New from geek jeweler Irina Blok, a superb new take on the digital photo frame. Only 50 of these hand-silk screened frames will be produced, at a price of about 50 bucks each. I predict Irina will have sold the lot before the end of today.
Assuming she does, and you’re too late to get your hands on one, she has plenty of other cool stuff for you to have a look at.
There’s been a lot of hot air posted in recent hours about Apple’s apparent “threat” to pull the plug on the iTunes Music Store if it doesn’t get its way.
This is, to put it politely, nonsense.
Apple would be insane to switch off the Store now. It has invested far too much of its business in products and services that integrate with the Store to just suddenly pull the plug and go home.
The quote that has caused all the fuss is this one, submitted by iTunes vice president Eddy Cue to the Copyright Royalty Board last year:
“If the [iTunes music store] was forced to absorb any increase in the … royalty rate, the result would be to significantly increase the likelihood of the store operating at a financial loss – which is no alternative at all.”
Let’s say that again: submitted by Eddy Cue last year. This is an old comment on an old issue and in no way reflects today’s reality: which is that Apple has invested a fortune in developing a line of products (iPhone, iPod) whose future is inextricably tied up with the Store. Switching it off would be little short of madness.
Of course Apple doesn’t want to run an unprofitable Store, that’s obvious. But what should also be obvious to all is that it isn’t going to suddenly have a tantrum and switch the whole thing off if royalties have to go up. The far more likely consequence is that you and I will have to pay a few pennies more for each song we buy.
Still embarrassed for them, those nice Jonas Brothers sporting purity rings at the VMAs. These Hanson clones seemed determined to make the Aughties not very naughty. At least they have cool gear.
Here Kevin picks up shirts from a dry cleaners, keeping his iPhone 3g in hand. Remember, always true to you darling, in my fashion.
Photo: courtesy Bauer-Griffin
Did investors react too quickly to analyst comments which sent Apple shares tumbling 18 percent Monday? Add Piper Jaffray to the list of analyst firms now calling for calm.
“We recognize investors do not see light at the end of the tunnel as market fears appear to be outweighing fundamental analysis” Piper’s Apple analyst Gene Munster wrote Tuesday.
Those fears – not including the Dow plummeting 777 points – were spurred by a spate of downgrades of Apple stock as analysts said slowing consumer sales could derail the Cupertino, Calif. company.
Photo courtesy wwww.stallman.org
Web-based applications like Google’s Gmail and Apple’s MobileMe will force people to buy into locked, proprietary systems that will cost more and more over time and ultimately put user’s data at risk, according to Richard Stallman, founder of The Free Software Foundation and creator of the open source operating system GNU. He calls cloud computing “worse than stupidity” in an interview with The Guardian. Follow after the jump to learn why cloud computing is not such a good idea and why Apple users should already know this.
Analysts went too far with their fears Apple could be caught in the downward spiral of consumer spending. Tuesday analysts say the 18 percent fear-driven drop in Apple shares may have been ‘overdone.’
Apple shares were up 3 percent to $108 early Tuesday after Monday losing $22.98 and closing at $105.26 on Nasdaq.
Goldman Sachs analyst David Bailey said Monday’s pullback “more than captures the concerns over Mac growth in a weakening spending environment.”
Yes, we know the iPhone camera is rubbish compared to most of its cameraphone rivals. But that needn’t stop people being creative with it. People like…
P0psharlow, who has created some stunning panoramic images with an iPhone and some very deft image manipulation:
Adobe appears to be pricing its soon-to-be-released CS4 suite of design tools much higher for users in the UK than for its US customers, according to a report at ITHound. For the extra £1000 the full Creative Suite 4 Master Collection is set to cost Mac users in the UK, a clever designer could fly from London to New York, buy the software in the US, and fly home, while still saving around £400.
Google has released Update Engine, an open source (released under the Apache license) software update framework for Mac OS X.
Of course, there’s already a very successful software update framework known as Sparkle, developed by Andy Matuschak. Judging by this comment in his Twitter stream (“Update Engine looks much better-designed and engineered than Sparkle, though a little clunkier in a few minor ways”), he’s already impressed with what he sees.
In an announcement on the Google Mac Blog, engineer Greg Miller says: “Update Engine can update all the usual suspects, like Cocoa apps, preference panes, and screen savers. But it can also update oddballs like arbitrary files, and even things that require root–like kernel extensions. On top of that, it can update multiple products as easily as it can update one.”
So what’s the difference between this and Sparkle? As I understand things (someone correct me if I’m wrong), Sparkle sits inside each app that uses it, and is used by that app to update itself. Update Engine runs separately and independently, and uses a system of tickets to remember which apps it should monitor and when they should be updated. And, as Miller explains, it can be used to update anything, not just apps but also prefpanes and the like.
What should we expect to hear from Apple Tuesday when it releases its fiscal fourth quarter numbers? Analysts offered Cult of Mac a preview of sorts, providing what they think CEO Steve Jobs will say tomorrow.
The overriding theme will be how Apple confronts the economic downturn which seems to be striking at the heart of the company’s consumer-oriented buyers.
