When boy meets girl in comedy 500 Days of Summer, he’s wearing an iPod. She hears The Smith’s “There is a Light that Never Goes Out” emoting from his headphones and they’re off.
That’s nothing new: the iPod crops up in plenty of movies. But this may be the first time a director used one to coach actors.
Director Marc Webb, who comes to the big screen from the music video world, gave actors Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel iPod Minis to help them prep.
Webb packed the devices with songs that he listened to while breaking down the script. The actors also had a playlist designed to convey the mood he was going after on each day of shooting. Deschanel told the WSJ she particularly liked day 44, dominated by Regina Specktor.
Today’s deals include refurbished Apple MacBook Pros, starting at $1,349, Floating iPod speakers from Excaliber,the Archos 5 Internet Media Tablet and many more.
Details of these and more Daily Deals can be found on the CoM Daily Deals page.
After my post yearning for more battery life out of my iPhone 3GS and hoping that the Mophie Juice Pack Air might hold the solutions to all of problems, a reader, who shall remain anonymous, tipped me off to some unresolved problems with the current generation fo the combination iPhone case/battery pack.
At left is one of two screenshots he sent me purporting to show the Juice Pack Air refusing to provide power to his iPhone (which kind of defeats its purpose). He bought one, was told it was defective, was given a replacement, and found it had the same troubles.
Here’s his explanation:
“It only happens if you discharge your iPhone to 20% warning. Then allow the Mophie to charge your iPhone 3GS until its depleted. Once it’s at zero charge the errors happen in the iPhone 3GS every time. I think those errors even crashed the phone once, but this is unconfirmed but feel its right since it was left to charge, placed in an outer mesh pocket of a laptop bag and found unresponsive later until removed from the Mophie and hard reset. Sigh.”
Anyone else seen these issues? I’ll admit, it has me back in a wait-and-see mode again…
The iphone nano: Like throwing your two favorite things in a blender. Via Solomobi
There’s been a lot of concern of late about just how sophisticated Chinese bootleggers have become at creating counterfeit Apple products. Leander got snookered by near-perfect iPod earbuds, the head of Apple Switzerland was furious to receive a gift of a bootleg iPod shuffle, and we’ve all seen an increasing number of knock-offs popping up all over the place, potentially undermining Apple’s value.
But for all our concern, there are also magical gifts like the above “iphone nano,” which looks as elegant and beautiful as if Conan O’Brien had done a “What If They Mated?” segment on his show for the iPod nano and the iPhone. Simply stunning. I know I’m jealous.
UPDATE: According to today’s reports, Apple will not recall iPod Nanos in Korea, but exchange faulty batteries.
An Apple Korea spokesman denied the recall, telling Joong An Daily the problem iPod Nano products were sold between September 2005 and December 2006. These products are no longer being sold in any of Apple Korea’s stores.
Apple will recall first-generation iPod Nanos in Korea after complaints that faulty batteries cause the MP3 devices to overheat and explode.
Since December 2008, four users filed complaints with the the Korean Agency for Technology and Standards over bugged iPod Nanos — three of them were for battery meltdowns while recharging.
The agency prodded Apple to recall first-gen iPod Nanos; Apple agreed to accept the recall recommendation but refused further comment.
Reports of iPod Nano battery meltdown have cropped up before, Japanese government launched an investigation into battery snafus in 2008.
Ever had an iPod battery overheat and liquify? Any success in getting a replacement?
Ocado is one of the UK’s classier supermarkets. It’s online-only (although closely linked to meatspace retailer Waitrose) and most people would probably say it appeals to the better-off kind of shopper.
It’s also, as of this week, a pioneer of iPhone shopping. The free Ocado app does a few clever things that the other big retailers might want to keep a close eye on when they finally get round to building apps of their own.
Make easy photo collages & slideshows with Pix Remix
What it is:Pix Remix is a new iPhone app from Bay Area-based Jump Associates and Originate Labs that lets you turn photos – taken with or stored on your iPhone – into slideshows, collages, and interesting pan & zoom presentations — and makes it incredibly easy and intuitive to share them in email or post them to Twitter and Facebook from right within the app.
Why it’s cool: Impressive for an initial release, Pix Remix is loaded with effective tools for personalizing your photo shows, with built-in transitions including fade/dissolve, push, drop and spin out; and the collage function makes it easy to drag, resize and bring photos to the front or back. The pan and zoom function lets you become an instant documentarian, guiding your viewers’ eyes from one spot to another on individual pictures, zooming in to a special detail area. Text can be added to give photos captions or tell a story about your show.
