Apr 3, 2008 Apr 5, 2008 Friday April 4, 2008
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Filling the Unlocked iPhone Gap with .Mac
Daniel Eran Dilger As Apple struggles to adapt its retail store inventories to account for sales flowing out of the country, the company has hinted that it may adopt other business models to target markets outside of the US. Apple COO Tim Cook has said the company is not exclusively married to the carrier revenue sharing model it began with AT&T, and which it also maintains in varying degrees with T-Mobile, O2, and Orange in Europe. Here's how Apple could diversify its revenue options by integrating .Mac services into its mobile WiFi platform. (more…)
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★ Firefox 3 vs. Safari 3
After a few weeks in the arms of Firefox 3 betas, I’ve returned to Safari as my daily browser. Unsurprisingly, it’s the interface that drove me back. But I’m not talking about cosmetic issues — or at least not only about cosmetic issues. The new default theme for Firefox theme looks pretty good, especially when you switch the toolbar icons to the small size. The Safari-style “GrApple” Firefox themes I linked to last month makes Firefox 3 look even better, albeit mostly by mimicking Safari. But cosmetic appeal is just the surface. Steve Jobs, in a 2003 New York Times magazine interview, said: “Most people make the mistake of thinking design is what it looks like. People think it’s this veneer — that the designers are handed this box and told, ‘Make it look good!’ That’s not what we think design is. It’s not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” And that’s just it. Firefox 3’s shortcomings as a Mac app are behavioral, too. The main issues that drove me back to Safari: Background Window Appearance — Starting with Leopard, standard application windows follow a simple, consistent rule: the frontmost window of the current application gets a medium gray color while all other windows have a lighter, flatter look. The idea is that with several windows visible at once, giving the active one a darker look makes it easier to pick out visually. (One of the long-standing gripes regarding the late brushed metal theme — Christ, remember that ugly thing? — was that its windows barely changed appearance when switching from active to inactive.) Firefox 3 doesn’t do this. Its windows all have the darker “active” look even when in the background. And I believe that its theming mechanism does not allow for it. Text Editing Shortcuts — Firefox 3 still doesn’t support certain standard Mac text editing key bindings. For example, in a one-line text field, the Up and Down Arrow keys should move the insertion point to the beginning and end of the line, respectively. Drives me nuts. Dictionary — Firefox doesn’t support the system-wide dictionary. In Safari (and most other apps), you can hover the mouse over any word and use Command-Control-D (by default) to display the definition of that word right there in the current window. Services — Firefox doesn’t support the Services menu. Safari does, and I use this all the time for invoking text filters I’ve made using ThisService, and for sending the current text selection to LaunchBar as input. Tabs — Firefox 3 does let you drag to reorder tabs within a window, and drag tabs between windows, but it doesn’t let you drag a tab out of a window to create a new window with just that tab. Safari 3 does. Picky-picky, I know, but I use this feature in Safari every day to group related tabs together in their own window. Location Field — The new Firefox 3 location field, the so-called “AwesomeBar”, is too clever. When I click the mouse in the middle of a URL, I just want to place the insertion point. I don’t want to select the entire URL. If I wanted to select the entire URL, I’d double-click. Click to place, double-click to select — just like any other text field. Auto-completion in Firefox requires the use of the Down Arrow key to select something from the list of suggestions. In Safari you can just use Return to accept the first suggestion. It might just be habit, but it feels to me like Safari’s auto-completion works a little better. Also, in Firefox, during auto-completion, the Tab key acts like Down Arrow — it selects the next suggestion in the auto-completion list. In Safari Tab moves the focus to the Search field, as it should. In Firefox’s favor, its new location field does some very cool things that Safari does. For example, when matching what you’ve typed against the URLs in your bookmarks and history, it looks anywhere within the URLs, not just at the beginning as Safari does. This means you can type “foo” to match the URL “example.com/foo/”. You can’t do that in Safari. History — I like Safari’s hierarchical History menu. What Safari does is list the 20 most recently loaded URLs, followed by sub-menus for each of the last seven days. Firefox only lists the 10 most recent URLs in the History menu. You can get more done right from the menu in Safari, whereas in Firefox you’ve got to open the History window. Page Load Progress Indicator — Every time I dally with another browser, I immediately miss Safari’s in-location-field progress meter. Back in January 2003 when Apple released the first public beta of Safari 1.0, I described this feature as follows:1 Hideous. It looks like partially-selected text. Please scrap it. Over time, the feature has not just grown on me, but I’ve come to appreciate the cleverness of its design. I was wrong, and whoever designed this for Safari was right. The truth is that page loading is the slowest and most unpleasant aspect of using a web browser. It’s important to know whether a page has finished loading yet, and so a browser’s progress indicator deserves a prominent spot. The best spot is nearly the location field, because that tends to be where your eyes are when a page starts loading. You can’t get any closer to the location field than being inside the location field itself. But, once a page has loaded, there’s no reason for a progress indicator to remain on screen. Firefox 3 has a small spinning progress indicator in the toolbar. It’s too subtle, and as a simple spinner, offers no indication as to how far along the page load has progress, only that it is still loading. Firefox does offer a proper progress bar in the status bar footer, but (a) it’s far, rather than close, to the location field in the toolbar; and (b) the status bar is optional — if you turn it off, the only progress indicator is the spinner. This one’s a total win for Safari. New Tab Shortcut — In Safari, Command-T always creates a new tab, even if a browser window isn’t frontmost; it does the Right Thing and creates a new tab in the frontmost browser window and brings that window forward. In Firefox, invoking Command-T just beeps if, say, the Downloads window is frontmost, or if there is no open browser window. Inline PDF Viewing — An obvious win for Safari. AppleScript Support — Firefox 3 has almost none. Safari’s is pretty good. Firefox 3 does have a lot going for it. Yes, it’s still in beta (b5 at this writing), but even in beta it is far better, at least Mac-wise, than Firefox 2. It also unquestionably offers certain advantages over Safari. For one thing, it does a far better job managing memory. The main reason I switched from Safari to Firefox in the first place was memory consumption on my PowerBook G4 — after just a few hours of my use, Safari 3 inevitably consumes at least 300 MB, often more, of private memory. In the same usage, Firefox 3 never seemed to use more than 90 MB, even after a few days. On a machine like my PowerBook with “just” 2 GB of