Linked List: June 26, 2009

Friday, 26 June 2009

Satchel 

One of my favorite things about 37signals’s Backpack service is that it offers a rich API with read/write access to just about everything you can store in it. My thanks to Stand Alone for sponsoring this week’s DF RSS feed to promote Satchel, their Backpack client for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Satchel lets you create and edit Backpack pages, notes, and reminders; lets you update your Backpack status and journal; supports multiple Backpack accounts; and more. Satchel even lets you edit Backpack items offline.

I use Satchel, and find it particularly handy for editing and managing checklists. Version 1.2 was just released this week and includes a bunch of performance and multiple-account improvements. The full version is $9.99, and you can try its read-only sibling Satchel View for free.

Looks Like There’s a Winner on the Netflix Prize Leaderboard 

The team named “BellKor’s Pragmatic Chaos” scored a 10.05 percent improvement.

Update: Looks like “BellKor’s Pragmatic Chaos” is the result of a merger between two leading teams.

Michael Jackson’s Patent for ‘Anti-Gravity’ Shoes 

Unbeige:

That’s right, intellectual property fans, Jackson is listed as the first of three inventors on United States Patent 5,255,452, granted in 1993 for a “method and means for creating anti-gravity illusion.” Translation: special loafers fitted with heels that can slot into the stage floor to allow the wearer to lean forward, Smooth Criminal style, at gravity-defying angles.

Mobile Uploads to YouTube 

The YouTube Blog:

In the last six months, we’ve seen uploads from mobile phones to YouTube jump 1700%; just since last Friday, when the iPhone 3GS came out, uploads increased by 400% a day.

Wow.

iPhone 3GS Signal Strength Oddities 

Ted Landau:

Almost immediately after getting my new iPhone 3GS, I noticed that it spent more time connected to the EDGE network, rather than the faster 3G network, than did my prior iPhone 3G. […]

Checking online, I found others reporting a similar situation. So I contacted Apple Support for an explanation. They said they were familiar with this matter and that there was nothing wrong. At least not with my iPhone 3GS. According to Apple, the software behind the status bar on an iPhone 3GS does a better job of showing when a switch from 3G to EDGE has occurred than does the comparable software on an iPhone 3G.

Interesting.

This Week’s ‘Your Mac Life’ 

I was a guest on this week’s episode of Your Mac Life, discussing with Shawn King the media coverage of Steve Jobs’s liver transplant.

Apple Leads in Customer Satisfaction in Vocalabs Tech Support Study 

The results aren’t even close.

The Pre Is Palm’s Last Chance 

Marguerite Reardon, reporting for CNet:

Palm announced big losses for its fiscal fourth quarter, the last quarter before its hot new smartphone hit the market, but executives see the Pre as the key to its turnaround.

CEO Jon Rubinstein said Thursday during the company’s earnings conference call that sales of the Palm Pre, which hit the market on June 6, have been “strong and growing.” He didn’t give exact sales figures for the device, which has a touch screen and uses a new operating system call WebOS, but he added that he “couldn’t be happier with our launch.” Analysts estimated that between 50,000 and 100,000 Pres were sold in the first few days that the device was available.

The reason it’s important that the Pre succeeds is so the mobile market doesn’t wind up like the desktop market — with just one single great experience, alone in a sea of crap.

FastScripts 2.4 

Daniel Jalkut:

FastScripts 2.4 is out, with an important change in the evaluation terms.

Use FastScripts for free, for as long as you like. All features are enabled and you may define up to 10 keyboard shortcuts. If you decide you want unlimited keyboard shortcuts, purchase a license to remove that limitation.

FastScripts is one of my favorite and most-used utilities.