The Verge Outs Vanity Fair's Scare Tactics

Anyone read Vanity Fair's absurd blame on social media for teens promiscuities? It's a bunch of craptastic scare tactics aimed at parents who know nothing. Here's an amazing takedown by The Verge's own Adi Robertson.

In fact, the article is mostly a series of salacious stories and broad warnings that could have been written at any time in the last 20 years — just swap in Britney Spears for Miley Cyrus. It quotes a counselor and a researcher, but cites only three pieces of non-anecdotal data: the percentage of teens using social media, the hours a day they spend on electronic devices, and the percentage of adolescents who've seen internet porn. Notably absent: how much sex teens are actually having, and whether that number is going up.

via The Verge

Selling your stuff?

From everyday's hassle free Gazelle to sometimes can be creepy craigslist, everyone is all about getting the bets bang for their used item. As new entrant to the market, Sold is here to make it that much easier for us all. Check them out! They just released an app for Android and has had an iOS app since their launch in April.

Sold. Launch Film from Sold. on Vimeo.

If you missed it a couple of months ago, Techcrunch first reported Sold back in April here.

update: the first item I put up on Sold was a pair of Tokidoki Sol Republic Headphones that retail for $120 and the offer I got was $53.  Seems reasonable for a "no hassle" sale, but I'm thinking that it's utility is worth more.  It's actually unopened as well.  Once you receive an offer, in my case 72 hours later, you have 24 hours to accept and being the transfer.  I have 12 left to decide.

The Truth to Syria

Depressing insight to what the truths of a civil war can be like through the eyes of Italian journalist Domenico Quirico --held hostage for 150 days.

In this place, when the hostage weeps, everyone laughs at the spectacle of his pain and sees it as a sign of weakness. Syria has become the Country of Evil, the land where evil triumphs and thrives like grapes on the vine under a Middle Eastern sun, and where evil displays all its aspects: greed, hatred, fanaticism, the absence of mercy; where even children and the old rejoice in their malevolence. My captors prayed to their God standing next to me, the suffering prisoner. They prayed content, without remorse and attentive to their rituals. What were they saying to their God?

via The Guardian

University of California San Diego at the Top

If you didn't know this by now, I recommend that you take a look at the rankings for Colleges / National Universities specifically Washington Monthly's ranking system. It takes into consideration various attributes that include social mobility, research and service instead of the exclusivity, campus amenities and waiting lists.  Coincidently, the Obama Administration is proposing a new ranking system on just that.

...he says schools should be scored on things like the cost of tuition, loan debt and how much graduates end up earning.

For more in-depth, you should read or listen to NPR's Michel Martin insightful interview with editor-in-chief Paul Glastris.  As some of you who are reading this, take this list into consideration as you or your child begins the application process or looking this fall.

My wife and I are proud alums of the number one school. Chalk one up for yet another top ten San Diego! Maybe it time for that tatoo of Geisel Library? Stay classy!

Here's an excerpt:

MARTIN: But the University of California at San Diego ranks number one. Now why is that?

GLASTRIS: That's the fourth year in a row for that school. They do an outstanding job on all three of our metrics. A large portion of their student body is on Pell Grants. They graduate those students at higher-than-expected rates. They do great on service and they're a research powerhouse. In fact, there's a - about half the top 15 schools are University of California schools.

via Washington Monthly

Cheap Tickets, Airline Tickets

Yes you read the title right. airline tickets are cheaper than ever before.  We might feel like we are paying more these days and complain about the cheap, no-frills experience but what do you want and how much are you willing to pay for it?  Bottom line is this: tickets are on the rise, pilot pay is at an all time low with some companies asking for more concessions and the airplanes have never been this full.  Can the ticket prices get any higher?

Unfortunately, maybe.  Even my buddy passes have either disappeared or are impossible to use because of the high load factors.

In 1974, it was illegal for an airline to charge less than $1,442 in inflation-adjusted dollars for a flight between New York City and Los Angeles. On Kayak, just now, I found one for $278.

via The Atlantic: How Airline Ticket Prices Fell 50% in 30 Years (and Why Nobody Noticed)

Hours without a Socket

13 hours and 29 minutes. That’s all you really need to know 

If you are looking for a back-to-school laptop, there's a clear winner throughout the ENTIRE industry.  From The Wirecutter and other reviews, particularly Nilay Patel's on The Verge, it's a no brainer unless you're naturally stubborn. For all the Wintel lovers out there, this might not be easy to swallow, but we all know which laptop runs Windows better.  If you still can't tell which laptop it is, it's the Apple's new Macbook Air.  

September is Confirmed for the new iPhone

Once again, it's that time of year for Apple to unveil it's latest offerings in the crowded smartphone market.  On September 10th, we can expect Tim Cook and the gang to take the wraps off the rumored iPhone 5S and maybe introduce a lower costing iPhone 5C.  This would mark the first time in six years that Apple debuts a new lower tier model rather than moving the previous generation a step down.  

As the timeline goes, Tuesday the 10th falls in line with the usual Apple event followed by ten days of hype until the official release on September 20th.  We can expect reviews three days earlier.  

Get your wallets and plastics ready.  Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that along with the new iPhones, we can expect the overhaul operating system, iOS7, to make it's final release.  Are you going to be upgrading?  

Paying for Eggs

When it comes to buying your eggs at Vons or Ralphs or at any local grocer, which way do you lean? Are you paying the extra $1 a crate or $0.25 an egg for the free range or organic dozen?

Did you vote yes on Proposition 2 back in 2008 stating that farmers must increase cage sizes for chickens, veal calves and pigs by 2015.  If you did, you'd be helping a great deal by off setting this cost by spending the extra dollars.  In theory, everything proves to be a great idea, but with an economy such as ours, counting every nickel becomes priority.  

But when people vote one way, then vote a different way with their fork, they unintentionally undermine the very agricultural changes they’re rooting for.

Because of the dichotomy between what voters say they want, versus the reality of how they shop, the California egg industry faces ruin. The situation was recognized as being so serious, in fact, that state legislators passed another law, AB1437, requiring that all eggs sold in California must comply with bigger cage standards.

via Modern Farmer: Voting One Way, Eating Another

iOS 7

A complete refresh. That's probably putting it lightly. Rebuilt and rethought from the ground up. A first in a long while, I'm really excited about iOS 7. When it comes to my job, I'll about Control Center providing easy access to Airplane Mode. =)

LUV is in the Air

What a concept from CEO Gary Kelly of Southwest Airlines.

His formula is so basic, yet so seldom applied: Take care of employees, employees will take care of customers, customers will take care of the company and its investors.

Now if every company followed this rule, I think we'd all be happier.

via The Denver Post: Southwest CEO Says All You Need Is LUV

Are you an 80s or 90s Kid

Upon meeting an individual, I tend to think about which decade they identify themselves. It gives me a point of inflection and creates a common dialogue. Here's Peter Hyman drawing a picture on the evaporation on the generational divide.

The lines are blurred, the edge has been dulled and the traditional time lines have been jumbled. We all now feed from the same cultural trough. And while the Baby Boomers are busy preparing their sloops for that sunset sail into retirement (provided their 401ks haven’t taken on too much water), the graying of Gen X has been postponed indefinitely.

Do we need to grow up or is that just a take from someone who lived through a visible divide?

Via The Observer

The Magazine

Marco Arment, from Instapaper & tumblr fame, has released a new subscription-based app on iOS simply called,"The Magazine". It's a different approach on technology related articles and their delivery.  I'm already looking forward to the next issue after finishing #1.  I want this to succeed and hopefully I can be insightful enough to be included some day!

Instead of the traditional labor-intensive magazine layout and expensive multimedia production, The Magazine’s article format is similar to Instapaper’s: one clean, adjustable, reader-friendly template with HTML, occasional images, and some small conveniences. It loads quickly, integrates well with sharing and system conventions (including text selection and VoiceOver), occupies minimal storage space, and shows the utmost respect for your time and attention.

The Magazine is leaving behind a lot of what magazines “need”. And many magazines really do need them. But I don’t think this does.

All of this is a bit crazy, and it’s not guaranteed to succeed. But I bet it will.

