I would have loved having parents writing such beautiful letter to me for my birth.
It’s an extraordinary beautiful welcoming.
133 karma · joined February 21, 2007
Sure some technical details where a show stopper for me, i.e. no email account, gamification/social currency had no effect on me and the lack of a proper mobile app.
But I overcame those obstacles: I’ve created a Facebook account for Earbits and I was automatically recording the playlists during the day so I could listen to them during my commute.
I think that the loneliness was far more important. I never met or connected with other users that were listening Earbits too (I’m in London, UK). Maybe the traditional listening radio experience was missing; with a DJ, a voice, a brand (Earbits) we can stick on. It’s one thing asking people to connect with an artist, but clearly it’s another to create an Earbits community.
That said I’ve discovered :
- extraordinary artists
It’s one thing to help listeners to discover new artists, it’s another to help them to discover good new artists! To me that’s the curation miracle :-)
- extraordinary founders
I’ve been inspired by your journey like no other. I really wish you the best for the aftermath of 16 June. :-)
Thanks again for all the work you’ve done.
In fact even the naming of a file and the folder structure never been an issue to teach.
Hidding an address does look like spam, not honest, cheating by design because the user doesn't know where s/he is without digging (clicking/taping once or more).
As this information was there effortless, if it become an effort to find out, then people are not going to do it.
One may think that information was therefore not needed on the first place.
One may think twice and say : an information visible effortless might be needed because of its effortless nature. It’s there and part of the context we use things. By example it’s needed to reassure the usage of something.
Why not starting to hide signs on the roads then. After all driverless cars don’t really need them and for everybody they distract the attention of the drivers.
Then Apple can act as a gateway and the automakers cannot put a veto on which app goes to the car dashboard or not.
I think we can learn from the fiasco of Renault trying to create a plateform with their R-link system. In this case the car manufacturer does the filtering of the apps but the rewards are low for the developers :
- antique system : android already 3-4 years old!
- no access to the car data : it's like making a smartphone app without being able to use the camera in your app. So as the user experience designer you're loosing very important data about the context of the user.
- low number of users : not many cars are sold with this system. (Carplay do not have many users yet but has much more potential of growth than R-link).
The marketing page of r-link : http://www.renault.co.uk/innovations/r-link/
I think people already showed many time they do want control, variety and choice.
However there is broken feature by design on ALL those streaming services: they stop for whatever reason.
As a listener it’s a terrible experience. It’s alaways when you start listening something you really like that it stops.
And you could think it stops because I try to listen on the mobile, so that’s normal. NO it stops even at home on your desktop. When you start listening a stream, you’re 100% of one thing : it will stop but NOT when you decide to stop it.
But it wouldn’t be that hard to build a system that actually use a better caching system and pretend to be live instead of trying to stream a live content.
Listeners already grasped the idea of listening events which are not “live” thanks to podcasts.
In fact what is streamed nowadays is mainly pre-recorded songs/stories. So the notion of “live” is absolutely not necessary unless you’re broadcasting sports or once-in-a-lifetime events. And then TV / FM does a much better job.
That said, Shoutcast services are mainly non-live type of streams anyways.
So there is a great opportunity to buy the installed base of Shoutcast creators and listeners and Winamp userbase (pro-anti itunes).
The main idea is you change the sofwtare to make it work even when there is no internet connection.
A better caching system needs to be made on the device itself and on the server side.
In terms of monetization, it’s easy: audio adverts have already proved financial success.
It does work only because of their repetition AND their relation with the audience.
The best example of audio adverts are the songs with high rotation counts: they are the adverts of the big labels.
Here you got a system of dedicated listeners that you can target repetitively, endlessly, fairly (you don’t have to stream blocks of minutes of adverts)
Audio ads on webcast radio start to catch up with Radionomy systems by example.
AOL proved they couldn’t leverage that community. I don’t think Microsoft will do any better job as their main focus will be “integrate”. A strategy that rarely works.
Of course “a non-stop stream even without internet connection“ can happen without buying Shoutcast & Winamp, but what a fantastic opportunity and shortcut for those who can.
«BBC Future (international version) We're sorry but this site is not accessible from the UK as it is part of our international service and is not funded by the licence fee. It is run commercially by BBC Worldwide, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the BBC, the profits made from it go back to BBC programme-makers to help fund great new BBC programmes. »
However the only trouble on those stories is they were describing France a bit too much like California.
