After announcing both the new TidBITS Events public calendar and the release of Sharon Zardetto’s “Take Control of Safari 6” ebook, we have a pair of big-picture pieces for you this week. Jeff Porten returns with a thoughtful article about a talk given by astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson on what makes a technology cool (and what the age of cool artifacts says about that technology). Then Adam Engst explains how to think like a publisher — and why everyone who creates information for others, regardless of the specific situation, needs to pay attention to these lessons from the world of publishing. Notable software releases this week include TweetDeck 2.0, Firefox 16.0.1, and Voila 3.3.
So you can more easily participate in our online and real-world events, we’ve created the public TidBITS Events calendar in iCloud. Subscribe and you’ll never miss one of our presentations.
We’re sure you can basically get around on the Web with Safari, but if you want to learn all that Apple’s powerful Web browser can do, check out Sharon Zardetto’s 143-page “Take Control of Safari 6” ebook.
Jeff Porten shares an interesting insight from a talk by astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson — we can identify abandoned or stagnating technologies when examples of that technology remain cool decades later. How might this inform our view of today’s cutting edge devices?
Thanks to the personal computer and the Internet, anyone can be a publisher today. But while our software may now solve basic visual design problems for us, most people don’t know how to think like a publisher, which results in information that’s poorly designed and conveyed. Adam Engst explains how to do a better job.
Notable software releases this week include TweetDeck 2.0, Firefox 16.0.1, and Voila 3.3.
We have two multimedia ExtraBITS for you this week — a video of a Saturday Night Live sketch that pokes fun at the fuss surrounding the iPhone 5 and a Macworld podcast with Glenn Fleishman that discusses some of the real quirks and problems in iOS 6.