12/07/2007
TowleTech V.83
Please welcome Jon Barrett, with this week's tech news about the world's second-larest Apple Store, robotic masturbation, eBook readers, Polaroid pictures, mega-sized Tetris games, and Facebook apologies.
Apple opened its third Manhattan store—in Chelsea—this evening. The three-story space, located at 14th Street and 9th Avenue, is the second largest Apple store in the country (just smaller than the one on Chicago's Michigan Avenue), but the big news is that it’s the first to offer free Pro Labs. Get more information, see more pictures and a video survey of the space here. Also at Gothamist, where we found the cool composite image above.
If you want an ebook but are torn between the Amazon Kindle and the Sony Reader, here’s a nudge from Sony: The company is now offering 100 free classic book titles with each purchase.
You think your thumbs hurt after a long text message? Ponder this: More than half of the top-selling fiction books in Japan for the first half of this year were written on a cell phone. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, mobile phone novels (called keitai shousetsu) have become a publishing phenomenon in the country. One book, Koizora (Love Sky), which is about a high-school girl who is bullied and gang-raped and then becomes pregnant, has sold more than 1.2 million copies since being published.
Check out this video of students rigging lights in a dorm into a sky-scraping game of Tetris. And while you’re at it, take a look at this PacMan Christmas tree.
As many amazing digital cameras as there are out there, no LCD screen or photo printer provides the unique satisfaction of a Polaroid print. And now there’s a site for Polaroid fans. Polanoid.net is trying to build the biggest Polaroid picture collection on the planet and is asking people to upload their personal photos for free. You can search the hundreds of thousands they have so far—by camera type, film type, location, and more.
Google this week released the “fastest-rising U.S search tearms.” Any of these sound familiar?
1. iphone
2. webkinz
3. tmz
4. transformers
5. youtube
6. club penguin
7. myspace
8. heroes
9. facebook
10. anna Nicole smith
Facebook’s CEO on Wednesday acknowledged that the company has made mistakes in its Beacon advertising program. Beacon announced users’ purchases—from sizes such as Amazon and Fandango—on Facebook news feeds. “We’ve made a lot of mistakes building this feature, but we’ve made even more with how we’ve handled them,” Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a blog post. “We simply did a bad job with this release, and I apologize for it… Instead of acting quickly, we took too long to decide on the right solution. I’m not proud of the way we’ve handled this situation and I know we can do better.” Facebook users, many of them organized by MoveOn.org, complained about the program after they felt it not only violated their privacy but that it ruined a few holiday surprises. With his apology, Zuckerberg also announced that users would be able to completely opt out of the Beacon program. Previously the site only allowed opt-outs on a site-by-site basis.
Google has launched a new interface for users who access the site with an iPhone, complete with a menu of services to choose from—home (search box), Gmail, Calendar, Reader, and More (docs sms, goog-411, news, photos, blogger, and notebook). You can see a video of the new interface (complete with Eye of the Tiger soundtrack) here. Meanwhile, in other Google news, it seems like the company is getting a little bit sloppy in its effort to scan every book ever printed.
And, in other iPhone news, an AT&T rep told Gizmodo.com last week that the company will soon have a data-only plan for the phone. Good news for hearing-impaired iPhone lovers.
OK, this is ridiculous. But it's good for a laugh. Introducing Rubbot, the male sex toy with the motto: Robotic Masturbation is coming. The creators are in beta stage (testers wanted, they say) and made this video to show how far they have to go.
Posted 6:00 PM EST by Jon Barrett in TowleTech | Permalink
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I would also like to invite all beta users of the rubbot who would compare to the size of a Heineken bottle to call me at 202-***-****.
Thanks!
Posted by: Alexander | Dec 7, 2007 10:55:46 PM
I wouldn't recommend Polanoid.
I love polaroids and there are some nice work on there, but Polanoid is a mess.
The web master email address listed under the faq doesn't work or at least it didn't two weeks ago when I tried it. Deleting pictures is really tough, sometimes you have to delete them two or three times for them to finally delete. Though they make it very easy to upload polas that already are on the web once you figure that out.
Posted by: A | Dec 7, 2007 11:48:07 PM
I find Mark Zuckerberg's post to be interesting, to say the least..kudos to his publicist...clearly, the whole Beacon program was vetted through the legal counsel that advised him that opt-out (i.e., you have to actively inform the site that you don't want your personal data farmed out)is perfectly legal in the US...as opposed to opt-in, which is the law in the EU (where you have to give the website explicit permission before they bundle off your personal data, and/or make it public). Seems as if the marketing department just assumed that most Americans wouldn't make a big stink about it, as they do with the vast majority of other websites they visit that perform in a similar basis...however, it became a public relations nightmare for him when the public cry was loud and fierce.
Really, why our internet laws are not the same as the European Union's is astonishing to me.
He knew Facebook could get big bucks from sites like Fandango if they could advertise that their members use the service; he just did not anticipate the extent of the negative press he would get.
I hope that other sites heed this warning.
Posted by: tommy | Dec 8, 2007 12:15:13 AM
Somehow, beta testing such a... vigorous... masturbating robot seems a bit... dangerous.
Posted by: erik | Dec 8, 2007 1:04:58 AM
I think Facebook sucks. I used it, had all my friends on it, but a combination of these privacy issues with a proliferation of those annoying third-party applications (X has challenged you to a Movie Taste Quiz, Y has sent you a Martini etc.) made me cancel the damn thing. I think they are fucking up.
Posted by: Mike | Dec 8, 2007 11:16:03 AM
Ok, Last night I saw something that I can't justify in my 40 years last night.
Trying to get to work I am stuck on 9th Avenue in a cab. Stopped forever, get out and decide to walk. I get to the corner and what do my eyes see?
Ten hhousand people wrapped in a line around a full city block waiting to get into the f****** Apple store.
WTF?
Police barricades. Traffic snarled. For a retail store? That already has two outposts in Manhattan and I assume is going to open longer than last night?
Please someone help me because I don't get it.
Or I have one word for you: Scientology. Money to get happy!
Posted by: Br!on | Dec 8, 2007 6:52:46 PM