Talkingapple's List: 90

• invitations for the event carry the tagline "Let's talk iPhone" and depict iOS icons for Calendar, Clock, Maps, and Phone.

• Sources close to the company say the demonstration — currently scheduled for Tuesday October 4, a date first reported by AllThingsD — will be held at Apple’s campus in Cupertino, California.

  • Why? Some might say Apple wanted to give the new CEO a more homie setting, or the announcement is not viewed as a huge one.
    
    I would not read too much into it. Maybe all events will be like this from now on. Or maybe the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts was already booked for that date.

• AppleInsider reports that Apple has started denying vacation requests for employees during the 2nd week of October.
• The first set of dates from October 9th-12th could represent iOS 5 launch, as Apple has informed AppleCare to expect an influx of support calls starting on October 10th.
• Coincidentally, Twitter has announced their own developer session in London on the same date. The October 10th Twitter developer session is said to have a "heavy focus on the iOS 5 Twitter integration".
• Meanwhile, the 14th to 15th dates suggests that Apple may be preparing for a retail launch of their next generation iPhones on that Friday, the 14th.
• UK Apple Stores have been similarly told to block out the "first two weeks of October".

3 more annotations...

• • Sounds credible. Maybe launch in other countries will be later accompanied by the iPhone 4S
• Japanese website Macotakara, which reported on Tuesday that Apple is likely to launch its so-called "iPhone 5" in those five countries on Oct. 14.

• • Android does this but it's clumsy. You have to send it to the cloud; it often requires you to help it with choices. Not ideal.

  • this is a game changer. Probably the biggest upgrade to iOS since 3rd party apps. It means there is a new way of using the device.
    Remember that image Apple had showing 3 technologies that gave birth to 3 great products? (mouse to mac, click wheel to iPod, multitouch to iphone) This is as big as that.
    
    This will be a life changer if you're in an office. Nad if API's become available...the sky is the limit.
• 9to5 Mac

  • and TUAW
• iPhone will come packed with 1 GB of RAM and the Apple A5 dual-core processor, as well as a vastly improved 8 MP camera.

  • which means they are doing all the work locally
• will contain Qualcomm's Gobi Baseband chipset for use as a true world phone (GSM and CDMA).
• It is based on technology from Siri, a company that was purchased by Apple last year. The Assistant requires the power of the A5 CPU as well as the 1 GB of RAM, which is why existing iPhones will not be able to take advantage of the new feature.

  • would explain why we did not hear about it on iOS 5 announcement 
• speech interface is launched by holding the home button for several seconds, after which a microphone interface slides up from the bottom of the screen, covering only about a quarter of the display
• could just say "send a text to Barb saying I'm going to the bank" and the message is created and sent. You can also use Assistant with the location-based reminder feature in the iOS Reminders app, by using commands like "Remind me to buy Vitamin D when I'm at Whole Foods Market." Voice requests for directions are also a feature
• ssistant also has a conversation view, in which the system literally converses with the user in order to provide the best results. Let's say set up a meeting with Tim Cook on October 4th. You'd say "Set up a meeting with Tim Cook," and the iPhone would respond by asking "Which email address should Tim Cook be notified at, home or work?" When you'd respond "Work,", the iPhone would ask the time and date you want to schedule the meeting for. At the end of the conversation, you'd be shown the details of the calendar event for confirmation.
• you can speak to the Assistant in your normal tone and speed of voice; it's that accurate. Assistant is also integrated with Wolfram Alpha, so you could also ask your iPhone questions like "Convert 10.2 acres to hectares" or "What's the cube root of 924?" and get an immediate answer.
• likely to be packed with privacy settings is "Find my Friends." With this feature, you could ask your phone "Where's Erica Sadun?"
• A slightly less reputable source adds that the upcoming iPhone also features AirPlay mirroring, which is found on the iPad 2

9 more annotations...

• • This for me is something Apple had to convince Nuance to do. Apple wants iOS developers to take full advantage of "Assistant".  
    
    Nuance probably thinks that Microsoft and others might pick up on Apple's ideas and do something similar...well, now they can!
• the free developer service, called NDEV Silver, will apply to about 90% of the app developers for iOS. Developers will also have free access to Nuance's connected text-to-speech (TTS) capabilities in over 30 languages, bringing natural sounding text-to-speech in the cloud.
• For larger corporate customers, Nuance will offer higher levels of services at what they call the Gold and Emerald level, but even these services will cost much less than the previous developer programs Nuance has offered.

1 more annotation...

• Japanese blog Macotakara reports
• China Unicom executive apparently confirmed during a presentation at this week's Macworld Asia that the "iPhone 5" set to be announced next week will indeed support HSPA+ sometimes-called "4G" technology, offering a maximum theoretical data speed of 21 Mbps (up from 7.2Mbps)

  • Not really 4G, but better than 3G
    the 3 network has started to deploy some of this and according to them, most of the country should have it by the end of the year.
• Qualcomm's world-mode MDM6600 chip found in the Verizon/CDMA iPhone 4 already supports 14.4 Mbps HSPA+, but the device itself is limited to CDMA networks.

