Amazing. Just amazing. Just as we were waiting for the first 100 GB 1.8″ hard drive–the same size hard drive that Apple (currently) uses in the biggest iPods–Samsung doubled the current 80 GB drives by announcing a huge 1.8″ 160 GB drive.
Even though rumors are that Apple is switching to flash memory in all of their iPods, A nice 160 GB iPod would be a great last hurrah!
Simply put, if you check Apple’s iPhone page’s you’ll see a link to their list of Apple Stores, and the current availability of iPhones. After extended hours, it shows that all Apple stores still have quantities available.
While Apple’s new iPhone ‘Activation & Sync Video’ has mostly accurate information on their plans, the final review, right in the middle of Apple’s new iPhone Activation & Sync Video you’ll see the following:
Apple announced:
In general this is strange because they also show a $10 upgrade to 1500 SMS minutes in the same video:
It seems that the upgrade for a current AT&T customer to the iPhone data plan is $20 for 200 included SMS text messages, and $30 for 1500. What Apple showed above is a better deal than what is currently being offered for the iPhone so this is likely why it was changed. All of the data plans should have included 1500 SMS text messages.
AT&T’s unlimited plans currently include 1500 SMS text messages, and it looks like the Apple plans were going to include this many as well. But if you look at what is being offered… only 200 SMS text messages, this is shameful. These should be free to begin with, but SMS messages are a profit center for cellphone carriers, and instead of including Apple’s text messaging client ‘iChat’ as part of the unlimited internet plan, they are using the expensive SMS messaging. You only get 200 SMS text messages (incoming or outgoing) on the current plan, and according to an AT&T representative, any additional text messages are $.10 each.
For more information about how SMS text messages, especially only 200 is not only restrictive, but potentially manipulative in causing higher cellphone bills with the iPhone, stay tuned for my next blog to be posted later tonight.
Look closely at this picture… It’s from the current STS-117 Shuttle Mission:
Now, if you look closely in the upper left-hand corner you’ll see (next to the other essential space item, the Bible) an iPod:
For many years its been known that the space shuttle’s computers are extremely outdated to today’s standards. Portable computers have been brought on board for science experiments, etc. This is the first time an iPod has been spotted on board. The funny part about this is that it appears not to be a current generation model, but one of the previous generations, so no television shows or movies for this crew. It’s also remarkable to notice that there is a dock connector plugged into the bottom of the unit. Could it currently be used as a hard drive? or perhaps a space black box? Is it plugged into an amazingly powerful shuttle stereo system??? or… and most likely… it it just being charged by the same batteries keeping the astronauts alive?
Cheers to the iPod! Risking its life in the name of science!
I wonder what’s on it… I wonder if NASA has ever updated the computers on the shuttle….
In a move that guarantees unexpected results, it was recently leaked by AT&T executives that AT&T is going to require iPhone owners to subscribe to an unlimited digital information plan. Whoa… With unlimited wireless access to the Internet, you don’t actually need a copy of a song, television program, or movie on your iPhone, you can just stream, or download it in your web browser. The “unlimited” concept opens up not only the idea of sharing your music over the Internet through streaming, but it inspires over-the-net playback. The iPhone, combined with unlimited Internet access, immediately becomes a Video iPod with storage the size and vastness of the Internet!
Digital Rights Management will effect all of us. Listen as the Fools break down what’s happening with one of the biggest controversaries in our lives regarding our music and videos, how we purchase them and the changing prices of it all. Dave and Marc will also touch upon the absence of the Concord and the new skinny behind the Spielberg/Lucas soon to go-into-production Indiana Jones 4.
In today’s media frenzy world, we’re at a point where many of us want to carry movies, television shows, and even our favorite YouTube clips with us to watch and share with others. We’ve evolved beyond photos and audio alone. We’re on the brink of the portable video revolution, and to answer this call, Apple has announced their long awaited Video iPod. Oh wait! No they haven’t! Instead of releasing the best Video iPod, Apple decided to mix an iPod with a Phone and Internet Communicator. Is this overkill, or the best pairing since chocolate chip cookie dough hit ice cream (arguably the best pairing after chocolate and peanut better got together)? Continuing this ongoing series, this article will examine how the iPhone measures up as only a Video Player. (Since the iPhone has yet to be released, evaluation of screen clarity and quality will not be examined until hands-on experience is available.)
Tilt your head to the right, and play this video of Apple’s new game iQuiz for the iPod.
Earlier today Apple posted this game on their French iTunes site, then quickly removed it, but not before someone had a chance to purchase it and has now posted the video above. Perhaps it’s coming later today, but for now, enjoy this possible ‘sneak peek’.
If you search ‘iQuiz’ on Google, you find many of them. Perhaps iQuiz is someone else’s registered trademark, and Apple’s caught already. I doubt it, but it wouldn’t surprise me either.
It looks like a good game. I’m looking forward to trying it. Personally, I like the iPod games. Cheers!
UPDATED: Apple has now released the game for 99 cents. It’s available now.
Yesterday at NAB in Las Vegas, Apple announced its new video editing suite, Final Cut Studio 2. As always, the new package of software is a bundle of upgraded previous software that makes life even easier if you are a professional video editor… or amature video editor with extra cash. On one hand, Apple has been bringing great tools to the entertainment world for years, on the other hand, film festival submissions are up by thousands every year with the same number of submissions accepted (In 2007, Sundace received over 6,000 and accepted only 48 films). Outside of the professional world, this clearly indicates that Apple has instilled confidence in just about every Tom, Dick and Jane who at one point in their lives wanted to “get into movies.” Steve Jobs has enabled our creative souls, and yes, a whole lot of movies are being made that will never see the light of day and shouldn’t. This sparks a new conversation that us career content providers in Hollywood have been kibitzing about for years.
Apple revolutionized the ease of placing your music on your iPod by enabling iTunes to be set to automatically convert your music when you placed a CD in your computers drive. But why not DVDs? The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998, which made it illegal for you to circumvent protection on a DVD, and duplicate what you already own. Ahh, remember the good old days where protection actually had to be intelligent enough to stop people from circumventing it? Now all it has to be is ‘there.’ You defeat it, you’re breaking the law. But what if you want your favorite movie on your iPod? Well, according to the law, you have to PURCHASE IT AGAIN likely through iTunes, or convert it from an unprotected format (feel like going through the long process of digitizing your old videotapes or laserdiscs, and encoding them?). So, today, you need to go to iTunes, and purchase your favorite movie from a major studio for ANOTHER $10; with quality that doesn’t even compare to a DVD! But wait, with superior hidef quality on the horizon, the byte (pun) may soon be worth the extra money.
Quality:
A basic fact. The higher the resolution, the better the picture quality is. That’s a generally true statement when you accept that the transfer of what you’re watching is of good quality. Historically, an old VHS tape was about 200 lines of resolution, whereas a laserdisc was about 400. The current DVD is at the full quality of the American standard television system of roughly 540 lines. When iTunes first started offering video, the quality was 240 lines; a bit higher than VHS. Now, all videos on iTunes are 480 lines; far better than VHS, and even better than laserdisc, but not DVD. Your DVD is still 11% better in picture quality (not to mention multi-channel sound). So, not only are you buying the same movie over again, but you’re paying for less. Now that’s not too bad when you plan to watch your movie on your iPod’s 320×240 screen, but what about the AppleTV. Apple is pushing a new television commercial that suggests that you should have one copy of a movie on your computer, iPod, and TV (why buy a DVD then?)
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