Google wants to get more involved with its app marketplace, Play:

Google Play, Google’s marketplace for Android applications which now reaches a billion people in over 190 countries, has historically differentiated itself from rival Apple by allowing developers to immediately publish their mobile applications without a lengthy review process. However, Google has today disclosed that, beginning a couple of months ago, it began having an internal team of reviewers analyze apps for policy violations prior to publication. And going forward, human reviewers will continue to go hands-on with apps before they go live on Google Play.

Additionally, Google announced the rollout of a new age-based ratings system for games and apps on Google Play, which will utilize the scales provided by a given region’s official ratings authority, like the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) here in the U.S.

I thought open was better? Open always wins?

Why is Google gettng involved? It couldn’t have anything to do with quality control. Nah.

I mean, it’s not like Android has problems with shitty scam apps or anything.

via The Combustion Chamber

Bill Gurley predicts ‘dead unicorns’ in startup-land this year

Bill Gurley, the prominent investor behind Uber and Snapchat, has been sounding the tech bubble alarm for months now. He’s preached about the dangerous appetite for risk in the market, the alarmingly high burn rates and the excess of capital sloshing around in Silicon Valley.

What’s that, Alan?

Robert Downey Jr. delivered a real bionic arm to a 7-year-old boy.

This is one of the coolest things that could ever happen to a kid.

Even at 37-years-old, you best believe I’d be getting an Iron Man prosthetic if I lost part of my arm.

via The Verge

It’s crazy how far software has come in 25 years.

Where will we be in 25 more?

via Designer News

There has been a bit of consternation about Apple’s focus on “fashion” and all that entails, but there is a very practical aspect to this focus: people need to be willing to actually put the wearable on their body. While “form may follow function” for tools, the priorities are the exact opposite when it comes to what we wear: function is irrelevant without a form we find appealing. In this case, design actually is how it looks.

It’s on this point specifically that most critics – including myself – have failed to appreciate Apple’s approach. After last fall’s presentation I compared the Watch’s introduction to that of the iPod, iPhone, and iPad and found it lacking for its lack of focus on functionality. What I now appreciate, though, is that this was almost certainly on purpose: there was focus in that keynote, it just happened to be on the Watch’s appearance; since I’m a geek I dismissed it, but normal consumers, especially in the case of a wearable, absolutely will not.

—Ben Thompson, How Apple Will Make the Wearable Market

via Twitter

—James Murphy, LCD Soundsystem

via vintag.es

Taken from xkcd

via thisisnthappiness

How well can people recall the Apple logo from memory?

Not well:

Taken from Taylor & Francis

via Quipsologies

Apparently the people at Pebble were ‘trolling’ Apple on Twitter while the Apple Keynote was happening.

Unlike BGR, it looks a little desperate to me, not hilarious.

Especially considering how Pebble stooped to Samsung-ing Apple’s product designs on Kickstarter.

This week Michael and Bryan discuss “Bryan” and “Brian”, toilet seats, Bryan’s personal movie awards at missiletest.com, the Apple Watch, Bryan’s distaste for Safari on his iPad, the criteria for an Apple “flop” versus an Apple “success”, iPhone notifications, Game Center, the suckiness of Facebook, Formula 1 driver Ayrton Senna and space exploration.

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