tbolt

Instagram and The Blogosphere

Yesterday was an interesting day for Instagram. The morning was full of backlash and outcries over their new Terms of Service. Then, after an official statement from Instagram, there was even more comotion. Now that the dust has settled a bit, I decided to take a look back.

Start by reading MG Seigler’s article on Tech Crunch

Some highlights:

Some days I feel like the blogosphere is full of paranoid attention whores. Other days, I’m sure of it. Today is one of those days.

Have to agree with this as I really don’t think the story warrented such a reaction.

Well, now we have Instagram’s actual statement on the matter, and it’s pretty straightforward: “To be clear: it is not our intention to sell your photos,” wrote co-founder Kevin Systrom. He goes on to note that: “The language we proposed also raised question about whether your photos can be part of an advertisement. We do not have plans for anything like this and because of that we’re going to remove the language that raised the question.” Not quite as straightforward — and I’m sure we’ll have 15 more blog posts on the matter — but clearly well-intentioned.

Well-intentioned or not, its quite the opposite of straightforward. It’s not their intention to sell everyones photos, but that doesn’t answer the question whether they will or not.

Fortunately, I am not the only one who drew this conclusion.

Note how ‘it is not our intention to sell your photos’ isn’t the same as saying ‘we won’t sell your photos’. Despite the forthrightness of the tone, the message is still unclear – will you or won’t you?

Update: Instagram has reverted back to the original Terms of Service

Late 2012 iMac thoughts

Remarkably thin.

That’s the impression the first glance gave me. It’s quite an engineering achievement, and further strengthens the argument that this is the future of desktop computers.

Now this new slim design doesn’t come without sacrifice. iFixits teardown shows just how difficult it will be to do any sort of upgrades or repairs. While a batch of nerds will be upset with this, it’s clearly the right move. Apple sells a clean and complete desktop. If you need hot-swap hd bays, or easily removable RAM, look elsewhere. Id wager 90%+ of iMac owners never even consider upgrading even the RAM.

Concerning the “updated” display. It’s nice, a good upgrade but not jaw-dropping. About what you expect since its not retina. Apple claims 75% reduction in glare, which, I had a hard time distinguishing that this was true. But going back and forth from a Thunderbolt Display, the difference is clear. It’s a very nice improvement but still not on the level of matte.

The Future of The Thunderbolt Display

One item I have been very intrigued by lately is the Apple Thunderbolt Display. Why? It’s a strange item that is so niche I wonder how it exists. However, I believe it to be a compelling product. Not only is it a gorgeous 27″ IPS display with excellent color accuracy, it also packs a number of hardware controllers.

The ultimate docking station.

With just one cable, connect any Thunderbolt-enabled Mac and get 27 inches of high-resolution screen space, high-quality audio, a FaceTime HD camera, FireWire 800 and Gigabit Ethernet ports — and a Thunderbolt port you can use to daisy-chain additional high-performance peripherals such as hard drives and video capture devices.

With the recent updates to the iMac, I can’t help but crave an update to the Thunderbolt display.

Not too often do you see a dock combined with a display. It’s a neat concept that really makes sense, and arguably the most elegant solution for laptop docking. The thin-and-light to-go machine and large home dock-in-a-display that simply extends your experience.

Let’s see an update for the Apple Thunderbolt Display with:

  • An ultrathin design similar to the Late-2012 iMacs
  • Screen-on-glass
  • A 75% Less reflective display
  • Optional Fusion Drive
  • A Couple USB 3.0 ports

I also wonder if we will see more integration with iDevices, like being able to hook up an iPad to a Thunderbolt Display would be quite interesting. Plus, following with the hardware-in-a-display model, we could see more benefits of pairing the Thunderbolt display with an iPad.