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UPDATE: This now looks like a  Javascript alert buried on a webpage, not a push notification. See below.

The iPhone’s Push notification system may be vulnerable to spam and malware popups.

CoM reader NyxoLyno Cangemi was using NetNewsWire RSS reader on his iPhone when what appears to be a push notification for anti-virus software popped up. See the screenshot above.

The popup message says his computer has “vulnerabilities and threats” and needs an immediate virus scan.

The popup is a notorious “rogue anti-virus” message, designed to trick naive websurfers into surrendering credit card details to fake anti-virus vendors. The unsuspecting websurfer see the message, follows the link and buys fake anti-virus software that steals their credit card number and installs malware.

The website URL in the iPhone popup points to a known rogue site, safeonlinescanv4.com, according to security firm MacAfee’s SiteAdvisor service.

The iPhone 3.0’s push notifications allow messages or alerts to be pushed to the user — incoming IM messages or new e-mails, for example. Apple billed the system as an alternative to battery-draining background processes. NetNewsWire for the iPhone does not offer push notifications. I’ve contacted the developer, NewsGator Technologies, for comment.

Have spammers and spyware frauds found a way to spam iPhones using push notifications? Anyone else seen this?

UPDATE: I asked CoM reader Cangemi what he was doing when the message popped up. Cangemi says he was browsing a folder of links, not any particular site, which was showing a list of headlines from his Sirius radio RSS folder. “I was scrolling through the list at the time it happened, which leads me to believe it was a push notification and could have occurred no matter what I was doing,” he says. In the comments, reader Matt J. reports he got a similar popup while using Safari, which again suggests push.

NewsGator Technologies forwarded an email from NetNewsWire’s lead developer, who also says it looks like a push notification.

He says: “I haven’t seen this before. NetNewsWire doesn’t use the push notification system. But other apps do, and a notification can appear in front of any other app. So I have no way of knowing where this notification came from. Another possibility is that he’d gone to a web page in NetNewsWire that has a JavaScript alert that put up that popup. It would be great to know exactly what pages he’d visited, but I realize it’s hard to find out after-the-fact.”

As Cangemi says, he wasn’t visiting a particular page, but browsing a folder of links. So it looks like push notification is the culprit.

UPDATE 2: In the comments readers Michael Weisman and DerekS say it’s more likely a Javascript alert dialog. “The default buttons on a push notification are ‘Cancel’ and ‘View’ where ‘View’ would launch the pushed-app,” notes DerekS.

“NetNewsWire has an integrated browser for reading stories,” notes Weisman. “This probably was designed to come up when the user navigates away from a page, so it popped up after the user went back to the story list. Also, the push notification system has a ton of security. The whole thing is encrypted, and the user needs to approve an app before it will even send them. There is no way for an app to send malicious notifications without your approval.”

As Microsoft begins hiring for its first retail stores, the giant is showing it’s usual flair for naming. What Apple calls a “Genius,” Microsoft is calling a “Retail Technical Advisor.”

Microsoft is hiring for its first two stores in Scottsdale, AZ and Mission Viejo, CA., which are due to open in September. While Apple is at pains to emphasize that its retail jobs are “More than a retail job,” Microsoft puts the word “retail” in its job titles.

According to the job listings, here’s how Microsoft breaks down other jobs in the store compared to Apple.

Concierge = Retail Customer Service Associate-Full Time

Personal Shopping Specialist = Retail Sales Associate

One to One Trainer = Retail Trainer

And here’s how Microsoft pitches its store to employees, compared to Apple. Where Apple says, “Be the face of Apple,” Microsoft says “You have unique experiences, skills and passions—and we believe you can bring them all to Microsoft for a rich, rewarding career…” in retail. Which is more compelling and less BS?

Microsoft:

You have unique experiences, skills and passions—and we believe you can bring them all to Microsoft for a rich, rewarding career and lifestyle that will surprise you with its breadth and potential. Just imagine the excitement and satisfaction of what you can do, where you can go, and the difference you can make with the resources of Microsoft behind you.

Apple:

Be the face of Apple—help people learn about, shop for, and get the most out of their Apple products. That means we’re not just looking for people with retail experience. Creative pros, technical experts, and business consultants have a place here, too.

Via Techcrunch.

Today’s deals include Power Stacks for your iPhone or iPod touch free from the Apps Store, the PowerBug AC adapter for free and iPhone cases almost free – 85 percent off.

For details on these and many other bargains, check out the CoM Daily Deals page.

New York’s Metropolitan Transit Authority wants to derail an independent iPhone app that publishes train schedules for violation of copyright.

Called Station Stops, the $2.99 app available on iTunes, is the work of commuter Chris Schoenfeld, who also writes the blog of the same name.

The app provides the timetable of the Metro-North Railroad for regularly-scheduled trains departing and arriving from Grand Central Station.

The MTA provides its schedules to Google Transit, but doesn’t release the data publicly.

To build his app, Schoenfeld did it the old way — by entering data manually from the published public schedule.

Schoenfeld, who has often been critical of MTA service, got a nastygram from MTA lawyers ordering him to stop presenting himself as an official service — and pay licensing fees for the schedules.

The MTA reckons the developer owes them a share of profits from the app, back pay the licensing fees. And a $5,000 non-refundable fee.

Schoenfeld’s not interested in ponying up. His sensible David versus ham-fisted Goliath story received a lot of sympathetic local news coverage — but that didn’t stop the MTA from asking Apple to take down the app on Aug. 14.

As of this writing, Station Stops is still for sale.

As one station stops blog reader, Karen Cavanaugh commented:
“I always use Station Stops to check the train schedule when I visit my daughter in Hoboken, NJ. I never think of it as an “OFFICIAL” website. I’ve been to the official website and it’s awkward.”

Via Stamford Advocate, Greater Greater Washington

Ever since the first computer laser mouse rolled out, it has required a reflective surface – meaning you had limited options for your pointer. Logitech hopes to do away with that barrier, unveiling two laser mice using the company’s so-called “Darkfield Technology.”

The Performance Mouse MX ($99.99) and the Anywhere Mouse MX ($79.99) offer the technology which can use microscopic deformities in otherwise absolutely clear surfaces, such as glass. A video shows the mice tracking on glass and a mirror.

[Via Logitech]

You have to see this to believe it. Above is a demo video of Paris 3D, a tourist guide to France’s beautiful capital city in photo-realistic 3D.

It looks absolutely stunning. The detail is unbelievable. Here’s a massive virtual city on your iPhone — right down to the gargoyles. There’s even people and vehicles — plus their shadows! — for added realism.

You can zoom in to particular streets or buildings, or zoom out to get a global view of the city’s layout. Tap on a building to get a data sheet on the structure, which includes the building’s history, photos, and where appropriate, phone numbers or opening times (like a museum).

Type a destination, and you zoom across the 3D city to see it.

You can to highlight particular categories of buildings — hotels and restaurants, for example, which show up color coded on the 3D map, making them easy to spot in a global view. The app is GPS-enabled, so you just tap a button to get directions. Street names are overlaid.

Performance looks fantastic. It renders better than Google maps. The demo looks like it was filmed on a iPhone emulator running on a developer computer. But if performance is as good on a real iPhone, it’ll be killer.

The app has just been submitted to the iTunes App store and should be available soon pending Apple’s approval.

The developer, Newscape Technology, claims it took twenty man-years of R&D over a four year period to develop, and is the first in a series of city guides.

Move over Google Maps!

Link to the Mobile 3D City website.

Via MacFeber.

Have you maxed-out your iPod or iPhone storage? We all likely have a good chunk of the 16GB or 80GB storage still free. Why not put that empty room to use by turning it into backup space? That’s the idea behind Storage Appliance Corporation’s Clickfree Transformer for iPhone and iPod, a device that copies data from your computer’s hard drive to your MP3 player or phone.

ID Software’s browser-based shooter Quake Live is finally available for Mac users — mostly.

An update to the game’s servers means the game can be played on Safari on the Mac, but not Firefox.

