All of the rumors we’d heard before now suggested that the next MacBook Pro — which will definitely boast Intel’s latest Sandy Bridge architecture, and may leverage Apple’s newly-signed deal for LiquidMetal — wouldn’t come until March, but now Slide to Mac is claiming that the new MacBook Pros will come next week.

According to SlideToMac, the new models will show up sometime at the latter end of next week… possibly on a Thursday or Friday. They say that Apple will release five new models, which will include two new 13-inch versions, two new 15-inch versions and one new 17-inch version.

First Rhapsody lashed out at Apple over the new App Store requirement mandating a 30% cut off-the-top of all in-app subscriptions and purchases, and now Last.fm co-founder Richard Jone is joining the cry, saying that “Apple [has] just f*cked over online music subs for the iPhone.”

They are labeled geniuses, they surround themselves with the coolest gadgets pushed by a tech giant who’s CEO has become a Silicon Valley rockstar. But does working at an Apple retail location match all the hype? An anonymous Apple retail worker gives a magazine interview, where he says “sometimes the company can feel like a cult.”

“They give us a little paper pamphlet, and it says things like — and I’m paraphrasing here — ‘Apple is our soul, our people are our soul,’ the employee tells Popular Mechanics. “There was this one training session in which they started telling us how to work on our personality, and separating people into those with an external focus and an internal focus. It was just weird.”

Steve Jobs is sitting next to President Obama. He’s wearing a black turtleneck!

This is an official White House photo. Here it is zoomed in:

Sony’s been making some noises lately suggesting that if their new Music Unlimited service takes off, they might ditch iTunes once and for all. Lest there be any doubt, though, that this is a fanciful fever dream that depends upon the digital equivalent of a pig sprouting wings and leaping majestically into the sky, Sony Network Entertainment COO Brandon Layden says that Sony won’t be ditching iTunes after all.

At a meeting held at the home of John Doerr of venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Apple CEO Steve Jobs met with President Barack Obama last night alongside other Silicon Valley executives, the White House has confirmed.

Unlike his peers at Yahoo!!, Netflix, Twitter, Google and Facebook, though, Jobs remained out of sight of reporters throughout the meeting, and was seen neither entering or exiting the meeting.

We’re all used to it now but when the iPhone first debuted, a common criticism leveled against it was battery life. Apple’s always been aggressive with power management across its iOS devices, but compared to the feature phones that were nearly ubiquitous at the time, the iPhone is a hog, and users buying one had to switch from charging their phones once every few days to charging it one or more times per day.

Apple’s only improved the battery life of the iPhone since then, but as our gadgets become ever more power hungry, there’s always going to be an increasing demand upon lithium-ion tech. In a new patent, Cupertino seems to have identified a new way to improve battery life, and while it’s hardly as esoteric as Apple’s more wild-eyed patents, it’s plenty exciting for those who want a longer lasting iPhone or MacBook.

Apple once again may be the focus of federal regulators. The Cupertino, Calif. company’s recent decision to require publishers to offer subscriptions through the App Store — providing a 30 percent cut for the tech giant — has prompted an initial antitrust investigation by the Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission, according to a Wall Street Journal report.

Although publishers seeking to sell magazine, newspaper and music subscriptions to owners of iOS devices can pitch services on outside websites, the new rules require companies offer iTunes as an alternative at the best available price. Traditionally, publishers offer tiered pricing based on where products and services are sold.

Anyone who has used the new MacBook Air can attest to what a tiny miracle it is. Spec-wise, it doesn’t look like much at all, but even the 1.4GHz 11-incher surprises by bleeding the edge of OS X performance in nearly all the ways that count for the average users through the accomplishment of its standard SSD drive. Consumers are thrilled, and so is Apple, with Tim Cook recently saying that Apple saw the new Air as “the future” of the MacBook line.

Looks like NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang agrees, but if anything, he’s even more excited about the Air than Cook is, claiming it’s not just the future of the MacBook line, but the future of laptop design across all platforms.

Earlier this week, ABC 13 Action News in Houston, Texas reported that an unnamed West University woman was robbed in front of her house. An iPad owned by the woman was used to locate the robbery suspect.

The woman was robbed at gunpoint while placing her child into her car. The robbery suspect took her jewelry and iPhone.

Both Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal reported that a smaller iPhone nano was in development, but now the New York Times says a shrunken iPhone is NOT on the cards.

Apple is developing a budget iPhone, the NYT says, but the device will not be any smaller than current models. Instead, it will scrimp on internal components, like memory, as we exclusively reported on Monday (More Detail On Apple’s iPhone Nano).

Keeping the iPhone nano’s screen size the same as current models makes perfect sense. Developers won’t have to code apps for different screen sizes, like they do on other platforms.

The Times did corroborate our report earlier this week, also reported in the WSJ, that Apple is planning a major overhaul of MobileMe. MobileMe will put a lot more media and files in the cloud, allowing users to stream and sync to all their devices without using cables.

The budget iPhone will make more use of voice commands, the NYT says.

In an interview with Peter Kafka over at All Things D about the launch of their new Music Unlimited streaming music service, Sony’s Tim Schaaf — who worked at Apple for fourteen years as a senior executive in charge of Quicktime, and was intimately involved in the company’s media products — allowed himself to be drawn into comment about his former employer, specifically in regards to Apple’s new in-app subscription and purchasing policies.

“It seems a little aggressive,” Schaaf said about Apple’s new policies, which threaten to kick from the App Store any app developer who fails to offer their app’s products and subscriptions through Apple’s in-app purchase mechanism, or offers them more cheaply elsewhere.

“Sounds like a good thing for Android,” Schaaf concluded, referring to Google’s less prohibitive terms as part of their competing One Pass in-app purchase and subscription service, and implying that developers would begin to flee the App Store if his former employer did not buckle.

Ouch. Do you agree with Schaaf’s assessment?

I know, it may seem like blasphemy to some of our readers (does it? Feel free to weigh in), but some Mac owners have (gasp) Android phones. For them, then, the release yesterday of TeamViewer for Android will let them access their Macs from their Droid-like phone of choice, for free — just as iPhone and iPad users have been able to do for about a year or so now.

Just install the desktop client on your Mac, pop the app on a suitable phone and you’re pretty much good to go. TeamViewer works with Windows (and Linux) boxes too; though if you’re a Windows user with an Android phone, the Cult of Mac logo is probably starting to burn your retinas right about now.

Apple was the only big name in mobile that didn’t show up at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this week… but it didn’t stop the iPhone 4 from winning the show’s Best Mobile Device Award.

According to the judges, the iPhone 4 won because “it has a great screen, sharp design, fantastic materials, and phenomenal ecosystem for app developers. In a tight race, the iPhone 4 built on the success of its predecessors to set the pace for smartphones.”

Ouch. That’s got to hurt: beaten by a company that didn’t even show up. All was not totally bleak for the Android and Windows Phone 7 device manufacturers in attendance, though: one of their own in HTC won the Device Manufacturer of the Year Award. Personally, though, we think that should probably have gone to Apple too.

Inception: App Edition – (Free + $11.99 in-app purchase) Universal – Entertainment

Inception: App Edition is one of the first of Warner Bros.’ App Store releases that not only delivers the full Inception movie, but also offers a stack of movie extras all within an app. You can download the movie on to your device to play at anytime, even when you’re offline, or, if you’re keen to save space, you can stream the movie over Wi-Fi or 3G. The app features five exclusive tracks, bonus features that take you behind the scenes, an array of movie film posters, and multiple languages.

For film fans and movie buffs, Inception: App Edition is the ultimate way to experience this breathtaking film on your iOS device, and it features hours worth of additional content you wouldn’t normally have access to if you’d have purchased the film through the iTunes Store.

The Dark Knight is also available as an ‘App Edition’ from Warner Bros.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0AsGfcJjuc

Starfront: Collision – (Free + $6.99 in-app purchase) iPhone – Games

Starfront: Collision is the latest in Gameloft’s long string of smash hit releases, and claims to be the epitome of real-time strategy games. It packs 20 action-packed missions across five gorgeous environments, a competitive online multiplayer mode, and striking 3D-redered environments, making it one of the best RTS titles for iOS to date. Discover the deep and engaging story of a war of resources told throughout the solo campaign, or wage war against friends in 4-person online multiplayer. Live your first battles as a commander completely free, and if you’re ready to take up the challenge of the full game, you can unlock it through an in-app purchase.

Gameloft has once again looked at an incredibly popular game and created an iOS alternative that doesn’t disappoint. It’s a model they’ve been following for while with their App Store releases, and one that certainly seems to be working incredibly well for them. For fans of Blizzard’s Starcraft series and other real-time strategies, I highly recommend Starfront: Collision – with its near-perfect UI and control system, countless hours of intense gameplay, and eye-popping 3D visuals, I think it’s one Gameloft’s most impressive releases so far.

Here’s the cover of the March 2011 edition of Wired magazine, which just showed up in the mail:

1 million workers

90 million iPhones

17 suicides

This is where your gadgets come from. Should you care?

Yes, you should care. We do. Kudos to Wired for shining a much-needed spotlight on this important issue.

