The Secret

The secret to blogging more, and this is perhaps true to any endeavor, is to keep yourself motivated.

The problem is that it's actually hard to find motivations.

But I'm back. For good. I mean it.

Thoughts on Apple's October 23 event

iPad mini

With Apple's tightening product cycle, I think I'll wait for a retinized display - expect it between February and June. Apple just can't wait to have your money.

iPad 4

As an iPad 3 user, a huge middle finger to you Apple. I still love you though.

iMac

Most likely hitting my room this December.

13-inch Retina Macbook Pro

Makes we want to buy a Macbook Air. Display is not that big of a deal to me, except for phones and tablets.

iTunes 11

Where is it?

iBooks 3

Just buy Instapaper and be done with it.

Iron Man 3

When a crazy ring-wearing chinese man destroys your world, its time to bring out the big guns.

Iron Man 3 - Movie Trailers - iTunes

Busy week

Besides work, here are the things that'll probably occupy my week (in order):

• Rap Genius
• Apple event
• Android event
• Microsoft event

Busy week indeed.

Good movie

What are the recipes of a really great film?

We all have different tastes but some themes and aspects has been tried and tested to make a masterpiece.

I'm not a film expert, just trying to write something out of what I observed after viewing tons of films and watching a really good one last night: Rian Johnson's Looper.

The film takes the much used "man travels to the past to change his future" plot, plays with it, and puts a new take on a time travel story.

To make a good film, one should take note of the following:

• Directors who write and direct their own film is almost always guaranteed to be a good one.

• Take a much used plot/storyline and put your own flavor on it. A much used storyline will help in attracting audiences with set expectations; your own flavor will be the one to destroy it and own your audience.

  Example: Create trailers and previews that'll force people to watch the film having a firm set of expectations.

  Crash those expectations during the film itself by going above them, not below.

  Minutes after Looper's credits rolled, my mind was still reeling from shattered expectations. The movie was something you couldn't have asked for. Others will hate it, but many will definitely like it.

  Shortcut: Go Nolan-like and create a totally new niche, ala Inception.

• Brilliant actors.

  I've never seen Bruce Willis go through different emotions in a single film and totally awed at the fact that a film with Joseph Gordon Levitt in it tends to be a good one.

  Emily Blunt is brilliant as ever, the rainmaker is the boy Dakota Fanning and it's hard to imagine Jeff Daniels play roles other than an anchorman if you're fresh from a full season of The Newsroom.

• Go through the different sets of emotions. You need good actors for this. Bruce Willis did a really good job.
• Think of a good way to establish characters that'll have more than two/three minutes of screen time. Looper did it in 5 min. or less intervals.

Other movies (those that I remember at the time of this writing) that got it right:

• The first Paranormal Activity
• Cabin in the Woods
• Every Pixar movie
• The Dark Knight
• Back to the Future 1 & 2
• Serenity (provided that you watched the whole (and only) season of Firefly.
• Taken
• Star Trek
• Daniel Craig Bond films

You'll notice that TDKR and Avengers are not on the list. Both are awesome eye candies, but not that great story-wise.

P.S. I urge you to watch Looper twice. Download this director's commentary and sync it with the movie on your second pass.

Grado SR80i

I always do research before making a big purchase, making sure that I'll be getting the maximum "bang" for my buck.

My search for the perfect headphone led me to this: a Grado Prestige Series SR80i Stereo Headphone.

The SR80i has been around for 8 years now but it still has great reviews compared to recent headphones and perhaps most importantly, still appeal to average users and the audiophiles alike.

Top of the line headphones are also known for their expensiveness and this is where the Grado SR80i really shines. SR80i is simply the cheapest headphone that can go head to head with its not-so-cheap, professional grade counterparts.

Looper

I've been waiting for this for almost a month now.

Looper finally hits our theaters tonight.

You know where to find me.

One more

Apple is expected to unveil a bunch of new iPads, something new with iBooks(!) and a 13-inch retina macbook pro next week.

We've got a little more to show you

Aluminum backside

Is it just me or people are looking at the back of an iPhone 5 as much as the screen?

I was wondering exactly that when this quote from the Steve Jobs bio came to mind:

When you're a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you're not going to use a beautiful piece of wood on the back. For you to sleep well at night, the aesthetic, the quality, has to be carried all the way through.

A lesson he got from his father, Steve, and Apple obviously took this to heart.

I can link you to hundreds of iPhone 5 photos that shows much more emphasis on the aluminum back of the phone rather than the front screen.

It's just beautiful.

You're missed.

Apple.com

I won't say I told you so.

Letter from Tim Cook on Maps

App piracy

Instead of releasing half baked products, Apple can first take care of existing problems that will probably blow on their faces case it went out of hand. Like app piracy perhaps.

Today apps can be cracked, downloaded, shared and installed at the touch of a button using glossy applications that has opened piracy to the masses.

Easy peasy.

The rich app ecosystem is one of the main selling points of iOS devices. Consumers might even consider moving to Android or Windows phone 8 if it weren't for the work of this brilliant developers. But with app piracy on the rise, this will be put into question.

Especially now that it has been proven that good apps can be developed in Android, and Microsoft is willing to pay big bucks to lure in developers. It may be hard to admit but money is also important to these guys.

It'll be nice for Apple to show a little more appreciation by doubling down on this problem. And as with any good intentioned work, It will be worth it.

iOS 6 maps

Is it just me or after Siri, Apple is now comfortable releasing half-baked software products?

Though the iOS 6 maps is not even close to being reliably useful. Not by a long shot.

With this amount of backlash, expect a statement that the product, just like Siri, is still in beta. And we can't argue with that. Jony has the same sensibilities with Steve when it comes to hardware design but with software, Steve has no counterpart. When was the last time that Apple got this amount of negative press on a software update, or lack thereof?

Whether we like it or not, Apple, just like Google, is now in the beta bandwagon.

The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

iPhone 5 reviews

Here's the gist of those early iPhone 5 reviews: It's longer, thinner, lighter and faster.

Represent.ph

A map of the Philippine startup scene. Built to connect and promote the thriving Pinoy startup community.

It's not much but we're getting there.

Torrent nation

We ranked 10th among the top BitTorrent users in the world for music and we use it mainly to pirate Maroon 5 tunes.

Musicmetric's DMI, short for Digital Music Index reports that during the first half of 2012, Philippines, alongside France and India are of the world's most active torrenting hubs as they passed the 8th million mark of music downloads via Torrent clients, with the music of Maroon 5 in the lead, which ironically, is on the Philippines for a one-night only concert happening tonight.

It depends on who you ask but music piracy can be a good thing for an artist. As with Ed Sheeran, UK's acoustic sensation, ticket sales on an artist's gigs and concerts will probably more than offset the losses supposedly incurred in illegally downloaded digital music.

For example, Maroon 5's current album, Overexposed, costs $14.99, roughly 600 pesos on iTunes while ticket prices for their concert costs $19 to $240 (that's 800 to 10,000 pesos). Along with endorsements and other deals (I'm not really familiar with the dealings in the entertainment industry) It'll probably more than compensate for the losses in illegal downloads.

Bottom-line is even if people pirate their music but eventually leads to a ticket sale, it’s a win-win.

P.S. Maroon 5 concert tickets sold out just days after the announcement back in June.

First look: iPhone 5

Jimmy Kimmel's little experiment just shows that people will still buy a new iPhone even if Apple didn't do sh*t.

Steve's reality distortion field didn't go with him.

An iPhone launch in the Philippines is badass

Good thing about Smart, one of the largest wireless service providers in our country, is that they know how to take care of their subscribers. And they pampered the hell out of them on this one.

We may not be one of the first countries (or second) to get the new iPhone but last year, Smart closed down a mall, gave free food, free coffee, free movie screening, a concert, a car and gadgets on an iPhone debut.

That's months worth the wait.

I wonder what's in store for us this year.

iPhone 5

There we have it, looks like the majority of iPhone 5 leaks & rumors were dead accurate. If this is Tim Cook doubling down on secrecy then I'll be damned. It's ironic that the moment he made that statement was the time when the entirety of the product was known to the public prior to launch. It'll be pretty tough to avoid leaks when your factories are on the other side of the globe.

