As widely expected, Apple’s “latest creation” is a tablet device called… the iPad! Here’s the official press release, and some details from TiPb’s take:

It looks like a giant, wide, iPod touch with a gorgeous display and enough graphics power to throw around HD video and handle very slick UI elements without any hint of lag.

Also shown off were Maps (including street view), iTunes LP and iTunes Extras, and Email, Calendar, and iPod functions that look like the iPhone but with a massive functionality boost from the Mac side, including pervasive use of popups.

It will run virtually all iPhone apps, unmodified. Pixel accurate, or via pixel doubling. iPad specific SDK ships TODAY!

• .5 inches thin
• 1.5 lbs
• 9.7 inch IPS display
• 1024×768 (Old school!)
• Capacitive multitouch
• 1GHz proc Apple A4 chip (PA Semi!)
• 16GB, 32GB, 64GB
• 802.11n WiFi
• BT 2.1
• Compass
• 10 hrs battery life
• 1 month standby
• Running iPhone 3.2 OS

Images after the break, more as this develops!

9to5mac points us to a GigaOm interview with computer and GUI pioneer Alan Kay that says:

“When the Mac first came out, Newsweek asked me what I [thought] of it. I said: Well, it’s the first personal computer worth criticizing. So at the end of the presentation, Steve came up to me and said: Is the iPhone worth criticizing? And I said: Make the screen five inches by eight inches, and you’ll rule the world.”

Just under 2 hours and they’ll take their shot!

Today’s “Come see our latest creation event” almost assuredly sees Apple reveal their long in development, long anticipated iTablet/iSlate/iPad, and along with finding out the name so I never have to type that again, we should finally put to rest all the rumors, leaks, and fakes — for this first version at least!

So while we all wait in anticipation, here’s a final roundup to help pass the time:

• Engadget has pictures (see top of post) of what may be a prototype iTablet bolted to a desk (like the key to the Fortress of Solitude, only Super Steve Jobs is strong enough to lift it!).
• Fray publisher Derek Powazek has an excellent post up outlining how he hopes Apple releases a device that makes consuming premium media fun enough that people will buy formerly print content from iTunes and the industry can finally monetize their work in the digital age.
• Former Apple employee and current Palm developer relations man-about-web, Chuq Von Rospach follows up, saying that if Apple truly nails the “content consumption” device, makes it easy to get and enjoy media, they’ll cannibalize some laptop sales but will sell “zillions” of iTablets.
• Wired goes so far as to say Apple isn’t going to re-invent the up-until-now failed tablet form factor but is going to re-invent content. Using an HTML5 (WebKit) platform like iTunes LP and iTunes Extras, it’s going to be as much about letting artists create for the iTablet as it is letting users consume on it.
• The Wall Street Journal [Google search link] says Apple is still negotiating last-minute deals, trying to frame a 70/30 split with book publishers the way they do with music and apps. This would lead to higher prices, $12.99 and $14.99 for current hard-cover best-sellers, but would mean Apple wouldn’t lose $4.50 per book the way Amazon is willing to on the Kindle to push device sales.
• Patently Apple reveals that Apple has just won iChat and “major” iTablet proximity detection patents, and a bunch of others.
• Director of photography Rodney Charters says that the iTablet will get some screen time on the TV show 24, in episode 20 or more likely 22. Hey, why not have it save Jack and the World in the season finale?

We’ve crossed the rubicon here TiPb-verse, and are way through the looking glass and down the rabbit hole. Steve Jobs is coming in just over 4 hours, and we can’t wait to see what’s coming with him!

Here I was dreading getting ready to write an article about how the January 2010 iTablet/iSlate/iPad release was poised to replicate the January 2007 iPhone release — a completely unannounced yet still massively hyped product that everyone thinks will be a minor iteration on the previous big-hit product, with all the surrounding cheers and jeers to go with it — when the saintly folks over at DOGHOUSE [via Giz] went and did it for all of us in tidy, 20 point form.

It’s often said truth lies in comedy and in that regard, the list in hilarious.

Just over 12 hours to go!

McGraw-Hill’s CEO has outed the iTablet before Apple’s “Come see our latest creation” event, scheduled for tomorrow, revealed it runs the iPhone OS, and undoubtedly has just earned himself a “bag of hurt” at the hands of one Steve Jobs. At 2:50 seconds in, Terry McGraw tells CNBC:

“Yeah, Very exciting. Yes, they’ll make their announcement tomorrow on this one. We have worked with Apple for quite a while. And the Tablet is going to be based on the iPhone operating system and so it will be transferable. So what you are going to be able to do now — we have a consortium of e-books. And we have 95% of all our materials that are in e-book format on that one. So now with the tablet you’re going to open up the higher education market, the professional market. The tablet is going to be just really terrific.”

Yeah. Oops! (But at least we appreciate the news!)

[via McRumors]

The New York Times says the iTablet/iSlate/iPad (latest probably-fake pic above) will have 3G, iPhone apps, and help protect democracy!

It will run all the applications of the iPhone and iPod Touch, have a persistent wireless connection over 3G cellphone networks and Wi-Fi, and will be built with a 10-inch color display, allowing newspapers, magazines and book publishers to deliver their products with an eye to the design that had grabbed readers in print.

How does this factor into protecting democracy? Because of Steve Jobs, and perhaps because of why Jobs considers it his most important thing he’s ever done:

“Steve believes in old media companies and wants them to do well,” said a person who has seen the device and is familiar with Apple’s marketing plan for it, but who did not want to be named because talking about it might alienate him from the company. “He believes democracy is hinged on a free press and that depends on there being a professional press.”

Free as in speech, not as in beer, because the viability of this media is prefaced on it being financial sound, which means — paid content. No one buys the media cow if they get free milk from the web (or something like that):

The December issue of GQ was downloaded from the [iTunes] app store almost 7,000 times, and twice as many times for its January issue. Last week, The New York Times announced plans to begin charging, by next year, frequent Web site visitors who are not also newspaper subscribers to read the online version.

Yet some of the people already charging for content aren’t yet on board. Who? You guessed it — TV networks:

But perhaps smarting from their experiences with Apple, many of the old-line media companies — NBC Universal, Viacom and Discovery among them — shrugged at (or totally dismissed) Apple’s plans for a TV subscription package, according to executives briefed on the talks. A person briefed on Apple’s plans confirmed that such a subscription video option was not part of any immediate offering.

If their experience is getting people to pay $2 for stuff that’s given away “for free” (from the consumer’s perspective) via broadcast channels every night is “smarting”, does this mean their alternative of choice is “dumbing”?

If so, print media is going all in, with TechCrunch reporting the tablet may come with a Barnes & Nobles book store, either as an App Store app like the iPhone, or even built in via partnership with Apple.

The two companies are thought to be working closely together, increasing the likelihood that Barnes & Noble will be part of the announcement on Wednesday. While Apple can run around cutting deals with the larger publishers, a built-in Barnes & Noble bookstore could include up to a million titles in one fell swoop, just like on B&N’s own Nook reader.

Only 1 day to go until Apple’s “Come see our latest creation” event, and then the crazy rumors will finally stop — and the crazy stories about people lining up outside the Apple Store in Times Square will start!

What’s a ton of hype without a bit of fun being poked at it, and after prying the mythical iTablet away from a plushy Steve Jobs, Walt Mosspuppet gives the full on, fake on, review.

Fire. The wheel. Barbers. The moveable printing press. Whiskey. The automobile. The personal computer. Walt Mossberg.

The iPhone. And now, finally, the iSlate.

Video, after the break!

Daring Fireball has an interesting post up regarding the continued lack of a Flash Player for the iPhone, and the reasons why Flash support for the iTablet/iSlate/iPad is unlikely:

I’ll leave the last word to Apple COO Tim Cook, who a year ago said, “We believe in the simple, not the complex. We believe that we need to own and control the primary technologies behind the products we make, and participate only in markets where we can make a significant contribution.”

Flash is owned and controlled by Adobe.

Gruber breaks it down into several broad strokes.

• According to Apple plugins in general, and according to sources at Apple, Flash in particular, is the leading cause of crashes on Mac OS X.
• In order to make a 64-bit version of Safari on Mac, Apple had to create a new plugin architecture because Adobe (still) only makes 32-bit Flash and since Apple has no control of the Flash code, they have to work around it.
• Flash is the only remaining major web technology that’s proprietary and controlled by one company, which is not good for the web, and if Apple can’t control something, they’d rather it be non-proprietary.
• Flash performance on Mac OS X is poor compared to QuickTime. Adobe would like to address this via direct hardware acceleration, Apple would rather developers use the existing, higher-level QuickTime APIs.
• Flash is used as a runtime, which Apple doesn’t support on the iPhone.

I’ll add two more things to this list, especially applicable to the iPhone:

• Flash is an increasingly large target for malware attacks. While Apple is slow to respond to zero day exploits, Adobe is as well. The idea that Apple would have to wait on Adobe to patch an iPhone exploit is likely not appealing to Apple. Imagine how long iPhone firmware updates would take then?
• Flash is privacy hostile, allowing sites to store “Flash cookies” which can restore deliberately deleted browser cookies and otherwise track user data. That Adobe still doesn’t better inform their users, and relies on an obscure website to provide controls is troubling to say the least. (That page is supposed to contain site-specific permission for Flash to access webcams. Mine contains entries for major online media sites and e-commerce stores).

Apple believes control helps them create the best user experience. It’s incredibly frustrating at times, but it’s how they’ve built their business and arguably attained some of their success.

I don’t believe for one moment Apple is pushing open standards over Flash for altruistic reasons. In this instance, however, their reasons happen to coincide with what’s better for the web. They’re also are one of the few companies powerful and popular enough to push HTML5 video.

The iPhone and quite possibly the iTablet are their best shot at doing that.

While TiPb’s been wondering just what happened to iPhone 3.2, app analytic company Flurry reports that it’s been undergoing testing since September… on the iTablet! Engadget sums up:

Flurry is saying that it’s detected around 50 devices on Apple’s Cupertino campus that have the “characteristics” of a tablet, running a new version of the iPhone OS numbered 3.2. How? Around 200 different apps with Flurry’s tracking code were downloaded and used on these mystery devices — mostly games, followed by entertainment and media apps — and Flurry first noticed this new device in October, with numbers picking up in January. Unfortunately, Flurry hasn’t said what these mysterious tablet characteristics are, so we don’t have much to go on.

While rumors suggest we might just see iPhone 4.0 announced this Wednesday as part of Apple’s iTablet/iSlate/iPad-centric “Come see our latest creation” event, they also suggest the iTablet itself won’t ship to customers sooner than March, and iPhone 4.0 may only get released to developers in beta. If that means a general release for iPhone 4.0 in June/July like previous years (and as opposed to March with the iTablet), there will have to be some compatibility update for the iTablet (and maybe iPhone and iPod touch) in the interim, and iPhone 3.2 is as good a name as any, right?

If iPhone 3.2 is released any time soon, however, we wouldn’t hold our breath for anything other than iTablet compatibility and maybe some tweaking of Apple’s built-in apps (like iTunes LP/Extras support). Any API or other substantive changes would require a beta period for developers. Now if 3.2 is announced for March (with immediate beta) and 4.0 for June/July, then that’s a different story…

UPDATE: 9to5mac followed up with Flurry and heard back from Peter Farago , VP of Marketing. Farago confirmed that they’d seen iPhone devices running OS 4.0 but those left the Cupertino campus whereas the tablet device did not (for secrecy reasons?). Also, the types of apps being tested (news, books, games) matched what they believed a tablet device would run. Read the complete statement via the link above.

What do you think?

No one outside the contract signers at Apple and AT&T know for sure when US iPhone exclusivity ends, but HotHardware is stirring up a storm with the rumor that it ends this Wednesday, at Apple’s “Come see our latest creation” event:

According to an inside source close to the going-ons involved in all of this, a new tablet of some sort may not be the only thing on deck for next Wednesday though. We have been led to believe by an inside source that AT&T will lose their iPhone exclusivity on the same day

Yeahbuwhy?

Inside of AT&T, we are hearing that the iPhone is causing more trouble than ever before. On some level, having the iPhone is hurting AT&T’s image. Because they are the only company to carry it, and it’s such a data hog, it’s largely to blame for AT&T’s network troubles. [...] The iPhone itself doesn’t really handle the switch from 3G to EDGE very well, so calls that are in-progress tend to fail whenever the 3G bands aren’t optimal and the phone attempts to step down to EDGE.

They claim AT&T is tired of the bad press and will let other networks share the burden while AT&T introduces new phones from other platforms (hello Android and webOS?) in order to compete.

The follow on rumor, of course and as always, is that Verizon will then start to carry a CDMA-friendly version of the iPhone 3GS and the new iTablet.

No comment from AT&T yet, but anyone buying this?

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

Not much hear besides the title — Steve Jobs says the iTablet/iSlate/iPad “will be the most important thing I’ve ever done” — which TechCrunch says they haven’t heard first hand but have heard second and third hand from multiple sources. Wait… what?

Okay, let’s have fun and assume it’s true. This from the man who brought or helped bring the Apple II, Macintosh, iPod, iTunes, Apple Retail, Pixar, and the iPhone to market? If he’s really that excited about the tablet, then it will be tough to set expectations any higher, won’t it?

We’ll find out for sure Wednesday during Apple’s “Come see our latest creation“. Hope you’ll join our coverage!

TiPb’s iTablet hopes and dreams are fairly simple — Apple, please make us a device we can give to our moms and never get another tech support call back from them in our lives.