Once you’ve got your photo show together, Pix Remix makes it easy to share in email or to post to your Twitter page or your Facebook profile. Email recipients have the option of viewing your work on a web page or within the Pix Remix app on their iPhone; updates to your Twitter status automatically append a bit.ly url that sends viewers to the Pix Remix web page for your show; shows can be posted directly to your Facebook profile, where your contacts can view your creations right within Facebook, without ever having to leave the site.
Pix Remix is so intuitive and easy to use, I made my first collage and sent it to myself in email while I sat on the porcelain throne in my office during my morning constitutional today!
Where to get it: Pix Remix is available now on the iTunes App Store; it sells for $2.99.
Important Disclosure: Cult of Mac contributor Pete Mortensen is the communications lead at Jump Associates and works in the firm’s growth strategy consulting business. He was involved in the original brainstorming sessions that led to the development of Pix Remix but was in no way affiliated with the writing of this product review, nor did his association with Cult of Mac influence the author’s use of the application or his conclusions regarding its quality or value.
Word Flipper is an addictive, fast-paced word search game for iPhone and iPod Touch that just hit the iTunes App Store with update 1.1 and is bound to generate new buzz with some excellent feature updates.
One user describes it as “Sort of Boggle meets Dance Dance Revolution with a carnival twist!” but it really must be played to be appreciated.
Jamie Grove, Word Flipper’s developer, said, “I wanted to make a game that combined my love of word games with the fast-moving action available on the iPhone/iPod Touch,” which he’s done by incorporating innovative use of the iPhone OS accelerometer.
The new version also incorporates social media functionality, with achievement awards, global leaderboards, and integration with Facebook and Twitter.
Word Flipper (iTunes link) is available now on the App Store and sells for 99¢.
Josh Darrah, an Australian graphic designer, crafted this iPod Mini case entirely in wood — with a nifty matching charger dock.
Darrah told Stuff he spent about four weekends to craft the case out of just $12 USD in materials — Australian red cedar for the main shell and Camphor Laurel for the click wheel and base.
He used screws instead of glue, making it a little greener (he did employ some double sided tape to secure the clickwheel).
XMenu from the Devonthink people is one of those freeware apps that I recommend to every Mac user I meet. The latest update, version 1.9, is newly released and boasts visual refinements and a helpful new feature.
For the uninitiated, XMenu is a Menu Bar widget for getting to stuff quickly without leaving the app you’re in. What I like most about it is its flexibility. You can have six different shortcuts in your Menu Bar if you like, or just one if you prefer to keep things simple.
That’s what I do. I use the user-defined widget and throw aliases for useful files and folders into ~/Library/Application Support/XMenu – that way, I keep my Menu Bar uncluttered but XMenu still gives me quick click access to stuff like my todo.txt, my income and expenses records, and a handful of use-them-every-day folders.
If your Dock is overcrowded with folders or stacks that you don’t use because, well, because it’s overcrowded, then you should have a look at XMenu. This latest update adds a text snippets manager that works just the same as the user-defined widgets. Put some plain or rich text files in the right place, and XMenu will let you insert them into any app with two clicks.
People have been speculating about a Google OS for years, and finally it’s official. Chrome OS will be open source, free, and popping up on a netbook near you in about a year or so from now.
Today’s deals include a Samsung Netbook that can be hacked to run OS X, a 2TB external HD for a nice price, and a Philips 42-inch LCD HDTV for $850. And many more!
Two weeks after an iPhone 3GS was dropped in a swimming pool while recording video, the phone is still frickin’ working says its owner.
“I’m talking to you on it now,” says Khena Kara, the iPhone’s owner, speaking from his home in Nashville, TN. “It’s still going strong.”
Kara’s iPhone 3GS gained internet fame after Kara accidentally dropped it in a swimming pool while recording a video. The iPhone kept recording as it sank to the bottom, and as he fished it out. “It still frickin’ works!” he says in surprise as he pulls the iPhone from the pool. Kara posted the footage to YouTube, and it spread fast on blogs and Twitter. It has now been watched more that 500,000 times.
“Yes, it’s real,” says Kara of the video. “It was the pool in my subdivision.”
Above is a video still of Kara taken from the iPhone video right after it was fished from the pool. And below it is a new picture of Kara taken with the same iPhone.
The new picture’s metadata appears to back up Kara’s story.
