Everything Rumors
Rumors of Reseach In Motion's iconic BlackBerry Messenger app wriggling its way over to iPhone may be coming to an end. Anonymous sources have claimed that new CEO Thorsten Heins shut down the idea of licensing BlackBerry Messenger to carriers and manufacturers as soon as he stepped in, and was actually against RIM doing any kind of licensing at all. Apparently the issue was "not up for discussion", according to the source. It's unfortunate that he made that call early on, considering he openly admitted to looking into licensing deals during the last quarterly conference call. Ex co-CEO Jim Balsillie was previously rumored to champion BBM on other platforms, a project which new sources claimed was called SMS 2.0 internally. They had even acquired a small company called LiveProfile to work on it.
Word has it that Samsung and Apple's mediated settlement talks were not fruitful, and that their patent dispute will be ongoing. This outcome probably seems a little obvious after Apple filed to ban the Galaxy Tab 10.1 from being imported to the U.S. the day the negotiations kicked off.
Yet more widescreen iPhone 5 rumors have hit the web this morning, with a whisper that at least one of Apple's multiple iPhone 5 prototypes boasts a 3.9 inch touchscreen with a 1136 x 640 resolution.
According to the latest rumor, Apple's co-founder, Steve Jobs, worked one the next generation iPhone 5 design prior to his passing last October. Bloomberg claims 3 sources familiar with the matter say there will be a redesign, 1 claims the redesign will involve a bigger screen, and 1 claims the redesign involved Steve Jobs.
Apple looks set to increase the next generation iPhone’s screen size to at least 4-inches according to information coming from people familiar with the situation. According to the sources, Apple has already placed orders for the larger screens from its Asian suppliers and they are bigger than the screens used on the current iPhone.
Right on schedule, the reports of Apple slowing down current generation iPhone production are hitting the internet. Just like parts leaks, case leaks, and all types of rumors, production reports are one of the signposts we all must pass coming down the long road to a new Apple product release, and this year certainly won't be any different. At least not now that Sterne Agee analyst Shaw Wu has claimed Apple has cut back on its iPhone manufacturing between 20% and 25% since last quarter.
Earlier today one "analyst" published an assumption that Google would be making Chrome for iOS (iPhone and iPad) and would market it extensively, and basically bring the desktop browser wars to mobile. He didn't claim any sources, anonymous or otherwise, or any leaked information, or any good faith basis at all for the assumption. It was purely a flight of fancy, and a poorly reasoned one.
Another supposed part leak from Apple's next generation iPhone 5 has shown up online. The component is listed as a headphone jack/earpiece/Wi-fi antenna. The iPhone 4S and iPhone 4 parts are grouped a bit differently -- but that's not what we find interesting. If this is indeed a part from the next generation iPhone, I don't think what it's listed as is what we're actually looking at. I think it's possible we're looking at Apple's new micro dock connector, the one iMore first reported on back in February.