As for the device itself, I'll give it a few weeks (or months) and see if I really want it. Though the new line of iPod Touch looks really sexy. And that Paperwhite...

Perhaps the really good thing that came out of this is that black iPhones are cool again.

Mark Zuckerberg on Disrupt

It's not everyday that Mark Zuckerberg speaks in public. Here he shares his thoughts on the IPO, going native, hiring, monetization, the instagram acquisition, the facebook phone and having fun.

Good stuff.

!Instascraper

From the Instapaper blog:

In retrospect, that was an overreaction. 9to5Mac’s statements, as much as they angered and scared me, did not constitute an opt-out. Furthermore, it was inappropriate to add a publisher to the opt-out list that did not explicitly request it.

I’ve now reversed that decision, and I’m sorry that I overreacted.

We are counting down to the final moments of this UDID debacle and paving the way to Apple's big September 12 event.

Wronged and still the first to apologize. You're the man @marcoarment.

The next iPhone

This is it. The next iPhone is coming. Yes, because of the uncertainty as to what its name will be (despite the huge number on the invitation), let's just call it the "next iPhone", at least until the 12th.

And if what iMore said is true, that the leaks are as accurate as what Apple will show us this coming 12th, then I wouldn't give a damn. Given the fact that they already established their credibility by breaking the September 12 announcement date, I'm starting to get a little worried that I actually will.

In a world pf S3s, Notes and Lumias, flawed as they are, we can't deny that their larger screens are just gorgeous to look at. And no claims of collectively reduced satisfaction from operating on greater-than-average screen sizes has been heard of so far.

As much as I hate to say this, as a person who spends most of his time staring at screens, a taller but not slightly wider iPhone is less appealing to me.

Headphones

This is headphone rant.

I've read from Macrumors that a new set of headphones will come along with the new iPhone. Out of Vietnam (same as my current set of Apple headphones) the new set will sport a unibody design 'characteristic of Apple products'.

It looks sexy and all that but still lacks the only feature I wanted to come with high-end earphones, physically-etched L/R markings.

Being quite the audiophile, I prize myself with high-quality audio. This means I make sure that the right headphone is in the right ear 'cause it simply ruins the overall musical experience when an earpiece is in the wrong place. You can sense that something isn't quite right with the music.

Simple engraved L/R markings can avoid that. Couldn't hurt if you put an extra assembly line for etching this marks. Will sure make a lot of people happy, and It'll free me from the crazy looks people give me when I closely look at the markings before placing each one in the place where they belong.

But it doesn't need to be Apple, nor does it have to be etched markings. It could come from anyone with a good sense of design and affordance that'll liberate us from this earthly problem.

S.H.I.E.L.D., Whedon & NPH

Wired has a suggestion for the upcoming Whedon-helmed S.H.I.E.L.D. TV series: Neil Patrick Harris.

Hear us out. This doesn’t have to be a big deal. He could just show up as a secret agent sometimes. (The man looks good in a suit — ask any fan of Barney Stinson.) But he also brings something we all know the two of you love: musical numbers

Or maybe not.

Kidding aside, I'm really looking forward to this one. Given the caliber of TV series' today, (e.g. Game of Thrones, Suits, The Newsroom), I'm expecting big things for this one. And given Whedon's track record, there's a good chance that we will not be disappointed.

Samsung Galaxy Note II

Fresh from its approx. $13 billion dollar loss, Samsung just unveiled the newest iteration of its Galaxy Note.

From The Verge:

After dominating IFA 2011 with its Galaxy Note introduction, Samsung is hoping to repeat the feat today with the Galaxy Note II. Now thinner and lighter, the new Note device comes with a redesigned S Pen stylus, a bevy of new software features layered atop Android 4.1, and an enlarged 5.5-inch display. Oh, and it now runs on a 1.6GHz quad-core Exynos processor.

We're too close to the Q4 holidays now that I think this and Apple's upcoming new iPhone will be the major players for the consumer's pockets.

