Now this looks interesting: Blasted is a Menu Bar app that quietly tracks what you’ve been working on – all the files you’ve created, opened, or modified recently – and makes them available when you need them via an unobtrusive icon.
Apple has shot three new TV ads for the iPhone: Dine in Dine Out, Pass Test Pass Time, and Nature Lovers.
Above is the Nature ad, the other two ads are after the jump.
Staff at an Apple retail store in Seattle are planning a walkout over “abusive” management, the first labor dispute to hit the company’s super-successful retail chain, IFOAppleStore is reporting.
Employees at Apple’s Alderwood Mall store claim the store’s management is “abusive” and cite unspecified violations of state and federal labor laws.
Apple’s human resources department hasn’t properly investigated their complaints, and even an appeal to the head of the chain, Ron Johnson, went unheeded, the staff told IFOApplestore.
Workers are planning a walkout at 1PM on October 3 if no action is taken before then.
The threat of industrial action is unusual for Apple’s stores, which have a reputation as a good place to work and an unusually high retention rate for retail.
Apple claims the turn-over rate for Apple store employees is just 20%, compared to an industry average of well over 50%.
Microsoft is attempting to hire Apple retail managers to staff its new stores, Jim Dalrymple of The Loop reports.
Citing anonymous sources, The Loop says managers are being offered better money and in some cases, relocation expenses. They are then encouraged to recruit their former colleagues with similar incentives.
The strategy seems to be in line with Microsoft’s playbook. Earlier this year, Microsoft reportedly tried to lure iPhone developers to the Zune platform with cash incentives.
Which means that Microsoft’s retail strategy can be summarized thus:
What’s next? Stock the stores with Apple products?
Microsoft’s first retail store is scheduled to open in October near Apple’s retail store in Mission Viejo, Calif., at The Shops.
Your kids won’t remember the day you made them wear the “cheese” body suit instead of the one with the cute felt Mac on it, but if you work it out right, a happy face photo in the Mac version and a stroppy pout in the cheese may hang around long enough to traumatize them.
Imagine the fun if you have twins: you could spark lifelong arguments about which one you have favored since infancy.
Handmade felt designs on 100% cotton, available in black, white or red.
$36 for the pair on Etsy.
The impulse to immortalize locker room nudity or wiggly-jiggly at the gym is leading at least one large gym chain to limit use of the new iPod Nano over privacy issues.
Health club chain Life Time Fitness has restricted use of the new Nano in its 84 facilities in 19 states, saying that it fears gym goers may shoot videos of people working out or in locker rooms.
The chain also forbids cell phone use in locker rooms to avoid nude or compromising shots of patrons making their way to the Internets.
Spokesman Jason Thunstrom admitted that discerning whether someone is taking video or just fiddling with a playlist can be difficult.
Gym goers at Life Time can still use their iPod Nanos in the work out room, however, as long as no one catches them capturing fellow participants grimacing through that last squat or revealing an eyeful of cottage cheese bottom.
It’ll be interesting to see how they manage to enforce it as video and photos become more common features; the same gym chain reported a couple of years ago that 60% of gym members used iPods or MP3 players to work out.
My gym would face a revolt if it tried to ban cell phones — more or less a permanent appendage in the locker room and weight room and most of those phones now have video and photo capabilities, so it seems a little harsh to single out the iPod.
Via Twin Cities
Like Apple, Microsoft is developing on a touchscreen tablet, several sources say.
CoM has heard rumors that Microsoft has a touchscreen tablet in the works. 9to5Mac is reporting that Microsoft is working on a tablet (and two touchscreen phones to compete with the iPhone).
Mary-Jo Foley at ZDNet has some details: Microsoft’s tablet effort is being led by James Allard, the Microsoft executive in charge of the XBox and Zune, and members of Microsoft’s Surface team, Foley reports.
Okay, at first the idea of using your iPhone while biking makes about as much sense as gabbing away on your phone while behind an auto’s steering wheel. But if risk is your middle name and you need your touch-screen on your handlebars, Dahon has just the ticket. The company’s BioLogic iPhone bike case is both waterproof (includes touch-sensitive membrane) and shock-proof. The case also pivots 360-degrees, permitting an on-bike experience in either landscape or portrait mode.
