Linked List: May 8, 2015

Friday, 8 May 2015

Investors Loan Rhapsody $10 Million 

Todd Bishop, writing at GeekWire:

Rhapsody, the Seattle-based streaming music service, has received new loans totaling $10 million from RealNetworks and another of its investors, according to a regulatory filing this afternoon.

Which fact is more surprising about this story: that Rhapsody still exists, or that RealNetworks not only still exists but has the money to loan Rhapsody?

‘The Remarkable Apple Computer’ 

Jim Edwards, writing for Business Insider:

After Business Insider recently published a charming set of photos taken by Apple’s earliest employees, veteran tech writer Sheila (Clarke) Craven got in touch and sent us this gem from February 1977: “The Remarkable Apple Computer,” a lengthy dissection of Apple’s launch product that Craven wrote after flying to San Francisco and interviewing founders Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. (Kilobaud eventually went out of business and its founder, Wayne Green, died in 2013.)

Craven says she believes it was the first article ever written about Apple. We checked with Wozniak, and he agrees.”Seems quite the way it was,” Wozniak told us. “The only thing I can note is that we were demonstrating the Apple ][ before we shipped any Apple I’s, so we knew that it was a temporary project.”

(Via Kottke.)

Windows X 

BBC News:

Jerry Nixon, a Microsoft development executive, said in a conference speech this week that Windows 10 would be the “last version” of the dominant desktop software.

His comments were echoed by Microsoft which said it would update Windows in future in an “ongoing manner”. Instead of new stand-alone versions, Windows 10 would be improved in regular installments, the firm said.

On the Primacy of Search Ads 

While researching today’s column, I stumbled across this interesting WSJ interview with JetBlue marketing chief Marty St. George:

WSJ: If you were only allowed to use one advertising vehicle, which would it be and why?

MR. ST. GEORGE: Search ads — because they fill seats. I can find people in one location who are searching for information about another city and then serve them an ad that gives them an offer to get to that city.

That the marketing chief of an airline values search ads more than anything else, even TV, speaks to the success of Google’s business model.

ESPN Is Breaking Up With Bill Simmons 

Not surprising, given what happened last year, but interesting nonetheless. It reeks to me of corporate spite — Simmons is both the best and best-known sportswriter today. He produces great work and brings a large audience. The only reason I can see for ESPN to let him go is that they just can’t abide his stridently independent voice.

No comment yet from Simmons, but I’m interested to see where he lands: another big corporate gig, or does he strike out on his own?

The Talk Show: ‘Sloppy on the Side’ 

This week’s episode of my podcast is all about the watch. That’s it. With very special guest Adam Lisagor.

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(The Comeback Kid hit career dinger 661 last night.)

Image Scaling Using Deep Convolutional Neural Networks 

Norman Tasfi, writing for the Flipboard engineering blog:

This past summer I interned at Flipboard in Palo Alto, California. I worked on machine learning based problems, one of which was Image Upscaling. This post will show some preliminary results, discuss our model and its possible applications to Flipboard’s products.

Some really impressive results.