“This update is Safari only, but we’ve pushed a ticket with the folks at Mozilla and hope to have the Firefox build fixed very shortly,” ID says.

Based on the popular Quake 3 Arena, Quake Live is a free, browser-based shoot-em-up. It features more than 40 arenas and five game modes, including duel, capture the flag and group deathmatch. Players can frag each other or computer-controlled bots, and can be matched according to skill level. The game requires a plugin to play. It is not Flash based.

The game went online earlier this year, but Windows only. It’s been wildly popular: more than 113,000 player accounts were created in the first six hours.

If you’ve never published a photo book using iPhoto’s built-in book publishing system, you should. They’re gorgeous. It’s amazing how your digital pictures take on new life when printed on the glossy pages of a bound book.

There’s now the option to print a larger hard-cover book measuring 10 inches by 13 inches, thanks to an iPhoto 8.1 software update. Until now, the largest book option was standard 11 inches by 8.5 inches.

The iPhoto ’09 update also adds new holiday cards and three new travel-oriented book themes.

Be warned: the update weighs 161MB. It is available to iPhoto ’09 users via Software Update.

Apple will to sell a massive 50 million iPhones a year by 2011, Wall Street analyst Toni Sacconaghi says.

In a research note on Wednesday, the Bernstein Research analyst said Apple will achieve this just by holding onto current market share and adding new countries and carriers.

Sacconaghi’s predictions are in line with estimates from a RBC report on Tuesday, which also estimates 50 million iPhones in 2011. Apple has sold 26 million units since the iPhone’s debut in 2007. Sacconaghi estimates Apple will sell 20 million in 2009.

* More smart phones: Smart phones will grow 27% a year in 2010 and 2011, Sacconaghi says.
* More carriers in more countries: Apple could add 11 million units by adding Verizon Wireless in 2011 when the exclusive AT&T runs out. Plus more carriers in existing markets will add 3.5 million in European and 4 million in Asia.
* China: Sacconaghi estimates a deal with China Unicom is worth 2.9 million iPhones in 2011; and maybe 6 million if Apple also adds China Mobile.

The numbers could be even bigger if Apple adds pre-paid iPhones and WiFi-only iPhones, Sacconaghi says. He notes 75% of the global cellphone market is prepaid.

Apple Corps Ltd and EMI music announced Tuesday the impending release of newly re-mastered versions of every song in The Beatles’ original catalogue. The worldwide CD release is scheduled for September 9, and could be one part of a marketing trifecta that coincides with both the release of “The Beatles: Rock Band” video game and a special keynote event scheduled for the same day by Apple, Inc.

A team of engineers working with state-of-the-art digital recording technology alongside vintage studio equipment labored the past four years at Abbey Road Studios in London to create the first digital re-masters of all twelve original Beatles albums in stereo, as well as the collections “Past Masters Vol. I and II, and all of the band’s recordings that were mixed for mono release.

The two boxed sets will comprise 28 compact discs and feature artwork as originally released in the UK with CD replicas of the original sleeves, and all original inserts and label designs.

Apple, Inc. has invited a number of music industry professionals and press to a keynote event on the same date as the Beatles’ music and video game releases, though there is no official word on what will be on tap from the company behind iTunes and the iPod.

Speculation has centered on the possibility Apple would release its long-awaited Tablet product, though chances of that happening appear to be on the wane. Observers now are looking for updates to the iPod line and possibly for the release of the next iteration of iTunes.

Given recent news that one out of four songs are purchased now on iTunes, it may well be The Beatles and EMI have got a good reason for letting Apple distribute the band’s catalogue.

Hit the jump for the full press release and list of albums/songs included in the release.

Here’s a rumor about Apple’s upcoming tablet that makes a lot of sense: There’s actually two of them: an iPod tablet with a six-inch screen and a bigger tablet that runs full OS X.

And Apple may introduce one or both in September, according to veteran tech analyst Richard Doherty, who spoke to BusinessWeek.

