Tech Industry

He’s Steve Jobs’ buddy, and he’s got some turn of phrase – here’s Oracle CEO Larry Ellison telling the Churchill Club why all the fuss and bother over ‘cloud computing’ is just so much hocus pocus – and he gets pretty funny, we thought…

Apple’s latest patent application has already set tongues wagging and tweets ablaze, as it describes a way to control the tablet with two hands by touch, think Minority Report.

Apple’s new patent describes a sophisticated multitouch input method, in which you use all ten fingers, complex movements and other gestures. You can even type. The patent describes sensors which will work to identify exactly what your gestures mean, will be able to move the cursor and enable various activities, all through touch.

Or, as the patent puts it: “Apparatus and methods are disclosed for simultaneously tracking multiple finger and palm contacts as hands approach, touch, and slide across a proximity-sensing, multi-touch surface. Identification and classification of intuitive hand configurations and motions enables unprecedented integration of typing, resting, pointing, scrolling, 3D manipulation, and handwriting into a versatile, ergonomic computer input device.”

The patent application basically describes the creation of an all-new user interface, designed to replace the current mouse and keyboard UI. It also notes the new interface has advantages against voice control because it allows people to more easily manipulate graphic objects and so forth.

“A generic manual input device which combines the typing, pointing, scrolling, and handwriting capabilities of the standard input device collection must have ergonomic, economic, and productivity advantages which outweigh the unavoidable sacrifices of abandoning device specialization,” the patent also notes.

Good news too for RSI sufferers: “Epidemiological studies suggest that repetition and force multiply in causing repetitive strain injuries. Awkward postures, device activation force, wasted motion, and repetition should be minimized to improve ergonomics. Furthermore, the workload should be spread evenly over all available muscle groups to avoid repetitive strain.”

There’s lots more in the patent filing, which is available here. We think reading the original patent is probably going to be better than any over-simplification we may provide.

With tablet rumours growing apace, it is interesting to reflect on this statement made by Gizmodo, citing a source the publication believes to have seen a prototype of the Apple device: “There was talk of making the device act as a secondary screen/touchpad for iMacs and MacBooks.”

So the Apple tablet could also replace the interface you currently use on your current Macs. And is now widely expected to ship in early 2010…

Via: AppleInsider
 

Looks like interconnection development is the new black, with earlier reports on Intel’s LightSpeed technology designed to connect everything to everything else now followed by the creation of a cross-industry group to create a unified interconnect to output multimedia content from a phone to a TV.

Apple’s already ahead on this, at least in some respects, as devices and docks already exist to take video and other media from an iPhone or iPod to a TV set, but any movements that aim to make life a little simpler should be welcomed.

Nokia, Samsung, Silicon Image, Sony and Toshiba have announced the formation of the Mobile High-Definition Interface Working Group. The group aims to create an industry standard a/v interface to connect mobile phones or portable consumer electronics devices directly to high-definition televisions (HDTVs) and displays.

This is likely to be based on Silicon Image’s Mobile High-Definition Link (MHL) technology, and will be promoted and marketed as a standard.

The aim is to create an easy and cheap technology to achieve this, pleasing manufacturers by not costing too much, and pleasing users by being easy-to-use. And it’s expected to support high-def.

The Working Group is expected to organize a Consortium of founding members who will develop a mobile connectivity technology standard specification that governs transmission and reception of high-definition content between portable devices and display devices, to support connectivity in accordance with the new specification.

Mac sync will soon be possible with Android phones, on Mark/Space’s announcement of The Missing Sync for Android.

Currently in development, the software will deliver a desktop sync solution for phones powered by the Android OS, such as the T-Mobile myTouch and HTC Hero. It will synchronize contacts and transfer media files between an Android phone and a computer running Windows XP, Windows Vista or Mac OS X.

Sync happens automatically and wirelessly whenever the phone is near the computer using Proximity Sync, which works even when the phone is in a backpack or pants pocket. Microsoft Outlook, Entourage and Mac OS X Address Book will all be synchronised.

