512 Pixels

The New York Times has posted some stunning photographs of crews pulling the Airbus A320 that crashed in the Hudson River last week out of the freezing water. Looking at the underside of the plane, it really is a miracle nobody died.

Remember Duck Hunt? The game devoured hours of my childhood, and is back to rob me of time again - this time in the App Store. But the developer (whose site is devoid of any information) may have stepped over a line with his app, as iLounge speculates:

Although the game has been approved by Apple, it likely infringes on Nintendo copyrights, making it highly possible that the game will be pulled from the App Store. We are awaiting comment from Nintendo regarding the title.

Somewhat related: the NES Zapper was some pretty amazing hardware.

CNET’s Don Reisinger:

But now, as a new Microsoft operating system starts making its way to store shelves, it’s incumbent upon us to forecast its expected impact. And after downloading the Windows 7 beta and immersing myself in its environment, I think I can say, both as a Mac user (I’m writing this on my iMac) and what some may call an Apple nut (I own just about every Apple product released over the past five years), Windows 7 will not only stymie Mac OS X’s growth, it will push Apple’s market share back down to pre-Vista levels.

[…]

That “satisfaction factor” will enable Windows 7 to capture some of Mac OS X’s market share. For the first time in recent memory, the new Microsoft OS will appeal to consumers who want a better experience, companies that want reliable software without breaking the bank, and vendors that want their customers to be happy. That didn’t happen with Vista, which forced many to switch to Mac OS X, but I think that it will happen with Windows 7.

I like that the guy tries to defend his Apple street cred in the same sentence of saying the Mac’s marketshare is going to shrink because of Windows 7 - no matter how much Apple stuff you own, your predications can still be off the mark.

The thing Don is missing is this simple fact: Very rarely do people switch back to Windows. Almost every switcher stays with the Mac if they make it past the initial weeks of learning a new OS. After that, they wonder how there was a time when they didn’t use the Mac. Effectively, once a Mac user, always a Mac user.

If Windows 7 does well - and I’m pretty sure it will - OS X will benefit. If Microsoft ships a solid OS, then Apple has to make sure OS X is at least as good, if not better. Competition is a good thing. Apple didn’t capitalize on Vista’s failure as much as they could have, sure. But a strong Windows 7 should keep the OS X group at Apple busy. With no real competition, where’s the incentive to push the envelope?

I don’t see people selling their Macs on Craigslist to buy a new Dell when Windows 7 ships.

Check this out:

In a telephone interview today, Jobs said he won’t comment further on his health.

“Why don’t you guys leave me alone – why is this important?” Jobs said.

These guys give journalists a bad name. I mean, even as the CEO of a major company, the man is a human being. And last time I checked, there are bigger economic stories than Apple at the moment.

Time has posted a photo slideshow of Presidents - when the enter office and when they leave. Gray hair seems to be popular amongst world leaders. And I thought my time as a Mac Genius was hard.

For a long time, Twitterific was top dog on the Mac and on the iPhone when it came to Twitter clients - and rightfully so. It’s interface is clean and simple, putting regular tweets, replies and direct messages all in the same list. This simplicity is a much-appreciated design element, especially on the iPhone’s touch screen. The Iconfactory (the makers of Twitterific and some other great apps) did one thing that was ingenious - they offered a free, ad-supported version, and a “premium” version without the ads. This model worked for them on the Mac, and they elegantly brought it to the App Store before most others had figured it out.

Other Twitter apps showed up in the App Store, and enjoyed moderate success, however. Twinkle is probably the other one that comes to mind quickly. Twinkle is a solid app for the most part, but busy. The interface makes my eyes explode.

Then Tweetie came along. I tried it when it first came out, and frankly, was impressed. It offered support for multiple accounts, and acted like Twitter’s website - allowing almost complete access to see people’s profiles, followers and more. Version 1.2, released late this week, builds on the program’s early success. A refined interface includes the “swipe” feature, which allows for faster interaction with a tweet. It is the same motion used in Mail and other applications to reveal the “Delete” dialog.

From the new panel that appears, you can reply, see the user’s profile or mark the update as a favorite. To un-select the tweet, simply swipe your finger back the other way. It is that simple.

The other big updates that most impressed me was the addition of the landscape keyboard and the ability to save drafts. There is one thing that irks me about the landscape keyboard, however. Once it is turned on via Tweetie’s settings (which are in the Setting app, not within Tweetie itself), it is always on, regardless of the orientation of the iPhone (unlike in Safari, where the keyboard adjusts to how the device is oriented). Hopefully this is something that will be resolved with an update.