RAM, Safari’s memory consumption was a system-wide performance bottleneck. There are few better ways to slow down Mac OS X than to force the system to start swapping. But last week I switched to a new MacBook Pro with 4 GB of RAM, so while Safari still uses significantly more memory than Firefox, it doesn’t lead to VM swapping on my MacBook Pro like it did on my PowerBook. I love Firefox’s auto-restoration of tabs and windows. Quit Firefox, relaunch it, and your previously-open tabs and windows are restored. Safari 3 has this feature, but makes you do it manually via the “Reopen All Windows From Last Session” command in the History menu. I’m sure most Safari users have no idea this feature even exists. At least as a preference, Safari should offer the ability to do this automatically. Another very cool history-related Firefox 3 feature: the History → Recently Closed Tabs sub-menu. If you accidentally close a tab in Safari, and that tab has been open for so long that you don’t know where it is in your history, it’s a pain to fish it out. With this Firefox feature, you get two histories: (1) the main, traditional one, which stores pages by when they were opened, and (2) a second one, which stores pages based on when they were closed. Both are useful. Firefox also has a shortcut (Shift-Command-T) for restoring the most recently closed tab — perfect for the common scenario of recovering from an accidental tab closure. Perhaps the biggest difference between Safari and Firefox is that Firefox offers an official, supported extension API. Safari supports “Internet plugins” for things like QuickTime and Flash, but offers no extension API for modifying to adding feature to the application itself. Thus, anyone who seeks to modify Safari must resort to unsupported input manager hacks for things like ad-blocking, fancier search, etc. With Firefox, plugins such as these are fully supported. It does seem to be the case that many Firefox 2 plugins don’t yet work with Firefox 3, but it’s a tremendous advantage for Firefox that this extension mechanisms exists. This is so big a part of Firefox that it’s arguably downright criminal that I’ve buried mention of it at the bottom of this review. But the one I want most, FlashBlock, doesn’t yet work with the latest Firefox 3 betas.2 Most of my reasons for preferring Safari to Firefox are Mac-specific details. Camino gets some of them right, but not all, and it’s missing the best thing about Firefox — the extensions. For users new to the Mac, who aren’t aware of these details, Firefox 3 might be as good or better than Safari in nearly every way. (For anyone more used to Windows than the Mac, the text editing behavior in Firefox might feel right rather than wrong, as it does to me.) In short, competition in the Mac web browser space is strong and getting stronger. Firefox isn’t just a great web browser, but it’s a pretty good Mac web browser, too. Nearly all my other complaints regarding that initial public release of Safari have since been rectified. Famously, Safari 1.0b1 didn’t support tabbed browser windows; Safari’s current tab support is my favorite of any browser. AppleScript support was non-existent; now it’s pretty good. Brushed metal windows are gone. And Safari’s location field auto-completion is much improved. ↩ Also excellent, perhaps even downright amazing, is the Web Developer extension. But it’s not something that’s generally applicable for daily browsing. I suspect there are many web developers who use Safari for regular browsing but Firefox for development, because of the Web Developer extension. ↩
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TUAW Best of the Week
Filed under: Features, TUAW Business, Weekend ReviewIt's the weekend. W00t! Time to kick back, relax and read the latest installment of TUAW's best of the week, where we gather up our favorite posts for your easy clicking enjoyment.Updates, Updates, Updates, Updates, and more Updates.Yes, keeping the weekly tradition of weekly updates is what Apple is starting to do best. Seems odd, because I used to expect this weekly update ("patch Tuesday") from some other company.Happy Birthday, AppleHere's to hoping this 32-year-old fruit doesn't get too mushy. Many developers working on Aperture 2.1 pluginsNice to see other developers making plug-ins that Apple should have included anyway.Liveblog with the iPhone Dev Team: iPwnageEarlier this week, Erica liveblogged with the iPhone Dev Team about the recently released iPwnage. An awesome chat that can be replayed by clicking the "Replay this live blog" button.Apple passes Walmart, number 1 in US music salesYeah, but does iTunes offer 1-hour photo service, auto service, and groceries? I didn't think so!Photoshop CS4 64-bit in Windows, only 32-bit in OS XThanks again, Adobe ... you've really shown how much you love us. Fortunately, it's been demonstrated scientifically that running Vista is damaging to the creative soul.Remix Radiohead in iTunesRemix. Radiohead. iTunes. Must I mention more?AT&T's Mobility CEO "spills the beans" on iPhone 3GWe've only been hearing this for months. Now it's semi-official. Woo-hoo, etc.WWDC '08 sessions postedApple posted the sessions that would be at this years World Wide Developers Conference. You are going, right?TV shows for German iTunes usersGermany finally got their TV Shows this week. iTunes: Free TuesdayGet some free tunes.So there you have it folks, this week's biggest news. Now featuring 5 more updates and restarts than last week.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Backstage: The Mac Guessing Game, Part 2
As promised; Dan Nicholls got it right. Cube aside, it's the only Mac I've wanted to own, but never had. Here are some other Mac-as-commodity pictures from Akihabara, Tokyo, Japan—the trip that cemented my need to pick up both of these machines, soon. ...
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Apple: We'll take Manhattan
Apple claims that the city of New York’s GreeNYC logo is a little too close to its own corporate logo for comfort.
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Update: Adobe reconsiders Photoshop Express TOS
You’ll recall that Adobe last week announced Photoshop Express beta – a free Web-based tool that allows you to crop, rotate, tweak, twirl, correct, and show off photos on Photoshop Express or Facebook. For free. You’ll also recall the ensuing flap that surround its onerous Terms Of Service (TOS) that, among other things, stated: “Adobe does [...]
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Adobe's Roadmap to Heftier Photoshop Bypasses Mac Land
In a heads-up effort that has resulted in a storm of blame, frustration and sometimes outright anger, Adobe's Senior Product Manager for Photoshop John Nack revealed this week on an official Adobe blog that the next version of the product, Photoshop Creative Suite 4, will be available in a 64-bit version only for Windows. Mac OS X users will likely have to wait for CS5 -- or longer -- to have the chance to move beyond a 32-bit version. Die-hard Mac users, of course, were less than thrilled.
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Free Your DRM Shackled Music
With a little bit of work, you can create DRM-free versions of your iTunes music.
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Analyst predicts 3G iPhone by June
Posted by Dennis SellersInvestment bank Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster said in a note to clients that he's confirmed the T-Mobile Germany is cutting the 8GB iPhone from €399 to €99. He thinks this means Apple is clearing out current inventory and will launch a 3G iPhone launch between now a nd June.
