Sony Warning: Don’t Turn On Your (Fat) PS3 If You Have Error 8001050F! [PS3]

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There is great clusterfuckassery going on right now on the PlayStation Network, affecting fat PS3s. Sony is working on it and they hope to "resolve the problem within the next 24 hours." Updated

We hope to resolve this problem within the next 24 hours. In the meantime, if you have a model other than the new slim PS3, we advise that you do not use your PS3 system, as doing so may result in errors in some functionality, such as recording obtained trophies, and not being able to restore certain data.

The latest thin PS3 model doesn't have this problem, but if you have a fat PS3, here's what you are facing if you turn it on:

• The date of the PS3 system may be re-set to Jan 1, 2000.
• When the user tries to sign in to the PlayStation Network, the following message appears on the screen; "An error has occurred. You have been signed out of PlayStation Network (8001050F)".
• When the user tries to launch a game, the following error message appears on the screen and the trophy data may disappear; "Failed to install trophies. Please exit your game."
• When the user tries to set the time and date of the system via the Internet, the following message appears on the screen; "The current date and time could not be obtained. (8001050F)"
• Users are not able to play back certain rental video downloaded from the PlayStation Store before the expiration date.

Update: According to some readers, Netflix doesn't work either.
Update 2: Some readers report everything is back to normal.
Keep watching for updates. [Sony]


RoboThespian, the Acting Robot, Can Give Robert Pattinson A Run For His Money [Robots]

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He may have plastic boobs saggier than Dame Judi Dench, but as Wired points out, this RoboThespian "shows more acting range than some Hollywood stars." The British robot has been programmed to show off a variety of acting abilities.

His creators, Engineered Arts, have made him completely self-supporting, with his torso capable of bending and turning, his arms able to move about, and even basic facial gestures performed. He is powered by compressed air, with the control system sitting in his torso along with the air valves that help him move.

The best bit however is that he can be fully-programmed to perform a script on cue, translating text to speech in English, Spanish, Germany, French and even Mandarin Chinese.

Seen in the videos below is the third version of RoboThespian, the most advanced so far—but also the coolest robot you've never heard of. [RoboThespian via Wired]


Assassin’s Creed II: Multiplayer Available Now, Free For 48 Hours [IPhone Apps]

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Assassin's Creed II is one of the best console games of 2009. And now, Ubisoft has released a top-down multiplayer version of it for the iPhone/iPod touch, free for two days.

The game, which is to the console version of ACII what the original Grand Theft Auto is to GTAIV, features a top-down viewpoint. The goal is to seek out fellow assassins who you're playing over WiFi and...assassinate them. You sneak around by blending in with civilians.

Sound fun? Well, it's free for now but bumps up to $2.99 after 48 hours, so get on it! [iTunes Link]


Florida Space Day

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Florida Space Day in Tallahassee March 3, 2010

"Key representatives from Florida's space industry will visit Tallahassee to participate in Florida Space Day and share the challenges the industry faces in ensuring Florida remains at the forefront of the nation's space program. Florida Space Day is a milestone event that presents an opportunity to educate and bring awareness to Florida legislators on the significance of the aerospace industry and its impact on Florida's economy."

International Yearbook of Futurism Studies

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International Yearbook
of
Futurism Studies

Editor

Günter Berghaus

Editorial Board

Matteo D’Ambrosio
Marjorie Perloff
Irina Suboti?
Jorge Schwartz

The last twenty years has seen some major advances in the field of Futurism Studies. What in the first decades after WW II was frowned upon and regarded with political suspicion, has subsequently taken a remarkable development, both in academia and on the art/publication market. Futurism has now come to be regarded as Italy’s most important contribution to modern art and as having left a lasting mark on Italian literature. Consequently, in the 1980s and 90s, a pool of more than 500 artists and writers has been rediscovered, presented to the public by means of exhibitions and publications, and dozens of them promoted to an elevated status in the national pantheon. Every history of art and literature of the past twenty years has accorded Futurism a prominent position in the cultural history of the country.

