I never knew

How the hell did I miss this last summer?? Some hilarious fake Mac ads with a “Linux” guy who’s as funny as the “real PC guy” (especially in Gaming, “I am root!”).

Well that’s a start. Seems Rogers will be carrying the iPhone.

The phone will be available with either two- or three- year contracts—potentially lowering the initial cost for long-term users versus the American two-year requirement—but will also be linked to a data plan for the carrier’s EDGE network.































(emphasis mine)

Hopefully they’ll upgrade their very very crappy data offering and have something unlimited at a decent price. If not it kind of defeats the purpose, I’d just buy it without data plan and use the wifi.

but the company has historically offered smartphones to Canadians between 6-8 months after the device is released in the U.S., placing an introduction roughly between late 2007 and early 2008.

Aarggh

(via cfd)

I was expecting a better designed version of the Pebl, I got a dream device, something I would have laughed off as impossible if seen on a rumor site. This afternoon Steve Jobs dropped a “nukulur” bomb in the cellphone world. Palm is dead and everyone else is maimed and crying for their mom.

The phones we have are Rosie O’Donnell, Apple is giving us Gisele. From a 10 year old Camry to an Audi S4. We were using something less than Windows 3.1 (at best) and we’re jumping to OS X in one keynote.

The iPhone is a phone, a widescreen video iPod, a pda, has wifi, bluetooth, 4GB, multitouch input on a large screen, no physical keyboard and looks like it should be displayed in a jewelery store. The interface is beautiful, looks smooth like butter, beautiful, revolutionary and, yes, beautiful. The only place this doesn’t blow all other phones out of the water is with the camera. Everything else makes the competitors look like they need a handcrank to operate. Who still wants a Nokia N series, a crackberry, a sidekick? All handheld devices on the market have just been stoneaged.

Now, Stevo, my man, my buddy, my brothah, where the FAWK is the plan to get this to us in Canada??? Why do you always dis us so?

Elsewhere:

Video of the Stevenote































Engadget coverage































Photos on Flickr































Size comparison

ps: Hopefully I’m not being toooo enthusiastic ;)

[Update]

Aaron was first to ask about it on chat, then Karl mentioned something along the same lines in the comments (no wonder they’re good friends). Either I’m less interested in that aspect, I’m slower or it already does so much of what I wanted that I was blinded but of course, they’re right, we’ll need to know how to add to it, what’s open, what’s not, what’s possible, etc. Surj Patel on Radar is writing about all that:

For something that may end up in a lot of pockets, the thing that I most want to see for it is a developer program. I want to see people empowered to make mobile applications and widgets that serve major and long tail needs. It would be the chocolate sauce on this ice cream. If you look at the huge third-party accessories market for the iPod then imagine what a software market for this device would be like. From early indicators it looks like OSX desktop widgets or something very similar can be created and distributed by users. We will have to use the OReilly FOO network to verify some of these claims and make sure we get our hands on a handset at some point. I also hope that they make unlocked versions available for sale internationally… One of the reasons that I am hoping for a developer program is that I love is to see people taking things that have one purpose and through their need and ingenuity making them do much more than originally intended. This is part of an interest area of mine dubbed constructionism. The idea in its very basic form is that you should create tools that enable people to create useful things and services for themselves. These services are much better appreciated. —technolust #1 – iPhone just launched

[Update 2]































Feeds in my reader: 189































Feeds that are actually supposed to be about Apple: 3































Mentions of the iPhone: 74

I’m not going to take the time to write down my own predictions, mostly because they’ve already been written by Croft and Gruber.

I predict that the iTV will include 802.11n, but will work over 802.11b just fine thanks to built in flash memory (not a hard drive) used for buffering. I also predict the iTV will be based on PortalPlayer technology and that it will be difficult to impossible to install new codecs for it. The unit will be $299, and may also be available either bundled or built-into a new Apple LCD HDTV.