Shirley Hornstein

From TechCrunch:

Now, dragging up old accusations against someone who doesn’t seem to be working at a major startup or venture firm might seem mean, especially in the context of this cryptic-but-contrite tweet from February: “I get it Karma, I did some stupid stuff and now I’m paying for it but I learned my lesson. I *really* did. Please stop torturing me? :-( ” And look, Shirley Hornstein has never done anything bad to me. Except, y’know, lie. It sounds like she’s done quite a bit of that around the Valley, and it seemed like it was time to bring that into the open — before any other naive souls accept her friend request.

True or not, I still feel sorry for the girl, which begs the question: If @arrington was still in charge, is this kind of article going to see the light of day?

Followers of top PH twitter users, how many of them are fakes?

Following the analysis of my own twitter account, I decided to test the accounts of the 10 most followed Filipino individuals on twitter and see their fake-inactive-good follower ratios.

The rankings are generated via Zoomsphere, the results are subject to the accuracy of StatusPeople and the number of followers on the time of individual analysis.

Before diving in to the results, here's a tidbit from Fast Company:

It appears that if your faker numbers are below 20 percent, you're doing OK. The more followers you have, the higher the fake percentage due to more exposure to spam bots. Interestingly, from what I've seen on blogs and in my own experience, the folks with faker percentages hovering 30-40 percent and higher are most often people you've rarely heard about

Take note that these are well-known, celebrity types:

1. annecurtissmith - 3,300,427 followers
   Fake - 50%
   Inactive - 38%
   Good - 12%
2. iamsuperbianca - 1,725,502 followers
   Fake - 42%
   Inactive - 45%
   Good - 13%
3. samuelmilby - 1,827,900 followers
   Fake - 53%
   Inactive - 39%
   Good - 8%
4. iyavillania - 1,557,899 followers
   Fake - 48%
   Inactive - 39%
   Good - 13%
5. kuyakim_atienza - 1,393,145 followers
   Fake - 47%
   Inactive - 40%
   Good - 13%
6. nikkigil - 1,378,549 followers
   Fake - 58%
   Inactive - 36%
   Good - 6%
7. dprincessmaja - 1,314,135 followers
   Fake - 52%
   Inactive - 39%
   Good - 9%
8. MsLeaSalonga - 1,134,581 followers
   Fake - 41%
   Inactive - 45%
   Good - 14%
9. noynoyaquino - 1,043,004 followers
   Fake - 43%
   Inactive - 39%
   Good - 18%
10. officialcharice - 920,640 followers
    Fake - 31%
    Inactive - 45%
    Good - 24%

The average fake followers for these accounts is almost half - 46% while the real ones (the 'Inactives' plus the 'Goods') is at 54%. That's pretty big, and that number can still go down if we remove the inactive followers.

This may suggest several things:

• They are buying twitter followers.
• Popular people are fake account magnets.
• Perhaps this fake, bot-created accounts are sentient and loves to follow celebs just like the average twitter user.

Recommended reading:

• Buying Twitter Followers? Beware StatusPeople, The Service That Exposes Social Media's Black Market
• The Twitter Underground Economy: A Blooming Business

StatusPeople

Riding along the people-buying-fake-followers debacle, I went over to StatusPeople to analyze my twitter account and see how many of my measly 347 followers are fake.

Fake-Inactive-Good(I'm assuming 'active' and 'real') twitter follower ratio via StatusPeople:

• Fake - 6 percent
• Inactive - 12 percent
• Good - 82 percent

Out of 347 followers during the time of testing, 6 percent of my followers are fake. That's approximately 21 followers. Less than the 43 inactives, I have 283 real & active followers. Not bad.

P.S. Am doing a little experiment and analyze some of the most followed twitter accounts in the Philippines. Stay tuned. :)

They made it!

As I write this, join.app.net just met our 500K goal, with 38 hours left. - Dalton Caldwell

After this announcement, people are obviously scrambling to get their usernames. As of this writing, App.net is $90K above its goal with 31 hours left. Looking good.

