This is the icon for a new section of the Finder in Lion (Apple’s latest update to OS X) called “All My Files.” It helps users find recently-used files, listing them by type, date and so on.
Look carefully. The file cards contain some of Steve Jobs’ best-known quotes, including the words to the famous “Think Different” commercial.
Do you recognize the quotes?
Via Tuaw: Mac OS X Lion features hidden tribute to Steve Jobs
Creating your own personal website can be a fun way to share pictures, videos, and more with friends, family, and the world. Apple includes an Application on every Mac for this very purpose called iWeb. In this video you will learn how to create a basic website in iWeb.
The New York Times‘ Bay Citizen website has published more remarks from Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak on the subject of Mike Daisey’s controversial one man show.
As previously reported, Woz was moved to tears by “The Agony and The Ecstasy of Steve Jobs,” a monologue about Apple and Foxconn, the company’s largest supplier in Asia that saw a rash of worker suicides last year.
Wozniak says he found the play deeply upsetting. He urges Tim Cook, Apple’s COO and current acting CEO, to go see the one-man show besucase the issues it discusses could hurt Apple financially in the future:
Tim should know about this very soon, so that he knows what’s in more and more people’s heads. The emotions and understanding and moral feelings that Mike brings out are very strong and could be a threat to Apple’s future, even though they are only simmering now.
The Bay Citizen: Apple Co-Founder Responds to ‘The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs’
Former Apple manager Paul Devine pleaded guilty in federal court in San Jose on Monday to a massive kickback scheme involving Apple’s supply chain.
Devine will forfeit $2.25 million in proceeds and property, the U.S. Attorney said.
Devine provided suppliers with details of Apple’s product roadmap and pricing targets in exchange for hefty kickbacks. When he was busted, feds found about $150,000 in shoeboxes under his bed and more money in foreign accounts and safe deposit boxes.
Devine originally pleaded not-guilty but later agreed to protect Apple’s trade secrets if the case came to court. That move was seen as a way to get a favorable plea bargain. Devine had faced 23 counts of wire fraud and money laundering. He plead guilty to one count of each statutory violation.
He awaits sentencing on June 6. He could face up to 20 years in jail, the U.S Attorney said.
Full press release below:
It’s a beautiful morning here in San Francisco to wake up and find your website has been effectively disappeared off the web by Google.
Cult of Mac has been downgraded by the changes Google has made to its algorithm to rerank content farms like Demand Media.
We’ve become a civilian casualty in the war against content farms.
You can read more about here in The Guardian, which highlighted us in a story about legit sites hit by the changes.
We’re not alone. Also affected is the British Medical Journal, PR Newswire, and one of the earliest online communities, The Well. According to an analysis by Sistrix, an independent search-engine analyst firm, hundreds of other legitimate, hardworking sites have also been hit.
Why us? We have no idea. The changes Google has made to its system are secret. What makes it worse is that Google’s tinkering seems to have actually improved Demand Media’s page rank, while killing ours.
We’re a blog, so we aggregate news stories like everyone else. But our posts are 100% original and we do a ton of original reporting, as The Guardian noted this morning.
Perhaps it was because we’re constantly ripped off by shitty clone blogs?
Or maybe because we ranked so highly for popular keywords like “Apple” and “iPhone.” In fact, we used to get a lot of love from Google, placing highly on Google News and Google’s general search pages. A lot of our traffic came from Google, which is why the changes are so serious. I’m already seeing a big drop-off in traffic. Over the weekend and today, the traffic is half what it normally would be.
I’m pissed because we’ve worked our asses off over the last two years to make this a successful site. Cult of Mac is an independently owned small business. We’re a startup. We have a small but talented team, and I’m the only full timer. We’re busting our chops to produce high-quality, original content on a shoestring budget.
We were just starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. After two years of uncertainty, the site finally looks like it will be able to stand on its two feet.
But this is a major setback. Anyone got Larry’s cell number?
I’ve had my 13-inch MacBook Air since they were first released and although I encountered video problems initially after the plethora of updates that Apple has released the video problems haven’t returned.
The updates included an EFI firmware update, a specific software update for the MacBook Air 2010 model, and the Mac OS X 10.6.5 software update. I even offered not one, but two suggested solutions to try.
These updates and suggested fixes worked for some, but unfortunately they didn’t work for everyone. People are still complaining on Apple Discussion Forums about problems they are encountering when connecting their MacBook Airs to external displays.
