Highlight’s Privacy Issues
I have finally found an app that scared me enough to delete it. It’s called Highlight.
In Highlight’s own words:
Highlight quietly runs in the background, surfacing information about the people around you.
In other words, you give Highlight access to your social networks and it looks for other people around you that might have similar interests. When someone is nearby the app thinks might have similar interests, it alerts you. You’re then able to see their profile, interests, etc. and determine if you’d like to contact them.
Sounds pretty cool, right? Well, it is. And lots of people at SXSW this year along with me also thought so. That is, till I saw how I was seen by other users who view my profile. In my opinion, the app provides a few too many pieces of myself that I’d rather not share.
First, it provides, not just my general city location (Washington, DC) - it gives my local neighborhood (Glover Park). OK, that piece of information I can simply change to something arbitrary and feel better. Though, I bet 90% of users wouldn’t think of that and simply give over their own neighborhood details.
The issue that got me very concerned had to do with my profile photo. Unbeknownst to me, adding my Facebook profile (I think) allowed the app to grab all my profile photos from Facebook. And not just my current photo, but ALL the photos I’d ever used as my profile picture were available for anyone to see. Fifteen in all. This cannot be un-done. The solution might be to delete your Facebook profile, but there doesn’t seem to be any way to do that within the app. I suppose you might be able to log into Facebook and delete the offending photos there as well, but I didn’t test this theory.
There is a privacy setting within the app, but it’s an all or nothing type of filter. Either you share everything with everybody or everything with ”friends of friends” only.
The idea of a ”smart” app that can help you forge relationships with people around you that have similar interests is intriguing. But the information the app currently shares with them about you is too much for me. For now, I’m deleting this app and my account. I hope Highlight will find a way to curb these types of ”over-sharing” elements for some users and still find a way to produce a great user experience.
UPDATE
I tried to contact Highlight via their privacy email address but it doesn’t seem to be valid.
Recipient address: privacy@highlig.ht
Reason: Remote SMTP server has rejected address
Diagnostic code: smtp;550-5.1.1 The email account that you tried to reach does not exist.
I believe the only way to disable the service is to delete the app in my Facebook settings, which is what I did.
Just a Theory: Condé Nast on the iPad
Some great insights and suggestions for Condé as well as a good description of the problem.
I can tell you from experience from working in large companies that the mentality is, “If it ain’t broke, why fix it?” Especially when fixing it will mean a lot of hard work and money.
The Executives might actually know about the problem, but they go home every night and sleep just fine without fixing anything. People judge them based on a numerical spreadsheet not by what the press/bloggers are reporting. Our sales are steady, you’re not costing us too much, therefore you’re doing a good job. It’s as simple as that. Until you get someone in a position of power who genuinely cares about a particular issue, this process/problem will stay exactly as it is - unchanged.
[Updated] Readability Directs Shared Articles To Own Servers, Cuts Out Original Publishers
The title should read:
Readability Caves To Greedy Bloggers/Publishers & Craps On Users
But that’s not what happened. Here’s what happened…
I’m a fan of Readability, but I’ve never liked how sharing an article from within its native or web app uses a self-hosted, Readability-ized version of that article. It doesn’t send your recipients to the original article on the original publisher’s site.
This is bad practice.
As a publisher, though, there are other practices I don’t like about any of these services or, more accurately, how they’re implemented in third-party apps. For example: in most Twitter clients, you can tap or right-click a link to send it to your reading service of choice without ever actually visiting the page and giving the publisher a visit and pageview.
Yes, it can be a pain in the ass to visit a page before saving it to read later if you’re on a crappy 3G connection, or you’re simply in a rush and don’t have time. But it still means an article is getting sucked off a publisher’s site without anything of value exchanged in return.
via Marco Arment
Update: The company responded to these complaints later this morning. Its app and web sharing features now link directly to publisher sites.
I’m probably the one person who actually preferred what Readability was originally doing. Why? Because I’m a user first. And users don’t care about seeing the original site.
Source: chartier
How Many Clicks to Report Twitter Spam?
I’ve not had too big a problem with spam, but I’m guessing a lot of big name bloggers/users do.
I’ve often thought of doing a comparison like this for twitter apps in regards to reading and posting. There’s a big difference in how each app shows different information.
If you missed it over the weekend, Square has killed off Card Case for a new app simply called ‘Square’. It follows the same basic idea of Card Case - allowing you to create virtual tabs at participating vendors - so I have no idea why they decided to kill it in favor of this whole new design.
The biggest problem with the idea wasn’t the design, it was finding vendors to adopt it. And even then, employees at participating vendors who understood what the heck you mean my saying, “Put it on my tab.”
I tried it a few times here in DC and got some very perplexed looks from the person behind the cash register. With a long line behind me, there was no way I was going to hold everyone up just so the un-informed employee could find a manager to take my new fangled way of paying.
Interesting redesign concept of the UX on the lock screen regarding the camera and unlocking slider.
Source: kurocha.blogspot.ca
Oink Shuts Down
We started Milk Inc. (the company behind Oink) to rapidly build and test out new ideas. Oink was our first test and, in preparing to move onto the next project, we’ve decided to shut it down to help focus our efforts.
I never could get into OINK for one simple reason - It grew out of control very fast. Too many duplicates and no way to manage them was a Type A personalities’ worst nightmare.
WLT: World View
Using instagram, tag beautiful type treatments with #wlt
“Project Re: Brief | Coke | Mobile Ad Demo” (by projectrebrief)
What an impressive demo.
Source: youtube.com
What Maps is iPhoto for iOS Using?
Update 3: John Gruber:
OK, what I’m hearing now is that Places still uses Google Maps, but the maps in Journals and slideshows are not using Google Maps, and are Apple’s own stuff.
Instagram: Update: What’s New in Version 2.2
Good news! Instagram v2.2 is now available in the App Store! Here’s what’s new:
Faster Camera
We’ve made it faster than ever for you to snap + share photos on Instagram.
Looking good. Now, if they’d just take my advice and find a way to post at a higher resolution.
Source: instagram
NYC Tourists & Locals: Embark NYC is a Damn Fine Subway App
New York City’s subway system scores high on both the confusing and unpredictable scales. Even the most seasoned New Yorker can’t predict when a tourist’s handbag will jam a 6 train’s door, disrupting service on the 4, 5, and 6 for the next 7 hours.
Embark NYC, an iOS and Android app, pipes realtime service data into their lovely app, which also includes clear maps, trip planning, and a host of nifty user experience elements. In fact, the app is so damn thoughtful that it really is the final word on NYC subway apps.
There’s one for DC as well.
Source: dvwlr
Photo Uploading-iPhone App Shootout
Today I’ve been testing every iPhone camera app I own. Because the iPhone 4S’s camera is an 8 megapixel camera and capable of outputting photos at 2448x3264, Facebook can now handle photos up to 2048 pixels; and future iPhone’s & mobile devices will only increase their resolutions; I focused specifically on photo uploading resolutions between the different apps. My iPhone 4’s camera however is only 1936x2592 so that was my baseline. I tested Camera.app, Path, Instagram, Facebook, Camera+, Tweetbot, Twitter, Flickr & Pinsnap. I was pretty amazed at what I found.
I thought this was pretty interesting. A visual side by side of Echofon, Twitter’s own app, Twitterrific, and Osfoora. I need a bigger screen to add Itsy in there.