Apple has developed prototypes of two different tablet machines—one that resembles a large-sized iPod and boasts a 6-inch screen, and another that features a larger display. Apple may launch one or both devices as early as September,” Doherty says. “A decision on whether and when Apple takes the tablet plunge lies with Apple CEO Steve Jobs,” Doherty says.

…

One of Apple’s prototype devices is able to run all Mac applications, and allows for video and audio editing and graphic animation, Doherty says. Another, which looks like a larger iPod, lends itself to watching videos, playing games, and reading e-books.

The two devices sound like the best of both worlds. An entertainment-oriented iPod tablet — like an iPod Plus — that runs the iPhone/iPod OS and is great for watching movies around the house; and a bigger Snow Leopard-capable device that can do real work. One for entertainment, another for education, kinda like Gizmodo’s Brian Lam suggested last week.

Doherty also predicts the tablet(s) could start as low as $679. It’ll be a hit because it’s got 65,000 Apps to run on it.

“Apple has a real opportunity to take the magic of the iPhone interface and give that more real estate to do the tasks… It’s an iPhone, but bigger. It’s something that you know, but bigger.” The device may be able to wirelessly access iTunes and Apple’s App Store, which offers more than 65,000 apps such as games, e-books, and calendars.

But what about the inside sources quoted by Jim Dalrymple and others that say the tablet won’t show until 2010? Perhaps the Mac tablet is for next year, and iPod Plus for 2009?

Bare Bones, the veteran Mac software company and producer of Yojimbo and BBEdit, has announced some changes to its product roster.

File utility Super Get Info is to be discontinued. There will be no further development, and support for the final release (1.3.1) will cease at the end of this year.

And Mailsmith, the plain-text mail client first released in 1998, is to be made freeware and will no longer be a Bare Bones official product.

Mailsmith’s new home will be at Stickshift software, owned and run by Bare Bones boss Rich Siegel. Who is, we should point out, remaining in charge at Bare Bones; the software remains the same, it’s just the details of who owns it that changes. Rich will now have two hats to distribute software under. (We’ve emailed him some supplementary questions for a little more detail; this post will be updated when we get a reply.) (See after the jump for additional comment.)

What does this mean for Bare Bones’ premium products, BBEdit and Yojimbo? More frequent updates, perhaps? One or two new apps, maybe? We’ll have to wait and see. I’m rather hoping for both.

If you’re lucky enough to live in Pittsburgh, you can report stuff like potholes, graffiti and other everyday annoyances straight to city hall via an iPhone app called iBurgh.

Peeved Pittsburghers first download the app, gratis on iTunes. First time users need to fill in name, phone number, email and home address — stored automatically for logging future complaints.

Users snap pics of traffic gridlock, abandoned cars or whatever.  The photos are geotagged and sent immediately to the city complaint hotline 311. Officials hope that if enough people use the app (they already get about 200 rants a day) they’ll have a cluster map of trouble areas to plan for future maintenance and repairs.

There were a few snafus as iPhone wielding citizens tried complaining via smartphone when the service debuted yesterday — a server restart was necessary at one point —  but at least one user managed to report that pothole successfully.

It’s the first app available on iTunes from a Carnegie Mellon spin-off whose other product was mobile video technology for sports events, called “yinzcam”  that let users at hockey games pick what to zoom in on with their iPhones.

Via AP

So, you are in college, sharing a dorm room, but don’t want to share your laptop with your roommate? How about a very stylish safe? DormVault is a nine-pound $80 vault which the manufacturers claim provides a “rugged steel” protection for your laptop (up to 17-inches), along with accessories.

The DormVault lets you bolt your laptop inside and once closed can be opened only if you know the lock’s combination. All that’s missing is a television with Cameron Swayze with the vault attached to an outboard motor.

If $80 is too steep, maybe you can simply lock your screensaver or as Wired’s Gadget Lab suggests, buy an inexpensive lock box.

[Via Gadget Lab and Gadget Review]

Apple is leading cellphones into a “new world order,” says one Wall Street analyst, and will clean up as smartphones become a big fat chunk of the overall cellphone market.

