Linked List: February 12, 2009

Thursday, 12 February 2009

‘I’ll Come to Your House and Chew Gum’ 

Joaquin Phoenix on Letterman last night. Dave’s never better than with an interview gone wrong.

Security Update 2009-001 

Includes a fix for the Safari RSS security problem publicized last month.

Daniel Sandler on How the Twitter ‘Don’t Click’ Trick Worked 

A lot of panicked Twitter users thought their account had been compromised, but it was far simpler than that:

The attack page creates a button labeled “Don’t Click” that does nothing at all, but it also loads twitter.com in an <IFRAME> directly on top of the button. That IFRAME is then made completely transparent using CSS.

When you click the button, you’re actually clicking on the (now invisible) ‘Update’ button on Twitter’s web interface instead; assuming you’re logged in to Twitter, you’ll immediately post whatever’s in the form input box.

Is there a good reason why browsers should allow <iframe> elements to be transparent?

Matthew Baldwin’s List of Mindfuck Movies 

“Some movies inform. Some movies entertain. And some pry open your skull and punch you in the brain.”

Shooting With the Quad Camera 

Quad Camera has an odd, retro, pixel-font interface, but it’s a cool app.

Lawrence Yang’s Response to the New Pepsi Logo 

That’s about right.

When Are Mac Hardware Updates Coming? 

Chris Seibold argues that Apple is “neglecting” the Mac, pointing to how long it’s been since the Mini, iMac, and Mac Pros have been updated as proof. Here’s the thing, though: Mac sales are higher now than ever. The desktop models are overdue for updates, though, and Apple’s recent quarterly unit sale numbers reflect this. I think it’s simply the case that Apple is aiming for a roughly annual schedule for all their hardware products — Mac, iPod, iPhone. No reason to get your pants in a knot. I expect the new Mac Mini and speed-bump iMacs and Mac Pros in March, if not sooner.

Authors Guild Claims Text-to-Speech Software Is Illegal 

Authors Guild executive director Paul Aiken on the text-to-speech feature in the new Kindle:

“They don’t have the right to read a book out loud. That’s an audio right, which is derivative under copyright law.”

That seems like a silly argument to me. Neil Gaiman agrees.

The Great Atlantic Ocean Swimming Hoax 

Chris Chase on Jennifer Figge, who “swam” the Atlantic Ocean:

The real issue stemmed from the fact that swimming 2,100 miles in 25 days is impossible. […] It’s infinitely more impossible when somebody only spends 21 minutes swimming during one of those 25 days. Michael Phelps swimming his fastest would take about 20 days to cover that distance. And that’s his fastest pace, sustained for three weeks, without ever stopping. Impossible.

QuickLook for Markdown 

Free plugin by Michael Dominic K. (based on an older plugin by Phil Toland) that adds QuickLook previews and Spotlight indexing for Markdown-formatted text files. Very cool. Uses the fast Discount C library for Markdown processing.