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Lesa Snider, Macworld
If you work in advertising or graphic design, the new Content-Aware Fill and the improved Refine Edge dialog are worth the upgrade price, not to mention the hundreds of enhancements that will make your editing life easier. If you never work in 3D, you can get away with the standard version of the program and save $300. That said, the extended version makes more sense because it includes extra goodies such as the option to load several images into a Photoshop document automatically (File ->Scripts ->Load Files into Stack), more powerful video editing, animation control, and more.
David Chartier, Macworld
Acquired by Apple in December 2009, streaming "music locker in the cloud" service Lala announced that it will shut down next month, but it leaves its users with a lovely parting gift.
AppleInsider
Adobe on Friday announced that its anticipated Creative Suite 5 product family is now available, with more than 250 new features and, for the first time ever, native 64-bit support for Photoshop, Adobe Premiere Pro and After Effects.
Tony Bradley, PC World
So, Apple doesn't want to allow Flash as a development platform because it doesn't want the advancement and innovation of the iPhone or iPad platforms to be at the mercy of Adobe. That seems fairly reasonable, but it doesn't fully explain why Apple took the extra--seemingly petty--measure of banning iPhone and iPad apps that are ported from Flash.
Heather Kelly, Macworld
Areas mentioned in Apple's release notes include improvements for working with Faces, tracking with GPS in Places, duplicating Smart Albums, and applying adjustments such as Chromatic Aberration.
Christopher Breen, Macworld
Keyboard Maestro is a fine macro utility offered at a reasonable price. If you don’t need the extra power offered by QuicKeys—specifically, decision actions and Web actions—and seek an easier-to-use tool, Keyboard Maestro is a solid option.
Christopher Breen, Macworld
iKey is a good macro utility and the most affordable one available to Mac users. Its set of commands is reasonably complete and its option to trigger macros from menus and palettes is welcome. For those on a budget who need a basic-to-intermediate macro application, iKey is a good fit. If you’re looking for more advanced options, Keyboard Maestro or QuicKeys are better choices.
Dave Caolo, TUAW
In response to Steve's assertion that "...Flash is the number one reason Macs crash," Narayen said that, if Adobe does crash a Mac, it's probably got something "to do with the Apple operating system."
Dave Caolo, TUAW
Steve Jobs, Apple
Besides the fact that Flash is closed and proprietary, has major technical drawbacks, and doesn’t support touch based devices, there is an even more important reason we do not allow Flash on iPhones, iPods and iPads. We have discussed the downsides of using Flash to play video and interactive content from websites, but Adobe also wants developers to adopt Flash to create apps that run on our mobile devices.
We know from painful experience that letting a third party layer of software come between the platform and the developer ultimately results in sub-standard apps and hinders the enhancement and progress of the platform. If developers grow dependent on third party development libraries and tools, they can only take advantage of platform enhancements if and when the third party chooses to adopt the new features. We cannot be at the mercy of a third party deciding if and when they will make our enhancements available to our developers.
This becomes even worse if the third party is supplying a cross platform development tool. The third party may not adopt enhancements from one platform unless they are available on all of their supported platforms. Hence developers only have access to the lowest common denominator set of features. Again, we cannot accept an outcome where developers are blocked from using our innovations and enhancements because they are not available on our competitor’s platforms.
Riva Richmond, New York Times
An iPad contains a wealth of personal information. Here are four ways you can keep that information private and secure.
Franklin N. Tessler, Macworld
Keynote for iPad is a good value as a standalone tool. But as a complement to the desktop version, Keynote for iPad is disappointing.
Rob Griffiths, Macworld
Taken for what it is (an incredibly feature-rich spreadsheet program running with a full touch interface on a 1.5 pound portable computing device) Numbers is a good start, and should meet the needs of most anyone looking to use their iPad to create and work with spreadsheets.
Jeffery Battersby, Macworld
Apple’s iPad word processor offers amazing features but lacks basic and necessary printing and file sharing options.
Sakthi Prasad, Reuters
Apple Inc may charge about $1 million for displaying advertisements on its mobile devices, the Wall Street Journal said, citing advertisement executives.
The rates may be even more to be among the first to advertise, the paper said.
Brett Terpstra, TUAW
Developers are talking, debating and speculating about the exclusion of Mac desktop apps from this year's Apple Design Awards.
Kirk McElhearn, Macworld
E-book store has potential, but there are early missteps.
David Chartier, Macworld
Customers in the U.S. who placed their pre-orders for 3G-enabled iPads early enough may commence refreshing Delivery Status and FedEx.com.
Paul Boutin, New York Times
To offset inconsistent cellular service, users have resorted to making calls from different locations and investing in microcell hardware.
Heather Kelly, Macworld
Jeff Smykil, Ars Technica
If you are a user of general database apps, Bento for iPad fits the bill as a somewhat scaled-down version of the desktop app. The layout mode isn’t as robust and videos don’t play, but for basic info, the application works and is well worth the $4.99 price tag.
Ed Baig, USA Today
Apple has acquired Siri, maker of a dutiful voice-activated "virtual personal assistant" iPhone app. The clever app, which I first saw at the All Things Digital conference last May and reviewed here in February, elevates mobile search to a whole new level. It is meant to help you plan things. Bark out "I need a taxi" and Siri will deliver nearby options. Ask it to remind you to send flowers to your mom for Mother's Day and the app will send an email at the right time to jog your memory. Siri comes out of SRI International's Artificial Intelligence project.
Cade Metz, The Register
After calling Flash a "CPU hog," Steve Jobs has given Adobe the chance to live down this now famous insult. And Adobe is taking it.
MG Siegler, TechCrunch
Yes, the software giant, which makes the rival Windows Mobile (and soon Windows Phone 7) phone software has announced a deal with HTC that allows them to license their patented technology.
Dave Caolo, TUAW
At long last, the wait is over. Apple has officially announced WWDC 2010. The "center of the app universe" will take place from June 7th - 11th at Moscone West in sunny San Francisco, California.
This is not a new OS X year but it is a big new iPhone OS device year and the conference schedule reflects that emphasis.
Glenn Fleishman, TidBITS
Then it struck me: my sunglasses. I removed them, and the iPad was, of course, just fine. The polarized sunglasses I was wearing had performed a neat trick of the light.
Matthew Miller, ZDNet
You may have some limitations on capability compared to a “full PC”, but the user experience and these other “magical” elements are so much more compelling that they override much of that IMHO. In addition, developers will probably figure out ways to address any glaring needs. Not to mention, iPhone 4 will come out in the Fall and make the device better as well.
Evan Ramstad, Wall Street Journal
The country's communications regulator on Tuesday said it wouldn't stop people from importing Apple Inc.'s iPad for personal use, ending a ban that early adopters in this tech-savvy country dubbed unfair. Some Korean tech Web sites had even started to publicly expose famous Koreans who had the gadget in apparent violation of the ban.
Gene J. Koprowski, FOXNews.com
The socially conservative Parents Television Council (PTC) thinks a wealth of salacious apps are currently available for iPhone users -- things like "My Vibe," which converts the iPhone into a vibrator, and "Love Positions Free," which has drawings of couples having sex. The group has publicly demanded that Apple stop providing porn to children -- and clean up its act.
Peter Burrows, BusinessWeek
In 2008, Steve Jobs said, 'Let there be apps.' Now a cosmos full of companies and developers is bound by the laws of Apple—for better and worse.
Jay Yarow , Business Insider
So, another case of an app being rejected for a seemingly arbitrary reason -- with no easy way to predict in advance that the app would have been rejected. Love Wolff or hate him, it's easy to see why developers get angry about fuzzy rules and fuzzier enforcement.
Ryan Singel, Wired
Making fun of Tiger Woods has become a national pastime after news of his extracurricular activities became public, but unlike nearly everything else in the world, there’s no app for that.
Erica Ogg, CNET News.com
Mary Duan, San Jose Business Journal
The criminal investigation into the purported theft of an apparent iPhone prototype came at the request of Apple Inc., officials said Tuesday.
Ashlee Vance and Brad Stone, New York Times
Apple wants the fastest chip for its mobile devices and has bought another chip maker to gain an edge over its competitors.
Apple has acquired a small Austin, Tex., company called Intrinsity, known for making zippy versions of a computer chip often found in mobile devices. The deal, which closed late last month and was confirmed by Apple on Tuesday, shows the company continuing to try to gain an edge in the mobile device market by purchasing technology and chip experts.
Steven Sande, TUAW
Kirk McElhearn, Macworld
TypeIt4Me has been around so long for a reason: It's a really useful utility that does what it says. If you want to give your fingers a rest, TypeIt4Me will help.
Kirk McElhearn, Macworld
TextExpander 3—particularly with the addition of syncing—is a worthwhile upgrade. Just be forewarned that it’ll take some time to set it up so it works just the way you want it to.
Dan Moren, Macworld
Chief among the new features is an in-window Live Search bar that searches as you type, highlighting any matches for the term you’ve entered. Newly enhanced script functionality lets you tie scripts to application or document events, such as quitting the program, opening or closing a document, and more. In addition, BBEdit 9.5 adds the ability to browse .zip files and enables a number of functions related to version control system Subversion, such as contextual menu options in the result list and project lists, and a new icon in project windows and disk browsers.
Marco Tabini, Macworld
FileMaker has announced the release of a new package of free templates for its consumer-oriented relational database application Bento 3 aimed at organizing a family’s every activity from chores to meal planning.
Dan Moren, Macworld
Panic has released an update to their classic FTP program, Transmit, adding new features, improved performance, and an overhauled interface.
Martyn Williams, IDG News Service
Some of Japan's biggest online electronics retailers have stopped shipping Apple products, apparently at the request of the Cupertino, California-based company.
Renai LeMay, ZDNet Australia
John Gruber, Daring Fireball
What’s the counter-argument? That REACT should never investigate any crime against one of the companies on its steering committee? What company would sign up for that?
See Also: John Cook’s First Day On The Job At Yahoo News, by John Gruber, Daring Fireball. His former employer, until earlier this month? Gawker Media.
John Cook, Yahoo! News
The raid that San Mateo area cops conducted last week on the house of Gizmodo editor Jason Chen came at the behest of a special multi-agency task force that was commissioned to work with the computer industry to tackle high-tech crimes. And Apple Inc. sits on the task force's steering committee.
Tim Bajarin, PC Magazine
Introducing the world to the PC and the GUI have cemented Jobs's role as a visionary. But perhaps the creation of a device that makes a computer totally transparent to the user, popularizes touch computing, and offers a vast array of computing scenarios for consumers and business might actually top his other achievements so far.
Wall Street Journal
Technically, Mr. Yu didn’t violate regulations because he only used the iPad to demonstrate e-book software and didn’t use its Wi-Fi networking capability.
Peter Smith, PC World
The iPad is a fun device and not something you'll need at the office. The smart money is still on waiting for a second generation, or a similar Android device, but I'm not getting any younger and I've been waiting for a tablet like this since my days watching Star Trek.
Michael Grotticelli, Broadcast Engineering
Rick Broida, CNET News
Too bad you probably won't get to enjoy it.
Agam Shah, IDG News Service
The U.S. International Trade Commission on Monday said it will investigate a patent infringement complaint filed by Elan Microelectronics in Taiwan regarding Apple’s multitouch devices including the iPhone and iPad.
Jim Dalrymple, CNET News
A class action lawsuit against Apple is alleging that the company relies on a faulty technology in its iPhones and iPods to determine whether a device has been exposed to liquid and can be repaired under warranty.
Christopher Breen, Macworld
Usually you can empty iPhoto's trash with a Control (right) click. Not so when iPhoto misbehaves. Here are solutions.
David Chartier, Macworld
If you're moving Keynote presentations from your Mac to your iPad for finishing later, a new Apple support doc covers some do's and don'ts to ensure you don't lose formatting or images.
Mark Sigal, O'Reilly Media
Obviously a lot can change in the next couple of years. It's easy to lose sight of the fact that the mobile industry that exists today looks nothing like the one that did before iPhone came on to the scene. Just ask Nokia.
Clearly, the best case for Google with Android is that mobile technology and mobile platforms become sufficiently commoditized for its device OEM-centric, horizontal model to tip the balance in its favor. Never say never, but paint me a skeptic -- barring as yet unseen missteps by Apple.