We start the day with some deals on iPhone and iPad applications. A new crop of iPhone app freebies includes the Talking Dragon, an interactive character. For the iPad is a new selection of applications with price reductions, including “Mad Skillz Motocross.” We also take a look at a number of iPad bargains, including a 16GB Wi-Fi tablet for $459.

Along the way, we also check out some Macs, including a 6-core Mac Pro running at 3.33GHz. The bundle also comes with 8GB of RAM and software for $4,081. As usual, details on these and many other items can be found at CoM’s “Daily Deals” page right after the jump.

On Monday, we reported how Apple is working on a streaming-only iPhone. The smaller, lighter device will have limited storage. Media and data will be streamed to the device over the network, like the second-generation Apple TV.

In November, we reported that the iPhone 5 will use a Near Field Communications chip (NFC) to enable an ambitious remote computing system. Wave the NFC-equipped iPhone near any compatible Mac, and the user’s entire Home directory will be loaded onto the guest machine — files, photos, music and even the same desktop background. It will be as though the user is sitting in front of their home computer. Apple has even patented the system.

How are the two related?

It’s unlikely that Apple will use Liquidmetal for the new MacBooks that are expected any day now, but it sure would be sweet. Check out how svelte the machines would be if Apple used the extra-stiff material.

Mockup by designer Dario Crisafulli.

Via SagiaMente.

Who wants one?

Apple announced its new plan for content publishers this week, and already it’s making money for the publishing industry by enabling wild, eyeball-grabbing headlines guaranteed to bring in the readers.

“Apple Just F****d Over Online Music Subs”

“Steve Jobs to Pubs: Our Way or Highway”

“Apple Launches Subscription System, Gouges Publishers in the Process”

“Apple Subscription Plans Anger Content Providers”

Digital-publishing-technology provider NewspaperDirect called Apple’s new policy ” unjustifiable,” “inexcusable,” “self-serving” and “ridiculous.”

The International Newsmedia Marketing Association felt “betrayed.”

OK, OK. We get the idea.

Movie critic Roger Ebert summarized another view in some quarters by tweeting: “Steve Jobs contributes his bit to the destruction of print media.”

That’s a compliment, not a criticism, by the way.

Meanwhile, just a day after Apple unleashed its new plan, Google unveiled one of its own, called Google One Pass. USA Today says the Google plan “undercuts Apple.”

So let’s collect ourselves and think this through. Is Apple’s plan really a major slap in the face to the publishing industry? Will it help kill print? And is Google’s One Pass a preferable alternative?

At this week’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha hinted that Google might be on the cusp of releasing its own answer to iTunes in the coming months.

In reference to their upcoming tablet, the $799 Xoom, Jha said that Android Honeycomb 3.0 would put Motorola in a better position to compete with the iPad because it “adds video services and music services.”

“If you look at Google Mobile services [in Android] today, there’s a video service, there’s a music service,” Jha said. Then he corrected himself. “That is, there will be a music service.”

The Apple halo. Once seen as a way to boost products, the magnetic power of Apple’s complete iOS family – the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad – are now helping the Cupertino, Calif. tech giant blow past anemic PC sales. The latest evidence: Mac shipments in December 2010 rose 23.5 percent – seven-fold the PC market’s 3.4 percent. The iPad, again, gets the credit.

“The halo effect emanating from the iPad will be even stronger than the iPhone halo effect in the business market if only because the iPad is a kissing cousin of Apple’s family of notebook computers,” said Needham analyst Charlie Wolf. Just how strong the halo has become is glaringly obvious when you break down Apple’s success in various markets.

How much money are you worth to mobile advertisers? Much more than an Android users, that’s for sure… at least according to this infographic put together by the boys over at Mobclix.

Of course, just how much money you’re worth depends a lot on what you mostly end up doing on your iPhone. Utilitiy users are worth almost $9.50 each on average, compared to just $7.20 for the same category on Android. Entertainment users are worth a few bucks less ($6.70 on iPhone, $4.90 on Android) and games are worth the least at just $4.00 per iPhone and $1.90 per Android device.

Mobclix came up with these numbers by taking their monthly advertising revenues for each app category and dividing them by users in a given month. At first blush, it looks like utility apps are where it’s at when it comes to mobile advertising, but as Mike Schramm reminds us, those numbers are skewed by the sheer volume of people spending more time on their iPhone in Angry Birds than editing spreadsheets on them.

If you’re ready to play at smuggling illegal immigrants over the US border, check out the demo for “Smuggle Truck.”

The game, from Boston company Owlchemy Labs hasn’t yet been approved by Apple, but you can try it out on gaming portal Kongregate for free.

“Smuggle Truck: Operation Immigration” has released a storm of controversy – and free publicity – for the game devs hope will be approved for iTunes by March.