Sep 12, 2007 Sep 14, 2007 Thursday September 13, 2007
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iPhone SIM unlock giveaway: round 4
Filed under: Announcements, CellphonesSorry we're running a little bit late on today's contest, but here it is! If you haven't (or don't want to) hit up iUnlock, the free, open source iPhone SIM unlock solution (which is still early on yet, but does indeed work), why not try your hand at taking home one of our iPhoneSIMfree "retail" unlocks? The IPSF crew has hooked us up with five iPhone unlock licenses to give away to you, our faithful, iPhone obsessed readers, so just hit up the simple rules below if you want to give it a shot. Here's how it works:Details about the unlock Bring your own iPhone. We're not supplying the device, just the unlock. You must send us your iPhone's IMEI; you can't resell the unlock. If we don't receive your IMEI in a timely manner, we may award the unlock to someone else. We will not be offering tech support on the unlock. Once you've got it, it's out of our hands, ok? We do not make any guarantees about the unlock. We're not guaranteeing that it will work when your phone gets the next Apple update later this month, that it will work with your SIM or your carrier, or even that it will work on your phone. We're not even going to guarantee you won't end up with a bricked phone. We're just handing it off to the winner, the end. The other regular rules (yeah, there are always rules): Leave a comment below. That's it! Who loves you, baby. You may only enter this specific giveaway once. If you enter this giveaway more than once you'll be automatically disqualified, etc. (Yes, we have robots that thoroughly check to ensure fairness.) In other words, be careful when commenting and if you submit more than once, only activate one comment, ok? If you enter more than once, only activate one comment. This is pretty self explanatory. Contest is open to anyone worldwide! Duh. Winner will be chosen randomly. Entries can be submitted for the next 24 hours. After that we'll move on to the next iPhone unlock. Good luck! Permalink | Email this | CommentsOffice Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!
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Oops: iPod classic v. semi-truck
Our iPod classic underwent an accidental stress test today, and managed to come out (mostly) alive. A MacBook that went through the same test, however, was not quite so lucky.Read More...
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16GB iPod Touch appearing in Apple Stores
Apple Stores are receiving their first shipments of the iPod touch, so act fast and you may have bragging rights for a few more weeks!Read More...
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iMac Software Update 1.1
Filed under: iMac, Software Update, AppleApple has released yet another tersely worded update, this time for everyone's favorite all in one Mac: the iMac. The iMac Software Update 1.1, ' provides important bug fixes and is recommended for 20-inch and 24-inch iMac models with 2.0, 2.4, or 2.8GHz processors.'Apple really doesn't make it easy to blog about these updates, since their descriptions tend to be a little light on details. But it is important and fixes bugs... so you know, download it and stuff.Thanks, monkeyclaw.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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iTunes Store having issues?
Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video Apple might have pleasantly surprised a few people today by shipping out the iPod touch earlier than expected, but that's being a bit overshadowed by issues plaguing the iTunes Store: users are reporting that purchased content isn't downloading, and that iTunes is popping up error messages saying that it's "unable to check for purchases." No word on what's causing the problems -- we're betting it has something to do with the launch of the iTunes WiFi Music Store, which hasn't gone live on the iPod touch or shown up on the iPhone yet -- but that doesn't make it any less annoying.[Via iLounge] Read | Permalink | Email this | CommentsOffice Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!
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News: See iPod touch, iPhone comparison videos now
In addition to our unboxing and comparison photos, iLounge has posted a series of comparison videos enabling you to see the iPhone and iPod touch alongside one another. The following videos are available: iPod touch versus iPhone Interface Comparison: See the iPod touch and iPhone interfaces running next to each other—everything minus music/video playback, Safari, and iTunes. iPod touch versus iPhone Safari Loading, Body Comparison: See…
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Office 2008 to offer easier enterprise deployment
In order to allow for easier deployment of Office 2008, the new version of Office will now use the Apple Installer and come as a .pkg.Read More...
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Top Ringtones Added To iTunes Store
Immediately after the debut of the iTunes ringtone feature for the iPhone, we have been graced with a top ringtones list to see what’s popular and what blasts out of everyone’s iPhones. I myself am not a huge fan of ringtones, I am still rocking it on the…
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iPod touch showing up in stores, gets unboxed
Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video So much for "a few weeks" -- just eight days after being announced, Apple's new iPod touch is showing up in Apple Stores, the support page just went live on Apple.com, and you know it's already gotten lovingly unboxed. Big ups to jmobley for doing the honors -- check out the rest of his Flickr set at the read link.[Thanks to everyone who sent this in] Read | Permalink | Email this | CommentsOffice Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!
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Incredibly Close Up Pictures With an iPhone
How do you think this close up picture of cigarettes was taken? Macro lens? What would you say if I told you that it was from the 2 Megapixel icamera on the iPhone? Believe it or not, these pictures were taken…
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iPod touch in the Wild
Apple Stores have iPod touch in stock.
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First Looks: Oakley O ROKR Pro Bluetooth Eyewear
A little more than one year ago, Oakley released O ROKR, a pair of stereo Bluetooth 1.2 headphones attached to a pair of Oakley sunglasses. Coupled with a Motorola Bluetooth-ready phone or an iPod equipped with a separately-sold Bluetooth transmitter, O ROKR let you wirelessly hear music or take phone calls. Now there's the Bluetooth 2.0-equipped O ROKR Pro ($249), which uses similar styling to the company's lighter, thinner plastic Thump Pro sunglasses,…
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iPod touch Features Guide available
If you can't wait for the iPod touch, download the Features Guide and prove how much of a nerd you are. Read More...
