Ma.gnolia: Jeff Croft's Bookmarks

Five Signs You're Living Beyond Your Means

jcroft — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 16:13:31 PDT

Useful personal finance information.

Apple apologizes for its MobileMe mess, offers 30-days free

jcroft — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 09:09:48 PDT

Apple has publicly apologized for the disaster that was the MobileMe launch, as well as the misleading use of the word "push," and given subscribers a free 30-day extension to their service. A nice gesture for what was, indeed, an ugly string of screw-ups. I especially like the letter's copywriting: no-bullshit, sincere, to the point, and personal. We all know a lot of companies would have taken a "our Terms of Service clearly indicate that we can not guarantee our services," sort of approach. Well-done, Apple. Now that things are running smoothly, I'm really liking MobileMe a lot. Not having to put my iPhone in its dock all the damn time to ensure I've got my latest contacts and calendar events on all my device is really a sweet thing. There's no doubt this is a better service than .Mac for iPhone owners. I'm not sure it's an improvement for those who just want to keep multiple Macs in sync -- but, whatever.

Webmaster Jam Session 2008 Session List

jcroft — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 14:42:01 PDT

WJS 2008 looks like it's going to be awesome. Last year, it had probably a better combination of fun and education than any other conference I attended. This year ought to be even better, as the event has moved to Atlanta, which, at least in my opinion, is a far better place than Dallas. Be there!

Touch Arcade

jcroft — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 17:33:57 PDT

A nice looking blog about iPhone/iPod touch gaming.

NonSociety

jcroft — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 14:27:11 PDT

NonSociety is "your window into [the] crazy lives" of a handful of women -- notably, Julia Allison. Basically, it's a few tumblelogs of hot chicks. More importantly (to me, anyway), the "lifecasts" have a clever and good-looking [horizontal-scrolling design](http://julia.nonsociety.com/). I dig it. Via [Rex](http://fimcoulous.com). *Just curious: anyone know if they're using Tumblr to power the thing?*

Apple changes MobileMe "features" page

jcroft — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 14:15:26 PDT

Apple has changed the text on it's MobileMe "features" page, indicating that sync from computer to cloud aren't really "push" at all, but rather standard interval-based syncs. The textual change comes after a lot of folks complained about "false advertising" and "deception" on the part of Apple. The page previously stated: > MobileMe stores all your email, contacts, and calendars in the cloud and pushes them down to your iPhone, iPod touch, Mac, and PC. When you make a change on one device, the cloud updates the others. Push happens automatically, instantly, and continuously. You don’t have to wait for it or remember to do anything — such as docking your iPhone and syncing manually — to stay up to date. As of today, it says: > MobileMe stores all your email, contacts, and calendars in the cloud and keeps them in sync across your iPhone, iPod touch, Mac, and PC. When you make a change in one place, MobileMe pushes the new information up to the cloud, then pushes the change down to your other devices. Choose a sync interval for your Mac or PC. On your iPhone and the web, sync happens continuously. It's good that Apple has made this more clear, but it doesn't change the fact that they absolutely *did* misrepresent how the service works -- not only on their site, but also during the WWDC keynote demo. Form talking to someone inside Apple, it sounds as though "true" push is likely to come to the Mac with updates to iCal, Address Book, Mail, and Safai, but who knows when that will be. It's good to hear it may be coming though, and is not entirely a lost cause. Thanks to [Bret](http://nyquistrate.com/) for letting me know about the text change.

StuffChicksWant.com

jcroft — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 10:21:03 PDT

Cool new aptly-named blog: it tells you what stuff chicks want. Good for chicks who want to know what they should want, and men that have to buy chicks stuff they do want.

BlackBerry Thunder

jcroft — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 14:54:09 PDT

RIM's soon-to-be-released "iPhone Killer" is pretty interesting. It features a multi touch screen with tactile feedback. Apparently, when you press an on-screen key, the screen actually depresses slightly and provides haptic feedback in the form of a buzz under your finger where you pressed on the screen. Just hearing about it, I'm not sure it's something I'd want, but I'd love to feel it for myself. If it work well, it could be very cool. It uses WebKit for its browser. I also like how the phone does full QWERTY in landscape and RIM's SureType in portrait -- clever choice.

Harper Reed on web hosting

jcroft — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 14:47:43 PDT

Harper Reed of skinnyCorp gives a rundown of web hosting companies he's had success with. He gives my personal favorite, WebFaction, an absolutely glowing review, and also has nice things to say about Mosso, MediaTemple, FDCservers, and Rackspace

Authentic Jobs: Lead Designer at SEOMoz

jcroft — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 14:42:26 PDT

I've met several of the SEOMoz crew in Seattle, and they seem like good people. If you want to work for one of the few SEO companies with scruples, here's your chance.

