Eric Schmidt says Google is the new Microsoft and it’s winning the war against Apple. I think he’s missing some perspective.

One of the key things that Steve Jobs realised when he returned to Apple in the late nineties was that the industry is not necessarily a zero sum game.

“We have to let go of a few things here. We have to let go of the notion that for Apple to win, Microsoft has to lose.”

This weeks PhotoFriday theme is “Constructed.” Unfortunately, while this picture may look appropriate I should probably tell you that I’m cheating. This image is, in fact, of the demolition, the deconstruction, of a car park near where I live.

It’s dark when I get up in the morning and it’s dark when I leave work in the evening. I’m not a huge fan of this time of year… But, it did mean that I was in central London yesterday for a lovely sunset. Sunset, of course, being the traditional segue into “Evening,” which is this weeks PhotoFriday theme.

I barely recall any mention of Halloween when I was growing up. That’s changed in the last few years. It’s certainly being much more heavily promoted these days and I want to say — though I have no evidence to support it — that it’s at the expense of Bonfire Night. Presumably children asking strangers for sugary treats is safer than fireworks and piles of burning wood?

Oslo’s new Opera House is bright and “Vibrant” — this weeks PhotoFriday theme — literally to the point that it hurts your eyes when the sun is out. (Fortunately this doesn’t happen very often in Norway!)

There are lots of cars “In Motion” around this roundabout in Lisbon, Portugal, which I thought made this a good choice for PhotoFriday this week.

I think like many photographers I love “Reflections,” this weeks PhotoFriday challenge theme, and have many images that feature them. However, I wanted to use a picture that I’ve not already used for a challenge and that pushed me towards this picture I took from my office window a few weeks ago: a Union Jack reflected in a window.

It’s been a while since I entered a PhotoFriday challenge, but when I saw that this weeks was theme “Texture” I immediately thought of this picture. It was taken in Spain in 2009 and has been the desktop picture on my Mac pretty much since then!

Like all the best upgrades, iOS 6 is almost entirely invisible. It works just like iOS 5 — which is to say, pretty well most of the time — but with some convenient new additions. Also, unlike version five, it’s been relatively stable throughout the beta process.

What’s new and what will you like? I’ve grown so accustomed to most of them that I had to look up the “What’s new” page on Apple’s website. Really, that’s a good thing. Invisibility is the fate of a feature that’s quickly integrated with how you use a device. (The thing that makes it tricky is that it’s also the fate of a completely useless feature that you never use.)

A couple of minor “admin” changes:

• If you want to get an email subscription, you can do so by using the “Subscribe to Blog via Email” option at the bottom of each page. Or, if you leave a comment, you can simply check the “Notify me of new posts by email” box. If you’re currently using the old system, please try to switch over to this new variant. Long story short: I can’t access the Feedburner service that I used to use
• For the same reason, I have switched the RSS feed. It should point to — indeed it may already do so — but please check and update if you use it
• I’ve added “Share” links on many of the pages. Some sites are a bit too in-your-face, practically demanding that you share posts. I’ve tried to add the functionality without being too obnoxious. Having said that, please do share my posts!