Apple might unveil its white colored iPhone 4 in the September 1, 2010 event. It is not entirely out of question because the holiday season is closing in and Apple would be able to create some hype but if we look at the tradition of Apple then there is hardly any reason to believe that Apple would talk about its iPhone because the summer events mainly focused on music devices.
Another set of rumors also came up that Apple would roll out its popular handset on another carrier aside from AT&T. Apple Insider reported that the Cupertino-based firm is in talks with Verizon and hammering out a deal.
Kaufman Brothers analyst, Shaw Wu, in a note, said that Apple is looking forward to tie up with another carrier and Verizon may not be its first choice. He said T-Mobile and Sprint are possible targets of Apple. He said, “From our checks with industry and supply chain sources and a recent SEC 10-Q filing by AT&T mentioning that exclusivity with "a number of attractive handsets" could end, we have conviction that the iPhone could likely finally be at another carrier besides AT&T here in the U.S. in 2011 and potentially at Verizon in 2011 or 2012... We believe the argument for AAPL to pursue Verizon sooner than later is to address the growing presence of Android.”
According to Don Reisinger, if Apple signs up with Verizon then many Verizon customers would flock to the stores for the phone but it would steal away many AT&T customers as well and this is something Apple would not want to see. If Apple signs up with another carrier then it would have to make sure that its strong relationship with AT&T continues.
Google rolled out a new feature on its Gmail that would help users to separate important mails from unimportant ones and would require less time finding out important mails.
Known as “Priority Inbox,” the feature automatically grades email into four categories- important, unread, starred items and everything else. This would help people to become more productive. About the product, Google said that it acts like a “personal assistant” that helps people to focus on the messages that matter.
While talking about the new feature, Keith Coleman, Director, Gmail, said that there are many features that signals the importance of a particular message. He said,
"Basic indicators include if this message is from someone you write to a lot or reply to a lot. Another category is terms - if the word Viagra is in the message, it is indicative of junk mail. And a third factor is something known as static features. That is if the message has been sent to you directly or to you and other people or a list of people."
The feature becomes more efficient the more a user uses it. It also has a priority setting tools to increase and decrease priority status of a message. It helps the product learn about the importance of various mails.
The Apple Music Event 2010 will be held tomorrow and rumor mill is going strong. The September Music Event has become a major tradition for the Apple. It unveils its various music and entertainment products in the event. Over the years, Apple unveiled some of the best products the industry has ever seen and they started new trends. This year, Apple is also believed to come with some great surprises and every body is eagerly waiting.
Here are some information about the Apple Music Event that you would like to know:
1) The Apple Music Event 2010 would take place at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Theatre in San Francisco on September 1, 2010. The event will start at 10 a.m. Pacific Time, 1 p.m. Eastern time. The email invitation does not give out much detail except a 9 a.m. registration time. For many years, Apple has been holding their events in this venue. In January this year, the company also revealed its famous iPad in this venue.
2) On August 25, 2010, Apple sent out invitations to the media people. The email invitation had a logo on it – an acoustic guitar with an apple shaped soundhole. This image led many people to think that the Apple Music Event 2010 would be focused on music.
3) In 2009, the Apple email invitation had a dancing silhouette. That year the Apple Music Event dubbed “It’s only rock and roll but we like it,” took place after labor day.
At the event, the company released 64GB iPod Touch, iPod Nano with a built-in video camera and iTunes 9.
4) The Apple Music 2008 was themed “Lets Rock.” At the event, Apple unveiled its 160GB iPod Classic, 4th generation iPod Nano with voice recording capability, a thinner iPod Touch and iTunes 8.
5) At the 2001, Apple Music Event Steve Jobs first unveiled the first iPod. Here is a video of Steve Jobs at the Apple Music Event 2001:
6) It is believed that Apple is going to unveil a newly designed iPod Nano that would not have any clickwheel but a smaller touch screen measuring 3cm by 3cm. Picture of cases revealed by Chinese company, X-Doria, led to the speculation that Apple would release a newly designed 6th generation iPod Nano which would look more like iPod shuffle.
The new iPod Nano will retain its traditional 30-pin dock connector. The bumps on the side of the cases indicate that the new iPod Nano would have buttons on the side probably volume control and open space on the led people to thinks that the Nano would come with clips. Case manufacturers have been creating protective cases for the new Apple iPod Touch and iPod Nano since July.
7) Another device that is creating lots of rumor is the iPod Touch. It is believed that Apple would unveil its 4th gen iPod Touch at the event that will come with many features of the iPhone 4. The new iPod Touch would have dual-camera. There will be one front-facing camera for Facetime video chat while a 3-megapixel camera would be fitted on the rear with auto focus and video recording capability. The new iPod Touch would also enable users to make FaceTime calls via Wi-Fi. Other features include high resolution retina display, gyroscope, 3G support and SIM tray. It is also believed that Apple would introduce a new entry-level iPod Touch priced at $199.
8) Rumor also spread out that Apple would introduce its newly designed home entertainment system Apple iTV previously known as Apple TV. The Apple TV was launched in 2007 but it did not become very popular. The newly designed AppleTV will be marketed as iTV. It is believed that the iTV would be priced at $99. It would sport A4 chip and would be able to play video at 720p. Engadget said that the iTV would sport a 16GB SSD while Technolog reported 160GB HDD. The iTV is believed to be running on iOS.
9) Apple would also roll out a new $0.99 TV show rental service at the Apple Music Event 2010. Apple is rumored to be in talks with Walt Disney, CBS, NBC Universal and Fox Studios. People would rent their favorite TV shows and would have to watch it within a 48-hour period.
10) Apple would roll out its new cloud-based iTunes where users are not required to install any software on their PC rather everything would be controlled from a server and user would be able to access via Wi-Fi and 3G for a monthly subscription fee.
