It’s hard to believe, but there’s a graffiti artist in San Francisco who objects to the iPod.
This giant billboard on the southbound 101 freeway was recently scrawled with the message: “Unplug!”
It didn’t last long. Apple had the billboard replaced within a couple of days. It’s now been swapped for an entirely new iPod ad. (The picture is a couple of months old. I’ve been meaning to post it for a while.)
Gratis Internet, the company behind FreeiPods.com, was sued by New York’s attorney general on Thursday for selling e-mail addresses in what’s been described as “the biggest deliberate breach of Internet privacy ever.”
The AP reports:
“Attorney General Eliot Spitzer accused Gratis Internet of selling personal information obtained from millions of consumers despite a promise of confidentiality.
The consumers thought they were simply registering to see a Web site offering free iPod music players or DVD movies and video games, Spitzer spokesman Brad Maione said. On sign-up pages, Gratis promised it “does not … sell/rent e-mails.”
Instead of confidentiality, Spitzer said, Gratis sold access to their e-mail information to three independent e-mail marketers, and hundreds of millions of e-mail solicitations followed.
Designer Derek Yee won a prestigious honor for his fantastic work on my Cult of iPod book.
Derek’s work was selected as one of the best design pieces last year by Step Inside Design magazine, a leading journal that every year runs a competition to find the 100 top designs.
Derek, who runs Octopod Studios, was honored in the Editorial category. Derek also designed my Cult of Mac book.
Step Inside says:
The front cover, which met initial opposition from Yee’s colleagues, successfully avoids generic iPod imagery, while referencing its predecessor, The Cult of Mac. Yee, founder of Octopod Studios, reflects, “I really wanted to stay away from anything that showed an actual iPod, that was silhouetted, or had white ear buds and wires. I didn’t want to sell the iPod. I wanted to sell the people that love their iPods. And I wanted to do it in a way that was pure.”
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I’m in the process of updating my Cult of Mac book for a paperback edition, to be published in the fall.
Some of the graphics are looking a bit dated, epecially the mockups of future Apple products, like those submitted to Engadget’s recent WWJD competition.
Trouble is, I’m having a hard time tracking down mockup makers. So I’m putting out the call.
If anyone has high-resolution, print-ready mockups, and they’d like them included in a new edition of the book , please contact me at mockups -AT- cultofmac -DOT- com.
Photo courtesy of Engadget.
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The first public screening of Pixar’s Cars was at the ShoWest conference in Las Vegas this week. Directed by Toy Story genius John Lasseter, the film is due this summer.
Writer Joseph L. Kleiman has the first review. He writes:
“Equal parts humor – there’s references to everything from the anti-establishment disobedience of the 1960’s to newer pop culture standards like “The Fast and the Furious” – and tenderness, the packed house openly combined laughter with tears. During a very touching scene about how the Interstate Highway system decimated towns along Route 66, there was barely a dry eye in the house. You heard me right. Looking around, I could see grown men sobbing (though I’m a bit modest to admit to anything myself). The scene was reminiscent and on a par with the scene where Jessie is thrown away in “Toy Story 2.”
Slashdot commentator on Windows on a Mac:
“We’ve figured out how to put an inferior OS on more expensive hardware! That way, we can have both the frustrations of Windows and pay out of the ass for Mac. Everybody wins!”
And here’s Joy of Tech’s take. Click the pic for the entire cartoon.
It reminds me of my experience of installing Linux on a Mac a few years ago — which was, “great, now what?”
Another Slashdot poster has a good point about Windows-running Macs being attractive to businesses — they won’t:
“First, dual boot is a myth, it is damn annoying and so counterproductive. Most people dont realise that until they actually experiment it, it’s hype now, but all Linux users know it’s a pain, and I know from experience that a dual boot Windows/Linux means one thing… Windows 90% of the time. Vmware and others solutions are the way to go for people who need Windows professionaly for a given application, I can’t wait for a Mac OS X version. Second, some people try to makes us believe that companies will buy Apple PC to their employees now that they can run Windows, yeah right, serious manager will buy more expensive hardware, plus a Windows licence, so that their employees can have an Apple design and the joy of using Mac OS X out of the office… “
An experiment by CNet to see whether copy-protected music files sucked the life out of player’s batteries is interesting but flawed.
According to CNet, DRM copy-protected music can decrease battery life by up to 25 percent thanks to the processing overhead necessary to play them.
But as one commentator on the story points out, the test compared protected WMA files with unprotected MP3 files. It should have compared protected-WMA to unprotected WMA, or Apple’s FairPlay AAC versus unprotected AAC.
The Dutch MacNed website has copies of the controversial pictures of a magsafe power connector that were removed from Flickr on Thursday at the request of Apple.
The magnetic MagSafe power connector allegedly burned up. Its owner, Rogier Mulder, posted some pictures to Flickr, which immediately caught the attention of Apple. He was asked to remove the pictures while the company investigates. He writes on Flickr:
“Apple support responded very well (thanks Klaas) and fast. Before I called our local Apple support line, the dutch engineers were already contacted by their US collegues (who saw the pics) to inquire if I already called in. I’m getting a new Macbook asap and I will return my current one.”
FreeiPods.com, the wildly popular marketing scheme that offers free iPods for trying out various subscription offers, sold the data it gathered on 7.2 million Americans to an email advertising firm, according to a story at Wired News by my colleague Ryan Singel.
(New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer) announced Monday that e-mail marketing giant Datran Media had agreed to a $1.1 million fine for knowingly buying marketing lists from companies with privacy policies that promised not to sell or transfer the lists to a third party.
… Datran’s biggest purchase, according to the text of the settlement (.pdf), was a list of 7.2 million Americans’ names, e-mail addresses, home phone numbers and street addresses from Gratis Internet, a company best known for promising free iPods, televisions and DVDs to users willing to sign up for promotions offered by partners such as Citibank, Blockbuster and BMG’s music club.
The sites inspired dozens of “Is there really such a thing as a free iPod?” stories in the press (including one by Wired News), and internet forums were packed with pleas for information on how to acquire a free version of Apple Computer’s signature fetish item. The freebie required a registrant to sign up five others into the program, and eventually the legalized pyramid scheme reached its inevitable saturation point.
While many did indeed get a free iPod, all ended up with inboxes full of marketing pitches, which began showing up within hours of registering.
Gratis lied to me for the story I wrote originally about the company (also linked above), which did wonders for their early credibility, and then lied again for a follow-up story I wrote about it’s privacy practices that was prompted by the avalanche of spam its customers mysteriously received.
In addition, Gratis Internet was a member of Truste, which provides a “privacy seal” to companies it says have a trusted privacy policy.
When asked by Wired News in 2004 how third-party spammers got hold of Gratis members’ e-mail addresses, Truste said it could not find a problem with Gratis’ practices.
“The results of our investigation indicate that Gratis Internet did not violate their privacy policy,” Truste investigator Alexander Yap wrote in an October 2004 e-mail. “Truste did, however, work with them to strengthen and clarify their privacy statement.”
Several months later, Truste revoked Gratis’ seal of approval, then quickly reinstated it, then pulled it again, but declined to state publicly its reasons.
In the wake of this week’s settlement, Truste’s spokeswoman did not return repeated phone calls, and executive director Fran Maier did not respond to e-mailed questions about why Truste never discovered the alleged sale or informed the public that Gratis was not adhering to its privacy policy.
As a million posts of New York Craiglist attest, there’s a lot of people on public transit wondering about the hottie across the way with the iPod on. What are they listening to? Will they go out with me?
The latter question is what “Missed Connections” is for, while the former may one day be answered by a device like the iPod Status.
Created by designer David Lu, the iPod Status is a “wearable information display” — a small screen attached to a shoulder strap that displays the song and artist information for a currently-playing tune.
“Many of us have taken rides on public transportation and wondered what the interesting-looking person beside us is listening to,” says a description. “IPod Status is intended to encourage social connectedness by making this hidden information visible.”
The device — presumably a prototype — was shown at the Seamless Fashion Show in Boston last month. More photos from the show on Flickr.
Take a craft knife, an iPod nano, some iPod Linux and a copy of MAME (Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator) and what do you get?
Pacman on an iPod in its own 6-inch tall arcade cabinet!
Steve Wozniak:
My best computer prank involved counterfeiting twenty thousand brochures for a phony computer. I did it at the West Coast Computer Faire, where the Apple was introduced.
Bruce Damer’s ever-excellent Digibarn Computer Museum has a scan of Wozniak’s proudest prank.
Nitrozak and Snaggy, the lovely people behind the Geek Culture website and the Joy of Tech comic, are giving away three of copies of Cult of iPod — as well as Geek Culture beanies, t-shirts and books.
Cult of iPod contains several JoT cartoons, like the iPod madness comic above. (Click the link for the full cartoon).
Entering the contest is easy — simply post a reply in the forum thread. The contest closes Friday November 18th at 8PM Pacific. Winners will be chosen at random.
Cult of iPod by Leander Kahney
The Best of The Joy of Tech by Nitrozak and Snaggy
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Apple I nerds may be interested in a Homebrew Computer Club retrospective at the Vintage Computer Festival this weekend in Mountain View, California. Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak will be there, as will several other Homebrewers.
“The VCF in conjunction with the DigiBarn Computer Museum is proud to
present a 30th anniversary celebration of the founding of the Homebrew Computer Club, the legendary Silicon Valley institution that helped to launch the era of the personal computer. Bruce Damer of the DigiBarn Computer Museum will moderate this panel of former Homebrew members, including Steve Wozniak, Lee Felsenstein, Allen Baum, Len Shustek, Bob Lash and Michael Holley.Join the panel as they recount their experiences and gab with the group as we feast on some yummy cake, courtesy of the DigiBarn.”
(The comical Homebrew diorama is taken from an Information Age exhibit at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History).
The Festival is at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View. Doors open 9:30am until 6:00pm; full exhibit is $12 per person per day; $7 per person per day for exhibit and marketplace only. Kids under 17 are free.
The Mac Compact Belgium website claims to showcase “the most important collection of Belgium.”
“You could grow this collection!” says the mysterious collector. “Phone me 0472 26 39 90”
Here’s a bigger picture.
(Via LinkMachineGo)
