Windows 10 Home Will Update Automatically

Tim Anderson at The Register found the following passage in the License Agreement for Windows 10 Build 10240:

"The Software periodically checks for system and app updates, and downloads and installs them for you.

You may obtain updates only from Microsoft or authorised sources, and Microsoft may need to update your system to provide you with those updates.

By accepting this agreement, you agree to receive these types of automatic updates without any additional notice."

As many are already aware, Windows 10 Build 10240 is the current release candidate for Windows 10. Now we know Microsoft's intent to become more flexibile with their software updates, much in the same way as Google handles Chrome OS. Policy changes for home users enables Microsoft to target consumer apps in a more efficient mannor, granting developers more power to iterate and less worry about feature support. Good news for developers and consumers alike.

iPods Are From "A More Civilized Age"

Serenity Caldwell came to the following conclusion over at iMore:

"Much as I love the delight of the iPod shuffle line, this is the latest in a long line of moves toward making the iPod obsolete. The Apple Watch is the future for semi-offline small devices you want to listen to while on the go; the nanos and shuffles of the world are the elegant, ancient weapons from a more civilized age of wired headphones and purchased music.

Long may they live on our shelves as reminders for what we used to have."

Getting over the mediorce performance of Apple Music as a product and overall bad iTunes interface design has been hard enough. Discovering a lack of support for my trusty iPod Video or iPod Shuffle was an even larger, possibly deal breaking, blow. I would have easily left Spotify if I could sync my playlists to a dedicated device. Such conveniance could easily have saved valuable storage on my "16 GB" (read: 11.5 GB accessible) iPhone 5S. Instead my iPods is left to the wired and synced age of old. 

Phil Schiller on New Horizons Flyby

Phil Schiller tweeted:

"MacBook Pro: When it absolutely, positively, has to be there on time, 3 billion miles away. #PlutoFlyby"

Such a simple tweet is marketing genius at work. By making realiable products at every price point (I see a 13" MBA, a few 13" MBPr, and at least one 15" MBPr), you grant yourself the ability to make bold statements. If you are reliable enough to help send a probe at a fifteen hundred mile wide planet three billion miles away, flaunt it.

New Horizon Reaches Pluto →

John Holdren, Director of Science and Technology Policy: 

“I’m delighted at this latest accomplishment by NASA, another first that demonstrates once again how the United States leads the world in space. New Horizons is the latest in a long line of scientific accomplishments at NASA, including multiple missions orbiting and exploring the surface of Mars in advance of human visits still to come; the remarkable Kepler mission to identify Earth-like planets around stars other than our own; and the DSCOVR satellite that soon will be beaming back images of the whole Earth in near real-time from a vantage point a million miles away. As New Horizons completes its flyby of Pluto and continues deeper into the Kuiper Belt, NASA's multifaceted journey of discovery continues."

Pluto is three billion miles away. We took a ten year road trip to take pictures of it. We came less than ten thousand miles from the surface. Let us collectively take a moment to contemplate the math required to obtain these breathtaking photos.

Is Textgate Coming?

For the sake of intrigue and humor, I'm just going to go ahead and publish thus sensationalized headline for normal media outlets to feed off of. Jamie Condliffe at Gizmodo writes:

    " A newly discovered bug seems to cause Messages on iOS to crash when a specific string of text is received—and if it happens while the phone is locked, it also seems to reboot the iPhone too."

Yes, this string of characters exists and is annoying for a moment, but I'm quite sure a group of highly qualified engineers on call in Cupertino has already fixed such an issue and twenty other related bugs we don't know about. A new patch for iOS will be published next week and all will be swell. Heck, Tim Cook will probably make a joke about it at WWDC. Mute the annoying people that send it to you and move along, nothing to see here. 

Verizon To Buy AOL

$4.4 Billion will be buying Verizon the likes of Engadget, Huffington Post, TechCrunch, and the prestigious AOL.com. AOL previously merged and was subsequently spun off by Time Warner Cable. Such a purchase for Verizon shows a desire for a stronger digital content presence. Other top ISPs are also generating in or investing in their own content, so this makes perfect sense for both organizations.

Knee Jerk Reaction - Comcast Breaks Off Time Warner Engagement

"People with knowledge of the matter" are reporting through Alex Sherman at Bloomberg some wonderful news for the state of the ISP ecosystem in the United States:

"Comcast Corp. is planning to walk away from its proposed $45 billion takeover of Time Warner Cable Inc."

All impacting factors and considerations aside, such a breakup of an impending monopoly super giant is joyously welcome news for anyone who wants to see competition and innovation in this space.

Feature Request: Better Bluetooth Headphone Management

A request for a genuine acknowledgment of the growing Bluetooth headphone trend is extended to the software platform community as a whole. However, for context, the idea will be expressed using the Apple ecosystem. 

The need for a software equivalent of a 3.5 mm headphone jack in software is emerging as we become a wireless technology society. We should simply be able to turn on our headphones, turn on Bluetooth, and automatically switch all audio to our headphones without going through two menus or swiping through a list. 

On OS X and iOS, a paired device will automatically play all sound if connected to the device, but what if I want to move my experience from my phone to my laptop? I have unpair and repair the device to a new medium. Shouldn't Apple be using their new Continuity technology to seamlessly hand off a Bluetooth pairing between devices? Apple already does an optimal branching of such an idea with AirPlay audio over WiFi. So why not extend the functionality to local Bluetooth devices?

Did You Hear? - Apple's WWDC Is Coming on June 8th

Spring rains are in the air and you know what that means, time to start scheduling summer developer conferences out in California! Apple today announced the 2015 World Wide Developers Conference will take place from June 8th to June 12th, 2015. Once again, Moscone Center will become the center of the technology universe when Apple announces new things for developers to play with. Current speculation and rumors point to a preview of Snow iOS 8 (iOS 9) and Snow Yosemite (OS X 10.11). We will also likely see how Apple Watch native apps will come together and maybe some new hardware (iPad Pro? Apple TV update?). We might even get Apple TV app previews too! Time and rumors sites can only tell.

Link List:

• TechCrunch
• The Verge
• Engadget

Chrome OS Pushes Budget Computing Forward

Simply put, Google's Chrome OS ambitions are well founded and pushing the limits of computing. Not in the sense of technological power, but rather in the power of access and simplicity. Creating a laptop for $150 or a sub-$100 desktop ultimately eliminates the cost of computing while still providing an experience which can enable anyone to do anything. Sometimes that is the power of computing, to provide a minimum barrier to do more.