breaking news posts

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, App Store

Delicious Library for iPhone runs afoul of Amazon's API terms, pulled from App Store

by Michael Rose (RSS feed) on Jul 7th, 2009

Update: As one might expect, this API restriction has also hit Pocketpedia; the app is now pulled as well (as of 7/17).

Sudden removal of an item from the App Store isn't unheard of; sometimes an app has a hidden bug or a content problem, and if Apple hasn't seen fit to take it off the store shelves then the developer can take matters into his, her or its own hands. Even applications that would seem to be wholly gratuitous and obvious ripoffs of other companies' IP might make it past the first round of Apple's scrutiny, only to be abruptly pulled under threat of litigation.

Apps that leverage content from websites and online services have another hurdle to clear: they may run afoul of trademark or licensing restrictions that prevent them from doing particular things with data from those third parties... things like, ferinstance, using that data on mobile devices.

This all brings us to Scenario D: the 'D' is for Delicious, and it's Delicious Monster's iPhone version of Library that's undergoing an unwelcome and rapid yanking from the App Store -- and believe it or not, Apple has nothing to do with it. Earlier today, Head Monster Wil Shipley announced that the iPhone app is on indefinite suspension and is no longer for sale; this is the consequence of a particular clause in the Amazon API terms and conditions. Part 4(e) of Amazon's agreement, which Shipley is a party to due to the desktop DL app's reliance on Amazon for book and DVD data, reads as follows:

(e) You will not, without our express prior written approval requested via this link , use any Product Advertising Content on or in connection with any site or application designed or intended for use with a mobile phone or other handheld device.

Amazon gave D-M an ultimatum: pull the iPhone app, or lose the API access for the desktop version of Library. Despite Shipley's requests for a mobile device exception, the big A did not relent. It's not 100% clear why Amazon chose to enforce this clause now, nor why the company is not providing exceptions to developers. We have an email in to their press office to inquire.

If you've got DL on your iPhone already, enjoy. If not... it could be a long wait.

Anvil photo from flickr: fboyd and remixed via CC license.

Tags: amazon, app store, AppStore, breaking news, BreakingNews, delicious, delicious library, DeliciousLibrary, iphone, library, wil shipley, WilShipley

Filed under: iTunes, Apple, App Store

iTunes Store & App Store problems

by Michael Jones (RSS feed) on Jul 7th, 2009

With the App Store celebrating its first birthday, there is a fair amount of news coverage, and with Michael Jackson's memorial service being broadcast, his fans are sure to be hitting iTunes up for some of their favorite songs. So it stands to reason that today is probably not a good day for the iTunes store to be having problems. Don't you just love Murphy's Law?

Reports have been steadily coming in for the past few hours that users are unable to download songs, searches are timing out, and the App Store is not working properly from the iPhone. Several users have also posted threads on the iTunes discussion board with connection problems.

I myself had troubles with searching for music from iTunes earlier today, but things seemed to be working better a short while later, so I figured things were fixed. Since then, however, we have received several other reports of troubles, yet things are working fine for me still. So it seems that this could be chalked up to routing troubles depending on your location, or it may just be intermittent and I've been lucky.

Either way, it's safe to say that there is definitely something going on, although exactly what it is remains a question. Searching seems to be working, albeit a bit slowly, and downloads are working fine for me, but others have reported not being able to download at all. As they say, YMMV (your mileage may vary).

Are you having troubles with either of the stores? Let us know in the comments.

Thanks to everyone who sent this in!

Tags: app store, AppStore, breaking news, BreakingNews, broken, down, itunes, itunes store, ItunesStore

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Hardware, Odds and ends, Apple Financial, iPhone

iPhone 3GS ranked #1 in cellphone sales in Japan... for now.

by Steven Sande (RSS feed) on Jul 5th, 2009

TG Daily (via Fortune) is reporting that Japanese market research company BCN's latest rankings of cellphone sales in Japan are showing that Apple's smartphone is the the current market leader in that country.

I did a quick check at BCN this afternoon while writing this post, and the iPhone 3GS 32GB is listed in first place in sales (see screenshot at right), with the iPhone 3GS 16GB in second place. The 3GS was just introduced in Japan on June 26th, and the sales figures are from the week of June 22 - 28. BCN's source of data includes point-of-sale information from many of Japan's largest electronics retailers, including Amazon Japan, Eiden, Bic Camera, K's Denki, and Best Denki.