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MacOSG: How to disassemble and repair your iPhone (video)
Posted by Dave MertenLast week, I explained what's 'under the hood' of an iPhone. This week, I will show your where to buy parts for your iPhone, and repair it yourself if you ever have a problem.
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MacOSG: No power or frozen iPod
Posted by Dave MertenSymptoms: iPod may not power on, may be stuck on the battery logo, or may have stopped responding while playing music (in which case the Click Wheel doesn't respond).
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Flow is new FTP, SFTP, WebDAV, .Mac client for Leopard
Posted by Dennis SellersExtendmac has released Flow 1.0, an US$29 FTP, SFTP, WebDAV, and .Mac client for Mac OS X 10.5 (“Leopard”). It utilizes QuickLook to preview just about any file, can automatically copy URLs to remote files, and includes an integrated editor complete with tabs, syntax coloring and code sense.
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'setteB.IT': iPhone app to be developed in 36-hour coding spree
Posted by Dennis SellersBy Fabio M. Zambelli Four Italian students this weekend will develop an iPhone application in a 36-hour coding spree.
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ScreenRecord goes Universal Binary
Posted by Dennis SellersMien Software has updated ScreenRecord, a Mac OS X screen capturing tool that records actions on the screen as a QuickTime movie, to version 2.0. The update is Universal Binary so runs natively on both PowerPC and Intel Macs running Mac OS X 10.4 or higher.
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Poll: what will be your next Mac desktop purchase?
Posted by Dennis SellersIn our new Macsimum Poll, we want to know what will be the next Mac desktop you purchase.
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MacSpeech Dictate available with specialized microphones
Posted by Dennis SellersMacSpeech's MacSpeech Dictate is now available for direct purchase from the company's web site in the U.S.. Customers can select from a variety of specialized microphones.
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New TruePower MacBook Pro 17 rechargeable battery available
Posted by Dave MertenThis high-capacity battery uses Lithium-Polymer cells (with integrated charge indicator LEDs) that are manufactured to high quality standards and utilize TruePower technology to provide a safe computing experience. It's also $30.00 less than purchasing one from Apple.
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Chicago Apple Store event was a huge success
Posted by Dave MertenBy Jason Seiden Nearly 60 people turned out to help launch 'How to Self-Destruct' recently at the Apple Store in Chicago. In a theater with 48 seats, that means it was SRO, baby!
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The geeks were right; music labels bow to technology
In a week that saw EMI hire a former file sharer, the labels help launch a service that encourages people to share music, and Apple become the country's largest retailer, the only thing that can be said is technology reigns supreme in the music industry.
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The geeks were right; music labels bow to technology
Apple's iTunes helped digital music go mainstream(Credit: Apple.com) Some of you out there can pat yourselves on the back. You've been shouting for years on Web sites, message boards, and blogs that the music industry would one day bow to technology. That day has most certainly ...
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LANrev releases free version of InstallEase
Filed under: Enterprise, Software, Cool toolsWho can take some software, bundle it for you? Make a free installer and then seal it up with glue? InstallEase can (with apologies to Sammy). The packaging utility, long part of the LANrev crossplatform management & audit tool, is now available free of charge -- making it very complementary to other no-cost packaging tools such as Apple's PackageMaker and the freeware Iceberg, and it compares in functionality to the $99 Casper Composer tool (also available as part of the comprehensive Casper Suite).The idea behind both InstallEase and Composer is simple: suppose you want to install a new application on 20 computers, complete with plugins and pref files. Rather than walking around to each one, you snapshot your pre-install state on a prototype machine using InstallEase, then install the software; finally, take an 'after' picture. Just like that, you've created a package installer that can be run by the individual users, pushed out with ARD, LANrev, Casper etc., or triggered to run from a remote server. It's a great timesaver, especially for programs that don't leverage Apple's .pkg installer format for standardized deployment -- Office 2004, for example.If you've got a passel of Macs to manage and you haven't tried InstallEase yet, give it a download and check it out.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Apple Gazette Daily 241 - No 64-Bit Photoshop, iPhones selling like crazy, and more
podcast sponsor link:http://www.audiblepodcast.com/applegazette Click the link above to get your free audio book from Audible, and help support Apple Gazette at the same time! Today's Show: No 64-Bit Photoshop, iPhones selling like crazy, and more You can subscribe via iTunes, or by RSS feed, or… you can listen to the episode right here: In addition to that, you can also download the Apple Gazette Daily Widget and listen to every episode of the show right on your Dashboard. Click Here to download.
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'Macsimum Recommended Reading' for April 4
Posted by Dennis Sellers“Does the iPhone Shortage Herald an Impending 3G Release? Probably Not”—RoughlyDrafted Magazine
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Mac software updates for April 3
Posted by Dennis SellersLuxology has released modo 302, the newest version of its 3D content creation software. The upgrade adds new natural lighting capabilities, additional layered Photoshop file support, an animation Track View, new modeling tools and other enhancements.
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New version of iSync phone plugins released with support for new phones
Posted by Dave MertenCell phone owners can use the iSync phone plugins from nova media to synchronize contacts and dates with a Mac, even if iSync does not yet support their cell phone model. The most recent version 6.0 adds 13 new plugins for cell phones from Nokia, Samsung and Motorola.
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xScope 2.1 brings refinement to OS X design tool
Iconfactory and ARTIS Software released an update to their awesome design/development tool xScope today, bringing the software to version 2.1. If you haven't seen xScope yet and you do any design on a Mac, you should definitely check it out.Read More...
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New iPhone case says it can boost reception
Griffin Technology on Friday announced its ClearBoost case for the iPhone. The company says that the case's built-in booster antenna improves reception, avoids dropped calls and helps isolate the iPhone from interference.
