Tag - iOS

We went to my sister’s place yesterday where we were having a family party for my nephew Jacob, who was turning 14. The place was lousy with iPhones.

I had one.
My sister Maria had one.
Her daughter Megan had one.
My sister Renee had one.
Her husband Jeroen had one.

Naturally, since I’m the technical one in the family, I was immediately pressed into duty helping everyone figure out everything they wanted to know about how to use their iPhone. But it was fun.

You know something is going mainstream when suddenly your entire family starts buying it …

Not so mobile me

July 14, 2008

I signed up for a 60-day trial of Apple’s new MobileMe service today only to find it is not currently compatible with OS X 10.4.11, more commonly known as “Tiger.”

The latest version of Mac OS X is 10.5.x, or “Leopard.” My home machine runs Leopard; my PowerBook still runs Tiger – and the preference pane that is supposed to be Mobile Me is still the old .Mac.

Which means, unfortunately, that all of Apple’s instructions regarding how to sync my iPhone and laptop are useless.

Hopefully an update will soon be forthcoming …

Reverse productivity

July 11, 2008

If someone could please explain to me why this application is in the “Productivity” category of iPhone applications, I would really like to know.

The entire application consists of a “game” of holding a button on your iPhone (or iPod touch) for as long as possible. Unshockingly, “Hold On” is the name of the application, and also the entire instruction manual.

The “app” is by IMAK Creations, and I can only assume it was their first attempt.

Funny!

At the very least, they’ve got people talking and linking, and that can’t be bad.

iPhone is myPhone

July 11, 2008

No time to publish much right now, except that yes, I finally have an iPhone. And yes, I’m pretty pumped about it.

It’s unnatural, a grown man being so excited by shiny plastic toys.

More later …

Canadian cell $$$ petition & the iPhone

July 8, 2008

Given the astronomical iPhone plans that Rogers is foisting on Canadian consumers, it’s a good time to support David McGuinty’s cell phone costs petition.

(McGuinty is a Liberal member of parliament.)

Here’s the petition:

Get Connected Fairly Act

I’ve signed. 15 people have signed in the last 10 minutes while I’ve been putting this post together.

How about you?

[ update from ruinediphone.com ]

On Wednesday July 9, at 3:00 pm EDT David McGuinty, MP, will be making an official video statement on ruinediphone.com. Please check back then.

Interesting!

Turns out the mobile web is just … the web

April 14, 2008

ReadWriteWeb sort of agrees
Last 100 disagrees
Mobile Marketing Watch might want to buy Mowser
Another one hits the deadpool
Venture Chronicles thinks the mobile model is wrong
Larry Dignan at ZDNet mostly agrees

Russell Beattie should stand up tall and proud. The Yahoo! alum gave up a secure job (well, sorta secure) and a steady paycheck to tread the uncertain waters of the startup life, and unfortunately was sucked down.

He developed Mowser, a mobile web browser for small-screen mobile devices (OK, that’s a fancy phrase for cell phones). Mowser made big fat web sites small and lean for tiny screens and narrow pipes. (Example: check out Sparkplug9 in all its Mowser glory.)

But then iPhone showed us that the future of the mobile web was … err … the web. Not some “baby internet,” in His Steveness’ words, but the real internet. In your pocket. On your phone. On your iPod. And those of us who had tried to scrunch the web down onto our 2″ screens jumped up and said Amen.

Here’s how Russell says it:

The argument up to now has been simply that there are roughly 3 billion phones out there, and that when these phones get on the Internet, their vast numbers will outweigh PCs and tilt the market towards mobile as the primary web device. The problem is that these billions of users *haven’t* gotten on the Internet, and they won’t until the experience is better and access to the web is barrier-free – and that means better devices and “full browsers”. Let’s face it, you really aren’t going to spend any real time or effort browsing the web on your mobile phone unless you’re using Opera Mini, or have a smart phone with a decent browser – as any other option is a waste of time, effort and money. Users recognize this, and have made it very clear they won’t be using the “Mobile Web” as a substitute for better browsers, rather they’ll just stay away completely.

I can’t agree more … as unfortunate as it is for someone who’s sunk his life savings into making the web work in miniature.

