Posts

  • movies.io

    movies.io combines a pleasant and great-looking user interface with all the functionality needed to find and collect the best films out there.

    In plain english, it’s a torrent searching service for movies.

    It has a fantastic interface which makes movie discovery a total joy. The only problem is that I can’t pay for these movies. There just isn’t an option available for international customers.

    The Perils of Copy Protection wrote about this previously.

    · · ·
  • The Blind Shooting the Blind

    Stephen van Egmond:

    Apple gets a lot of ignorant hate, and a lot of ignorant reverence. Let me give some informed reverence for one area where they kick so much ass: accessibility.

    I simply gawped when one blind woman pulled out an iPhone then snapped a perfect shot, guided by the built-in Camera app.

    Can you believe it, a blind person can use the iOS Camera.app to shoot a decently focused photo?

    The magic lies in VoiceOver: “One face. Small face. Face near right edge. Autofocussed.”

    You might end up asking yourself why Apple went to such effort to let a blind person take a picture. The only answer I can give is they not only care about making accessible applications: they also actually put in the effort.

    Exactly.

    There are a few more VoiceOver examples in the linked-post, go check it out.

    · · ·
  • Apple Turns Over Entire Inventory Every Five Days

    AppleInsider:

    A report from research firm Gartner says that Apple has an inventory turn metric of 74, which means that the iPad maker turns over its entire inventory once every five days, a staggering number for a consumer electronics company.

    The only other company to beat the Cupertino, Calif., electronics giant was McDonalds with 142.4 inventory turns equating to a 2.5 day turnover for total inventory.

    Dell and Samsung followed Apple in the electronics category with turnovers every 10 and 21 days, respectively.

    Kindle-maker and internet sales monolith Amazon took the second overall spot on three-year revenue growth of 37.7 percent and boasts an inventory turnover about once every 37 days. The way in which Amazon operates is novel, however, and continues to push the envelope of generally accepted inventory practices.

    Can you believe it, Dell, the pioneer of Just-in-time manufacturing has a slower inventory turnover than Apple?

    Apple is just not a very good marketing company, it is an extremely efficient and effective company.

    · · ·
  • Initial Thoughts on Windows 8

    A few days back, I decided to take Windows 8 Release Preview for spin. I downloaded the ISO files files and installed it into VirtualBox as a brand-new virtual machine.

    After playing with Windows 8 for an hour, I’m convinced that there are severe design issues in the current state. Furthermore, it is unlikely that Microsoft will think otherwise and fix these glaring errors before Windows 8 goes RTM.

    The biggest surprise I had was that there isn’t an intuitively way of quitting or switching metro apps, shutting down the computer, and locating functionality which once was in the Start Menu.

    Michael Mace made a 13 minute summary video along with a review and critique of the Windows 8 UI. While I’ve heard comments that his reviews are overly biased and potentially fear mongering, read it for what it’s worth.

    · · ·