Looks like my unsubscribed The Daily app is going to have some companionship on my Newsstand.

Letdown of an iPhone 5 Experience

After guiding a good friend through his iPhone 5 activation, I told him that it would make for a good story. Here is Manoj Osuri's first 48 hours with his iPhone 5. My initial iPhone 5 experience has been less than ideal, to say the least. It's not that I think it's a bad phone…it's actually pretty awesome, now that I've gotten it working. But it was the "getting it working" part that really tainted the experience.

So one of the things I love about iPhones (and my limited experience with Apple products in general) is how quick and easy it normally is to go from opening the box to enjoying the new device without skipping a beat. I pre-ordered phones for my wife and myself. When they arrived over a week earlier than we initially expected, it felt like Christmas came early.

We both turn our phones on, see that it prompts us to sync it with our iTunes, and run straight to our computers. My wife has an HP running Windows 7, and I have an early 2008 MacBook Pro. Within a couple of minutes, my wife has her phone up and running without any problems. I, on the other hand, get a message saying that my phone cannot sync to any iTunes lower than 10.7. I don't think this is more than just a minor annoyance, but when I try to install it, I find out it won't run on my operating system. I do realize that my OS is old (OS X 10.5... I have no idea what animal that corresponds to in Apple's feline nomenclature), but I kept up with all the available updates, and I don't think it's right that I would be forced to buy a new OS in order to use my phone. A big reason why I spent about 4 times as much money on a laptop 4 years ago was because I was put under the impression that my computer would not go obsolete in a few years. I assumed that paying for new operating systems every couple of years would not be involved in keeping my computer relevant. Luckily, since I'm pretty close to being computer illiterate, Elijah was able to help me get OS X 10.6 installed on my computer, but the process took up my entire afternoon and early evening. While all of that was happening, I had my old phone backing itself up on iCloud (which in hindsight is probably something I should have done before). It took nearly as long, but at least I was able to get my phone working that evening. And because the activation of my new phone had technically started, I had no usable phone the whole time.

After going through all of this, I definitely lost most of my excitement over my new iPhone. Getting this phone was not nearly as awesome of an experience as when I got the 3G or the 4. I guess it really left a bad taste in my mouth that, compared to my wife's setup process, I felt like having an Apple computer made things way harder on me than if I had had a PC. And to make things worse, my story still isn't over….

Now this part is definitely not a knock on Apple, but rather a terrible experience with AT&T. That night, my wife and I went to an AT&T store to combine our separate accounts into a family plan. As I expected, I had to change my number since she has a North Carolina number, and I have a Maryland number. Since NC is considered to be in same regional market as Georgia (we live in Atlanta) it made more sense for me to change my number to an Atlanta area code, and have her keep her old number. (Not to mention that she had to deal with enough hassles with changing her name after we got married, so it was my turn to take one for the team!) So after combining our accounts, I started texting my friends and family my new number. I realized something was wrong when every group-text failed to deliver. (Yes, I checked my settings to make sure it was enabled). So having to text all of my contacts my new number individually added to my annoyance with my new phone. The following day, when I left our condo (and our wifi) I saw that my phone would not connect to the internet. I could still call and text (as long as it wasn't a group text), but no internet. At first I thought it was another phone issue, but after investigating a bit further, I start to think that my data plan never got reactivated after getting the new number. That was confirmed when I called AT&T. The person who helped us at the AT&T store the night before somehow missed that step. But in a way, it was a blessing in disguise, because not only did she forget to reactivate my data plan, but she never actually set up our family plan. She just put both of our individual accounts on the same bill. I probably wouldn't have caught that for a while since I use auto-pay, and we would have ended up paying a lot more than we were supposed to. And I'm not 100% sure, but I wouldn't be surprised if having no active data plan was the reason why I couldn't send group-texts. So most of another afternoon was wasted setting up my new iPhone 5.

All that said, I am happy with my new phone... it's pretty awesome. And while I wasn't really expecting to be blown away by it, I did expect to at least have a fun and exciting experience when I got it. And thanks to all the issues I had, the "new iPhone experience" definitely wasn't fun or exciting.