Linked List: May 18, 2011

Wednesday, 18 May 2011

Daring Fireball T-Shirts Now Available ★

In case you missed the announcement last week, DF t-shirts are now available.

I don’t keep a large number of shirts in stock — what I do is take orders for a week or so, and then do a print run just to cover the number of shirts that were ordered. I’ll keep the shirts on sale through the end of this week, but come Friday, the order form will come down. In other words, if you want one, order now.

New in this round of shirts: a black tee with gray logo. All orders will ship at the end of May or first week of June.

Who Is Acorn For? ★

Gus Mueller:

Acorn isn’t Photoshop. I have no desire to turn Acorn into any sort of Photoshop clone. Acorn opens up PSD files, borrows many keyboard shortcuts and ideas from Photoshop (just as Photoshop borrowed from MacPaint), but Photoshop is not Acorn’s future.

This upsets some people. I know this because I get the angry emails. This makes some people very happy. I know, because I get the love letters.

TermKit ★

Steven Wittens rethinks the Unix terminal interface and interaction model. Ambitious, to say the least.

Translation From Weasel-Speak to English of the Key Question in Twitter’s FAQ for Developers Regarding Their New Policy for Third-Party Client Apps ★

Q: Will Twitter’s own applications also go through the OAuth web flow?

A: We’re taking this step to give more clarity and control to users about the access a third-party application has to their account. The way users interact with Twitter’s clients is not expected to change.

Translation: No.

Ed Bott on the ‘Mac Defender’ Trojan Horse Scam ★

Bott quotes an anonymous AppleCare support rep that the Mac Defender scam is a growing problem, and here links to a bunch of threads on Apple’s support forum from affected users. Trojans aren’t a new problem on Mac OS X — trick a user into installing an app with admin privileges and the game’s over. Mac Defender isn’t an indication that Mac users need anti-malware software — in fact, the reason it appears to be succeeding is that it preys on uninformed users’ belief that they might need anti-malware software.

So, for the sake of argument, let’s take it as a given that this sort of thing is becoming more common. What can Apple do? Think about it. (My guess: think about why the iPhone and iPad, despite being far more popular than the Mac, have no trojan horses.)

How Does a Socialist Public Servant Pay for $3,000-a-Night Hotel Suites and First-Class Flights? ★

Annie Lowrey reports for Slate on Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s lavish lifestyle.

Update: The WSJ reports that Strauss-Kahn paid only $800 a night for the hotel suite, despite its $3,000/night posted rate.

Facebook Awarded Patents for Tagging in Photos ★

Kim-Mai Cutler, Inside Facebook:

Tagging was arguably the feature that made Facebook the biggest photo site in the world and seeded the idea for creating the platform.

Now the company has finally won a patent for it.

More bad patent news.

Google Rolling Out Server-Side Fix to Android Authentication Flaw ★

Google:

Today we’re starting to roll out a fix which addresses a potential security flaw that could, under certain circumstances, allow a third party access to data available in calendar and contacts. This fix requires no action from users and will roll out globally over the next few days.

It hadn’t occurred to me that they could fix this server-side. This means users won’t have to wait for any sort of software update on their devices, and takes all the piss and vinegar out of my snark yesterday.