Mobile web browsers have come a long way since we first introduced an XHTML version of Reader back in 2006. For example, iPhone and iPod Touch owners know how powerful having a full-featured browser is. We on the Reader team are heavy mobile Safari users. Sometimes we use it to kill time, other times for answering important questions that come up during brunch: What is Tyrol's first name? How is maple butter made? How do you sweeten rhubarb for sangria? What is John Gruber saying now? For questions like the last one, we of course use Reader to keep up with our subscriptions. #

I can confirm that the new iPhone Google reader interface is indeed rather awesome.

Formula 1 will finally get a new video game title in 2009, three years since the last official F1 game made by Sony. Formula One Management were reported to be demanding up to $200m for the rights.
First, the good news: the game won’t be exclusive to a single machine, and is expected to be available for ‘major home consoles’ (presumably PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Nintendo Wii), PC and other formats. This is very important and I’m sure Codemasters’ expertise in producing cross-format titles helped them win the contract over the likes of Sony. #

I wasn't overly impress with the last revision of Colin McRae's DIRT (some annoyingly over-excited yank commentating 'dood!') and the demo of Race Driver GRID, whilst admittedly only available yesterday, has a shockingly wooly, inaccurate and easy driving engine (compared to Forza 2 anyway) - though the commentator is less excitable, so I'm hoping the F1 game will improve upon this.

Version 2.5.1 of WordPress is now available. It includes a number of bug fixes, performance enhancements, and one very important security fix. We recommend everyone update immediately, particularly if your blog has open registration. The vulnerability is not public but it will be shortly.

...and it's still just as much of a pig as it ever was to upgrade yet we still get the upgrade now alerts and security hassles. The only 2 plugins I can find to hand, the creatively named "Wordpress Automatic Upgrade plugin" and "Instant Upgrade plugin for WordPress": The first refuses to reactivate my plugins meaning I have to print-to-preview the plugins screen then go through reactivating them (please let me just disable the pointless plugin deactivation); and the second refuses to recognise my ftp set as being valid but is at best vague about what might be wrong (although the other plugin seemed happy).

So why the fuck isn't there a built in WP upgrade system? The plugin upgrader is getting there (why it goes to a new window and doesn't use AJAXy goodness I dont understand) so bits are in place there somewhere.

Let your friends know about ExpanDrive by becoming a fan on Facebook. We’d love some help getting the word out about ExpanDrive, so we’re offering up a $20-off coupon [making ExpanDrive only $9!] to all fans once when the page hits 100 users.

I’ve said it before — one of my favorite things about the iPhone is no Flash. I will now add and no SilverlightPlugin.

One such copy seems indicative of the whole Vista experience. On boot up, instead of seeing potentially confusing system messages, you now see a progress bar and the word Microsoft. This is a lot like the boot up screen with a Mac. Except, the word Microsoft is blurry. I know, who cares? But it is a great metaphor for the Vista experience. Decent (stolen) ideas, bad and lazy implementation.

As it turns out, one field that already makes extensive use of accelerometers is seismology. Usually these sensors are buried underground, generating much of the data seismologists use to model earthquakes. So in 2006 when Cochran saw a program called SeisMac, a light went on. SeisMac uses the accelerometers in Mac computers to let people shake their computers and watch the motion translated on screen into a graph. Cochran wondered if the same technology could be used in earthquake sensing, and suggested the idea to colleagues at the Scripps Institute of Oceanography, where she was working at the time.

"I sort of said, 'Hey, what do guys think if we take this accelerometer and make a seismic network out of it?' And of course Jesse was like, 'That's the coolest idea I have ever heard.'"

Thus was born Quake Catcher Network. The two scientists -- joined by Carl Christensen, a programmer with experience in distributed computing -- started in September 2007.