Sports photographers on the sidelines of games sometimes find themselves a little too close to the action. One NFL photographer had an unexpected meeting with the quarterback recently, and the clip of what happened quickly went viral online.
During the game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Baltimore Ravens on October 6th, Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson got shoved out of bounds and straight into photographer Shelley Lipton.
Instead of hurrying back onto the field, Jackson immediately walked back to Lipton and gave her a helping hand up from the turf.
I’ve been on the sidelines of an NFL game as the “protector” of an NFL Films camera guy and it was terrifying. I’m a big guy but NFL players are huge and heavily armoured. Good to hear this shooter was OK and got the shot.
Backblaze likes to talk about hard drive failures — a lot. What we haven’t talked much about is how we deal with those failures: the daily dance of temp drives, replacement drives, and all the clones that it takes to keep over 100,000 drives healthy. Let’s go behind the scenes and take a look at that dance from the eyes of one Backblaze hard drive.
After sitting still for what seemed like forever, ZCH007BZ was on the move. ZCH007BZ, let’s call him Zach, is a Seagate 12 TB hard drive. For the last few weeks, Zach and over 6,000 friends were securely sealed inside their protective cases in the ready storage area of a Backblaze data center. Being a hard disk drive, Zach’s modest dream was to be installed in a system, spin merrily, and store data for many years to come. And now the wait was nearly over, or was it?
This is a silly bit of fluff and marketing but it’s fun and reading between the lines is interesting to see how companies like Backblaze go about their business.
Level Lock is a $250 deadbolt enabled with Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. It’s essentially a computerized lock that users can control through an associated app. For example, users can unlock their doors through Bluetooth with their phones, or send a text message with a pass to a guest if they need to get into their house.
The idea is to make a high-quality smart lock that discards a lot of the conventional thinking about residential locks, or create a new product from first principles, similar to how Apple approaches the design of a new product by thinking about the experience first.
How many of you have or are interested in “smart locks”? I can see a specific use case for them but, at $250, that’s way too steep for me.
Hagibis, which means “speed” in the Filipino language of Tagalog, is reportedly the worst storm Japan has seen in 60 years. However, until just a day before, another flurry of images from Japan was causing immense curiosity on social media: A dark pink, almost purple sky.
While some people sought to derive spiritual meaning from the colour, there’s a simpler explanation for the phenomenon, which is seen as the harbinger of storms.
The storm was devastating and caused great loss of life. A lot of these social media photos “looked fake” or at least over-edited but there’s a scientific explanation for them.
Got some time? Cause this official video from Disney weighs in at about 3 hours, 17 minutes.
Not sure they ever expected anyone to watch it, as much as they wanted to make a point about their back catalog. They’ve also been tweeting every single title in a seemingly never ending stream of tweets from their official Disney+ Twitter account.
Of all the up-and-coming streaming services, Disney+ seems the biggest no-brainer, the most bang for the buck, especially if you grew up with the Disney Channel.
Sam Henri Gold finds the neatest Apple nuggets. This one is an unreleased commercial for the iPhone 4s, and for Siri, Apple Maps, and iOS along the way.
iPhone 4S Ad featuring John Krazanski, created 2012 but never released to the public. Many other unreleased ads in the Archive 😏 pic.twitter.com/BuRA8Mmrcf
Follow the link, scroll down the the chart. How many adults have a net worth between $1,000 and $10,000? Turns out, that’s the biggest bar on the graph, with 1.7 billion adults.
And the smallest bar on the graph, with a net worth of $100 billion? They list them by name.
I tend to use both. If have a long drive ahead of me, I’ll visit both for route recommendations. If they disagree, it’s usually because one is aware of an accident or traffic problem that the other isn’t.
And if I am looking for a local food recommendation, I’ll look at both, but tend to trust the Google Maps crowd source data, rather than Apple’s Yelp data. Not a fan of Yelp, wish Apple built their own crowd-source food recommendation mechanism, rather than depend on Yelp. I’ve always felt like Apple and Yelp are an odd partnership.
This was posted back in 2017, was filmed just a few weeks into Steve’s return to Apple back in 1997.
It reentered the conversation again because of comments about Apple’s core values Steve made at about 6:17 in.
The reemergence came, at least in part, due to Steve’s statement about core values and a perceived disconnect with Apple’s decisions on banning the HKLive app.
I found the whole video riveting. It’s 15 minutes long. If you’ve got a taste for Apple’s history, worth watching the whole thing.
Six lessons from the team that created Luna Display, which got Sherlock’ed by Catalina/iPadOS’s Sidecar. Interesting, informative, and remarkably gracious.
Working out the math of whether or not to update to Catalina? Take a few minutes to step through these quotes Michael Tsai collected from various members of the Mac technorati.
I am writing these words from my Catalina install. Though I did run into some snags with the install, so far my Catalina experience has been rock solid.
If you do decide to make the leap to Catalina: Obviously, do a complete backup before you start, and spend the time digging through the list of your 32-bit apps to make sure there’s nothing on that list that you’ll miss.
To do that:
Apple menu > About This Mac
Click the System Report button
In the sidebar on the left, scroll to Software > Legacy Software
Anything you absolutely need? Check to see if there’s a 64-bit upgrade. Do the upgrade before you install Catalina.