That said many foreigners usually do see opportunities when locals are just blind.
So if there is any attractiveness to France seen by Indian people who believe they can leverage those opportunities, this should be welcomed and probably rewarded too.
However I changed my point of view as fremium+IAP does solve the problem of being able to try the real app.
From a developer point of view it's only one app to maintain. If further features are added, you have to pay to unlock them. Also developing a new version of an app always been a headache for a developer : without IAP, the only way is to create a new bundle so you're back to square one when you have to maintain several versions of the same app (which Apple forbid anyways in their TOS).
On any case we never really owned any software anyway. E.g. our copy of Microsoft Office always been a licence from Microsoft allowing us to use their software.
So "App as a service" doesn't seems a bad model and in-app-purchase fit that model nicely.
Now the real problem is the security and as my iPad is used by the whole family, I deactivate the IAP on the settings and only reactivate when I need it.
If somebody want a purchase, s/he need to ask me first. It's not ideal but does one thing I love : it kills the "instant gratification" process. And that only save a lot of money to the whole family!
Bravo! I wish you a lot of success and certainly redirect my friends to it.
I always thought a real shop was the missing link at KS. I understand KS concern to stop their "service" at the funding level, but from a user point of view, it’s a bit short. And from a creator point of view, KS fees of 5%+taxes+etc. might be a bit steep. One example is once the project has been funded, KS could at the very least display the link of the website creator without "nofollow".
To me it looks like KS is missing tools to help creators to really understand how they can manage their backers and their fulfilment after the funding. It would give KS so much data in this critical phase.
But it looks like KS is already working addressing this issue. In 2012 they’ve implemented the deadlines for creators and made clearer the refund for failed rewards.
On any case there is an opportunity here for third party services to KS projects that have been funded (and maybe failed as well).
Kickstarter (KS) always defined on their pages that a successful project is a "successfully funded" project.
It’s hard to know how KS can calculate a successful project by the way we understand it : a project that have at least delivered all its rewards and "shipped" the product advertised.
"KS's terms of use require creators to fulfill all rewards of their project or refund any backer whose reward they do not or cannot fulfill." But KS do not track those data. They are the responsibility of the creator.
Hence the column "successful" just mean "successfully funded". And the column Launched just mean "launched on KS and asking for funding".
Originally the clock app wasn’t included on the iPad.
This version of clock is well made, simple to use as this kind of app should be. Not rocket science but alternatives version are clearly missing on the Appstore. (I looked for one of them that could replicate the one I have on my Android 4 Galaxy S2).
(Re)introducing the Clock app is great, but borrowing the design of very well known clock is a even better.
It fit the trend of Apple reunding well known texture and design. If that trend is good or bad is another question fueled by love and hate feelings.
But Mondaine, the owner of that clock design, have licensing option already in place : http://www.mondaine.com/private-label/
Apple could have just bought the licence of this design. End of story.
Apple could also have taken this opportunity to ask worldwide watchmaker to give their clockface designs for the official Apple Clock application.
I am sure every watchmaker in the world would have even paid fro that privilege. After all they are all spending millions in magazine adverts.
I don’t understand the position of Apple just after the Samsung lawsuit.
The result is to show Apple being arrogant once more and it put the company in a mismatch branding situation that could have been avoided.
Clearly somebody at Apple is not doing his / her job.
We’re talking about a Clock application here! Not Maps which is another fiasco much much more difficult to fix.
That kind of decision never been the role of Steve Jobs. Who else is missing at Apple ?
This version of click is well made, simple to use as this kind of app should be..
Borrowing the design of very well known clock is a good idea too.
But Mondaine (the owner of that design) have licensing option already in place : http://www.mondaine.com/private-label/
So clearly Apple could have just bought the licence of this design.
But they could also have taken this opportunity to ask worldwide watchmaker to give their clockface designs for the official Apple Clock application.
I am sure every watchmaker in the world would have paid without questions. After all they are all spending millions in magazine adverts.
I don’t understand the position of Apple just after the Samsung lawsuit.
The result is to show Apple being arrogant once more and it put the company in a mismatch branding situation that could have been avoided.
Clearly somebody at Apple is not doing his / her job.
