A US magistrate judge Monday ordered Apple and Amazon to try settling their two-year-old App Store trademark dispute before going to trial August 19. They’ll be closeted together for negotiation on March 21 and the judge said, “No participant in the settlement conference will be permitted to leave the settlement conference before it is concluded.” Apple claims that Amazon’s Appstore treads on its App Store mark and confuses the consumer. Amazon contends the term is generic and commonplace in the industry. A district court has just absolved Amazon of Apple’s charge of false advertising.
A few weeks ago, I swapped out my Nexus 7 for an iPad Mini. I forced myself to grab the iPad Mini at every turn, and I have to say I am overwhelmingly disappointed. While it was fun to check out Infinity Blade and other similar titles, I found more and more that it is a crippled device. I’m a big Google user, and I found that the lack of dedicated apps for Google services (most notably Google Voice) to be obnoxious. I had to jump through hoops just to get my contacts synced to the device. But here are my major gripes (and a few shiny points). Many people try to compare the Android versus Apple ecosystems, mostly by saying that Android apps are not “optimized” for the tablet experience. If an Android app is not the right size for your tablet, the OS automagically scales it to the screen, and it works. If an iOS application isn’t made for the tablet, it can at best “double in size” which looks AWFUL. For devices in which the screen is the primary way to interact, the jacked up way that Apple handles non-HD apps is awful. Also, any allegations of X number of apps is a farce, because many apps (especially those for services Google doesn’t offer their own app) are just basically glorified bookmarks. There are some apps which are better (Facebook App seems to work smoother), but that’s about it. You can find a lot of games for the iPad only, but to be honest, if you do your research there are viable Android alternatives (that more often that not) play exactly the same. Apps are expensive in the Appstore (which is probably why they sell more). But they are not better. There might be more of them but they are limited to Apple’s walled garden, limiting what they can do. Apple also charges money for, well their own apps. Things like Garage Band and more cost $5 just to play.
Apple has cut component orders for the four-month-old iPhone 5 because of weaker-than-expected demand, the Wall Street Journal said Monday citing “people familiar with the situation.” It’s unclear if Apple initially over-ordered out of concern for potential shortages or if it is moving to introduce new phones more frequently. The company reportedly informed suppliers of the cuts last month according to Wall Street analysts, many of whom called it “old news.” The Journal’s story, which followed the Nikkei saying the same thing, briefly sent the “world’s most valuable stock” skittering below $500 before it staged a tiny comeback to around $504, down around 17 bucks.
In what would be a major strategy shift Apple is reportedly considering selling a “lower-end” iPhone later this year to meet competition from Android, which has been eating Apple’s lunch with its multiple models. The Wall Street Journal said late Tuesday that the cheaper iPhone, which could impact Apple’s healthy margins unless it attracts the non-iPhone consumer, could look like the classic iPhone but come in a polycarbonate plastic case rather than the iPhone 5’s up-market aluminum housing. The paper also said “other parts could remain the same or be recycled from older iPhone models.” The company recently introduced an iPad mini that’s smaller and cheaper than the standard iPad but there’s only been one iPhone with different storage capacities since the dingus was first introduced.
This is a massive cookbook with tons of recipes. It covers a ton of material and it covers it in depth. Although this book is more of a reference than a cover to cover read, every time I use it to look something up I find myself getting sucked in and reading several chapters. The author starts off with a really cool chapter called The Basics. It covers a ton of basics. Everything from packaging iOS apps for distribution to Objective-C language basics to loading data from bundles to using NSNotificationCenter to broadcast events. The rest of the chapter's recipes topics are reflected in the titles of the chapters. I have listed them all below.
Apple said Monday that, excluding re-downloads and updates, more than 40 billion iPhone, iPad and iPod touch apps have been downloaded from its App Store and that it has paid developers more than $7 billion. That makes nearly 20 billion downloads in 2012 alone, Apple said. Nine months ago downloads had hit 25 million and payments were at $4 billion, up from $2.5 billion the preceding July, so the download craze is on a roll. This past September Google Play downloads hit 25 billion. Apple’s App Store has over 500 million active accounts and had a record-breaking December with over two billion downloads during the month. There are 775,000 iOS apps, including 300,000 native iPad apps, available.
