tweetbot two point oh [permalink]
Far and away my favorite iPhone app. I’d wager an estimate that it accounts for about 40% of my time spent using my iPhone. Some great new features in 2.0, including image thumbnails in the timeline, one-click tappable links, and better contrast. If you use twitter daily, I couldn’t recommend this app more highly.
Update: Also, Tweetbot for iPad.
why do we care what a ‘pc’ is?
Is whether or not the iPad is a PC a simple issue of semantics? Yes.
Are semantics important? Yes.
We have more access to data than ever before. Companies have this general tendency to release charts and graphs that paint their position in the most positive light, and having clarity and context for any given data is important to understanding the truth. Just ask Horace Dediu.
For the past few decades when you’d see a chart labelled 4th Quarter PC Sales, there wasn’t much ambiguity. It was talking about desktops and laptops, the things with keyboards, mice, monitors, applications, browsers, files, drives, plugs, and ports. They were the de facto tool for getting online, email, productivity, etc., and looking at “PC Sales” usually painted a pretty clear, if not complete, picture of the industry. That isn’t the case anymore.
The iPad threw a wrench into the gears of the computer industry. Whether by cannibalizing traditional PC sales or drawing a wider set of users into the fold of the internet-connected, its impact is being felt far and wide. We need to frame the conversation if we want to have meaningful discussions about our industry, and having meaningful discussions about the PC industry can no longer exclude mention of the iPad.
the real personal computer
If the years following January 2007 have been any indication, touch is rapidly fulfilling its destiny to become the predominant human-computer interface, and it will have a reign spanning multiple decades.
Desktop and laptop computers are essential tools for people in a wide variety of fields. Many of the tasks they’ve come to tackle were hard to even imagine thirty years ago, but calling them “personal computers” hasn’t masked the fact that they haven’t been much more personal than your letter opener. Traditional PCs require that you come to them on their terms, overcoming numerous physical and intellectual abstractions. The iPad was the first computer built to meet you on your terms. It brings the last 35 years of digital technology into the physical world in a way so natural, not only do grandmas and toddlers get it, but so do kittens and lizards.
If we aren’t counting iPads and other tablets as PCs, then PCs are well on the road to becoming a radically less relevant category, falling fast and hard. In twenty years, the computer an average human uses will look a lot more like an iPad than it does like a PC. That is, if tablets aren’t PCs, in twenty years people will be saying “what’s a PC?”
citation technique [permalink]
Continuing the theme of my last post, Nick Disabato describes his attempt at solving the text referencing problem in his upcoming series of design essays, Distance.
Distance doesn’t have page numbers; instead, it has paragraph numbers at the beginning of each paragraph, which direct readers to the right place in the essay. In the PDF and physical book, these are to the left of each paragraph. Kindle’s and ePub’s paragraphs begin with them. And in ePub, Kindle, and PDF, each of these is represented by a permalink that can be used in a specific citation.
We know this isn’t entirely novel, but maybe it is for interactive texts. And we’re well aware that it proscribes a specific citation style that “breaks” traditional citation schemata, which may frustrate some people – but we didn’t take this decision lightly, and think it’s for the betterment of our writing to generalize citation across analog and digital platforms. It’s increasingly unreasonable to assume that readers will keep their content in just one form, and we’re well aware of that, and trying to account for that in the best way that is as reverent to the text and the reader’s habits as possible, meeting everyone halfway.
(via Jason Brennan)
book references in the digital age
How do we reference locations in electronic books? Historically, it’s been easy to throw out a page number, and many people were likely to have the same edition as you or at least one with the same page layout. With digital distribution of books coming into stride, that expectation is completely off the table. So, how can we point someone to a specific reference/passage in a book?
The Bible has had this problem covered centuries, but the process also took centuries to come about. Ideally, there would be some standard for breaking up and addressing content within books. Some obvious choices are chapter:paragraph:word or chapter:paragraph:sentence. For it to really be effective though, it needs some level of consistent support within book reading software.
Is Amazon or Apple going to spearhead something like this, or with the advent of search is this a moot point?
they’ve learned their lesson alright [permalink]
Philip Elmer-DeWitt thinks the Apple education event is getting overhyped, and that they aren’t releasing a “GarageBand for e-books” publishing tool. Here he quotes MacInnis of Inkling:
[Apple has] learned their lesson from upending the music industry.
