According to a report on local television station KHOU Channel 11 you just might get more than you bargained for after your next trip to a local Apple Store in Houston, Texas. According to authorities in Houston there have been at least six Apple customers in Houston who have been followed home and robbed at gunpoint.
On Tuesday this week Square started passing out invitations to the companies first special event. The event will take place at Square’s headquarters in San Francisco on May 23rd at 10:00 AM PDT. Some “exciting news” will be announced.
When it was first revealed at CES earlier this year, we were all amazed with the Spiderpodium Tablet by Breffo ($35). Somewhere in between a toy, and a multipurpose iPad stand, the Spiderpodium has an extremely unique design that is adaptable for almost any tablet device. I got the chance to play around with the unique stand over the last few weeks, and while I think that it’s incredibly clever, there are definitely some drawbacks.
Looking for a cool new case to protect your magical iPad from slime, scratches, termites, and falling debris? Yesterday we published our review on the beautiful, wooden BrudaCase and now we’re giving our readers a chance to win a Cherry BrudaCase for free (retail value $150).
We’ll select one reader at random as the winner of the giveaway and have a BrudaCase mailed out to you. The contest will run from Friday, May 13th til Monday, May 16th at 12PM PST. Limit of one entry per person.
If you can imagine an iPad the size of Apple’s largest iMac, with the iOS multi-touch interface plus the power of OS X, then you can imagine the next generation of computing.
You’ll use it tilted at an angle on your desk like a drafting table. Or, you’ll tilt it up for TV or presentations, or flat for using it as a table. Or you’ll use it as a coffee table or a kitchen counter top. The point is: You’ll use it.
Apple has a gazillion patents for their version of this technology. Microsoft has already promised a consumer version of Surface. The third generation of desktop computing (after command line and GUI generations) is coming.
But Google has already announced the operating system for their giant desktop multi-touch PC of the future.
The BrudaCase for iPad 2 is a sleek, elegant case made out of wood to protect your iPad while still maintaining a classic look that is truly worthy of holding your favorite tech treasure. With its nod to the past, while still looking to the future, the BrudaCase is one of the most beautifully manufactured iPad cases I’ve come across. Handcrafted in the heart of Amish Country Pennsylvania, the case doesn’t set out to be just another piece of beauty, as it also brings a lot of thoughtful functionality with it.
The case is made from slabs of cherry or maple wood that have been precision trimmed, sanded, and finished by an Amish cabinet-maker. The two pieces are held together by two discrete hinges inside the case. Padding lines the interior cavity to protect your iPad 2 from scratching, while four magnets secure the two sides together to prevent the case from opening accidentally. One of the neat things about the BrudaCase is how they addressed the need for different viewing angles. Two different notches inside the case allow the user to adjust the viewing angle of the iPad based on preference or the need to do some typing. The typing angle didn’t feel that comfortable though as the angle of inclination was a bit greater than that of a SmartCover, and to achieve the typing angle the iPad is recessed a bit too far back in the case for my liking.
In an effort to appease the angered politicians in Washington, Apple is sending VP of Software, Bud Tribble, to the Senate hearing to discuss the storage of location data on iPhones. Location-Gate became one of the hottest topics concerning privacy and the use of cellular phones recently. At the center of the controversy, Apple quickly released an update to iOS (4.3.3) to amend the issue of iPhones storing user’s location data, which could possibly be acquired via a third-party to discern everywhere the user has been over the past few months. Senator Alan Franken has been the most vocal opponent of the recent discovery and was the one to initiate the hearing.
Bud Tribble has been with Apple since the 80’s, but as a Jobs loyalist, he left the company when Steve was ousted and became one of the founding members of NeXT, serving as the company’s VP of Software Development where he worked on projects that would later become the foundation for OS X.