Akky Akimoto at Asiajin is providing some perspective on the numbers. It's not unusual for a new phone to jump to the top of the list as it is released. As he notes, the Sony Network Walkman was #1 in the BCN ranking of music players at one time in 2005, but for the complete year, Apple iPod had a 60% share of the Japanese market.

Still, this is good news for Apple, and as Mr. Akimoto says, "Becoming No. 1 even for a week is better than never being No. 1..."

Tags: breaking news, BreakingNews, iphone, iphone sales, IphoneSales, japan

Filed under: Retail

VA Apple store closed due to shooting, armed robbery attempt

by Michael Rose (RSS feed) on Jul 3rd, 2009

The Clarendon Apple Store in Arlington, VA is closed today as police investigate a shooting that took place there this morning. The Washington Post reports that a woman was injured via a gunshot to the shoulder during an armed robbery attempt. TV station WJLA adds the detail that the victim was an employee who went to answer a knock at the store's rear service door.

I've shopped at the Clarendon store, and the staff has always been unfailingly helpful and courteous. I hope that the victim of the shooting enjoys a complete and prompt recovery, and that the Clarendon team can also recover quickly from what must be a very traumatic experience.

Via jdonels tweet, thanks Chris Anderson.

Tags: breaking news, BreakingNews, retail, robbery, store, washington

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Hardware

Psystar emerges from Chapter 11, and still making applesauce

by Michael Jones (RSS feed) on Jul 1st, 2009

The infamous Mac-clone maker Psystar is apparently set to emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and it seems that they are planning on getting right back into their previous routine with a new hardware offering to boot.

In an e-mail newsletter that went out to subscribers today, the company states that the Chapter 11 protection was "critical" to their daily operations, and that they are now ready to "emerge and again battle Goliath." More information is expected to be available "in the coming days" when they are formally discharged by the Bankruptcy court.

Along with the announcement, the newsletter also introduces Psystar's newest hardware offering, the Open(7), which "brings together OS X and Intel Nehalem Xeon technology" in what they are calling their "fastest and most quiet computing configuration." In addition, they are stating that all new systems will feature a new bootloader, called the Darwin Universal Boot Loader (DUBL), and mentioned plans of an open source release in the near future.

The e-mail was wrapped up with a simple anecdote: When life gives you apples, make applesauce. So this begs the question, are they referring to the fruit, or the company?

Thanks to Sean Wightman for the tip!

Tags: apple, breaking news, BreakingNews, clone, hackint0sh, psystar

Filed under: iPhone, SDK, iPod touch

Is this what's in the next iPhone update?

by Mel Martin (RSS feed) on Jul 1st, 2009

The iPhone Blog is reporting what's purported to be in the next, and hopefully imminent iPhone update to version 3.1. As we've reported, developers were seeded with the beta Tuesday.

Here's the list:

Voice Control now works over Bluetooth
Updated AT&T profile to 4.2 (MMS is now enabled)
Improvements to OpenGL and Quartz.
iPhone vibrates when moving icons
Non-destructive video editing means trimming a clip no longer saves over the original video but gives you the option to "Save as copy..."
APIs to allow third party apps to access videos and edit them.
Updated modem firmware to 5.08.01

If true, it will put smiles on a lot of iPhone owners' faces. The omission of Bluetooth voice control seemed downright silly. Losing your original video after an edit seemed pretty counter-intuitive as well. It also appears MMS will appear in the update, but that only matters if AT&T turns it on.

No firm dates for the update of course, but if the above is accurate it will be a good one.

Thanks Brad for the tip

Tags: breaking news, BreakingNews, iPhone, iphone os 3.1, Iphone3.1, iphoneos, IphoneOs3.1, MMS, update, video editing, voice control

Fluent Mobile releases the first news aggregator iPhone app

by David Winograd (RSS feed) on Jun 30th, 2009

Fluent Mobile has released an innovative news oriented iPhone app that may be a game changer. The Fluent Mobile app aggregates mobile ready content from multiple content providers. According to M:Metrics in January of this year, mobile news sites were visited over 63 million times and the number is growing. This is a huge market.

