Apple

Analyst Andy Zaky overestimated Apple earnings by 20 percent last quarter.

Here’s his take right after: Why Apple’s big miss doesn’t matter. This miss is just a minor blip due to analysts getting overzealous with their estimates.

Today, he wrote: Apple Fiscal Q1 2012: The Biggest Earnings Blowout in History

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As noted by RazorianFly, Siri can now help users retrieve the best deals for consumer electronics and gadgets sold at Best Buy. How does she handle this, you might ask? Well, Siri gets some of its answers from the acclaimed answer-engine Wolfram|Alpha.

Wolfram Research announced yesterday they are leveraging data from Best Buy’s public application programming interface, allowing users to browse more than 35,000 appliances and consumer electronics products sold by Best Buy.

Third-party applications and services that integrate with Siri automatically benefit, so Siri is now able to deliver answers to your product-related queries sourced from Best Buy’s vast database.

In addition, taking into account Wolfram|Alpha’s clever decision-making and analysis engine and Siri’s natural-language interface, you can ask her to, let’s say, list plasma TVs larger than 50-inches. Even though Best Buy-sourced answers are laid out as any other information Siri sources from the web, Apple could -in the future- take advantage of Best Buy’s public APIs to produce rich results sporting product images, categories, more meta data and so forth.

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The iPhone 4S is one of the first devices to support Bluetooth 4.0. Today, the first accessory to take advantage of the new technology is a new Kickstarter project called Find My Car Smart.

Find My Car Smart uses a Bluetooth 4.0 powered dongle to transmit the location of a car that can then be picked up by an iOS app, letting a user find a car in a busy parking lot on a map. Due to it being a Kickstarter project, it will need to get enough backers to see the light of day. It’s pretty cool, nonetheless. So, if you’re interested make sure you pledge.

Microsoft is also getting in the Bluetooth accessory game with the release of a new tablet keyboard. The Bluetooth Mobile Keyboard 5000 is portable and it will hook up with an iPad, Android tablet or any other device that supports Bluetooth.

Microsoft makes the Bluetooth Mobile Keyboard 5000, available for $49 on their hardware store. If you can’t look past that Windows logo, you could always just buy an Apple wireless keyboard for $68,or even try Apple’s iPad Keyboard dock.

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A new hack by a Chinese manufacturer will allow a user to make an iPhone 4/4S’s Apple logo glow. Much like the MacBook’s, the logo will glow once you turn the device on.

K.O. Gadget, the maker of this mod, said it can be done at home in less than five minutes. For $42, K.O. Gadget will send you the kit to perform this hack, but it would void an iPhone’s warranty.

The mod is easy because all you’re doing is replacing the back panel on the iPhone. The backpanel has a transparent Apple logo that allows light to pass through, but the key is the “light strip” that is added in. You can see the addition in the video below.

The light strip and custom backing doesn’t add any thickness to the device, because it uses the same glass material that Apple uses. K.O. Gadget also said there isn’t any over heating issues or battery life issues.

If you’re the adventurous type, this is something definitely worth checking out. Check out the install process below:

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Apple’s iPhone 4S hit Chile and Brazil this evening, and boy is it overpriced. The company’s online store has the R$ 2,599 price tag attached to the 16 GB SIM-free version. The 32 GB/64GB versions of the popular smartphone sell for R$ 2,999/R$ 3,399. The exchange rate of Brazilian dollar is approximately R$ 1.71 to USD 1.00… so you get the picture.

Just to give you a little feel, the unlocked 64 GB iPhone 4S in Brazil sells for three times its $849 United States asking price, or a whopping $2,000. This slideshow cleverly depicts what this amount of money can buy folks in Brazil. Turns out you can get a decent fridge, a big screen Sony Bravia TV or even an entry-level Ford car for the price of an unlocked 64 GB iPhone 4S.

So, why those exorbitant price points?

