RIP Steve Jobs

"Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything -- all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart. ... Stay hungry. Stay foolish." -Steve Jobs

Plug & Play

Pretty sure I'm going to need one of these when they become available March 31. Lets you plug your guitar (or whatever instrument) directly into your iPad, Mac, iPhone or iPod Touch via the dock connectors or USB port to play in GarageBand. FINALLY.

[via Gizmodo]

The Good Flock

I've been looking for a good iPad case for a while now, and I think this just might be the one. From my throw pillows, to my blog background, to this iPad case, I've gone Navajo-print crazy! This particular case is from a website called The Good Flock, which has lots of other great cases for laptops, iPads, Kindles, and even pencil cases! Check them out, they're pretty stellar.

A Guide To The New iPhone 4

Click here for Engadget's superb, extremely in-depth and detailed guide to the new iPhone 4.

Sam Mendes iPhone 4 Commercial

Here's the new commercial for the iPhone 4 directed by Sam Mendes of American Beauty and Revolutionary Road fame.

What's New For iPhone 4

This is a great video that walks you through what's new about the iPhone 4.

The New iPhone 4

Click here for the full live-blog run-down from Engadget.

Introducing The New iPhone 4

This is pretty crazy. Someone (presumably an Apple employee who will soon be fired) lost the new iPhone 4 at a Redwood City bar, and Gizmodo got a hold of it. Click here to have a look and learn everything you want to know about it. Here's a quick rundown of what's new:

• Front-facing video chat camera
• Improved regular back-camera
• Camera flash
• Micro-SIM instead of standard SIM
• Improved display
• What looks to be a secondary mic for noise cancellation
• Split buttons for volume
• Power, mute, and volume buttons are all metallic
• The back is entirely flat and either glass, ceramic, or shiny plastic
• An aluminum border going completely around the outside
• Slightly smaller screen than the 3GS with higher resolution
• Everything is more squared off
• 3 grams heavier
• 16% Larger battery

Apple acknowledges iPhone passcode flaw, promises fix next month

Apple's taking a pretty lackadaisical attitude toward one of the most easily avoided security flaws in recent memory, calling the iPhone's passcode lock bypass a "minor iPhone security issue" and saying that a fix will be rolled out in September. Thanks, Apple; we suppose it'd be a little too much trouble to ask for a fix sooner, even though you already fixed it once in 1.1.4. For what it's worth, a company spokeswoman is quick to point out that the flaw can easily be hidden by changing the home button double-click functionality to take you to the home screen, but most users don't know that, now do they? Way to show some hustle, guys -- cookies and gold stars all around.

iPhone 3G customers receive texts about 'important software update'

Owners of Apple’s iPhone 3G began receiving text messages Friday from Apple and AT&T telling them to upgrade their phone’s software to deal with “bug fixes” for the new device.

Some owners of the phone, which went on sale July 11, have complained about problems with dropped calls and poor reception, and said the phone’s 3G, or third-generation wireless, network is not working as fast as was promised.

Apple issued a 2.0.2 iPhone software “update” Aug. 18 to deal with what it only describes as “bug fixes” with the new device. To get the update, customers need to sync their iPhones with Apple’s iTunes program on their computers.

Is Apple shooting in the dark to fix iPhone 3G issues?

Hopes were high that 2.0.2 would decisively crush the reception woes some iPhone 3G owners have experienced since taking delivery of their cracking beauties; dropped calls, latching onto EDGE reception when 3G (also known as "the good stuff") is available, and general signal strength wonkiness have all plagued a select group of handsets since launch, making for a decidedly MobileMe-like user experience. Some upgraders are actually reporting just the opposite, though -- for these lucky few, 2.0.2 seems to be making reception somehow worse than it already was, and what's more, there are intermittent reports cropping up of broken third-party apps, too. With the 1.x line of builds having chugged along with relatively little drama for a year, here's our question: what the hell is going on? Why does 2.0, after two post-launch builds, still feel like a beta? MobileMe took the lion's share of the fall for Apple having spread itself too thin through the launch-heavy summer months, but did some of that fire-drill mentality trickle over to the breadwinner, too? Sound off in comments with your experiences putting 2.0.2 through its paces so far!