RBC analyst Mike Abramsky on Tuesday upped estimates for Apple, RIM, and Palm as smartphone sales take off — and Apple in particular will benefit selling 50 million iPhones.

Abramsky says smartphone penetration will be a whopping 35% of the global cell phone market by 2012 (504 million units). Apple and BlackBerry maker RIM will dominate, but Palm will be along for the ride too (if it survives the short term) because of its pretty good WebOS software.

Abramsky forecasts:

Apple: FY11 estimates $50.3 billion revenue (18% year-on-year growth) on 49.3 million iPhones. Price target upped to $250 from $190.
RIM: FY11 estimates $21.2 billion revenue (32% y/y growth). Price target $150 from $100.
Palm: FY11 estimates $3.2 billion revenue (52% y/y growth). Price target $25 from $18.

Report: Silicon Alley Insider.

UPDATE 3: The iPhone email issue looks like a real bug and not a settings issue after all. CoM reader Paul Taylor ran through the procedure described below, and all the email he ever deleted on his iPhone is still there going all the way back to the iPhone’s purchase in 2007. Says Paul:

I read your post ” Update x2…..” with interest because I was appalled to discover this problem in mid June and reported it to Apple after having no success correcting it (nor did three Apple ‘Geniuses’ one of whom was characterized by his peers as “The iPhone Genius — if he can’t fix it no one can.” He couldn’t).  I sent it off to Walt Mossberg on August 3rd to see what his efforts might produce but have seen nothing to date.

I had performed all the exercises described in your post (after doing thorough searches of all mailboxes on my Mac Pro and my ISP server to be sure the particular emails were NOT there.

BTW – with regard to the ‘Remove’ settings, ALL deleted emails back to the purchase of my original iPhone in 2007 were still there, so the day / week / month settings are immaterial, at least in my case. The problem apparently has always been present, the new search feature merely exposed it.

The only relief (not fix) I have found so far, has been to first make sure unwanted emails have been stripped from all mailboxes, then do a “Restore” on iTunes.  The relief is short lived — the ’emails that wouldn’t die’ are gone, but all email deleted following the restore begins to collect anew.

UPDATE: The iPhone email bug that caused such a fuss yesterday is not a bug but a configuration issue, says knowledgeable CoM reader Dr. Harry K. Zink.

If you properly delete your emails, this does not happen – i.e. remove the email from both SENT and INBOX, after which you need to go into the TRASH folder, and manually select the messages, and select DELETE again. This applies to IMAP, ActiveSync and MobileMe accounts. POP accounts are affected by this, but only because they are configured to retain deleted mail for a period set in ‘settings’ for that account — if you set it to one day, and wait 36 hours, the messages are also gone.

This is a function of the way IMAP and especially POP mail leave mail in the Deleted Items folder, or Trash folder, for the duration specified in the settings — it seems most users never bothered looking in their settings (the default is to keep deleted messages for a month before they auto-delete – you can also set it to a day, or manually delete instantly).

Furthermore, this does *not* apply to ActiveSync accounts, where a deletion is instant and complete (thus corporate kids can stop the sweating and heavy breathing – Apple’s got your back), and neither on MobileMe accounts (you know, Exchange for the Rest of Us). On IMAP accounts, if you manually delete it from the trash, the messages are gone as well. It’s POP accounts which have this issue.

So for the most part this is being blown terribly out of proportion – not by the original guy who discovered this, but by all ruminants and regurgitators, particularly those who are too lazy to properly investigate something like this.

To change the “Remove” settings for POP accounts:
1. Go to Settings>Mail, Contacts, Calendars
2. Select the account you want to modify
3. Go to >Advanced. Under the “Deleted Messages” heading, you’ll see the “Remove” setting. Choices are: after a day, a week, one month or never.
Screenshots after the jump.

Apple is aware of the iPhone email bug CoM first reported yesterday and will likely issue a fix in iPhone 3.1, the next major update of the iPhone/iPod OS.