DjangoCon 2008

jcroft — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 13:41:29 PDT

The first annual DjangoCon will take place September 6th and 7th at the Googleplex in Mountain View. It will coordinate with the 1.0 release of the popular web application framework, and will include a release party on Saturday night. There is only space for about 200 attendees, but the conference is *free* (you are, however, encouraged to make an optional donation to the [Django Software Foundation](http://www.djangoproject.com/foundation/) to help cover costs).

MobileMe doesn't push from Mac to Me.com and handheld devices

jcroft — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 13:37:55 PDT

Turns out, MobileMe doesn't "push" changes to calendars and contacts made on your Mac to the Me.com web apps and your handheld devices. From an [Apple Knowledgebase article](http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1155): > Changes made on your computer will be synced to the MobileMe "cloud" once every 15 minutes (or every hour in Mac OS X 10.4.11). Changes to calendars and contacts made on Me.com or on your iPhone *will* be pushed to your Mac immediately, but the reverse is not true. Strange. From Apple's [MobileMe features](http://www.apple.com/mobileme/features/) page: > MobileMe stores all your email, contacts, and calendars in the cloud and pushes them down to your iPhone, iPod touch, **Mac, and PC. When you make a change on one device, the cloud updates the others. Push happens automatically, instantly, and continuously. You don’t have to wait for it** or remember to do anything — such as docking your iPhone and syncing manually — to stay up to date Emphasis mine. For many people, including me, a 15 minute sync time is probably just fine in real-world usage. But, it definitely seems contrary to how the service was promoted and demoed at the WWDC keynote, and I can definitely understand why so many people are complaining about it on the MacRumors forums and across the Internet. This sort of reeks of deception. A couple things worth pointing out about this, for those wondering why it's a big deal: 1. It's an especially big deal for laptop users, who are prone to opening their laptop, adding a calendar event or contact, and then closing it again. If MobileMe really "pushed" from Mac to the cloud, then this behavior would be fine -- the update has already made it to the cloud by the time the laptop is closed. If a user has to sit there, laptop open, for at least 15 minutes, to ensure the sync takes place, that sucks. 2. MobileMe isn't all about the iPhone. It's *supposed* to keep *all* your devices instantly in sync, including multiple Macs. Someone who doesn't have an iPhone but has two Macs might want to keep their laptop in sync with their desktop. The old .Mac did this at a 15 minute interval, and MobileMe was promoted as an improvement that made the sync near-instantaneous. In reality, for this user, MobileMac is not an improvement at all -- and that also sucks.

Review: Practical Django Projects

jcroft — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 20:52:16 PDT

Clint Ecker has a nice review on Ars of my buddy James Bennett's new book, Practical Django Projects.

Twitter users reporting problems with iPhone in-store activation

jcroft — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 08:10:28 PDT

According to a growing number of people on Twitter, Apple is having problems with its in-store activation process. Couple this with the botched MobileMe rollout, and this launch isn't looking good for Apple right now. Here's hoping they get it all resolved in short order. Update: [Engadget on the activation problems](http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/11/itunes-activation-servers-go-down-iphone-3g-customers-being-sen/).

.Mac migration to MobileMe hits some roadblocks

jcroft — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 20:10:57 PDT

It's now been 24 hours since the start of the six-hour downtown window Apple gave for the .Mac to MobileMe migration. I'm frustrated. A lot of people are frustrated. But a lot of other people, in forums around the Internet, are saying, "Oh, get over it. You've waited this long for MobileMe, you can wait another day or two." Those people are *missing the point*. I pay for .Mac, and I rely upon its services (notably Sync, Back to My Mac, and iDisk). I'm not upset that MobileMe isn't ready yet; I'm upset that Apple has taken away my .Mac services. MobileMe can take six months for all I care, but I *need* my syncing and iDisk. Apple has another problem at play, too: a lot of the hype surrounding the new iPhone 3G is directly related to its integration with MobileMe. The iPhone went on sale hours ago on the other side of the world, and will go on sale in less than 10 hours here in America. If the push e-mail, contact, and calendar functionality Apple has been hyping for the past couple months isn't available when these people get their iPhones home, the media is going to have a fucking field day -- and RIM's stock is going to look pretty darn good. Update: Media frenzy has begun. [AP article on .Mac/MobileMe transition woes](http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25630792/). And a new article on [ComputerWord](http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9108998&intsrc=hm_list).

Where is the Native Brightkite iPhone App?

jcroft — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 17:48:35 PDT

The Brightkite team says their native iPhone app will be out by the end of the month. Great news, because so far, I'm not very impressed with Loopt or Whrrl. Brightkite's iPhone web version defeats both by a long, long longshot.

