Apple - page 64

Apple reports over 10 million applications downloaded from the AppStore in its first weekend, according to a press release issued by the company today. There may be discord brewing between the company and developers of the applications being distributed in the AppStore, however, as blogger Bret Terpstra writes for The Unofficial Apple Weblog.

Many applications from the App Store are crashing frequently, according to Terpstra, and some veteran developers are pointing the finger at Apple, claiming crash logs indicate a “growing consensus that Apple has released a highly unstable “final” version of the 2.0 firmware.”

If it seems prices of the latest iPod and iPhone accessories are rising, you may have Apple’s licensing department to thank, according to a story in Popular Mechanics. Though the company is typically reticent to discuss the details of arrangements such as the one that allows some electronics manufacturers to place a “Made for iPod” designation on their products, managers and decision makers for both retailers and manufacturers indicate Apple’s licensing fees and specially made chips that allow gadgets to work with Apple gear can add 10% or more to the price consumers pay for an item.

Last year, Apple introduced a proprietary authentication chip that works like a silicon key to unlock streaming video functionality on iPhones and iPods and generally authorizes the devices to work with approved accessories. The “auth chip” meant third-party companies wanting to produce iPod-compatible gadgets first had to deal with Apple–the only company selling the chip. Previous-generation iPods could output video over a generic $2 iPod video cable, but new phones and iPods require officially licensed Apple cables–and these can cost up to $50, according to the report.

Apple’s contention is that its authentication technology and licensing protocols, which can entail auditors from Cupertino poring over a company’s books and records to ensure that Apple gets paid for every device sold, helps maintain high quality for products associated with the Apple brand. Some manufacturers complain, on the other hand, they must reduce the quality of their wares in order to pay Apple its share and still keep prices at levels that stimulate consumer demand.

Updated below – Apple CEO Steve Jobs pronounced the iPhone 3G’s worldwide reception “stunning,” according to AppleInsider.

Noting the 1 million phones sold in its “opening weekend” (as the lines between commerce and entertainment grow ever more blurred), Jobs trumpeted the fact that “It took 74 days to sell the first one million original iPhones, so the new iPhone 3G is clearly off to a great start.”

Of course, its availability in more than 20 countries helped iPhone 3G sales, whereas the original phone was first offered only in the United States, but consumers’ embrace of the new model is sure to heat up the smartphone market. The sales numbers are impressive by any measure, especially given widespread activation issues that slowed down the purchase process and caused much grumbling among opening weekend buyers.

Apple’s sales figures are the subject of some debate in the wake of the company’s press releases this morning, according to a post at Fortune‘s Apple blog. While sales at Apple retail outlets are counted at the register, sales to partner carriers such as AT&T are counted by the company when they leave the loading docks in Asia. “In other words, some of those 1 million iPhones recorded as sold by Apple (AAPL) may still be in transit,” says the Fortune report.

Also today, Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster put sales at around half the 1 million reported by Apple and said he thinks it will take two weeks or more to hit the 1 million served mark.

Apple confessed to problems making the transition from .Mac web services to its highly anticipated MobileMe product, according to MacWorld, but the service may be up and running this morning after yesterday’s rocky rollout.

A statement posted earlier today to the Apple website read “”The MobileMe transition is underway but is taking longer than expected. Please refer to the official System Status to the right for current information on the availability of MobileMe services. We apologize for any inconvenience.”

But as you can see from the screenshots below, we finally have a log-in page and access to our me domain. The servers are running very slow at this writing. Stay tuned for updates; your mileage may vary.

Access to the account page behind the following secure screen

Was met with a Loading wheel that I gave up on after 5 minutes

But I was able to get to my Gallery

Though not my mail. I have confidence Apple engineers will work out the kinks.

It’s iPhone launch day in the US and early reports from several sources indicate a scene of controlled chaos across the country as Apple Retail and AT&T employees work to satisfy the demands of people who must have a new phone today. It’s nothing like the mayhem that attended demand last summer when the first gen iPhone made its debut, but AT&T’s on-site activation requirement seems to be making the purchase of of a new iPhone much longer process than the 15 minutes touted earlier in the week as the time it would take to get in and out with a phone.

Steve Wozniak was quoted in MacWorld admitting gadget lust would keep him in line overnight down in San Jose to get a new phone this morning, but said,””A lot of the people I know just aren’t going to upgrade yet.”

I’ve been a gamer for a very long time. I distinctly remember my dad helping me to play one of the earliest Space Invader units by lifting me up (what with a diminutive version of your correspondent not being able to see the screen properly) and then pretty much instantly regretting it (what with me being rather heavier than he realized). I’ve devoured games on ZX Spectrums, Commodore 64s, BBC Micros, Amigas, PCs, Macs, and consoles from Atari, Nintendo, Sega, Microsoft and Sony. And although today’s gaming landscape is clearly significantly more conservative and homogenized than that of the 1980s or early 1990s, there are still many gems lurking amongst the dross.

It’s curious to see Apple again taking interest in games. Few will remember the disaster that was the Pippin, a joint production with Bandai that rightfully made #22 on a top 25 worst tech products of all-time list by PC World, and Macs have never really been at the forefront of gaming, with users typically forced to pick up two-year-old PC games at current PC-game prices.

With iPhone, there’s a feeling things might be different this time. Right from the start, Sega was extolling the virtues of the device, demoing a highly competent version of Super Monkey Ball, and reports suggest spec-wise that Apple’s hardware rivals Sony’s PSP and Nintendo’s DS, which are the only two mobile gaming platforms worth a damn. Also, Jobs claims a third of the first wave of applications on the AppStore will be games.

My concern is that the genius of Apple’s lack of physical controls for most applications (thereby enabling context-sensitive controls and keyboards) might be its undoing in the games world. Jailbroken iPhones offer emulators of classic consoles, but the lack of tactile controls renders them borderline unplayable, and although the iPhone’s accelerometer and touch-screen will force (some) developers to create unique and innovative products, there’s a real risk iPhone as a gaming platform will remain a seriously niche concern, by virtue of lacking a D-pad and other ‘standard’ controls.

Some might argue that iPhone’s unique controls can only be a good thing, using Nintendo’s Wii and DS consoles as ‘proof’. But while both of those devices have proved staggeringly popular, they offer alternatives to developers. Yes, you can wave the Wii remote around like a loony, or draw on the DS touchscreen, but more typical control methods are also catered for. And it’s pretty obvious that some developers try to shoehorn unwieldy control systems into games (a shocking number of DS games require hateful microphone-based controls at some point) on such consoles because they can. But with the iPhone, they will sometimes have to.

Looking at iPhone gaming demos to date, there’s already a split between games such as Super Monkey Ball using iPhone to fashion highly intuitive controls via tilting, and more traditional games being hamstrung, leading to having to ‘jolt’ your iPhone upwards to make a character jump. A quick glance around the web suggests I’m not alone in wishing iPhone catered for all, rather than those with an ‘accelerometer and tilting’ fetish. One Mac user created a mock-up of a PSX-style controller for iPhone, and the people over at icontrolpad.com (pictured right) have prototyped a device that almost turns iPhone into a PSP-style handheld console.

Unfortunately, any devices along these lines are likely to be limited to jailbroken iPhones—at least for the foreseeable. But here’s hoping Apple takes these ideas on board. For while I’m all for innovation and playing something new, it’d be a shame to restrict iPhone to certain types of games, simply by not giving developers access to a full range of controls, tactile or otherwise.

The AppStore went live this morning, included in the iTunes 7.7 release available through Software Update.

Though this is surely to change over time, only a handful of applications are available in the Applications pane of iTunes this morning. More than 500 titles are included in the initial launch, according to a piece in the New York Times, in which Steve Jobs is quoted, saying of the AppStore, “”We are not trying to be business partners [with developers].” Instead, he said, the goal is to “sell more iPhones.”