Currently 1.5% of all web content is Google optimized and nicely formatted for mobile devices and the number is increasing. Fluent Mobile takes advantage of this content and aggregates it, creating a news portal with content from Bloomberg for business, ESPN for sports, The Washington Post, CNN, Fox News and USA Today, among others, for news. Upon launch, content will be provided by 32 separate sources and more will be added as relevant sites become mobile enhanced. For the first time an app provides one-stop shopping for news.

The information is organized well, allowing you to choose from a number of categories including U.S. News, Entertainment, Sports, Business, and Travel.

Continue reading “Fluent Mobile releases the first news aggregator iPhone app”

Tags: aggregator, aggregators, app review, AppReview, breaking news, breakingnews, fluent, iphone, mobile, news, news reader, NewsReader, release, releases

Filed under: iPod Family, Software Update, iPhone, Apple TV

Apple TV software update adds gesture support via Remote

by Michael Jones (RSS feed) on Jun 24th, 2009

Apple has quietly pushed out software updates for both the Apple TV and the Remote application for the iPhone and iPod touch. The update, identified as version 2.4 for the Apple TV, and version 1.3 (24) for the Remote app, adds gesture support for controlling Apple TV from your iPhone or iPod.

Our in-house Apple TV geeks, Megan Lavey and Christina Warren, both installed the updates and gave them a try. Megan indicated the gestures were quick and responsive, and coupled with the ability to use the iPhone/iPod keyboard to search for shows, the new versions made it much less tedious to navigate through your shows.

Boxee users may wish to hold off on updating, however, as it seems that you may not be able to reinstall Boxee after completing the update. Also worth noting is that the new Remote app requires the 3.0 software update to be installed on your iPhone or iPod touch.

Thanks to everyone who sent this in!

Gallery: Apple TV Remote Gestures

Tags: Apple Remote, apple tv, AppleRemote, AppleTv, breaking news, BreakingNews, iPhone, iPod Touch, IpodTouch, Remote

Filed under: Apple Corporate, Apple Financial, iPhone

Estimates of 500K iPhone 3G S weekend sales too low by half

by Michael Rose (RSS feed) on Jun 22nd, 2009

It's a good thing Gene Munster shaded his anticipatory numbers a bit over the weekend, otherwise he'd be in the market for a new crystal ball. As mentioned yesterday, the signs were pointing to a bigger opening weekend for the latest handset from Apple, and the results did not disappoint: in a company press release this morning, Apple announced sales of 'over a million' iPhone 3G S units through Sunday 6/21. Also noted in the brief release were the six million downloads of the iPhone 3.0 software update; no details on the number of iPod touch users who have also updated.

In addition to the raw number -- impressive enough -- there are two other tidbits in this release that bear mentioning. One, it's got a quote from Steve Jobs; this reinforces the notion that El Jefe Esteban is on his way back to the iCEO seat on a more active basis, as reported in the Wall Street Journal on Friday. Two, it looks like bloggers and journalists aren't the only ones having a problem with the odd spacing on Apple's latest product name; the press release repeatedly refers to the new phone as the "iPhone 3GS." We feel your pain.

[via AllThingsD]

Tags: 3.0, breaking news, BreakingNews, iphone, million, munster, sales, wowza

Filed under: Apple Corporate, Apple

WSJ: Jobs had liver transplant, on schedule to return to work in June

by Steven Sande (RSS feed) on Jun 20th, 2009

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Apple CEO and co-founder Steve Jobs had a liver transplant two months ago in Tennessee, but is still expected to return to work by the end of the month.

Jobs, who went on a medical leave from Apple in January, has had continuing medical issues related to a bout with pancreatic cancer. The type of pancreatic cancer that Jobs has will often metastasize in other organs, particularly the liver. According to the WSJ article, it is expected that Jobs will work part-time upon his return to the company in order to speed his recovery.

The 54 year-old Jobs missed the Apple shareholder meeting in February, and hasn't been flying in his corporate jet (one of the perks he receives along with his US$1 annual compensation) as much as he had in the past.

The TUAW staff, along with many of our readers, is looking forward to the return of the Steve Jobs to the company he helped to create.

