The iX500 Scanner Sends Your Digitized Docs To Your Mac or iDevice [Review]
Erfon Elijah, cultofmac.com

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Once I start­ed my review of the ScanSnap iX500 doc­u­ment scan­ner, the new model in Fujit­su’s huge­ly pop­u­lar line of top-tier ScanSnap scan­ners, it didn’t take long to see this machine was going to earn its…

I love my ScanSnap. Great product.

Philips Hue Light Bulbs and Bridge, The World Is Changed.

Last year, Philips, the big electronics conglomerate, released some light bulbs called the Hue, which can be controlled individually to change colors and fade in and out and go off and on. They made quite a splash. But in the last week, Philips upgraded the free app for iOS devices and added other features that take the Hue light bulbs deep into the future. Among other things, the Hue light bulbs now work with a timer to go on and off and change scenes. They can also work with geofencing data from your iOS device to sense when you are coming home and go on, and also they work with the wonderful website IFTTT so that they can be triggered from all sorts of data on the web, like weather data, or text messaging, etc.

Simply put, the Hue light bulbs are a game changer and really represent our future where we will be able to control our surroundings with specificity and also automate everyday functions.

So How Much Does It Cost And What Do you Get?

You can get a Hue starter kit which consists of three bulbs and a bridge to control bulbs for $199 in the Amazon store and also the Apple Store. An individual Hue light bulb costs $59.95 in the Apple store. Set up is easy: the bridge is a round, small white disk with blue glowing buttons. You plug it into your wifi router (and also plug in its electric power plug). You then launch the free Hue App that you downloaded on your iOS device. And then you press the button on your Hue bridge and the app finds the bridge and the bulbs that are automatically connected to it. When you add additional bulbs beyond the three bulbs in the starter set, you search for them in your app. Set up was really easy for me. Altogether I hooked up 5 Hue light bulbs. I have two more that I plan to install soon.

Don’t Forget The Power Savings from the Hue Bulb!

Before you worry that the Hue light bulbs are expensive realize that they are LED bulbs that only use 8.5 watts of power. The traditional light bulbs I replaced use 65 watts of power and give our the same or less lumens that the Hues give off (the Hue bulbs give off 600 lumens). Where I live the cost of electricity and delivery comes to around 22 cents per kilowatt. The Hue light bulbs also have an estimated life of 15,000 hours. The bulbs in my home they replaced have a life of 3,000 hours. So if the lightbulb I replaced costs $4 over the course of 15,000 hours I would go through 5 of them for $20. Still you say they Hue at nearly $60 is 3 times more than $20. Yes, but look at the energy savings over 15,000 hours. By getting the Hue I will save 56.5 watts for each bulb. So each bulb saves:

(15,000 x. 56.5)/1000 x $0.22 = $186.45

So if you are replacing 40 standard bulbs in your home, you will save (using these same cost of electricity assumptions):

$186.45 x 40 - ($30 x 40) (the cost difference of the bulbs) = $6,258.

Over the life of the Hue bulbs, you would save over $6,000 as compared to keeping your traditional non LED bulbs. Of course you purchase non-programable LED bulbs (including those made by Philips) that are half the cost of the Hue bulbs and still give you energy savings.

So the Hue bulbs aren’t just a luxury – they are a way to save money if you currently have traditional bulbs.

Lets take a look at how right now the Hue light bulbs are a game changer.

Automation with the Hue App

The Hue App itself, now has allot of automation built in. On May 14,2013, Philips updated the app to version 1.10 and provided these new features:

What’s New in Version 1.1.0

• Geofencing feature: Scenes can now automatically turn on when coming home and turn off when leaving home
• Scenes can now be switched on or off using a timer between 1 and 59 minutes
• Alarms can now be set to recur in a weekly schedule and with a random offset for the start and end time
• Fades of alarms now start at the set time instead of ending at the set time
• Increased reliability of alarms
• Improved vibrant colors for LivingColors and Hue lights and added support for LivingWhites
• When activating a scene the lights change at the same time synchronously
• Compatible lights can now be added to the system using their serial number

These features were taken as a major upgrade by those who have been following the Hue light bulb phenomena.

Remote Internet Control

The Hue’s bridge connects to the internet and if you log in through your Hue App and create an account on the MeetHue.com website, you can control all your Hue connected lightbulbs through the internet. This means if you are out of town and want to put the lights on, you can trigger it remotely. This could be handy if you want to put the light on because you are going to use a video monitor to observe your house or apartment. Or maybe you just want to put the lights on because you are concerned people know you are away and may break in.

