It’s the last full week of April, and you know what that means — well, nothing really. We’re in a desert lately when it comes to juicy Apple rumors and no one seems to know what’s going on with new MacBooks, the annual WWDC show or much of anything else out of Cupertino, but that isn’t stopping the rumor sites from digging as deeply as they can. Let’s take a look at what’s new for Monday, April 23, 2012!
The cloud has had a busy day, first with Adobe making its Creative Cloud offering official, followed by Microsoft essentially rebooting its own SkyDrive with a new version 2.0. As part of the revamp, the iOS SkyDrive app got a universal makeover with native iPad support (including the new iPad’s Retina Display), the ability to upload multiple photos or videos, easy links to share with friends and file management skills. But the story doesn’t end there — Microsoft has also introduced preview versions of a desktop app for the Mac, available to OS X Lion users, which integrates SkyDrive into the desktop similar to Dropbox and competing services. The only downside of this change is that Microsoft is getting stingier with storage — where Windows Live and Hotmail accounts used to get 25GB free, users who haven’t actively used their storage will be downgraded along with new users to 7GB. Thankfully, this is easily rectified for existing users by visiting your SkyDrive storage management options and accepting Redmond’s kindly offer to get a free upgrade back to 25GB — or even buy more storage, should you need it.
The Feds continue to pressure Apple over ebook pricing, with the recent antitrust lawsuit kicking things up a notch or three. According to The Wall Street Journal, Apple’s response is that books, magazines and newspapers shouldn’t be treated any differently than apps — Cupertino gets a 30 percent cut of them all, and the company refuses to simply settle the lawsuit the way publishers Hachette, HarperCollins and Simon & Schuster have. “I don’t think you understand,” explained Apple iTunes boss Eddy Cue. “We can’t treat newspapers or magazines any differently than we treat FarmVille.” Of course, that hasn’t stopped publishers from pushing for more favorable terms anyway, despite Amazon clearly being the real monopoly for publishers thanks to its lock-in with the Kindle format.
The dust has barely settled on Microsoft’s purchase of billion worth of patents from AOL earlier this month, and already roughly two-thirds of them are getting snapped up by Facebook. According to AllThingsD, Microsoft has cut a deal with Facebook worth 0 million, which will put more than 600 of the former AOL patents into the social networking giant’s hands. That leaves around 265 patents remaining in Microsoft’s hands, while recouping more than half of the cost of the earlier deal. Given that Yahoo sued Facebook last month over 10 patents they claim infringement on, the deal is probably not much of a coincidence. The deal also includes a license to “approximately 650 AOL patents and applications that will be now be owned by Facebook” in Microsoft’s case, as well as a license to “approximately 300 patents that AOL did not sell in its auction.”
We’re in a definite downturn when it comes to Apple product rumors as the masses wait for whatever is coming down the pipeline next, so a number of websites have been quick to poke around looking for any signs of things to come. One such item popped up today on AppleBitch.com, claiming that the iPhone’s familiar home button may get a facelift when the next model arrives later in the year. The buttons were discovered on TVC-Mall.com, a Chinese supplier site based out of Shenzhen that claims to be selling “iPhone 5 replacement parts.” While it’s quite likely that Apple has indeed locked their iPhone 5 (or is that “new iPhone”?) designs by now and pieces of it may be floating around, we’ll still file this rumor in the “grain of salt” category until we see what CEO Tim Cook and friends have to announce.
If you downloaded the Office for Mac 2011 Service Pack 2 released on April 12, you may have noticed a thorny problem affecting the database for Outlook users. (Users of the cheaper Home & Student Edition that doesn’t come with Outlook are immune from this, of course.) On Friday, Microsoft pulled the troubled update from their AutoUpdate service, while documenting a fix for afflicted users in a blog post. “Our goal is provide the simplest update experience for everyone — so we have temporarily stopped pushing out the SP2 update through Microsoft AutoUpdate while we investigate the issue,” the Mac team noted. A manual update remains available for download, but Microsoft encourages most users to wait for a corrected update to hit the pipelines.