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Zombie Apocalypse: The Computing Perspective
Filed under: Cult of MacToday, David Hambling over at Wired posted about surviving a Zombie Apocalypse through best practices. What's missing from this article, however, is the IT spin on things. As you know, zombies are primarily Wintel users, formed from the primordial ooze of Enterprise computing and minimal IT support as much as from Voudou curses and spiritual possession. Mac users are naturally resistant to Zombie attacks despite lower per capita conventional firearm ownership due to their reliable computing environment. Fewer trips to IT support means limited exposure to a transformed city-scape where maddened zombie hordes roam for victims. Plus, Apple users can listen to their own portable lifestyle soundtrack on their iPods while watching the walking dead rampage through the streets. Safety + entertainment = win, win. Unfortunately, in the case of Vampire rather than Zombie attacks the case is reversed. By a 20% margin, Wintel users have better access to holy water and crosses. And I'm pretty sure that wooden iPod cases won't work well as stake-through-the-heart replacements and the iRosary was never brought to market as an actual product. Should Apple decide, however, to enter the undead-thwarting arena, you can be sure their devices will be sleek, well designed and offer that Jonathan Ives je nais sais quoi.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Backstage: The Mac Guessing Game
You've probably already read about the Cube Project, and you might have seen my cryptic related comment that I was planning on making only one more classic Mac acquisition. This week, I made that purchase. So, dear readers, which since-discontinued Macintosh computer do you think would be worthy of using and displaying alongside a Cube? I'll post some interesting photos when someone gets the right answer. Also: Ever since the iTunes 7.6.2…
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Rumor: New iPhone Spy Pics Surface
Is it real, or a person with too much time on their hands?
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iTunes Tops Music Vendor Charts
Apple's online iTunes music store is now the No. 1 music retailer in the United States, according to the latest data from the NPD Group. To get there, iTunes had to beat out Wal-Mart. To date, Apple says iTunes has 50 million customers and has sold more than 4 billion songs from a catalog of over than 6 million choices. iTunes, of course, sells digital downloads with both single and album options, while Wal-Mart sells physical CDs in its brick-and-mortar stores. The chain also has an online sales presence.
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Mac-Only Social Net Takes First Steps
Mac users now have a social networking service built exclusively for them. Net4mac offers freeware that, once downloaded on Mac OS X v10.4 or later systems, creates opportunities for Mac users to connect with others in a number of ways. Net4mac offers typical social network features -- with a Mac twist. For instance, user-created profiles could include the types of Apple products members owns and groups could form based on Mac applications. The service also features job searches and classified ads.
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Rumor Mill: What you’ll be coveting from Apple next
Hey there, it’s Jake here again. Jason stepped away from his MacBook Air and left it logged into his ZDNet blogging account (Wheeee!) so I figured that I’d pen another quick roundup of the latest rumors on the Apple front– before he gets back. iPhone 3G. Inventory is constrained across the U.S. and AT&T’s Mobility CEO Ralph [...]
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Widget Woes
Work on those wonky Widgets.
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WWDC ‘08 sessions and labs announced
Apple has posted a list of initial sessions and labs that will be part of WWDC ‘08. The list includes more than 60 how-to technical sessions and hands-on labs you can take at this years conference which takes place in San Francisco from June 9–13, 2008. The formerly named World Wide Developers Conference gives developers “direct [...]
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Apple logo installed at Boston's future Apple Store
Filed under: RetailWe're getting closer, Bostonians. The flagship Apple Store that we've been anticipating for more than a year is starting to resemble an Apple Store.The folks at ifoAppleStore have a live webcam pointed towards the construction, and Flickr user kokernutz has posted a shot of the shrouded logo.This store is on Boylston Street, directly across the street from The Prudential Center in Boston's upscale Back Bay. This will be the ninth store in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the first in Beantown. It's been suggested that it will open in May. I'll be there!Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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First Looks: iHome iH12 / iH12BR Clock Radio for iPod
Taking after the classic Sony cube-shaped clock radios of the 1980s, iHome's new iH12 ($80) is shown here in the iH12BR version, black in color and packaged with a remote. Billed as a stereo sound system and dual-alarm clock radio with a "passive subwoofer," the iH12 has a small but bright screen for time and date, AM/FM radio tuning, and toggling between iPod and auxiliary input. Four included dock adapters, an external antenna and power supply…
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Ozzy Knows Best
Why can't they be like we were, perfect in every way? What's the matter with kids today? -- Meredith Willson, The Music Man, 1957 Every generation disapproves of the one that follows and barely claims to understand the generation that follows that. It's the way we are, simply because we tend to see everything in the context of our own experience -- an experience that is changed by age, the times we grew up in, and yes by technology. I'm from the Baby Boom generation and we, by our sheer numbers, have had an inordinate effect on what it means to be "perfect in every way." But our time is passing quickly just as technology explodes after 50 years of Moore's Law. The result is technology that will shortly be beyond us but not beyond the generations that follow. Our grandchildren will run a world very different from the one we ran and many institutions will simply have to adjust or die. This is the third and, I promise, last week of my look at education and technology. In the two previous weeks we established that there is a generational transition happening that is already having a profound destabilizing effect on education. Parents who are today in their 20s -- parents of the kids who go to school with my three sons ages 6, 3 and 1 -- grew up with personal computers, mobile phones and video games. More importantly, THEIR PARENTS (our kids, except for those of dirty old men like me) did, too. This new generation of parents lives in a digital world and has little patience with analog traditions. Where we think of bricks and books they think of electrons and photons. Where we remember what time the library opens, they wonder why it should ever close. The world will shortly be more theirs than ours and they'll be calling the shots with the result that many aspects of life, including education, will change forever. This is inevitable and can't be halted. Nor is it even appropriate or good for it to be halted, which is one point some readers have trouble understanding. If you can't stop the tide, it is a waste of resources even to try. This emerging world will be very different in many ways. How many of these kids expect to someday earn a pension? Surveys show that few of them expect Social Security to even survive until their retirement -- if they can ever retire at all. Where we went through a couple career changes they'll go through half a dozen or more in a life that will outlast ours by 20 years. Growing up is changing from becoming what you will be to becoming what you will be for a while, and that has a huge impact on the educational requirements placed on our society. If you expect to start your career over half a dozen times, how do you prepare for careers 2-6? As we learned last week from the Amish, there are very efficient educational models out there. Few would look to the Amish as role models yet they are remarkably good at what they do. Part of any answer is figuring out what education is for. We use it for paying dues, for passing time until a certain level of maturity is reached. We use it for networking and finding mates. We use it for acting goofy at the expense of our parents. And we use it, to some extent, to learn what we need to know to get by. The question that has so far gone unanswered in this series, then, is how will we learn in the future? It's easy for old farts