I don’t know whether the event is being overhyped or not, or whether they are releasing any such authoring tool. But if Apple learned anything from “upending the music industry” it’s not that they should avoid shaking things up. I’m pretty sure upending the music industry was ground zero for Apple’s meteoric return, and their current position among the most profitable tech companies in the world.
i love at&t
It’s perhaps the longest running gag in the mobile phone industry that AT&T drops calls. I haven’t experienced that very much, but then again, I wouldn’t top the charts for voice usage on any list. However, I hear people complain about AT&T’s customer service just as frequently, and that’s when I feel like they’re talking about a different company. After a decade or so of paying my own bills and dozens of hours spent on hold, I have to say AT&T has been one of the best companies in regards to customer service.
I just got off the phone with Lisa. Our call was connected almost instantly after being prompted to dial zero to speak to a customer service representative. After I briefly mentioned an unexpected charge that showed up on my bill, she explained precisely where the charge came from, how she’d help me prevent it in the future, and how she would process a refund for the charge. This wasn’t a one-off experience. AT&T reps seem to always know more about my account than I do. What they say lines up with what I see on my bill, or my account online. I’m repeatedly surprised at how quickly they can respond to issues with my account. And this isn’t short lived either. I’ve been a customer since they were AT&T Wireless, through being purchased by Cingular, and the subsequent acquisition and rebranding under AT&T Inc.
Once, within the first few months of opening my account, they even called to let me know that my bill was due that day, and offered to take my payment over the phone to prevent late charges. Did you read that last sentence? I’m not making this up. I’m not sponsored by AT&T or anything, but I feel like with all the bad press they get, I should let people know that my experience with them has been quite different. Am I alone in my satisfaction?
Now if only I could find a broadband company that doesn’t suck. Cough..COM..Cough..CAST…
mobile provision quicklook plugin [permalink]
This isn’t flawlessly well-formatted, but this plugin is highly valuable for any Apple developer or tester who’s ever had to futz around with provisioning files. (via @chockenberry)
five years ahead
Five years ago today Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone with the claim that it has “software that’s at least five years ahead of what’s on any other phone.”
Would you rather have the iPhone of 2007 over today’s next best alternative? I think I would.
again with the science [permalink]
Quantum Levitation strikes again.
power of the pentatonic scale [permalink]
Incredible! (via Neven Mrgan)
bearded dragon crushing ants [permalink]
I bet you never thought you’d be watching a lizard play a video game.
get iphone wifi mac address
Recently, I needed to do this in an iOS project, and it turns out to be harder than it should be to find a simple solution. So I made one here. Just drop this in your network utilities class or whatever.
rare steve jobs speech [permalink]
A new rare Jobs interview turned up, presented by the Computer History Museum.
path 2.0
Facebook
- Groups
- Events
- Apps
- Ads
- Desktop Experience
————————————————————
= Path 2.0
how to perfectly reheat pizza [permalink]
After ages of reheating pizza in the microwave out of laziness, I finally switched to the oven a few years back. Who knew there was an even better way?
mixel [permalink]
Mixel, a social collage making app for iPad (that sounds weird doesn’t it), is out for free on the App Store. It turns out the weird idea is actually simple and fun, and it gets those creative juices flowing. It is very reminiscent for me of playing with Kid Pix.
imessage followup
After posting my concerns with the group messaging issues in iMessage, I posted a bug report to Apple. I marked it as a security bug, because it’s an issue with regards to privacy.
Apple Product Security emailed me a response yesterday to let me know they’re aware of the problem, and are addressing it. Good to hear them acknowledge the issue. Here’s hoping it gets fixed in the forthcoming update.
inspiring creativity
Codify circled the web today. A new app with the tagline “Make Anything on your iPad.” That’s a bit hyperbolic, but it does inspire you to think creatively.
This reminds me of the stuff that got me excited about technology when I was growing up. Things like playing with Logo on the Apple II computers in our elementary school. I made the other second graders look like fools with all the awesome things I got that little onscreen triangle to do. Hours were spent toying around in HyperCard on our Macintosh Plus, entertaining myself with my imagination. Not to mention Kid Pix, MacPaint, and many others.
Maybe it’s the nostalgia being kicked up as I’m reading the Steve Jobs biography, but seeing this kind of thing on the iPad gets me excited about computers all over again. When I think about how these tools encouraged and inspired me to learn, and consider what the iPad brings to the table, it’s kind of mind-blowing.
