Cult of Mac

From a current advertising circular. But the proximity of the “i” and the “Phone” must be a coincidence, right? Right?

Don’t buy them all at once, now. Plenty of Ralph’s “iPhones” to go around.

Thanks for the tip, SBI!

UPDATE: Another online back-up solution to consider is Mozy, which gives out 2 gigs for free and charges for any additional storage. You can check them out here.

Backup remains the most elusive and under-appreciated form of computer technology. Though everyone knows we should, no one actually backs up other than the most diligent among us. I have a huge external hard drive, but I manage to put things on it maybe once every few months, if that. Good thing I did that at all, of course, as my hard drive just died on my Powerbook.

Anyway, until Apple unleashes Time Machine in Leopard to change back up forever, there are other things to try. One such as Carbonite, an online backup service that’s got some decent buzz on the PC side and now has a Mac client in beta. I haven’t given it a shot myself yet (will report back soon), but hey, free software!

If you’d like to get in on the beta, send a note over to [email protected] and mention Cult of Mac. The old high school friend who tipped me off claims that’s all there is to it. Let me know how it goes — he’ll hear about it if there are any troubles.

As you’ve no doubt seen by now, Apple announced the sale of its 1 millionth iPhone Monday morning, just five days after Steve Jobs cut the multimedia communicator’s price by $200. No one can seem to agree whether this is a successful launch or not. Some folks even predicted that Apple would sell 1 million iPhones would sell in the first weekend.

So it might make sense to look back at the historical data. How long did it take to sell 1 million iPods? According to official sales data, Apple didn’t pass the psychological barrier until July 2003, almost 21 months after the company first put 1,000 songs in our pockets. It took eight times as long, and for a device that was cheaper, didn’t require a subscription and was going after a completely unclaimed market, whereas the iPhone is aiming for the strengths of the mobile handset market.

Now, the first iPod was only available for Macs, but even the first quarter of the 3G iPod that finally got Apple over the one million hump only included 304,000 iPods sold, despite being designed for Windows. No matter how you slice it, the iPhone has been a break-out hit from day one. And with the price finally in line with the competition, the future’s only looking better.

We’ve known the new iPods for just a week, but they’re already getting a bit too familiar. The guys over at iFixit performed strip searches of both the iPod classic and the new “fatty” iPod nano and posted the evidence. I’ve got shot of the nano in the raw after the jump, then head over to the full gallery.

Way back in January, when the iPhone was young, readers uniformly predicted that unlocked iPhones would hit the streets moments after Apple released the device. I was rather conservative in saying it would take 24 hours — some readers said unlocked iPhones would be common on eBay a week before the street date.

And yet, it’s really taken until…uh, NOW, for widely available iPhone unlocking to arrive. iPhoneSIMFree is a $99 application that makes the iPhone work on any GSM carrier worldwide, including T-Mobile, where I’m stuck for the time-being. Visual Voicemail is broken off of AT&T, but everything else is just fine and dandy. Anyone ready to take the plunge now that the price is down and AT&T isn’t an absolute requirement?

Most of the furor over the big iPhone price cut is over-blown. I’m still frankly amazed that Apple has offered $100 store credit to every iPhone owner who isn’t benefiting from the $200 price drop. It’s unprecedented and creates a dangerous expectation that the same will happen the next time Apple cuts a product’s price.

But at least the people who have complained most loudly about Apple’s decision to me OWN iPhones. I can’t say the same for Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post, who claims he would be “iRate” about the price cut. If only he owned one.

This time, though, he has failed to live up to one clause in his implied contract with iPhone buyers. The sky-high price was supposed to guarantee a decent period of exclusivity. For a time, if you bought an iPhone, you were supposed to be the envy of your friends. The ability to show off all the neat things it could do was your compensation for the fact that the iPhone didn’t really change your life.

Hmm. Yes. Other than that, it’s a pretty standard “What’s wrong with the world today?”-type column (Did you know that technology doesn’t actually solve all of life’s problems? Or that people are getting stabbed with knives and forks? And calling each other names like dork?). But he had to change direction at some point — it’s hard to lead the charge of a cause when you’re not actually part of it.