The BioLogic iPhone case ($60, January) can be teamed with Dahon’s ReeCharge system that provides juice for your gadget via the bike’s generator.
[Via Bikehugger and Gadget Lab]
“Art in the Time of the iPhone” is one-man show by artist Matthew Watkins, on now at Apple reseller C &C in Bari, Italy until September 25.
Watkins, who hails from England and lived in Canada before moving to Italy, shows just how versatile an artist can get by letting his fingers do the talking on the touchscreen.
His mainstay is the Brushes app, out of which he transferred the works to forex, paper — and even had two rugs made in Katmandu (see above) from designs made with his iPhone.
Hit the jump for a Q&A on how Watkins got the iPhone art from his phone to a gallery and for a gander at more of his work.
Apple can keep the porn off iTunes, but it may be having a harder time keeping Apple retail stores smut free.
A 10-year-old girl was dragged, bug-eyed, out of the Apple store in Lakeside after her mom found her looking at porn on one of the iPod demo models.
“I called to complain and was told matter of factly by staff this happens a lot as people come in and download it for a laugh,” mom Helen Goodman told website the Echo.
“I don’t find it funny and all my friends think it’s disgusting, but Apple say there is nothing they can do to stop it.”
C’mon. There has to be a way to make the Apple store kiddy-safe — or maybe there’s something else behind the looks of wonder on those retail store field trips?
Via the Echo
This fantastic rotating iPhone dock is made entirely of Lego. It’s the work of Steven Combs, a long time Lego and Mac enthusiast who runs web sites for adult fans of Lego and fans of technology generally.
Here’s a video showing the rotating mechanism in action:
I wanted to know a little more about hacking Macs with Lego add-ons, so I bombarded Steven with a few questions. And here’s what he said.
Google says categorically that Apple has rejected its Voice app for the iPhone. Apple denies this, saying several times that the app is still under consideration. Apple has said this in official documents submitted to a government inquiry by the FCC, and most recently today in a statement to the press.
Someone is lying. Who is it?
Well, the test is quite simple:
Last Thursday, iFixit’s CEO Kyle Wiens spent all day in San Francisco trying to buy the new fifth-generation iPod nano. It was the day after Steve Jobs introduced the new iPod, but none of Apple’s stores in the city had them. So that evening, Wiens sent iFixit’s summer intern on a red eye to the east coast with orders to buy one and immediately tear it apart.
The intern’s teardown was reported all over, generating massive attention for iFixit. The next day, iFixit got a genuine scoop with a teardown of the new iPod Touch, which surprisingly doesn’t feature a camera. But iFixit’s dis-assembly revealed space for a camera. Apparently, the Touch was supposed to get one after all.
Between the two teardowns, iFixit generated literally thousands of news stories — from Gizmodo to the Los Angeles Times. Not bad for little repair shop started by a pair of college students in San Louis Obispo, Calif.
iFixit makes its money by selling spare parts for Macs, iPods and iPhones. Its mission is to help people fix their own devices. It publishes free and easy-to-follow repair guides, but it gets the most attention for it’s superb product teardowns.
This is internet marketing par excellence. Not only are the teardowns creating genuine news for the tech press, they are efficiently executed and beautifully documented. The photos are superb, and the walkthroughs are clear and informative. Best of all, Wiens is a genius at sending the media timely and informative emails about the teardowns that all but write the stories for reporters.
“Our goal at the end of the day is to keep devices working longer,” said Wiens modestly in an email to me earlier this week. “Anything that we can do to make repair sexy and gadgets feel less like a black box, the better.”
My friend Brian Chen over at Wired.com has a great story today with a lot more detail about Wiens and his teardowns. Read it here.
Apple has responded to Google’s charge that Phil Schiller rejected Google’s Voice app: “We do not agree,” says a spokesman.
Apple says it has NOT rejected the Google Voice app and continues to evaluate it. In a statement, Apple PR says:
“We do not agree with all of the statements made by Google in their FCC letter. Apple has not rejected the Google Voice application and we continue to discuss it with Google.”
Earlier today, Google unredacted its response to the FCC, claiming that Phil Schiller had personally killed the Google Voice app in a phone conversation in July.
Who’s lying?
