Archives

Is Apple A Boring Company Now?∝

Mike Elgan:

Let’s be honest about what we really want from Apple this week. We all want to know if Apple can still blow us away, or if they’re just a boring company now.

Steve was radical and Tim is stoic. Even swift giants are still giants.

All In One Running Android: Crippled∝

This is what I hear:

Hi. I’m a computer running an operating system that is not designed for a physical mouse and keyboard and that has hardly any useful apps that makes those two non-native interaction devices a necessity. Nice to meet you, I am the Acer DA220HQL.

The original story said it would run on an Intel 4430 which would be more powerful than the computer I built my mom in February. Sadly, this $400 joke will be graced with something less than a Haswell, a TI 4430 ARM dual-core.

UI is hard∝

Matt’s been working on the WarGame UI recently and I’ve seen his progress. It’s slow going. User interaction is harder than many other points in programming, not because it is necessarily technically complicated, but because balancing functionality and an intuitively obvious quality is hard. For my designs, I see UI on the web so much easier since there is so much less scaffolding to build up, but WordPress is an example of where that intuition is a little off. Designing an interface for sixteen percent of the visible Internet isn’t easy and doing in the constraints of ten years is extraordinarily challenging.

Post Formats have long been integrated into the WordPress, but since their creation, there has only been a little selector to pick between them. The WordPress Core was going to adopt a new UI for allowing more obvious ways of using those formats, but it didn’t make into the upcoming release of WordPress. It will be pushed into a plugin for now but as it matures there, it may integrated back into the Core.

Gmail tabs, maybe coming soon∝

The Next Web has an image that indicates a tab-based UI is coming to Gmail at some point in the near future. As you can see in the screenshot below, we’re looking at four different tabs, with each one presumably storing certain types of emails.

Please, just make them automatically filtering labels. I don’t need more visual garbage when I view email.

Guild Wars is Over∝

Polygon:

Guild Wars, ArenaNet’s 8-year-old MMORPG, will no longer receive new content and is switching its support to automated, the developer announced via the game’s official website.

By the six.

Yes, Guild Wars 1. I give it another year and it’s likely going offline.

Yahoo and Flickr∝

While I still feel the same about Tumblr getting the short end of the stick, today’s Flickr announcement singles a revival. Congratulations Yahoo, you did a great job with Flickr, finally.

When I think about Flickr, I remember my mom telling me about it when I was just in elementary school. I relate it to Pinterest because it’s a service my mom uses, not me. I never uploaded pictures to Flickr growing up, mostly because I had no pictures to upload and when I did later in life, I used Instagram to send them to Facebook and Twitter simultaneously — Google+ is currently winning the photo battle for me personally though as they keep the best sizes available.

Yahoo and Tumblr∝

I hope Yahoo does not destroy Tumblr like Twitter destroyed Posterous.

I hope Tumblr refuses to accept this offer from Yahoo, despite all it could offer them. I talked about this on At The Nexus #76 in more detail. Good luck to both, more to you, Tumblr.

Tumblr is taking a very safe approach with this acquisition – the CEO stays onboard and the company maintains plenty of autonomy. That’s great. And Yahoo said they’ll keep their hands off the porn business that somehow wound up on Tumblr – that is the best sign, I think, that Yahoo believes in Tumblr as a platform.

Good luck to you both.

Windows 8.1 Will Be Free∝

Windows Blue, officially titled Windows 8.1 now, will be free to Windows 8 users through the App Store.

Which means you’ll need to get a Microsoft Account and sell your soul, which may or may not be worth it to you.

Nvidia Shield for just $349∝

Yeah, cool story, about a hundred dollars too expensive.

A portable gaming device with a Tegra 4 should not cost as much as a GTX 670. Sorry, just saying. Oh, and it should not cost just as much as my PS3 I bought two years ago.

Well, at this point, I’m just whining.

Press, syncing soon∝

I plugged Press months ago and it was quashed after Google Reader’s death announcement. Today, Press will support altenerative sync-options after doomsday.

I think we’ll be seeing more of this very soon from many other Feed Readers.

Disclosure: I bought Press and really promoted it. It looks great. But sadly, in the style I consume tech-news throughout the day, Press was not suited to my needs. Thus, I don’t use it on my phone. It’s on my Nexus 7 still though, where I think it’s interface style excels.

PS4 Won’t Leak Like A Sieve∝

Sony learned a lesson from the PS3. Don’t make a console so powerful that is too expensive for normal gamers to afford. I look forward to E3 where Sony actually reveals the hardware look — it matters more than you might think. Spiderman lettering was just as much at fault as the absurd launch price of the PS3.

Euphonia∝

At Paul Miller’s recomendation (since he’s been offline for a year), Euphonia is about obsession with technology. For me, it hits even closer to home since I’m a programmacaster and I record things all the time.

The movie is about an hour long and at points it feels longer, but it’s generally well made and it has its moments. I lost interest towards the end when the recording hits the quicktime but overall, I liked it.