Scenes For Different Groups Of Bulbs and Settings

The most helpful feature of the Hue app is that it allows you to assign bulbs to different custom scenes. The custom scenes can be named and given different light colors and light intensity. Moreover, you can assign particular bulbs to each scene. For example, I created two scenes for just the bulbs in my bedroom.

I called one scene “Low BD ” and the other “High BD.” When I press the former, the lamp in the bedroom gets brighter and goes to the highest stetting. When I press the Low BD button it goes down in intensity. I could create other buttons which have the lamp change to a specific color or light Hue. You get different pages so you can create countless scenes and store them on various pages. You can rename the pages and just like apps on the iOS platform you can press, wiggle and then drag the scene to another page. I named the first page “Main.” You can create all sorts of groupings of the light bulbs, such as having various scene buttons for lights in the living room, other scene buttons for lights in the hallway, kitchen, bathroom, etc. Right now you are limited to controlling 50 bulbs at one time from the Hue app as the Hue app can only connect to one Hue bridge at a time and the Hue bridge can only connect to up to 50 bulbs. You can of course install more than one Hue bridge in your home or business, and have up to multiples of 50 bulbs for the number of bridges you have. But each bridge will have to be controlled by a different iOS device.

Geofencing

Geofencing is maybe the most intriguing new feature in the Hue app. Right now it is limited to checking of boxes that say “Switch scene on when I arrive” or “Switch scene off when I leave,” or add the limiting rule that this should only occur “Only outside of daylight hours.” If you return home during daylight hours, that limiting check mark will prevent the light from going on but at night it will go on if you return then. In the future, we are probably going to see more geofencing functionality, like a light blinking or changing color when you arrive at work so your family knows you made it, or a light change when you arrive at a certain store to remind the folks back at home you are there. Or how about a light that changes color the farther you are from home?

Automation With IFTTT

IFTTT, stands for “If This Than That”, and on that site you can create “recipes” which are essentially automation actions. For example, you can have a recipe where a text is sent to you every morning telling you the weather. Or you can create a rule that emails with attachments have the attachments dumped into your DropBox folder. But now, your Hue light bulbs, which are connected to the internet, can be controlled by IFTT recipes. So you can create all sorts of crazy recipes that trigger your Hue lightbulbs to change color, blink on and off, change color scenes, etc. Already there are interesting recipes, such as if it begins to rain then change the light colors to blue, or loop your Hue through a rainbow of colors at sunrise, or if you receive an email from a specific address then blink certain Hue lights to notify you.

Third Party Apps

The other great thing that Philips has done is provide APIs for Hue so that third-party developers can create innovative apps. Already ready there are various free or pad apps in the iOS App store. One interesting free app is Hue Party app which allows music to trigger light changing to the beat of the music. It also purports to cause a strobe through shaking the phone and taps to change the beat of the lights. I haven’t used it yet but it looks interesting and fun.

Conclusion

My first impression is that the recent app and API upgrade by Philips has made the Hue light bulb and bridge a great futuristic product. I can’t wait to see what additional functionality Philips will provide and what interesting things developers do with the third party apps.

But I am really excited because I think that what Philips is doing is just the start. Philips competitors will also release wireless-controlled light bulbs and other everyday items will also probably be controlled by wireless signals and other means. Maybe in the future we will have light bulbs which we can project a picture, a movie or a hologram. Imagine walking into a building and using your smartphone or Google Glass to control various lights or to project your photos and other media. It is going to be crazy in the future!

DOJ: Apple colluded with publishers to raise e-book prices
by Dara Kerr, cnet.com

A new document filed in the e-book price-fixing suit accuses Apple of conspiring to hike prices, but the tech giant denies these claims, saying it was actually partaking in constant one-on-one negotiations.

Apple vio­lat­ed antitrust laws by…

Apple’s defense in DOJ’s ebook antitrust case makes sense: it offered publishers a selling platform to compete with Amazon and any collision was only among the publishers. This case, brought by the Justice Department, could go to trial against Apple soon. Should be a dramatic antitrust trial.

Apple Updates iMovie for Mac With Bug Fixes and Stability Improvements
J. Glenn Künzler, mactrast.com

Apple has released a new update for iMovie for Mac, bring­ing the ver­sion up to 9.0.9. The update doesn’t add any­thing new, but rather focus­es on minor bug fixes and per­for­mance improve­ments.

What’s New in Version 9.0.9- Addresses…

iMovie is a great app on the Mac to edit movies. It taught me how to edit movies many years ago. Is it is incredibly powerful and can do a lot of things. It just got upgraded to version 2.5.2 and with minor updates. Check it out. If you want to edit movies, it’s a great way to start.

