Thanks to its front-facing camera, the iPad 2 is capable of producing a glasses-free 3D effect using head-tracking technology. Jeremie Francone and Laurence Nigay from the Laboratory of Informatics of Grenoble at the EHCI Research Group have used this technology, along with some really basic applications, to show off what the iPad 2 is capable of when it comes to 3D.

We track the head of the user with the front facing camera in order to create a glasses-free monocular display. Such spatially-aware mobile display enables to improve the possibilities of interaction. It do not use the accelerometers and relies only on the front camera.

The video below demonstrates how the concept works, and I think it’s really impressive. I can’t wait to see how developers might use head tracking to create a 3D gaming experience.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBQQEcfkHoE

It looks like a stack of iPhone 4s, but this is a coffee table — the iTable.

It’s also a speaker dock with a motorized speaker bar that rises like a stage organ when your hand is swiped across the  touch-sensitive controls (see the video below).

Designed a built by Kyle Buckner, who is best known for custom car interiors, the iTable is the first in a line of Apple-themed furniture.

“I am creating a line with this category,” said Buckner by IM.

Lots more pictures and a video after the jump:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Sj2Q0rGUmo

Here is British comic Eddie Izzard on OS X’s Software Update. It’s pretty funny and spot on.

The clip is taken from his Izzard’s live show at the Madison Square Garden, which is just out on DVD.

It has got to be the first standup skit ever about OS X’s Software Update. In fact, it’s the first skit I’ve seen from a popular comic about Macs in general, except Sinbad of course. A sign of Apple’s ever-expanding popularity?

Via Gizmodo.

These may not be the worst of times, but they’re not the best either. So the folks who make Geotrio Tours, an iPhone app that allows users to become virtual tour guides, think that awesomeness should be rewarded — they built a feature in their virtual tour app that allows people who go on the user-made tours to tip their guides, all from within the app.

The tours use the iPhone’s GPS to guide tourists along a set route, with photos and audio automatically popping up at predetermined points along the route. If they enjoyed the tour (and if they’re not cheap sods), at the end of the tour, tourists can leave tips for the guide. Virtual guides can make tours of anything they want, for free, at Geotrio’s website, or via their free TourRecorder app. There’s also a paid, pro version for the likes of big institutions.

No one’s going to make a million bucks off the app (if your tour is that good, send me a link), but it might net you some money for time invested in a fun little project.

Author Walter Isaacson’s authorized biography of Steve Jobs is likely to be a doozy, if this fascinating profile of Bill Gates in Time is anything to go by.

I just spent the last hour or so reading the 1996 profile, which Isaacson published when Gates was at the height of his power. Isaacson managed to get full access by persuading Gates it was a shot at winning Time’s Person of the Year. Gates didn’t win, but the profile is a great piece of work. It’s full of personal anecdotes and is psychologically penetrating. Isaacson talked to Gates’ friends, family and colleagues, and paints a rich, detailed portrait. It’s highly readable but also critical of Gates. We can only hope Isaacson does the same thing for Jobs, who has famously resisted biographers so far. As previously reported, Jobs has granted Isaacson full access for iSteve: The Book of Jobs, which is to be published early next year. (I don’t think it’s fair, but columnist Michael Wolff says Isaacson is a social-climbing sycophant).

Here’s a taste of the Gates piece:

When Gates decided to propose to Melinda in 1993, he secretly diverted the chartered plane they were taking home from Palm Springs one Sunday night to land in Omaha. There Buffett met them, arranged to open a jewelry store that he owned and helped them pick a ring. That year Gates made a movie for Buffett’s birthday. It featured Gates pretending to wander the country in search of tales about Buffett and calling Melinda with them from pay phones. After each call, Gates is shown checking the coin slot for loose change. When she mentions that Buffett is only the country’s second richest man, he informs her that on the new Forbes list Buffett had (at least that one year) regained the top spot. The phone suddenly goes dead. “Melinda, Melinda,” Gates sputters, “you still there? Hello?”

