The new $79 Kindle is no. 2, and various Kindle models actually make up the top 12 gadgets on Amazon right now.
The Kindle is available in three versions, the color-display tablet called ”Kindle Fire”, the touch screen eReader ”Kindle Touch” and the no-touch but cheap ”Kindle”. The $79 model that Dan Frommer mentions is the one that’s basically the same old Kindle as before, i.e. just a cheap eReader without touch and likely with crappy controls.
Based on this I guess that a lot of Kindle customers are very price-sensitive, so it’s likely that even the Fire will compete on price rather then features.
Both these theories have given wind to the idea of an ”iPhone 4S”, much like the 3GS which was a beefed-up 3G. I’ll go on record and say that there will not be an iPhone called the 4S. The only reason the 3GS was called that was that it was the third iPhone and the second one already had the number three in it.
So my guess is that if there is just one new model it will be the iPhone 5, whether it’s a ”revolutionary” update or just a beefed-up 4. If there will be two models, they will both likely feature the numeral 5 in their name.
Now, let’s se if Apple proves me right or wrong.
Unfortunately you will need a Facebook account to access Spotify from now on, unless you already have an account set up.
A my friend Emil put it in a tweet, being able to use your Facebook account is a good thing, being forced to do it is a bad thing. I like it when modern more or less web-related companies integrate with each other, but when membership in one requires you to be using the other it’s really not a good thing.
I’ve had a Spotify account for a really long time now. It’s always been a premium account, except for the first few months. I’ve been fairly happy with the service and selection they provide. However one thing about Spotify has bothered me. (The same goes for any other company that provides streaming media.) No matter how long I’ll be a member, nothing of what I chose to listen to will be mine. The second I quit my membership I will lose the ability to listen to the songs. Contrast this with money spent on a download service, like iTunes. When I pay for a download I purchase something. If I chose to throw away my iPod and iPhone, thrash my Mac and burn my iPad to ashes, the right to listen to the music I’ve purchased is still mine. Any computer or computer-ish device that can play AAC audio files enables me to listen to my purchased music. (Yes, of course I must make sure the actual files are present on the device.)
This is by no means Spotify’s fault. It’s an inherent flaw in the streaming business model. To some people it’s no problem, and to me the benefits of Spotify has counterweighted the limitations of the nature of streaming. However, I’ve noticed that I don’t listen to as much ”new” music as I would need to in order to really make full use of Spotify’s benefits.
Some time ago Spotify changed the terms for free accounts and made some cheap accounts available. Suddenly the free accounts had a limit to how many songs could be listened to in a month. This really pissed of some people. Apparently some people still thinks free music should be part of the human rights. (Let’s save that discussion for some other day.)
This didn’t really change anything for me. If anything it was just an indication that the advertising didn’t pay off as good as some people thought and that Spotify felt a need to limit the free accounts in order to gain more paying customers.
So far Spotify’s collaboration with Facebook hasn’t changed anything for me, since the new rules only apply to accounts created now and in the future. However, if it does start to apply to old accounts I will likely cancel my Spotify subscription and start spending the $10 a month in the iTunes Store instead. I currently don’t have a Facebook account and I will not create one just because Spotify wants me to. I pay money to Spotify to listen to music, not to have them forcing me to get a Facebook (or any other social network) account.
This is a list of what I think needs to be done.
Apart from that I should also spend some time making it more responsive, since right now it’s more of an adaptive design.
[…] other day I wrote a post about some things that needed to be changed on this blog. That change-process has now begun. Some content has been removed from the content area and moved […]
[…] iteration of this sites design is slowly progressing. Out of the four points I presented in my original post about the design update, one is now complete and the others is in […]
[…] I wrote earlier today, this blog needs some sort of design re-make in order to better distinguish the actual post content […]
Tuesday, Oct. 4.
That’s the day Apple is currently expected to hold its next big media event, according to sources close to the situation, where the tech giant will unveil the next iteration of its popular iPhone.
AllThingsD also states that Apples new CEO Tim Cook will be the one leading the keynote speech at this, and all future, Apple events. I think that is not necessarily correct. Cook will likely lead this one to show everyone that he really is the new man in charge. However in the future someone else might be better qualified to do the keynotes. To paraphrase John Gruber, Steve Jobs didn’t do the keynotes because he was the CEO. He just happened to be both the CEO and a really great keynote speaker.
This data seems to support the hypothesis that Android users are disproportionately less willing to spend money (note that the data does not say that users don’t have money, but simply that they are not spending it).
Which is why my current idea for a smartphone app will be realized as an iOS app, not an Android one. (Click through to the original post to se the actual charts.)
A weekly podcast about changing technologies and the future of the web, discussing HTML5, mobile, responsive design, iOS, Android, and more. Hosted by Jen Simmons.
The first episode was published last week and featured Peter Lubbers who told us a great deal of information about web storage/local storage/web databases etc. and I thought it was awesome. This weeks episode is a long talk with Ethan Marcotte about ”Responsive Web Design”.
I highly recommend you all to start subscribing to this (and all other great 5by5 shows).
Men det går alldeles utmärkt att köra google+ utan javascript! Och för den delen tror jag du hade tyckt om Google+!
Update: Okej lite för snabb med att skjuta där, var från höften. Viss funktionalitet försvinner ju faktiskt. Men en del saker fungerar ändå.
For the non-Swedish speaking audience of this blog, what he says is that some things in Google+ still works, even without JavaScript. I’ll admit (as I did in my original post) that I haven’t really tested Google+ myself, that all of the writing was based solely on what I’d read about it. He also says that I’d probably like Google+.
Emil’s got a point. I really should have tried Google+ before coming down hard on it. I also might like it, if I tried. There is absolutely no ideological statement behind me not using Google+. (The same is true for me not using Facebook.) It’s just a lack of interest in immersing myself in yet another community/social network.
Map of Moscow played at the ”Granny Goes Street” festival this weekend and I took some photos. Here is one of them. More can be found at my flickr.
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Henrik Carlsson's Blog
5 mars, 2012 07:11[…] in mind though, the last time I made a prediction I said the then upcoming iPhone would absolutely not be called the […]