Outside Italy, the development has been similar. Between 1945 and 1970, few publications were dedicated to the international branches of the Futurist movement, and even less to the leading figures in Italy. This situation changed remarkably after the epochal 1986 Palazzo Grassi exhibition, Futurismo e futurismi. A long series of international exhibitions throughout the Western world raised Futurism to a status on a par with Expressionism, Dada and Surrealism. Consequently, it entered the syllabus in academic institutions and became a standard topic, not only in courses of fine art, design and architecture, but also Italian Studies, Hispanic Studies, Slavonic Studies, Cultural Studies, Theatre History, Music History etc.

This trend has even been surpassed in Eastern and Central Europe. After the demise of the Communist régimes, the historical avant-garde could be thoroughly re-assessed and in many cases for the first time uncovered. A wealth of artistic creativity in the often short-lived democratic States of the 1910s and 20s has come to light, and the central position played by Futurism in it has now been firmly established. This has resulted in over 2,500 publications since the fall of the iron curtain in 1989.

The astounding development outlined above found a peak in the 2009 centenary of the foundation of Futurism. 300 exhibitions, 45 international conferences and an uncountable number of theatre and musical performances, radio and TV broadcasts have given Futurism an unprecedented prominence in the cultural calendar. Futurism Studies as an academic discipline is now firmly established and produces some 300-350 monographs annually (more than half of them outside Italy), tendency still rising. Yet, it is conspicuous that this discipline is strongly compartmentalized, not so much in terms of artistic media, but along national borders. Italian scholars rarely take note of the heaving research that is being carried out in the UK or US, not to mention Russia, Brazil or Germany; but also vice versa, Mexicans or Argentinians tend to be very knowledgeable about creacionismo, ultraismo and estridentismo, but publish few studies on Zenitizam, Zaum-poetry or Poetizmus.

One of the consequences that can be drawn from this situation – and it is one that I have presented, to considerable approbation, at numerous conferences in 2009 – is that the debate on Futurism must become more globalized and be less centred on Italy. Futurism had a world-wide impact and generated many international Futurisms. It made important contributions to numerous avant-garde movements, despite the fact that their agendas only partially overlapped with Marinetti’s aesthetic and political programme.

I have suggested at various academic gatherings in 2009 the founding of an International Yearbook of Futurism Studies, designed to act as a medium of communication amongst a world-wide community of scholars and a forum of debate on the manifold Futurist and para-Futurist phenomena in and outside of Italy. This idea has won widespread support, and half a dozen leading scholars have enthusiastically agreed to serve on the board of such a periodical. More colleagues will be approached in the next months to serve as contributing and consultant editors. Typically, they will be experts on the multifaceted influences of Futurism in their respective country, act as intermediaries to their academic community (especially of young scholars), solicit contributions for the Yearbook and act as referees for essays submitted.

Thus the Yearbook will facilitate contacts across national borders and academic disciplines and establish a global network of academics working in the field of Futurism Studies. The periodical will also act as a coordinating medium for bi-annual regional conferences (the first will take place on East and Central European Futurism, as part of the 2010 EAM conference at Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznán/Poland, 9-11 September 2010; a second is planned on Latin-American Futurism for 2012 in Rio de Janeiro, a third on woman Futurists outside Italy for 2014 in Toronto).

The Yearbook will publish essays generated from those conferences, but also contributions focussed on other countries. It will have an interdisciplinary orientation and publish research concerned with literature, fine arts, music, theatre, dance, decorative arts, graphic design, fashion etc. Each volume will have some 250-300 pages and consist of the following sections:

  1. Announcements of conferences, exhibitions, publication ventures (10-15 pp)
  2. Essays related to world-wide Futurism (180-200 pp.)
  3. Country surveys discussing recent work carried out on Futurism in individual countries (30-40 pp.)
  4. Conference reports, reviews of books, performances, concerts, exhibitions (10-20 pp)
  5. Bibliography of recent Futurism studies with a world-wide coverage, designed to serve as annual addenda to my Bibliographic Handbook of Futurism (15-20 pp)

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Freescale’s i.MX508 Chip Will Make E-Ink Readers Way Cheaper and Turn Pages 4X Faster [Guts]

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The silicon inside 90 percent of ereaders out there is made by Freescale, and their new chip, the i.MX508—based on a ARM Cortex A8 (sorta like the iPad!)—will make them cheaper, and page turns 4x faster.