Okay, maybe never is dreaming in AMOLED color, but we’d settle for seldom at this point. And we don’t mean to pick on mom — feel free to substitute or add dad, siblings, neighbors, and everyone else to the list.

Now, almost no one outside of Steve Jobs knows exactly what Apple will be releasing at “Come see our latest creation“, yet everyone and their blog is speculating, including TiPb. Doing for print media what they did for music? Sure. Great. Nice. Text books, subscription TV, iWork touch? Fine. Fine. Fine. Content and apps you will bring we have no doubt. We expect no less. But we want that one more thing, and we want it pretty much to be what Daring Fireball, Ars, and Marco Armant suggested almost a month ago — a modern, highly abstracted re-conception of the personal computer meant for mainstream users.

Apple helped bring the CLI (command line interface) to the masses with the Apple II, the GUI (graphical user interface) with the Mac, and the multitouch interface with the iPhone and iPod touch. Each has been easier for more people to use than the one before, but the iPhone and iPod touch traded mobility for functionality to the extent that while great devices, they can’t fully replace netbooks or laptops, which is the sweet spot for consumers.

An iTablet could. An iTablet that removes any care or concern about right vs. left mouse clicking, saving files within hierarchical directories, icons disappearing from docks, files littered across the desktop, disk and other maintenance, complex software installations, windows getting lost, drivers causing disasters, and all the headaches that come with a regular person trying to manage a monstrous modern computer system like Windows, Mac OS X, or Linux.

Google is trying to do a lot of that with Chrome OS, but that will still be a WIMP (windows, interface, mouse, pointer) GUI that’s basically a browser and subject to the greatest terrors WebApp interfaces can bring.

If Apple can bring an iPhone level of usability to a tablet sized device and give it just enough productivity to let regular people edit what documents they need to while enjoying incredibly easy access to their magazines, newspapers, books, videos, music, games, and apps… If Apple can make a device that “just works” for 80% of mainstream users… If Apple can make a computing product that I can give to my mom and not have to worry about getting a call saying “where did my internet go?” or “I swear it’s clicking on things by itself”…

If Apple can do for the personal computer once again what they did with the Apple II and Mac — make it more usable for more users — then that’s all TiPb really wants.

Will we get it? Shrug. Apple’s track record is fairly good, and a lot of people smarter than we are seem to think it’s the next logical step, so all that’s left is to cross our fingers, throw away our tech support hotlines, and wait for Wednesday’s “Come see our latest creation”.

Fox News is once again weighing in on the iTablet — and the iPhone — claiming sources within AT&T and Verizon are telling them negotiations to carry the device(s) are getting hot and heavy:

According to the story, there would be two versions of the iTablet/iSlate/iPad, one supporting AT&T’s fast GSM/HSPA network and the other supporting Verizon’s reliable CDMA/EVDO network. Both would likely have WiFi and access to associated WiFi hotspots. Verizon’s version might also be subject to tiered pricing.

Additionally:

According to a source at Verizon, Apple has been in talks with ‘the big red map’ to offer the tablet on its robust CDMA network. Additionally Verizon is in talks with Apple to bring the iPhone to its network by late spring or early summer, but specifics haven’t yet been finalized.

An iPhone on Verizon makes increasing sense for Apple. At a certain point, everyone who prefers AT&T as a carrier, or is willing to live with AT&T as a carrier just to have an iPhone, will have an iPhone. For Apple to grow their customer base, they’ll need to expand to a network that supports those who want an iPhone but aren’t willing to go to AT&T just to get it. The king of that hill is Verizon. Apple has broken exclusivity almost everywhere else. It will have to do it in the US, and LTE is too far out to be a logical change-point.

The rest of the article contains an amusing amount of bickering between the carrier rivals, with AT&T implying any network would have problems with the 7000% data spike that comes with the iPhone.

No matter what happens, we’re hoping for multiple carriers, as that would be a multiple win for US consumers.

AppleInsider is claiming “people familiar with the device” as saying Apple’s upcoming iTablet/iSlate/iPad will have a physical design reminiscent of the original iPhone 2G launched in 2007:

Nestled in an aluminum shell that leverages the Apple’s expertise in unibody construction but thinner proportionality than the original iPhone, the tablet reportedly sports all of the same buttons found on the handset, right down to its iconic home button — which, like the volume toggle, is missing from the rendering.

Similarly, the tablet is said to sport all the same in/out connectivity as the current iPhone 3GS, including a 3.5-mm stereo headphone jack, built-in speaker grills, a microphone, GPS, 3G connectivity and a 30-pin dock connector. Like the rendering, its 10-inch display is framed by a black border that bleeds into its wrap-around aluminum enclosure.

The above conceptual rendering from Fotoboer.nl is said to be close, though lacking the home button and other details. Apple being Apple, they’ll likely want to maintain visual ties between their iPhone, MacBook Pro, and iMac lines, and that means blacks, aluminums, and glass, so this doesn’t sound at all far fetched.

AppleInsider is also hearing there may be a CDMA-compatible (read: Verizon-friendly) chipset version, but don’t know if it’ll make it into the final product.

Meanwhile, 9to5mac picked up a DigiTimes story that hints Apple’s new smart, long-lasting MacBook battery technology will be found in the iTablet as well:

Taiwan-based [MacBook battery suppliers] Simplo Technology and Dynapack International Technology are expected to share orders from Apple for its tablet PC, according to a Chinese-language Commercial Times report.

Again, not far fetched at all. Apple leverages their technologies across their product lines, and that’s one of the keys to both their hardware and platform models.

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Boy Genius‘ sources have been hearing that AT&T has been meeting with their regional executives to discuss network changes that will soon be taking place in order to handle the load of “unannounced” devices that will use “heavy data”.

iTablet and/or 4th generation iPhone perhaps?

“Heavy data” use has led AT&T to talk about tiered data pricing plans in the past. When these “unannounced” devices appear on their network, would you be surprised to see AT&T spring that on us as well?

[Via BGR]

When the Wall Street Journal cites sources and talks Apple, it’s usually part reporting, part expectation setting, and if this is the latter, than exactly what Steve Jobs plans the iTablet to do for print media — newspapers, magazines, and books — is no less than what he did for music on the iPod. Digital revolution much?

• Focused on the home and the classroom
• Shared by multiple family members [Um, sorry sis, get yer own!]
• Apple has explored electronic textbooks
• Has virtual keyboard
• Working with print media on text content
• Working with CBS/Disney on video content
• Working with EA on video game content
• Talking with Microsoft about search and maps
• Cable/TV providers resisting giving Apple “best” content (4-6 shows per channel), would rather it be “all” content
• $1000 price point “tested” again
• iTablet UI meant to be shareable; Apple has explored “sticky notes” as a way to share messages; facial recognition as a way of knowing who’s using it
• Apple planning web-based version of iTunes called iTunes.com
• “Buy” buttons would go wide on as many websites as possible

Part round up of previous stories, part analyst musing, part real information, check it out and let us know what your sorting hat puts in the “real” pile.

MacRumors, who originally dug up Apple’s involvement with the iSlate and iGuide names, has come across a trademark filing that suggests iPad may now be in the lead:

A search in the Canadian trademark database reveals that Apple’s dummy corporation Slate Computing, LLC also applied for a trademark for “iPad” under the categories of handheld mobile digital electronic devices with a broad range of applications. This application was filed in July 2009 — much more recently than the original iSlate trademarks which date back to 2006-2007. Slate Computing, LLC did not apply for a similar trademark in the U.S. due to the fact that Fujitsu appears to control the U.S. trademark as it relates to handheld computing. Of course, this didn’t stop Apple from using the iPhone name despite it being owned by Cisco in the U.S. at the time of the iPhone’s launch.

International filings also exist, though under the name IP Application Development, which thus far can’t be linked back to Apple.

So, iTablet, iSlate, iPad, does it matter to you what Apple calls their new mega-iPhone, as long as they don’t call it delayed for the Jan. 27 “Come see our latest creation” event? Right? Right? Sigh.

The Wall Street Journal “leaks” that Apple is negotiating with publisher Harper Collins over the rights to market e-books on Apple’s “latest creation“, presumably the iTablet/iSlate.

We say “leaks” because, well, it’s the WSJ and the story credits contributions from someone who’s been getting an awful lot of awfully good Apple information recently. Also, we’ve heard for a while now that Apple has been in talks with traditional print media book, magazine, and newspaper publishers in order to line up content for the iTablet — and presumably the iPhone, iPod touch, and other iTunes connected devices, since that’s Apple’s ecosystem and their forte.

So, on one hand this story serves to firm up expectations that a tablet style device will be announced, and set them as to what one of its new features will be — doing from print media what the iPod did for music (and what has tried to do for movies and TV, despite Hollywood’s myopia). Here’s the crux of it:

Brian Murray, the chief executive of HarperCollins, said in December that e-books enhanced with video, author interviews and social-networking applications could command higher retail prices for publishers than current e-books. Many of the country’s largest publishing houses are worried about the sale of new bestsellers for only $9.99 in the e-book format. New releases of enhanced e-books could sell for $14.99 to $19.99, a person familiar with the situation said. HarperCollins is a unit of News Corp., which also owns The Wall Street Journal.

Sounds like iTunes LP (for music) and iTunes Extras (for movies) would get an e-book-centric companion, perhaps magazines and newspapers as well. (Though magazines and newspapers traditionally involve subscription services, something Apple, despite the many years of rumors, has yet to offer for music or TV).

What remains to be seen is, if these negotiations pan out, whether Apple will focus on print-media-gone-digital as the killer feature of the new device/service or just one of several (like the iPhone’s wide-screen ipod, internet communicator, phone combo pitch).

[Thanks to @jordanak1 for the head's up!]

Fox News, which originally predicted a media-focused Jan. 26 event, is back to say Apple’s now-Jan. 27 “Come see our latest creation” will focus on the iTablet, iPhone 4.0 operating system (no hardware), and iLife 2010.

iTablet/iSlate/iWhatever makes the kind of sense that does. The hype is so loud you can hear it in space. What it is remains a mystery, but if Apple wasn’t going to show it off, we’d expect a leak or PR blurb hinting they weren’t to shape expectations.

iPhone 4.0 we would have expected to see in March like iPhone 2.0 and iPhone 3.0, but showing it off in January like iPhone 1.0 could give developers more time to make their apps iTablet — and/or iPhone HD — compatible. Likewise, if there are any other major changes/enhancements under the covers.

iLife 2010 is a bit of a mystery. We’ve heard iWork 2010 might be going multitouch for the iTablet (and hoped for the iPhone as well), but all we’ve heard about iLife is that iDVD might become an iTunes LP/iTunes Extras development interface (DVDs being passe in the Apple-verse, of course). Could they also go multitouch?

So, nothing we didn’t expect, but a lot more to get us excited. What do you want most?

[Thanks everyone who sent this in!]

Apple has gone and made it official — “Come see our latest creation” and it’s on for January 27, 2010.

iTablet, iPhone 4.0, iPhone HD… or something completely different like iLife ’10? Any guesses as to what we’ll see?

Too keep up with TiPb’s ongoing coverage of this story as it develops, keep our “Come see our latest creation” tag link handy!

[via Engadget]

Ars made some waves in the iTablet rumor pool this morning, taking a look and determining that a 10″ OLED (organic light emitting diode) or AMOLED (active matrix light emitting diode) aren’t realistic given current supply constraints. Basically, only Samsung and LG are equipped to make the panel, and According to Barry Young, Managing Director of the OLED Association:

“On the Samsung configuration they could produce about fourteen 10.1-inch panels per substrate,” he told Ars. “With a 70 percent yield, if all their capacity was dedicated to 10.1-inch, they could produce about 150,000 per month. Given that Samsung cannot meet its current order backlog, they are unlikely to build that many 10.1-inch displays.”

“LG has 10 to 15 percent of Samsung’s capacity,” Young said.

So that means 1) Apple wouldn’t be able to make very many 10″ OLED/AMOLED iTablets and 2) the ones they did make would be very expensive.

Another complication? If Apple switches to OLED/AMOLED for the 4th generation iPhone (like the display on the new Google Android Nexus One), that would mean an even greater constrains on the supply for any iTablet use.

All things considered, given the costs and constraints, I’d rather have OLED on my iPhone. What about you?

China, like France and Korea wants in on the larger screen iRumors, and is certainly willing to raised the stakes — in addition to a 9.7″ iTablet, Commercial Times is also saying Apple plans a 22″ multi-touch iMac.

Apple will outsource production of the 22-inch model to Quanta, with Taiwan-based Sintek Photronic supplying the touchscreen panels

There have been touch-enabled Windows displays for a while. The thrill of the interactivity, however, has been tempered by the simple fact that it’s tiring to hold your arms up and gesture a lot on a giant display. This is presumably why Apple has so far integrated multi-touch into their MacBook trackpads rather than their screens, and into the Magic Mouse rather than into the iMac display (don’t get us started on why they haven’t simply offered an iMac trackpad peripheral or better yet — a Magic Mouse app for the iPhone!)

It’s hard enough imagining a consistently comfortable usage paradigm for an iTablet (how do you hold it to type, to watch a long movie, to read a long novel, etc.), harder still to riddle it out for an iMac display — unless Apple plans for it to be an occasional-use method, a bonus for of interactivity.

Of course, Apple hasn’t announced any of this yet, but speculating about rumors is fun, especially when it involves technology from the iPhone, that could expand or be returned to the 4th gen iPhone. So let us know what you think.