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News: iPod touch shipping, unboxing photos on flickr
The iPod touch is now available at some Apple Stores, and the first unboxing photos of the device have appeared on photo-sharing site flickr. The iPod touch comes in a hard box, similar to the iPhone's, and features a photo of the device's “Now Playing” screen, with album art from artist Corinne Bailey Rae. While the iPhone shows users a picture of the earth, and states “Activate Phone”, the iPod touch shows a picture…
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First Week With The 160 GB iPod Classic
Here’s an unformatted collection of thoughts and experiences since picking up a 160 GB iPod Classic, the last one in stock at the Apple Store in Alpharetta GA, last weekend. This blog is going to be from the point-of-view from someone who’s jumping from a 2nd gen (click wheel) iPod to the 6th gen “classic” model. So some of this is new to me and won’t be new to those of you with more modern iPods. Though I’m not completely oblivious to iPod evolution: I have been borrowing a 2nd gen nano from my wife while my old one is in the shop (no, it’s not back and not refunded after more than two months; yes I have initiated a chargeback). I’ll Take the 160 Gig Classic, If You Have Them in Silver, Please Over the course of August, I set about re-ripping my entire CD collection, pictured below. I’d previously ripped probably about 200 CD’s at various bitrates, and with the advent of iTunes Plus re-setting my feelings about appropriate bitrates, plus a 300 GB second drive in the G5 still only half full, I decided to move the collection up to 192 kbps AAC for rock, 256 for jazz, classical, soundtracks and everything else. Rather than pick and choose what to rip, or try to figure out exactly which discs I’d already done, I figured it would be faster to just get everything. At the end of this process, I had a library that was about 60 GB. So when Steve announced the new iPods, I was kind of stumped. To their credit, Apple has rolled out an iPod product line that’s very clear in the appeal of each unit: ModelConcept ShuffleTiny, cheap, giftable NanoSmall, cheap, video, giftable ClassicEnormous storage TouchNovel, new functionality, widescreen video I’d been pining for an iPhone-like iPod, but the iPod Touch would only be able to hold a quarter of my music, and wouldn’t have much room for video. So given this chart, and with the size of my library fresh in my mind, the sensible choice for my needs was the Classic. Yeah, the widescreen would be great for video, but I just didn’t know how much video-watching I would really need (besides, if I’m traveling, I probably have my PowerBook and can watch DVD’s on that). Of course, some people are asking why there wasn’t an iPod Touch offered with an HDD. I suspect that would be too much a change of the form factor of the Touch, making it un-Steve-ishly bulky. So, given the choice between compromising the Touch and having more models out there than Apple would usually prefer, they chose the latter. But I wonder how long the Classic will really live on? 160 GB is crazy huge… maybe when Apple can get 32 GB of flash memory at a reasonable price, we’ll see the end of the HDD-based iPod. Initial Sync Copying 60 GB of music over USB 2.0 is no small task. I initially was just going to have iTunes sync my library to the pod, but then thought better of that and went back to manual mode. I selected all my tracks and dragged them over: I let that go for about two hours. When it was done, iTunes got slow and balky, and wouldn’t let me copy video to the iPod. Eventually, it just crashed. So, I ejected the iPod and found that rather than having 10,000 songs in my pocket, I had 0. Grrr. At this point, since I had little or no usable data on there other than my podcasts, I did a “restore”, and then started copying songs in smaller chunks, about a thousand at a time. Much better. Notes and Nonsense So, anyways, I finally had all my tunes, plus a few ripped DVD’s and a TV show I bought from iTunes. So how well does it actually work? Here are a few impressions: Notice how the screenshots show the menu set against part of an album cover? The cover art is randomly selected from your library, and moves with a sort of “Ken Burns effect”, changing every 8 seconds or so. Cover Flow is stupid. No, it’s inconsistent. iTunes knows to group together artists from a compliation like a soundtrack, either by use of the “compilation” flag, or by assigning an “album artist” (even if it’s just “various artists”). The iPod, on the other hand, repeats a cover over and over again, once for each artist on the album. Maybe iTunes is right and the iPod is wrong, maybe vice versa, but they really ought to both work the same way. Syncs take a shockingly long time. Shocking because it’s not clear that iTunes is really doing anything — before you get to the file-copying, you’ll spend as much as 30 seconds enjoying the Spinning Beachball of Doom. Ejecting the iPod Classic takes about 60 seconds, which seems ridiculously long. Memo to self: only plug it in to sync and charge, because waiting for the eject is damned annoying. Since we’re talking about the old-style iPod screen, and not the widescreen of the Touch, 4:3 video like TV makes a lot more sense than widescreen movies. To illustrate, the TV show Rumbling Hearts versus a DVD rip of the widescreen movie The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension: The cable connection is inconsistent: sometimes neither the Finder nor iTunes notices when I’ve plugged in the iPod. In a weird case earlier today, I plugged in the iPod and went on with some other business, not noticing that it hadn’t mounted. Later, an iCal alarm woke up the iPod and made it beep, and with that, it mounted in the Finder and appeared in iTunes. Weird. I forgot to take a picture of this, but kana characters look beautiful in the new GUI. If you’re into J-pop or J-rock or other content where the song titles are in Japanese or Chinese characters, you’ll find it’s crisp and clear to read on the screen. Hey, have you been using the enhanced podcast format (either with apps like Garage Band, or the Chapter Tool)? Well, you can stop now. The iPod Classic doesn’t show the images at the chapter stops. Come to think of it, it looks like the Chapter Tool has disappeared from Apple’s website too? Oh, and you know what? I’m thinking 160 GB might end up being more than I really need:
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MakeiPhoneRingtone updated to be more reliable with AAC files
An update to MakeiPhoneRingtone uses a more reliable method for adding AAC files as ringtones to iTunes. Better get crackin' before Apple releases an iTunes update.Read More...
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Want a BMW? Have an iPhone?
Perfect! Then you are welcome with open arms at BMW dealerships. Of course BMW had to be first in introducing its cars fitted with the ability for iPhone integration. I don’t know about you all, but I want a…
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More rumors about iTunes movie rentals
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, iTS, Multimedia, Video, iTunes, AppleCNN Money has more fuel for the fire on the iTunes movie rental rumors popping up lately. They say Apple is in talks to get the rentals up and running with major Hollywood studios.Supposedly the movies would be watchable on the iPod or iPhone, but could not be copied, and would not actually be purchased. You'd have a 30 day access period to the movie for $2.99, but CNN doesn't say whether that means you get to watch it once during the 30 days, or if it's yours for as many times as you want it during the period. The low price says just one viewing to me (since iTunes movie purchases are at least $9.99, if not more), but you never know.Of course, the big question is: would you do it? If incorporated with the iTunes WiFi store, I think it could be huge-- be somewhere bored on your iPhone, click a few buttons, and be watching The Incredibles within minutes. But as usual, it all depends on what the studios want-- if the whole process is burdened with DRM, and I get error messages when I try to re-sync with iTunes, they can keep their rentals. I'll just make a note to put it in my Blockbuster queue.[via Ars]Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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★ The Ringtones Racket
