Wednesday, June 20, 2007

The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) (10 сообщений)

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The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)
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  • WWDC07: Bust or Boon?

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    It's not often I agree with Paul "Argue Cuz I Can" Thurrott, but sometimes he hits the proverbial nail on the head: In one sentence on his blog, Internet-Nexus, Thurrott sums up the WWDC keynote snooze-fest that wedgied some of the Mac community: "And now we know," say Thurrott, "that OS X is as mature an OS as is Windows and, in the end, there's really just not much you can do beyond the evolutionary stuff." If you ignore the "as mature as Windows" bit, you see the inarguable logic: OS X is a beautiful, powerful, and mature operating system. It's feature-rich, stable, and could easily be considered the best operating system on the market today. So why mess with a good thing?

    WWDC keynotes are no longer about announcing revolutionary new features of Mac OS X, for the simple fact that we're all revolutioned out. OS X has reached its prime: it does what needs to do, plenty more, and any major revisions could wind up doing more harm than good. So now it's all about the tweaks, the "evolutionary stuff," as Thurrott calls it: refining the Finder, cleaning up the interface, fixing the tedious quirks that have plagued the OS from day one, etc. Jobs can't get on stage anymore and wow the audience with drool-y features like Exposé.

    One could easily argue that the keynote was fudged. Jobs may have the power to take even the most mundane and make it sound world-changing: but when (most of) the material is genuinely bland, and uninteresting, and expected, even His Jobness himself can't save it. Maybe the problem here is that Apple doesn't realize it can't wow the general public with the minor OS X tweaks anymore -- that instead, if it wants to publicize the hell out of its WWDC keynotes, it should focus on pro hardware upgrades, on maybe a few new software features that might turn heads, on the new markets Apple's posed to commandeer: mobile, web, etc.; on only the stuff worthy of a Jobsian appearance.

    From what I'm hearing, with few exceptions, developers loved WWDC. It's all about the sessions, the learning experience, the dev networking. The keynote, on the other hand, is for the public, for the tech-ignorant media: and this year's WWDC failed to recognize that.
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  • Image Gallery: YouTube on Apple TV

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    Now that YouTube has arrived on the Apple TV, an image gallery of all the new features seems only fitting. Apple has done quite a nice job with the debut of this custom YouTube UI, and it is surprisingly feature-packed. In terms of video quality, I can comfortably say that most videos that started out in a decent quality to begin with (TV show clips, CG videos from design students, etc.) look *worlds* better in YouTube on the Apple TV (re-encoded to H.264 from the original, mind you; Apple thankfully doesn't put up with the dreadful quality of Flash video) than YouTube online. If you can't get to an Apple TV to take a ride for yourself, check out our YouTube on Apple TV image gallery to get a decent idea of what's in store for this clever new Apple TV feature.

    Gallery: YouTube on Apple TV

    YouTube menuRating a videoWaiting for a streamFeatured videosYouTube video - Kiwi!
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  • Turn your smartphone into an iPhone-wannabe

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    Stuck with your current smartphone for the remainder of your service contract? Tied in with business? Just can't wait 'til June 29th to get some of that iPhone-y goodness? No worries: Andy Ihnatko has you covered. In his Thursday column for the Chicago (go Cubs!) Sun-Times, Andy lists numerous ways to turn your multi-touchless Phone of Yesteryear into a genuine 'iFaux.' Included in the list are apps like Pocket Tunes (music app), Pocket Player (video app), Opera Mini (browser app), Google Maps (uh, map app), and a swanky service called SimulScribe that gives you a psuedo-Visual Voicemail feature, sending your voicemails to you as text (plus an audio attachment) via e-mail.

    Check the fully skinny, and enjoy Andy's trademark humor, in his full article on the Sun-Times site.
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  • Sent from my iPhone

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    Since today seems to be all about tiny little details of the iPhone, why not continue that trend? Blogger Paul Kedrosky shares something interesting an iPhone user told him. While composing an email the iPhone will insert the signature 'Sent from my iPhone' at the bottom of the message (I am sure you can turn this off if you like). Taking a page from Blackberry's book, Apple wants people to know that their friends are using iPhones.

    Now, if you want to convince people that you have an iPhone ahead of schedule simply add 'Sent from my iPhone' at the bottom of all your emails. No one will be the wiser.

    Thanks, Nik (from whom I also snagged the graphic for this post).
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  • iPhone gallery shows off Dock, iPhone headphones

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    Eagle eyed TUAW reader Eric noticed that Apple has updated the iPhone photo gallery. Not only that, but they updated it to include pictures of a heretofore unseen iPhone dock. Not the most groundbreaking of news, I will admit, but since we have relatively little information about the iPhone we need to obsess over something, right?

    The gallery also includes a better picture of the iPhone headphones, which include a microphone so you needn't lift the iPhone to your head when someone calls you while you're listening to Macy Gray (or any other artist, one assumes).

    Update: It would seem that we have could a glimpse of the iPhone dock before, during the intro keynote. That glimpse was fleeting though, so now you can stare at the dock for hours and hours.
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  • iBacklash: Are ZDNet blogs naysaying the iPhone?

