SuperSite Blog : Apple

Apple Delivers New Macs, Multi-Touch Mouse

pthurrott — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 17:05:42 GMT

Apple today unleashed a number of consumer computing products, all of which look quite interesting. The refreshed products include:

iMac. Now available with 21.5- and 27-inch (!!!) 16:9 widescreen displays, the new iMacs look impressive.

Apple today unveiled an all new iMac line featuring brilliant LED-backlit 21.5 and 27-inch widescreen displays in a new edge-to-edge glass design and seamless all aluminum enclosure. The new iMac line, starting at $1,199, is the fastest ever with Intel Core 2 Duo processors starting at 3.06 GHz, and Core i5 and i7 quad-core processors for up to twice the performance.*

Where "*" means "cough, cough". Twice the performance. Oh, Apple.

Mac mini. There's no separate press release for this one, but Apple also revamped its entry level Mac mini (and in Apple land, "entry level" of course means $600 to $1000, and not $299 as in the PC world).

The Mac mini is now faster, offers more storage and comes standard with double the memory. Starting at $599, the entry level Mac mini features a faster 2.26 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor and 2GB of DDR3 1066 MHz memory, a 160GB hard drive, five USB 2.0 ports, FireWire 800, NVIDIA GeForce 9400M integrated graphics and a SuperDrive. The $799 Mac mini features a 2.53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 4GB of memory and a larger 320GB hard drive. Apple now offers a $999 Mac mini that is specially configured with Mac OS X Snow Leopard Server. Mac mini with Snow Leopard Server features two 500GB hard drives for a total of 1TB of server storage in the tiny 6.5-inch square by 2-inch tall Mac mini enclosure.

That last option is really interesting, though I'd like to see an optical disc-less Mac mini for the desktop too. And I'll spare you Apple's claims about the "world’s most energy efficient desktop." OK, maybe I won't.

And last, and potentially most interesting...

Magic Mouse. A new multi-touch mouse. There's no mention of Windows compatibility anywhere, but this one looks good.

Multi-Touch allows customers to navigate using intuitive finger gestures. Instead of mechanical buttons, scroll wheels or scroll balls, the entire top of the Magic Mouse is a seamless Multi-Touch surface. Magic Mouse comes standard with the new iMac and will be available as a Mac accessory at just $69 ... Magic Mouse features a seamless touch-sensitive enclosure that allows it to be a single or multi-button mouse with advanced gesture support. Using intuitive gestures, users can easily scroll through long documents, pan across large images or swipe to move forward or backward through a collection of web pages or photos. Magic Mouse works for left or right handed users and multi-button or gesture commands can be easily configured from within System Preferences.

Magic Mouse isn't available yet, saving me a trip to the Apple Store. ("Dodging a bullet," as I say.) I am curious to see one in action.

Google: Apple DID reject Google Voice. Thus, Apple DID lie to the FCC

pthurrott — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 19:04:05 GMT

Google's response (here it is in PDF format) to the FCC firmly states that Apple lied, pure and simple:

Apple's representatives informed Google that the Google Voice application was rejected because Apple believed the application duplicated the core dialer functionality of the iPhone. The Apple representative indicated that the company did not want applications that could potentially replace such functionality.

[Apple senior vice president Phil] Schiller informed [Google] that Apple was rejecting the Google Voice application.

Google Latitude was also rejected, and Google noted that there was no contact at all from AT&T about these issues. Meanwhile, Google continues to "work with" Apple. You know, as much as you can.

Game, set, match. And if there is anyone out there that still believes Apple, seriously, get a life.

AppleInsider jumps the shark, declares Zune HD 'failed'

pthurrott — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 18:45:00 GMT

While I wait for what I just know will be hugely positive reviews of the Zune HD from Walter Mossberg and David Pogue (after all, these guys treat Apple product launches like just-discovered new books of the Bible), I can at least point to some of the crazy silliness coming out of the Apple fan base. AppleInsider--which, by the way, I actually like quite a bit normally since they're not usually this partisan--has written an absolutely insane and uncalled-for anti-Zune HD article. I've gotten a lot of email about it, and while I'd like to just ignore it, I am afraid that people will assume it's all true. What they're presenting are five myths of the Zune HD. Actually, it's four non-myths and one completely made up issue, but whatever. Let's waste just a little bit of time on this stupidity. (And you have to think that if Apple had adopted any of the stuff they're complaining about, AppleInsider would have been tripping all over itself congratulating the company.)