Unlike Palm – which attempted to hack its way into iTunes support by posing its Pre as an Apple device, the Missing Sync software will also sync iTunes and Windows Media Player music playlists via USB cable. Photo and video sync will also be supported.

In other news, Palm has announced a new detente with Amazon. The company’s latest WebOS 1.2 software enables Pre users to download music from Amazon’s MP3 store over a cellphone network. This probably won’t please customers who purchased a Palm Pre on the promise of iTunes support, but there you go…

And in the other corner, DoubleTwist for Mac debuts October 6, and is likely to work with Apple’s mobile devices, potentially enabling support for a jailbroken app store, CNN speculates.

We all know Intuit’s Bill Campbell sits on Apple’s board, so it’s nice to hear his company today announced an all-new version of its popular QuickBooks package for the Mac.

Aimed at small businesses, QuickBooks 2010 ships in late October and offers a range of new tools for business users, all couched within what the company describes as “the simplicity they expect from a Mac product”.

The package offers a fast and easy user set-up, delivers customizable reports and graphs and has integrated features which can support available plug-ins for credit card processing and hours tracking.

Business owners can also pay their employees with Intuit QuickBooks Payroll for Mac, an integrated add-on payroll service. This online offering helps users easily manage everything from paychecks to W 2 forms, including federal and state tax payments and form filings.

“Now more than ever, business owners are concerned about profitability,” said Kiran Patel, executive vice president and general manager of Intuit’s Small Business Group. “So with this new version, we focused on the areas that help business owners be more productive, such as at-a-glance reports, integrated credit card processing and simplified routine tasks. This means they have more time to grow their business with the insights they need to improve their bottom line.”

The software will cost $199.95, but is available for pre-order now from Amazon for $189.99, with a price guarantee meaning if the price falls again pre-launch, Amazon will honour all orders made at the new, lower price, rather than the original deal.

QuickBooks 2010 for Mac includes over forty enhancements that help users save time, make money and get paid. Below is a list of key new features and improvements.

Reflecting the trend to abandon PowerPC support, Intuit QuickBooks 2010 for Mac is designed to work on Intel-based Macs (running Mac OS 10.5.7, 10.6, or later).

We’ve said it before, we’ll say it again, Apple has big plans for eBooks and its future Apple tablet will help kickstart yet another change in publishing, just as the Mac helped launch the notion of desktop publishing.

Apple is reportedly engaged in extremely high level talks with senior executives from across the publishing industry with a view to making eBooks available to the tablet, and while these may start as the kind of text-based publications you’d find on a Kindle, these will advance to become true multimedia content delivery vehicles.

Perhaps a sign of what’s to come is visible in iTunes Extras/LP. These combine multiple assets and can be purchased from iTunes. They are designed to replicate the DVD or album experience, and while the jury’s out on their success in that, they clearly offer opportunities for the creation and distribution of engaging content.

Now Gizmodo tells us that Apple has been in talks with newspapers, magazines and book publishers, including the New York Times, McGraw Hill and Oberlin Press.

The entire vision relates to Apple’s future tablet, Gizmodo explains: “Several years ago, a modified version of OS X was presented to Steve Jobs, running on a multitouch tablet. When the question of "what would people do with this?" couldn’t be answered, they shelved it. Long having established music, movie and TV content, Apple is working hard to load up iTunes with print content from several major publishing houses across several media.”

The report continues to explain a meeting held on Apple’s Cupertino campus between Apple executives and senior figures from across the publishing industry. This followed an internal Apple competition the winning idea of which was textbook distribution through iTunes, a vision that’s already got strong foundations through iTunes U.

There’s even been a major example of what the vision could be, with Dan Brown’s recent new book also made available as an iPhone application. This title explores various potential advantages in digital reading, with support for notes, changing font styles, suggested reading, and tell a friend features, as well as the classic eBook experience.

Talks are understood to be gathering intensity at this stage, as Apple heads toward its purported January introduction of the Apple tablet. And hints that as both a creative tool and as a device for accessing Apple’s growing empire of digital content, Microsoft’s Courier has a lot of catching-up to do – after all, all we’ve seen of that so far shows Redmond’s vision is no more than as a glorified sketch/scrapbook. And scrapbooks are cheap.

