But now the rumor mill says that last one might just have been removed because Apple is planning a tether solution of their own. Gizmodo claims that one of their readers is corresponding with His Steveness himself (a fact we find obviously dubious, but hey it's Friday of Labor Day weekend, so we'll give 'em a pass). You'd think that Steve Jobs would reveal the fact that AT&T and Apple were trying to offer a tether solution through a slightly better venue than a quickly jotted "Sent from my iPhone" email, but remember how we first heard about the SDK -- the man knows how to stick important pieces of news in strange places.
The original emailer mentioned tethering for the fee of an extra $30 a month (which seems exorbitant considering that Netshare did it for a one-time charge), but then again, AT&T's networks are going to get even more waterlogged should something like this come down. So odds are if Apple does work out a deal, it's not going to be cheap.
Apple has posted a nifty tip for Mail users who miss the discontinued iCards feature from .Mac: You can use Mail stationery to create an attractive card-like message with your own photos.
In a post on the Mobile Me blog (hey, it's not dead!), Apple says "...it's like the old Make Your Own iCards feature on steroids, and a whole lot easier to use in the bargain."
For Leopard users, Mail comes with 30 email templates you can customize in lieu of sending an iCard. Personally, I think an email is better than an iCard anyway, what with all the greeting card spam that goes on.
You can use photos that you take with Photo Booth, for example, or pictures from iPhoto. Customize it with a clever note, and away you go.
If you don't have Leopard or still want to use an online greeting card site, there are plentytochoosefrom.
Just in time for the first really scary hurricane of the season, Weather Underground is providing an iPhone-specific version of their mobile site that includes a tropical storm tracker. The mobile site URL is http://i.wund.com, and the tropical storm page can be accessed directly at http://i.wund.com/tropical.
As you can see in the screenshot above, the tracker shows the location, intensity, and other statistical information about each storm. In this case we're looking at Tropical Storm Gustav, which appears to now be a Category 3 hurricane. The full-screen view seen above requires a flip to landscape mode.
If you're an iPhone user and live in any location where tropical storms can be a hazard to life and property, you might want to add this site to your Home screen.
Last week you may have caught some photos going around of a cute Foxconn factory worker flashing peace signs. The photos were found on a UK man's brand-new iPhone, and posted at MacRumors.
The mystery girl's identity is being protected by Foxconn, and a company spokesman said that her job is not in any danger. Taking pictures with the camera is a normal part of the testing procedure done before the phone is shipped out.
As with other Chinese internet celebrities, identities are hard to come by. Second Brother on the Right, who was part of the Olympic torch procession through many countries, is still anonymous.
Doesn't matter if you're Obamapublican or a McCainocrat. One thing all Americans can agree on is that Macs rule when it comes to live media presentation. The Democratic national convention here in Denver is no exception. TUAW reader-on-the-spot YodaMac sent in these pictures live from the Pepsi Center.
Gallery: DNC Macs
They show this beautifully designed video backdrop being used at the convention, and better yet, the man-behind-the-curtain.
YodaMac writes: "Here are a couple of pics I snapped on my iPhone at the Pepsi Center in Denver during the DNC. Just thought it was interesting that those giant screens being used seemed to be run by Macs! (see 2nd picture- behind the scenes) I don't know about "ALL" the screens, but those fellas were definitely changing the names that appeared on the big screens for different speakers as they took the podium."
In a rather surprising move, the publishers of the top Windows Mobile monthly magazine, Smartphone & Pocket PC, have announced that they're suspending publication. What's even more interesting is that they will be publishing a quarterly iPhone-oriented magazine titled Smartphone magazine's iPhone Life.
Smartphone & Pocket PC magazine publisher Hal Goldstein noted in a blog entry that the reason isn't that sales of Windows Mobile devices are plummeting -- on the contrary, almost 20 million Windows Mobile devices were sold during the last Microsoft fiscal year. It's just that advertising support from Windows Mobile manufacturers, cellular carriers, and developers has dropped significantly.
It appears that they are expecting big things from the iPhone market and advertisers, as they will be publishing the quarterly iPhone mag in paper and online versions. My personal speculation is that they realize that with all the venture capital going into iPhone development, there will be a lot of developers who will want to buy ad space to flaunt their products.
Do you think this move is indicative of a larger trend that may spell doom for Windows Mobile? Voice your opinion in the comments!