Myth 1: OLED is a great display technology for mobile devices

Not a myth. The OLED display on the Zune HD blows away the screen on any iPod or iPhone, sorry. Looked at side by side, inside or out, there is no comparison. This is especially true if you view the screen off-center. The OLED screen looks good at all angles. With the iPod touch, you find yourself fidgeting with it to get the screen to look better. (You can't tilt the Zune HD away from you enough to make it look bad. With the iPod touch, it's only OK when perfectly on center, and even then it's not nearly as good as the Zune HD.)

And while these shots don't do the real-world differences proud, they're at least representative.

Put simple, OLED isn't just "great" display technology for mobile devices. It's the superior technology, period.

Myth 2: NVIDIA's Tegra processor leapfrogs existing mobile processors

Again, not a myth. Both devices utilize an ARM processor at the core, but the NVIDIA design builds off of that with supporting chipsets for storage and video that improve performance and battery life. It can drive HD displays up to 1280 x 1050, unlike the iPod touch. But the real proof is in the using. And unlike AppleInsider, I've used the new iPod touch and Zune HD side-by-side. Zune HD performance is excellent, sorry. The iPod touch is no slouch. But to call these two devices anything but competitive is disingenuous.

Myth 3: Zune HD is mobile HD

No one claimed Zune HD was "mobile HD." The Zune HD supports HD output at 720p and includes an HD radio receiver, and Microsoft is very clear about that. The iPod touch does neither, with a dock or otherwise. Neither does any other portable Apple device.

Myth 4: Zune HD delivers high definition radio

Not a myth. I was just using this feature a few minutes ago. It does indeed deliver HD radio. And as AppleInsider notes, "Analog radio isn't going away." Good thing Microsoft realizes this. Because the Zune HD includes a standard FM radio tuner too. Unlike the iPod touch. And like every other Zune before it.

Myth 5: Zune HD games and software will wow you

This is the one actual myth, but it's also one of AppleInsider's creation, as no one ever claimed that. What Microsoft is doing is providing a number of small applications and games to Zune HD customers, for free, as a benefit of buying into their platform. Over time, they can and will open up the so-called Zune apps store to outside developers. (Witness yesterday's release of the Zune HD-compatible developer tools.) But this is just the first step in what is essentially a new platform. And remember that the Zune is really about entertainment, pure and simple. The Zune HD delivers on its core functionality quite nicely. No one questions that Apple has created a tremendous Apps platform, exclusionary as it may be.

Despite the hype, the Zune HD appears to have failed before even hitting the market.

Sure. And despite the hype, AppleInsider has absolutely failed to give the Zune HD a fair chance. We get it, Apple doesn't make it, so it must suck. But we also get that if Apple had released this product, it would have gotten a hugely favorable review. From you. From the Wall Street Journal. And from the New York Times. But thanks for trying.

There are a number of other inaccuracies in this poorly researched blog post around "Microsoft's standard operating procedure" (actually, Apple's, as it turns out), and the supposedly poor quality of mobile IE on the Zune. (Surprise! It's shockingly good.) But what can you expect from someone who wrote a post about a product that a) competes with the company they love, and b) they've never even seen let alone used?

I'm calling BS on this one, sorry.

Apple offers up evolutionary iPod updates, Jobs at music event

pthurrott — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 19:36:20 GMT

Today’s 9/9/9 Apple event was surprisingly light on surprises. Steve Jobs returned to the stage after almost a year’s absence and got a nice standing ovation. But Apple’s announcements were mostly lukewarm, and had been telegraphed weeks in advance. Among the key announcements are:

Big numbers. Apple highlighted why the company is desperately in need of antirust oversight. It has sold over 30 million iPhones in two years. It’s users have downloaded 1.8 billion apps from the iPhone Apps Store. It’s iTunes Store is the number one music retailer in the world. Apple has sold over 8.5 billion songs. It has over 100,000,000 users who have provided the company with their credit card numbers. Apple has sold over 225 million iPods (including over 20 million iPod touches and 100 million iPod nanos) and has 74 percent market share. This is all simply amazing stuff.

