950 lucky – if that’s the right word – fans of the artist formerly christened Prince Rogers Nelson have the opportunity to get a limited edition iPod Touch bundled with their purchase of The Prince Opus, a $2,100 book of photographs produced by Kraken Opus, a British publisher whose aim is to create the “most epic, stunning, iconic publications ever seen in the world.”
One cannot tell from the promotional material how many GB the iPod Touch holds, but it comes pre-loaded with a 15 song live soundtrack from Prince’s 21 night 2007 performances at London’s O2 arena, as well as a 40 minute movie from the shows, made by the diminutive star himself.
“People familiar with Apple’s operations say they still expect to see Mr. Jobs return in June. Some of these people also say members of Apple’s board of directors are monitoring the situation directly, communicating regularly with Mr. Jobs’s physicians.
People inside the company, business partners and others who are familiar with the situation say life at the Cupertino, Calif., company remains much the same as it did before.
Those at other corporations who deal with the company also say their interactions with Apple haven’t changed. Mr. Cook, who had already been handling most of Apple’s day-to-day operations, has kept tight control over the company, say business partners and those inside Apple.”
The article also speculates about the future of Apple management, stock prices and employee turnover.
An app called “Wish You Were Here” lets you use pics taken with your iPhone, personalize a greeting and caption and then send them via snail mail.
Currently available to send to US addresses, WYWH creates 4.25″ x 6″ color postcards from your iPhone or iPod Touch.
As a postcard fanatic, I love this idea. The download plus first two postcards are free, after that it costs $1.30 per card, not bad considering you don’t have to find stamps on the road or settle for dull postcards — the pic on the other side of the stilted sample message could change its meaning entirely…
There are a number of excellent reasons to be bullish on Apple (AAPL) stock, according to Wall Street analyst Shaw Wu. Despite already having risen 45% on the year, Wu believes Apple could bake another 25% or more of profit into its share price, based on expectations around what the Kaufman Bros. high-tech analyst calls “several catalysts in the months ahead.”
“We anticipate [Apple’s] new iPhone 3.0 software to ship” in time for the 2009 WWDC in June, Wu said in a report released Monday. He’s also expecting consumer interest in Apple to remain strong with the introduction of new iPhone hardware, also in time for WWDC.
The expected launch of Snow Leopard should be a further catalyst for the Mac business, which has already seen a boost from recent desktop refreshes (iMac, Mac mini, and Mac Pro). “And last,” Wu said, “the potential for a new form factor, perhaps Apple’s answer to the netbook, with a large screen iPod touch-Mac hybrid” could end up pushing AAPL from its current $119 price to something more like $152.
Less than a month ago, on March 24, Wu removed Apple from his “Focus List” citing the appreciating stock (then up only 19%) and the fact that “many of the product catalysts we were looking for, namely the new iMac, have occurred.” But that was at a point just after the overall stock market had been tanking since January; in the last several weeks the market’s been on a tear and some in the financial analysis business believe the worst of the “recession” is behind us.
For a little more perspective on the inscrutable science of stock price analysis, recall that less than a year ago, when Apple was opening its AppStore and releasing the iPhone 3G, Wu and many other AAPL analysts expected the company’s stock to go as high as $225. AAPL had already topped out just over $200 prior to the AppStore launch and nose-dived to well below $100 by January of this year.
Apple has released new lists of the “all time” Top 20 paid and free iPhone and iPod Touch applications, as the iTunes AppStore plows on toward 1 billion total downloads.
The “all-time” designation is kind of interesting, given the AppStore has only been open less than a year, but some of the numbers coming out make an impressive case for yet another ding in the universe attributable to Steve Jobs and his little niche computer company.
The number two paid app, the lovely, meditative Koi Pond has been downloaded 900,000 times at 99¢ apiece, according to one report, certainly a nice year’s work for its developers, The Blimp Pilots.
