It’s an interesting list, but I agree with their top choice.

Gerry Conway:

This is a very big deal, because it strikes to the heart of what made Comixology’s app a near-perfect venue for discovering and falling in love with new comics, a venue creators and publishers have been searching for since the collapse of mainstream newsstand distribution in the late 1970s-early ’80s: it destroys the casual reader’s easy access to an impulse purchase. And that’s a terrible development for the future of comics.

There are so many good parts of this article I could have quoted.

Marcin Treder:

Design is not principally measured by a product’s visual appeal; its aesthetic qualities.

It’s also measured by how it was planned and articulated, how it was built, how it functions. It’s about the design’s ability to improve upon the current reality.

It seems to me that it’s the function part that many people often leave out. It matters, a lot.

When Netflix signed their traffic peering deal with Comcast, that was a precedent. This deal with Verizon makes these deals a way of life.

The details of the arrangement are currently confidential. However, they surely must come as a foregone conclusion at least for Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam, who said that he expected to sign a deal with the streaming company days after the Comcast agreement. However, the deal flies in the face of the stance Netflix has thusfar espoused, saying that preferential treatment violates their definition of true and total net neutrality. In an impassioned blog post, CEO Reed Hastings wrote, “The essence of net neutrality is that ISPs such as AT&T and Comcast don’t restrict, influence or otherwise meddle with the choices consumers make.” After the company made what many saw as a Faustian pact with Comcast in February for direct connectivity, Hastings conceded that the company would reluctantly make deals of that kind going forward, while still fighting for net neutrality.

A Faustian bargain indeed.

Bloomberg:

Nokia named Rajeev Suri chief executive officer, picking the head of its networks division to chart the company’s future and forecasting a return to sales growth after selling the mobile-phone business to Microsoft Corp.

The stock jumped the most in six months after Espoo, Finland-based Nokia also said it plans to spend about 5 billion euros ($6.9 billion) on dividends, share buybacks and debt reduction. The appointment of Suri, 46, ends the search for a replacement for Stephen Elop, who returned to Microsoft with the sale of Nokia’s handset division for $7.5 billion.

By choosing Suri, 149-year-old Nokia is intensifying its focus on wireless-network equipment as it faces a new start without the phones that made it famous. Suri, who has run the network unit for four years, needs to challenge larger Ericsson AB (ERICB) and Huawei Technologies Co. to reverse falling equipment revenue, which accounts for about 90 percent of Nokia’s sales.

Samsung is being attacked from both ends. Chinese brands like Huawei (largest telecom equipment maker in the world) are attacking from the low-end and Apple is attacking from the higher end. Tough strategic position.

From AT&T:

AT&T* today announced plans to launch a high-speed 4G LTE-based in-flight connectivity service for airlines and passengers in commercial, business and general aviation. The service, planned to be available as soon as late 2015, will be capable of providing in-flight broadband for customers including fast, reliable Wi-Fi and onboard entertainment.

Looks like a shot across the bow of in-flight internet provider Gogo.

[Via Business Insider]

The big stories here are the $100 price drop and the battery boost:

The new models also received a slight bump in battery life for iTunes movie playback, with the 11-inch model jumping from 8 hours to 9 hours and the 13-inch model from 10 hours to 12 hours.

That’s a nice little boost. Love this update.

The Code Conference takes over where All Things D left off. It’s already sold out.

Fascinating article by Gary Gibson.

At New Relic, we make it super easy to build faster and better performing mobile applications. Is using New Relic really that easy? Yes, yes it is. We know you’re busy coding (and reading The Loop), that’s why in just five minutes you can deploy New Relic and be looking at game-changing data. Our first-of-its-kind SaaS mobile app monitoring solution pinpoints problems quickly in your mobile app. Spend less time troubleshooting, get more positive reviews and focus your time where it matters – on developing new features and growing your user base. Use New Relic to track your app performance across devices and networks and get full end-to-end visibility. The people using your app will thank you for it.