Apple reportedly wants to buy Waze to help fix its giant maps gaffe but according to what TechCrunch heard it doesn’t want to spend the $750 million asking price. It’s reportedly offering $400 million plus $100 million in incentives. The three-year-old Israeli-born Waze uses crowdsourcing to plot routes around traffic jams and in the process create real-time maps. It’s said to have shaved five minute off the daily commute in Israel.
Having found a bunch of Android-based Samsung widgets violate four Apple patents, the US International Trade Commission has ordered the giant Korean company to post a bond worth 88% of its US smartphones sales as well as 32.5 % of its media player and 37.6% of its tablet sales if it want to keep selling the things. The decision, which is largely backed by the agency’s staff, is preliminary, subject to the affirmation of the ITC’s six-man board of commissioners and the White House. The commissioners are supposed to decide by February 25 and the president 60 days later. At that point Samsung could be looking at an import blackout.
If James Watt had also invented the Deisel Engine … If Rudolf Diesel had also invented Electric Engine … If Guglielmo Marconi had also invented Telephony … If Alexander Graham Bell had also invented Mobile Phones … If Thomas Alva Edison had also invented the Fluorescent Lamp … If Edgar F. Codd had also invented the rules of post RDBMS technologies … Then they would be like Steve Jobs – the inventor of the next generation technology which supersedes his own invention. It was the MAC which had started the WlMP (Windows Icon Mouse Pointer) era. It was the iPhone and then the iPad which started the post WIMP era. Well … you may say that Steve Jobs did not invent the products alone. But then same thing can be said about all the name mentioned above.
Armed robbers pulled off a heist at the Apple store behind the Paris Opera in the center of town on New Year’s Eve. Reuters reports that they made off with over a $1 million worth of widgetry although Apple is still calculating the loss. Four masked thieves broke in about 9 o’clock at night, three hours after the shop closed, while the local gendarmerie was distracted by celebrations along the Champs Élysées. They escaped in a van.
I did not look closely at the description of this book before acquiring it. I mistakenly thought it was going to be about the Core Frameworks iOS has to offer. I thought that because I own the previous version of the author's book The iOS 5 Developer's Cookbook: Core Concepts and Essential Recipes for iOS Programmers. It turns out the lineup is just being restructured and the iOS 5 Developer's Cookbook: Core Concepts and Essential Recipes for iOS Programmers is being broken into two volumes and a tutorial book. This is the first of a 2 volume cookbook set. I think the more appropriate and less confusing title should have been used like The iOS 6 Essentials Developer's Cookbook, or The iOS 6 Fundamentals Developer's Cookbook. Although it was not what I expected, I thoroughly enjoyed the book and found the all the content valuable.
Apple late Monday lost its bid to get a permanent injunction barring 26 of Samsung’s Android-based widgets that a jury found infringed six of Apple’s patents from the American market. Concurrently, the court threw out Samsung’s bid for a new trial. The Korean company claimed the jury, which awarded Apple $1.05 billion in damages, was misled by a foreman that 20 years ago was involved in a lawsuit with Seagate, his former employer and a company Samsung later bought into. The suit drove him into bankruptcy and he supposedly introduced “incorrect and extraneous legal standards” into the jury’s deliberations that may have produced a faulty verdict. The judge didn’t buy it. Samsung should have asked better questions during voir dire, she said. FOSS Patents says without the injunction the “jury verdict has little more than symbolic value.”
Sometimes I wonder if anyone, in the entire history of computing, has every bothered to read and consider the contents of a typical End User License Agreement (EULA). Some Product Manager, I suppose (though truthfully, I’m not even sure of this one). The EULA, however, is important. It’s the foundation of an important consent ceremony that ends with only one effective choice: pressing OK. This much-maligned step in every software installation is the only real binding between an end user and a provider of software. Out of this agreement emerges a contract between these two parties, and it is this contact that serves as a legal framework for interpretation should any issues arise in the relationship.
