Conceptual iOS 7 Video
/Would love to see some of these features in any future version of iOS.
If Apple is boring then why are you writing about them?→
/The title of Henry Blodget's article just kills me.
I find his claims that Apple needs to make an iPhone with a better battery, laughable. I have an iPhone 5 and out of the 3, 3G, and 4 it has the best battery life I have seen in an iPhone. Apple is the leader in developing better technology when it comes to batteries.
Moron.
Wanted: Local iCloud Backups
/The move towards the cloud is making it easier to get all of your data on all of your devices with little to no effort.
For the purpose of getting your contacts, calendars, bookmarks, reading lists, reminders, and notes on all of your devices, Apple's iCloud just works, as advertised. This has at least always just worked for me...so far.
I have completely switched my devices over to iCloud to let it manage this data, but I have been nervous ever since I turned it on. The fear is that I may wake up one day, open my contacts and there is nothing there. The same goes for all of the personal data I listed above.
All of these items could be manually backed up, but that would be time consuming and most likely something that you would easily forget to do.
It would be nice if Apple allowed users the ability to automatically download backups of these databases with the flip of a toggle switch. Having the ability to download a backup of this data, and allow it to save two or three revisions of that database would definitely make me feel more at ease with having my data in iCloud.
Even if Apple had been successful with all of it's attempts at online services, which everyone knows they have not, I would still be as leery with fully trusting that they would be able to protect this data forever.
For now I will just have to set reminders, and hopefully not be too busy to follow the process to manually back this data up so that I could restore it in the future if need be.
Apple's Design Teams Need to Get on the Same Page
/Apple updated it's Podcasts app yesterday, and before I hit update I wondered if there would be a redesign of the interface. I was correct in thinking that the skeuomorphic Reel To-Reel tape recorder was most likely removed. What I wasn't expecting was to have yet another instance of an inconsistent AirPlay design.
Apple updated the lock screen a couple of months ago; which aligned the cover art in the center of the screen for the iPhone 5, and changed the look of the controls. The first thing that I noticed was that the AirPlay icon when active changed from what has always been blue in color, to an orange.
When I got in my car this morning I loaded the Podcasts app and I noticed that there is yet another change in the AirPlay icon color. It has been changed back to blue, but it is a darker color than it was before. I know these are little details, but these are the little details that Apple usually sweats.
Samsung's New Strategy: Copy the Future instead of the Past→
/I love the title of the above linked article posted on CNBC.com. "Samsung Gets a Head Start on Apple With SmartTVs." You mean they are finally going to make a smart tv? Actually no this isn't their first attempt to make a "smart tv". They have been making what has been considered a smart tv for years.
Samsung has been making smartTVs for six years, but the company may have felt under pressure to release its new line early in the year because of speculation that Apple will roll out its own TV in the fall.
So in other words, because Apple is doing it (rumored to be anyhow), than Samsung has to step up and make one? The article goes on to state that it doesn't care what other companies are doing, but they are focusing their efforts on what they are creating.
The iPhone has been out since 2007, which revolutionized the phone industry, and brought about true smart phones. Samsung Followed. The iPad came out in 2010, and revolutionized what people perceived as tablets. Samsung followed.The AppleTV set top box has been out since 2007, and rumors have been present about Apple evolving the set top box into a TV of it's own since. It has been exactly six years, the same amount of time Samsung has been making smartTV's according to the quoted article, that the AppleTV has been on the market. Samsung rode the coat tails of the first two markets, and with the help of investing so much cash in trash advertising*, they have succeeded in growing their presence in at least the phone market. You would think that a company who has had six years of experience making smart televisions, and more experience in television design in general, would have been able to best Apple on this market.
It seems to me that Samsung's latest strategy is to get ahead of Apple by taking rumored products that may be released in the future and come out with them first, or at least alert the media and let them know that they will be coming out with such products. They are coming out with a TV that will be able to run apps, do all of the tasks you can do on your phone assumably, and they are also coming out with a watch like device (of course this is a rumor), but where have I heard of that one before?
It is well known that Apple takes a long time to develop their products so they get it right. (The iPad has been in existence since as early as 2002) Even if Apple doesn't come out with a full fledged television, I am almost certain they will expand their TV brand. If Samsung does beat Apple to the market with a television equivalent to their phones, they might want to look into copying Apple in the innovation department or they are doomed to lose that market as well.
*The Samsung Trash Ads comment: I say this because I cannot stand when a company directly attacks another company in it's advertising. Apple was never named in the commercials, but it is completely obvious that they, and their user for that matter are the direct target. I don't believe Apple's commercials have been so bold at all. If I am wrong and someone is willing to show me where than I will be happy to say that I am wrong.
∞