apples
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Non-browning GMO apple slices go on sale next month
Mushrooms won't be the only non-browning produce on store shelves for long. Thanks to genetic modification, we'll soon see Golden Delicious apples that don't oxidize for three weeks after being cut, bruised or bitten into. They'll be sold in packages of slices and will go on sale in the Midwest in February and March. According to Arctic, the company responsible for the fruit, this feat was achieved by "silencing" polyphenol oxidase (PPO) expression.
Well Fed Buff: Dalaran Applesauce
You think I have a thing for apples, do you? It's autumn, people -- pick 'em while the pickin's good. Because you know what goes great with a meal of Half a Lovely Apple ... With Bacon but before Mini Candied Apples? A heaping serving of spicy, fragrant Dalaran Applesauce. The win to this encounter is the magical item we equip, the Dalaran Apple Bowl -- otherwise known as your slow cooker. It makes simmering fresh, homemade applesauce so magically simple that you'll find yourself grabbing a bag of honeycrisp apples every time you go to the store. Seriously, you do next to nothing, and the achievements just roll in. And the smell, oh, the smell ... Your whole house will smell like fresh-baked apple pie. In fact, we prefer to eat our Dalaran Applesauce hot like apple pie filling from tiny ramekins, although it's delicious in its more traditional chilled form as well.
Rob Janoff and how he made the Apple logo
ZLOK has re-posted an article (originally meant for the defunct Sync Magazine) about Rob Janoff, a designer who's credited with coming up with the iconic-as-they-come Apple logo. It's actually a really short piece, but he does talk pretty candidly about where he got the idea: by buying a bag of apples and slicing them up in different ways.And the original design was just a single color Apple (which, of course, Apple has used versions of since), but Jobs thought the design should be more colorful, so the logo got its familiar colored bands. Janoff says he just threw the colors in where he thought they might fit, which makes sense -- they don't match up with the physical spectrum at all, they're just sort of in there.Cool to see that something now so well known started off so simply. Janoff did the work for a design firm, and says that nowadays, he gets "not even a holiday card" for his invention. Apple does take their time recognizing inventors, though -- maybe the card's in the mail.[via Cult of Mac]
The sun-stamped Apple doesn't fall far from the iTree
Some forms of Apple fandom are quick and simple -- the button, the tote bag, the temporary tattoo (not to be confused with the more permanent variety). Some forms, however, require commitment and patience. I don't speak the predominant language over at useloos.com, but I can guess that the translated caption for this photo gallery might be "How do you like them apples?"Update: Per Cult of Mac, It looks like the source for the tattooed apples is this Japanese site -- translations welcome.Yes, one very patient apple tree owner applied icon stencils for the Apple & iPod logos to a treeful of apples, and then let the sunshine do the work. The results can be seen to the right and at the gallery -- a bushelful of neatly logofied fruit, ripe for the munching. Talk about living your brand.Thanks Tim!
App Store on track to do a billion items by 2009
You read that right -- it took the iTunes Store a few years, but as Roughly Drafted has calculated, Apple's App Store is on track, even if growth stops right now, to hit a billion apps served up by 2009. Obviously not all of those are paid apps, but by any count, that's a ton of applications dumped onto iPhones and iPod touches around the world.That said, the App Store is far from perfect -- Apple's approval process has come under fire lately for a lack of transparency, among other issues, and of course the iTunes Store didn't have the benefit of most of its content being free. Of course the App Store is working to get apps on phones, but there are lots of kinks to be worked out, including just how "open" Apple is letting the store be, questions of quality over the software that does make it in, and just whether it's worth developers' time to deliver these applications anyway.Just as the iFund guys noted, however, we're only in the first few steps of a marathon here. There's a long way to go, but already, in terms of an iPhone software distribution system, the App Store is a huge success.[via Ars]
Around Azeroth: Floating island... of DEATH!
Reader Flyv of We Know on Eitrigg sends in this stellar shot of one of the many floating islands above Nagrand. But below the most innocent looking apple tree lies a corpse with an axe through its head. What a way to go...Update: Reader Gallen of Stormscale sends in this speculation on how all this might have happened. (The suspense!)Do you have a unique shot of Azeroth or Outland that you'd like to show off to the rest of the world? Tell us about it by e-mailing aroundazeroth@gmail.com! You can attach a picture file or send us a link to one -- and don't worry about formatting, we'll take care of that part. See more of your pics from Around Azeroth. %Gallery-1816%
NeoDigits' Helios HVD2085 upscaling DVD player reviewed
Matt Burns has a thorough review of the NeoDigits' Helios HVD2085 upscaling DVD player (also known as the NeuNeo HVD2085) over at our sister blog HDBeat, and not only does he train his own experienced eye on the unit's video performance, he actually goes so far as to set up a single blind test at one of the big box retailers pitting the Helios against the store's top traditional player. In his private testing, Matt finds that the component and HDMI-equipped Helios delivers a superior picture quality compared to a standard Sony DVP-NS725P progressive scan unit (although, as he admits, it's not an apples-to-apples comparison), most notably in how it is able to smooth the picture -- but it doesn't really live up its advertised claim of improving a movie's resolution. He also digs the Hitachi-inspired remote, clean and intuitive menus, and plethora of connectivity options, although the construction here sounds a bit flimsy. At least in terms of pure picture quality, the big box customers were in total agreement with Matt; they overwhelmingly chose the $250 Helios over the almost-$300 Harmon Kardon DVD 22 in the random sampling, citing both its superior color and sharpness.
