Behind Twitterrific 5 →

The Iconfactory’s Craig Hockenberry:

We are well aware that people are going to complain about missing features: push notifications and streaming are obvious examples. But so are trends, and video support, and in-line photos, and… well none of that matters. We believe in building opinionated software.

The product you have in your hands is what we wanted and needed it to be. As the tagline on the website says, “A simply beautiful way to tweet.” We achieved that goal.

Personally, I find myself actively disabling notifications in most of the apps I install these days. Notifications are great when used in moderation, but it’s very easy to use them to the point of distraction. Since I read Twitter as free time permits, I don’t need a reminder. Similarly, a constant flow of streaming tweets interrupting my day sounds more like a bug than a feature.

But guess what? That doesn’t matter either. I’m just one of the opinions that made this software.

In an age where some work to please as many potential costumers as they can, this is refreshing. Just like the app itself.

That said, The Iconfactory knows they don’t work in a vacuum:

And now we’re going to start listening to our customer’s opinions. We’re all excited to get feedback from a larger audience and see how that fits in with our new minimalist vision. If you think Twitterrific is good now, just wait until you see what happens with your collaboration.

I’m excited to see how this app evolves. It’s on the home screen of my iPad mini, and I don’t see that changing any time soon.

Bloomberg Businessweek Interviews Tim Cook →

This whole interview is great, but this bit really jumped out at me. Here’s Tim Cook:

Everybody in our company is responsible to be innovative, whether they’re doing operational work or product work or customer service work. So in terms of the pressure, all of us put a great deal of pressure on ourselves. And yes, part of my job is to be a cheerleader, and getting people to stop for a moment and think about everything that’s been done.

Alfred 2 →

Speaking of Alfred, Vero Pepperrell published this today:

In version 2, Alfred will be even more polished and user-friendly than ever. To achieve this, Andrew has rewritten Alfred from the ground up to make every aspect more efficient, more powerful and more flexible, reusing only around 15% of code from v1. Of course, we’ve also taken great care to ensure existing users would still feel at home with v2.

I’m excited. Alfred is one of the most-used apps on my MacBook Pro.

The 512 Podcast 041 – The Ones Who Care Have the Tools →

This week, Myke and Stephen discuss the Matias Quiet Pro, then Stephen rants about Apple’s new iMac.

RSS Sponsor: Igloo Software →

Let’s face it, we’re heading into the worst time of year for getting work done. Everyone is getting ready for [insert holiday of choice here].

It seems like Janice is always out of the office. Bob’s coming in late every day. And if Kelly sings [insert holiday song of choice here] one more time, you’re going to go insane. But you can’t work from home – your shared drive is locked down and your VPN is just. so. slow.

This holiday season, ask your boss for a cloud-based collaboration platform. You’ll be able to securely work from home and your coworkers will love the built-in social tools. They can share updates about what they’re working on, and you can ignore the cat videos. Your boss will love your increased productivity.

’Tis the season for an intranet you’ll actually like. Try Igloo.

Sponsorship by The Syndicate.

It’s Love, Not Addiction →

Martin Lindstrom:

But should we really characterize the intense consumer devotion to the iPhone as an addiction? A recent experiment that I carried out using neuroimaging technology suggests that drug-related terms like “addiction” and “fix” aren’t as scientifically accurate as a word we use to describe our most cherished personal relationships. That word is “love.”

via Patrick Rhone