Apple Share Price Breaches $500, Hits All-Time High

// February 13th, 2012 // No Comments » // Weird or Interesting News

Apple Share Price Breaches $500, Hits All-Time High: “Apple’s share price pushed through the $500 barrier as trading opened this morning, reaching an important psychological figure. The stock price has been on a tear ever since Apple reported blowout earnings for the first fiscal quarter of 2012, rising more than $75/share, or nearly 18%, in just under three weeks.

Apple is now worth more than $469 billion, making it the most valuable public company in the world by a significant margin. Exxon Mobil, the second most valuable public company, is worth approximately $400 billion after a weakening in that company’s price.

Apple is a long way from claiming the “most valuable publicly traded company ever” title. Among many others, Microsoft had a peak market cap of $642 billion during the dot-com boom in September 2000. That company is now worth just over $250 billion. With the reversal of fortunes, Apple is in fact now worth more than Google ($199 billion) and Microsoft ($256 billion) — Apple’s two biggest competitors — combined.

What scares Facebook

// February 2nd, 2012 // No Comments » // Weird or Interesting News

What scares Facebook: “Like a good friend, Facebook says it doesn't want to invade our privacy or hang out with folks who spend all their time looking at a cell phone.

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‘Stomping the Worm’ in 8 countries

// January 30th, 2012 // No Comments » // Weird or Interesting News

‘Stomping the Worm’ in 8 countries: “For his efforts to protect Haitian children from parasites, Aaron Jackson was honored as a CNN Hero in 2007.

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The Return of Western Sky’s Criminally High APRs

// January 26th, 2012 // No Comments » // Weird or Interesting News

The Return of Western Sky’s Criminally High APRs: “

A couple days ago we posted a screenshot a user submitted of Western Sky’s insane APR for a $5000 loan. Well, apparently if you go to their site there’s a handy guide to their rates for other loans. Basically the less money you borrow, the more Draconian the APR.

For a simple $1000 loan you end up paying $5,256.56 (counting the loan fee), and that’s not even the worst way they extort you. If you look at the previous Western Sky post from two days ago, you can see that you pay 8 times the amount you borrow on a $5000 loan.

This is of course nothing new, but still it’s fun to do the math and realize the extent to which these loan agencies are bending people over. Unless you really need some money to feed your expensive crystal meth addiction, I recommend going elsewhere for your cash. –New Guy Nick

Claims deadline approaches for MagSafe power adapter owners

// January 5th, 2012 // No Comments » // Weird or Interesting News

Claims deadline approaches for MagSafe power adapter owners: “

If you have a MagSafe power connector for your MacBook or MacBook Pro, there’s only so much time left to make your claim under the class action settlement relating to problems with the adapter. The lawsuit was settled by Apple in November 2011.

Per The Apple Core, he problem with the early MagSafe was a week sleeve. Of course, the cable bent and the wires inside the plastic sleeve could become frayed and pull out. This posed a fire hazard and many customers replaced the units. Apple settled, but of course, “the settlement is not an admission of wrongdoing.”

Owners of MacBooks and MacBook Pros can receive various cash payments covering the purchase of replacements adapters within the first three years following the initial purchase of the computer. The amount of the cash payments vary depending on when the replacement adapter was purchased.

The FAQ page for the settlement is here and the timeline page is here. The date to object to the suit and to exclude oneself from the suit just passed. The site says that March 21, 2012 is the due date for the sending of claim forms, which can be downloaded from the site.

If you have two cents to throw in or your own MagSafe power adapter story, please let us know what’s on your mind in the comments.

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Facebook’s Timeline available for all

// December 15th, 2011 // No Comments » // Weird or Interesting News

Facebook’s Timeline available for all: “People around the world began seeing messages from Facebook on Thursday encouraging them to start scrapbooking their life.

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Updates to the Gospel Library App

// December 9th, 2011 // No Comments » // LDSTech, Weird or Interesting News

Updates to the Gospel Library App: “

Gospel Library provides a comprehensive collection of Church material on your mobile device, including scriptures, conference addresses, magazines, manuals, and even videos. Recently the Gospel Library app for iOS has been updated with three new features:

• Improved media playback options
• Study Notebook integration
• LDS Music integration

Improved Media Playback Options

You can now listen to audio narrations for English scriptures, general conference addresses, magazines, and some lesson material. You can also watch videos of general conference addresses and other material. When you’re viewing content with media playback options, a play button appears enabled in the lower-right corner of the app.

When you click the Play button for conference addresses, you’re prompted with either video or audio media options.

If you play the audio, the play button changes states to indicate the audio is playing. If you choose the video option, the video stream plays.

Overall, the media playback gives you more options to consume the content, rather than just reading.

