Apple - page 18

Steve Jobs famously once quoted Picasso as saying: “Good artists copy; great artists steal.” And by that metric, Apple is a lousy artist.

Apple is stolen from by just about everybody. Microsoft and other companies steal design and interface ideas from Apple’s OS X. Cell phone handset makers steal Apple’s iPhone design elements. The new tablet market is essentially Apple’s iPad plus the tablets that steal ideas from the iPad. Everybody has stolen Apple’s approach to app stores.

There’s a difference between stealing ideas and stealing intellectual property. Stealing winning general approaches to doing things like multi-touch gestures on a tablet device is good. Stealing the code to do that is bad.

Microsoft has long been accused of stealing Apple ideas in the many designs of Windows that have occurred over the years. Windows has tended to be more challenging to use than OS X over the years, and Windows products tend to be less elegant. Because of all this, Apple fans often dismiss Microsoft as a company without innovation.

In fact, the opposite is true. Microsoft’s research wing is an under-appreciated engine of invention, in my opinion. And while Microsoft fails to productize some of its best inventions, it’s also occasionally successful at implementing new ideas in real products.

I’ll go further. Apple and its customers would benefit enormously if Apple were to steal the following five key ideas from Microsoft.

There’s long been a number of urban legends about how Apple came up with its iconic logo.

There’s the idea that the bite symbolizes knowledge, or that the overall image is a tribute to mathematician Alan Turing, who committed suicide by taking a bite of an apple laced with cyanide.

But here’s the real story.

In case you missed it, Apple stole the spotlight this year at SXSW by launching iPad 2 in a temporary popup shop right in the heart of Austin.

I had heard that Apple was opening a popup store at a secret location during SXSW, but the location wasn’t a secret for long.

Long lines, big signs, high fives—even dancing ensued once the twitterverse got wind of the popup’s location. It was a crazy fun time, so if you haven’t seen it yet, check the video and let your eyes behold the insanity of this brilliant iPad launch.

PS, excuse the video’s abrupt ending, my camera ate some of my video bytes.

httpvhd://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2WHnDE3i7U

Months of anticipation. Hours of physically waiting. Finally, I got my claws on the iPad 2. First impressions: It’s amazing. It’s a lot like the original iPad only anorexic, sports two cameras, and packs beefier processing power. Apps are fast just like everyone is claiming. Photobooth is a lot more fun to goof around on that I thought it would be. It feels a little bit heavier than I expected, but not in a bad way. It’s solid. My only gripe so far is that the Smart Case doesn’t stay totally flush with the iPad’s casing when you flip it around the back of the iPad when using it. Stay tuned for our in-depth review coming soon.

httpvhd://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3wKYDkCrMs

Almost shamefully, I’ve waited in line on launch day for every iPhone and iPad. Each waiting experience has had it’s highs and lows. All have definitely been memorable, but today’s takes the cake. Waiting in line at Apple’s Store at Biltmore Fashion Park in Phoenix, I was surprised to run into Phoenix Suns basketball player Mickael Pietrus waiting at the front of the line to get his hands on the iPad 2.

The only way to ensure that you have an iPad 2 today is to buy one from one of the many retail outlets. However, all retailers are not treated equally, so I’ll be giving you the run down on the best places to purchase your iPad 2 from.

Your best, hassle-free bet is to pick one up from an Apple Specialist. Here’s why:

It’s almost too easy to make a parody video of Apple and its products these days. The company follows an easily discernible regularity in its product launches and despite growing popularity and marketshare for all of its products over the last decade, Apple’s “image” is tagged with the weight of a certain “hipster cred” that tends to make for easy pickings when it comes to ridicule.

Director Dan Dobi and writer Steve Rogowski skate pretty close to several uncomfortable lines in this one, however, which, presumably is intentional.

After all, parody and sarcasm are about getting people talking, right?

When the Apple Store came back online yesterday after the announcement of the iPad 2, customers were a bit shocked to find out that Apple is not taking any pre-orders for the device until March 11th, the same day the product hits store shelves. Apple has always had a great track record of taking pre-orders on products after they’ve been announced, so we’ve been wondering just why they’ve changed policy this time. Could it be that they’re afraid they’re not going to have enough initial stock to satisfy store orders as well as online orders?

Rumors were flying around the web days before the event that Apple has been facing supply constraints for the iPad 2 and that the product was facing the serious possibility of being delayed until April or May. When Steve Jobs took the stage yesterday, he went out of his way to adamantly state that the iPad 2 would be launching worldwide in March, and not April or May. Is the move to eliminate pre-orders an effort to increase the lines at stores and build even more hype around the excitement of the launch? That could possibly be the answer but I think it’s a bit unlikely.

