Mark is an award-winning journalist who worked at 9to5Mac for over six years. He covers Apple and other topics related to the consumer technology industry.
Macenstein points to this listing on Sears’ website for iWork at a $39.99 price point. iWork getting a price reduection?! Nope. It’s a project tool set called iWork and it even has an Apple-ish logo. Wikipedia can explain trademark infringement. The funny part is that Sears sells Apple’s iWork productivity suite too.
Buy the iWork Tool Set here, something tells us they are going to be off the shelves soon!
Following yesterday’s proof of concept for hacking into the new iPod nano’s file system, developer Steven Troughton-Smith has figured out a way to put the device into DFU mode to install custom firmware files. The first part of the process is something anybody can do now with their sixth generation iPod nano. That is to hold down the iPod’s restart buttons until you see a black screen and a double reboot.
From here, Troughton-Smith modified the popular jailbreak utility iRecovery to work with the non-iOS iPod nano. After this, he used the newly modified iRecovery application to install an extracted operating system file onto the iPod nano (video above). This file was built to boot the iPod nano into a white screen mode and that is exactly what it did.
This obviously does not sound groundbreaking but in reality it is. An encrypted firmware file was just installed on an iPod nano and functioned as intended by the installer. This discovery is a step in the right direction for custom made firmware files to be installed on the iPod nano and is the best evidence yet for a possible iPod nano ‘jailbreak.’
A hacker/developer close to 9to5mac has let us know that Troughton-Smith’s discovery is a big step in the right direction, but before any custom firmware can actually be installed and used through this method an actual exploit in the iPod nano OS will be need to be found. To summarize, the method to install custom firmware on the iPod nano is present, but the jailbreak community is in need of an exploit to actually make this method useful.
Bloomberg reports that Apple was sued on December 23rd over claims that App Store apps are proving user data to advertisers without consent. The lawsuit claims that Apple’s iOS devices “are encoded with identifying devices that allow advertising networks to track what applications users download, how frequently they’re used and for how long.” The lawsuit also states that user information like age, gender, and political views are being sold to advertisers as well.
The lawsuit not only puts Apple up as a defendant but cites the creators of popular apps like Paper Toss, Pandora, The Weather Channel, and Dictionary.com as defendants too. Apple of course defends themselves stating that they review each App Store app to defend its user’s privacy and will remove and reject any that take users data for malicious or advertising purposes.
The filers of the lawsuit are hoping for their claims to turn into a class-action-lawsuit and say that anyone who has downloaded an App Store app to an iOS device since December 1st 2008 should be eligible for compensation. The App Store opened up on July 11th 2008 so we’re unsure where this December 1st date exactly stems from.
Step a board this $600,000 per week superyacht Solemates and be prepared to control your entire trip with an iPad. An iPad lets you control the entertainment systems, climate systems, blinds and lights among other things. Our favorite feature would have to be the button to summon a crew member for another drink. The best part is that if you don’t have an iPad (yet you’re boarding a $600,000 per week boat) the captain will hand you one when you board.
As reported by MacStories, developer James Whelton apparently was able to break through the sixth generation iPod nano’s “cache comparison” system to make unofficially supported modifications. The developer proved the concept in the video above by demonstrating the ability to remove apps off the device. Although this does not seem ground breaking, the possibility of apps, video, calendars, and games on the latest iPod nano could soon become a reality.
The developer claims that he found files pertaining to games, apps, video, and calendars within the iPod nano’s file system leading to the conclusion that the nano’s operating system is definitely a hybrid between the old iPod nano operating system and iOS. The core is the old system while the layer on top resembles iOS. The developer says he will be posting more information about the nano “jailbreak” in the next few days so stay tuned.
A prototype of Apple’s first portable Macintosh has just been posted for sale on eBay. The device is said to have not been intended for sale and is clearly marked as a prototype unit with a label stating “this device is a demonstration unit only. Production units will comply with all applicable Federal Rules and Regulations.” The device itself is in “perfect condition” but does not power on. By perfect the seller means the outside as the inside contains a defunct acid battery.
The Macintosh Portable is the basis for the laptop computers we use today. It ran on a rechargeable battery , included a screen which flipped shut and had an input device. In the case of the Macintosh Portable is was a trackball. More photos of the protoype device are at eBay.
Digitimes reports that Apple will ship 20-21 million iPhones in Q1 2011 including 14-15 million WCDMA (what iPhones currently use) phones and 5-6 million CDMA phones. The report also backs up rumors pointing to a Q1 2011 launch for the Verizon iPhone. Interestingly, Digitimes also cites a CDMA iPhone for Asia meaning Verizon won’t be the only carrier getting the new iPhone next quarter. Digitimes also reports that Apple shipped a total of 47 million iPhones in 2010 with 15.5 million of them shipping in the fourth quarter.
A Wichita Falls, Texas Find my iPhone user shares his Christmas miracle:
Pretty amazing Christmas Story! Early this morning my 2005 Land Rover was stolen from the Marriott in Wichita Falls TX. The local police put me on hold, transferred me around and did nothing. My iPhone was in the car in between the seats and turned on. I tracked it using MobileMe Find My Phone to HWY 287 on the way to Decatur. When they exited the highway and headed on a Farm road for Justin TX a few miles away, I contacted the Justin Police and with the help of a very savvy operator we pinpointed the car at a Sonic. While I was on the phone with her, she said the officer sees your car and is going to make the arrest. A few minutes later she frantically calls me to start tracking the car again. The officer had handcuffed the suspects, sat one down on the curb while putting the other in the back seat. When he got back, the guy had Houdini’d the cuffs from behind his back to the front, fought with the officer and jumped in my car, dragged him and ran over him. I followed the car on the iPhone and directed the Highway Patrol to where he was – high speed chase ending with him flipping the Land Rover several times. The policeman is going to be fine – he is at the hospital with multiple bruises etc. The screenshot is where the car thieves ran over the policeman and escaped. I am just so thankful the policeman was not seriously hurt – I could care less about the car or the crook.
His story not only shows how helpful Find my iPhone is for finding your lost iOS device but also shows how helpful it can be for retrieving items like cars. If you read the account you will notice that a helping police officer was badly injured in the ordeal but he is now in stable condition. A double miracle. Here’s a video of the accompanying news report. (Clarification: The news report incorrectly cites OnStar as the tracking service although it was really MobileMe according the user. Also, in case it isn’t painfully obvious, that screenshot isn’t of this incident)
Sleipnir is a great new browser for the iPhone and it brings some unique features to the table. It’s not native like iOS Safari and it doesn’t bring flash video to the iPhone like SkyFire but it does bring a very unique and intuitive tabbed browsing experience. The tabs feature (video above) lets you flick through your different tabs (similar to Opera Mobile) without having to leave the page you are currently browsing.
Sleipnir also has a very smooth full screen mode that users may find helpful on pages with a lot of text. The browser is also very smooth and “snappy” overall with quick pinching and zooming. Additioanlly, the browser has an enhanced search bar that lets you quickly search Google, Amazon, eBay, Wikipedia, Google Images, Google Realtime, Yahoo, and Bing. It’s available for free on the App Store. (via TUAW)
In his best and worst products of 2010 post today, Walt Mossberg declared Apple’s iPad as the number one product of 2010. The iPad is not the only Apple product on the top three list with the iPhone 4 tying at number 3 with the Samsung Galaxy S phone series. 4G networks are number two on the list and the top three worst products (in order) are the Dell Streak, Google TV, and TiVo Premiere.
Taking Walt’s top spot this year was none other than Apple’s iPad. For a 1.0 product, the iPad was amazing. With the new iOS 4.2 operating system and its huge selection of apps, the iPad continues to stay ahead of the competition.