The chip's a custom SoC that integrates the functions from multiple chips into one—specifically, the E-Ink hardware display controller—along with that Cortex A8, which gives the readers enough juice to turn pages in half a second, versus the two seconds that's typical now. As the first chip expressly designed for ereaders, it also strips out unnecessary features, so the net result for the ereader is that it's $30 cheaper a unit. Freescale wagers that with the cost savings, it could drive ereaders to under $150 by the end of the year. (Though that in part depends on how much the E-Ink displays themselves are going to continue to cost.)

An E-Ink reader that costs $150 would definitely look more attractive as a dedicated long-reading device against an iPad that does lots of things on top of reading—and has those fancy digital magazines—than the ones that more like $260 today. Then again, Amazon's working on a full-color multitouch Kindle with Wi-Fi, if that tells you anything about the future of E-Ink readers. In the meantime, I'm all for cheaper. [Freescale via Bloomberg via Digital Daily]


NordicTrack x7i Could Allow You to Jog on the Moon [Exercise]

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Your Technotronic playlist aside, running on a treadmill is inherently boring because you are stuck in a room running on the same platform. But what if you could switch things up and simulate actual, real world topography?

The NordicTrack x7i Interactive Incline Trainer, $2,000, is loaded with Wi-Fi to interface with iFit Live, a fitness database that pulls actual trail and marathon routes from Google Maps (which, though not supported in the limited official workout library at this time, should really include Google Moon).

The corresponding information shifts your incline dynamically (40-degree incline, 6-degree decline), plus you get to see a bird's eye view that allows you to track progress through your practice environment, or you can even take a look from the ground level through Google Street View.

Now, if only the NordicTrack x7i weren't a treadmill, we'd really be on to something. [NordicTrack via PopSci]


I am created Shiva, destroyer of worlds | Bad Astronomy

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This is totally cool: an animated simulator that lets you make model solar systems! It’s put together by the PhET Interactive Simulations group at — hey! — the University of Colorado at Boulder.

All you have to do is put in the masses, locations, and initial velocities of the objects (up to four) and then hit "go". What you’ll probably find is that for almost any parameters you use, you won’t get a stable system. You’ll fling off the tiny moon, or drop a planet into the star, or collide two planets (when you do, one survives after a brief comical flash). There are preset conditions that will put together a stable simulation, so I suggest you start there and then tweak the numbers. The most fun thing is to fiddle with the mass and see what happens.

mysolarsystem

You’ll note a slider that says Accurate vs. Fast. That has to do with bin size. Basically, a simulation like this calculates the force of gravity of each object on every other object using Newton’s law. But it needs a time interval to do this: where will all the objects be after some period of time? You can pick that time step, but the smaller the time step the more accurate it will be. That’s because gravity works continuously. If you take the Earth’s current position and velocity and ask where it will be a year from now by just adding a year to the program, it’ll extrapolate the Earth’s current velocity direction! The program will take that velocity (about 30 km/sec) and multiply it by one year, and get a distance of about a billion kilometers. It’ll then place the Earth there. But that’s not right, because the Earth orbits the Sun; the Sun’s gravity is continuously changing the direction of Earth’s motion. So the smaller the time step, the more accurate the program will be.

At least, I think that’s what’s going on here. I’ve fiddled with programs like this before, and that’s what I’ve found. Roundoff error can be bad too; because the program can’t do the calculations exactly — the decimal value has to cut off somewhere — every step has a little bit of error in it. That adds up, and after a few orbits things can go wonky. This one does a pretty good job of that, it looks like.

