Linked List: March 31, 2010

Wednesday, 31 March 2010

Pogue 

David Pogue:

Speaking of video: Apple asserts that the iPad runs 10 hours on a charge of its nonremovable battery — but we all know you can’t trust the manufacturer. And sure enough, in my own test, the iPad played movies continuously from 7:30 a.m. to 7:53 p.m. — more than 12 hours. That’s four times as long as a typical laptop or portable DVD player.

Mossberg 

Mossberg:

After spending hours and hours with it, I believe this beautiful new touch-screen device from Apple has the potential to change portable computing profoundly, and to challenge the primacy of the laptop.

Ihnatko 

Andy Ihnatko:

In fact, after a week with the iPad, I’m suddenly wondering if any other company is as committed to invention as Apple. Has any other company ever demonstrated a restlessness to stray from the safe and proven, and actually invent things?

The bastard has four other iPad articles already.

Ed Baig: ‘The First iPad Is a Winnerl 

I love how Baig, Pogue, and Mossberg get review units before everyone else, and race to publish their reviews. Where by “love” I of course mean “hate”.

Lifehacker on Password Security 

Interesting how much more secure 8-character passwords are than 7.

Nokia N97 Promotional Video vs Real Life 

What a turd.

Court Says President Bush Violated Wiretapping Laws With Warrantless Wiretap 

Remember when this shithead was our president?

If you haven’t been following the fight over the legality of warrantless wiretapping, this case, involving lawyers working with the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation, is extremely important. When it was revealed that the Bush administration was wiretapping phonecalls without a warrant, lawsuits were filed — but the “problem” was that the parties (such as the ACLU) that filed the lawsuits didn’t have “standing” because they had no evidence that they, personally, were impacted by the warrantless wiretapping. This created a ridiculous Catch-22 situation. As long as the government hid its illegal activities and never said who it spied on, it could spy on anyone illegally. No one could bring a lawsuit, since there was no proof that they had been impacted by the illegal spying.

Then the feds screwed up. They accidentally sent the evidence of wiretapping some lawyers for the Al-Haramain group to those lawyers.

Germans Love David Hasselhoff 

Jesus Diaz:

According to a reliable source, Apple Germany had ordered only 75,000 iPads. Against all their predictions, they got 250,000 orders.

Does anyone still doubt that this is going to be huge?

Another Good Quarter for RIM 

They missed revenue estimates, but subscriber growth is up, and that’s what matters.

Only 90 People Preordered JooJoo Tablet, 15 Canceled It 

Speaking of iPad rivals.

ShakeItPhoto: Polaroid-Style Photo App for iPhone 

Seems to be the app used by David Guttenfelder for his aforelinked Afghanistan combat photos. (Via The Ref.)

‘Premium’ HDMI Cables Are a Rip-Off 

The Rip:

With analog cables, the signal degrades, with digital cables such as HDMI, it either works or it doesn’t. The signal doesn’t degrade any more than your JPEGs degrade when you put them on a thumb drive.

Asus Talking Up iPad Rivals 

Elizabeth Woyke, reporting for Forbes:

Asus is about to roll out its own iPad rivals. In an interview with Forbes, Shih revealed that Asus is planning to release “at least two” tablet PCs in the coming months. […] Shih said one Asus tablet will likely run Google software, such as the upcoming open-source operating system, Chrome, or the mobile operating system, Android.

They don’t know yet? (And if it’s Chrome OS, just how soon could it arrive?)

The other will probably be based on Microsoft’s Windows platform.

“Probably”? Yes, these iPad competitors from Asus sound imminent and thoroughly thought-out.

Scathing Critique of Ogg 

Måns is not a fan, to say the least.

David Guttenfelder’s Afghanistan iPhone Photos 

iPhone as photojournalism tool.

DoubleTwist Adds iTunes-Like Interface for Android Market 

If you’ve got a Mac and an Android phone, I’ll bet you want this.