Advantageous MP3: comparison shop from the iTunes Store

Advantageous MP3: comparison shop from the iTunes Store

Now that iTunes has raised prices, why not shop around?

On music release dates

Here’s a thought: why not just release the album when it’s done? Wouldn’t promotion work even better that way? ‘Try to remember to check it out on this random date! Since you don’t have enough appointments in your life already!’ vs. ‘Available now–surprise! Go buy it!’

But no, they finish it and then shelve it for two or three months. Then they act all surprised and hurt when it leaks on the internet. Duh!

And don’t give me any crap about distribution channels taking time to produce pieces of plastic and cardboard and move them around. This is 2009: we have the internet. If your old distribution channels are slowing you down, don’t wait for them. They can release when they’re ready. If they raise too much of a fuss about competitive disadvantages due to non-simultaneous release, just dump them already. They’re dinosaurs, they’ll be extinct soon anyway, and their desperate attempts at self-preservation are only hurting you. Trust me, your target audience knows how to use the freaking internet.

Yes, it’s a risk. But an even bigger risk would be to ignore obvious trends. Sometimes the market presents you with uncomfortable choices. You deal with it or you get trampled.

But of course, this is the music industry we’re talking about. They would never try to just bury their heads in the sand. Right.

Time Warner Cable to begin charging extra for Internet usage beyond a certain amount in Rochester NY, other cities

Time Warner Cable to begin charging extra for Internet usage beyond a certain amount in Rochester NY, other cities

… customers will be charged from $29.95 to $54.90 a month, based on data consumption and desired connection speed. Customers will be charged $1 for each gigabyte (GB) over their plan’s cap. Time Warner Cable offers four cap levels of 5, 10, 20, and 40 GB. A download of a high-definition movie typically eats up about 8 GB. A recent report from Sanford C. Bernstein suggests that a family on the 40 GB plan that streams 7.25 hours of online video a week (a fraction of the 60 hours Americans spend watching TV in a week) could end up spending $200 per month on broadband usage fees. And that’s just for video viewing, before factoring in such Internet activities as music downloads and photo sharing.

As an Ars Technica reader commented, it’s very telling that they’re doing this in Rochester, but not in neighbouring city Buffalo, in the latter of which Time Warner faces steep competition from Verizon’s FiOS, a superior service even without considering extra usage fees.

It’s not yet clear if or how this affects customers who use EarthLink Cable via Time Warner, such as myself, but you can bet I’ll be looking into DSL.

Usage note: this type of plan is sometimes incorrectly referred to by the press as a ‘bandwidth cap’. Bandwidth refers to the sustainable data rate, e.g., 10 Mbps. The announced changes would not have any effect on bandwidth. A more accurate description would be ‘transfer cap’, as it is a limitation (or punitive billing) based on the amount of total data one transfers per month.

Edit: some more info (but mostly speculation) here. Also, an article in the local paper which seems to come across with an oddly corporate-pandering attitude, but does have a helpful chart.

Skype for iPhone and iPod touch

Skype for iPhone and iPod touch

If I take out my iPod touch in public, someone inevitably asks me ‘is that an iPhone?’ To which I answer, ‘no, it’s an iPod touch.’ After the resulting blank look, I elaborate: ‘it’s like an iPhone, without the phone. It does many of the same things, like browse the web, check e-mail, and of course play music; but it does not make phone calls.’ I used to add something like, ‘it runs iPhone OS’, but that did not seem to help get the idea across.

I only mention this because it is sort of remarkable to me that I’ve had this exact same conversation so many times. People are both aware and interested enough in the iPhone as a brand to recognise an iPhone-like device and even enquire about it, and are also surprised to learn that Apple also makes a similar device that is not a phone.

Now, however, my explanation will be complicated somewhat. Together with the aforelinked app, my existing SkypeOut account, and a pair of Apple Earphones with Remote and Mic, the device is in fact an iPod that is not an iPhone but does make phone calls (but does not properly receive them - we’ll have to wait till iPhone OS 3.0 for that). I am not sure how I will explain this in an easily-digestible form the next time I am asked. And don’t even get me started on cellular vs. WiFi, because by that point I am no longer answering a simple question but delivering a lecture.

But all of this is neither here nor there. My iPod makes phone calls now. That’s pretty cool.

However, the plot thickens:

Please note: Skype is not responsible for errors or crashes which result from changes in the underlying iPhone OS.

An odd thing to say. Two possibilities come to mind:

1. Skype have very little confidence in Apple’s software; perhaps they have been reading too much of the sensationalist side of the web-o-tron. They only begrudgingly came out with this app at all since their users just wouldn’t stop nagging them for it, and their you-asked-for-it attitude is reflected in this almost cheeky advisory. In this case, their words are meaningless, and there is nothing to worry about. As long as Skype use only public, documented APIs, like Apple tells you to do and like most developers obligingly follow, it is unlikely (although not impossible) that their software would break in a future version of iPhone OS. The entire point of public APIs is that they are a promise from Apple that the functionality will continue to work indefinitely, or, failing that, developers will have ample advance notice if they do ever change.
2. Skype are using private APIs, and they at least have the foresight to realise that this is probably going to break their app sooner or later (the promise, as above, does not exist for private APIs; on the contrary, private APIs are almost a promise that things will break). Skype have decided to go ahead and do this anyway, for whatever reason, and are trying to shift blame away from themselves. I can only speculate on why they would use private APIs, but my guess would be that it would have something to do with emulating the iPhone’s own native Phone application more closely, which may not be possible with Apple’s sometimes-limiting public APIs. I hope this isn’t the case, because in this light, the ‘note’ as worded would be downright dishonest: using private APIs or not is a conscious choice on the part of the developer, and the responsibility for this choice very much lies with those who make it.

Either way, I am surprised that Apple let this slip without comment, although stranger things have come out of Apple’s review process.

Edit: this Ars Technica article brings up another possibility, which admittedly is the most likely of them all:

1. If you ‘jailbreak’ your device and install non-Apple-sanctioned software, it can apparently cause Skype to crash or behave strangely. You’d be a complete moron to complain to Skype if you do this, but of course people will do it and then complain anyway. I would suggest that Skype be more clear about what they’re talking about in this case, but I’m sure there’s a line in Apple’s agreement that says you can’t even acknowledge the existence of ‘jailbreaking’, or something.

no title

New Zelda game!

Phone books - who needs 'em?

Phone books - who needs ‘em?

Incidentally, more people should know about 1-800-GOOG-411. It’s incredible.

I do feel good that the process I always believed in and really defended – about feeling the story instinctively as you go through it, and not being tied to, “Oh, we know exactly how it’s going to end up” – that that was true. We were able to get there and could say, “We’ve been making this mosaic, and now we just need to put the final touches on it and we’ll have a complete picture.” There’s loose threads and things that don’t quite work, but I think that’s in the nature of almost any show. By and large, I think we did a pretty good job of it.

I do feel good that the process I always believed in and really defended – about feeling the story instinctively as you go through it, and not being tied to, “Oh, we know exactly how it’s going to end up” – that that was true. We were able to get there and could say, “We’ve been making this mosaic, and now we just need to put the final touches on it and we’ll have a complete picture.” There’s loose threads and things that don’t quite work, but I think that’s in the nature of almost any show. By and large, I think we did a pretty good job of it.

—Ronald D. Moore, on Battlestar Galactica

TimeMachineEditor: Change Time Machine's backup schedule

TimeMachineEditor: Change Time Machine’s backup schedule

Awesome. Unlike some of the rather sketchy-looking utilities I’ve seen, this doesn’t mess with the backup daemon - it just edits a configuration file (which I had previously been editing by hand).

Since Time Machine already supports these options, they really should be present in System Preferences, even if hidden under an ‘Advanced…’ section or something. I get that Apple was trying to make the concept of backups drop-dead simple in order to appeal to the masses, but making these options inaccessible was taking it a bit too far.

No-contract iPhone: starting at $599

No-contract iPhone: starting at $599

So… it costs $370 to add a cellular radio and a crappy camera to an iPod touch? Really?

no title

Edward James Olmos at the United Nations

I think he’s forgotten how to talk like a normal person :)