In any case, he’s now looking for a job.

Someone will benefit by having him on-board. Not only is he new media savvy, he’s just spent his life savings figuring out what doesn’t work. Some smart company is going to be the beneficiary of that hard-won wisdom as he starts building what does.

. . .
. . .

More analysis, insight, and general reportage:

iPhone is a trojan horse for Mac software development

March 6, 2008

I’m watching VP of iPhone software for Apple, Scott Forstall, in today’s Apple Event.

He’s demo’ing the API and development environment, and my first thought was: this is a trojan horse for Mac OS X development.

Thousands of developers are going to want to write applications for the hottest mobile device on the market … and as they do so, they’ll all be learning how to program for a Mac, using the same tools – the same development environment.

This is going to pay dividends for many years to come.

iCapital for iPhone

March 6, 2008

This is a big, big deal:

KPCB’s iFund is a $100M investment initiative that will fund market-changing ideas and products that extend the revolutionary new iPhone and iPod touch platform. The iFund is agnostic to size and stage of investment and will invest in companies building applications, services and components. Focus areas include location based services, social networking, mCommerce (including advertising and payments), communication, and entertainment. The iFund will back innovators pursuing transformative, high-impact ideas with an eye towards building independent durable companies atop the iPhone / iPod touch platform.

“A revolutionary new platform is a rare and prized opportunity for entrepreneurs, and that’s exactly what Apple has created with iPhone and iPod touch,” said John Doerr, Partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. “We think several significant new companies will emerge as this new platform evolves, and the iFund will empower them to realize their full potential.”

“Developers are already bursting with ideas for the iPhone and iPod touch, and now they have the chance to turn those ideas into great companies with the help of world-class venture capitalists,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We can’t wait to start working with Kleiner Perkins and the companies they fund through this new initiative.”

Let a thousand flowers bloom.

mini-blogging

February 25, 2008

Thanks to an extremely generous brother-in-law, I’m blogging this from my new iPod touch.

Far, far, far too cool.

Of course, I quickly picked up the $20 extra apps package from Apple, which really makes this useable as a mobile platform …

Well, enough for now.

I’m super-happy with the Touch, but I’m not going to start writing novels on a touchscreen.

IMHO: Incremental but important

January 15, 2008

I’m sure everyone and his dog knows what Apple announced today at MacWorld:

iPhone and iPod Touch updates
Movie rentals on iTunes and new Apple TV
Time Capsule backup appliance
MacBook Air

There was no iPhone, no huge incredible surprise. But there was incremental improvement on a wide variety of fronts … and the new Apple TV is an amazing product that now I’m interesting in buying. (Though, once again, Canada has to wait for full service availability.)

There’s a lot in today’s MacWorld that’s going to make a lot of money for Apple.

Mega Nano Hassle

January 14, 2008

Having an iPod Nano can be a lot more work than you bargained for.

I got a fatboy Nano for Christmas. It’s great, sleek, beautiful, tiny, and the wretched bleeding thing does not hold all my music.

Having never had this problem before (owning both a 20GB 4th generation and a 30GB 5th generation of what is nostalgically now referred to as an iPod classic) this is causing me some serious angst. (OK, I’m lying about the angst part. Actually it’s just minor irritation, bordering on mid-level annoyance.) But in the wee, wee hours of the morning they really don’t feel too terribly dissimilar.

It turns out there is no easy way to tell the black-box machina Apple calls iTunes to “sync-up-all-the-music-that-fits-on-my-ipod, selecting-by-albums, giving-me-new-stuff (or at least a random sampling of all my music) every-single-time-I-sync.

I don’t know about you, but I find that distinctly annoying.

After all, my time is too valuable to spend manually figuring out what kind of music I want to listen to for the next few days. After spending 30 minutes on the worthless local paper, channel-surfing for an hour or so, and some impressive-looking but sadly resultless procrastination on household chores, the last thing I want to do is to make the computer do what it ought to do for me. It resembles work entirely too closely.

So: Apple. Please create a setting in the iPod prefs that does the above-mentioned task.

