Verbs, the excellent IM app for the iPhone and iPod touch has been updated to include Facebook chat support.
While I don’t have a Facebook account, I do know that Verbs is the best looking (and best-functioning) IM app I’ve tried for iOS.
To help celebrate this release, the lovely people over at #include tech. have given me a handful of promo codes for the app, which I’ll be giving away over on the site’s Twitter account later today.
Eric Schmidt, back in 2010:
Google policy is to get right up to the creepy line and not cross it… We don’t need you to type at all. We know where you are. We know where you’ve been. We can more or less know what you’re thinking about.
Seems like Google’s already crossed it.
It’s here, and tiny for most users — clocking in at 17 MB for most. Changes include:
The full version is 79 MB, and there is a special build for Mac minis and MacBook Airs.
Well, it’s finally here. You asked for it — you wagged your finger about it — you hate the people you follow on Twitter so much that you don’t want to hear another peep out of them, yet deep down you don’t really want to get in one of those uncomfortable, “Why did you unfollow me!?” moments. Or maybe someone’s had a little too much caffeine and you just need a break. With Tweetbot 1.5, you can mute those pesky over-tweeters and keep meme-esque hashtags from cluttering your #pantsfree timeline. Although I hear there’s a self destruction mechanism built in if you ever mute #tweetbot.
My favorite Twitter client — on any platform — keeps getting better.
Having lived with the pain of Vista pre-SP1, I can tell you that the problems currently facing Apple with Lion are worse. Much worse. In fact, it’s such a nuisance that I’ve decided to install Snow Leopard into a different partition and switch to the old OS for the time being, keeping Lion so I can keep an eye on future updates to see if they fix these issues.
I don’t think many would say 10.7.0 is without bugs, but this really just seems like link bait.1 Vista was a serious piece of crap out of the gate, and honestly, still is in many respects.
Update: Ben Brooks chimes in:
With Vista my computer was barely useable, and honestly wasn’t useable for what I wanted to do on it for months.
Lion is not worse than Vista and saying so is a flat out lie.
Crap, I fell for it, didn’t I? ↩︎
On the front page of the Mac App Store, Apple is highlighting three apps that have been “Enhanced for OS X Lion.”
In the featured app section at the top of the page, two more apps show off their newly-learned tricks like Versions and more.
As Lion’s install base continues to grow, apps without these types of features will feel more and more dated. Clearly, Apple recognizes this, and is pushing Mac developers toward including these new features in their applications. Doing so is good for Apple and its customers.
One of the world’s richest men, in a guest column for the New York Times:
I have worked with investors for 60 years and I have yet to see anyone — not even when capital gains rates were 39.9 percent in 1976–77 — shy away from a sensible investment because of the tax rate on the potential gain. People invest to make money, and potential taxes have never scared them off. And to those who argue that higher rates hurt job creation, I would note that a net of nearly 40 million jobs were added between 1980 and 2000. You know what’s happened since then: lower tax rates and far lower job creation.
Wait, it didn’t trickle down?
[via Daring Fireball]
The acquisition of Motorola Mobility, a dedicated Android partner, will enable Google to supercharge the Android ecosystem and will enhance competition in mobile computing. Motorola Mobility will remain a licensee of Android and Android will remain open. Google will run Motorola Mobility as a separate business.
Larry Page, CEO of Google, said, “Motorola Mobility’s total commitment to Android has created a natural fit for our two companies. Together, we will create amazing user experiences that supercharge the entire Android ecosystem for the benefit of consumers, partners and developers. I look forward to welcoming Motorolans to our family of Googlers.”
This could be the start of a fundamental shift in Google’s strategy with Android. Until now, the company has made a few “Google phones” — such as the Nexus S — with partners, and have allowed other companies to go crazy with Android.
The reason for this was simple enough — Google couldn’t do hardware.
But now, with this acquisition, this isn’t true anymore. It raises lots of questions.
Will Motorola-built phones ship with stock Android? Will Motoblur be folded into Android? Will HTC and others still have access to updates as quickly as Motorola-built phones?
The biggest question, however is this — did Google just spend a ton of money to acquire Motorola Mobility for its portfolio of patents? (My guess is yes.)
Whatever the answers to these questions are, Google’s claim that Android is “open” is simply harder and harder to believe.
Here’s another headline to add to the almost never-ending news stories about Google and the Associated Press. But this time, instead of bickering over licensing agreements and the like, the two companies have decided to team up and help student digital journalists. They just announced the AP-Google Journalism and Technology Scholarship, a new national scholarship program “targeted to individual students creating innovative projects that further the ideals of digital journalism.”
Six $20,000 scholarships will be awarded to college sophomores, juniors, seniors and graduate students for the 2012–13 academic year. The Online News Association will monitor the program and the scholars will be selected in Spring 2012.
I won’t lie. While I expect this phone to be a flop, that UI is quite pretty. Given Fusion Garage’s track record, however, I’m not going to get my hopes up on this thing being functional.
The International fire truck may be my favorite.
Apple’s new headquarters looks as well-designed as the company’s products.