Time: IN SEARCH OF THE REAL BILL GATES

Via Apple 2.0: The man who won Steve Jobs’ trust

Okay, this is sorta creepy — and if you aren’t aware of this little fact by now, you should be: Unless you’ve adjusted the settings to turn this feature off, every time you snap a photo with your iPhone it embeds data with your exact location in the image file. This data, called a geotag, can be easily read using easily available software by anyone who has access to your images online (btw, contrary to what the folks at NBC say, it’s not new technology; the ability to geotag photos has been around since at least the first iPhone to include GPS, the 3G).

Among modern addictions, the one to iOS photo apps appears to be gaining purchase in the global culture. Facebook, Flickr and all manner of photo sharing services across the Internet are rife with the evidence, as is the success of web-based standalone services such as Instagram and Hipstamatic.

So, if you’re inclined to think of your iPhone or iPad as a palette for creativity, consider FX Photo Studio for the full-on rush its beautifully executed UI and finely detailed features bring to your artistic toolbox.

This 99¢ app ($2.99 for the iPad version) from the developers at MacPhun packs nearly 200 different effects and filters into a robust processing engine that will amaze you with its ability to enhance your photographs in ways limited only by your own imagination.

We start another week of deals with a number of Mac Pro Xeon workstations. The units from the Apple Store start at $2,039 for a Quad Core Xeon 2.66GHz. Next is a leather flip stand for the iPad. (We also include several other iPad cases.) Finally, there is a deal on Apple’s Final Cut Studio 3, which bundles Final Cut Pro 7, Motion 4, Soundtrack Pro 3, Compressor 3.5, DVD Studio 4, and Color 1.5 — all for $709.

Along the way, we all take a peek at several software titles, ranging from Adobe Photoshop Elements 9 to the backup and synchronization tool Sync Pro 6.

As always, details on these and many other items can be found at CoM’s “Daily Deals” page right after the jump.

Forget those china plates, iPad and iPhone apps are the new must-haves for people who want to follow the fairy tale wedding of Kate Middleton and Prince William.

To makes sure there is as much interest as possible on April 29, broadcasters and publishers are crowding the iTunes store with dozens of apps, many of them free, aimed at filling the teacups of royal watchers the world over to brimming.

Among them are the Royal Wedding Insider from BBC America (with an unfortunate ad for The Tudors miniseries in it), The Royal Wedding from Hello! Magazine as well as offerings from NBC , one from People that allows you to print your own commemorative stamp and a virtual tea towel app.

Though they’ll probably never surpass the interest in the Kate Middleton doll with its big head or the fun factor in commemorative condoms, unlike ceramics (which more or less live forever) you can dump these apps guilt-free as your interest wanes post-nuptials.

Let’s face facts: worrying about someone dropping a twelve pound bowling ball on your new iPad 2 is probably as paranoid as, say, worrying about it being trampled by an elephant driven insane by the winter’s musth.

Still, if you must worry about such things, or other high impact calamities that could happen to your iPad — like a 747 smashing into it as it plummets out of the sky, or a narcoleptic parachuter face planting upon your tablet after sleeping through his ripcord count — it looks like you might want the G-Form Extreme Sleeve.

Made of something called “PORON® XRD™,” the G-Form works by turning rigid upon impact, protecting the iPad from being smashed into smithereens. As you can see, it works quite well, and it’s not even that expensive at $59.95.

The new Fusion case for the iPhone 4 from Nelson Technologies is the thinnest, lightest, and the longest running rechargeable battery case currently on the market, promising up to an extra 42 hours of audio, 11 extra hours of video, and 2 extra days of runtime.

Despite its low profile design – which adds less than an inch in total width or depth and weighs less that 2.4 ounces – the Fusion also claims to be robust and protects your device from ordinary wear and tear.

The case features a 1,500 mAh lithium polymer SaFPWR smart battery that’s rechargeable for over 500 cycles and increases iPhone runtime by more than 200%. Intelligent built-in technology ensures your iPhone never short-circuits, overcharges, or over-discharges.

Blowing into them isn’t going to do a lick of good, but if you’re a fan of retro gaming, these gorgeous iPhone 4 cases have been designed to look exactly like the backsides of retro Famicom and NES cartridges, replete with emphatic warnings about taking your copy of Zelda into the bathtub with you, or trying to clean the contacts by licking them out. These beauties aren’t cheap, though: each one will cost you nearly $57.

Apple’s AirPlay system is an exclusive club. If you want to be part of it, you pay Apple a licensing fee to get “Made for AirPlay” certification, at which point Apple sends you a private key that allows your hardware to broadcast itself as ready for streaming. Technically, there’s no whiz-bang hardware at play here: just a private key that Apple keeps close.

Developer James Laird just ripped that key from Apple’s clutch. Frustrated by the lack of open-source Airport Express and/or AirPlay emulators out there, Laird has just released his own home-baked emulator, called SharePort.

SharePort allows you to stream music from iTunes to third-party software or AirPlay certified hardware. Previously, you could stream iTunes to an Airport Express, or use third party software to stream to an Airport Express, but now you can use iTunes to stream directly to 3rd party software or hardware.

Last week we reported on an issue plaguing owners of the 3G iPad 2 hooked up to the Verizon network. A growing number of users have reported a problem with their device that means they have to reboot their iPad to reactivate their 3G data connection. On Friday, Apple issued an official statement to All Things Digital, acknowledging the problem and reassuring users that they are investigating the issue:

We are aware that a small number of iPad 2 customers have experienced connectivity issues with the Verizon 3G network and we are investigating it.

A thread on the Apple Support Discussions forum now spans 9 pages long and is full of reports from disgruntled Verizon customers who are having problems with their iPad 2. The issues begins when 3G is turned off from within the settings app. When it’s turned back on, the data connection does not restore, simply displaying a “Searching…” message where the carrier’s name should be.

The only fix at the moment is to reboot the device while 3G is set to ‘on’ – this restores the data connection upon reboot. It’s likely a fix for this problem will come in a minor iOS software update shortly.

[via InfoWorld]

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTuniZZA1VY

A new iPhone application called Friends Aloud from VoiZapp uses state of the art text-to-speech technology to read aloud your Facebook news feed. It cycles through your friends’ status updates, as well as the associated comments, and reads them out in a pleasant, easy to understand voice.

For Facebook addicts Friends Aloud allows you to peel your eyes away from your iPhone or computer screen but remain up to date. Leave your device in your bag, pocket, or on your desk, and carry on with your day while you listen to everything that’s happening on Facebook.

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Offering that imitation as a parody allows commentary while avoiding the Wrath of Legal. Spoofs of Apple commercials are certainly not a new phenomenon, but recently we’ve moved past Get A Mac and Dancing Silhouettes into the Jony Ive Era: soft music, featherlight products and dark T-shirts.

The world’s creative types have noticed, producing a stream of variations on Apple’s ubiquitous advertising. SlateV uses Ive himself to introduce one of Apple’s greatest technological wonders, the iPhone 4 Bumper.

The hiring of a Senior Composites Engineer at Apple has fuelled more speculation that the company could move away from aluminum for building future devices, choosing to use carbon fiber instead. Kevin Kenny began work at the Cupertino campus this month after spending 14 years building carbon fiber bicycles for Kestral Bicycles, where he was the President and CEO.

This isn’t the first time Kenny has worked with Apple; a patent called “Reinforced Device Housing” filed by the company in 2009 had Kenny’s name on it, and depicted an outer casing for electronic devices made from ultra-strong carbon fiber. The patent reveals Kenny was clearly working with Apple for a long time before he became a full-time employee.

The iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad have already made Apple a huge player when it comes to gaming, with the touchscreen devices proving to be stiff competition for handheld consoles such as the Nintendo DS and the Sony PSP. However, two faces headed to the Apple camp would suggest the Cupertino company wants to get even more serious about gaming.