Steve Jobs, introducing iTunes 7.4 during last week’s Apple special event: “We’re going to ship a new version of iTunes tonight, to support some of the new products you’re going to hear about shortly. And the biggest new feature is going to be ringtones. Well, we’re going to do ringtones in our own special way.” Apple’s own special way of doing ringtones is this: You can only use songs purchased from the iTunes Store; you must pay an additional 99 cents on top of the price of the song itself; only a small subset of the songs at the iTunes Store are eligible; and, if you decide to create a second ringtone using a different segment of the same song which you’ve already paid for twice, you must pay for it again. But you do get to pick which segment of the song to use. This “special way” seems fair only when compared to the ringtones offered by competitors, which, as Jobs pointed out in his keynote, typically sell for $2.50, which price includes only the ringtone snippet, not the entire original song itself. The whole ringtones racket is predicated on the notion that ringtones are something different than songs. This notion is bullshit. You don’t turn songs into ringtones; you treat them as ringtones. They’re not even a different file format. It’s just a different context for playing the same song on the same device.1 This false notion that ringtones are something in and of themselves is an anachronism, an artifact dating back to the time when mobile phones existed in their own ecosystem, wholly separate from the PC or the Internet. There was no way to transfer songs from your computer to your phone, because phones didn’t support USB or Bluetooth. Back then, if you wanted new ringtones, the only way to get them onto your phone was through your mobile service provider. And because people did want them, and there was no other way to get them, the mobile providers were able to charge exorbitantly high prices for them. But ringtones are simply digital audio files — no more, no less. (Actually, they are less, given that most are only 15 or 30 seconds long.) The way it should work today, not just with the iPhone but with any music-playing mobile phone, is that any song the phone can play should be allowed to be specified as a ringtone. If you shouldn’t have to pay for each device on which you play a song — computer, iPod, Apple TV — then clearly you shouldn’t have to pay for each context for playing the same song on the same device. Instead of the complicated, confusing mess of a ringtone policy that Apple announced last week, what they should have announced is this: Any song you can play on your iPhone can be used as a ringtone for no additional charge. Want a new ringtone? Just buy it from iTunes or rip it from a CD. Yes, this might have further antagonized Apple’s already-contentious relationship with the music labels (and with the entertainment media conglomerates in general; cf. NBC), but the reason these relationships are rocky is that the executives running these companies are stubborn fools who are only willing to consider ways to keep things the way they were, and who hold their own customers in utter contempt. You can’t reason with the masterminds behind “ringles”. The distinction between ringtones and songs is an artificial marketing construct. It is a misconception, albeit a widely held one, that there is any foundation in copyright law for this, i.e. that an honest consumer is obligated to pay for ringtones separately from “regular” songs for some legal reason. Not so. Copyright attorney Nilay Patel dispelled this notion last week in a piece at Engadget. Patel points out that, oddly enough, even the RIAA agrees: Well, the RIAA wanted to be able to distribute ringtones of its artists without having to pay them big money to do so (surprised?), and it won a decision last year before the Copyright Office saying that ringtones weren’t “derivative works”, meaning they didn’t infringe on the copyright of the songwriter. So if you have the right to play a song, you have the right to use it as a ringtone on your phone. There’s no reason to feel one iota of guilt about using tools like MakeiPhoneRingtone or iToner. All That Is Gold Does Not Glitter Clearly, in some way, Apple is beholden to the whims of the music labels with regard to iTunes’s ringtones support. There are over six million songs available for sale through iTunes, but, as of this writing, only 500,000 are available for purchase as ringtones. Why aren’t all songs available for purchase as ringtones? Clearly it’s not Apple’s choice, but a limitation imposed upon them by the music labels. Even if we concede for the moment that it’s reasonable to charge additional money to use songs as ringtines, the question remains: What is wrong with the music labels that they won’t allow Apple to sell every song at iTunes as a ringtone? It boggles the mind. The recording industry is going down the tubes because people are buying less and less music each year; but here, in iTunes, they’re willfully turning down potential sales. Customer: I’m willing to pay you an extra dollar for this song I’ve already given you a dollar for, so that I can use it as a ringtone on my iPhone. Music Labels: Nope. iTunes — the application, not the store — has long supported two distinct types of music: files obtained from outside the iTunes Store, and those purchased from the iTunes Store and restricted by FairPlay. The difference being one’s afforded usage rights; FairPlay-protected songs are restricted in terms of the number of devices they can be played on, for example. With the introduction of ringtones support, iTunes now breaks songs into three groups: Non-iTunes Store songs. iTunes Store songs which are not eligible for sale as ringtones. iTunes Store songs which are eligible as ringtones. Apple’s right to sell songs through iTunes is not simply a matter of copyright law. If we assume, as seems likely, that the music labels stipulated in their contracts with Apple that songs to be sold at an additional cost for use as ringtones must be cleared separately, the distinction between groups 2 and 3 is not under Apple’s control. But group 1 — those songs in your iTunes library which you did not purchase from the iTunes Store — is under Apple’s control. Apple can’t charge you for the right to use these songs as ringtones, but they could allow you to do so for free, just as you’re allowed to play them on a Mac, iPod, Apple TV, or iPhone for free. They could do it, but they haven’t. From the inception of the iTunes Store, Apple has done right by its customers. The iTunes Store was conceived and designed as something customers would enjoy. It competes fairly, both against traditional music sales on physical media such as CDs, and against illegal bootlegging. It can’t beat bootlegging on price, but it can beat it in terms of convenience and user experience. Three billion songs sold can’t be wrong. iTunes’s new ringtone feature, though, is the first time Apple has created a feature that is only usable with iTunes Store tracks. Burning to disc, transferring to peripheral devices such as iPods and Apple TV, playing over the air to Airport Express — in all these cases, the features work with all songs in your library, wherever they came from. In fact, prior to ringtones, the only special treatment iTunes granted to iTunes Store files were additional restrictions, such as the “only five authorized computers” rule. The difference with ringtones isn’t legal; it’s that there’s money to be made. Even if you agree that the entire notion of a “ringtone industry” is a racket, you might be tempted to argue that Apple would be foolish not to participate simply because it’s a profitable endeavor. But rackets seldom continue forever. Short-term, yes, surely Apple is already generating additional revenue from the sale of ringtones. But this money comes at a cost: resentment. For any song you already own on CD, Apple is asking you to pay three times for it in order to use it as a ringtone on your iPhone: once for the CD you’ve already purchased, again to buy a needless duplicate of the track from the iTunes Store, and a third time to generate the ringtone. A fair, free “just use the songs you already own as ringtones” policy wouldn’t generate revenue directly, but it could be used as a powerful marketing bludgeon. Consumers know what ringtones are, and they know that mobile providers want them to pay through the nose for them. Imagine an ad proclaiming that with the iPhone, any song in your iTunes library can be used as a ringtone. Want to use a new hit single as a ringtone? Just buy it from the iTunes Store, and play it everywhere. The policy as it stands now, on the other hand, discourages people who know better from buying tracks from the iTunes Store. Apple may well close or change the loophole in a future iTunes update, but as of version 7.4.1, the “change the file extension” trick and yesterday’s newly discovered metadata trick (now used by MakeiPhoneRingtone 1.1) allow informed iPhone users to do what they should be able to do, both by common sense and U.S. copyright law: use any song they already own as a ringtone — but only with songs that aren’t protected by FairPlay.2 Faced with the choice between doing what’s right for customers or charging them money for something they shouldn’t need to pay for, Apple chose the latter. There is no middle ground. And any business that hinges on your customers “not knowing any better” is a bad business. Even when using a snippet rather than the entire song, a smart implementation could simply store the “ringtone” as time markers indicating which portion of the song to play. And even if the implementation does involve creating a copy of the original song file, it’s no more something you should pay for than the copy of a song on an iPod synched from your computer’s iTunes library. ↩ iTunes Plus tracks, however, do work as free ringtones using these tricks. And Ambrosia’s $15 iToner utility somehow allows you to use even FairPlay-protected songs as ringtones. ↩
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GelaSkins for your iPhone
Filed under: Accessories, iPhoneThe iPhone is great and all (expect my review of the iPhone within the week, I know you are all dying to hear what I think!) but there is one major problem with it: Apple is selling a ton of them but they all look the same. When you reach a certain density of iPhones within a group there is a high likelihood that someone will end up with the wrong iPhone. Luckily, GelaSkins offer up some highly attractive iPhone skins (with accompanying wallpaper) to help your iPhone stand out in the crowd.The GelaSkins iPhone skins cost $14.95 a pop.[via Laughing Squid]Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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False: iPhone Unlock Hack Impersonations And The Truth!