The US Patent and Trademark Office, which has been re-examining Apple’s pinch-to-zoom patent (US No 7,844,915) presumably at Samsung’s behest, said Wednesday that all 21of its claims are invalid on the basis of prior art, specifically for anticipation and obviousness. It’s a preliminary decision. As the Wall Street Journal says, the patent – well, at least claim 8 – was a cornerstone of Apple’s infringement case against Samsung, which filed the PTO’s decision with the federal court in San Jose, California that heard Apple’s infringement case this summer. Apple, which has called the patent the commercially most valuable of the three multitouch software patents-in-suit, is expected to appeal.
Samsung said Tuesday that it will drop its attempts to get Apple products banned anywhere in Europe using its standards-essential patents (SEPs). It’s not dropping its infringement suits, but will limit its SEP claims to monetary damages. It will still seek injunctions for Apple’s alleged infringement of its non-SEP patents. Samsung claimed its action was “unilateral and voluntary,” but FOSS Patents assumes that the European Commission, which has been investigating Samsung’s use of SEPs, leaned sufficiently on the Korean company for it to change its legal strategy ahead of a statement of objections (SO).
Returning from Asia Jefferies financial analyst and Apple follower Peter Misek said several iPhone 6 prototypes and an iTV, presumably integrated with Apple’s mobile ecosystem, appear to be floating around. There’s reportedly an iPhone model with a 4.8-inch Retina+ IGZO screen, 128GB of storage and a new A7 quad-core processor. Misek expects an iPhone 5S with a “new super HD camera/screen, a better battery and near field communications” to ship in June or July. It should come in six and eight different colors instead of just black and white. There may – heavy on may – be a cheaper iPhone, a “retooled iPhone 4” with a “scaled-down modem [and] apps processor,” targeting pre-paid and emerging markets, especially in Asia, that could sell for $200-$250. Foxconn could make 200k-300k a day. An iPad 5 could launch around June with an IGZO screen that would cut the thickness in half and significantly reduce the weight.
Google couldn’t have picked a prettier time to release the upgraded version of Google Maps for iOS it’s been working on since Apple kicked it off the iPhone and iPad in September in favor of its own dodgy Apple Maps that couldn’t find the Eiffel Tower, utterly embarrassed the company, forced CEO Tim Cook to publicly apologize and fire the guy responsible. Google Maps for iOS hit the Apple App Store late Wednesday hours after the Australian police labeled Apple Maps “life-threatening” for misdirecting motorists into a desolate Outback desert where you’d better have a four-wheel drive, extra gas and a few canteens to survive. Seems Apple Maps misplaced the town they were headed for. Anyway, you can still hear the Halleluiah chorus that greeted the free Google Maps download. It’s already the top app, embarrassing Apple some more.
Well, there may actually be an Apple TV in our future. The Wall Street Journal says the company is working with Asian component suppliers and testing large-screen high-resolution TV prototypes. The testing is apparently in its early days and involves Foxconn, which assembles the iPhone and iPad, and Sharp. Apple has reportedly been testing TV prototypes internally for several years, but it’s unclear if it will bring such a thing to market. The Journal points out that such a move is likely to annoy Samsung, the world’s biggest TV maker by shipment and a major supplier of components to Apple. Their relationship is shot through with holes already because of their litigation over Android.
Apple and Samsung were back in district court in California Thursday. Samsung wants the jury verdict finding it ripped off the iPhone overturned or the $1.05 billion judgment against it reduced. It’s one of the largest decisions ever in an IP case. Apple, which says its future depends on differentiation, wants the judgment increased to $1.77 billion for willful infringement and eight of Samsung aging widgets permanently enjoined. It also wants the jury verdict that the iPad wasn’t infringed overturned. Samsung wants an entirely new trial claiming the jury was tainted by the foreman Velvin Hogan who “deliberately concealed information” about a lawsuit with hard drive-maker Seagate nearly 20 years ago that resulted in his filing for bankruptcy.
After “Designed by Apple in California, Assembled in USA” tags were spotted on some new iMacs, Apple CEO Tim Cook confirmed Thursday that production of one of the company’s existing Mac lines is moving to the US. Production will ramp up next year. Apple is investing $100 million to produce the things here and will subcontract the work out. He told Bloomberg BusinessWeek, “We’ve been working on this for a long time, and we were getting closer to it. It will happen in 2013. We’re really proud of it. We could have quickly maybe done just assembly, but it’s broader because we wanted to do something more substantial.”
This week, we’ve been putting both the iPad 4 and the Microsoft Surface tablet through their paces. In our testing, we’re happy to say that both tablets are very solid HTML5 platforms. Internet Explorer 10 on the Surface has a broad, well-implemented HTML5 feature set that mostly meets and occasionally exceeds mobile Safaris. On the performance front, the iPad 4 leads in raw JavaScript and Canvas performance while the Surface has a faster SVG implementation. Having comprehensive, high performance HTML5 support is now a “must-have” feature for new mobile devices. For end users, both these devices promise great user experiences from well-designed HTML5 apps. Going into our testing, we were bringing expectations set by the iPad 3 and our developer hardware for Windows 8. When we reviewed the iPad 3 in the Spring, we were disappointed with iPad performance. Ordinary web pages as well as HTML5 apps had stutter and visible tiling. Raw JavaScript performance was actually lower on the iPad 3 than the iPad 2. In our opinion, it was an underpowered device, so we were not entirely surprised to see the iPad 4 arrive with vastly improved hardware specs so quickly. On the Microsoft front, when we took our first look at the IE10 preview last Fall, we were very impressed with its HTML5 feature list, but wondered if performance would hold up on tablet-grade hardware. Read on to see what we found.
Prevention is better than cure. For many this is a cliché ridden saying, but there is a whole lot of truth in this it; why waste money on curing a certain medical condition, when you can prevent. What's more, you can now give mobile power to your efforts at prevention and improving your health. Nowadays, various smartphones such as an iPhone, help users take care of their health easily, through a variety of iPhone apps available on the iTunes store. Let's take a look at the top five iPhone apps, which take care of your well-being.
Apple has reportedly fired Richard Williamson, the NeXT legacy who botched the mission-critical maps program that replaced the Google Maps program Apple used to offer on its widgets. Apple wanted Google Maps off its iPads and iPhones because it loathes Google and its Android operating system. The screw-up forced CEO Tim Cook to publicly apologize and promise the widgetry would improve. Apple then fired Williamson’s boss, mobile-software chief Scott Forstall, last month. He reportedly refused to apologize for the blooper.
Apple claims six more Samsung products, including the Galaxy Note II, infringe eight of its patents and wants to add them to its other California suit against the Korean giant, the one that doesn’t go to trial until March of 2014. Its first California suit against Samsung resulted in a jury verdict awarding it $1.05 billion in damages. The decision will be reviewed by presiding District Court Judge Lucy Koh on December 6. She could ban the Samsung products that were found to infringe or throw the verdict out. Since they are older products, Samsung’s biggest risk is to its pride and reputation.
Late Wednesday right before Thanksgiving Day Apple was ordered to turn over a copy of its recent 10-year licensing deal with HTC – the one that ended all litigation between them – to Samsung. Apple said it didn’t care if Samsung got it but deferred to HTC, which said it didn’t care either, but wanted the publicly undisclosed royalties blacked out because HTC and Samsung compete against each other. HTC of course is understood to be paying Apple. Magistrate Judge Paul Grewal said he didn’t think Samsung could get very much out of knowing the royalties because “the licensing fees with HTC are relevant to the degree of consumer demand for Apple’s patented features” but obliged Samsung anyway with an unredacted copy of the settlement including the fees so his disclosure decisions involving third parties would all be consistent.