Both the Android Market and iTunes are like flea markets: there’s some good stuff up front and lots of junk the more you rummage around the piles of crap in the back.

And the junk just seems to multiply the more you look.

Case in point: Google recently yanked “Is My Son Gay?” from the Android market after allout.org launched an online campaign about the homophobic quiz app. (Questions included “takes a long time to do his hair,” or if he “likes football” rather than “musicals.”)

The trouble is that both iTunes and the Android Market have apps that are just as offensive.

Steve Jobs was a man known for his signature style. During the last decade, the CEO and entrepreneur was hardly ever seen in public without his black turtleneck, blue jeans, and New Balance sneakers.

Many have stopped wondering why Jobs chose such unusual attire to wear while unveiling revolutionary products to the world, but it turns out that there’s actually an interesting story about why Jobs was never seen without his turtleneck and blue jeans.

Apple is working fervently on its own chip technology for the post-PC era, according to TechCrunch. Specifically, Apple has 1,000 engineers (or about 5% of its Cupertino workforce) working on its series of processors for upcoming products.

Steve Jobs himself said that “getting low power and smaller is the key to everything” when it comes to chip design. Apple is thinking ahead to the future of the revolution it started with products like the iPhone and iPad.

Stuff.tv’s video hands-on with Siri is even more impressive than Apple’s demo videos. Not only do they show it opening websites, sending IMs, checking the weather both locally and across the world, setting a wake-up alarm, doing currency conversions and finding the distance to the moon, Siri even changes its accent according to whether it is talking to a Yank or a Brit.

Pretty awesome. Who said this wasn’t a killer feature for the iPhone 4S?

Incredible.

[via Bashir Sultani]

Want to play with the same version of iTunes us devs have been rocking for the past few months? iTunes 10.5 is out, and it brings support for the iPhone 4S, the iCloud and iTunes Match along with it. Not that you’ll be able to use iTunes Match yet, but best be prepared anyway.

You can download iTunes 10.5 here. Pick it up now if you plan on upgrading to iOS 5 tomorrow, or plan on getting an iPhone 4S on Friday. It’s a 103MB download on the Mac.

Update: iTunes 10.5 actually doesn’t support iTunes Match. Instead, iTunes Match support has been shuffled off to iTunes 10.5.1 Beta, which is also now available for download by devs.

Movie studios, faced with dwindling DVD sales as consumers turn to streaming, want to create their own cloud-based storage option to compete with Apple. Aptly named UltraViolet, the service apparently hinges on invisible interest by audiences that have abandoned physical sales.

Sure, the new iPhone 4S has a brand-spanking new iOS 5, the endlessly cool Siri voice-recognition and HD-quality digital camera. But perhaps the most exciting feature for Apple is the 71 percent to 73 percent profit margin on each handset sold – and there should be millions, one analyst said.

Walter Isaacson’s upcoming biography of Steve Jobs has according to rumor already been picked up for a $1M option by Hollywood, but who should play Steve? Here are some casting ideas, some great (bring back Noah Wyle!), some not so great (Michael Cera?) Who is your favorite?

Did you miss out on preordering an iPhone 4S? Afraid to brave the lines outside of your local Apple Store? Skeptical that Wal-Mart, Target and Best Buy will get the iPhone 4S you want? You now have another option: go pre-order an iPhone 4S at Sam’s Club today, then pick it up Friday.

The iPad has become the favored device for slurping up media in the U.S., overtaking the iPhone in August, according to new figures from an Internet research firm. Apple’s iOS also is the overwhelming choice for U.S. media consumption with Android a distant second.

As the number of voice calls have dwindled, mobile carriers now rely on text messaging as a profit center. Now that source of revenue is under attack as Apple prepares to release iOS 5 and iMessage, a feature allowing free messaging between iPhone, iPad and iPod touch users.

Rather than complying with Apple’s App Store terms and throwing the Cupertino company 30% of every sale it makes, Audible has launched an iPhone-friendly web app that allows users to add a bookmark to their home screen for quick and easy purchasing.

The Jobs tributes show no sign of slowing down. Some Minecraft players have been getting busy building their own Jobs tributes out of blocky Minecraft stuff. The one above, by KickAssTechnology, is particularly nicely done and ends on a poignant tone.

There’s more where that came from.

While Apple may not be all too happy about it, some German customers are ecstatic today having received their iPhone 4S pre-orders three days before the device is scheduled to launch.

Finder has two nice features that you might want to turn on if you aren’t using them already the Finder status and path bars. Both of these give you kick access to some very useful information about your Mac.

Continue reading

Want to know what Apple retail employees can tell you about iOS 5 and iCloud? These images are of leaked internal Apple documents which are provided to retail store employees to help them sell iOS 5 and iCloud.

The first GeekBench benchmarks for Apple’s new iPhone 4S prove that dual-core A5 processor makes this baby a super speedy smartphone. Thought your iPhone 4 was quick? The new iPhone is about 68% quicker!

Following its unveiling of the iPhone 4S on October 4, Apple published a gallery of photographs taken with the device’s 8-megapixel camera. The results were stunning — so good, in fact, that many criticized the company for editing the photos before they were posted. However, this awesome image of a one dollar bill has not been edited, and it’s amazing.

New from the folks at Realmac Software is Analog, an desktop OS X application that iPhone photographers will find rather familiar.

In the tradition of artists throughout history, those proud iconoclasts at Apple who created the original Macintosh signed their creations for posterity. Inscribed into the inside rear panel case mold for the 128k, 512k and Mac Plus are the signatures of Steven Jobs, Bill Atkinson, Andy Hertzfeld, Bruce Horn, Jef Raskin and the rest of the historic team.

Boy Genius Report has an interesting scoop on how Sprint and Apple will be handling the upcoming iPhone 4S launch this Friday, October 14th.

Apple is well-known for keeping its unreleased products under lock and key, and the 4S launch is no exception. Those that were lucky enough to pre-order the iPhone 4S during the initial rush last Friday will get the product delivered to their doorstep when it becomes available in stories Friday.

Steve Jobs’ death certificate has been officially released, according to Bloomberg. His exact time and cause of death is documented in the certificate.

Jobs suffered from a rare form of pancreatic cancer that publicly surfaced for the first time in 2004. In April of 2009, Jobs underwent a dangerous liver transplant after taking his first leave of medical absence earlier that year. He continued to battle cancer while intermittently serving at Apple until his formal resignation two months ago.

Apple was incredibly secretive about Jobs’ health condition throughout his years of treatment, officially calling his disease an “undisclosed medical condition.”

We’ve been hearing tell that Facebook would be getting a native iPad version forever, but there’s been no official confirmation until now. Well, point your browser here and take a gander at the official Facebook for iPad webpage, complete with a link to the iOS App Store.

Sadly, that link only leads to the iPhone-only Facebook app, but consider this proof that the native iPad will be dropping soon… maybe even this week.

(Thanks, James!)

Me & Steve Stories — Some of the best stories about Steve Jobs are the personal, intimate ones. We’re collecting them here and will run as many new stories as we can find. If you have a story about Steve you’d like to share, please send us your submissions.

Steve Jobs loved to drive fast, and even late in his life, it wasn’t an uncommon sight to see him zooming down the highway at breakneck speeds to the Cupertino campus. Back in 1979, though, Stephen Stapleton got a joyride that he would always remember from Jobs… all in a breakneck search for Woz!