Linked List: November 3, 2011

Thursday, 3 November 2011

LG Turns to Shareholders to Help Revive Android Smartphone Business 

Charles Arthur, reporting for The Guardian:

Shares in LG Electronics plunged 14% on Thursday as the company announced a 1.06tn won (£590m) rights issue which will be used mainly to fund a revival of its loss-making smartphone business.

The South Korean company’s shares have already fallen by more than 40% this year, but the decline as it announced the demand from existing shareholders was its biggest daily fall in more than three years, and knocked around £625m, or $1bn, off its market capitalisation.

Android is winning!

Hours-Long Siri Outage Today 

I got this one, while trying to dictate a text message this afternoon: “My mind is going, John… I can feel it. I can feel it.”

Nerdy Stripper 

This week’s episode of The Talk Show. Topics include the new Siri ads, the murky future of the Mac Pro, and iPhone 4S/iOS 5 battery life.

Brought to you by BBEdit 10 and MailChimp.

Clint Eastwood on Gay Marriage and Politics in General 

Clint Eastwood to GQ:

Because what I really believe is, let’s spend a little more time leaving everybody alone. These people who are making a big deal out of gay marriage? I don’t give a fuck about who wants to get married to anybody else! Why not?! We’re making a big deal out of things we shouldn’t be making a deal out of. […]

They go on and on with all this bullshit about “sanctity” — don’t give me that sanctity crap! Just give everybody the chance to have the life they want.

User Interface of the Week: FabuList for the BlackBerry PlayBook 

“Unique”, all right.

Fantastical 1.1 

Speaking of menu-bar calendars for Mac OS X, Fantastical 1.1 now includes the ability to edit events — a really nice improvement to one of my favorite utilities.

Day-O 

New simple menu bar clock/calendar from Shaun Inman. Free.

Don’t Give Your Users Shit Work 

Zach Holman:

Some people still like shit work. They can spend an hour moving Twitter accounts to special Lists, and then at the end of it look back and say “Boy, I spent an hour doing this. I really accomplished a lot today!” You didn’t. You did shit work.

(Via Brent Simmons.)

Brilliant Idea of the Day 

Neil Hughes at AppleInsider, on a “research report” by analyst Ben Reitzes:

He believes the appeal of the iPad could be extended to more PC users if Apple were to extend keyboard options with touchpads, in addition to the touchscreen interface on the iPad itself.

And what exactly would move on screen with the touchpad? The mouse cursor? Why take this guy seriously? This is like someone recommending to Amazon in 1996 that they should print a catalog of everything in their store.

Kindle Owners’ Lending Library 

Amazon:

With Prime, Kindle owners can now choose from thousands of books to borrow for free including over 100 current and former New York Times Bestsellers — as frequently as a book a month, with no due dates.

You need to own an actual Kindle, though, not just use the Kindle app on another device. And, publishers need to opt-in, and none — zero — of the big six have.

Stop-Motion Music Video Shot Over Two Years With 288,000 Jelly Beans 

A lot of work for three minutes. (Via Jeff Carlson.)

David Pogue on Windows Phone 7.5 

David Pogue:

Windows Phone 7.5 is gorgeous, classy, satisfying, fast and coherent. The design is intelligent, clean and uncluttered. Never in a million years would you guess that it came from the same company that cooked up the bloated spaghetti that is Windows and Office.

Update: Fixed the link to point to a URL that shouldn’t prompt you to log in to the NYT site.

‘Skyfall’ 

We now know the title of the next Bond film, but not much else. And there’s a Twitter account. Excited to have a good director like Sam Mendes at the helm.

Update: Highlights from the press conference.