Note that the inclusion of audio and video with Gospel Library requires the presence of media links in the content. These media links were not included in previous content downloads, so to play the audio or video, you must either delete and re-install the library content (a somewhat tedious process), or you must delete and re-install the Gospel Library app (the preferred method).

Before you delete the app, make sure any notes you added have been synchronized with your LDS Account (otherwise they will be lost when you delete the app).

To delete and re-install the Gospel Library app:

1. Start Gospel Library.
2. Back up any notes by going to Settings > Account Settings. Click Sync Now. Wait until the Pending Changes number becomes zero.
3. Tap the iPhone’s Home button to exit the app.
4. Tap and hold the Gospel Library app icon until the icon wiggles and shows an X.
5. Tap the X.
6. Press the iPhone’s Home button to return to the normal mode.
7. Open to the App Store and search for LDS Gospel Library.
8. Install the app. Then start it.
9. Tap Manage Library.
10. Tap the content you want to download.
11. Tap the green download arrow to download the content.

When you re-download the latest content to the Library, the new content will contain media links to play audio and video. (Note that the audio or video itself does not download locally but rather streams from a Church server; you must have either WiFi or a cellular connection to play the media).

Study Notebook Integration

My Study Notebook is now accessible from within the iOS Gospel Library app. Previously, notes synchronized between the two apps, but now you can access My Study Notebook directly within the Gospel Library interface, rather than just from LDS.org. A Notebook button appears in the upper-left corner of the Gospel Library app home screen.

This Notebook view shows you content from My Study Notebook. These items include the following:

• Marks: Passages you highlighted.
• Notes: Passages you annotated.
• Tags: Passages you have tagged.
• Links: Passages you have linked.
• Documents: Documents help you collect and organize your notes for talks, lessons, and topical study.

Probably the most common features are tags and documents. When you tag passages with a keyword, such as millennium, all passages with that same tag appear in a list.

You can add passages to a document by tapping and holding a verse, and then tapping Send.

LDS Music Integration

The iOS Gospel Library app also integrates with LDS Music. When you view a song from the Hymnbook or Children’s Songbook, a link labeled Open in LDS Music link appears at the top of the screen. When you click the link, the song opens in LDS Music. LDS Music shows sheet music and plays audio.

In the image above, the left screen is from Gospel Library. When you click Open in LDS Music, the hymn opens in LDS Music. When you finish the song, the Return to Gospel Library link takes you back to Gospel Library.

Note that if you don’t have LDS Music installed, when you click Open in LDS Music, you will be invited to install it.

Roadmap

Currently these new features are only available for the iOS version of Gospel Library. Eventually the features will be available for the other platforms as well.

“

Apple’s Retail Self-Checkout Doing Well, Strong Promotion Coming at Grand Central

// December 6th, 2011 // No Comments » // iPhone, Weird or Interesting News

Apple’s Retail Self-Checkout Doing Well, Strong Promotion Coming at Grand Central: “CNBC reports on word from a source who claims that Apple has been very pleased with customer usage of the EasyPay self-checkout system for its retail stores. Under the system, customers can use the Apple Store app on their iPhones to scan shelf-stocked items in an Apple retail store and pay for them using their iTunes Store accounts. Customers can simply walk out of the store after the transaction is completed without needing to speak with any store employees.

The report does not offer any specifics on the program’s performance, but vaguely suggests that it is at least meeting expectations.

Apple’s self checkout revolution may have seemed a bit crazy, but it’s apparently working out.

That’s what I hear from a source familiar with Apple’s retail operation.

…

The intelligence I’m getting is that the benefits of the new system are outweighing any negatives.

The report notes that Apple is also expected to heavily promote the self-checkout feature at its new Grand Central Terminal store set to open on Friday. With the open floor plan and throngs of commuters quickly passing through the store, the feature will likely be a popular one for store visitors.

While some have been skeptical of the usefulness of the self-checkout feature, many customers had expressed frustration at difficulties with getting the attention of store employees to complete simple transactions, and the new self-checkout avoids that situation entirely while freeing those staff members for more specialized consultation and training with other customers. Apple has reportedly noted that it envisions self-checkout and another system in which customers can pickup online orders in-store eventually being the primary ways in which customers make purchases from Apple retail stores.

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Can positive thinking make you well?

// December 5th, 2011 // No Comments » // Weird or Interesting News

Can positive thinking make you well?: “There is much to be gained and no risks involved in trying to reach the best state of mind possible, Deepak Chopra says.

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Mayans never predicted world to end in 2012? (Reuters)

// December 2nd, 2011 // No Comments » // Weird or Interesting News

Mayans never predicted world to end in 2012? (Reuters): “Reuters – If you are worried the world will end next year based on the Mayan calendar, relax: the end of time is still far off.”