Twenty-five percent of the first 500 applications at the store will be free, according to Jobs. Of the commercial applications, 90 percent will be sold for $9.99 or less, he said in the Times article, adding that a third of the first wave of applications will be games.

As of this morning, if you already know of a game or application that is or should be in the AppStore, it may be available through a search by name.

Here’s another screenshot showing apps in the layout. It should also be noted that the AppStore is currently available only for your browsing pleasure. Until the iPhone 2.0 firmware is released (perhaps later today?), you won’t be able to download any applications to your iPhone or iPod Touch.

Apple’s web services product, formerly known as .Mac, becomes MobileMe tonight, sometime between 6pm and 12am Pacific Time. A major overhaul to the $100 per year service will let subscribers manage email, calendar and contacts, pushing new data and changes automatically to desktop, laptop and mobile devices. Photo sharing features and disk space on Apple’s webservers let members store and share large files.

Apple produced a handy guided tour video and staff writer David Chartier posted a comprehensive piece on the details for Ars Technica today.

Of the more than 25,000 developers  who applied to Apple’s iPhone developers program, 4,000 were admitted, according to a story in Fortune. Apple set a July 7 deadline for those accepted developers to submit their applications for inclusion in the inaugural launch of the iPhone AppStore, expected to coincide with the worldwide debut of the iPhone 3G in two days.

We bring you now 12 interesting Apps to look for. Descriptions and screenshots after the jump.

Marko Karppinen, principal at MK&C, an eight-person software development studio in Helsinki, Finland, wrote a post on the company blog today claiming Apple responded to a phishing expedition by someone with a yahoo.com email address and turned over Karppinen’s Apple ID password, compromising his personal details, .Mac account information and Apple Store profile data.

Apple’s Developer Relations department did not respond to requests for comment.

J. Douglas Field, Segway CTO

We’re not sure if Steve Wozniak had a hand in the negotiations, but Apple has lured Doug Field, Segway’s chief technical officer, to join Jonathan Ivie’s design team as Vice President of Product Design, according to a post Friday on the SegwayChat forum.

As blogger Jason D. O’Grady notes, writing for ZD Net the move is curious, given Field’s background as an engineer and Segway’s not-so-glorious reputation for product design. Asked about his reaction to the Segway’s original design, Steve Jobs famously said, “I think it sucks.”

Here’s hoping Field gets a better grade from Jobs at his first Apple executive review.

Photo via Fortune

My AT&T account tells me I’ll be eligible for a hardware upgrade on August 16th. I’ll probably wait at least until then to pick up a new iPhone 3G. And something tells me I won’t be disappointed.

Then again, I don’t have a sustainability agenda to push, as do a quintet of twenty-somethings calling themselves alternatively TheWhoFarm and Waiting for Apples, who began queuing up in front of the Apple Store on 5th Avenue in Manhattan on Friday. The group is going for the Guinness Book of World’s Records entry for “longest time waiting in line to buy something,” according to Fortune, and hopes to persuade the next President of the United States to transform the White House’s 17-acre lawn into an organic farm.

It’s not clear what effect the group’s affinity for Apple may have on the company’s efforts to gain acceptance with Enterprise users.

Image by Gail Ahlers

Two Apple shareholders have filed a class-action lawsuit against present and former Apple officials including Steve Jobs and four members of the Board of Directors, as well as former CFO Fred Anderson and former General Counsel Nancy Heinen. The lawsuit charges Apple officials with fraud in connection with the company’s practice of backdating stock options, the subject of an SEC investigation in 2007, in which the regulatory agency cleared Jobs of any wrongdoing.

That’s not enough for Plaintiffs Martin Vogel and Kenneth Mahoney, according to a story published by Information Week, which details the allegations against Jobs and company. Vogel and Mahoney are seeking to recover losses stemming from a drop in Apple’s share price that reduced the company’s market cap by over $7 billion in the wake of Jobs admitting to “irregularities” in the granting of options to company executives and to the existence of an internal investigation into the matter in 2006.