11) News reports also said that subscribers of Apple iTunes now would be able to enjoy a music demo for one minutes from 30 seconds. This new feature would be announced by Steve Jobs at the Apple Music Event 2010.
12) Apple promised its iPad users to provide an iOS 4 update this fall and it might be done at the Apple Music Event 2010. Apple has not roll out the beta version of iOS 4 for its iPad.
Apple App store is currently the most successful and rich App store in the world with an astounding collection of 2,50,000 apps and counting. All these applications run on Apple iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad.
Launched in July 2008, the App store has been a resounding success both among app developers and users. Within six months, the store observed its half-billionth download and within the next four months reached one-billionth mark. However, Apple did not reveal how many were paid downloads and free downloads.
As per 148Apps.biz, Apple store currently has an estimated 2,52,227 active apps for the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. In addition, there are also another 49,696 inactive applications that are not available any more on the app store. This makes the total number applications to 301,923 applications.
All these applications have been uploaded by 50,545 active publishers which means on average, developers uploaded 322.7 applications every day on the app store.
This shows that Apple has been able to build up a successful system. However, there are some serious issues that need to be addressed by Apple sooner or later. First, how many of these applications are useful applications? how can you know about these applications? and most importantly, how you can find the ones you really need?
It is a good thing Apple has a rich collection but at the same time, it also has to make sure that app users can easily and smoothly find out applications that they are looking for.
After Google Nexus One, HTC Evo 4G, Motorola Droid, and Droid 2, which came with pre-installed Android 2.2, HTC Droid Incredible owners will be able to upgrade their OS to Android 2.2 aka Froyo. Other phones that are waiting in the line are Droid X and Samsung Galaxy S series phones.
Android 2.2, launched in May 2010, takes up 93.7 MB. Google Nexus One first to receive the update. It comes with a host of new features including a new home screen, Adobe Flash 10.1 support, Wi-Fi tethering, MS Exchange support, applications installable via SD-card, video recording at 720p, an overall 2-5x performance improvement, cloud to device messaging and many more.
Verizon launched Android 2.2 on August 27, 2010. It said that HTC Droid owners would be informed about the update via SMS messages sent to their sets. In case if the users do not receive an message, they can update their phones manually. Inorder to install the update users should go to the Settings, About Phone and System Updates.
If you have not received any message from Verizon then be patient and wait for a few more days. Since Verizon is updating so many phones, it is taking some time.
HTC Droid Incredible was launched on Verizon on April 29, 2010. The phone is powered by 1GHz Snapdragon CPU. Other features include 8GB of internal storage expandable up toi 32 GB via microSD slot, 748MB of ROM, 8 megapixel camera with dual LED flash and autofocus, 480 x 800 AMOLED capacitive touchscreen, and HTC Sense UI.
Social networking sites are not only popular among younger people but older people as well. A large portion of the users of social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn consists of people who are fifty years and older. These people use social networking websites to connect with their grandchildren, childhood friends and school friends.
Unfortunately, Facebook, the most popular social networking site, does not take these older users into account. Currently, Facebooks ad targets people aged between 13 and 64 years not more than that.
In November 2009, leading research firm, AC Nielsen, published a study which revealed that Facebook’s ranking improved from number 45 to number 3 on the list most popular sites among seniors.
According to the Washington-based Pew Research Center and American Life Project survey, in 2009, adults aged 65 and older accounted for 4 percent among people who logged on to social networking sites on a typical day, which jumped to 13 percent at present. This is a huge increase and these people are among the most active users of social networking sites.
Though 13 percent seems a small portion but AC Nielsen report says that this demographic is very important because they have “more disposable income and leisure time” than other people.
However, these 13 percent does not include the Baby Boomers. The oldest Baby Boomers are starting to turn 65 years meaning more people are going to be added in this age range.
With rising popularity of Facebook among people, a new market would be created for the social networking site to explore.
Fresh on the heels of its $7.86 billion McAfee acquisition, world’s top chip-maker, Intel, on August 30, 2010, announced that it finalized a deal with Europe’s second largest chip-maker, Infineon Technology AG, to acquire its wireless business for about $1.4 billion in cash. Intel hopes to complete the deal in the first quarter of 2011.
The wireless unit of Infenion produces chips for laptops, netbooks, and smartphones including the iconic Apple iPhone.
Intel CEO, Paul Otellini, said that the “wireless connectivity” sector is the next big market for the company as more and more devices are now featuring internet connection capabilities.
Currently, Intel dominates the PC market. Its chips can be found in more than 80 percent of the PCs around the world but it does not have a strong presence in the smartphone industry which is currently observing “double-digit annual growth.”
Intel tried to enter the wireless market with its Atom processor but it did not succeed. The company currently provides wireless chips to LG and Nokia. Through this acquisition, Intel would be able to strengthen its 3G, 4G Wimax and Wi-Fi product offerings.
According to Infenion, its wireless unit accounted for $1.17 billion, a third of the company’s revenue in the last fiscal year and sales in third quarter increased by 38 percent.
Bernd Laux, Research analyst, Chevreux in Frankfurt, said that the price tag for the acquisition was “fair” and the deal was “smart and well-timed.”
Shipping delay of the Apple iPad is not news anymore. Due to the huge demand of the device, Apple often misses its shipping dates. Now, iPad owners would not have to worry about delays anymore. In its latest announcement, Apple said that it will start the shipping process for all its six iPad models within 24 hours after getting orders online.
Apple unveiled the iPad in January. It first released the Wi-Fi only version. It started taking pre-orders from March 12, 2010. The Wi-Fi only iPad was launched on April 3, 2010. In April, the company launched the 3G model. As of late July, Apple sold more than 3.27 million units.
Initially, Apple was able to deliver on time. On March 27, 2010 the company announced that any pre-orders would face a shipping delay of more than a week. In case of 3G-enabled iPad, the early pre-orders were delivered in late April while later pre-orders had been delayed till May 7, 2010.
