Linked List: October 29, 2009

Thursday, 29 October 2009

Updating iTunes Extras and LP Content for Your Apple TV ★

You have to wait for updated versions of existing iTunes LP and Extras content before they’ll work on Apple TV 3.0.

New UI and adds support for the iTunes Extras (movies) and iTunes LP (music) formats. Screenshots of the new UI are here. Looks good to me — especially how they’ve moved “My Movies”, “My TV Shows”, etc. to the top of the menu lists. (And they’ve switched the system font from Lucida Grande to Helvetica.)

A Comparative Study of User Intellect Based on Anti-Productivity Applications Included in Operating Systems ★

I’m a sucker for a good cheap shot like this.

One-Handed Computing With the iPhone ★

Nice observation from Jason Kottke:

The easy single-handed operation of the iPhone is not one of its obvious selling points but is one of those little features that grows on you and becomes nearly indispensable. A portable networked computing and gaming device that can be easily operated with one hand can be used in a surprising variety of situations.

One-handed operation wasn’t feasible on stylus-based systems.

iTunes 9.0.2 Breaks WebOS Syncing Again ★

At this point, it’d be news if a new version of iTunes didn’t break Palm’s WebOS syncing hack.

Wired: ‘An Epidemic of Fear: How Panicked Parents Skipping Shots Endangers Us All’ ★

Splendid feature in Wired by Amy Wallace on the movement to skip childhood vaccinations:

The rejection of hard-won knowledge is by no means a new phenomenon. In 1905, French mathematician and scientist Henri Poincaré said that the willingness to embrace pseudo-science flourished because people “know how cruel the truth often is, and we wonder whether illusion is not more consoling.” Decades later, the astronomer Carl Sagan reached a similar conclusion: Science loses ground to pseudo-science because the latter seems to offer more comfort. “A great many of these belief systems address real human needs that are not being met by our society,” Sagan wrote of certain Americans’ embrace of reincarnation, channeling, and extraterrestrials. “There are unsatisfied medical needs, spiritual needs, and needs for communion with the rest of the human community.”

Looking back over human history, rationality has been the anomaly. Being rational takes work, education, and a sober determination to avoid making hasty inferences, even when they appear to make perfect sense. Much like infectious diseases themselves — beaten back by decades of effort to vaccinate the populace — the irrational lingers just below the surface, waiting for us to let down our guard.

How Critics Reviewed the Original Macintosh in 1984 ★

Somehow I missed this vintage 25-year claim chowder collection from Philip Elmer-DeWitt back in January. Here’s John C. Dvorak’s take on the Mac:

The nature of the personal computer is simply not fully understood by companies like Apple (or anyone else for that matter). Apple makes the arrogant assumption of thinking that it knows what you want and need. It, unfortunately, leaves the “why” out of the equation — as in “why would I want this?” The Macintosh uses an experimental pointing device called a “mouse”. There is no evidence that people want to use these things. I don’t want one of these new fangled devices.

Phillies Hope to End 364-Day World Series Drought ★

The Onion:

“The bottom line is we’re a pretty inexperienced team, and for many of these young players, this will be the first time they’ve been to the World Series in a year.” Manuel said. “A lot has changed in that time. If you would have told me last October that this country would elect a black president before the Philadelphia Phillies made it back to the World Series, I would have laughed in your face.”

While Philadelphia players admitted the 11-month championship- winless streak has been difficult for them personally, most agreed that it’s the fans who’ve suffered most, enduring more than 500,000 minutes without a World Series victory.

JSON vs. Plist for Sending Web Service Data to iPhone Apps ★

Sam Soffes:

What I found was very surprising. TouchJSON actually beat plists. It was slightly faster in every test I ran. This is awesome because plists have a much larger file size. They are usually about twice as big as JSON files due to all of the extra markup.

Count me in with Wolf: I wish Apple had just updated the old plist text format — which looks remarkably like JSON — instead of going XML.

(Another great web site design, too.)

Update 1: A bit of chirping on Twitter complaining that Soffes should have used the binary plist format, rather than XML. But how do you create binary plist data from web apps written in Ruby, Python, PHP or whatever, if they aren’t running on Mac OS X? I don’t think the binary plist format is documented by Apple.

Update 2: Dave Dribin points to this open source Core Foundation code, where the binary plist format is documented in the comments.

Phil Coffman on iPhone Photography ★

Some great iPhone photography app recommendations from Phil Coffman. I hadn’t heard of either Mill Colour or TiltShift Generator before, and both are fabulous. I’m having fun with both.

(Also, I adore the design of Coffman’s web site. Just perfect.)

NYT Profile on Motorola’s Android Resurgence ★

Good piece by Saul Hansell in the NYT on Motorola’s effort to build itself around Android smartphones, and the leadership of co-CEO Sanjay Jha. But just to note how different a position they’re in from Apple, note this bit on early prototypes of the Droid:

Verizon worried that the angular design of what was to be the Droid appealed much more to men than women. Motorola quickly rounded some of the phone’s edges and added a rubberized backing to create a softer feeling.

Can you imagine Apple taking industrial design feedback from a carrier?