at an incredibly uncomfortable table,…
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“Smart” Phone Market Shares
Dina Bass: Microsoft’s share of the smartphone operating-system market declined to 2.8 percent in the third quarter, from 7.9 percent a year earlier, according to Gartner Inc. Android’s share increased to 25.5 percent from 3.5 percent, while Apple’s iOS share declined to 16.7 percent from 17.1 percent. That is an incredibly small market share for…
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CNN’s 8 Least Evil Banks In America
I am linking to the Consumerist post about this because they list out the banks so you don’t have to click through a slideshow. I am posting this not because it is ground breaking news, but to promote the bank I use: USAA. You don’t have to be military to use it, but if you…
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iPhone 4 “Glassgate” Lawsuit
Matt Brian: LA resident Donald LeBuhn has filed a class action lawsuit against Apple, accusing the company of misleading customers as to the strength of the glass used in its iPhone 4… Except for the fact that it is called “glass” — which inherent to the word glass means that something is fragile. This bit…
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In Meetings, Pen & Paper, Not Glass and Fingers
Randy Murray, responding to my two posts that responded to his about not using an iPad in meetings: Ben may be right, but only for a select few, people like himself who can master the technology to a degree that it becomes invisible. It doesn’t work that way for me and I’m pretty good with…
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Kyle Baxter Makes an Excellent Point
Kyle Baxter in reply to this post by me: That’s all possible through an iOS application and AirPlay, but there’s no way something like that could gain traction following that route. Telling users to (1) purchase an Apple TV, (2) purchase an iOS application, and (3) stream it to their Apple TV is so convoluted…
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Is AirPlay the App Store for the Apple TV?
Leading up to the launch of the Apple TV 2 there were rampant reports that the Apple TV would get iOS and its own App Store. At the time it only seemed natural that Apple would make such a move — netting more revenue for the Apple TV “hobby”. With a $99 price tag it…
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No Opting Out From Facebook Turning Your Check-Ins, Likes Into Ads
Jacqui Cheng on Facebook using users in ads: Still, there are ways in which the system could be improved, especially for those concerned about their privacy being respected. The most obvious is that users are not notified that their posts are being used in ads, and cannot block their posts from becoming ads unless they…
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How to Turn Disaster Into Gold
Jason Fried on apologies: “I apologize” is renting the problem. “I’m sorry” is owning it. CampFire had a lot of glitches in December and 37signals did an epic job handling the problem from a customer relations standpoint. If you want to know why they handle problems the way they do — or better — if…
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Quote of the Day: Khoi Vinh
“Few companies seem to understand the concept of design so cannily and yet so incompletely as Google does.” — Khoi Vinh
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New Apple.com Design
An all new navigation bar that looks modern and has a sweet fly-in bounce transition. Very nice.
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“We’ll be retiring our support of OpenID on May 1”
37signals: OpenID has been a burden on support since the day it was launched. I used Open ID on 37signals the minute it became available because it gave you a single sign on. It was a pain in the ass every time. I for one am glad to see it go and the 37signals ID…
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Read & Trust
A new community of writers that I am honored to be included in: Everyone has a favorite online writer. And asking them which writers they recommend is a great way to expand our reading list and explore new topics and viewpoints. Read & Trust is committed to gathering together the best independent writers available—the ones…
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Stand Tall
I hate standing — it makes me tired and hurts my feet. Even though I hate standing I decided that my main office desk (a 6 foot by 3 foot desk) was going to be a standing station. I didn’t do this to be cool, nor because I hate my office chair (I love my…
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Quote of the Day: Mandy Brown
“I still believe that to be true, but with one important modification: it’s not that a blog post has permission to be rough so much as that roughness is its natural state. Meaning, blogging encourages exploration and experimentation. In this way, blogging is the kind of writing authors have done for centuries but which usually…
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Meetings and the 1960s
A few people have asked what my reference to the 1960s was all about in my last post. It is nothing revolutionary, just based on my observations of 1960s meetings from watching Mad Men. Which means: the 1960s involved a lot of Scotch during meetings, which seems like a pretty nice addition to most meetings.
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900-HP DIY Electric BMW Keeps Getting Better
Keith Barry: The current iteration features 300 lithium iron phosphate cells in a battery pack that provides a claimed range of with 110 miles — roughly a full day of drag racing, drifting or general hooning. Propulsion comes from a DC motor designed and built by VST; it churns out a whopping 900 horsepower. That’s…
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Fraser Speirs On the Rapid End-Of-Lifing of Android Devices
Don’t be fooled by the title, Speirs hits the nail on the head with his analysis of the current tablet market: Having said that, my core belief about the new wave of “tablet computing” is that the hardware is only relevant insofar as it enhances the user’s experience of the software. These devices really are…