As reader Steven points out below, a good test is whether Google’s app is available in the app store — which it is not. “Until the application does appear in the App Store, we can all say with 100% certainty that it has been denied,” he says.
When news appeared of a iPhone holster that also gave Apple’s sleek design a bulky BlackBerry keyboard, the gadget press was beside itself with indignation. “iTwinge Is the Stupidest iPhone Accessory Of All Time, Ever,” roared Gizmodo Wednesday.
How opinions change in just two days and a bit of viral video. That YouTube clip from gadget’s maker “Makes Me Cringe a Little Less,” is Giz’s revised opinion on the iTwinge.
“We’ve been overwhelmed by the amount of interest (Positive and negative) in the iTwinge,” Michael Nykoluk, Partner in Mobile Mechatronics, told CoM by email. The company reports it will have “limited preproduction quantities available” the week of October 5th.
To answer some of those negative reviews, Mechatronics released a YouTube video Thursday showing the iTwinge in action and listing some of its benefits, including fewer typos due to the $30 gadget’s physical keyboard.
[Via Mechatronics and Gizmodo]
Apple’s Phil Schiller personally rejected Google’s controversial Voice app, new documents reveal.
Schiller rejected Google’s VOIP app because it “duplicated the core dialer function of the iPhone,” Google said in documents released on Friday. The documents were published by the company and the Federal Communications Commission, which is investigating Apple’s rejection of the app.
Google’s version of the story directly contradicts Apple’s version of events. According to Apple, the app hasn’t been rejected; it is still under evaluation.
But according to Google, Schiller personally told Alan Eustace, Google’s senior vice president of engineering and research, that the app had been rejected during a phone call on July 7.
“It was during this call that Mr. Schiller informed Mr. Eustace that Apple was rejecting the Google Voice application…” Google says.
Curiously, the revelations didn’t come to light until today because Google kept parts of its response to the FCC secret to protect “sensitive commercial conversations” between the two companies.It decide to relax its request after Apple published its response and groups requested the info under the Freedom of Information Act, Google explains in a blog post.
Google’s full response to the FCC’s questions about the rejected app are here (PDF).
If you are a parent you know the drill for the iPod Generation: turn that down before you lose your hearing, inserting the required cautionary tales of sitting too close to the speakers at a Stones concert. The usual reaction: “What did you say?” (lifting one headphone cups.) Well, Griffin Technology was speaking to the choir when it introduced MyPhones, their new volume-limiting headphones for children.
Key to MyPhones is the 85db limit, the maximum the $39.99 headphones permit. The 85db number is the threshold for safe listening; above 85db and your hearing will be damaged, according to the Academy of Pediatrics and other safety experts. “Parents can rest easy, knowing that their kids’ hearing is not compromised,” Griffin Technology founder and CEO Paul Griffin announced.
Along with over-the-ear rather than in-the-ear design, the new headphones also offer soft rubber ear cushions and an adjustable band. But the addition that may be most embraced is the heavy-duty cable for what Griffin calls “a traditionally weak link in headphone design for kids.” I prefer to call it the saving parents big bucks option. Headphone cords are not simply conduits for wiring, but a hanger, a pulley, and a dangler for the attached device.
MyPhones also speaks the creative side of kids. Headphone owners can replace the inserts with designs created by other children by going to the www.myphoneskids.com site.
[Via Griffin]
We end the week with a trio of top Apple gadgets: MacBook Pro laptops complete with AppleCare, Griffin’s TuneFlex iPod Dock for in the car, and special App Store download deal for “Secret of Monkey Island.”
For details on these and other bargains (such as Jabra’s “Dog Tag” Bluetooth Eardset), check out CoM’s “Daily Deals Page.
Brit pop man-of-the moment Gary Go calls his iPhone the “fifth member of his band” and was the first musician to rock out on the device in front of 70,000 fans.
Go was on our radar last spring, when it was announced that he’d be using his iPhone to accompany his opening act, along with a four member human band, for boy band veterans Take That at London’s Wembley Stadium.
More on facing fans armed with an iPhone and the video after the jump.
Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry owned the first Mac Plus, and it’s about to be auctioned off next month.
Roddenberry’s Mac Plus will join one of Michael Jackson’s gloves in an auction on October 8-9 by Profiles in History, an auctioneer of Hollywood memorabilia.