But how about the number one paid app, the game Crash Bandicoot? Its total downloads are unreported, but one could assume a figure somewhat north of Koi Pond’s 900K — at $5.99 per copy, Crash Bandicoot must have Vivendi Games Mobile wondering how much richer they might have become had the world economy not suffered a total melt-down in the past year.
On the free side of the ledger Facebook and Google Earth run one-two, which is no surprise at all, given the worldwide popularity of those two web properties.
Apple has a giveaway contest going in conjunction with the countdown to one billion downloads, with winners slated to get a fully loaded MacBook Pro, a 32GB iPod Touch, a $10,000 iTunes Gift Card and a Time Capsule wireless hard drive.
Here’s just one of a number of interesting handmade iPhone and iPod cozys and cases from Vintage Coquette, a woman named Elizabeth, who describes herself as “a lover of all things cute and/or vintage.”
Check out her shop on Etsy – she is definitely channeling that special brand of cute with its roots in Hello Kitty and Japanese gadget-fu.
Watching Microsoft try to strike back at Apple with the Laptop Hunters series of commercials is almost hilariously tragic. Inevitably, the “ordinary people” (actors) who star in the spots go in “open-minded”, which means they’re looking for a very cheap laptop with a huge screen, which is a category Apple obviously doesn’t offer. The latest entry, with “Lisa” and “Jackson,” finds the hunters dismissing Macs as “cute” while making ultimate gasface, before getting really excited about a Sony VAIO with a 16.4″ screen and a Blu-Ray drive. Excuse me, “Blu-RAYYYY!” Because, as we all know, there is nothing more important than being able to watch a movie at 1080p on a plane. That’s just a fact.
Honestly, it’s a relatively smart ad campaign, but you can practically envision the ad agency pitch meeting, in which the research department notes that Apple’s cheapest 17″ laptop is almost $3,000, while Dell, HP and the rest make really cheap 17″ laptops — critical vulnerability. Here’s the thing. Very, very few people like 17″ laptops. They’re huge, heavy, and really hard to fit onto a cafe table at a coffee shop. Far more people are happier with something small, light, and thin — which is why Netbooks are all the rage right now. Not to give Microsoft free advice or anything — or to do Crispin, Porter and Bogusky’s job for them — but this would be a way more effective ad campaign if they had their shoppers walk out with four Eee PC 904HAs and had some change left over. All this ad campaign is showing is that if you want to get a big, heavy laptop with lots of stickers from Intel and Nvidia plastered on the wrist rest, you want a PC.
Meanwhile, Netbooks are actually a market phenomenon, and they offer something that Apple hasn’t delivered yet. But why play up innovation when you can play up cheapness? I suppose that’s the core difference between Apple and MS, after all these years. Apple always makes a big deal out of quality and design. Microsoft tries to hook you with a killer low price.
(Also, in writing about Microsoft’s “comeback campaign,” BusinessWeek noted that this ad shows the family choosing a PC because it has Blu-Ray, “on which many games are printed.” Um… for PS3, maybe. Has anyone ever released a PC game on Blu-Ray as an option, let alone as an exclusive?)
BasiCMYK is a talented photographer and self-described geek who was lucky enough to get one of the 300 limited edition PodBrix Young Woz and Jobs playsets when they were issued not long after the iPhone’s debut in 2007.
He’s also apparently a big Steve Wozniak fan, allowing in the description of the accompanying photo that “every time there’s a Stevenote I secretely hope The Woz will pop up on the screen.”
Something tells me there’s no limited edition Bill Gates or Steve Ballmer Lego knock-off playsets lurking out there anywhere.
Inspired by Magritte’s “The Son of Man” painting, this decal comes in black, gray and white for 13″, 15″ and 17″ laptops. If you’re going to add on to the already sleek design, it’s a nice take.
Apple sits atop BusinessWeek‘s list of “The 25 Most Innovative Companies” for the fifth year in a row, according to a statement released Thursday by the magazine and the Boston Consulting Group.
