Linked List: August 16, 2011

Tuesday, 16 August 2011

Samsung Galaxy Tablet EU Ban Overturned ★

Kenny Hemphill, MacUser UK:

A court in Düsseldorf has lifted the injunction it granted Apple last week, which prevented Samsung from selling its Galaxy Tab 10.1 in all European Union countries except the Netherlands.

Ballmer Was Right About Android ★

Writing at Slate, Farhad Manjoo argues that despite their current protestations that acquiring Motorola isn’t going to change their approach to the Android platform as a whole, the math compels Google to try to be more like Apple:

Now Google has to find a way to recoup at least $12.5 billion from Android (on top of whatever else it was investing to build the OS). That looks very difficult. Earlier this year, Gene Munster, an analyst at Piper Jaffray, estimated that Google makes just $6 in ad revenue per Android user per year. By 2012, that number could be $10 per Android user per year. Across all users, that would mean about $1 billion in annual revenue. Even if that figure grows over time, it will take a long time for Google to make back the money it spent on Motorola, let alone to turn a profit.

As Steve Ballmer said last year, Android isn’t free.

Apple Releases OS X 10.7.1 via Software Update ★

Finally.

Cupertino Releases Plans and Renderings of New Apple Campus ★

Gorgeous renderings. So utterly Apple-y.

50 for 50 ★

Colleen Wainwright:

For my 50th birthday, what I want is to raise $50,000 for my favorite nonprofit, WriteGirl.

Great idea for a really great cause. To promote the effort, Colleen is doing a series of interviews about writing, including this one with my wife.

I would love to see a nice spike in her fundraising graph from DF readers.

Kagi Sparks Controversy With $5 VisualHub Lion Update ★

Strange story, and I think a very poor decision by Kagi.

Update: To be clear, I don’t think Kagi stole anything, or ripped anything or anyone off. (Arguably, perhaps, they shouldn’t have treated the customer list for VisualHub as theirs, though.) Their mistake, to my eyes, is betraying the trust of the developers who use their payment services. Tyler Loch is the developer of VisualHub, and he chose to use Kagi as his payment processor. He was Kagi’s client. Now, Kagi is selling something based on Loch’s work against Loch’s wishes. Other developers see this and think they can’t trust Kagi. Trust with developers is a primary asset for a service like Kagi.

And now to make things worse, Kagi CEO Kee Nethery is criticizing Loch’s business decisions. Maybe you personally agree with Nethery that Loch handled the discontinuation of support for VisualHub poorly. That doesn’t matter. It simply isn’t the place for a payment processor to turn against a developer client like this.

Jackass of the Week: Adrian Shaughnessy ★

Adrian Shaughnessy, writing on the London riots:

One group has so far escaped blame: designers. […]

But for the past three or four decades the major role of graphic design has been to create the branding and collateral of desire. For those who can afford entry into this world — no harm is done. For those who can resist the blandishments of this world — no harm is done. But for those who have neither the education nor emotional maturity to deal with this, immense harm is done.

Poor people are too stupid to deal with well-designed stuff. OK.

How Big Is Apple’s New Proposed Headquarters? ★

Pretty big.

Google’s Android Press Release Generator ★

Convenient.