ADAM SCHOALES

The best ad I’ve seen in a long time.

Really great tips here from a developer who gives actual examples of how his app is making the transition to iOS 7. 

Notice he’s not removing all the personality his app had developed over the years, simply pulling some of that personality back to fit nicely with the new aesthetic of iOS 7.

John Mayer ladies and gentlemen.

The four-time Tony Award host and former Doogie Howser, M.D. will star on Broadway in the spring as the gender-bent rock chanteuse at the center of Hedwig and the Angry Inch, the cult musical that was made into a cult movie.

Holy shit, I need to see this!

Well I won’t lie to you: this is fantastic!!

I can sense already the response from the more cynical in the audience: “overblown bullshit” and “hippy claptrap” but I think this perfectly captures the spirit of Apple. It addresses the constant calls from the Wall Street analysts and ADHD-addled gadget bloggers for Apple to move into every possible market and sector. It explains why Apple’s executive team takes such umbrage at shoddy knock-offs. More than anything, though, I think it lays out, in as explicitly a way as is possible, the “vision” foolish writers claimed Tim Cook failed to articulate in his D11 appearance:

“We spend a lot of time On a few great things. Until every idea we touch Enhances each life it touches.”

In my opinion this has been, from the return of Steve Jobs at least, the singular goal of Apple. Not to make all the moneys, not to dominate markets, not to impress bloggers but simply to make products that enhance our lives.

This is exactly it. I love when tech-pundits bitch about Apple not innovating and praising companies that, in actual fact, do no inovating of their own but rather iterate (*cough*samsung*cough*). 

But I especially love when tech-pundits claim to love Apple, and yet they don’t understand their very ethos. 

A “You might remember me from” supercut by Christopher Coleman. 

Basically the greatest thing on the internet.

It’s finally here. Jamie Benning is back with another one of his legendary filmumentaries, this time focusing on the original summer blockbuster: Jaws.

These things are absolutely astonishing, and if you haven’t yet watched his past efforts you simply must!

Two of my favourite people on the planet.

And Joan Rivers.

One of my all time favourite web series is back, and the season premiere is fantastic!

So think for a minute about a scenario in which, say, a phone number is identified overseas as being linked to terror activity. It is so identified by, say, NSA overseas intercepts or through intelligence gathering by the CIA or the military. And say that there exists a database of billions and billions of telephonic contacts in the United States over a period of months or years. And say a computer could then run the suspect number through that data base and determine a pattern of communication between that overseas phone and several individuals in New York, or Boston, or Detroit. Would you want that connection to be made and made quickly? Or do you want to leave law enforcement to begin trying to acquire the call history on that initial phone from overseas carriers who may or may not maintain detailed retroactive call data or be unwilling to even provide that data fully to American law enforcement or do so without revealing the investigative effort to the targets themselves?

Maybe I’m naive to think that the government isn’t inherently an evil entity? Maybe I’m naive to think that this really is an effort to take advantage of current technology to prevent catastrophes from happening? Maybe I’m just watching to much of “The West Wing” and forget that real governments aren’t run like the Bartlett administration…

But I gotta tell you, David Simon has some really great points here.

For instance, did you know that it is a federal crime to be in possession of a lobster under a certain size? It doesn’t matter if you bought it at a grocery store, if someone else gave it to you, if it’s dead or alive, if you found it after it died of natural causes, or even if you killed it while acting in self defense. You can go to jail because of a lobster.

If the federal government had access to every email you’ve ever written and every phone call you’ve ever made, it’s almost certain that they could find something you’ve done which violates a provision in the 27,000 pages of federal statues or 10,000 administrative regulations. You probably do have something to hide, you just don’t know it yet.

Really? Lobster law?

Of course all this assumes that Big Broth— err — “The Government” wanted to make you a criminal for some reason. You know, go after Joe Somebody for some obscure law that they didn’t know they were breaking. 

Of course, at that point they must have caught all the real bad guys, or you know, used the Lobster Law to get those guys too…

Mayor Rob Ford was one of only three members of council to vote Thursday against giving city money to Pride, the Toronto International Film Festival, the Art Gallery of Ontario, and other major cultural organizations.

Our mayor, ladies and gentlemen.

The basic functionality hasn’t changed. You still use iOS in the same way, and almost everything is where you expect it to be. The same gestures work. There are a few differences here and there – it’s a major new version of the OS, after all – but the changes are mostly aesthetic.

You won’t be confused by iOS 7 if you’re accustomed to a previous version. You will, however, probably find that it feels more fluid, responsive and modern.

iOS 7 is a recognition that Apple’s previous design languages couldn’t scale to the growth of the phone as a computing powerhouse. Let’s dig in.

Wired looks at iOS 7.

Nifty!

Some truly beautiful stuff here.