Via Daring Fireball.

Though Apple’s big iPod announcements last week promise to make video playback the new status quo in digital media players, one minor detail got lost amid the excitement. Though the new video nanos, iPod classics, iPod Touches and iPhones are capable of 480p output via a new Component video connection kit, they won’t be capable of working with third-party video accessories released over the last two years, such as those cool portable DVD player lookalikes that were all the rage a few months ago.

According to b, the new iPods’ TV-out feature requires an authentication chip found almost exclusively in Apple accessories, such as the (now-dead) iPod HiFi and the Universal Dock. Otherwise, the menu item is locked out. There is no apparent technical reason for this, just a monetary one. Pretty skeevy of Apple. anyone feeling burned right now?

Boffo scuttlebutt out of Lalaland: Fruit-tech tells the Nets to chop epi-bucks in half! Socko! Peacock.

(Non-Variety translation: Rumor has it that Apple wants to change the price of iTunes TV downloads to 99 cents.)

I’ve been thinking and talking a lot about why Apple would want to force the networks to make less money per download on TV shows, and the best answer I’ve heard comes from my fiancee: Apple believes cheaper downloads will lead to more sampling, and therefore greater popularity for newer shows.

Think about it. You’ve heard great things about “How I Met Your Mother,” but you don’t want to spend the time or money to get the first DVD on NetFlix. The whole series isn’t available through On-Demand cable, and you’re definitely not sold enough to buy the box. With a full iTunes archive, you could try out the pilot for a buck. At $2, it feels too much like you’re over-paying for a set you might want later, as sets average out to about $2 per episode. At a dollar, it’s a product sample. For $2, you’ve already invested.

The real competition for iTunes downloads isn’t DVD box sets — it’s cable On Demand service. That’s what hasn’t clicked until now. The TV networks, because many of them also own record companies, can only view their product compared to song prices. But it’s an artificial comparison. Which will you play more times: A hot song you love or an hour-long episode of Heroes? If anything, songs should cost more than TV shows.

For myself, I would buy a lot more shows on iTunes if the price goes down — especially for series I don’t watch or from channels I don’t subscribe to. The more I think about it, the more I like it. It’s incredibly consumer-focused, but also focused on growing the audiences of series with niche followings. It means more revenue than On-Demand for the networks, as well as possible boosts for DVD season box sets.

What do you think, how would your iTunes habits change if the TV prices drop?

Via Buzzsugar.

The legions of iPhone owners who were enraged by yesterday’s $200 price cut on the device they paid $599 for have been heard in Cupertino, as Apple CEO Steve Jobs has announced a $100 store credit good for any purchase at physical Apple Stores or the online Apple Store. The offer applies to anyone whose purchase fell out of the 10 business day window where Apple gives out price break credits.

Though making a considerable offer toward appeasement, Jobs did take the opportunity to chastise iPhone owners in his letter:

Second, being in technology for 30+ years I can attest to the fact that the technology road is bumpy. There is always change and improvement, and there is always someone who bought a product before a particular cutoff date and misses the new price or the new operating system or the new whatever. This is life in the technology lane. If you always wait for the next price cut or to buy the new improved model, you’ll never buy any technology product because there is always something better and less expensive on the horizon. The good news is that if you buy products from companies that support them well, like Apple tries to do, you will receive years of useful and satisfying service from them even as newer models are introduced.

Ouch! What say you, iPhone owners? Is this good enough? Or will nothing less than $200 do it for you?

Thanks for the heads-up, d0b3rmann!c

Nothing Steve Jobs announced this morning was as surprising as the $200 price cut to the 8 GB iPhone and the discontinuation of the 4 gig model (currently blowing out at $299 while supplies last — deal of the century). Less than three months on the market, Apple chopped the price by more than a third.