[DigiTimes via MacRumors]

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Many of the latest rumors about the Apple iTablet/iSlate involve it being a large iPhone, or as Daring Fireball points out, the iPhone being a smaller version of an older Apple tablet project. Way back in June of 2007, the New York Times mentioned just that, and the tablet project was Safari Pad:

Mr. Jobs seized on the multitouch technology after Apple product designers proposed it as a “safari pad,” a portable Web surfing appliance. Instead, he saw the technology as something that could be used for a similar purpose in a cellphone, a former Apple employee said.

We’ve linked to those stories and that name several times over the years, and while we doubt an actual shipping Apple tablet will still be called Safari Pad, given the state of the rumors, Gruber’s point (linked above) is salient:

The Tablet is what Apple set out to build all along, and the iPhone was an offshoot that shipped first because the technology wasn’t there yet to produce The Tablet. In short, that Apple has had something bigger in mind — both physically and conceptually — from the outset.

Gruber’s also heard there won’t be a camera or webcam in the tablet, but we’re still keeping our fingers crossed.

Either way, it’s looking more and more like the “next big thing” for Apple is tightly connected to the iPhone.

The Boy Genius claims, based on info from a source who’s proven reliable before, that we haven’t gotten an iPhone OS update recently (oh, hai still missing iPhone 3.2!) because:

there’s too much tablet-related code/references in the OS and Apple obviously didn’t want that to leak.

He’s also heard that multitouch gestures for the iTablet/iSlate are “out of control”, it’s got a super-fast ARM processor that runs the iPhone OS kernel, is model K48AP, and is pretty much an “iPhone on steroids”.

If this pans out, being so closely linked to the iPhone will no doubt disappoint Mac OS X tablet enthusiasts, but benefit the iPhone in terms of leveraged development and shared features.

Either way, we can still only expect it when we see it…

When Apple bought multitouch maestros FingerWorks for their talent (and patents, ‘natch), they kept FingerWorks.com and all it’s old product photos and pictures online and intact. No longer, according to MacRumors:

The removal seems to correspond with the impending announcement of an Apple tablet later this month. One possible explanation is that Apple will finally be implementing many of the same advanced multi-touch keyboard gestures that were originally pioneered by Fingerworks.

And, again to speculate widely, a possibly closely aligned iPhone 4.0, since Apple has proven over and over again that they’re very good at leveraging technology developed for one platform to another.

Did France Telecom/Orange exec Stéphane Richard just get caught off guard enough to confirm the immanent arrival of Apple’s iTablet/iSlate, with a webcam? NowhereElse.fr has the video clip (go to 6:10 to see the relevant bit), and Techcrunch provides the translation for those who don’t understand French:

Jean-Pierre Elkabbach: According to weekly Le Point, in a couple of days Apple will be launching its tablet computer …
Stéphane Richard: Yes.
Jean-Pierre Elkabbach: … equipped with a webcam.
Stéphane Richard: Yes.
Jean-Pierre Elkabbach: Are Orange customers going to be able to enjoy it?
Stéphane Richard: Of course!

We’re still waiting on Apple to announce it (or announce the rumored Jan. 27 announcement!), however. And word on whether or not Steve Jobs has hopped a plane to France, ready to kung-fu death-touch his loose lipped Euro carrier partner…

The New York Times says Apple has been working on a multitouch version of their iWork office suite — Pages word processor, Numbers spread sheet, and Keynote presentations — for their rumored upcoming iTablet/iSlate, along with complex gestures based on technology they acquired from Fingerworks.

“The tablet should offer any number of unique multitouch experiences — for example, three fingers down and rotate could mean ‘open an application,’ ” said one former engineer, who asked not to be named because Apple demands secrecy from all current and former employees.

Sounds a little complex and obtuse from a company whose success to date has been primarily based on simplicity, but Apple could feel multitouch has been introduced well enough by the iPhone, trackpads, and even the Magic Mouse that users could now handle more complex gestures. We’d imagine, however, that the more complex the gesture, the more complex the function it’s intended to invoke — meaning average users could stick to the simple stuff.

Another former Apple designer said a team at the company had “spent the past couple of years working on a multitouch version of iWork,” Apple’s answer to Microsoft’s Office software suite. This could indicate that Apple wants the tablet to be a fully functional computer, rather than a more passive device for reading books and watching movies.

It also makes us think a multitouch version of iWork would be just great on the iPhone and iPod touch as well (right Apple?)

For their part, 9to5mac also points out the previous rumors about Apple seeking engineers for an online iWork WebApp. An integrated offering with local and server storage and access, perhaps?

Hey, wow, look here — more Apple iTablet/iSlate rumors, and this time they’re bringing aluminum (unibody?) casing rumors along for the wild ride:

Suppliers for Apple Inc’s new tablet computer have begun shipping touchscreen panels and will start delivering aluminum casings for it next month, sources said, implying a second-quarter product launch.

Does aluminum, which was removed from the iPhone with the 2nd gen iPhone 3G, make sense in an iTablet with an HSPA or CDMA radio? Or will that get the plastic finish, and the Wi-Fi only version get the aluminum? That would be two finishes like we heard rumored previously, and would mirror the iPhone/iPod touch model… What do you think?

[via MacRumors]

Windows pundit and iPhone user Paul Thurrott, on the prospects of an an Apple iTablet, after a briefing with Lenovo:

I spent about an hour and a half meeting with [Lenovo] this morning and while I am charitably described as a ThinkPad fanboy, the truth is, they just make the best notebooks on earth. And now they’re getting even better. It’s dizzying. I posted a bit about this yesterday, but there is so much going on here. In fact, their near-final version of a tiny notebook with a breakaway tablet screen absolutely kills anything Apple could possibly announce later this month. It’s not even close.

Daring Fireball‘s spot-on reaction:

Um, OK

If it’s being shown at CES, I’ll try to stop by and get a second opinion

UPDATE: According to WMExperts liveblog, it was a Tablet PC by HP running Windows 7 and called — wait for it — the HP Slate. Yes, named after Apple’s latest tablet name rumor. Looks chunky, and its using a desktop OS. Okay.

ORIGINAL: So the rumor is Steve is about to introduce a new tablet device — no, not Steve Jobs of Apple, but his nemesis Steve Ballmer of Microsoft — and he’s rumored to be doing it tonight at CES!

Our sibling site, WMExperts, has the details and Dieter and Phil will be there live covering Ballmer’s keynote at 9:30pm ET, 6:30pm PT, 2:30am GT (tomorrow morning, yeah?)

Will it be the crazy courier concept we saw before? More Tablet PC tomfoolery? Surface-to-go? And if Apple is unicorns, is this the pegasus?

And does this have any effect on Apple’s rumored iTablet show on Jan. 27? Or does Apple just ignore what everyone else is doing, as usual, and show up with what they got?

Computerworld is rumoring that Apple’s allegedly-to-be-announced-January-27th iTablet/iSlate will run on Verizon‘s CDMA network according to… an analysts sources (!)

“The tablet will be supported by multiple [mobile] carriers,” said Brian Marshall of Broadpoint AmTech, citing unnamed sources he said were close to the situation. “Verizon and others,” he continued. “Definitely Verizon. I’ve been told that’s a certainty.”

Meanwhile, AppleInsider quotes another analyst who says, when it comes to the iPhone, Apple and Verizon can’t see eye-to-eye on pricing. Control-freaks the both of them, no one is yet blinking:

Currently, it is estimated that Apple gets a favorable $700 average selling price per iPhone, subsidized through exclusive carrier AT&T. Compare that with the ASP of the Motorola Droid, exclusive to Verizon, which costs an estimated $450 per sale.

Also, combined CDMA/GSM chips, which would let the iPhone run on both Verizon and GSM carriers like AT&T and most of the rest of the world, aren’t likely to be ready until the second half of 2010.

Hey, maybe Verizon will get a CDMA iTablet, but it can also be perpetually tethered to an AT&T/GSM iPhone! Sound off in the comments!

The Baltimore Sun has regurgitated a recent Apple patent filing for a 3D, multitouch, zooming user interface. So the speculation jumps immediately to iTablet/iSlate and iPhone 4.0? Is this the “surprising interaction method” we’d heard rumored? Or just another in a long list of patents Apple may or may not ever get around to implementing in a real device? Place your bets in the comments!

[Baltimore Sun via Engagdet]

The Wall Street Journal is wading into that whole Apple iTablet/iSlate thing, saying:

Looking to build on the momentum of its iPhone and iPod, Apple Inc. will unveil a new multimedia tablet device later this month, but isn’t planning to ship the product until March, say people briefed by the company.

Now for the weird part:

Apple was working on two different material finishes for the device, one of these people said, though it was unclear whether the Cupertino, Calif., company was just testing the finishes or planning to come out with multiple versions of a tablet at different prices.

Plastic vs. unibody aluminum? Black vs. white? Adamantium vs. unobtainium? They care nothing about further elaboration, so we’re left to wonder.

Still rumors of tentative schedules and obscure design elements is something, right?

[Wall Street Journal via Daring Fireball]

Take this with a 7-to-10 inch capacitive grain of salt, but French site M4Ever [Google translate link] is claiming that we might just see iPhone 4.0 beta fairly soon (hey, maybe as soon as the Jan. 27 media event?) Macrumors supplies the clean text:

Several of our sources give us two pieces of information concerning the famous Apple tablet: In late January, in addition to its tablet, Cupertino should have a beta of iPhone OS 4, accompanied by an SDK. Our informants also tell us of a “simulator” specifically adapted for the tablet. Evidently, the major novelty of the SDK therefore concerns the interface, making it easier for developers to adapt to different screen resolutions. The new iPhone could also benefit from a higher pixel density.

Real, fake, really fake? We know we’ll get iPhone 4.0 seeded to developers eventually, and resolution independence (i.e. iPhone HD and iTablet) is something TiPb’s been talking about for a while now. No matter what, if Apple wants App Store level success to continue with next generation devices, they’ll need to get the SDKs into the hands of developers, so while — again — this is just a rumor, it’s going to come true sooner or later. The only real question is… when?

It’s not the previously rumored Tuesday, Jan. 26, but Digital Daily is claming a “source in a position to know” has told them:

Apple (AAPL) is indeed planning a media event later this month at which the company will announce a major new product.

Steve Jobs has “dented the universe” previously with the Apple II, Mac, iPod and iTunes, Pixar, and again with the iPhone. He’s reportedly been working on a new product, often referred to as “the tablet” (or iTablet) with special focus for the last while. Given how tightly integrated Apple is as a company, where Mac development enhances iPhone enriches iPod touch amps up Apple TV goes right back into the Mac, whether or not this new product is an iPhone, and iPhone HD, a new iPod, or the much-rumored iTablet, the services and technologies it brings with it will no doubt be reflected in iPhone 4.0 and whatever 4th generation iPhone comes later.

That’s why TiPb is following these stories with such interest. iTunes LP and iTunes Extras is a side note until it’s the foundation for new media on an iTablet and iPhone. The iTablet OS X is a tangent until iPhone HD uses its pixels to much the same effect.

And that’s why we’ll do our best to cover it for you up to Jan. 27, on that day, and thereafter. (Unless it’s only iLife ’10, in which case we’ll blog it and move on… )

Meanwhile, let us know what you think Apple will be announcing, and what you want them to announce, if different.

Previously we linked to Daring Fireball’s John Gruber, who felt Apple was going to redefine the experience of personal computing with their (perhaps) upcoming iTablet/iSlate, and now Marco Arment of Tumblr and Instapaper, and John Siracusa of Ars Technica share their thoughts as well.

Arment starts off laying out the pros and cons of the iPhone and MacBook form factors and functions, and the struggle other devices have had trying to fill the in-between with a tablet. As to Apple’s take:

I see two possible outcomes: either Apple has come up with a radical new input method for this form-factor that will overcome the fundamental problems that made every other similar device suck, or the Tablet isn’t this form-factor.

(Sure, there’s a third possibility: that Apple is repeating the mistakes of similar products and making their own JooJoo or Foleo. But that’s too unlikely — and stupid — for me to take seriously.)

He predicts the first, a radical new input method.

Siracusa sticks to what is either already known (not much) or can be inferred by the realities of available technology, Apple’s huge iTunes customer base, massive iPhone developer pool, and established relationships with content providers.

The Apple tablet will have a color, video-capable touchscreen, about 10 inches diagonal. It will have flash storage, WiFi networking, and few ports and hardware buttons. There will be a software keyboard. Its operating system will be based on the same core as Mac OS X and iPhone OS, and its GUI API will be an evolution of Cocoa Touch. The platform will (eventually) be open to third-party developers. You will be able to buy media and applications right on the device using your existing iTunes account. Some of that media will be new territory for Apple: print media like magazines, newspapers, and books.

His “good bets” include a custom PA Semi chipset, and iTunes LP-like format and SDK for print media content. His “wildcard” is whether or not the first version with have 3G. Either way, he sees no surprises in hardware, but reminds us that software has far fewer limitations.

Take a read of both and let us know if either changes what you expect Apple to do with the iTablet (when and if they release it).

Mosspuppet passed along a rumor that says Apple is not going to provide 3G radio for the iTablet/iSlate, but rather make it automagically, and persistently tethered to an iPhone, harkening back to Palm’s legendary Foleo device — that never shipped.

Sure, Mosspuppet is a… well, a puppet, and likely only has access to the plush version of Apple’s upcoming tablet, but the humor to this rumor has us thinking — it’s totally the kind of crazy, maddening move that would drive consumers out of their minds and get the tech press shouting “why?!” from every post.

And AT&T would love it, given how they haven’t even gotten iPhone tethering up and running and it’s, what, 2010 now or something?

Happy New Year and welcome to the iPhone blog’s 2009 TiPb Editor’s Choice Awards for the very best (in our opinion!) iPhone and iPod touch apps and accessories released in the last year!

Smartphone of the Year: iPhone 3GS (by default)

We’re not really doing Smartphone of the Year since, unlike our sibling sites, Apple has so far seen fit to only release one new iPhone each year. However, that doesn’t mean we don’t think the iPhone 3GS isn’t terrific. It is. Even if we consider the smartphone space as a whole, even if we put it up against the best Android, BlackBerry, Nokia, Palm, and Windows have to offer, while it might get bested — even eclipsed — in certain specs or feature sets, there’s still nothing that brings it all together in so appealing a mainstream package as the iPhone 3GS.

From its butter-smooth interface now with “s as in speed” to its singular build quality to its incredible ecosystem to its 120,000 apps for anything and everything, even if we did do this category — which we’re not — the iPhone 3GS would still be our pick for Smartphone of the Year. So there.

Competition of the Year: Palm Pre and webOS

Make no mistake, the Droid, the BlackBerry Bolds and Tour and Storms, the Nokia N900, the Windows Phone HTC HD2 — each brought it in their own way (hey, it’s why we do the Smartphone Round Robin), but each mostly brought it with hardware specs like 480p displays, or services like free navigation. They made good things better.

Palm brought it with a whole new OS, one that combined amazing visualization for multitasking with brilliant notification handling, and sidestepped the developer divide by using web technology as their SDK. If the iPhone woke up a complacent smartphone industry, Palm made sure they stayed awake another year. Sure the hardware could have been harder core and there was that whole iTunes sync brouhaha, but that combined with the “years in the desert” to go from PalmOS to webOS, made Palm even more of a comeback story, and who doesn’t root for Rocky? That’s why the Palm Pre is our competitor of the year!

Apple Innovation of the Year: $99 iPhone 3G

Last year Innovation of the Year was easy: the App Store. Now, two-billion downloads, well over 100,000 apps, and almost universal imitation not just from the Android Market, but now from BlackBerry App World, Microsoft Windows Marketplace for Mobile, Nokia Ovi Store, Palm webOS App Catalog, and who knows what else, it’s still far and away the market leader, if the idea itself has long passed being led. Not that Apple didn’t try in 2009, with the iPhone 3.0 Sneak Preview Event the undoubtedly innovative in-app purchases (including free apps no longer needing to stay free) and accessory access via the dock and Bluetooth. Push notification tops the candidates list as well. It isn’t he full-on multitasking some still demand, but it covers 90% of the functionality at 20% of the battery drain (ahem) and hey, even some multitasking smartphones don’t handle push notification yet.

But no, we’re going with something more important even if less interesting. The $99 iPhone 3G. Sure, it’s last year’s model, but it’s got the latest iPhone OS 3.x on it and most importantly it redefined — and disrupted — what was considered a budget smartphone and forced every other platform and player to lower prices and reconsider the — frankly crappy — handsets they offered for cheap. Up front cost shouldn’t mean much to people on contract for $2000+ over two years but it does. Getting under $100 was huge for Apple. And for consumers, who’s previous budget choices were the likes of Palm Centro, BlackBerry Pearl, or WinMo… whatever, it was huger still. That makes the $99 iPhone 3G our Apple Innovation of the Year.

App Store App Innovation of the Year: Augmented Reality

Last year Google Mobile snuck in some private-API wizardry (later made all nice and legal by iPhone 3.0) to make voice search so good we thought we were in Star Trek. This year Apple announced accessory access and all sorts of new API’s and developers certainly didn’t disappoint. Some of the most amazing new iPhone Apps weren’t new to mobile, however. RedLaser reads barcodes and finds competitive prices amazingly well, but Android had that first. Likewise Qik is finally streaming live, but geeks were doing that from the N95 a couple years ago. Still, with everything from the latest Apple Remote to Zipcar, it’s harder then ever to single one app out.

So we’re singling out a category — Augmented Reality. Take a live camera view, add location services and — one day, visual recognition — and layer data on top of it. Hold your iPhone camera up to a restaurant and the menu pops up for you to read. Point it west and see the tweets of the physically closest people you follow. Point it at your friend and get a reminder you owe him $5. We’re not sure if it’s just trendy concept or will really, truly prove functional one day, but just like Google Mobile made us think of Star Trek, this combines several cutting edge technologies in such a way that it makes us think of a dozen sci-fi heads-up displays and gorramit if we don’t want that future today.

UI Gem of the Year: Tweetie 2 “Pull Down to Refresh”

Too small to be the overall innovation of the year, this category is for the tiny little tweaks that never the less make all the difference. Lots of developers continued to make drop-dead gorgeous iPhone apps in 2009, including Tapbots’ latest Pastebot, Twitterrific 2‘s ability to hide so much functionality behind so sensible a layout, and Facebook 3.0 finally showed how to do massive social networking right on a local app, and Apple even rolled out new Voice Recorder and Compass app interfaces. It was something much simpler, however, much more insidious that got inside TiPb’s user experience this year.

Yeah, it’s totally Tweetie 2‘s terrific “pull down to refresh”. Apple built the wonderful, tactile feeling elasticity of the “rubber band” effect into iPhone 1.x but never did much with it. Developer Atebits took it and made it a simple, intuitive way to request new data from an internet server — in this case update your Twitter timeline. That many of us now try to use it to reload a page in Safari, or get new messages in Mail, or refresh anything and anything that feels like it should refresh when we pull down shows just how simple and intuitive it is. Sometimes it’s not the big once-and-a-while’s that make the difference, it’s the little use-it-all-the-times.

Camera App of the Year: ReelDirector

iPhone 3GS brought a much improved camera and video recording, amazingly improved photo software, and even trim-able video recording. A lot of apps took advantage, both of the old gear and the new. Leanna covered five fantastic ones earlier, and since then a couple have even come around to offering video for the iPhone 3G.

But if video is the new still, ReelDirector ups the ante from Apple’s trim to full-on (for a mobile) video editing. From titles to transitions, soundtracks to Ken Burns effects, it may not be Final Cut Pro but it’s definitely a fun first cut.

Productivity App of the Year: Documents to Go Premium

Over two and half years in and some are still foolish enough to call the iPhone a toy. Unless, of course, they mean the iPhone can make even productivity work more fun than it has any right to be.

Documents to Go, which updated their flagship app to Premium and added PowerPoint editing and Gmail attachment support at almost the last minute gets our vote. Even though Apple still hasn’t provided a universal document repository, or file picker (the way the picture picker works for images), Documents to Go continues to push the boundaries of what an Office-style app can do on the iPhone.

Social App of the Year: Twitter Clients

If Facebook had gotten push notifications, if Skype had actually gotten 3G access, this category might be even harder to decide than it already is. Likewise notification enabled IM clients such as BeeJive that now has group chat is a social powerhouse.

But those iPhone twitter clients just. won’t. stop. We already mentioned Tweetie 2 and Twitterrific 2, but there’s also Birdfeed, and both Twitbit and SimplyTweet made it into our staff picks of the year. And yeah, TweetDeck is on the iPhone now as well. In addition to the general-purpose clients, we have apps like Birdhouse that excel at writing and Reportage that make reading manageable. Heck, even Twitter’s own WebApp got a great makeover.

Twitter exploded in 2009, and the quality of iPhone Twitter apps exploded right along with it. They’re all so good, again we can’t pick just one, so we’re naming them all the social networking apps of the year!

Navigation App of the Year: Navigon Mobile Navigator

Another of app category made possible by iPhone 3.0 is turn-by-turn GPS navigation, and it didn’t take long for top of the line, premium-priced market leaders like TomTom to come on board (and with car kits!), and subscription services like the TeleNav-powered AT&T Navigator have come on board, but low-cost, crowd-sourced alternatives have also flourished. And even with the 800lbs gorilla of the newly announced Google Maps Navigation staring them down all searchy and free, they’ve continued to update and innovate.

Navigon’s MobileNavigator has been helping push the pace of those updates and that innovation. Whether it’s text to speech or live-traffic, this maps-on-board solution took iPhone 3.0′s APIs and didn’t run — it drove.

Action Game of the Year: N.O.V.A

If there was a theme to iPhone and iPod touch gaming in 2009 it was the maturing of the platform that brought both big franchises and games very much akin to the big franchises. There are literally too many to list (though Jeremy started and Chad focused in on FPS‘ a while back).

But N.O.V.A brought “Halo” to the iPhone. Maybe we should have found something more original, more uniquely dependent on the iPhone’s specific technologies. But N.O.V.A brought “Halo” to the iPhone.

Racing Game of the Year: Real Racing

Given the accelerometer, racing games are just such a natural fit for the iPhone and iPod touch that it’s no wonder there are so many great racing games for the platform (Chad’s picked out a top 5 already!) And with iPhone 3GS and iPod touch G3 level horsepower and OpenGL 2.0 no doubt there’s even better ahead (hey, we’ve seen a glimpse of it already).

For now, however, Real Racing is where it’s at. Our 2009 Grand Prix winner is also a racing game of the year.

Puzzle Game of the Year: Ramp Champ

A lot of great puzzle games have hit the iPhone, from Peggle to Stoneloops to Bejeweled 2 and Tetris, to well almost every great puzzle game that could come to the platform. In 2008, however, Trism showed you could do an iPhone-proper puzzler and do it incredibly well.

Ramp Champ took a flick at it in 2009, with gorgeous graphics, one of the best implementations of in-app purchases to date, and arguably too much challenge for its (or rather its players) own good. There maybe puzzle games with bigger brands, more levels, and perhaps even better physics, but when we think about what we love most about iPhone software — indie developers, attention to detail, love of UI — Ramp Champ lands squarely in the bullseye.

Jailbreak App of the Year: ProSwitcher

Even post-iPhone 3.0, Jailbreak continued to fill gaps in functionality like theming, BT keyboards, lockscreen widgets, notification management, and — of course — unlocking the iPhone 3GS. If Apple won’t do it, it’s been proven time and time again the Jailbreak community will.

ProSwitcher did the same, but looked especially great doing it. Take a Jailbroken iPhone, add Backgrounder to get your multitask on, and then manage the whole thing with Safari Pages-style — and yes, webOS cards-style UI candy.

Bluetooth Headset of the Year: Blueant Q1

Apple raised the stakes in 2009 by adding iPhone 3.0 support for A2DP stereo Bluetooth — sort of. Apple forgot to add all the proper control protocols, so you can’t skip tracks, but boy can you still rock out. Now iPhone and iPod touch users can enjoy music (and adjusting volume), and excellent products like the Motorola S9-HD and the Jabra Cruiser speakerphone.

And if that wasn’t enough, our pick for BT headset of the year, the Blueant Q1 got an update — really, how often to BT headsets get firmware update?! — to enable A2DP. It’s a premium product, just like the iPhone, but with voice control, and support for two phones (for you dual wielders), it’s also a fantastic one.

Case of the Year: Otterbox Defender

Apple can’t win. They change the design of the iPhone 3G and people with iPhone 2G cases complain their old accessories don’t fit. They keep the iPhone 3GS in the same duds, and people complain it’s boring. But at least the case makers could concentrate on better rather than different, and better they have. From the soft-stylings of the iSkin solo to the gloss of the Case-mate Barely There Chrome and the utility of the Golla bag, there’s definitely a “case for that”.

And if we’re talking case, and we’re talking protection, the Hummer of cases, the battle-armor of protection, is the OtterBox Defender. It’s not for those who just want a sticker or a skin, a splash of color or the smell of fine leather — it’s for those who want their iPhone survive. And it’s our case of the year.

EPIC FAIL of the Year: Capricious App Store Rejections

No doubt the App Store is such a smash hit that even Apple was unprepared for the tsunami of submissions they’re now facing. The numbers are staggering, but not as staggering as the growth rate. But choosing to be a gatekeeper comes with it the responsibility of being a good gatekeeper. It’s Apple’s store and they can fill it’s virtual shelves with what they want, but when the developers who make the apps those shelves are being filled with lose faith — when they no longer trust Apple’s rules, or realize there are no consistent rules being enforced, even if Apple and mainstream users don’t lose out, the platform does. Sure, they’ve made some small improvements inside iTunes connect and with the RSS feed, but they’re slow to the point of being arduous.

Some developers have been frustrated enough to leave the iPhone. A few returned only because the competitions’ development environment, install base, and user experience wasn’t competitive enough… yet. But that “yet” could change at any moment. And if the best and brightest developers are making the best and brightest apps for Android rather than the iPhone, that’s not a loss to Apple’s bottom line, it’s a loss to their heart.

That’s why rejected App Store apps, specifically the capricious, opaque way in which they’re continuing to be rejected, is our epic FAIL of the year.

Story of the Year: iTablet

We’ve mentioned most of the other big stories already — the still amazing Jailbreak journey, the still disappointing App Store rejections. And then there was the leave of absence, and triumphant return of Steve Jobs.

But iTablet/iStlate was the story that wouldn’t quit, however, and the rumors, speculation, and rampant geek want built and built throughout 2009. We’re not even sure actually announcing the device (which may just happen in 2010) could have been a bigger story — anticipation is just that powerful. Whether (more likely when) it ultimate comes out, Apple’s mysterious, mythical, magical, maybe iTablet is our story of the year.

