Linked List: September 9, 2010

Thursday, 9 September 2010

Vox Shutting Down 

I couldn’t decide between a “Did you know Vox is still around?” joke or a “Did you know Six Apart is still around?” joke.

Layer Tennis, This Friday: Scott Thomas vs. Mark Weaver 

With commentary from yours truly. From my match preview:

On the one side, serving to begin the match, Scott Thomas, best known for his work as Design Director for Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign — a campaign which established one of the strongest visual identities of the last decade, and, arguably, the most distinctive in U.S. political history. On the other side, playing the even-numbered volleys, designer/illustrator Mark Weaver. Both are first-time Layer Tennis competitors, but, intriguingly, Weaver’s wonderful “Make Something Cool Every Day” project strikes me as being about as close to Layer Tennis practice as one can get.

And when they say this week’s “who goes first?” toss is the Citizen Kane of coin flips, they ain’t kidding.

The Talk Show, Episode 7 

The only podcast you’ll hear featuring Dan Benjamin and me talking about Twitter client UI design (including the new Twitter for iPad) and Apple’s new lineup of iPods. And: Blade Runner. Sponsored this week, once again, by the geniuses at Instapaper.

MG Siegler on Android’s Openness 

MG Siegler:

In the post, I posed a question: if it’s not the iPhone/AT&T deal, why do you choose Android? Nearly 1,000 people responded, and a large percentage focused on the same idea: the idea of “openness.”

You’ll forgive me, but I have to say it: what a load of crap.

New in iOS 4.1: Keyboard Accessibility for VoiceOver 

iOS accessibility keeps getting better:

Now a VO user can pair a bluetooth keyboard to their iDevice and not only use it to type and edit text, but also completely navigate and operate the device from the keyboard as well.

(Thanks to Joe Clark.)

Your Lying Pants 

Abram Sauer, writing for Esquire, on “vanity sizing” in pants waistlines.

Google, on Apple’s Updated Mobile Advertising Guidelines 

Google:

Apple’s new terms will keep in-app advertising on the iPhone open to many different mobile ad competitors and enable advertising solutions that operate across a wide range of platforms.

Statement by Apple on App Store Review Guidelines 

Big changes to the App Store guidelines from Apple:

We have listened to our developers and taken much of their feedback to heart. Based on their input, today we are making some important changes to our iOS Developer Program license in sections 3.3.1, 3.3.2 and 3.3.9 to relax some restrictions we put in place earlier this year.

In particular, we are relaxing all restrictions on the development tools used to create iOS apps, as long as the resulting apps do not download any code. This should give developers the flexibility they want, while preserving the security we need.

In addition, for the first time we are publishing the App Store Review Guidelines to help developers understand how we review submitted apps. We hope it will make us more transparent and help our developers create even more successful apps for the App Store.

Great news for developers, really. I’ll have details in a bit, but in short, they’ve relented regarding the ban on third-party development tools, and they’re promising greater transparency on the review process.