At one point, customers had to wait for more than two weeks after placing orders. Shipping delays slightly declined during May, June and July. Things improved further in August as shipping delays declined to around three to five days.
The condition of the international launch was worse for it was delayed for a month. iPad customers in the U.K., France, Japan, and Italy were able to place preorders in early May and received the device in late May. Those who ordered after May 12, 2010 had to wait till June 7, 2010.
The Oxford English Dictionary is considered to be one of the top sources of English language words for 126 years. The latest collection of Oxford Dictionary consists of twenty volumes weighing 750 pounds that were published in 1989.
Currently, the lexicographers are working on the third edition of the dictionary and it has not been finished yet but on August 29, 2010, Oxford University Press, publishers of the dictionary, said that they are not sure whether they would print the third edition for the Internet version of the dictionary has become very much popular.
The twenty volume set OED costs $1165 and till date, Oxford University Press sold a total of 30,000 sets. On the other hand, the Internet version now gets 2 million hits per month from subscribers for a yearly subscription fee of $295. Amazon.com also sells the 20 volume dictionary for $995.
This popularity of the Internet version and high online revenue led OUP to release the next edition on Internet. Currently, a team of 80-lexicographers are working on the third edition of the OED and they only finished 25 percent of the work. OED just does not provide meanings but etymologies as well.
However, OUP will not entirely abandon the idea of printing the latest edition. It will do a limited printing but it all depends on the demand of the dictionary.
After Apple, now Google is said to be starting its own “pay-per-view” movie rental service. News reports came out that Google is now going to start a movie rental service via its video website, Youtube, and the search engine giant is in talks with various studios.
The service would charge people $5 to rent movies and they would have to watch it within a 48-hour period. Up to this, everything is fine but the challenge is enabling users to get this service on TV. Currently, there are several media center OSes like Boxee, XBMC, and WindowsMediaCenter that supports YouTube but their technology is not enough for this type of service and this is where Google TV comes in.
Google announced Google TV at the Google I/O conference in May 2010. Built on Android 2.1 and Google Chrome Browser, the Google TV brings together Internet and regular television. Some of the television would come with pre-installed Google TV programme and while some would require an external set-top box. Here is a video clip showing how Google TV would work:
The major short coming of Google TV is that it does not have its own service like that of Apple TV.
Google TV partnered with Sony and Logitech and chipmaker, Intel for the processor and Best Buy. It would become available in Fall 2010.
The August 29, 2010, is a big day for Samsung for its Galaxy S series smart phone reached one million sales. This is big achievement for Samsung. The company is now in second position in the Android based smartphone market in the U.S. where Motorola and HTC are jointly dominating the top spot.
On the occasion, Dale Sohn, President, Samsung Mobile, issued a statement where he said, "I am proud of the instant success of the Galaxy S line up and I am very pleased to announce that because of the support of our carrier partners and loyal customers, we have shipped one million Galaxy S devices in the U.S. market. Samsung Mobile looks forward to sharing additional Galaxy S milestones in the future."
Currently, in the U.S. T-Mobile and AT&T offers Galaxy S phone. AT&T sells the phone under the name Galaxy S Captivate while T-Mobile sells as Galaxy S Vibrant. The Android based smartphone had been launched in July 2010. Sprint and Verizon would also get their version of Galaxy S phones. It will be rolled out as Epic 4G on Sprint while Fascinate on Verizon. Two other carriers U.S. Cellular and Cellular South would also being selling the from this fall.
The Galaxy S series phones are run by Android OS 2.1. and it would be further upgraded to Android 2.2 Froyo by the end of 2010. So, this is also a big achievement for Android. The popularity of Samsung Galaxy S phones reveals the fact that Android-based phones are catching up with smartphone buyers.
There, Nikhyl has mainly predicted that Facebook, Google (Gmail Phone) and Skype would replace phone numbers in near future. His basic assumption is that Facebook has a lot of facilities when it comes to traditional phone numbers provided by telecom operators.
The first thing that cannot be ignored is the matter that people still consider Facebook or Gmail or Skype something extra to their mobile phone numbers. This attitude is not going to die down that easily for basically one reason.
The main problem is that an user needs a smart phone and very good internet connection if he wants to be connected with Facebook, Gmail or Skype. Not only smart phones are expensive but also wireless Internet is not cheap either. This price issue means that most people still cannot afford a smart phone even in USA.
Of course, within perhaps 5 years, most people will own smart phones. However, for the other countries, especially in Asia and Africa, it will take many years. So, it will take really a long time for the phone numbers to die.
The user-base of Apple iPhone Facebook app crossed 100 million active users per month. According to Facebook Developers blog, currently 150 million users access Facebook via mobile devices and out of them, iPhone Facebook app accounts for 100 million users. Interestingly, Apple, as of June 2010, sold 100 million iOS based devices including iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch which means that almost every iPhone,iPad and iPod Touch contains Facebook application.
This is a big success for Facebook iPhone App. Currently, Facebook for iPhone application has 103,578,916 monthly active users. David Kirkpatrick, author of The Facebook Effect, said that the Facebook application is the most important application running in iPhone and iPad and without the Facebook, iPhone would have never become so much important as it is. He received a secret information from a source that “more than half of all usage of the iPhone of apps, other than those provided by the phone itself like telephony and email, is coming from Facebook. And on the iPad, too, it’s just a huge, huge part of usage. So in a way, Apple and Facebook are joined at the hip, and I think that’s one reason why Zuckerberg and Jobs have been spending time together.”
On August 18, 2010, Facebook unveiled a new feature called Places that allows user to share their locations with their friends.
The Facebook application for iPhone also received “granular” privacy settings. It features a new inbox that support “threads with multiple users.”
The Facebook app for iPhone is available at iTunes App Store for free. It runs on iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad running iPhone OS 3.0 or later.