like me to assume everybody will learn the way we did, but that's unlikely simply because the underlying assumptions are changing. When I was a kid human labor was cheap and technology was expensive. Today technology is cheap and getting cheaper, while human labor is expensive and becoming more so. Yet our model of education technology is still so defined by that remembered Apple IIe in the corner of the classroom that is it difficult for many to imagine truly pervasive educational technology. This is in large part because there is no way that Apple IIe or any PC is going to somehow expand to replace books and teachers and classrooms. For education, the personal computer is probably a dead end. It's not that we won't continue to have and use PCs in schools, but the market and intellectual momentum clearly lie elsewhere. So forget about personal computers: the future of education probably lies with digital games. I say "digital games" rather than "video games" or "PC games," or "handheld games," because the platform doesn't matter as much as the application. Whether it is a PC or Mac, xBox or PS3, PSP or Nintendo DS, gaming has done an excellent job of proving that the application is more important than the platform on which it runs. Stories came out this week from the NPD Group announcing that 72 percent of Americans play PC or video games with 58 percent of those played online. Those numbers -- which apparently don't include kids, by the way -- are HUGE and explain all by themselves much of what is happening to traditional mass media like TV, magazines and newspapers. We're spending so much time playing games that we don't have as much time for those older pursuits. Only drive-time radio thrives and that's just because we don't have a practical model for playing games while driving. Digital games are a bigger business than Hollywood movies, than book publishing, than television, than music. And at a time when what we're decrying is the lack of attention our children and grandchildren are paying to traditional modes of education, they are spending hundreds of hours learning to steal virtual cars and play lead air guitar. Clearly the best instructional platform is one that already attracts users to spend countless hours in its mastery. At this point it is a relatively simple matter to bend some games to the will of education and training. While I can describe this and even advocate it, I can't do it, myself. I'm simply too old. Studies show there are gamers and non-gamers and I am definitely one of the latter. I've been a pilot for close to 40 years and I don't even like to play Flight Simulator. But that's my problem and that of people from my generation and older. My wife, who is 15 years younger than me, plays all the time. It is easy to imagine how the PC and video game industries could teach us many things other than how to blast our opponents into infinity. If you play a Beowulf game for 20 hours and it includes all the characters and narrative of the book, will you have mastered the material well enough to pass a test? Probably. I am not saying schools will disappear. I AM saying that new modes of instruction will emerge and they will inevitably involve processing power and context. We took our kids to Washington, D.C. for Spring Break and I would have loved to outfit them with MP3 players loaded with age-appropriate descriptions of what we saw. That's just scratching the surface. The success of the Nintendo Wii game system is important to this emerging change in education because the Wii is the first game system based on an extremely flexible user experience. It's not an especially powerful game platform compared with the PS3 or xBox 360, but it is adaptable and user friendly. People want to do new stuff with their Wii's, so why not use them to learn? Add to this mobile data and communication and we're back to what John Scully of Apple called so many years ago a Personal Digital Assistant. Scully was 15 years ahead of his time and didn't know it. But the PDA that actually works, if I've done my Moore's Law calculation correctly, will be at least 1,024 times as powerful as that original Newton. My vision for future digital education has a key difference from traditional 20th century education. A fundamental aspect of education has always been that it comes to abrupt and quite specific endpoints associated with various cultural rites of passage. We graduate. There is a first day of school and a last day of school. At some highly specific and anticipated moment we disconnect from the education mother ship and go off on our own, often never to return. Why? Well to make room in school for someone else, of course. Why? In my future model the "school" is only a PC/game machine/mobile phone/headset thingee that clues me in about everything around me and helps me learn what I need to know. Why would I ever give that up? The truth is we won't. If we have more students, we just build more devices. Classrooms aren't absolutely necessary, nor will location even matter. My proposed model for future education is actually based on the home life of Ozzy Osbourne. Remember The Osbournes on MTV? Who were those kids always hanging out with young Jack and Kelly Osbourne? Remember, they were slightly older and substantially smarter and better looking but not so much better looking as to be threatening. They hung out with Jack and Kelly but clearly answered to Sharon Osbourne. Why would these cooler kids even bother with Jack and Kelly? They were Osbourne employees, hand-selected playmates intended to keep dropouts Jack and Kelly safe and learning after a fashion. They were the flesh-and-blood versions of a true Personal Digital Assistant that any parent would hire if they had Ozzy's money. Now turn that model into a Bluetooth headset. Imagine a 24/7 mobile Google with a conscience. "Do you really think this is such a good idea, Bob?" It's your favorite teacher with you all the time but with an ON-OFF switch. "Well if you really insist on trying to fly this Huey helicopter -- AND I CERTAINLY RECOMMEND AGAINST IT -- start by putting your right hand on that lever attached to the floor, which is called a cyclic."
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How-To: Make the best of Time Machine and AirPort backups
Ars spent some time with Time Machine, including its new wireless abilities. We have some tips, gotchas, and utilities that can help you get the most out of Leopard's built-in safety net.Read More...
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16GB iPhone Selling Like Hot Cakes, Avid Goes After FCP and More iPhone News
10.5.3 seeded to developers, AT&T's Pogo browser and everyone is chasing the iPhone.
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MarsEdit 2.1.3 helps keep drafts in WP and Blogger
Filed under: Software, Cool tools, BloggingDaniel Jalkut posts that TUAW's favorite blogging app, MarsEdit, has hit version 2.1.3. Mainly a bug fix update, the biggest change is that drafts in WordPress and Blogger are now better handled -- their "draft" status is apparently better preserved.Additionally, a few markup elements, specifically "#tags#" and "#askurl#" have been tweaked to work better, and there is also improved handling of URLs in localhost-based blogs.MarsEdit is available, as always, for $29.95 from Red Sweater, or free for a 30-day trial period.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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iPhone shortage eases as Germans get a bargain
Apple is starting to get iPhones back into its U.S. retail stores after a brief stock-out, and T-Mobile has slashed the price of the 8GB iPhone to new lows ahead of an expected 3G launch.
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The World's Smartest End Table, Smoking Your Phone, Document Standards Gone Wild
Last year, Microsoft successfully mated a touch-screen PC with one of those old Ms. Pacman games you might see at your typical dive bar. Thus the Microsoft Surface -- the world's smartest end table -- was born. At first, it spent most of its time finger painting and identifying objects placed on top of it. Now that it's a little older, Microsoft has decided it's time for Surface to go out and get a job. So it's ready to start working at a few AT&T stores starting later this month.
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JAJAH to deliver native iPhone VOIP App this summer
JAJAH is reportedly developing a native iPhone VOIP application which is set to be released in the summer. Steve Jobs has already gone on record as saying Apple wouldn't restrict such a thing over wi-fi connectivity, and Jajah may be one of , if not the, first to offer a VOIP solution for the handheld. Jajah already offers a web-based calling solution for the iPhone, which users would be able to access when not connected to the wi-fi network. Look for the application shortly after the iPhone 2.0 launch this summer.