I love this show. It’s satire, but underneath it all is well researched, sharp witted, down to the bones truth. And funny as hell, too.

x2y is a beautifully simple aspect ratio calculator for the iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch. Built for designers and web developers who need to resize images and videos in code, x2y calculates dimensions for you automatically. Just choose the original aspect ratio or size, enter one of the new desired dimensions, and the missing dimension will be calculated instantly.

This is a cool app.

Sounds to me like this is a very large exploit (impacts IE version 6 through 11) that is currently active, being used in attacks. If you use Windows, the quickest fix is to switch to another browser, at least until a patch is made available.

The zero-day code-execution hole in IE versions 6 through 11 represents a significant threat to the Internet security because there is currently no fix for the underlying bug, which affects an estimated 26 percent of the total browser market. It’s also the first significant vulnerability to target Windows XP users since Microsoft withdrew support for that aging OS earlier this month. Users who have the option of using an alternate browser should avoid all use of IE for the time being. Those who remain dependent on the Microsoft browser should immediately install EMET, Microsoft’s freely available toolkit that greatly extends the security of Windows systems.

The vulnerability is formally indexed as CVE-2014-1776. Microsoft has blog posts here, here, and here that lay out bare bones details uncovered at this early stage in its investigation. Although there is no exploited vulnerability in Adobe Flash, disabling the browser add-on will also neutralize attacks, analysts at security firm FireEye Research Labs wrote in a separate blog post published Sunday. Disabling vector markup language support in IE also mitigates attacks.

From Microsoft’s security advisory:

Microsoft is aware of limited, targeted attacks that attempt to exploit a vulnerability in Internet Explorer 6, Internet Explorer 7, Internet Explorer 8, Internet Explorer 9, Internet Explorer 10, and Internet Explorer 11.

The vulnerability is a remote code execution vulnerability. The vulnerability exists in the way that Internet Explorer accesses an object in memory that has been deleted or has not been properly allocated. The vulnerability may corrupt memory in a way that could allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code in the context of the current user within Internet Explorer. An attacker could host a specially crafted website that is designed to exploit this vulnerability through Internet Explorer and then convince a user to view the website.

This is the cost of a widely splintered user base. To fix this, Microsoft has to patch all versions of IE. And what will this mean for Windows XP users? Microsoft has ended support for Windows XP. Will those users remain vulnerable unless they switch?

Microsoft is in a tough position here. Short term, I’d switch browsers or follow the instructions in this blog post, which might solve the problem for some.

Wired:

Mystery Science Theater 3000 (is) the cult-­stoking comedy series that provided awful films with hilarious, sharp, high-speed detractors’ commentary. MST3K is the story of a sarcastic Earth dweller—played initially by series creator Joel Hodgson and, in later years, by head writer Mike Nelson—who’s exiled to a ramshackle spaceship called the Satellite of Love, where he’s forced to watch an endless supply of crapola movies. Our hero’s response to such torture, naturally, is to unleash a torrent of withering one-­liners, or “riffs,” that he delivers with the help of a couple of robot pals.

I never actually saw the show but have heard many geeks and nerds refer to it lovingly.

This bike lock is pretty clever. Most of these U-shaped locks are notoriously easy to pick, often just using a simple Bic pen.

This lock offers no apparent keyway. And when you do find a place to put the key, all you get is a hollow cylinder. Watch the video to see how this works. The coolness starts at about the two minute mark.

If someone buys Jim lunch with Tim Cook, pick me up one of these locks, too!

In short: the FCC would allow network owners (your Verizons, Comcasts, etc.) to create Internet “fast lanes” for companies (Disney, The Atlantic) that pay them more. For Internet activists, this directly violated the principle of net neutrality, which has been a hot-button issue in Silicon Valley for a long time.

Net neutrality is the idea that any network traffic—movies, web pages, MP3s, pictures—can move from one place (our servers) to any other place (readers’ computers phones) without “discrimination.”

Definitely a hot-button topic.

You have to respect someone with this much talent.