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    Over at 2 A Day, they certainly think something's gotten into the water at ZDnet. The quick meta-analysis shows that 11 ZDnet blogs have posted more than 50 negative items about the iPhone in the last 10 days or so. Is this excessive pre-release carping, or simply prudent, slightly contrarian analysis? Don't forget, ZDnet is home to some of the most well-regarded voices in the Mac blogosphere... and certainly mainstream media outlets like the Wall Street Journal (analysis courtesy Daring Fireball) are not being coy on the topic of iPhone's appropriateness for the corporate market.

    I know I'd be frustrated if someone was peeking over our shoulders at TUAW and second-guessing our individual editorial choices, seeking for a hidden bias and specific agenda. 'Course, the thing is, around here we wear our agenda on our collective sleeve: we're Apple fans, and we wouldn't be here if we weren't. While we may cast the occasional gimlet eye at the choices and products made at One Infinite Loop, the fact is that we're all excited about the iPhone, and I don't see that there's any point in pretending otherwise. If there is an iPhone backlash brewing, I hope we'll be among the first to point out the line of people jumping off the bandwagon -- and, as we've said repeatedly, let's try to reserve formal thumbs-up or -down on the device until it ships.

    Update: Larry Dignan has posted a post-by-post response to the 2 A Day item over on the Between The Lines blog at ZDnet. Summary: Larry says nobody's hatin' on the iPhone.

    [via Fake Steve]
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  • YouTube available now for Apple TV, will be on iPhone when shipping

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    Attention Apple TV owners, you might want to run software update. Why? Because Apple has just released the YouTube update. You might recall that Apple announced Apple TVs would soon be able to play YouTube videos thanks to a free software update (which is all part of the surprising and delighting). That update has come, and it is available for download.

    Apple also announced today that the 'mystery 12th app' on the iPhone is... a YouTube viewer! That's right, no longer will you be tethered to your desk watching grown men put Mentos in Diet Coke bottles, you can do that while walking around, riding a bus, or sipping coffee at a Starbucks. The iPhone YouTube app will have a multitouch display and work over EDGE and WiFi (though I imagine it'll work best with WiFi).

    Remember that YouTube has started encoding videos in H.264, so that Flash will not be needed on either the Apple TV or the iPhone to enjoy this content. 10,000 YouTube videos will be available on June 29th in this format, with more coming every week.

    Update: TUAW reader Brad points out that Apple added a video of the YouTube app to the iPhone section of thier website. Go check it out.
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  • Ask TUAW: time shift in iPhoto, HDTV to a Mac, backing up, and much more

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    Last week, Mike did a great job with Ask TUAW and we had a bumper crop of questions. We won't be able to get to all of them this week, but we'll be looking at a number of different issues including: shifting times in iPhoto, getting a Mac and HDTV to work well together, comparing the 24" iMac to the Power Mac G5 in gaming, setting recurring events in iCal, backing up, customizing Mighty Mouse tracking, and getting Gmail in Mail.app.

    Remember: everyone's welcome to post questions for Ask TUAW; we're happy to help! Just leave questions for next week in the comments. Now let's get to it.

    Continue reading Ask TUAW: time shift in iPhoto, HDTV to a Mac, backing up, and much more

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  • Five things Apple can do to bring gamers back

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    Apple is releasing games for the iPod. EA and id show up at the WWDC keynote. And the rumors say Nintendo may team with Apple for the iPhone. All signs point to an Apple that seriously wants to reenter the gaming market, an arena that has been dominated by PCs and consoles for quite some time. But exactly how can they do it?

    They're doing some of the right things already, and we can expect them to do more in the future. But here's five suggestions (or predictions, if you will) about what Apple can do to attract gamers back to the Cult of Mac.

    1) Put (even more) games on iTunes. Steam is a nice digital distribution system, and Xbox Live Arcade is a better one. But no one has done digital distribution like Apple has with iTunes-- first music, and now movies and television shows. What they need to do is add games to the software, and even go so far as to create a kind of "iTunes Arcade," where you can buy games for your iPod, your iPhone, your Mac or MacBook, and even your Apple TV. And I'm not talking dinky downloads like Lost-- I'm talking EA's Madden, Need for Speed, and even Battlefield 2142. Run patches and updates through there as well (EA's Link might not like that, but it hasn't been successful enough that they wouldn't consider joining iTunes if asked), use CoverFlow as a cool browsing and launching interface, and you've got the key not only to a solid revenue system, but also a promotion and distribution channel.

    Continue reading Five things Apple can do to bring gamers back

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  • Making the Web a Better Place for iPhone

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    Even though the true nature of the iPhone's capabilities when it comes to browsing the Web have yet to be confirmed or denied, a group of eager web developers, designers, and other enterprising folks are anticipating the iPhone's impending release. Not only that, they are already planning an event to help improve the Web browsing experience for all users of the device. According to Apple Insider, the free event, dubbed the iPhone Developers Camp, will feature an agenda of classes and seminars aimed at "making the Web a better place for Apple, Inc.'s upcoming mobile handset."

    So, if you're a developer, a designer, an interested party who wants to help out or you just want to see a bunch of people with using iPhones in the wild, you may want to mark July 6-8 on your calendar and plan on attending the event. For more info, there's always the event's official site. I admit to not knowing a whole bunch about developing Web applications or designing anything of real value, but as someone who will definitely be getting an iPhone as soon as I possibly can, having the best possible Web browsing experience while using it sounds like a great thing to me.
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