Blogs

WWDC 2014: Why being wrong is the most exciting thing in years!

WWDC Logo

WWDC Logo

Looking back to last week’s WWDC keynote and also my last blog post (as well as the pre-WWDC TUAW Talkcast), the one thing that struck me besides being completely and utterly blown away was the fact that almost all predictions and wishes were totally wrong. Mine almost certainly were!
Granted, I didn’t expect to be right, but even the things I really, really thought would happen, didn’t happen after all. And even our wildest guesses, things we thought very likely wouldn’t happen, were just minor bullet-points on the long list of really amazing announcements.

All of this is really exciting to me.

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My WWDC 2014 predictions

WWDC Logo

WWDC Logo

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been talking on multiple occasions about what I expect to be announced during WWDC next week. And as those predictions are all spread over different podcasts and chats, I thought I’d document them here so people can point fingers after the announcements and laugh about how wrong I’ve been.
Yes, I expect to be wrong. I have no real insight into Apple, no secret sources other than a few hints here and there from people who are better connected than me. Nothing more than my own understanding of how Apple works based on what I know and how the company has behaved in the past. Plus maybe a little bit of wishful thinking.

So, here we go. I’m ready to be ridiculed.

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Opinion: Why App.net hasn't failed and why it hasn't been a success either

App.net Logo

App.net Logo

I really love App.net. There, I said it. Just wanted to make that perfectly clear before I dive into this topic.

App.net, or ADN as many like to call it, has been around since August 2012. Initially Mixed Media Labs, the company behind ADN, had launched the service as a Twitter competitor using a Kickstarter campaign to gain traction and collect much needed funds . Their idea: to create a service where the user pays a small fee each month to use the service and with that becomes the real owner of his data. The service doesn’t need to sell its user base to advertisers to keep the lights on (unlike Twitter, Facebook and so many of social networks).

Recently, those initial users/supporters were up for subscription renewal.

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How to build a DIY standing desk for cheap

My standing desk

My standing desk

A few years back, I saw someone in a professional radio studio working on a standing desk. This was way before my time as a web radio host and even before I started thinking about my career (I was still in school). Back then, the ease of moving around in the studio fascinated me.
Years later, when I was producing/reading the news for a smaller web radio station, I got the chance to experience the advantages of working on a standing desk myself. A desk I had also built. It wasn’t the fancy, motorized version I had seen before, but a mere raised counter top version. Still, I loved it! With its faults and everything.
Then I moved, switching universities, quitting the web radio “job” and leaving the desk behind. For years I worked on “normal” desks, sitting all day long.
Every now and then I would hear about standing desks (or treadmill desks), or see one on the internet somewhere. And every time I would think about either buying one or somehow changing my workflow so that I wouldn’t sit as much. Then I would dismiss the idea for one reason or another.

Until I build my own version of a standing desk last weekend.

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