The Yerba Buena Center is now preparing for the big Apple event that would take place on September 1, 2010. If you remember, Apple unveiled its iPad in the beginning of 2010 at this place. For years, this place has been used by Apple.
On August 25, 2010, Apple sent out invitations to media people containing picture of an acoustic guitar with a sound hole cut in the shape of Apple. The 2009 Music Event invitation contained a dancing silhouette.
Apple Insider posted a picture of the preparation of the event at the YerbaBuentaCenter in San Francisco. Here is the picture.
The logo led many experts believe that Apple would make some serious announcements related to music.
However, the center of all the rumor is the iPod Touch. It is believed that Apple would unveil a new iPod Touch at the show that would come up with many features that are currently available at the Apple iPhone such as high resolution retina display, dual camera- a front camera with supporting Facetime feature, a rear camera with flash, and gyroscope.
There is also a rumor about a newly designed iPod Nano sans clickwheel. The new iPod Nano would feature a small touchscreen and would have squar size just like the iPod Shuffle.
News reports are also saying that Apple would release a newly designed set top box named iTV for $99 that would support varios applications. In addition, Apple is rumored to start a new service that would allow users to rent TV shows for $0.99.
With Apple Music Event closing in the rumor mill has gone wild. Recently, photos of cases by Chinese company, X-Doria, surfaced which indicated to an square shaped iPod Nano. This means the new iPod Nano would be smaller and should be more like iPod shuffle, the smallest music player produced by Apple, in terms of design. It would also retain its tradition I/O connector. Here is the picture.
The bumps on the side of the cases indicate that new iPod Nano would have buttons on the side probably volume control. Case manufacturers have been creating protective cases for the new Apple iPod Touch and iPod Nano since July.
It is also believed that the new iPod Nano would come with a touchscreen rather than its iconic click wheel. Taiwanese blog, Apple.Pro reported a touch screen measuring 3cm by 3cm that would be used in the 6th-gen iPod Nano. Here is the picture:
The second-generation iPod nano had a screen that was about 3cm by 2.5cm. The current iPod shuffle is not large enough to house a USB doc. Instead, it has a special USB cable that connects the device through its headphone jack. If the new iPod Nano comes with same USB cable then users would not be able to use it with other devices.
In today’s world marketing has great importance for business. It is marketing that makes or breaks product and this is why Microsoft is making sure that its new Windows Phone 7 get necessary amount of media exposure. It is reported that the software giant is going to spend more than $400 million in marketing for its Windows Phone 7.
However, this has not been disclosed by Microsoft but Jonathan Goldberg, analyst, Deutsche Bank telecommunications analyst made this prediction. For Windows Phone 7 Microsoft’s total expense would exceed $1 billion including development. Another unnamed source also said that MS would spend $500 million in marketing.
True, this is a huge budget but Microsoft has a long history of spending such large amount in marketing. Windows XP, which was launched in 2001, saw a whopping billion dollar advertising budget of which half-billion is spent by Intel and Microsoft and another half-billion by PC makers and retailers. Then Microsoft spent another half-billion in marketing while launching Xbox. In 2007, the company spent another half-billion dollar as per the reports of USA Today and AdvertisingAge for Windows Vista which failed miserably. In June 2009, Microsoft spent another $180 million for its overhauled search engine Bing. For Office 2010, the company spent $80 million of which, 70 percent had been spent online.
This time Microsoft is very serious for its early mobile OS did not gain much popularity among smartphone makers. The company even abandoned its earlier smartphone OS and focused wholly on the Windows Phone 7 which reveals its desperate attempt.
After the failure of Google Buzz, Google is preparing for another attempt to build up a social networking site. Dubbed “Google Me” inside Google office, the project is now a hush hush thing. The rise of social networking website, Facebook, has become a major challenge for Google these days and Google is now acquiring companies and gathering experts for its social networking project.
Earlier this month, Google acquired Slide for $182 million and paid an additional $46 million in retention bonuses to its CEO, Max Levchin, who is also the co-founder of PayPal Inc. It is believed that Levchin would become a vice president of engineering and would play a major role in Google’s social network project.
Recently, Google picked up Angstro, developer of Noteworthy News, a service which delivers news on people and companies to a user’s professional network.
Like Levchin, Google hired, Rohit Khare, a respected figure in the field of Internet research and the co-founder of Angstro, to build up its social networking website. A Google spokesperson confirmed the acquisition of Angstro but did not comment on his role in Google’s social networking project.
In his blog post, Khare wrote “Our work here is done…” which was first noticed by L.A. Times. He further said, "While our work here may be done, the struggle for open, interoperable social networks is still only just beginning, and I'm looking forward to working on that in my new role at Google,"
Khare is a good choice for Google because of his vision of a web that is opened and not confined to one website such as Facebook. Currently, Google cannot access Facebook. One of the product Khare’s Angstro created was exporting information from Facebook and other social networks.These types of products could be very helpful for Google to build its social network.
Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft, on August 27, 2010, announced to file lawsuit against eleven major companies for infringement of patents filed by him more than ten years ago.
The complaint was filed on August 27, 2010, in morning at a Seattle Federal court. The companies are AOL, Apple, eBay, Facebook, Google, Netflix, Office Depot, OfficeMax, Staples, Yahoo and Google's YouTube.
AOL, Apple, Google and Yahoo were each charged with four claims of patent infringement while Facebook was charged with one. The other companies were charged with two claims each. Google and Facebook said that the lawsuits were “unfortunate” and “without merit.”
The lawsuit is based on four patents that cover basics of online commerce. The technology includes recommending products to a user based on what he is seeing at present or allowing readers to see a news story based on the current one he is reading. The other two patents are related to displaying information on a webpage such as news updates or stock quotes.
Allen’s lawsuit claimed that these companies violated patents developed by Interval Research, a Silicon Valley research lab, funded by him in 1992. The lab was shut down in 2000. The patents were later transferred to Interval Licensing, another company Allen owned. Interval Licensing owns most of the 300 patents from Interval Research.