However I use adblock on every browser. Therefore I have less training than others to ignore ads. When I see one, it just hit me stronger (it's a side effect of adblock).
The main point for me is how Apple did come up with a such low resolution (1024x768@132ppi) for a screen that you hold so close to your eyes? The technology is there for much higher density screens. I was expecting Apple to lead the way.
There is nothing that machine do better than any laptop out there (notebook, laptops, etc.) And it’s the keypoint of the Steve keynote.
It’s a luxury machine designed to spend (and possibly waste) time and money by being entertained and by buying more, more and more instant gratification items without having a direct control of your expenses.
Kudos to Apple to be the best player in this category but it’s not a tool for people creating stuff.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-based_solar_power
http://www.nss.org/settlement/ssp/library/index.htm
If we can transform a huge wifi-like signal coming from space onto electricity, surely it’s possible to do the same thing at a smaller scale?
The motion on films is not smooth at all, shaky at best. That’s why cameramen make sure not to move their camera too much and use a lot of tricks to avoid "motion sickness". In one hand they do use full frames (aka progressive frames) but only at 24 fps.
That’s not exactly what you call "Motion blur" to be "the biggest reason TV and film get away with smaller framerates".
However, yes, to have a good motion you need to have a good framerate.
You can read a very good interview of James Cameron about it: http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117983864.html?categoryid=...
It basically says: Perceived resolution = pixels x replacement rate. and the magic number is known: it’s 48 fps.
The main problem is not only having the game/software logic to send the frames to the display fast enough but also having the display being able to display them!
CRT were able to do it through interlaced frames, but mainstream flat panel technologies (plasma/LCD) basically can't. OLED should do better on the near future.
That said when there is no motion, 1 fps is just fine :-)
3:10 to 3:29
Steve:
I asked him if he would come up with a few options. And Rand said:
« No. I will solve your problem for you and you will pay me. And you don’t have to use the solution.
If you want different options, go and talk to other people.
But I’ll solve your problem the best I know how. And you’ll use it or not, that’s up to you. You’re the client.
But you'll pay me. »
Steve Jobs (NeXT Inc.) paid Paul Rand $100,000 in 1986 to create the NeXT brand identity.
Apple do understand software. You cannot release Mac OS X, iLife and other jewels without understanding software. Also Mac developers jumping off the iPhone bandwagon are not jumping off the Mac plateform.
For the iPhone, Apple tried a different model that nobody really tried before.
They indeed have a broken store but the previous models on other platforms never worked. The most successful one before was for the PalmOS and it wasn't over the air.
However Apple always been an arrogant company. With their customers, their providers and their developers.
The climax of this arrogance has been reached with the iPhone eco system (certainly helped by the arrogance of the mobile phone operators).
And for many it is not sustainable.
But anyways, who really cares?
Apple can open the doors of the store overnight. It wouldn’t have been the first time they do one thing making you beleive it was the only way and then suddenly change in the opposite direction.
That’s the strength of Apple: they can change. Not only they can change but they usually know when, with what, for who and at which price.
I never realised the arrogance was a trade mark of this process though. Note: I don't mean being evil by being arrogant.
PG and YC need more of those cover stories to spread their message.
One step at a time :-)
And the picture really look good.
Atlas is going to save me a lot of time.
Sure you can still edit the plist by hand or programatically but I don’t find it more efficient neither easier.
When you download ARC you get a HN example inside.
However it’s not only the “tag line” which need to be rewritten but also the content.
Which mean one version of the article for HN users, another for Reddit and yet another for Digg.
Which can translate into three levels:
- advanced (readers able to understand abstractions),
- intermediate (readers who want to understand “how to control”)
- and beginners (readers who just want to find a solution to their problem through a simple step by step process).
This force onself to write with a specific audience in mind. And I think it’s the key point of Paul Graham article: understanding your users.
Last but not least: having the comments section on where you found the link but not on the page where is displayed the article.
I found HN comments with Stackoverflow are so far the only sites where proper discussions can really happen with very inspiring thoughts.
However those Karma thingies, I absolutely don’t care. Also the triangle button (upvote), I use it only as a bookmark button.
Also what’s really rewarding is when you check the “New” page and see few hours after it hits the home page. You feel you’re not only following.
Have a good day and thanks for your work. Thibault