Jeff Carlson, TidBITS
Instead of bringing a laptop, with its capacious hard drive, you can bring just the iPad and a pocket full of inexpensive SD memory cards.
Serenity Caldwell, Macworld
After a ray of sunshine, it's back to bleak skies in the world of editorial cartoons. Just days after Mark Fiore’s application NewsToons was finally approved—after a media frenzy over the Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist’s November rejection—the App Store’s reviewers are at it yet again.
Philip Elmer-DeWitt, Fortune
James Pomfret and Melanie Lee, Reuters
Just three weeks after the global launch, bootleg versions of Apple Inc's hot-selling iPad tablet PCs have begun showing up on the shelves of online and real-world shops in piracy-prone China.
Louis Gray
Pete Cashmore, Mashable
Given the benefits to developers (more money!), consumers (more great Mac apps, easier access) and Apple (ka-ching!), how could there be a case against a Mac App Store?
Brian Stelter, New York Times
Mark Fiore’s cartoon application is now available through the Apple App Store. But a group that represents cartoonists like him is now lobbying for the company to change its rules for humorous, politically charged apps.
Eriica Sudan, TUAW
Leander Kahney, Cult of Mac
While Woz was waiting in line to buy the iPad last month, an Apple test engineer showed him a prototype iPad. It was just a few hours before the device went on sale. Woz, who is still an Apple employee, fired up the Numbers app. Little did he know, the unit was 3G test prototype, and was not to be shown or used outside of secure areas at the company HQ.
Brooke Crothers, CNET News
On top of the allure of the aluminum designs, MacBooks are sequestered, at retail, in their own special space--whether it be Fry's or Best Buy (what Best Buy calls "Apple Shops"), very visibly separated from the crush of Windows 7 machines. This, in turn, leads consumers to partition Apple products in their minds: Apple versus "others."
Alex Ahlund, TechCrunch
The iPad is a device that may be misunderstood for a while. It’s certainly not revolutionary in the typical sense, but its subtle influences may eventually justify that characterization. We can surely expect to see even more casual users jumping on the band wagon and certainly a spike in casual game development for the device. As the product evolves, becoming more powerful feature-rich, it may become even more ubiquitous than we expect. This will be an extremely interesting space to watch within the coming months and years.
Bob Tedeschi, New York Times
I haven’t had the chance to road test the iPad while vacationing, but after two solid weeks spent testing it on a virtual vacation — a multi-continent jaunt through backwoods, beach and city without leaving my couch — here’s my verdict: if you have an extra $500 to $700 to spend on one, plus another $100 or so for some great apps, it’s worth the plunge.
Calev Ben-David, Bloomberg
Israel has lifted a ban forbidding tourists and citizens from bringing Apple Inc.’s iPad into the country, the Communications Ministry said in an e-mailed statement.
Chris Rawson, TUAW
Marco Tabini, Macworld
A new version of the popular disk repair utility for Mac adds real-time health monitoring and 64-bit support to help keep your data safe.
MG Siegler, TechCrunch
Apple isn’t taking it too seriously because they haven’t yet figured out a way to make a lot of money off of the device. And as we all should know by now, Apple loves to make money. It doesn’t make products just to make them. That’s why the Apple TV’s position remains a weird one. For now.
Beatweek
But one way or another, I believe that the effects of Apple’s Switch campaign are only now surfacing, as it has breathed legitimacy into Apple’s subsequent ad campaigns, and it has given Mac users everywhere the go-ahead to become active Mac advocates within their own circles. Although “Switch” will never get the credit it deserves, it helped to get the party started in various ways.
Daniel Lyons, Newsweek
Apple's new iPad is more than just a gorgeous consumer electronics device. It's also a kind of challenge to the Internet itself—or at least to the conventional wisdom of what the Internet is supposed to be all about.
Scott M. Fulton, III, BetaNews
While bitterness continues over the implications of Sections 3.3.1 through 3.3.3 of Apple's recently modified Developers' Agreement (PDF available here, through the Electronic Frontier Foundation), there's lingering suspicion about the indeterminate boundaries pointed to by the long-standing Section 3.3.14, which now applies to iPad content as well as iPhone.
Rob Pegoraro, Washington Post
I've been covering the computer industry for a long time, so I'm used to people thinking very highly of Apple and resenting criticism of it. I've seen the same thing among fans of other companies and products: Linux, Microsoft, Google, you name it. But it's something different to see people twisting themselves into logical contortions to defend things that Apple itself then recognizes as errors.
Ken Mingis, Computerworld
All in all, Apple has delivered a laptop that's more than just an evolutionary upgrade with unseen updates under the hood. It has moved its higher-end MacBook Pros closer to true quadcore speeds, while improving battery life and adding serious GPU performance.
Glenn Fleishman, TidBITS
I tested a Skype call with a USB headset, and the quality was just terrific. This make the iPad even more viable for phone calls, eliminating a requirement for a Bluetooth headset which requires separate charging and pairing.
Dave Caolo, TUAW
Dan Moren, Macworld
Adding ePub support into writing tools themselves is great for writers. While ePub is an open format, the tools that were previously available for conversion suffered from a severe case of open-sourceitis, boasting clunky, inscrutable interfaces often written in cross-platform technologies like Java. Writers shouldn’t have to be techies to get their work onto the iPad, any more than they have to be to load up their music and photos.
Dan Frakes, Macworld
MoofMenu is a simple but useful (and quick) utility that lets you create a custom, hierarchical menu of files and folders in the menu bar.
Greg Sandoval and Declan McCullagh, CNET News
Silicon Valley police are investigating what appears to be a lost Apple iPhone prototype purchased by a gadget blog, a transaction that may have violated criminal laws, a law enforcement official told CNET on Friday.
Apple has spoken to local police about the incident and the investigation is believed to be headed by a computer crime task force led by the Santa Clara County district attorney's office, the source said. Apple's Cupertino headquarters is in Santa Clara County, about 40 miles south of San Francisco.
Jay Yarow , The Business Insider
Pavel Alpeyev and Yoshinori Eki, Bloomberg
Apple Inc.’s iPhone shipments to Japan more than doubled in the past year, capturing 72 percent of the country’s smartphone market, a research firm said.
Charlie Sorrel, Wired
Brett Arends, Wall Street Journal
Savor the moment, by all means. But don't get complacent. If you're an Apple shareholder, here are seven things to be concerned about—and one thing you can do about it.
Daniel Ionescu, PC World
"We did not say we would bring it to iPhone, we said to date we've had it on Android and that in the future it may come to other platforms but did not confirm this will be coming to iPhone at all," a Google spokesperson told PCWorld.
Sharon Zardetto, Macworld
Where was it that you read that insightful analysis of the latest politico peccadillo? Where did you see that nifty mockup of the Next Great Thing from Apple? We all want to get back to pages we’ve visited on the Web sometimes. It’s easy to find a site that you’ve bookmarked—but what about the ones you breeze through without saving, but later wish you had? Safari 4 provides a myriad of options.
Glenn Fleishman, TidBITS
The process of importing photos couldn't be more straightforward; it's rather like a good hybrid of Image Capture and iPhoto's import processes.
Heather Kelly, Macworld
The update adds Raw image support for nine popular camera models including the Canon EOS Rebel T2i, the Leica S2, and the Sony A230.
Alexander Vaughn, App Advice
Chris Rawson, TUAW
Adobe's stance has long been to blame Apple for the poor performance of Flash on the Mac, citing Apple's unwillingness to allow third-party developers access to APIs necessary for hardware-accelerated video. Adobe no longer has that excuse to fall back upon: Apple posted a technical note back in late March that removes this restriction and allows third-party developers access to hardware-acceleration APIs for h.264 decoding in compatible GPUs.
Martin Peers, Wall Street Journal
Mr. Jobs should either use a big chunk of the money or return it to shareholders.
John Paczkowski, Wall Street Journal
So this float-adjusted achievement of Apple’s is really more of a psychological milestone than anything — one made possible only because S&P is counting just the 87 percent of Microsoft’s shares that are available for public trading.
Steven Sande, TUAW
David Dahlquist, Macworld
What gives? There’s a wide selection of similarly feature-less clock apps available right now—but either digital or paid—so why reject his? Does Apple have some kind of vendetta against analog clocks?
Dan Nystedt, IDG News Service
The iPad appears to be selling well in Asia despite the fact that Apple's official overseas launch isn't until the end of May, as specialty stores obtain them to resell at premium prices and travelers to the U.S. bring them home.
Josh Lowensohn, CNET News
Have you always wanted a scanner, but held back because of size and cost? Do you have a Mac and a digital camera? Then good news: Prizmo for Mac offers a good enough solution to let accomplish most of your scanning needs without the extra hardware.
Simon Aughton, Mac User
Peter Oppenheimer, Apple’s chief financial officer, said that Apple has successfully positioned the iPad not as an alternative to a Mac or iPod touch, but as new type of device, which he referred to as a handbook, that does some things better than either.
James Galbraith, Macworld
The biggest performance difference, as you’d expect, was in our Call of Duty frame rate test, in which the new system, aided by its GeForce 320M graphics, was able to display twice as many frames per second than the older model with its GeForce 9400M graphics.
Michael Rose, TUAW
Stephen Shankland, CNET News
What a difference two weeks and a few words of legalese can make to the future of a widely used programming technology.
In that span of time, Adobe has gone from touting its technology for building Flash applications that run on the iPhone to canceling future development of that technology.
Connie Guglielmo, Bloomberg
Apple Inc. Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs, after saying profit almost doubled last quarter, tantalized investors with the promise of “extraordinary” new products that analysts say may include an overhauled Apple TV.
Daniel Jalkut, Red Sweater Blog
I think the failure to update entries on Apple’s Mac downloads site is a consequence of staff at Apple being stretched thin.
Jason Snell, Macworld
If you look at the overall revenue picture for the three lines, it’s clear that the Mac continues on an upward swing, while the iPod slowly trends down. The iPhone, meanwhile, is launching into the stratosphere.
Jenna Wortham, New York Times
Perhaps what is surprising is the utter delight and occasional vitriol permeating the reactions around the Web.
Jack Shafer, Slate Magazine
If the secrecy pixie dust that Apple sprinkles onto its products works best on people who already believe in Apple magic, then the real test of the company's marketing machine would be to drive the astronomically larger customer base of Windows users into the stores to buy iPads. To do that, the company would have to leave its secrecy comfort zone. It would have to be more forthcoming about what the product does and why you should buy it. And finally, if Apple's secrecy strategy is so effective, why don't more manufacturers ape it?
Jeff Bertolucci, PC World
Now, I know that some of you will accuse me of blaming the victim. But the fact is that Apple had an opportunity to plug the leak. Its paranoia contributed to a corporate culture that prevented it from doing so. Now its summer party has been ruined. Oh, well, there's always the next iPad.
MG Siegler, TechCrunch
David Dahlquist, Macworld
Spanning Sync allows users to sync their iCal calendars and Address Book contacts with Google, making it possible to update your calendar via Google and re-sync it to your Macs, distribute calendar data via Google Apps, sync calendars between multiple computers, and more.
Addy Dugdale, Fast Company
Meet four minor App developers with major ideas. All age 16 or younger, they're part of a generation raised with multi-touch and social media, and they're cranking out profitable ideas for new devices and platforms as fast as manufacturers let them.
Warren Buckleitner, New York Times
Apple generally makes news by publishing new apps, not by unpublishing them. But last week, it made some educators upset when it removed an app, Scratch Viewer, from the iTunes App Store.
Scratch Viewer was designed to let educators and others review a child’s work that was created on an iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch using the Scratch programming language, which has become popular in many schools.
See Also: Apple Rejects Kid-Friendly Programming App, by Brian X. Chen, Wired.
Leander Kahney, Cult of Mac
Philip Michaels, Macworld
Apple’s fiscal second quarter may have been a quiet one in terms of product releases, but the company still turned in a stellar financial performance over the last three months. On Tuesday, the company reported sales of $13.5 billion and a profit of $3.07 billion for the second quarter ended March 27.
Revenue rose 49 percent from last year’s adjusted second-quarter sales of $9.08 billion, while profits were up 90 percent, making the 2010 second quarter the best non-holiday quarter in Apple’s history, according to CEO Steve Jobs.
