TechCrunch says that it’s got its hands on a massive cache of info about an unannounced photo-sharing app for the iPhone–from Facebook. And it says that the app looks amazing.
Tag Archives | Apple. iPhone
The iPhone Gets “Liquid”
The unlocked U.S. iPhone is real. And Horace Dediu explains why he thinks it’s a big deal. (Hint: it doesn’t have anything to do with Americans buying iPhones to use in the U.S.)
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Unlocked iPhones. A Great Idea. In Theory!
When rumors surfaced yesterday about Apple beginning to sell unlocked iPhones in the U.S. this week, I said I was intrigued by the idea of an unlocked iPhone 5. But I didn’t elaborate. And the scuttlebutt persists.
So here’s a little more detail: my interest is more emotional than rational. I can pull together enough money to pay for a phone in one large chunk. I don’t particularly want to be sign a contract with a wireless carrier if I don’t have to do so. I sometimes travel overseas. So the notion of owning a phone outright, avoiding obligation, and being able to use it outside the U.S. with a local carrier rather than via pricey AT&T roaming is appealing. It’s what I’ve done several times in the past. (I’ve also bought locked-but-unsubsidized phones that weren’t iPhones from AT&T, which has cheerfully unlocked them for me a few months after purchase.)
Except…
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In Case It Wasn’t Clear Already, Apple Likes to Build Software for Apple Devices
Over at This is My Next, Joshua Topolsky has a thought-provoking piece that says that Apple is going to discontinue its only major browser-based Web apps–the ones that are part of MobileMe–next year after iCloud is fully up and running. There’s a lively debate going on via Twitter between Topolsky and some folks who say that he has it all wrong: the MobileMe Web apps will survive the iCloud transition.
Even if the MobileMe Web apps don’t get the ax, the gist of Topolsky’s piece remains relevant. Apple filled last week’s WWDC keynote to the gills with news, but it was all about operating systems, apps, and an ambitious piece of Internet plumbing called iCloud. No surprise there: there’s never been much evidence that Apple is terribly interested in creating Web apps. But it loves to create traditional software that runs on hardware devices it builds.
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Unlocked iPhones in the U.S. This Week?
I wouldn’t buy an unlocked iPhone 4–even if I could do it at an Apple Store in the U.S., starting this week. But if the iPhone 5 is available unlocked from the get-go–well, that would be sort of tempting.
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Disaster Averted: Apple Revises App Store Content Rules
Whew! Every time I’ve bought a Kindle book over the past few months, I’ve worried about the new iOS App Store guidelines Apple announced earlier this year, which said that app developers could only give iOS users access to content purchased outside of the App Store if the same content was available inside the App Store at the same price.
Apple takes a 30 percent cut of the money publishers make inside the App Store. So the new rule seemed to force some companies into an impossible situation–such as Amazon, which was already handing 70 percent of Kindle book prices over to publishers. Apple apparently wanted all of the remaining 30 percent for itself, destroying Amazon’s business model.
But as MacRumors’ Jordan Golson is reporting, Apple has quietly blinked. Now the rules don’t say that app developers need to match content offers made outside of the App Store inside the App Store. Companies don’t need to use In App Purchases at all. They just can’t provide a “Buy” button inside an app that makes it easy for a user to go to the Web and buy new content.
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A Quick Look at iOS 5
Engadget’s Jacob Schulman has a nice walkthrough of iOS 5’s major new features on the iPhone and iPad.
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Ten Questions About Today’s Apple News
Almost 38,000 folks turned out for Technologizer’s live coverage of Apple’s WWDC keynote this morning. We had a good time. But as the comments came in from attendees, there was clearly a serious contingent of folks who still held out hope that Apple was going to announce a new iPhone today–and who just didn’t care that much about software and services. For them, no new hardware meant that the event was a letdown.
On Twitter, I responded this way:
Dear everyone who's irate there was no new hardware: THIS WAS MUCH MORE IMPORTANT & INTERESTING THAN NEW HARDWARE.
— Harry McCracken (@harrymccracken) June 6, 2011
This was among the most news-packed Apple events I can recall, and in its own way it was one of the most wildly ambitious ones. Apple is finally making the iPhone and iPad into autonomous devices that don’t rely on a Mac or Windows PC. It wants to store vast quantities of data for us and be responsible for safeguarding it and getting it to the right place. It’s making iOS look more like OS X and OS X look more like iOS. It’s not yet clear whether all of this stuff will pan out, and people who already bristle at Apple’s approach to the world will like this new, more fully Apple-centric version less than ever. But if you think the event was a big yawn because there wasn’t a new iPhone that was a bit thinner and a bit faster, you live in a different world than I do.
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The Next Version of iOS: Predictions, Please!
[UPDATE: I’m closing the survey and compiling the results. Thanks, folks!]
At 10am PT on Monday, June 6th, Apple will hold its WWDC 2011 keynote, with news about OS X 10.7 Lion, the next version of iOS, and something called iCloud. I’ll be there in person at San Francisco’s Moscone West for Technologizer’s live coverage, joined by Ed Oswald and Techland’s Doug Aamoth for color commentary.
You can join us on Monday at technologizer.com/wwdc11, and I hope you will. (You can also head there now to sign up for an e-mail reminder.)
With less than 48 hours to go, time is running out to make predictions about what we’ll learn. We already know most of the details about Lion, and iCloud remains fairly enigmatic. So let’s focus in on iOS 5, or whatever the next version of the iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad operating system turns out to be called.
I’ve put together a survey that’ll let you make predictions about iOS 5 features and enhancements, (It’ll take you a minute or two to complete.) I’ll report on our aggregate predictions as a group before the keynote–and after Steve Jobs and company have spoken, we can see how accurate we were.
Click here to take the survey. Thanks for participating, and see you on Monday.
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Serendipity, Guaranteed
Serendipity is wonderful, but it doesn’t happen often. For every enriching coincidence – meeting someone who becomes a lifelong friend or lifelong partner, finding that fantastic hidden restaurant – we miss how many? Dozens, maybe hundreds of other lucky opportunities?
Now several tech startups are trying to increase the odds of connection.
How? By combining intimate knowledge of your comings and goings with understanding of your likes and dislikes – then connecting you with likeminded people and perfect places.
What do they ask in return? For most, an opportunity to push hyper-specific ads or discount offers.