Discovery News:

They’re a pair of jeans with a set of speakers, a wireless mouse and a keyboard embedded into the upper thigh regions. Imagine typing — literally — on your lap and you get the picture.The jeans were designed to “combine fashion and technology”.

If you wear these, don’t be surprised if someone punches you in the FGHJ.

Alec Saunders is the Vice President of Developer Relations for RIM:

PlayBook OS 2.0 benchmarks better than any other mobile implementation (just point your PlayBook at HTML5Test.com), and better than every desktop browser, except Chrome 16. It also includes WebGL for accelerated 3D graphics, and with WebWorks, we can free HTML5 code from the browser, let you upload it to AppWorld, and turn that HTML5 website into a revenue generating HTML5 application. How ‘bout them apples?

Two things:

1. Make sure you’re near a Wi-Fi connection before pointing your PlayBook at any site because it doesn’t have 3G.

2. You think it’s a good idea to allow developers to sell an app based on an HTML5 Web site? That’s not a plus. People want real apps, not fake shit.

Highlights of items from Whitney Houston that will be auctioned include a Whitney Houston black velvet dress owned by Houston. The floor length long-sleeve dress has a high collar and is embellished at neck and waist with metallic silver ribbon, black and clear stones giving the illusion of a necklace and belt. (Est: $1,000 -$2,000), a Whitney Houston vest worn by Whitney Houston in the blockbuster film “The Bodyguard,” (Warner Bros. 1992). The fitted vest has a floral pattern in gold, blue and pink, two exterior pockets, shawl collar and four button closure. Purchased by the end of production sale by the film’s set costumer Janet Sobel (Est: $400-$600), and a pair of pearl drop earrings also worn by Whitney Houston in The Bodyguard (Warner Bros. 1992), faux pearl with silver tone bead cap and euro clip with scallop (Est. $600-$800). Other items include jewelry and costumes from Houston’s appearance in film and on stage.Highlights include a Charlie Chaplin iconic cane (Est. $20,000/$30,000) and Charlie Chaplin film worn suit (Est. $20,000/$30,000) and a number of his own personal items including his personal drivers license (Est. $2,000/$4,000) originating from family members and the Estate of Charlie Chaplin. Other highlights include Clark Gable’s riding jacket from “Gone With The Wind,” (Est. $10,000/$15,000), a tuxedo jacket worn by Judy Garland in “A Star Is Born,” (Est. $4,000/$6,000), a Charlton Heston screen worn robe (Est. $30,000/$50,000) and screen worn staff (Est. $20,000/$30,000), screen used tablets (Est. $40,000/$60,000) from “The Ten Commandments,” Marilyn Monroe pantaloons worn in “River of No Return (Est. $20,000/$30,000) and a vintage Christian Dior gown worn by Grace Kelly, known more famously as Princess Grace of Monaco (Est. $10,000/$20,000)

Matthew Panzarino:

That’s not the same, however, as crassly transforming one operating system into another to cash in or exert more control. The ’10 ways that OS X is being turned into iOS’ headline is easy to write, and you can’t argue with the fact that both platforms are informing decisions made in the other, but there is a distinct difference between unification and absorption.

Matt gets it.

This is going to be fun.

The Wall:

Whether it is uploading photos, that we then allow another entity to have control of, or granting access to our Facebook or Twitter account to a third party – we are, often unknowingly, giving away data, and, in certain instances, giving away certain privacy rights associated with that data.Admit it, when that long, boring box of detailed legal information pops up when you download an app or sign up to a website, you just hit “I Agree” and don’t actually read it, don’t you? Well maybe there are a few things you should be paying attention to.

While some of the information may be location (UK) specific, the article does serve as a reminder that the “social media” space can be scary and have real word consequences. Thanks to Colin Crawford for the heads up.

iPhone Savior:

Each lithograph will retail for $75 and then Norman intends to sign the back of the initial run of 300 and sell them for $125 each — the dimensions measure 26 x 34 inches. For this piece Seeff added color to the Apple rainbow logo on the front of the Mac. It’s a wonderful bit of detailing that adds a special quality to the black and white image.

Make sure you read the story of the image’s creation.

Lifehacker:

Mac OS X has a ton of great features, but there’s always room for improvement. Many developers have felt the same and created a bunch of great apps to enhance OS X’s capabilities. Here are our top 10 apps that can power up your Mac to the next level.

TIME:

To set the record straight, today isn’t actually Presidents’ Day. It is still known as Washington’s Birthday, according to the federal government and section 6103(a) of title 5 of the U.S. Code.

Tim Bajarin:

From Microsoft and their partners point of view, they are really hoping that history literally repeats itself. Just as Windows was used to bypass Apple in the past, they are “praying” that Windows 8, with its ability to deliver a similar OS and touch UI experience across multiple devices can revive their fortunes and make them relevant again.

I don’t believe it’ll happen this time. Apple is different than the company that fought with Microsoft in 1984 for desktop operating system supremacy. In a way you could say that Microsoft has been trying to build a tablet OS for years and failed. Apple reinvented the way people think about tablets and mobile operating systems and in the process they have won the mindshare and market share of consumers. It seems clear from Windows 8 that Microsoft doesn’t even understand the war they are fighting.

Computerworld:

Three lawmakers from the U.S. House of Representatives have asked the Federal Trade Commission to investigate whether last week’s report of privacy violations of Safari users by Google violated a consent agreement the company had reached with the FTC last year.

Google has allegedly worked around Apple’s own privacy controls for Mobile Safari in order to track users who depend on Google services like Gmail. Ed Markey (D-MA), Cliff Stearns (R-FL) and Joe Barton (R-TX) want to know if Google has violated that consent agreement.

IDG News:

Apple has threatened to take legal action against a little-known Chinese firm for inflaming an ongoing dispute over the iPad trademark, alleging that the company’s founder and its lawyers have made misleading statements that could damage the U.S. tech giant’s business in China.

Longtime Mac developer Daniel Jalkut writes a great article on Gatekeeper and Sandboxing.

Lex Friedman:

But whatever the reason, I hope Apple changes its thinking quickly. I’m a fan of Siri on my iPhone, and I can imagine plenty of ways Siri could deliver awesomeness on the Mac.

Lex makes his case for why Siri should come to Mountain Lion and some ways it could work. I don’t know if I’d use Siri that much on my Mac. It seems quicker for me to just use the built-in data detectors to add an appointment or open an app using Spotlight.

Brett Terpstra:

It’s designed to add auto-pairing for bracket and quote characters to MarsEdit, and it’s based on a bit of information that I hadn’t been aware of before.

Smart people doing smart things.

AppleInsider has the video and a rundown of the events leading up to the kerfuffle.

Shadoe Huard talking about Windows 8 Developer Preview:

I could waste a few thousand words describing every bewildering detail of this clusterfuck but I can talk about one thing that will sum it all up for you: The Windows logo.

Flavorwire:

We’ve taken a look at gorgeous bookstores and amazing college libraries, so we thought it was time to bring you a little inspiration for the home library — though we admit, not too many of these designs would fit in our own NYC apartments. Click through to check out our collection of beautiful private and personal libraries from all over the world

It’s hard to believe some of these beautiful libraries are found in someone’s home. Then again, some of these homes are probably as big as your high school.

Serious Eats:

Consumers and even some bartenders have a misconception that single-malt Scotch is not a blended whisky, but this is a myth. Single-malt scotch is a blend, but it’s a very specific type of blend. In fact, nearly all whiskies on the market today are blends—bourbons, ryes, Tennessees, scotches, etc.—although in this article I’ll focus on Scotch.

This article and its follow up, “The Serious Eats Guide to Single Malt Scotch”, are well written and really interesting examinations and explanations of what Scotch is. It’s an acquired taste but once you acquire it, you’ll enjoy it!

Eli Hodapp for TouchArcade:

Unsurprisingly, so far the game has been met with overwhelmingly negative iTunes reviews as users who are wise to this whole fiasco post their feelings on the game. Not everyone hates the game though. Zynga Senior User Experience Designer John Lerma mentions in his iTunes review:

Well, I guess they have to push the review averages up somehow…

ABC News:

Apple has given “Nightline” anchor Bill Weir exclusive access to their suppliers’ factories in China, amid reports of safety problems, hazardous conditions and underage workers. Weir is the first journalist go inside the factories to see these life changing gadgets get made. He traveled to Shenzhen China to see firsthand what life is like for factory workers, most of whom have never used an iPod, iPhone or Apple computer.Weir’s report airs on a special edition of “Nightline” Tuesday, February 21 at 11:35 p.m. ET on the ABC television network.

Matt Gemmell:

Let me make this perfectly clear: piracy is your own fault.You’ve got the whole situation almost exactly backwards.

There’s so many great quotes that I could have used from Matt’s story, but this sums it up nicely for me.

Cool Material:

We’ll try any beer we can get our greedy hands on. If a friend says he just picked up a sixer of something crazy, we’d expect some craft brew that’s hopped out of its mind or an imported stout that tastes like biting into chocolate cake, and we’d gladly partake.

We’re all big fans of beer here but most of these brews would make us think twice about reaching for the bottle opener.

Macworld put together a great list of questions and answers about Mountain Lion.

BoingBoing:

The Blast Lab at Imperial College, London, is a place where scientists study how explosions affect the human skeleton, and try to find ways to mitigate some of those effects. As you can imagine, this involves blowing stuff up fairly regularly and The Blast Lab is a pretty loud place.But the team of students behind PLoS’ Inside Knowledge blog noticed something cool about that. The sounds in The Blast Lab weren’t just loud noises, they were loud notes. Edit them together, and you could reproduce a whole song, using nothing but sounds recorded in a working scientific laboratory.