Joel Rickett, editorial director of Penguin’s Viking Books, told The Observer newspaper: "The ebook is very quickly becoming a publishing reality and The Lost Symbol (iTunes link) will be one of the fastest-selling books of recent times.
"Once people can flip between books, look up references online and switch to an audio reading, everything will change very quickly."

Other recent activity came in the iTunes release of the Mayhem comic book in the iTunes LP format (iTunes Link). As John Fortt at Fortune noted, "Maybe the tools Apple created to digitize Gibson’s Mayhem comic will be part of an author’s kit with that oft-rumored Apple tablet?"

This followed Apple boss Steve Jobs statement to the New York Times that Apple doesn’t see eBooks as a big business – for the company.
Being a big business for Apple doesn’t necessarily mean eBooks aren’t a potentially big business for its platforms. eBooks are the second-biggest content category on iTunes after games, so there’s a proper eBook gold rush surging up. It’s just that Apple doesn’t publish the books…but it does create the platform – particularly its mobile platforms.

Also bear in mind Coolerbooks.com and its recent move to partner with Google to launch the world’s biggest online ebookstore – 40 times bigger than Waterstones it aims to offer over two million titles by the end of 2009, with one million titles available right now.

Initially, however, Apple hopes to use its leading advantage in the education market to help popularise its tablet, as we surmised in an August report.

When it comes to the education markets, Apple already knows the score. “We teach teachers not just about Apple solutions, but also how to create content that’s suitable for digital learning,” Apple’s director of EMEA education markets, Herve Marchet, told Macworld UK. "If you want to play in the education market, you need to be a solutions provider. You aren’t just bringing in the machine, you must also offer appropriate software, content and models for best practise in content creation.”

And beyond Apple, Disney (a company which has, erm, Apple CEO Steve Jobs on its board) today launched Disney Digital Books, which it terms, "reading made magical".

The eBook gold rush is now on….

Akamai is preparing the ground for what could emerge to be an avalanche of HD video content streamed directly to an iPhone, as it beefs up its international content delivery infrastructure for provision of HD video services.

We’re also wondering if support for iPhone will lead to easier access to live and on-demand online video content for other Apple devices, such as the Apple TV, which some say may proffer a Web browser designed to enable easy access to video content found online. But that’s just speculation.

What isn’t speculative is Akamai’s news. Apple and Akamai have held a relationship for close to a decade now, with the Web infrastructure firm enabling Apple’s Web properties to be internationally available without lag. Particularly iTunes.

The Akamai HD Network is a system for streaming high-definition live and on-demand video to a variety of devices. It will enable content and service providers offer online video that matches the traditional TV and DVR (digital video recorder) experience through buffering, adapting to network and processing speeds along with all-new features for navigating the content, Akamai said.

Video lovers will be able to watch HD Network content on computers in the Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight formats, but also on the iPhone, said Akamai President and CEO Paul Sagan.

Attempting to deliver high bitrate HD files can create long buffering delays, slow start-up times, and frequent interruptions. Because the Akamai HD Network chooses the optimal bitrate for delivery – it is faster and more consistent than any other network. With fully integrated DVR capabilities for live video across Flash, Silverlight, and the iPhone, the Akamai HD Network enables a personalized and interactive experience that matches HDTV.

As proof of concept, Akamai has made a live broadcast of its press announcement of the new service available in multiple formats, including Flash, Silverlight – and iPhone. Go test the iPhone stream right now, if you like…

The Akamai HD Network is a streaming platform that leverages the following functionalities:

– Adaptive Bitrate Streaming
Unique network and player streaming process that is designed to enable uninterrupted playback at HD bitrates that seamlessly adjusts to fluctuations in available bandwidth to provide the best quality possible for each user

– Instant Response
Immediate response to viewer interactions with the video player, including sub-second time-shifting (such as pause, rewind, seek and play commands) video startup times, and seamless stream switching
– HD Video Player
Open, standards-based video player for faster time to market
– HD Player Authentication
Authenticates player for all three environments ensuring only authorized players access content.

"Seeing is believing," said Paul Sagan, President and CEO, Akamai. "With the Akamai HD Network, we are revolutionizing the way content traverses the Internet with a new approach to bringing an HDTV-like experience online. We’re entering a different online world, where many content owners and publishers need to deliver HD-quality video to a much wider online audience, with a higher level of interactivity for consumers. Delivering ‘web-quality’ content to ‘web-sized’ audiences is one thing, but delivering HD-quality content to broadcast-scale audiences is another."

We’re wondering if the recent iPhone streamed live Underworld performance may have been a test of concept of Akamai’s new service for iPhone users? We also wonder if we may see live performances at iTunes events streamed live to iPhones in future, such as the coming Glasgow performance by legendary act, Echo and the Bunnymen. Though that’s just deeply idle speculation. Though with Akamai’s service, it is now possible, subject to the caveat of the ‘net neutrality’ debate…

Annoyed with Adobe? Feel the company’s customer commitment to be a little weak? Somewhat annoyed at the company’s opaque price tier structure when it comes to Creative Suite sales in the UK and Europe in comparison to the US? Wondering why it won’t stick strictly to Apple development guidelines to create CS in the first place? Perhaps there’s a reason behind it all. Perhaps that reason has just become pretty visible – Adobe’s got a Dell.

Here’s the deal: Dell announced today that Shantanu Narayen, president and CEO of Adobe, has been appointed to the company’s board of directors. Mr. Narayen, 46, joins the board immediately and will stand for election at Dell’s next shareholders meeting.

“As CEO of one of the world’s largest and most diversified software companies, Shantanu will provide us with valuable insight as we develop and deliver IT solutions to customers,” said Michael Dell, chairman and CEO. “In addition, he brings strong operational expertise and experience, leading a company known for its innovative culture and growth.”

Mr. Narayen has been CEO of Adobe since December 2007, after serving as Adobe’s president and COO, responsible for day-to-day global operations, product research and development, marketing, and corporate development. He held key product research and development positions at Adobe, including for worldwide products, product development and engineering technology.

Before joining Adobe in 1998, Mr. Narayen was co-founder of Pictra Inc., a pioneer in digital photo-sharing over the Internet; led desktop and collaboration products at Silicon Graphics; and held senior management positions at Apple, that last stint was a long time ago, it’s clear.

So there we have in interesting rift. Adobe and Apple helped revolutionise desktop publishing way back in the day, with close and friendly relations between the founders of both firms. Flash forward to today, and Adobe’s current CEO seems to want to send us all to Dell.

In part 3 of his interview with Techcrunch, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer laid some choice tidbits for us to dissect…like the following:

The most successful [IE competitor] by far is Firefox. Chrome is a rounding error to date. Safari is a rounding error to date. But Firefox is not. The fact that there’s a lot of competitors probably is to our advantage. Yeah, we’re right now about 74 percent overall with the browser market, roughly speaking. But we’re having to compete like heck with IE 8, with great new features. The other guys are getting more and more unanticipated competitive attack factors, the thing that Google announced yesterday where they replaced IE but they don’t tell you. I mean that’s how I would say it. For all intents and purposes of what they’re doing IE is not there. It’s their operating system. Instead of now masked as browser, it’s masked as a plug in basically to IE. So, you know, we’re going to have to compete like heck and you know, see where things go. The one thing that’s unclear is what’s the economic play for anybody else competing with us at the browser level. Is this all about kind of controlling the search box or is it about something else?

Marketshare from Aug 2009 NetApplications

Think the the IE Chrome Frame annoyed Ballmer at all? 

Other things that are around 7% of market share: Bing search engine and Mac Hardware in the US.  Two other things that Microsoft doesn’t focus on or care about. 

Would he call Bing a rounding error?  Why is he being so sensitive on browsers? Perhaps he’s a little worried that IE is heading toward the magic 50%.

Internet Explorer marketshare over the years

Speaking of Mac, Ballmer had some words for Apple’s desktop product.