iPhone 3.1 firmware. A free incremental update for all iPhone models (and, I believe, all iPod Touch models), iPhone 3.1 appears to deliver some nice features across the board. I’m surprised Apple didn’t call it “iPhone’s Snow Leopard.” The addition of 30,000 ringtones at $1.29 a pop doesn’t do much for me, but could be a big deal for many.

iTunes 9 for PC/Mac. Anyone hoping for a sweeping overhaul of the bloated and slow iTunes application will be disappointed, but iTunes 9 does have some interesting new features, including an improved Genius, much better content syncing (a huge weakness previously), and a neat visual way to sync the layout of app icons on the iPhone screen using iTunes. Best of all, though is a new PC-to-PC content sharing feature that appears to be modeled on Windows 7’s HomeGroup functionality (albeit with old-school-style logons). I’m eager to see that in action. And the iTunes Store has gotten a much needed makeover, with some interesting Zune-like Artists and content pages. An iTunes LP feature combines a digital album with other rich content, but I’m not sure how valuable this really is: Who listens to music while staring at the iTunes PC app?

iPod touch. The late 2009 iPod touch devices are mostly simple upgrades of last year’s models, with the same form factor and underlying hardware (except for the 32 and 64 GB units, apparently, which have the faster, 3GS-style underpinnings). (Apple made an interesting point about iPod touch gaming, though it’s unrelated to new models: It already has far more games than do the Nintendo DS or Sony PSP, and those games are far less expensive. This makes the iPod touch/iPhone platform far more valuable.) Prices are down and capacities are up, as you expect: $199 for 8 GB, $229 for 16 GB, $299 for 32 GB, 64 GB for $399. (Note again that the 32 & 64 GB models have the faster processor and OpenGL|ES capabilities.) Note: Originally, I had written that only the 64 GB version had the more advanced hardware.

iPod classic. Curiously, Apple is keeping the iPod classic but not providing any notable updates. It still costs $249 but the HDD goes from 120 GB to 160 GB.

iPod shuffle. The ridiculous iPod shuffle continues forward, but Apple has finally done the obvious: They’re making an adapter so you can use any headphones you want. Duh. Prices are down, capacities are up: $59 for 2 GB, $79 for 4 GB, and $99 for 4GB “Special Edition.” There are new colors.

iPod nano. As we’ve known for weeks, the iPod nano picks up a video camera, microphone, and speaker. It’s also getting CoverFlow and, like the Zune from three years ago, an FM radio. Pricing: $149 for 8 GB and $179 for 16 GB.

What wasn’t discussed. Apple completely ignored the Apple TV, again. There was no discussion of a much-rumored Apple tablet. No Beatles catalog on iTunes. No truly new hardware or software.

I’ll need to watch the streaming version of the event, but for now, I don’t see anything hugely dramatic. I’ll provide write-ups for iTunes 9, the iPod touch, and iPod nano next week.

iPod touch 3G and iPod nano 5G revealed

pthurrott — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 12:46:38 GMT

It’s been a tough couple of weeks for Apple. First the Snow Leopard debacle, and now the 9/9/9 event has been ruined: An iPod case maker has inadvertently revealed two of the devices Apple will debut today, the iPod touch 3G and the iPod nano 5G. (According to CNET, anyway.) Here they are.

iPod touch 3G

iPod nano 5G

The 'blame anyone but Apple cadre,' Part 217: AT&T

pthurrott — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 18:55:00 GMT

So AT&T is finally adding MMS support to the iPhone 3G/3GS on September 25, about two months after Apple first announced the feature and other international wireless carriers provided it. Yep, AT&T sucks. And I should know, I've been using this horrible network, first in "EDGE" form, and then with their supposed 3G network, for two years now. God, how I miss Verizon.

There's just one problem. AT&T isn't unique, and all wireless carriers are horrible. And it's hard to credibly assert that Verizon's admittedly superior 3G network wouldn't simply buckle under the pressure of all those iPhone users. It just would. When I had my Verizon USB dongle, speeds were usually decent, but let's face, I was one of 17 people using the thing at any given time.

Also, I've taken my iPhone all over Europe. Allow me to dispel the rumor that any of AT&T's international competitors are any better. In Ireland, Britain, The Netherlands, Belgium, France, and Portugal, I've had all kids of connectivity issues on a variety of iPhone-compatible networks. iPhone connectivity is terrible everywhere. It will be terrible on Verizon if that ever happens.

