Khoi Vinh just announced his new company, and it’s Mixel, a social collage-making app for iPad. It lets you make collages—Mixels—from included photos, your own, or ones you pick up from the collages other people are creating. Mixels are saved and posted publicly for everyone to
Over the weekend, occupy supporters “protested” a tribute to Ronald Reagan event put on by conservative advocacy group American For Prosperity (of which David Koch is a large donor) in Washington, D.C. When I say protest, I mean intentionally block traffic (and tell drivers “you have no power right
Yoni Appelbaum’s fascinating look at maple syrup’s history (http://www.theatlantic.com/life/archive/2011/11/making-the-grade-why-the-cheapest-maple-syrup-tastes-best/239133/): The market for maple syrup offers an odd inversion. The thin, pale fluid labeled Fancy or Grade A Light Amber commands
Cuba provides a nice glimpse into unintended consequences of government regulation: But the tight grip on imports means cars will remain scarce and command eye-popping prices, whatever their condition, economists and car brokers say. “A car that in another country you’d pay to destroy, you can sell here
Fusion Ads was purchased by BuySellAds. I’m skeptical it’s going to work out, but regardless, best of luck to Chris Bowler with whatever it is he does next. You won’t meet a nicer, more caring guy.
Square just updated their Card Case iPhone app with a new feature: automatic tabs. Basically, you can now walk into stores that support Square and pay without ever taking out your phone or wallet. Pretty neat.
Zach Holman: Simplify. Don’t give your users the shit work. Someone needs to make that into a poster.
To end his biography of Steve Jobs, Walter Isaacson printed an extended excerpt of what Jobs said during their interviews. This section, if you haven’t read it already, is worth the price of the book alone. I don’t want to quote too much from it (yet), because some
Mona Simpson’s eulogy for her brother: We all — in the end — die in medias res. In the middle of a story. Of many stories. Just beautiful.
Apple is organized around functions, rather than divisions: The result is a command-and-control structure where ideas are shared at the top — if not below. Jobs often contrasts Apple’s approach with its competitors’. Sony (SNE), he has said, had too many divisions to create the iPod. Apple instead
HP is keeping their PC division after all: HP today announced that it has completed its evaluation of strategic alternatives for its Personal Systems Group (PSG) and has decided the unit will remain part of the company. “HP objectively evaluated the strategic, financial and operational impact of spinning off PSG.
Jacqui Cheng reviews the new iPod nano (http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2011/10/running-with-nike-putting-the-2011-ipod-nano-to-the-test.ars): I’ll cut to the chase: Nike+ on the new iPod nano was not particularly accurate for me on speed or distance, but the