Anyway, go play god with your very own cosmic erector set. It’s fun, and before you know it a long time will have passed… but you might get a feel for orbital mechanics. It’s worth it.


Mike Mann on Point of Inquiry: Climate Denial Astroturfing Online? | The Intersection

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There are now some 51 comments at the Point of Inquiry forums on the latest show. But so far none are getting into what I found most intriguing in my interview with Mike Mann.

When I asked his views on the “really energized global warming movement on the web” at around minute 31:30, Mann suggested something that has been on a lot of our minds—namely, that although it may appear that online climate deniers are really fired up right now on the web (hence all the comments on everybody’s blog), he suspects some of it is astroturfing:

The anti-science industry has fully exploited the resources made available by the World Wide Web. So it isn’t coincidental. It isn’t like that’s an organic thing that has emerged from grassroots anti-climate change activists….

In the exchange, which runs about 2 minutes, I tell Mann I too have my suspicions, but at the same time, am skeptical and would want to see some solid proof before I fully buy into this idea. After all, there really is a groundswell on the political right at the moment (see the Tea Party movement) and that is surely also spilling over into the climate denial blogosphere. And that would be, I guess, “organic.” So the question is, how could we tell the two apart?

Meanwhile, if you haven’t yet I encourage you to listen to the Mike Mann interview here, and to subscribe to the Point of Inquiry podcast via iTunes.


LT Switchgear Upgrades

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Dear all,

we have 5.5KW LCP module in LT mcc but we have the motor of capacity 22kw, 415v, 3ph, full load current: 39A. No other spare modules are available. now i want upgrade the 5.5kw module to 22kw module. what are the things to be considered for conversion. I had doubt in dimensi

In the Packaging Wars, Can Shrooms Overtake Styrofoam? | Discoblog

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background2When it comes to packaging a precious TV or even a pricey vase, mushrooms aren’t the first things that pop to mind as a durable alternative to Styrofoam or cardboard. But a company called Ecovative Design has used mushroom roots, the part of the fungus that’s called the mycelium, as a sturdy material that can be used for packaging. The creators say that the process is so simple, they grew the first samples under their beds.

The first step in creating the packaging, called the “Eco Cradle,” is to grow the thin, hair-like mycelia by feeding them agricultural waste like buckwheat hulls, rice hulls, or cotton burrs.

Discovery News reports:

After about a week or so, tons of tiny white fibers appear. The material is then dried to halt the growing process, creating packaging with impressive durability that is also biodegradable and compostable.

The creators claim the entire process uses about 10 times less energy per unit of material than the manufacturing of synthetic foams–making this fungal product an environmentally friendly option to Styrofoam. They add that the packaging can also be molded into different shapes, providing the best protection for delicate objects. Ecovative says it will start making packaging for two Fortune 500 companies this spring.

While the all-natural material is made from mushroom parts, Ecovative notes that the stuff shouldn’t be tossed into your stir-fry. You could eat it, the company notes in its FAQ, “but it’s non-nutritious and doesn’t taste very good, so we don’t recommend it.”

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Image: Ecovative Design


The Myth of iPhone App Piracy [IPhone Apps]

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People rarely talk about iPhone app piracy, but when they do, it sounds devastating: 90% piracy rates, $450 million in lost sales, etc. Here's the truth: App Store piracy isn't a big deal—and it never will be.

With these shockingly high reports comes the general air that developers are being marauded and pillaged by Viking hordes and that Apple isn't doing enough to stop it. This resonates! Developers don't control much about the App Store, so if the entire app protection system has been cracked—which it has—you'd expect the looting to be wholesale; the impact on developers to be immediate and devastating; and the problem to be grave indeed.

And yet the piracy issue seems to be dying. The story behind the lack of a story, it turns out, is that iPhone piracy is nowhere near as serious as many people say it is, and that before long, it may not be a problem at all.