Ever since the iPhone’s introduction, the level of noise, drama and suspense is enough to force anyone to tear their ears out. Unfortunately its reached a new pinnacle, almost to the point where this could be an epic novel filled with action,…
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PC Mag gives iPod Touch an Editor's Choice
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, iPod Family, iTunes, Reviews, ApplePC Magazine has given the iPod Touch a 5/5 score and their Editor's Choice award. High praise even from a definitely non-Apple source. Tom Gideon calls it "a thing of beauty," and says it's the best iPod ever. Well, no duh.He does say a major drawback is that the WiFi store doesn't contain movies, but that's just a matter of time, isn't it? Otherwise, he says the store works great, and will allow for plenty of spur-of-the-moment music purchasing (which surely Apple will love). Gideon even spends quite a bit of time on what I really think is one of the most important features of the iPod Touch-- the Starbucks integration. Every time you pass a Starbucks, an icon shows up in the dock of the iPod Touch's iTunes WiFi screen, and that is huge. Advertisers with even a little bit of forward-looking ability are probably fainting at the thought of what they can do with what.Strangely enough, Gideon doesn't mention the one problem I have with an iPod Touch, and the reason I'm sticking with my video iPod: the memory. 8 and 16gb are just embarrassing for a serious music player, whether the interface is amazing or not. For Gideon and other folks with only 16gb of music, obviously it's not a problem. But for us music lovers, who want to carry around our entire collection in our pockets, the current Touch doesn't cut it. Better to stick with a classic and leave the awesome interface for the iPhone.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Macally busts out cup holder-compatible BTCUP iPod FM transmitter
Filed under: Portable Audio, Wireless It's far from the first cup holder-compatible iPod dock, but Macally's new BTCUP boasts a few more tricks than the usual fare, including not only an FM transmitter, but Bluetooth hands-free functionality as well. To make the former task a tad easier, the device includes up and down buttons and a backlit LCD display to let you tune in to any FM frequency between 88.1 and 107.9, with the hands-free calling option also accessible at the touch of a button. For some added privacy, the BTCUP comes equipped with an earphone, and it'll of course charge your iPod as it pumps out the tunes (the device itself is powered by the cigarette lighter outlet). Look for this one to set you back $120, with a BTCUP specially designed for the iPhone set to follow sometime in the fourth quarter of this year.[Via PC World] Read | Permalink | Email this | CommentsOffice Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!
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New Apple Wireless Keyboard unboxed (and shipping)
Filed under: Hardware, AppleTonight is the night of new Apple product unboxing! First we had the iPod Touch unboxing and now we have Flickr user MischievousOne's pictures of her brand new Apple Wireless Keyboard (which, it would seem, is finally shipping though the one I ordered hasn't shipped yet) here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.I asked MischievousOne how she liked the new keyboard and she said, 'I also love the feel of the keys. I've got a black MacBook and I love typing on it. This is very similar to that, if not exactly the same. So far, I like it a lot.' Sounds about right to me. Any of you received your new wireless keyboard yet?Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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iPod Touch Features Guide (PDF)
This is certainly curious: Before you can use any of the iPod touch features, you must use iTunes to set up and register iPod touch, and to create an iTunes Store account (if you don’t already have one). (Thanks to Rosyna.) ★
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iPhone vs. dog: 1 - 0
Filed under: Humor, iPhone The sight of a poor, defenseless Nano getting smashed under a tire was bad enough but a dog versus iPhone story? Well, that's enough to bring a tear to the eye. Tyler Hall left his iPhone on a table recently while he took a shower and it seems his dog mistook it for a Snausage.Luckily, Tyler pried the phone away from Gracie before she could totally destroy it and the ringer/speaker seems to have sustained the most damage. The screen protector did its job and when Tyler removed it, there wasn't a mark on the glass.Continue reading iPhone vs. dog: 1 - 0Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Mac Office 2008 to Use the Standard Mac Installer
Good news from Microsoft’s Mac BU’s Dunstan Gourlie: To that end, I am happy to announce that Office 2008 for Mac will use the Apple-recommended Apple Installer technology for Office 2008 installation. This means that the data that Office installs will ship on the disc in .pkg format, installs will work well with Apple Remote Desktop (ARD) and will be Applescript-able. Once installed, the user has the freedom to move the Office folder to a different location on the system and Office will run from there. I hope that this will make Office for Mac configuration/deployment easier for IT admins.  And in other good news, they’re no longer going to spew additional fonts in your Library folder whether you like it or not. ★
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mStation Orb - Coolest iPod Stereo I’ve Ever Seen
The mStation Orb has been out for a little while now, but I missed it when it initially launched. I caught my first glimpse of it today, and I have to say, there is something about it that I really dig. The mStation Orb has a dedicated subwoofer, Syncs with iTunes, and 30 watts of superior power. It was also named “Best New Product� at Retail Vision. It comes in blue, red, pink, green, silver, black and white. It's available now, and it'll run you $129.95. Click Here for more info.
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How can I remove my photo from messages in Apple Mail?
Remain anonymous by messaging your contacts on the down-low.
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News: mStation announces mophie Wraptor for iPhone, iPod classic, touch, 3G nano
mStation has announced the redesigned mophie Wraptor case for iPhone, iPod classic, iPod touch, and third-generation iPod nanos. The mophie Wraptor combines a scratch-resistant polycarbonate shock-resistant outer shell with a pop-up soft rubber cord wrap for earphone cord management. The cord wrap pops up to allow users to wrap up their earphone cords, then folds down to secure and hide the earphones. The mophie Wraptor for iPod nano, classic, touch…
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iPod Touch unboxing
Filed under: iPod FamilyNo sooner do we get word that some Apple Stores have the iPod Touch in stock do we find some unboxing pictures (via our sister blog, Engadget). The pictures aren't the best but it will give you a good idea of what comes in the box (here's a hint: other than the iPod, not much. Am I the only one that misses the days when you got lots of stuff with your iPod? I feel like an old man, 'In my day iPods came with docks! And they had a FireWire port! And they were Mac only! You kids with your iPods and your touching.').If those pictures leave you clamoring for more iPod Touch info check out the iPod Touch Feature Guide (yep, it is a PDF).Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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iPod Touch spotted in some stores
Filed under: iPod Family, RetailAn eagle-eyed and (understandably) excited reader let us know that the Apple Store Somerset in Troy, Michigan had a few iPod Touches for sale ahead of the September 28th ship date. A quick call to the store revealed Dan was right, they had 14 in stock but were already sold out. The store employee said that some retail stores, particularly on the East coast, have been receiving shipments already. He said that though they're mainly designed to be floor models, stores have been selling them to customers as well. He says the rolling shipments are expected to continue until the 28th when all the retail shops will have them in stock.The Apple Store employee added one last thought before the call was ended. "They're so worth the wait," he said. No doubt.Permalink | Email this | Comments
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iPhone UK Launch Speculation, Apple's New Logic Studio, QuickTime Update, and More
Is the September 18 shindig in London for the European iPhone? Plus, Apple has new software for music production, there's a new QuickTime update, and can you guess what product is cooler than the iPod?
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Cha-Ching 1.1 brings more power to importing, organizing finances (Updated)
Tag-based financial manager Cha-Ching has been updated with new tagging tools, a polished UI, and more bank compatibility. For those who don't need the kitchen sink in their financial software, Cha-Ching is a better option than ever.Read More...
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iTunes Ringtone Maker Works but Calls for Improvement
Apple's new iPhone ringtone making option, which is built into iTunes 7.4.1, is astoundingly cool and yet annoying at the same time. First, the cool. It's cool because it's so easy to create a custom ringtone. Cell phone users who have previously balked at paying something like $3 for the latest radio hit ringtone -- if they could even figure out how to find, download and install it on their phones -- can now make their own iPhone ringtones out of their favorite "eligible" songs for $1.98.
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Apple Schedules U.K. Press Event for September 18
Hello, iPhone. ★
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Yours Truly on Last Night’s ‘Your Mac Life’
I was a guest on last night’s episode of Your Mac Life, talking to host Shawn King about the breakdown between NBC and Apple, and iTunes’s new ringtones racket. ★
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News: Poll: Did Apple screw up on iPod touch storage?
Before Apple introduced the new slate of iPods, we ran a poll asking which potential new iPod interested you the most. The responses were clear: 80% of iLounge readers most wanted a hard disk coupled with a large touchscreen display. Now that Apple has revealed the iPod touch, coupling an iPhone-like screen and interface with iPod nano-like memory capacity, we want to know your thoughts. Did Apple drop the ball on this product, creating something…
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News: Apple posts iPod touch Features Guide
Apple has posted a PDF-formatted Features Guide for the iPod touch. The 85-page guide covers virtually all aspects of the device's features, interface, and connectivity. According to the guide, the iPod touch will come with a pack-in stand for viewing video and photo slideshows, and will allow users to display playback controls when the device is locked with a double-click of the Home button. The guide also explains the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store…
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Rig of the Week: Mac mini at sea
Filed under: Mac mini, Rig of the WeekWe've seen lots of Mac mini based carputers, but now reader Matt sends us a link to this excellent Mac mini "boatputer" setup. Running MacENC navigation software, this Mac mini is hooked up to a GPS reciever, waterproof display and waterproof touchpad to give real-time marine navigational charts to Bob Etter, the enterprising sailor who built it. I think this nice piece of nautical Mac kit is clearly worth a TUAW Rig of the Week nod.Thanks Matt!Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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A great combination: European iPhones, Starbucks coffee, and Pavarotti
[My apologies to the memory of Pavarotti, but I just couldn't resist]Reuters says that Apple has called a UK press conference for Tuesday, September 18. The big buzz is that this is the beginning of the iPhone Europe barrage, whereby we find out which carriers -- the current favorite in the UK is O2 -- and which stores will carry Apple's flagship phone/ipod/internet communicator. But you never know with these special events. Given the love Steve Jobs was passing out for Starbucks at the iPod special event, perhaps, we'll be getting an announcement of the iLatte.Personally, I am intrigued by an idea passed on by reader Paul Rudé, who suggested that Apple perhaps might want to use its Starbucks relationship as a new vehicle for selling iPods and iPhones in Europe. Given my prior observation concerning Apple's lack of retail stores and Genius Bars in Europe, having a channel relationship with Starbucks could extend Apple's reach into European retail. Such an arrangement might be particularly effective with some type of "Mobile Genius" support, where Apple Geniuses would hold scheduled service sessions at local Starbucks shops and thereby provide some of the on-the-ground support that customers look for at Apple Stores, and do so in a friendly, neighborhood environment. Yes, it would be a huge undertaking and would require a deep relationship with Starbucks in terms of logistics, training, and compensation. But on the other hand, if Apple can manage to create stores-within-stores in Best Buys in the US, the idea may not be completely crazy. And for those worried about disconnect between the prices of expensive Apple electronics and Starbucks coffee, don't forget that Starbucks already sells $1,000 expresso machines here in the US.In Paul's note, he also suggested another exciting idea to Apple Europe: Apple should buy the video rights to the full Pavarotti funeral mass and sell video copies via the iTunes store. In Europe, where opera fans are much more common than here in the US, such a video program could be very popular, and there are no conventional sources for that content. Without the constraints of shelf space, the iTunes store is the ideal venue in which to sell such a program. And it would further demonstrate to international Apple customers that Apple appreciates their interests as much as US ones. It would be a very smart marketing tactic in Apple's iPhone launch into Europe; I think Apple should pick up on it. Technorati Tags:Apple, Europe, Humor, iPhone, iTunes, Marketing, Starbucks, Pavarotti
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iTunes movie rentals round 2: 30 days, $2.99
Rumors of movie rentals coming to the iTunes Store are back, with unconfirmed details and empty hope. Still, it sure would be cool and could give the Apple TV a whole reason to exist.Read More...
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iPod touch gets its first review, release date
Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video Here it is, ladies and gentlemen, the first review (or at least the first we've seen) of the iPod touch, Apple's new iPhone-aping, widescreen media player / WiFi device. If you can't wait until September 28th (the proposed release date), you can sink your teeth into one lucky critic's view of the new device. According to PC Magazine, the iPod touch is a, "Thing of beauty," which shouldn't surprise anyone, considering the praise for its design-doppelganger, the iPhone. The review notes that all of the media player and internet controls are the same as the aforementioned device (Cover Flow, lists, zooming, etc.), though the touch allows you to "double-click" the button on the front of the device to bring up a music control-panel, no matter what application you're in. It's not all sweet-loving however -- PC Mag isn't too psyched on the Starbucks feature, which apparently can't be turned off, and says that the earbuds are absolutely awful (no real surprise there), though the complaints are minor compared with the praise lavished on the player. Don't take our word for it, though, hit the link and read the whole thing for yourself. Read | Permalink | Email this | CommentsOffice Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!
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News: iPod classic tests reveal audio problems
Newly released audio measurements comparing the iPod classic to a fifth-generation iPod suggest problems with the newer iPod's Cirrus Logic audio codec. Having initiated a discussion in Apple's iPod classic forums, Marc Heijligers writes, “The measurements show is that the iPod Classic indeed has an uplift in treble, and its timing response is incorrect.” According to Heijigers, the new Cirrus Logic audio codec chip, which…
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News: Gecko Gear debuts Gecko Ice for 3G nano
Gecko Gear has given iLounge an exclusive first look at its upcoming Gecko Ice case for the third-generation iPod nano. The two-piece clear hard plastic case completely covers the nano except for the Click Wheel and hold switch/headphone jack/Dock Connector, and will include a neck lanyard, protectors for both the Click Wheel and Dock Connector, and a Universal Dock connector. The Gecko Ice will be available in October, and will sell for $25.…
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Tip: Look up words in place using the dictionary
When you encounter an unfamiliar word while reading online, what do you do? Maybe it's a term you've never seen before, or maybe you think you know what it means or how it's pronounced, but you're unsure. When you're reading offline, you probably skip over such words after having scanned the surrounding words for context. But online, on a Mac, you can look up the word in place: (more…)
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Missing Icons on iPhone? Exciting. Missing Icons on Touch? Pitiful.
The iPod Touch may feel cheaper or look cheaper than the iPhone (we won’t know for sure until it ships) but what we do know is the main menu screen looks like the iPhone home screen. But the similarities end at the…
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Mac 101: change keyboard modifier keys with a Windows keyboard
Filed under: Switchers, Mac 101You may recall that one of Apple's slogans when the Mac mini was released was BYOKM-bring your own keyboard and mouse. Well a lot of those keyboards will of course be Windows keyboards, and while they work fine on a Mac, there's one particularly annoying thing. For some reason the keyboard Windows key is mapped to the Mac Command key and the keyboard Alt key is mapped to the Mac Alt or option key. The reason this is a problem is that on a Windows keyboard the Alt key is right next to the spacebar (where the Command key is on a Mac keyboard). So if, like me, your keyboard shortcut muscle memory is to the key next to the spacebar then all your shortcuts get messed up on a Windows keyboard. Fortunately, there's a simple solution to this problem in the Keyboard tab of the Keyboard & Mouse Preference Pane. There if you click on the "Modifier Keys..." button you'll be taken to a dialog where you can easily remap the keys. So to make a Windows keyboard work like a Mac keyboard just change the option key to the command key and the command key to the option key as follows:Continue reading Mac 101: change keyboard modifier keys with a Windows keyboardRead | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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A Baffling New Phenomenon: Customized Ringtones
At last week’s presentation for journalists in California, Apple unveiled a refreshed iPod lineup and several secondary developments. One of them, which I didn’t have room to cover in my iPod review today, involves the availability of custom ringtones for the iPhone. Ringtones, of course, are little 30-second snippets from pop songs that play on your [...]
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A script to ease scp for files with odd names
Here's a perl script that will escape filenames and send the files to a remote server using scp. I save it as scp-to-coppit.org in my user's bin folder, and make it executable (chmod a+x scp-to-coppit.org). Then from the command line, I can do this: scp-to-coppit.org File with weird char's.txt. Here's the code:#!/usr/bin/perl@ARGV = map { s/'/\'/g; $_; } @ARGV;my $files = "'" . join("' '", @ARGV) . "'";my $results = `/usr/bin/scp -rBq $files dcoppit@coppit.org:.`;print "Output: $results" if $results ne '';[robg adds: I haven't tested this one.]
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Discover a Sticky note's creation and modification dates
When a note in Stickies is collapsed (double-click on its title bar or type Command-M), you can hover the mouse on the title bar to see a tooltip appear that shows the Sticky's creation and modification dates. For some reason, this doesn't work when the Sticky is expanded.[robg adds: In my testing, this worked just fine when the Sticky was expanded -- just hover over some portion of the title bar, and you'll see the creation and modification info pop-up. Nifty trick.]
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10.4: Recover from a dragging issue in Disk Utility
I think this is an issue with Intel Macs, but it may be all Macs with a 10.4 Installer DVD. Apple has a support document, Unable to drag and drop in Disk Utility while started from install DVD, that explains a bug in Disk Utility found on some 10.4 Install DVDs (including my MacBook Pro's). I ran into this when my hard drive failed, and I needed to clone it to send it off to Apple for replacment -- and now again that I want to upgrade to a new 200Gb 7200/16Mb internal hard drive.There is a workaround beyond those provided by Apple, assuming your internal hard drive has Disk Utility on it, it's in the normal place, and you are willing to use Terminal. After you boot from the Installer DVD, and are on the first installer screen (just past the language screen), go to the Utilities menu and choose Terminal. In Termi...
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Free Ringtones for your iPhone - including the Totally Rad Show Theme!
There are several ways for iPhone users to get Free Ringtones on their iPhones now. From our own iRing, to Rogue Amoemba's MakeiPhoneRingtone, iToner and more…but so far I haven't seen any Free Ringtones for the iPhone. So, I thought I'd make a few in Garageband. Below you'll find 6 completely free, completely legal iPhone Ringtones including the theme to the Apple Gazette Daily podcast, and the theme to my favorite video podcast The Totally Rad Show. 80's Cop - Inspired by the greatest 80's Cop movie of all time, this theme makes me want to run around sticking bananas in tail pipes all over town… Acoustic Mellow - To me, this one sounds like half the songs released in the 90s. Matchbox 20 fans should feel right at home with this one. Heavy Guitar - If the Foo Fighers were making a generic sounding Ringtone, it's possible that it would sound something like this. Sands of Adventure - Composed mostly of Middle Eastern Instruments, this one, surprisingly, reminds me of the television show Firefly, and is probably may favorite of the bunch. Apple Gazette Daily Theme - The current theme of my Daily Apple News podcast. Totally Rad Show - TRS is my favorite video podcast, and I highly recommend it to anyone interested in Movies, Video Games, Television, and Comics. Used with permission. Click Here to check out the show.
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3G iPhones will arrive before Christmas, says analyst
An analyst is predicting that 3G iPhones will appear before the end of the year, based partly on the recent deal with InterDigital for 3G technology.Read More...
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Apple Holding Special UK Event on Sept. 18th
Tuesday September 18th, 2007 is the date. London's Regent Street Apple Store is the location. “Mum is no longer the word” is the tag line associated with the announcement, and those three facts are all we're going to know about what Apple has planned for their UK special event next week. Of course, everyone is assuming one thing, and one thing only - iPhone. Since this is special event is coming only a week before the Apple Expo Paris, which is the largest Apple Evnt in Europe, it's safe to say that this announcement is specific to the UK - making it even more likely the the iPhone will be the focus of the event. Apple Gazette will, of course, cover the event as best we can or all our UK readers. I'm not sure yet if we'll be able to live blog it, but at the very least, we'll have the information from the invent as soon as it's over. via TUAW
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News: ezGear rolls out cases for iPod classic, touch, 3G nano
ezGear has announced its new line of cases for the iPod touch, iPod classic, and third-generation iPod nano. The clearCase Classic for iPod classic ($25) is a clear acrylic case for the iPod classic, and offers access to the dock port, headphone jack, hold button, and Click Wheel, and comes with an integrated removable belt clip and removable neck strap. The ezSkin Slimline for third-generation iPod nano is a silicone case that features access to…
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The New iPods are Confusing
Ahh remember the good old days when there was one iPod? That amazing beautiful little 5 gigger that changed the music industry forever. And then there was the second generation, then the third, then the shuffle, the nano, the video and now the iPod touch. How far we've come.…
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Apple: Mum's the word until the 18th
Apple has sent out invites to members of the UK press to a special press event on September 18. The invite says "Mum's no longer the word."Read More...
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Samsung's SGH-P520 is the Armani Phone
Filed under: Cellphones It's been awhile since we've heard from Samsung's SGH-P520. Now we know why. The pretty little touchscreen was undergoing a couture refitting in preparation for launch as the Armani Phone -- take that LG Prada. Priced at €400 (about $557), this FCC-approved tri-band GSM / EDGE candybar is listed with a 2.6-inch 240 x 320 pixel display, stereo Bluetooth, and microSD expansion to augment the 50MB on-board. Funny, we heard it also has WiFi though there's no mention of it by the folks at GSMHelpDesk who tracked this pup down. Expected before the end of the year in Europe.[Via Unwired View] Read | Permalink | Email this | CommentsOffice Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!
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InformationWeek sums up Mac buying for newcomers
Filed under: SwitchersMitch Wagner bought his first Mac in February of this year, and the 8-month gestation period has given InformationWeek's Mac blogger plenty of experience with his new platform of choice (and don't forget what "experience" really is); he's now realized that he can share this hard-won wisdom with other folks new to the platform. Hence, The Newb's Guide to Apple, a collection of the advice and buying guides from IW over the past year. In case you're wondering whether you should buy an iPhone -- Wagner says "I love mine, but you don't want to get one yet." OK, um, sure thing...Despite the slightly deprecatory title (seriously, I don't know anyone who likes being called a 'newb'), Wagner's helpful links are worth a visit for new users and anyone thinking about a new Mac purchase. His piece on where to buy and find support offers a suggestion I hadn't heard before: try scifi and fantasy discussion groups, that's where the geeks are (he recommended SFF.net's Mac forum). Happy shopping!Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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News: Apple UK holding 'Mum is no longer the word' press event
Apple UK has sent out an email invitation to select media outlets announcing a press event to be held at the Apple Store, Regent Street in London on September 18 at 10:00 a.m. The invitation reads simply, “Mum is no longer the word.”, and includes directions to the store. The event could likely be used to introduce the European version of the iPhone; however, no confirmation of such an announcement has yet been given by Apple, or by the…
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YouTube Find: Apple Ad featuring a “Hero�
Before he was Peter Petrelli on Heroes, Milo Ventimiglia, was…well…Jess on Gilmore Girls…but before THAT, he was in this Apple commercial…
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A Second (Graphical) Look at Apple's July iPhone Sales
Carl Howe at Blackfriar's Marketing has put together a Quicktime movie that sheds an interesting light on Apple's (AAPL) million iPhone mark. He was responding to commentary in the press and blogosphere -- in particular Dan Frommer's Apple's iPhone 1 Million Is Below Plan in Silicon Alley Insider -- suggesting that it reflected weak demand. One of the points Howe makes in rebuttal was that the iPhone was hard to find for 21 of the 74 days it took Apple to sell those 1 million units and he supports that assertion with this cool little clip: Click on the above image for a movie of iPhone availability for the month of July; Quicktime required Howe goes on to write a couple graphs that shivs Apple skeptics so deftly that I quote them in full below the fold: This is a very typical pattern for Apple. Whenever it tries something new, various pundits bet that it will fail in the effort because, well, just because. BusinessWeek wrote the epitaph of Apple retail when it launched, and now those stores garner more dollars per square foot than any other retailer, bar none. The iPod was written off by Slashdot as "No wireless. Less space than a Nomad. Lame.", and the iPod is now by far the dominant music player. And now bashing the iPhone's success (which by the way, writers from Bloomberg and CNET to Suckbusters, not to mention John Dvorak, claimed would fail horribly) and price cut has become the latest journalistic parlor game. But it's also important to remember that even with all the launch and sales-bashing, the iPhone remains one of the best-selling consumer products in history as measured in dollars, passing Microsoft Windows 95, Microsoft's XBox 360, and even the Nintendo Wii launches. At one million phones, Apple has pulled in about half a billion dollars in sales that will add to its balance sheet over those 74 days, And at the new price point and with the holiday season approaching, those numbers will only go up rapidly, regardless whether the actual sales for the year are 2 million, 3 million, or 10 million. (link)
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Is the iTunes Music Store scratching and skipping?
Filed under: iTunesOver the past couple of days, we've received reports here at the TUAW home office (located in the seaside town of Ocean Beach, MD; excellent taffy) of multiple download problems in purchasing music at the iTunes store. While the transaction completes as far as billing is concerned, the actual file downloads... don't. Users are getting connection errors and the file never seems to arrive. In addition to the reader reports, a couple of us have seen the problem firsthand.There are several threads on Apple's discussion boards covering the issue, and most seem to converge on the suggestion that a large download queue may be behind the problem, or a single corrupt song that blocks further downloads. If doing a manual check for purchased and undownloaded music doesn't solve the problem, Apple's download support page for iTunes recommends submitting a problem ticket within your iTunes purchase history; this should allow the customer service agent to clean your queue and improve your download experience. For worldwide customers, the main directory for iTunes support is here.For what it's worth, late Wednesday night I bought an album that downloaded cleanly and quickly, but obviously people's mileage is varying. With the level of attention brought to the iTunes store by the NBC withdrawal and the iPod product announcements, this is not the time for Apple's technical execution to falter; the iTunes Store didn't get to be the #3 music retailer in the USA by stalling customers in the checkout lines. We'll keep an eye on the trouble reports and see how things progress.P.S. One year ago, the iTunes store was down for a good reason...Thanks to everyone who sent this in.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Why I Don't Have an iPhone
Recently I was asked the question, "Why is it that you hate the iPhone?" The surprising thing about that question is that I don't hate the iPhone at all. However, I can see why so many of you would think I do. After all, given that I own multiple companies with promiment presence in the Mac and Apple space, you would almost expect me to have one. I almost expect me to have one, but I don't. When colleagues ask me if they should get one, more often than not I find myself talking them out of it. There are a few reasons for this which I'd like to explain.
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iPhone Assassin (and 100 other iPhone games)
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Gaming, iPhoneReader Silver sent us his site of iPhone games, basically just a big linklist of online web games for the iPhone. There are buttons there for voting and "favorites," but I couldn't get them to work. Still, if you're looking for a big lineup of what's out there to play, there you go.And on that list, I found a pretty cool "game" that I'd never heard of before called iPhone Assassin. The concept is pretty interesting-- basically, you sign up on the web to play, and then whenever you see someone in real life with an iPhone, you call out that you've "killed" them, and then on the site, it tracks how many kills have been made and who's still alive.Now, yes, it does occur to me that while the idea may sound good in theory, the execution (pardon the pun) leaves a little bit to be desired-- I do agree that most iPhone owners probably don't want maniacs running at them yelling about a kill. And yes, it's probably true that not many iPhone owners have actually seen this game yet, and so there are probably way too few people in on the joke-- more often than not, you'd have to explain the whole thing to anyone you assaulted on the street, and even more likely, they probably wouldn't be amused.Still, for the easily amused like myself, the idea seems really fun. If they come up with a way to make it a little more secret (maybe a special phrase that you could drop), and a little more automatic (although I have no idea how they'd do that-- can you make iPhones "see" each other over WiFi or Bluetooth?), a real-life iPhone scavenger hunt might be fun.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Apple "Mum is no longer the word" press briefing in London next week
Word on the high street is that Apple is holding a press briefing at their Regent Street Apple store on September 18th. The invites are circulating as we speak to various members of the UK press. That's not exactly the biggest of venues for a 3G iPhone launch for Europe but who knows? Really, does anybody know?[Thanks, Chris P] Read | Permalink | Email this | CommentsOffice Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!