Summer is upon us friends, and if you haven’t started losing that winter gut to get ready for the beach and other summer festivities now is as good a time as ever to get started. A lot of the guys here at Cult of Mac are fans of cycling and our favorite iPhone app for cycling workouts is the recently updated Cyclemeter ($4.99) by Abivo. One of the nicest things about the app is that it can be used not only for cycling but also running, swimming, or hiking. To celebrate the coming of summer, Abivo sent us 10 promo codes to give out today. We’ll be giving them out to 10 of our faithful Twitter followers on Saturday, May 7th at 10am PST.
Here’s how to enter the giveaway:
1: Follow Cult of Mac on Twitter (this contest is open to current followers and new followers).
2: Tweet the following line: “I need the new Cyclemeter app from @cultofmac because [insert your personal reason]”
3: 10 winners will be selected on Saturday morning at 10AM PST. I’ll DM the winners their promo codes.
Note: 5 Instant Winners will be chosen for the first 5 people who tweet us a picture of them riding a kids bike in Walmart.
Have fun, and good luck.
httpvhd://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w85fxNueX4g
Apple has provided us with some of the best ads ever created. The Mac vs PC Campaign ads have been some of the most memorably entertaining advertisements to grace the television. Unfortunately Apple pulled the plug on the fun banter between Mac (Justin Long) and PC (John Hodgman) last year. However, should you feel so inclined to walk down memory lane with the plethora of Mac vs PC advertisements, Adweek has compiled all 66 ads for your viewing pleasure. They’ve even got them ordered out chronologically.
[via Adweek]
update: you can also view the ads in a much more pleasant layout on Squrl.
Contrary to reports of growing friction between Apple and publishers over iPad subscriptions, the Telegraph said working with Apple was just peachy.
Telegraph Media Group digital editor Edward Roussel told the Financial Times that Apple has been “cooperative and helpful” during the development of the newspaper’s latest iPad app which launched today.
Roussel says his company has no gripes with forking over a percentage of profits to Apple because the app store is such a “user-friendly” way to pay – and similar to the costs of distributing a print product.
Subscribers who want to read daily will fork over £9.99 a month (nearly US$15); single editions of the digital paper can be bought for £1.19. The app is free to download.
“The bottom line is we don’t have a gripe with Apple on the subscription model that they have,” Roussel says. “We found they were prepared to enter into a dialogue with us.”
Via FT
Wouldn’t it be great to get paid to play with your beloved iPhone? Thanks to a new startup Gigwalk, that dream is now a reality. The Silicon Valley startup launched their program today and are accepting applications for new Gigwalkers in cities across America.
Using Gigwalk’s iPhone app, Gigwalkers sign up to complete a list of task in their local area using their iPhone in exchange for a small cash sum (gigs pay between $3 – $50). Once a task is completed, Gigwalkers are paid via a PayPal account that is linked to their Gigwalk account, making everything incredibly simple and efficient. While these small gigs won’t replace your full-time job, you can earn a tidy sum on the side. Gigwalk reported that their highest paid Gigwalker earned $2,173 completing 277 gigs over the 6-month private-beta period.
The idea behind the new service is that every smartphone is a node in a vast network. By tapping into that huge network companies can accomplish huge data tasks that require small amounts of information from a large number of locations in a highly efficient manner.
While the beautiful hardware that Apple creates gets a lot of the attention, many people forget that the appeal of Apple’s devices is within the software more than anything else. Asymco.com recently published an article elaborating how the profit from Apple’s two operating systems (OSX and iOS) outpace the profits that Microsoft makes with Windows 3.5x over.
On the Mac side of operations the site says:
“While a lot of the credit for Apple’s success is rightfully assigned to the iOS franchises, the OS X business has more than quadrupled in five years. This has happened without drastic price fluctuations. Neither holds for the overall PC industry which has seen both volume and sales decline while prices have eroded along with profitability. On top of that, growth has nearly evaporated.”
What You’ll Win
Each winner gets their favorite color ThinSkin FREE. Yep, you get to choose the color you want.
Giveaway Details
This giveaway is void where prohibited and there is no purchase necessary to enter the giveaway. Prizes will be shipped directly from ThinSkin. Cult of Mac is not responsible for shipping/handling of the prize. Please provide an accurate physical address if contacted that you are a winner.
