Articles by Rene Ritchie
Yup, Kevin Rose is back, back again, this time with a sneak peak at Qik for the iPhone, the online video broadcasting App that everyone and their Twitter-feed was “going live” with on the Nokia N95 last year.
Not a jailbreak, but a real honest-to-Steveness App Store application, Kevin says it will be available soon. We say… will Apple approve it? And if they do, what will it say having internet broadcast video capability on a device that still lacks support for local video recording?
Who knows? As Dieter points out, Apple’s cagey approval/rejection process is still incomprehensible.
Qik looks to be One Sweet App, however, and we can’t wait for it to “go live.” Can you?
Technically motor vehicles, we suppose, as people who can still afford to fill up the honking huge gas tanks on trucks and the like get their fair share of iPhone/iPod love as well, as Ars Technica reports that integration has now hit a majority level of 58%.
Proprietary dock port notwithstanding, Apple’s dominance of the music player — and now music phone — market has no doubt driven (ha!) the adaption. More egalitarian-ly, USB integration has hit 33%, with an even higher rate of increase. Says Jeff Smykll:
When my significant other bought her new Scion XD earlier in the year, one of the things she was really excited about was the iPod integration that came standard. The unit is pretty slick: the iPod can be controlled from the steering wheel, the information about the currently-playing song is available on the head unit, and the iPod’s playlists can be traversed using the stereo’s knobs.
Pretty slick. Now we have to decide if we’re going to spend our recession-dwindled savings on a car with iPhone integration… or similarly priced Macbook Air. Oh, why do you test us so, Apple?!
Back during September’s iPod and iTunes focused “Let’s Rock” event, Apple announced that they would begin carrying “stunning” HD TV Shows, and that — surprise surprise — NBC had come skulking back into the fold as well.
Now Apple reports that they have all 4 big US-based television networks: ABC, CBS, FOX, and NBC available in HD, and what’s more:
200 million TV episodes sold, including more than one million HD episodes purchased since the launch of HD programming on iTunes last month.
“Purchased” should indicate that they’re not counting the promotional freebies given away at the start of the HD push, right Apple? Since TV is available via cable, satellite, and for free over the air, one million episodes at $3 a shot is pretty impressive.
Of course, Apple and the major networks, and their archaic international licensing systems (wanna talk “bags of hurt”?) mean that there’s currently no HD TV for users outside the US, and still no US network TV for people in countries like Canada. Ahem.
Can we get on that nowish, Mr. Cue?
Huge rumor. No corroboration. Not journalism. Posting this from a first time, antonymous tipster and if it doesn’t pan out… well… I’ll be boiled in clam chowder eventually anyway… But it’s Friday and this is FUN. Of course, Dieter already told us about the complicated legal quagmire surrounding turn-by-turn GPS, but dagnabit, we wants it!
Apple has begun quietly demonstrating an internally developed iPhone GPS Navigator program that includes turn-by-turn, 3d views etc. Visually, it is very similar to Tom-Tom, but with the expected Apple eye candy. They were sketchy about the details, but it seem that this will not be part of the core software (I.E. they intend to charge for it). It was also unclear whether they were using cellular-based data to share traffic information, but some of the screens seemed to indicate that it would.
Our nameless could be friend — might be prankster — says this will be released after 2.2, but in time for the holidays.
Are we getting played? Or is this happening? Again — not news, not reliable leakage, but pure rumormongering at its most unsubstantiated. Take it for what that’s worth.
Because of Apple’s high media profile, Greenpeace likes to have a little fun with them. Nothing gets headlines like bashing Apple in the tech industry, especially if you’re hippie enough to make Steve Jobs seem more like Stephen Colbert. With Al Gore on their board, however, it’s probably safe to say Apple has to at least appear to be one of the more — if not most — environmentally friendly major tech company in the US. Case in point, and unprecedented second open letter from Steve Jobs:
For the past several years, Apple has made a concerted effort to be more transparent about the steps we are taking to protect the environment and make our business more sustainable. In this environmental update, I’d like to inform you of our recent progress and introduce you to a groundbreaking system of reporting that we believe is unmatched in our industry.
The iPhone got a brief mention as well:
More recently we introduced our first BFR and PVC-free iPods and iPhone 3G with mercury-free displays.
Sounds okay? Second steppish enough at least? Not quite for Greenpeace:
Not quite the breakthrough we were hoping for.
Ouch. Though, to be less sensationalistic, they did have lots of positive feedback as well.
Hopefully Apple will make true on their timeline, and other manufacturers will follow suit.
It’s not easy being green, but I don’t think any of us want to live on the earth from Wall-E, do we?