This is just plain cool. No one would ever need to do this, but amazing to me that one machine can support such massive connectivity.

Just two weeks after being purchased by Amazon, digital comic book seller ComiXology has announced that it’ll be retiring its app in favor of a new read-only version that requires users to purchase comic books via their website, much like Amazon does with its Kindle app.

I saw many people call this the day Amazon bought them.

The Verge:

On July 20th, the five remaining members of famed comedy group Monty Python will reunite for one last show, and you won’t have to fly to the United Kingdom to watch. Due to popular demand, The Last Night of Monty Python will be streamed live to 1,500 theaters around the world.

The performance is expected to include some of the group’s famous sketches, although we’re not yet sure which ones. “I think you can expect a little comedy, a lot of pathos, some music and a tiny bit of ancient sex,” Eric Idle told the UK Press Association.

OMG I am so going to be in a theatre watching this on July 20th.

Appleinsider:

Virtually everyone who had offered an opinion about Apple’s iPhone mix got everything wrong.

In stark contrast, no drastic measures were recommended for fixing Moto X. Even the Wall Street Journal couldn’t bring itself to describe Google’s price slashing of the Moto X (from $550 to $399) as a desperate measure to move inventory.

Despite all the media pampering for Google, the reality in this case was that Motorola lost over $700 million for Google in just the last six months of Moto X sales.

As a follow along to the previous “iPad is doomed!” story comes this. I truly do not understand how the tech and mainstream media can see the same data points and come up with the exact opposite conclusions. That is, the iPhone 5c is a flop and the Moto X isn’t. Even if you are being intentionally biased for Google, the data doesn’t support you.

MG Siegler:

iPad sales did disappoint one group of folks immensely: Wall Street.

As a standalone business, just based on the last 12 months of revenue, the iPad would be in the top 100 companies in the Fortune 500. Think about that for a second. The iPad alone is bigger than almost all Fortune 500 companies.

If the iPad is a fad, it’s the greatest fad in the history of American business.

It’s easy to point to “fewer iPads sold” and Chicken Little the story to death – as respected columnist Gassee and Mossberg have done. But it would still be wrong.

Yesterday, we posted about Realmac Software’s experience with negative reviews on the App Store and their inability to reach out to the user directly to address the problem.

Reaching out to the customer directly would allow a developer to quickly aid a confused user, gain valuable insight into a problem and, perhaps, avoid more poor reviews. Ideally, a newly satisfied user would change their 1 star review to a 5 star review. But even without that last bit, the shortened feedback cycle would certainly lead to improved software.

That said, Microsoft is now rolling out the ability to respond to feedback directly from Dev Center.

This new capability enables developers to respond to reviews of Windows Phone apps directly from Dev Center. Once you create a response, users will receive the comment via email from Microsoft and can even contact you directly if you included your support email address in the app submission ‘Support email address’ metadata.

If you are an iOS developer, I’d encourage you to look at the linked article and leave a comment on this post. Is this the right approach? Would you be for this same approach on the App Store? Something different? [Via iOS Dev Weekly]

Think you know how to generate a secure password? Do you follow your own advice?

This is a thoughtful look at the process of guessing people’s passwords. Well written, an enjoyable read, and I learned a few things along the way.

This is heinous.

Men cruise around homeless shelters, the 16th Street Mall, and plasma donation clinics in an effort to find people desperate for money.

The men will drive victims to Apple stores and convince them to sign numerous contracts for numerous iPhones. Victims will then be paid $100 or more in exchange for several iPhones.

The iPhones can be unlocked and sold on the international market for more than $700 dollars each.

The victims sign up for these contracts, get some quick cash, end up on the hook for thousands of dollars or ruined credit.

9Wants to Know observed an Apple store employee collect Sauer’s information for several contracts.

The same Apple employee was seen giving Sauer’s new iPhones directly to the schemers.

If this is true, I assume that employee is about to spend some time in jail. Heinous. [Via 9to5Mac]