There's a growing trend to just blame AT&T for all of the iPhone's troubles. I'm not sure that's fair, since most networks simply can't handle the amount of wireless traffic these devices bring. But if ever there was one example of Apple's hold on the press, it's this whole AT&T thing. Consider the Google Voice debacle. Even after AT&T asserted publicly that it had absolutely nothing to do with the Google Voice rejection, publications as credible as The New York Times were still blaming them. Nope, it's never Apple's fault.

It's kind of like the reaction to Snow Leopard, a service pack if there ever was one. There's so much here, I'll just cherry pick the most obvious: If Microsoft had the temerity to ship a mostly-64-bit OS that utilized a 32-bit kernel, the Mac community would be up in arms, ridiculing the software giant endlessly. It's hard to imagine Apple not making an "I'm a PC, I'm a Mac" commercial lampooning this. But Apple does just that and ... nothing. Meanwhile, because Apple has run out of ideas and had to improve the low level parts of OS that, three years ago, apparently needed absolutely no improvement at all, the Apple fan base accepts Apple's offering on blind faith: "Because Apple has provided this, this then is exactly what we need." It must be nice to have such a trusting audience, and one that is so eager to spend money, year after year. Even on a service pack.

So let's blame AT&T for everything, please. Just don't be so sure that whatever the next network carrier is will be any better.

Apple's culture of lies, Part 2: A different way of looking at it

pthurrott — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 14:53:12 GMT

One thing I've often thought with Apple is how much worse off the PC industry would be if they were ever dominant, because they're such a belligerent company. But a more level-headed way to view Apple's recent push-backs from the top of the heap is that they're suffering from exactly the same problematic mind-set that doomed Microsoft a decade/decade-and-a-half ago, back when antitrust regulators from the FTC and DOJ first accused the company of illegal anti-competitive behavior. That is, they're just a product of their history.

What I mean is, until very recently, Apple was the underdog, and they've been the underdog for almost their entire existence. This creates a certain mindset, and under Steve Jobs especially, it's created a very aggressive competitive spirit. This aggressiveness is fine when you are literally the underdog, just as was the case with Microsoft early in its career and it was trying to wrest the PC industry from IBM, Lotus, WordPerfect, and other tech dinosaurs. But once you have a dominant market position, that aggressive behavior--so important for an up-and-comer--isn't just bad, it's illegal. It's just hard to turn it off when it's been part of the corporate psyche for so long.

Microsoft got into antitrust trouble because they behaved in a manner that was illegal, but only for a company that holds monopoly power. During this time, I fielded innumerable emails from people wondering why it was OK for Apple or Linux to bundle applications in their OSes when it wasn't OK for Microsoft. (Answer: Apple and Linux didn't/doesn't have a desktop OS monopoly.) And so on. The answer was always the same: If Microsoft didn't have a monopoly, what it did in the mid-1990s would have been legal.

As I write this, Apple doesn't quite have a monopoly in any given market, but they are pretty darned close in a few, and getting closer all the time. And you can see how aggressive this company is, and how they're protecting their core products at the expense of users. The time to stop this behavior is now, not after Apple has secured the digital music market (arguably already done), the digital movie and TV show markets, and the consumer smart phone market. These are the markets that Apple is set to monopolize, and we've already arguably passed the point where that is no longer a given, a certainty. You can argue that we're not there yet, possibly. But we will be.

So. With this obvious comparison of two very similarly belligerent companies--Microsoft of the mid-1990s and Apple of today--in mind, I think the time has come to rein Apple in. To examine Apple's exclusive relationships with wireless carriers. To force it to open up iTunes to competing players, and its iPhone and iPod devices to competing software and services. If we don't do this now, it will only be more difficult in the future. All you have to do is look at Microsoft's never-ending antitrust saga--which has now stretched on for 15 years, involved regulatory bodies on three continents, and gone on far longer than its actual bad behavior--to see why it's time.

We spend too much time worrying about whether Microsoft will be the next IBM. What we should be worrying about is that Apple has already become the next Microsoft. Let's fix that. Let's nip this one in the bud. Let's do it now.