Steve Jobs is on medical leave and now one of his key lieutenants reportedly wants to return to his native U.K.
Apple’s head designer Jonathan Ive wants to return England to live, reports the Sunday Times. Ive, of course, is one of the key geniuses behind Apple’s string of blockbuster hits and is perhaps the world’s most influential industrial designer.
British-born Ive has reportedly proposed a plan to “commute” to Cupertino, Calif., from his $4 million manor house in Somerset, but Apple’s board is none too thrilled with the idea. Ive is said to be at “loggerheads” with the board, reports the Sunday Times.
A friend of the family told the paper: “Unfortunately he is just too valuable to Apple and they told him in no uncertain terms that if he headed back to England he would not be able to sustain his position with them.”
According to The Times, Ive has just reaped about $30 million from a ‘golden handcuffs’ deal signed in 2008, which has now expired. He and his wife Heather want to educate their twins in their native country.
Apple refused to comment on Ive’s employment status and said it was “speculation” that he wanted to return to the U.K.
The Sunday Times: I created the iPad and iClaim my £18m (Story behind pay wall).
Via Daily Mail.
Steve Wozniak, Apple’s co-founder, was moved to tears by a play about the working conditions of Apple’s factories in China.
Woz went to see “The Agony and the Ecstacy of Steve Jobs” by Mike Daisey on Tuesday night at the Berkeley Repertory Theater. The one -man show, which describes the working conditions in the massive factories that make gadgets for Apple, Hewlett-Packard and others, made Wozniak cry.
The Apple cofounder told the New York Times’ Bay Citizen website:
“The shocking things that Mike said which brought me to tears were so because they came as a first-person story,” Wozniak said. “Mike was living the pain of what he was describing as he told it.”
The monologue describes Daisey’s trip to Shenzhen last year, where he met workers at Foxconn’s plant as young as 12 and 13, and heard tales of the long, repetitive work. As many as 17 workers have committed suicide at the Foxconn plant.
Wozniak also said: “I will never be the same after seeing that show.”
If you’re a packrat like me, and you need a really big bag for your MacBook plus everything else, you should seriously consider the Alix Laptop Tote Bag from J’Tote (pronounced zhe-tote).
I have been toting the Alix around for a month now. I have to say that this bag is my new favorite. It can take a beating and still looks great. If passion is your fashion, this bag is your match.
According to 9to5Mac MobileMe sales haven’t stopped instead they surmise that Apple is simply moving MobileMe subscriptions to online ordering only.
However, as they pointed out you can only join MobileMe under a 60-day trail. Paying for it isn’t currently possible and you cannot currently order the boxed version.
I think that starting March 2nd we will see MobileMe subscriptions that will be for sale in the Mac App Store.
What do you think?
[via 9to5Mac]
Apple’s new Mac OS X Lion adds support for a recovery partition as part of the OS installation and while this may not seem important to most users — it is. Apple is making the tools and resources available to you that will allow you to perform disk repair and recoveries on your mobile Mac while on the road or on your desktop Mac at home. The utilities will be readily available and therefore you won’t have to go hunting for that always elusive DVD or USB stick.
This is because the new partition labeled Recovery HD acts just like the DVDs and USB sticks that Apple has traditionally shipped with its computers. You simply press and hold the Option key after starting your Mac. You are eventually presented with a list of the available boot partitions.
You use the arrow keys to select the boot drive and press Return. The system will then boot from the selected disk. In this instance you would choose the Recovery HD disk to access the Mac OS X Lion recovery partition.
It looks like Apple is going to have another blockbuster OS release later this year. I don’t know about you, but I cannot wait until Lion hits store shelves (virtual or otherwise).
Check out more photos after the read link.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cX928KC8jiA
Here’s a quick video tour of the new Mail client in OS X Lion. It’s got a three-pane view, nicely threaded “Conversations,” and a goes full screen. It’s very good. Mail alone is a good reason to upgrade to Lion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UC4cguWNFlg
Here’s a quick overview of Mission Control and Launchpad in OS X Lion, Apple’s upcoming major update to OS X.
Mission Control is like Expose, Spaces and Dashboard on steroids: Hit a hot corner and all the open windows fly away. You then get an overview of all the running applications, with thumbnails of open windows. There’s also your Dashboard widgets and virtual desktops in Spaces. When it was first previewed by Apple last year, critics said Mission Control was a mess, but I think it’s pretty good. It works really well. It’s much clearer than Expose, and I can see it becoming a central part of my workflow.
