Tumblrette 1.0 from back in August of 2008, which eventually became Tumblr for iPhone.
It was my first foray into software development and taught me a great deal of patience. It also helped me understand why engineers are all a little nuts.
Uh oh.
Bloomberg Claims Verizon Wireless Will Offer IPhone in January -
Verizon Wireless, the largest U.S. mobile-phone company, will start selling Apple Inc.’s iPhone next year, ending AT&T Inc.’s exclusive hold on the smartphone in the U.S., two people familiar with the plans said.
Odd proclamation by a reputable news source. There’s no mention of ‘rumor’ in the article, either. It does seem plausible though. If the exclusivity agreement was struck in 2006, one year before the iPhone shipped, then the dates line up.
Going through stuff and getting rid of some old development books.
Yeah, that’s a Shockwave book. Don’t hate.
And the first successful FaceTime chat goes to…Jon Maddox!
That was totally worth $700!
kubi:
Yeah, it’s 100 degrees at 10 in the morning and I’ve been standing in line for over three hours and I’ve probably got at least that much to go, but at least they’re handing out free chicken biscuits.
Just spoke with Jim in the line. I’m about 4 hours worth of people behind him and I have a reservation. Good on you guys for sticking it out but I’m going to walk.
What a strange, mis-managed launch.
[video]
Since Apple won’t allow me to take these apps off my iPhone, I guess this is better than nothing.
Tumblr BlackBerry App 1.1
Whew! With all the stuff going on last week I almost forgot to announce the newest BlackBerry App update.
The biggest change: an in-app native Dashboard. Also, your Dashboard now supports liking, reblogging and has an embedded audio/video player and an image viewer.
Check for updates in App World to get the newest version!
ProTip™: As an alternative to scrolling, use the ‘j’ and ‘k’ keys to move through Dashboard posts.
It’s totally Chimay time.
Since I’m at the airport 2 hours before the plane arrives for my 6 hour flight, I thought I’d post some quick thoughts about the week. I cannot comment about actual session content due to the NDA, so I’ll keep to overall impressions. Feel free to ask me about anything and I’ll answer as much as I’m allowed to convey.
I have been to 3 WWDC’s. The first one was the year that the iPhone was announced and where Steve Jobs made his infamous “sweet deal” pitch. 2010 was a far cry from 2007. Even though it was just as crowded as last year it felt more so. There has been some speculation that it was because the IT tracks were gone and that those folks came anyway, clogging up sessions that they would otherwise had skipped. While I’m not sure of the reason I am sure of one thing: Apple needs to do something about it. Splitting the conference might be the only option at this point to alleviate the congestion. I missed 2 or 3 sessions because the lines started 15 minutes before the announced start time and lasted 15 minutes beyond it, at which point the Apple employees turned the rest of us away. After a hike in the conference ticket price this year, there were many attendees that were none too pleased.
This WWDC was very dirty. There was a distinct lack of respect for public space. During the keynote queueing there was spilt coffee, upside down pastries and innumerable used tissues and napkins left for the maintenance crew to dispose of once everyone started moving. I caught many an attendee dropping tissues on the floor mid-stride. A fellow that I met from Mumbai explained to me that it was cultural. I don’t know if that’s true, but I do know that it was disgusting and disrespectful.
The sessions this year were just as they were last year. They tend to follow the same pattern:
The bash on Thursday night was well executed, as usual. Apple convinced OK Go to perform this year and while they were great Apple could have just played their CD on loop for 2 hours. A vast majority of the attendees wouldn’t have noticed. They are an interesting crowd to expose live music to. I heard more applause in draw-code optimization sessions than I did for OK Go. Poor guys.
So here’s the part where I tell you that i don’t think I’m going back next year. There would have to be some substantial changes to what the conference has become and I feel like it would be more efficient to send someone else going forward. I met and reconnected with plenty of folks this year, and thats always awesome. I also observed some despicable behavior from a few of the cool kids that made me question the whole deal. WWDC is always a mixed bag but this time there were a few too many black jelly beans for my taste. Your mileage may vary.
[video]
Karma -
Gray Powell will be forever known as the guy who lost the iPhone, thanks to Jesus Diaz. But now Jesus Diaz will be forever known as the guy who calls himself a technology reporter, yet had an iPhone 4 in his hands for a week and missed almost everything that was interesting about it.
That works for me.
No More iTunes by Florian Pichler -
NoMoreiTunes is an extension for Safari 5 which disables the script that tries to start iTunes when you visit a link to the iTunes Store. It’s annoying and redundant as there is iTunes Preview for Music and Apps now.
Since this doesn’t work on movies I modified the redirecting page for them to show a big button which loads iTunes once (and only if) you click it. I’m working on this one to become a bit more powerful.
I didn’t realise how much I wanted this extension until I heard about it.
This might be the first “gotta have” Safari Extension that I’ve seen.
“how you doin’?”
I can attest. That dude was totally creepy.