A comparison of approximately two times higher iPhone prices in Brazil compared to the U.S. The chart is courtesy of The Next Web.

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Avatar, a 2009 epic sci-fi flick written and directed by James Cameron, has marked a major technological breakthrough and ushered in a new era in digital effects. Although development on the movie began in 1994, when Cameron wrote an 80-page scriptment for the film, the director soon found he would have to wait for the necessary technology to become available if he were to achieve his vision of the film.

Beginning Dec. 20, a special edition of Avatar is landing on Apple’s iTunes Store packing in interesting iTunes Extras unavailable on other platforms. According to the press release, these interactive digital enhancements let fans:

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As the rumored early 2012 iPad 3 release draws closer, Cydia Blog discovered a part for the iPad 3 on TVC Mall’s website. What you see above is apparently a replacement part for the microphone on the iPad 3, and shows some pretty major changes compared to the iPad 2’s microphone — namely the shape. The apparent dock connector and ribbon cable for the iPad 3 also leaked this summer. Cydia Blog reports:

The new part, when compared with iPad 2, shows a different arrangement in internal circuitry, hinting a major re-design. The tail end of the part makes a “U-turn”, whereas the iPad 2′s Microphone Mic Flex Cable makes almost 90-degree turn both ways. Except for few details, the leaked part so far doesn’t offer a tantalizing tease.

The iPad 3 is rumored to launch early 2012 — maybe February — with a rumored higher res display and thicker form-factor. Other specs are rumored to be a dual-mode wireless chip for both CDMA and GSM, Apple’s A6 processor, and more RAM. Citi’s analyst Richard Gardner says he’s heard from sources that a February launch is coming, but some have pointed to mid-summer. The updated mic form-factor above could point to pretty major internal changes. It should be worth noting, however, that manufacturer replacement parts aren’t always in the final version. (via MacRumors)

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As originally reported on our sister blog, the search Goliath has published its annual list of top search queries, a tradition that started eleven years ago. It comes as little surprise that ‘iPad 3’ and ‘iPhone 5’ were among the fastest-growing search terms of the past year. More specifically, ‘iPhone 5’ was the sixth fastest-growing search term on Google.com in 2011, while ‘iPad 3’ ranked tenth.

Feverish iPhone 5 speculation hit its highest point in search the week of September 25, just a week ahead of the October 4 iPhone 4S presser. Searches for ‘iPhone 5’ rose 1,658 percent between 2010 and 2011, easily outnumbering those for the iPhone 4S, as seen in the above chart from the Zeitgeist site. Searches for ‘Steve Jobs’ grew 982 percent in 2011, enough to score the ninth spot.

Called Zeitgeist, the project “sorts billions of Google searches to capture the year’s ten fastest-rising global queries and the rest of the spirit of 2011″, per the official Google blog post. In a testament to the popularity of the Kindle Fire, positioned as an inexpensive iPad alternative, Amazon’s tablet placed ahead of Apple’s new phone, the iPhone 4S, which ranked second in the fastest-rising consumer electronics category, followed by the HTC Sensation, the Samsung Nexus Prime, Sony NPG and the yet-to-be-released iPad 3 (#9).

Two unreleased products piquing such a commanding interest – the cell phone that never materialized and the forthcoming tablet – wow, talk about the power of the Apple hype machine. More below the fold.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAIEamakLoY]

Apple’s late co-founder Steve Jobs made the list (mark 1:50) was the ninth fastest-growing search term on Google.com in 2011.

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Apple has just released an update for the 2nd generation Apple TV, version 4.4.4 (9A406a). As of now we know the update brings bug fixes, but we’re checking for more. Hit up your Apple TV to download the new firmware or hit up the direct link.

Update: Apple has also released a small update to the iPhone 4S, bringing it to version iOS 5.0.1 (9A406). Hit up the the direct link.

Update X2: Apple has dropped a note saying that this update fixes SIM card issues on the iPhone 4S.

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Apple opened up its proprietary 30-pin dock connector to third-party developers back in 2008, with iOS 3.0 APIs enabling hardware accessories to communicate with your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad via dedicated apps. The way it works today, plugging in your accessory puts up a prompt telling you to automatically download an appropriate app. This is supported only by some accessories so in most cases users are required to navigate their way around the App Store and find that app themselves. But Apple’s penchant for providing simple and seamless solutions once again becomes evident in a new patent application filed in June 2010 with the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office.

Entitled “Method and System for Locating an Accessory and an Application for Use With a User Device”, it describes a plug-and-play system where plugging in your accessory automatically produces a list of multiple compatible apps that go with it – not just that one companion app from your accessory’s vendor. Additionally, the invention would work the other way around to allow easy discovery of hardware accessories compatible with the apps you actually have installed on  your device by utilizing an in-store kiosk, pictured in the above patent drawing.

Speculating further, the proposed solution would pave the way for a new (and lucrative) market where accessories play nice with apps.

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Apple climbed into the list of top 10 places to work in 2012, alongside fellow technology giants Google and Facebook, according to a new Glassdoor survey.

The fourth annual Employees’ Choice award highlights 50 of the best workplaces. The findings are measured through company employees’ survey responses on Glassdoor.com.

“The reviews are in,” said the career community website in its Dec. 14 press release. “Employees have spoken, revealing the best companies to work for in 2012; and, they love working at some of the biggest tech, science and management consulting companies in the nation…
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Morgan Stanley analyst Katy Huberty wrote in a note to clients issued yesterday (via Fortune) that U.S. consumers are expect to buy more iPhones in the first calendar quarter of 2012 than even the holiday quarter this year. This is noteworthy as the holiday quarter has traditionally been Apple’s strongest three-month sales period.

Not even the two recent Samsung television commercials (here and here) that poke fun of line waiters seem to be slowing the iPhone momentum (unless you believe a YouGov survey, chart included below the fold). Huberty is now projecting CQ4 iPhone sales anywhere from 31 to 36 million iPhones versus the previous model calling for 30 million units (Wall Street: 28 million). For the first quarter of the next year, Huberty is projecting an astounding 41 million units based on last week’s comments from AT&T and an Alphawise survey conducted for Morgan Stanley the week after Thanksgiving.

That’s a 46 percent increase over her previous 28 million estimate (Wall Street: 26 million). In all, Huberty wrote, Apple should sell 190 million iPhones during the calendar year 2012. As for iPad…

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Last week Samsung got to breathe a sigh of relief as an Australian court ruled they didn’t “slavishly copy” the iPad with the Galaxy Tab 10.1, as Apple has been insisted from the onset in court documents. Yesterday, the South Korean company told the Sydney Morning Herald that the court cases have helped make their device a “household name” and today we are seeing the Galaxy Tab maker taking advantage of the media spotlight and the fact that it’s been in the headlines thanks to lawsuits and those cheesy commercials.

As tweeted by Martin Aungle, an Australian corporate and marketing communications professional, Samsung is now pitching its device as “the tablet Apple tried to stop”. The above advert ran in the Sun-Herald newspaper this week. Samsung has obviously decided to up the stakes in this game considering they resisted up until now mentioning Apple by name in their marketing communication. We’ll see, of course, whether publicly celebrating its courtroom victory at Apple’s expense will have any effect on sales.

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We’re starting to get reports that Apple is sending out emails to users in Spain and elsewhere in Europe notifying them the iTunes Match service is officially available for 24,99 € per year (as shown above). One Twitter user also claims that he was able to subscribe to the service in Europe two days ago before iTunes told him it was a mistake and returned his money.

“I managed to buy iTunes Match in Europe two days ago. Now they told me it was mistake and returned the money.

The email he provides looks identical to the one above apart from the language. It’s of course possible this is a slip up on Apple’s part ahead of an official rollout in the near future. Let us know in the comments if you have access to the service, which you can try here.

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We’ve got reports coming in from Canada where it is listed at C$27.99/year and Australia where it is A$39.99.  In the UK, it is £21.99.

Last week Apple also opened up the cloud service to users in Brazil to accompany the launch of the iTunes Store in Latin America.
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Google has just started rolling out an update to the Gmail app for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch with a few new welcomed features. First off, users now have the ability to set a custom signature for messages as well as a vacation responder. Both of those new features will be available via the gear icon at the top of the app’s new menu. The update also includes support for nested labels and the usual “bug fixes and UI improvements”.

A new Scribbles feature allows you to open a canvas, draw a picture or sketch with multiple colors, brush sizes and line elements, and attach it to a message within Gmail. Scribbles is available now in both the Gmail iOS app and Gmail mobile web app. Another notable and highly requested change is a new notification sound on iOS 5, making it easier to tell when you’ve received an email

Google also mentioned in their blog post that they are continuing to work on some of the most requested features from users including multiple login support, banner notifications, and a “send as” feature to send mail from multiple accounts within the app.

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BBC is getting set to air a new documentary entitled ‘Steve Jobs: Billion Dollar Hippy’ tonight at 9:00pm on BBC HD and BBC Two. According to the Telegraph, the documentary apparently presents a more “ruthless image of Jobs” where Wozniak reveals that Jobs reduced him to tears following the release of Walter Isaacson’s ‘Steve Jobs’ bio (click the image above for the clip of Woz from the doc):

Jobs, for instance, tricked a young Wozniak into writing code for a computer game but pocketed the majority of the payment for the project from Atari himself. Wozniak admits on the programme that he cried when he heard about Jobs’s scam following the release of a book on Jobs.

The doc is hosted by Evan Davis, and features appearances from Tim Berners-Lee, Rita Clifton, and Stephen Fry. It will also of course include interviews with Steve Wozniak and others that were close to Apple and Jobs. The program profiles Avie Tevanian, who worked with Jobs as head of software at Apple until 2006, who tells a story of trying to get Jobs to join in on a stag party:
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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUa4IAQetTk]

Here’s a fun iPad game for the whole (Partridge) family.

Rockmate turns your iPad into a complete music studio easy and super fun to use. You can compose, record and play songs with up to 4 Rock players on one single iPad. Rockmate is easy to play with smart chords progressions, sounds great with separated guitar effects and in-house produced audio samples and is also fully customizable with multiple drums and keyboard styles.

Rockmate is ready to rock ! Your guitars are always well tuned, no need to carry your drum kit or to patch your keyboard. A smart metronome and a real-time looper will assist you in composing and recording your songs. That you can share by email or in your iTunes sharing folder.

We want as many people as possible to experience Rockmate. So we have decided to make Rockmate available for one week (From 14 to 21 december 2011) at the introductory price of $0.99. Regular price $3.99.

(iTunes $.99)

For those who are after something in the professional realm, a new App called Shredder was released today…
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Calcalist, a daily business newspaper published in Israel by the Yedioth Ahronoth Group (which also publishes Yedioth Ahronoth, the country’s most widely circulated newspaper) on Tuesday ran a story claiming Apple was actively engaged in talks to buy fabless flash memory chip maker Anobit for as much as half a billion dollars. In a follow-up story this morning, Calcalist reports that Apple’s senior research and development executive Dr. Edward H. Frank is already touring Israel, investigating possibilities of an Apple-run development center as numerous Silicon Valley technology giants already operate R&D centers in the country, including Intel, Google, IBM, Microsoft, Qualcomm, Broadcom, Yahoo!, eBay and China-based Huawei, to name just a few.

Apple’s Frank is a member of Carnegie Mellon University’s Board of Trustees and chairs the university’s Inspire Innovation campaign. He is apparently holding meetings with a bunch of Israeli startups who are hoping to wow the world’s most valuable technology company with next-generation solutions promising to bring flash storage prices down while substantially extending the lifespan of flash memory chips. The delegation headed by Frank has already met with executives at Intel Israel, the Calcalist story claims.

Globes chimed in with information from sources that “Apple has hired Aharon Aharon, a veteran player in Israel’s high tech industry, to lead the new development center”.

Should the Anobit deal go through, reporters Assaf Gilad and Meir Orbach write, Apple may be interested in further acquisitions of other Israeli startups specializing in innovative flash storage solutions. This includes XtremIO which develops server-based storage systems and its rival Kaminario, as well as DensBits which specializes in controller based signal processing to improve the operation of flash memory chip processors.

DensBits licenses its technology which improves flash memory chips’ reliability to about 100,000 deletions – twice that of its nearest competitor Anobit – helping reduce the prices of flash memory chips dramatically. Both DensBits’ and Anobit’s technology is believed to be licensed by many flash memory chip makers. Specifically, South Korean Hynix uses Anobit’s solution for a flash memory chip inside the iPhone 4S. Interestingly, Apple co-Founder Steve Wozniak is lead scientist for a competing enterprise SSD operation called Fusion I/O.

Ed Frank can be seen in the below clip talking about his experience at Carnegie Mellon University and how it continues to influence him today.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jhvb_hkJGkc]

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DigiTimes reports, based on “sources in the upstream supply chain”, that a next-generation MacBook Pro with a Retina-capable display sporting a 2880-by-1800 resolution could arrive in the second quarter of 2012:

While the prevailing MacBook models have displays with resolutions ranging from 1680 by 1050 to 1280 by 800, the ultra-high resolution for the new MacBook Pro will further differentiate Apple’s products from other brands, commented the sources.

The report continues asserting that Acer and Asustek Computer also plan to launch high-end Ultrabook models sporting  the 1920-by-1080 pixel resolution displays versus the 1366-by-768 displays typically found on today’s Ultrabooks. The rumor might make sense as Intel’s upcoming Ivy Bridge platform natively supports displays with up to a 4096-by-4096 pixel resolution and is capable of decoding multiple 4K video streams at once. Lion also added support for 3200-by-2000 wallpapers, doubling icon resolution to 1024-by-1024 pixels and enabling HiDPI display modes.

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On April Foolsday in 1976 Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ron Wayne signed the founding contract for Apple Computer.  Eleven days later, Ron Wayne  decided to sell his 10% of the company for $800, which is now worth $3.9 billion.  The founding contract that made history was originally expected to sell for $150,000, but today sold for a cool $1.6 million to Eduardo Cisneros, chief executive officer of Cisneros Corp, at a Sotheby’s auction in New York, reports Bloomberg. The Cisneros family is the second wealthiest in South America according to a 2006 Forbes listing.

The story goes that apparently the consigner bought the legal papers back in the mid-1990s “from a manuscript dealer” who is thought to had acquired them from Wayne. We’ve posted the bidding after the break.

Update: we’ve confirmed the documents have sold for $1,594,500, but the $1.3 million that Fortune reported doesn’t include the buyers tax the auction house tags on. Thanks Dewitt!

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Whoa, Microsoft is definitely on a roll today. In addition to the Xbox Live client for iPhone and the Halo Waypoint companion app for their popular gaming franchise, both of which were recently released on Apple’s iOS platform – and on top of today’s release of Kinectimals, their first-ever game for the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, the Redmond, Washington-headquartered software giant just outed another iPhone app.

If you’re a fan of 25 gigabytes of free storage from Microsoft (a 100MB individual file limit) , Christmas definitely came early with today’s release of the official SkyDrive for iPhone . A free download from the App Store, it lets you access all of your content (including files shared with you) stored on SkyDrive cloud storage. You can also upload photos or videos from your iPhone to SkyDrive, view your recently used documents, share a link to any file using email and create/delete folders.

So Microsoft, how about that Office for iOS?

[slideshow]

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