Mr. BALLMER: Here’s Windows and Windows is a very successful product. How do you attack Windows? Well, you attack with the high end, and hardware. That’s an attack. That’s – I won’t call it the Snow Leopard attack. I’ll call it the Mac attack of which Snow Leopard is a piece. You could attack from the side. That’s the Chrome – Firefox attack. You can attack from cheap, from below. You’re not from the side. You’re one on one, but that’s kind of a Linux, Android, presumably Chrome OS, who knows, attack vector. You can attack through phones that grow up. You know, mama don’t let your phones grow up to be PCs or something. I don’t know. But that’s another attack vector. So, you could say how do I feel about all these attack vectors? Strong, I feel very strong here.

I mean, we’re gaining share. Apple is expensive. And in tough economic environment, people get it. Their model is, by definition, expensive. And we’ve actually held or maybe even gained just a tiny bit of share relative to the Mac in the last 12 months. And it’s not really Snow Leopard. It’s really Windows PCs versus Mac.

That’s the trade-off. We’ve done extremely well versus Linux-powered machines with the Androids or Linux and we’ve done that primarily by having a better solution and being willing to do the right thing from our pricing perspective. And Windows 7 will only make this, I think, more competitive here.

Not sure where he’s been getting his numbers.  Apple has been outperforming the overall PC market for the last 480 quarters in a row or something.  Could you call this a fib?

Rumours that Apple plans an update for its iMac and Mac mini range continue to percolate as the company’s first Q10 quarter gets set to start.

Reports claim Apple’s already informing sales channels that several of its desktop Macs are heading into short supply as the company presumably preps its new SKUs. AppleInsider claims Apple Retail is warning outlets that further orders on many models will not be met, specifically for the Mac mini and iMac range.

Amazon also appears to be out of stock, directing orders to third party resellers (such as J&R Music and Computer World, DataVision Computer Video or Techno Intelligence), rather than honouring them itself. Interestingly, current models are available through the giant retailer at a variety of discounts, up to $30 less than book price in some casesbr />
Similar availability constraints are impacting supply of the Mac mini, with orders again directed toward third-party resellers.

Apple’s own retail store, however, continues to promise new order iMacs will ship within 24-hours.

Apple last update these two products on March 3, 2009, when it reduced prices, offering the 24-inch model at the same price as the previous 20-inch iMac.

Previous claims have suggested the redesigned all–in–one could come crammed with a SD card reader, quad-core processors and even Intel’s Xeon inside, said Mac4Ever. The site also predicted an aluminium remote control and a touch-enabled mouse would make their debut with the new desktop all-in-one.

Earlier this month, Wedge Partners predicted a redesigned iMac with a “thinner, organic design, likely with smoothed or rounded edges.

The firm also expects “new, lower price points to drive demand and create a meaningful competitive threat” to coming PCs based on Windows 7 as well as to the booming netbook segment. “We believe these new designs and price points will help Apple achieve a 3 million unit quarter for Macs in [calendar] Q4,” the analysts said.

Which would make a strong start for Apple’s new financial year, as it prepares next year’s purported tablet release.

Well, here’s a natural evolution of the work Apple’s already involved in, seems the company is developing a touchscreen remote for the “upcoming Apple TV”.

This makes sense, after all, we can’t imagine every Apple TV owner is necessarily going to want to spend the cash required to pick up an iPhone or an iPod touch to use as a remote control for the media-focused device. There’s going to have to be some form or remote control, if only so you too can lose an Apple product down the back of the sofa…

So, Boy Genius Report cites this information as emanating from a source which the site rates as pretty hot, having correctly previously predicted iPhone homescreens in iTunes along with integrated social networking elements.

The site claims to have been sent an image “we’re told is a product mock-up that may coincide with the launch of a revised Apple TV.”

What’s interesting here is that you can see a Safari button on that there mocked-up screen. We wonder if the on-screen controls become a keyboard if you hold the remote in landscape mode?