Now tap the link that says “About Safari & Privacy…” (it’s the second of these links, just under the Check for Apple Pay switch)
Scroll down to the section labeled “Fraudulent Website Warning”
At the bottom of that paragraph:
Before visiting a website, Safari may send information calculated from the website address to Google Safe Browsing and Tencent Safe Browsing to check if the website is fraudulent. These safe browsing providers may also log your IP address.
Those words have raised a lot of eyebrows. The headline linked article digs into some history and lays out the concerns. Start off by reading the section “What is “Safe Browsing”, and is it actually safe?” That’ll set the table for why Google’s Safe Browsing is imperfect where privacy is concerned.
Which leads to:
The problem is that Safe Browsing “update API” has never been exactly “safe”. Its purpose was never to provide total privacy to users, but rather to degrade the quality of browsing data that providers collect. Within the threat model of Google, we (as a privacy-focused community) largely concluded that protecting users from malicious sites was worth the risk. That’s because, while Google certainly has the brainpower to extract a signal from the noisy Safe Browsing results, it seemed unlikely that they would bother. (Or at least, we hoped that someone would blow the whistle if they tried.)
But Tencent isn’t Google. While they may be just as trustworthy, we deserve to be informed about this kind of change and to make choices about it. At very least, users should learn about these changes before Apple pushes the feature into production, and thus asks millions of their customers to trust them.
OK, now you’re caught up. Is this a tempest in a teapot or a genuine privacy concern? Looking forward to an official response from Apple.
UPDATE: And here’s Apple’s official statement:
Apple protects user privacy and safeguards your data with Safari Fraudulent Website Warning, a security feature that flags websites known to be malicious in nature. When the feature is enabled, Safari checks the website URL against lists of known websites and displays a warning if the URL the user is visiting is suspected of fraudulent conduct like phishing.
To accomplish this task, Safari receives a list of websites known to be malicious from Google, and for devices with their region code set to mainland China, it receives a list from Tencent. The actual URL of a website you visit is never shared with a safe browsing provider and the feature can be turned off.
I have no plans to move my main iMac to macOS Catalina, at least for the forseeable future. There are two key apps I use—Fujitsu’s ScanSnap scanner software and the Many Tricks’ accounting app—that are both 32-bit. In addition, there are changes in Catalina relative to permissions that make it somewhat Vista like and slow down my interaction with the system.
There are two things that I wanted to get rid of on my iMac: The notice about Catalina, and the infuriating red dot. At its simplest level, this appears to require just two Terminal commands
This is (yet another) example of Apple’s parochial insistence that “We Know Better.” There’s no reason this notification and popup should not be able to be permanently dismissed.
It’s been a rough week for Apple in China. Dave and I talk about that, some problems with macOS Catalina, and how much I hate musicals.
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I can’t recall an Apple memo or statement that crumbles so quickly under scrutiny. For a company that usually measures umpteen times before cutting anything, it’s both sad and startling.
This is the tip of the iceberg on hot takes concerning Apple’s dealings with China. This issue is complex, and Apple has made a decision that China’s market is important to them, have stepped into the fire.
Then there’s Catalina. There’s this hot take from Tyler Hall (just a snippet, read the whole thing:
Apple’s insistence on their annual, big-splash release cycle is fundamentally breaking engineering. I know I’m not privy to their internal decision making and that software features that depend on hardware releases and vice-versa are planned and timed years (if not half-decades) in advance, but I can think of no other explanation than that Marketing alone is purely in charge of when things ship.
There’s another hot take making its way around Twitter, not going to link to it because it appears to come from an Apple employee and there’s no grain of salt big enough to make it worth sharing without attribution and permission, but it’s a doozy.
My experience with Catalina has been spotty at best. There’s lots of general stability and wonderful new features, punctuated by bizarre bugs that have consumed a lot of cycles to work through.
Difficult times for Apple, hard to see this when you know how hard these folks work, and reflect on how much Apple has changed the world. I’m old enough to remember the days of the flip phone, having to type a message with a phone’s digits as your keyboard. What we have now is a miracle to me. I’m hoping we get through these difficult times quickly, get back to the whimsy.
With iOS 13, you can now quickly reboot your iPhone using Voice Control. If you haven’t set it up, open Settings, head to “Accessibility,” and select “Voice Control,” then tap “Set Up Voice Control” and follow the prompts.
Now, simply say “Reboot Device” (no need to say “Hey Siri” or anything first). When you do, you’ll see a prompt. Just say “Tap Restart,” and your phone will reboot.
This is fascinating and fun to play with. I can definitely see the value as an assistive tech. Take a few minutes and go through the steps, try this for yourself.
My bet is, somewhere there’s an official set of Voice Control verbs out there. Wondering if that list corresponds to a similar list for, say, Shortcuts.
UPDATE: To learn more, dig into this Apple support page. Also, turn on voice control and then say: “Show me what to say” (H/T Roman Meliska).