Apple Music Event is going to take place in September and it suddenly created a buzz all over the net. All the big tech blogs and websites are talking about the event where they would see technologies that would create new trends in future.
In 2008, “Lets Rock” was the theme of Apple Music event where it rolled out its 160GB iPod Classic, the 4th generation iPod Nano with voice recording capability, a thinner iPod Touch and iTunes 8.
Next year, the Music Event took place after Labor Day and dubbed“It’s only rock and roll but we like it,” That year, Apple released its 64GB iPod Touch, iPod Nano with a built-in video camer and iTunes 9.
On August 25, 2010, Apple sent out email invitations to media people which had the picture of an acoustic guitar with Apple logo. In 2009 Apple Music Event invitation had a dancing silluete. The Apple Music event 2010 would take place at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Theatre in San Francisco on September 1, 2010.
The event would start at 10 a.m. Pacific Time, 1 p.m. Eastern time.The email invitation does not give out much detail except a 9 a.m. registration time.
At the center of all speculation is the all new Apple iPod Touch. It is believed that the company would unveil its latest iPod touch 4 at the event. The new iPod Touch is expected to have many features of the iPhone 4. It will have dual camera including a front-facing camera for FaceTime videoconferencing, retina display, and a gyroscope. It is believed that the new iPod Touch will be released in stores during the holiday shopping season but the actual release date will be known at the event. The iPod Touch would cost around $200.
Apple would also unveil its new cloud-based iTunes where users are not required to store any applications rather would they have to rely on wireless networks –Wi-Fi and 3G. Users would have to pay a monthly subscription fee.
News reports are also saying that Apple will unveil its newly upgraded Apple TV rebranded as “iTV.” Priced at $99 the new iTV would sport A4 CPU and would only handle 720p not 1080p full HD. According to Technolog the new iTV would have 160 GB HDD but Engadget says 16GB flash storage.TheApple TV was launched in 2007 but it did not see much success.
Apple is also planning to roll out a new $0.99 TV show rental service and the company is in talks with various studios including Walt Disney, CBS, NBC Universal and Fox Studios.
According to Kaufman Brothers analyst, Shaw Wu, there is a good possibility that the new iTVhas a great potential and it would become a “multimillion unit seller.” The new device would start the next major trend into home entertainment industry. He said that the new Apple TV could hit the stores this Christmas or could be further pushed to early 2011.
Another speculation is that the September event would see a newly designed iPod HYPERLINK "http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20014813-1.html"Nano sans click wheel. The click wheel, like the touchscreen, remained one of the most significant innovations in the field of engineering and helped Apple to regain market in the 2000s. It is believed that the new iPod Nano would come with a smaller touchscreen.
Last year, Apple included some new features in iPod Nano including a video camera and a FM tuner.
It is not sure whether the new iPod Nano would have a touchscreen and if it does would it have access to App store apps or run newly developed apps and run on iOS4.At this moment all this is just speculation but if it happens that it would be a big change for the iPod Nano.
After iPad, the Netflix instant streaming application will now be available on iPhone 4 and iPod Touch. With the Netflix streaming application user can browse and watch movies and TV shows available at the Netflix library via Wi-Fi and 3G.
One of the major weaknesses of the Netflix application is that it has a low-resolution graphics which means it would not be able to take advantage of the high-resolution retina screen of the iPhone 4.
The application has a simple UI. The bottom tabs enables user to switch between home page, Genre pages, search, Instant Queue option which requires users to activate from his Netflix account.
The application is free and it runs on iOS 3.1 and higher OS. The user would have to create a Netflix account and then be able to browse titles through the Netflix Watch Instantly Service. However, if the user wants to see movies, the he would have to subscribe to the service for $8.99 per month.
The services offered include- Movies You'll Love; New Arrivals: Movies; and New Arrivals: TV.
The app also contains an additional category of movies based on the users’ personal preferences determined by the movie he or she would watch on Netflix.
The Google Summer Code program 2010 ended on August 23, 2010, and this year there were many female participants.
Over the years, the program brought more than 3,400 students who worked on more than 200 open source projects containing millions of lines of codes. This year’s Summer Code Program saw more than 1000 students from 69 countries writing codes and of them 6.5 percent were female represent 23 countries.
Ann Marie Horcher is an information systems security Ph.D. candidate at NovaSoutheasternUniversity. She worked on a program that would enable users to transform a docbook file to epub format used in e-book readers like Amazon Kindle, Barnes and Noble Nook and iPad. Thanks to her project, it is now easy to move technical documentation to a portable format. Here is a video clip that shows Ann Marie’s work:
A bioinformatics graduate student from the University of Michigan, Kathryn Iverson, had been mentored by NationalEvolutionaryBiologySynthesisCenter. She worte “a library implemented in Java with KML to build geophylogenies.”
Layla Oesper, a Ph.D. candidate in BrownUniversity computer science, built a plugin for Cytoscape. She was looking for a job that would give her the opportunity to attend two wedding ceremonies. Here is a video clip where she talks about her project.
Microsoft is Windows Phone 7 will come with integrated Xbox Live features and the company is also working on a new technology that would allow players to play through their mobile phone sets.
Imagine a player playing X-box games with his console with another one who is playing using his mobile phone supporting Windows Phone 7.
At the Microsoft X10 conference in Toronto this week, in an interview with Toronto-based tech- site RGB filter, Greg Milligan, Mobility Solutions Manager, Microsoft Canada, talked about this new technology. He said "We are working on realtime phone-to-console, likely initially through Wi-Fi, and operator networks are sensitive to that,"
He also said that multiplayer will be supported between Windows phones and PC games using the Games For Windows Live interface.
Milligan said that initially Microsoft would roll out “turn-by-turn” and “companion” games. Games like Catan or Scrabble fall under “turn-by-turn” category where two players would have to play in turns.
