Posts in Linked

The Original Voice of Siri→

Great story by CNN’s Jessica Ravitz, who found, almost by accident, the woman who says she’s “100% sure” she’s the voice of the original Siri (the one that debuted with iOS 5 exactly two years ago).

Behind this groundbreaking technology there is a real woman. While the ever-secretive Apple has never identified her, all signs indicate that the original voice of Siri in the United States is a voiceover actor who laid down recordings for a client eight years ago. She had no idea she’d someday be speaking to more than 100 million people through a not-yet-invented phone.

Her name is Susan Bennett and she lives in suburban Atlanta.

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Pocket’s Refresh for the Web→

If I had any previous complaint about Pocket, it’s that their website felt too much like a tablet app and wasn’t easy to use on the desktop. Following Pocket’s iOS 7 update, they’ve redesigned their website making it significantly easier to use. Everything has been unified into a single cohesive toolbar, it’s faster, and it’s visually more appealing. If you’re at the office or on the go, Pocket on the web is now just as great as its native iOS and Mac apps.

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MacStories Sponsorships→

Sponsorships allow me to run this site and provide our readers with in-depth reviews of iOS and OS X apps, editorials, and tutorials to enhance their workflows and get the most out of their devices.

We’ve updated our sponsorship page with new available dates, information on prices, and an email address to get in touch with me and book a sponsorship. If you want to directly promote your product or service to MacStories readers, there is no better way than the weekly sponsorship.

There’s only one open slot left in October, and four until the end of the year. If you want to book them or get information about 2014 slots because you’re planning ahead, let me know.

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Rdio Makes “Stations” Feature Free For All Users→

In a move that doesn’t come as a surprise following Apple’s entrance in the online radio space with iTunes Radio, music streaming Rdio is announcing today that the “Stations” feature will be free for all non-subscribers. Until today, people could try out Rdio’s full feature set for 14 days, then sign up at $9.99 per month; after today, Stations will remain always available – without the 14-day limitation – in Rdio’s mobile apps.

We’re inviting everyone to listen to all of Rdio’s stations, drawing from over 20 million songs, through our mobile apps for iOS and Android without ever pulling out the plastic. Even if your subscription or trial has ended, you’ll be able to choose from 10 different station types — including stations based on artist, song, and over 400 genres plus You FM, a personalized station based on your listening habits — so you can keep the music playing for as long as you want at no cost to you.

Casey Newton has an interview with Rdio’s Chris Becherer at The Verge:

To get the complete Rdio service, which includes on-demand listening of tracks and offline song storage, the user still has to pay $9.99 a month. But executives hope that if the people who complete the free trial continue listening to Stations, they’ll be more likely to subscribe in the long run. “We don’t need you to subscribe right away,” says Chris Becherer, vice president for product, in an interview with The Verge. “You can live inside Stations for a long time. We think that over time, you’ll start building up your collection, building up your favorites. And whenever you do subscribe, all that stuff is ready to go.

The new free radio feature is available for users in the US, Canada, and Australia. More details on how it works from Rdio:

By combining The Echo Nest’s Taste Profiling technology with Rdio’s beautifully dynamic design and rich data on listening history, we’ve unlocked an unprecedented personal radio experience for all mobile users to enjoy for free.

I have been listening to Rdio Stations for the past few months, and the quality of their recommendations is impressive. The “Your FM” personalized station has been particularly accurate in the songs and artists it recommends, and I believe that if Rdio can scale well enough to accomodate free users on Stations without sacrificing quality, the feature could help in selling more subscriptions. It’ll be interesting to see the repercussions of Apple’s iTunes Radio and Rdio’s new free option in a few months.

Rdio for iOS can be found here.

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Notograph→

Developed by Craig Bradley, Notograph is an interesting iPhone app for “non-photo photos”. I had been testing the app before its release in August, and, while I don’t use it, I think that it’s a good idea.

Here’s how the developer describes it:

Have you ever been thumbing through pictures of your kids or your cats and had the moment interrupted by a picture you took just to remember something?

If you already use your camera for pictures of sketches or business cards or whiteboards or napkins or signs or any other thing you want to remember but DO NOT want in your camera roll or your Photo Stream, then NOTOGRAPH is just what you’ve been waiting for.

What I like is that Notograph always starts ready to take pictures, which can then be organized through linear thumbnails and optionally synced with iCloud/Dropbox or manually sent to Evernote. Notograph doesn’t want to do OCR or other crazy camera-related features – it’s an app to archive, indeed, “non-photo photos” outside of the main iOS Camera Roll. If you don’t like the idea of using something like Evernote or other syncing services for pictures that you don’t want in your photo library, Notograph is a fine utility.

$1.99 on the App Store. Here’s the developer’s roadmap and story of first six weeks of sales.

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Joe Cieplinski On App Pricing and App Store Customers→

A different and refreshing take on the recent discussions on app pricing and In-App Purchases by Joe Cieplinski:

If we were to convert Teleprompt+ to the free with in-app purchase model, for instance, the three of us at Bombing Brain would be out of business in a couple of weeks.

Our customers are primarily prosumers and pros—people who wouldn’t trust their business to a “free” app. Our high price is a large part of what has made us successful in this market. (Along with years of cultivating a reputation for being better than our competition.) Converting this particular app to free with in-app purchase now would likely be an unmitigated disaster. We know, because there have been free alternatives that have crashed and burned. Hard.

While In-App Purchases may work for some apps, I agree that developers shouldn’t follow other developers’ advice blindly without carefully considering their userbase and customers. The Omni Group, for instance, charges a “premium” for apps that they know their customers will be happily paying for because they trust the company.

Joe continues:

Users looking to pay a premium price may be few and far between, but each one is ten times more valuable than the “average” iOS user to a developer like me.

Again, it depends on whether you’re after market share or a subset of App Store customers who can sustain your business by paying for higher-priced apps. It’s a great perspective, so read Joe’s post here.

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