The news should come as no surprise to anyone who keeps up with trends in the computer, telecom and entertainment industries, though the report does contain undercurrents of weariness with Apple and the #2 company, Google. Both firms received more than 30% fewer votes in the 2009 survey than they got last year, with some respondents complaining about Apple and Google both “resting on past glory” and relying on “improvements [to] previous technology.”
The special report, “The World’s Most Innovative Companies,” will be featured in BusinessWeek’s April 20th issue, on newsstands April 10th.
BusinessWeek.com will also feature expanded content, including an interactive table of the full ranking of the top 50 most innovative companies, a slide show on 50 up-and-coming innovative companies, and a full description of the methodology used to compile the lists, at www.businessweek.com/go/09/innovative09.
Taiwanese company Elan Microelectronics has sued Apple for the unauthorized use of two of Elan’s patents in Apple’s MacBook, iPhone and iPod Touch products.
“We couldn’t find a common viewpoint with Apple, so we decided we had to take action,” Elan spokesman Dennis Liu told the New York Times, adding that the companies had been in licensing talks for about two years.
A statement published on Elan’s website says the patents cover innovations in touch-sensitive input devices incorporated into smartphones and computer touchpads.
“The first patent at issue, U.S. Patent 5,825,352 (“the ‘352 patent”), relates to touch-sensitive input devices with the ability to detect the simultaneous presence of two or more fingers. Multi-finger applications are becoming popular in smartphone and computer applications. The ‘352 patent is a fundamental patent to the detection of multi-fingers that allows for any subsequent multi-finger applications to be implemented. The second patent, U.S. Patent No. 7,274,353 (“the ‘353 patent”), is directed to touchpads capable of switching between keyboard and handwriting input modes.”
Elan said it won a preliminary court injunction against a U.S.-based rival, Synaptics, in a dispute over one of the patents mentioned in the Apple lawsuit, after a suit was filed in 2006 by a unit that was a subsidiary at the time. Synaptics countersued.
Both actions were dismissed last year after the two companies reached a cross-licensing agreement. That result likely emboldened the company to take legal action against Apple, an analyst who follows Elan told the NYT.
Getting physical with your iPhone may cause a short circuit from sweat. At least that’s what a couple of iPhone users in Houston complained about to “Ask Amy,” a consumer advocate segment of local news station KPRC Channel 2. (Story here.)
“I never would’ve bought a phone if I knew it would ruin the first time I got it out at the gym,” Stacie Keneker complained.
“They sell all these accessories that you are supposed to be able to use at the gym to make it convenient,” Lee Pittman, described as “peeved at Apple” said.
The news story goes on to say that Keneker and Pittman use their iPhones at the gym to listen to music or use the calorie-counting fitness applications that come with the phone. They said Apple employees told them their sweaty palms are the likely culprit here. So far none of these consumers has gotten any relief from Apple — moisture is considered an accident, so not covered by warranty.
“On most cell phones, the sensors are located underneath a removable battery and enclosed by the cover that usually locked the battery into place. In comparison, Apple’s sensor (at the bottom of the iPhone) could easily be set off by sweat from your hands. You can see the sensor locations for a iPhone 3G in the photo above and a Nokia cell phone below for comparison.”
The easiest way to avoid the problem may be using a case that covers both the headphone jack and the docking/sync connector.
What they are: Utilities for iPhone. Weightbot is a weight tracker that enables you to input your weight (in US, UK or SI units), whereupon it reveals your BMI and also tracks your weight over time, automatically graphing it. Convertbot is a conversion tool for things like speed, currency and length.
Why they’re good: Neither of these apps is unique in its field, but what Tapbots have done is create utilities that make the mundane a little bit fun. Suitably mechanical sound effects pepper the apps as tasks are done, and the interfaces are beautiful and tactile. Also, in taking a unique path regarding UI, these apps are more usable than most. Weightbot is a shining example of an interface suited to iPhone—it’s perfectly intuitive, making fine use of the touchscreen and accelerometer (for example, turn your iPhone sideways to see graphs). Both apps are also stable and affordable.
