Recent Articles

Anita Ramasastry:

Facebook says it will not advertise to children within the app or sell any data it collects to advertisers. There are also, at present, no in-app purchases offered.

Note that they don’t say they won’t collect data at all, which would be something that people who wanted to protect kids would do. Just that they won’t sell it. I’d assume, those kids sign up for proper Facebook later, they release the flood gates on that data.

Mike Isaac reporting:

Uber is facing at least five separate federal investigations, including at least one over a software tool called “Greyball,” which the company created to evade law enforcement in cities around the world. It is also facing an investigation into whether the company broke the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act for bribery overseas, a claim Mr. Jacobs made in his letter.

But sure, tell me again why you prefer taking an Uber over a Lyft.

This is a great post from Bianca Bosker. Some choice quotes:

Harris began to see that technology is not, as so many engineers claim, a neutral tool; rather, it’s capable of coaxing us to act in certain ways.

And:

In the end, he says, companies “stand back watching as a billion people run around like chickens with their heads cut off, responding to each other and feeling indebted to each other.”

Best thing I’ve done recently is turning off badges on my email client and turning off most push notifications. So far that’s only on my iPads, but it’s very freeing.

I love this model.

You don’t see many people rocking the Echo, but it’s a great bag. Just a bit too small for my abnormally long back.

Dan Goodwin:

In a blog post disclosing the vulnerability, the researchers included most of the code required to exploit the vulnerability. A competent developer would need 20 to 60 minutes to supply the missing portion. With that, the developer could build a smartphone app that could silently break into any existing VT20i safe in seconds, as long as Bluetooth was turned on.

Yikes.

Shawn Blanc:

A good camera will only become obsolete if you neglect it or else outgrow it.

I stopped with my X100T. I’d love to upgrade it, but I couldn’t tell you the last time I used it. The iPhone X camera is fantastic. So is the X100T.

Om Malik:

This isn’t going to end because the publications are still trying to pump out as much content, get as many falling dollars and prostitute themselves in the name of growth. Marketers will keep pushing their clients and making them influencers.

Even bigger news: the UI won’t make you hate life, like say Hulu’s UI does.

MarsEdit was a staple of my Mac days. I’ll always love this app.

Mark Crump:

Your identity can be wrapped up in “that guy who went iPad-only. Inevitably, you hear from all the people who gave you grief about it two years ago with an extra helping of “told you so.” So, being able to publicly and critically assess whether a tool works for you, and change course if it isn’t, is a good trait. It’s disheartening that Fraser feels that iOS 11 doesn’t meet his needs anymore and he needs to use a Mac again.

I don’t follow anything on twitter so I’m out of the loop on the complaints. But it doesn’t strike me as an iOS 11 issue, as the iPad is decidedly better today than it was a year ago. Seems more likely requirements of the users have changed.

Shawn Blanc:

Also, after nearly a decade of using Simplenote, I’m giving Bear a try. Bear is, without a doubt, far more polished and sophisticated than Simplenote. But it’s the — ahem — simplicity of Simplenote that has always been its charm.

I loathe Bear, but many like it. Notes is the best Note taking app you can get on iOS, especially if you move between iPads and iPhones.

As a side note: it’s really great to see Shawn back to blogging on his site again.

By the way, we’ve also released 3.2.4 for iPad, which adds some basic shortcutsfor external keyboards. We hope you enjoy these updates!

I didn’t realize this was added, but this makes me very happy. I gave Things shit for a long time, but Things 3 is the best productivity app you can get.