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I “Leaked” the story about the Biometric EarPods. But I’m not proud of it

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Re: I “Leaked” the story about the Biometric EarPods. But I’m not proud of it

#31

Post by chucknelson »

stevenp wrote: post #22

If anything, this story calls out the sensationalism of a tech press that just sucks up anything it can find and runs with it as a story. We've seen unsubstantiated "reporting" of Apple rumors like this for years, and these stories never add anything valuable to the discussion. I'm glad this fake rumor got so much traction. Maybe enough people have egg on their faces that we will do better in the future. But probably…

> Maybe enough people have egg on their faces that we will do better in the future. But probably not.

This definitely won't do anything to stem the unsubstantiated rumors. It's all about page views and entertainment.

There is an audience for these types of things (that is probably growing?), so it will continue. I'm sure many, like myself, don't care if they are fake either. Much of it is just something somewhat entertaining to read when browsing the web.

Re: I “Leaked” the story about the Biometric EarPods. But I’m not proud of it

#32

Post by crazypyro »

_Adam wrote: post #24

This was obviously fake because measuring blood pressure isn't something you can do via the ear canal in a non-intrusive way. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_pressure#Measurement Kind of sad that even a single person believed this. Why is everyone so willing to forego scepticism?

I think a lot of people, especially non-technical ones, could have gotten caught up in what I will call the "Apple Innovation" effect. People just assume that because Apple has been a source of innovation in technology in recent years, they can jump across technological barriers just by focusing on it. At least, that is my take.

Re: I “Leaked” the story about the Biometric EarPods. But I’m not proud of it

#33

Post by lmm »

encoderer wrote: post #29
glenra wrote: post #14

The thing is that made-up or not, this is a really good idea . An idea whose time has come. Something like it is probably inevitable. Everywhere you go, you see people walking around with Apple headphones in their ears much of the time. The hardware connected to those headphones doesn't merely send music out to the ears from the phone, it also accepts signals in the other direction to enable microphone input and a fe…

Meh, I think the idea is thin. So I can have biometrics info only when i stick something in my head ? Quantified Self or whatever you want to call it is certainly big business, but it NEEDS passive data collection to ever be a mainstream success. Thus the fitbit, and possibly the iWatch. "Just stick these sensors in your ears" is not a good solution to this. And "All the info you want about what your body is doing wh…

> "All the info you want about what your body is doing while you listen to music" is not exactly what I'm going after when I use these apps.

When is it that you want the info on what your body is doing? Lots of joggers seem to listen to music at the same time.

Re: I “Leaked” the story about the Biometric EarPods. But I’m not proud of it

#34

Post by at-fates-hands »

msvan wrote: post #30

It's not the OP's fault, it's lack of integrity in the press. You start by propagating a rumor on some insignificant source like Secret, then a blogger picks it up. The blogger gets noticed by people on Twitter, who catch the attention of some small news source. Bigger newspapers notice that the story is blossoming in the lower echelons and they pick it up. Suddenly, something which carries zero truth has become fact…

>>> but it's done over and over again by media manipulators who have realized that it's a bug in the system that's easily abused for fun and profit.

To me, this is the most interesting part. You'd think in a media environment such as today, you'd think people would take more time when vetting stories like these, instead its the exact opposite. People are constantly jumping on and promoting stories without a hint of journalistic integrity.

90% of what I read now, I take with a grain of salt. You just can't trust anybody any more.

Re: I “Leaked” the story about the Biometric EarPods. But I’m not proud of it

#35

Post by jamesaguilar »

Companies could start "leaking" things via secret to make it useless as a means of real leaking. Personally, I think that in this new information age, that is going to be the only way to get privacy, either for corps or individuals. Decreasing the signal is infeasible, but increasing noise is certainly possible.

