The Netflix topic is like the gift that keeps on giving. Last month I was working on a post with three take-away lessons from their summer price change fiasco. In the middle of drafting that post, Update One to that post became necessary – Netflix said they were sorry for handling it so badly, and now they were splitting into two companies.
So much chatter ensued as a result of that move by Netflix that I put out Update Two about some of the reasons which may have been behind it.
Update Three noted that none other than Roger Ebert had weighed in on the topic. And Update Four posted a great Saturday Night Live skit on the subject. A skit I should point out, that now looks hopelessly out of date.
Which brings me to Update Five:…
The world lost a great mind today. Although I had warning, I am still more deeply affected than I would have expected. I have admired and respected Steve Jobs and adored his products for almost 30 years. Apple is almost entirely responsible for two of the most abiding passions of my life – a fascination with technology and what it makes possible, and a love of excellent design. When well executed, computers are, as Jobs called them, “a bicycle for the mind.” There is no business figure I have read more books and articles about, watched more of, or followed with greater interest. Watching him get sicker and sicker over these last years has been truly awful, and, as odd as it is to say about the CEO of a for-profit company making consumer electronic devices, I feel like a little piece of me died today as well. I truly will miss him. I can think of no better way to mark his passing than to dig up the following note I wrote him right after his liver transplant, a month after the iPad debut, when he had begun to make regular headlines for answering the occasional private email, and Apple was taking a lot of heat for refusing to support flash on the iPhone.
[Originally Published on July 10; Updated on October 3]. In honor of Apple’s big iPhone announcement tomorrow, I thought it was worth republishing this list of the best things about Apple’s iOS 5. It will be awesome. Most of the focus will be on the new hardware, but the fact is that it is really the software that will make a bigger difference to most people. There is something for everyone to look forward to amongst the 200+ new features headed our way. Here’s the list of the top 10 things I am most psyched about:
[Originally Published July 19, 2011. See current updates at end.]