Bring on 2010!

Well, that’s it — TiPb’s Editor Awards for 2009 gone and done! What will we see in 2010? Who knows, but we’re excited to find out!

Did you agree with any of our picks? Disagree? What would YOU have given the nod to? Feel strongly about it? Tell us — or tell us off — in the comments! (And we’ll have our next Readers’ Choice Awards coming up later in 2010 so you can put your apps where your opinions are as well!)

Happy New Year

–The iPhone blog team

Daring Fireball‘s John Gruber often “guesses” what Apple will be releasing, and those guesses are sometimes dead-on-accurate, but when it comes to the iTablet/iSlate, Gruber says Apple’s invoked a full on pre-January 2007-like “cone-of-silence”. Still he’s written up an interesting estimate of what, in his opinion, and iTablet just might be:

I say they’re swinging big — redefining the experience of personal computing.

It will not be pitched as such by Apple. It will be defined by three or four of its built-in primary apps. But long-term, big-picture? It will be to the MacBook what the Macintosh was to the Apple II.

I am not predicting that Apple is phasing out the Mac. (On the contrary, I’ve heard that Mac OS X 10.7 is on pace for a developer release at WWDC in June.) Like all Apple products, The Tablet will do less than we expect but the things it does do, it will do insanely well. It will offer a fraction of the functionality of a MacBook — but that fraction will be way more fun. The same Asperger-y critics who dismissed the iPhone will focus on all that The Tablet doesn’t do and declare that this time, Apple really has ****** up but good. The rest of us will get in line to buy one.

Gruber makes the kind of sense that does here. Apple will produce a large-sized, mainstream-targeted device that excels at handling the media iTunes excels at delivering, combined with the same type of (though not the same UI for) the ease of use the iPhone’s multitouch technology and user experience wowed us with in 2007.

If they’re making one. Wink. Wink. Nudge. Nudge.

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Join Rene and special guests Phil Nickinson of Android Central and WMExperts and Keith Newman of the PreCentral.net PalmCast Round Robin Android Droid and Hero vs. iPhone and Windows Phone HD2 and Touch Pro2 vs. iPhone, more iTablet, iPhone HD, and iPhone 4.0 rumors, and all the week’s news and opinions. Listen in!

Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
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Fox News’ Clayton Morris is upping the ante on the rumored January 26 Apple Media Event, not only saying it’s the real deal, but that it will focus on “mobility”:

I’ve spoken to a source inside Apple who confirmed a “big” event for January. While nothing official has been handed down from the notoriously tight-lipped company, my source took the Financial Times report one step further by saying this event will focus on the mobility space, meaning we’ll see something related to the iPhone/iPod touch product line.

An earlier than usual iPhone 4.0 preview to give developers time to go resolution-independent for an iPhone HD? A camera-toting iPod touch to p!$$ off everyone who got the camera-less version for Xmas? An announcement that Apple is taking itself fully to the cloud? Or just some iTablet/iSlate the entire interwebs have been gossiping about for years?

If you’ve Quantum Leap’ed or flashback’ed from this fictional future, let us know!

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

According to former chief Chinese Googler, Lee Kai-fu, who apparently is well connected with Apple manufacturing partner Foxconn, the upcoming iTablet/iSlate looks like a giant iPhone with:

• an awesome UI packed in a beautiful 10.1-inch screen
• 3D graphics,
• virtual keyboard,
• video conferencing,
• e-books,
• Internet and other functions

All this from a connected friend, discussed in his Chinese language post [Google translate link]. Oh, and Apple expects to produce 10 million of them in the first year.

Happy kindling for the fires of rumor, indeed!

[Gadget Mix via TUAW]

iSlate seems solid but might not (or never) be used, while apple.com/ichatmobile was a bust, so where does iGuide fit in? Says MacRumors:

iGuide Media, LLC. is another Delaware-based company whose sole purpose appears to be to obtain a trademark on behalf of Apple, Inc. In this case they have a single trademark application for the term “iGuide” that is currently pending. The application was first filed in December 2007. Again, we found Apple’s Senior Trademark Specialist Regina Porter’s signatures on the trademark documents linking iGuide Media, LLC to Apple, Inc. Meanwhile, the lawyer handling the paperwork for the iGuide trademark is the same lawyer who filed for the iPhone trademark under Ocean Telecom Services, also on behalf of Apple. Like iSlate, it seems clear that Apple created iGuide Media, LLC to obtain the iGuide trademark.

TechCrunch has also done another post-post dig but didn’t find any smoking apples.

Still, TiPb agrees iGuide sounds far more like a service than a product, and not even a very cool sounding one at that. Any ideas?

UPDATED: Yeah, looks like Apple set up a simple redirect from apple.com/ichat[anything]to the main iChat page. Sigh. We still want it.

ORIGINAL: No sooner did iSlate.com surface than 9to5mac has noted that http://apple.com/ichatmobile doesn’t return a “page not found” error, but rather redirects to Apple’s iChat for Mac OS X.

Could be nothing, of course. (But if I didn’t post this next part, Chad would never forgive me). Or, in the best-case scenario, Apple is finally (finally) putting the pieces in place to launch an actual, mobile iChat application for the iPhone (and perhaps just-as-mytical at this point, iTablet).

Now whether it will be text-only IM, or use video, or indicates the 4th generation iPhone and rumored iSlate will have a front-facing camera is a box of crazy even we’re not opening this holiday season!

Some interesting rumor updates on the iTablet, or iSlate if Apple goes that way, including the status of its panel and production, and some nostalgia for another unreleased bit of Apple kit — the Newton-era MessageSlate.

Last things first — a while back on iPhone Live! Chad and were chatting tablets and he wondered if Apple would go with iBook. To me, 1) that sounds more like a device that folds open and closed like a laptop or dual-screen tablet and 2) Apple is historically the very opposite of nostalgic and ruthlessly disposes of the past in a relentless drive for the future.

But now MacRumors reminds us about the old Newton-based MessageSlate, and we’re left to wonder — does this make the rumored tablet name of iSlate more likely, or less likely?

Now to the meat of it, MacRumors is also quoting Economic Daily and Digitimes on stories involving orders for supposedly tablet-bound “connectors” and Foxconn’s subsidiary Innolux for 10″ touch panels.

The panels, they say, are what’s been holding the tablet up:

Apple has been seeking solutions to strengthen the glass of the 10-inch panel for the device and was forced to delay the launch until first-quarter 2010, the sources noted.

To go along with these rumored details about rumored products, we still have a rumored January 26th, 2010 for the rumored announcement, so stay tuned!

Following up MacRumors discovery of the iSlate.com domain name yesterday, TechCrunch dug a little deeper and found more to support the iSlate guestimation, and now MacRumors is back again with another trademark — Magic Slate.

Could Magic Slate be the Apple touchpad Daring Fireball thought would be released alongside the Magic Mouse last October? Or are they both just red-herring rumors, spreading blog frenzy along holiday cheer?

Either way, the idea of a multi-touch pad peripheral for Macs — especially if it has a screen built-in, like the farthest-fetched rumors have suggested since back when the glass trackpad MacBooks were first introduced — is compelling.

Of course, with the simple release of an app, Apple could make the iPhone or the iPod touch the ultimate Magic Slate (not to mention the iSlate/iTablet proper for large screen tracking).

Still, this is the story equivalent of unicorns mating with zebra. Striped unicorns still don’t exist, and neither (yet?) do iSlate or Magic Slate.

Santa was kind to MacRumors.com, gifting them with discovery that Apple has owned the internet domain name iSlate.com since 2007, though it’s been hidden away much of that time:

it seems Apple’s name was temporarily exposed as the actual owner of “iSlate.com” for several weeks in late 2007. It was changed back within a few weeks, but MacRumors has found the historic record proving Apple ownership of the iSlate.com domain.

Hey, didn’t Bill Keller, executive editor of the New York Times reference an Apple slate two months ago?

“I’m hoping we can get the newsroom more actively involved in the challenge of delivering our best journalism in the form of Times Reader, iPhone apps, WAP, or the impending Apple slate…”

Hmmm…. TiPb’s just been calling it still unannounced device the iTablet, others have called it the iPad, but how does iSlate grab you?

AppleInsider has come across an interesting patent from Apple, titled “Keystroke Tactility Arrangement on a Smooth Touch Surface that details a multi-touch tactile keyboard for an iTablet-like device:

“The articulating frame may provide key edge ridges that define the boundaries of the key regions or may provide tactile feedback mechanisms within the key regions. The articulating frame may also be configured to cause concave depressions similar to mechanical key caps in the surface.”

“Preferably, each key edge comprises one to four distinct bars or Braille-like dots. When constructed in conjunction with a capacitive multi-touch surface, the key edge ridges should separated to accommodate the routing of the drive electrodes, which may take the form of rows, columns, or other configurations.”

“Specifically, the recognition software commands lowering of the frame when lateral sliding gestures or mouse clicking activity chords are detected on the surface.”

Another candidate for the rumored “surprising” tablet interaction method?

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And the iTablet Saga continues today, with the New York Times blogging that, according to an Apple employee:

“I can’t really say anything, but, let’s just say Steve [Jobs] is extremely happy with the new tablet.”

It’s long been known that Apple has had a tablet in the labs for years, and that the iPhone was a result of leveraging technologies experimented with for a “Safari Pad“, but Steve Jobs and Apple didn’t see a mainstream market for the device and so never released it in its own right. Arguably, they’ve been just fine with the iPhone and iPod touch filling that niche.

Moreover, the NYT post adds that former Apple employee has told them:

“You will be very surprised how you interact with the new tablet.”

Would that we could stare into its black gloss and will it to do our bidding. Is there an app for that yet?

Anyway, if these rumors have any substance to them, what’s changed in Steve Jobs’ and Apple’s minds? The App Store? The maturing of digital media content so that an iTablet could become the iPod of the next decade?

[via MacRumors]

The Financial Times is dropping the Apple Special Media Event bomb:

Apple is expected to use the venue to make a major product announcement on Tuesday, January 26th. Both YBCA and Apple declined to comment.

Apple’s last event introduced the iPod touch G3 back in September. Absent Macworld this year, their next cyclical event would be an iPhone OS Sneak Preview in March.

If this event is real, there’s no way to know what Apple will announce. Of course, everyone and their Twitter account will be guessing, and perhaps hoping for, an actual Apple iTablet. (Which means if it’s “only” iLife ’10 there’ll be a mini riot on the interwebs, right?)

It’s almost new year; put on your prediction hat and tell us what will happen!

[Thanks to everyone who made our inbox 'splode with this!]

From analysts to so-called insiders, the rumors are growing that Apple just might have an event in January to just maybe announce the just possibly new iTablet with just a few select iPhone apps running full screen, resolution independent by showtime.

Meh. Apple has held January events for a long time — they introduced the iPhone at Macworld 2007 after all, and while Apple has pulled out of that event this year, there’s nothing to stop them trying to once-again upstage CES and put on their own invitation-only shindig sometime during the first month of 2010.

TiPb has long believed Apple has an iTablet in the labs since before the iPhone, and they’re only waiting on Steve Jobs to decide it has a place in the Apple lineup (other than toilet web-reader, apparently) for it to go to market. If Jobs is happy enough with whatever the current working prototype is, we’ll see it soon-ish. If not, we’ll be waiting until he is. That’s why Apple pulled out of Macworld — to keep to their own schedule.

As to iPhone app developers being asked to ready “full screen” versions of their apps… okay. Some apps like Safari, Mail, iPod (movies) will of course need to work “full screen” regardless of the size of the device, be it an iPhone, iTablet, or WVGA-style 4th generation iPhone HD. In fact, a larger iPhone is theoretically more of a problem than a tablet, because they’ll have to scale while many 3rd party apps could just run as smaller windows on a tablet UI. Do calculators really need to be “full screen”? Do Twitter apps? (Tweetie and Twitterrific for Mac OS X aren’t “full screen”, and that’s considered an advantage). Sure, games will want to use every pixel Apple gives them, as will some other apps. For many, “widgets” will be the way to go. In a mythical iTablet universe, Apple would have a mythical UI brilliant enough to handle “full screen” and widget elegantly. (And would have already been telling developers to do stuff like use web-based UI and CSS buttons for scalability, where appropriate).

So, as we head into this magical time of year — no, not the holidays, the “next Apple rumorpalooza!” — let us know what you think.

Apple iTablet: signs point to yes, it is uncertain, at this time no, or ask again later?

[Silicone Alley Insider via MacRumors]

In the ever-envigorating game of “What’s That Apple Patent for Anyway?” this time we get a look at a multi-touch click-wheel iTablet, a way to remotely control your Mac from your

First up, an un-thin looking iTablet-style device with a retro click-wheel but an even more interesting backstory, according to 9to5mac, as:

One of the patent applicants for Apple is a one Dr. Carlin Vieri. He’s no longer with Apple (hel left just over a year ago). He happens to be the VP of Engineering for [rumored Apple iTablet screen supplier] Pixel Qi right now.

Second, a patent to allow the iPhone to remotely control your Mac either via gestures, specialized on-screen buttons, and/or Voice Control, as well as support for peripherals like printers. PatentlyApple has the goods, but from the sounds of it, you could email that new PDF home, launching Preview, deleting some pages, then sending it to the printer so it’s waiting, warm and ready when you get in door.

