Sometimes Apple still manages to surprise me (Kilala.nl (Cailin Coilleach)) by Cailin Coilleach

I've been using Apple computers and software for almost five years now. Since then the OS X operating systems has gone through a lot of changes, becoming nicer and nicer along the way. All kinds of nifty features were added, most of them without becoming bloatware. The fact that I've seen five years of this stuff has had its effect though and I find it hard to become enthused by most of the new stuff. It's great and all, but you won't catch me dancing down the street.

But sometimes, sometimes a little nugget of gold comes out of Apple and I'm completely in love with their software again.

Case in point: the Genius function that was added to iTunes recently and the Remote application for the iPhone.

Genius will take any song in your library and, given a few circumstances, will create a new playlist containing 25 songs that ought to go nicely with the selected song. This selection of tunes is based on data gathered from the iTunes libraries from thousands of users world wide. This doesn't work out perfectly each time, but usually it gives me great results.

Let's say that I pick the Beastie Boys' Sabotage. iTunes will almost instantaneously suggest songs that go with it. In this case I got (among others):
* Wu-Tang Clan, Gravelpit
* Black Eyed Peas, Pump it
* Outkast, Roses

And so on. I reckon that the quality of iTunes' selection depends wholly on the amount of songs you have from a given genre. I can imagine that a Genius playlist for German Schlager music would be quite impossible on my computer ^_^; The great thing about all of this though, is the fact that I am constantly re-discovering songs that I'd even forgotten I had!

Combine this with the Remote application which runs on my iPhone and I can have a very nice evening on the couch. Using the app I can control all of iTunes' operations without ever touching my Mac. And because I'm re-discovering music I can immediately assign rankings to these "new" songs, or just skip past them if I really hate them.

Posted in: apple , genius , iphone , itunes , remote

History of Software on the iPhone - A Prelude (Tiny Screenfuls (JoshB)) by Josh Bancroft

My iPhone is now an iBrick. Here’s how it happened, what I learned, how it felt, and what you might be able to learn from the whole thing. I’ll write up the details of that story in a separate post. This one is for background.

I am a HUGE iPhone fan. I camped out on release day to be number one in line. I’ve used the heck out of my iPhone every single day since I got it. I’ve taught other people how great they are, answered countless questions about it, and generally been a huge fan.

I have had many, many mobile devices, and understand that since the operating system for most devices resides in flash ROM, and isn’t meant to be readily modified, you can’t expect the device manufacturer to help you fix problems you run into with a modified device. This hasn’t prevented lively developer communities from springing up around popular devices - like XDA-Developers, etc. - to help power users get even more functionality and fun from their devices.

Soon after the iPhone was launched on June 29, 2007, such a developer community popped up around it. Even though Apple made it very clear that they didn’t intend to support iPhone developers at all. “Make web applications. That’s good enough.” was the edict from Cupertino. Most people I know, from real developers to regular old users were miffed that Apple wasn’t releasing a Software Development Kit (SDK) to make applications for the iPhone. So the development community took matters into its own hands.

It ranged from people like Joe Hewitt (of Firebug and now Facebook fame - he’s the guy that wrote Facebook’s iPhone UI, which has been featured in Steve Jobs keynotes) engineering and releasing tools like iUI to make better web applications to the dedicated hackers who figured out how to get your own applications to install and run on the iPhone. Following best practices from the Linux world, they gave people how were willing to “jailbreak” their iPhone the ability to run Nullriver’s AppTapp Installer.app - a package manager that opened the door to browse and install dozens of iPhone applications.

There was an uneasy stalemate between Apple and the iPhone developers. Apple openly admitted that they weren’t going to support these 3rd party developers, but they weren’t going to try to stop them, either. On September 11, 2007, Gearlog published this quote from an interview with Greg Joswiak, VP of Hardware Product Marketing at Apple:

I asked him about independent, native software development for the iPhone. He said Apple doesn’t oppose native application development, which was new to me. Rather, Apple takes a neutral stance - they’re not going to stop anyone from writing apps, and they’re not going to maliciously design software updates to break the native apps, but they’re not going to care if their software updates accidentally break the native apps either.

In other words, iPhone “hacking” would follow the same path as other mobile devices, like Windows Mobile, iPods, etc. No one expected Apple to help customers make 3rd party applications work. Everyone knew that the most you could expect from Apple was a complete wipe and restore back to factory new settings. In fact, when iPhone updates 1.0.1 and 1.0.2 were released, this is exactly what happened. If you had “jailbroken” your iPhone and installed 3rd party apps, the device was wiped and restored to Apple’s known good “clean” state. No more than two weeks later, Apple radically reversed its position on this issue.

Then came the seemingly similar activity of “unlocking” iPhones to work on cellular carriers other than AT&T. The iPhone is a unique device in that it’s extraordinarily locked down, meant only to work if you have a valid account with AT&T. Without active AT&T service, you couldn’t use any of the other features of the iPhone. No wifi web browsing, no iPod media playback, nothing. So the people outside of AT&T service area (the whole world outside the United States), and people who couldn’t or didn’t want to switch to AT&T could never have an iPhone, under Apple and AT&Ts rules. Many people felt this was unfair and dictatorial, and It’s interesting to note that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) requires U.S. cell phone carriers to SIM unlock customers’ phones upon request, for overseas travel, or any other reason.