‘Coffee with Tim Cook’ auction ends Tuesday afternoon, current bid is $605,000
Yoni Heisler, tuaw.com

A few weeks ago we reported on an online auction where the winner will have a unique opportunity to sit down for coffee with Tim Cook over at Apple’s headquarters at 1 Infinite Loop.Since the auction began about three weeks ago, the bids reached…

Should I bid?

Apple seeks to add Galaxy S4 to ongoing Samsung patent suit in California
Jordan Kahn, 9to5mac.com

In its ongo­ing sec­ond major patent trial against Sam­sung, Apple yes­ter­day filed a state­ment with the US Dis­trict Court in Cal­i­for­nia claim­ing that after exam­in­ing the recent­ly released Galaxy S4 it has “con­clud­ed that it is an…

It makes sense that Apple is adding the Galaxy S4 to its Samsung lawsuit.

Steve and Bill/60 Minutes

Sunday Night, May 12, 60 Minutes ran a piece where Charlie Rose interviewed Bill Gates (click here). The subjects ranged from Bill’s efforts to cure diseases among the poorest billions on Earth and his relationship with Steve Jobs. CBS also has additional footage from the store on its website, here.

I found the piece to be kinda of moving. Bill Gates clearly was emotional when reminiscing about his relationship with Steve Jobs and visiting towards the end of his life. I was also impressed with what Bill Gates is doing to get rid of diseases like tuberculosis other basic illnesses that are unnecessary killing the poorest on the planet. Really, Steve Jobs and Bill Gates will always be considered together in the history of mankind and development. I wonder if any of today’s innovators and business leaders will every be able to match what Steve and Bill achieved.

I live in NYC. I have Time Warner cable and pay close to $50 per month for Internet. It is becoming clear that my cable speed is not keeping up with my ATT LTE wireless speed on my smartphone. Look at this comparison. I am getting more that 40 mbs down and over 8 mbs upload on LTE. Cable is giving me less in both categories. We need more competition in cable. Hope Google fiber comes to NYC.

Great tribute to the iPad’s three year anniversary.

This is a Macsfuture first look at a web app that runs on iOS that is a weather app. It is called Forecast and the website that you can get it at is forecast.io.

Mountain sunset

Apple recently upgraded the GarageBand app on iOS to work with the AudioBus app which costs a few dollars.  This is a huge breakthrough on iOS as it allows apps to communicate directly with each other.  In this case, AudioBus is a cool app that allows music and sound apps to work together.  In this video, I have the music I am playing in the Figure app pipe through AudioBus and record on a track in GarageBand.  It is amazing and could be the future of what Apple allows on iOS 7.

Yesterday, Samsung unveiled the Galaxy S4 at an Samsung PR event at Radio City Music Hall.  If you have checked the internet or Twitter, you know that it is a fiasco.  The entire event highlights how tasteless Samsung is and why even Apple at its worst moments can’t even come close the horror that is Samsung.  Among other things, Samsung PR put on actors who put on skits that were sexist and campy.  Things were so bad that even Molly Wood, who has consistently dumped on Apple and boosted Android, posted a well-written and justified damning critique of Samsung’s event.  You can get it here.

“Because yes, it is frequently kind of sucky to be a woman in tech. I do a great job of telling myself not to read the YouTube comments and of ignoring or blocking the caveman trolls that make it hard to even want to do this job sometimes, and yes, of pretending that I don’t know I make less than men who do less than I do. But don’t mistake any of those coping skills for some kind of obliviousness to the fact that the number of booth babes hasn’t declined all that much since my first MacWorld and we just keep having these same conversations and troll attacks over and over and over.

So you know what, Samsung? You’re not helping. Shut up and make me a phone.”

(Molly Wood on CNET.com)

You can see the entire Samsung Radio City PR nightmare here:

As many of you were surprise or shocked to find out, yesterday Google announced will soon shut down the Google Reader service:

We launched Google Reader in 2005 in an effort to make it easy for people to discover and keep tabs on their favorite websites. While the product has a loyal following, over the years usage has declined. So, on July 1, 2013, we will retire Google Reader. Users and developers interested in RSS alternatives can export their data, including their subscriptions, with Google Takeout over the course of the next four months.

Google.

Personally, I never used this RSS grabbing service, or if I did, it was a long time ago and just to see if I liked it.  For the last few years, I have been getting my news and blog posts fed to me using other tools.  Most notably, I find that I am mainly reading news stories and blog posts through the Flipboard apps on my iPhone and IPads. It is a great service and the magazine like interface his highly usable.  The other way I get my stories and blog posts, is Twitter.  I follow people like @Kontra who constantly post great links.  

So between these services, I really didn’t need or use Google Reader.  I think allot of people don’t use Google Reader and many more people use Flipboard and Twitter.  For this reason it is not surprising that Google is shutting down Google Reader.