Last, PatentlyApple also shows off a new kind of universal dock. It employs an elastic, spongy material that can morph into the shape of any iPod or iPhone, past, present, or future. Yes folks, it might just make the dock insert extinct.

As always, there’s no telling when, if ever, Apple will make use any of these patents in ant consumer-facing product. But it’s fun to watch.

It was bound to happen, but with Toshiba announcing that it’s managed to cram 64GB of NAND flash memory onto a single chip, we can now officially start the rumors of a 64GB iPhone and 128GB iPod touch… perhaps as soon as next year’s 4th generation models if prices get low enough fast enough.

The iPod touch doesn’t have to worry about all the phone-related radios, and so has double the slots for memory, and will likely always get twice as much storage as the iPhone. Question is, at 128GB might Apple finally retire the veteran (and last) hard drive-based iPod classic?

9to5mac also posits those same chips would work mighty fine in a mythical iTablet in lieu of an SSD drive.

Apple typically releases new iPhones in June/July, new iPod touches in September, and hasn’t announced any iTablets… yet.

Chad and Phil spotted this in the wee hours, and it being no more believable than many of the so-called analyst predictions about the when’s and how-muches involving Apple’s still unannounced iTablet, we figured it might be a fun, fakety fake fake sort way to start off the real weekend.

And if Apple by chance does make something close-ish to this, would you want?

[No Where Else via Gizmodo]

If Apple does release a mythical iTablet, could the mythical advertising return them to the glorious campaign of “Think different” past? TiPb doesn’t take anything involving the iTablet as anything approaching news, but seeing as how our site was originally called “Phone different” this particular rumor warmed even our frozen, jaded little blogger hearts.

And, frankly, we’d love to see a refreshed, renewed, Think different on our TV and in our webs.

[via 9to5mac]

Marketwatch is citing “checks” and saying that Apple’s unannounced, still mythical iTablet will begin production in February, “implying” a launch in March or April. The iTablet and also-unnannounced companion services delivered via iTunes are said to feature:

• 10.1 inch multi-touch LCD (no OLED)
• Traditional Apple 30/70 split for print publishers (which is better than Amazon’s traditional 50/50)
• To be sold at an average price of $1,000 at a 22% margin

Price sounds high to us. Apple has had tablet concepts in the vault since before the iPhone but they’ve never made it past Steve Jobs. He’s going to need to see a market for them and a price that delivers that market. Apple is premium, but they’ve already got the iPod touch at under $500 and the MacBook at over $1000 (both of which provide great balances of portability and functionality). If a place exists for an iTablet, it would seem to be between those two points.

The CrunchPad has crashed and burned amid antics and accusations worthy of the silliest TV legal dramas (Denny Crane!), but from its ashes has risen might rise the JooJoo. No, really, that’s what they’re calling it because it’s magic.

A 12″ capacitive tablet that runs only a Unix kernel and boots in 9 seconds into a WebKit browser, and… that’s it. Think Chrome OS but not Google’s in a mythical iTablet package but not Apple’s. Other specs include 4GB of storage, WiFi (no cell data), 5 hours of battery life, USB, headphone, and $500 to take home.

We’re with the many other tech’ers who think that’s a hefty price for a mobile web browser, given the price of everything from the iPod touch (or iPhone) to ultra-cheap netbooks, but there may just be a niche for those early adapters who don’t blink at half a grand.

Perhaps not ironically, Steve Jobs is rumored to have said he won’t ship an Apple tablet until the device does more than let people browser the web on the toilet. Whether that means this specific a device is a space Apple isn’t going to enter, or that $500 for anything that won’t run more than just a web browser is a non-starter in the minds of arguably the best product picker of the last 20 years… you tell us. Want?

For more on the JooJoo check out Engadget‘s hands-on…

Sports Illustrated has thrown their hat into the ring of media properties racing their content towards a tablet (or mythical iTablet) delivery system for the future. This is part of Time Inc.’s initiative, produced by Wonderfactory.

Apple, of course, has yet to announce an iTablet, but that’s not stopping the declining old-world media companies from getting themselves ready… just in case.

[Thanks to McLaughlin for the tip!]

The iPhone, iPod touch, and still rumorware iTablet (among other mobile platforms) are so compelling that publishers like Condé Nast and now Time Inc. and Hearst are racing to get their slowly dying print media content all prepped and ready for an iPod-like digital savior. Says the New York Observer (via MacRumors) says:

The company would make up one of the biggest alliances among rival publishers ever formed in print media, with Time Inc., Condé Nast and Hearst all expected to join, houses that together publish more than 50 magazines, including The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Vogue, Time, People, Sports Illustrated, Esquire and O, The Oprah Magazine.

The difference between this and just shipping e-reader content of Kindle-like devices and apps? They don’t want to “pave the cowpath” (TM Fake Steve), they want to try and come up with an innovative way to make their content available that harnesses the power and connectivity of mobile devices, and in a way delightful enough readers will be willing to pay for it.

“With magazines, the form has to change,” [Time exec John Squires] continued. “All I’m saying is that there are ways to design magazines differently for that kind of experience that’ll be attractive and will feel different to a consumer.”

Good luck with that — and we mean it sincerely. We want to be wowed.

How badly does Wired’s publisher, Condé Nast, want to get their content on the still-mythical Apple iTablet? Badly enough that they’re working with Adobe to mock up their old content for this new (and still hypothetical!) medium. See the video above. (Warning! turn down your volume first!)

Now, we understand when movies started they were just filmed stage productions, and so it makes some sense that this looks a lot like scanned magazine pages made slideshow — with a nice interactive map thrown in. The good news is that Apple’s iTablet is still unreal, so there’s plenty of time for content providers to play around with ideas on how to better present it dynamically, not quite like the web or even iPhone apps or iTunes LP/Extras, but a hybrid of all the above and more. Something next.

[Wired via Gizmodo]

Apple has yet to announce an iTablet, which is good because the supposed universe dent’er is supposedly suffering a supposed “delay” — getting pushed back from early to late 2010 so that Apple can supposedly add a supposedly expensive, LG-crafted OLED (organic light emitting diode) screen to the mythical mix.

At 9.7 inches, it would cost $500 for the panel, and bump the entire kit up to a $1500 or $1700 price point. So much for the imaginary device filling a slot between the sub-$500 iPod touch/iPhone and the $1000 MacBook, right?

A cheaper 10.6 inch device is also rumored to be in the imaginary pipeline for that, somewhere over $800. Both could get “cheaper” (front facing consumer price-wise) if they run 3G and are subsidized by a telco, like the iPhone is by AT&T.

There were OLED rumors for the iPhone 3GS earlier this year (with iTablet chatter attached), which of course didn’t pan out (though they did for the Zune HD). Would Apple go big on OLED for an iTablet before they go small, and presumably more affordable, with the iPhone? Especially if it delays something that’s had no public mention and certainly no release date attached to it? (Insert Microsoft Pink references here).

Either way, you want OLED?

[DigiTimes via Gizmodo]

According to Business Insider, the mythical iTablet is imminent due to the unnamed, unverified, unspecified travel of someone at Apple who does… something:

a source tells us a system integration engineer friend of his at Apple has been ramping up his travels back and forth between China lately, broadcasting word of his travels over the Internet.

A friend of a friend — no names! — asked TiPb what will end up being more ridiculous, iPhone rumors or iTablet rumors. We answered — yes!

Anyone have an iTablet case (with or without camera hole!) they want to leak our way?

TechCrunch has posted an interesting photo and write up of the Apple Tablet that never was — the Pen Mac, unreleased in favor of the PDA-style Newton back in 1990.

The Pen Mac was a fully functional Mac computer (it even played the Mac startup chime) with a pen based touch screen. The screen itself was identical to the Mac Portable, but with the addition of pen touch. And of course the case was a lot smaller than the Mac Portable. The Pen Mac was supposedly not much more than one inch thick. Users could plug in a keyboard and mouse or easier input.

So, it happened before will it happen again? From Newton to iPod touch. From Pen Mac to… iTablet? We’ll have to wait for 2010 to find out.

Bill Keller, Executive Editor of the New York Times, when discussing the evolution/revolution underway in the print media industry, mentioned off-the-record and in passing:

“I’m hoping we can get the newsroom more actively involved in the challenge of delivering our best journalism in the form of Times Reader, iPhone apps, WAP, or the impending Apple slate…”

And so the question becomes, was this an unintentional leak based upon content discussions the NYT has been having with Apple, or is Keller — like all of us — just so inculcated with speculation about the near-mythic Apple iTablet that he — like all of us — speaks as though it’s inevitable?

[via Gawker, thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Could this be the first peek of the 2010 iPhone 4G… the SIM card tray?! If not, could it be for the iTablet? Engadget says:

procured from Foxconn (the rumored Apple tablet manufacturer) and available for $14.05 starting October 23rd for the 4th generation iPhone / iTablet… whatever the mythical host device might ultimately be named.

And here we thought we’d have to wait until next year for rumors like this! Cue the case-maker leaks in 5… 4… 3..

Could Apple’s still unannounced, non-existant (for consumers anyway) iTablet be the ultimate comic book reader? Chicago Sun-Times columnist, Apple aficionado, and Sheldon-esque comic book lover Andy Ihnatko suggests just that. When writing about LongBox, which seeks to do for comics what iTunes did for music (i.e. bring a fractured, self-destructive, myopic industry kicking and screaming into the 21st century), he says:

I’m pretty sure that Apple is entering into a formal alliance with LongBox. When I asked Hoseley about what kind of partnerships the company is forming, he spoke vaguely of what was taking up most of his time at the moment: a lengthy and complicated agreement with a seriously large company operating in the media space.

I pressed him for more details while on the record. Rantz would only hint that this specific company had received high-profile coverage in both the Engadget and Gizmodo blogs in the previous week.

Would I love to have read Planetary #27 on a gorgeous capacitive multi-touch display? Absolutely. Would the next logical step be dynamic content a la Watchman motion comic? Absolute-lier! Do we expect to see Steve Jobs hold up an iTablet in January, clearly showing the latest issue of Ultimate Avengers, Captain America in tight-focused frenzy? Who knows at this point, but the comic industry will go the way of the dinosaur if they don’t adopt an iTunes-like online distribution method and soon, so as much as some of us want it, they need it.

The iPhone already has Comics, with a lot of independent content. Marvel and DC, where are you?

(Tangential – Steve Jobs is Disney’s largest shareholder and Disney just bought Marvel.)

[via MacBreak Weekly. Photoshop above yet again a homage in honor of Windows 7 launch day!]

Digital Trends and Leif Iverson was gracious enough to have me on their podcast last week, and we took the opportunity to talk:

• How To Read e-Books On Your iPhone
• Apple Tablet: Latest Updates
• CTIA 2009: Best Of Show

Digital Trends has also updated with a great new look, and more gadget content than you can shake an accelerometer at, so be sure to check it out.

Foxconn is rumored to be producing 300,000 – 400,000 of the much hyped, still fabled Apple iTablet for introduction sometime in Q1 of 2010 says DigiTimes. This, of course, is the next stage of any good Apple rumor evolution, after specs and before random case leaks…

10.6 inch screen from Innolux Display, focus on digital print like e-books, good battery life, killer UI, etc. are all mentioned as well.

Now we just need Steve Jobs to say something dismissive like “people don’t read”… Oh, wait…

iPhone 4.0 SDK Sneak Preview event should be held March 2010. Might we have an earlier event to look forward to now as well, the iTablet Introduction?

While the entire industry is increasingly painted as breathlessly holding their breath for an Apple iTablet sometime in 2010, the New York Times re-affirms they’ve been working on just such a device since at least 2003:

“It couldn’t be built. The battery life [using PowerPC chips] wasn’t long enough, the graphics performance was not enough to do anything and the components themselves cost more than $500,” said Joshua A. Strickland, a former Apple engineer whose name is on several of the company’s patents for multitouch technology.

More essential than that, even as technological hurdles were cleared over the years, the idea kept getting shot down by Apple CEO Steve Jobs because no one could answer the question of “what they were good for besides surfing the Web in the bathroom”.

Ultimately, Apple’s experiments with a Safari Pad were leveraged into making and marketing the iPhone instead — something Jobs, and users, obviously found more compelling.

Arguably, the same problem still exists. Apple’s own hardware (like PA Semi chipsets), software (like iTunes LP and iTunes Extra), and industry rumors over print-derived content (like magazines, books, newspapers, etc.) add sub-plots even while the main storyline is still getting fleshed out.

Not lost, however, is that while competitors have tried to evangelize the tablet concept for a decade and received nearly zero traction, the mere thought of a post-iPhone Apple iTablet has achieved so much media buzz the category itself has seen a re-birth from a variety of players.

Apple’s would likely have 85,000 iPhone apps (possible 100,000 by launch), which — as has been speculated before — could run, several at a time, each in their own window like on a desktop system, along with full screen versions of Safari, iPod, and whatever i-app shows dynamic “print” media.

If the iTablet ends up being real, and being “All your media in your hands”, Apple might have a story of their own finally worth telling. Then we’ll just have to see if people buy it.

AppleInsider has found yet another multi-touch patent application, this one expanding on Apple’s already massive portfolio to include the ability to recognize which finger is touching, distinguish between palms and fingers, and enable all manner of restin

unprecedented integration of typing, resting, pointing, scrolling, 3D manipulation, and handwriting into a versatile, ergonomic computer input device

Check out the full article for more, and let us know if you think this is more fuel for the iTablet hype machine, or if Apple could have something else up their sleeve?