Under “companion type gaming,” if a player plays a certain game on his Windows Phone 7 handset and wins a particular level which results into some kind of achievement or unlocking of another level, the data will be automatically transferred to the console game version so that when the player plays the console version, he would play in the recently unlocked level.
Last week at the GDC Europe 2010 Game conference at Cologne, Germany, Microsoft unveiled games for its Windows Phone 7 smartphone OS. Initially, there will be sixty gaming titles. Gaming studios like Gameloft, Konami, Namco Bandai, PopCap, and THQ are working on Windows Phone 7 games.
Apple’s much talked about Musical event would take place on September 1, 2010 at San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Theatres. On August 25, 2010, Apple sent out invitations to media personalities about an upcoming event containing the image of an acoustic guitar with an Apple logo-shaped sound hole.
Apple has a long tradition of holding this event in September where the company unveils its new music devices and technologies such as iPod, iPod Touch, iTunes etc.
However, no other details about the event, except the invitation, are out. Yet, news reports with various speculations are coming out every minute.
It is believed that Apple would showcase a new iPod Touch that would have features of the new iPhone 4 including a high-resolution Retina-display, a gyroscope and a FaceTime feature.
There is also speculations of an upgraded $99 Apple TV renamed as iTV and a new $0.99 TV show rental service on iTunes.
The Apple Music event of 2009 had been very significant because Steve Jobs, the legendary Apple CEO, made his first public appearance at the event after his liver transplant operation. The event took place the after Labour Day dubbed “It’s only rock and roll but we like it.” Apple also unveiled its 64GB iPod Touch, iPod Nano with built-in video camera and iTunes 9.
At the 2008 Apple Music Event themed “Let’s Rock,” Apple rolled out the 160GB iPod Classic, the 4th generation iPod nano with voice recording and a thinner iPod Touch. The company also debuted iTunes 8,. Genius.
On August 25, 2010, Microsoft’s Russian website revealed details about the user interface of Internet Explorer 9. Since March 2010, Microsoft released four developer previews of IE9 but the previews did not have any User-Interface. The new IE9 borrowed heavily from Google Chrome browser.
The IE9 interface sports back and forward buttons with the former larger than the later like Mozilla Firefox.
Instead of providing traditional menus, the new IE9 placed tabs on top of the browser window. It also has address-cum-search bar like Google Chrome.
Like Google Chrome, the new IE9 would have a simplified UI. In a promotional statement, Microsoft said "Your browser is not overloaded with navigation elements, and compared with other browsers leaves more space for the site,……Now the user sees only what is necessary for navigation."
Uses can also pin sites to their Windows taskbar just by dragging the tabs of IE9 and then access those sites with a single click without opening the main browser.
Just like the Aero UI, the new IE9 would have “quick-release tabs” feature that would
enable users to see two-tabs in equally-sized, side-by-side frames. The first beta of IE9 will be released on September 15, 2010. Though Microsoft did not confirm any release dates, it is speculated that the browser would become available in April 2011 during Microsoft’s annual Web conference in Las Vegas.
On August 25, 2010, Google rolled out the built-in Google talk chat app, a plug-in that would enable Gmail users to make VoIP calls from the Gmail.com in-box or from within iGoogle. Currently, this feature is only available to Gmail users in the U.S.
Calls made to Canada and the U.S. will be free till January 2011 and costs of international calls would range between 2 cents and $5 per minute. On the official Gmail Blog, Robin Schriebman, a Google software engineer, wrote,
“We’re rolling out this feature to U.S. based Gmail users over the next few days, so you’ll be ready to get started once ‘Call Phones’ shows up in your chat list,”
Schriebman further said that the feature will not be available to Google Apps but Google is working on to make this feature available to the users of Google Apps as well.
The picture above shows how Gmail users would be able to make VoIP calls using the new “Call Phone” feature once it is added in Gmail. Gmail users can make calls just by dialing the phone number of the person they want to contact with. In order to enable this feature users are required to install Google’s voice and video plug-in (to get the plug-ins visit this link).
Toshiba is going to introduce the first 3-D enabled television in the world that would not require users to wear special glasses. User would be able to enjoy 3-D images without wearing any glasses. The television will launched by the end of 2010.
Initially, Toshiba will launch three models and one of them comes with a 21-inch screen. Toshiba would sell the models for several hundred thousand yen. It said that the release of the TV will coincide with the starting of the holiday shopping season.
In the traditional 3-D technology, 3-D televisions project images at high speedsto viewers’ right and left eye respectively and the 3-D images are then re-constructed in the brain. Wearing 3-D glasses a viewer does not see an image intended for the right eye with the left eye and vice versa.
The televisions would feature an integral image systems developed by Toshiba that emits rays at different angles allowing the viewers brain to create 3-D images without using special glasses. Users would also be able to enjoy 3-D contents from different sitting positions would not strain users eyes.
Toshiba would used HD panels so that users can watch 3-dimensional images. The TV would be able to display all the 3-D content and HD content .
After the success of James Cameron’s Avatar, top electronics companies came up with their own 3-D products at the CES 2010 but 3-D TV is yet to become popular.
Apple is planning to introduce a new TV show rental service on iTunes at its annual music event on September 7, 2010 before the starting of the new prime-time TV season.
Apple’s $.99 TV show rental service would enable users to rent shows and watch the program within the next 48 hours of the purchase. Already Apple has a movie rental service on its iTunes store which enables user to rent movies and watch within a specific period.
Bloomberg, which first gave out the news, said that Apple is now in talks with major studios including CBS and Walt Disney and News Corp.’s Fox Studios. Mr. Jobs a member of the board of Disney and also the company’s largest shareholder since the studio purchased Pixar Animation studios in 2006.
This new TV show rental program would also replace iTunes subscription service for television on which Apple is said to have been since 2005.
