Mike Cohen

links for 2009-03-21

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  • destination: OUT —
    An mp-free jazz blog focusing on rare or out-of-print music. We generally publish once a week. Songs will be available for a limited time, and are for evaluation purposes only. Attend concerts. Buy music.
    (tags: music blog mp3blog)
  • The Online Photographer: Giving Us a Power We Don't Have
    "On the 16th of February, the U.K. Government passed a law (in the Counter Terrorism Act) making it illegal to take a photograph of a police office, military personnel or member of the intelligence services—or a photograph which 'may be of use for terrorism.' This definition is vague at best, and open to interpretation by the police—who under Home Secretary guidelines can 'restrict photography in public places.' "
    (tags: photography government fascism)

Canadian accused at U.S. border of 'stealing American jobs'

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Via CBC:

A B.C. sales representative who markets equestrian products in Canada was barred from crossing the U.S. border to attend a trade show last month by a U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer who accused him of trying to steal American jobs.

“He looked at me, and in a yelling voice he said, ‘You’re friggin’ stealing jobs away from American citizens,’ and I tried telling him that I wasn’t,” Joel Borsteinas told CBC News.

Borsteinas, a Canadian citizen, said he’s been in business for 15 years, acting as a middleman between U.S. and Canadian suppliers of western wear and equestrian products and Canadian retailers who want to stock the products.

He said he goes to the U.S. half a dozen times a year to attend trade shows and meet with suppliers who want him to market their products to retailers north of the border. They pay him a commission for every Canadian order he sends to them.

As an American working for a Canadian company, I find this completely outrageous. I got to Vancouver at least once a year, and lately I’ve been thinking very seriously about moving there. My job would be a lot easier if I was working on site, and I’m getting more disgusted with this country every day because of bullshit like this, despite having a president I like & respect.

iDrive Warning

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When I noticed the free iDrive backup utility at MacUpdate, I decided to download and try it, which requires signing up for the iDrive service. Big mistake. When you sign up for iDrive, you’re prompted to invite friends from your gmail address book. When you do so, it doesn’t give you an option to choose who to invite. It spams *EVERY* address, including posting addresses for services like Tumblr.

My iPhone 3.0 score card

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Yesterday I posted my list of things I’d like to see in iPhone OS 3.0. Here’s how the actual OS stacks up to my wish list.

  1. No tasks & doesn’t appear to be a calendar API.
  2. We have note syncing, but not clear whether there’s a note API.
  3. YES! The standard mail form can be accessed via a new API.
  4. No. Apple still insists background processing will drain the battery too fast.
  5. YES! You can now access the iPod library and control the audio player.
  6. Yes
  7. No, although there are some improvements like spotlight searching.
  8. YES!
  9. YES!
  10. Not clear if we have video recording.
  11. YES! MMS is supported with a new message application that replaces SMS.
  12. YES! We have full cut/copy/paste/undo!

There are also a lot of other goodies, like accessory hardware access, in-application store purchases, bluetooth stereo, and peer-to-peer connections.

My iPhone 3.0 Wish List

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As everyone probably knows, Apple is having a media event tomorrow to announce iPhone OS 3.0. Here are some of the things I’d really like to see.

  1. Support for tasks in the calendar, and a full API for accessing the calendar.
  2. Note syncing, and an API to access notes.
  3. An API for sending mail with attachments. Having the user re-enter their SMTP info in another application is a major FAIL.
  4. Some limited background processing and launchd or cron for scheduling processes.
  5. API to access & control iPod, at least to determine the current song playing, which applications could use to obtain artwork & lyrics or submit to last.fm, for example.
  6. Support more video formats in AV Player.
  7. Better application management in springboard – categorize applications, folders, jump to any screen, list view.
  8. Landscape view in mail & other applications.
  9. Push notification.
  10. Video recording.
  11. MMS.
  12. Copy & Paste.