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iPhone owners do everything but talk
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, iPhoneI always pay my iPhone bill with the phone itself. It's simple -- touch settings, then phone then AT&T services. In just a few seconds, I can wave about $70US goodbye. What a world!There are other options on that screen, like "View my minutes," which I usually check when I pay my bill. As of right now, I'm looking at 1300 roll over minutes. This can only mean one thing:I rarely use my iPhone as a phone.I'm not alone. According to a report on International Business Times, 46.5 percent of iPhone owners spend the time they use their iPhones engaged in voice calls (that number is 71.7 percent for BlackBerry owners). Also, iPhone owners in the US claim to spend 12.1 percent of their iPhone time on the net (compare that to 2.4 percent for all other mobile phones on average), and nearly 12 percent of their time listening to audio (compared to 2.5 percent for others).In observing my own behavior with the iPhone, I use it most often as an iPod, and then to check email and use the net (Twitter mostly). For me, the iPhone is a computer that just happens to make phone calls, not a phone with some cool features. It appears I'm not the only one with this opinion.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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About That iPhone Shortage
Shawn Zade, who runs a small company called "Wireless Imports" in New York, is among hundreds of businesspeople who have tried to make a buck from purchasing and reselling Apple's iPhone at a higher price. However, his job has gotten so hard lately that he may exit the iPhone resale business altogether. The departure would be a casualty of what analysts and salespeople say is a widespread shortage of iPhones. "We'd be calling every store, they'd be sold out, sold out, sold out," Zade says.
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News: Mix: AT&T, iSuppli, MySpace Music, Beckham's touch
U.S. iPhone carrier AT&T this week announced plans to change the way it handles early termination fees for users on one- or two-year contracts. Under the new plan, which takes effect May 25, the fee will be lowered by $5 for each month, every month, for the life of the contract. The average iPhone users spends less than half their time using their device for actual phone calls, according to the latest survey from iSuppli. Owners of competing products,…
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Net4Mac - Social Network Application only for Macs - huh?
Net4Mac is a new social network only for Mac Users. To make sure none of those pesky PC users can be involved, to access the network you have to download an application. That's kind of where I stop being interested. I don't really want to download an app to visit a website. It doesn't help that there are numerous grammatical and spelling errors on their description page (”internet connexion required”, “Search members using different of criteria”). When you go to the contact section you are only given a series of emails and an iChat name. No phone number, no address…a little further inspection on the site and you can see that its actually the team behind App4Mac, but I'd recommend to the site creators that they make this information a little easier to get ahold of. It's unsettling when you can't find the proper information about a company, and I think people are much more likely to just dismiss this application if they have any concerns about its legitimacy, rather than take the time to look it up. At first, I dismissed this is as some kind of spammy-looking app, because it wasn't clear who made it. Besides that fact, however, I don't really know if this is something that I'm interested in it at all. I mean, I already have Twitter, and there's Facebook, MySpace — the list goes on forever. Do you see this being something you would use?
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VoIP calls via an IPhone coming from Jajah
Posted by Dave MertenHow would you like to make VoIP calls via your iPhone? Well, if it's up to Jajah, it will happen sooner than later.
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Review: Pacific Rim Technologies Mirrored Film for iPod touch
Pacific Rim Technologies has its own takes on MirrorFilm called Mirrored Film for iPhone and Mirrored Film for iPod touch, each sold for $15. These stickers are nearly identical to the Artwizz offering, save for a few tiny tweaks listed below. Their lower ratings are based on two facts: their higher prices and their failure to meet a promise on both their packaging and the Pacific Rim web site. On a positive note, Mirrored Film for iPhone fixes one…
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Desktoptopia goes free and PC for version 1.5
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Desktops, Software, FreewareMy personal favorite desktop wallpaper app, the echo-named Desktoptopia, sent us a tip with a great announcement today: not only have they released version 1.5, and not only have they released a PC version (for your work computer to use, I guess), but Desktoptopia is now a completely free app.Now, I don't know if this is new or not, but their FAQ page says that the reason they're now free is that some of the wallpapers that will show up on your desktop (the app periodically changes your wallpaper for you, as often as you'd like) are "beautiful desktops that reflect a brand." I haven't yet seen any obvious ones pop up in the old version, and I haven't started using the new version yet, but I guess there's a chance that you could have, say, a Wal-mart desktop show up. That would probably give me reason to uninstall the software right there, but of course that's up to you -- if you don't like it, you could always try Desktopia, or just do it yourself with Automator.I haven't had that problem yet, though -- in my experience, Desktoptopia has provided some great wallpapers (with no brands I could notice) as regularly as I'd like with no fuss at all. If you want some change to come regularly to your desktop wallpaper, but don't want to go hunting around for the right pics, Desktoptopia is a great solution that is now completely free. Great to hear.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Today's software updates: Keynote and Airport Admin Utility
Another new day brings more software updates from Apple. If you're rocking an old-school UFO-style AirPort Base Station and/or Keynote 4.0.2, these are for you.Read More...
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Study: Apple shipped 2.315 million iPhones in final quarter of 2007
Posted by Dennis SellersA new report by the Research and Markets says that Apple shipping 2.3.15 million iPhones in the fourth quarter of 2007, expanding their marekt to select European countries.
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iPhones best-selling products at the online Apple Store
Posted by Dennis SellersIn the last week of March the 16GB iPhone was the best-selling item at the online Apple Store, notes 14U. The second hottest selling product was the 8GB version of the communications device.
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Intel demos Cliffside wireless technology
Posted by Dennis Sellers Intel has demonstrated its Cliffside wireless technology during the day of Intel Developer Forum, reports Softpedia.
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Automatically eject/mount disks on sleep/wake
Using a laptop with permanent external drives can be a bit annoying when you leave the desk -- you have to manually eject all your devices, otherwise you get that dreaded 'Device Removal' dialog. With a little bit of Terminal magic, though, you can automatically eject disks when you sleep the laptop, meaning you can just put the lid down and go. Disks are also reconnected automatically on wake, for when you're just sleeping the computer without going places.It's all thanks to a little utility by Bernhard Baehr called SleepWatcher, which runs in the background and is triggered by sleep and wake events, calling scripts to perform required actions. Download and install SleepWatcher and its StartupItem. Next, you're going to create ~/.sleep and ~/.wakeup files which SleepWatcher will call upon. Pull up your favourite text editor and paste the following in ...