I’m going to be bold on my prediction here and suggest that Apple will launch an MVNO under the name Apple Wireless, and will launch some kind of a smartphone — or at least a more smart phone. It probably won’t have a QWERTY keyboard, but probably will have great integration with Mail.app, Address Book, iCal, and the like, in addition to the obvious iTunes. It should also have a camera of some sort, because, frankly, a phone wouldn’t sell today without one. If this prediction is accurate, then I’d better hope Apple doesn’t release these for another 90 days, because I’ll need time to save up for a couple of them.—Macworld 2007 Predictions

I don’t agree or at least I hope the MVNO part wont happen, I think they’ll sell them unlocked for any provider from their stores. I know, the WSJ talks about a deal with Cingular, they could have a package there and still sell direct.

And then Gruber makes me very afraid by predicting a new MacBook Pro.

Good-bye, anodized Aluminum, hello something new that plays off the design cues of the new Mac OS X user interface mentioned above. The red/yellow/green/blue candy-colored transparent elements of Aqua resemble the hardware from the old G3 iMacs and Power Macs. The aluminum PowerBooks (and, now, MacBook Pros) are the hardware counterpart to good old Brushed Metal windows. Apple’s new machines are going to be designed to look best running the new user interface.—Macworld Expo 2007 Predictions

God I hope he’s wrong. Pendergast II is only 3 weeks old man! Couldn’t you have given your predictions earlier?? I’m hoping he’s wrong, you don’t know how much.

Christmas comes early for Gruber who will probably get to hand out a bunch of “jackass of the week” awards when the Month of Apple Bugs comes along.

I’m writing this using Pendergast the second, the faster, thinner, brighter, more memoried successor to my “old” Powerbook. It also has one of those newfangled Core Duo processors that will allow it to thread the muddy FUDdy, virus and malware plagued waters of the world that Gates built. I will now be able to see how the other 94% lives without slowing down to a crawl with Virtual PC.

The speed my god, the speed!! This thing is fast, haven’t waited on anything yet, everything is snappy and according to the resource monitor so far I just touch 20% of CPU usage once in a while, compare that to the steady 55% from before, it already feels roomier. The screen is so insanely bright I’m happily keeping the brightness at 50% and it still feels clearer than before. The screen is also at a higher resolution so I’m keeping Firefox at the same size (previously fullscreen) and still have more than two inches left on the right and three quarters at the bottom.

The only trouble so far is the Flash player that wasn’t working, had to go back to version 8.0 of the plugin, and a few small accessories that I hadn’t kept upgraged, like Mail Appetizer and Coconutbattery that needed to be moved to the universal binary version.

Unrelated to the actual Macbook Pro but still a spot on the general experience of buying one; “ships in 1-3 days” is very misleading since built to order systems ship from China, adding 2 weeks to the process. I don’t give a shit is it ships in 2 days when shipping takes 2 weeks, a more realistic estimate would have been appreciated. I ended up buying (leasing really) a standard config. locally.

One of the greates pieces of software I’ve found in a looong while is Xtorrent, it’s the simplest and most effective torrent client I’ve ever tried (and it looks great). The search is integrated, no more going through torrent site after torrent site, downloading the little file and opening in another software, just search, order by number of seeds, double click and there you go. Xtorrent found me a popular fast downloading links for everything I’ve searched for and it’s stable as hell without sucking ressources like a lot of it’s competitors. Kickass application.

(Phil Ryu has a detailed review.)

I’m selling my trusty laptop, I’m upgrading to a Macbook Pro so Pendergast the Powerbook is for sale.

• PowerPC 7447a (G4) 1.5GHz

































• 1.5GB RAM

































• 80 GB (5400 RPM)

































• 15.0” Widescreen

































• Combo drive (CDR/DVD)

































• Wifi, Bluetooth, illuminated keyboard, 10/100/1000Base-T

































• OSX 10.4.8

































• Less than 1 year and a half old

































• Battery is 5 weeks old

• Treated with ultra care all it’s life

  $ 1300.00CA

  Very competitive price, have a look on eBay if you want, the same configuration is going for $1250-1300US and the street price according to Every Mac is $1050 to $1200US but that’s with 512MB RAM.

  “Why shouldn’t I just get a Macbook?”. No taxes on this one, larger screen, more RAM, more solid construction, it just looks cooler. You can say you have my old Powerbook*.

  email me if you’re interested or have questions.

