- danah boyd | apophenia » How Censoring Craigslist Helps Pimps, Child Traffickers, and Other Abusive Scumbags
Again, relevant to the interests of a number of parties I know, I imagine. Absolutely excellent argument for why the censorship of Craigslist is *not* a good thing, and will not help in the fight against sex trafficking and exploitation of women.
- TUNED UP! PHONE CASE & STAND
I may be developing an addiction to iphone cases. But tell me this isn't awesome. You can't can you?
- Dave Gorman: Google Him
Dave Gorman demonstrates remarkable sanity, as per. In fact, here's a quote that basically runs my entire life: "Either way, there's no value in wasting energy in getting upset. The next thing is always more exciting than the past."
Tag: iphone
Bookmarks for July 29, 2010
- erwtenpeller – War of the Worlds – SoundCloud
Dubstep remixes of Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds.
- Google Alarm | F.A.T.
Ever wondered just how much Google is learning about you? Turn this on, and see. I'm not posting this as a dig at Google, but rather just in a "be informed about what information about you goes where".
- Ping Pong Battle for iPad on the iTunes App Store
Requires an iPad and 2 iPhones to play. Suspect that it's not going to be set-the-world-on-fire exciting, but it's worth a look, I think, if nothing else than because it's a reasonable innovative idea that is bound to have other applications.
- Cool Tools: The Best Magazine Articles Ever
I've been Instapapering stuff ever since I got my iPad for weeks now, and not quite finding the time to get it all read – to the point that when I'm done with my current book, I'll probably spend a week or two's commuting time catching up on them, rather than picking up another book. So obviously, what I need to make my backlog truly huge is a trove of excellent instapaper fodder. (If you are an iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad user who isn't making use of Instapaper, you're missing out on one of the best things about them.)
Bookmarks for July 26, 2010
- rotonic for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad on the iTunes App Store
Horrifyingly addictive little game – I downloaded it, and then when I looked up, it was hours later.
- Insufficient data – Charlie's Diary
I'm actually more optimistic about what "Big Society" can potentially achieve than most people I know, but I recognise that actually, most of what it can achieve is (significant) optimisation of already-funded and already-managed programs that are set up with the correct social tools. Which is why I found this such interesting ready: Charlie Stross, in the course of wondering about how many people you'd need to send to Mars, ably demonstrates why society is already far too large and complex for "Big Society" to ever work past a certain limit.
Bookmarks for July 23, 2010
- Janet Fitch's 10 rules for writers | Jacket Copy | Los Angeles Times
Actually, these aren't half bad, and if I could make more of an effort to remember them, it'd probably lift my writing quite a lot.
- Wayward Alzheimer's patients foiled by fake bus stop – Telegraph
Architectures of control, right here. Nice.
- The ever-arrogant Apple « Observatory
I admit to coming off like a bit of an Apple fanboy, but still, this piece really nailed something for me: if Apple are sometimes arrogant (and I don't think there's a dispute about whether or not they are) then it's because they've earned the right to be by leading the way in personal computing on a technology level for decades now. They may not have been the most successful financially, but they've been the game changing-innovators since before the iPod, never mind the iPhone and iPad. And if someone comes along that can humble them, then I will sincerely welcome them but it hasn't happened yet. The reason I buy Apple products is that they're the best on sale at the moment, and as soon as someone comes along that offers me a better experience, I'll switch.
- Stuart Roebuck: Mobile Proxy Cache content modification by O2
I'm a little fucked off about this, but not quite willing to throw my toys from the pram over it – not least because I can't, having just signed up for another 18 months. But it's one to keep an eye on, and one to be professionally aware of, at least, as more clients start asking up for iPhone/iPad tailored content.
Bookmarks for July 9, 2010
- EPICWIN
Soon, you will be able to level grind as you go about your daily grind. This is either genius, or bleakly depressing.