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Judging from the company’s recent moves, Apple’s cloud plans may be even bigger than originally thought. What’s better than one new data center in North Carolina? How about a second one in Prineville, Oregon, just a stone’s throw from a similar Facebook facility?
KTVZ.com is reporting that Apple has purchased 160 acres of land in Prineville, Oregon. The .6 million purchase from Crook Country was confirmed by Apple to local NewsChannel 21, and the land is only “a stone’s throw” from a huge facility there owned by Facebook.
The deal only became public this week as Crook County had been working with a company known only as “Project Maverick” — a move that came along with the requisite non-disclosure agreements to keep the deal quiet until it was finalized. On February 15, the first public document identifying Apple Inc. as the buyer finally became public.
Apple spokeswoman Kristin Huguet confirmed that the company “purchased the land for a data center,” but would not comment further, in keeping with traditional Cupertino policy.
“We just don’t know what their plans are,” Crook County Judge Mike McCabe said, adding that he’s “confident it will be good for Prineville and Crook County. These folks have been wonderful to work with. We will look forward to a long-term relationship with them.”
The February 15 signing of the deed to the property by the county commissioners coincides with the Oregon Senate passing legislation “to lift a property tax ‘cloud’ over data centers such as Facebook” — so the timing of the purchase is not likely a coincidence, given the “sizeable property tax breaks” that come with the bill.
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(Image courtesy of KTVZ.com)
The dust has settled, everyone has cleared out of the Guggenheim in New York City, and we all know Apple’s education plans, which include an update to iBooks and new iBooks Author and iTunes U apps. Before we switch back to gossip about the next iPad or even the iPhone 5, let’s address the rest of today’s news, which includes the unfortunate (and unsurprising) bankruptcy of photo legend Kodak. Here’s the rest of the news for this Thursday, January 19, 2012.
If you need further proof that the world has gone app crazy, look no further than Wednesday night’s Facebook pow-wow, which introduces the concept to Timeline. According to The Facebook Blog, users can now “enhance your timeline with apps that help you tell your story, whether you love to cook, eat, travel, run, or review movies.” Sure, Facebook has always had bolt-on apps, but the new initiative promises to integrate them into a user’s Timeline in a more organic way, with 60 companies providing apps at launch, including Foodspotting, Foodily, Ticketmaster, Pinterest, Rotten Tomatoes, Pose, Kobo, Gogobot and TripAdvisor. Facebook promises “there will be apps for all types of interests, as more apps will launch over time.” You have been warned…
The rumor mill has unfortunately churned up another true tale, as AllThingsD is reporting that photography legend Kodak has filed for bankruptcy protection. The news isn’t much of a surprise and “follows years of struggle by the film giant to transition to a digital imaging company.” Kodak will continue operations using 0 million in financing from Citigroup and hopes to come out of restructuring next year. “Kodak is taking a significant step toward enabling our enterprise to complete its transformation,” said Antonio M. Perez, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer in a company press release. “At the same time as we have created our digital business, we have also already effectively exited certain traditional operations, closing 13 manufacturing plants and 130 processing labs, and reducing our workforce by 47,000 since 2003. Now we must complete the transformation by further addressing our cost structure and effectively monetizing non-core IP assets. We look forward to working with our stakeholders to emerge a lean, world-class, digital imaging and materials science company.”
The Big Apple was home to a (little) Apple media event this morning at the Guggenheim, which introduced iBooks 2, iBooks Author and iTunes U to the educational community. Along with those releases, Apple also pushed out a minor update to iTunes which is now available for download. “iTunes 10.5.3 allows you to sync interactive iBooks textbooks to your iPad,” the release notes explain. “These Multi-Touch textbooks are available for purchase from the iTunes Store on your Mac or from the iBookstore included with iBooks 2 on your iPad.” Hit the link to download the update directly or check Software Update if you prefer a smaller download.