Simon & Schuster announced on Sunday that the authorized biography of Apple CEO Steve Jobs has been scheduled for an early 2012 release. The book entitled iSteve: The Book of Jobs is being written by Walter Isaacson, who has been working on the biography since 2009 and has enjoyed rare and exclusive interviews with Jobs, members of his family, and his colleagues at Apple.

As a parent, it is always important to keep tabs on what your children are doing on the computer. Whether it’s the sites they are visiting, the amount of time they spend online, or even what applications they are using, Mac OS X can cover it. OS X includes a set of parental controls that can be tweaked to anyone’s liking. In this video, you will see how to set up parental controls and use the features that work best for you.

When the clocks go forwards or back, people from New Zealand to New York miss their appointments because their iPhone alarm does not go off on time. Every time I complete a 10km run using my iPod nano, TIger Woods congratulates me on having completed another 500km. And as you read this, thousands of backups are failing because Time Machines are freezing in time.

What do these seemingly disparate events having in common? They’re all presumably the handiwork of Apple’s “B-team”.

[Update] Thanks to everyone who subscribed and commented, tons of really great comments, I had a fun time reading them all! The two winners are below, if you’re one of them, I’ll be contacting you via Youtube. Stay tuned for another great giveaway next Tuesday!

Winners:

• AGreatDane123, against all odds, you got the first qualified comment in. I applaud you sir, you are a winner. Congrats!
• Anthonypeter, it is for pity that I choose you, for no one should go through life not having won anything. Congrats!

Still rollerskating around in your short-shorts with tunes blaring on the headphones that came with your original Walkman? Tsk tsk… Everyone knows that’s a look that won’t be hip again for at least another 5 years.

It’s no secret that the iPad 2 should open the floodgates of the augmented reality experience — and here’s another example of what the iPad 2 can do with AR.

No doubt in anticipation of Yuri’s Night, Vito Technology has just released an AR-equipped version of their venerable star-watching iPad app, Star Walk ($5). Just hold the screen up to the sky and the app will superimpose constellations and all sorts of other info onto a realtime image of the sky being viewed through the iPad 2’s camera. And that’s on top of all the other cool features, like a satellite tracker, night mode and a time-machine function that lets you see what the sky looks like on any given day or time.

Still saving for an iPad 2? That’s ok, the iPhone version has the same features (but not the awesomeness of the iPad’s giant screen), and it’s on sale for a buck till April 12 — which, not coincidentally,  is Yuri’s Night.

Just like Pogoplug and ZumoCast (the latter currently MIA from the app store), Tonido is a service that’ll let users stream media and access files on a computer from a mobile device. It sort of combines features from both — it’s completely free, works via a mobile app that connects to server software (free download from Tonido) running the user’s computer and allows access to music, videos, photos and even plain ‘ol documents. In fact, pretty much everything on a connected hard drive is accessable.

The big difference with Tonido though, is that virtually nothing is stored in a cloud — not even your account password (“think of the Tonido server like a giant router” says co-founder Venkat Ramasay). Don’t want to use your computer as the server? Tonido sells a remarkably-Pogoplug-looking NAS device for $99 that you can plug an external HDD or USB stick into. Ramasay says the software footprint is also very small, and that’s it’s also intended to run on home routers.  The next version will also support Airplay.

The interface seems a little rough around the edges — I wasn’t able to stream music because I couldn’t figure out a way to simply select music to play, for instance — but it’s free, so worth taking a look at.

We close out another week with three hardware deals. First up are nine iMacs from the Apple Store, starting at $1,019 for an i3 powered iMac running at 3.06GHz. The desktop machine also has a 22-inch screen. Next is a luxury iPad convertible flip case. The final spotlight item is a USB turntable from Numark which converts your vinyl to MP3 and then ships them to your iPod with a built-in dock.

Along the way, we also check out other deals on iPad cases, as well as software and accessory bargains. As always, details on these and many other products can be found at CoM’s “Daily Deals” page right after the jump.