In any case, Boy Genius Report warns readers to take this information on board with a high degree of caution, However, given Apple’s recent Apple TV price cut, its no great stretch of imagination to predict a new model of the device is currently wending its way out of Apple’s secretive r&d labs.

We wonder if it will have support for games?

Yet more Mac security FUD has been reported as fact, with a security researcher touting that a group of Russian hackers have been offering 43-cents per Mac as a reward to hackers subverting security on the platform.

It’s a FUD report, of course, as it fails to note that the general rate for Windows hacking is 50-55-cents, and fails to note that the website offering the bonus has since shut down, due to lack of interest.

As reported by Greg Keizer at Computerworld and repeated through numerous publications – including at least one which really should know better – it has been claimed that Russian hackers are targeting the Mac.

Naturally, all the usual suspects are involved in the info chain who bought us this ‘story’: Graham Cluley of Sophos quotes another researcher, Paul Ducklin, who himself points to a presentation given last week by Dmitry Samosseiko, himself a Russian-born researcher for – wait for it – Sophos.

CNN has the best rebuttal of the story. It takes a look at the six-page security research document and points out that the reference to Mac security occupies precisely one paragraph.

"Mac users are not immune to the scareware threat. In fact, there are ‘codec-partnerka’ dedicated to the sale and promotion of fake Mac software. One of the recent examples is Mac-codec.com. At the time of writing this article, the site is no longer available, but just a few months ago it was offering $0.43 for each install and offered various promo materials in the form of MacOS ‘video players’."

With security researchers seemingly determined to slam Mac security (potentially because they’d be out of a job if everyone switched to the platform) CNN notes that actual instances of Mac targeting groups are extremely rare. The report also points out that the site at the centre of the story has now shut down.

Once again these security warnings are pure FUD. Widely reported as fact. Doubt we’ll see a retraction by any of the publications who blindly carried the story.

Of course, we’re not saying Mac users can afford to be complacent. You can’t. It’s wise to be wary of downloaded files from sources you don’t recognise, it’s wise to be wary of opening links purporting to be from big names such as Amazon or PayPal, in case they are spoof phishing attacks.

Basically, common sense prevails, one must keep an eye on what is going on – but come on, it’s time to separate the FACT from the FUD.

Apple has taken three of the top five places in this year’s CoolBrands list, with the iPhone at top of the poll, Apple itself in third place and the iPod securing fourth place in the list, led for the last three years by Aston Martin, which fell to second place this year.

The success of the iPhone this year, which sold 5 million units between March and June, has led to it rising from second to become the most stylish brand. The shortlist for the survey is compiled by 2,500 voters. The final twenty brands are voted on by a panel.

BlackBerry saw some gains, climbing 16 places to seventh place, while the BBC’s iPlayer was the only new entry to take a top 20 slot. Google’s YouTube was recognised as the number one online brand.

Stephen Cheliotis, chief executive of the Centre for Brand Analysis, said: "The iPhone is something everyone has been talking about. There has been so such a buzz around it and people who haven’t got one, want one.”

Top 20 Coolest Brands:
    1.    iPhone
    2.    Aston Martin
    3.    Apple
    4.    iPod
    5.    Nintendo
    6.    YouTube
    7.    BlackBerry
    8.    Google
    9.    Bang & Olufsen
    10.    PlayStation 3
    11.    Xbox
    12.    Tate Modern
    13.    Dom Perignon
    14.    Virgin Atlantic
    15.    Ferrari
    16.    Sony
    17.    Mini
    18.    Vivienne Westwood
    19.    Rolex
    20.    BBC iPlayer

Ending O2’s exclusive status as sole UK iPhone supplier, France Telecom’s Orange this morning said it will begin selling the iPhone in the UK from later this year.

"Orange UK and Apple have reached an agreement to bring iPhone 3G and 3GS to Orange UK customers later this year," Orange said.

"Orange, which has the largest 3G network covering more people in the UK than any other operator, will sell iPhone in all Orange direct channels including Orange shops, the Orange webshop and Orange telesales channels, as well as selected high street partners," the carrier said.

O2 will continue selling the device, but its exclusive contract will expire. The company has attracted over one million iPhone users to its network since the device went on sale.