I would really hate to draw the conclusion that you are simply making it tough for people to own low-capacity iPods and engaging in some stealthy marketing for upmarket 160 GB versions … particularly when you’re releasing 8GB iPhones that would not hold my music collection either. That would just be cynical.

After all, if the geeks at ArsTechnica can’t figure it out either (and no, none of the suggestions there possess either of the two desired virtues of humane computing: elegance and … actual functionality), how can a mere mortal figure it out?

Thanks!

Apple tablet – a huge iPhone?

January 7, 2008

Is this a marriage of convenience between an Apple iMac and a new Tablet, possibly (please!) to be announced at MacWorld in the next couple of weeks?

mac tablet and imac

What a brilliant idea … portable tablet on the road, around the house, in the boardroom … and full-size keyboard, mouse, and line-of-sight positioning on the desk. The rough sketch is from an Apple patent application.

Sign me up for one!

Credits: I saw it at Nick Carr’s Rough Type, MacRumors, and MacNN.

However, they seem to be fitting it into the subportable notebook space. I personally wonder if it isn’t a tablet … a huge iPhone. The possibilities are intriguing … hook it in to charge up, take it out to lounge on the sofa catching up on blogs or watching your favorite TV online.

In the workplace, take it out to the meeting, take it out to the conference. Use the on-screen keyboard, use multi-touch, maybe even use speech. Back in the office, hook it in to charge, use your keyboard and mouse, and generally use it as a desktop computer.

A guy can always dream, right?

iPhone and greed

January 6, 2008

Ken Ollin is wondering if the biggest innovation in the iPhone is greed. At least, that’s the catchy title of his blog post.

What he’s really questioning is why the iPhone is a closed garden instead of an open software development ecosystem.

In response, of course, eager Mac users have responded with the usual flood of comments to anyone who questions Apple – mostly making good points about the software development kit that will be coming out in February or so.

But Ken’s post is still valuable, as I commented on his post:

A lot of people have made good points in the comments. The SDK, etc.

But … let’s not lose sight of the point (even if we are Mac fans – and I’m one too.)

The point is that the ecosystem is more important than an individual piece of software or hardware – and any individual company. This is the key insight that initially won Microsoft the operating system war, and losing this insight is what is costing Microsoft today.

The point for Apple: cultivate the ecosystem. The returns are huge multiples of what the closed garden generates. Apple is likely moving in this direction with the SDK.

But here’s why commentary like this is valuable: the ecosystem approach is not in Apple’s DNA. Apple *is* learning it, but true-blue Apple SOP is to go it alone.

An occasional reminder is a good thing for Apple – and a good thing for all of us who love Apple products and software and ethos.

Too cool iPhone physics game

December 5, 2007

Baffled. Utterly baffled.

October 30, 2007

How much did you pay the music industry for the record player you bought 30 years ago? What percentage of your 15-year-old tape deck’s cost went to the music companies? And how much did the RIAA get when you bought your new Bose speakers?A big fat zero, obviously.Which is why I’m so utterly baffled by comments like this:

Zucker also revealed his company had asked for a cut of iPod sales – though the company receives no dividend from sales of record or CD players.”Apple sold millions of dollars worth of hardware off the back of our content and made a lot of money,” he said. “They did not want to share in what they were making off the hardware or allow us to adjust pricing.”

Almost. Literally. Unbelievable.What can you expect, I guess, from an industry that sues its customers, cheats its stars, eats its young talent for lunch, and is generally a disgusting, manipulative, and corrupting influence on popular culture.What a zero.

More music industry madness

October 13, 2007

So, Universal wants to invent a new model for music sales:

Universal Music Group, the world’s biggest record label, is looking to mobile hardware makers to foot the bill for a free music subscription service for buyers of a certain mobile phone or music player, The Telegraph reported Saturday.