Having now lived with an iPhone 3GS for the better part of three weeks, I remain incredibly impressed with the device. It’s powerful, fast, and running extremely mature software that’s delightfully quirk-free.
That said, it’s also become apparent that if you’re actually interested in using the phone for its intended use (web browsing, e-mail and video), battery life is ridiculously inadequate. In spite of assurances at WWDC, the 3GS only lasts marginally longer than the 3G, and I often need to charge up mid-afternoon to make sure i have decent battery for my train ride home.
Yesterday, things really went out of wack, and I could literally watch my charge diminish by 2 percent per minute when I was doing nothing so much as leaving it on my desk. A restart fixed it, but it was an extreme case of a persistent problem.
I started thinking about all of this thanks to Joel Johnson’s review of the Mophie Juice Pack Air over at BB Gadgets today. I still think having any case would be a downer, but the extra battery power is becoming increasingly necessary to enjoy my long-awaited iPhone in the manner I choose. That said, I can’t really bring myself to by one of those big battery packs that hold four times the charge, or what have you — afraid of losing it.
What’s been your experience? Do you moderate your Flight Control play to preserve your talk time? Or do you sport a bonus battery pack?
In the unlikely event that you’ve been yearning for more browsers on your Mac, and in the even less likely event that you wish you could splash out money for one; well, sunshine, your prayers have been answered.
For iCab, the last Mac browser that still costs money, is still being updated and has just reached version 4.6.1. And it can be all yours for 20 bucks. (I’m wracking my brains, and I can’t think of any other browsers that cost money these days – not since OmniWeb went free. Shout if you know of another.)
Exactly one year ago, Apple brought forth the iPhone App Store, which has gone on to become the greatest gift to Twitter’s growth imaginable. Among other things.
Let’s hope they have it really perfected by next year.
By all accounts, the iPhone 3GS launch has been a tremendous success for Apple. Despite launching in a down economy, the new model managed to sell as many units in its first weekend as its predecessor with little sign of slowdown. It’s also been an incredibly smooth launch. Though the iPhone 3G launch was marred by product shortages and buggy software, Apple’s kept a steady supply of hardware in the channel, and iPhone OS 3.0 is quite stable for such a new release.
But as effective as Apple has become in managing all of the aspects of the iPhone that it controls (hardware and first-party software), the launch also reveals the challenges the company faces in its efforts to take advantage of a larger network. AT&T’s signal strength continues to be a subject of much heated debate, and more crucially, Apple’s position as minder of a large software platform with thousands of developers looks increasingly untenable.
I don’t need to go into detail about the numerous cracks in the App Store facade of the last year: the baby shaking app, the unapproved porn, the copyright infringement, the excellent apps inexplicably rejected for arbitrary reasons and the apps that never made it out of the approval process one way or another. What I can say is this: the release of the 3GS has inspired a burst of app submissions the likes of which Apple has never seen before. When the App Store first opened a year ago, it had a flurry of submissions, but a smaller pool of developers. This is the first real “event” period since the iPhone dev community has grown, and the submission pool is not unlike the giant hyperwall of apps that dominated the conversation at this year’s WWDC.
A developer friend tells me that a pre-release version of his app was checked off and approved in a week in the period immediately before the 3GS announcement. The final release, submitted the day of the WWDC keynote on June 8, took nearly four weeks to get through the system, and I’m told that Apple has even notified its developer community that all apps are taking between three and four weeks to vet. That means it takes four times as long to get new products to consumers, four times as long to fix bugs, and four times as long to go from finished work to money-making.
If Apple wants to maintain the dominance of the iPhone and the success of the App Store, it needs to find a more effective way to manage the sheer volume of submissions it’s tackling. Too much crud is making it through, and too much brilliant code is sitting on the shelf. The iPhone is by far the best mobile platform today. Unless Apple learns to treat its developers better on the front end (I hear payment works brilliantly), they won’t be loyal when the next Next Big Thing comes around.
The United States Department of Justice has taken the first baby steps that could eventually lead to an official investigation of the Telecom industry and the effects its exclusive carrier agreements have on consumer prices and choices, according to a Wall Street Journal report Monday.
The initial review looks to determine whether large U.S. telecom companies such as AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. have abused the market power they’ve amassed in recent years, according to people familiar with the matter.
Largely moribund and hamstrung by internal politics and inefficiency during the Bush administration, DOJ under President Barack Obama has seen renewed relevance as an arm of the Federal government and has lately signaled business as usual could soon be ending for an industry left to its own devices during the past decade or more.