So the development community set to work on a “SIM unlock” for the iPhone, which modified the radio/baseband part of the iPhone firmware to allow it to use ANY SIM card from ANY carrier. The unlocking apps were released. The world rejoiced. And no one expected Apple to support iPhones that weren’t on the AT&T network. Just like installing 3rd party applications, the most you could expect Apple to do would be to wipe and restore your iPhone to its original state.

An application called anySIM was the first free version of these unlocking apps. It was made available through the popular and simple Installer.app package system (it was pulled a few hours later). During the time it was available, I downloaded it. I didn’t need or want to unlock my iPhone - I’m happy with AT&T’s service (we have two lines of service in our family), and I didn’t even have a non-AT&T SIM card that I could use to test and see if the unlock worked. But I’m a geek and an enthusiast and a blogger, so I ran the unlock software, if only to document the process, just like all the other 3rd party software installations I had done.

And that’s where all the trouble started…

(Click here to read the next part of the saga: I admit it - I ran anySIM to unlock my iPhone (a photo story))

Posted in: 1.1.1 , apple , at&t , blog , firmware , hacking , ibrick , iphone , itunes , sim card , software , unlock , update

Thoughts on The Beat Goes On (Martin Gordon's Blog (cptncelchu)) by Martin

Despite being a day late, I still want to comment on the iPod announcements made yesterday.

iPod shuffle
New colors and no storage bump on the shuffles gets a huge yawn from me.

iPod nano
The actual nano looks much better than those leaked shots that were floating around a few weeks ago. There was no storage upgrade for these guys either, only price drops to $149 and $199 for the 4 and 8 GB version, respectively. Video finally comes to the nano, but with such a tiny screen I wonder how useful it will actually be. Still, having the nano hooked up to a TV via video out makes for a very portable DVD player replacement.

iPod classic
80 GB storage for $249 (and 160 GB for $349) makes the 6th Generation iPod (or 1st Generation iPod classic?) quite the monster. The standard iPod form factor has become, as the name suggests, a classic and I'm glad Apple stuck with it instead of forcing everyone to the touch screen.

iPod UI
The new iPod UI is an incremental upgrade, with the most notable feature being Cover Flow (which I don't find much use for personally). The new UI also marks the first time that the nano and classic have reached software feature parity (video on the nano also means complete feature parity), so it'll be interesting to see if Apple considers the nano/classic "complete". Prior to yesterday's announcement, it had been two years since both devices saw a significant upgrade, and I wonder if it'll be just as long before we see the next big change for these two lines.

iPod touch
I couldn't make up my mind over whether I thought Apple would actually release a phoneless iPhone this soon. On the one hand, pricing would have been tricky - either it would be priced too low to cannibalize iPhone sales or priced too high to make it a terrible value. On the other hand, there was only so much further Apple could take the iPod classic before it had to enlarge the screen (thereby necessitating removal of the click wheel). I personally dislike the design of the device. The chrome border is gone in lieu of either a matte metal or plastic (hard to tell from the shots) and the iPhone's scratch-resistant matte back is gone for the iPod's iconic scratch-prone shiny metal back. Further, the upper bezel looks disproportionate without the earpiece and the WiFi antenna's plastic covering makes the back of the device asymmetric. Other minor things I noticed (and am apathetic about) are that the sleep/wake button has switched sides and that the headphone jack is on the bottom of the device.

iTunes WiFi Store
Apple is ever slowly creeping into tablet/UMPC space and the touch was the second step in that direction. Instead of working down from the desktop, as Microsoft has done (with limited success), Apple has worked up from the iPod. It's apparent from the name: this isn't a MacBook nano, it's an iPod touch. Unveiling the iTunes WiFi Store and partnering with Starbucks is a small step into building Apple's mobile eco-system, something other device makers have either not attempted or have been unsuccessful at. This will be the touch/iPhone killer feature, and perhaps the future of mobile advertising - truly contextual advertising and services that supplement a brick and mortar's main operations. It's not the device that will reach out to the world, but the world that will reach in to your device.

That said, I don't see myself using the WiFi Store that much since I don't use the iTunes Store much to begin with. However, if the WiFi store allows for over-the-air podcast downloading, then I'll be all over it.

Ringtones
I'm tech-savvy enough to not need iTunes to walk me through making ringtones, but I would argue against those complaining about the price. The extra $.99 is something I see as AT&T having a hand in. Still, $2 for both the song and ringtone is a good deal compared to the $2-$3 one might pay for a ringtone-only otherwise.

iPhone at $399
Though Apple announced during their last earnings call that margins would be lower this season, no one saw this coming. The market is interpreting it as a sign that iPhones aren't selling as well as Apple would like. The original 5 GB iPod dropped 25% five months after introduction (from $399 to $299), so large cuts aren't completely out of the ordinary for Apple. I see the price drop as something Apple planned all along as a way to aggressively go after market share after milking early adopters for an extra $200 and as a way control demand during launch.