How It Works

It's tough to talk about iPhone app piracy without tacitly endorsing it. The mere mention of DRM cracking methods and application sources is—or rather, was—enough to send people looking, and presumably, stealing. But look at the piracy subscene today reveals that, like the jailbreak scene it's a part of, it's just not the same as it used to be.

Kicking off your career in app theft isn't too hard, and it'll only take a few minutes of Googling to get the full instructions. Still, I'll keep this as abstract as possible. Here's how you do it:

• Jailbreak your iPhone or iPod
• Open Cydia, the jailbreak equivalent of the App Store, and add a particular download source that isn't part of the default lineup
• Download two apps: One that lets you crack apps you've purchased for the benefit of others; and another that lets you install cracked applications yourself
• Download cracked apps to your heart's content, from various sources around the internet

The Myth of iPhone App PiracyAt the peak, there were sites that aggregated huge numbers of download links together into an easily browsable website, which meant that once your phone was cracked, you could tap through these websites like you'd browse the App Store—links to the latest apps were plentiful, and you could snag that game you just read about on Gizmodo within a day or so, tops.

The most popular of these sites, called Appulo.us, disappeared just last month, leaving pirates without a centralized resource for apps. Soon, torrent sites and carbon copied link-dumps picked up the slack, at least for people dedicated and savvy enough to find them. So, yeah, piracy is alive, to be sure. But how serious is it?

The Problem

I wanted to find out how bad piracy was, so I went straight to the developers. I started with the types of apps I thought would be least vulnerable, just to set a baseline: Productivity apps. The verdict? Yes! Piracy happens!

"Roughly 10% of our paid app users are coming from piracy." That's Guy Goldstein, CEO of PageOnce, the company behind Personal Assistant, a top-selling organizational app. This is pretty stunning, if you think about it. Personal Assistant is available in a fairly full-featured free version, and as useful as it is, it's not the most glamourous of apps—it's a utility, not a flashy game. The paid version tracks a little high for a productivity app, at $7, but not matter how you slice it, Personal Assistant isn't the most obvious target for piracy. Nor, apparently, is it a serious victim: "Although i think piracy is generally bad and negatively effects companies, for us it's not big issue—our business model is based on purchasing, but also advertising. The more users we have, the better." Right, so piracy is happening here, but it doesn't really matter. Let's move onto the people who you'd really expect to be getting ripped off.

I contacted TomTom, whose navigation apps start above $50. They were cagey. Cagey and brief:

TomTom takes piracy very seriously. Per corporate policy, we do not disclose information about our ongoing efforts to disrupt software theft.

So I moved on to their direct competitor, Navigon, whose MobileNavigator North America app runs $90:

Navigon is well aware of hacked iPhone Apps. As with any other software, it is only a question of time when applications are being hacked and distributed illegally. There's no security mechanism available to prevent this 100%. Since hacking of additional application functions, which are available through Apple's In App Purchase mechanism, is more difficult, this helps to better secure Apps from software piracy. Our legal department is watching this very thoroughly and Navigon will fight piracy with all legal means.

Less cagey, and more ragey. But this is an official position—a conversation with a Navigon rep left me with the impression that while they don't condone piracy, obviously, it wasn't exactly the Issue of the Day. Ripe targets that they are, nav companies don't seem to be losing sleep over this. Which leaves the game developers.

What apps are more pirateable than games? They're shiny, they're extremely popular, and they're often expensive. Surely the EAs and Gamelofts of the world are the hardest hit, right?

On record, they basically clammed up. Off the record, though, they were a bit more free. A rep from one of the largest studios—you've probably played one of their games if you have an iPhone—told me "It happens, but I don't think it's that big of an issue." I couldn't coax out any specific stats, but in relation to total sales, piracy figures are "small."

In fact, it was hard to come by hard piracy figures from any major developers, but one thing is certain: The occasionally reported 50%+ piracy rates are rare among major developers. And overwhelmingly, major devs are underwhelmed by the problem. So, where are all the pirates?