Readers of the blog (and lots of other sites) are screaming bloody murder, throwing about accusations that defenders of the price cut are Apple employees, demanding refunds and more. I would love to join in on the outrage, but this is entirely typical of the way Apple handles truly new technologies.

The very first Mac debuted in February 1984 for $2,499 with 128k. Just eight months later, the company rolled out the Mac 512k for $3300 in September. That would have been fine, but the Macintosh Plus, with 1 meg of RAM, came out in January 1985 for just $2,600. Anyone who bought a Mac 512k got hosed even worse than the earliest adopters.

When the first iMac came out, it shipped in August with a 233Mhz processor and a stunningly under-powered graphics chip for $1,299. Two months later, a revision tripling the video ram came out for the same price. It was the difference between playing Myth at all and not, on a non-upgradable machine.

The multicolor edition shipped in January for the same price, a 266Mhz chip and a significant better graphics chip. By may, 333Mhz chips rolled for the machines. And then it all got replaced by the iMac DV, which included FireWire, completely obsoleting the previous line.

Perhaps the most egregious recent Apple screwing consumers moment came with the iMac line in 2005 and 2006. The iMac G5 with ambient light sensor shipped in May 2005. Then it was replaced by the iMac G5 with a built-in iSight in October, just three months before the transition to Intel chips, when an identical but much-faster machine came out for the same price.

And, of course, the AppleTV was on the market for just two months before Apple brought out the 160-gig model, with four times the storage of the non-upgradable original.

I’m still paying the price for getting a first-gen Powerbook G4 12″. I got no SuperDrive, no DVI port and no USB 2.0, even though I bought just two months before the upgrade.

At this point, if you buy a first-generation Apple product, you’ll probably see either a huge price drop or feature boost within a couple months of your purchase. It’s nasty, it’s mean and it’s capricious, but it’s the way Apple works. If you want to get the most from Apple, wait for their products to mature and drop in price.

It’s entirely likely that a 3G iPhone with a 16gig drive will be announced in Europe in September. That’s just the way Apple operates. I think the reason it’s so upsetting in this case is that the company always introduces its products with flair and says to the world, “This is the one! This is how it should be done!” And we believe it, we overpay, and watch in dismay as Apple introduces One More Thing after One More Thing…

In what has now become the most frequent and most frequently unrequited Apple rumor, the company did not announce the availability of Beatles songs on iTunes. Despite featuring Paul McCartney in an iTunes commercial, and Steve Jobs downloading a John Lennon song and a McCartney song during the intro of the iPod Touch, the Beatles catalog is still unavailable for sale as a download.

The only reason I care any more is because it’s such a tease. Jobs is a Beatles fanatic. The lawsuit with Apple Corps is settled. At the end of the day, it’s not a big deal, because everyone who likes the Beatles owns their music in other formats already, but this is just starting to get bizarre.

Picture via The Apple Press.

In the most unanticipated news of the Apple “Beat Goes On” event, CEO Steve Jobs announced that the high-end 8 GB iPhone will now retail for $399 with a two-year AT&T wireless plan, a price cut of $200 less than three months after the device first shipped.

Jobs said that the company would ship its 1 millionth phone this month and wanted to make the device more accessible, hence the cut. I have to also see the move as strategic related to the new iPod Touch, which delivers every feature of the iPhone except for e-mail, text messaging and phone calls, and will retail for $299 for an 8GB model. Making the iPhone cost $100 more for the same size and costing the same as a 16GB model is a lot more palatable than a $300 premium.

Still, I wonder what this says about the success of the iPhone. We’re talking about a 33 percent price cut. Is Apple disappointed by iPhone sales or merely competing with itself

Via Gadget Lab

At San Francisco’s Moscone Center West, Apple CEO Steve Jobs today met every bit of speculation that fans of the iPod had thrown in his direction in the week leading up — and then some.

The biggest news of the day is the iPod Touch, a virtual twin of the iPhone that eschews phone features and ramps up the multitouch multimedia features. The Touch carries a 3.5 inch screen on a body only 8 mm thick — even thinner than the iPhone. The device has 8 or 16 GB of storage and will sell for $299 or $399.

