posts

The Realities of Online Publishing

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Joshua Schnell of Macgasm, discussing his struggle with Google Ad revenue falling off after a server move:

After four months of trying to wrap my head around the case of the missing ad-revenue I realized something, I probably rely more on Google than I do Apple for my daily business. Sure, Apple provides me with the news we cover on Macgasm, but Google makes the coverage possible with Google Reader. Our email … hosted at Google. Our analytics … provided by Google. Our ad-revnue … primarily courtesy of Google. My main IM client of choice for the website … Google Talk. Our number one source of traffic … Google.

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On Happiness and Anger

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James Shelley:

But as counter-cultural as it may be, I have serious misgivings about the pursuit of happiness. There is a massive, irreconcilable clash between our modern obsession with happiness and the lives of our cultural heroes like Nelson Mandela, Aung San Suu Kyi, Martin Luther King, Mohandas Gandhi, Mother Teresa — people who would have never inspired us had they simply taken the path of least resistance in order to achieve their own happiness. No, these individuals followed a trajectory set by a pursuit of meaning, justice and purpose. Values set their respective frameworks for making decisions (and significant sacrifices) in life.

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iTunes Match to Offer Downloading and Streaming [Updated]

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Arnold Kim at Mac Rumors:

What wasn’t clear before is the fact that music can be either streamed or downloaded locally to any of your computers or devices. While the video only shows the service on a Mac, we’ve confirmed it works the same way on iOS devices. So, essentially, you will have instant access to your entire music library from all of your Macs, iPhones, iPads, or iPod touches for only $25/year. This ability on your iOS devices means your music library won’t need to take up valuable space on the device itself, as long as you have some sort of internet connection.

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The War on Fakes

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Mark Millan, CNN:

Apple was slow to act against the booming counterfeit industry in China and other Asian countries, according to cables obtained by WikiLeaks.

The technology giant eventually organized a team in March 2008 to curtail the explosion of knockoff iPods and iPhones, according to an electronic memo from the Beijing embassy dated September 2008.

When I was behind the Genius Bar, it was surprising to me how often someone brought in an “iPod from eBay,” wondering why it didn’t work.

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Gizmodo, on the Steve Jobs Pics

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Joe Brown:

There is a photo floating around the Internet of Steve Jobs looking very ill. It’s shocking. You won’t find it here. I’m not posting it. Instead, I’m posting a picture of myself that was also snapped unexpectedly. See above.

This isn’t about journalism or ethics or taste. We have violated those precepts before to bring you a story, and we’d do it again. But this time it just feels gross.

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On Cult of Mac, Steve Jobs’s Health and a Lack of Truth-Seeking in Reporting

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Earlier today, Cult of Mac writer Nicole Martinelli linked to a TMZ piece showing a photo of what appeared to be a very weak, very sick Steve Jobs. The photo looks doctored to me, but TMZ is reporting them as factual photographs.

In her article, Martinelli wrote:

We’re holding out hope that they are fakes.

After the post went live and gained a few dozen comments, Cult of Mac editors replaced Martinelli’s byline with one reading “Staff Writer.”

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Twenty Years of Linux

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Ryan Paul at Ars Technica:

Although Linux hasn’t been a slam-dunk success in every market—it remains a dud on the desktop—the operating system has had a profound impact on the technology industry and on enterprise computing. Columbia University professor Eben Moglen, one of the original authors of the GPL, took a moment at LinuxCon to discuss his views about the role Linux plays in society. He described Linux as the steel and coal of a 21st century industrial revolution. Linux and the Internet, he said, have together changed human civilization more than any other pair of inventions.

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