Orange has already published a page to its website where customers interested in getting an iPhone can register their interest.

Orange in the UK has also proposed a merger with the UK arm of T-Mobile. If approved, this will create the UK’s largest mobile network, and make the iPhone available to over 49 million UK mobile users.

Commenting on this news, O2 this morning issued the following statement: "We’re proud that we’ve been able to offer an exclusive iPhone deal to our 20 million customers for the last two years. We always knew that iPhone exclusivity was for a limited period of time, but our relationship with Apple continues and will be an ongoing success. We have over 1million iPhone customers and they remain very important to us."

Engadget has an interesting little extra information on the Light Peak 10Gb bus standard that Intel curiously demonstrated on a Hackintosh this week.  Now we know why they used a ‘Hackintosh’ – it actually wasn’t a Hackintosh but a real Apple Blue Motherboard. 

It turns out that Apple has developed the standard and was instrumental in bringing it on board over at Intel.  Instrumental in this case means Steve Jobs aguing with Intel chief Paul Paul Otellini about getting the product into new motherboards.

10Gbs is fast.  It is 10 times faster than Gigabit Ethernet (and is duplex meaning both tx and rx are 10Gb as the same time).  That is also faster than the DisplayPort connector that connects Apple’s displays.   The video below shows a video card driving an HD monitor while a 2 GB file copy transpires in a few seconds.

The good news from Engadget is that Apple machines with this technology are to debut within a year – they say around the back to school season.  A lower power version is due a year from then (in 2011) and would be a good fit for mobile devices like a tablet.  The bus standard is expected to hit 100Gbs in the future as well.

In the meantime, it might also make a good dock connector-type port.  It would allow USB/Firewire/Ethernet/DisplayPort all to run at full speed simultanously and would only require one plug.

Apple’s iPhone may be in the ascendant, but competing players continue to face problems in the space, with Research In Motion shares falling 11 per cent on the pre-market this morning and the recently-introduced Palm Pre Phone this morning discounted to just $100 on Amazon.

Palm Pre carrier, Sprint, recently cut the cost of the Pre to $150 (after rebate on a 24-month contract), but Amazon today discounted that. That’s a $400 saving on the original retail price…and probably not a pretty sign for Pre…

Palm was in the news a lot this week, with market rumours speculating Nokia may make a bid to take over the company emerging at the same time as Palm issued a major tranche of new stock options in an attempt to pull in cold, hard investment cash.

The company also took a hit this week when the USB Forum declared it in the wrong to establish iTunes syncing on the Pre, and demanded to know why it was using Apple’s USB Vendor ID number in order to achieve this without Apple’s permission. The company now has only a few days to explain itself.

Over at Research In Motion, strong device sales in the just-gone quarter couldn’t hide Wall Street’s disappointment at the company’s confession it expected to miss analyst targets in its Q3 cycle.

Net profit declined 4% from this time last year to $475.6m on sales of $3.53bn (up 4% y-o-y). But analysts weren’t convinced the company could maintain momentum, particularly as it chases the low-end markets, with Goldman Sachs, Raymond James and Deutsche Bank all issuing downgrades, driving a sell-off in company stock.

Intel offered an interesting tech preview of a new technology, Light Peak optical device interconnect, at IDF this week. The technology enables a computer to drive a greater-than-HD display while saturating an SSD RAID – all over one single cable.

This new tech seems pretty likely to interest any high-end video or graphics professional, and is the kind of interconnect we kind of anticipate will be of use in the future digital home…but what makes this demo interesting is the operating system that’s being run on the hackintosh machine – Mac OS X…

Seems like poetry to us: After all, we know that Apple had OS X running on Intel processors inside its deepest, darkest, most secret labs for many years before the Intel transition. Now it suggests PC makers may even now have OS X running on their machines, hoping always Apple will one day liberate its operating system from its hardware. And while that seems unlikely, it’s nice to know there’s always that possibility for Apple to rapidly expand its OS market share.