Think. What does a model where you buy a piece of music-playing equipment and then the music itself is free remind you of? Oh yes, radio!Hmm … so they’re trying to reinvent radio here? Nice “new” model here.I wonder what other parts of the radio experince they’ll try to replicate? The lousy music choice? The annoying DJs? Maybe. But there’s another piece of the radio universe that I predict will come along with the “free” music, if this model actually makes it out the door.Advertising.That’s the only way there could possibly be enough revenue in this ridiculous model to support a continual flow of new music. But isn’t the 20 minutes an hour of radio advertising one of the reasons we bought iPods in the first place?No worries. As Dr Phil would say: this dog won’t hunt.PS:Why are the labels so fixated on hardware revenues? They are constantly complaining about the money Apple makes on the iPod … but they never complained before about not getting revenue from radios and stereo equipment. If only they would fixate on being best at what they’re supposed to do: find and promote great music.

1-year old using iPhone

September 28, 2007

This is bloody amazing:

(Saw it here.)

What really is the iPhone?

September 26, 2007

There’s a great column at Strominator that explains exactly what it is:

The iPhone is not a phone, its the first generation of a new type of computing device. One that will change how we view computing. One that will make our lives simpler. We won’t have to learn how to use applications, we’ll just use them. We won’t worry about launching applications, saving files, quitting — just using. Every other smartphone is still based on an archaic, cumbersome, paradigm taken straight from desktop computers. Drop-down/pop-up menus, programs, files — ugh. Look how bad Windows Mobile is, and most of us are used to the real Windows on our desktops. Why should a phone take minutes to just turn on? The alternatives are not much better. Mobile OSX, what runs inside the iPhone however, is a whole new beast. Intuitive, responsive, and an extension of the beautiful hardware that it runs on.

Which is not to say there aren’t issues … as the article also talks discusses.

iPhone in Canada, Please

September 19, 2007

Brand protection, marketing, and responsiveness in a new media world

September 9, 2007

Consumer-generated Media has a nice breakdown of Steve Jobs open letter to early iPhone adopters who hit the roof when Apple recently announced the $200 price break.Excerpt:

What an incredible year to watch and learn from CEO-level behavior in times of crisis and difficulty. First we had Jet Blue, faced with an impossibly difficult situation, take to the airwaves on YouTube, apologize profusely, and announce a new passenger bill of rights. While Menu Foods practically hid their CEO during the pet recall issue, Mattel put their CEO, Bob Eckert, on the website video airwaves to nurture trust and confidence in the wake of the toy recall (a still-in-progress case study). Now we have Steve Jobs, who just wrote and posted the most remarkable letter in response to concerns about iPhone’s recent price decrease. He coupled an apology with a $100 Apple credit for all early-buyers of the iPhone. This is classic Defensive Branding. I predict it will be one of the most discussed, debated, and linked-to letters of the year, and so far I’ve already counted over 800 unique blog postings referencing his letter since 6 PM last night.

A full breakdown of the letter follows …

The iPhone comes to Canada … well, sorta

August 31, 2007

Well, I just made my first iPhone call.That’s no biggie to hundreds of thousands of people in the US, of course, but the iPhone has not yet been released in Canada.Mike Skovgaard, a buddy at work, has been buying them in the US and taking them up to Canada to unlock them to work with the Rogers and Fido cell networks. He’s already done it with a few, and showed me his latest. Apparently, Mike was only the third person in Canada to unlock the iPhone.So, review in one paragraph or less? Awesome. Cover flow is great, voice quality is excellent, phone usability is amazing, photos are really cool, Google Maps is incredible, etc. etc. Everything just works, and everything just works the way you think it ought to work.Love it, can’t wait for it to “officially” come to Canada.

Running list: Apple iPhone lawsuits

August 30, 2007

Apple is getting its ass sued off over the iPhone.I’d like to write a scathing critique of modern idiots who buy things they haven’t researched and then blame others for their idiocy, and an equally damning tirade against companies that produce nothing, add nothing, and do nothing but think up obvious ideas, patent them, and then suck blood out of other companies … but I just can’t sum up the energy.Instead, I’m going to list all the Apple iPhone lawsuits I can think of … and ask you to add any others in the comments.