Apple just posted the full length video from this morning’s keynote. Users wanting to view the event can now stream the entire 72 minute video of Steve Jobs unveiling the iPad 2 by going to Apple’s website (click here for video). Also, if you’d like to download the video it’s been made available on iTunes (click here for iTunes download).

httpvhd://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_I9OEV6_Ak

Here’s the latest video that Apple has released on the iPad 2. Six minutes in length, it features Johnny Ive, Scott Fortsall, and few other Apple employees talking about the design and user experience of the new iPad 2.

update: here’s the video for the new Smart Cover in action

httpvhd://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCb4BOd8iXQ

Did you guys hear that the iPad 2 was announced today? Steve Jobs, in living legended status, even did the unveiling. Here’s everything that you need to know about what went down today at the Apple Keynote.

True to the rumors, Apple found quite a bit of things to update and tweak on the iPad:

They boosted up the processor considerably, switching from a 1GHz A4 processor to a 1GHz dual-core A5 processor. Along with the faster processor, Apple claims they’ve cranked up the graphics and are pumping out 9x the graphics performance, although there was no specification given on what they did to improve on the PowerVR SGX 535 graphics processor of the first unit.

In a move to clear existing inventory of original iPad units, Apple has slashed prices on the iPad. You can purchase a refurbished 16GB Wifi iPad for only $349. Pretty stellar deal considering that the original iPad still matches up extremely well in comparison to the competition and should be a viable machine for another year. If you’re leery about getting a refurbished unit but still want a cheaper magical experience, Apple has knocked $50 off the original price for brand new units.

The Apple Store is back online and updated with the new iPad 2. Apple won’t start selling the iPad in stores until 5pm on March 11th. Tragically, as our colleague John Brownlee noticed, there isn’t an ability to pre-order the iPad 2, as orders aren’t going to be taken until March 11th. Guess if you want an iPad on March 11th you’ll have to wait in line at the store with all the other crazy and deranged fans.

With the announcement of the iPad 2, Apple has refreshed the iPad 2 page on their website to reflect the new product, complete with videos and lots of information on the new iPad 2. Click over on the link for all the action. More

You’re sitting there waiting for the iPad 2 to be announced. After waiting for months you’re chomping at the bit and know that you’re going to buy one even if you’re not totally sure what all of it’s features are gonna be. One thing to consider is how you’re going to pay for the upgrade. While you can certainly deal with the hassle of selling your old iPad on Craigslist or Ebay, you might want to consider using NextWorth.com to trade in your iPad for cash.

NextWorth, is offering high trade-in values for the first generation iPad to help subsidize the cost of an upgrade. Apple products tend to retain value more than other brands, and the iPad is no exception. Current trade-in values on NextWorth for iPads with Light Wear (as of 2/23/11) are:

iPad 16G Wifi: $255

iPad 32GB Wifi: $285

iPad 64GB Wifi: $310

iPad 16G Wifi + 3G: $298

iPad 32G wifi + 3G: $350

iPad 64GB Wifi + 3G: $390

One of the nice things about NextWorth is that they’re partnered with Target to offer an in-store trade-in option. With over 900 participating Target stores (and 500 being added in the next three months), consumers receive either credit toward a purchase, or a prepaid Target card for the value of the trade-in that can be used for any item sold at Target. Via the NextWorth.com website customers are given the options of cash or a giftcard when they trade-in. NextWorth also provides free, fully-insured UPS shipping service to all online customers.

If you’re looking for a quick way to come up with the cash for an iPad 2 their service is definitely worth a look. It’s a lot quicker than coordinating a sell yourself online, and in some cases they’re offering about 65% of the original value for the iPad during trade-in.

The Apple universe is all a twitter on the day before the Cupertino company tells media what “2011 will be the year of.”

The folks at bookmaker.com are wagering that we’ll see three versions of the iPad 2 (96%), a front and rear-facing camera  and a  non-smudge screen & gyroscope (96%).

Less likely, they speculate, are a USB port (83%), flat back (61.7%) and a 7-inch version  (160%) . (Yep, that’s over 100%. For once, the fuzzy math isn’t mine, that’s how betting odds work).

Take our poll and let us know what you think. Or what you hope for.

