If you can’t settle with Rdio, find a happy home at Spotify, or are satisfied with Google Play Music All Access, there’s a new music streaming service coming from the same guys who make those bass heavy Beats headphones. Matt Panzarino at TechCrunch writes:

… It’s in an internal, private beta with ‘people who know and love music’. It’s also rolled out to some ‘artists and other influencers’ in order to get feedback, so celebs are playing with it as we speak. Rogers says they’re tweaking the service based on the feedback that they’re getting, and re-iterates that the service is set to launch in January.

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How does a streaming service like this differentiate? Do you make a service and launch with mobile apps that give you the most options like Rdio and Google, or differentiate in a specific way as Spotify does with playlists, Spotify Apps, and sharing? Considering who’s behind the project, I’m both curious and excited to see the end result.

David Smith’s lightweight podcast app now has a web companion in beta.

Today I’m rolling out a beta version of website integration for Pod Wrangler right on feedwrangler.net. You can now listen to your podcasts from within any modern browser. Playback position is synced up with Pod Wrangler so you shouldn’t need to fuss with finding your place. This works great for finishing off that episode you were listening to on your drive into work or in a context when you just can’t use your iPhone.

If you don’t like listening to podcasts in iTunes or in Apple’s Podcast app, give Pod Wrangler a try. It’s not an app that’s big on looks, but it’s fast and functional. If you run or listen to podcasts on your daily commute, Pod Wrangler recently added On-the-Go which makes playback controls big and easy to tap. You’ll have to become a full member by making an in-app purchase in the iPhone app to gain access to the web version, but being able to listen to your favorite podcasts from any of your desktops and laptops is really nice.

Darrell Etherington from TechCrunch writes about how iBeacons are being used to sell digital magazines. Here’s a clever idea:

The tech is very handy in a number of scenarios, as in a coffee shop for instance, where the establishment could subscribe and enable access to full magazines to patrons who come in. It’s made even more convenient with the addition of iBeacons on iOS, as the whole digital handshake can happen automatically, providing the user with the best possible and most frictionless experience. Another possible use is in modernizing the doctor’s office, offering up publications in the waiting room that are more useful and more current than five-year old issues of Good Housekeeping.

Eric Slivka from MacRumors on the latest in-dash technology to be found in the new Honda Civic and Honda Fit:

The new Civic, which goes on sale tomorrow, and the upcoming Fit, which launches early next year, will offer an all-new Display Audio interface featuring a 7-inch touchscreen that will be familiar to smartphone users, offering easy access to a variety of features.

“Display Audio” is quite the oxymoron.

Whatever happened to iOS 7 in the Car? What Honda is offering are proprietary (and expensive in the case of navigation) apps that are simply launched through the car’s virtual dashboard.

You could accomplish many of the goals of the way I use GIFs with inline videos or links to Youtube/Vimeo. However, I find that in many cases the result of a simple focused GIF is far better than a video. Firstly, they don’t require fancy hosting or embed codes to work. Any modern browser can display them inline. Their short, looping nature also make it really easy to immediately get the gist of what the video is trying to communicate. They also take far less time to create than a polished video.

I have the same setup as David Smith, only I use Reflector to capture videos of iOS devices.

GIFs are typically used for Internet memes and jokes (or wars), but they have been working well in my reviews, especially for iOS 7 apps. Creating GIFs of iOS apps is one of the few things that I still can’t do on iOS.