Nice take on March Madness where you pick your favorite smartphone. The first round is the iPhone vs the Acer Liquid Jade 2 (whatever that is).

With Apple’s source code, the FBI could, in theory, create its own version of iOS with the security features stripped out. Stamped with Apple’s electronic signature, the Bureau’s versions of iOS could pass for the real thing.

This has to make you think twice. It just has to.

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The tone of the brief reads like an indictment. We’ve all heard director Comey and Attorney General Lynch thank Apple for its consistent help in working with law enforcement. Director Comey’s own statement…that there are no demons here? We certainly wouldn’t conclude it from this brief. In 30 years of practice, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a legal brief that was more intended to smear the other side with false accusations and innuendo, and less intended to focus on the real merits of the case. For the first time ever, we see an allegation that Apple has deliberately made changes to block law enforcement requests for access. This should be deeply offensive to everyone that reads it. An unsupported, unsubstantiated effort to vilify Apple rather than confront the issues in the case.

To do this in a brief before a magistrate judge just shows the desperation that the Department of Justice now feels. We would never respond in kind. But imagine Apple asking a court whether the FBI could be trusted because, there is this real question about whether J. Edgar Hoover ordered the assassination of Kennedy. See ConspiracyTheory.com as our supporting evidence. We add security features to protect our customers from hackers and criminals. And the FBI should be helping to support us in this because it keeps everyone safe. To suggest otherwise is demeaning. It cheapens the debate and it tries the mask the real and serious issues. I can only conclude that the DoJ is so desperate at this point that it has thrown all decorum to the winds.

Look, we know there are great people in the DoJ and the FBI. We work shoulder to shoulder with them all the time. That’s why this cheap shot brief surprises us so much. We help when we’re asked to. We’re honest about what we can and can’t do. Let’s at least treat one another with respect and get this case before the American people in a responsible way. We are going to court to exercise our legal rights. Everyone should beware, because it seems like disagreeing with the Department of Justice means you must be evil and anti-American. Nothing could be further from the truth.

I wasn’t on the call, so I can’t really comment on the tone… other than the obvious.

Apple has said the government’s request would create a “back door” to phones that could be abused by criminals and governments, and that Congress hasn’t given the Justice Department legal authority to make such a demand.

In the court filing on Thursday, federal prosecutors said Apple’s stance was “corrosive” of institutions best able to safeguard “our liberty and our rights.” The government also said Apple “deliberately raised technological barriers” to prevent the execution of a warrant.

I’m assuming the government means that Apple increased security on its devices and they don’t mean they raised technological barriers, as in, brought up arguments in court. I don’t see any proof that Apple “deliberately raised technological barriers” just to prevent the government from getting into this phone or any other phone. Apple has been steadily increasing the security of its devices for many years, and will most likely continue to do so with future versions of its devices and operating systems. As they should.

500px:

We walked along the jetty looking down at a large school of fish just beneath the jetty. We noticed a number of reef sharks patrolling the area near the jetty and as we watched the reef sharks slowly moved into the school of fish, with the fish retreating away from the immediate area around the shark.

It was amazing to watch the continuous parting of the school of fish as each shark moved through the mass of fish. I took a number of photos from different angles over about 20 minutes, but opted for this one as my favorite.

I saw this really cool picture last year and wondered about the story behind it. The lesson of the shot is, “Always carry your best camera”.

Former Google CEO and current Alphabet Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt was in South Korea for a press event this week, where he was spotted taking pictures of the event using an Apple iPhone instead of a Google Android handset.

That is one bizarre man.

Apple events at its Cupertino headquarters are my favorite. The venue is intimate and you feel like you’re part of the event. The company will have a live stream that you can watch on March 21.