Battery lawsuitsApparently, there’s three of them now.
Roaming feesI agree, roaming fees suck …
Keyboard patentSome guy dreamed up something, and now he owns it forever? Interesting. Even more interesting, because he’s currently in jail for fraud!
CiscoOK, this one’s over … but Cisco did file a lawsuit over the iPhone name
Any more? I’m sure it’s just a matter of time …

Apple’s Sept. 5 iPod Announcement: iPod, iPhone, iPDA, iComputer, iMobile Computing

August 28, 2007

Apple’s scheduled a Steptember 5th special event: “the beat goes on.”It’s obviously about iPods. My guess is that Apple’s now ready to take the next step. More to the point, the marketplace is finally ready for Apple to release the next evolution in iPod: mobile computing.You already see it in iPhone. And we know that OS X is underpinning future iPods.iPods have been carrying our calendars and notes for years. But it’s always been the sideshow, the off-off-Broadway down-the-lane-to-the-left non-attraction.I think the new iPods are going to take a huge leap in functionality. iPhone’s seamless reading of PDFs, Microsoft Office documents, and more will be part of the iPod experience.It’ll still be the entertainment hub – music, movies, podcasts – that it is. But it’s going to take the next step to a mobile computing platform that includes some of what we currently think of as “business” functionality and some of what we think of as “consumer” functionality – especially games.It would not shock me if concurrent with this unveiling of the new iPod we have an “iSDK,” a software development kit for iPhone and iPod.You read it hear first.

MediaTemple: hosting on iPhone

August 8, 2007

MediaTemple (my host) just released an interface to control your entire hosting account via iPhone.Pretty cool.A little trendy, but I can imagine this being extremely useful when on the road. To be honest, I bet it’s easier to use than their current control panel, which I’ve never been able to fully understand.Now we just need WordPress for iPhone.

cruel & unusual

July 11, 2007

‘Nuff said.

[tags] iphone, blender, willitblend, john koetsier [/tags]

Apple: give away iQuiz for free

July 9, 2007

Why on earth is Apple selling iQuiz?

it’s a tiny application that lets you run quizzes on your iPod. McGraw-Hill is using it to deliver their new interactive learning for iPod program.

Apple’s charging only 99 cents for it on the iTunes store. But why not give it away for free?

Then it could be the basis of a new standard delivery mechanism for educational content … and curriculum companies wouldn’t have to worry about tolls on the road for their potential market. Surely the revenue that Apple would win from increased iPod sales would vastly outweight a couple of pennies on iQuiz.

Now will they get the zen of Apple?

June 30, 2007

Sometimes it’s hard to convince PC users of the benefits of Apple computers and Mac OS X.

Since their computers are hardly personal, and just tools, and essentially lacking style and personality, they don’t understand, can’t grasp, cannot fit in their brains the concept of an interface that has been obsessively designed to fit, to function, to form an environment that accepts and welcomes people.

Maybe the iPhone will solve this problem. Check out what this Time reviewer says:

The user interface is crammed with smart little touches — every moment of user interaction has been quietly stage-managed and orchestrated, with such overwhelming attention to detail that when the history of digital interface design is written, whoever managed this project at Apple will be hailed as a Michelangelo, and the iPhone his or her Sistine Chapel (Steve Jobs can be Pope in this scenario). If you’re not a reviewer, chances are you won’t even bother to look at the manual. Translucent, jewel-like, artfully phrased dialogue boxes come and go on cue. Window borders bounce and flex just slightly to cue the user where and how you’re supposed to drop and drag and scroll them. When you switch the phone to “airplane mode” (no electronic transmissions, for use on planes) a tasteful little orange airplane slides into the menu bar, then zooms away when you switch out again. (This was so pleasurable that I repeatedly entered airplane mode while using the iPhone, even though I wasn’t actually on an airplane.) As soon as my phone realized it belonged to someone with a nonsense-name like Lev, it started correcting typos like “Leb” and “Lec” to match.

That’s the zen of Apple taken to a whole new level.

Sold!

June 26, 2007

The first reviews of iPhone are starting to come out. Saw this on the NY Times:

On the iPhone, you don’t check your voice mail; it checks you. One button press reveals your waiting messages, listed like e-mail. There’s no dialing in, no password — and no sleepy robot intoning, “You…have…twenty…one…messages.”

I so so so so so hate voicemail. But this makes it much more email-like … which is a quantum leap.

[tags] iphone, voice mail, email, john koetsier [/tags]

eWeek and iPhone: fear and loathing?

June 22, 2007