Craig Manning’s Top 100 Albums of the 2000’s

Contributor Craig Manning is a madman. He’s written up thoughts on his 100 favorite albums from the 2000’s. One-Fucking-Hundred. There’s some great stuff in here:

The resulting project took me the better part of six months. I chipped away at it every night before bed, taking just 10 or 15 minutes before I turned in for the night to sit down in front of the computer, choose an album, and cast myself back in time to when it captured my world. Slowly, the list took form. Eventually, I realized that the list wasn’t just a catalog of music, but also an autobiographical story, told through albums that I loved in the most formative years of my life. As it turned out, writing about the music I loved between the ages of nine and 18 meant writing a lot about my life. Some of the stories told below are things I’ve revealed before. Some are things I don’t think I’ve ever told anyone. All form the backbone for a collection of albums that is completely “me.” I didn’t write these records, but there’s at least a song from every single one of them that feels like it came directly from my heart.

Twitter To Delete Fake Accounts

Twitter

The New York Times:

Twitter will begin removing tens of millions of suspicious accounts from users’ followers on Thursday, signaling a major new effort to restore trust on the popular but embattled platform.

The reform takes aim at a pervasive form of social media fraud. Many users have inflated their followers on Twitter or other services with automated or fake accounts, buying the appearance of social influence to bolster their political activism, business endeavors or entertainment careers.

I wrote about this five months back and all I can say is: finally.

iOS 11.4.1 and Blocks Passcode Cracking Tools Used by Police

iPhone

Chris Welch, writing for The Verge:

Apple today released iOS 11.4.1, and while most of us are already looking ahead to all the new stuff coming in iOS 12, this small update contains an important new security feature: USB Restricted Mode. Apple has added protections against the USB devices being used by law enforcement and private companies that connect over Lightning to crack an iPhone’s passcode and evade Apple’s usual encryption safeguards.

If you have an iPhone, you should install this when you get the chance.

Drake Tops the Charts

Drake

Drake has the number one album in the country this week:

Scorpion, which was released on June 29 via Young Money/Cash Money/Republic Records, bows with 732,000 equivalent album units earned in the week ending July 5 according to Nielsen Music. Of that sum, 160,000 were in traditional album sales.

Starbucks to Eliminate Plastic Straws

Starbucks have announced they will be eliminating plastic straws globally by 2020:

Today, Starbucks Coffee Company announced it will eliminate single-use plastic straws from its more than 28,000 company operated and licensed stores by making a strawless lid or alternative-material straw options available, around the world. Starbucks, the largest food and beverage retailer to make such a global commitment, anticipates the move will eliminate more than one billion plastic straws per year from Starbucks stores.

Elvis Costello Cancels Tour After Cancer Surgery

Elvis Costello

Elvis Costello has revealed he is recovering from cancer surgery and canceled his upcoming tour.

To leave you with some more optimistic news, The Imposters and I – together with several of our other friends – have made a magnificent new record of which we are truly proud. It will be issued in October, I believe. We will return at the soonest opportunity to play that music and your favourite songs that still make sense to us all.

Take very good care of your loved ones but Gentleman, do talk to you friends – you’ll find you are not alone – seek your doctor’s advice if you are in doubt or when it is timely and act as swiftly as you may in these matters. It may save your life. Believe me, it is better than playing roulette.”

How Smart TVs in Millions of U.S. Homes Track Us

TV

The New York Times:

Samba TV is one of the bigger companies that track viewer information to make personalized show recommendations. The company said it collected viewing data from 13.5 million smart TVs in the United States, and it has raised $40 million in venture funding from investors including Time Warner , the cable operator Liberty Global and the billionaire Mark Cuban.

Samba TV has struck deals with roughly a dozen TV brands — including Sony, Sharp, TCL and Philips — to place its software on certain sets. When people set up their TVs, a screen urges them to enable a service called Samba Interactive TV, saying it recommends shows and provides special offers “by cleverly recognizing onscreen content.” But the screen, which contains the enable button, does not detail how much information Samba TV collects to make those recommendations.