Linked List: August 5, 2013

Monday, 5 August 2013

Joseph Volpe:

The Moto X exudes no tech halo like the Galaxy S 4 or the HTC One because it is the sum of averages. Here’s how I see it: You know those people who own iPhones, but don’t know which model number they own and also refer to all Android phones as Droids? This phone is for them.

How the ITC Forced a Veto in the Samsung-Apple Patent Case ★

Philip Elmer-DeWitt, summarizing ITC commissioner Dean Pinkert’s dissent in favor of Apple in the Samsung patent spat that culminated in Obama’s veto:

That the only time Samsung made such an offer — in oral discussions in December 2012 — it came with strings attached to which Apple could not agree.

What those strings were are blacked out in the document, but Pinkert adds in the next sentence: “it is neither fair nor non-discriminatory for the holder of the FRAND-encumbered patent to require licenses to non-FRAND-encumberd patents as a condition for licensing its patent” (emphasis his).

Reading between the lines, it sounds like Samsung had refused to license its standard-essential patents (SEPs) unless Apple offered its non-essential iPhone patents — the company’s crown jewels — in return.

Frankly, I’m shocked that a company as scrupulous as Samsung would resort to this sort of extortion.

Remembering the Apple Newton’s Prophetic Failure and Lasting Impact ★

Mat Honan, writing for Wired:

In product lore, high profile gadgets that get killed are often more interesting than the ones that succeed. The Kin, the HP TouchPad, and the Edsel are all case studies in failure — albeit for different reasons. Yet in the history of those killings, nothing compared to the Apple Newton MessagePad. The Newton wasn’t just killed, it was violently murdered, dragged into a closet by its hair and kicked to death in its youth by one of technology’s great men. And yet it was a remarkable device, one whose influence is still with us today. The Ur tablet. The first computer designed to free us utterly from the desktop.

LG Is Looking to Buy Some Coverage for Its New Phone ★

John Biggs, writing for TechCrunch:

As the trend towards the convergence of journalism and marketing marches ever onward today we celebrate LG’s efforts to buy press for their new phone, the LG G2. We received this email this morning from a member of the Burson Marsteller team in Korea. I’ve left out her name because clearly she’s new over there. It proposes that, in exchange for an unspecified amount of money, we do either an in-depth review of a specific feature of the phone (battery or the display, naturally), or a wild and crazy 1:1 comparison against many devices, including a “torching test.” They’ll even pay for multiple reviews of the phone!

Shocker.

Stanley Kubrick, Cinephile ★

Speaking of Kubrick, Nick Wrigley interviewed his brother-in-law and long-time producing partner Jan Harlan to assemble this list of films Kubrick admired. Some great movies on this list, no surprise, but also some curious omissions — nothing from Scorsese, nothing from Hitchcock, nothing from Malick.

The interview with Harlan is terrific, too. E.g.: Back in 1970, Kubrick considered Woody Allen to play the lead in what eventually became Eyes Wide Shut.

‘Kubrick Collection’ Zeiss f/0.7 Digital Movie Camera Rigs Now Available to Rent ★

Be sure to watch the short documentary on Kubrick’s camera rig to use this lens back in 1975 to shoot Barry Lyndon.

Jeff Bezos Buys The Washington Post for $250 Million ★

Paul Farhi, reporting for the Post:

The Washington Post Co. has agreed to sell its flagship newspaper to Amazon.com founder and chief executive Jeffrey P. Bezos, ending the Graham family’s stewardship of one of America’s leading news organizations after four generations.

Seattle-based Amazon will have no role in the purchase; Bezos himself will buy the news organization and become its sole owner when the sale is completed, probably within 60 days.

I did not see that coming. Here’s Bezos’s letter to Post employees.

Alex Rodriguez Suspended Through 2014 Season ★

Sad day for baseball and for Yankee fans. The timing is almost bizarre though — tonight will be A-Rod’s first game in the lineup all season — and word is he’s going to appeal the suspension and might play the remainder of the season.

12 other players around the league received 50-game suspensions; Rodriguez is the only player who is appealing. A-Rod fighting this until the bitter end makes a certain sick sense. If he is truly innocent and the victim of an elaborate conspiracy by MLB and/or the Yankees (fat chance), fighting the charge is the right thing to do. And if he’s guilty (sure looks like it) and accepted the ban, a suspension through the end of 2014 might effectively end his career. He’ll turn 40 during the 2015 season. Whatever games he can play during this appeals process may well be the only MLB games he’ll ever get to play again.

Notable: MLB has not made public the actual evidence against Rodriguez (nor any of the other suspended players), nor has Rodriguez failed a drug test.

Update: Front page of today’s New York Post.

Worst Idea So Far This Week, But the Week Is Young ★

Hunter Walk, apparently in all seriousness:

I’d love to watch Pacific Rim in a theater with a bit more light, wifi, electricity outlets and a second screen experience. Don’t tell me I’d miss major plot points while scrolling on my ipad [sic] — it’s a movie about robots vs monsters. I can follow along just fine.

(Via Jay Yarow.)

‘Louse Got Your Tongue?’ ★

My favorite episode so far of Just the Tip. “That Amy, she’s just too damn sensible.”