As the fervor surrounding tomorrow’s big announcement builds, fanboys and fangirls are eagerly sitting around their computers gulping down all the latest iPad 2 rumors that the Internet has to offer. One of the popular rumors out there is that tomorrows iPad 2 unveiling will be a disappointing spec bump and that the real grand daddy of tablet computers, the iPad 3, will be unveiled later in the year (possibly in September if Gruber and others are correct).

Cult of Mac has published a number of articles supporting the idea that Apple will be releasing two iPads in 2011. While there have been a significant amount of doubters to this theory of two iPads being launched, one must take into account that such a move wouldn’t be completely unprecedented. I’m referring to the iPod Mini 2G vs. the iPod Nano in 2005.

Who’s to blame for the disastrous roster of health, safety and environmental problems chronicled by Apple’s recently published “Supplier Responsibility 2011 Progress Report“?

In the past year, and especially in the past month, Apple has become associated with the many problems of Chinese manufacturing for two reasons.

First, a string of high-visibility suicides by employees of the Taiwanese contract manufacturing firm Foxconn were universally reported in the media as having occurred “at factories that make iPhones” and other such associations (even though those factories typically make products for many different companies).

And second, Apple’s “Supplier Responsibility” report generated enormous news coverage, and most of it overemphasizing Apple’s role and de-emphasizing the role of other parties.

Media aren’t the only ones associating Apple with Chinese factory problems.

Last week, Apple released a document called The Supplier Responsibility 2011 Progress Report, in which they detailed findings of a series of audits of factories that make Apple hardware. Apple also laid out their intentions in the report for addressing the problems they discovered.

We’ve been down this road before. Every few years, some Western country is either shamed into disclosing or issues a report voluntarily about the ghastly realities of Chinese manufacturing. Everybody vows to try harder. The factories and outsource manufacturing firms claim to implement new programs to curtail abuses and violations. Workers get a raise (never mind that they’ll be forced to retire in their 30s so management can bring in younger, more timid and lower-paid workers).

And the Chinese government often announces bold new initiative and laws to fix the problems. Everybody is reassured, and then it’s back to business as usual.

The problems never really get fixed. There are three reasons why.

Click here to read the rest of this article.

While everyone else is talking about the new almighty Thunderbolt ports the new MacBook Pros are sporting, one big switch that isn’t getting all that much attention is Apple’s switch from NVIDIA GeForce GT graphics processors to AMD’s Radeon HD GPUs.

The switch takes place on the 15″ and 17″ units while the smaller 13″ MacBook Pro just has the standard Intel integrated graphics card. Apple is claiming that the switch to AMD has increased performance threefold over the old MacBook Pro models.

Imagine this scenario: your Mac crashes and all of your files are gone forever. Do you want this to happen to you? If not, Time Machine is the perfect solution. It automatically backs up your Mac every hour, so you can always have the peace of mind that your files are safe. The video below describes how you can set up Time Machine quickly and easily.

Rebutting the National Enquirer’s morbid rumors that he is near death, Steve Jobs will be among the attendees at President Barack Obama’s dinner with tech industry leaders in San Francisco tomorrow, an inside source tells ABC News.

At today’s White House press briefing, press secretary Jay Carney said that the focus of the event will be “innovation and job creation” with business leaders “who know a lot about private sector job growth.”

The full list of attendees has not yet been released, but it has been learned that outgoing Google CEO Eric Schmidt, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, and Paul Otellini of Intel are also on the guest list.

Microsoft’s recently-announced partnership with Nokia will significantly increase the chances of both Apple and Nokia settling their bitter patent infringement lawsuits against each other, says a long-time intellectual property activist who keeps a close eye on the patent strategies of the tech world’s largest firms.

This week, Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal and TechCrunch all published rumors that Apple plans to compete in the mid-ranged smartphone sector, with the launch of a smaller, more affordable iPhone, to be sold alongside the iPhone 4. At Cult of Mac, we predicted as much six weeks ago.

Of course, rumors of a smaller, cheaper iPhone are nothing new. They’ve been around for almost as long as the iPhone itself. And with good reason. Any seasoned Apple watcher will recognize this as Steve Jobs’ standard MO. Launch an iconic, up-market product, allow the market for it to grow and mature, and when the underlying technology becomes cheap enough, introduce a smaller, more affordable mass market version.

What better way to bide your time waiting for that institutionally late Amtrak than loitering in an Apple Store? Such seems to be the thinking in Cupertino, as sources now indicate that Apple wants to open a brand new Apple Store right in the heard of New York City’s Grand Cental Terminal.