Andy Ihnatko, Chicago Sun-Times
Gizmodo has a legitimate and spectacular scoop on their hands. They’ve done something that’s unprecedented in the Steve Jobs era: they have published substantive, first-person, hands-on information about an unannounced Apple product. The actual information they gleaned is pretty thin, but let’s not begrudge them their due. Denton says that the site did it for the benefit of their readers. That also happens to be the only motivation that ever matters to a journalist.
Let’s also not gloss over the means by which they got that scoop. Not through legwork and developing sources, but by buying something that was offered to them.
Jeff Smykil, Ars Technica
In the end, using iWork for the iPad is a lot like going to the moon. It might be a nice place to visit, and it may even be fun to bounce around for a bit, play a little golf, or buzz around in that sweet little moon buggy, but in the end, it’s not a place I’d like to live, or even stay for any extended amount of time. iWork is decent, but there is only so much you can do for an office suite without a full keyboard and a mouse.
So while iWork is usable on Apple’s new "magical" device, it probably won't cut it for serious users. If you need to make an on-the-fly change to a document or presentation, you might lose some formatting or suffer some other unexpected quirks. What Apple calls file sharing, I call a pain, and the inability to print just magnifies things.
Bob LeVitus, Houston Chronicle
Apple's MobileMe is a unique collection of integrated Internet-based services that makes using Macs, iPhones, iPod touches, iPads and even Windows PCs even better.
Brian Lam, Gizmodo
Bruce Tognazzini, Ask Tog
For those of us around Apple for the launch of the 1984 Mac, things are awfully familiar.
In bringing that original Mac to market, Steve hit on a formula that worked for him. He keeps repeating it, and it seems to get better every time. It worked for the iPhone, and it worked for the iPad, too. Here are the necessary elements.
Miguel Helft and Nick Bilton, New York Times
The company is known as the most secretive in Silicon Valley, and leaks are rare. But after the phone prototype was left in a bar in the Silicon Valley town of Redwood City, photos of the device began appearing over the weekend in technology blogs, sparking a frenzy of hype among the Apple-obsessed.
Monica Guzman, Seattle Post Intelligencer
Adam C. Engst, TidBITS
This is it - TidBITS has turned 20 years old! In what is a bit of happy coincidence, the email issue containing this article is #1,024. That's right, we've officially published 2^10 issues of TidBITS, or, roughly speaking, 1 kiloTidBITS. Geeky, eh?
TidBITS
Adam C. Engst, TidBITS
Yukari Iwatani Kane, Wall Street Journal
That's the trouble with making revolutionary products. Investors keep wanting more of them.
Mike Dano, Fierce Mobile
Although browser vendor Opera made a big splash on the iPhone, and Skyfire is poised for a similar effort, other mobile browser companies don't seem too keen to get onto Apple's platform. Mozilla, maker of the popular Firefox browser, said it does not plan to build an iPhone version of its Firefox Mobile product, and Bolt browser maker Bitstream and NetFront browser maker Access have similar positions. "Our understanding of browsers in the iPhone App Store is that a ‘full' Web browser like Firefox that incorporates its own Web rendering and JavaScript engines would be prohibited," said Jay Sullivan, Mozilla's vice president of product.
Chris Foresman, Ars Technica
The problem mainly affects the Apple Headphones with Remote than came with iPod shuffles made between February 2009 and February 2010, which have serial numbers in the range of xx909xxxxxx to xx952xxxxxx or xx001xxxxxx to xx004xxxxxx. If you have headphones that came with an iPod shuffle in the affected range that have stopped working, Apple will simply replace them free of charge for two years from the date of purchase.
Electronista
Apple today countersued Kodak over alleged patent violations. The complaint accuses Kodak of copying technology relating to image processing as well as energy management and memory design. Many of Kodak's C, M and Z series EasyShares are supposedly infringing on the patents, as are pocket camcorders like the Zi8.
Dan Miller, Macworld
Christopher Breen, Macworld
Whether DragThing is a good fit for you depends a lot on how you like to interact with your Mac. If you’re the kind of person who routinely calls up Spotlight to launch applications and locate items on your Mac using your keyboard, DragThing’s mouse-focused interface may not be for you. If, on the other hand, you appreciate having the items you use most often available as clickable icons in nicely defined, customizable docks, you owe yourself a test drive.
Andy Ihnatko's Celestial Waste of Bandwidth (BETA)
So. I say once again that Gizmodo has a lot of explaining to do. Even if they’re completely innocent of any wrongdoing, they need to resolve this part of the story.
Mike Ash, Under The Microscope
Apple has built a successful yet flawed system. The App Store has been around for nearly two years, and yet Apple has done very little to fix the flaws. There is a regular series of high-profile mistakes coming out of the system, yet Apple’s response to each one is to patch over the mistake and hope that it doesn’t happen again. The community’s response is largely to say that mistakes happen, and that it’s a small price to pay for such an excellent platform.
This attitude won’t fix the problems. Apple’s system is inherently flawed. The continuing mistaken rejections by Apple are not unavoidable, and we shouldn’t just shrug our shoulders at them. There is a lot that Apple can do to fix these problems, and we’ll all benefit if they do.
Jason Chen, Gizmodo
You are looking at Apple's next iPhone. It was found lost in a bar in Redwood City, camouflaged to look like an iPhone 3GS. We got it. We disassembled it. It's the real thing, and here are all the details.
Steven Sande, TUAW
Beatweek
I suddenly can’t get myself excited about Apple’s laptop lineup even though I’ve spent a decade partaking in it.
Alexander Vaughn, App Advice
Apple just updated its online store and now finally displays a shipping date for the iPad 3G in the US.
Dave Girard, Ars Technica
It's truly impressive that Photoshop CS5 is successful at adding a lot of useful, engineering-heavy features in CS5, all while porting over to a new and stable Cocoa 64-bit code-base on OS X. And it's encouraging to see that a program that has no real competitors isn't just being phoned in. Against the on-going daytime drama of "Apple vs. Flash," Photoshop is still just a great program and CS5 is a worthwhile update for a broad cross-section of users. My complaints are about minor issues—things like the low-res preview in HDR Merge Pro or window layering with AIR filters—can be addressed in a x.1 update without really slowing people down in the meantime.
Ryan Chittum, Columbia Journalism Review
Look, let’s face it. The iPad is the most exciting opportunity for the media in many years. But if the press is ceding gatekeeper status, even if it’s only nominally, over its speech, then it is making a dangerous mistake. Unless Apple explicitly gives the press complete control over its ability to publish what it sees fit, the news media needs to yank its apps in protest.
Peter Ha, Techland
“You're only allowed to purchase two iPads in your lifetime, ma'am.”
Jillian Coyle, WUSA
Less than a week after the feverishly hyped launch of Apple's iPad, the touch-based multimedia tablet has been praised as one of the most revolutionary tools for travelers since the airport kiosk - and panned as a cumbersome, underwhelming gadget whose most notable application is that it tags its spendthrift owners as technology lemmings.
Chris Foresman, Ars Technica
Computer anti-malware firm Intego has identified a new variant of malware for Mac OS X, dubbed HellRTS.D. When installed on your machine, it opens a backdoor that lets hackers take control of your machine without your knowledge.
John Battelle
espite the gorgeous products and services you’ve created, we worry that you’re headed down a road that may lead to your own demise.
Peter Payne, TUAW
In a place that's as resistant to change as Japan is, doing what Apple is trying to do is going to be an uphill battle. I certainly wish the Apple team well.
Chris Foresman, Ars Technica
It turns out that there are several reasons that factored into Apple's decision, including cost, graphics performance, battery life—and the laws of physics.
Frédéric Filloux, Monday Note
We now face a small club of high tech giants — Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Yahoo and Apple — who, over the years, acquired an unprecedented ability to gather and process data. As competition is heating up among them, the data they’ll be able to get will continue to increase in tactical and strategical value. As a corollary, they are increasingly inclined to keep such data close to the vest.
Dan Turner, Computerworld
Despite some snark that "it's just a ginormous iPhone," developers of iPad apps have found that the size does matter -- and that's in addition to the iPad's unique multitouch functions and interface elements. A properly designed iPad app is not just a pixel-doubled iPhone app, nor is it a desktop app with the mouse replaced by a finger.
I spoke with UX designers and product managers at two companies -- The Omni Group and Zinio LLC -- to find out more about the challenges they faced developing for the iPad. In particular, I wanted to know more about whether it confounded their initial design plans, or whether they were surprised to find new possibilities for user functionality.
Yoni Heisler, NetworkWorld.com
Jobs response simply reads, "YouTube now supports HD video." Okay then, I'll take that as a no.
Brad Stone, New York Times
The Silicon Valley entrepreneur James Anthony says he is often surprised to find that other developers for the iPhone and iPod Touch have the exact same programming education he does. They, too, learned the secrets of Apple’s hit mobile devices from the Stanford course on iPhone applications, which was introduced in fall 2008 to a packed lecture hall.
Wolfgang Gruener, Tom's Hardware
What struck me was how the article noted that the device called Dynabook dates back to 1968.
Mike Elgan, Computerworld
Will the content-creation elites admit how absurdly wrong they were when the tidal wave of content-creation apps really hits, or when the first bestselling novel written on the iPad is published, or when they see their own kids expressing creativity on the iPad?
The notion that iPad can't be used for content creation is patently, provably, laughably false. Those repeating this absurd notion owe their readers, listeners and followers an apology, followed by a correction. It doesn't matter if you want the iPad to exclusively serve content, the fact is that people are creating content on it every day. And the avalanche of creativity apps hasn't even started yet.
AppleInsider
Apple recently repositioned several of its board members to bring the company back into compliance with its own governance guidelines after the sudden death last month of long-time director Jerome York left a void in its leadership.
Daniel Bergner, New York Times
What is a man’s ideal female form? A study of the blind tries to find out.
Charles Levinson, Wall Street Journal
Travelers have been bringing laptops and cellphones configured to U.S. standards, including other Apple devices with the same wireless configuration, into Israel for years without incident. Some Israeli lawmakers alleged on Friday the decision undermines Israel's status as a global leader in the high-tech industry.
Brier Dudley, Seattle Times
The San Francisco region is the most Apple friendly part of the country, with 32.3 percent of the people in Apple's hometown area likely to own a Mac, iPod or iPhone, according to a new report from Experian Simmons.
David Carnoy, CNET News
I woke up the next morning and headed back to the Apple Store. This time I didn't stop to talk to anyone. I just went downstairs and paid for the thing, all $650 (including tax).
Nick Bilton, New York Times
If you already own an iPad, or plan to buy one, a $30 cable can output some Web video, photos and presentations - completely displacing the Apple TV.
Erica Ogg, CNET News
So what does that mean for the future of news or editorial products on the iPad and iPhone? It's safe to assume that quashing political satire isn't Apple's goal here. But it's a legitimate concern for the journalism community that to be featured on the App Store they have to submit their news content to a company unafraid to exercise what sometimes seems like arbitrary control. The thinking goes, what if Apple finds a headline offensive? Or what if there's an unfavorable article about Apple itself even? That's not to say Apple would do that, but its inconsistent handling of App Store submissions sets a troubling precedent.
AppleInsider
A San Francisco resident has filed a lawsuit against Apple alleging that the company unfairly declines warranty coverage for its products solely on the basis of triggered moisture sensors, which the suit alleges are unreliable evidence of abuse.
Venessa Lee, Today
We seem to have moved beyond talk of a Swiss standard, towards aiming to be a global city. But to what extent is Switzerland still an appropriate role model, and should cross-pollination between the two cultures be looked at more seriously?
Gabriel Madway, Reuters
Apple Inc's shares have barreled upward at a torrid pace over the past year, yet as the company's quarterly report approaches, no one on Wall Street seems prepared to slap an "overvalued" tag on the company.
AppleInsider
The newly released MacBook Pro line is now using a new serial number format to support continued growth and scalability.
Mitch Wagner, Computerworld
In my time using the iPad, I’ve found some tips and tricks for making the device even more versatile and easy to use, including accessories to buy, avoid, and re-use; tricks for writing on the iPad; and at least one really bad gotcha to avoid.
Loper OS
You want a non-tyrannical Apple? Rather than striving to weaken Apple so that it can be devoured by its brawny-yet-mindless competitors, do something constructive. Experiment with GUIs which don’t trace their descent to Xerox PARC. Forever renounce the idiotic practice of copying Microsoft, that cheap imitation of a cheap imitation. If you are creative, create. Otherwise, strive to find a strong-willed Jobs figure gifted with good taste, and become his loyal servant. This is how we get quality products, everywhere from architecture to operating systems. There is no other way. Creativity requires a mind, and a herd has none.
John Gruber, Daring Fireball
Keeping the rules secret may make things easier for Apple, but it’s weakening the platform. Clarity is a sign of strength. If Apple’s leadership wants the tight control, they should accept the amount of hard work that would go along with managing it openly.
Kenneth van Wyk, Computerworld
Time will tell if I’m right about the security aspects, but I’m betting the problems with malware, viruses and the like that we see on other platforms will be virtually obliterated with the iPad model. What consumer won’t find that a breath of fresh air?
Brooke Crothers, CNET News
Ryan Tate, Gawker
Let there be no question, then: Apple will punish its enemies as surely as it will tax its users and developers.
Patrick Seitz, Click
Rival market research firms Gartner and IDC late Wednesday provided wildly different views of Apple’s Mac shipments in the U.S. Both say Apple is the No. 5 vendor, but their reports diverge from there.
Ken Segall
I think there is a sizable group out there just determined to see Apple fail. Interestingly, this group falls into two categories: friends and foes.
Charlie Sorrel, Wired
f you take a look at Apple’s “magical and revolutionary” iPad, you might see a brand new device, an entirely new product category that sprung forth from Apple’s labs fully formed. Take a closer look, though, and its parts start to seem rather familiar. In fact, pretty much every bit of the iPad has been seen before. We’re not talking about leaked spy photos either. Over the last several years, the iPad has been tested in public by Apple itself.
From the unibody case to the multitouch screen to the very software that drives the iPad, it seems that everything from Apple in recent years has been little more than a byproduct of the iPad design and testing process. Looked at another way, the iPad is little more than a rehash of features found in half a dozen previous products.
Steve Cheney
It’s clear from a strategic perspective that Apple has thought about vertical integration incredibly deeply. Their choice to enter the CPU business was not made lightly, and reflects a platform heritage and an ability to steer developers (afforded by huge network effects). We will likely find out what's really inside the A4 soon. But one thing is already clear: Apple is sowing the groundwork to make architecture changes seamless—developers will only need to flip a switch to give their apps blazing, native performance.
Ilya Vedrashko, Hill Holiday Blog
Back in January, we greeted the announcement of Apple’s upcoming ad network with cautious optimism and a lot of questions. Today, Apple’s iAd team headed by the now former CEO of Quattro Wireless Andy Miller visited Hill Holliday to fuel the former and answer the latter. Here is what we can share.
Dan Miller, Macworld
If you have a Macbook Air (or any other laptop, for that matter) with a solid-state drive, you can increase its battery life by forcing it to hibernate instead of sleep.
Adam C. Engst, TidBITS
Princeton University's Office of Information Technology has posted a document describing networking problems suffered by roughly half of the 40 iPads on campus. The problem isn't so much experienced by the iPad as caused by it - here's what's happening.
John C. Welch, Macworld
The challenge anytime Apple rolls out information well ahead of a product release is that the details can be decidedly sparse. So long as you keep that in mind and are willing to apply a bit of logical speculation, though, you can get a pretty good idea of what to expect from the iPhone 4.0 update on the IT front.
Neven Mrgan’s Tumbl
iPhone OS 4.0 has multitasking. This is not the multitasking you’re used to. The sooner you accept this, the better.
Lukas Mathis, Ignore The Code
Rafe Needleman, CNET News
I've been adapting to the iPad's niggles for two weeks and I will continue to. It's a fun and beautiful device, and it is actually useful both at work and at home. Although my affection for this device is tempered by the expanding list of annoyances, I'm hanging on to it in the hope, which I think is reasonable, that most of these issues will get fixed. That's the price you pay for drinking the Kool-Aid. I mean, being an early adopter.
Brooke Crothers, CNET News
Laura Miller, Salon
Without decent metadata, iBooks is even more annoying than the App Store.
David Carnoy, CNET News
"The iPad does everything the Air does," she went, "so there isn't much of a reason for the Air to continue." The opinion was clearly hers, not Apple's, but she spoke with such conviction I felt it must be based in some sort of fact--or perhaps she was just hanging around too many geniuses at the Genius Bar downstairs.
Eliot Van Buskirk, Wired News
“Yes, we still allow developers or other advertising companies to serve ads within their apps,” Apple spokeswoman Trudy Muller told Wired.com. However, section 3.3.9 of Apple’s new developers’ agreement appears to hobble non-Apple advertising networks, even though the company will allow them onto its devices.
Jenna Wortham, New York Times
With Apple having sold 50 million iPhones, it was perhaps inevitable that a cottage industry of iPhone repair shops would spring up.
Simon Dumenco, Advertising Age
Want to be a pathetic, passive, compliant consumer? There's an app for that.
Paul Boutin, Venture Beat
The waiting is the hardest part: iPhone and iPad app developers are still trying to find out exactly what Apple means by changes to the wording of its developer contract that appear to ban important software functions widely used by app developers.
On the other hand, it’s become widely accepted as fact that going forward, Apple won’t allow Flash apps to be converted to iPhone / iPad apps — no way, no-how, no excuses.
MacSoda
These days Mr. Jobs seems to be responding to everyone.
Jim Finkle, Reuters
Apple Inc's decision to delay the sale of its iPad overseas may frustrate customers in Germany, France or Japan -- but it brightened the day of at least a few crafty fans closer to home.
So-called resellers, opportunists who scoop up hot products and sell them over the Web at inflated prices, have recently been charging premiums of more than $500 on sites like Craigslist or eBay for the iPad.
Dan Frakes, Macworld
If you’ve got a Magic Mouse and wish you could take better advantage of its technology, you owe it to yourself—and your mouse—to give MagicPrefs a try. Given that it’s free, what do you have to lose?
Marco Tabini, Macworld
Apple has released a new version of the tools that patches a number of bugs, as well as introducing the occasional bit of new functionality.
David Chartier, Macworld
Security Update 2010-003 for Snow Leopard, Leopard Client, and Leopard Server fixes exactly one vulnerability: the potential execution of arbitrary code when viewing or even just downloading a document with a maliciously-crafted embedded font.
Dan Moren, Macworld
Don Reisinger, CNET News
The Communication Ministry's decision to ban iPads in Israel is mainly due to the limited testing it has been able to perform on the device. It has asked iDigital, Apple's Israel distributor, for details on how the iPad works. But until it's satisfied, U.S. iPads are not welcome within its borders.
David Dahlquist, Macworld
New in CoverScout 3.3 is integration with Equinux’s SongGenie 2, which analyzes your iTunes library, looking for untitled and misspelled tracks, as well as tracks without lyrics, and spruces them up by automatically correcting these issues.
Dan Frakes, Macworld
Which should you choose, the iPad Keyboard Dock or a Bluetooth keyboard? It depends on how you plan to use an external keyboard. I've been using both options over the past week or so; here are some things to consider when making your decision.
David Chartier, Macworld
Apple has updated Backup, one of the overlooked perks of MobileMe, to version 3.2. The update is about par for the course, including reliability improvements, but it introduces one interesting new feature apparently borrowed from Time Machine: automatically recycling old backups to conserve space.
Chris Foresman, Ars Technica
Apple had originally planned to slowly roll out the iPad around the world beginning April 24. However, due to "surprisingly strong US demand," Apple has announced that it will delay the international launch of the iPad until late May.
Philip Michaels, Macworld
Kirk McElhearn, Macworld
One feature that is greatly improved compared to both the iPhone and iPod touch is the ability to create and edit playlists on the iPad. The only possibility on these smaller devices is to use the on-the-go playlist feature. But the iPad has some extra-large playlist creation features—here’s what you can do to make your own playlists on the iPad.
Dave Winer, Scripting News
To be clear -- the future iPad has a keyboard and word processing software. They're going to roll out all the features of the Mac, one step at a time, bud this time they're going to avoid the pitfalls. Their ace in the hole -- if they don't like how something is going, they have the power to nuke it. Adobe is the first BigCo to get the message. Everyone who follows will get the same message.
Anders Bylund, Motley Fool
So it's in Adobe's best interests to talk peace with Apple, but posturing on both sides makes that look impossible.
IT World
So, unless things change drastically between Apple and Adobe in the next few weeks, from what I'm hearing you can expect to see Adobe taking Apple to court over the issue. It's not going to be pretty.
Michael Grothaus, TUAW
The problem with Jobs' answer is that Apple does not own any trademark on the word "pad." In fact, a quick check of Apple's Trademark List reveals only two trademarks with the word "pad" in them: iPad and MacPAD.
Farhad Manjoo, Slate Magazine
Does that mean Google is doomed to lose to Apple?
David Carnoy, CNET News
God, I loved her. Honest, smart, a good sense of humor. Why should I care that the iPad was a first-generation device? I wanted one. I had to have one. She'd sold me with her zen-like anti-sell and I realized that a thousand iPad ads seared into my retinas had taken their toll and worn me down. I was a beaten man, ready to submit.
Chris Foresman, Ars Technica
Apple's approach in the new 15" and 17" MacBook Pros differs from Optimus in two key ways. The first is that the switching is all handled automatically by Mac OS X without any user intervention (though there is actually a System Preference to deactivate it, if you choose). The second way that it differs from Optimus is that the integrated graphics are powered down when the discrete GPU is active. This saves even more power than Optimus does, leading to a stated battery life as long as nine hours.
AppleInsider
Preliminary benchmark tests with Apple's new 15-inch Intel Core i7 MacBook Pro shows the notebook's CPU has gained a 50 percent performance boost over its Core 2 Duo predecessor.
Alec Saunders, CircleID
As Microsoft learned from their experience with Borland, Jobs and co need to be mindful that developers will naturally migrate to tools which offer advantages such as productivity improvements, cost savings, or user experience benefits. Prohibitions, unfortunately, will only work for Apple for a short time. Ultimately, they must choose to compete for the hearts and minds of developers.
Leander Kahney, Cult of Mac
Chris Foresman, Ars Technica
Those hooking up the latest MacBook Pros to an HDTV using an HDMI adapter can now do so a little more easily: Apple has updated its implementation of Mini DisplayPort to pass audio signals through to any device that supports them.
Cameron Sturdevant, eWeek
My MacWorld experience showed that enterprise management tools for Apple products are bobbing to the surface. IT managers in regulated industries should acquire tools that bring the Mac into the management fold for compliance reasons. Configuration management tools are also available to help ensure that required software and patches are available so end users can concentrate on work, not system management.
Mark Sigal, O'Reilly Media
As the iPad descends upon us, it is fair to ask, "Is this the beginning of the end, or the end of the beginning?" Depending upon whom you ask, the conclusions widely vary.
Lex Friedman, Macworld
This 5.0 release offers full 64-bit Snow Leopard compatibility, along with improved expansion performance and a freshly-redesigned interface for creating and editing text shortcuts.
Derrick Story, Macworld
iPhoto '09 integration is one of the many improvements added to Aperture 3. With a little planning, you can migrate your iPhoto library quickly and easily.
AppleInsider
Apple on Tuesday issued long-awaited updates to its MacBook Pro line of notebook computers, upgrading them to Intel's latest high-end Core i7, Core i5 and Core 2 Duo mobile processors, and adding new automated graphics switching technology.
Jackie Dove, Macworld
Not surprisingly, Adobe has incorporated a long list of user requests into this upgrade—notably the ability to drag and drop a file into an open document to create a new layer and to simultaneously adjust the opacity of multiple layers. Enhancements to the image editor’s warping and painting capabilities, selection-refinement tools, photographic tools, and 3D features—not to mention the program’s ability to work with huge files—are the hallmarks of the CS5 release. It's all accomplished with relatively little change to the program's familiar interface.
Olga Kharif, BusinessWeek
Jim Dalrymple, CNET News
We had a feeling it would be the case, but Apple CEO Steve Jobs confirmed on Monday that the original iPhone would not run the company's newest iPhone OS.