Steve Jobs and Larry Page have been invited to testify at the May 10 senate hearing on privacy and mobile telephones.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy extended the invitation, saying in a letter to the two that: “like many Americans, I read with deep concern recent press reports indicating that” the devices “collect, store and track user location data without the user’s consent.”
[Update] Thanks go out to all our followers who were really excited about the Mono Solar Charger. We had a lot of responses and wish we had a few more of these to give out, but there can only be one winner this time. Stay tuned for a new giveaway we’ll be announcing next week. And the winner is…..
DriveC “@cultofmac I will continue to hold the environment hostage unless my demands of one Solio Mono Solar Charger is met by 10AM PST on Thursday.”
Congratulations. Get in contact with me on Twitter in the next 48hours or I’ll be giving it to someone else.
Last week we reviewed Solio’s Mono Solar Charger (review here), and now here’s your chance to win the nifty device for yourself. We’re giving away one Solio Mono Solar Charger this week to one random reader. Here are the qualifications to be entered in the giveaway:
1) You must be one of our followers on Twitter. (if you’re already a follower there’s no need to un-follow and then follow again)
2) Write a tweet mentioning @cultofmac on why you want the Solio. (example: need Solio from @cultofmac cuz Steve Jobs refuses to give my iPhone a removable battery).
Only one entry per person. The winner will be chosen at random, but creativity will definitely help you get seen. Contest ends Thursday at 10AM PST.
Good luck.
Everybody freaked out this week about the discovery that iPhones store location history in an unencrypted file. Congressional grandstanders Al Franken and Ed Markey demanded that Steve Jobs explain himself. Matt Drudge used his Caps Lock key to write a screaming headline about it. Gimme a break.
The whole “LocationGate” scandal is a non-issue, as far as I’m concerned. It’s just a lot of noise about a potential privacy breach that buries the real privacy violations happening every day.
The program is a win-win for customers, like myself, that are interested in recycling electronics (an effort to save the Earth), upgrading to a new iPod, iPhone, Mac, or iPad, and saving some money at the same time.
Samsung Electronics says it has filed lawsuits against Apple claiming patent infringement. The suit comes just one week after Apple sued Samsung, accusing the company of copying iOS products and packaging. Samsung filed its suits in South Korea, where the company is based, as well as in Japan and Germany. Samsung claims Apple infringed at least 5 of its patents.
“Samsung is responding actively to the legal action taken against us in order to protect our intellectual property and to ensure our continued innovation and growth in the mobile communications business,” said a Samsung spokesperson. Translation: “It’s on, bitches!”
Finally, Apple is dragging one of the many copycat hardware makers into court for copying Apple’s brilliant ideas.
Or…
Apple joins in on the lawsuit frenzy to win in the courts instead of competing on features, price and user friendliness.
What are we to make of Apple’s recent lawsuit against Samsung? Is Apple right? Did Samsung “slavishly copy Apple’s innovative technology, distinctive user interfaces, and elegant and distinctive product and packaging design”?
What’s the likely outcome? Why Samsung? Why now?
The legal mumbo jumbo surrounding cases like these make them boring as hell. But the impact of this turn of events could be far reaching, and affect the future of computing and mobility.
What you need to know is that while this lawsuit seems narrow and specific — targeting a handful of Samsung devices for copying the iPad and iPhone — it’s really a warning for industry at large, and about the entire iOS family of products, from wristwatches today to desktops tomorrow and everything in between.
This is not about the iPad vs. the Tab. It’s about Apple’s very unique approach to everything vs. everyone else’s business-as-usual — and it’s about the future of computing.
Your iPhone does more than just make calls. It’s the perfect companion for almost every situation because there’s an app for almost everything. Having taken my iPhone 4 with me on a couple hikes to the bottom of the Grand Canyon, I can attest that it’s an amazing tool to keep by your side during outdoor excursions. Of course that is until you see your battery meter dip below 3%. At which point the iPhone 4 becomes just an expensive piece of metal and glass. To aid your charging dilemmas on your next camping trips, Solio has created a great line of portable solar chargers.