Tags: breaking news, BreakingNews, health, liver, steve jobs, SteveJobs, wall street journal, WallStreetJournal

Filed under: Cult of Mac, iPhone

iPhone 3G S waiting, hoping, livestreaming

by Victor Agreda, Jr. (RSS feed) on Jun 19th, 2009

No one expects the iPhone 3G S lines to stretch on as the 3G lines did, but that doesn't mean there isn't some anticipation. In fact, in several places where lines will allow (as in, not in my mall) there are queues forming already for the fastest iPhone yet.

How many of you are willing to wait in line? Several of us are getting shiny new S-for-speed-emblazoned iPhones tomorrow. Steve had his shipped, Tim is going to the AT&T store, Chris ordered online but might check out the madness anyway, and I've set up an account already and will hopefully see a concierge at the local Apple Store in the morning. Stay tuned for our coverage of standing in line, swiping a credit card and dialing a phone -- with pictures.

In the meanwhile, you can see what current lineholders are seeing and posting. Here's a sample (post more in the comments if you find other liveblogs or tweets).

FIRST! The iLife blog guys managed to line up at the big glass cube store in NYC. Stay dry, guys!
There's a Ustream channel, of course.
Richard Lai is liveblogging from London... which should be opening pretty soon as I type this.

Note: Thanks to all our international readers for the comments! Also thanks to everyone in the US now waking up and waiting in line. Good luck, everyone.

Sang shares some pics from the Apple Store in San Diego's University Towne Center from about 1:30am ET, below.

Gallery: Waiting for a 3G S in San Diego

Update from Knoxville line at 7am:

Gallery: Knoxville iPhone 3G S line

More from the line in Knoxville after the break.

Continue reading “iPhone 3G S waiting, hoping, livestreaming”

Tags: breaking news, BreakingNews, iphone, iphone 3g s, Iphone3gS, line

Filed under: iPhone, App Store, iPod touch

Sirius XM app now live at the app store

by Mel Martin (RSS feed) on Jun 18th, 2009

As expected Sirius has released the free iPhone/iPod touch app so satellite radio fans can listen wherever they go if they have an online subscription. The Sirius XM [App Store] offering is said to include 120 channels. The write up on iTunes does not mention Howard Stern, but says nothing definitive one way or the other. That's a bit ominous.

The app also allows you to purchase songs you hear at the iTunes store, and has a favorite channels setting. The app runs on OS 2.2.1 but has been tested on the just released iPhone/touch 3.0.

The channel selection is set up for both Sirius and XM subscribers. Sirius is offering a 7 day free trial for non-subscribers to try the service and see if they like it. This app has been expected for a long time, ever since the iPhone was first announced. A lot has changed in satellite radio since then, and it will be interesting to watch the dynamics of people getting their satellite radio with an Apple product rather than a dedicated satellite receiver.

Happy listening. (Update: Readers are telling us no Howard Stern, no MLB or NFL games. Oh my.)

Thanks to reader John Mackay for the tip.

Tags: app, app store, breaking news, BreakingNews, iPhone, iPod touch, satellite radio, SatelliteRadio, sirius xm, streaming radio

Filed under: iPhone

Timezone confusion baffles eager 3.0 downloaders

by Michael Rose (RSS feed) on Jun 17th, 2009

We're not innocent of error, and on occasion we create our own dramatic bits of fail, but in this case we can help clarify things: If you are visiting an "official Apple site" that shows a release date of June 18 for the iPhone 3.0 software update, take a closer look at that URL before you start jumping up and down in panic.

Yes, that 'sg' does indeed signify that you are looking at the Singapore version of Apple's site, even if PC World mistakenly says that the US site has been updated with the "delayed" release date -- they are also linking to the incorrect URL. ComputerWorld has the correct info. Of course, Singapore is not on Pacific Time, but you can see here how the 10 am PT slot shows up around the globe. We're also getting links from folks mistakenly pointing to the Australia version of the site and saying "It's out now!!" Please, do yourself a solid and check in iTunes or in Terminal before engaging full freakout mode.

How did this spin out of control? A tweet sometime last night, from whom we do not yet know, with the Singapore link that got picked up and amplified over and over again. We did our best to squelch it, but it keeps coming back. The good news is, with any luck we'll all be on track with our watches very soon.

In the meantime, you can visit us on Twitter at our new Q&A address -- @ask_tuaw -- or, for some tunes to keep your mind off your anticipation, click through to the second half of this post for a custom TUAW's "Music To Wait For Upgrades By" playlist.

