Hello, Little Printer

Another video. This thing is too cool.

Address Is Approximate

Simply stunning stop-motion animation using Google Streetview.

Just Say No to Internet Censorship

From Tumblr, "Congress is considering two well-intentioned but deeply flawed bills, the PROTECT-IP Act and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA).

As written, they would betray more than a decade of US policy and advocacy of Internet freedom by establishing a censorship system using the same domain blacklisting technologies pioneered by China and Iran."

Get involved.

R.I.P. - Steve Jobs

I met the man twice. Spoke a few sentences to him, I doubt he ever remembered. But I did.

“The future is already here, just not evenly distributed.”

Ben Hammersley's prescient speech to the IAAC.

"Fundamental Truth Number two is that the internet is the dominant platform for life in the 21st century."

"We can bitch about it, but Facebook, Twitter, Google and all the rest are, in many ways the very definition of modern life in the democratic west. For many, a functioning internet with freedom of speech, and a good connection to the social networks of our choice is a sign not just of modernity, but of civilisation itself."

Jack Kevorkian to run HP.

The Wall St. Journal has a lucid year-in-review of HP and the utter disaster it turned out to be.

Just when I thought HP was poised to be great again they snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

Post-PC Era.

MG Siegler nails it:

"No matter what you think of HP’s big moves this past week, their step away from the PC world speaks volumes. They’re not doing it because they’re batshit crazy. They’re doing it because sales are declining and the margins suck. They’re doing it because they can’t beat Apple."

"It’s not a good sign for an industry when the leader of that industry quits and walks away. No amount of spin can change that."

Apple needs some competition.

The worst sites in the world.

Slate tries to answer the question, "why are restaurant web sites so bad?"

"… I haven't ever seen an explanation for why this industry's online presence is so singularly bruising. The rest of the Web long ago did away with auto-playing music, Flash buttons and menus, and elaborate intro pages, but restaurant sites seem stuck in 1999."

"Say you're a designer and you've got to demo a site you've spent two months creating," Bohan explains. "Your client is someone in their 50s who runs a restaurant but is not very in tune with technology. What's going to impress them more: Something with music and moving images, something that looks very fancy to someone who doesn't know about optimizing the Web for consumer use, or if you show them a bare-bones site that just lists all the information? I bet it would be the former—they would think it's great and money well spent."

I've often asked myself this very question. Restaurant sites (and to a similar extent, band sites) are a morass of shoddy design, poor load times, and clunky navigation. Some of these sites are absolutely beautiful to look at but a complete failure as a functional web site. What many restaurant owners don't seem to realize is that their web site is often the front door to their business. Superdoop's philosophy, the simplest solution is often the best solution, might be a good foundation to build your front door upon.

You Will.

Prescient AT&T ads from 1993. Narrated by Tom Selleck, directed by David Fincher.

One question; where's my stinkin' jetpack?!

Buying Stocks.

A great post by Ron Delany about doing the basics to get the US economy back on track.

"I just bought some shares in an index fund that tracks the Wilshire 5000, which means I just bought shares in the 5000 largest American companies. I did this because I wished to take substantive action immediately upon learning of Standard & Poor’s downgrade of US credit. Standard & Poor’s, and to a lesser degree, Fitch and Moody’s bear much responsibility for the global recession from which we are trying to extricate ourselves. They maintained AAA ratings for companies run by abject criminals who knowingly, consciously, and systematically lied to US citizens and citizens of the world at large. Thus, they are culpable in the collapse of many banks (my own included) and their actions, among other things, drove thousands of families from their homes. As such, their opinion is worthless to me and it should be worthless to you."

404 Fun.

A 404 error is the page of a web site one is automatically directed to when the web server can't find the requested link. Normally these are just generic, auto-generated pages but sometimes webmasters have a little fun with them. The fellows over at Nosh have spent a lot of time on theirs. Maybe a bit self-aggrandizing but still fun nonetheless.

iPad - The New Gamer's Machine?

Electronic Arts' CEO, John Riccitiello, says that consoles are no longer the dominate gaming platform they once were and there may be a new sherif in town.

"Consoles used to be 80% of the industry as recently as 2000. Consoles today are 40% of the game industry, so what do we really have?… We have a new hardware platform and we’re putting out software every 90 days. Our fastest growing platform is the iPad right now and that didn’t exist 18 months ago."

The times they are a changin'.

Mozilla keeps on truckin'.

A mere 3 months after releasing a major update the Mozilla Foundation is at it again with Firefox 5. Download and give what many (myself included) consider to be the web's best browser a try. Improvements include:

• Better standards support for HTML 5, CSS3, MathML, XHR and SMIL
• Better visibility for the Do not track header preference
• Stability and security improvements
• Improved canvas, JavaScript, memory, and networking performance
• Improved spell checking for some locales

While you're at it, try their excellent email client, Thunderbird, as well. The web works better when unencumbered.

Verity.

TermKit.

An ambitious project to bring the Unix terminal out of the dark ages.

"The Unix philosophy talks about software as a toolset, about tiny programs that can be composed seamlessly. The principles are sound, and have indeed stood the test of time. But they were implemented in a time when computing resources were orders of magnitude smaller, and computer interaction was undiscovered country.

...while I agree that having a flexible toolbox is great, in my opinion, those pieces could be built a lot better. I don't want the computer equivalent of a screwdriver and a hammer, I want a tricorder and a laser saw. TermKit is my attempt at making these better tools and addresses a couple of major pain points.

I see TermKit as an extension of what Apple did with OS X, in particular the system tools like Disk Utility and Activity Monitor. Tech stuff doesn't have to look like it comes from the Matrix."

See it in action. Pretty slick!

Apple backs the little guys.

Apple officially responds to patent troll Lodsys' claims.

"Therefore, Apple requests that Lodsys immediately withdraw all notice letters sent to Apple App Makers and cease its false assertions that the App Makers’ use of licensed Apple products and services in any way constitute infringement of any Lodsys patent."

Pretty black & white.

USB 3.0 vs Thunderbolt

So Hewlett Packard in it's infinite wisdom has decided to bet on USB 3.0 instead of Thunderbolt. HP's worldwide marketing manager, Xavier Lauwaert said HP didn't see value in including Thunderbolt in desktops. "On

the PC side, everybody seems to be content with the expansion of USB 3.0. Do we need to go into more fancy solutions? Not convinced yet."

No convinced yet? Considering Thunderbolt is superior to USB in every regard, will soon be included on all Intel motherboards, and has a much longer life span ahead of it; what other convincing does HP need? The largest PC manufacturer in the world watches the rest of the industry move forward while it runs in place. Sigh.

Yet another reason to overhaul the patent system in this country.

Patent-troll Lodsys is threatening to sue small iOS developers over in-App purchasing. All this company does license the patents it holds (bought) and extorts them over the little guys. I picture a couple of guys in shark skin suits; extortion (injunction) letters in one hand, clubs in the other, knocking on the doors of these small-time developers.

Their website is proof that these guys aren't legit; it looks like a domain placeholder. Shameful.

How GPS works in mobile phones

A clear and concise explanation of how the iPhone finds your location and what data it stores. For the paranoid amongst us.

Front Pages from May 2nd

A round-up of front pages from around the nation the day Osama went down.

The Appalachian Trail in 5 minutes

A six month journey of all 2,181 miles of the Appalachian Trail in 5 minutes. Amazing.

Beleaguered Apple Announces Quarterly Results

Apple Inc. posted their quarterly financial results: 3.76 million Macs sold during the quarter, 18.65 million iPhones, 9.02 million iPods, and 4.69 million iPads. A profit of $5.99 billion.

Wait, aren't they going out of business?

RIP - Download Squad

Arianna Huffington, in her infinite wisdom has decided to shut down possibly the best software info site on the net. Download Squad, ye will be missed.

Blackberries can now run thousands of apps! Maybe. Sort of. Not really.

RIM recently announced that its new Playbook tablet will be able to run the thousands of already available Android apps. Caveats ensue:

• The PlayBook will technically be able to run most Android apps, via a "virtual machine" that makes the app think they are running on an Android phone.

• It will support apps as new as Android 2.3 "Gingerbread." It will NOT support apps for the new Android 3.0 "Honeycomb," which is the one designed for tablets.

• You won't just be able to access the Android Market on your PlayBook. RIM will run a separate Android app store, and developers will have to submit their apps manually to that store.

So the Playbook will theoretically be able to run thousands of apps designed for smartphones, not tablets, they may or may not show up on the Blackberry store, and they could perform poorly? Holy crystal clear technology roadmap, Batman! Where do I sign up?

The iPad 2

I'll let David Pogue sum it up...

“An utter disappointment and abysmal failure” (Orange County Design Blog). “Consumers seem genuinely baffled by why they might need it” (Businessweek). “Insanely great it is not” (MarketWatch). “My god, am I underwhelmed” (Gizmodo)...
Apple sold 15 million iPads in nine months, created a mammoth new product category and started an industry of copycats.

15 Million iPads sold, an industry of copycats follow, and the second iteration only improves upon the first. An abysmal failure indeed.

Who are you calling scruffy-looking?

Some amazing Star Wars inspired Lego photography.

It warms my geek heart.

My phone has the sniffles

Most people today have two choices when it comes to smartphones: Android or iOS. Both have their pluses and minuses but you'll probably never need one of these on an iOS device.

I suppose when your ear begins to seep purulent fluid you know you're infected.

F.A.D. Training

We would like to welcome a new client, F.A.D. Training into the Superdoop fold!

Janelle came to us looking to promote herself and her personal training services. Collaborating together; we came up with a simple, clean design that she seems very pleased with. Check out her site and classes and start getting your rear in shape today!

Web site special!

Just a reminder; our $599 complete web site special is still in effect. Contact us today and let's get things rolling.

Lots of cursing

This is so true...

Think

A fascinating look into one of America's most innovative companies on its centennial anniversary. A film by Errol Morris with music by Philip Glass.

Engrossing.

Bill Gates ate my email!

Some spot on satirical analysis by The Oatmeal about what your email address says about you. Although I disagree about AOL in its current state; their email system has gotten a lot better. While I still think Gmail is best in class there are other free email services worth trying out.

I suppose the same can be said about a person's preference in browsers. If you're using anything other than IE you probably know your way around a computer a bit. IE users, please switch to a real browser. The web can be a beautiful place.

A store for every App

Realmac Software provides a little insight into why Apple's App Store can be such a boon to developers. 5,000 copies in two days ain't too shabby; and they're spot on about the Store's chart ranking ability to exponentially boost sales.

The Pale Blue Dot

Hopefulness for the new year, inspired by Carl Sagan.