With this new service, Apple user would get easy access to the popular TV shows and would also make Apple devices such as iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch more attractive to consumers. The latest episodes would be available for Apple’s rental service within 24 hours since their broadcast and will be commercial free.
In addition, iTunes would become the biggest retailer of music and mobile applications and compete with companies like Netflix Inc., Amazon.com Inc. and Hulu LLC, which offer their own online video services.
Yahoo completed transferring its backend search to Microsoft’s Bing in the U.S. and Canada. The two companies signed an agreement in Summer 2009 under which, Yahoo would take over the worldwide sales duties and Bing would power Yahoo’s backend search.
On August 24, 2010, Satya Nadella, Senior Vice President, Online Services Division, Microsoft, on the Bing community blog worte, “Today I am happy to share that Bing is powering Yahoo’s search results in the U.S. and Canada (English only for now, the other languages will come in the weeks and months ahead),…We continue to work hard on the migration to AdCenter, and are optimistic about completing this phase later this fall.”
About 13 months since the two companies announced to collaborate their search operations, Microsoft and Yahoo announced that the results of all Yahoo English language searches made in the U.S. and Canada have been powered by Bing search. Users who would use Yahoo search would see a tag saying “Powered by Bing” on their results page.
The two companies are still working on to finish the transition of paid search before the holiday period. Microsoft executives said that transferring Yahoo’s U.S. advertisers and publishers to Microsoft’s AdCenter platform would be completed within 2010. Nadella wrote that his company’s primary goal is to smooth the transition experience as holiday season in around the corner.
On August 24, 2010, Dell announced Aero smartphone in the U.S. It is Dell’s first foray into the smartphone segment. The phone is launched on AT&T with a price tag of $99.99 with a two year two-year AT&T contact. Users can also get the unlocked phone for $300 from Dell website. The interesting thing about Dell Aero is that it comes with features that can be found in more expensive smartphones in the market.
The smartphone runs on Google Android 1.6 popularly known as “Donut.” Ron Garriques, President, Dell Communications Solutions, said, “The Dell Aero is built with a focus on style and performance to help people find new ways to connect with friends and express themselves socially, supported by the nation’s fastest mobile broadband network.”
The phone measures 4.8 inches x 0.46 inches x 2.28 inches and weighs 3.67 ounces. It sports a 3.5-inch multi-touch display with a resolution of 640x360 pixels. The display has pinch-to-zoom functionality
The 3G-enabled Aero supports quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE (850/900/1800/1900MHz) and tri-band UMTS/HSDPA (850/1900/2100MHz) networks. It also has Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS and assisted GPS. If the user signs up with AT&T he would be able to access AT&T’s 20,000 hotspots.
The Aero packs a 5-megapixel camera with 8x zoom, flash, dedicated camera key and shooting and editing capabilities. It has 2GB built-in memory which can be expanded up to 32GB via microSD. The phone supports Adobe Flashlite. Other features include full HTML browser, POP, IMAP and Webmail email accounts, and Microsoft Active Sync Email.
Apple is working on a touchscreen enabled iMac but it will not just going to be a desktop with touchscreen. The filing reveals that the new iMac would have two different OS- the regular Mac OS and the iOS which would operate when switched to touchscreen.
The patent had been unearthed by a website titled, Patently Apple. It talks about various Apple patents. The patent titled “Transitioning with modes of input” was filed on July 9, 2009 with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and it WIPO published it on January 14, 2010. Paul Costa, a Hardware Engineering Manager at Apple had been named as the inventor.
Pictures submitted in the patent shows that the new Apple iMac screen comes with an adjustable stand that can be moved up and down and the screen can be swiveled to lie flat.
The filing says that the new iMac would run on Mac OS X when used in standard configuration just like a desktop computer using mouse and keyboard but when the user would want to use it like an iPad, the sensors fitted into the device such as accelerometers would detect the change in the orientation of the screen and would start up the iOS with a touch-enabled user interface just like an iPad tablet PC.
In January, DigiTimes reported about Apple creating a touch-enabled iMac and the PC would be sold later this year.
Google is testing a new search technology that instantly changes the entire page as the reader keeps typing in the search box. Rob Ousbey, an SEO consultant in the U.K., found out about the test and captured results on video. Here is the clip:
If you look at this video clip you would see that this new search technology is actually an extended version of its query suggestion tool. The query suggestion tool generates suggestions for search in the form of list as you type in the search box. In this technology, the entire search page changes as you continue typing in the search box just like the suggestion tool.
The video clip shows that upon typing “s” the suggestion tool generates various suggestions. Upon typing “stra” the suggestion tool generates “straw.” Upon typing “straw” the search results page changes immediately, including ads to strawberry pie.
In a recent interview with The Wall Street Journal, Google CEO, Eric Schmidt said, "I actually think most people don't want Google to answer their questions,…They want Google to tell them what they should be doing next."
Google is always extensively testing its search engine for it brings the bulk of the company’s revenue. A Google representative told Techcrunch that the streaming search is in test phase and at any given time, the search engine giant conducts somewhere between 50-200 tests.
The A.R. Drone was first unveiled at the CES 2010. Initially, the device could be flown via iPhone. Now, it can be controlled by iPad. The drone is produced by French company Parrot and it is very fun and exciting to fly the toy helicopter.
A.R Drone would become available in the U.S on September 3, 2010 at Brookstone store for $299. It is also available for pre-order now.
You will have to first pair up the units which is not so difficult. The helicopter can create its own wireless network but if there are too many network signals in the area, the drone would not be able to fly.
Here is a video clip of the drone being flown using iPad.
The drone is equipped with two cameras, one pointed forward while the other pointed downwards you can see the video on your controlling device. The cameras would not help user to control the devices flight for they generate views 15 frames per second. However, on the outside you would have great views with the camera. The cameras have been designed to enable players to play augmented reality games that were also demonstrated at CES 2010. The games would become available in the Apple App Store by the end of 2010.