“An internal tipster has provided us with proof that Apple is fully aware of this issue and will probably be including a fix in iPhone OS 3.1,” says Gizmodo.

Meanwhile, it appears the bug is limited to POP email accounts, not IMAP accounts. It is probably a Spotlight caching issue. Spotlight on the iPhone/iPod creates local copies of emails, which aren’t deleted when the originals are.

There seems to be several ways to fix the bug. Sometimes, simply waiting works; the message cache is eventually cleared. It’s also possible to erase the cached messages by loading and reloading them several times, according to Richard from 148Apps.

“From my messing around with email, the message actually disappears after viewing it a few times. At first I thought the email disappeared after deleting it a few times but I simply viewed the messages about 3 or 4 times and it disappeared.”

Instructions for configuring your iPhone POP accounts to delete email after jump:

Apple will host a special media event on Wednesday Sept. 9 (09/09/09) and there will be new iPods but no Apple tablet, according to John Paczkowski of All Things Digital.

Citing “sources close to the company,” Paczkowski says the event will be held in San Francisco — probably at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, a smaller venue which Apple has used before.

There will be upgrades to the iPod line and iTunes, which may get integration with social networks, but definitely no tablet:

“Our sources insist it will not involve any discussion whatsoever of the tablet that Apple is reportedly developing.”

Another All Things Digital report last week said Apple was was planning a media event for sometime during the week of September 7th, while the conventional wisdom is now that Apple will not introduce a tablet this year.

Apple usually holds its media events on a Tuesday (which gives the press and VIPs a work day for travel), but Monday that week is Labor day.

If the average digital camera has become a bit ho-hum, Samsung Electronics America may refresh your opinion. The company Monday introduced three new cameras, one with Wi-Fi and two with touch LCD screens — one on the front and one in the traditional rear position.

Never use your iPhone for incriminating or embarrassing emails you might not want others to see.

CoM reader Matt Janssen has just found a bug in the iPhone’s 3.x software that allows deleted email to be retrieved.

In other words, the iPhone and iPod Touch’s Mail app doesn’t properly delete email. Erased email messages can be easily retrieved using a simple search with the iPhone’s built-in search tool.

“Obviously this is could be a major security issue if you think you deleted something from your iPod but it’s not really deleted,” says Janssen. “You can still search through messages that are deleted. And this isn’t messages that are just recent. I found some messages that are over three or four months old.”

The bug could reveal embarrassing email sent or received by cheating spouses, or messages that kids don’t want their parents to see. It’s present in the software for both the iPhone and iPod Touch.

Janssen has made a video to demonstrate the bug. In the video, Janssen creates an email in a standard POP account, sends it to himself and then deletes it. The message appears to be gone from his inbox, but he’s able to retrieve it using the iPhone’s Search function. Janssen has to search for the deleted message twice. On first try, the Mail app crashes and sends him back to the Home screen. But on the second try, the message is retrieved and displayed. It even retrieves messages that are deleted from the server.

“Hopefully Apple will fix it in some later releases,” says Janssen.

Link to Jannsen’s YouTube video.

TomTom’s much-anticipated car navigation software for the iPhone is finally available on the App store for $99.99.

The software wowed at Apple’s World Wide Developers Conference in June by proving the iPhone could be a platform for industrial-strength software like a turn-by-turn navigation system.

TomTom’s app offers the usual GPS features: route planning, turn-by-turn voice instructions, 6 million points of interest, and auto re-routing if a turn is missed.

But it also boasts tight integration with the iPhone, including pinching and zooming of maps, automatic rotation between portrait and landscape modes, and tight integration with the iPhone’s contact list (tap a contact and the software finds the quickest route to them).

The App also includes TomTom IQ Routes, a smart route-finding feature that recommends routes based on popular driving patterns.

Be warned: the App and it maps weigh in at a whopping 1.21GB. And at $99, the software is more expensive than rivals like CoPilot Live ($34.99), Sygic Mobile Maps ($39.99) or Google’s free Map app; but it doesn’t require a monthly service fee, like AT&T’s Navigator, which adds $10 a month on your phone bill as long as you use the app.