Remember all those people saying that the closed nature of iOS was going to stifle this kind of experience for the next generation? To that I would say, nobody complained that you couldn’t create things on the Apple II. Nobody called it a consumption device. And yet, in what universe is the Apple II more capable of creative expression than the iPad?
Think, a kid today can run around with an iPad or iPhone and record and edit a movie, on a single device. Another one can write a short story, without feeling intimidated because they don’t know how to touch type. It’s all right there on the screen. Paint a picture, record a song, and with something like Codify, make your own game!
If I had an iPad as a kid, my parents would have needed a crow bar to pry it away from me, every single night. I can’t wait to see what the next generation starts to do with technology.
imessengers be warned
iMessage, one of the headlining features of iOS 5, has a peculiarity with handling multiple recipient messages that you should keep in mind.
There have been a number of instances where I’m seeing peoples’ replies to messages that I received from someone else. In some cases it has been clear that they were intended as a private response. If you send a text to multiple iMessage users, anyone who responds inline will have their message sent to everyone. I previously thought this was an issue with people having “Group Messaging” enabled in Settings→Messages, but apparently this functionality comes standard with iMessage. As far as I’ve been able to determine, you can’t turn it off without disabling iMessage itself.
These messages will show an address bar at the top, so you can see that multiple people are in the conversation. However, this still poses a few problems:
- When you get one of the new banner notifications or lock screen alerts, it only lists the sender. There is no indication that it’s part of a group message. If you happen to jump in and respond quickly without being mindful of the contacts listed at the top, you very well may send your message to people you weren’t intending to.
- When you’re sending multiple people a message, you should assume you’re also sending around a list of everyones’ contact information as well. How can you privately send multiple people the same message? It doesn’t appear that iMessage gives you that option.
I could be missing something, but I’d imagine this is not going to work for everybody. If you have some information about this that I don’t, please fill me in. Otherwise, message multiple recipients with caution in the meantime.
photo stream failings
Photo Stream is a great new feature in iOS 5/iCloud. It makes really great strides towards the whole PC Free situation by taking your Camera Roll online.
But it has two glaring problems:
- It makes the assumption that every picture taken or saved, along with all your screen grabs, deserves a place in the cloud.
- Given that assumption, it still provides no way to delete those one-off images individually from the stream.
This really diminishes the possible uses of Photo Stream. I’d love to throw it up as a sideshow on my Apple TV, but the experience suffers when that homescreen I shared or those images I catalogued for work pop up.
I’m looking forward to using it more once this gets addressed.
must see videos
A few videos popped up this week that you have to see, and likely most of you already have. If not, check out the sound effect guy from Police Academy making his voice sound convincingly identical to an electric guitar, complete with finger noise and feedback. It gets better and better all the way until the end of the video.
Michael Winslow – Whole Lotta Love
Also, on a nerdier note, someone has posted a demonstration of quantum locking. I won’t try to describe it here (as I haven’t read about how it works yet), but it will break your mind to see it in action.
Quantum Levitation
Craziness.
goodbye steve
Steve Jobs, chief misfit, knew that the best way to see the future was to build it. His handiwork was a crucial part of inspiring my creativity, even from childhood. From Kid Pix creations to HyperCard stacks, those early experiences with technology resonated with me.
It’s impossible to measure the impact he had on the world, but the desire of so many to reflect on his life speaks to how much he will be missed.
Thanks Steve for never squandering the time you had. Our prayers are for comfort and peace to those who loved you most dearly.
my dad, on yesterday’s news
I read for 20 years that Apple was just barely hanging on. Now with Exxon/Mobil, one of the two wealthiest companies on earth. Two lessons: 1) keep believing what you believe in; and 2) Don’t pay too much attention to the media.
eye phone four ess
In Tim Cook’s first product introduction since being officially named CEO, Apple introduced us to the iPhone 4S yesterday. There was an above average rumor mill leading up to this release, so let’s take a look at how things faired.
Confirmed Rumors
The A5 processor was a pretty fair bet. Following the apparent pattern established last year with the iPad and introduction of the A4, there was good reason to believe the latest and greatest iPhone should run on Apple’s latest and greatest chip. By all accounts the 4S is snappier, and by the looks of it this new computing power is put to good use.
Ever since they acquired Siri in April 2010, rumors have been floating around that Apple would reintroduce their voice recognition technology as a major component of the iPhone. Leading up to Tuesday’s announcement, those rumors began to have a consistent voice. Apple opted to keep the name, and Siri assistant was reborn as the key new feature of the iPhone 4S. While the product demos suggest that Siri is a very capable assistant, I assume there is a reason Apple has chosen to designate it as beta. Rather than jumping up and down for what Siri offers today, I’m much more excited about where this technology will be five years from now.
