Making short GIFs of YouTube videos is a pretty well-established practice now — so much so that there’s dozens of websites dedicated to this finest of art forms. But YouTube might be about to make them all obsolete, thanks to a new built-in GIF maker. Read more…
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YouTube Now Lets You Make GIFs From Videos
Some time in 2015, Iowa will become the first state to offer an official app from the state’s Department of Transportation that can serve as your driver’s license and ID . That’s pretty incredible. It’s also getting us much closer to a more convenient, wallet-free future. Read more…
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Iowa Is Going To Let You Use a Smartphone As Your Driver’s License
An anonymous reader writes Fabrice Bellard (creator of FFMPEG, QEMU, JSLinux…) proposes a new image format that could replace JPEG : BPG. For the same quality, files are about half the size of their JPEG equivalents. He released libbpg (with source) as well as a JS decompressor, and set up a demo including the famous Lena image. Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Bellard Creates New Image Format To Replace JPEG
Remember when Apple went after that handy note-taking widget , a popular app that’s one the first truly useful widgets for iOS 8? Turns out, Apple’s been pulling all kinds of apps that take advantage of new features in iOS 8—even after they’ve been approved to be in the App Store. And developers are starting to get pretty upset. Read more…
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Apple Is Pulling a Bunch of the Neatest iOS 8 Apps
LastPass just announced a new feature for the password manager that automatically changes your password for sites when a hack is reported. Read more…
The CarPlay interface is undoubtedly better for using while driving than the regular ‘ole screen. But unless you’ve got a shiny new car (or one of the expensive aftermarket dashes), chances are you don’t have anything to pair your iPhone with. But this tweak gives you an idea of what CarPlay would look like running on just your handset. Read more…
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This Tweak Puts CarPlay On Your iPhone Without An External Screen
SmartAboutThings writes In Q3 2014, IDC notes that Google shipped 715, 500 Chromebooks to U.S. schools while Apple shipped 702, 000 iPads. Thus, Apple’s iPad has lost its lead over Google’s line of Chromebook laptops in the U.S. education market as Google shipped more devices to schools last quarter. While analysts say [registration required] that this advantage for Google’s Chromebooks can be attributed to their low cost, the presence of a physical keyboard has also been seen as an important factor. Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Chromebooks Overtake iPads In US Education Market
HP has just announced a new business laptop. But judging on looks alone, you’d be forgiven for thinking that it’s just a Macbook Air with a sticker over the Apple logo. Thankfully, there’s a few tricks inside to differentiate things. Read more…
HughPickens.com writes Damon Darlin writes in the NYT that Apple pay is revolutionary but not for the reason you think. It isn’t going to replace the credit card but it’s going to replace the wallet — the actual physical thing crammed with cards, cash, photos and receipts. According to Darlin, when you are out shopping, it’s the wallet, not the credit card, that is the annoyance. It’s bulky. It can be forgotten, or lost. “I’ve learned while traipsing about buying stuff with my ApplePay that I can whittle down wallet items that I need to carry to three”: A single credit card, for places that have not embraced, but soon will, some form of smartphone payment; a driver’s license; and about $20 in cash. Analysts at Forrester Research estimate that over the next five years, US mobile payments will grow to $142 billion, from $3.7 billion this year. “If I were to make a bet, I’d say that 10 years from now the most popular answer from young shoppers about how they make small payments would be: thumbprint. And you’ll get a dull shrug when you ask what a wallet is.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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The Cashless Society? It’s Already Coming
The 8.2 version of iOS is still in beta and unavailable to non-developers, but that hasn’t stopped Chinese-based outfit TaiG from breaking it free from Apple’s shackles (and also jailbreaking 8.1.1, the current release, in the process). Read more…