Siri may be old news to those of us who bought iPhone 4S handsets back in October, but for patent junkies, things have just started to get interested. Patently Apple is reporting today that “the first killer patent application behind Siri was published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.” Not surprisingly, Apple doesn’t plan to limit the technology to iOS devices but instead “envisions the technology playing a role in vehicles and in-vehicle entertainment systems where an Intelligent Assistant will be considered the king of user interfaces.” The website has a lengthy and detailed examination of the Siri patent filing, dating back to 1987’s “Knowledge Navigator Concept” which proves that Apple has envisioned this kind of technology well before the iPhone was even introduced. The report closes with some prospective uses for Siri which includes “the iPod touch (a personal digital assistant), iMac (desktop computer), MacBook (laptop computer), iPad (tablet computer), consumer electronic devices, consumer entertainment devices; iPod (music player); camera; television; Apple TV (set-top box); electronic gaming unit; kiosk or the like.”
Riddle us this: How can textbook publishers manage to sell a textbook for only through Apple? According to AllThingsD, it’s a matter of simple volume — or at least that’s how McGraw-Hill CEO Terry McGraw is looking at it. But there’s more than meets the eye, because such publishers traditionally sell their printed textbooks direct to schools, which continue to use them for “an average of five years.” The new iBookstore method is only .99 (or less), but the burden of the purchase is on the student (or their parents), although many schools will provide students with codes to download their textbooks. Since the digital textbook can’t be resold or passed on to another student, McGraw views it as a win for his company because in theory, each year another student will be purchasing a copy — and in five years’ time, they’ll have netted the same amount, even after Apple takes their slice of the pie. Apple’s Eddy Cue also confirmed that .99 isn’t part of any kind of “pilot pricing,” explaining “all of our books will be .99.”
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It’s been one of those busy days for tech enthusiasts: Rather than dreaming about the weekend ahead, we’ve had product launches all over the place in the mad pre-Christmas holiday rush before things start to shut down next week. If you’ve already played around with your Facebook Timeline update or nabbed that sweet new Roku iOS app and are waiting for your Apple TV to update, take a breather and see what’s new for this Thursday, December 15, 2011.
Hey, would you look at that… after teasing us nearly two months ago, Facebook has finally gone ahead and officially rolled out the red carpet for its new Timeline profile feature. According to The Facebook Blog, users will have a seven-day “review period” to review everything appearing in your Timeline before anyone else can see it, and as always, you can choose “View As” to get a preview of what it will look like to the public at large. Timeline is also rolling out to Android and the Facebook mobile site, but sadly no iOS love quite yet. So how do you get it? It will gradually appear for all users soon enough, but you can kickstart things into action right now by visiting this web page and clicking “Get Timeline.”
After repeated rumors of an imminent launch, the third Nexus-branded Android handset has finally arrived on U.S. shores with the release of the Samsung Nexus Galaxy through Verizon Wireless. According to The Verge, the flagship Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich handset with 4G LTE will cost users a cool 9.99 with two-year contract, but e-tailers such as LetsTalk.com are already offering it for nearly half that price with discounts — although it’s currently backordered and “likely to ship in one to two weeks.” According to BGR, eager early adopters have already been spotted outside a few Verizon stores nationwide to be the first to get theirs. It’s not quite the frenzy iPhone users have become accustomed to with their product launches, but clearly demand is higher than normal for these handsets on launch day.
Now here’s an odd one for Apple update fans: According to MacRumors, the company pushed out a new version of iOS 5.0.1 specifically tailored to the iPhone 4S — but those of us who have already updated receive nothing. What’s in this mysterious new Build 9A406? Beats us, but with iOS 5.1 already in beta testing, everyone will be getting a new update soon enough. Meanwhile, the second-generation Apple TV was also updated to version 4.4.4, which Apple claims “includes general performance and stability improvements, including a fix for an issue that displayed an error when playing some video content.” Fair enough.
If you own one of the Roku streaming boxes and also carry an iPhone in your pocket, there’s a little treat awaiting you in the App Store today. According to the Roku Blog, the company has finally introduced an official, free iPhone remote control app — and best of all, it works on all Roku boxes, including a first-generation model we had lying around here. Users of the newer Roku 2 or Roku LT players will need to grab the software update version 4.2 before they can use the app, but older players already received the necessary update with a recent version 3.1 update. The company is also promising an Android app, for those of you on that side of the fence, but gives no firm date for its availability.