Bookmarks for May 19, 2010
- ReclaimPrivacy.org | Facebook Privacy Scanner
If you're staying on facebook, I thoroughly recommend that you use this, to be absolutely sure of what your settings are. Remember, if you don't set everything correctly, you friends can share information about you without your knowledge, so do make sure to check…
- People are walking architecture, or making NearlyNets with MujiComp – Blog – BERG
Yes, someone at BERG has done a thing, and I'm linking to it again. What this thing is is a short exploration of bottom-up ubicomp, and how it is making our cities come alive. Cleverness is basically the art of drawing useful connections that others don't, and Matt Jones is bloody good at it, skating here from Archigram to Clay Shirky via Muji and Guy DeBord, and laying out a way of bringing on the future of our public spaces. Plus, I love the idea of the porch being the point where the public and the private mesh. Much friendlier that the computer-nerd term DMZ, much more useful.
- Museum of London – Street Museum
Nifty little app for visually mining the history of London while out and about.
Bookmarks for April 29, 2010
- Thoughts on Flash by Steve Jobs
Abridged: "Will you stop fucking whining? If your product was useful to us, we'd support it. It's not, so we don't. That's business for you. Go develop something useful, and we'll talk."
- Cook Your Meat in a Beer Cooler: The World's Best (and Cheapest) Sous-Vide Hack | Serious Eats
Why did I not think of this?
Bookmarks for April 19, 2010
- YouTube – Iron Man Punches Hugh Grant
A daft little video that tickled my funnybone in a disproportionate manner.
- This Is Apple's Next iPhone – Iphone 4 – Gizmodo
"Whoops" say Apple. "We've accidentally generated a load of hype for the product we were pretty much ready to announce in a matter of a couple of months. Oh dear."
- Penny Red: There's just no pleasing some people.
I skate in just ahead of the group that Penny Red is talking about here – a decade older, with fractionally more financial security, I can afford to rent a place on my own, although not do anything as extravagant as *buy* somewhere, but the sense of political disenfranchisement she's talking about is bitterly familiar.
Bookmarks for February 12, 2010
- Light Blue Touchpaper » Blog Archive » Chip and PIN is broken
The tech details will be lost on most of you, but in brief: if an attacker can get your card cloned, then they can also pretend to know your PIN – fraudulent transactions they make will be reported to the bank as "Verified by PIN". This is bad, because if a transaction is reported as "Verfiied by PIN" then as far as the bank is concerned it's legit, and not disputable. Chip and PIN is, and always was, design to protect the banks, and not the consumers. Just y'know, saying. You might want to write angry letters to your banks, and suchlike.
- Liberal Conspiracy » Astonishing transcript of Boris evading questions
Well, what did you expect when you all voted for the fuck? Someone who might be good for public services in London? I know Ken was a weasel too, but he was at least London's weasel, with the interests in London in his weaselly little heart (possibly some distance behind his own interests, but they were *there*), and every time I read a story about Boris, my blood pressure spikes something dreadful.
- Liberal Conspiracy » Glenn Beck comes to UK; advertisers run away!
This, I feel rather neatly sums up some key differences between the UK and the US. Just occasionally, I'm happy to live in the country I do.
- Fuck you, Google « Fugitivus
And this is why google buzz is poorly implemented, badly designed, and generally a massive fuck you to all google's users. I'm still trying to work out how to switch it off completely.
- Introduction to Square
Not sure if this is available to people in the UK yet, but if and when it is, this is could make life a lot easier.
- Cope » Caillois completeness
Interesting set of metrics for judging the game-ness of something.
Bookmarks for December 11, 2009
- Airlock
Mac App that allows locking/unlocking and other actions based on proximity of iphone. There's a potential problem with bluetooth related battery drain on the iphone here, but if they've somehow cracked that, then this could be very interesting/useful – not so much for the security tools, but more for the fact that I could them script for proximity, and use that to log my location through the day.
- BBC News – Postcode data to be free in 2010
About time. UK based locational services are about to get better. Or at least cheaper.