In a very surprising move, however, the device keeps the iPhone’s WiFi antenna and Safari web browser. It offers almost the full capabilities of an iPhone without the need for an AT&T account. In all likelihood, VoIP calling could be enabled with a microphone accessory, making this a true phone replacement for the adventurous. I had thrown this out as a possibility last week and dismissed it as cannibalizing iPhone sales too much. This is one gutsy move by Apple.

The device can even purchase songs and videos directly from a new WiFi-based iTunes Store that will now also be available to iPhone users. Anything purchased from the store syncs back to users’ computers. All content costs the same as it does on the full store, and everything available through the traditional iTunes store can be purchased from the WiFi store. Perhaps most bafflingly, Apple has a new partnership with Starbucks that will allow iPhone and iPod Touch users to press a fifth button in Starbucks stores to find out which song is playing in the store and instantly download it to their device if they like it. Users can see the last 10 Starbucks songs. Starbucks chairman Howard Schultz joined Jobs on stage for the announcement. Wifi iTunes Store connectivity is free at Starbucks — but not to the wider Internet, which will require a T-Mobile Hotspot account.

Jobs also announced the iPod classic, a revamp of the original iPod in a metal case at 80 GB and 160 GB, selling for $249 and $349 for those with bigger storage demands; oddly squat video iPod nanos at 4 and 8 GB for $149 and $199; color iPod shuffles at 1 GB in a (product) RED configuraiton; and 99-cent ringtones for iPhone.

All images via GadgetLab

We’re all waiting for Steve’s next big announcement, and in the mean time, why don’t we scarf down some of these sumptious Mac cupcakes, brought to you by GeekSugar? I really like the designs, which went straight for icons rather than attempting to represent more familiar Apple artifacts. Can you name them all before we eat them?

Other than the idiosyncracies of its software keyboard and the slowness of EDGE wireless, the biggest deficiency in the iPhone is its lack of instant messaging capabilities. Apple has been slow to bring out a true iChat client, so third parties have introduced a variety of solutions, none of which have been that great. That might be over with the introduction of mobile chat from twenty08 (mirror here), which looks as good as an Apple app and runs twice as nicely. Currently, it only supports AIM protocol, but the developers have GPL’ed the code, so it should get better over time. Get it while it’s hot!

Via Digg.

After Friday’s rumpus relating to NBC’s withdrawal from the iTunes Store, it’s small wonder that the company has already made a business decision to thumb its nose in Apple’s general direction. The Peacock Network will make theirs Amazon Unbox, the amazing new service that no one uses.  And, wouldn’t you know it, Amazon has consumers in mind, right NBC?

“This further expands our longstanding relationship to bring a robust content offering to the marketplace in a variety of ways that will benefit the consumer and, at the same time, protects our content,” said NBC Universal’s president of digital distribution, Jean-Briac Perrette, in a statement.

Whoops! Looks like they’re just being greedy! It’s known that NBC got into a dispute with Apple over fixed pricing on iTunes, and wouldn’t you know? Amazon offers a variety of over-priced options and makes it way harder to actually watch anything you download! In fact, Unbox won’t let two people in the same household share content on a device — in other words, couples are SOL.

What a kinder, gentler model! <Sigh> I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: iTunes saved “The Office.” What a pity that NBC can’t tell.

Ars Technica 

The accelerometer is the technology of the moment, featuring in the Wii and iPhone, both of the era’s biggest breakout technologies. Jason Kottke, always provocative dares to ask: Do their sensors measure up to those built into babies? The answer may shock you.

So while the Wiimote’s accelerometer may be more sensitive, the psychological pressure exerted on the parent while lowering a sleeping baby slowly and smoothly enough so as not to wake them with the Moro reflex and thereby squandering 40 minutes of walking-the-baby-to-sleep time is beyond intense and so much greater than any stress one might feel serving for the match in tennis or getting that final strike in bowling.

Via Digg.