After a premature rollout last night that early adopters were quickly refunded for, Apple’s new “scan and match” subscription service, iTunes Match, appears to be going live around the world. According to MacRumors, the service popped up again on the radar in the U.K. and was soon followed by Canada, Ireland, Mexico, Australia, France, New Zealand and Spain. Users in these countries are reporting success in subscribing to iTunes Match and matching their libraries accordingly, so it would seem as if the second time is the charm in this case. The rollout today was kicked off by Apple updating their iTunes terms and conditions in these countries, which specifically mention the iTunes Match service.
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It was both a blessing and a curse to be an Apple fan last week, with the iPhone 4S announcement immediately overshadowed the death of co-founder Steve Jobs. But now, the second full week of October is in full swing, with more than a million preordered iPhone 4S units headed to customers this Friday. Here’s what else is making news for Monday, October 10, 2011.
If there’s one internet company with an identity crisis right now, it’s Netflix. According to a posting on The Netflix Blog by CEO Reed Hastings, the company has reversed their decision to split the streaming and DVD services up, with the optical discs being shuffled off to a new site called Qwikster. Those plans are now dead, with everything staying put under the Netflix shingle. However, the CEO didn’t say what will be happening to the company’s plan to start offering video games via Qwikster, so there could still be some blowback yet to come from that camp.
Still looking for a slick IM app for your iPhone? How about one that also does double duty on your iPad as well? Look no further than Verbs IM, which is celebrating the arrival of a universal version 2.2 with full iPad support with a price drop to 99 cents for a limited time only. The app delivers GTalk, AIM, MobileMe and Facebook IM chat in a slick, clean interface, but take note: You’ll need to shell out .99 via in-app purchase if you want Pro features like push notifications or keeping your account logins valid for up to seven days.
Apple’s Phil Schiller gleefully touted a 2x increase in speed with the iPhone 4S over the previous model, but was it all just marketing chatter? Apparently not, with MacRumors reporting on the first hands-on video from AppVV.com, where the handset scored 89567 using BrowserMark, a Mobile Safari-based benchmark tool. By comparison, an iPhone 4 running iOS 5 clocked in at a poky 44856 — just a hair under the promised 2x speed boost. Sounds like we’ll all be flying come October 14!
iCloud is rolling out to users on Wednesday alongside iOS 5, but according to AppleInsider, Apple will be rolling out some necessary updates ahead of time to get you ready. Japanese blog Macotakara claims that OS X Lion 10.7.2 and a new version of iTunes are both due either Monday or Tuesday, but they failed to mention that iPhoto will also need an update to support the iCloud Photo Stream feature. Developers have been beta testing iTunes 10.5, but no one knows for sure if that will actually be the version pushed out this week to support iCloud. Stay tuned!
According to 9to5Mac, Apple CEO Tim Cook has fired off an internal email to employees, announcing the company’s plans for a private celebration of co-founder Steve Jobs’ life which will take place on October 19 in the outdoor amphitheater on the Cupertino campus. The full email can be found by hitting up the link above, which opens with Cook confessing, “I have experienced the saddest days of my lifetime and shed many tears during the past week.” While it’s hard for all of us as fans, you can only imagine how difficult it will be for those who actually worked side by side with the man.
In related news, Bloomberg today confirmed that Jobs died at his home in Palo Alto and a death certificate released this afternoon listed the cause of death as respiratory arrest caused by a “metastatic pancreas neuroendocrine tumor.” The time of death was listed as 3pm PST on October 5; no autopsy was performed and Jobs was buried at a “non-denominational cemetery in Santa Clara County” on October 7.
Facebook has just rolled out a big iOS version 4.0 update, including the addition of native support for the iPad as part of the newly universal app. There are seriously a huge amount of changes noted with the release, so it’s probably easier to just head to the App Store and get downloading rather than sitting here reading this. Seriously… just do it.
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