Leander Kahney - page 36

The Sonos Controller for iPad is now available on the iTunes App Store.

The app turns the iPad into a music hub for WiFi-connected Sonos players, streaming music from a variety of online music sources.

We got a sneak peek earlier this summer and were very impressed. The slick app makes digital music very easy — especially listening to online music services like Pandora, Rhapsody, Last.fm and the fantastic Mog.com. Using the iPad as a big Wi-Fi remote control, you can play music from your iTunes library, thousands of online radio stations, satellite radio subscriptions, or online sources.

Sonos sells wireless music players that make it easy to get multi-room audio around your house. Plug in a player in each room and stream music to each one (or the same music to all of them). Sonos’ products have won kudos for painless setup, ease of use, relative low-cost (you can spend a lot more) and innovation — this is the home stereo of the future. The iPad app takes it to the next level.

Analyst Michael Gartenberg is a fan. “I’ve been testing for a while and it shows the power of the tablet platform perfectly,” he just tweeted.

Sonos Controller for iPad [Sonos]

Sonos controller app page [iTunes]

Apple’s hard-charging COO TIm Cook has denied rumors he’s leaving Apple to be the CEO of HP.

Cook denied the rumors this morning while speaking to analyst Brian Marshall of Gleacher & Co.’, Barrons reports:

Tim Cook will not be going to HP, he loves Apple,” Marshall tells me Cook told him.

Apple’s stock took a pounding this morning on the rumor. Cook is credited with turning Apple into a paragon of operational efficiency and is pegged to be Steve Jobs’s successor.

Plans for Steve Jobs’ new house have been dug up. They show a fairly modest 5,000-square-foot house with five bedrooms and a private vegetable garden.

If anything, the conceptual plans submitted to the Woodside Town Council depict more of a small, private retreat than any towering glass-and-steel tech chapel or totem of wealth. According to these initial designs, Jobs intends to populate the 6 acres with an assortment of indigenous flora; a simple three-car garage; a modest 5 bedroom home with plenty of windows and decks; a network of lighted stone walkways; and even a private vegetable garden. Everything is neat, tight, pragmatic, and in its place.

Gizmodo: The Plans For Steve Jobs’ New House

Comment Of the Week comes from reader Dayne Jones.

Earlier this week we published the following headline about Steve Jobs ranking in Forbes’ annual rich list:

Steve Jobs Ranked 42rd Richest American In Forbes Annual List

“What’s 42rd?” asked one reader, to which Jones replied:

“It’s pronounced “Forty Terd”

Made me laugh. Here’s the thread.

Look at this incredible picture from London’s Mail on Sunday showing the massive crowds that line up every morning to buy unlocked iPhone 4s.

The Mail claims the unlocked iPhones are being shipped to Asia and the Middle East, where the iPhone 4 has yet to go on sale. Unlocked handsets can be sold for double their purchase price. At first I thought the picture was from the grand opening of Apple’s new Covent Garden store, which opened recently, but the Mail says the lines are forming every morning:

At 6.50am in Covent Garden security guards stopped people from joining the queue. About 230 were cordoned off behind airport-style barriers waiting for the shop to open.
At 7.30am a manager came out and stood on a chair and said: ‘We have iPhones for you. We will open the store in half an hour. Just be nice. Be orderly.’A cheer broke out as the shop doors opened just before 8am.

The New York Times says the same thing is happening in NYC, but may slack off when the iPhone 4 goes on sale in China on Saturday: Buyers Send iPhones on a Long Relay to China.

Thanks Kato.

The highly rated Springpad “remember anything” service is rolling out several nifty new features — starting with mobile notifications that will alert users to events, news and special offers.

Springpad is a free lifestyle service that makes it easy to save digital content — everything from news stories to recipes, email, wine labels, restaurant reviews, travel tips and so on.

It rivals similar services such as Evernote and Backpack, but value adds by analyzing saved content and layering it with metadata like special deals, nearby retailers, and useful links. If you save recipes, for example, it can automatically generate shopping lists of ingredients. Scan the barcode from a bottle of wine, and it’ll give you info and also find a local retailer.

“Anytime, anywhere, anyhow — it makes it drop dead simple to capture stuff you want to remember,” said Springpad CEO Jeff Janer in a phone interview last week.