When Apple marketing chief Phil Schiller detailed the iPhone 11’s new camera abilities in September, he boasted, “It’s computational photography mad science.” And when Google debuts its new Pixel 4 phone on Tuesday, you can bet it’ll be showing off its own pioneering work in computational photography.
The reason is simple: Computational photography can improve your camera shots immeasurably, helping your phone match, and in some ways surpass, even expensive cameras.
Pretty impressive cast, including Academy Award winner Octavia Spencer and Emmy winner Aaron Paul. I’ll definitely check this one out. Truth Be Told comes to Apple TV+ on December 6th.
Today’s iOS 13.2 beta introduces a new option that allows iPhone and iPad users to delete their Siri and Dictation history and opt out of sharing audio recordings, features that Apple promised after being called out for its Siri quality evaluation processes.
Earlier this year, it was discovered that Apple hired contractors to listen to a small percentage of anonymized Siri recordings to evaluate Siri’s responses with the purpose of improving the assistant’s accuracy and reliability.
Apple promised tools to manage this stuff, and here they are.
macOS Catalina was released to the public earlier this week, making it easier for developers to port their iPad apps to the Mac. Twitter is joining the club today with a new Catalyst version of its iPad app that’s now available on the Mac App Store.
This feels like a beta app, a work-in-progress. Try it for yourself. One clue: When you get to the login screen, try resizing the window. The panes within don’t resize. They are non-responsive. This is basic stuff. I suspect this is a Catalyst issue, not a Twitter issue, but not certain.
If you’ve got access to Catalina, try it out, see for yourself. Me? I’m back at my regular 3rd party Twitter client.
Apple Inc. Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook defended the company’s decision to remove a mapping app in Hong Kong, saying on Thursday that the company received “credible information” from authorities indicating the software was being used “maliciously” to attack police.
Apple pulled HKmap.live from its App Store on Wednesday after flip-flopping between rejecting it and approving it earlier this month. Apple made the decision after consulting with local authorities, because it could endanger law enforcement and city residents. Cook echoed that sentiment in an email to Apple employees.
I’ve never said this about a Tim Cook missive but what a load of crap. Apple is between a rock and a hard place on this and, as I said to Jim Dalrymple on last night’s Your Mac Life podcast, it’s a position they’ve put themselves in and I have no sympathy for the company on this issue. They deserve all the flack they are getting – from both sides.
Follow the headline link to take Apple’s official Catalina tour. You’ll likely want to click or tap one of the arrows at some point, just to switch the tour to manual. Makes it much easier to follow. But worth stepping through.
I love that this works fine on your iOS device, or on an older version of macOS. Gives you a chance to learn, without committing to the install. Be sure to click the + when it appears on a page to learn more.
Apple has pulled an app from the App Store that Hong Kong protestors have been using to track police movements, saying it violates the company’s guidelines and local laws.
Apple approved HKmap Live last week after reviewing its decision to initially reject the app from the App Store .
And:
However, on Wednesday Apple was criticized by Chinese state media for its decision to make the app available. “Letting poisonous software have its way is a betrayal of the Chinese people’s feelings,” said the People’s Daily.
Apple’s official response:
We created the App Store to be a safe and trusted place to discover apps. We have learned that an app, HKmap.live, has been used in ways that endanger law enforcement and residents in Hong Kong. Many concerned customers in Hong Kong have contacted us about this app and we immediately began investigating it. The app displays police locations and we have verified with the Hong Kong Cybersecurity and Technology Crime Bureau that the app has been used to target and ambush police, threaten public safety, and criminals have used it to victimize residents in areas where they know there is no law enforcement. This app violates our guidelines and local laws, and we have removed it from the App Store .
This is an incredibly complex situation for Apple, indeed for anyone doing business in China. Sides are being drawn, push coming to shove. Ben does a nice job laying out a number of issues that are all coming into focus here.
Apple has added the Xbox Wireless Controller to Apple.com, although the accessory is currently unavailable to purchase at the time of writing. Apple sells a few different gaming controllers on its website to connect to iOS, iPadOS, and tvOS devices, but as of yet the company has never directly sold Microsoft or Sony’s own gaming controllers.
I’ve been using an MFi controller on my iPad and, I have to say, it makes all the difference in playing Apple Arcade games.
are’s breakthrough designs for the Macintosh, which included the smiling computer at startup, trash can for recycling and a computer disk for saving files, are now commonplace in the digital era. They are so recognizable that they are legendary.
Known today as “the woman who gave the Macintosh a smile,” Kare had little experience with computers when she first went to work for Apple in 1983. She was a young sculptor when she received a call from an old friend asking if she would be interested in applying for a job creating graphics and typefaces for the new personal computer Apple was planning to release in 1984.
Kare had never designed a typeface before, but she didn’t let her unfamiliarity stop her.
I love reading stories about Kare’s design process and philosophies.
I recently spent a few days trying a variety of Arcade titles on an Apple TV 4K and a 55-inch 4K TV, primarily using the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One controllers. In short, while there’s plenty of promise, Apple Arcade doesn’t yet work as well in the living room as it does on the go.
I’ve played a couple of games on the Apple TV but CNET is right in saying there’s a lot more work to be done. For me, using an Xbox One controller is not a fun experience.
