Linked List: September 23, 2016

Friday, 23 September 2016

My thanks to iFixit for sponsoring this week’s DF RSS feed to promote their new Pro Tech Toolkit. It’s a set of tools specifically designed for modern electronics repair. They sent me one a few weeks ago and it is excellent. Even the case is nice. It has every little oddball screwdriver you might need. Last year the Apple Watch came out with a new tri-point screw, smaller than anything iFixit had seen before. Now their toolkit contains a screwdriver for that screw — which is also now used in the iPhone 7.

I actually have an older iFixit toolkit (I think I might have picked it up at a Macworld Expo, years ago?), and this new one is better in every way. These are just damn good tools. Check out iFixit’s recent teardowns of the latest phones from Apple and Samsung, and, if you’re interested in the toolkit, use coupon code “courage” (ha!) and you’ll save $5.

Snapchat Releases First Hardware Product, Spectacles ★

Seth Stevenson, writing for the WSJ:

In an unmarked building on a quiet side street just off the beach in Venice, California, 26-year-old Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel stands in a small conference room. He’s draped a towel over a mysterious object sitting on a table. He is eager to the point of jitters.

“You wanna see it?” he asks, grinning widely. There’s drama in this reveal: I’m about to join an exceedingly small circle of people whom Spiegel has shown the object to. As he lifts the towel, he breaks into a delighted laugh. “Boom!”

What initially appears to be a normal pair of sunglasses turns out to be Spectacles, the first hardware product from Snap Inc., as the firm has been newly christened (Spiegel is refreshing the company name because its offerings now go beyond the Snapchat app). When you slip Spectacles on and tap a button near the hinge, it records up to 10 seconds of video from your first-person vantage. Each new tap records another clip.

Uh, those do not appear to be a “normal pair of sunglasses”.

Keith Olbermann: ‘Vin Scully Is a Legend, but He’s Not a Saint’ ★

Keith Olbermann, writing for GQ, has the best appraisal of the retiring Vin Scully I’ve seen:

It is mind-bending to consider that he has not just been on 22 of the 94 annual radio and television World Series broadcasts ever, but been alive for 87 of them. It is goose-bumpy to recognize that the season he began broadcasting major league games, Connie Mack was still the manager of the Philadelphia Athletics (Mack had become A’s manager in 1901 and we’ve just passed the 130th anniversary of Mack’s debut as a major league catcher). And it almost requires the language of Light Years to realize that if you start a new job the day after his last scheduled regular-season Dodger broadcast and you stay in that gig as long as Scully has in his, you will not be leaving your new position until Sunday, September 26, 2083.

You will also have to be almost flawless at that job over these next 67 years. Lost in the pilgrimages and the longevity is the reality that unlike almost every other great broadcaster in any field and of any time, there is not only no long list of Scullyian Gaffes, there is almost no list. Amid the Kirk Gibson call, and the Bill Buckner call, and the Hank Aaron call, and the Larsen Perfect Game call, and the Koufax perfect game call — there just aren’t many mistakes.

I’ve been watching as many of his calls for the Dodgers down the stretch as I can. At 88 years old he’s still the best there is.

CNBC: ‘Twitter May Soon Get Formal Bid, Suitors Said to Include Salesforce and Google’ ★

David Faber and Anita Balakrishnan, reporting for CNBC:

Twitter shares surged Friday after sources said the ailing social media company moved closer to being sold.

The sources said the company has received expressions of interest from several technology or media companies and may receive a formal bid shortly. The potential suitors include Google and Salesforce.com, among other technology companies, sources said.

The news was taken seriously enough that Twitter’s share price closed up 21 percent for the day. If this happens, I sure hope it’s Salesforce that buys them, not Google. Why? Just a gut feeling that Salesforce would be less likely to screw Twitter up. I could be completely wrong on that, though.

The Curious Case of Chris Ziegler’s Employment at The Verge and Apple ★

Nilay Patel:

Hey everyone — there have been questions about Chris Ziegler and his absence from The Verge in the past few weeks. I want to provide answers for those who have been worried about him.

First, Chris accepted a position at Apple. We wish him well. […]

Chris began working for Apple in July, but didn’t tell anyone at The Verge that he’d taken a new job until we discovered and verified his dual-employment in early September. Chris continued actively working at The Verge in July, but was not in contact with us through most of August and into September. During that period, in the dark and concerned for Chris, we made every effort to contact him and to offer him help if needed. We ultimately terminated his employment at The Verge and Vox Media the same day we verified that he was employed at Apple.

This is really bizarre. Obviously The Verge can’t have staff members simultaneously working for one of the companies they cover, but surely Apple would consider this just as much of a conflict of interest as The Verge would.

No word on what Ziegler is (or was? — several little birdies have told me Ziegler is not listed in the company directory) doing at Apple. And Ziegler’s Twitter account has been silent since August 8.