From the ACLU blog, referring to an image of the iPhone 5c internals (found on this page):

> The large chip on the front marked A6 is the processor — a custom chip designed by Apple specifically for its devices. It contains the CPU, BootROM, RAM, crypto engines, Apple’s public signing key (used to verify software updates), and the UID key (see our previous blog post). > > The largest chip on the back (outlined in red above) is the NAND flash, where all the data is stored, including both the encrypted filesystem and the Effaceable Storage. > > The FBI can simply remove this chip from the circuit board (“desolder” it), connect it to a device capable of reading and writing NAND flash, and copy all of its data. It can then replace the chip, and start testing passcodes. If it turns out that the auto-erase feature is on, and the Effaceable Storage gets erased, they can remove the chip, copy the original information back in, and replace it. If they plan to do this many times, they can attach a “test socket” to the circuit board that makes it easy and fast to do this kind of chip swapping.

Seems to me, if this is true, either the FBI is not aware of this possibility, they are aware but not technically able to pursue this process, or they are aware of the technique and are pursuing Apple for political reasons.

Also seems to me that there might be more to it than this blog post implies. It seems logical that iOS would refuse to allow any more login attempts once auto-erase is enabled. However, while reading this guide, I realized that this still wouldn’t prevent the FBI from pursuing their own attempts to access the NAND flash memory.

Interesting.

Niel Cybart, writing for Above Avalon:

The best way to understand why Apple is releasing a new 4-inch iPhone in 2016 is to look at the changing iPhone user base. Apple is now selling iPhones to an installed base of more than 550 million users with a multitude of wants, needs, and desires regarding their smartphones. Apple is making a bet that it is time to expand iPhone development to three different screen sizes in order to appeal to the 20% of the user base that prefer single-handed iPhone usage over larger screen options. Releasing a new 4-inch iPhone would be an admission by Apple that the only way to maintain a vibrant iPhone upgrade cycle is to expand the iPhone line.

Terrific analysis. Be sure to look at the iOS vs Android price pyramid graphic to understand the holes in the existing iPhone market coverage:

By targeting the premium segment of the market, Apple spent years developing a loyal iPhone base of hundreds of millions of users willing to spend an above average amount of money and time on their iPhones. This trend stood in stark contrast to the vast majority of smartphone sales taking place at the low-end of the market where consumers used their phones very differently.

Apple has long eschewed that lower end of the market. Will a 4-inch phone be inexpensive enough to help Apple expand to the lower levels of that pyramid?

Leave your iPhone behind when you leave a restaurant? This Apple Watch app will let you know you left it behind and help you locate it. Smart idea. Review by Jonny Evans for Computerworld.

Lauren Goode, writing for The Verge:

ExxonMobil today said it would start accepting Apple Pay as a form of payment at around 6,000 ExxonMobil gas stations around the U.S, something that Apple CEO Tim Cook had said was coming during the company’s first quarter earnings call.

However, these Apple Pay payments won’t be tap-to-pay, unlike the experience at almost every other point-of-sale system that works with Apple Pay. In this case, Apple Pay will be integrated into Exxon’s existing Speedpass+ app, which is free to download and uses your geolocation to pull up local pumps. A customer can drive up to the pump, enter the pump number within the Speedpass+ app, and use his or her thumbprint to authorize payment through Apple Pay.

Interesting that you can’t just wave your phone or Apple Watch at the pump to enable payment. Anyone know why?

Update: Reader Erick Erickson pointed me to this Fast Company article, which explains:

Instead of telling gas stations to replace or upgrade pumps—which would have involved $30,000-$40,000 of expenses and major disruption to operations—ExxonMobil is piggybacking on two years’ worth of work it’s already invested in its Speedpass+ app, which has been undergoing testing in five markets. Adding support for Apple Pay to the iPhone app, which also directly supports a variety of cards, was the easy part. All the stations have to do is install a software update on their payment system.

Still, not the same transparent process of simply holding up your Apple Watch to pay.

Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance was one of the witnesses who testified before the House Judiciary Committee last week (you can read details of that hearing here), taking the side of the FBI.

Yesterday, Vance went on TV (you can watch the interview here) to lay out his case on Fox News’ Mornings with Maria. Vance does a solid job laying out his argument and is well worth watching. Keep these two thoughts in mind, though:

• If Apple built in the backdoor that Vance is seeking, hackers would no doubt get at your data without having to seek a court order.
• Once the bad guys realize that their iPhone communications are vulnerable, they’ll adopt any of the myriad of alternative encryption mechanisms available to them as open source tools. Which means we’ll have given away our privacy for no gain.

Good to absorb both sides of this battle, keep clear why Apple’s position is both correct and vital. Note also that Vance says that he thinks the answer lies with Congress, but that he is pursuing a path through the courts.

Before you continue, take a sec to watch this very short video, which shows a close up view of the MacBook Pro’s gently pulsing sleep light.

OK, now here’s Alex Taylor, from this Quora post:

I recall listening to a rare lecture by Jony Ive in London back in the late 1990s where he explained that, when you were trying to sleep, the old sleep LEDs of laptops would blink on and off harshly, lighting up your entire bedroom each time which made it harder for some people to get to sleep and irritated people.

They therefore set out to create a more relaxing light which was not so aggressive and seemed more anthropomorphic.

As simple as this may sound, it meant going to the expense of creating a new controller chip which could drive the LED and change its brightness when the main CPU was shut down, all without harming battery life.

Most previous sleep LEDs were just driven directly from the system chipset and could only switch on or off.

Apple carried out research into breathing rates during sleep and used that figure to derive a model for how the light should behave to create the most relaxing atmosphere and make the product seem more human than robot.

Such a tiny thing. The incredible attention to detail and craft is a hallmark of Apple products.

[Via the terrific Mac Kung Fu]

Kif Leswing, writing for Business Insider:

In a Spanish-language interview broadcast on Univision on Wednesday, Cue defended Apple’s refusal to cooperate with a court order asking it to help the FBI extract data from an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino shooters.

And:

“When they can get us to create a new system to do new things, where will it stop?” Cue said.

“For example, one day [the FBI] may want us to open your phone’s camera, microphone. Those are things we can’t do now. But if they can force us to do that, I think that’s very bad,” Cue said, according to a translation provided by Apple.

And:

“What they want is to give them a key to the back door of your house, and we don’t have the key. Since we don’t have the key, they want us to change the lock,” Cue said.

And:

“For example, when we made Apple Pay, we did not want to have the number of the credit card, because if you keep it, and if someone steals it, they can use it anywhere. When you use Apple Pay, instead of using that number, we use a new number every time you buy something,” Cue said.

Want to hear this for yourself? The interview is in Spanish (Cue’s parents emigrated from Cuba, he grew up speaking it at home) and a bit of the video is embedded below.

Bitter Southerner:

Among the most prized objects owned by Southern families are the cast-iron skillets passed down from generation to generation. The ones in your kitchen probably came from Lodge Manufacturing Co., in the tiny Tennessee town of South Pittsburg. Most of us know well the memories contained in those old skillets, but we know very little about the integrity of the people who make them. A visit to the Lodge foundry certainly has lessons to teach us about the South and its culture. But more importantly, Lodge also exemplifies something remarkably rare in today’s business world: a family-run company that has built a booming, global business without selling out its hometown.

I used to live in the general area and I wish I had know about Lodge Manufacturing back then. It sounds like a fascinating place and company. I now own a couple of their cast iron skillets and love using them.

I use Siri a lot on my Apple TV, but there’s some things here that I didn’t know.

The ad is embedded below.

The tag line is, “I can’t do that on my Mac”. Granted, I am an Apple person, with clear bias. But, that said, this ad feels more like something you’d see from a marginalized product that adds a feature purely for the ability to make that claim. The ad doesn’t fill me with wonder, doesn’t even come close to having an emotional core. There’s no whimsy.

If Microsoft is going to take on the MacBook or the iPad Pro (which would have been a fairer comparison for this particular use case), they are going to have to dive deep within themselves to get in touch with the elements that make their product truly special. That’s where Apple’s best ads start.

Neil Gonzalez, writing for Wonder How To:

You can deactivate Find My iPhone on the device by going to Settings -> iCloud -> Find My iPhone and toggling it off. Alternatively, you can also just turn off iCloud altogether.