If you’re wondering where to hang your hat tomorrow morning as Steve Jobs takes the wraps off a new bunch of iPod products (oh, c’mon. Do you really think he would just introduce a leather case and a speaker set? That never happens!), feast your eyes to our colleagues at Wired’s Gadget Lab. They’ll be down in sunny Cupertino, typing like madmen to bring us all the freshest information. If iPhone Socks get announced, you’ll see it there first! The fun begins at 10 Pacific sharp. We’ll see you there.

Predicting the future of any technology is a risky proposition. Weird, unexpected things happen that no one can anticipate. Lest any of us forget, for a brief moment in 1998, many assumed that DVD-Audio would replace the CD before something called Napster totally changed the game.

But predictions of the future are fun (why else is speculation about Apple so fascinating?), and everyone gets in on the act at some point. The latest to try to imagine what comes after the iPod is Rick Rubin, the bearded producer who launched the career of the Beastie Boys and revived those of the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Johnny Cash. He’s legitimately credited with helping to break hip hop worldwide, but I hardly think his abilities to accurately read the new sound 20 years ago has anything to do with his ability to guess how we’ll get our music.

“You’d pay, say, $19.95 a month, and the music will come anywhere you’d like. In this new world, there will be a virtual library that will be accessible from your car, from your cellphone, from your computer, from your television. Anywhere. The iPod will be obsolete, but there would be a Walkman-like device you could plug into speakers at home.”

You want to know what I love about this quote? That it’s actually stating the complete obvious,  but it also anticipates a future where people treat music differently than they do now. First, yes, the iPod will be obsolete at some point in the future. And then Apple will release a new one, including one that works in speakers at home (Oh, wait, that’s been around for years). People are obsessed with the current solution instead of thinking about the needs that it meets.

The bigger question is why anyone thinks subscription music will suddenly take off, however, I can’t guess. Subscription music has never been big, dating to the Columbia Record Club. We’re probably only a year or two from a time when we can put our entire iTunes libraries into a cloud we can access from anywhere, but I want it to be my library, not every song ever. I want to have access to the whole library and choose a song to download, but I want to add things to my library, not have glorified radio going on.

But you heard it here first folks: Sometimes, technology gets obsoleted!

Via Epicenter.

The iPod will get three new features at Steve Jobs’ media extravaganza Sept. 5 according to the rumor mill: a touch-screen, Wi-Fi and digital radio. I think two of three are likely:

1. The touch-screen is a slam dunk. It’s the natural successor to the scroll wheel. Who’d buy a new, high-end iPod without it? Case closed.

2. Wi-Fi is unlikely. What’s it good for? Sharing tunes with other iPod users in public, ala the Zune? Maybe, but I think not. Copy protection and DRM is too problematic. How about using Wi-Fi to sync tunes with your computer? Maybe, but you’ll still need a cable to charge the device, so what’s the point? Maybe Wi-Fi could connect the iPod to a set of speakers via an Airport Express base station and AirTunes? Seems like a lot of trouble for a pretty minor feature. Wi-Fi is good for getting on the internet, so unless the iPod is also getting Safari and e-mail, I don’t see the point of adding it.

3. Digital radio is the real killer. It’s a feature that could spell real trouble for the satellite radio industry. With digital radio, the iPod could be a portable TiVo for music, automatically recording favorite shows, rewinding live broadcasts and purchasing songs over the air. Digital radio is so consumer-friendly, it’s completely transformed the UK radio market in a couple of years, and though U.S. broadcasters seem terrified of it, the success of satellite radio is spurring them into action. As Wired News reported in July:

“In the United Kingdom, more than 4.7 million digital radios have been sold since 1999. Listeners browse station listings in an electronic program guide, pause and rewind content as it’s broadcast, bookmark specific programs or songs, and record them using postage-stamp-size memory cards. And starting in May, they can buy songs as they hear them on the radio, downloading them to computers, digital receivers or cell phones.