You know those movie trailers that begin with the narrator intoning the familiar words "In a world...."? Beau Weaver, a Hollywood narrator and diehard TUAW reader who does a lot of those trailers, was asked by his friends to create an iPhone ringtone that played on the same phrase. He did, and he'd like to share it with TUAW readers for free.
If you thought the new Get a Mac ads were spot-on or funny, then you will definitely get a kick out of this. On Microsoft's Photosynth website, they admit something that we've known for years: They're not cool enough to run on Macs.
"Unfortunately, we're not cool enough to run on your OS yet. We really wish we had a version of Photosynth that worked cross platform, but for now it only runs on Windows. Trust us, as soon as we have a Mac version ready, it will be up and available on our site," reads the website.
Photosynth is a technology Microsoft has designed to create 3-D "worlds" with your photos. This technology is definitely cool, and we actually would like to see it come to the Mac, but the way they worded the install page just makes us laugh. Meanwhile, VMware Fusion's Pete Kazanjy told us that the warning about Photosynth not working in a virtual machine isn't quite right; he got it running just fine in Fusion 2 Beta 2, and has the video to prove it.
Microsoft has set aside $300 million for an ad campaign featuring once-funny comedian Jerry Seinfeld in a series of advertisements targeting Apple. [Insert "master of his domain" joke here. -Ed.]
According to the Wall Street Journal, Microsoft will pay Seinfeld $10 million to appear in a series of ads for its "Windows, Not Walls" campaign that will feature Seinfeld and Bill Gates, Microsoft's chairman. According to AdWeek, other highly-relevant comics like Chris Rock and Will Ferrell may also appear in the ads.
Wired notes that Microsoft's "choice of Seinfeld was an effort to avoid pandering to the kids with 'a celebrity that was too hip.'" Mission accomplished.
It's unclear why the titan even has to advertise; its highly successful Windows Vista and Zune media player products have dominated the landscape for ... I'm sorry. I just can't type anymore. I'm laughing too hard.
The campaign is due to launch September 4, and will be produced by MDC Partners' Crispin Porter + Bogusky. The agency is responsible for such memorable hits as Burger King's "Subservient Chicken" and Miller Lite's "Man Laws," the latter with Burt Reynolds. Will his star ever stop rising?
Erik Schwiebert is one of the lead developers on the Mac Business Unit team under the Microsoft banner. I find their position constantly interesting -- even in these enlightened days of Safari for Windows, many dyed-in-the-wool Mac users still consider Microsoft the enemy, and yet the Mac BU has always been like a kind of diplomatic envoy. We have to use things like Office and Entourage, so we cautiously let them across the border, regarding them like strange visitors from the other side of the wall.
But maybe that's just all in my mind. Recently, the Mac BU released an update for Office 2008, and lots of users, apparently, have suffered from error problems while trying to install it. So many, in fact, that Schwiebert has responded to the problems on his blog, saying that the problems are most likely because users have deleted or otherwise messed with files inside the installation, causing the installer to abort. And that strange Mac BU/Mac users fragile truce comes into play here as well -- he specifically calls out Xslimmer and Monolingual, two programs that delete often-unnecessary files in OS X, for causing the issues.
There's a workaround floating around, but Schwiebert warns it leaves the application suite in a possibly unstable and unsupportable state. Unfortunately, Schwiebert doesn't really offer any solutions (other, we guess, than to reinstall the software so that it's back to the full install, and then apply the update). And the alliance between the Mac BU and their users remains fragile -- we've got to work together, but it seems that many are unhappy about it.
The land of Hello Kitty is also the land of the iPhone.
Here in the US, we only have 2 or 3 magazines that cover the Mac, and they usually throw in coverage about the iPhone. Smartphone & Pocket PC Magazine is coming out with a special iPhone magazine called iPhone Life. But for our Japanese friends, many iPhone-specific magazines have been available for over a year.
In the photo at right, you can see 4 of the mags that were found recently in a Tokyo camera shop. One commenter to a Macenstein post reported seeing 6 different iPhone magazines in a small "Kwik-E-Mart" on one of the tinier Japanese islands.
Apparently the content of the magazines is quite similar, with articles about jailbreaking the 3G being popular. Would you buy an iPhone-specific magazine? Take our poll!
An Apple Premium reseller in the UK sent us these photos of an Apple recycling information mailer they received: but the mailer itself was sent in a decidedly non-green way.
From photos the reseller sent, it appears the mailer consisted of two sheets of standard A4-sized paper. Those sheets of paper were placed inside a large, yellow clasp envelope. That envelope was then placed inside a corrugated cardboard box. The box was then mailed to the UK from Switzerland.
While all of these materials are recyclable, it seems like a little bit of a waste to send what could have fit in an everyday DL-sized envelope (that's about the size of a number 10 envelope for us Americans) in ridiculously oversized packaging. Plus, it probably would have saved them a bundle on postage.
Apple has been making a concerted effort to reduce its environmental footprint: not only with the program mentioned in this mailer, but for everything from iPhone packaging to how it makes its displays. Surely this isolated incident isn't representative of the company as a whole, but still. Sheesh.
Yesterday we posted a tip about using your iPhone on a cruise ship, but what about if you want to use a Mac on a ship or in a hotel and you don't have a MacBook to take along with you?
AppleInsider's Prince McLean is reporting that installations of Macs in hotels and on cruise ships are going strong, with thousands of Apple machines being sold for installation in those locations by Apple's Enterprise Sales Group. Back in June we mentioned the Fontainebleau's plans in Vegas -- they're also installing another 1,400 24" iMacs in rooms at the flagship resort in Miami Beach.
Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines has Mac minis installed on its Freedom Class (3,600 passenger) ships, and is working with Apple on IT infrastructure for its upcoming Oasis Class (5,400 passenger) liners. The deployments planned will have up to 16,150 Ethernet drops per ship, racks full of Xserves, and thousands of client Macs.
Whether it's an in-room email and information kiosk, a public information center, or an intelligent set-top box, the Mac is definitely making inroads into the hospitality and travel industry.
Fantasktik is a taskbar app for Leopard that makes it easy to see what windows and applications are open, and to switch between them. Dockland Software, the developer of Fantasktik, announced in a press release today that the app is available for US$9.99 through the end of September. On October 1st, the price rises to US$14.99.
After installing Fantasktik, a small taskbar appears either just below the menu bar or just above the Dock -- you can set the location from System Preferences. The taskbar shows all of your open applications and windows in small icons, and by hovering your cursor over the icons you see a preview of the window contents. The preview is powered by Core Animation and provides a look at all open windows for an application through a MultiTouch-like interface called Click and Slide.
You can minimize the Fantasktik taskbar by clicking one of the small buttons on either end, and double-clicking an application icon collapses or expands all window icons associated with that app.
Fantasktik requires Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard. A 15-day free trial is available from the Fantasktik website.
If you're going on a cruise vacation, don't be concerned about being out of touch. Chances are excellent that you can use your cell phone.
Reader Steven Madow reminded TUAW that many cruise lines use a service called Cellular At Sea to provide you with satellite-linked cellular service. Almost 100 ships currently use the service, which is a joint venture between AT&T Mobility and SeaMobile.
Madow said that with his iPhone, configuration was a simple matter of looking at the settings (right) for a carrier called "Cellular at Sea." The cost of the service varies depending on your home carrier, but for AT&T users it is about $0.79 per minute. While that's not exactly cheap, it's priceless if you need to keep in touch in case of an emergency.
Most cruise lines also provide Wi-Fi based onboard Internet service. Rates for these services usually range from $0.75 per minute down to $0.30 per minute. The more time you prepay, the lower the rate is.
To find out if your favorite cruise ship has Cellular At Sea or Internet service, click the Read link or visit the website for the cruise line.
Apple has posted a 
Last week you may have caught some photos going around of a cute Foxconn factory worker flashing peace signs. The photos were found on a UK man's brand-new 
Doesn't matter if you're Obamapublican or a McCainocrat. One thing all Americans can agree on is that Macs rule when it comes to live media presentation. The 
In a rather surprising move, the publishers of the top Windows Mobile monthly magazine, 
Erik Schwiebert is one of the lead developers on the Mac Business Unit team under the Microsoft banner. I find their position constantly interesting -- even in these enlightened days of Safari for Windows, many dyed-in-the-wool Mac users still consider Microsoft the enemy, and yet the Mac BU has always been like a kind of diplomatic envoy. We have to use things like Office and Entourage, so we 
The land of Hello Kitty is also the land of the iPhone.
An Apple Premium reseller in the UK 
Yesterday we posted 
If you're going on a cruise vacation, don't be concerned about being out of touch. Chances are excellent that you can use your cell phone.
