How Apple will turn the Net’s top into TV’s bottom

How Apple will turn the Net’s top into TV’s bottom:

These deals will be motivated by a shared sense that Something Must Be Done, and by knowing that Apple will make TV look and work better than anybody else ever could. The carriers have seen this movie before, and they’d rather have a part in it than outside of it. For a view of the latter, witness the fallen giants called Sony and Nokia.

I don’t know anything about Apple’s plans. But I know a lot about Apple, as do most of us. Here are the operative facts as they now stand (or at least as I see them):

[A must read (if you care about content distribution).]

Source: Doc Searls Weblog

Apple Television, AirPlay and Why the iPad is the new TV Apps Platform

Apple Television, AirPlay and Why the iPad is the new TV Apps Platform – Jeremy Allaire – Voices – AllThingsD:

But it won’t matter, because with Apple TV, cable content is just an app. What matters is that soon potentially tens of millions of HD capable monitors will become a screen for the hundreds of thousands of apps running on devices that are already in your hands.

[Jeremy Allaire priced plenty of reason and detail, but the truth is what else could it be? Dive into the morass that is networks and related contracts? I can’t imagine…]

We Only Think We Know the Truth About Salt

We Only Think We Know the Truth About Salt:

This attitude that studies that go against prevailing beliefs should be ignored on the basis that, well, they go against prevailing beliefs, has been the norm for the anti-salt campaign for decades. Maybe now the prevailing beliefs should be changed. The British scientist and educator Thomas Huxley, known as Darwin’s bulldog for his advocacy of evolution, may have put it best back in 1860. “My business,” he wrote, “is to teach my aspirations to conform themselves to fact, not to try and make facts harmonize with my aspirations.”

[Another health care mess that needs cleaning up.]

The Wirecutter: Best Standing Desks

→ The Wirecutter: Best Standing Desks:

Today, there are more electric-lift options with programmable heights: the GeekDesk Max, the NewHeights, and the attractive NextDesk Terra. I’m glad Mark found these: now I don’t need to worry that I won’t be able to replace my desk when the AdjusTables’ unreliable lift mechanism inevitably breaks.

[Or you could spend way less money and not sweat the measurements by buying one of these, and dropping a piece of plywood on it as a top. (I had just the piece I needed in the garage. If you don’t have such stuff in your a garage, IKEA sells tops at reasonable prices) I don’t mind the minor effort.]

Source: Marco.org

Writing with Bitly

Writing with Bitly:

As an art and a practice, writing is no less a product of its instruments than are music and painting. We not only need pianos, drums and brushes, but Steinways, Ludwigs and Langnickels. Microsoft doesn’t cut it. (Word produces horrible html.) Adobe had a good early Web writing tool with GoLive, but killed it in favor of Dreamweaver, which is awful. There are plenty of fine text editors, including old standbys (e.g. vi and emacs) that work in command shells. Geeky wizards can do wonders with them, but there should be many other instruments for many other kinds of artists.

[Great insight.]

Source: Doc Searls Weblog

Old Farts Know How to Code

Old Farts Know How to Code:

Nick Bradbury:

“Old farts” are often excluded from that culture, not because we’re lousy coders but because we won’t put up with that shit. We have lives, we have families, we have other things that are important to us.

In addition to the sexism that has been discussed a lot recently, software engineering suffers from extreme ageism and workaholism.

I’m about to turn 30, I’m married, and we just had a baby. This will implicitly (and illegally, of course) disqualify me from working at almost any startup.

∞ Permalink

[Well it doesn’t preclude them all, but you do have to know how to pick ’em. And the classic startup does fall into the above criteria. More’s the pity, as I know lots of “older” folks with lots to share…]

Source: Marco.org

Here’s The Inside Story Of What Happened On The Facebook IPO

Here’s The Inside Story Of What Happened On The Facebook IPO:

The estimate cut, moreover, was followed by three additional pieces of information that were interpreted negatively by some institutional investors:
1) The price range for the deal was increased, which made the deal even less attractive in light of the estimate cut,
2) The size of the deal was increased, which meant that more stock would be sold, and
3) Many smart institutional Facebook shareholders like Goldman Sachs decided to sell more stock on the deal—the “smart money,” in other words, was cashing out.

[snip -ed]

In the meantime, it’s hard to conclude anything other than this:
In one of the biggest IPOs in history, in which a huge amount of stock was sold to small investors, privileged Wall Street insiders once again got top-notch information…and individuals got the shaft.

[Mote and more I think this company is infected with sleaze. If not, they have a lot of work to do to convince me otherwise.]

What Eduardo Saverin Owes America (Hint: Nearly Everything)

What Eduardo Saverin Owes America (Hint: Nearly Everything) | PandoDaily:

As an immigrant myself, I’ve got no patience for the argument that he should keep all of it. Pretty much everything in my life that I enjoy wouldn’t have happened without my being in the United States. My education, my job, my wife and family, the fact that I’m not persecuted for my race or religion (I was born in South Africa), the fact that I can sometimes forget to lock my doors at night and not end up killed by marauding bands—I hate paying taxes as much as the next guy, but when I think about all the ways that the United States has been integral to everything in my life, taxes seem like a tiny price.

Now, remember that the tax rate on long-term capital gains is only 15 percent. In other words, Saverin gets to keep 85 percent of everything he’s making from Facebook’s IPO. Given how much of his wealth depends on the government, that’s more than fair.

[Right on. The low level cheesiness surrounding Facebook and its founders is remarkably high. It may be time to toss my account.]