However, if you don’t have the iPhone anymore or can’t access it because of a lost passcode, the new user won’t be able to activate the iPhone, you won’t be able to get back in, or you might not be able to restore to a previous iTunes backup. Luckily, there’s a way to disable Find My iPhone remotely from a computer or other iOS device.

Read through it, then tuck this one away.

From S-Video, through DVI and Mini-DVI, all the way to USB Type C, this quick reference chart shows all the video ports ever used on a Mac. Anything missing?

[Via Mac Kung Fu]

Federico Viticci, writing for MacStories:

Today’s Google app updates highlight a major problem I’ve had with Google’s iOS software in the past year. One of the long-held beliefs in the tech industry is that Google excels at web services, while Apple makes superior native apps. In recent years, though, many have also noted that Google was getting better at making apps faster than Apple was improving at web services. Some have said that Google had built a great ecosystem of iOS apps, even.

Today, Google’s iOS apps are no longer great. They’re mostly okay, and they’re often disappointing in many ways – one of which is the unwillingness to recognize that adopting new iOS technologies is an essential step for building solid iOS experiences. The services are still amazing; the apps are too often a downright disappointment.

I’ve never felt positive about Google’s iOS apps. I use Google apps extensively on my Mac. Google’s gmail service has been rock solid for me, Google docs, Google Maps, too. But once I move over to iOS, things change.

Have you ever used a Windows app that someone ported to the Mac? An app that does what it is supposed to do, but feels like whoever designed it didn’t really understand how a Mac app is supposed to work?

That’s how Google’s iOS apps feel to me. As if they were written in Java to run under Android, then force ported to iOS. The iOS apps are missing the thoughtful details, that last 5% that takes an app from solid to magical.

The Washington Post on Tim Cook growing up in rural Alabama, dealing with racism and being gay, and developing his own moral compass.

Rolling Stone:

Over the decades, many people have claimed to be the “fifth Beatle.” But the only person who can credibly hold that title was Martin. The producer not only signed the Beatles to their first record contract in 1962 but went on to work extensively with them on the vast majority of music they recorded over the next eight years, from “Love Me Do” to the majestic suite that wrapped up Abbey Road.

“George Martin made us what we were in the studio,” John Lennon said in 1971. “He helped us develop a language to talk to other musicians.”

And this fascinating bit:

Martin also played on some Beatles songs, including the piano on “In My Life.” “I couldn’t play the piano at the speed it needed to be played, the way I’d written the part,” he said in another 2012 interview. “I wasn’t that good a pianist, but if you had had a really good pianist, he could do it. I couldn’t get all the notes in. One night I was by myself and played the notes at half speed but an octave lower on the piano, recording at 15 inches per second. When I ran the tape back at 30 inches per second, the notes were at the right speed and in the correct octave.”

A tough loss.

Very good article with a lot of photos for comparison.

AC/DC are forced to reschedule the 10 upcoming dates on the U.S. leg of their “Rock or Bust” World Tour. AC/DC’s lead singer, Brian Johnson, has been advised by doctors to stop touring immediately or risk total hearing loss.

Tomorrow’s show in Atlanta through Madison Square Garden in New York, NY in early April will be made up later in the year, likely with a guest vocalist. More information regarding these rescheduled shows to come. Current ticket holders can hold on to their tickets for the rescheduled dates or receive a refund at point of purchase.

Very sad news for AC/DC. Personally, I don’t want to see a show with a guest vocalist.

Re/code:

When the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship begins March 15, fans will be able to watch two games side by side through a new split-screen feature available exclusively through Apple TV.

The split-screen feature lets fans watch two games simultaneously and toggle between the two to listen to the commentary. The app also supports AirPlay, so users can beam video or audio to compatible speakers or the Apple TV. It’ll also deliver alerts and updates to the Apple Watch.

Except for the “big games”, I rarely watch any college basketball until this time of year. Then I’ll watch every game broadcast. This could be a really great way to feed my March Madness addiction.