Launchpad, on the other hand, won’t be. Launchpad is like the Home screen on the iPad. Icons for all your apps are displayed in a grid. But it suffers from the same problem as the iPad — it’s hard to find the app you’re looking for among the clutter. Much easier to launch a search. Same in Lion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPzRWca53Is
As you’ve probably heard, touchpad scrolling is backwards in OS X Lion. Instead of pulling your fingers down to scroll down a window, you know push your fingers up.
Confused? You will be. It undoes years of muscle memory. So why would Apple do this?
It’s easy: because of iOS. It’s the same gesture you make on the screen of an iOS device when you scroll up and down the screen. You want to scroll down? You pull the content up.
It’s another example of the influence of iOS on OS X.
Apple’s Developer Forums going crazy about the new way to install OS X Lion through the Mac App Store. There’s complaints about failed downloads, invalid redemption codes and overall installation issues. But once developers get it installed, they say the new OS is awesome and totally opens up the Mac to new possibilities.
The HappyBirthdaySteveJobs.com tribute website is going gangbusters.
Thrown up a couple of days ago, the site has survived attacks from malicious hackers and has seen more than 45,000 visitors from 147 countries.
It is currently displaying more than 13,000 birthday wishes to Steve Jobs, whose birthday is today.
One of the site admins, London student Raoul-Gabriel Urma, says he’s been up for 48 hours trying to keep the site running. Here are the stats:
Apple is adding several auto-saving features to Lion, including Auto Save, Versions and Resume.
“Mac OS X Lion automatically saves your work — while you work — so you don’t have to,” says the company.
One of the most interesting implications is that you may never have to quit an application again, or go hunting for the file you were working on.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jbOZvNidCA
Apple has posted video of OS X Lion’s new gesture controls in action. Look how iPad-ish the whole experience is.
Lion features several new multi-touch gestures, including rubber-band scrolling, page and image zoom, and full-screen swiping.
Apple shareholders have voted down a proposal that would have required Apple to disclose Steve Jobs’ succession plan.
The vote came at Apple’s annual meeting today. The proposal was brought by the Laborers’ International Union. Apple’s board also opposed.
Apple has said in the past that it has executive succession plan, though it hasn’t revealed what that plan is.
Steve Jobs wasn’t present at today’s meeting. He continues his indefinite medical leave. This is only the second time in a decade he has missed the annual event.
All Things D: Apple Shareholders Reject Proposal to Disclose Succession Plan
We all know that Steve Jobs is obsessed with crafting top-notch customer experiences. Of course, he’s famous for being dismissive of focus groups, but did you know he spies on customers at his local Apple Store?
If you’re wondering were all the comments went, they’re currently being imposted into Disqus. We’ve switched to Disqus, a commenting platform with all kinds of great features, including great social integration, notifications and multimedia.
When it’s up and running, it promises to be a great system. However, importing the old comments can sometimes take a while: maybe even two or three days.
That’s for existing comments. New comments should post immediately. Fingers crossed it’s up and running quickly. In the meantime, please leave any questions, comments or complaints in — you guessed it — the new comments system.
And thanks for your patience — Leander.
Raoul-Gabriel Urma writes:
We are computing students from Imperial College London and created a website dedicated to Steve Jobs allowing members of the public to leave their birthday comments and this way to support him while he is currently dealing with serious health issues.
Our aim is to allow as many people to wish him a happy birthday this way letting him know he has a back-up of so many.
Leave your best wishes here: Happy Birthday Steve Jobs.
Have you ever seen a great YouTube video that you wanted to download but didn’t know how?
The browser extension FastestTube solves that. The free extension works with Safari, Firefox, Chrome, Opera and even Interent Explorer!
This video will show you where and how to get FastestTube, as well as download a video and save it to your hard drive.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ph97RbPIh_U
Apple is helping finance a major remodel of Stanford Hospital (where Jobs was photographed by the sleazy National Enquirer). But is Apple also helping design the $2 billion facility, perhaps based on the design of its retail stores?
Check out the rendering of the atrium above. Look familiar? Note the massive skylight, the marble floors. Is that a Genius Bar on the right?
Most important, the brains behind Apple’s stores — Ron Johnson — is intimately involved.
The new MacBook Pros expected later this week will boot off solid-state drives, claims Boy Genius Report, citing unnamed sources.
In addition:
Boy Genius Report: New MacBook Pro models imminent; we’ve got some new details