I’m currently writing this blog post on an iPod touch at my local Apple Store, thanks to the WordPress App for the iPhone/iPod touch. Writing on this onscreen keyboard is still a little bit clunky, but I’m certainly doing it faster now than I was doing when I first picked up an iPhone here a year ago.

As i’m sure many of my readers are aware, I’ve been a very longtime holdout when it comes to iPods and iPhones. In fact, as I described in a recent blog post (boy, I wish this thing had a way to let me copy and paste links), my opinion of the iPods (including the touch) has been that they pretty much didn’t do anything that I couldn’t already do on my laptop. True, these things ate more mobile, but just how many of the mobile features that these things offered did I really need to have with me when my laptop was not handy?

But now this darned thing called the App Store is out. Not only has it wowed certain influential tech reviewers like David Pogue (if you haven’t seen his latest video about the App Store, you’re missing out on something GREAT), but it’s even making me take another look at these pocket-sized wonders.

Twitterriffic is certainly one of those Mac apps that has ported over very nicely to the iPhone/iPod touch, but it actually extends the ability of Twitter to reflect what you are actually doing. After all, most if us certainly don’t spend every moment of the day doing things just in the computer, so for Twitter to realize its full potential, it has to be the kind of service that can go mobile. I’ve had the chance to try Twitterrific on the iPod touch, and it has really felt like a nice transformation from its beautifully-simplistic interface on the Mac to an equally beautiful and simplistic interface on the touch. I could easily see it making me 50% more active on Twitter.

WordPress, the app that I am using right now to write this blog post, is also a very interesting examplenof what’s possible. After downloading this app onto here, all I had to do was enter the URL of my blog along with the username and password for my WordPress admin panel and boom, I was in my admin via the app with the ability to edit my past posts or write a new one, like I’m doing now. I could totally see using this to write a brief blog post from somewhere, although maybe not a really long one like I’m doing now.

1Password has not yet gotten their iPhone version out yet, but after seeing the preview that they posted on their blog, it’s another app I’m quite interested in. One of it’s abilities is supposed to be allowing you to generate super-tough and super-safe passwords, but I’ve been a bit slow at getting many of my passwords safe because I wouldn’t remember them if I needed to login from somewhere else and didn’t have 1Password there to autofill the info for me. Between having 1Passworf on the iPhone/iPod touch and the my1Password service, however, both of which are coming up soon, I could really have a nice solution for keeping track of my passwords and keeping them secure.

OmniFocus for the iPhone/iPod touch, however, has GOT to be the deal-clincher for me. Since I bought the Mac version at Macworld in January, I’ve been working on adopting OmniFocus and getting used to using it to help me organize the various tasks surrounding my life (and try to reduce stress as well). The problem, however, is that it lives on my computer, which I don’t have with me at places like school and other places where I really need to have it handy to add actions to (as well as reminding me of what actions I need to get done). OmniFocus for iPhone/iPod touch, however, would eliminate that problem by letting me have my OmniFocus lists with me to get to, and let me sync them with the ones on my computer. Add in those awesome mobile-only features like location-aware contexts, and it’s about time to put the “Slippery With Drool” signs out.

While I’m still not interested in the iPhone (unless someone wants to donate the $70/month AT&T plan to me, since I doubt I’ll ever be able to afford that and don’t like AT&T anyway), I’m starting to show a bit of interest in the iPod touch for the first time. It may have just been a touchscreen wifi media player when it first came out, but now, thanks to the App Store, I’m convinced that it’s the best PDA out there, and one that I’m really getting interested in. However, I’ll keep waliting until Apple releases their next line of iPods (likely this fall) until I start saving.

P.S. Do yourself a favor to maintain your sanity. Don’t write a post as long as this on an iPhone or iPod touch. It takes too much patience.

Tags: 1Password, App Store, Apple, applications, iPhone, iPod touch, OmniFocus, Twitter, Twitterriffic, WordPress

Well, the iPhone 3G release is just days away now, yet for some reason, the hype doesn’t seem as awe-inspiring as last year’s did. Which is quite surprising, given that right after I watched Steve Jobs’ keynote last month, my thought on the new iPhone and the 50% price reduction was, “At last, Apple finally got the iPhone right.” And that’s a big statement coming from me, as someone fully certified as being immune to Uncle Steve’s Reality Distortion Field. But yet, in the past month, many revelations have come out to smash Apple’s party, and most of them from the cell carriers, the gatekeepers needed to allow the iPhone to function.