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A workaround for SMB share disconnects
When mounting an SMB share from a Windows 2003 server, I ran into the problem that after about five minutes, the share would disconnect and I would not be able to reconnect to it at all. My system log would say things like this:KernelEventAgent24 tid 00000000 received VQ_NOTRESP event (1)KernelEventAgent24 tid 00000000 type 'smbfs', mounted on '/Volumes/xxxx', from '//xxxx;xxxx@xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx/xxx$', not responding KernelEventAgent24 tid 00000000 found 1 filesystem(s) with problem(s) loginwindow23 1 server now unresponsive kernel smb_iod_reconnect: The reconnect failed to xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx! error = 4 I found a solution, after trying many other things. It is probably due to a bug in the network software of Apple or the server. I use a laptop which normally uses a wired connection with fixed IP as a first choice, but there is wireless connection in the building, too, and my laptop pulls an IP number from the DHCP server at the same time via ...
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10.5: Show files that Time Machine does not backup
Leopard's Time Machine is a huge step forward in backup for the average Joe (or Jane). However, one problem is that applications can tell the system to not back up certain files. This is intended to avoid backing up working files, cache files, and such that don't generally need to be backed up. However, we know that VMware, at least, is using the mechanism to quiet exclude virtual machines from being backed up, and others could come. While this makes sense in some ways, it could easily lead to a disaster for those who aren't aware of it happening.So, with that background, I played around for a few minutes and I figured out how this flag is stored. Turns out that Apple's doing the right thing here and using the metadata store. This means we can find the files with the Spotlight engine. To do this from the command line, do this:sudo mdfind "com_apple_backup_excludeItem =...
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10.5: Show user pictures with transparency
It bugged me for a long time that the user pictures in the login window would not respect a user picture's transparency mask, but draw the icon on a white square instead. Luckily I found out how to get rid of this in Mac OS X 10.5! As this solution requires the use of Terminal, the usual "use at your own risk" applies.Leopard stores the cache where it keeps the user pictures accessible via the command line utility dscl. Let's assume the user account whose picture we want to change is called steve. (Obviously, replace steve with the short name of your account in the following commands). Type the following into the terminal:dscl . -read /Users/steve PictureThis should give output like this, reflecting your currently-selected image:Picture: /Library/User Pictures/Animals/Butterfly.tif There is also an entry i...
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Photographer looks at prospective Aperture 2.1 plug-ins
Photographer Rob Galbraith has taken an in-depth look at a bevy of upcoming Aperture 2.1 plugins, and also has details on the way the plugin architecture works.Read More...
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Apple battling New York City environmental logo
In somewhat of a role reversal, Apple is opposing attempts by nonprofit NYC & Company to trademark a logo for New York City's new GreeNYC campaign.Read More...
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Under The Radar News - Friday
Credit derivatives show unexpected strength. Despite heavy cynicism from credit analysts, a recent rally in credit derivatives isn't slowing. The iTraxx Crossover index, which measures the cost of protecting 50 risky European companies' debt, fell 30 BP to 480, its first visit below 500 since the beginning of February. Financials are down 77 BP from a March 17 peak; non-financials are down 49 BP.
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New Apple campus two years behind schedule
Apple announced plans for a new campus in Cupertino, CA two years ago to support its growing workforce and even considered abandoning their current digs at One Infinite Loop in the process. They’ve since decided to stay in Cupertino, using both locations. According to a story in Fortune plans at the new site are running behind [...]
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The Music Biz: Something Important Is On The Horizon
Having ceded the file based music opportunity (mp3s and DRM’d file formats) to Apple (AAPL), the recorded labels are now getting hip to the much bigger opportunity - streaming music. Yes, it’s true that listeners will still want to own files for a few more years. There are places and devices that can’t get high bandwidth wireless Internet access, like my Macbook Pro which I am using to write this on the plane ride home to NYC. I am listening to mp3s (no DRM for me) in iTunes all the way home. But over the next five years, the number of places and devices where you can’t get a speedy wireless connection is going to dwindle to maybe the car. And you’ve always got radio in the car, which is going to get better and better because it has to in order to survive. Like everything that has happened in digital music, the rights holders have been once again been forced into dealing with an emerging technology. Companies like Last.fm (CBS) and imeem and others have, over the past year, done deals with the leading rights holders to give them permission to stream pretty much any song they want to listeners over the Internet. They can do this “on-demand�, meaning you want to listen to the new Jack Johnson song, you tell your favorite web music service that and it plays. They can also stream music in various forms of smart playlists, either the tracks you have marked as your favorites, or the tracks your friends have suggested to you, or the tracks that people who like the same music as you like. Each and every service has a different take on these playlists. I happen to like Last.fm and Hypemachine. You may like Pandora. Someone else might like Jango. Your kid’s Myspace (NWS) page might have an imeem playlist on it. And because of all this innovation in streaming music over the past year, the number of people actively listening to music streamed over the Internet is rising quickly. It’s becoming a mainstream activity, particularly among the younger set. I think of these web services as the new radio stations. Everyone of my generation has had their favorite radio stations. Everyone of my kid’s generation will have their favorite web music services. There will be hundreds of them. All supported by advertising, just like traditional radio stations, and all of them licensed by rights holders (eventually), and all of them paying the rights holders a little coin every time their song is played. And because these services will be free to anyone who wants to listen, they will be very popular. Never before have you been able to decide you want to listen to something you don’t currently own and then just play it. No searching on Limewire or Bittorrent, no waiting for the download - you type in the name of the song you want to play and you hit play. These services are coming to mobile phones. Probably in the next year we’ll all be listening to pandora or last.fm in the gym on our phone instead of our limited library on our iPod. That’s when this new form of listening is going to explode. And that’s when Apple is going to wish it had thought more about streaming and less about file based music. But you can’t feel too badly about Apple because a good number of people will be listening to Pandora or Last.fm on their iPhones. Two things happened this past week that may be important to this emerging market. First, MySpace got in the game. They cut deals with most of the major labels to allow them to offer their own streaming service. It’s MySpace, and as Bob Lefsetz points out, they have their own set of challenges with technology and user experience. But music is a HUGE part of the MySpace experience and they have over 100 million people a month coming to MySpace, often for music, and that’s a much bigger audience than anyone else has for a streaming service. And they’ve been in the business of streaming for a long time, not in a particularly easy to use way, but they play a lot of music to a lot of people every day. So I think MySpace will be a meaningful player in the emerging streaming music business. The other thing that happened is Ian Rogers left Yahoo (YHOO) Music where he had been leading the charge for the past couple years and joined a small startup in LA that has some ideas about this emerging market. Ian is a super smart guy, one of the few people I’ve met in the web music business who really gets where this is all going. What Ian knows is that the fans are the most powerful distribution points for music. He gets the power of mp3 blogging. He understands that the HypeMachine has built a terrific new age radio station by aggregating all the music that is being posted onto mp3 blogs and he understands that further enabling that kind of behavior, where the fans are the ultimate arbiters of what gets played and what gets popular, is the end game for all of this. I don’t know much about what the company Ian joined does. And I haven’t been told about any of their plans. So this is all just conjecture on my part. But watch what they are going to do closely. I think something important may come of out that development. Here’s what we need. We need someone to create an easy to search streamable library of all the recorded music in the world. We need to be able to grab a track and embed it on our blog. We need to be able to see how many people played it. We need others to be able to crawl these user pages with the embedded music and create algorithms based on who posted it, how often it was played, and how often it was reblogged and linked to. The services that do all of that need to be able to play the music that flows out of these social algorithms in the same way. This all has to be licensed and legal and it has to result in money flowing to the artists. If you put the music on your blog, you should have two choices. Allow the ads to be served into your music or your page or both by the service you got the music from. Or deal with the monetization yourself and pay the royalties you owe. Most people will do the former but some will do that latter. When this platform is built and served up, a million flowers will bloom. Everyone who wants to be a radio station will be one. And it will be simple to do it. And it will be legal. And we’ll be able to listen in our homes on our home stereos, at the gym, at work, at the library, and some day in the car. That’s the future of the music business. And we’ve made a lot of progress in the past year getting there. I am excited as a fan, a listener, a technogeek, and an investor. Note: Sorry for the absence of links in this post. I wrote it on the plane home last night and didn't have time this morning to fix it up.
