9to5 Staff

Video conferencing on the iPhone rumors have been around almost as long as the iPhone itself.  Well, they are still in rumor mode but have a very slightly more realistic chance at coming to fruition if Apple’s latest patent unearthing gets the go-ahead.  Informationweek (via Apple Core) found a bunch of information relating to video conferencing on the iPhone.  Quoth the patent:

In some embodiments, the functions may include telephoning, video conferencing, e-mailing, instant messaging, blogging, digital photographing, digital videoing, Web browsing, digital music playing, and/or digital video playing. Instructions for performing these functions may be included in a computer-readable storage medium or other computer program product configured for execution by one or more processors.
….
In some embodiments, an optical sensor is located on the back of the device, opposite the touch screen display on the front of the device, so that the touch screen display may be used as a viewfinder for either still and/or video image acquisition. In some embodiments, an optical sensor is located on the front of the device so that the user’s image may be obtained for videoconferencing while the user views the other video conference participants on the touch screen display.

Is this something we’ll see in iPhone 3.0?  Although patents are rarely a good indication of upcoming products, this one is an interesting read.

According to the New York Times, Apple, led of course by Steve Jobs, is now pushing its weight around in negotiations with the record labels.  They admittedly are a bit afraid of Apple

In interviews, several high-level music executives, who spoke on the condition that they not be named to avoid angering Apple, said they operated in fear of Apple’s removing a label’s products from the iTunes store over a disagreement, even though that has never happened. The labels do not have much leverage in negotiating with Apple.

Of course even in vacation mode, Steve Jobs is still running the show.

…All the labels agreed except Sony Music. Its chairman, Mr. Schmidt-Holtz, wanted the pricing to go into effect right after the announcement, while Mr. Jobs wanted a longer time horizon. According to a person briefed on the telephone call, Mr. Schmidt-Holtz and Mr. Jobs had a heated exchange by phone on Christmas Eve. Eventually, Sony gave in and agreed to a longer waiting period. (So much for spending the holidays relaxing with the fam?)

Even without Jobs, in the negotiating, Apple still holds the upper hand and plays their cards well.

Even if Mr. Jobs does not get personally involved in future negotiations, music executives still fear dealing with Apple. One chit the company holds is the power of the iTunes home page, where it promotes music. They also say that the entire Apple staff, including Eddie Cue, the vice president in charge of iTunes who handles the relationships with the record labels, do their best to follow Mr. Jobs’s style in their own negotiating.

The final results seem to be pretty good for consumers.  Higher quality songs without DRM.

via Apple2.0

Shuffle Magazine reports:

In a full page ad in this morning’s Gulf News, Etisalat announces that they will be brining the iPhone to the UAE at a later day. The ad reads:

The UAE’s Emirates Telecommunications Corporation – Etisalat today announced that they have signed an agreement with Apple to bring the iPhone 3G to the United Arab Emirates and to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia through Mobily later this month. More information will be released at a later date.

You’ll recall that neighboring Egypt disables GPS on all local and roaming iPhones as per national policy.  There is no word yet on whether or not other Middle Eastern carriers are forced to do so as well.  If we had to guess we’d say yay in UAE and nay in Saudi Arabia.  But we don’t know nothin’

For you right to lefters:

??????? ???? ?? ???? ????? ???????? ? ???????? ???? ??? ?????

??? ???? ????? ?? ????? ” ??? ???? Gulf News” ??????? ???? ????? ????? ??????? ?? ??????? ?????? ??????? ????? ???????? ??????. ?? ??????? ???????:
“???? ???????? ?????????, ???????? ????? ?? ??????? ???????? ?? ??? ?????? ???? ????? “??? ??” ??? ???? ???????? ??????? ??????? ? ??????? ??????? ???????? ???? ???? ??????? ?? ??? ???? ?? ??? ?????. ?????? ?? ????????? ??? ???? ??????.”
??? ? ??? ???? ??? ????? ?? ???? ?? ???????? ???? ?? ???? ???? ?????? ??????? ?? ??? ????? ???? ????? ???? ??? ?????? ? ????? ?? ” Stuff Middle East” ??? ?? ?????? ???????????.

OK, it’s 9.93% but we’re rounding up to 10% which is a significant milestone.   The Mac OS rose from 9.63% in December, a gain of over 3% in Net Applications most recent survey of January Internet usage.  If you look at the past year, there is no question the Mac is steadily gaining ground vs. Windows.

iPhone and the iPod touch also did very well posting significant gains.  Specifically the iPod touch gained 37% since December on very strong holiday sales.

Credit crunch hits Apple?  Not likely with that $28 billion in the bank.  But there seems to have been some problems affecting people’s iTunes store credit.

According to Venture Beat and a few hundred Twitterers, there seems to have been a minor glitch when purchasing videos or music.  The error reads:

Due to a problem with the iTunes Store, your store credit balance is temporarily unavailable for use in purchasing music; you may continue purchasing using a different method of payment.

As of this writing the problem appears to be solved.

Well, we guess it had to happen.  There is now an app that breaks the encyption on App Store apps and allows people to (pirate) share them with others.

A project started by a coder named ‘SaladFork’, Crackulous was officially only available to a limited number of individuals, but it quickly gained notoriety as it makes the process of cracking software ridiculously easy. The successor to the more fiddly xCrack script, Crackulous is now being developed by ‘Angel’ and has a full GUI. All people have to do is buy an app from Apple and click a button, it’s that easy.

Although the software package was publicly released just hours ago, the source for this version (0.9) isn’t yet available. Crackulous is set to be released as open source software so that many people can contribute to its development, with original dev SaladFork commenting, “I’ve filled the source code heavily with comments explaining exactly what it’s doing and how it’s doing it. My hope is that Crackulous can be a learning resource for all the prospective iPhone developers out there, and will be able to revolutionize the cracking scene by producing a standard for application quality and functionality that can easily be reproduced to great effect.”

Normally, this would be a big deal.  However, Apps at the app store are pretty reasonably priced and the experience of purchasing and installing them is so easy that we don’t see that many people switching over to the dark side to save a few bucks.

Bloomberg reported this weekend that Adobe engineers are working diligently on getting Flash down to an acceptable level of power usage and performance to work on the iPhone/iPod touch architecture.  The bad news?  Don’t expect this technology to become available in the first half of 2009.  According to Adobe’s press release on the matter:

The joint technology optimization is targeted for the ARMv6 and ARMv7architectures used in the ARM11™ family and the Cortex™-A series of processors and is expected to be available in the second half of 2009. The partnership stems from the Open Screen Project, a broad Adobe sponsored initiative of industry leaders – including ARM – to deliver a consistent runtime environment across multiple devices by taking advantage of Adobe Flash Player and, in the future, Adobe AIR. The initiative is set to address the challenges of Web browsing on a broad range of screens, and remove the barriers to publish content and applications seamlessly across screens. For more information, visit www.openscreenproject.org .

By the second half of 2009, the iPhone 3.0 Operating System will be around.  So will new iPhone ARM Cortex A(8?) series hardware that will likely be able to handle the intensive CPU requirements that Flash takes to perform well.  Will Apple back port it to older hardware?  Perhaps but it is unclear how it will perform.

Tough times are hitting New York City.  Mayor Bloomberg has to come up with ways to make up for all of the lost tax revenue on Wall St.  One of his solutions?  Levy taxes on music downloads from Apple,  Amazon and anyone else still selling music online. 

For now, Bloomberg is proposing $894 million in new sales taxes, including:
-Increasing the sales tax by one quarter of one percent from 8.375 percent to 8.625 percent
-Repealing the sales tax exemption on clothing purchases under $110
-And new taxes on lots of things that are now tax-free, like music downloads.

That’s right – download a song or movie on your iPod and you pay new sales taxes.

We aren’t exactly sure how it would be enforced (by address of credit card?) nor when this will go into effect.

From 9to5mac.com/toys (feed), comes Amazon’s Friday sale of the week:  Canon’s highly-rated PowerShot SD770IS 10MP Digital Camera with 3x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom comes in at $159.99.  That’s $15 less than the nearest competitor (usually priced over $200) and the lowest price we’ve ever seen.

Take it up a notch (or 3) with the new Canon G10 at almost $100 off list and tied with the lowest price we’ve ever seen at $404.

.

Add Transcend’s 16 GB SDHC SD Class 6 Flash Memory Card TS16GSDHC6E [Amazon Frustration-Free Packaging] for $24.47 and/or Apple’s iLife with iPhoto for a new low price of $74.49

SD770IS Manufacturer Description:

Instantly recognizable, the classic "Box & Circle" ELPH design lives on in the PowerShot SD770 IS Digital ELPH. This sleek, slim head-turner is the perfect everyday camera. High-end specifications include 10.0-megapixel resolution and a 3x optical zoom lens. Spectacular images are easy to create thanks to advanced Canon technologies like Face Detection and Motion Detection Technologies that eliminate blur.

PowerShot SD770IS Highlights

1x zoom/3x zoom

3x optical zoom and Optical Image Stabilizer The PowerShot SD770 IS Digital ELPH’s 3x optical zoom is a clear winner when it comes to getting up close and personal. And Canon’s invaluable Optical Image Stabilizer reduces the blur of camera movement, even in tricky low light situations.

2.5-inch PureColor LCD II screen for bright, accurate color The PowerShot SD770 IS Digital ELPH gives you a large 2.5-inch LCD screen for excellent control when framing your shots. Canon’s PureColor LCD II offers more spectacular color, resolution and contrast even when viewed at an angle (compared to PureColor LCD). The screen is highly durable and easy to see in any light with a scratch-resistant, anti-reflective coating. It also features Night Display for easy viewing in low light — a perfect feature for gathering friends and family around to see your images.

Motion Detection Technology automatically detects subject movement and optimizes exposure control Life doesn’t stand still for picture-taking. That’s why Canon included its advanced Motion Detection Technology in the PowerShot SD770 IS Digital ELPH. This sophisticated feature works in the background to instantly evaluate how fast your subject is moving. Then it automatically selects and sets the optimal exposure and ISO settings to keep everything looking sharp and clear. When you need higher ISOs for action-stopping shutter speeds, Motion Detection Technology provides it. But when no movement is detected, it allows lower ISOs for excellent color and detail. So whether you’re shooting a bride walking down the aisle, a ballet recital or even a child’s soccer game, you can relax and shoot with confidence knowing you’ve got the picture you intended.

With Canon’s Face Detection WB (right), skin tones are not affected by overall lighting

Improved Face Detection Technology sets the focus, exposure, flash and white balance automatically Canon’s powerful Face Detection Technology delivers even better results with the new SD770 IS Digital ELPH. The Face Detection Technology continues to recognize faces in a scene, and concentrate exposure (daylight or flash) and focus upon them. But the SD770 IS Digital ELPH adds more: Face Detection WB means the camera concentrates upon faces when calculating white balance for the best possible skin tones. Face Select and Track lets the SD770 IS Digital ELPH user highlight one face among several in a scene, and the camera concentrates on that person, even as they move around the scene. Face Detection Technology is a powerful contributing factor in Canon’s new Motion Detection Technology.

DIGIC III Image Processor for superior image quality and improved functionality With DIGIC III, your images boast superior quality, the camera operates at top efficiency and battery life is enhanced. What’s more, DIGIC III enables Canon’s Face Detection Technology and Red-eye Correction to give you better, more true-to-life people shots. Simply press the Shutter Button halfway down, and the camera automatically pinpoints the faces in the scene and chooses the ideal focus point. The camera controls exposure settings and flash to keep every face looking bright and natural. Red-eye Correction can be handled in-camera, in two ways. The entirely new Red-eye Correction during shooting uses the Face Detection Technology to recognize and remove red-eye from flash images as they’re taken, before the file is written to the memory card. It’s also possible to correct red-eye during image playback, using simple settings in the SD770 IS Digital ELPH’s menu.

iSAPS Technology is an entirely original scene-recognition technology developed for digital cameras by Canon. Using an internal database of thousands of different photos, iSAPS works with the fast DIGIC III Image Processor to improve focus speed and accuracy, as well as exposure and white balance.

Red-eye Correction provides three options for removing red-eye from subjects in flash pictures.
1) The new Red-eye Correction during shooting actually identifies and corrects red-eye in human subjects as pictures are taken.
2) The SD770 IS Digital ELPH can be set to automatically detect and correct red-eye during image playback.
3) The user can manually locate any red eyes in a scene during image playback on the LCD screen, and command the camera to remove them.

Print/Share Button for easy direct printing and downloading The PowerShot SD770 IS Digital ELPH’s Print/Share button makes direct printing easier than ever. Simply connect the SD770 IS Digital ELPH to a Canon PIXMA photo printer or SELPHY compact photo printer or any PictBridge compatible photo printer, press the lighted Print/Share button and print! Also use the Print/Share button to transfer images to a computer (Windows and Macintosh).

Print your own ID photos in 28 different sizes or use the Movie Print function to output multiple stills from a recorded movie on a single sheet with a Canon SELPHY compact photo printer.

Product Description

This camera has features including a 10.0 Megapixel, 1/2.3-inch CCD, DIGIC III Image Processor, 3x optical zoom lens with a shift-type optical Image Stabilizer (IS) system and 2.5-inch LCD monitor with wide viewing angle. It uses new compact, high capacity Battery Pack NB-6L to shoot up to approx. 300 images (based on the CIPA standard when the LCD monitor is on), and SD memory cards, SDHC memory cards, MultiMediaCards, MMCplus cards and HC MMCplus cards for the recording media. Images are utilized with a direct print compatible printer, computer and TV via Hi-Speed USB.

Not only did we learn the GDrive is coming, but we now know more about what it can do. "GDrive allows you to access your files from anywhere, anytime, and from any device – be it from your desktop, web browser or cellular phone".   Think about having your Photos, Videos and Music on GDrive for playing on your iPhone and iPod touch.   Everywhere. 

Yes, this is good.  9to5Google.com good.  Anyone thing this will take Adobe files?

via GOS

CNet points us to an interview that Steve Jobs gave to Rolling Stone in 2003.  It is almost eerie how spot on Apple’s viewpoint was on music six years later.  Jobs goes into detail on how much thinking is done by a lot of Apple’s PhDs who "know this stuff cold".

I don’t know what hand-wringing is. We did a lot of thinking about it. The biggest risk, obviously, was that we saw people buying Macs just to get their hands on iPods. So taking iPods to Windows was really the choice. That was the big decision. We knew once we did that that we were going to go all the way. I’m sure we’re losing some Mac sales, but half our sales of iPods are to the Windows world already.

He also went out of his way to show his understanding of the music business.  A lot of people have asked why Apple doesn’t become a record label.  Jobs knows this isn’t Apple’s core competency.

Well, there’s a lot of smart people at the music companies. The problem is, they’re not technology people. The good music companies do an amazing thing. They have people who can pick the person that’s gonna be successful out of 5,000 candidates. And there’s not enough information to do that — it’s an intuitive process. And the best music companies know how to do that with a reasonably high success rate.

Great article.

OK, we are just a bit too intrigued by this little Pre thing. Here’s Peter Skillman, VP of Design at Palm, Inc. showing why he’s so proud of the WebOS. Notice the Snappiness™ of that ARM Cortex processor and the Amazon Music store at 3:20.  MobileDivide via Engadget.

Although he is saying Nokia N95, about no one is fooled that the iPhone is the real competitor for this device.  We hope Apple answers a lot of these features in iPhone OS 3 in June? 

Prepare to avert your eyes.  Dell is planning on entering the Smartphone space with a little gem they might call the MePhone, according to SAI.  People they’ve chatted with (as well as the Wall Street Journal) say Dell has two models coming our way.  One running Android a la the G1.  The other running Windows Mobile.  How will Dell differentiate itself?  That remains to be seen.  They are entering a very crowded market currently dominated by RIM and Apple’s iPhone.

The move isn’t surprising as mobile phones are rapidly catching up with computers as the preferred way people access the Internet.  Dell, coming off a pretty bad quarter has to be gazing over at Apple’s earnings sheet with a bit of envy.  Dell’s been rumored to be working on a mobile phone since the iPhone was announced.

According to SAI, we aren’t going to be graced by these beauties until September 9th but Shaw Wu (our fav Mac Analyst) told the Wall St. Journal that they might be coming (or announcing) as early as 3GSM in Barcelona next month. 

This wouldn’t be Dell’s first forray into the wireles space.  Dell has also been moseying up the the telecoms carriers lately striking deals to sell their Mini 9 w/3G with two year plans in Europe. 

Flickr user zacislost (via MacTalk via Wired via Gizmodo) found an old copy of a Japanese magazine called Axis which has some pretty funky stuff from Apple (via Frog)’s 1990’s R&D department.  Have a look.

Apple today took down last week’s NVIDIA firmware update for MacBook/Pro/Air.  The update didn’t fix the issues with the Dual Link DVI adapter on 30 inch displays, and furthermore, we’ve received word that some users with 15-inch Unibody MacBook Pros have reported speaker popping since installing the update.  We’ve also heard that external displays are flickering or not working at all.  While we’ve felt no such pain, there was obviously enough out there for Apple to pull the update.  Apple, uncharacteristically,  has issued no statement..

(image from Giz)

UPDATE: Looks like google has taken the carnage down.

We love the Google street view cam, especially out in the rural areas where things get "Deliverance".  But we feel sorry for Bambi, who paid the ultimate price for our voyeurism.  To see how it all went down, Click here.  Move forward a few slides, then look what destruction we have wrought.  A moment of silence please.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words and although the Storm beat the $599 iPhone by a few days, the 3G iPhone kinda killed everyone.

Macworld reports that Intel is set to reveal its first eight-core processor at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference in San Francisco next month.  The ISSCC program reveals that Intel will discuss an "eight-core, 16-thread Xeon processor manufactured with a 45-nanometer process".

Yes, we are hoping to see these in Mac Pros and XServes.  The timing could be the reason Apple is waiting to release the new Mac Pros.  Macworld speculates that it could be the Tylersburg Platform.

The timing of the presentation suggests the eight-core Xeon processor is likely to be the Nehalem EP processor, an upcoming chip that is designed for dual-socket servers and workstations. This segment of the Xeon line is due for a refresh, and the Nehalem EP processor is scheduled to be released during early 2009.

Like other Nehalem chips, the Nehalem EP chips will include an integrated memory controller and use Intel’s Quick Path Interconnect (QPI), which replaces the front-side bus and allows more data to flow between the processors and other components in the computer, speeding up the computer’s overall performance.

Intel declined to comment on the Xeon processor specifically.

Update: Pinchmedia has some more info

MacRumors happened upon some code in the new SDK which seems to reveal that a new iPhone is coming in June.  While this news isn’t really unexpected, it is the first signs we are seeing that the iPhones are going to be upgraded (what? you thought Apple was going to discontinue them?). 

On a separate note, they also got a screengrab from a web hits vendor which shows that someone with one of these new iPhones has been browsing the web – or that someone has been spoofing for fun and profit.  No word yet on whether this person was looking for weight gaining supplements.

They go on to speculate that the new iPhone will have multiple core chips with multi core graphics.  While we can’t speak for the graphics chips, we don’t expect multi-core CPUs to enter the handset market this year. 

The news is similar to the December news that new Mac Mini and iMac graphics drivers were found in the most recent versions of Leopard.   While we know there are going to be updates, we just like to see evidence of it.

Perhaps in response to the outcry in Britian over the "speed" of the iPhone 3G commercials, Apple has decided to play it safe. New iPhone Ads contain a millisecond of "Sequences shortened. Apps from the Apps store".  Yes, it is a slow news week.