Solio’s Mono Charger ($60), combines a high-efficiency solar cell, with a long life lithium-ion rechargeable battery in a solid impact resistant casing for all those adventurers who need battery power no matter where they journey. The design of the device is incredibly simple. Nothing detracts from the solar panel, and it’s very easy to use. To begin charging simply place it in the sun and press the Start button on the back of the device. A red LED light will blink to indicate that it’s collecting energy.
The big news today is all about how Apple has apparently been busy secretly squirreling away data about your movements on your iPhone 4 or GPS-equipped iPad, and storing it in a file on your computer via syncing. Is this a big deal, or business as usual, just a giant tech company doing its thing?
[polldaddy poll=4946757]
If possession of any one app could ever be considered an instant ticket to membership in the Cult of Mac, this is it. Mactracker has been around since early 2001, and we’ve talked about it before on our site (Giles Turnbull thought it was so fantastic he included it in his list of 50 Mac Essnetials); but last week a newly-updated version hit the Mac App Store — which is enough to earn it a spot as today’s Daily Freebie.
The app lists painstakingly complete data on every Mac product ever made in an elegant, searchable, easy-to-use interface. The new update even brings with it the ability to track your Macs’ serial numbers, service work performed, etc.
The app is free, but we think a little donation at the app’s website (which is where those who’re allergic to the App Store can also download the app directly) is money well spent.
I tried to look up something this Sunday morning on Apple’s Discussion Forums and they were down. Now fast forward to this evening after all the obligatory Sunday events and the sites back up along with a big surprise. Apple has launched Apple Support Communities. The site is back up in a big way.
Apple Support Communities are a revised version of Apple’s popular discussion forums. The site now makes it easier for Mac, Mac OS X, iPhone, iPod touch, iPad, and iOS users to find answers to problems or questions they might have.
The iPad has inevitably made its debut into the congressional debate over the federal budget.
On Friday, Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. D-Ill., made reference to it during a rambling monologue concerning America’s budget and the state of our economy on the House floor.
Nearly a year ago, I predicted in my Computerworld column that Apple’s iPad would not only eat into netbook sales, but sales of laptops and even desktop PCs. It was an unpopular prediction.
If you look at the 300+ comments attached to that piece, you’ll see that the majority of commenters at the time thought I was crazy, stupid or both.
One wrote: “Obviously Mike Elgan has gone off the deep end on this one. This article is so naive to the real world, and so far fetched it makes me think this is nothing but, once again, a biased article by an iSheep in its purest form.”
Another said: “This article made me laugh out loud. I thought I was reading The Onion!”
Still others were more direct: “I’m pretty sure this is the stupidest article on the internet.”
You still hear people dissing the iPad these days, of course, but nobody dismisses it. Sales of the iPad have far exceeded the expectations of all but a tiny minority of us who were very bullish from the start. Analysts have had to raise and raise again their unit-sales estimates. Early doubters have been silenced.
Now, you might think I’ve come to brag that I was right and my critics were wrong about iPad replacing PCs. A Gartner report published this week says that PC shipments are down from last year. Overall PC shipments in the United States fell by 6.1 percent. HP was down 3.5 percent. Dell dropped 12 percent. And Acer took a nearly 25 percent hit in unit sales. Meanwhile, Apple’s sales grew nearly 20 percent.
One analyst at Gartner said the PC declines resulted from buyers “turning their attention” to media tablets and other devices. The “media tablet” market is a euphemism for the iPad, which owns 70 percent market share and is expected to sell in the 45 million unit range this year.
But no, I’m not here to brag. The replacement of PCs I predicted hasn’t quite begun in earnest. The replacement will come. And I will brag. But for now, it’s more interesting to see how the iPad is gradually undermining the foundations of PC dominance.
Here’s how Apple’s iPad is setting the stage for the decline of the PC.