Image via AppleInsider

By any measure of event marketing, Apple’s rollout of its next-gen iPhone 3G has already been a success, with stories having run in every major media outlet, from Time to Fortune to BusinessWeek, CNN, The New York Times as well as on Internet blog sites large and small, covering the phone’s worldwide debut on July 11.

Both Apple and AT&T, the iPhone’s exclusive US wireless carrier and distribution partner, have posted videos hoping to get customers iReady for the big day and, according to a story in Fortune, reporter Philip Elmer-DeWitt says their approaches couldn’t be more different.

The Apple video, shot in the company’s signature stark, simple style, calmly lays out all the feature-based reasons you should believe that owning anything less than an iPhone may leave you unprepared to face the challenges of living in the modern world. As Elmer-DeWitt writes, “It’s hard to watch it to the end and not harbor iPhone 3G lust.”

At&T’s video, on the other hand, calls to mind the chaos and frustration likely to attend your effort to get your hands on one of the new phones on launch day, recommending that you may well want to visit an AT&T store in advance of July 11 to get your papers in order and your background check, uh, credit check out of the way to minimize hassles and delay when you come back to get the phone and have it activated.

As the countdown to launch day nears, more and more people are likely to be liveblogging the event and the pent-up demand for the device will continue to build. Some, however, are thinking more along the lines of Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, like Dameon Welch-Abernathy at The PhoneBoy Blog, who says, “Get iReady to be iScrewed.”

Check out this gallery of gorgeous photographs of the recently opened Apple Store in Sydney, Australia by photographer Christopher Chan. Born in Kuala Lumpur, the 34 year-old Chan keeps his day job as a Sydney-based Cisco Business Operations Manager when he’s not traveling the world shooting landscapes, architectural and other travel-related subjects. He uses a Canon 30D camera, loves his Canon EF-S 10-22mm lens the most, and works on a 15″ Macbook Pro running Mac OS X 10.5.3 and Aperture 2.1.

Hit the jump for his beautiful pix.

Ahead of Apple’s 3rd Quarter earnings report due later this month, fans of the Cupertino, CA computer company have reason to believe Big Mo is on their team, according to reporter Charles Jade at Ars Technica. Citing information available from the web metrics firm Net Applications, Jade reports significant increases in market share for both Mac OS X and Apple’s Safari web browser over the past year. Based on recent trends, the percentage of Mac OS X users should break the 8% mark in July, having gained nearly 2 full percentage points in the past year. Intel Macs posted gains as a percentage of Macs in use as well, possibly accounting for much of the reasoning behind Apple’s decison to make its Snow Leopard OS update, due in the spring, an Intel-only affair.

Apple’s chosen wireless carrier for the United States revealed pricing details for the iPhone 3G models, set to debut on July 11, according to information posted to the company’s website. New customers signing a two year service contract with the Dallas-based phone company can purchase the new phones for $199 and $299 for the 8GB and 16GB models respectively. Current AT&T customers who are eligible for an upgrade will also be able to purchase at the fully subsidized pricing while those not eligible for an upgrade will pay $399 and $499 for the two models. In typically cryptic AT&T style, the company’s upgrade eligibility requirements are not made public but only to logged in users requesting information specific to their account. The company’s generic message on upgrades reads “Device offers are made available from time to time based on a number of factors: service tenure, spending levels, payment history, usage practices and other factors,” though existing customers nearing the end of a two-year service contract cycle will presumably be able to purchase a new iPhone at the fully subsidized pricing with a commitment to a new two year contract.

In a somewhat puzzling development, AT&T issued a statement today saying it will sell the new phones “in the future” without a service contract for $599 for the 8GB phone and $699 for the 16GB model. Previously, neither Apple nor AT&T had indicated any intention to make the phones available without a service contract. Customers seeking to purchase phones on and near the July 11 launch date will be required to activate AT&T service at either an Apple store or an AT&T outlet, unlike the original iPhones released one year ago, which users could activate for service from their home computers. Existing AT&T customers will pay an $18 activation fee to get service on new iPhones; new customers will pay $36 for service activation.

Photo by Peter Payne

The Naked Bikers, a global protest vehicle for raising oil dependency awareness, rode through London on a sunny day in June. Photographer Peter Payne’s arresting image at panoramas.dk shows the stunning visual capabilities of QTVR, Apple’s 360-degree and CubicVR photo viewing technology.

Apple has ordered millions of earth-friendly packaging trays from a Dutch company that makes injection-molded shipping products from potato starch, according to The Register. After weathering criticism in the past from the likes of Greenpeace for the company’s use of Brominated Fire Retardants (BFRs) and Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) in its products, last year, Apple CEO Steve Jobs promised a greener Apple. Turning once again to the company that made shipping trays for the first generation iPod nano and iPod video, Apple plans to ship its new iPhones in cardboard boxes with a fully recyclable tray made from 100% natural sources such as potato or Tapioca starch, according to Hans Arentsen, CEO of the Dutch company PaperFoam.

Channel Flip is a “video magazine” produced in London with a focus on Mac tech-tips, video gaming and film. Instead of writing articles, the Channel Flip team produces short, snappy clips of how-tos and reviews of mobile phones, HDTVs, laptops and portable technology, as well as gaming titles on console, portable and PC. The film department looks at the week’s must-watch DVD releases, including film analysis and a close view of things going on in the movie world.

The clip above shows how to use Apple’s Time Capsule for something more than a mere back-up device and network router.

Photo by gazjoe

Officials in China have confirmed the location of Apple’s first retail operation on the Mainland, in Beijing’s Sanlitun district, according to China Tech News. The 3000+ square foot outlet, which will be managed and operated by employees of the Cupertino, CA-based computer giant, has been developed by Hong Kong’s Swire Properties as part of a 580,000 square foot mixed use project that includes additional retail and boutique hotel space housed in a 17 building complex.

The expectation is Apple will display and sell its full range of products directly for the first time to Chinese consumers, who up to now have had to acquire Apple gadgetry through licensed third-party retail agents.

Apple will open the three-floor store on July 19 and plans to launch a second Retail Store in Beijing during the Olympics, according to a report today in The Shanghai Daily.

Apple’s App Store, the online distribution channel for applications being developed for the iPhone by third-party software makers, will presumably open its virtual doors with the release of iPhone’s 2.0 firmware and the debut of the 3G model hardware on July 11. Phone users and developers alike are understandably excited about possibilities on the horizon, but as developer Paul Kafasis writes for Inside iPhone, many aspects of the way forward remain uncharted.

With Apple having no previous experience in the role of software publisher for outside developers, Kafasis is concerned about uncertain protocols on issues including support, free trials, review copies, refunds, discounts, bulk sales, and upgrade pricing. On behalf of consumers he wonders if software will be tied to a single device, if it will be able to be backed-up and recovered later and what will happen when a user gets a new iPhone.

Most importantly, perhaps are unanswered questions about who will have and control the all-important customer information. “When we sell software to a customer, we can track visitors, hits, downloads, and more. We also get a name and email address we can use to contact the customer later, if needed,” he writes, and then wonders, “will [developers] get any of this from the App Store? If so, what pieces of it?”

Many people felt the initial release of the iPhone last year was badly hobbled by the restriction against native third-party applications. The emergence of such applications soon, and their distribution through the App Store, are thus as likely to be roundly welcomed as it is certain the roll-out will encounter bumps in the road. With a future all three parties – Apple, developers and consumers – would like to see as fulfilling, whether and when that might be the case will depend on the answers to some of Kafasis’ questions.