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News: GizMac ships DuraSport case for iPod nano 3G
GizMac Accessories has begun shipping its DuraSport case for the iPod nano (with video). The DuraSport is a silicone case for the iPod nano featuring Click Wheel protection, a clear plastic face shield for screen protection, side grips, and an included quick change lanyard, carabiner clip, and armband with velcro closure. In addition, each DuraSport includes two different colors of cases in every package. “The DuraSport silicone iPod case gives…
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Does the new NYC logo infringe on Apple’s trademark? You be the judge.
Apple and the city of New York are having a bit of a spat over the new GreeNYC logo. Apple feels that the new logo is too similar to their own logo and have made a formal attempt to block the trademark that the city has filed for the new logo. Now, before we get into it, it is important to mention that any company that feels there is even a remote chance of the trademark being violated has to make an active effort to defend it, or risk losing their own trademark license. Now, having a said that - I'm not really sure that Apple has anything to worry about here. You can see the two logos above. What do you think?
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Twitter on your own Server and Teach your iPhone to back itself up
Why blog in one place and tweet from another? In the spirit of efficiency, I've got a do-it-yourself twitter you can run from your own server. There's also a new IM client that lets you post to Facebook and Twitter while monitoring Gmail, IMAP and more. Join me for these and an iPhone app pick in this week's Freeloader Friday. [read more at MacMerc.com]
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Leaving Google in No Man's Land
Google (GOOG) is sort of in no man's land, both in its chart and in my portfolio.
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Wall Street Breakfast: Must-Know News
Job market woes. New jobless claims were the worst since September 17, 2005 (the week following Hurricane Katrina), up 38K to 407,000. There may be discrepancies due to Easter. The AXL strike that has caused shutdowns at 30 GM (GM) factories is also a factor, and, of course, underlying deterioration in the job market. Today, the biggie: Non-farm payrolls.
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Mac Bloggers: All Eyes on iPhone
While the Apple-related blogging world has seen a range of topics this week, including updates to iTunes, QuickTime and Front Row, it should come as no surprise that this week's hottest focus of Apple-related blogging comes courtesy of the ever popular iPhone. If something happens in the mobile cell phone world, the iPhone gets play. If something comes up in the online music or video world ... there's a good chance the iPhone will get play. The dominant coverage this week, however, is not only about how it will shake out in future models -- bloggers are covering where it's not.
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Fast Money Recap: 4/3/08: Housing Hyprocrisy
Recap of CNBC's Fast Money, Thursday April 3. Click on a stock ticker for more analysis.
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Is There a Mobile Phone Recession?
A Gizmodo author wrote a sobering analysis in Popular Mechanics of the CTIA conference on the wireless industry this week:
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Mac OS Ken: 04.04.2008
NPD: Apple Top Music Retailer in U.S. in January and February / MySpace Makes Official MySpace Music Announcement / RBC Capital: A Third Explanation for iPhone Shortage / Apple Acknowledges iPhone Shortage (Does Not Say Why) / Germany: T Mobile Drops 8Gig iPhone to 99 Euros (With 2-Year Contract) / Apple Sues Big Apple Over Green Apple Logo
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Would we miss you?
John Moore has a great series about known brands and their importance to our lives. If Pizza Hut disappeared tomorrow, who would miss them? Could you find a replacement pizza? A replacement place to work? What about your personal marketing, though? If you disappeared tomorrow, would the customers you call on miss you? The places you're applying for a job? The guys on the board of directors you sit on? The users who call tech support where you answer the phone? I spent an hour on the phone with Apple support yesterday. The guy I talked to was named Seven. (Gotta love that). Seven would be missed. In fact, every time I call Apple, I hope it's Seven on the phone. The problem with fitting in and being a cog in the machine is that cogs are intentionally designed to be easily replaceable. When one breaks, you just get another. No one particularly misses the old one.
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Hold On To RIMM
On Wednesday, RIM (NASDAQ: RIMM) reported its Q4 and fiscal year 2008 financial results.
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Logitec's Bluetooth 2.1+EDR adapter offers 300 foot range and 5x more battery life
We know what you're thinking: Jeebus, not another Bluetooth adapter Engadget, slow news day? But if you check that snark for a moment, you'll notice that this ¥2,280 (about $22) Logitec adapter is a Bluetooth 2.1+EDR + Class 1 device. That means an operating range up to 300 feet and all the goodies that come from 2.1. In other words, easier pairing and up to 5x longer battery life for like-speced Bluetooth keyboards and mice. It also supports 15 different Bluetooth profiles (9 on Macs) including your favorites for stereo audio and handsfree devices. Now that Bluetooth 2.1 is beginning to trickle out into retail, you won't be buying 2.0 gear anymore will you?[Via Impress] Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments