Seth Weintraub

Tolmasky via Flickr

The New York Times profiles Francisco Tolmasky who was hired out of college early by Apple in 2006 to work on Mobile Safari in the run up to the launch of the iPhone. It is hard to imagine a more difficult first job than working with Steve Jobs on something so important.

Mr. Jobs was taking a monthlong vacation, so Mr. Tolmasky had to wait for him to return to give his personal blessing for the hiring. “He was super guarded about the project, and he was probably suspicious of some random 20-year-old,” Mr. Tolmasky said. “I remember being very frustrated. This was, like, an impossible task.”

It wasn’t just Mobile Safari…
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NVIDIA updated its CUDA drivers to 6.0.37 for Mac OS 10.9 Mavericks today. As TonyMacx86 points out, it is for…

Apple internal slides

There has been no shortage of rumors that the iPhone 6 will have a big screen ranging from 4.7-inches to over 5 inches. But why is Apple doing this? They just changed the display size from 3.5-inches to 4-inches and another screen size increase could present a headache for developers, casemakers and the whole ecosystem.

The answer, from Apple’s own research/presentation, shows they have to. There is no growth in the 4-inch phone market for devices that cost more than $300. In fact, that market is shrinking overall.

Why?

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[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tSbPukGpVY]

TV Tokyo got a quick interview with Apple VP of iPad, iPhone and iPod Marketing Greg Joswiak. In the snippit, cropped above from a longer segment, Joswiak boasts that Apple is approaching 70% iPhone marketshare in Japan – something he attributes to Apple’s  relentless focus on quality and the Japanese consumer’s desire to put quality above cost.

As you’d expect, Joswiak deflects questions about the iPhone 6 to the chagrin of the reporter.

Apple this year landed the biggest Japanese carrier NTT DoCoMo which also spurred renewed pricing competition among its competitors allowing Apple’s Japanese marketshare to explode to near 70%.

(via Macotakara)
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[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4bQxN-bXFQ]

After a long build up, Apple’s first Eastern Europe/Asia Minor store opened up today in Istanbul at the Zorlu Center. As with some other flagship stores, it is mostly subterranean with a glass upward protrusion. This one has four large panes of glass covered by a white roof with a darker Apple logo surrounded by a fountain as pictured below.

Image via ifoAppleStore

Apple yesterday held a press event attended by one of the Apple Store leads Steve Cano. Tim Cook took to Twitter to announce the opening:

[tweet https://twitter.com/tim_cook/status/452417592544608256]

More images and videos below:

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Evidence presented by Samsung

Apple SVP of Marketing Phil Schiller took the stand again today in the Samsung Patent Trial v2. Schiller was grilled on a number of emails Samsung came up with in discovery that painted Apple as paranoid about the rise of Android and Samsung’s Galaxy line in particular. CNET covered one such email where Schiller seemed concerned with the quality of Samsung’s Superbowl ad campaign:

After watching one Samsung pre-Super Bowl ad Schiller wrote an email to Vincent, commenting on the ad. “It’s pretty good and I cant help but think “these guys are feeling it” (like an athlete who can’t miss because they are in the zone) while we struggle to nail a compelling brief on iPhone,” Schiller wrote in an email, presented in court on Friday. He added: “Something drastic has to change. Fast.”

The concern was apparently so strong that Schiller wrote an email to CEO Tim Cook contemplating firing its dedicated marketing agency Media Arts Lab (MAL), a subsidiary of TBWA Chiat Day which itself is a subsidiary of Omnicom. Steve Jobs brought in Lee Clow at Chiat Day to create the Think Different campaign when Apple was teetering on bankruptcy in 1997 and the agency has been Apple’s only outside ad team ever since. In 2013, Apple’s “Designed by Apple in California,” was its first new branded ad campaign since 1997. Samsung positioned that campaign as a response to its Android threat…
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[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbquGkxWuyE]

We’re huge fans of Pad & Quill so we’re excited to let you know that today the St. Paul, MN-based company announced some new wallets/cases for iPhone 5/s. Most notable is the $70 Traveller case [WANT] which will hold your iPhone and multiple cards in a pouch around back with a slider that helps eject your wares. We’ve noted before how much we like Pad and Quill’s rugged construction and genuine materials.

My dad had an old coin pouch that he carried everywhere with him and I have very good memories of that. We made this case inspired by his old coin pouch. It’s a tribute to my Dad and to the Craftsman. This is a VERY intricately hand assembled iPhone cover that includes a generous hidden back pocket for multiple Credit cards and ID. This is soft full grain luxury and rugged protection.

The Traveller comes in both Whiskey Brown and Onyx Black.

To accompany this new case, P&Q also just launched 3 new Pad & Quill Wallets made of the same luxury materials…
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Ahead of the latest Apple-Samsung trial, Apple is sharing some of the details regarding the creation of the iPhone with the WSJ. As an aside, Apple also shared a shot of the secret windowless room where the original iPhone meetings took place. The nondescript room is where most of the design decisions for the original iPhone’s software were made and is called “hallowed ground” to Greg Christie, who designs the software interface for products and one of the first members recruited to work on the device in 2004.

It doesn’t mean that the windowless room, lit by fluorescent lights hanging from the ceiling, looked like anything special. Christie recalled the walls had signs of water damage from a flood in an adjacent bathroom. A few images covered the walls including one of Apple’s “Think Different” posters of famous graphic designer Paul Rand and another of a large chicken running around without its head.

Inspiration comes in many forms.

Apple may be sharing this information to drum up public support before the trial. Or, perhaps more likely, Apple knows this information will come out in the trial and wants to “own” the story beforehand.

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We’ve reviewed a fair bit of Thunderbolt docks for Mac here and one thing remains constant: The starting prices range well over $200 (Belkin’s a deal at $150) and that’s before you buy an expensive $30 Thunderbolt cable. The question is: Do you really need Thunderbolt to have a quality/usable dock for your MacBook? Can you get almost all of what you need just from USB 3?

Kanex sent me their $90 USB 3 SimpleDock a few months ago and I’ve put it through its paces ever since.  The first thing you’ll notice out of the box is that it is made extremely well, looks very ‘Apple’ and is substantial in weight. It doesn’t move when you plug in devices because of that weight and a rubberized bottom. On top, all you’ll see is a space that coincidentally fits an iPhone perfectly with a charger cable hole through the bottom. Around back, you’ll find 3 USB 3 ports, a Gigabit Ethernet port as well as a 10W high powered ‘Charge-only’ port.

So you are getting 3 products in one here: An iOS device quick charger, a USB3->Gigabit Ethernet adapter and 3 port USB 3 hub. The question is: Is the SimpleDock worth the $90?

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From 9to5Toys.com:

Virgin Mobile, a Sprint subsidiary, is offering the iPhone 5s contract free for some pretty unheard of prices right now.  The 16GB iPhone 5s is going for $385 without a contract in Gold (best), Space Gray and White.  A 32GB iPhone 5s will run you $455 while a 64GB iPhone 5s will run you $525.

Virgin is also slashing the prices on the iPhone 5c with the 16GB model in all colors is $315 while the 32GB model is $385. Those are easily the lowest prices we’ve seen for the current generation iPhones.

What’s the catch?

The catch, if you want to call it that, is that these are locked to Sprint’s Virgin subsidiary.  While Sprint’s 3G and 4G network isn’t always rated the best, it is nationwide and Virgin Mobile also has the lowest unlimited data plans starting at $30/month.

Also a little birdie told us that you can actually unlock the Virgin iPhones for about $130 at Chronic Unlocks giving you a new, unlocked iPhone 5s for just over $500. 

For those who were considering an iPhone but hesitated at the costs, that’s around $1000 bucks for a current generation iPhone and 2 years of unlimited data. You won’t find anything lower.

Former WSJ Apple writer Yukari Iwatani Kane’s long-awaited book based on more than 200 interviews with current and former executives and insiders goes on sale today  ($12.74 Amazon/$14.99 iBookstore/Free Audible Audiobook). We got an advance copy, and I enjoyed the first 85 pages or so of background including Steve Jobs’s transitioning the company during the last bout with his terminal cancer. This area  included some interesting new tidbits (did you know Apple almost sold the original iPad for $399?).

The middle of the book meanders somewhat aimlessly into the big stories after Steve Jobs’s death, but spending way too much time on Foxconn, the Samsung trial, the DOJ ebooks trial and patent minutia. I frankly had a hard time staying involved in some of these chapters because it was like re-reading old news reports with little new information to keep me satiated.

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From 9to5Toys.com:

The Apple Store just got filled with refurbished iPad Airs in a few varieties starting at $419 for 16GB and $509 for 32GB in both Space Grey or White. That’s $80/$90 off the new price and the lowest price we’ve seen for iPad Airs with Apple’s 1 year AppleCare warranty (we saw them new for $430 last week). Apple certified refurbished products look and act like new, come with all manuals and accessories, a new outer shell batter and come in a new white box.

Walmart still has refurbished iPad Airs for $399 but with a more dubious 90-day non-Apple warranty. Meanwhile, if you are after new iPad Airs, Staples currently has them for $50 off across the board. 
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From our Google Analytics logs, at around noon ET, over 70% of our site visits for the day came from iOS 7.1. I know our audience is at the tech-savvy end of the spectrum, but the number still impresses me, especially considering that many of the older iOS devices can’t even be updated and 7.1 isn’t yet Jailbreak-able.

It makes Chitika’s numbers look a little backwards.

As for iOS 8? Those numbers are growing pretty fast too (below).

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The promise of the Thunderbolt standard is that it can deliver a lot of data over long distances very quickly for many types of devices. Unfortunately, that promise has been pretty slow to materialize, and the long distance piece of the equation has been particularly painful.

Corning is hoping to turn that around this year with the consumer launch of its Thunderbolt Optical Cables in 10 meter (33 foot), 30 meter (99 foot), and 60 meter (198 foot) sizes. With these lengths, you can put your Thunderbolt hard disk and arrays far away from your desk. If you have a Thunderbolt Display or a Thunderbolt dock, you can even move your Mac to the utility closet or basement and really clean up your desk space.

I’ve been using the 33-foot version for a few weeks and here’s my take:
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I’ve been on the search for the perfect headphones for my whole life.

Apple’s fall out of my ears if I think too hard and I even have problems keeping typical in-ear headphones in my ears when working out. Getting those weird things that go around my ears to hold them isn’t a great general purpose solution.  In-ear headphones also typically lack the depth of sound of over the ear headphones.

Unfortunately, over the ear headphones often lack the mic and iOS controls that you can easily get with in-ear headphones. Add that they are usually bulky and heavy and are too hot on the ears and you usually have a non-starter as a general purpose headset.

The Onkyo ES-CTI300(SS) On-Ear Headphones with Control Talk for iOS Devices aim to be the best of both worlds…

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[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sN5HT9mj_4M]

There’s no real hard news at this talk given by Elon Musk this week but it is certainly interesting to see the back and forth with the iPhone Engineer (Evan Wong? Didn’t quite get the name) and the CEO of Tesla. Apple is of course rumored to be an investor in Tesla’s battery Gigafactory so that makes the conversation all that more interesting. Some notes:

• The engineer manages a big part of the hardware development of the iPhone.
• Apple is one of the biggest buyers of batteries along with Tesla and they’ve done a lot of thorough testing
• Chemistry, material, packaging and process affect  battery life constant.
• Tesla buys 18650 form factor batteries and is sticking to them.
• When musk asks about the energy density, the engineer knows not to say anything (he says he doesn’t want to get sued by his employer – to many laughs from the audience).
• Musk assumes the battery energy density is public domain because of teardowns
• Musk says in high production they can get to 260Wh/KG at the lowest price per kW which might be good info for those looking at the Gigafactory specs.
• Apple likely can’t use these cells in their products because they are 18mm thick, much thicker than many of Apple’s products – or so speculates Musk

More of the conversation here.
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Looks like an amusing show from Mike Judge.

I was a huge gushing fan of the Bose Soundlink Mini when I reviewed it this summer, calling it the “Best Sounding portable Bluetooth speaker ever”. For $199 you’d get bookshelf type of power and clarity with 6 hour battery in a portable package that you could throw in a coat pocket, bag, or purse.

This week, Bose started shipping a bigger version, the $299 Soundlink 3 which is officially the successor to the Soundlink 2 but it grabs a lot more technology, features and appearance from the very successful Mini.  The big bro ‘III’ boasts an impressive 14-hour battery, 6 Bluetooth device memory, and doubles the Mini with four drivers and two passive radiators. In the process it doubles in size to a 3-pound package that isn’t nearly as portable as the Mini at 5 inches high, 10 inches wide, and 2 inches deep.

But does that $100 and double size give you appreciably better sound?

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