App.net: to fund or not to fund?

There's a chance that you already read about resident bloggers Siegler & Gruber's thoughts on Dalton Caldwell's baby, App.net.

Now it's your turn.

I listed some of the reasons why you should or should not help in financing Caldwell's brainchild:

Why fund it:

• You just want something new.
• You hate the prospects of third-party developers being alienated.
• You don't want to subject your online social experience to the whims of advertisers.
• You want to pay for the services you use.
• If you're sick of the ads in twitter.
• If you're sick of the ads in Facebook.
• If you're  sick of the lack of ads in Google+.
• Facebook is too cluttered.
• Twitter is too cluttered.
• Google+ is way too cluttered this early.
• Your mom is on facebook.
• Your mom is on twitter.
• Your mom is on Google+(?).
• You just can't have enough social media accounts in a lifetime.

Why not fund it:

• App.net doesn't offer something new to the table besides an ad-free social platform.
• You don't like paying for social media services because seriously, who does that?
• You already have too many social media accounts to last a lifetime
• You like twitter.
• You like facebook.
• You like Google+(?).
• Your mom already backed it.

App.net's funding campaign is halfway there and has 5 days left to complete it. It's faith is in your hands (and pocket).

Square - Starbucks deal

Big day for one of my favorite tech companies besides Tesla and SpaceX, Square.

I am pleased and proud to announce that today Starbucks signed up for Square. - Jack

The hip & young payment service and cofee giant Starbucks struck a mutually beneficial deal that gives Square $25 million in investments, a seat on Square's board for Starbucks CEO Howard Shultz and the incremental integration of Square's tech with Starbuck's existing payment systems.

The state of mobile plans in the Philippines

There’s an article on NYT’s Bits blog about the state of prepaid phone plans in the US:

Prepaid phone plans, where you pay the full price for a cellphone and then pay lower monthly rates without a contract, seem to offer what most budget-conscious people want. So why haven’t they really caught on?

After reading this article, the first thing that came to mind was, “this is totally opposite here in the Philippines” at least for now.

Here’s why the average Filipino stick to prepaid:

• the retail mindset
• average Filipino income can’t possibly cover everything, much less a postpaid plan
• networks doesn’t advertise postpaid plans that much (until now)
• the availability of super-affordable phones
• cheap call & text rates

And here’s why the average Filipino will move to postpaid:

• the chance to own a phone at half or even a quarter of the original price may just be too good to pass up
• the pressure of not being “in” with the new aka the buy-what’s-new mentality
• advertising that doesn’t tell it all
• the average Filipino income is growing (which is a good thing, unless they spend it all on phones)

For the same reasons mentioned on the article, people are slowly moving towards postpaid plans now. The proliferation of iPhones and S3s and Notes are a testament to that.

Blinded by the false sense of affordability, of being “in” with the latest, and the overall consumerist mentality, its only a matter of time before the majority of Filipinos switch to postpaid plans. Were living in an iPhone economy after all. Steve would be proud.

Then again, I might be wrong. But so long as there are cheap phones and cheap rates out there, prepaid plans are still the king.

The email that gave birth to a 7-inch iPad

There was a very interesting email released today as part of the whole Apple vs. Samsung case:

Having used a Samsung Galaxy, I tend to agree with many of the comments below (except moving off the iPad). I believe there will be a 7" market and we should do one. I expressed this to Steve several times since Thanksgiving and he seemed very receptive the last time. I found email, books, facebook and video very compelling on a 7". Web browsing is definitely the weakest point, but still usable.

This email is from Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior VP of Internet Software and Services, after reading this GigaOM article, and gives us a rare perspective around the very reclusive Cupertino chiefs.

This email may just be the spark that started Apple’s work on a 7-inch iPad so let’s take this rare chance and analyze this email piece by piece:

Having used a Samsung Galaxy, I tend to agree with many of the comments below (except moving off the iPad).

Despite Apple bashing non-Apple tablets as mediocre, they still use it.

I believe there will be a 7" market and we should do one.

This email was sent January 2011, considering the rumors of a September 2012 release, excellent execution on their part.

I expressed this to Steve several times since Thanksgiving and he seemed very receptive the last time.

This is classic Steve Jobs right here. Telling the outside world that a particular kind of product is improbable but is actually warming off to the idea.

I found email, books, facebook and video very compelling on a 7". Web browsing is definitely the weakest point, but still usable.

This experience is proven, especially with the release of the Nexus 7, who received favorable reviews, even from Apple fanboys who hated Android products to their guts.

It has been a long summer. A 7-inch iPad is coming.

Eddy Cue dumped the iPad

Another casualty of the Samsung vs. Apple case is the release of an internal email between Eddy Cue and other top Apple employees (w/ the exception of Steve):

Having used a Samsung Galaxy, I tend to agree with many of the comments below (except moving off the iPad). I believe there will be a 7" market and we should do one. I expressed this to Steve several times since Thanksgiving and he seemed very receptive the last time. I found email, books, facebook and video very compelling on a 7". Web browsing is definitely the weakest point, but still usable.

There is an iPad mini.

Metro

On The Verge:

Microsoft is killing off the use of its Metro design name to describe a tiled interface in Windows Phone and Windows 8.

For now, that’s all you need to know.

Cheap shot

Vic Gundotra in the whole Facebook-Dalton/Twitter-3rd party apps debacle:

I've repeatedly stated the reason - I'm not interested in screwing over developers. When we open an API, we want developers to feel confident that the innovations they build are going to be long lasting. Releasing an API, and then later changing the rules of the game isn't fun for anyone, especially developers who've spent their life's energies building on the platform.

Developer Tom Cruise:

Show me the API!

Twitter: “It’s not you, it’s me.”

Developers cower in fear, or anger, as news of twitter cracking down on third party apps - mostly used by geeks and power users, that hitch on its platform is gaining traction.

And the departure of Mike Mccue, CEO of the most-beloved app Flipboard, which by the way does a good job of prettifying those usually bland tweets, from Twitter's board did nothing to lessen those fears.

To the @twitter team: it was amazing to be part of the board. You're truly changing the world. Thanks @ev @jack @dick for the opportunity.

— Mike McCue (@mmccue) August 1, 2012

Is this Twitter really doubling down on consistency or is this them trying to double the profits?

Well, it looks like a little bit of both.

They are aiming to provide a consistent experience across all their supported apps starting with Cards, a novel way of displaying data that'll be attractive to users ala Flipboard and advertisers as well, hence, getting them that pile of cash that may justify their venture-backing under huge valuations.

Though there was a study which says that mainstream users won't be affected by this impending fallout, we can't rule the geeks out. Because when geeks are unhappy, bad stuff tends to happen. I'm sure Jack (cool guy!) and Dick (not so cool) wouldn't like that.

P.S. Twitter should spend a little cash, okay, maybe not so little, too late for that, and buy Flipboard. I'm sure good things will come out of it. Oh, and while were at it, buy Tweetbot as well. They're doing a better job than you guys.

WebGeek DevCup

WebGeek Philippines will be hosting a hackathon this coming 25th of August at the Meralco Multi-Purpose hall in Ortigas.

In this day-long hackathon, each team will be given six hours to develop a web application based on the theme to be given that day. Presentations will be delivered from 8:00 PM to 10:00 PM. During this time, teams are expected to have accomplished a web app that will either be fully or partially functional.

From the looks of it, this will be one hell of an event. Just look at their sponsors(!) & media partners:

Smart DevNet, BlackBerry, IdeaSpace, Meralco, Sulit.com.ph, Amazon Web Services, Mozilla Philippines, PayrollHero, PinoyBBdev, Iron.io, StartupDigest, AppSumo, SGE, The New Media, TechNode, Newsbytes, 1stwebdesigner, WhenInManila, E27, The Next Web, Tech In Asia and Digital News Asia.

Interested? Yes? Great! Go to webgeek.ph/devcup for more details.

Tim Cook in Manila

A tweet from @asianpundit got my attention:

Apple CEO Tim Cook will be in Manila in late November? #Philippines

— Michael Alan Hamlin (@asianpundit) July 31, 2012

Asked for further details of the visit, here's what he has to say:

it has to do with procurement and best practice, I believe.

— Michael Alan Hamlin (@asianpundit) August 1, 2012

Tim Cook will be meeting w/ Charles Villasenor, Chairman and CEO of Procurement and Supply Institute of Asia (PASIA).

Talks will probably revolve around Apple's supply chain so those who are hoping for an Apple Store deal in the Philippines (including me), still has a lot of wishing and praying to do.

The Gmail reaction

Microsoft just launched their Metro-themed email service, outlook.com - dubbed as "The Modern Email for the Next Billion Mailboxes", and so far, I like what I'm seeing.

With a minimalist interface combined with the sense of being one of the firsts, it has that early Gmail feeling. Time will tell if this will stick or will they track the path that leads to the Gmail of today, with the ads, clutter(?) and all that.

With the minimalism, virtually unlimited storage and the not-forced social media integration, Outlook seems like a total reaction to Gmail and what it has become.

P.S. They can do without the creepy guy on the landing page.

September madness - smaller iPads and larger iPhones

It's confirmed(?) that Apple will hold an event on Wednesday, September 12. And we all know what that means, more stuff to waste our money on!

Here's what's purportedly coming:

• new iPhone
• iPad Mini (wooot!)
• new iPod Touch
• a bunch of iCases
• iPad 4th-Gen (unlikely, unless they want to piss off iPad 3rd-gen users)

I'm really psyched with the iPad Mini, the original iPad is just too big for me to carry around. And unless the next iPhone will sport anything more than what I'm hearing from the rumor mill, which is turning to be much more reliable nowadays, I think I'll pass. Though that white iPhone sure is sexy. That, and this.

Microsoft kicking it in hardware, one step at a time

Whoever said that Microsoft sucked on hardware?

Okay, I did, once. But not since I saw their awesome line of mice and keyboards. Here are the latest ones.

And just like that, and for the second time, Apple just got a little less exciting for me. At least until the fourth quarter :P

7-inch love affair

Definitely getting a 7-incher, if not for the thrills of a better reading experience. Because let's face it, lugging around an iPad is just inconvenient for avid book readers and content consumers alike.

Big thanks to Nexus 7 for paving the way. Wish you could run iOS.

Want live TV coverage of the Olympics? Stop tweeting

Remember what I said about the Olympic network ready for the games? This just happened.

ASLR that works - Android 4.1 Jelly Bean

Android is catching up to iOS in some aspects besides design sensibility.

Now sports better Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) in 4.1 Jelly Bean - where it randomizes the location of objects in memory.

Initially implemented in 4.0 ICS, it was laughed off by security experts when it failed to randomize the executable and memory regions, rendering it vulnerable to real-world attacks. So long as a hacker knows where a certain part of memory of is located, it's vulnerable. Jelly Bean finally fixed that.

Android still lacks code signing, long present in iOS where it should prevent the execution of unsigned code. Still, kudos for moving forward. Makes you think though, being Linux-based should've made it easier for these guys to implement high security features in Android. Just sayin'.

Prepping the Olympic Network

Is London's network infrastructure ready for the enormous traffic that the Olympic season will generate?,

We'll find out this friday.

Roar

Mountain Lion is out. Ars gets comprehensive. Maybe too comprehensive.

Thunderstruck

An email sent from an Iranian scientist was recently posted on F-Secure's blog:

I am writing you to inform you that our nuclear program has once again been compromised and attacked by a new worm with exploits which have shut down our automation network at Natanz and another facility Fordo near Qom.

According to the email our cyber experts sent to our teams, they believe a hacker tool Metasploit was used. The hackers had access to our VPN. The automation network and Siemens hardware were attacked and shut down. I only know very little about these cyber issues as I am scientist not a computer expert.

There was also some music playing randomly on several of the workstations during the middle of the night with the volume maxed out. I believe it was playing 'Thunderstruck' by AC/DC.

If this is true then at least one of Stuxnet's seed has humour. And a good taste for rock music.