Benjamin Clymer, Forbes (blog)
Computer nerds, tech columnists and the general public may not know where the iPad fits into the existing media consumption landscape--but the blind and visually impaired see it as the only e-reader worth owning. Call it further proof that Apple is more than just a pretty face.
Lucas Mearian, CIO
The rapid spread of tablet devices like the Apple iPad and HP Slate could prove to be a boon to providers of online storage services as users seek ubiquitous data access and synchronisation across multiple mobile platforms for devices that don't have much internal storage capacity.
Morey Haber, CIO
When will Apple become a juicy target for hackers and cyber-crooks? Industry experts have predicted that as Apple's market share grows, so will the malware targeting its platforms. To date, this has yet to happen, but why?
Bill Ray, Register
Last week Apple announced version 4 of the iPhone OS, adding a lot of stuff which makes the iPhone harder to insult, but also adding the ability to send SMS messages from within an application. That might seem a minor addition, but if it lasts into the final release it could open the way to a host of applications which draw their revenue direct from the customer without having to go through iTunes, or Apple.
Alexander Vaughn, App Advice
Opera has just announced that Apple has finally decided to approve their alternative iPhone browser, Opera mini.
David Bunnell, All2GetherNow
Just as my vision turned into a painful blur, Steve turned to Andrew and asked, "What makes you think a dull PC guy like yourself can appreciate an elegant machine for artists like the Macintosh?"
Marco Tabini, Macworld
Well-known independent Mac developer The Omni Group has announced that it will extend its 30-day refund guarantee to sales of its iPhone OS software made through Apple's App Store.
John Siracusa, Ars Technica
Apple is playing a dangerous game of chicken with itself. On one hand you have its mobile platform strategy and associated products, succeeding in the market and growing ever upwards and outwards. On the other hand you have the policies that are ostensibly making this happen, pissing off developers and causing high-level corporate clashes. If the platform outruns the angry developers and partners, Apple wins, and wins big. But if things start to go south for the platform, Apple's options are becoming fewer by the day.
Peter Bright, Ars Technica
The new 3.3.1 terms tie developers' hands, yet do nothing to ensure that applications are high quality or that platform features are exploited by software developers. In our view, the targets remain Adobe and Android, and everyone—except perhaps Apple—still loses.
Ramu Nagappan, Macworld
Christopher Breen, Macworld
Thomas Fitzgerald
The worst thing about this is the way that Adobe are trying to claim the moral high ground and claim that they are only trying to forwarding the interests of developers, and some people are actually believing them.
Andrew Leonard, Salon
It is long past time for us to dispense with binary notions of closed versus open, and instead think of the technology ecosystem as populated by multiple hybrid beasties. In this new landscape, some succeed with tighter, proprietary models -- Apple -- while others flourish through a comparatively greater embrace of openness -- Google. But everyone competes on a basically level playing field -- the Internet and the ever-lower cost of computing processing power make certain of that. In this environment, you fail when you don't deliver real value to your customers, not because you chose a strategy that was more open or closed than that of your competitors, and especially not because you leveraged your market dominance into crushing a competitor who might have had a better product than yours.
Apple is not the new Microsoft. Nobody is the new Microsoft. That's because the Internet won.
Carolyn Kellogg, Los Angeles Times
Books on the iPad are electronic without losing their essential bookness, in a way that e-books haven't been before.
Louis Gerbarg, /dev/why!?!
Ideally Apple should have some provisions for adjunct or secondary runtimes that let developers use internal scripting. Failing that, Apple should include some language interpreters on the system that games can use for their app logic. While not as flexible as letting games include their own interpreters, if Apple exposed JavascriptCore outside of UIWebView, and included a Lua interpreter in the base system it would solve this as practical a issue for many games.
Sharon Zardetto, Macworld
Have you ever noticed the miniature icon that sits next to a window’s name in its title bar? It’s more than just a decoration. In many instances, you can work with this icon—known as the proxy icon—just as you would a full-size file icon in the Finder, which can often save you the hassle of navigating back to the original item to copy or move it. And document proxy icons offer their own unique opportunities. Here are some of my favorite time-saving tricks.
Jason Snell, Macworld
As Thursday showed, Apple’s management is being aggressive in making moves that they believe will place the company at a competitive advantage. Whether or not they’re the right moves remains to be seen, but I don't think why Apple is making them is any sort of mystery.
Joe Kissell, TidBITS
Jean-Louis Gassée, Monday Note
Steve Jobs has seen enough in his 34 years in the computer business to know, deeply, that he doesn’t want to be at the mercy of cross-platform tools that could erase Apple’s competitive advantage.
Cho Ji-hyun, Korea Herald
Among smartphone manufacturers, Apple was picked as most competitive when examining seven different fields, an international financial service group recently said.
Mike Benbow, HeraldNet
Resistance is not futile, and Apple is a good example of that.
Jackie Dove, Macworld
The program is now 64-bit native to take advantage of the full memory of the CPU, even when users are working on high-resolution projects.
Jackie Dove, Macworld
Dreamweaver now features authoring and testing support for third-party, PHP-based content management systems like WordPress, Joomla!, and Drupal, allowing designers to get accurate views of dynamic Web content from within Dreamweaver.
Jackie Dove, Macworld
With InDesign CS5, Adobe’s page layout program has assumed a new dimension that takes the app beyond the traditional boundaries of print production. This new version lets you create documents that can incorporate complex interactivity, animation, Flash video, and MP3 audio files without working in a timeline or writing code.
Jackie Dove, Macworld
Adobe has unveiled Flash Catalyst CS5, a new professional design tool that lets users create Web application interfaces and design interactivity without writing code. Together with Flash Professional CS5 and Flash Builder 4, Flash Catalyst enhances collaboration between designers and developers.
Jackie Dove, Macworld
Among the major updates are features such as Content-Aware Fill, Puppet Warp, and HDR Pro and HDR Toning. There are also new painting effects, a new version of the Camera Raw plug-in, automated lens correction, flexible custom panels, a new workspace switcher, and more.
Jackie Dove, Macworld
Adobe has introduced a host of improvements and new capabilities to Illustrator CS5, its flagship vector drawing program. Among them are perspective drawing, a bristle brush, and integration with its new Flash Catalyst CS5.
Jackie Dove, Macworld
Adobe has launched Premiere Pro CS5, an upgrade of its professional nonlinear video editing package. With it, Adobe has introduced the Mercury Playback Engine, a technology that allows users to open projects faster, refine effects-rich HD sequences in real time, experience smooth scrubbing, and play back complex projects without rendering.
Todd Shields, Bloomberg
Google Inc. Chief Executive Officer Eric Schmidt said Apple Inc.’s move into mobile advertising shows the market is competitive and Google’s bid for AdMob Inc. should be approved by U.S. regulators.
Robert Scoble, Scobleizer
Because, well, if you hire a developer who can do Objective-C that developer is generally going to be a lot more talented than someone who can only do Flash. That developer will come up with some cool new features that the Flash or .NET versions won’t have (or, even worse, can’t have because those systems must compile to a lowest-common-denominator).
Steve Jobs wins this game. Why? Because he — unlike in 1994 — controls the developers.
Sharing The Truth One Thread At A TIme
Adobe made a wrong bet in 1996 and is suffering the consequences in 2010 and has no one to blame except themselves. It’s Adobe’s turn to show that it matters to Apple and the tech industry. I don’t remember Apple or Steve Jobs whining in 1996-2006 about Adobe not contributing to the Apple ecosystem.
Kirk McElhearn, Kirkville
In the end, the decision to buy a book from one or another will be, in part, fueled by a book’s availability (Amazon has far more books than Apple). But given the choice, at the same price, I’d choose to buy books for iBooks, because the reading experience is more flexible, and the display of text more attractive.
Steven Johnson, New York Times
Whatever Apple chooses to do with its platform in the coming years, it has made one thing clear: sometimes, if you get the conditions right, a walled garden can turn into a rain forest.
Beatweek
Henry Blodget, Business Insider
"We’ve been there before, and intermediate layers between the platform and the developer ultimately produces sub-standard apps and hinders the progress of the platform."
Henry Blodget, Business Insider
Remember that investigation into whether Apple, Google, Intel, IBM, and other big tech companies had a secret agreement not to poach each other's employees? Well, government investigators have found enough to be concerned about that they're stepping up the probe.
Fred Vogelstein, Wired News
Six months ago an Apple analyst told me he thought the company’s long-term goal was to become the internet’s cable TV company. I didn’t get it then. I really get it now.
Nicholas Kolakowski, eWeek
Apple's iPad weight, size and usage mode places it at risk for a higher rate of accidents, according to Rapid Repair, which publishes an online teardown of the electronic devices it repairs. While the iPad's larger screen presents a bigger target for accidental collisions, and generates more force in falls, Apple's engineers have likely used data from the iPod Touch and iPhone development to improve the iPad's design choices.
Callan Tham, Trapper's Swamp
Don't play the game if you don't understand how to win it, or if you're not there to win it. And washing dirty linen, or attacking fellow opposition politicians in public, might win you some applause but it will not win you elections. And to that end, politicians like Ng and Chee ought to do us all a favour and fade into the sunset. And bring their baggage with them.
Dan Grigsby, Mobile Orchard
Ask permission environments crush creativity and innovation. In healthy environments, when would-be innovators/creators identify opportunities the only thing that stands between the idea and its realization is work. In the iPhone OS environment when you see an opportunity, you put in work first, ask Apple’s permission and then, only after gaining their approval, your idea can be realized.
Bijan Sabet
The web wins again!
Tom Kaneshige, PC World
Apple has had one of the most spectacular weeks in mobile tech history, taking dead aim at Adobe, Amazon and now Google.
Hank Williams, Why Does Everything Suck?
I have no question that this will be tested in court. I don't think there has ever been a case like this because only Apple could make such a ridiculous attempt to control how developers work. But what is interesting here is that allowing this provision to go to trial may put the entire App Store concept under a legal microscope. Because it seems to me there is a reasonable risk that not only is 3.3.1 restraint of trade, but that the entire "you can only sell apps on iPhones and iPod touches that we approve" thing is found to be restraint of trade. Wouldn't that be tasty.
JR Raphael, PC World
Brad Stone, New York Times
In releasing e-book numbers that mean little, Apple is taking a cue from its rival, Amazon.com.
Terry Heaton’s PoMo Blog
So the fact that it is Apple that’s trying to put the toothpaste back into the tube with its “i” series of devices and ecosystems is truly stunning, if you take a step back and look at the bigger picture.
But for all that’s happening, I think it is Wozniak’s spirit that will prevail, for once having tasted freedom, it’s pretty hard for people to go the other way.
Rob Walker, New York Times
We shouldn’t make fun of early adopters for their vanity; we should thank them for being our guinea pigs, and enthusiastic ones at that.
Farhad Manjoo, Slate Magazine
Why is Steve Jobs trying to convince us that iPhone ads are a good thing?
Peter Bright, Ars Technica
Apple's current—and in our opinion, objectionable—position is now close to the complete opposite of its initial stance. From promoting openness and standards, the company is now pushing for an ever more locked-down and restricted platform. It's bad for competition, it's bad for developers, and it's bad for consumers.
Jacqui Cheng, Ars Technica
Thursday's announcement immediately turned up evidence that Apple might be adding a flash to the iPhone's camera, thanks to functions named VCaptureDevice.hasFlash, AVCaptureDevice.flashMode, and AVCaptureDevice.hasTorch. Apple is allegedly investigating LED flash options, which would make such a feature very BlackBerry-like. Additionally, the latest iPhone SDK continues to contain hints about a front-facing camera as well as iChat support.
AppleInsider
The primary reason for the change, say sources familiar with Apple's plans, is to support sophisticated new multitasking APIs in iPhone 4.0. The system will now be evaluating apps as they run in order to implement smart multitasking. It can't do this if apps are running within a runtime or are cross compiled with a foreign structure that doesn't behave identically to a native C/C++/Obj-C app.
John Gruber, Daring Fireball
The number one priority at Apple is to grow mobile market share faster than Android. Anything that is not directly competitive with Android is on the back burner.
rc3.org
Apple already has very wide latitude in deciding which apps will be approved for the store. If apps are low quality, they can be declined. And Apple can always issue more guidelines to application developers based on the content of the apps rather than on which tools were used to build them, requiring companies who create libraries to help produce iPhone applications to meet certain standards in terms of look, feel, and functionality in order to be included. It’s not necessary to cut everyone off.
