On the one hand, I could buy a digital camera. On the other? A brand new goddamned 30–gig iPod!
On another hand, y’know… third hand ‘n all… I’m glad to see that the new Apple music service is featuring Massive Attack. I might end up buying 100th Windows after all, though 99¢ USD per song seems a little steep when buying an entire album. In all, this “rock and roll rebirth” will do little to affect my music buying habits; I’ll still buy CDs because I like a solid product in my hand, I like the covers and the liner notes, and I like listening to entire albums through and through… slowly coming to appreciate songs that I might not have bought if a 30–second snip was all I had to base my opinions on.
On the other hand (this is getting ridiculous, unless I were Forearm of the Mutant Liberation Front… which I might be), being able to sample songs in an unlimited fashion (well, limited to 30 seconds of each I suppose) could very–well mean I buy more music over all; though not necessarily from Apple.
Prognosis? The Apple music initiative will somehow affect my life as a music afficionado, especially given that I am a Mac user and potential future iPod owner. Mmmmmmm.
Posted by Chris Clark on April 29, 2003 at 3:35 AM
This update is a real mixed bag if you ask me, and you did, else you wouldn’t be here. While I appreciate all the new features and question some of the UI adjustments (I doubt that “flattening” the play button or tweaking the volume slider makes a damn bit of difference to anybody, Apple), I’m a little pissed about the text.
Yes, thank you for allowing me to choose small or large text in the UI, and I appreciate that there has been a lot of bitching lately regarding antialiasing small fonts; so here’s my two cents: aliased fonts look like ass, particularly in iTunes. It’s like the interface has been cheapened… with pixels. It’s still a thoroughly useable application, don’t get me wrong, but it’s not as attractive as it was back in iTunes 3. Hell, that shade of green on the icon is even making my stomach turn a little.
Posted by Chris Clark on April 29, 2003 at 3:58 AM
Only a week ago I was talking shit about switching to Safari, and suddenly I’m drawn back to the cradle–like hold of Camino. Don’t ask me, I’m insane.
Download the latest nightly build; there has been sufficient change since version 0.7’s release to please even the stodgiest of stodges. Bookmark handling is still ugly and nightmarish; but a few solid feature additions have fanned the embers of my one–time Camino romance back into flame. Popup blocking now (at last) features a whitelist (something Safari is begging for) and also allows you to prevent sites from changing your browser window’s size and orientation. A Google search bar (more–or–less identical to Safari’s) is now available, but goes one step further for minimalist–browser–dudes such as myself.
You see, I don’t like browsers: on the whole, they’re exceedingly ugly and I’d really just like them to get the hell out of my way so I can browse web sites. With both Safari and Camino, I’ve gone out of my way to hide the navigation bar: it’s very minimalistic, and you know how I love that shit. This works fine for a person such as myself who can happily browse using just the keyboard; occasionally hitting Command–L if I need to type an address manually (or to check where the hell I am). Camino handles Command–L URL entry very elegantly: dropping a sheet down for your typing pleasure. If you’ve just hit Command–L just to check where you are, or perhaps to copy/paste your current location to a blog entry, you can hit Escape to dismiss the sheet. The addition of the Google search bar means that you can hit Command–Shift–F to be treated to a similarly–styled search sheet. Very nice. Safari is not so poised, not so elegant. Command–L drops down the whole navigation bar: buttons, URL entry, Google search, the whole kit–n–kaboodle. Sure, that’s OK for URL entry or Google searching… but if you’re just using it to copy/paste your current location there is just no easy way to dismiss that motherfucker. Command–Shift–|?? That’s on the other side of the fucking keyboard!
I find it supremely amusing how these little UI differences get me so riled up and tip the balance of my browser–favoritism so regularly. One day, though, when Camino’s bookmark handling isn’t so half–assed I will swear my unwavering allegiance for real. Autofill would be nice too, but hey… open source projects move slowly. Like a glacier. I can wait.
Posted by Chris Clark on April 29, 2003 at 4:34 AM
Sascha Höhne has updated his site, Rad.E8, to a whole new look. His has always been one of the better–designed flash sites on the net (nevermind that Sascha is also the creator of Snow.E2, one the coolest icon sets available for OS X and Win XP) but I’m not so hot on this new design.
I suppose this is a personal taste thing, but he’s also changed his logo; something I consider inexcusable given that his old logo was one of the simplest, yet most devastatingly–beautiful logos in existence.
Ever.
Posted by Chris Clark on April 29, 2003 at 5:47 AM