Re: I “Leaked” the story about the Biometric EarPods. But I’m not proud of it

#36

Post by dpeck »

at-fates-hands wrote: post #34
msvan wrote: post #30

It's not the OP's fault, it's lack of integrity in the press. You start by propagating a rumor on some insignificant source like Secret, then a blogger picks it up. The blogger gets noticed by people on Twitter, who catch the attention of some small news source. Bigger newspapers notice that the story is blossoming in the lower echelons and they pick it up. Suddenly, something which carries zero truth has become fact…

>>> but it's done over and over again by media manipulators who have realized that it's a bug in the system that's easily abused for fun and profit. To me, this is the most interesting part. You'd think in a media environment such as today, you'd think people would take more time when vetting stories like these, instead its the exact opposite. People are constantly jumping on and promoting stories without a hint of j…

> 90% of what I read now, I take with a grain of salt. You just can't trust anybody any more.

But you (the ubiquitous you) still click and occasionally share to others who will click. Thats the only part that really matters to the decision makers.

Re: I “Leaked” the story about the Biometric EarPods. But I’m not proud of it

#37

Post by Nexxxeh »

mikeash wrote: post #26
mortenjorck wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a long shot that the poster would have actually endangered anyone’s position at Apple, but I suppose it’s already a somewhat long shot that he managed to nail both the patent and an area of expertise of a recent hire, all without any prior context. Given that, I think this was the right thing to do.

Even if it did manage to get somebody at Apple in trouble, the fault lies entirely with Apple laying down false accusations with insufficient evidence, not with the guy who made a lucky guess and didn't even do it intentionally.

Yes, but Apple's actual shitty behaviour or this hypothetical shitty behaviour might stop someone putting food on the table.

If someone loses their job over this, the fact it's just Apple being arseholes won't be of much comfort to the newly unemployed (unless it's a lucrative wrongful dismissal suit I guess.)

Does anyone have any confidence in Apple doing the right thing by its employees or indeed customers?

Re: I “Leaked” the story about the Biometric EarPods. But I’m not proud of it

#38

Post by not_that_noob »

encoderer wrote: post #29
glenra wrote: post #14

The thing is that made-up or not, this is a really good idea . An idea whose time has come. Something like it is probably inevitable. Everywhere you go, you see people walking around with Apple headphones in their ears much of the time. The hardware connected to those headphones doesn't merely send music out to the ears from the phone, it also accepts signals in the other direction to enable microphone input and a fe…

Meh, I think the idea is thin. So I can have biometrics info only when i stick something in my head ? Quantified Self or whatever you want to call it is certainly big business, but it NEEDS passive data collection to ever be a mainstream success. Thus the fitbit, and possibly the iWatch. "Just stick these sensors in your ears" is not a good solution to this. And "All the info you want about what your body is doing wh…

Yes exactly. I want it monitoring when I sleep, not just when I listen to music. Fitbit isn't sweating this one.

Re: I “Leaked” the story about the Biometric EarPods. But I’m not proud of it

#39

Post by normloman »

mantrax5 wrote: post #9

This is the most responsible and humble disclosure of a fake leak I've seen in my life. Even though this guy/gal started it all, if we felt a little more responsible about the effect of the words we say and write like that, it'd be a better world out there. It's easy to just wave your hand and say it's just bullshit rumor, but yes, it does have effect on people at Apple and the industry as a whole. The very fact of r…

They didn't intentionally start a rumor. They didn't even try to make it sound realistic. Shouldn't we blame the press instead, for lending credibility an unsubstantiated rumor by an anonymous source?

Re: I “Leaked” the story about the Biometric EarPods. But I’m not proud of it

#40

Post by DanBC »

_Adam wrote: post #24

This was obviously fake because measuring blood pressure isn't something you can do via the ear canal in a non-intrusive way. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_pressure#Measurement Kind of sad that even a single person believed this. Why is everyone so willing to forego scepticism?

Suitably advanced technology is magic and so most people (who don't really know what blood pressure is, nor how it's measured) will be happy to believe that some widget you can plug into your smart phone will do all kinds of stuff.

Also, UK papers are happy to fill their pages with nonsense. They are not saying it's true. They are reporting someone else saying it's true.

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