Where to get them: Both apps are available from the App Store (Weightbot, Convertbot). At the time of writing, Weightbot is priced at $1.99 and Convertbot is $0.99.
Shaan Hurley, technology platform evangelist for AutoDesk, has thrown down a hint about a major software development for Mac OS X. The company’s AutoCAD software is a last of the “I have to use Windows, because I need Program X” applications, and moving it to Mac OS X could have major impacts for people working in industrial design, engineering, and architecture.
Hurley says he’s now using both Windows and a Mac, and he would love feedback in a survey to “help shape the future of the next generation of AutoCAD products for the Apple Mac OS X Operating System and hardware.” That’s promising. Even though this was posted on April 1, Hurley assures that this is no April Fool’s joke.
Any hardcore AutoCAD folks who would make the switch out there?
An idea whose time has come: a massage table with an iPod dock built in.
The Sonora Sound Spa Table with integrated Bose Speakers and an iPod Nano has a $6,195 price tag, so it’s not the kind of thing most people could have at home.
But if these became standard equipment at spas, it would be a vast improvement. You could have your kinks worked out while listening to an audio book from home or some non-annoying relaxation music. (No more pan flutes!)
A 23-year-old iPod repairman pleaded guilty in federal court in Grand Rapids, Michigan to fraud and money laundering after acquiring more than 9,000 replacement iPod Shuffles by entering serial numbers into Apple’s Web site.
Nicholas Woodhams, who has to pay back Apple for the shuffle-and-switched iPods he re-sold for $49 each, also faces up to 30 years in prison.
As part of the plea deal, Woodhams also has to hand over a home in Portage, an Audi S4 sedan, a race car, a motorcycle, six computers and over $570,000.
U2’s lead singer Bono recently revealed in an interview with a DJ in Toronto that his ego knows no bounds. The band’s quiet break-up with Apple in favor of first Palm and now RIM? Well, it’s all because Steve Jobs wouldn’t let him help out with the hardware and software design of the U2-branded iPod.
“[RIM] is going to give us what Apple wouldn’t — access to their labs and their people so we can do something really spectacular,” Bono told Alan Cross.
Hmm. While I’ve always been impressed with U2’s ability to design an experience, ala ZooTV and the PopMart Tour, I can’t say that I have any confidence that U2’s input could have in any way, shape, or form improved the iPod. I’ll trust Apple’s creatives more than U2’s…singer.
It looks like an iPhone and is about the same size as one, but it won’t harbor any of the nasty germs of your smart device.
This artisanal iPhone soap, which sells for $7.99, smells like “mojito” or “tropical mango,” more than you can say for the real thing. The maker Meilin, whose day jobs have also included troubleshooting cryptic error messages from SQL server databases, has also put together soap to give programmers a smile and a bar resembling an iPod.
Over at Core 77, this earbud holder was an in-house entry in this month’s one-hour design challenge to make something useful out of business cards.
Eric says he’s been using it for a week and its still holding up..In any case, it’s a nice way to use those out-of-date cards (dot-com bust, anyone?) instead of just recycling them…
Other Apple-related entries in the business card challenge include an iPhone stand and speakers. Feeling creative? There’s still time to enter the contest — the top five entries win 1,000 business cards.
Sean Kovacs brings word of GV Mobile, his new iPhone and iPod Touch client for the Google Mobile service, which should be available early next week. Google Voice is a remarkable service built on an old start-up called GrandCentral that Le Goog acquired a few years back. Basically, it allows you to consolidate all of your phone numbers to a single number, control who can call you, screen calls, listen in to voice mail as it records, send free text messages, and transcribe your voicemail. It can even allow people to dial your phone by clicking on a link on a web page. And since it initiates calls, not just placing them, iPod touch users can create a phone call to a different device!
