Withings Releases Activite Steel →

November 18, 2015 · 23:52

This is probably the most interesting watch on the market for people who need fitness trackers, but don’t want to use a separate device nor buy something like an Apple Watch. I don’t like its design personally—it’s too thin and small for me—but I know people who absolutely adore them.

Withings released the Activite Steel today—it features a 316L stainless steel case and a silicone strap—and priced it at $169.95 / €169.95. It’s much cheaper than the high-end model, which also features a leather strap and sapphire glass, and just a touch more expensive than the Activite Pop with a PVD-coated case.

Tweetbot 2.2 for Mac is out!

November 18, 2015 · 19:02

Apple finally approved Tweetbot 2.2 for Mac, with a few new interesting changes and bug fixes. Most notably, the conversation view now follows Tweetbots for iOS’ behaviour, with the newest Tweets on top, and the app now supports Split View and fullscreen mode in OS X 10.11 El Capitan.

Continue reading →

Five New Apple TV Ads

November 18, 2015 · 17:19

Apple debuted five new Apple TV ads yesterday, showcasing various features of the new platform. The obvious one is video, which is represented by Netflix and HBO Now—neither of which is still available in Poland, which pisses me off to no end. The second, potentially very important, feature are games, with the heroes being Crossy Road, Disney Infinity 3.0 Edition: Star Wars and Asphalt 8.

I am writing these words sitting in a cafe and one of them made me laugh out loud, to the consternation of the people around me—guess which one.

Watch the ads →

iPad Pro vs. iPad Air 2 vs. iPad mini 4 Display Shoot-Out →

November 18, 2015 · 17:05

Dr. Raymond M. Soneira:

The differences and similarities in performance between these 3 current iPad displays are really interesting and surprising… We’ll cover these issues and much more, with in-depth comprehensive display tests, measurements and analysis that you will find nowhere else.

Biggest doesn’t mean best, but it’s close, so I won’t spoil the surprise. Oh, there are lots of interesting tidbits of information that you won’t find in the comparison tables.

Lightroom 2015.3 / 6.3—Old Import Dialog is Back →

November 18, 2015 · 11:42

Adobe:

Lightroom CC 2015.3 and Lightroom 6.3 are now available on Adobe.com.  The goal of this release is to provide additional camera raw support, lens profile support and address bugs that were introduced in previous releases of Lightroom.  This release also restores the Import experience available prior to Lightroom 6.2.

I was waiting for this—the import module in 6.2 increased my import times by a factor of two. Hopefully everything will be back to normal.

My plea to Adobe: Please spend the next few months optimising Lightroom for speed.

Mac App Store: Single Point of Failure →

November 17, 2015 · 18:22

Michael Tsai:

The Mac App Store is supposed to make things easier, but it’s also a single point of failure. Not only is it neglected, but sometimes even the existing functionality stops working. Mac OS X 10.9 introduced a code signing bug that prevented me from submitting updates for several months. In June 2015, there was a month-long iTunes Connect bug that prevented my uploaded build from entering the review queue. And I currently have a bug fix update that Apple has been reviewing for 33 days (with 8 days of waiting before that). When I inquired about the status, Apple told me that everything was normal and that I should just keep waiting. In short, the system is broken on multiple levels, and there is no evidence to suggest that things will get better.

I’ve always been a big fan of the Mac App Store as a user—it just makes things so easy—but what Michael mentions is completely unacceptable. It has been getting worse and worse over the past two years or so, and today I will actually actively spend time looking if an app is also available straight from the developer. The purchase procedure is usually much more irritating, I have to store the license information in 1Password, but ultimately it’s been worth it thus far.

Make sure to read the comments below Michael’s post too.

Apple Watch 2 Rumoured in Q2 or Q3 2016 →

November 17, 2015 · 18:12

Zac Hall:

While it’s no surprise that Apple would be planning to introduce the Apple Watch 2 in 2016, a third quarter release would mean a launch two years after the first model was introduced and roughly a year and a half since it went on sale.

I personally expected the second generation Watch to show up at least two years after the first one went on sale, but this theoretically makes sense in terms of the holiday quarter.

Take this with a grain of salt, as usual.

Tim Cook about converging Mac and iPad →

November 17, 2015 · 18:03

Adrian Weckler interviewing Tim Cook:

Speaking to Independent.ie, Cook denied that the death of computers such as the Mac was imminent and said that there would be a market for such traditional personal computers for the foreseeable future.

“We feel strongly that customers are not really looking for a converged Mac and iPad,” said Cook. “Because what that would wind up doing, or what we’re worried would happen, is that neither experience would be as good as the customer wants. So we want to make the best tablet in the world and the best Mac in the world. And putting those two together would not achieve either. You’d begin to compromise in different ways.”

He’s right, it wouldn’t be a good experience. Macs and iPads excel in different areas: the former is extremely powerful and potentially complicated to use, while the latter is simpler, but due to iOS’ constraints, requires more work to incorporate advanced workflows. The good news is that people will be able to get more and more done on the iPad over the next few years, especially since the operating system will gain new capabilities, empowering developers to make even more amazing apps.

Rdio joins Pandora →

November 17, 2015 · 17:32

From the Rdio blog:

We’d like to update the entire Rdio community regarding today’s announcement that Pandora plans to acquire Rdio’s innovative technology and critically-acclaimed design…

We thank you for your continued support over the years and look forward to bringing you even better music experiences in the future as part of the Pandora team.

