- Groupon Editorial Manual (Scribd) — When introducing something nonsensical (fake history, mixed metaphors), don’t wink at the reader to let them in on the joke. Don’t call it out with quotes, parenthesis, or any other narrative device. Speak your ignorance with total authority. Assert it as fact. This is how you can surprise the reader. If you call out your joke, even in a subtle way, it spoils the surprise. Think of yourself as an objective, confident, albeit totally unqualified and frequently blatantly ignorant voice speaking at a panel you shouldn’t have been invited to. It’s interesting to see a quirky voice encoded in rules. Corporates obviously need this, to scale and to ensure consistency between staff, whereas in startups it emerges through the unique gifts and circumstance of employees (think Flickr’s Friendly Hipster voice). (via Brady Forrest on Twitter)
- Deloitte Corporate gTLD (Slideshare) — Deloitte one of the early bidders to buy their own top-level domain as a branding move. The application fee alone is $185,000.
- Haikuleaks — automated finder of haiku from within the wikileaked cables. (via Andy Baio on Twitter)
- PS3 Code-signing Key Broken — the private keys giving Sony a monopoly on distributing games for the PS3 have been broken. Claimed to be to let Linux run on the boxes, rather than pirated games. Remains to be seen whether the experience of the PS3 user will become richer for the lack of Sony gatekeeping. There’s even a key generator now. (via Hacker News)
"sony" entries
Developer Week in Review: Apple devs cry "gimme shelter"
Apple protects their developers, Oracle earns a few bucks, and Sony has a bad week
If you were an Apple developer, it was a good week. If you were a Sony executive, it was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week. If you were Oracle, it was business as usual.
Four short links: 30 December 2010
Systematic Voice, gTLD Branding, Haikuleaks, and PS3 Code Signing
Sony-Google Deal Adds 500k Public Domain Books to E-Reader
Sony is adding 500,000 public domain EPUB-based titles to its Reader catalog through a partnership with Google. Paul Biba at Teleread examines Sony's rationale: Sony's apparent intent, meanwhile, beyond adding value to the Reader, will be to use public domain books in ePub to entice people to install its software and in time buy its reader devices. In the…
Report: No Kindle Launch in UK This Year
Europe's complicated mobile landscape will prevent the Kindle from launching in the UK this year, reports The BookSeller: In an interview with The Bookseller, Brian McBride, managing director of Amazon in the UK, said it was not yet clear when the Kindle would launch in the country … "In Europe it is a minefield as there are so many…
New Sony E-Reader Has Touchscreen, No Web Connection
Web connectivity has always been the key difference between the Kindle and Sony's Reader. With Sony's release of its third-generation e-reader, Web connectivity is still the big separator. The PRS-700 is faster and offers more storage than its predecessors, but it does not include a Wi-Fi or cellular option. The PRS-700's most notable upgrades are an LED reading light and…
The Pitfalls of Publishing's E-Reader Guessing Game
Hunting for e-reader sales figures is a fun diversion, but the underlying ambiguity threatens to distract businesses from bigger digital issues.