Weird and wacky Apple gadgets that time forgot, on The CultCast

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Apple TimeBand: great-great-grandfather of the Apple Watch.
Apple TimeBand: great-great-grandfather of the Apple Watch.
Photo: Apple

This week on The CultCast: The weird and wacky Apple products Cupertino hopes you’ve forgotten! Well, we haven’t, Tim. Plus: The best new features in iOS 10.3 and macOS 10.12.4; rumor mills say Apple might resurrect the PowerBook; iPhone 8 rumors point to a backside Touch ID sensor; and the inspirations for Steve Jobs’ best one-liners.

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This week’s links

‘iPhone Edition’ could have rear-facing Touch ID sensor

  • A (somewhat sketchy) new report claims that the tenth anniversary iPhone, commonly referred to as the iPhone 8, will instead by called the iPhone Edition.
  • In addition, it suggests that the major form factor redesign that’s been reported on may turn out to be less drastic than some are imagining — although changes will include features like a rear-mounted Touch ID sensor.
  • According to the report, which is accompanied by renders showing the design, the iPhone Edition won’t feature a Touch ID sensor embedded beneath the display, but rather a fingerprint scanner on the rear of the device.
  • It also won’t come with the glass back plate, but will instead stick to having a metal back plate as the result of glass’ tendency to shatter when dropped

Does Apple trademark filing mean PowerBook is coming back?

  • A couple of news outlets are flipping their lid over the news that Apple has filed a new worldwide trademark for the word “PowerBook,” the name of Apple’s pre-MacBook laptop series, which ran from 1991 until 2006.
  • In fact, a lot of Apple’s trademarks are about stopping its assets falling into other company’s hands — as happened when rival watchmaker Swatch decided to trademark Steve Jobs’ iconic “One more thing” catchphrase, shortly after Apple began competing with it in the watch business.

Swiss watchmaker hits back at Apple by trademarking ‘One more thing’

  • This isn’t the first time Apple has had people try to pilfer its well-known “One more thing” phrase. At the launch of Apple ripoff artist Xiaomi’ Mi 4 smartphone, CEO Lei Jun “borrowed” Apple’s tagline while also wearing a black top and blue jeans.
  • The trademark was registered in Germany in May, but was granted in 2015.
  • It was originally a quotation by Jobs of Peter Falk’s Columbo character
  • “Stay hungry, stay foolish” – Whole Earth Catalog, a magazine Steve Jobs loved.

20th Anniversary Mac

TimeBand

  • It’s hard to imagine, but there was actually a time when the Apple freely shared its concepts with the world. In 1991, under the leadership of John Scully, Apple shared a bunch of design concepts with a Japanese magazine called Axis.
  • One of the strange products included in the spread was a wearable wrist computer called TimeBand.
    Like an iPad mini living on your wrist!

The beautiful, the portable, Apple PowerCD

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