Apple's culture of lies finally dawns on a surprisingly unsuspecting world

pthurrott — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 16:30:34 GMT

When it comes to my relationship, such as it is, with Apple, there's one thing that always gets in the way: Apple's culture of lies. The company is pathological about misrepresenting the truth. It's like they can't help it.

This week, Apple bald-facedly lied to the FCC, in what is probably the most obvious example of why I'll always love Apple's products but loath their culture. A culture, which equally obviously, is aped by its most fanatical followers. You've all seen the smug emails, blog posts, and comments here on this very blog. These guys are just jerks. And they get that 'tude right from the mothership.

But the nice thing about this FCC incident is that the rest of the world--and world in which, yes, the mainstream press actually blamed AT&T for the Google Voice brouhaha before having all the facts because, heck, Apple would never do something like that--is finally catching on. Finally.

Here's a great example, courtesy of Fortune:

I'm sorry, Microsoft. On behalf of Silicon Valley, I’m sorry.

We cursed you, mocked you, labeled you the Evil Empire. Your crime: trying to control the technology world.

Your detractors say you intimidated PC makers, crushed Netscape, and tried to turn the web into an extension of the Windows platform. As it turns out, local darling Apple (AAPL) probably would have done the same thing.

Just look at how Apple is behaving today with a fraction of the power you had.

Apple's iTunes has an estimated 87% market share in music downloads, a beachhead it is using to expand its influence in much the same way you used Windows to expand yours. What has Apple done with its dominance? It has refused to let other media players sync with iTunes. It has tried to strong-arm Hollywood into selling content on terms mostly favorable to Cupertino. It has tightly controlled the iPhone ecosystem, insisting that its own iTunes app store serve as the only way to broadly distribute software.

And now, in the Google Voice episode, we see Apple blocking perfectly good software that competes with its ideas. When you tried this sort of thing, Microsoft, we called you a bully and went to the feds. Now that Apple’s doing it, we’re calling it … well, we’re not sure what to call it.

Allow me to help. I know exactly what to call Apple. A bully.

Of course, some of us have known this all along. So, welcome to reality, Fortune. I assume others will follow.

Apple to ship Snow Leopard this week

pthurrott — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 14:17:51 GMT

In a weird last-minute announcement, Apple announced this morning that it will ship its $29 Mac OS X service pack, called "Snow Leopard," on Friday.

Apple today announced that Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard will go on sale Friday, August 28 at Apple’s retail stores and Apple Authorized Resellers, and that Apple’s online store is now accepting pre-orders. Snow Leopard builds on a decade of OS X innovation and success with hundreds of refinements, new core technologies and out of the box support for Microsoft Exchange. Snow Leopard will be available as an upgrade for Mac OS X Leopard users for $29.

To create Snow Leopard, Apple engineers refined 90 percent of the more than 1,000 projects that make up Mac OS X.

Curiously, there are no major new end user features worth noting, which explains the "service pack" claim above. (Yes, it supports Exchange, but that won't impact most Mac users.) I've been using this thing all year, including the final version for the past week or so, and I have to say ... there's just not much there. It makes my "Windows 7 vs. Snow Leopard" series somewhat ponderous to write because I can't focus on what's new but must instead just compare the two OSes more generally. In case it's not obvious, users expect things to improve somewhat with each OS release, that's the minimum, but Snow Leopard doesn't go beyond that at all. This stands in sharp contrast to Windows 7, which does indeed change the overall Windows experience in useful ways. Snow Leopard is just simple refinements. Sorry, but it's just not that interesting.

And while Snow Leopard is indeed priced right for those up-to-date Mac users who paid $129 each year to upgrade to the latest OS release, or even more to just buy a new Mac, it's going to cost the hold-outs a lot more: $169 for a package that also includes iLife 09 (which is good) and iWork 09 (which is pointless). That's the only way that previous-generation ("Tiger") Mac OS X users can get Snow Leopard. And that's only for those on Intel-based Macs. You didn't upgrade yet? Sorry, Luddite, you can't get Snow Leopard.

I raise this issue because there's been a lot of talk lately about how Microsoft won't support direct upgrading of an 8-year-old operating system (XP) to Windows 7, though it does support a very useful migration process. Apple, meanwhile, isn't supporting upgrades from machines that were sold as recently as two and a half years ago. I think this distinction is important, and doesn't get enough attention.

Anyway. I'll put up a short Snow Leopard article this week and then get back to work on the Windows 7 vs. Snow Leopard series.