The Mac Plus — serial number F4200NUM0001 — was given to Roddenberry in January 1986. The auction house expects it to fetch $800 to $1,200.
One year after disgruntled iPhone App developer Mike Ash wrote about his frustrations trying to get his software approved by Apple, he says nothing has changed. The App approval process is so bad, in fact, he’s giving up altogether.
“I have abandoned the platform,” he writes. “Apple’s nonsense is just too much for me. There’s no joy in iPhone development, and an enormous amount of frustration.”
Last year, Ash wrote a high-profile blog post about his experience working with Apple. Detailing all the hoops he had to jump through, and several rejections of his software, Ash’s post drew a lot of attention from blogs and a lots of comments from developers who’d had similar experiences.
Apple’s approval process has long been the subject of criticism and frustration. The process is secretive and opaque, and developers often complain apps are often rejected or held up without good reason. Google’s Voice App, for example, is still undergoing approval — a roundabout way of rejecting an app from a big and important partner without actually rejecting it.
Apple’s head of marketing, Phil Schiller, has tried to smooth ruffled feathers by reaching out to unhappy developers. The biggest problem with Apple’s process is the sheer volume of apps submitted for approval. Apple’s 40 full-time testers must scrutinize about 8,500 apps a week, according to information from Apple in response to an FCC inquiry. Each app is reviewed by two testers, so that’s about 80 apps a day, per reviewer — every day.
In his latest post, Ash says the consumer’s experience of the App Store has marginally improved, but behind the scenes, nothing has changed for developers.
“Apple VP Phil Schiller has been making noises about trying to improve things, but so far this is just talk,” Ash writes. “Apple’s improvements, virtually insignificant already, have mostly gone to improving the store, not the development process.”
It’s so bad, he’s given up completely. Ash says he’ll write software for the Mac instead, which requires no approval process.
This video of a slowly rotating iPhone through an X-Ray is surprisingly cool. There’s no word on where the video came from, or why it was made. Strange.
The music industry is planning to introduce new laws that would require Apple to pay for music in downloaded movies and TV Shows — and iTunes’ 30-second song previews.
The move comes from the industry’s royalty-collection agencies — ASCAP, BMI and others — which collect royalties on music that’s broadcast or performed.
The agencies collect royalties on songs played on the radio or your local dive-bar jukebox, but say they are left out of the digital revolution. Artists are not being paid for music downloaded in movies and TV shows, or previews on Amazon, iTunes and other digital outlets, the agencies say. So they’re lobbying Congress to bring Apple and others in line with cable and broadcast outlets.
On the one hand, the agencies make a compelling point about the consumption of music. Music used to be public. It was broadcast on the radio of performed at concerts, and the industry had mechanisms for collecting royalties on this. But now music is private. It’s loaded onto iPods and played through computers — but there’s no mechanisms for monetizing these new consumption patterns.
“This is really a fight about the future,” one industry spokesman tells CNet. “As more and more people watch TV or movies over an Internet line as opposed to cable or broadcast signal, then we’re going to lose the income of the performance.”
This doesn’t sound unreasonable, but 30 second song previews? As CNet notes: “For many, this would also undoubtedly confirm their perception that those overseeing the music industry are greedy.”
Tired of wrapping your iPhone in titanium? Looking for something a bit more ‘real’ when it comes to cases? Well, you can’t get more ordinary than some cardboard and a Sharpie-looking typeface. That’s the concept behind Case-Mate’s “recession case.”
“The recession case lets you keep cash in your pocket without sacrificing on unique design for your beloved iPhone,” the company announced. The case costs $0.99 individually or a “bailout bundle”of 10 cardboard cases for $7.99.
At least it’s not shocking pink. That was my first reaction to the Pentax K-x, the updated big brother to the K2000. Maybe Pentax thought the K-x would be lost in a sea of competing black-hued cameras. Maybe the company is taking a cue from Apple, with its rainbow of iPods. Whatever the reason, once you get beyond the color issue (there are also navy blue and traditional black versions) the device does sport some interesting features.
The K-x offers photographers a 12.4 megapixel chip with a shutter firing up to 24 frames-per-second. Along with face-recognition and other usual suspects, the K-x will also shoot 720p HD video, an ability not often seen on still cameras.
