iPhone’s Anti-Customer Config File

In March of this year Apple applied for a patent on technology that enables or disables features of a phone via a config file. The tech is already in use: it’s the carrier profiles we’ve been downloading recently. On the one hand this is just an extension of the parental controls that Apple has included [...]

First They Ignore You, Then They Ridicule You, Then They Fight You

It’s an aside to Kathryn Greenhill’s larger point, that all this 2.0 stuff is about a shifting power to the user, but she places L2 somewhere on Ghandi’s continuum of change between ridicule and fight.
The photo above (original by Monster) is in support of Greenhill’s larger point: control is shifting. Trains were once seen as [...]

Whose Technology Is It Anyway?

I wasn’t planning on posting much about Keen’s Cult of the Amateur, but I did. And now I find myself posting about it again. Thing is, I’m a sucker for historical analogy, and Clay Shirky yesterday posted a good one that compared the disruptive effects of mechanized cloth production to today’s internet.
Yes, that’s actually the [...]

Keen Says I’m Killing Culture, Byte By Byte

Andrew Keen’s The Cult of the Amateur; How Today’s Internet Is Killing Our Culture is getting a lot of attention from usually quiet corners of the web, and I’ve had to quell the urge to write a story under the headline “Andrew Keen Tells YouTubers to Eat Spinach.”
Keen’s argument rests on the belief that “culture” [...]

Flightplan

Perhaps it’s just because I’m in the air again today, but I’m fascinated by Aaron Koblin’s animation of aircraft activity, illustrating the pulsing, throbbing movements of aircraft over North America. Nah, this is hot. You’ll love it too.
Also worth checking out: Koblin’s other works.
Aaron Koblin, aircraft, animation, aviation, flight, path

Home Theater Remote Control

I have a sort of guilt complex about looking at home theater issues. Nonetheless, I’ve been building one piecemeal ever since I found an incredible deal on a video projector. Now I’m working on assembling a video jukebox of sorts and I need to face the remote control stumbling block.
That’s why I like the Logitech [...]