So the ipad 2 was launched in San Fransisco yesterday. For anyone who missed it the key points are that it is faster, slimmer and lighter.

In fact, its significantly faster. It's in fact TWICE as fast as the original iPad. Maybe we have become so used to Apple progress that it is easy to just shrug our shoulders at such an achievemnet. Well its much more significant than that.

This is wehere Moore's law comes in. Moore (who worked at Intel) stated in 1965 that the quantity of transisitors in an integrated circuit had been doubling over time. The graph below shows the strength of the correlation.

In 1975 Moore re-stated his law stating that the number of transitors was doubling every two years. Since 1965 Moore's law has been correlated to a number of industries and more generally to the advancement of computing and it keeps working.

So with the ipad 2 we have seen that doubling in processing power within 12 months! Moore felt that the speed of advancement may actually slow after 10 years. So this is a "mind blowing" achievement and one that competitors will seriously struggle to compete with because in March 2012 the iPad3 will be twice as fast again.

This competitive advantage could last 10 years or more and as many futurists have noted is leading towards a potential technological singularity where innovation happens in an instant. So let's make a bold prediction that the iPAd10 will arrive in 5 years not 10.

I have been using Spotify Premium for a few months now and barely even looked at iTunes since. Amazing how quickly habits change and how profoundly. I went from spending hundreds of pounds on CDs, importing them to iTunes, making playlists and listening to them on my ipod. I was happy. I liked this arrangement. Part of me was pleased with this new musical revolution. I bought a wireless device for the car so that my ipod could travel wherever I went and I delighted at the touch screen simplcity of the interface. This was 6 months ago.

Today all of that Apple kit lies wantonly in the house somewhere like a friend I have grown apart from. And I don't think I'm going back.

Just to be clear, first and foremeost, I am a lover of music. I was a late adopter of iTunes and even CDs. I clung onto my love of vinyl for longer than was really sensible. I became somewhat militant. I loved vinyl. The digitisation of music was the devil's work. And yet I became a very early adopter of Spotify. How times flies?

So what's the secret of Spotify's success.

For me it comes to down to the following 5 things: 

The Experience: Frankly it is a thing of total beauty. Not only does it work but it works sublimely.

The Cloud: Everything is in the Cloud. Forever. And it works everywhere. 

It's Social: I could spend hours on this particular point but this is perhaps one of the best integartions of Facebook in existence. It seduces you into an endless journey of discovery.

Multi-device: It works on everything. Again beautifully. 

Business Model: Follows the freemium model of tiered access enabling mass market reach and then premium services for the top tier.  

Try it but be warned its totally addictive.

If you’ve been to Wikipedia recently you will have seen this:

Wikipedia being who they are, so so web, they ran extensive testing on the copy line for this.

Read from the bottom of this page to see how it evolved into a moody picture of Jimmy Wales face and a line that’s similar to a request for an organ.

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2010/Banner_testing

David McCandless has done a graphic for it:

I think Cher Lloyd is now a racing certainty to win X-Factor.

I think this because Facebook told me so.

It seems that the marketing and management bods at Syco (Simon Cowell’s label) have been busy setting up Facebook accounts for the remaining acts in the competition. Of the eight remaining six have accounts – Katie does not due to the torrent of abuse it would receive, and Wagner doesn’t because… well because he’s Wagner.

I stumbled across these this morning whilst fulfilling a sudden need to get a double hit of X-Factor and social media. I found Rebecca Ferguson’s account – who is my favourite for what it is worth. It seemed very generic and clearly daily posts pumped out of Psycho. The URL was www.facebook.com/rebeccafergusonmusic. She had 97k fans when I checked. Not sure whether this was high or not I checked if the syntax worked for the remaining artists (e.g. mattcardlemusic, marybyrnemusic et.). It did and I listed the amount of fans they each had.

Cher Lloyd has far, far more than anyone else. Over a million in fact.

The bookies have Matt Cardle to win, followed by Rebecca and then One Direction.

However, based on Facebook I’m going to make the following guess for the result and order of elimination:

8^th Katie Waissel - page not found

7^th Wagner - page not found

6^th Paije – 19,906

5^th Rebecca Ferguson - 96,845

4^th Mary Byrne - 97,660

However its likely to be Rebecca 4^th, Mary 5^th Katie 6^th  Wagner 7^th and Paije 8^th

I say that as Rebecca will always win a sing off with Mary based on the judges votes. Anyone will beat Wagner in a sing-off and they’ll keep Katie until she’s contractually obliged to sign for Psycho (6^th) as they allegedly bought her out of an existing deal.

The final

3^rd One direction - 164,673

2^nd Matt Cardle - 343,137

Winner: Cher - 1,086,458

Issues

Correlation between “Likes” and actual voting.

I’m not saying there is completely. Its just the lead that I think makes it statistically relevant. Three times as many votes as hat boy Matt Cardle.

Voting is a moveable feast on X-Factor. Last year Daniel led for the first three weeks in the vote and then dropped away. Joe only came through as the winner once it was down to the final 4-5.

Bookies having the inside track

Again, its moveable in terms of votes. What is true now may not be in two weeks in terms of Saturday night votes. Where will all of Wagner’s votes go, and Mary’s and if the above is correct, Rebecca’s?

Media noise

Cher gets more media attention than the others as she’s brattish and there is gossip that goes with her, hence more interaction with her online. There would definitely be a relationship here, however despite her manifest diva nature and alliance with the fading start quality of Cheryl Cole, she is no Katie Waissel and seems to have the publics backing.

Make of it what you will. I think she’s a good bet to win.

Particularly when you can get her at 10/1.

Cool series of design talks by inspirational creative type people, including Tony Hawk and Kit Hinrichs founder of Pentagram.

Check them out

This was the five billionth.

Allegedly. I’m sure if the real one was a picture of the Parnell slumped in a stool at the company bar they may have waited one photo more.

If you’re interested it took them 342 days to add the last billion photos to their collection.

The previous billion took 341 days.

Which makes me think they’ve entered a period of mature growth, rather than still being in the rapid phase (which Facebook is).

A Monday morning pick me up – Awesomeness Reminders.

“With AwesomenessReminders, a real person will call you every day to tell you how much you rock. If you're not around, we will leave you a voicemail.”

Cheaper than a life coach they claim. I like this from the Q&A:

Q: Your web page sucks. How do I know the service is legitimate?

A: By spending less money on web design we can afford to spend more time telling you or a loved friend, coworker or family member, "You're awesome!"

They also have a service called compassion pit and a site called End Ants.

Thought neither can tell you you’re awesome for a meagre 10 bucks a month.

Photo from the Awesome site. Perfectly encapsulating how the service makes people feel: