Month: April 2012

Cha-Ching ⇥

The reason I’m posting a bunch of links regarding the big Instagram deal is because I don’t think anyone saw this coming. It’s pretty shocking.

Anyway, Mike Isaac over at Wired magazine notes what each of the employees will be receiving. Suffice to say, it’s a huge paycheque, especially for the CEO:

[Instagram CEO Kevin] Systrom owns 40 percent of Instagram, according to a source close to the company, who provided Wired with figures from 2011. That will net Systrom $400 million to take home as a result of the deal.

Isaac also notes that Instagram’s 13 part-time employees each get a portion of a $100-million pool. That’s one enormous payday.

Instagram’s User Base Wasn’t the Only Thing Growing ⇥

Shawn Blanc:

Last week: April 6, 2012, Instagram raised another $50 million on the same valuation of $500 million.

Today: Sold for $1 billion.

That’s one hell of an increase. My bet is that Facebook wanted to ensure they captured their biggest competition in the mobile photo sharing space.

On a slightly related note, Shawn Blanc recently rolled out a dashing update to his site. You should check it out.

Facebook to Buy Instagram for $1 Billion ⇥

Thomas Houston:

Mark Zuckerberg took to Facebook today to announce that Facebook has agreed to acquire photo-sharing service Instagram for $1 billion in “a combination of cash and shares of Facebook.” The entire Instagram team — 6 employees — will be joining Facebook, and interestingly, Zuckerberg says that Instagram will be built and grown “independently” and that its integration with other services is an “important part of the experience.”

Big, slightly alarming news. I love Instagram, and I don’t hate Facebook nearly to the extent that detractors seem to. But I can’t see how the sterility of the latter will integrate with Instagram.

Neven Mrgan explained on Twitter:

Instagram is the first Facebook acquisition of a popular product. Really interested to see how they’ll integrate it into FB.

There was Gowalla, which was a) already riding off into the sunset, b) stitched into Facebook invisibly; the product disappeared.

Absolutely. I’m not sure Facebook understands how important it is to preserve the Instagram experience.

My other theory is that Facebook desperately wants to acquire Tim Van Damme.

Nice Timing, AT&T ⇥

Brain X. Chen:

AT&T said last month that when Nokia’s new Lumia 900 phone went on sale April 8, it would benefit from the company’s biggest product introduction ever, exceeding even the iPhone’s.

The big day is here. But nearly all 39 AT&T stores within proximity of Times Square in Manhattan were either closed for Easter Sunday or did not answer phone calls. The few that were open did not have the handset in stock.

Pure stupidity.

Blew ⇥

It’s a week of significant deaths and anniversaries. Eighteen years ago today, the body of Kurt Cobain was found in his Aberdeen home. This is “Blew”, as performed at Reading Festival, 1993. Worth watching are the studio breakdowns of Nevermind with producer Butch Vig.

We Die Young ⇥

In the midst of the deaths on Thursday, I neglected to mention that it was also the tenth anniversary of Layne Staley’s death.

Wait, a CEO Said That? ⇥

Ben Brooks shares some of his favourite bits from Larry Page’s tome of a letter to shareholders:

I am really not sure why he even included this bit when talking about Google Wallet:

No more claiming you left your credit card at home when your friend asks you to pay for lunch!

Pro tip: don’t accuse your user as being the schmuck that is mooching off of his friends.

Brooks also notes Page’s (over)use of exclamation points, a punctuation mark which is almost always unnecessary.

Please Stop Hauling Out Steve Jobs’ Ghost ⇥

Mat Honan:

It’s pointless drivel that does nothing to advance an argument. It’s the same bullshit you see about America’s Founding Fathers. “The Founding Fathers never would have supported a moon base!” How can you contradict that? How can you argue with anyone who pretends to know the wishes of the dead?

Well said.

Why Android Won’t Ruin Instagram ⇥

Dan Frommer:

The good news is that the only way Android could ruin Instagram is if you let it ruin Instagram for you.

Precisely. I don’t follow people on Instagram that post crappy photos. If you don’t like someone’s content, don’t follow them. Easy.

Update from the CEO ⇥

Larry Page (emphasis mine):

I have always believed that technology should do the hard work—discovery, organization, communication—so users can do what makes them happiest: living and loving, not messing with annoying computers!

Further along in the same section:

When you sign up for Google+, you can use Circles to group people into different categories, such as “Friends,” “Family,” or “Rocket Scientists,” and then engage with them just like in real life.

The Difference Between 7″ and 7.85″ is Everything ⇥

Odi Kosmatos (emphasis mine):

Here’s why I think there will be a tablet from Apple that’s optimized for reading and has a 7″ retina display that runs iPhone apps unmodified, not a tablet with a 7.85″ display that runs iPad apps unmodified.

Kosmatos, later in his post:

A 7″ diagonal screen (7.08″ to be exact) just happens to be the exact size of two by two iPod touch retina displays. That’s a 4″ x 6″ display surface. An iPod touch screen has 326 PPI. The 7″ screen would also have 326 PPI just like iPhones and iPods. This would yield a resolution of 1920 x 1280. This resolution would be able to run current retina iPhone applications pixel perfect using the traditional 4:1 pixel scaling, like retina displays do with non-retina apps.

Notice how bad non-retina apps look on a retina display? This would essentially be an “@4x” display, which would force developers to modify their retina apps to be double-sized again.

I think Kosmatos has an interesting idea here, but I think a 7.85″ non-retina iPad is far more likely, partially because of the reasoning I’ve presented, and partially because it’s more logical to market a small iPad than a big iPod touch. Via Jim Dalrymple.

Simplicity and Obviousness ⇥

Sebastiaan de With:

With releasing iOS 1.0, Apple set its set of standard interface paradigms for its touchscreen devices. We’re only now beginning to truly grasp the interactions of this brave new world and seeing what people can reasonably be expected to ‘figure out’ on their own accord (take pinch-to-zoom as learned gesture, for example). Clear is a great example of this: for me, it was a delight to figure it out, but one of my older family members was less than delighted by it: the lack of visible features she was so used to intimidated her.

Good points here. I think a lot of the new paradigms surface through repetition and familiarity. It’s a self-driving machine: successful interaction methods are discovered with one app, are copied, and become widely-used. Take a look at pull to refresh, for example.

Google Begins Testing Its Augmented Reality Glasses ⇥

It’s a cool idea that I will never use. Think Bluetooth headsets, only about ten times more irritating.

I’m perhaps being short-sighted, given that the video is demonstrating social networking achievements in augmented reality. However, Jason Lotito notes that this has further potential:

What this will provide for disabled and autistic people is amazing. It’s too easy to get caught up in the “social sharing” part of this and forget that something like this can really help change people’s lives.

Absolutely. And, to be entirely truthful, I think it will be more applicable in the lives of the disabled than in our lives.

Nokia Lumia 900 Review ⇥

I really wanted to love this device. As I have frequently stated, I think Windows Phone 7 is an interesting and generally well-executed operating system. Joshua Topolsky also wanted to like it, but found it wanting:

These aren’t minor gripes I have — they speak to the foundations of this OS. My annoyances aren’t just about the color choices in the calendar, they’re about whether or not scrolling in apps functions as it should, or if I’ll get important updates in the background. Can I use IRC without breaking my connection every time I leave the app? How many steps does it take to get to the information I need? Do webpages display properly? Will the apps I need or want to use make it to this platform, and will they be any good when they get there?

In some ways, I feel like I’m reviewing a webOS device again (but with much, much nicer hardware). There are all these wonderful ideas at play, but it’s impossible to look past the nagging bugs and missing features.

But I thought my phone sucked? Brian X. Chen, yesterday:

Nokia’s strategy to sell its new Lumia smartphone is to make you feel dumb about what you already have. New video ads from Nokia, the Finnish phone maker, suggest that iPhones and Android phones are flawed, unfinished “beta” devices, which makes you a sucker for having one.

Nokia has built a great device here, and Windows Phone 7 should be a great operating system. Or, more accurately, it has the potential to be a good OS. But it is perpetually far behind what Apple and Google are shipping, making every device it ships on a “beta” device, in opposition to the marketing promise.