The Geekcast

The Geekcast


The Geekcast #335 - Flickr for iPhone

January 16, 2013



News:


 


Facebook Unveils a Smarter Search Engine

 


Now we know what Facebook is building: a better internal search system.


Speaking at a much-hyped event at Facebook HQ, founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a raft of improvements to “graph search” — that is, the ability to search within your social graph for specifics.


The search improvements involve the ability to ask questions in regular English, such as “which of my friends live in New York?” The search is now intelligent enough to rank your friends based on how much interaction you’ve had — so that closer friends will appear higher up the results list.


It can also search based on stories or photos you’ve Liked. One example Zuckerberg offered: the site can now display which of his friends have Liked the HBO show Game of Thrones. You can search for people who Like multiple products or services, which seems likely to be a bonanza for marketers.


Photos can also be ranked by which have the most Likes, based on the people most important to you in your Friends list. And one of the most useful use cases appears to be searching for local businesses that have received a thumbs-up from friends (and their friends).


Graph search starts today in beta, and will appear as a large blue search bar at the top of your Facebook page.


 


http://mashable.com/2013/01/15/facebook-graph-search/


 


Exclusive: CBS forced CNET staff to recast vote after Hopper won ‘Best in Show’ at CES

The Dish Network’s Hopper wasn’t simply in the running: it had actually taken the top prize


On Friday, news broke that CNET had been forced by its parent company CBS to remove the Dish Network’s Hopper set-top box from its “Best of CES” awards due to ongoing litigation between the two companies. CBS has been battling the Dish Network in court over the Hopper’s ability to skip past commercials automatically (NBC, ABC, and Fox are also taking action).


CBS Interactive representatives told The Verge that the Hopper with Sling had been “withdrawn from consideration” from the “Best of CES” awards due to CBS’s lawsuit with Dish; that the ban on coverage is limited only to specific products implicated in ongoing litigation with CNET’s parent company; and that the ban only applied to product reviews and that news coverage would be exempt. That policy appears to have been hastily put in place. Prior to the move Friday, CNET had reviewed the Hopper and written extensively about the device.


But the problems may go deeper than that. The Verge has now learned that the facts of the case are somewhat different than the story CNET and CBS had previously shared with the public. According to sources familiar with the matter, the Hopper was not simply an entrant in the Best of CES awards for the site: it was actually chosen as the winner of the “Best of Show” award (as voted by CNET’s editorial staff).


Apparently, executives at CBS learned that the Hopper would win “Best of Show” prior to the announcement. Before the winner was unveiled, CBS Interactive News senior-vice president and General Manager Mark Larkin informed CNET’s staff that the Hopper could not take the top award. The Hopper would have to be removed from consideration, and the editorial team had to re-vote and pick a new winner from the remaining choices. Sources say that Larkin was distraught while delivering the news — at one point in tears — as he told the team that he had fought CBS executives who had made the decision.


 


http://www.theverge.com/2013/1/14/3874682/exclusive-cbs-forced-cnet-editors-to-recast-vote-after-hopper-win


 


Internet prodigy, activist Aaron Swartz commits suicide

 


Aaron Swartz, an Internet savant who at a young age shaped the online era by co-developing RSS and Reddit and later became a digital activist, has committed suicide.


Swartz’s body was found Friday evening in Brooklyn, said Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman with the New York medical examiner’s office. The 26-year-old had hanged himself in his apartment.




At age 14, Swartz co-wrote the RSS specification.


He was later admitted to Stanford University, but dropped out after a year because, as he wrote in a blog post, “I didn’t find it a very intellectual atmosphere, since most of the other kids seemed profoundly unconcerned with their studies.”


What he did next was help develop Reddit, the social news website that was eventually bought by heavyweight publisher Conde Nast in 2006.


Swartz then engaged in Internet digital activism, co-founding Demand Progress, a political action group that campaigns against Internet censorship.


But he pushed the legal limits, allegedly putting him on the wrong side of the law.

In 2011, he was arrested in Boston for alleged computer fraud and illegally obtaining documents from protected computers. He was later indicted in an incident in which he allegedly stole millions of online documents from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He pleaded not guilty in September, according to MIT’s “The Tech” newspaper.


Two years earlier, the FBI investigated him after he released millions of U.S. federal court documents online. The alleged hacking was significant because the documents came from the government-run Public Access to Court Electronic Records, or PACER, which typically charges a fee, which was 8 cents a page in 2009.


No charges were filed in that case, but on October 5, 2009, he posted online his FBI file that he apparently requested from the agency. He redacted the FBI agents’ names and his personal information, he said.

In that file, the FBI said more than 18 million pages with a value of about $1.5 million were downloaded from PACER in September 2008 to Swartz’s home in Highland Park, Illinois.



http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/12/us/new-york-reddit-founder-suicide/index.html?hpt=te_t1


 


Nissan knocks $6,400 off Leaf sticker price, sells S model for $28,800

That lower-cost Nissan Leaf we heard about? It just got a sticker price. Savvy car buyers will be able to kick off their haggling at $28,800, the Leaf S’ MSRP. Don’t expect the price war to last long though — dealers will waste no time leveraging relevant tax credits, which in California, can dip the car’s price as low as $18,800. The price reduction hits the entire line, too — pricing the Leaf SV and SL at $31,820 and $34,840, respectfully. Nissan attributes the savings to local construction, dodging foreign currency fluctuations by building the vehicles in its existing Tennessee facilities. The move puts the Leaf a little closer to competing with its gas-guzzling cousins, and goes a long way to placate EV buyers put off by the car’s 2012 price hike. Still too pricy? Don’t worry — Nissan promises that you can still lease it, too.


http://www.engadget.com/2013/01/15/2013-nissan-leaf-price/


 


Simple’s online-only banking app launches on Android

The banking startup reaches a crucial milestone, but it’s still just getting started


 


Today online banking startup Simple announced the first Android version of its app, which is designed to replace traditional personal banking with an online-only experience. The app allows customers to see their balance at a glance, find nearby ATMs, deposit checks, as well as view and categorize their past spending.


The Portland-based startup generated a lot of buzz when it teased the product two years ago, partly because it was cofounded by early Twitter engineer Alex Payne, who has since stepped back into an advisory role at Simple. The company built up a wait list of more than 125,000 potential customers and started sending out invites eight months ago when it launched its iPhone app. However, Android users were told to wait.


…Simple’s Android app took about four months to build because company executives decided they wanted to build a version for Android from scratch rather than simply port the iPhone version over. To achieve this, Simple partnered with New York-based development shop Two Toasters. “It probably would have made business sense to just port the app and get it out there as fast as we could,” Simple’s head of mobile engineering, Dustin Barker, told The Verge. “But that’s just not what we do. I’m just really excited to put an app out there that is Simple reimagined for Android.”


There are a few differences between the iPhone and Android versions of the app. The iPhone version has customer support messaging within the app, which the Android version does not. The iPhone app also allows customers to send payments from within the app. The Android version will introduce a new feature “spend from goal,” which allows users to set aside a certain budget for something — say, gambling in Las Vegas — and track that balance as they spend.


Now that the Android version is launched, Barker says Simple’s next goal is to build out both apps until they have matching features. The company then plans to introduce an iPad-native app. No version is planned for Windows phones, although the company hasn’t ruled out the possibility.



************


Geek This Week:



Aaron:  Installed Path again on my iPhone. Trying to figure out what the hell to do with it. Pebble announced their shipping date of January 23rd! Unfortunately I backed it late (started April 10 and I backed it on May 2) so I probably won’t get it for a while.


 


Gozer: Xcom. Comcast sucks.


 


*************




The Geek’s Choice:


**************


Featured Segment:  Flickr for iPhone


A great app that is more than a suitable replacement for Instagram. Edit photos, apply filters, share to a bunch of networks, and more.


**************


Feedback & Items of Note:


**************


Sponsors:



Check us out on Stitcher! Visit http://www.stitcher.com/geekcast and sign up. Not only can you catch the podcast through the app, but if you use the code ‘geekcast’ within the app and you’ll be entered to win $100!




Audible: Try Audible Now and Get 1 Free Audiobook Download with a 14 Day Trial. Choose from over 85,000 Titles. Continue your membership and receive 1 audio book credit a month for only $14.95 per month!  Just visit <a href=”http://www.audiblepodcast.com/TheGeekcast“>AudiblePodcast.com/TheGeekcast</a>


I97zFtIv8Dk