Fifty Most Influential Female Bloggers

jcroft — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 15:35:04 PDT

A solid, well-rounded list that includes a ton of great bloggers and a handful of good friends. Via [Rex](http://fimoculous.com), who is [just a bit uptight](http://twitter.com/fimoculous/statuses/854991174) about people not giving him credit for the links they steal from his site -- even though he no doubt stole them from somewhere else. (Just teasing, buddy.)

How to Get the iPhone 2.0 Upgrade Right Now

jcroft — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 14:09:17 PDT

Ever since I tweeted that I have installed iPhone 2.0 and downloaded apps from the app store, I've gotten countless IM's, DM's, and e-mails asking me how. It's been all over the Internet all morning, so it's no secret, but Wired has now published a comprehensive, step-by-step guide that is probably the simplest to follow that I've seen. So, get on it.

Daniel Will-Harris: Working with a designer

jcroft — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 15:14:12 PDT

A nice piece on how to be a good client for a designer.

Matt Brown on "Digital Film"

jcroft — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 14:05:54 PDT

Matt talks about a few ways the digital photography process if different from shooting film, and why those difference may be keeping you from getting the best possible photos. He offers some great tips on how to "reel yourself in" from the digital world and get back to some of the film methods that work so well. While I generally think these are great tips and would definitely encourage anyone to try them, I also think some of the things Matt suggests avoiding (taking too many photos, using the LCD too much, etc.) can be great exercises in and of themselves. I guess what I'm saying is: while one can definitely learn a lot by shutting off the LCD and limiting the number of shots, I think one can also learn a lot by taking a million photos, rushing home, and seeing what they got. The thing is, most folks *already* do that every day, so Matt's suggestions are a great change of pace for those who have never shot film, or haven't shot film in a long time.

Malcom Gladwell on hiring

jcroft — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 10:20:09 PDT

Great video of Malcolm Gladwell talking about the challenge of hiring in the modern world. While some of his sporting examples are a little questionable, I completely agree with the basic premise that the combine, and other similar measures of performance in other industries, are inherently flawed. I would add, too, that I think the way we *promote* people to management in the United States is idiotic. The idea that someone who performs very well in his/her job makes them a good candidate for a promotion to management is flatly absurd. The skills needed to be a great manager are drastically different -- and in some cases, *at odds with* -- the skills needed to be a great worker.

django-chunks

jcroft — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 15:28:38 PDT

This is extremely similar to an internal app we used to The Lawrence Journal-World, and to one I've used on some of my personal project. For those of us well-versed in HTML and such, it may not be necessary (you can just put these bits straight into your templates), but if you need arbitrary pieces of content to be manageable via the Django admin interface (so that some non-HTML savvy folks can edit them, for example), it works well.

26Gallery

jcroft — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 15:25:05 PDT

Really cool, unique art pieces designed from a series of letters. Great for decorating, the abstract fields of color remind me of Rothko. Very reasonable prices, too.

Shortwave

jcroft — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 15:04:23 PDT

Shaun Inman's clever little search bookmarklet is extensible and customizable. Simple and clean. I dig it.

Matt: Multi Account Twitter Tweeter

jcroft — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:31:54 PDT

Carsonified's four-day Django gem has launched. It's a little tool that lets you easily post a single tweet to multiple Twitter accounts. Although it's not something I particularly need (I only use one Twitter account), it's a nice example of how quickly a team can make something cool with Django, and it's got a freaking wonderful illustrated design, to boot. Congrats, Carsonified!

Webmonkey: Install Django and Build Your First App

jcroft — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 13:17:48 PDT

Webmonkey has jumped on the Django bandwagon with this nice tutorial on how to get up and running with the Python-based web application framework.

Cornerstone: GUI SVN Client

jcroft — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 13:16:13 PDT

Another Mac SVN client. This one, at a glance, looks more interesting than Versions, to me.

Rabhuja Design, copyright infringement at its finest

jcroft — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 12:53:07 PDT

The jackass (or asses) that run this site have pirated my chapter of Web Standards Creatvitiy, a book I co-authored for Friends of ED, and published it in their blog as their very own. From what I can tell, their entire blog is made up of articles they didn't write. What a bunch of assholes.

EveryBlock adds Charlotte and Philly

jcroft — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 13:11:16 PDT

Congrats to my friends at EveryBlock, who have launched a couple new cities, as well as some new functionality. Good stuff.

An interview with Tara Hunt

jcroft — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 11:47:07 PDT

My buddy Mel Kirk interviews online community guru Tara Hunt -- who, for the record, I finally got to hang out with a few months ago in San Francisco and found to be downright awesome.