In the post I made yesterday on MacFocus Magazine I ranted about cell phone carriers and how they hinder the iPhone, which has been more than clear in the past month. Even ignoring how other cell carriers are screwing would-be iPhone customers (I’m looking at you, Rogers), the iPhone 3G comes with plenty more strings attached. I could start with the basic craziness of charging an extra $10/month for the 3G service for the iPhone, which not only eliminates the iPhone’s $200 price drop, it actually makes the total cost of the iPhone more expensive. I could then go to the unexplained reason for the iPhone no longer being activated in iTunes. Not only does it take one of my favorite attributes of the old iPhone and throw it out the signature-free window, but it’s going to make the already ridiculously-crowded Apple Stores much worse and cause people the hassle of having to go through all the usual cell phone heck. (Plus, not having an online option is going to mess it up for the people who don’t live near an Apple or AT&T Store; are people going to have to make iPhone pilgrimages now?)

Oh, and it’s nice that AT&T will finally offer an contract-free option (note how AT&T didn’t say “unlocked” anywhere) for the iPhone, but putting it at a $400 surcharge, plus tax, is ridiculous! It would be smarter to buy the iPhone for $200 or $300 (instead of $600 or $700), sign the contract, pay for one month of service, then cancel and pay the $175 early termination fee on the contract. By my math, that would save you over $150 over the contract-free option. And why exactly can’t the iPhone be activated with GoPhone pay-as-you-go yet?

That’s why I’m still not interested in an iPhone. The phone itself is nice, and finally is something I would desire except for it having to go through AT&T under a two-year contract at a substantial monthly fee. No thanks, I’m not that desperate to go mobile.

The alternative would be the iPod touch, which thanks to its imminent App Store upgrade will finally become the best non-cell phone PDA out there. (Palm originally beat it in my opinion by having open access to applications that actually did things, but now the iPod touch has that too, and with far better quality.) The only main differences now between the iPhone 3G and the iPod touch are the phone part, the lack of GPS (though the iPod touch still has the somewhat-less-accurate Skyhook function, but even the original iPhone didn’t have that), and–oh yeah, the ability to be online without access to a wifi hotspot.

See, that’s my one remaining issue here. Yes, the iPhone has the ability to be online wherever there is a good cell connection, while the iPod touch is restricted to just wifi networks. At that point, wouldn’t it just be smarter to rely on my laptop instead, since it also can only connect to the internet at wifi hotspots? Besides that, at present, the iPod touch (which clearly has less functionality) is $100 more than the iPhone. Granted, the iPod touch doesn’t have to be hindered by a service plan, but it does make one wonder if Apple isn’t planning to up the specs on the iPod touch this fall.

I have never been interested in an iPod because I’ve always said that I’m satisfied with listening to iTunes on my computer, and don’t really need my music elsewhere in most cases (except maybe a 12 hour flight, which I don’t do very often). I’m not strongly interested in an iPod touch, because it pretty much has the same, if not less, functionality of my MacBook, albeit in a smaller form factor and a different interface. I might be interested in the iPhone, since it does have a few tricks that my computer doesn’t, except for it being connected to AT&T and therefore being far more expensive than I could ever hope to afford in my current position thanks to that darned service plan crap.

What exactly is the place of these pocket-sized devices in my life? They may be more attractive to me than they were a few years ago, but Steve Jobs is going to have to full just a few more tricks out of his hat before I’m in the mood for one of these iDevices.

Tags: activation, AT&T, carriers, devices, dilemma, iPhone, iPod touch, laptop, rant, rate plans, services

I’ve blogged about how Apple has really ramped it up against Microsoft Office with iWork ‘08. That is, they’ve ramped up against Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. But what about Outlook/Entourage? Well, Apple also has its return weapon for Entourage, which is the combination of Mail, Address Book, and iCal, and in Leopard, Apple has added even more to these three applications to increase the competition. But are these enhancements worth their weight in gold? Well, Address Book hasn’t seen any significant new features, so I’ll ignore it this go-around. iCal’s Feature Presentation will happen later this month, which means today’s focus is on Mail.
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Tags: Address Book, calendars, data detectors, e-mail, Entourage, features, HTML, iCal, iPhone, iPod touch, Leopard Feature Presentation, Mac OS X Leopard, Mail, managers, newsfeeds, notes, Outlook, productivity, review, RSS, Safari, stationery, Stikkit, sync, templates, to-dos

Us Mac users may have teased Windows lovers because it took Microsoft 5 years in between the releases of Windows XP and Windows Vista, but now we’re a little guilty of lengthy releases too. Mac OS X Tiger was released on April 28, 2005, and now Mac OS X Leopard will be released on October 26, 2007. Exactly 2 and a half years, which is half of the length of the interim between XP and Vista.

In preparation for the upcoming release of Leopard, I will be doing a 5-part series on my blog this week taking a look back at everything that has happened over the last 130 weeks. I was originally going to make this a single article, but after getting so many ideas, I have decided to split it into five posts covering five different categories of events. If you have any additional ideas of significant things that have happened during the last 910 days, leave them in the comments. (Although note that I will be out of town for a portion of this week; I have this full series pre-scheduled.)

In this first part of the Tiger-to-Leopard series, I cover the significant events affecting Apple themselves since Tiger came out. Be sure to check out the other articles in the series.
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Tags: announcements, Apple, article, history, iLife, iPhone, iPod, iWork, Mac, Mac OS X Leopard, Tiger-to-Leopard

Many many props go to Macworld writer/editor Christopher Breen who just posted his editor’s notes entitled Is Apple on the Wrong Path? I think that this was an excellent article that really clearly puts everyone’s feelings towards many of Apple’s recent decisions, in particular the iPhone bricking issue, in words and presents an argument that makes perfect common sense. It definitely does it better than that “Is Apple the New Microsoft?” article that Computerworld’s Mike Elgan posted awhile back, which made totally unclear points. This article is really clear, and I really hope that Apple reads it and understands that what they did last week to iPhone owners is not cool, and is going to turn people against them. Apple’s success has gone to its head, and they need to wake up and start thinking about the actual consumer and what’s best for them, not what’s best for Apple or AT&T.

Tags: Apple, bricking, Christopher Breen, decisions, iMovie, iPhone, Macworld, opinion, stupidity

I may not be a big fan of the iPhone, but like it or not, it’s built-in web browser interface is revolutionary. As soon as a few patents expire, we are going to start seeing the iPhone’s web interface in more and more places. In my latest Lorelle on WordPress guest post, I cover some of the basics on making sure that your site is easily usable and readable for iPhone users, along with a link to Apple’s more detailed documentation on how you can build full-fledged web applications for this iPhone.

Check out the article.

Tags: Apple, article, guest blogging, iPhone, Lorelle VanFossen, web browsing, web design, website

Well, there’s now a number of sites that are now selling unlock keys for the iPhone, as TUAW reported, and a number of people have been wondering how long it will be until Apple posts an iPhone software update that overrides this hack. But personally, it is my opinion that it would be more beneficial to Apple to allow the iPhone unlocks than to stop them, and here’s why.

Apple has an exclusive agreement with AT&T to have the iPhone be restricted to AT&T’s network only, and I would assume that that means that in the agreement, Apple is also obligated to override any hacks that may cause the iPhone to be unlocked to other carriers. Obviously, we can’t see the specific details of the agreement, but I would think that if Apple wasn’t obligated to override these unlocks with software updates, then that would be because there was specific language in the AT&T-Apple agreement. But let’s try both scenarios.

Suppose Apple is not obligated to override the unlocking hacks. That means that suddenly, the possibility of an iPhone opens up to many more people. The people who love the thought of having an iPhone (those things have a 92% approval rating, after all), but perhaps are stuck on an existing contract, or just can’t stand the thought of contracting their life (okay, their money, anyway) to AT&T, now have a solution. They can buy an iPhone, unlock it, and then they’re good to go! This totally opens up Apple’s iPhone market a bit more, and I’m sure Apple would like that.

But then, suppose Apple is obligated under the agreements to override the unlocking hacks. What if they just refuse to do it? After all, for a cell phone network<->creator agreement, Apple certainly has more control over the iPhone’s software than most cell phone manufacturers. So what could AT&T do to force Apple to override the unlocks? Nothing. About all AT&T could do would be to terminate the exclusive agreement. But then, that would mean that Apple would now have a finished toy that’s already sold a million units in just over two months to dangle in front of the faces of the other companies like Verizon and T-Mobile, who no doubt are suffering due to Apple’s newfound iPhone dominance, and they’d be willing to sign up with Apple in a minute, which would, again, expand Apple’s potential iPhone market. Obviously, AT&T couldn’t kill something that’s been so successful for them just like that, so they’d probably have to let Apple allow the unlocks to stick around (see the previous paragraph).

Regardless of these, the fact that the iPhone has now been unlocked puts Apple in the advantage. Apple will win with a larger customer base, regardless of whether AT&T cracks down on them or not, and AT&T will lose. The only way that Apple can lose (and have AT&T win) is if Apple does go ahead and crack down on these unlocks, but that would be shooting themselves in the foot, and given Apple’s lax policy towards hacking the Apple TV, I think that Apple is probably going to be smart enough to live and let live for this time around.

Tags: Apple, article, AT&T, hacks, iPhone, opinion, unlocks

Ugh, not another one of these:

Does Steve Jobs like making these big keynote announcements? Call me crazy (Hi, Crazy!), but didn’t he just do one of these last month? And then, another one like two months before that? And then, every time Steve plans one of these announcement keynote things, the rumor websites go wild trying to predict things, and looking at what Apple Legal has censored, etc. MacRumors’ rumor roundup has links to all of these places where the legal geniuses have triumphed. You know something, Apple? If you hate rumor websites that much, how about you stop with the keynotes and announce new products like everybody else does? Just randomly pop it on your website one day and issue a press release–it’s painless! You would totally catch the rumor websites off guard!

Okay, whatever, so it’s another big keynote coming up tomorrow, and this time it’s all about music again. And it’s right before the holiday shopping season again. This is starting to sound like a pattern, right? Apparently not, since everyone is complaining again that iPod updates are “overdue.” How long will it take these websites to figure it out–Apple sells most of its iPods during the holiday shopping season, which is why they annually revamp the lineups right before the holiday quarter starts. I don’t see what’s so hard to get here. This is a big reason why I continue to do podcasts: because a mainstream press can be very stupid a lot of times and I feel it’s my duty to get out some stuff that makes a bit more sense. *sigh*

But one of the things that I really want to remind the Apple/Mac news stream is that rumors are rumors. This means that they’re rumors, which means that they really aren’t confirmable, which is why I tend to make my predictions based upon what I’d like to see, not based upon what will happen, because if I say something “will” happen, and it doesn’t, I’ve now successfully reduced my credibility. That’s why I make predictions based on things that I’d like to happen, which means there’s no credibility involved whatsoever. How many times have you seen a rumor be right? You could probably count them on the fingers of one hand, with the last time that I can personally recall being the Intel Macs announcement from June 2005. And Apple always throws something out that you can’t predict. Who would have expected Apple to have ZERO Mac announcements at Macworld 2007? Who was thinking that Apple would do a .Mac Web Gallery–and that’s it? And nobody was ready for the announcement of Safari for Windows. Rumors are rumors, and not much else.

So with that downer, what would I think would be more likely to be seen tomorrow? Again, this is just personal opinion, with absolutely no factual backing. Let’s tackle the rumor roundup one by one:
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Tags: announcements, Apple, iPhone, iPod, iTunes, Keynote, music, rumors, Steve Jobs

Internet celebrity Justine Ezarik has posted a video of the 300-page AT&T bill she received. She apparently has unlimited text messaging alongside her unlimited data and everything else plan, and AT&T took it upon themselves to not only print a detailed record of every KB she downloaded on the web, but also print a detailed record of every text message she sent! This adds up to 300 pages, however AT&T was thoughtful enough to ship it to her in a box. I wonder if they’re going to throw the shipping fee onto her bill as well?

I mean, I’m sorry, but some person had to pack all that stuff into the box instead of sticking it in the normal envelope, wouldn’t that person be smart enough to mention something like this?

For Apple to become “A Greener Apple”, it may mean a bit more than LED backlighting for laptop screens. Apple would potentially be a whole lot greener if they found themselves a new cell provider.

Tags: Apple, AT&T, iPhone, Justine, phone bill, Revver, stupidity, waste

Forget all you guys that want an iPhone nano (I’m looking at you, Robert), how about this concept for an iPhone shuffle? “Hello, who is this?”

Tags: Apple, iPhone, multi-touch, shuffle, stupidity, Video