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Fact: The iPhone Attracts Women
It’s a given, shiny and advanced devices that have been met with much fanfare are sure to attract the opposite sex. I don’t know if there is an official statistic but the iPhone, it’s like a chick magnet, literally. …
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Ringtonator, a GUI for the ringtone hack
Filed under: Software, Hacks, Tips and tricks, Open Source, iPhoneLast night, Joe sent us a GUI app he put together for Cleverboy's ringtone hack we posted yesterday. Ringtonator is a drag-and-drop application that will turn any AAC file into an iTunes/iPhone ringtone, or vice versa.One caveat-- while this program doesn't require a separate install of AtomicParsley, the application that makes the metadata edit possible, it does still require AAC encoding on the sound file-- Joe says he might add in mp3 to AAC conversion at a later date, but he doesn't really have to, as it's easy enough to figure out how to do that.But once you've got the AAC file, just drag it onto this little wrench phone thing, and iTunes (the current iteration, anyway) will play nice with it. Thanks, Joe!Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Mac OS Ken: 09.13.2007
Apple Up on UBS and Morgan Keegan Notes / The Utility Belt Questions iTunes Rigid TV Pricing / Trouble Report: Download Issues Through iTunes / Apple Releases Logic Studio / Australia: Apple Training for the Enterprise / IHT: iPhone Knock-Offs / Report: 240Gb iPod Classics (Possible) in 2009 / Former Apple Execs Join Palm
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How Closed Is the iPhone?
Daniel Eran Dilger"Six Reasons Why Apple May Never Open the iPhone" outlined the rationale behind the strategy driving Apple's software plans for its new mobile. At the same time, it's important to take a reasonable appraisal of the iPhone's supposedly closed nature. While Apple is unlikely to open up the iPhone in the same sense as the Mac anytime soon, it is already an open platform in ways that matter. [Six Reasons Why Apple May Never Open the iPhone]Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don't.While it's always easy to criticize Apple's position, it's not as simple to plot out an alternative course that would actually work better, or work at all.Recall that pundits fell all over themselves over the last two decades insisting that Apple do a variety of things they assured us would solve all of the company’s problems, including ideas to:License its OS to other hardware makers.Copy Microsoft's Windows strategies.Compete directly against Microsoft in IT markets.Split into hardware and software companies.Buy Be, Inc. for its BeOS.Adopt the Linux kernel.License Windows from Microsoft.While it was easy for the advice columnists of industry rags--who don't run multibillion dollar hardware companies--to insist at various times that Apple should have done all those things, it was all wishful conjecture. In contrast, Palm actually did all of those things and none of them worked out for that company, which was facing circumstances similar to Apple.[The Egregious Incompetence of Palm]Closed as in Managed, Not as in Locked Down.Apple is keeping mobile OS X devices closed to manage the experience of users, not so much to kill or prevent third party development. The company just officially clarified that, indicating that its policy on third party development was indeed largely related to the difficulty of maintaining APIs for developers, as I described on Monday.[Apple not opposed to native iPhone app development - AppleInsider]Since 2001, Apple has kept the iPod closed in the sense that it has made no efforts to sponsor third party software development. It did not prevent any third party development however, and made no efforts to stop users from either porting Linux or developing the alternative RockBox firmware for it.Apple didn't want an array of shareware applications holding up future development and bringing scorn upon the company for changing how things worked in new models. That policy allowed Apple to remain competitive and nimbly improve iPods across new generations of hardware in various directions with the Photo, Mini, Nano, video, and now the Touch. At the same time, Apple also expanded its own iPod software development in partnerships with Nike+, various games developers, and an ecosystem of integrators, resulting in a platform that is actually openly active despite being officially regarded as closed. The iPod is really best described as a managed platform.Now compare Microsoft's Zune and its Xbox line. While Microsoft welcomes games developers to its platform, it's only welcoming in ways that suit the company. It refuses to allow Linux developers to roll their own firmware, erecting signed boot barriers to thwart any unauthorized software. While Apple has no problem with RockBox on the iPod, Microsoft has worked to stop the XBMC "Xbox Media Center" project, an effort of identical intent. With the iPhone, while Apple has only ever officially supported a web platform for third party developers, it has similarly done little to stop anyone from assembling and distributing their own software for it. So far, it has only been AT&T that has worked to stop certain efforts, and those relate to commercial distribution of hacked versions of Apple's own firmware. [Inside the iPhone: Third Party Software]Software Wrapped in Hardware.Apple's core competency is in offering a managed experience. Its products are known to "just work," a reputation that has spanned two decades. While Apple has only enthusiastically jumped into application software over the last decade, the secret to Apple's slick hardware integration has always been software. The difference between Apple and Microsoft is that Apple sells its software wrapped in hardware. Microsoft only licenses software, and its few and failing hardware products have always really just been software licenses tied to loss leader hardware. That results in Apple being confident that only a small minority of users will want to put Linux on their Mac or RockBox on their iPod, and that in neither case will it pose any threat to the company, because it's happy to offer those users hardware at a profit.However, Microsoft is very threatened by the prospect of its hardware devices being wiped clean and replaced with free software, because it fears it will cut into Xbox Live and Zune Marketplace sales, where the company plans to make most of its revenues. It loses money on the hardware, particularly after all the warranty maintenance it has to pay.[Leopard vs Vista 4: Naked Sales]Apple's Shaken Software Sales Confidence.If Apple is so confident in its software, why doesn't it sell it head to head with Microsoft, either in PC licensing, IT sales, or in kicking open the door to rival Microsoft's Windows Mobile, which embraces development? The answer lies in the irrational, upside down world of software sales that Microsoft has constructed and maintains in place.It's easy to insist that Apple could open up the iPhone and bring about world peace, but that's a lot like insisting that Apple could have successfully licensed its Mac OS, or could have used Linux or Be, or split in half, or any of the other things that may have looked wise until they failed elsewhere. I think Apple feared developing a mobile platform that wouldn't gain critical support. Remember that Apple not only offered the world Rhapsody gold and got nothing but blank stares, but also couldn't sell NeXT's WebObjects even after reducing the price from $50,000 to eventually essentially making it free.WebObjects is the dynamic web application server engine that delivers the online Apple Store and the iTunes Store. Prior to being acquired by Apple, NeXT's WebObjects was used to power Dell's first commercially successful web store and by MCI to develop the back end of its Friends and Family campaign, a feat other providers scrambled in vain to copy but couldn't because the technol