… IBiquity says that the HD Digital Radio Alliance, a consortium of U.S. broadcasting chains, will commit nearly $250 million in air time to promote the format in 2007. And UBC Media’s Simon Cole says that satellite’s head start in the United States might actually be good news for HD Radio. “Satellite is softening up the market,” he says. “It’s waking U.S. consumers up to what digital can deliver.”

Sunday, I caught a cab with some friends over to a favorite bar in the lower Haight. By complete chance, we got the most Mac-loving cabbie in the entire city. He was blasting music on his iPhone through the stereo, and he fixed his 4g iPod while he drove by slapping it around a bunch. Most impressively, he announced plans to sell off a recently acquired Titanitum PowerBook G4 for parts on ebay. He was a consummate wheeler-dealer.

To cap it all off, as we arrived at our destination, he pulled out his iPhone, scrolled through his video list and produced the intro movie for Leopard, which I hadn’t even seen yet. Needless to say, it was gorgeous on the iPhone. Enjoy the visuals, courtesy of San Francisco’s finest. Apple’s really embracing that supernova look, eh?

Apple just slapped NBC down hard. Responding to reports NBC was pulling out of the iTunes Store, Apple announced that it was prematurely canceling their partnership — Because NBC wanted $5 per episode of its shows!

Apple® today announced that it will not be selling NBC television shows for the upcoming television season on its online iTunes® Store (www.itunes.com). The move follows NBC’s decision to not renew its agreement with iTunes after Apple declined to pay more than double the wholesale price for each NBC TV episode, which would have resulted in the retail price to consumers increasing to $4.99 per episode from the current $1.99. ABC, CBS, FOX and The CW, along with more than 50 cable networks, are signed up to sell TV shows from their upcoming season on iTunes at $1.99 per episode.

Incredible. NBC has benefited from iTunes more than anyone else, and they’re throwing out crazy price increases. I mean, that would have made Friday Night Lights Season 1 cost $110! NBC is selling the DVD for less than $20 brand-new with more special features! If this is any indication of Hulu’s pricing scheme, it’s screwed out of the gate.

Via Daring Fireball.

Rick James pic from CBC.

A lot of mystery remains about Apple’s big iPod event next week. Will we see widescreen touch iPods (what were known as “true” video iPods before the iPhone showed up)? Nanos with video? A shuffle that can scramble your brain?

What is certain is that, for once, Steve Jobs won’t demonstrate a new iPod video with a clip from “The Office,” as NBC Universal has announced its withdrawal from the iTunes Music Store as of December, according to the New York Times. While it’s possible that existing content will remain or that NBC will offer new content on an as-chosen basis like Universal Music has, it’s more likely that NBC is packing up its toys for Hulu.com, the bizarre commercial video service that NBC and News Corp. promise to launch “real soon now.”

This is a huge blow — NBC makes up 40 percent of all video sales, and I can’t think of a recent iTunes event that didn’t feature an NBC show, which really says something, given Steve Jobs’s close ties to Disney and ABC. Not a sign of doom, but a clear sign that Apple isn’t as secure in video as it has been in music.

Via Apple 2.0.

Just got the chance to watch this absolutely hysterical video that demonstrates the iPhone as rendered by Microsoft. It savages the company every which way for some typical and not-so-typical flaws that show up in MS products. It’s so spot-on, in fact, that it reminds me of the notorious “Microsoft iPod” commercial from a few years back.

Of course, that spot turned out to be generated by Microsoft itself, so it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that this is of similar origin. It’s the kind of video you watch yourself to remember what not to do, you know? Especially since the user who uploaded it has no other videos on YouTube…

Via Apple 2.0

Leopard isn’t even here yet, but the first big Easter Egg has already turned up. All icons for the new version of Mac OS X are resolution independent (basically, they can scale to be freaking HUGE), which provides all kinds of room for mischief. Apple has already taken advantage, printing the full text of the first “Think Different” commercial (Also known as “Steve’s back in town, boys!”). Ah, memories

Italian site Macity turned up the thing, which makes them responsible for my tears. I’m not crying, though. I was just cutting onions — making a lasagna.

For one…

Via Digg.