Saved content is synchronized across iPhone, iPad, Android and Web apps. The service was recently named one of Time magazine’s 50 Best Websites and favorably reviewed by the Wall Street Journal.

On Wednesday, the service is adding alerts to its mobile app — event reminders, news alerts, to-dos, price drops, coupons, and special offers, etc. If you show an interest in Apple’s iOS, for example, it will alert you if Apple issues a software update.

The company is also releasing an extension for Google’s Chrome, which will make it easy to add content without leaving the browser. An extension for Safari will follow in about 30 days, Janer said. It is also adding push notifications to Android (available today) and iOS, which will available in about a month pending Apple’s approval.

Here’s a video of the new features in action:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REssNBbtmjc&hd=1

Here’s a taster of what iOS 4 will be like on the iPad, courtesy of AppAdvice.com.

See also: iOS 4.2 Beta 1 For iPad, iPhone & iPod Touch Now Available To Developers

Thanks Chris.

Apple has moved quickly to debunk this morning’s story that Steve Jobs tried to smuggle ninja stars aboard a private plane.

“Steve did visit Japan this summer for a vacation in Kyoto, but the incidents described at the airport are pure fiction,” Apple told All Things Digital. “Steve had a great time and hopes to visit Japan again soon.”

Apple is once again friends with Google, at least as far as mobile ads go.

Google says its wholeheartedly approves of Apple’s relaxation of its mobile advertising policy. The old policy effectively locked out Google’s AdMob platform from in-app advertising on the iPhone and iPad.

Apple’s new terms will open up in-app advertising to competitors and enable advertising systems that work across a range of platforms (IE. iPhone and Android), Google says.

“This is great news for everyone in the mobile community, as we believe that a competitive environment is the best way to drive innovation and growth in mobile advertising. Mobile advertising has already helped to fund tens of thousands of mobile apps across many different platforms and devices, and it will help do the same for many more in the years ahead.”

Google: An Update on Apple’s Terms of Service

Most of the restrictions in Apple’s new App Store guidelines make perfect sense. Who wants apps that drain the battery? There are commonsense bans on hate speech, objectionable material and gambling.

But there are two restrictions that might cause problems: rejecting apps in categories that are already crowded (fart apps), and pornography.

What do you think? Should Apple approve fart apps and porn and let us make our own choices?

[polldaddy poll=3740789]

Did Steve Jobs personally write Apple’s new App Store Review Guidelines, the long-awaited rules of what is and isn’t allowed in the App Store?

It certainly sounds like it. The language of the document is remarkably casual. It reads as though Jobs dictated it himself off the top of his head. For example:

We will reject Apps for any content or behavior that we believe is over the line. What line, you ask? Well, as a Supreme Court Justice once said, “I’ll know it when I see it”. And we think that you will also know it when you cross it.

It’s actually a pretty fun read, for a developer doc.

Most of the restrictions make sense. There are commonsense bans on hate speech, objectionable material and gambling. The most contentious area is pornography. Some adults think they should be allowed to make their own choices, and not have Apple act as a nanny.

The new guidelines are published on Apple’s Developer website (registered developers have to log in). Here’s the full text:

“This thing is thin!” says iFixit CEO Kyle Wiens, who just performed a teardown of the 4G iPod touch. “So thin that there is literally no room for the 5 MP camera in the iPhone 4.”

Here’s what he found:

Just as Apple has released the iOS 4.1 update, iPhone hackers have found a new way to jailbreak the latest iOS that will be hard for Apple to patch.

The Dev-Team’s Musclenerd says his fellow hacker pod2g has found a boot ROM exploit in the iOS 4.1 as it goes live. Musclenerd advises iPhone users to stay away from the 4.1 update until work on the latest jailbreak is completed.

”Crazy timing that @pod2g got latest exploit just as 4.1 went public (lots of work left…keep away from 4.1 for now!)” Musclenerd tweeted.

A low-level bootrom exploit will be hard for Apple to fight. Boot ROM exploits cannot be patched with a firmware update the way that Apple closed the PDF security hole that the iOS 4.0 JailbreakMe exploit relied on.

Apple would have to make changes to the hardware of its iOS devices to fix the exploit. Previously, pod2g discovered the 24kpwn exploit, which allows older iOS devices to be jailbroken via PwnageTool, but has been patched by Apple in its latests devices.