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Yes, the iTablet rumors just keep on coming, with the latest from Gizmodo being that Apple is in talks with traditional print publishers — text books, newspapers, and magazines, to redefine their industry they way they have music (and are trying to do with video).

Two people related to the NYTimes have separately told me that in June, paper was approached by Apple to talk about putting the paper on a “new device.” [...] A person close to a VP in textbook publishing mentioned to me in July that McGraw Hill and Oberlin Press are working with Apple to move textbooks to iTunes.[...] Apple also recently had several executives from one of the largest magazine groups at their Cupertino’s campus, where they were asked to present their ideas on the future of publishing.

Why?

The eventual goal is to have publishers create hybridized content that draws from audio, video, interactive graphics in books, magazines and newspapers, where paper layouts would be static. And with release dates for Microsoft’s Courier set to be quite far away and Kindle stuck with relatively static e-ink, it appears that Apple is moving towards a pole position in distribution of this next-generation print content. First, it’ll get its feet wet with more basic repurposing of the stuff found on dead trees today.

Gizmodo is also backing the rumored January announce date. What remains uncertain is, of course, the market for next generation print media. The Kindle was recently, and very publicly, panned by Princeton students as being unusable. Apple will have the benefit of the existing iTunes and iPhone ecosystem to fall back on, and buy them time — people can browse the web, listen to music, watch videos on the iTablet — but they’ll have to present a much more usable solution to get that print dinosaur cyberized for the next millennium.

Apple might be preparing a 10.7″ multi-touch iTablet with 720p resolution, running the iPhone OS, for announcement in January and release in May/June 2010. That’s just one of the rumors dropped by iLounge this morning, from a source they say was accurate about the most recent iPod nano, iPhone, and Chinese iPhone stories.

Like the iPhone and the iPod touch, iLounge’s source claims both a 3G and non-3G version will be available, so users can weigh always-on connectivity vs. another monthly telco bill.

Apple is no stranger to big product announcements in January, but since exiting Macworld, they’re also now free to set their own schedule. Possible delays? Odds of it receiving the official “b’okay” from Steve Jobs in its current form are said to be 80% (after it already being nixed at 7″ for being “too small”). That’s good, but far from certain.

Also far from certain, but certainly interesting is Microsoft’s equal and opposite tablet concept — the Courier, which focuses not on media but on journaling. Gizmodo has another video up. It reminds us of those awesome, future-filled Bill Gates keynotes from CES. Most of what Gates demoed hasn’t made it to market, however. Hopefully the Courier will fare better.

People are used to phones, they’re used to MP3 players, laptops, desktops, even set top boxes. A decade later, there’s no indication of tablets breaking through into the mainstream, so Apple, Microsoft, and everyone else has their work cut out for them.

We’ll see if the iTablet can tell a compelling enough story, and offer a feature set that sells.

Apple has hired Michael Tchao as Vice-President of Product Marketing reporting directly to Senior Vice-President, Phil Schiller. What’s noticeable about this new hire, however, is that Tchao has worked for Apple before — he’s one of the original developers of Apple’s Newton message pad.

Apple, Tchao, and all involved are being mum on what Tchao’s specific roll at Apple will be, but rampant internet speculation has, of course, gone something like “ZOMG! iTablet!”

[New York Times, Photo via http://www.flickr.com/photos/eschipul/]

While everyone is waiting on Apple to unveil their universally rumored iTablet/iPad device next year, Gizmodo has just scored the scoop on what Microsoft just might be planning to counter it — the “Courier” tablet.

Decidedly un-Apple in it’s approach, with dual booklet screens, pen and touch input, and feel that’s all organized chaos, it’s also strikingly different to Microsoft’s previous Tablet PC efforts (which were largely tweaked versions of XP and then Vista). Here’s why:

Until recently, it was a skunkworks project deep inside Microsoft, only known to the few engineers and executives working on it—Microsoft’s brightest, like Entertainment & Devices tech chief and user-experience wizard J. Allard, who’s spearheading the project. Currently, Courier appears to be at a stage where Microsoft is developing the user experience and showing design concepts to outside agencies.

Head on over to Gizmodo to see a video of the concept in action (not iPhone friendly, sorry). Then come back here, tell us what you like and don’t like, and let us know how you think Apple’s take on the tablet will differ.

iTablet rumors, paused for a week to allow some Apple Music Event rumors, are returning full force with a fresh batch straight from Taiwanese suppliers, who say the device will launch in February 2010. According to Taiwan Economic News:

The tablet PC features a 9.6-inch screen, finger-touch function and built-in HSPDA (high speed download packet access) module, and adopts a P.A. SEMI processor chip and long lasting battery pack, selling for between US$799 and US$999.

Given that Apple has a fairly regular product calendar, with iPhone OS Beta in March, WWDC and iPhone release in June, iTunes and iPod in September, and Mac events scattered in-between when new designs are ready, and especially considering Macworld in January is no longer on Apple’s calendar, but we’ve all gotten used to giant product events at the beginning of the year… a February date makes some sense.

Not being locked to Macworld also means no firm date for the rumored release, so Apple can wait until the last minute and, venue availability not withstanding, hold it whenever the product is ready. Meaning, even if the February rumor is solid now, it’s a moving target.

As to the specs, sounds like the rumors we’ve heard to date, though HSPDA does conflict with previous Verizon rumors (which still runs EVDO rev-A). It would be nice to finally see those Apple-spun PA Semi systems on a chip, however…

Enough of our rumor ruminations, what do you think? Sound plausible?

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

With Apple consolidating its Apple TV offerings this morning down to a single 160GB SKU at a lower $229 price point, we’re once again split between Apple axing their “hobby” or giving it a much-needed refresh.

If Apple does axe the Apple TV, however, something would need to take its place in the living room. Could that something be the iPhone 3GS and iPod touch G3 and the still-mythic iTablet? Dock them properly to an HD TV, and could you have a solution with one heck of a built in controller?

We know the iPhone (and likely new iPod touch) can support 720p and 1080p out. We even hoped Apple would flip the switch on that feature last week in order to better position themselves competitively against the about-to-ship Zune HD. They could still flip it at some point, however, along with introducing new HDMI-based video output cables.

This would go a long way towards showing iPhone and iPod touch content on the big screen, but right now one of the Apple TV’s strengths is streaming rather than just storing and showing. You can attach an Apple TV to your HD TV and, without any local content, stream all the iTunes media you have on your Mac or Windows PC, and the potentially 2TB drives that can now attach to those (or more with RAID, Drobo, etc.)

Neither iPhone nor iPod have ethernet, and both are stuck on the older, slower 802.11g Wi-Fi standard (though the iPod touch G3 might be updatable to 802.11n).

That’s where an iTablet, presumably with much beefier internals and faster Wi-Fi (though we still doubt ethernet) comes in. Apple could position it as a dock-at-home, take it with you on-the-go solution.

Of course, whether you’d want to lock your iTablet to a TV rather than using it to surf and chat while watching TV is debatable, and could be a deal-breaker for many. Though better that than just trying to up-sell everyone to a Mac Mini…

Looking at it this way, it seems that even in an iPhone, iPod touch, and perhaps iTablet world, there’s still a place for an Apple TV in the lineup. If only for now.

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Rumors of an iTablet continue to gain steam while Apple boasts a metric ton of refinements for their new Mac OS X Snow Leopard release, including better performance and smaller footprint, then goes and adds a new virtual keyboard that just begs to be touched…

…Ah, yeah, here come the Mac OS X Snow Leopard on iTablet stories!

9to5Mac leads this latest charge with the keyboard while Cult of Mac points also to the new Dock Expose, and all new, all-touchable Stacks grid. (See Apple’s feature overview).

So, could Apple be making a Mac OS X iTablet, or is your money still on an iPhone OS X iTablet? Or could they really be making both?

While most recent rumors have been swirling around Apple developing a 10″ iTablet that would basically look like an oversized iPod touch, Gizmodo has a source, said to have been 100% reliable in the past, who’s telling them Apple is also planning 13″ and 15″ tablets, one of which… will run Mac OS X.

This source claims that the two touchscreen prototypes—made of aluminum, but on the shape of big iPhones—were in a factory in Shenzuen, China. One of them “was running Mac OS X 10.5.” When I asked, the source didn’t know if these were built for demonstration purposes, or if they were preproduction units. The company has a tight relation with Apple but “it’s not FoxConn.”

Could Apple be making both small, iPhone-like tablets and larger, MacBook-like tablets? Do we want them to?

Since returning to work following a 6-month leave of absence and a liver-transplant, Apple CEO has been locked on delivering the long-rumored, hugely-anticipated (by the blogsphere at least) Apple iTablet, or so says the Wall Street Journal.

Similar to the months before the January 2007 unveiling of the iPhone, Jobs is said to be relentlessly micro-managing away with his typical utter focus on usability and design, making engineers cry and developers miserable in hopes of delighting consumers with a tablet concept that “just works”.

Making it worse, apparently, for Apple employees this time around is that aforementioned leave of absence Jobs took gave them all a brief respite of freedom, and now they’re left to lament what they previously never knew. Or something like that. Really, melodramatic much?

What’s clear, however, is that Jobs takes introducing whole new product categories very seriously:

Mr. Jobs killed the project twice in recent years, the first time because the battery life was too short, and the second time because there was insufficient memory, said one of the people familiar with the matter.

Asked for comment, however, Steve Jobs proved he’s still on top of his game, at least when it comes to curt responses:

“much of your information is incorrect,”

You go Steve!

Update: Fake Steve chimes in with Do not get in my way when I am on a mission, or I swear to God you will get hurt

[via MacRumors]

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News

iTunes, iPod, and iTablet

• Apple iPod/iTunes Event Scheduled for Sept. 9?
• UPDATED with Video: iPod touch Leaks Begin! Is This the Third Generation’s New Camera?
• Third Generation iPod touch Pricing at 16GB/32GB/64GB for $199/$299/$399?
• iTunes Now Sells 25% of US Music
• Apple iTablet Gone Wild: Nerdfights and Molotovs and iPads, Oh My!
• Fake or Really Fake? Apple iTablet UI Goes YouTube

iPhone and iPhone OS

• iPhone 3GS: 99% Pure Customer Satisfaction!
• iPhone MMS: Apple and AT&T Sued, MMS Not Possible(?!), and When Does Summer End Anyway?
• iPhone 3GS Camera Pre-Caches Images Before You Take Them?
• Analyze This: 82+ Million iPhones a Year by 2012?

Apps and App Store

• UPDATED: TomTom Turn-by-Turn Navigation for iPhone Beginning to Appear in International App Stores and Car Kit — compatible with iPod touch and other GPS apps?
• Qik for iPhone Lands in the App Store — Without Live Streaming
Dev-Team: Palm Pre May Track User Location, but 3rd Party iPhone Apps Do Too!
• Facebook 3.0 (Sans Push) for iPhone Submitted to iTunes App Store

General

• Apple’s New North Carolina Data Center Among Largest in the World
• The Competition: Android and Windows Mobile Remind Us Not to Take Future iPhone Updates for Granted?

From the Forums

• From the Forums: Push Apps, GPS Apps, Native iPhone Apps/Features, Data Usage

Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

Looks like Wednesday, September 9 might just be this year’s date for Apple’s annual iPod and iTunes event, where it’s widely expected we’ll see the third generation iPod touch (with video camera?), iTunes 9 (with Blu-Ray and “social” integration?), as well as other refreshes to Apple’s music-themed lineup.

Now, TiPb thought it would be September 8, because Apple almost always drops product on Tuesdays, like last year’s Let’s Rock event (and it still might this year, the above is only a rumor from a source), but we’re not going to read anything into it if it is a Wednesday this time around either.

All Things Digital also says, however, there’s one big ticked item we won’t be seeing:

The event will be held in San Francisco–most likely at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, where it has occurred in years past–and is expected to showcase upgrades to the iPod line and an update to iTunes that may involve some sort of social element. Our sources insist it will not involve any discussion whatsoever of the tablet Apple is reportedly developing.

Still remaining, however, is the other great unknown — will Steve Jobs take the stage once again, or leave things to the Tim Cook/Phil Schiller/Greg Jozwiak team that filled in during his leave of absence earlier in the year?

Yet another “leaked” Apple iTablet “image”.

There’s no way Steve Jobs lets the home button cut across the bezel like that, right?

[via Silicon Alley Insider, via Nowhereelse.fr]

Now that we’ve got the iPhone, the only thing currently left to fantasize (fetishize?) about seems to be the iTablet, with rumors increasing at an exponential rate — and maybe bringing more than a little crazy on with them.

First up, following Brian Lam’s story yesterday concerning the iTablet and it possibly shipping soon, former Macworld’er Jim Dalrymple says on The Loop that his sources confirm it ain’t happening before 2010, which matches up with what John Gruber’s hearing on Daring Fireball, and previous accounts from Apple Insider. Hopefully this will be settled before the Twitter nerdfights escalate (or we run out of popcorn).

Hey, maybe Apple can show off the iTablet during an October 2009 laptop event, then ship it next year, like they did with the Apple TV and original iPhone? That make everyone happy?

Brian Lam also mentioned a mysterious, yet “it all made sense” code name for the iTablet. Funnest theory we’ve heard so far? “Molotov” from Twitter user Jason Diaz who thinks Apple’s going to use the iTablet to make their upcoming Cocktail initiative da bomb this winter. (Wikipedia it).

