Berkeleynerd on Hacker News:
A friend of mine at Apple reported multiple Black Vehicles (Lincoln Town Cars and Escalades) with at least one having MD License Plates at the Apple Executive Briefing Center this morning between 11AM and Noon. Occupants had ear pieces and sun glasses and were accompanied by a CHP (California Highway Patrol) cruiser and three motorcycle escorts.
Kurt Opsahl:
EFF applauds Apple for standing up for real security and the rights of its customers. We have been fighting to protect encryption, and stop backdoors, for over 20 years. That’s why EFF plans to file an amicus brief in support of Apple’s position.
Tim Cook:
The United States government has demanded that Apple take an unprecedented step which threatens the security of our customers. We oppose this order, which has implications far beyond the legal case at hand.
This moment calls for public discussion, and we want our customers and people around the country to understand what is at stake.
The FBI has been working on Apple to give them access to iPhones for a long time now, and now it appears that they’re using the tragic death of the victims of the San Bernardino attack as a way to force Apple’s hand. Public opinion is a strong weapon, especially if they can get the people behind them.
I’m happy to see Tim and Apple fighting this.
Todd Cunningham:
“Deadpool” opened at No. 1 in 60 of the 61 markets in which Twentieth Century Fox rolled it out and, as it did in North America, shattered multiple records along the way.
So what country opted for something other than Marvel’s foul-mouthed bad-ass with a bad attitude played by Ryan Reynolds?
That would be Poland, no joke.
When we make the international news, it’s usually because of something stupid like this.
Mark Gurman:
Apple is currently planning to introduce a new 4-inch iPhone dubbed the “iPhone 5se” and a new iPad Air at an event on Tuesday, March 15th, then put the products up for sale online and in retail stores as early as Friday, March 18th, according to sources. Apple is unlikely to offer pre-orders for the new devices, according to sources who cautioned that the plans could still change.
I would love for the products to be available for purchase on the day of their announcement. Basically I want Tim Cook, Phil Schiller, or whoever is up on stage at the time to say: ‘Available… today.’
By the way, for those asking: I’m not buying the new iPhone 5SE nor the iPad Air 3 — my 6S Plus and iPad Pro are doing fine.
John Gruber:
Drop what you’re doing and find a pair of headphones: my guests on this special episode of my podcast are Eddy Cue and Craig Federighi. It’s a wide-ranging discussion, and includes a bunch of interesting scoops: the weekly number of iTunes and App Store transactions, an updated Apple Music subscriber count, peak iMessage traffic per second, the number of iCloud account holders, and more.
I can’t wait to listen to this.
I loved all my iPads, especially when travelling. They’re light, take up little space, and I even read on them instead of on my Kindle, just to have one less device with me. However, when I travel to places and plan to take a lot of photos, I always take my MacBook Pro1 instead of an iPad, albeit the decision is not an easy one.
While I can pretty much use the iPad, and more recently the iPad Pro, for close to everything, it does not run Lightroom nor does it support RAW files the way Lightroom for the desktop does. That is the single reason why I take the laptop. If I had an iPad mini, I would have probably taken that too2. But I don’t. And I want to be able to edit my photos.
So, Adobe, what I want, and need, is Lightroom for iOS which replicates the desktop version’s features, and allows me to transfer everything over to my Mac once I get home, integrating it easily with my existing catalog. Please make this happen.
Top Gear:
People of the world, may we present the brand new Top Gear TV team!
We are very proud to announce that racing driver Sabine Schmitz, YouTube star Chris Harris, F1 pundit Eddie Jordan and motoring journalist Rory Reid will join Chris Evans, Matt LeBlanc and of course, The Stig, when the show returns in May.
I’ll say it flat out: I don’t much like Sabine as a host, but she is one impressive driver. Chris Harris is of course awesome, and I like Eddie, but I have my reservations about the rest of the team — I guess I’ll just have to watch the ‘first’ season with the new crew to make up my mind.
via @mikeyziel
This appears to be the project for Casey’s Beme office in New York City. It’s a few screens down from the top on the right side. I was quite surprised to find out that a group of Polish designers are responsible for this!
My thanks to Artur for the find!
I have used Day One for over four years now, and I truly believe it’s the best ‘dear diary / journal’ app out there. I recently wrote a few words about the new additions and my first impressions of Day One 21 — it’s second iteration in which is was rewritten from the ground up. It’s still on sale — it will be ending sometime tomorrow — and you can get it for 50% of the price.
★ Day One 2 Journal + Notes – Mac – Lifestyle – €19.99 →
★ Day One 2 Journal + Notes – iOS – Lifestyle – €4.99 →
The new version has had a huge impact on my personal writing — I now input a few entries per day, instead of a few per week, and I use the Mac version much more now; it’s greatly improved.
Mike Jahr:
You follow hundreds of people on Twitter — maybe thousands — and when you open Twitter, it can feel like you’ve missed some of their most important Tweets. Today, we’re excited to share a new timeline feature that helps you catch up on the best Tweets from people you follow.
Here’s how it works. You flip on the feature in your settings; then when you open Twitter after being away for a while, the Tweets you’re most likely to care about will appear at the top of your timeline – still recent and in reverse chronological order. The rest of the Tweets will be displayed right underneath, also in reverse chronological order, as always. At any point, just pull-to-refresh to see all new Tweets at the top in the live, up-to-the-second experience you already know and love.
Seems very reasonable and if I understand it correctly, this will be opt-in, which is rare these days. I wish Twitter kept all their new email mailing lists opt-in too.
P.S. This feature is not available nor will it affect the users of third party apps such as Twitterrific and Tweetbot.
Probably the cutest video I’ve seen in a long time! Must see!
Ben Rosen:
I’m 29 years old, and I’ve been on Snapchat for about a year now. I post fairly often (usually on my Story), and I get a decent amount of engagement from my friends. Quite honestly, up until Thanksgiving, I thought I was pretty good at Snapchat.
Then I watched my little sister on Snapchat.
I’m 37 and I only find one good use for Snapchat — when travelling you get to bring your followers along for the ride.
ME: Tell me what your day is like on Snapchat.
BROOKE: When I wake up, I have about 40 snaps from friends. I just roll through and respond to them.
ME: How do you respond? Like, “haha good one, Elsbitch”?
BROOKE: No conversations…it’s mostly selfies. Depending on the person, the selfie changes. Like, if it’s your best friend, you make a gross face, but if it’s someone you like or don’t know very well, it’s more regular.
ME: I’ve seen how fast you do these responses… How are you able to take in all that information so quickly?
BROOKE: I don’t really see what they send. I tap through so fast. It’s rapid fire.I’m mesmerized. What’s even the point of sending snaps to each other if you don’t look at them? Am I crazy? That seems so unnecessary. Still, this is adult-brain talking. If I wanted to be one of the teens, I needed to just accept it and press on.
This seems completely pointless and a complete waste of time. While this sort of behaviour seems to increase one’s popularity, I cannot see what the benefits of it are. The downsides seem huge though — an inability to focus, lack of personal interests in many more important (and fun!) activities, etc. I recall I used to spend all my free time reading books instead of staring into smartphone screens — probably because these weren’t invented yet — on public transport, during family dinners, and wherever else that I could.
Like I said — I’m 37 — but in case you do want to follow me for some obscure reason that I fail to understand, my avatar-scan-to-follow-thingy is posted below.