Apple's growing slice of the music business – in pie charts

pthurrott — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 21:08:04 GMT

Some good info from Fortune (and NPD):

The NPD Group on Tuesday issued what at first appears to be a pair of contradictory facts:

Apple now controls the largest share of the music business, its iTunes Store accounting for 25% of unit sales in the first half of 2009, up from 14% in 2007.

Compact discs are still the most popular format for paid music, accounting for 65% of unit sales.

How can this be? The trick is that Apple controls the lion's share — 69% — of paid downloads, whereas CD sales are spread out among many players, chief among them Wal-Mart, Best Buy, Amazon and Target.

To see better how this works, let's put the data into pie charts...

Check out the original post for the charts, which do indeed help clarify things.

Microsoft's Zune continues to struggle

pthurrott — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 07:12:10 GMT

I think we all realize the Zune isn't exactly setting the world on fire. But in these days leading up to the release of the Zune HD, things have apparently gotten worse than ever.

To be sure, the Zune provides a tiny, and apparently deteriorating portion of Microsoft's business. Revenue for the non-gaming side of Microsoft's Entertainment and Devices unit, which includes the Zune, tumbled 42% to roughly $211 million for the fourth fiscal quarter ended in June - or about 2% of the software giant's total, according to regulatory filings.

Microsoft said revenue at its Entertainment and Devices division was undercut by a 54%, or $100 million, decline in Zune platform sales.

In a survey conducted last fall, IDC's Kevorkian said only 4.8% of those with a portable media player reported having a Zune, while 61% had some sort of iPod.

So, in late 2008, the Zune actually had 50 percent more usage share in the MP3 player market than the Mac did in the worldwide PC market. (Hey, math can be fun.) When you consider how little advertising Microsoft did/does for the Zune, that's rather astonishing. What's Apple's advertising budget? $10 gazillion or something?

Comedy aside, it gets worse.

More recent data from NPD Group Inc. indicates that the Zune's already slim market share may have slipped further. NPD Group analyst Ross Rubin said in the first half of this year, Zune's share was 2%, compared to about 70% for the iPod.

Put simply, I am a fan of the Zune. The PC software is superior to Windows Media Player and iTunes by a wide margin. The current devices are decent, but now lagging behind the touch screen/App Store goodness Apple offers. The online marketplace is good, but not as good as iTunes Store, though that matters less with music because MP3/AAC is universally compatible. (For movies and TV shows, there's simply nothing like the iTunes Store.) And of course Zune offers various features and functions that simply aren't available on the iPod at all. It's competitive from a technical/usage standpoint at least.

But it's not competitive, apparently, where it arguably matters most: In the market. It's unclear whether Microsoft can turn things around with the Zune HD, no matter how good it is. I fear a small but temporary bump on its release and then another long, slow slide into irrelevance. And that's too bad. The Zune is actually a neat platform for digital media.

LOL! Apple demanded that Microsoft stop advertising PC price advantage over Macs

pthurrott — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 15:25:26 GMT

I'm sure you've seen the news. If not, I've written something up about it.

Microsoft COO Kevin Turner relayed a funny story about Apple. The Cupertino Mac maker recently called Microsoft and demanded that the software giant stop running its "Laptop Hunter" ads on TV. The ads highlight how expensive Macs are compared to PCs, and how much more choice there is in the PC market. That's a lot of chutzpah, even for Apple: Its annoying "I'm a Mac" ads have been running for years and often include inaccurate information about Windows and PCs.

Turner revealed how desperate Apple is to prevent people from realizing how much more expensive Macs are than PCs. "Two weeks ago we got a call from the Apple legal department saying, 'Hey, you need to stop running those ads, we lowered our prices,'" he said. "They took like $100 off or something. It was the greatest single phone call that I've ever taken in business."

Finally, Microsoft had gotten to Apple. "I did cartwheels down the hallway," Turner continued. "At first I said, 'Is this a joke? Who are you?' We're just going to keep running them and running them and running them."

Turner noted that the ads work because they're the truth. He talked about reading an ad for an electronics retailer in the newspaper this past Sunday and examining the prices for different computers. "You can get a 13.3” Macbook for $1,199 from that retailer," he said. "Guess what? [From] that same retailer, you can get a PC with more RAM, a bigger hard drive, and almost a three-inch bigger screen for $649. This is...the Apple Tax."