  *Ok, that one’s a joke ;)

Gartner now puts Apple at 6.1% market share in the US, 1.5% growth year over year. Nice.

I want to stop posting so often about Apple but damn it, that shit is funny !

The level of technical sophistication and application integration required to make this work is beyond Microsoft within the next year or five years from now. So where Windows Vista will bring a variety of older Apple OS features to the PC desktop, Apple’s Leopard will go far past the desktop metaphor altogether and introduce friggin’ TELEPORTATION.—Beam Me Up: Apple’s iTV strategy is iChat on steroids

Fortune, 2/19/1996: “By the time you read this story, the quirky cult company…will end its wild ride as an independent enterprise.”—When Apple Hit Bottom

I don’t know what it will take for studios to come on board with the iTunes store but seeing Disney sell 1 million worth of movies in the first week is probably a good first step in convincing them.

John Gruber, reviews the latest Jobs presentation in his usual detailed and intelligent manner but I especially enjoyed his review of the iPod history (last 3 paragraphs), the step by step process of juggernautification.

You’ve probably already seen it in a lot of places but I’ve got to mention it anyway, wouldn’t be an Apple cultist if I didn’t. So yeah, a few new products from Stevo.

Love the all aluminium Shuffle with the clip. It’s so small at first sight I thought it was a remote, not the shuffle! I’m unenthused about the new colored “back to mini” nano, might like them more when I see them in person.

The new iTunes 7.0 is super elegant, loads of nice little tweaks and details. They’re bugging me with the menu items for tv shows and movies which we can’t get here but whatever (duh, you can disable those in prefs.).

They also launched the new movie store in iTunes with only movies from Disney and subsidiaries (Pixar, Touchstone, Miramax) and only in the US. We’ll see how that catches on and how much catching it takes to convince other studios. Let’s hope we don’t have to wait a year before it moves up north.

One more thing; they announced iTV (to be renamed) for Q1 2007. When I first heard of it I thought it was a new kind of Mac specifically for the living room but it seems to just be a streaming box that plugs into your tv and sound system. Cool and I need something like that but seems a bit steep at $299.

I guess finally the rumors were true, seems the Apple Store will be selling something new today. Although it really sucks that they close down the Canadian store when we all know anything new will be US only. We still can’t buy fucking tv shows on our version, guess when the movies will be coming? 2008?

Everyone expects only Disney to have signed on but I’ve got a hunch it’s going to be more than that, might be HBO or a couple of smaller studios that add a few well known indyish titles but I don’t see Jobs going live with only “his own” (he’s the biggest stock holder) movies from Disney, he’s got to have something else.

We’re at the Apple Store in effing Laval but it’s pretty cool, packed and the lineup still going at 3pm. :-p

Welcome to Apple’s most extraordinary retail store yet, located on New York’s Fifth Avenue — one of the world’s most popular shopping areas. Take a virtual tour of Apple Store Fifth Avenue — choose a number to jump into your area of interest.—Apple Store Fifth Avenue, Virtual Tour

I know, I know, quit it with the new Mac ads but I can’t! They’re funny! Seems to be more and more about the PC guy though.

If you’ve got a Powerbook or iBook, don’t forget to check the latest battery recall, mine is on it and I ordered the replacement in 30secs with the little form at right. Really sucks though that I had it replaced 4-5 months ago because it had lost capacity and it needs replacement again!

Apple came out yesterday with a Report on iPod Manufacturing, they seem to be intent on fixing the situation and being pretty transparent about it although it’s only one PR text so who knows?

Nothing for me in today’s announcements by Apple but I’ll still mention it because with the new Mac Pros they complete the transition to Intel in 210 days and that’s impressive.

It would be fine if Apple released a widget that would allow users to voluntarily submit such information (that’s basically what the system-wide Software Update program does), but making it automatic and seamless means most users don’t know how to turn it off. It feels like the work of Microsoft.— How To Disable Apple’s ‘Dashboard Advisor’

I’d loooove to have a system like this iMac Concept in what? 5-6 years?

Niiiiiiice. Very very cool laser etched Powerbook with graphic based on Magritte’s Son of Man painting. Well done.