(Equally, of course, it could be a Mac-based development system used under license to test what the Mac excels at – graphics cabability…)

Via: Engadget

Steve Ballmer dished some device numbers to Techcrunch this evening.  Included in here was the wisdom of Microsoft not making its own branded phone because..

What does Apple sell every year of iPods: 30 million, order of magnitude, something like that. What is the whole video game market is maybe 30 or 40 million in units a year. But when you get these categories that are 300 million, 500 million, a billion, a billion-five a year, the truth of the matter is you’re gonna want multiple points of manufacture, with a lot of innovation around it whether its supply chain, for geographic diversity, and our basic play with our software is to try and be super high volume. So I think you can have an Apple in the phone business, or a RIM, and they can do very well, but when 1.3 billion phones a year are all smart, the software that’s gonna be most popular in those phones is gonna be software that’s sold by somebody who doesn’t make their own phone. And, we don’t want to cross the chasm in the short run and lose the war in the long run and that’s why we think the software play is the right play for us for high volume, even though some of the guys in the market today with vertically oriented solutions may do just fine.

Great points all, especially when Microsoft’s branded Pink phones were outed this week.  Maybe these phones are so secret that no one told Monkey Boy of their existance.  Check the video out below:

We always like these – thought we’d share.

Update: OK, this is another fake. Google Spell check didn’t catch the "Tree easy steps" part. Neither did we. And that tweet was from the Unofficial Chrome developers account.

Google’s ChomeOS was announced a few months ago as a mainstream operating system for Netbooks (and tablets?!).  Today, via unofficial Tweet, Google is showing off the first video of the operating system. 

Update: OK, this is another fake. Google Spell check didn’t catch the "Tree easy steps" part. Neither did we. And that tweet was from the Unofficial Chrome developers account.

Google’s ChomeOS was announced a few months ago as a mainstream operating system for Netbooks (and tablets?!).  Today, via unofficial Tweet, Google is showing off the first video of the operating system. 

The OS is mostly just a log on to Google services (and it looks like it has a touch screen/tablet component to it).  We also see Skype, video camera and a music applications there in that super-exposé mode as well.

Steve Jobs cited growing competition between Google and Apple as reasons why Eric Schmidt had to be removed from the Apple board of directors.  This would be that competition.

We’re beginning to warm to Microsoft’s Windows 7 marketing schema – it’s a gift that just keeps on giving, though unfortunately, unlike the XP-Vista-Win7 transition, in marketing there’s no V.2.0 upgrade. And this one’s a doozy…

Take your mind to the streets of Paris: the food, the art, the music from the rooftops, the mix of languages, the landmarks, Crazy Horse Club, Moulin Rouge, the culture and the cafes…Ask yourself, what’s a struggling software giant going to do to get tuned into the Parisian zeitgeist? Read on to find out…

Sure, we know they plan some parties; we know they’re poaching Apple staff to talk knowledgeably about the need to buy an Internet Security package with every PC; we know they plan to open their own chain of Microsoft shops…now it seems, Microsoft’s making an early stage move to diversify its business (and take on another Seattle native, Starbucks), opening its own coffee shop in Paris. Zut alors!

Techcrunch has images of the new coffee shop, situated in the city’s busy heart at 47 Boulevard Sebastopol. There tourists rub shoulders with French natives, exchange a few colloquialisms, chatter idly as they enjoy life in the clutch of cafes there.

Microsoft’s “Windows Cafe” will only be open for a few weeks starting October 22. Inside, you’ll be able to buy snacks and drinks and play on a few Microsoft products, including an Xbox – though you won’t be able to buy any Microsoft stuff. You can already sit on the street outside and enjoy free WiFi access.

We kind of wonder what the coffee will be like, it being Paris and all. Has Microsoft poached some hapless Starbucks employees to serve that hot beverage from an astonishingly confusing list of variations on the theme? Will there be a Microsoft Guru there to deal with the sundry PC systems as they fall over and require rebooting?

We know WIndows 7 is the OS Microsoft hoped Vista would be, but we’re far more curious to read user reviews of the coffee. Will that too need virus protection with every purchase??