Twitter Blog
We're thrilled to announce that we've entered into an agreement with Atebits (aka Loren Brichter) to acquire Tweetie, a leading iPhone Twitter client. Tweetie will be renamed Twitter for iPhone and made free (currently $2.99) in the iTunes AppStore in the coming weeks.
Peter Elstrom, Bloomberg
“To the extent new releases of operating systems or other third-party products, platforms or devices, such as the Apple iPhone or iPad, make it more difficult for our products to perform, and our customers are persuaded to use alternative technologies, our business could be harmed,” Adobe said today in the filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission under a “risk factors” heading.
The filing signals that tensions between Adobe and Apple are escalating as Apple Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs snubs the Flash standard, used on almost all computers in the U.S. Yesterday, Apple released new rules that force application developers to write programs directly for the iPhone operating system, not intermediary software such as Adobe’s products.
I, Cringely
“What I can’t figure out is why he (Steve Jobs) is even trying (to be the CEO of Apple)? ” wondered Bill. “He knows he can’t win.”
It is easy to see what Gates meant if you look at a comparison of the two companies in June, 1998. But look at the two companies today.
Rob Griffiths, Macworld
iMovie’s user interface is unlike anything I’ve ever seen in any other video editing package. Whenever I try to use iMovie, I find its interface constantly interferes with my ability to actually get anything done. Sometimes different is good, but sometimes, different is just different.
Dan Gillmor, Mediactive
Jumping into an ecosystem like this violates fundamental journalistic principles, I believe. And the more popular the iPad gets the more potentially dangerous this could become to the information ecosystem.
Again, Apple has every right to push around its customers and media “partners” in pursuit of its business goals. What bothers me is the media companies’ willingness to cede so much of their authority to a company that has demonstrated its willingness to abuse it.
Luke Bornheimer, 9 To 5 Mac
Apple has started to reject apps with the word "Pad" in their title that do not explicitly use wording such as, "runs on," "for," "for use with," and/or "compatible with."
Brooke Crothers, CNET News
In the wake of the iPad rollout frenzy, new MacBook rumors are touching a raw nerve among the Apple laptop faithful.
Scott Kirsner, HarvardBusiness.org
Clint Ecker, Ars Technica
Anders Carlsson, an Apple employee, announced today on the WebKit mailing list an evolution of the WebKit project called WebKit2.
WebKit2's major aims are to bake both a "split process model" and a non-blocking API into the WebKit product—and by extension into Safari and any other client which takes advantage of the WebKit2 framework.
John Gruber, Daring Fireball
So from Apple’s perspective, changing the iPhone Developer Program License Agreement to prohibit the use of things like Flash CS5 and MonoTouch to create iPhone apps makes complete sense. I’m not saying you have to like this. I’m not arguing that it’s anything other than ruthless competitiveness. I’m not arguing (up to this point) that it benefits anyone other than Apple itself. I’m just arguing that it makes sense from Apple’s perspective — and it was Apple’s decision to make.
Stephen Coles, The Font Feed
A device designed for media consumption could validate Apple’s dedication to design by emphasizing design’s most basic element: typography. But so far, it flops.
New York Times
Does the iPad offer designers and users a new medium, or is it merely an iPod Touch on steroids? How much does the form factor of a device drive the creation of new kinds of content and how that content is read, heard and watched?
Rich Jaroslovsky, BusinessWeek
He read, he worked, he played games, he made a lady gasp. His weekend with the Super Tablet.
Bob Tedeschi, New York Times
If you budget around $100 for a few new and upgraded apps, you can easily make the iPad into much more of a constant companion than something you just trot out when the neighbors are watching.
Eli Milchman, Cult of Mac
Boy, Steve Jobs doesn’t mess around, does he. Not content with his Google throwdown, he’s challenging the entire telecommunications industry with the iPhone’s new Background VoIP.
Adam C. Engst, TidBITS
After Apple announced that 300,000 iPads had been sold on the first day (meaning, via pre-order and on the first day), many people wondered if the iPad would maintain its sales velocity. The answer would seem to be yes, with Jobs stating that as of today Apple has sold 450,000 iPads, meaning that another 150,000 have left shelves in the subsequent four days (one of which was Easter Sunday, when few Apple Stores were open).
John Brownlee, Cult of Mac
The real improvement here, actually, is the way that iBooks will now automatically sync your page and bookmarks across devices, just like the Kindle. What that means is if you leave your iPad at home, you can read your iBook on the iPhone from the page you left off.
Riva Richmond, New York Times
Today, when Apple gave a preview of the next version of the iPhone operating system, it was great to hear about the new features that could help consumers cope with the privacy and security issues involving location-based services.
Matt Asay, CNET News
In recent years Apple has created its own reality distortion field, similar to the one created by Microsoft, by virtue of a steady stream of winning, innovative products.
Sure, people still say "But it's not like Windows," but now they mean that as a reason to use Apple products, rather than to avoid them. This reasoning leads to a free pass on just about all Apple design decisions, some of which may not actually make sense.
Lance Whitney, CNET News
Ottawa-based Wi-LAN, which patents wireless products, is suing around 18 of the tech industry's largest players over what it claims are patent violations of Bluetooth technology. More specifically, Wi-LAN is alleging that these companies--which include Acer, Apple, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Lenovo, Motorola, Sony, and Toshiba--have all infringed on one of its U.S. patents for selling PCs and mobile phones equipped with Bluetooth.
Dan Moren, Macworld
The ability to run multiple apps, folders for organizing your mobile applications, and Mail improvements lead the major changes coming in the next version of the iPhone operating system. Apple gave a sneak peek Thursday at a developer preview of iPhone OS 4.0, which is coming later this summer.
Marco Tabini, Macworld
Apple introduced a new advertising platform designed specifically for the iPhone OS platform during the company’s iPhone 4.0 preview event on Thursday. The new technology, dubbed “iAd,” will be built straight into the forthcoming update to Apple's mobile operating system.
iAd allows developers to include ads directly into their apps. The ads, in turn, are designed to provide a rich promotional environment, complete with what are essentially mini apps-inside-the-app that, according to Jobs, are written entirely using the HTML5 standard—a clear jab in the direction of Adboe's competing Flash platform.
Chris Holt, Macworld
Due out “later this year,” Game Center is a social network platform for games that will allow you to invite friends, do automatic matchmaking, compare yourself to other players via leaderboards, and earn achievements. Think of it as Xbox Live for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad users. “We want to make gaming even better on the iPhone, so we’re adding a social gaming network,” explained Scott Forstall, senior vice president of iPhone Software during Apple’s iPhone OS 4 announcement.
Jason Snell, Macworld
Apple is achieving the appearance of multitasking—the ability to run more than one program at a time—through a combination of app-switching features and background processes managed by the operating system itself. What is not being added to iPhone OS 4.0 is the more traditional concept of apps running, full bore, whether you can see that or not.
rc3.org
It looks like Apple wants to make sure that being multi-platform stays expensive, and that people just stick with building applications for today’s dominant platform — iPhone.
John Gruber, Daring Fireball
My reading of this new language is that cross-compilers, such as the Flash-to-iPhone compiler in Adobe’s upcoming Flash Professional CS5 release, are prohibited. This also bans apps compiled using MonoTouch — a tool that compiles C# and .NET apps to the iPhone.
Gregg Keizer, Computerworld
Adobe will flip the switch next week on a service that silently updates customers’ copies of its popular Reader and Acrobat PDF programs, the company’s chief security executive said Thursday.
Robert Mohns, Macintouch
Conceptually, the iPad is a blank canvas. The big screen becomes whatever it needs to be. It's a transformative experience, and it enables the iPad to be something that the iPhone and iPod Touch never could be — a creator's tool.
Eric A. Taub, New York Times
The $60 Jump Start, from DLO, doesn’t cover the entire back of an iPhone or iPod. Instead, the device, black and rubbery, slips over about the middle two-thirds of the phone, allowing it to maintain its sleek shape.
Seth Weintraub, 9 To 5 Mac
Justin Long (Mac) told the Onion's AV section that Apple's iconic 'Get a Mac' ads might be done. In fact, he's heard from John Hodgman (PC) that Apple was "moving on".
Greg Kumparak, MobileCrunch
Coming in at just shy of 4,500 lines of code, the entire purpose of AdLib appears to be to bring native app-esque functionality to Web Apps, often counteracting the default behaviors that make Safari play nice with the rest of the web.
Joshua Kennon
Sascha Segan, PC Magazine
The iPad is fast. Since we have quite a few Apple products around here, we decided to see just how fast, by benchmarking it against an iPhone 3GS, an iPod Touch (3rd generation), an original iPhone and my 2.2-Ghz Intel Core Duo MacBook Pro.
Unsurprisingly, the iPad beat all the other portable products. On the most comprehensive publicly available native benchmarking app, BenchTest, it proved 1.6 times as fast as the iPhone 3GS and 3.72 times as fast as the original iPhone.
John Manning, Secret Lab
All promotional images of the iPhone show the time as 9:42 AM. Nobody knew the exact reason why, though theories abound. But on the iPad, the time is shown as 9:41 AM. Hmm.
AppleInsider
Apple has created a new development framework to enable rich web apps for iPad using simple HTML, CSS and JavaScript, following its previous efforts to do the same for the iPhone and within iTunes.
Brian Palmer, Slate Magazine
Microsoft wasn't allowed to bundle Internet Explorer with its operating system. Should Apple get to decide what software goes on the iPad?
Mat Honan, Gizmodo
As early adopters, the opportunity to define proper etiquette is ours.
Marco Tabini, Macworld
In the end, private frameworks remain edge cases; the vast majority of apps that are submitted to the App Store are either approved or rejected on a basis other than private framework usage, and the numbers clearly indicate that this issue has not prevented the formation of a vibrant—and profitable—software ecosystem around iPhone OS.
Dan Moren, Macworld
If you’re dissatisfied with the way OS X’s built-in application switcher interface works, then you might consider the latest version of Many Tricks’s Witch window switching utility, which on Wednesday was updated to version 3.
AppleInsider
Apple refused to accept one iPad application to its App Store until the proprietary "pinch to expand" multi-touch gesture, which is found in Apple's own Photos application, was removed, a developer has told AppleInsider.
Owen Fletcher, IDG News Service
The Federal Trade Commission may be preparing to challenge Google’s planned acquisition of AdMob on antitrust concerns, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Dan Miller, Macworld
My hands-down favorite new Mac app of the past year or so has been Dropbox. One reason I like it: I keep discovering new things it can do.
John Gruber, Daring Fireball
Apple hasn’t thought of everything with iPad, but what they’ve thought about, they’ve thought about very deeply.
Jay J. Nelson, Macworld
I wholeheartedly recommend Veenix TypeBook Creator 2.4.1 to anyone who has struggled with choosing appropriate fonts for a project. Its unique feature set lets you explore the fonts you have, offers the best selection of layouts for specimen pages, and is reasonably priced.
Dan Frakes, Macworld
You could just go out and buy new “Made for iPad” accessories. But we’ve spent the past few days testing the iPad with existing accessories to see if you can reuse those add-ons. Here’s what we’ve determined so far.
Leslie Grandy, Technorati
Given the explosion of Apple retail locations, and the correlating growth in Mac share, if ever there was a time to hold an authorized reseller to their agreement, it is now with the launch of the iPad and it most definitely is with Amazon.
Vanessa Miller, Daily Camera
About 80 students and 12 of their teachers will get the 16G Wi-Fi iPads -- which retail for $499 -- to help with reading, studying, researching and experimentation. Headmaster Brian Johnson said he'll consider expanding the use of the devices to other grades if everything goes well.
John C. Dvorak, PC Magazine
What is completely overlooked at the moment, is the potential to sink Microsoft, once and for all—or at least relegate the company to commodity computing (formerly known as desktop computing). The irony, of course, is that Microsoft predicted the trend toward pad computing. It just didn't predict that it, as a company, wouldn't be playing in the big game.
Howard Kurtz, Washington Post
Lyons apologized Tuesday for misstating the sequence of events. The conversations he recalled -- quite vividly, he says, because he "was so freaked by it" -- took place shortly after Newsweek agreed to hire him as Levy's successor, not before. Lyons says Levy told him directly that Apple was upset at his hiring and told others at Newsweek (including then-business editor David Jefferson).
Jacqui Cheng, Ars Technica
The iPad isn't a big iPod touch—an iPod touch is a miniature iPad that restricts the full multitouch experience in exchange for offering greater portability. With the iPad, in contrast, you get multitouch the way it was meant to be done. That's one of our many take-aways after having submerged ourselves in iPad land since launch. The larger screen doesn't just offer more space to work with—it opens up a different and more immersive user experience. Because of this different experience, though, the closed nature of the platform can get under some users' skin in ways the iPhone and iPod touch do not.
Still, the iPad is likely to just be a starting point for Apple and for multitouch computing in general. There are obvious downsides to the device—we'll tell you what those are—but it's clear that it does sit in its own category that floats somewhere between a smartphone and a laptop, and it serves different purposes than either its smaller or bigger siblings. But we're getting ahead of ourselves.
Rosa Golijan, Gizmodo
The iPad doesn't have a built-in camera, but you can give it something better. By putting an app onto each an iPad and an iPhone, you can connect the two via bluetooth and have a wireless camera for your iPad.
Chris Foresman, Ars Technica
iPad owners may get a (very) small reprieve when going through security checkpoints at US airports. The Transportation Security Administration told the Associated Press that iPads generally do not need to be removed from carry-on luggage when going through X-ray screening.
Todd Lappin, Laughing Squid
My iPhone-savvy 2.5 year-old daughter held an iPad for the very first time last night, and it turned out to be an interesting user-interface experiment.
John Carroll, ZDNet
I won’t ever stop rooting for another company to take bigger market share so long as Apple is the kind of company that it is (Google seems the most likely candidate). But, I will appreciate the design of their products.
Rick Broida, CNET News
Howard Hill, The Guardian
For dyslexics, books are much easier to read on its screen.
Tim Wu, Slate Magazine
The iPad is Steve Jobs' final victory over the company's co-founder Steve Wozniak.
Jeff Carlson, TidBITS
Now that I have an iPad in my hands, I've discovered some new techniques and hidden shortcuts, and also found myself making heavier use of existing iPhone shortcuts (including a few I didn't realize were there).
Marco Tabini, Macworld
If you feel like your brand-new iPad isn’t working with wireless networks the way you think it should, the problem may not be in your head. Apple’s support forums contain a number of comments from frustrated users who are experiencing problems while trying to set up their Wi-Fi connections. And Apple itself has posted a support note and FAQ on Wi-Fi and the iPad.
Dan Miller, Macworld
For now, file management is the biggest weakness in Apple’s iWork apps. Otherwise, they—and particularly Keynote—look like nicely capable mobile apps that fall somewhere short of their full-fledged desktop counterparts. The iPad as business machine? These iWork apps make it plausible.
Andy Ihnatko's Celestial Waste of Bandwidth (BETA)
See, I learned exactly what it’s like to be the star of “The Hot Spot,” “Career Opportunities” and “Mulholland Falls.” Everywhere I went — the speakers’ office, Monday evening’s party, and even during my panels — everyone was really happy I was there but it was the same story. It quickly became clear that while they liked me as a person, they mostly thought of me as the support and mobility system for two big, meaty, luscious things.
Namely, my iPad, plus the MiFi mobile WiFi access point that would let them see the Netflix streaming app in operation.
Marco Arment
This app’s undocumented API use wouldn’t pass the App Store submission process, yet developers need to compete with it for App Store attention.
Jay Yarow, Business Insider
Dave Winer, Scripting News
Like everyone else who got one, I am trying to figure out how to make it my own. I keep hitting frustrating limits. I want to use it to write. Impossible, I've discovered. None of my writing tools are there. Not just the ones I use to enter keystrokes into the computer, and edit and revise them, but also the tools I use for finding information I want to reference in my stories.
Harry McCracken, Technologizer
Before Saturday, when people asked me how important the iPad was going to be, I told them to judge it not by the sum of the device that Apple released this week. iPad is a platform, and platforms are processes–so if you’re trying to figure out if iPad is a big deal, envision the one that Apple will release a year from now. Then decide.
Don Reisinger, eWeek
The iPad is different. It delivers such a unique take on computing and getting the job done that most companies would likely prefer it over a laptop. It's a surprise, I know. But it's quite true.
Steve Kolowich, Inside Higher Ed
The iPad has landed. But should campuses be throwing it a welcome party?
Liza Daly, Threepress
Overall I’d say iBooks is pretty good for a first-generation ePub reader. The biggest concern is of course that once you purchase books from iTunes, you’re locked in to only reading them in iBooks.
Tonya Engst, TidBITS
Liz Castro, Pigs, Gourds, And Wikis
I opened up a book of poetry and cried for page breaks.
Matt Asay, CNET News
Cory Doctorow believes the iPad signals an end to innovation. It doesn't. Apple's iPad actually points to a beginning of innovation in personal computing. Where Doctorow and I likely agree, however, is that such innovation won't come within the confines of Apple's beautiful iPad device, but rather at its margins.
David Carnoy, CNET News
Several iPad owners are reporting that their iPads have been overheating--and shutting down--after spending as little as ten minutes in the sun. How big an issue is this?
Christopher Breen, Macworld
It's wise to not let a 13-year-old have your credit card number. But there are other ways to help minors legally obtain the media they're after.
Laura Miller, Salon
Surprise! The futuristic device provides an ideal sanctuary for the most old-fashioned leisure activity.
Farhad Manjoo, Slate Magazine
But once you try one, you won't be able to resist.
Adam C. Engst, TidBITS
The iPad becomes the app you're using. That's part of the magic. The hardware is so understated - it's just a screen, really - and because you manipulate objects and interface elements so smoothly and directly on the screen, the fact that you're using an iPad falls away. You're using the app, whatever it may be, and while you're doing so, the iPad is that app. Switch to another app and the iPad becomes that app. If that's not magic, I don't know what is.
Matt Neuburg, TidBITS
My overall reaction to the iPad as a developer is extremely positive. I think the iPad's cheerful, bright screen cries out: "Hey there, programmers and prospective programmers, come on in! The water's fine!"
Erica Ogg, CNET News
A company that has already sued Apple over a patent on zooming and scrolling on a mobile Web browser, is now adding the iPad to the lawsuit Monday.
Jacqui Cheng, Ars Technica
Andy Ihnatko's Celestial Waste of Bandwidth (BETA)
I just got an invite for a special event on the Apple campus on Thursday. Topic: the future of the iPhone OS. Image: the long shadow of a number “4.”
Joe Clark
This was the weekend those of us with high standards lost their remaining residue of patience for ideologues who hyperbolize about open systems without actually creating something people want to use.
Dan Frakes, Macworld
While it has its limitations, especially for power users, it gets most of the basics right, and it excels at the most important tasks: viewing and composing messages, displaying attachments, and connecting reliably to nearly any e-mail server. And while the iPad version is, by my ballpark estimate, 85 percent identical to its iPhone counterpart, that 15-percent difference—which is mainly a product of the iPad’s increased screen space—makes for major increases in usability and productivity.
Ed Hansberry, InformationWeek
I am sure Flash will continue to be around for a long time to come, but Apple may be making enough of a difference to webmasters to ensure that if they want their content viewed on the iPhone or iPad, they will need to rethink how they use Flash on their site, if at all.
Mitch Wagner, Computerworld
Like I said: My wife and I are very happy with our iPads, we're glad we bought them when we did. But I don't want to write yet another blog or article praising the iPad. You can already find a million of those. I just want to let you know about some problems you might encounter if you decide to buy one for yourself.
Bill Briggs, MSNBC
Market cap, one method for measuring a company’s value, may represent the real chase. Among some tech insiders, however, bets on the ultimate winner are all over the board — with many prognosticator linking their forecasts to the potential rise of the iPad — or to long-term, lukewarm reactions to the new tablet.
AppleInsider
Apple on Monday announced that it sold over 300,000 iPads in the U.S. on its first day of availability, including preorders shipped directly to customers, and purchases at Apple retail stores and Best Buy outlets.
Apple also revealed that more than a million applications were downloaded from the App Store for the iPad. Apple's iBookstore saw over 250,000 books downloaded on the first day alone.
Jenna Wortham, New York Times
While many developers have spent weeks working on applications for Apple’s newest toy, only a handful were given iPads on which to test their software. The rest had to wait until the device went on sale Saturday for the moment of truth: How well does our app work on the iPad? Does it look and feel right? Or do we have a lot more work to do?
Adding to the urgency was the knowledge that many of the earliest apps for the iPhone ended up being among the most successful. A slow start with an iPad app could mean getting lost in the clutter of Apple’s crowded online store.
Tony Bradley, PC World
As a Microsoft Word loyalist, I had some minor issues with Pages, but overall it seems to be a more than capable substitute and an app I can rely on if traveling with my iPad and leaving my notebook at home. I won't be abandoning my Windows 7 notebook any time soon, but the iPad does an admirable job filling in as a business tool in addition to simple Web-surfing and playing music.
Mac Stories
Shira Ovide and Russell Adams, Wall Street Journal
Newspaper and magazine companies rushed to prep their titles for the debut of Apple Inc.'s iPad last weekend. But while publishers hail how the tablet computer lets them showcase their wares, some are working to develop ways to sell their publications separately from Apple's iTunes.
Talking Biz News
"And Newsweek hired me anyway, but sure enough, we didn’t get any access, we didn’t get — I don’t have an iPad. I didn’t get a device from Apple."
Don Clark, Wall Street Journal
A look inside Apple Inc.'s new iPad points to more business for some familiar component suppliers to the Silicon Valley giant.
Harry McCracken, PC World
But here’s the thing: one-size fits all buying advice just doesn’t work.
Will Knight, Technology Review
It's lightning fast, intuitive to operate, and very good for tasks certain tasks: reading, watching videos and playing games. If you're into e-books I think it's an excellent platform for that. But I like to input stuff too, and it's a pain to type on. The lack of multitasking, external ports or camera limits its usefulness as a more general-purpose computer.
Alexander Vaughn, App Advice
Dan Miller, Macworld
The iPad Keyboard Dock makes text entry on an iPad feel natural; I could type comfortably enough to write the first draft of this review on it. Using it to type in Pages, I had my first “this isn’t just a big iPod Touch” experience; it really could be a legitimate business tool. If you’re going to use the iPad for work, you’re going to need a keyboard. I can certainly recommend this one.
Jeff Carlson, Seattle Times
My overall impression is that Apple recognizes that details matter, contributing to a great experience. The iPad goes to great lengths to cater to people who are unfamiliar with computers or who respond better when put at ease.
Suw Charman-Anderson, Strange Attractor
Looking at the iPad app rollout, you can easily separate the digital wheat from the chaff in the content industries, and you can see those who are developing digital businesses and those who are trying to protect print margins and who see the iPad as a vertical, closed model to control and monetise content.
Om Malik, GigaOm
In many ways, the iPad’s lack of multitasking ability makes it worthy of focusing on just the task at hand. In my brief usage of the device at the time of its unveiling, I felt a near-complete interaction with an email or a document or a web page. That was near nirvana when it came to consumption of content.
Scott Kirsner, Boston Globe
Few companies generate so much ink around new products, or anticipation of what’s coming next. It seemed like a good time to ask designers, entrepreneurs, and executives around Boston — some former Apple competitors, some ex-employees, and some just admirers — what makes the Silicon Valley company so special, and what they’ve learned from Apple and its famous chief executive.
Shawn Blanc
My first thought was that the iPad actually is the best way to experience the Web. Safari is so fast, and navigating around with your fingertips is so natural.
John Boudreau, San Jose Mercury News
A number of Apple apostles did experience more than the thrill of holding a new shiny object: They got a serendipitous jolt of tech royalty. In San Jose, over-nighters and early-risers got to hobnob with Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, who joined the pre-iPad vigil at 6 p.m. Friday at Valley Fair Shopping Mall. In Palo Alto, Apple CEO Steve Jobs sauntered unannounced into the University Avenue store shortly before noon to drink in the scene.
Lex Friedman, Macworld
Minutes went by, and no iPad arrived. But soon that minute stretched to an hour. And then another.
