Linked List: September 22, 2011

Thursday, 22 September 2011

The Food Allergy & Anaphylaxis Network Charity Walk ★

One of my favorite things to do here at DF is direct your attention to worthy charitable causes. This one, though, is very personal — my wife Amy is raising money for a cause that means a lot to our family. It’d mean a lot to me if the DF audience could help her reach her goal.

Possession Versus Utilization ★

Horace Dediu, analyzing the discrepancy between iPhone and Android smartphone market share, and usage share of paid Wi-Fi services at airports and during flights:

What the data seems to suggest therefore is that for data services the iPhone is a far more popular tool than Android. But for in-app ad impressions and browsing the products are used in a similar manner.

The big difference is however that the services where iPhone utilization is high are those where users have to pay something. Most (if not all) of the ad impressions in apps are for free apps. So ad consumption scales with possession. But non-free services don’t. This data seems to support the hypothesis that Android users are disproportionately less willing to spend money (note that the data does not say that users don’t have money, but simply that they are not spending it).

iPhone users and Android users are simply very different. And consider, too, that Google is probably just fine with Android’s don’t-want-to-pay-for-anything user base: Google doesn’t really care about selling anything to Android users, they just want to show them ads.

iOS Devices Dominate Airport Wi-Fi Usage ★

Boingo Wireless reports that smartphones and tablets now account for 59 percent of airport Wi-Fi connections. Ina Fried, writing at some website:

Apple’s iOS continues to dominate the mobile space, accounting for 83 percent of the mobile total. Combined, all Android devices are still a distant fourth place behind the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch when it comes to popularity on Boingo’s network.

Insert your own witticism about Android “winning” here.

Meg Whitman Is Named Hewlett-Packard CEO ★

Apotheker held the job for 11 months.

Apotheker to Take Home $25 Million in Severance From HP ★

Here’s how HP’s stock did under his leadership. Other than setting fire to the company’s campus, I’m not sure how he could have done worse.

Things Apple Is Worth More Than ★

Beleaguered no more. (Via Kottke.)

SEO for Non-Dicks ★

Matt Gemmell:

Stop wilfully conflating optimisation with being a slimy liar. Stop being a dick on the internet. Write something interesting, and keep doing it for months and years. SEO will then follow naturally.

Hard to disagree with even a word of his advice.

Cringely Called It ★

Cringely, back in February:

Then there’s Meg Whitman, who expected at this point to have resigned from the HP board to spend all her time running California as governor. But that didn’t happen, so now what is she to do? You can only get so many pedicures. She’ll eventually get around to hip-checking Apotheker and taking his job.

Can’t get more accurate with a prediction than that.

Russian Man Climbs Moscow Skyscraper Without Safety Equipment ★

Whenever I watch a video like this, my hands sweat profusely.

‘The Madness Must Stop’ ★

Larry Ellison called it, the day Apotheker was named HP’s CEO:

“I’m speechless,” he wrote in an email to the Wall Street Journal. “HP had several good internal candidates… but instead they pick a guy who was recently fired because he did such a bad job of running SAP.” […]

“None of the HP board members own much HP stock so they have little to lose,” he wrote. “But the HP employees, customers, partners and shareholders will suffer. The HP board needs to resign en masse… right away. The madness must stop.”

He was wrong about one thing, though. The madness didn’t have to stop.

I ♥ Skeuomorphism ★

Cleverness from Robert Padbury.