Apple today updated their refurbished Mac offerings with refurbished versions of their latest MacBook Air models. The entry 11.6 inch MacBook Air with a 64 GB SSD, a 1.4 GHz processor and 2 GB of RAM is $849. The entry 13 inch model with a 1.86 GHz processor, a 128 GB SSD, and 2 GB of RAM is $1099. Other models with enhanced configurations are available too. View the deals here.
A 13 year-old iPhone user will be going to court against Apple Korea next month over an iPhone 3G repair dispute. Back in October of this year the 13 year-old’s father asked for $251 in compensation from Apple after they refused to fix his daughter’s iPhone 3G, despite the one year warranty. Apple claimed they could not fix his daughter’s iPhone for free as it apparently had water damage, according to the trivial water sensors, which the family denied causing. After this, an attorney for Apple’s Korean front attempted to settle with the family under the table in exchange for the family keeping quiet and not speaking of the incident to the press.
This plan obviously did not work out for Apple and now they have a court hearing opening on January 13th. The family refused Apple’s settlement because their goal was not specifically to receive the monetary compensation but was to make sure others do not face the same issues with Apple’s repair policies. The 13 year-old’s father Lee Chul-ho sums up his feelings about the case below:
Although we filed the suit to receive the repair fees, the ultimate purpose of the suit was aimed at demanding that Apple improve its service policy so that people facing similar situations can get back unjustly paid repair expenses. There is no point of raising the suit if only one individual gets compensation.
We just got our hands on some information about the upcoming Mac App Store. First here’s a screenshot of the login page you will need to pass through in order to download apps. What’s interesting based on the description is that you will be able to use your Apple Account, iTunes account, or MobileMe account to download apps.
Next, the Mac App Store will have parental control preferences as well as age ratings that are similar to those found on the iTunes App Store for iOS devices:
The Mac App Store won’t only be a new application in Mac OS X 10.6.6 but will be integrated deeply into the operating system. A MacGenerationforum poster found that when he attempted to open an unsupported file on Mac OS X 10.6.6 build 10J537 his Mac asked him if he would like to search the App Store for an application to open the unsupported file type. This new feature can be compared to a feature on Windows that allows you to search the web for applications to open unsupported files. The Mac way is more native and secure though due to Apple’s Mac App Store review process. Above is our screenshot in English.
Apple has updated their online MobileMe Calendar application, at me.com, to include alerts. Just like on an iOS device or the Mac’s calendar application, me.com will now let you set alerts for calendar events. Any alert you setup on me.com will automatically sync to your other MobileMe devices. You can choose to be notified 5 minutes, 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours, 1 day, or 2 days in advance of your event. If you are on the me.com calender application at the time of an alert, you will be notified (shown above). Screenshot of setting up an alert at me.com is after the break.
SkyFire for iPad has just hit the App Store and it brings flash video content to the iPad as well as a slew as other bonuses not found on the native Safari web browser. SkyFire for iPad costs $4.99 and an iPhone version is available as well for $2.99. SkyFire for iPad’s feature list is after the break.
According to Mobile Magazine a Kinect-like gesture system for the iPad will be demoed in early January at CES 2011. Elliptic Labs is the company behind the technology and they specialize in “creating new and intuitive ways of interacting with computers.” For some time now the company has been working on a version of a Kinect-like gesture system for the iPad using a prototype tablet (video above).
The technology behind the system sits in a special iPad dock and is ultrasound. This dock creates a “touchless zone” ” that covers approximately one foot in front and to the side of the iPad’s screen. Elliptic Labs’ CEO Stian Aldrin explained the vision for the technology on the iPad and its real world applications.
The idea is that you use touchless gestures to operate primary functions of a docked tablet in situations like when you have wet or greasy hands in the kitchen. In general tablets are made for being handheld. When it is docked you are often walking or standing further away, and then using a finger on the screen involves a change of modality. Rather than bending down, leaning forward or picking it up you can use larger movements a little bit further away to do things like volume up or next song without changing modality.
Kinect-like gesture technology would be a huge feature for the iPad whether it comes via a third party or even from Apple. The video above shows it in action on a prototype device but check out a picture after the break with the iPad as the device being demoed.
Remember HyperMac’s awesome external battery packs for Mac notebooks? Remember how Apple made HyperMac cease sales of the devices due to the use of Apple’s Magsafe technology? Well now the chargers are finally back and HyperMac’s compromise with Apple is clear based upon how these new versions work.
The heart of the issue between HyperMac and Apple were the Magsafe connectors so now, you need to buy your own car lighter adapter through Apple. You can’t really sue someone for making a battery for a car adapter, can you?
We spoke to HyperMac and they informed us that this is just a temporary solution as these new models power up your notebook but don’t recharge them. This means that you can sit at 30% internal battery charge all day with a HyperMac plugged in, but it will never actually recharge the battery.
Apple is really widening their iPad sales channels recently. October saw Target, Walmart, Verizon and AT&T stores. November added Sam’s Club and Navy Exchange. The iPad made its way to BestBuy.com earlier this month and now AT&T has started selling 3G iPads at its online store. Let us repeat, online store. Online! The online store sells all three models at the usual $629, $729, and $829 price points. The data plans are of course the same no contract deal and are sold separately through the iPad itself or AT&T’s new iPad 3G web portal.
A “leaked” picture of Flipboard for Mac made the rounds this morning and many had their doubts about its legitimacy. Flipboard contacted 9to5mac to let us know the “screenshot” is fake and “is not from Flipboard.” Flipboard also told us:
We definitely believe the desktop is part of our future, but it’s still on the whiteboard and not something we are launching soon. The desktop requires a lot of attention to design and UI and we’d like to take the time to get it right.
So there you have it. Flipboard for Mac is not launching soon and is not coming to the Mac App Store on January 6th. Until then, keep munching on the awesome iPad version.
The seller of one of the Steve Jobs action figures let us know that his auction was removed at the request of Apple. The reason for removal is that the doll “violates a celebrity’s right of publicity.” Since having his auction removed at Apple’s request, the seller took a daring move and has put it back on eBay. It’s currently at a $1000 and it will most likely be gone soon too.
With the iPad 2 only about 100 days away, Apple is still yet to finish their global rollout of the first generation iPad. Today, Apple has added Israel to their list of countries with the iPad. Although Israel is yet to have any official Apple Stores or an Apple Online Store, the country does have iDigital as their official Apple retailer. The iPad starts at NIS 2250 in Israel and both the WiFi-only and WiFi+ 3G models are available. Thanks, Eric K.
After being pulled a few months back do to an undisclosed (with Apple) easter egg, tap tap tap’s Camera+ has returned to the App Store. The app has several new filters and enhancments in addition to the usual bug fixes. The full list is after the break.
Apple has just updated iPhoto to version 9.1.1 and the update includes some enhanced photo emailing features, bug fixes, and overall stability improvements. You can now email photos through apps besides the Mac’s included mail application and you can also use two new photo email themes: “Classic and Journal.”
This update adds new email options to iPhoto ’11. It also improves overall stability and addresses a number of other minor issues. Specific fixes include:
Adds a preference allowing photos to be emailed using an external email application
Adds “Classic” and “Journal” themes to email.
Photos attached to an email can now be sized to Small, Medium or Large
Improves reliability when upgrading a library from an earlier version of iPhoto
iPhoto now correctly preserves the sort order of Events after upgrading a library
Event titles displayed in headers can now be edited in Photos view
Addresses a problem that could cause duplicate photos to be added to a MobileMe album
Scrolling overlay now correctly displays ratings when photos are sorted by rating
Photos are now sorted correctly when a rating is changed and photos are sorted by rating
Fixes a problem that could cause text formatting controls to become inaccessible when editing a calendar
The update is recommended for all users of iPhoto ’11.