The Jailbreak Factor


Peter Farago, a VP at iPhone analytics firm Flurry—the guys who spotted the iPad in their logs days before it was announced—track roughly one out of every five apps purchased from the App Store, and their software runs deep: Though it doesn't collect individualized personal data, it can tell if a device running a tracked app is jailbroken or not. In other words, Flurry knows exactly how many of the millions of devices its tracked apps are installed on are jailbroken. Take a guess.

It's... as low as you might expect. Lower, even.

"Under 10% of the iPhone installed base is jailbroken."

Just to make this clear, a company that at any given time is tracking five out of the top ten most downloaded apps in the App Store is detecting a jailbreak rate of under 10%. Less than one out of ten, and often significantly less. The figure tends to bottom out at just above 5% after every time Apple issues a software upgrade, slowly creeping back up to previous levels as the Dev Team and the like issue updates to the jailbreak software. Bear in mind, jailbreaking is a prerequisite for app piracy, but not every jailbreaker is running even one pirated app. Start peeling off the people who jailbreak just to enable multitasking or Wi-Fi tethering, or to skin their iPhone, or just to see what all the fuss is about, and "under 10%" starts to looks even slimmer.

Given the state of jailbreaking, I find these numbers easy to believe. Back in 2007, before there was an App Store, jailbreaking was as easy as opening a website in Mobile Safari. Today, it's a bit more difficult, and depending on which iPhone you have, sometimes impossible. (Sorry, late model 3GSers!) And Farago says it's always under siege: "There's a cycle that exists, but basically, it's this kind of thing that happens—every time there's an OS swap, it goes away for a while," dipping by "a few percent" before creeping back up to previous levels.

Now, I don't want to play down these numbers, because even a tiny percentage of a user base as large as the iPhone's is enough to throw a developers' pirated/paid stats out of whack—this can happen, and cases in which pirated downloads exceed paid downloads have been documented—but such stats are misleading. Without even having to speculate about what percentage of pirates would have otherwise purchased the app, they represent a small portion of the app-buying population. In such small numbers, jailbreakers simply can't screw a developer over, except in those rare cases in which the developer has to pay significant continuing costs to deliver data and services once an app is installed. Even then, Flurry finds that pirated apps are often launched just a handful of times after they're downloaded.

With the App Store offering most—though not all—of what the jailbreak scene used to provide, cracking your phone, going through the trouble of ducking regular upgrades and enduring the constant fear of rendering your phones permanently useless just isn't that attractive anymore. To be a pirate right now, you really have to want to be a pirate. This isn't Napster. This is Usenet. And pirates aren't potential customers. They're pirates.

Why Developers Don't Care

At first I found many developers' silence on the issue curious. But after talking to a few, and finding out the scale of the problem, it makes sense: An app developer has nothing to gain by taking their fight public—Apple is clearly aware of the issue, and it's not like you can somehow convince hardcore pirates to start paying for all the dozens of apps they steal, because they were never going to buy them in the first place. To these people they're literally just free samples, and are most frequently treated as such. Developers do have something to lose, be it investor confidence (a lot of studios are heavily funded by VCs, who probably don't want to hear about any theft problems), a relationship with Apple (who would most likely prefer that developers discussed app DRM cracking and piracy privately), or the goodwill of the public, who aren't usually going to feel sympathy for a company anyway.

Most importantly, if developers do have a problem with piracy—say that, like PageOnce, they found themselves prominently featured on one of the more popular pirated app repositories—they can do something about it.

When an app is cracked, that is to say that its DRM has been stripped, and the app has been reduced to an unprotect .IPA file, ready for sideloading through a jailbreak utility. But in the middle of 2009, Apple introduced a system by which app developers could sell services or add-ons from within their apps. This was good way for paid apps to extend their profitability, and the in-app purchases were effectively unpirateable.

Then, in October, Apple changed the rules: In-app purchases were allowed in free applications as well, meaning that developers could provide free trial apps that could be upgraded to full versions by way of in-app purchases. Popular apps could consolidate their free and paid versions into one app, and on the way, make piracy all but impossible. After all, what's the point in cracking and bootlegging an app anyone can get for free?