The 8 megapixel camera was right on the money. Fortunately, Apple didn’t stop there. Better optics, a much improved backside illuminated sensor, and a bump up to 1080p video are all very welcome changes. All this on top of the amazing photo software in the App Store, and the iPhone 4S is the best consumer point and shoot camera you can get your hands on.
Denied Rumors
Numerous iPhone cases and anecdotal evidence pointed to a radical new enclosure design for the “iPhone 5″ that many people were expecting to see Tuesday. A sleek, smoothly-beveled metal backing certainly could have made for a beautiful phone. The steam that these rumors picked up just goes to show you how much stake people place in the appearance of their handset. I wouldn’t doubt that there are a some prototypes locked up somewhere in the Apple campus that resemble these designs, but people hoping for a visual refresh this time around were disappointed.
Some late breaking rumors suggested Sprint had scored exclusivity on the purported cutting edge next-generation “iPhone 5″ model. Reports said they had agreed to purchase millions of the devices, without regard to whether they would be bought by customers, in order to lock in the deal. While Sprint did make the cut as a new carrier for the 4S, the immensity of the deal was clearly overblown.
One of the longer standing rumors has been an iPhone with a larger screen. This seemed to gain some support from the case designs that were floating around. To me this has never been likely. If you don’t think Apple ran some seriously thorough research and development before landing on the 3.5 inch screen of the iPhone, you might have a narrow view of how they operate. Changing the physical size of the screen affects interaction and software design more than many people would realize. Frankly, I would be surprised if we ever see an iPhone with a larger or smaller screen.
Out of Left Field
Apart from rumors, we saw two new apps debut that hadn’t been talked up by the rumor mill. While they aren’t exclusively for the iPhone 4S, they are noteworthy.
Cards is an app that lets you build greeting cards right on your phone using your photos and a number of templates. Apple will print, envelope, address, and ship your card for $2.99. This represents a small subset of Apple’s print offerings available in iPhoto, but it’s a practical app that I’m sure will get good use.
Find My Friends allows you to keep track of where your friends are whether you’re at an airport, a museum, or a party on the beach. They even suggest you could use it to check and see if your kids made it to school. A really simple idea that will definitely come in handy on certain occasions. Important for an app like this, it seems to have very simple and transparent privacy controls.
Certainly from a technological standpoint the iPhone 4S looks like a substantial bump up from the iPhone 4. While many people are disappointed not to see an iPhone 5, let us remember the 3GS. It’s main advantages over the 3G were a better camera, and faster internals. Sound familiar?
Ask anyone who upgraded from a 3G to a 3GS, and you’ll hear nearly universal satisfaction. As of last quarter, the two and a half year old 3GS was still the second best selling handset in the world, only behind the iPhone 4.
I anticipate a similar story with the 4S.
naming whiplash
The original iPhone was obviously named iPhone. No one was surprised by this. The press had already been calling it that for the better part of a decade. But one of the major criticisms of the original iPhone was its lack of 3G networking. Apple was apparently docked hard enough for this that they wanted to address the shortcoming right in the name when they released the iPhone 3G. This was technically the second iPhone, but 3G was a pretty big deal, so iPhone 2 didn’t work.
Then comes along the next iteration, technically, the third iPhone, but you can’t call it iPhone 3 when you’ve already released the iPhone 3G. The 3GS had two big differentiators, faster internals and a better camera. However, being that it wasn’t a radically new design, Apple decided it was enough to tag an S for speed on the end.
Finally come WWDC 2010, we can finally call this next thing what it is, iPhone 4. All is right in the world. Apple is set up to sequentially name their future iPhones. Everyone will be happy, and no one will be confused.
And then comes the iPhone 4S… wha-WHAT? So, now the fifth iPhone is called iPhone 4S. So, what the heck do they call the next one, iPhone 6? iPhone 5 would be incorrect. Now everything is all messed up again.
My guess is that the next iPhone will go back to the beginning and simply be called iPhone. A numberless product line has worked for both iPods and Macs for ages now, and frankly I can’t imagine what else they could do going forward.
click-wheel ipod games removed from itunes [permalink]
Seems to me this is a pretty good indicator of what’s going to happen to the classic iPod.
a new day
The iPhone has done more than shake up the phone industry—it has shaken up our collective vision for the future of computing. I’ve found myself building, designing, and dreaming about what’s next in mobile software without having to slot out time, or populate my to-do list. That’s the kind of interest and drive I want to have in my full-time work.
Today, I’m excited to announce that I’ve accepted a position at ZAAZ as an iOS developer. ZAAZ is an interactive digital agency, utilizing analytics to plot out digital strategies for their clients. Increasingly, those strategies are calling for iOS apps.
I have always been proud to be employed by 5TH Cell. It has been a privilege to be involved with so many wonderful and well-received projects, and to work with such dedicated and talented people.
I’m looking forward to this new chapter in my career, and can’t wait to build some great apps.
amazon press conference [permalink]
If this is anything other than their tablet announcement, it’s a waste of a press conference.
movie clip brain reconstructions [permalink]
About two and a half years ago I posted about a group of Japanese researchers reconstructing still images from brain waves. It looks like that line of research has progressed quite a bit since then.
layoffs at hp’s palm division [permalink]
I’m sure this won’t hurt their “commitment to developing webOS as a platform.”
reading rainbow gets ipad reboot [permalink]
Three reasons I like this news:
- I remember watching Reading Rainbow as a kid.
- I’m a pretty big fan of seeing the iPad used in education.
- You can never have too much Geordi La Forge.
dress like steve jobs day [permalink]
It was news to me. This morning a coworker told me it’s dress like Steve Jobs day. I, unfortunately, don’t have the black turtleneck nor the New Balance shoes to complete the costume.
friday reading
MG Siegler over at TechCrunch scored a double-whammy today starting with his take on the value of the iPad, and the threat it is posing to Microsoft.
When I went on vacation a few months ago, I brought both my laptop and my iPad. I promised myself I wouldn’t do any work during the trip — as a result, the laptop never came out. Not once. The iPad? I used it every single day, for hours.
It was followed up with an inside scoop on the now-imminent Amazon Kindle Tablet. The touch based Kindle sounds very much in line with the rumors and speculations, but the article is well worth the read. It looks to be the first interesting contribution to the tablet eco-system since the iPad.
Good stuff.
embrace the platform
Shaun Inman recently posted a treatise on touch, where he describes some issues and considerations for a touch control scheme for platform games.
On screen buttons are a stop gap for supporting yesterday’s control scheme on today’s platform, and Shaun is going easy on them when he says they “are not the way forward.” The truth is they are unworkable at best, and they tend to skew towards abominable.
Each platform has strengths, and successful games play to those strengths. Shaun should be applauded that The Last Rocket feels perfectly at home on the iPhone. Few games manage to do this.
The biggest revolution of iOS is getting the computer out of the way of the software. You do that by making the interactions transparent and obvious. Instead of making the platform suit the games, the games must suit the platform. That might mean you shouldn’t port your last popular title, or you may need to think again before building that remake. The way forward for game developers is building titles that embrace the platform.
who is apple’s next taste-maker?
Steve Jobs is a man with impeccable taste, like a Vignelli with a bent for technology. The minutiae of Apple’s pipeline, products, and services have been subject to his stamp of approval for years. There is something cohesive about Apple across all levels of the company. That DNA is a reflection of Jobs’ personal style.
The impression I get is that Tim Cook doesn’t fulfill this role. My main concern for Apple is that they might not be able to keep up the current momentum without that singular, brilliant taste-maker. It is rather well established that matters of style are not well suited to board rooms.
windows 8 ribbon explorer [permalink]
Because Windows Explorer doesn’t have enough buttons, checkboxes, and drop down menus. (via Ben Brooks)
the big apple [permalink]
Silicon Valley capitalism had arguably delivered what the Soviets had dreamed of and failed, modernism for the masses. An iPhone really is the best phone you can buy at any price. To paraphrase Andy Warhol: Lady Gaga uses an iPhone, and just think, you can have an iPhone too. An iPhone is an iPhone and no amount of money can get you a better phone. This was what American modernism was about.
(via kottke)
tools & toys [permalink]
A man buys something for two reasons: a good reason and the real reason.
Shawn Blanc has introduced a new website where he curates a fine list of gadgets and trinkets for the modern geek.
21 kilometer apple logo [permalink]
As a tribute to Steve Jobs, Joseph Tame took a 21km run around Tokyo in the shape of an Apple logo. Now that’s a dedicated fan.