See you, Rdio. Seriously.

Surfin’ Safari Details How to Use Apple’s San Francisco Font in CSS →

November 16, 2015 · 14:30

Myles Maxfield:

Web content is sometimes designed to fit in with the overall aesthetic of the underlying platform which it is being rendered on. One of the ways to achieve this is by using the platform’s system font, which is possible on iOS and OS X by using the “-apple-system” CSS value for the “font-family” CSS property. On iOS 9 and OS X 10.11, doing this allows you to use Apple’s new system font, San Francisco. Using “-apple-system” also correctly interacts with the font-weight CSS property to choose the correct font on Apple’s latest operating systems.

Tempted to try it on here…

PointOut Updated to 1.3 with iOS 9 Multitasking and iPad Pro Support

November 16, 2015 · 12:25

I recently wrote about the future of PointOut for iOS, expecting to wait at least a month or two before its next update, but lo and behold—1.3 is here with support for the iPad Pro, a simplified landscape view on iPhone, full landscape support on iPad, and most importantly, Split View and Slide Over functionality. You can find my full review of PointOut over here.

★ PointOut – iOS – free (with IAP) →

Tim Cook: Apple is Open →

November 15, 2015 · 22:32

Brendan Klinkenberg posted Tim Cook’s email to Apple employees regarding the inappropriate behaviour in Melbourne’s Apple Store:

Our stores and our hearts are open to people from all walks of life, regardless of race or religion, gender or sexual orientation, age, disability, income, language or point of view. All across our company, being inclusive and embracing our differences makes our products better and our stores stronger.

I wish all people had a similar set of values.

Charles Perry about the Patronage Model →

November 15, 2015 · 22:22

Charles Perry:

Proponents of this model call it “patronage,” but it has little in common with the historical concept of patronage where a well-off patron paid an artist an amount to commission a work of art. This new model, in fact, is the opposite of patronage. Instead of requiring a patron to provide money up front in exchange for an item of value, this new model gives away all the value in advance and requires nothing from those who receive it. It less resembles patronage, or even commerce, than it does begging, or busking if you’re feeling generous.

Interesting point of view, although I personally have a different take on the subject—set a high enough price to make your useful product sustainable and market the hell out of it. There is a tiny flaw with my theory: most people don’t want to pay for software, even when it’s really well done.

Some Are More Equal Than Others →

November 15, 2015 · 22:11

Elie Fares:

Today, 128 innocent civilians in Paris are no longer with us. Yesterday, 45 innocent civilians in Beirut were no longer with us. The death tolls keep rising, but we never seem to learn.

Amid the chaos and tragedy of it all, one nagging thought wouldn’t leave my head. It’s the same thought that echoes inside my skull at every single one of these events, which are becoming sadly very recurrent: we don’t really matter…

When my people died on the streets of Beirut on November 12th, world leaders did not rise in condemnation. There were no statements expressing sympathy with the Lebanese people. There was no global outrage that innocent people whose only fault was being somewhere at the wrong place and time should never have to go that way or that their families should never be broken that way or that someone’s sect or political background should never be a hyphen before feeling horrified at how their corpses burned on cement.

I stare in alarm at headlines mentioning deaths and murders every day—it’s impossible to avoid them—and I think of the horrors that the dead’s families must be going through every single time. Whatever their religion or skin colour.

App Store Deals — 2015/11/15

November 15, 2015 · 01:55

I haven’t found anything truly interesting during these past few days to share, but I noticed that the first instalments of The Room series are currently on sale—I’ve been meaning to try them for ages now.

★ Alhambra Game – iOS – Games – €4.99 > €2.99 →
★ Focus 2 – Mac – Photography – €14.99 > €1.99 →
★ Syberia 2 – iOS – Games – €4.99 > €0.99 →
★ Syberia – iOS – Games – €4.99 > €0.99 →
★ Sygic Europe: GPS Navigation – iOS – Navigation – €24.99 > €19.99 →
★ Sygic North America: GPS Navigation – iOS – Navigation – €29.99 > €19.99 →
★ The Room – iPad – Games – €1.99 > €0.99 →
★ The Room Two – iOS – Games – €2.99 > €1.99 →
★ The Room Three – iOS – Games – €4.99 →
★ This War of Mine – iOS – Games – €14.99 > €6.99 →
★ Tweetbot for Twitter – Mac – Social Networking – €12.99 > €9.99 →
★ Worms™ 4 – iOS – Games – €4.99 > €0.99 →

Not So New →

November 15, 2015 · 01:17

Samantha Bielefeld:

The patronage-only model is so new, and very experimental, but has that stopped others from replicating it?

Technically, the patronage model that Marco Arment adopted isn’t especially new. I first saw it many years ago on David Smith’s Pedometer++ [App Store]—he’s a unique developer in terms of experimenting in the App Store, choosing different monetisation options between his many apps, and adapting extremely well to current trends. In fact, I wrote about his tip jar a while ago. To my knowledge, which isn’t especially impressive when it comes to this subject, Marek Moi’s PointOut [App Store] followed suit with a unique system of buying him coffees as a thank you.

The problem with the App Store is that a select few developers with unique ideas are able to price their apps accordingly, while the rest have to compete with many free apps that are good enough. Quite frankly, I want to pay for quality software for the sole reason of supporting the team behind it, and so that they continue to maintain their products and hopefully add new features too.

Sadly, I realise I’m in the minority…