Many people have long decried exclusive carrier agreements that make popular gadgets such as Apple’s iPhone available only to consumers willing to sign multi-year service agreements with AT&T and likewise Blackberry’s Storm to those who’d sign with Verizon.
The Wall Street Journal quoted the Justice Department’s antitrust chief, Christine Varney, saying she wants to “reassert the government’s role in policing monopolistic and anti-competitive practices by powerful companies.”
Apple’s iPhone has recently become the most popular camera on Flickr, one of the Internet’s most well-regarded photo sharing social media sites.
Expressed in “percent of members” terms, the iPhone has lately bested two models of Canon’s EOS Digital Rebel, of which the XTi had long been the clear favorite choice of Flickr members.
UPDATE: Since this post was originally published, the Flickr site’s graph has been changed, and now shows the iPhone is the #2 camera among Flickr members, resting just behind the Canon EOS Digital Rebel XTi, which has apparently enjoyed a bump in popularity for which the previously published graph did not account.
[Thanks Rafael, for the heads-up on the graph change!]
Among popular camera phones, the iPhone has outdistanced its rivals since its release two years ago and recently widened the gap between its nearest competitor, the Nokia N95, by a huge margin.
The data is to be taken with a grain of salt as anecdotal and largely unscientific, but it is interesting to note such graphic evidence of popularity for a phone camera that had been denigrated by many as one of the most pitiable features of Apple’s popular smartphone.
Apple recently upgraded the specs on the iPhone camera, giving it a boost in pixel capacity and adding both variable focus and video capabilities, which should only increase its attractiveness going forward.
Love the Exploded 128 Mac tee but find there are only so many places you can wear it? You can hang up your Apple love with Garry Booth‘s take on the inner workings of this milestone Mac, it’s part of a trio of retro-Mac posters.
snippets from Mactrilogy posters
You can also deck your halls with “Macronaut,” Ray Frenden’s space-age voyager who looks like he’s lost Command or create a den of antiquity with Gary Gao’s “Mac Ghosts,” specters of computers past.
This is a limited run of fewer than 100, offered at a package price of $39, so if you’re interested in the Mac Poster Trilogy, make a move.
One of these iPhone headsets is from Apple; the other is a knockoff.
Spot the difference? One of these is a $30 iPhone Stereo Headset from Apple. The other is a $14 knockoff from the Philippines.
Thing is, the $14 copycat is as almost good as the original. It’s nearly physically indistinguishable. The sound is exceptionally good. And the microphone/remote works the same as it does on the genuine article.
Even the packaging is remarkably realistic.
Except there’s a few things that are off — a few minor details that give them away as fakes. Plus, they broke down after a week.
The audio manufacturer Shure has battled knockoffs for years. http://www.flickr.com/photos/digaderfox/
The audio manufacturer Shure is known for its excellent headphones, which makes it a favorite target of counterfeiters.
In May, Shure helped Chinese authorities bust knockoff shops run by two Shanghai companies that were making copycat Shure headphones. The raids uncovered large quantities of Shure E2c and E4c earphones, which sell for about $70 and $170 respectively, as well as headphones branded JVC and Audio-Technica.
Unlike copycats of yore, today’s counterfeiters are amazingly sophisticated and accomplished, turning out high-quality knockoffs that in some ways rival the originals. Flickr user digaderfox bought a pair of fake Shures on eBay last year, and documented the surprisingly high quality of the knockoffs on the photo site.
Apple is also is becoming a target of copycats, with amazingly good knockoffs of iPhones and headsets coming onto the market.
Paul Applebaum, Shure’s Executive Vice President and General Counsel, said counterfeiters are increasingly sophisticated. Some are setting up convincing factory-direct websites, or hijacking U.S. eBay accounts to make it appear goods are shipped domestically.
In the security video, the employee is seen opening the back door to the store after the suspect rang the bell at about 10.15 AM. She is led back into the store at gunpoint, and was shot soon afterward. The suspect fled on foot.
Police describe the suspect as a thin black male, aged 35-45, wearing a dark baseball cap and light-colored shirt and pants.
Anyone with information is asked to call the Arlington County Police Department Tip Line at 703 228-4242.
Or call Detective Alan Lowrey at 703 228-4199 or Detective Michael Austin at 703 228-4241. Det. Lowrey can also be reached via email at [email protected] and Det. Austin can be reached at [email protected].
Full text of the police description of the crime and appeal for help after the jump.