Continue reading “Timezone confusion baffles eager 3.0 downloaders”

Tags: breaking news, BreakingNews, error, iphone 3.0, Iphone3.0, singapore, timezone, twitter

Filed under: iPhone, App Store, iPod touch

Are you really Sirius? Streaming radio iPhone app expected this week

by Mel Martin (RSS feed) on Jun 16th, 2009

In what may be one of the great anti-climax stories of all time, it looks like Sirius/XM is finally releasing an iPhone/iPod touch app this week, probably on the 18th.

Subscribers who asked about the app are getting the following email... apparently Sirius support team members are paid! by the exclamation point!

Thank you for contacting SIRIUS regarding whether or not there is a SIRIUS iPhone application available. We are here to help! We appreciate the time you have taken to contact us in regards to this matter! We are happy to inform you that beginning June 18th a SIRIUS Internet Radio application will be available at the Apple iTunes App-Store for the iPhone and the iPod Touch! All Premium SIRIUS Internet Radio subscribers will be able to download the application from the Apple iTunes App-Store for free on their device and access the service at no additional cost! Subscribers who are listening to the Basic Online Service for free must first upgrade to the Premium Online Service for $2.99 per month to access the application on the iPhone or iPod Touch.

It's been a long and tortured road getting here. Competing players were stopped dead by Apple, and the Sirius player has been talked about ever since the iPhone came out. A couple of weeks ago we reported the app would appear 'real soon' and now it looks like this is the week.

No word as yet on how many channels will play on the app, but this is a highly anticipated release. We hope it's fully compatible with iPhone 3.0.

Tags: app store, breaking news, BreakingNews, iPhone, iPod touch, sirius satellite radio, streaming radio, XM

Filed under: Security

Java vulnerability in Mac OS X finally patched

by Michael Rose (RSS feed) on Jun 15th, 2009

It's been a long wait. Fire up Software Update and you should see Java for Mac OS X 10.5 (or 10.4) update 4. This update closes a vulnerability first discussed in August of last year; it was patched by Sun and most other JVM developers months ago.

Apple's sluggishness on fixing this security issue could have allowed attackers to run arbitrary applications or processes on your machine if you visited a webpage hosting a malicious Java applet. The vulnerability was pointed out in graphic fashion by security researcher Landon Fuller.

Fuller took the exploit code that was circulating in the wild and built a proof of concept page that would run an innocuous program (the command-line 'say' utility) from a rigged Java applet; after the ensuing publicity, less than a month later, we have a patch.

Once you've updated, if you took the precaution of disabling Java in your browser settings, you can feel free to go ahead and turn it back on... although, if you haven't missed it, no need to change anything.

Thanks to everyone who sent this in.

[via Glenn Fleishman / TidBITS]

Tags: breaking news, BreakingNews, java, patch, security, urgent

Tip of the Day

To get an instant map to any address, just go to your Address Book and right click on the address field of any one of your contacts and select "Map Of." The address will then be revealed in Google Maps on Safari. You can do the same if a data detector determines there is an address in an e-mail in Mail.

Learn More

TUAW flickr Pool

www.flickr.com

Featured Galleries

TUAW bloggers (30 days)

#	Blogger	Posts	Cmts
1	Steven Sande	45	3
2	Dave Caolo	35	4
3	Mel Martin	31	0
4	Mike Schramm	30	0
5	Michael Rose	19	23
6	Josh Carr	18	24
7	Victor Agreda, Jr.	15	6
8	TJ Luoma	14	25
9	Erica Sadun	12	1
10	Ken Ray	11	2
11	David Winograd	10	5
12	Joachim Bean	10	3
13	Aron Trimble	10	3
14	Sang Tang	9	0
15	Chris Rawson	9	0
16	Brett Terpstra	7	5
17	Megan Lavey	6	9
18	John Burke	6	3
19	Lauren Hirsch	4	0
20	Brett Kelly	3	4

More Apple Analysis

AAPL on BloggingStocks The Apple category feed from BloggingStocks.com
AAPL Quote, News & Summary The AAPL financials page from AOL Money and Finance
iPhone analysis from BloggingStocks iPhone tag feed from BloggingStocks
Macintosh news and reviews on Download Squad The Macintosh category feed from Download Squad

The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)