Apple even says as much (albeit with no lack of redundancy): "Using In App Purchase in your app can also help combat some of the problems of software piracy by allowing you to verify In App Purchases."

Ngmoco took their fight against piracy public last year, quoting impressively high unauthorized download figures during new apps' first days in the app store. Today, nearly their entire product lineup is based on on the in-app upgrade model. And even after the transition, Ngmoco insists that piracy wasn't the motivating factor in their switch. In an interview with TouchArcade, it was the massively high download rates for free apps, vs paid apps, that lured Ngmoco toward in-app purchases. The elimination of piracy was a pleasant side effect, at best.

The moral of the story for developers? If you think you have a problem with piracy, you probably don't. If you still think you have a problem with piracy, you can stamp it out. Simple as that.

In-app purchases change the way developers market and sell their apps, and just as much, the way we consume them. Downloading a single app and then purchasing expansions for it is a superficially different procedure than downloading a free trial followed by a full app, or just taking a risk on a full app in the first place. But the way in which your transaction happens is different, too.

When you buy an iPhone app, it can be synced to multiple devices, as long as said devices are authorized on your iPhone account—the cap here if five, but that's enough to share amongst your family or friends, or to enable an easy transition from an old iPhone to a new one. In-app purchases, however, don't work the same way, at all. Here's what Apple says about syncing in-app purchases across devices:

• Consumable products must be purchased each time the user needs that item. For example, one-time services are commonly implemented as consumable products.

• Nonconsumable products are purchased only once by a particular user. Once a nonconsumable product is purchased, it is provided to all devices associated with that user's iTunes account. Store Kit provides built-in support to restore nonconsumable products on multiple devices.

• Subscriptions share attributes of consumable and nonconsumable products. Like a consumable product, a subscription may be purchased multiple times; this allows you to implement your own renewal mechanism in your application. However, subscriptions must be provided on all devices associated with a user. In App Purchase expects subscriptions to be delivered through an external server that you provide. You must provide the infrastructure to deliver subscriptions to multiple devices.

Problem is, this isn't how it works right now. In-app goods are sold on a strict per-device basis, because the only user information available to developers is the device identifier, not the account identifier. As it stands, when you buy something by way of an in-app purchase, it applies to your phone only, and not all the registered devices—iPhones and iPod Touches—on your iTunes account. Maybe that's no big deal now, but when the iPad arrives, this might become a problem.

Pirates... From the FUTURE

App piracy today may not be a massive factor in the App Store economy, but it would be wrong to characterize it as nothing. It does exist, and to a developer who makes money selling apps, even one illegally downloaded app is one too many. Still, looking forward, this issue is clearing up almost completely:

• iPhone app piracy is already low, and isn't on the rise in any meaningful way
• The latest iPhone 3GS has proven very difficult to jailbreak, and Apple seems to be actively thwarting efforts with each baseband/software release
• In-app purchasing is coming of age, and effectively eliminates piracy

If you want to call the iPhone pirate a species, he would be an endangered one; if you want to call the jailbreak scene a subculture, it would be passé; if you want to call app piracy a problem, it would be more nuisance than crisis.

Apple's pending extermination of piracy is great news for developers, but for users, it'll come at a cost. And for want of an example as to why, this post couldn't come at a better time, with Apple purging "offensive" apps from its official store—increasingly be the only place for iPhone owners to download apps. If Apple wants to be the only provider of apps (and they do!) then they need to be held to a high standard of transparency and consistency, which—trust us—they're nowhere near meeting.


Exploring Strange New Worlds

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Just when you thought you were safely nestled in a nice plateau of learning something like this has to come along and bump you off…

Actually it’s more of a welcome interruption, I could tell the engines weren’t running as smoothly as they could be. Lots of power interruptions, wasted cycles, and general confusion. But the brain is good at making anything seem normal after a while, so wasn’t everything just normal?

