Senior Correspondent Arnold Woodworth's First Weekend Web Wrap-up of 2015

Apple responsible for more than half of all mobile device activations this holiday season

Apple accounted for 51.3 percent of all activations during the week leading up to and including Christmas (which also includes other holidays like Hanukkah). Samsung finished in second place with 17.7 percent of device activations followed by Nokia, Sony and LG with 5.8 percent, 1.6 percent and 1.4 percent of all activations, respectively.

http://www.techspot.com/news/59257-apple-responsible-more-than-half-all-mobile-device.html



The First 21 Apps To Download For Your New iPhone 6

http://www.businessinsider.com/best-iphone-apps-2014-12



RANKED: The Best iPhones Through The Years

http://www.businessinsider.com/ranked-the-best-iphones-through-the-years-2014-12



Think Retro: When Apple's User Guides explained it all

I have a paper manual for desktop Macs from 1991, a fantastic, beautiful, ring-bound thing filled with elegant, simple line drawings, crisp, smart text, and best of all, clear and unpatronizing information on how to get started with your Mac.

There’s even information on just simply how to hold the mouse, with such rudimentary advice as to make sure the mouse cable is pointing away from you:

It’s easy to think that such drawn-out, plodding explanations—of a computer technique so basic most of us wouldn’t even think it needed explaining—are quaint. That they’re a relic.

http://www.macworld.com/article/2863942/think-retro-when-apples-user-guides-explained-it-all.html



Twitter Has A New iOS Analytics Feature — And I'm Obsessed With It

Twitter recently rolled out a new analytics feature for its iOS app that will allow anyone to check the engagement on any tweet they send.

If you have an iPhone and don't see it, check to make sure you have the latest version of the app.

http://www.businessinsider.com/im-obsessed-with-new-twitter-ios-analytics-feature-2014-12



Sony execs reduced to using BlackBerrys after hack

With computers down during Thanksgiving week, the Sony Corp. unearthed a cache of BlackBerrys, which still worked because they send and receive email via their own servers.

hackers hadn’t simply stolen data. They had erased it, rendering Sony's entire computer system unusable.

Sony’s film and television studio was the victim of one of the most malicious cyberattacks in history.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/sony-hack-behind-the-scenes-as-the-crisis-unfolded-2014-12-31



Sony hack sparks countless conspiracy theories

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/sony-hack-sparks-countless-conspiracy-theories-2014-12-30



A good commentary on the Sony hack

There are claims that the hackers stole some 100 terabytes (TB) of data.  You'd need to buy at least 25 new hard disks (at 4 TB each) for your computer to hold that much data.  That's a ****-ton folks, and it had to go through somewhere on Sony's network on it's way out, through the internet and to the hackers.  It wasn't detected and stopped, even though it takes a lot of time to transfer that much data over the internet.  That right there tells me everything I need to know about the competence, or rather the stunning lack thereof, of the people involved in so-called "security" at Sony.

http://www.market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=229700