• The November Plan – Post now updated with my recent trip to Austria.
• Apple’s Mistake – "How much of the goodwill Apple once had with programmers have they lost over the App Store? A third? Half? And that's just so far. The App Store is an ongoing karma leak."
• The Daily Shoot – A great idea to help people (myself included!) to take more pictures. I think a lot of us have the will, just not the time or inspiration. Time is hard but inspiration just got a little easier.

• A Sense of Entitlement: Tweetie 2 – I think Apple needs to do more here — to allow for paid upgrades — but I also congratulate the author of Tweetie for having the nerve to charge for a significant update. He'll come across a lot of resistance but it's absolutely the right thing to do and it, potentially, paves the way for smaller developers to do the same thing.
• Peep Show ‘won’t change’ for anyone – Looking forward to this. Slightly worried that it might overstay its welcome — how can you top eating a family pet in terms of gross out? — but then I thought that for the last couple of series too…
• Fail Yet Succeed? – Nice discussion of the kind of things that all software projects go through. Really this is about half of my job!

I try to keep ZX81.org.uk free of direct promotion of my iPhone applications but I think the launch of a new one warrants an exception to the rule.

www.cut Icon

www.cut is a utility that shortens URLs so that they can be mailed, Twittered or FaceBooked without worrying about character counts or line breaks.

Find out more at the above link or head straight to the App Store to download a copy. It’s free so you have nothing to lose!

• UK ID Card Technology Cloned… – "… in 12 minutes." Wonder when the government will get the message that ID cards are a bad idea. Oh, and there's no such thing as unforgeable.
• The hidden truth behind drug company profits – "The idea of ring-fencing life-saving medical knowledge so a few people can profit from it is one of the great grotesqueries of our age. We have to tear down this sick system – so the sick can live." Big companies and the patent system effectively kill the poorest and most vulnerable people.
• Bodega – Interesting idea: an app store for the Mac. Not run by Apple and hence no crazy review process!

• In pictures: Satellite eye on Earth – July – Awesome images.
• Amber Ale: Brewing Beer From 45-Million-Year-Old Yeast – Science, history and beer, and all in one story. How could I not bookmark this article?
• Microsoft's Long, Slow Decline – "The evidence is staring Microsoft’s leadership in the face that they have lost the most lucrative segment of the market, but, judged by their actions and public remarks, they seem to think it’s all a big joke. They should be sweating this but they’re laughing it off."

• Anatomy of a feature – Great post describing how hard it really is to add a supposedly easy feature.
• The Matrix, but with money: the world of high-speed trading – Good introductory piece about algo trading and the technology used to implement it.