ExtraBITS for 16 May 2011
The beauty of the Web is that there are so many little facts that might be nice to know, and someone else has already shared them. That accounts for this week’s collection of links, noting 1Password’s creator’s name change, the appearance of the Library of Congress’s National Jukebox, and the tweaky fact that you can’t replace the new iMac’s main hard drive.
1Password Maker Changes Name to AgileBits — The company behind the popular 1Password utility has changed its name from Agile Web Solutions (which didn’t really reflect what they did) to the pithier and more accurate AgileBits. It’s not big news, but in a day and age where there are all sorts of phishing scams and the like, knowing the true identity of our tool makers is important.
Library of Congress National Jukebox Unveiled — The U.S. Library of Congress has opened the National Jukebox, a Web site that offers Flash-based streaming access to over 10,000 78 rpm discs issued by the Victor Talking Machine Company between 1900 and 1925. (The discs have been made available thanks to blanket permission from the rights-holder, Sony Music.) Thousands more are slated to be added soon. This is one of the great promises of the Internet, though it’s worth noting that these recordings can’t be downloaded because sound recordings published before 1972 are subject to state and/or common law protection, not Federal
copyright law, and thus won’t fully enter the public domain until 2067.
New 2011 iMac Hard Drive Cannot Be Removed or Replaced — Other World Computing has a new blog post explaining that the new 2011 iMacs now rely on a 7-wire SATA power connector and Apple proprietary firmware on the main hard drive to monitor the drive’s temperature. Remove or replace it, and the iMac’s fans run at full speed all the time. Boo on Apple for preventing owners from replacing the drive with one from any third-party vendor! Also be sure to read Other World Computing’s followup post.