When it rains, it pours. Apple shares took a battering Monday as two more financial analysts downgraded the company amid mounting worries how spending cuts will hurt the Cupertino, Calif. company.
Morgan Stanley analyst Kathryn Hubert slashed her target price for Apple stock to $115 from $178, sending shares down 14 percent to $110 by noon.
Hubert also downgraded the company to “equal-weight from “overweight.”
Another analyst Monday joined the growing chorus voicing caution about how the economic downturn may finally be catching up with Apple.
RBC Capital Markets analyst Mie Abramsky downgraded Apple shares to “sector perform,” shaken by last week’s numbers indicating consumers were holding off purchasing Mac laptop and desktop computers.
Abramsky also trimmed his target price for Apple shares to $140 from $200 and cut his fourth quarter expectations. The analyst said Monday Apple is likely to report earning $32.8 billion, slightly off of $33 billion previously projected. The RBC analyst also lowered his prediction for 2009 to $40 billion from $42.5 billion once expected.
Nitrozac is an artist and co-founder of GeekCulture, a high-tech humor web site, thriving online community and, according to the artist, purveyor of fine propeller beanies. She says she’s always wanted to take contemporary technology subjects and render them in old style media, and has been offering her acrylic and oil paintings on canvas by auction since December 2007. “I love working with digital images on my Mac, but there is something extremely satisfying about creating with paint and a canvas,” she adds, and describes her paintings as “based on my work at the The Joy of Tech. The subject matter will usually be geeky and techy; the people, places, and things that make up geek culture.”
Her latest work is titled, “The Introduction,” a painting of Steve Jobs unveiling the MacBook Air at Macworld 2008, shown above. Click through in the gallery below to see some of her past work.
Chloe & The iTunes Babysitter from Jason Bedell on Vimeo.
OK, this one might divide the audience somewhat.
Here’s Jason explaining how the iTunes visualizer has saved his day, kept his daughter quiet, and enabled him to do some work. You can hear the relief in his voice as he says: “Steve Jobs, thank you.”
Is this the best concept in babysitting since, um, TV? Or is she a little young for Apple cult indoctrination?
Do share your opinions in the comments.
Disney star Vanessa Hudgens plays peek-a-boo with the paps from behind her iPhone on the streets of Beverly Hills. Not surprisingly, after a few steps Hudgens needed to see where she was going and dropped the stance.
The iPhone, however, continued to protect and serve as she speed dialed her mom (or therapist?) for solace.
Funny, it doesn’t look like she was having a bad skin day, maybe she just wants to get in on the game of match the celeb with the cell phone.
The return of the Lightsaber application to the app store is one to be hailed with much fanfare. Star Wars fans everywhere rejoice, and in the three days that the application has been on iTunes it has received over 1,400 reviews with an average four star rating.
Our night of watching the presidential debates was put on hold to test the rereleased application. Shortly after unsheathing my saber I was viciously attacked by an insidious villain! The ensuing epic battle (I’m on the left) was caught on video by horrified onlookers:
Testing Lightsaber Unleashed from Dean Putney on Vimeo.
Ultimately, we loved the new Lightsaber Unleashed. For those every day around-the-house epic battles, there’s really nothing like a good free Lightsaber application. We loved the built-in theme music, the accelerometer was quite accurate with our strokes, the different colors were great, and it really felt like we were holding lightsabers. Our only critique is that we often met our peril to an accidentally retracted beam (if you tap the screen with your saber drawn, you’re brought back to the menu screen).
If you have an iPod touch or an iPhone, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t have this application installed. Let’s have some impromptu lightsaber duels!
Here’s hoping that Apple’s feverishly-anticipated “Brick” project is the world’s first all-screen laptop — like this mockup of the OLPC version 2 by designer Yves Behar.
There’s slim chance, of course, but I for one would love a computing device like this: A hybrid iPhone-meets-Macbook-Air that would put hot netbooks like the EeePC to shame.
Apple’s “Brick” would be a hybrid laptop/tablet/ebook that dispenses with a physical keyboard and trackpad in favor of a virtual, adaptive UI that blends multitouch, gestures and its own orientation to switch between different modes:
Laptop — When the Brick is held horizontally with the two screens at an angle, the bottom screen turns into a virtual keyboard and touchpad. There’s no tactile feedback for touch typists, but never mind, corrective text handily makes up for the myriad errors. The top screen acts like a regular laptop screen, except that it also is touch sensitive, and is responsive to multitouch gestures like double-tap to zoom, pinching and scrolling.
Tablet — When the two halves are opened fully they snap together in the middle to make a tablet with a continuous touch-sensitive screen. This mode is best for surfing the web, browsing and editing photos, and displaying mind-altering music visualizers.
eBook — Like laptop mode but held vertically. Each screen transforms into an electronic page for easy reading. Displays eBooks, eMags or specially laid out websites. Readers navigate by swiping the screen to turn the pages.
Tabletop — Like tablet mode but for two people. When an onscreen button is pushed, the screens are oriented for two users sitting opposite each other. Great for collaborative tasks and especially games.
And why’s it called “Brick”? Because it smashes Windows!