1 more annotation...

• our crew received a tip from an iPhone accessories supplier that an iPhone 5 prototype had gone missing from the Foxconn factory in Shenzhen Futian district.
• The missing prototype is said to have been enclosed in a case to disguise it as a current-generation iPhone 4–which brings to mind the iPhone 4 prototype acquired by Gizmodo that was camouflaged as an iPhone 3GS.
• test model with a finalized iPhone 5 chassis featuring the tear-drop design. However, the interesting thing about it is that it apparently houses what we assume to be slightly modified iPhone 4 electronics with components such as the A4 chip and even the same amount of memory.
• llegedly sold to one of the iPhone case manufacturers for RMB ¥20,000 (about $3,100). We were told that Foxconn was aware of the loss and had penalized internal management for the incident.
• we are already seeing a plethora of iPhone 5 cases for sale from many case manufacturers. Some even claim to have shipped “thousands” of these cases.

  • They also make the point that manufacturing these costs case designers thousands.

  • So all this case influx is more likely due to this prototype than the design documents, which is what we thought. btw, this was allegedly leaked just a few weeks ago.
• Aside from this tapered design, the iPhone 5 cases are of almost the same thickness as existing iPod touch cases.

4 more annotations...

• An alleged photo of AT&T's inventory system was leaked Thursday, revealing the arrival of iPhone 5 cases
• according to BGR, who originally published the leak.
• according to BGR, who originally published the leak.
• The Tough Case, Pop! Case and Barely There product lines seen in the photo reportedly represent a hard case, soft case and skin, respectively, and will be available at launch in a variety of colors. Earlier this month, the case maker posted images of its iPhone 5 cases before quickly taking them down.
• The New York Times subsequently reported that, according to an Apple engineer source, the images "seemed potentially authentic." That report also noted that the next-generation iPhone will sport a "fairly different" design than the iPhone 4.

3 more annotations...

• cases for the rumored iPhone 5 redesign have already begun arriving at AT&T retail stores, as one reader has sent us alleged photos of iPhone 5 silicone sleeves

  • All of these resemble the wider, tampered design

• • back in march we saw photos of prototype iPhone4 with 64GB
• iPhone N94 device has appeared in the Apple internal inventory system
• heard from manufacturing sources that Apple has at least been prototyping 64GB versions of the new iPhone, we would say it’s fairly likely that Apple’s new iPhone will come in 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB capacities; just like the iPad.

1 more annotation...

• Facebook will launch its long-awaited iPad app at Apple’s iPhone 5 launch event on Oct. 4,

  Mashable has learned

  • That being the case, I guess Facebook might introduce deeper integration with iOS. Twitter-style
• Mashable has learned
• Facebook is also expected to release a revamped version of its iPhone app
• a blog post Monday by former Facebook engineer Jeff Verkoeyen. In that post, he revealed that he left the company (for Google) partially because Facebook has been sitting on the completed app since May.
• The problem, according to two sources familiar with the situation, has been a combination of timing and a strained relationship with Apple.

• Facebook has also been working on a project to bring the Facebook Platform to mobile devices. The project, labeled “Project Spartan” by some (a name not used internally at Facebook, according to one of our sources), is designed to be a platform where developers can bring their Facebook apps to mobile devices via an HTML5 platform.

   

  What we’re hearing is that Apple is actually working with Facebook on perfecting the HTML5 platform.

  • Either I'm missing something here, or this does not make any sense. why would Apple help?
    
    We all know Apple views the iOS as a two platform based device. HTML5 apps and native ones. Up to this point, Apple has shown no interest in trying to bring an appstore like system for html5 apps (which google already does). Maybe they are experimenting something here with Facebook.

4 more annotations...

• UK, research firm InMobi
• 39% of mobile users in that study said they want to buy an iPhone 5 with 48% of them committed to purchasing the device in the first six months from launch. Only 12% of them said they'd buy an iPhone 4S.
• , 62% of UK iPad users said they plan to purchase a iPhone 5, while 45% of BlackBerry users and 24% of Android device owners said they would purchase the upcoming handset. Interest in an iPhone 4S was also significantly lower in the UK market, at 25%, 7% and 18%, respectively.

1 more annotation...

• • would you buy the argument that it is now more of a liability than a product that lifts Apple's image?
• it's a good time to tell you all what we've heard. It seems that the "product transition" Apple mentioned on the last earnings call could very well be within the iPod line. Specifically, if you want to buy an iPod shuffle or iPod classic from Apple, you should do it sooner rather than later.
• If Apple killed these off, all of its iPods would have touchscreens, and something tells me it wants it that way
• we see few changes coming for the iPod touch

2 more annotations...

• Magazines
• Over 100,000 movies and TV shows
• Designed from the ground up, Kindle Fire's simple, intuitive interface

  • Absolutely seems like it. All Android complexity was removed.It looks to that this is just Linux with a few Android processes on the background. In fact, the word Android is only mentioned once in the webpage
• All apps are Amazon-tested on Kindle Fire for the best experience possible.

  • The Apps are gotten from the amazon Android store and are vetted individually!
• The Kindle Store offers over 1 million books
• Supports Adobe® Flash® Playe
• Kindle Fire gives you free storage for all your Amazon digital content in the Amazon Cloud.
• 17 million songs in the Amazon MP3 Store.
• Stay in touch using our built-in email app that gets your webmail (Gmail, Yahoo!, Hotmail, AOL etc.) into a single inbox

  • The guys that created the Playbook for RIM are the same that created this one. And it shows.
    But amazon had the brilliant innovative idea of adding email
• Free Month of Amazon Prim
• 7" multi-touch display with IPS (in-plane switching) technology and anti-reflective treatment, 1024 x 600 pixel resolution at 169 ppi
• 8GB internal
• Up to 8 hours of continuous reading or 7.5 hours of video playback,
• We've refactored and rebuilt the browser software stack to push pieces of the computation into the AWS cloud. This lets Silk do more work, more quickly, and all at once. We call this “split browser” architecture.
• With each page request, Silk dynamically determines a division of labor between the mobile hardware and Amazon EC2 (i.e. which browser sub-components run where) that takes into consideration factors like network conditions, page complexity and the location of any cached content.

  • So not like Opera, which just did all the work for you and rendered a webpage completely stale, void of any interactivity
• Shorter Transit Times

  • because in a webpage you're rendering content from various domains, your browser is doing DNS queries and TCP handshakes for all of those, which takes time. Amazon's servers keep a constant open link with these sites, saving time.
• EC2 servers have massive computational power
• Silk might observe that 85 percent of visitors to a leading news site next click on that site’s top headline. With that knowledge, EC2 and Silk together make intelligent decisions about pre-pushing content to the Kindle Fire

  • Interestingly they are implementing an SSL proxy for SSL requests. That means they are as a man in the middle even on your supposed safe connections. I'm glad you can turn Silk off. This would be a deal breaker for me.

  • If well implemented this could be very interesting. I fear that some might be lost in translation. But if they nail the splitting...than this is a winner for the user and off course, bare in mind they now know everywhere you go and what you do on the internet.

16 more annotations...

• • (explain the business model)
    Apple will always deliver the best hardware, no doubt about that. The iPad is much more than a consumer device. It is used by many to complement productivity on a laptop.
    
    And the apps will always be better (if not for the fact that people that are willing to pay £400 for a device hence more willing to pay for good software)
    
    But this is very very appealing. Simple, smooth, concentrates on delivering content. Who better than amazon to do that. And at £130, it is fantastic
• It’s all about the content, though. That’s the difference that other tablet makers missed. Motorola, Samsung, RIM — they seem to be chasing the iPad on specs, building the best tablet they can manage at the same starting price of around $500. But they have no clear message telling people what you can do with them.

  • They have everything, from apps, music, books, to movies (free for prime users)

• The Trojan Horse, discovered by security firm Intego, has been found on malicious web sites that invite users to install the phony Flash Player, telling them it is required to access certain content

  • Just make sure the "Open safe files" is disabled in Safari

  • especially tricky for Lion users, as flash does not come pre-installed
• eplicates the look and feel of the real Flash installer. It includes design elements and logos that could convince some users it is the actual official software from Adobe.

  • Flash installer has that very funky installer, don;t know if that is replicated.
• The code used by Flashback can be injected in certain applications run on the computer and the Trojan can connect to remote servers in order to send specific information about the infected computer -- including its MAC address, which is a unique identifier for every machine.
  
• Users can also manually check to see whether they were infected by looking for the file "~/Library/Preferences/Preferences.dylib" on their Mac
•  

  pple has already distributed a malware definition update to block another Trojan horse, “Trojan-Dropper:OSX/Revir.A,” described late last week as a malicious program posing as a PDF download.

3 more annotations...

• In a decision handed down by the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), Apple has been denied an application for a trademark on the term Multi-Touch.
• In a decision handed down by the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), Apple has been denied an application for a trademark on the term Multi-Touch. Apple originally applied for the trademark on January 9, 2007, the day the iPhone was introduced.
• MULTI-TOUCH indeed is highly descriptive of a feature of the identified goods.

  • In Apple's defence though, they applied for this the day the iPhone was introduced

  • plus, it is a now broadly used term in the industry. This makes even less sense than the samsung 3g patents 

1 more annotation...

• all twelve European Countries that had been without iTunes Music Store access now appear to be offering music content to customers. The list of countries includes Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia.
• a number of European countries where users are seeing their first movie downloads available for rental and purchase
• iBookstore expansion includes 25 new countries, and authors and publishers are now able to select the new countries where they wish to distribute their works in iTunes Connect.

1 more annotation...