Well maybe not.

Today I was exploring why I didn’t get along with a colleague of mine and why it was I just didn’t have any patience for him. Was it that I was just feeling tired and low on creative energy and so was just being protective of it because I didn’t want interacting with him to use it all up?

Maybe.

But why was I afraid to use it all up? Why did I think, I of ultimate power in the universe was so power limited? Maybe to have a good excuse for why I wasn’t out changing the world more and faster and better! (‘I’m tired’ and ‘I don’t feel good’ are great get-out-of-jail free cards). So then I started to look at that. Why do I think I *have* to change the world? Why do I always feel so guilty that I haven’t done more?

Well, I guess it is an underlying world view that I have had for a long time (read a very OLD habit). It is as dear to me and as comfortable and as close as anything could be in my identity/ego. But as I looked at it, I could see, it was true it was suffocating me.

I could see that most of my life was spent trying to fix myself (gotta be perfect, gotta be perfect), trying to fix others (what is wrong with that guy anyway? how long till he gets removed from the team so I don’t have to deal with him?) and trying to fix society (I even gave an exceptional speech at TEDxNASA about how we could start too).

I instantly started to laugh. I spend so much of my day dealing with my own failings, dealing with other people’s failings and trying desperately to keep humanity’s failings from either derailing the space program or heaven forbid- following us out into space! It seemed to be all I ever did! Fight against the failings of myself, fight against the failings of others, and fight against the failings of humanity. No wonder I was so tired!

Luckily, I remembered a lesson from one of my favorite teachers, Gene Roddenberry. An episode of Star Trek where Kirk is divided in two – the good Kirk and the bad Kirk- and you think the whole time “hey, that wouldn’t be so bad, split myself in two and then jettison the bad and keep only the good!” but as the episode unwinds it becomes obvious that the good Kirk alone is missing something, he can’t make decisions or give orders and is feeling weak. Finally the crew realizes that both Kirks are dying— that they need each other to live. They miraculously fix the transporter room just in time and ‘beam’ the two Kirks back into one. The old commanding, decisive Kirk is back and when Spock asks him how to explain where the bad Kirk went to the crew, he says, “tell them that the intruder is back where he belongs and to leave it at that.”

I realized that what if I stopped fighting all the ‘bad’ inside me, and stopped worrying so much about all the ‘bad’ in others (even the guy on my team) and even stopped worrying about the ‘bad’ in humanity escaping out to the stars, or worse yet not letting us get there. It seemed strange to stop. What would I do all day? What would become of us???

I realized that in the past I had encouraged people not to fight each other but to fight entropy, after all entropy is the REAL enemy of us all right? Suddenly even that was called into question. Death is entropy and death is critical to a biosphere’s function. It is part of the design. Without it the system would not work, just like without the bad Kirk, Kirk did not work. Maybe I don’t even need to fight entropy. I started to wonder if maybe it was time to have my life be about something other than fighting.

I pondered that one as I watched strange enormous snow flakes begin to fall out my window. What would I do all day? What does the Dalai Lama do all day? I guess just be with everything as it was happening. Be compassionate, be accepting, be peaceful. It seemed a strange concept. What would I judge my self-worth on? What if people thought I was lazy? But I realized those where just thoughts of someone who was always fighting.

I began to realize that I had no idea what that life would look like and even more strangely that it was ok not to know. I am an explorer right? What better place for me then somewhere off the map… Somewhere new to explore.

What could I create or have my life be about if I wasn’t fighting? What inspires me?

What I do know is I love the beauty of snow falling, I love the sublime feeling of being connected with another person, I love the joy of exploring the unknown, and I have a lot of respect for the Dalai Lama.

Pressure-Activated Buttons

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Hi everyone,

I'm a product design student and I'm currently working on a project designing a new personal alarm worn on the wrist. I want the alarm to be activated by applying a pressure on two 'buttons' so the buttons can only react if the specified force on the buttons have been r