Rob Griffiths, Macworld
Saturday morning, I found myself in déjà vu land all over again, as they say. I spent the morning standing in line outside the Washington Square Apple Store in Tigard, Oregon—standing in nearly the same spot as when I queued up for the release of the original iPhone in 2007.
iFixIt
The iPad battery is alot bigger than an iPhone 3G battery. The iPhone battery has about 1/5th the capacity provided by the iPad battery.
Serenity Caldwell, David Dahlquist, Lynn La, Roman Loyola, Marco Tabini, Macworld
Early adopters in New York, Massachusetts, and San Francisco clamor for Apple’s latest device.
Dan Frakes, Macworld
For some sites, iPad browsing is an incredible experience; for others, you’ll find yourself saving URLs to visit later on your Mac. The good news is that, compared to the iPhone, the balance has shifted significantly towards the former and away from the latter.
Dan Frakes, Macworld
In short, there’s nothing wrong with your iPad; it’s just hungry for power. In this respect, the iPad is a lot like many USB hard drives and Apple’s external optical drive for the MacBook Air: it needs more juice than the typical USB port provides.
Andy Ihnatko's Celestial Waste of Bandwidth (BETA)
It disappoints me to see commentators on TV today dinging the iPad for a lack of multitasking. A tech expert whose mission is to communicate tricky technology to civilian audiences can’t let that pitch go by with a flat “no.” You also shouldn’t offer a flat “yes” but at least the statement “the iPad OS multitasks” is technically correct. You’re there to educate. Which means that you don’t want people to come away thinking that (for example) iPod playback stops when you try to get your mail or fire off a Tweet.
Peter Burrows, Bloomberg
Microsoft Corp., the world’s largest software maker, has no plans to make a version of its Office suite of programs to run on Apple Inc.’s iPad, said Stephen Elop, president of Microsoft’s business division.
An iPad edition of Office would likely be built by a unit within Microsoft’s consumer business that creates versions of Office that work with Apple’s Macintosh personal computers. Kristen Woody, a spokesman for that unit, says it “doesn’t have anything to share at this time.”
Kirkville
When Apple announced the prices of the first apps they presented – Pages, Keynote and Numbers, from their iWork suite – they set a new bar for App Store pricing.
Seth Weintraub, Computerworld
Daniel Jalkut, Red Sweater Blog
I joined Apple because they were threatening to change the world. I stayed on at Apple because they were changing the world. And I remain loyal to that company because, in spite of my absence, they have changed the world. In more ways than I can imagine, they’re inventing the future. And I’m along for the ride.
AFP
The fevered buildup to Saturday's iPad launch has demonstrated the brute efficiency of the little-known Asian suppliers responsible for turning Apple's design vision into hands-on reality.
Yukari Iwatani Kane and Geoffrey A. Fowler, Wall Street Journal
Electronic books are expected to be a major selling point for Apple Inc.'s iPad, which goes on sale Saturday. But competitors, particularly Amazon.com Inc., could end up as major e-book providers for the new device.
Mark Milian, Los Angeles Times
With several school districts across the country providing students with free laptops during their tenure, a cheaper and perhaps more practical solution could be to supplant computers with iPads. Some schools are already planning to dole out Apple's new tablet computer, as others debate doing the same.
Joshua Brustein, New York Times
Apple’s tight control over software development for its products has been an issue in the past. Many developers have long complained about the strict, sometimes arbitrary-seeming standards it keeps over what Apps it offers through its App store.
Yet the rush of developers working on apps for the device before they have even touched it — and the general mania that has been building for the last two months — makes it clear that there are plenty of fans.
John Brownlee, Cult of Mac
If you need to write to a mounted volume over SMB, you might want to hold off on updating to OS X 10.6.3 if you haven’t done so already: Apple support forum users are reporting major problems in multiple threads that SMB is borked.
Lance Whitney, CNET News
The iPad will let you watch streaming movies from Netflix, play games from Electronic Arts, and read the latest adventures of Spider-Man, thanks to new apps announced Friday.
Jason Snell, Macworld
More details about the iPad have come out. And we’ve managed to get our hands on an iPad all our own. So we’re able to go back and update our old iPad FAQ with the latest details about the device.
Philip Michaels, Macworld
If FileMaker isn’t careful, people are going to start saying that Bento is the database software maker’s flagship app. After all, the company—which offers an entire line of professional database applications under the FileMaker brand— already produces versions of Bento for both the Mac and the iPhone. On Friday, the software maker unveiled an iPad version of its personal database application, with a number of features designed specifically to take advantage of Apple’s new tablet.
Brian Stelter, New York Times
Television networks are taking sharply different approaches to the iPad.
Christopher Mims, Technology Review
The iPad isn't the only thing making its big debut this Saturday. Several hundred newly minted iPad applications, many of which have been painstakingly redesigned and rebuilt for the device, will also get their first airing.
Jay Yarow, Business Insider
Before the iPad even hits Apple's shelves, take a look at this impressive list of companies converting to an iPad-friendly format for video:
Jeffery A. Trachtenberg, Wall Street Journal
As book publishers and retailers prepare for the launch of Apple Inc.'s iPad on Saturday, there are clear signs of the glitches and confusion that many expected would accompany the adoption of a new e-book pricing model.
Andrew Leonard, Salon
From the moment he first lifted the veil on the iPad until today, the entire process has been a work of art. Genius doesn't seem adequate to describe it.
Matt Hamblen, Computerworld
If the iPad is truly going to be “magical,” as Apple claims it will be, a lot rides on AT&T’s networks, especially its much-derided 3G performance for the iPhone.
Jason Snell, Macworld
Macworld took possession of an iPad Thursday morning, and for the last few hours we’ve been poring over it, taking photos and screen shots, trying out accessories, and tapping through every app on the device.
We’ve got a long way to go and a whole lot of questions to answer. But here’s a quick take with some initial thoughts on this new device.
Nicholas Bonsack, Macworld
The iPad won’t make its official debut until this weekend, but the apps that will run on Apple’s new tablet have already started popping up on the App Store—provided you’re using the latest version of iTunes, that is.
Serenity Caldwell, Macworld
The iPad supports syncing for e-mail, contacts, calendars, and Safari bookmarks, “no docking required,” and supports both iCal/Address Book and Microsoft Outlook combinations.
Aayush Arya, Macworld
Apple’s appeal for reconsideration of its trademark application for the word “iPhone” has been rejected by the Swiss Federal Administrative Court, which maintained that the term is a non-distinctive word for which Apple could not be granted a trademark.
Andy Ihnatko, Macworld
I fear that hundreds of thousands of early-adopters will buy these first-generation apps and suffer a serious letdown. I’m betting that the iPad won’t show its true strength until a couple of weeks later, after thousands of developers have finally been able to run their apps on a live iPad. They will slap their heads, have one last night of intimacy with their significant others, and then sleep in their offices until they’ve completed and released a totally-revamped edition.
But the initial damage will have been done.
Rich Mogull, Macworld
What you do and don't have to worry about Macs and PCs connect.
Eric Sink
Your Mom wants a computer she doesn't have to ask you to fix. She is willing to trade power and flexibility to get simplicity. The iPad is another major step.
Stephen Fry, Time
I am here at Apple's invitation to try out the iPad, and later in my visit I will spend an hour with the company's boss, Steve Jobs — the first time I've ever spent any real time with him. But as I meet with Schiller and Cue, I feel it only fair to reel off the list of negatives the iPad will meet on its release. It falls between two stools — neither small enough to be truly portable nor big enough to be called a proper computer. Everything, I point out, is under Apple's control, as usual. No Adobe Flash capability, no multitasking, no camera. It's just a scaled-up iPhone or iPod Touch.
"There's a negative way of saying that," says Schiller, "and a positive. 'Oh, it's just a big iPhone ... boo!' or 'Hey, it's like a big iPhone ... cool!' Luckily, millions of people have those, so there is an instant ease and familiarity when they first encounter the iPad. As for everything else, it's not about the features — it's about the experience. You just have to try it to see what I mean."
Connie Guglielmo, Bloomberg
Apple Inc., looking to succeed where rivals like Microsoft Corp. failed, is betting that consumers are finally ready for tablet computers, even if they have to do without some features.
Lukas Mathis, Ingore The Code
Let’s say you want to open the App Store on your iPad, and you know that you’ve put this icon at the bottom right of your apps. Turning the iPad shuffles the positions of your icons. The App Store now suddenly jumps to the middle of the second row.
Nancy Gohring, Macworld
On Wednesday, the ITC said that one of its administrative law judges will hold an evidentiary hearing to look into Apple’s complaint. The ITC now has 45 days to set a target date for completing the investigation.
Noah Kravitz, Huffington Post
Apple knows how to capture consumer imagination, and they know how to make technology simple. For all the high-end geeks crying foul over what iPad can't do -- no multitasking, no user installation of apps beyond the Apple-controlled store, no Flash content in the Web browser, and so on -- millions of average consumers are much more interested in what this thing can do.
And what's that? What can the iPad do? In a word, it can simplify computing.
Wall Street Journal
The launch of Apple Inc.'s iPad is fueling an ocular debate: What type of e-reader is easiest on the eyes: the black-and-white screens that simulate ink on a printed page or the back-lit color screens used by computers and the iPad?
Neal Karlinsky, Eloise Harper and Hanna Siegel, ABC News
It's early morning and Apple has invited us behind locked doors inside a store that hasn't opened for a private showing of the much-anticipated iPad.
Our sneak peak included a look at applications, better known as apps, from developers in Los Angeles and Seattle.
Andy Ihnatko, Chicago Sun-Times
If the price and the size aren’t obstacles to you, then it’s the clear winner.
Scott McNulty, Macworld
Apple goofed by giving people an option for expedited shipping option for a product slated to arrive on a certain date.
The Mac Observer
Apple has clamped down on third party companies offering non-U.S. customers iPad delivery, according to MobileGamesBlog. Customers that had ordered iPads through these companies began receiving e-mails letting them know that Apple had canceled their orders, and that they would receive refunds.
Andy Ihnatko, Chicago Sun-Times
The most compelling sign that Apple got this right is the fact that despite the novelty of the iPad, the excitement slips away after about ten seconds and you’re completely focused on the task at hand ... whether it’s reading a book, writing a report, or working on clearing your Inbox. Second most compelling: in situation after situation, I find that the iPad is the best computer in my household and office menagerie. It’s not a replacement for my notebook, mind you. It feels more as if the iPad is filling a gap that’s existed for quite some time.
Edward C. Baig, USA Today
Apple has pretty much nailed it with this first iPad, though there's certainly room for improvement. Nearly three years after making a splash with the iPhone, Apple has delivered another impressive product that largely lives up to the hype.
Bob "Dr. Mac" LeVitus, Houston Chronicle
I had high expectations for the iPad, and it has met or exceeded most of them.
Tim Gideon and Wendy Sheehan Donnell, PC Magazine
David Pogue, New York Times
The bottom line is that the iPad has been designed and built by a bunch of perfectionists. If you like the concept, you’ll love the machine.
Xeni Jardin, Boing Boing
Just as the iPhone, Palm Pré and Android phones scratched an itch we didn't know we had, somewhere between cellphone and notebook, the iPad hits a completely new pleasure spot. The display is large enough to make the experience of apps and games on smaller screens stale. Typography is crisp, images gem-like, and the speed brisk thanks to Apple's A4 chip and solid state storage. As I browse early release iPad apps, web pages, and flip through the iBook store and books, the thought hits that this is a greater leap into a new user experience than the sum of its parts suggests.
Walter S. Mossberg, Wall Street Journal
My verdict is that, while it has compromises and drawbacks, the iPad can indeed replace a laptop for most data communication, content consumption and even limited content creation, a lot of the time. But it all depends on how you use your computer.
Jeremy Singer-Vine, Slate Magazine
Can staring at an iPad hurt your vision?
Dan Moren, Macworld
The new version of AirPort Utility fixes a couple general bugs along with two specific issues: one where it won’t import all settings when importing a configuration, and one where it won’t correctly propagate MAC address control lists when using an extended network. The latter issue also led to a potential security problem where unauthorized computers could join a locked network via a network extender.
Christopher Breen, Macworld
Although the primary purpose of the update was to bring iPad compatibility to Apple’s jukebox-and-more media application, other changes—both significant and not-so—came along for the ride. Here’s what’s new and changed.
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