I’m quite enjoying the “what if” series on XKCD.

A much better solution than my workaround of creating an empty smart mailbox. Disabling the unread badge for Mail.app is one of the best things I’ve done for my productivity. I’m trying hard to process email in batches rather than letting the constant trickle steal my attention whenever I am at a screen.

The 6D is clearly aimed at tempting APS-C owners to upgrade to full frame, but here Canon has given itself another problem. Its EF-S lenses simply won’t fit on the 6D, so users with a decent collection – perhaps the 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5 USM, 15-85mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM and 60mm f/2.8 Macro USM – will have to buy a new lens set to use with it. At which point the barrier to switching systems becomes rather lower, and the temptation to change brands stronger. On the other hand, let’s not forget that Canon’s EF lens lineup is very strong indeed, with a large number of reasonably-affordable fast primes to go alongside the workhorse ‘L’ series zooms, and more-esoteric optics such as the unique MP-E 65mm f/2.5 1-5x Macro.

Overall, though, it’s difficult to shake the feeling that the EOS 6D simply lacks the ‘wow’ factor of its main rival. Whereas Nikon seems to have taken the approach of taking away as little as possible from D800 when creating the D600, Canon appears almost to have gone the other way, removing as much as it thinks it can get away with at the price. The result is the kind of conservative, slightly unimaginative design that’s become the company’s hallmark. It’s still bound to be a very good camera, of course; just perhaps not quite as good as it could be.

Still looks like a pretty solid upgrade from my Rebel T2i. (thanks Shawn)

The Verge has confirmed with Verizon Wireless that the iPhone 5 won’t support the feature when it’s on the carrier’s cellular network, even if it is connected to LTE. This is in contrast to the rest of the LTE phones in Verizon’s lineup, all of which support simultaneous voice and data when connected to LTE.

(emphasis mine) Ok, this really sucks. (thanks Jim)

There are more teams currently in playoff position in the bottom half of team payroll than in the top half. The top five teams in winning percentage all rank outside the top five in opening day spending, and only one of the top five by winning percentage even ranks in the top 15 of spending.

So, yeah. This isn’t a normal year, and this probably isn’t the start of any kind of trend, but the data is pretty clear – you simply cannot make a judgment about a team’s ability to contend by looking at how much money they spend on their roster.

Watching the evolution of how baseball teams build their rosters over the last ~15 years has been fascinating.

I’ve been a fan and user of Pukka, sorry to see it go. As far as I can tell, the best option out there for Pinboard users on the Mac is the bookmarklet and Pinboard website (which are both pretty solid).