Motorola sent cease-and-desist letters to websites that uploaded a leaked version of the Android 2.2 Froyo.My Droid World is one of the sites to receive the letters and it removed the software from its servers. The letters carried the name of Richard Rushing, Senior Director, Information Security, Motorola.
News of sites hosting the leaked version came out on August 20, 2010 and immediately Motorola responded.
Motorola introduced Droid X on July 15, 2010 on Verizon Wireless. Motorola was supposed to launch the phone with the new Android 2.2 Froyo but the phone came with Android 2.1 OS while the handset maker planned to release firmware updates of Froyo in September but many users did not want to wait that long.
The Droid X has been criticized for refraining users to modify the phone and use customized Andorid OS. The Droid X used a new technology called eFuse- a boot loader and chip combination that makes it difficult to modify the phone.
In an official statement, Motorola said, “If a device attempts to boot with unapproved software, it will go into recovery mode, and can re-boot once approved software is re-installed. Checking for a valid software configuration is a common practice within the industry to protect the user against potential malicious software threats."
Android developers have been able to devise a way to modify the device. Koushik Dutta released the first working recovery of Droid X that allows the user to backup and restore the phone using Nandroid backup which allows users to load custom ROMs onto a Droid X.
Apple iTunes users are increasing becoming victims of fraudulent purchases over iTunes store. Users are finding that they are being charged for purchases worth hundreds of dollars on iTunes store they never made.
PayPal processes these unauthorized purchases and said that customers are being reimbursed for these purchases. A PayPal spokeswoman said that the fraud is happening on the iTunes side.
However, iTunes has nothing to do with the frauds. The security measures of iTunes have not been compromised. The users are victims of phishing e-mail messages which lure them to give out their iTunes account information. Fraudsters then purchase items from the store.
Apple said that fraud victims should work with their banks and credit card companies. In emailed statement Apple said, "iTunes is always working to prevent fraud and enhance password security for all of our users,….But if your credit card or iTunes password is stolen and used on iTunes we recommend that you contact your financial institution and inquire about canceling the card and/or issuing a chargeback for any unauthorized transactions. We also recommend that you change your iTunes account password immediately."
Consumers have been complaining about the problem since early 2009 and the number of victims is continuing to grow.
Microsoft is going to launch its new phone platform, Windows Phone 7 in September. According to Brandon Watson, Head, developer experience for Windows Phone 7, the company will release the final version of its Windows Phone Developer Tools on September 16, 2010.
Already the beta version of the Windows Phone 7 is available and its has been downloaded more than 300,000 times and developer can develop their own applications using the beta version. Even after the release of the final version, developers can upgrade their applications as their products would be uploaded in the store in October 2010. The first phone with Windows 7 platform would also became available at that time.
The company would also conduct a limited test of its application submission certification process to ensure application developers can upload their applications without any hassle.
Microsoft launched its app store with the launch of Windows Mobile 6.5, its current operating system. At that time, there were only few hundred applications at its store.
Microsoft is working hard to make sure that users get their necessary applications from their app store. It has been working with different companies including eBay, LeFigaro, Open Table, Photobucket, Realtor.com, Seesmic and the Associated Press. Last week, the company announced sixty gaming applications from different studios including Gameloft, Namco Bandai, PopCap and THQ. The games will be also integrated with Microsoft gaming console Xbox Live.
According to the latest report of Gartner research Windows Mobile currently accounts for 5 percent of mobile applications market share which was 9.3 percent last year.
In order to stop unauthorized users from accessing the iPhone, Apple developed a new technology and filed a patent application for it on August 19, 2010. Now, the company would be able to detect an unauthorized user and remotely terminate its service in case of a theft or hacking. The patent also covers Apple iPad and iPod Touch.
Apple’s application number 20100207721, filed on the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office’s database, describes the method to detect unauthorized users.
The patent says, “A photograph of the current user can be taken, a recording of the current user's voice can be recorded, the heartbeat of the current user can be recorded, or any combination of the above,…..The photograph, recording, or heartbeat can be compared, respectively, to a photograph, recording, or heartbeat of authorized users of the electronic device to determine whether they match,”
The patent also states that Apple could erase sensitive information if necessary.
In July 2010, the U.S. government announced jailbreaking to be legal which gave rise to the possibility of iPhones, especially the jailbroken ones, being hacked by luring users to access a website. In early August, Apple released updates for it iOS 4.0.2 running on iPhone 4, iPad and iPod Touch which enables users to protect their phones from being hacked. Immediately, Comex, developer of the JailbreakMe 2.0, released the source code which experts believe would be used by other hackers to develop new hacking tools.
HP outbid Dell over acquiring Fremont, California-based data storage company, 3PAR. Last week, Dell offered to acquire 3PAR for a price of $1.3 billion, which many thought to be very high, but HP on August 23, 2010, came up with a higher acquisition offer of $1.6 billion, exactly three weeks after its chief executive, Mark Hurd, was forced to resign over allegation of sexual harassment.
Regarding HP’s offer, Dave Donatelli, HP's executive vice president of Enterprise Servers, Storage and Networking, said, "HP's proposal offers superior value to 3PAR's shareholders. Our global reach, strong routes to market and commitment to innovation uniquely position HP as the ideal fit for 3PAR,"
HP agreed to pay $24 per share, a 33.3 percent premium, against the price offered by Dell’s $18 per share submitted on August 16, 2010. This bid resulted into a 38.6 percent surge in 3PAR share prices to $25 while HP shares declined 0.9 percent to $39.51 and Dell increased 0.3 percent to $12.11.
Brent Bracelin, Analyst, Pacific Crest, on his note said that 3PAR as an exceptional firm, which despite incurring financial losses had been able to compete with top storage providers like EMC and HITACHI. Regarding HP’s offer, Brent also said that HP had been too distracted with Hurd’s departure and did not focus much on the acquisition offer.