More pictures after the jump.
Sonic Lighter is slightly different to all the other iPhone virtual lighters; it checks in with the GPS and pings a remote server with the device’s location at the moment the app was started.
The result: a Google Map covered with little red flames, every one of them an instance of Sonic Lighter getting all lit up.
And the map has few surprises: big swathes of red flames across North America, Europe and Japan. But hold on, what’s that, up there? In the Arctic Ocean, hundreds of miles north of the Chukchi Sea, itself north of where Alaska and Russia kiss? It’s a single, solitary Sonic Lighter ignition. Maybe it’s a member of Sarah Palin’s crack squad of Russia-monitoring sniffer dogs. Or maybe it was just some guy on a plane. Either way, we salute you, most-northerly Sonic Lighter user. You should get a prize, or something.
(If anyone’s taken their iPhone to the north or south poles, and has some interesting iPhone pics to prove it, please contact the Cult.)
The sharp-eyed folks at iphone savior spotted a MacBook Pro cameo on the season premiere of The Office.
In it, receptionist Pam appears in the Scranton branch from New York via iChat video.
While it’s easy to understand that Office followers — wry code monkeys and creative types alike — would appreciate the nod, Dunder Mifflin seems so much more PC than Mac.
How many places like that use MacBook Pros?
An apparent shift by iPhone 3G buyers to lower-priced 8GB models reportedly prompted Apple to trim by 4 million the number of handsets it will build for the rest of 2008. Cupertino will order 14 million to 15 million phones instead of 18 million analysts first projected.
Pacific Crest’s Apple analyst said Friday “supply-chain checks” found since mid-September Apple is not meaningfully resupplying AT&T stores that have sold down their inventory of 8GB iPhone 3Gs.
The first unlocked iPhones may be selling through Apple’s online Store in Hong Kong, according to a report this morning in at a Singapore-based blog. Techgoondu is reporting online shoppers at the Apple web site in Hong Kong are beingn told “”iPhone 3G purchased at the Apple Online Store can be activated with any wireless carrier. Simply insert the SIM from your current phone into iPhone 3G and connect to iTunes 8 to complete activation.”
The 8GB is HK$5,400 ($695) and the 16GB is HK$6,200 ($798). Ouch. Shipping is free, and they are supposed to ship “within 24 hours”. Apple’s warranty for the iPhone 3G is local only – “Warranty service is restricted to the country where Apple or its authorized distributors originally sold the iPhone.”
Honk Kong-based carrier Three enjoyed a brief two and a half month exclusivity deal with Apple and recently sweetened its iPhone rate plane to include “free unlimited wifi.”
MacBook update fever has the Mac community in its grip, and everyone’s talking about or leaking images of possible new MacBook designs.
But what about the growing threat of so-called “netbooks”? Those tiny, cheap machines pioneered by Asus and now on offer from pretty much every PC manufacturer around.
ZDNet wonders if Apple will make something similar, or, more likely, reduce its MacBook prices to compete. (I don’t think that’s very likely, but anyway.)
The Apple Gazette declares a resounding no, saying that the netbooks are not affecting MacBook sales anyway. They are reducing sales of more expensive non-Apple Windows laptops, but not hitting Apple products that hard at all.
I’m inclined to go along with the Gazette’s view that reducing the MacBook prices by a little — getting them down to the $700-$800 range — would be sufficient to make sales soar once more. That said, I suspect it’s more likely that the machine will be much improved and stay at roughly the same price that it is now.
Personally speaking, the biggest hurdle to overcome is battery life. I still yearn for a good sized mobile machine that will last for the best part of a day without a charge, and none of the current netbooks, or the MacBook Air, will do that. And I know which of those I’d rather buy.
AC/DC guitarist Angus Young explains it very simply in his high voltage comments on a Telegraph story about the state of the music industry:
“We don’t make singles, we make albums.”
Well that’s one view, I suppose. I’d love to have been a fly on the wall during that interview. What else did he have to say?
Excited Bristol Apple Store staff, preparing to let in the first customers
It’s hard to get the British excited about something, especially a new shop. But that does’t stop the staff at the shiny new Bristol Apple Store doing their level best to get the queue outside cheering and waving. A bit.
It has to be said: this store opening is unlike most others. Central Bristol ground to a halt this morning because an entire shopping mall, encompassing several surrounding streets, was opening for the first time.
The Apple Store was just one among 150 or so shops welcoming new customers. The opening ceremony for the mall included a MC on a cherry picker, shouting bad poetry and exhorting the crowd to spend and spend. And four drummers sat at four drum kits. The sound echoed around the streets and made the echos made the drummers sound out of time with each other. But nobody minded. Dancers and free runners danced and ran freely. And eventually, Mr MC man declared the Cabot Circus (warning: eye-wateringly awful web site) mall open. The masses flooded in to spend their money.
But that was only half the queuing for the Apple fans. The mall opening is over, and now they have to rush down a newly-opened street and start a fresh queue inside steel crowd barriers. And there they wait, for another 30 minutes, while Store staff do the usual whooping and cheering and getting people excited.