Updated: Now available via the iTunes App Store
Want to get attention for your App? Innovative and drop dead gorgeous UI is one heckuva way to do it. Enter Weightbot from Tapbots. Killer mascot, even more interesting user experience. These are the kinds of high-polish Apps we’ve been waiting for (no pun intended!)
Anyone else pushing the iPhone envelope? Please let us know!
Thanks to Mark for sending this in!
Title says it all, and you know what? Good for Google. While the holier-than-geek community criticizes Apple’s admittedly adamantium grip on the iPhone App Store while raving about the “open platform” of Google’s Android, the harsh realities of internet existence — including malicious code and apps — means that no playground can be entirely free of adult supervision, lest it quickly degenerate into Lord of the Flies land. Says Computerworld (via Macrumors):
In the Android Market terms of service, Google expressly says that it might remotely remove an application from user phones. “Google may discover a product that violates the developer distribution agreement … in such an instance, Google retains the right to remotely remove those applications from your device at its sole discretion,” the terms, linked to from the phone, read.
Allowing all sorts of background and music/media Apps that Apple would never allow is a great move for consumers — and for putting competitive pressure on Apple to do likewise. Making sure they have some precautions in place, however, is a responsible move on Google’s part.
During Tuesday’s “Spotlight on Notebooks” Keynote, Steve Jobs wasn’t the only jean-and-dark-shirt uniformed Apple exec on stage. COO Time Cook took an unusual turn, discussing Mac business. SVP of Design, Jonathan Ive, an even more unusual presence in front of the audience, introduced the new “brick” unibody concept. And Marketing VP Phil Schiller — who’s no stranger to Keynotes — took part in the Q&A at the end.
It wasn’t all Steve, all the time.
Because of this, Gizmodo’s Jesus Diaz says Steve may be thinking of leaving in the near future, to live out his days on the beach, content that he’s shown investors and customers that Team Apple will Boom! along quite nicely without him, much as Microsoft is… er… doing without Gates in the daily driver’s seat:
Steve Jobs is leaving Apple. Not tomorrow, but probably very soon. That’s why he started to say good bye today, doing something more important than just presenting new MacBooks, MacBook Pros, and an updated MacBook Air. Today’s event was a play in which he clearly told everyone that the company is more than himself. Since the very first minute, when he immediately sat down to let Tim Cook talk, he was saying: “Hey, look, Apple is more than Steve. These are The Guys, the Goodfellas, the A-Team. They share the same vision I have. And they are going to push the company forward when I change my office chair for a hammock and caipirinhas on my private beach in Hawaii”.
Daring Fireball’s John Gruber, however, says Steve isn’t going anywhere. He points out that Jobs has shared the stage before, often letting adepts take the more highly specialized presentations, like introducing Leopard at WWDC. Gruber says:
But so long as he’s healthy, working at Apple is exactly the thing Jobs wants to do. He’s consumed by his work, and I think it’s only in the last two or three years that Apple has gotten to the point where Jobs feels he has a decent set of crayons at his disposal. In Jobs’s mind, the iPhone is only the beginning of what a truly flourishing Apple can produce. Why would he leave now? “A hammock and caipirinhas on a private beach” would be living hell for Steve Jobs.
We’re with Gruber on this one. While Diaz is saying what many of us were likely thinking during the show, Jobs doesn’t strike us as the casual CEO. His investment in Apple is lifelong. He’s not Woz, he’s the Wizard, and they’ll have to pry his hand off Apple’s perfectly balanced, aluminum and gloss black steering wheel if that’s ever going to change.
John Welch wrote in to let us know about Shards and Hedonism. Shards also has a free demo lite version, Shardsette available via the App Store.
Shards is a hybrid that combines inlay and breakout style games. Each level is composed of four types of triangles: floor, empty, wall, and void. You must first fill the empty triangles by tapping triangle based shapes in that appear in a bubble that the player controls with tilt movements. Hedronism is a permutation puzzle. You start on a faceted globe and can move to your immediately adjacent neighbors changing their color in a predictable sequence. The goal is to turn the globe into any single color in the shortest time possible. Advancing to the next level increases the number of colors. Best time is kept for individual levels and for the difficulties easy, medium and hard.
Thanks John!
Major League Baseball’s App for the iPhone has been in the news due to a price drop — and the little controversy surrounding it’s seasonal expiry — as of late. Well, now Apple has thrown a huge spotlight onto it again, this time likely hoping to ride the playoff popularity wave.
For baseball fans who want their fix when they want and where they want, the commercial gets it right: “game changer” indeed.
Check it out at Apple.com