Next up, Justin pointed us to a MacLife post which shows a Border survey asking if an Apple iPad is high up on the “will be purchasing” list. We’ve heard the name iPad before, so is this just a resurgence of old rumors by a company sadly out of iTouch, or more fuel for that naming fire?

Lastly — for today at least — the Macalope thinks that if Apple is really ready to ship a tablet, they must have found “a hook”. We think so too, but like the ‘lope we struggle to see what it is aside from “big screen iPhone/iPod touch”. Likely hindsight, come this or next year, will fix that…

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News

New Product Watch

• Apple Shoots Top Secret Commercial for New Product?
• Updated: Apple Going Social? More iTunes 9, “Social App”, and App Organization
• iTunes 9 to Add iPhone App Organizer, Blu-Ray?

App Store

• Apple VP Phil Schiller Responds to Ninjawords iPhone App Store Incident
• Apple VP Phil Schiller Emails Steven Frank, No E-Book Rejection Policy, Working to Improve App Store
• Google to Launch Google Voice on iPhone as WebApp
• iPhone 3GS-Specific Apps Start to Land in App Store

The Competition

• Zune HD to be Priced $100 Less than iPod touch?
• BlackBerry to Get iPhone-Class Web Browser… Next Summer
• Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.5 Caught on Video
• Sony, Warner, Universal and EMI to Launch iTunes “Cocktail” Album Competitor?

More News

• Would You Give Up Using Your iPhone in the Car for Increased Safety?
• Deposit Checks Via iPhone Photos
• Still No MMS on AT&T — But Would You Use it Anyway?
• Patent Watch: Apple Taking Stand Against Abused iPhones

Forums

• From the Forums: iPhone Jailbreak?, Yahoo vs Gmail, Tom Tom Car Kit, Wallpapers & Ringtones

Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

MediaMemo reports that multiple music industry sources have been informed that Apple’s annual Special Music Event, typically involving iPod and iTunes, will take place the second week of September — and since Apple usually holds these events on Tuesdays, that would make September 8 the day to watch.

Widely expected to be seen at the event is Apple’s third generation iPod touch, rumored to be getting a camera like it’s big iPhone brother, and perhaps the same “S stands for Speed” performance chipset. Chatter has also spread about the iPod nano getting a camera, as well as iTunes 9 speculation involving app organizing, Blu-Ray support, and social network integration. And let’s not forgot iPhone 3.1 we saw iPhone 2.1 last year, after all).

The two biggest mysteries will, of course, be whether or not Apple chooses to debut their near-deafeningly rumored iTablet at the event, or hold off for another event (annual MacBook event perhaps?) or next year, and whether or not a newly returned Steve Jobs takes once again to the keynote stage.

TiPb will, as always, provide ongoing coverage leading up to, during, and post event. (We can’t wait either!)

Gizmodo honcho Brian Lam claims to have received a cryptic call with nebulous details on the much-rumored Apple iTablet, shedding light and casting in shadow at the same time. Highlights:

• Lam believes the source is in a position to know about the iTablet
• The source implies he or she has sat in meetings about the device
• 10 inch screen
• Looks just like a big iPhone (though that may change)
• 2 versions: with webcam and without (for education?)
• $700 – $900 price tag
• May function as secondary touchpad/screen for Macs
• OS is still big question mark
• Super-secret Lam-Googled product code name that “made sense”

So, do we know more now… or less?

It’s just a snippet of the mythical iTablet user interface, and while Gizmodo is almost sure it’s fake, Brian Lam holds one tiny breath of hope for it to be true. Either way, it’s an interesting concept. We’ve heard rumors that, if Apple’s tablet uses a version of the iPhone OS, it may run multiple iPhone apps as windows on the larger screen.

We’re guessing most of you will chime in with “fake, fake, fakety, fake!” in the comments, but what do you think of a multi-window (and multitasking!) iPhone-like OS?

Apple Insider picks up a Sierra Sun story about Apple filming a top secret commercial for a new product at a restaurant called Jax at the Tracks in Truckee, California. Said owner Bud Haley:

“Apple found us, they’re trying to show us as a hip and cool spot for the 20-something crowd.”

Indeed? So what was it for, folks? The upcoming third generation iPod touch? The mythical iTablet? Steve Jobs’ revolutionary iVeggie Smoothy cup? Sound off in the comments and let us know what you expect!

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iPhone 3.0.1 – SMS Fix

• iPhone OS 3.0.1 Now Available Via iTunes
• Fixes SMS Security Vulnerability
• iPhone 3.0.1 redsn0w & ultrasn0w Safe for Jailbreak, no more Purplera1n

iPhone 3GS Watch

• Rogers Canada to Start Selling 8GB iPhone 3GS?

Apps and App Store

• App Store Insists Ninjawords iPhone Dictionary Remove “Objectionable” Content, Still Classifies it 17+
• Apple Adds “App Store Review Status”, Escalation Email, to iPhone Dev Center
• FCC Investigating Google Voice Rejection from Apple’s iTunes App Store, AT&T’s Involvement
• AT&T Issues Non-Denial Denial on Denying Google Voice Entry into App Store

iTunes & iTablet

• iProd 1,1 Once Again Seen in iPhone Firmware
• Crazy Rumor: Apple to Turn iTunes Accounts into Paypal Competitor?!
• Apple Launches iTunes Store (Music) in Mexico!
• FCC Investigating Google Voice Rejection from Apple’s iTunes App Store, AT&T’s Involvement

Jailbreak Central

• Apple Officially Warns Against Jailbreaking
• Top 5 Must-Have Jailbreak Apps: Post iPhone 3.0 Edition

Carrier Talk

• TiPb Poll Results: Verizon Couldn’t Handle the iPhone Either
• T-Mobile UK Offering Unlocked iPhones to Retain High-Value Customers?
• Rogers/Fido Canada Extend 6GB/$30 Data “Promotion” to September 15

The Competition

• Microsoft Gives Devs Guide to iCloning iPhone Apps for Windows Mobile
• iPhone developer revolt brewing, what can Palm learn?

In Other News

• Netflix Next to Stream to iPhone?
• Google’s Eric Schmidt Resigns from Apple Board of Directors
• Nintendo: iPhone May Damage Sales

Help and How To

• Want Easy Google Voice Access on Your iPhone? Go Old School with a Bookmarklet!

Forums

• From the Forums: iPhone 3.0 Jailbreak Apps, Overheating, 3GS Photos, Battery Tips

Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

Ars Technica has once again found references to an iProd 1,1 in Apple firmware, this time iPhone 3.1 Beta 3. iProd was last seen back in May in the iPhone 3.0 betas under the prototype designation iProd 0,1.

For those unfamiliar with Apple versioning, 0,1 is thought to be used for pre-release prototype hardware. 1,1 was used for both the first iPhone (original 2G) and iPod touch. iPhone 3G was 1,2 (minor revision) while the second gen iPod touch was 2,1 (major revision). iPhone 3GS is 2,1 as well, and it’s widely expected that Apple will introduce an iPod touch 3,1 in September.

Says Ars about the new, as yet unnamed iProd(uct):

While it’s easy to speculate that this may be the rumored Apple tablet we keep hearing so much about lately, we have yet to find any evidence that iPhone OS 3.1 is capable of running on a device with a tablet-sized screen. It’s just as possible it may refer to the camera-equipped iPod nano, though we doubt such a device would run iPhone OS. Hell, it might even be an iPhone nano.

To the list of iTablet and iPhone nano, we add iNetbook. Let the speculation increase!

Barrons (via MacRumors) claims an unnamed analyst has seen the near-legendary Apple iTablet and thinks:

The machine impresses with its display of hi-def video content, says the veteran analyst, who asked not to be identified. “It’s better than the average movie experience, when you hold this thing in your hands.”

And what’s more, competitors know that we know that they know that it’s coming soon:

“It’s close enough now to a final design that in Asia, there’s no other product in the waiting room or in the bullpen,” said the analyst. “There are dozens of ODMs [original device makers] making products for Lenovo and other PC makers that are all waiting to see what the Apple product is.”

So does this mean just as the iCloned iPhones are waning, the iReplicated iTablets are just waiting to launch? We’ll know come September. Or October. Or… January to March 2010!

(And yes, we still have polls open on both when it will ship, and what OS is will run, and whether or not it will succeed – get voting!)

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iPhone 3.1 Watch

• Updated: Apple Release iPhone 3.1 Beta 3 to Developers (Beta 2 Expiring Tues, July 28!)
• iPhone 3.1: Augmented Reality Apps are a Go!

Apps and App Store

• UPDATED: Apple Rejects Removes all Google Voice Apps for iPhone from iTunes App Store
• GV Mobile Brings Google Voice to iPhone… via Cydia for Jailbreak
• Apple Reverses Decision, Allows Promo Codes for Apps Rated 17+
• Apple Improves iTunes App Store Search, Asks Developers for Keywords
• Quick App: Apple Releases MobileMe iDisk App for iPhone Amazon’s Jeff Bezos Apologizes to Kindle (and iPhone Kindle App) Users
• Google Finally Provides Latitude to iPhone Users — Yeah, it’s a WebApp

iTunes & iTablet

• iTablet: When Will it Ship and What Will it Run? now that Steve is finally happy with it, and Verizon is racing to get LTE ready…
• Apple and Record Labels Trying to Reignite Album Interest with “Cocktail”?

Carrier Talk

• CEOh-Snap! AT&T Says iPhone Exclusivity Will End… Eventually
• Verizon: iPhone 3GS Cost us Money, Helped Drive Innovation Rogers Canada Roundup: Q2 Financial Results, Out of Stock, and 21Mbps HSPA+ Testing
• Apple and China Unicom Finally Maybe Potentially Have an iPhone Deal. Possibly.

The Competition

• Palm Re-Hacks iTunes Sync, Shows They Care More About Ego and Press Than Pre Users, and files a complaint against Apple
• Palm’s Roger McNamee Wants to Know if You’re Still Using an iPhone?

In Other News

• iPhone 3GS Hardware Encryption “Useless”?
• 1GHz ARM Mobile CPU on the Horizon — but is it iPhone Bound?

Help and How To

• Pro Tips: How to Secure Your Jailbroken (or Regular) iPhone Against Hackers

Forums

• From the Forums: iPhone 3.0 Jailbreak Apps, Overheating, 3GS Photos, Battery Tips

Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

Rumors about the iTablet, the still mythical Apple media/web pad, are just growing stronger and yes, it does remind us of the heady days before the iPhone announcement. But just like the iPhone wasn’t a click wheel iPod with a phone dialer bolted on, the iTablet — if and when it ever ships — may not just be an iPod touch on hulk serum.

TiPb takes a look, and runs some polls, after the break!

We already asked you your thoughts on the iTablet and Verizon, so now let’s look at the possible shipping date.

Rumors seem evenly split between a September and a January release. September would coincide with Apple’s traditional iPod (and now iPod touch) event and allow for the typically monstrous holiday sales cycle — though it might cut into that same monstrous cycle at the expense of the iPod touch. January would be the old Macworld slot, where Apple previously introduced the iPhone in 2007. TiPb sees January as more likely, especially if Apple wants developers to have time post-announcement, pre-release to ramp up third-party software. What do you think?

Next, the OS. There’s seems to be 3 major options: Mac OS X, iPhone OS X, or a new Tablet OS X. Mac OS X is the dream option but if Apple goes that way, with a touchscreen tablet, people are going to want to install Photoshop which means it needs a fast processor, lots of room for RAM, and beefy storage as in 64MB+ of solid state. That equals a beefy, MacBook Air style price tag, not the $800 we’ve heard rumored. iPhone OS X is an option, with an expanded SDK and/or the ability to run iPhone apps as widgets on a bigger screen, but would it truly be able to leverage the potential of a tablet-sized device? Lastly, a custom, in-between Tablet OS X is always possible, but it means a 3rd platform for Apple to maintain and all the overhead that goes with it. Any guesses?

Techcrunch reports sources claiming Verizon is racing to get 20-40 markets up and running on their 4G LTE (Long Term Evolution) network by Q1 2010 to coincide with an iPhone and iTablet launch.

Verizon is getting 60Mbps in 4G tests which is admittedly ZOMG fast, and since they’re going with LTE, this network will be theoretically compatible with AT&T and other GSM carriers also moving to the same technology.

And yes, it does sound too good to be true, but we won’t go all Leo Laporte on them just yet…

We know you want your iPhone on Verizon. But what about your iTablet. And are you willing to wait for LTE to get it? Let us know in our poll!

[Thanks Icebike for the tip!]

Where there’s this many iTablet rumors, there just has to be an actual product Steve Jobs is finally happy with and will be unveiling to the world at a special Apple event in early 2010, right?

That’s what Apple Insider is reporting. The gist is as follows:

• 10″, 3G networked device similar to “a jumbo iPod touch”
• Guided by Steve Jobs from hospital, home, and work
• Culmination of at least 6 previous prototypes Jobs vetoed
• Will launch in first quarter of 2010
• Verizon may be the carrier
• Delays caused by lack of satisfaction over Intel Atom power consumption
• Hence Apple bought PA Semi to build in-house, custom chipset based on ARM

Check out the full article, linked above, for more.

Still and all, even if this is real, Bill Gates has been trying to push the tablet concept for almost a decade with little or no mass market acceptance. Can Apple work another product category miracle, doing for the tablet and e-book form factor what they’ve done for the MP3 player and smartphone?

Can Apple take the tablet from geek niche to consumer necessity? Or is this doomed to Apple TV “hobby” status from the get go?

Check out our fancy new blog poll, below, and let us know!