Almost all of the podcasts from Alex Jones, the media personality known for his right-wing Infowars platform and conspiracy theories, have been blocked from Apple’s iTunes Store. Apple is citing hate speech as the reason, just like Facebook, YouTube and Spotify when those platforms blocked his content. Apple told Buzzfeed,

Apple does not tolerate hate speech, and we have clear guidelines that creators and developers must follow to ensure we provide a safe environment for all of our users. Podcasts that violate these guidelines are removed from our directory making them no longer searchable or available for download or streaming. We believe in representing a wide range of views, so long as people are respectful to those with differing opinions.

I’m with Andrew Orr on this one: Apple made the right move on this one. Regardless of political views, actively engaging in hate speech is wrong, and when you’re in Jones’ position can entice others into doing the same—or even into taking physical action against other people. And saying Apple, Facebook, or any other company that refuses to host or link to Jones’s content is violating his First Amendment rights is flat-out wrong; the U.S. Constitution prohibits the government from curtailing what you can say, not what companies allow on their online services.

A recent study, described at Big Think, reveals that students who multi-task with smartphones in class are less able to retain information they’ll need for future exams. From the article. “This finding demonstrates for the first time that the main effect of divided attention in the classroom is not an immediate effect of selection or switching on comprehension but a long-term effect of divided attention on retention,” the researchers wrote.

I first came across this article via Daring Fireball, and it discusses the Bullsh*t Web, a term for the ad-filled web we’re now familiar with.

Take that CNN article, for example. Here’s what it contained when I loaded it:

• Eleven web fonts, totalling 414 KB
• Four stylesheets, totalling 315 KB
• Twenty frames
• Twenty-nine XML HTTP requests, totalling about 500 KB
• Approximately one hundred scripts, totaling several megabytes — though it’s hard to pin down the number and actual size because some of the scripts are “beacons” that load after the page is technically finished downloading.

Ads are necessary to keep things free, but the amount of crap that most modern websites are filled with is unnecessary.

Apple became the first company with a US$1 trillion market cap on Thursday, and CEO Tim Cook marked the occasion with a memo to employees for helping reach the milestone. Cook called the event a «Significant milestone,» and went on to say products and customers are more important than a number. He said,

Financial returns are simply the result of Apple’s innovation, putting our products and customers first, and always staying true to our values.

It’s true: Without products like the iPhone, and incredibly loyal customers, Apple wouldn’t be where it is today.