An optional car mount kit (pricing has not yet been announced) includes iPhone charging, a GPS-boosting antenna, a speaker for turn-by-turn instructions, and a microphone for hands-free dialing and Voice Command. The mount kit can be used in horizontal and landscape orientations.

The TomTom app is compatible with the iPhone 3G and 3GS. It is available on iTunes in four versions:

TomTom US & Canada – $99.99
TomTom Western Europe – $139.99
TomTom Australia – $79.99
TomTom New Zealand – $94.99

Google’s Eric Schmidt “resigned” from Apple’s board because Chrome and Android were encroaching on Apple’s core business, or so Steve Jobs says.

But what if the opposite were true? What if Apple is encroaching on Google’s core business?

Later this month, Apple is expected to break ground on a massive new data center in Maiden, North Carolina.

In terms of size, Apple’s data center is as big as they come.

“Apple is planning about 500,000 square feet of data center space in a single building,” says Rich Miller, editor of Data Center Knowledge. “That would place it among the largest data centers in the world… This would qualify as a big-ass data center.”

Question is, what will Apple use it for? Apple’s plans are secret, of course, and some have speculated it’s to support Apple’s growing  MobileMe business and online iTunes stores.

But Miller says the size of the data center hints at something else. Companies building centers this big are getting into cloud computing. Running apps in the cloud requires massive infrastructure: Google-size infrastructure.

“The companies that are building the biggest data centers tend to also have the biggest cloud ambitions,” says Miller.

The full interview with Miller after the jump:

Another fake but interesting spyshot of Apple’s tablet has been published by the French blog Nowhereelse.fr.

Says the blog (in translation): “The ball of rumors and other Fakes is clearly open. After photos of a so-called prototype of the new 3G iPod Touch, here is a rather realistic picture of what appears to be the famous MacTablet that we could in this case call iTouch … Anyway I take my hat off to its author if it is a Fake!”

It is fake. The staging with a Nokia cellphone is just too — well, staged. Plus, would Apple put the Home button at the bottom instead of the sides, where it would be easy to hit with a thumb?

Most interesting is that the tablet is shown displaying the “Welcome” message when installing OS X. Other recent tablet fakes have shown the device running the iPhone OS, or a version of. That of course is the big question: what operating system will the tablet run? We like the idea of OS X.

If a Japanese warlord from the Sengoku period had an iPhone, this is the case they’d protect it with. It’s handmade with special lacquer and gold dust, takes a craftsman four weeks to make, and costs a cool $1,000. It’s so special, it has its own protective case — that’s right, a case for the case.

Japan’s SoftBank BB has just started offering a series of five handmade iPhone cases called the Japan Texture line.

Designed with the help of a historian, the cases are inspired by the rich pageantry of the Sengoku period (1467 to 1615).

Each case comes in a swank wooden box, and includes a historical booklet and its own protective pouch.

Via CrunchGear.

Pretty convincing  pictures and a video of the upcoming iPod Touch with a camera have surfaced. The pictures and video show clearly the camera and microphone first hinted at in dozens of cases for the device.

Posted to a blog by Maxim Radio talk hosts Covino & Rich, the pictures and video show a prototype device with a distinctive red motherboard and a cracked screen. The blog has published several images of the device.

The prototype was a “durability test phone,” the blog’s tipster said, and was likely tossed out. It was purchased from an iPod parts dealer. According to the tipster, who claims to work with Apple:

-to show it’s real. If you look at the board, it states Apple 2009 very clear. The 2nd gen AKA iPod touch out now, has 2008 on it. They haven’t revised the 2008 touch. I will compare them in pic in a sec.

-BTW, these phones NEVER leave Apple and this one left but it was a durability test phone, so that’s why the screen is all gridded off and cracked.

-The side by side picture is the inside of the current gen vs the 3rd gen (one coming out in September).

-I acquired this from a guy that I buy parts phones and iPods from. I believe he’s a recycler in ***********, so what most likely happened is that Apple threw this away and he some how got it and sold it for parts.