[Via Mobility Site]

Update: Apparently Steve Jobs, who should have his face buried in a developer workstation somewhere in Cupertino slaving away on iPhone bug fixes, somehow found the time to slack off for half an hour and fire off an email to some guy who wrote him complaining about third-party apps that are crashing on startup. Jobs allegedly says that the issue is a "known iPhone bug" and that it'll be fixed in the next update come September -- but frankly, we wish he'd let his assistants attend to this sort of needless communication so he could get back to, you know, writing code and inventing phones.

iPhone mod turns the Apple logo into a mini-flashlight

Sure, this video feels like it might veer into creepy snuff-film territory right at the beginning, but luckily it just reveals a fairly sweet looking iPhone mod. Apparently some Russian iPhone fans have replaced the regular, boring Apple logo on the back of an original iPhone with an eye-piercing, glowing version. There's not a lot of detail on how this is done -- and the video is in Russian -- but the source link claims it's just a matter of, "removing the aluminum 'fruits' and inserting the glowing ones." We'll see about that. Otherwise, check this similar step-by-step mod seen earlier. Eerie video included after the break.

Update: As commenters (and Croiman himself) have pointed out, this appears to be a boost of the impressive Croiman Psycho iPhone mod we saw back in April.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgfyUsjwGwM
[Via Hack a Day]

The Reason Behind iPhone 3G's Dropped Calls?

An Infineon chip could be at the root of complaints from around the world that Apple Inc's new iPhone drops calls and has unpredictable Internet links, according to a research report from Nomura.

Growing complaints on the reception of iPhone 3G signal

Problems include high incidence of dropped calls, switching onto EDGE while the device is stationary and loss of reception while in good coverage.

Magazine blames iPhone’s design for 3G woes

Spotty wireless broadband connectivity for some of Apple Inc.'s new iPhones most likely results from a hardware problem introduced during mass production, a Swedish technical magazine reported Wednesday.

Jobs Confirms iPhone 'kill switch'

Best Buy To Begin Selling iPhone 3G - It's About Damn Time

And now for the irony: it'll be no better a buy than what you can find at ye olde Apple or AT&T store. Best Buy officially becomes the first third-party retailer in the US to sell the iPhone in an official capacity -- 3G or otherwise -- when it launches the iPhone 3G in some 970 stores plus an additional 18 dedicated Mobile locations on September 7 for the same $199 and $299 price points found elsewhere. Quoth Best Buy Mobile's CEO, "We had a lot of work to do, obviously, to get in a position where Apple and AT&T would feel good about Best Buy Mobile carrying it, and that's what we've done in the last 18 months." In other words, this has been a pretty persistent effort to score the third-party exclusive essentially since the original model was announced, and it's just now paying off." There's no indication on how the addition of Best Buy to the US sales mix will affect production or distribution, but at least there'll be one more place to try to find some frickin' stock.

iPhone experiencing GPS problems after 2.0.1 update?

While some complaints after any firmware update are to be expected, there seems to be a decided uptick in the number of reports of problems with the iPhone's GPS (ranging from general wonkiness to all out failure) after the most recent 2.0.1 update. As the responses on the MacRumors forums indicate, however, the problems are far from across the board (or confined to the iPhone 3G), and GPS problems haven't exactly been that rare of an occurrence before this latest update either.

Apple working on streaming your iTunes library to your iPhone?

Apple's experimented with allowing iTunes to stream over the internet as well as your LAN in the past and quickly removed the feature (probably due to RIAA pressure), so we're not placing too much stock in this, but AppleInsider's unearthed a patent that seems to describe a way to stream music over the 'net to your iPhone / iPod touch. The goal is to prevent you from having to selectively sync content to your device -- instead, you'd sync just the metadata and stream whatever you wanted direct from your machine as though it was all stored locally. There are some obvious problems here -- it wouldn't work if you didn't have service (or over EDGE, really), most home upstream connections aren't that fast, etc., etc., -- but it's certainly interesting, and a welcome addition to local storage if it ever makes the scene.

The World Wide Web - August 5th, 2008

A Reason To Live In Arkansas
http://materialicio.us/2008/08/02/arkansas-house-marlon-blackwell/

Vampire Weekend (for lovie)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_i1xk07o4g

Delta Plans to Offer Wi-Fi on Its Jets
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/06/business/06wifi.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

iPhone 2.0.1 now available through iTunes
http://www.engadget.com/2008/08/04/iphone-2-0-1-now-available-through-itunes/

In-flight calling ban passes hurdle in House
http://www.engadget.com/2008/08/01/in-flight-calling-ban-passes-hurdle-in-house/

My Bloody Valentine Announce North American Tour
http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/news/50411-my-bloody-valentine-announce-north-american-tour

Radiohead Use Fancy Technology in Camera-Free Video
http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/news/142023-radiohead-use-fancy-technology-in-camera-free-video

Radiohead – House of Cards
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8nTFjVm9sTQ