Too funny.

Apple releases iPhone Software Update 3.0 to the public

pthurrott — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 18:50:42 GMT

Apple:

The free iPhone OS 3.0 Software Update includes some great new features, as well as all the features from previous updates. iPhone OS 3.0 also lets you run the next generation of iPhone apps, like peer-to-peer games and more. If you’ve never updated before, now is the perfect time.

Cut, Copy & Paste

Quickly and easily cut, copy, and paste text from application to application. Select entire blocks of web text with a tap. Copy and paste images from the web, too.

Landscape Keyboard

Want more room to type? Rotate iPhone to landscape to use a larger keyboard in Mail, Messages, Notes, and Safari.

MMS (not on AT&T)

Send MMS messages and include video, photos, audio, and contact info.² Even tap to snap a picture or shoot a video right inside Messages.

Spotlight Search

Find what you’re looking for across your iPhone, all from one place. Spotlight searches all of your contacts, email, calendars, and notes, as well as everything in your iPod.

Voice Memos

Capture a memo, a meeting, or any audio recording on the go. Voice Memos works with the built-in iPhone microphone or with the mic on your headset.

Improved Calendar

Create meetings via Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync and subscribe to calendars with new CalDAV support.

Buy Movies, TV Shows, and Audiobooks

Download movies, TV shows, music videos, and audiobooks from the iTunes Store on your iPhone.

And so on.

Mozilla puts Safari's '11 million downloads' in perspective

pthurrott — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 13:22:06 GMT

LOL. As if it weren’t bad enough that Apple was force feeding Safari 4 to its customers and then gloating about the number of downloads it achieved, we have this bit of news from Mozilla’s Asa Dotzler, which really puts that figure in perspective.

I just read that Apple is reporting 11 million Safari 4 downloads in just three days. That's pretty amazing.

I'd like to follow up that report with one of my own.

Firefox 3.0.11 was downloaded about 150 million times in the last 24 hours.

Ahahaha. That’s good stuff. Or as CNET’s Matt Asay puts it, it makes Apple’s number “almost a rounding error.”

It would be spiteful, but all too easy, to put most of Apple’s claims to the test like this and reveal them to be the silliness that they really are. It continues to astonish me that Apple gets such a pass in the tech media.

Thanks to Marlon H. for the tip.

11 million Safari downloads? Um. Sort of

pthurrott — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 19:46:28 GMT

Apple is no stranger to hyperbole. In fact, they sort of reinvented it, and regularly take it to new levels. The week of WWDC, you might normally expect the hyperbole to have burned out by the time Bertrand "Grima Wormtongue" Serlet disappeared from the Moscone stage in a swirl of smoke and sulfer. (See how easy that is?) But it didn't. Today, Apple announced the following dubious milestone:

Safari 4 Downloads Top 11 Million in Three Days

Apple today announced that more than 11 million copies of Safari 4 have been downloaded in the first three days of its release, including more than six million downloads of Safari for Windows.

The rest of the press release is pointless PR fluff, so let's just focus on the central claim. 11 million downloads, of a barely-used browser. In just three days. I mean, my God. Did Apple just do something incredible here?

No. Apple is making lemonade. And that's amply explained by Robert "about to be mail-bombed" Strohmeyer over at PC World.

As someone with three Macs at home, I couldn't help but notice that Apple pushed Safari 4 out as an automatic update to all of its users this week. Yesterday, all three of the Macs in my household received the update, and we don't even use Safari.

An informal poll of my friends and colleagues reveals a whole lot of the same. Got the update dialog, downloaded and installed it, don't intend to use it.

What is at issue is the ridiculously thin claim that the latest Safari is a wild success on the basis that Apple basically pushed it out to everyone it possibly could, whether they wanted it or not.

So there you go. And I count myself among that crowd of 11 million who downloaded it, tried it, and will never go near it again. Why would I? I have real browsers that can, among other basic activities, work in full-screen mode. You know, unlike Safari.

BTW, Apple fanatics, if you're not yet mad enough at Robert for pointing out the painful truth, be sure to read New MacBook Pro Can Boot From an SD Card. (Duh. So Can PCs.). That's another nice bit of obvious reporting that usually escapes the Apple-friendly media.