Although I was optimistic back in November, it appears the Samsung Galaxy Camera is a disappointment due to poor image quality and high price. Point and shoot cameras costing less than half the Galaxy Camera match it in quality, according to The Verge’s Aaron Souppouris.

I had too much faith in Samsung’s product design team. Samsung took a smartphone and glued big camera to it. Perhaps the Galaxy Camera is a sound concept: the idea of taking quality pictures then being able to edit, refine and share them from the device itself appeals to me. The design process if this were the goal, though, would be to start with a great camera and work backwards towards the software. Samsung started in the wrong place, which may explain why they created such a poor product.

I feel it’s now too late for this type of “smart-camera”. The smartphone has won. The quality of iPhone cameras has increased far faster than point-and-shoot cameras have over similar periods of time. The apps available for the iPhone are almost limitless. I see a future where cameras are either built into our smartphones/mobile communicators or are dedicated, extremely high quality devices akin to DSLRs.

Gabe, proprietor of the always-wonderful Macdrifter, has a neat description of the ways he puts RSS to work. I suggest reading the entire article for some sensible tips which might just help you out.

Like all technology, it’s important to ensure it’s working for you, not the other way around. It’s easy to become a slave to RSS, reading everything presented to you like some sort of zombie. Stop it—that’s unhealthy. My favourite part of the article was this optimistic sentence:

The best amateur writing is happening right now on the web.

I think Gabe is correct in this assessment; I certainly feel the websites I read regularly are of a very high standard. Because I know so much great writing is “out there”, I sometimes give myself unrealistically large amounts of reading to wade through. The tricks in this article will help if I ever become overly saturated with words.

NASA writes:

New observations by the MESSENGER [sic] spacecraft provide compelling support for the long-held hypothesis that Mercury harbors abundant water ice and other frozen volatile materials in its permanently shadowed polar craters.

Just as Jason SIlva says, this really is the first time in human history where we don't need time-lapse photography to witness the advancement of our species.

What's next? Sean Solomon, principal investigator of the Messenger mission explains:

"But the new observations have also raised new questions," adds Solomon. "Do the dark materials in the polar deposits consist mostly of organic compounds? What kind of chemical reactions has that material experienced? Are there any regions on or within Mercury that might have both liquid water and organic compounds? Only with the continued exploration of Mercury can we hope to make progress on these new questions."

One of my favourite music creation apps for iPhone, Figure, has been updated to support the iPhone 5’s resolution. Created by the team behind the oh-so-powerful Reason music software, Figure is more of a fun, simple app aimed for those with any amount of musical experience.

It now works on iPad, too.

I reviewed Figure back in April, and I still enjoy the app to this day.

Recommended.

Not a fan of the iTunes 11 icon? 

Louie Mantia, creator of the previous iteration (one of my personal favourites), has thrown together a few gorgeous alternatives. My vote is for the dark orange edition — it neatly matches iOS and spices up the otherwise blue sea of icons in my dock.

BGR reports:

According to data compiled by StatCounter, the total Internet usage of computers running Windows 8 over a four-week period ending on November 26th equaled a mere 1.31%, compared to the 4.93% Windows 7achieved one month after its launch in 2009.

Surprise, surprise.

Judith Burns writes for BBC News:

Failing to teach evolution by natural selection in science lessons could lead to new free schools losing their funding under government changes.

The new rules state that from 2013, all free schools in England must teach evolution as a "comprehensive and coherent scientific theory".

This is a law I can get behind. Now, when can the same rules apply to all schools?

Matt Haughey writes about why he prefers Twitter over Facebook:

Twitter is a steady stream of mostly joy and makes my life better. Facebook is filled with people I barely know, chain-emails and disaster news about the sky falling that reminds me of my own past as well as my “friends” at every turn. The Internet is here today and all about tomorrow, and I prefer my social media to reflect that, and that’s why I love Twitter.

As a writer, I'm a little frustrated that Matt wrote this article before I did. I've had similar thoughts about the way these two social networks coexist for a few months, but getting these thoughts written down was a challenge. This article does it extremely well, in a concise and personal way.

The more I use Twitter, the happier I feel.

The more I use Facebook, the more miserable I feel.

It's as simple as that.

Dmitry Fadeyev writes about Windows 8:

The road to a good OS is not a blurring of the lines between PCs and tablets, but rather an amplification of the differences through a strong focus on the uses that each category serves. The desktop OS should make use of large screen real estate and the precise targeting of the mouse cursor. The mobile OS should be optimized for the small screen and for the rough tap of the finger.

It doesn’t make any sense to port a user interface optimized for mobile touch devices to the desktop, and neither does it make sense to give tablet users the desktop interface. Each was custom built for its own environment, and each is optimized to be operated by different methods. In their compromise, what Microsoft are doing now is giving a tablet to people who want to buy a PC, and giving a PC to people who want to buy a tablet. Since there is no hybrid device that works great for everything, there is no point in compromising the experience by designing a hybrid UI.

This is the exact issue I've had with Windows 8 since I first learnt about the approach Microsoft was taking with its design.

If you — like me — have been playing the new Need for Speed game online and have been unable to work out if and when you'd unlock the various cars, here's a great guide.

I've been enjoying the game a good amount, although it reminds me of Burnout Paradise a lot. This isn't necessarily a bad thing overall, it was just a little disappointing.

Hopefully we'll be treated to a new Need for Speed: Underground style game before too long. I love being a pretend boy racer.

Oops.

Jakob Nielsen writes a thoughtful criticism of Windows 8 from a usability perspective, highlighting some of the issues the new design paradigms introduce. The points he raises mirror my main concerns. It's a long article, so Jakob's summary is handy:

Hidden features, reduced discoverability, cognitive overhead from dual environments, and reduced power from a single-window UI and low information density. Too bad.