Am I upset that I paid $599? Absolutely not. I was perfectly paying that amount and the price drop doesn't change that. I don't see Apple owing me anything much more than I see BMW paying me for the depreciation of my car when the 2008 models come out (in fact, I'm paying them for the depreciation). Price drops and technology progressing are facts of life. The only thing that I might be upset about is that the cost of entry to the iPhone Club has gone down and iPhone owners who felt a sense of superiority and exclusivity as a result of ownership just dropped a few rungs on the social ladder now that the iPhone is accessible to "regular" people. I am not in that group. I see adoption of the iPhone (or Mobile OS X platform in general) a good thing for users, both in terms of a greater demand for new software features or an increased pressure on other device makers to make better devices.

Technorati Tags: Apple, iPhone, iPod nano, iPod touch, iPod classic, iTunes, iTunes WiFi Store

Posted in: apple , iphone , ipod , itunes , mobile , music , news , thoughts , wireless

Steve Jobs owes us a beer, or two (Kilala.nl (Cailin Coilleach)) by Cailin Coilleach

$ grep -i "Order total" ./iTunes.mbx | grep -v FONT | grep -v "=.." > Totals.txt

$ for NUM in `cat Totals.txt | awk '{print $4}' | tr , . | tr -d =`
do
TOTAL=`echo "$TOTAL + $NUM" | bc`
done

$ echo $TOTAL
1076

$ echo "Ouch..."
Ouch...

Posted in: audio books , itunes , itunes music store , music

Jump on the Bandwagon - Backup Your iTunes Online (Martin Gordon's Blog (cptncelchu)) by Martin

Aaron Swartz points to Bandwagon, an OS X app that seamlessly backs up your iTunes library to a service built on top of Amazon S3. It'll be available on Feb 22, and bloggers can get a free account for posting about the service before it launches.

Technorati Tags: Bandwagon, iTunes, Apple, OS X, music, backup, Amazon, S3

Posted in: amazon , backup , itunes , os x , web 2.0

DRM Dumpster automates the DRM stripping process - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) [ma.gnolia] (Put together quickly (Haligan)) by MichaelBiven

Tags: apple, mac, itunes, drm

Posted in: apple , drm , itunes , mac

DRM Dumpster automates the DRM stripping process - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) [ma.gnolia] (Put together quickly (Haligan)) by MichaelBiven

Tags: apple, mac, itunes, drm

Posted in: apple , drm , itunes , mac

ScobleShow Review (Martin Gordon's Blog (cptncelchu)) by Martin

I'm just about done watching every episode of Robert Scoble's ScobleShow put out so far. As someone who hasn't touched his DSLR in a very long time, my favorite (and most inspiring) episodes are the Photowalking with Thomas Hawk series of videos.

The best part of his show is that it works. I've subscribed to Thomas Hawk's Digital Connection and checked out Zoomr (though I'm still partial to Flickr). And while I haven't checked out all of the companies he's featured, I have checked out a few of them (Become.com [video] and Cuts [video]). And while I probably would have checked those sites out if Robert would have linked to them on his blog instead, they are a lot more memorable if I can put a face to the site I might just look at a handful of times. In other words, the stickiness factor of video is much higher than that of text.

My concerns about video podcasts apply to the medium in general, not just Robert's show, but I think it's worthwhile to mention them here:

One of my big concerns with video podcasts, and particularly ones so full of content, is the inability to comment effectively. While I can easily quote a section of one of Robert's blog posts, it's currently impossible to similarly comment on a particular snippet of video without making people download the entire show and manually search for the part I'm commenting on. Perhaps Cuts (a video-editing app featured on the ScobleShow) could help with this.

Another factor affecting the amount I comment is that the iTunes -> web browser link isn't quite there. I know that Ze Frank and Rocketboom have active communities, for example, but they're non-existent to me because of the effort it takes (yes, I'm lazy) to go from a given video in iTunes to that video's comments. Contrast this to the simplicity of the NetNewsWire -> web browser link, where I can just push the right arrow and have the post load up for me in the background.

Finally, I feel that Robert's videos are a bit too long. The product demo episodes have been short enough and require video so I'll watch those straight through. The interview episodes tend to be a lot longer and keep my attention for less time. My main concern with those is that they often don't convey any visual information - I can keep them playing behind a bunch of windows and not miss anything by just listening to the audio.

All that said, Robert's show does give us some great behind-the-scenes content as well as also providing footage for those of us not in the Bay Area with which to refine our mental images. Unless I fall too far behind (which doesn't look likely given my ever-decreasing count of unlistened podcasts), I don't see myself unsubscribing any time soon.

Technorati Tags: Robert Scoble, ScobleShow, video podcast, vidcast, Thomas Hawk, Zoomr, Become.com, Cuts, Ze Frank, Rocketboom, iTunes, video

Posted in: blogs , itunes , podcasts , review , rss , video