And GV Mobile packs most of that into a handy-dandy iPhone OS app. The video’s pretty slick, and it seems to carry over most of what makes Google Voice so much fun. For now, it’s available only to those who had GrandCentral accounts and those who know folks at Google, but this should be a great companionreplacement to the main iPhone dialer once the service goes more mainstream. Now, if only the free SMS was two-way… no one would ever pay for AT&T’s overpriced SMS plans again… 9to5Mac via Gizmodo
Well, who doesn’t like a little Michael Jackson, dancing babies and quick, snappy edits in a smartphone commercial?
But does anyone think Apple’s legal department won’t soon notice the uncanny similarities between the UI for LG’s Arena and Apple’s own iPhone?
It’s no secret that Apple loves LG displays, but whether that love extends to a willingness to overlook LG’s ripping-off the iPhone’s UI remains to be seen. On the other hand, it’s possible LG licensed the UI. Neither Apple nor LG representatives were available for comment at press time.
Text strings in the latest beta release of iPhone 3.0 software indicate support for the 802.11n wireless standard, according to several reports over the weekend.
In addition to representing an upgrade to the WiFi capabilities of yet-to-be released versions of iPhone and iPod Touch, support for Broadcom BCM4329 chips — through which 802.11n would be accessed — could improve battery life on Apple’s mobile devices. iThe iPhone and iPod Touch currently only support slower 802.11b/g networks.
Perhaps the more interesting implication of details emerging in the 3.0 beta is the promise of video recording and upload capability, a feature some have derided the iPhone for lacking in its initial releases. A recently discovered video upload screen indicates a new version of the iPhone is meant to be able to upload video to MobileMe accounts, which would no doubt come as a welcome feature upgrade for users of Apple’s web services product.
It’s possible video uploading would be supported to any server, and that Apple will also be releasing iPhone software to edit video on the fly, but even if official support for video is limited, whole new avenues for 3rd party development will open up as a result of video on the iPhone.
As others in the smartphone market struggle to catch up to Apple’s product and services offerings, it appears Steve Jobs may have been right when he said his company is already years ahead of the competition.
Stanford’s School of Engineering recently launched a 10-week course on iPhone programming, available gratis on iTunes.
The video podcasts of about an hour each that teach programming for the iPhone and iPod Touch are the same ones offered on the Palo Alto campus, minus the tuition, with a few days lag time.
“There’s a lot of interest in the iPhone,” said Brent Izutsu, Stanford’s project manager for Stanford on iTunes U. “This course provides an excellent opportunity for us to show the breadth and depth of our curriculum and the innovation of our students.”
Not surprising, now that the media are calling the race to make money-making apps the new “gold rush.”
Via Apple Insider
What it is: A menu extra that provides at-a-glance statistics relating to CPU usage, memory, drives, your network, drive temperatures, fans, Bluetooth and date & time. Stats are shown in the menu bar, and each item’s menu provides further information.
Why it’s good: It’s fast and it’s stable, plus, unlike many similar applications on the Mac, it’s free. Set-up is absurdly simple, done via a System Preferences pane (although, iStat menu guys, being able to open configs directly from each menu would be a nice idea). The crowning glory is the Date & Time module. It enables you to show the time and date simultaneously in the menu bar, and the item’s menu provides a simple calendar and optional world clock. All three of these things are available as individual shareware via other companies, but here they’re all integrated, well implemented and free.
Where to get it: iStat menus is available from the iSlayer website, and even if you only use the Date & Time module it’s worth a look. Note that if you use the app very regularly, a small donation will help iSlayer work on future verisons.
The doll version of Steve Jobs wears a black turtleneck, jeans and the kind of intense gaze bound to make you feel guilty while downloading useless apps instead of masterminding something great.
Brought to you by podbrix, the same folks who created a limited-edition Young Woz and Jobs Playset in Lego (unfortunately sold out), this plush version of Jobs will cost you about the same as a pair of Apple earbuds ($32.00, shipping included).
Only 500 available, so if you want a pocket guru, now’s the time to act.