Tweetie also offers Twitter-wide search, an ability to see tweets posted close to your location (using the iPhone’s location services) and one very unusual feature called the “ App Store Popularity EnhancEr.” The “PEE” feature is a satire - within Tweetie’s settings. Here’s Loren Brichter, Tweetie’s creator:

PEE is a collection of ever-growing technologies scientifically designed to enhance the size of that certain something… You guessed it: App Store sales!

Teams from around the globe have analyzed figures and come up with a secret formula for App Store success. I share these findings today, ABSOLUTELY FREE. Success is made up of: a FLASHLIGHT…. and DIRTY WET FART SOUNDS!!!

Tweetie is the only app that bundles together these two incredible features FOR THE VERY FIRST TIME. Accept no imitations. Why buy a dedicated fart app AND a flashlight, when you can have BOTH, and get a TWITTER CLIENT along with it!!!

Even with the silliness of PEE, Tweetie has grown into a respectable Twitter client. Yes, it’s more complicated than the ever-popular Twitterific, but the two programs seem to have different goals: Tweetie is aiming to recreate twitter.com within an app, while Twitterific seems to be about putting all your info on one screen - and both meet their goals very nicely. Tweetie can be purchased in the App Store for $2.99.

Gearlog:

Janis Krums, a tourist in New York City from Sarasota, Florida, took a picture with his iPhone of the US Air flight 1549 crash in the Hudson River this afternoon. Krums, who posted the picture on his Twitter account, @jkrums, was speaking live as a witness on MSNBC within minutes of capturing the image.

Without a doubt, the iPhone (and other smartphones) have increased the speed news travels and is reported. The question for journalists (and their audiences) is: Are first-hand accounts like this actually “news.” My answer is no, but people like Janis Krums are increasingly vital in tipping off the news media of breaking events.

IDG:

Intel’s fourth-quarter profit plunged 90 percent from a year earlier, as the chip maker battled a worsening economy and recorded a steep loss from investments.

The company recorded net profit of $234 million for the quarter ended Dec. 27, compared to $2.27 billion in last year’s fourth quarter. The net profit also fell short of the $257.22 million consensus expectation from analysts polled by Thomson Reuters.

The results included a loss of $1.1 billion from equity investments and interest, primarily due to a billion-dollar reduction in the value of Intel’s investments in Clearwire, the company said.

Ouch.

CNN, on the man filling Steve Jobs’ shoes for now:

Cook’s stamina is the stuff of legend at Apple. He often begins e-mailing the executives who work for him at 4:30 a.m.; worldwide conference calls can take place at any time of day. For years, Cook held a standing Sunday night staff meeting by telephone in order to prepare for yet more meetings on Monday morning.

[…]

As long as Jobs stays healthy, Cook won’t need to worry about personal visibility. He can just keep doing his thing, grinding away offstage. But if he does get tapped for the CEO job someday, Apple may not suffer from acute Stevelessness as much as the world seems to think.

Cook also took over when Jobs was out in 2004 for surgery. Apple will be fine without Steve at the helm. Cook and the team of executives at Apple are far stronger than the group running the company in the 1990s, when it took Steve Jobs to save Apple from collapse.

As the whole Internet reported today:

In order to take myself out of the limelight and focus on my health, and to allow everyone at Apple to focus on delivering extraordinary products, I have decided to take a medical leave of absence until the end of June.

I have asked Tim Cook to be responsible for Apple’s day to day operations, and I know he and the rest of the executive management team will do a great job. As CEO, I plan to remain involved in major strategic decisions while I am out. Our board of directors fully supports this plan.

I look forward to seeing all of you this summer.

Steve

There are a lot of rumors going around - that his cancer is back, that he is not being as honest as possible, that he may not return to Apple - but frankly, I think that the public needs to just let those things go, and let the Jobs family (and Apple) experience some normalcy for the next few months.

I love when a big company announces their product to be dead - years after the market has declared it so and moved on. Today, the retro/now-officially retro technology is the LaserDisc. Gizmodo:

Pioneer had continued to build players long after the format had been declared dead, largely because of the large LD collections that many Japanese customers had built during the years that the format’s popularity soared (comparitively) in that country.

Here’s some more on the format.

This takes the headache out of running the nightly WebKit build as my main browser on my Macs. It also makes the customer Automator script I wrote a few months back useless.