For complete instructions on jailbreaking and advice on the best software to install, see our Jailbreak Superguide.

Via Redmond Pie.

A case that converts the iPod touch into an iPhone (kinda) is coming to the U.S.

GoSolarUsa Inc. says it is bringing the Apple Peel 520 to the United States.

Developed by Chinese company Yosin, the Apple Peel 520 clamps to the back of the iPod touch and contains a battery, dock connector and SIM card slot. With it, the iPod touch can make phone calls and texts. Early reviews are mixed: it works but is buggy.

It is expected to go on sale for about $60. GoSolarUsa hasn’t given a launch date.

Go get it! Available through iTunes.

The update for iPhone and iPod touch includes lots of bug fixes, as well as new features like HDR photos, HD video upload, TV show rentals and Game Center.

The update is compatible with iPhone 4; iPhone 3G and GS; and iPod touch 2G. Not all features work on all devices however.

In November, Apple will release iOS 4.2, which will include iPad support.

Here are three of the best alternative iTunes 10 icons so far, and instructions how to install them:

Wow — that was quite a show from Steve Jobs. A brand new line up of iPods (except the Classic); a hot new AppleTV that costs just $99; and a potential Myspace killer in Ping, iTune’s social network for music.

But which announcement was the big one long term?

Will a FaceTime-enabled iPod allow Apple to route around AT&T and other wireless carriers? Or will the new, inexpensive AppleTV be the product that finally takes settop boxes mainstream, and Apple’s next big hit? Or is the new multitouch nano a glimpse at the future of multitouch personal electronics (think nifty iWatches)?

[polldaddy poll=3704292]

Apple is live streaming Wednesday’s iPod event as a test of its massive new data center, we’ve been informed by a source.

Apple’s first live video broadcast in years is a test of the server farm’s ability to stream a future version of iTunes for iOS devices, our tipster says.

“The goal is to monitor traffic load and quality,” says our tipster, who asked to remain anonymous to preserve their connections at Apple.

Forget battery packs or antenna boosters. In my book, this built-in bottle opener is a truly useful addition to an iPhone case.

The iBottleoppener is a $19.99 case for the iPhone 3G or 3GS with a bottle opener on the back. It’s available for pre-order, but avoid the promo video, which is bad infomercial cheesy.

Danish illustrator Mads Peitersen has been painting a series or really imaginative pictures showing the anatomy of technology. His guts of an iPhone pic is particularly cool.

“Smartphones today are soo advanced and good they almost behave alive. And becomes an extension of your body,” he writes.

Via LaughingSquid.

There’ll be a new $99 AppleTV tomorrow with Netflix movie streaming, Bloomberg reports.

Apple Inc., preparing to announce a new set-top box that delivers TV to consumers, will include movies from Netflix Inc., according to three people with knowledge of the plans.

The streaming service would be available on the revamped version of Apple TV, due to be introduced tomorrow in San Francisco, said two of the people, who asked not to be identified because the plans haven’t been made public. Users would pay a subscription fee to Netflix for the service, the people said.

The new AppleTV will cost $99 — $130 less than the current model, Bloomberg says. Apple will also update iTunes and offer a new iPod touch with a higher-resolution screen (likely a Retina display to match the iPhone 4’s).

The new Apple TV is rumored to be renamed iTV and run a version of iOS, possibly making is capable of running apps and games from the App Store. There’s no word on whether Netflix’s service will be an app or integrated into the device, as it is with some DVD players.

Netflix already offers a subscription movie streaming service through a wide variety of devices, from Blu-Ray players to  TiVo and game consoles. There are also Netflix apps for the iPhone and iPad that stream movies and TV shows to subscribers.

This parody of Apple’s saccharine new FaceTime ads is pretty funny.

The Oxford English Dictionary will not be printed again thanks in part to the iPad, Alastair Jamieson reports for The Telegraph:

Simon Winchester, author of ‘The Meaning of Everything: The Story of the Oxford English Dictionary’, said the switch towards online formats was “prescient”. He said: “Until six months ago I was clinging to the idea that printed books would likely last for ever. Since the arrival of the iPad I am now wholly convinced otherwise.”

Wow.

Take this with a pinch of salt, but we’ve been tipped that Apple’s rumored $1 TV subscription service, due to be unveiled next week, is technically correct but missing an important detail.