I had the great fortune to attend an early screening of WALL*E, Pixar’s latest feature film, on Tuesday night. And, like just about every Pixar movie ever, it’s absolutely phenomenal. As much as I love Apple, I have to admit that the output of Steve’s other company is a lot more consistently excellent. Even more wonderfully, WALL*E is filled with references to Apple. It’s a fun bonus in an already great film.

Lots of people have remarked that Apple Design Chief Jonathan Ive was involved in designing EVE, the sleek, white, glossy robot that WALL*E falls in love with. As much as she resembles an older iPod, however, the cleverest thing about EVE is that she appears to have no seams in her surface, though they appear when she lifts her arms. There’s even one scene (pictured) where WALL*E tries to find her hand while it’s in locked position, and he struggles to find the gaps — an obvious reference to the notoriously difficult-to-open iPod or iPhone.

But the Apple references run deeper. Every morning, WALL*E opens up a solar array in order to charge himself up for the workday to come. Hilariously, as soon as he reaches 100 percent power, the classic Mac booting chime goes off. And it’s definitely the older sound — it’s quite tinny. I’d bet they taped it off of a Quadra rather than a current Mac.

One last Apple reference: WALL*E’s favorite way to unwind is to watch an old VHS tape of the Barbra Streisand movie Hello Dolly (it’s OK; it is actually totally weird, if in a sweet way). But that tape then plays through a circa 2006 video iPod, which WALL*E then magnifies with an enormous lens into a projection screen.

WALL*E: Come for the love, stay for the Apple in-jokes. What could be better than that?

Pictures via About.com

Photo by Silvio Sousa Cabral

Amid reports of a surge in orders for all flavors of Apple gadgetry, anticipation of the iPhone 3g’s July 11 debut has the Apple Retail division preparing for the onslaught and chipmakers such as Broadcom and Marvel hoping happy days are here again.

Wall Street analyst Craig Berger, speaking for FBR Capital Markerts, says the bump in Apple’s supply chain activity “suggest[s] Apple continues to knock the cover off the ball, that its product cycle momentum is ramping, and that any consumer spending malaise in the U.S. or Europe has yet to impact Apple-related product demand.”

In a memo distributed throughout its Apple Stores division, company executives laid the ground rules for interacting with the public as 3G launch day approaches. Among the anticipated issues, the idea of getting on a waitlist for first dibs was shot down definitively by Apple corporate, and retail employees have been told to call any customer who has reserved an iPhone Personal Shopping session on or after July 11th to inform them Personal Shopping sessions will not apply to the iPhone 3G.

At an Apple Store in New York this week, actor Kiefer Sutherland is said to have made a strong case for obtaining a pre-launch iPhone 3G to no avail.

The company plans to hold worldwide retail meetings on July 6th to begin conveying more specific official launch procedures to its staff, according to a report at the Unofficial Apple Weblog.

UPDATE: This post originally borrowed liberally from an article written by reporter Dan Warne for APC Magazine. Though I linked to Dan’s piece and indicated the “10 Reasons” were his ideas and not mine, I realize now that reprinting his article with only the slightest changes and editing on my part could be seen as misleading at best and were certainly not in keeping with the standards to which I and Cult of Mac aspire. I ask for readers’ – and especially for Mr. Warne’s – forgiveness for my error — Lonnie Lazar.

People have been dying for the iPhone 3G for over a year, ever since the first user attempted downloading a web page on AT&T’s excruciatingly slow EDGE network. And let there be no doubt, when the phone hits global streets on July 11, people will rejoice, the coffers at Apple HQ in Cupertino will once again groan with excess and mobile carriers from AT&T to Vodaphone to O2 will breathe short-lived sighs of relief.

But in spite of the wow-inducing touchscreen interface, the bright and bold display, the push-synching of email, contacts, calendar, tasks and photos from Apple’s new MobileMe services, and the relative pleasures of speed on the 3G network – as always – Apple will have released a product that fails to meet some consumers’ insatiable expectations.

Herewith, 10 reasons to feel like Steve Jobs is ripping you off once again, as compiled by APC Magazine reporter Dan Warne: