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A New Round of Apple VS Adobe Confrontation
This week's sensation was a published officially on Apple's site. If you didn't read it or want to remind it to yourself, here are its main tent poles:
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Leave a commentCompanies Will Pay $10 Million To Be Placed in Apple's iAd Program
Yesterday The Wall Street Journal reported that this year Apple is going to charge companies 1$ million for iAds on its mobile devices. Citing an unknown but reliable source familiar with the matter those companies that want to become a part of the iAds launch will pay $10 million to be first in the door.
The pricing policy of iAds is pretty simple. Every time user sees an ad the advertiser is charged a penny. If he's tapping the banner, Apple charges $2. So $1 million ad buy will provoke a big amount of its views and user taps.
In addition to a higher price Apple wants to take more control over marketing campaigns of its clients. But still it doesn't reduce companies' interest in iAds:
"Despite the high price, ad executives at agencies from Boston to New York and San Francisco to Los Angeles have crowded into conference rooms in recent weeks to listen to the tech company's pitch for iAd".
One of the advertisements that is already developed is an ad for Nike's Air Jordan basketball shoes. It includes iAd logo and animated banner. If you select it, you'll see an interactive store locator, special videoclip and exclusive offers taking place at local stores. This iAd was also shown by Apple on its iPhone OS 4 preview event.
Some experts think Apple's appearance at the market of mobile advertisement may convince some other selling ads companies to switch to other mobile platforms (for example, Google Android).
With a growing popularity of apps for Apple devices advertisers and developers see iAds as a potential opportunity to reach a wide audience and raise more money on it.
iPhone 4G Finder Is Revealed And Regrets His Mistake
Wired.com finally figured out that 21-year-old Brian J. Hogan from Redwood City, California, is a person who found an iPhone 4G prototype and sold it to Gizmodo. The resource identified him by following clues on different social networks and then confirmed the information from a source who involved in the investigation around the device.
Brian regrets that he didn't try harder to return the iPhone to its owner, according to his attorney. He is willing to cooperate with authorities to avoid any consequences.
The story of iPhone's revealing is very similar to the Gizmodo's one. Brian got the device from one of his friends in the bar. When he didn't find its owner he took it home. There he used Facebook, but then the phone shut down. Sometime later Brian removed a fake cover and understood that it must be a prototype of iPhone 4G. He tried to call Apple Care but this didn't take effect.
Then Brian offered several journalists to take a look at the device. But he believes that Gizmodo's payment was for allowing it exclusive access for reviewing the phone, but not for purchasing it.
The bar owners say Hogan didn't come to the public house in attempts to find the device's owner. Grey Powell returned several times and asked about any information on his iPhone.
Brian has recently transferred schools and will continue studying in the autumn. Before that he was giving swimming lessons to children and also volunteered at a Chinese orphanage when he was enrolled in a study-abroad program.
Apple Acquired Another Chip Maker Intrinsity
Yesterday Apple closed a deal of acquiring Intrisity, a small company in Austin, Texas, that specializes on mobile computer chips producing.
This is a second time for the last two years when Apple buys a small chip company to have the facilities for making fast and power efficient processors. In 2008 Apple purchased P.A. Semi for $278 million, but with the lapse of time many chip maker employees had left company because of inadequate compensation (by the way, some of them are now in Agnilux, another company that was recently acquired by Google).
Well-known chip analyst Tom R. Halfhill has information from his sources that Apple paid $121 million for Intrinsity, but company’s representative Steve Dowling didn't comment on this information.
Such a deal isn't expensive for Apple at all, thinks Tom Halfhill:
“The purchase price is like pocket change to Apple, and they get a lot of benefit”.
It is widely speculated that iPad's A4 chip is based on Intrinsity technology that improved its processing power from 650 MHz to 1 GHz without increasing the battery consumption. With acquiring this chip making company Apple will be able to increase that 350 MHz by itself. Moreover, the company seems to be looking forward for creating its own version of ARM chip. Some other companies like Qualcomm, Marvell and Nvidia had the same experience and spent millions of dollars to gain a satisfactory result.
It is interesting that rumors about this deal started when some people saw that a significant number of Intrinsity employees changed their employer section to Apple in LinkedIn.
Also Apple's desire to create its own mobile chip contradicts to its strategy of purchasing Intel chips for computers.
Oprah Winfrey Admires Apple iPad
Recently Oprah Winfrey declared herself a fan of iPad in the front of millions of TV viewers. She called the device "amazing" and said that its hardware will "change the way kids learn." TV host admires its backlit touchscreen and thinks it has great opportunities for reading, playing games and sharing photos.
Some time ago Oprah has been promoting Amazon Kindle on TV, and once the sales of this device were boosted so strong the company had problems with keeping up with demand. When she has been speaking about iPad she also mentioned Kindle in the past tense, like she "HAD a Kindle". But later her spokesperson said she still uses both devices.
Oprah's Book Club may be viewed in iBookstore for iPad, and its books may be purchased for a standard fee.
Every third sold first-gen iPhone is still in use
Today mobile ad firm AdMob has released another Mobile Metrics report that consists of information about the software and hardware that had been used by Apple's handsets owners in March.
The study reveals that only 2% of all Apple devices with iPhone OS are first-gen iPhones. But it is important to notice that since the first sale of iPhone OS-based device Apple sold over 85 million of its worldwide. If we'll take the period between June 2007 and July 2008 (time when iPhone 3G was shipped), then it turns out that company sold 6.1 million of iPhone 2G, which is approximately 7% of the total sum of handsets that were sold.
Fortune Brainstorm Tech journalist Philip Elmer-Dewitt continues to count and then sums up:
"If 7% of those iPhone 1Gs are driving 2% of AdMob's traffic that suggests that nearly one in three is still ticking - and visiting the Web."
Obviously, the popularity of the first-generation iPhones will be further reducing without iPhone OS 4.0 support.
AdMob also found that the most popular iPhone in March 2010 was iPhone 3GS, which generated 39% of all traffic. This is much higher result than 9% in September 2009.
Other information can be seen above on the graphs.
Apple Wants to Acquire ARM Holdings?
This Wednesday London Evening Standard posted an article about supposed acquisition of ARM Holdings by Apple. According to the source:
"Apple is ARM's biggest customer and speculation is that the iPad maker wants to take chip design in house."
With a reference to an unknown trader it is claimed that with such a deal Apple could stop ARM from delivering its technology to everyone else's devices. That looks convenient. But we were not sure if it is a rumor or not, so we waited for a while for further information.
Police investigates the situation with iPhone 4G prototype
As you remember, some time ago Gizmodo acquired an iPhone 4G prototype for $5,000. The story was pretty mystical - Gray Powell who is (or was?) an Apple employee decided to drink some beer and then lost his iPhone 4G in the pub. Another guy found it and then supposedly tried to bring it back to Apple, but nobody believed it's an iPhone 4G. So he sold it to Gizmodo.
Journalists at Gizmodo were very happy - they made a video of it, took dozens of pictures, disassembled it and again made photos and videos. Then Apple officially asked Gizmodo to bring it back and they did it.
Well now we have information from the made by Greg Sandoval at CNET where it is said the police are currenty investigating the circumstances of the story to find the evidence enough to support the criminal prosecution.
iRetrophone: Like Making Calls In 1937
Freelancestudios created another cool accessory for iPhone - this time it's an "iRetrophone" dock that allows you making calls with a retro handset. The design is obviously borrowed from Henry Dreyfuss, prolific industrial designer who in 1937 created the iconic type of phone.
The base is compatible with any iPhone. We also recommend installing the app ($0.99) so that the pair looked really authentic.
iRetroPhone is available for purchase in ping, clear or black resin for $195.
iPads Become Popular Among Hospital Staff
Some time ago we posted an article about shocking popularity of the iPad among physicians. Well yesterday PCWorld posted an article about first institution which is looking forward to use this device. It is a Kaweah Delta Health Care District in Visalia, California. Its director of technical services Nick Voloshin says healthcare workers need a device with a long battery life while moving from location to location, and iPad is a great choice not only for usual everyday tasks, but also for looking at EKG results, X-ray images, and for other purposes that can be easily delivered with Citrix virtual desktop. He has already bought three iPads to test it and have plans to deploy more than a hundred for hospice and health care workers, pharmacists, dietitians and nurses in a next two months.
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Interesting facts from Apple Financial Results Conference Call
Recently Apple Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook and Chief Financial Officer Peter Oppenheimer had a financial conference call with the press and analysts. Here are some interesting facts we gained from the conversation:
Google Purchased Agnilux For Reasons Unknown
Dan Primack from Pehub.com reported yesterday that Google acquired Agnilux. The latter is a startup company in San-Jose comprised of former Apple, P.A. Semi, Cisco and TiVo employees. It is intriguing that there almost no public information about the reasons why Google bought it and what Agnilux has recently been working on. One of the Google representatives confirmed the information but didn't comment it on.
Agnilux's website is currently unavailable, so we have no information about the company. But because of former P.A. Semi employees it seems like Agnilux may be working on a new chip that can be a rival to Qualcomm's SnapDragon or Apple's A4 SoCs. But, according to an investigation made by New York Times in February, one of the employees named Mark Hayter said:
"We want to make a splash. We don't want our manufacturer to take our intellectual property before we're ready".
So it looks like the company's main purpose in kept in a big secret. But it is known that later NYT heard from another Agnilux employee that the company is working on server and has a partnership with Cisco. Well that might be interesting to Google whose thousands of servers till this moment have been made by the company's engineers but not purchased.
Skyfire Browser Will Bring Flash To iPhone
Some time ago Apple approved Opera Mini and now everybody can download it for free. Skyfire team understood it as a reason to work harder so now they look forward to bring their own mobile browser to iPhone and iPod Touch. Skyfire CEO Jeff Glueck congratulated the Opera in his company's blog and told about upcoming version for 'iDevices'.
The idea of their app is almost the same as for the Opera - the browser also renders web content though the remote servers of the company and then presents it on a mobile devices. But with Skyfire users can view Silverlight, Flash and Quicktime content without needing any of the plugins or powerful processor.
The video above shows how the Skyfire browser works on Symbian devices.
Apple named final date for 3G iPad retail launch
As you remember yesterday Apple updated its online store claiming the 3G iPad will be shipped May 7. Well today EnGadget received information from the company that the device will come to American stores on April 30th at 5PM. It is also the day when people who have pre-ordered iPad will get it. So the promised "late April" date is finally confirmed.
iPhone 4G is real and Apple wants it back
Yesterday Gizmodo posted photos and videos of iPhone 4G prototype. Apple reaction was simple - Senior VP and General Counsel, Bruce Sewell, wrote to Gizmodo:
It has come to our attention that Gizmodo is currently in possession of a device that belongs to Apple. This letter constitutes a formal request that you return the device to Apple. Please let me know where to pick up the unit.
Well, this sounds like a proof that the lost/stolen iPhone 4G is real. Here is a scan of this letter:
Here is the reply from Gizmodo to Apple: