Hey, broham, hitting the waves today? You better go pledge $49 to get the Proof Nano case, a case that turns your Nano into a waterproof watch. Designed by the folks at Boombotix, the watch will completely protect your Nano and even supports a small Bluetooth adapter that will stream tunes to your wireless headphones automagically.
The Kickstarter project will be funded at $17,000, so get cracking. → Read More
In a moment as historic as Alexander Bell’s call to his assistant, an iPhone hacker wrote on Twitter that he had successfully ported Siri to the iPhone 4 and iPod Touch.
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These are bittersweet days for Tony Fadell. The man who oversaw 18 generations of the iPod and the first three versions of the iPhone is finally launching his new company, Nest Labs, today. It has been eighteen months in the making and marks a new era for thermostats– and quite possibly other neglected categories of home electronics.
But he’s also recently lost his former boss and long time friend Steve Jobs. In this final segment of our sit-down interview with Fadell, he talks about the Steve Jobs he knew. He also talks about the future for Apple, and what he hopes Apple’s legacy will be for entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley.
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Even if you read our story earlier tonight on iPod Godfather Tony Fadell’s new company Nest Labs and its new Learning Thermostat, you may still be wondering how anyone could make a thermostat an object of beauty. So we sat down with Fadell to get a video demo of the device that brought him out of retirement and has been eighteen months in the making.
True to the Apple aesthetic it’s one big dial you can spin and push to control a sophisticated array of features.
It’ll be the first thermostat marketed directly to consumers. Can they get excited enough to plunk down a couple hundred dollars? My husband and I are finally putting a new heating system in our drafty San Francisco Victorian. After this demo, I was sold. How about you? → Read More
For the last eighteen months, the tech world has been anxiously awaiting news of what iPod godfather Tony Fadell is up to. His staff has been sworn to secrecy since word got out he was leaving retirement to do something new. Despite reporters camping out in front of his office with cameras, the news somehow stayed a secret– no small feat in the ever-leaky land of Silicon Valley.
No doubt the anticipation raised expectations in fan boys’ minds that the next great entertainment or communication device was going to be unveiled by the former DJ who oversaw 18 versions of the iPod and the first three versions of the iPhone.
Fadell is well aware that those fan boys may be in for some confusion or some disappointment today. Because he’s announcing what finally got him to come out of retirement and start a new company: A desire to reinvent thermostats. → Read More
On October 23rd, 2001, Steve Jobs introduced the iPod at a special event, showing off a design destined to become iconic. Ten years later, the brand is as strong as ever, though sadly, we have lost its inventor.
Take a few minutes to watch the original product announcement and take a short trip through the evolution of the device that is arguably the most important in Apple’s history. → Read More
It’s been a busy morning in Cupertino at Apple’s ‘Let’s Talk iPhone’ keynote. The big headline was the iPhone 4S, but no iPhone 5. Perhaps you had a hard time following all the news from Apple on the iPhone, iOS 5, other iOS devices and apps. Apple didn’t offer a live online webcast to the public. But the TechCrunch team, on two continents, has been busy tracking all the Apple news. Click inside the post for an organized summary of the headlines. → Read More
Apple’s on an unveiling spree right now, and the next thing on their list is a slightly tweaked version of the iPod Touch.
First things first, Apple dropped the price down to $199 for the most basic 8 GB model, down from $229. The price drops have hit across the board, with the 32 GB model going for $299 and the hefty 64 GB going for $399.
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It’s only been 10 years since the iPod launched, and since it’s become the number one selling music device in the world, according to comments made by Tim Cook at Apple’s “Let’s Talk iPhone” event in Cupertino this morning.
He mentioned that market share in the U.S. has been over 70 percent “for a very long time” (at 78 percent now), during the course of which 300 million iPods were sold around the world. → Read More
One end of this cable connects Apple’s proprietary 30-pin connector and the the other end connects to an audio jack or mini USB port. You can then hook up any PMP or phone to any set of Apple speakers, thereby turning what once was an iPod-only party into one that supports Archos, Android, and anything else you can think of. → Read More
Following Google’s stellar earnings last week, Apple has today announced their own earnings for their Q3 period. As expected, they’re good. Massively good.
Apple set several new records in terms of both revenues and sales. Most notably, Apple’s revenue was a staggering $28.57 billion — over $5 billion ahead of their (always low) guidance, and almost $4 billion ahead of the $24.92 billion that Wall Street had been expecting. What’s perhaps craziest about those numbers is that they’re a new record for the company, and it comes in a non-holiday quarter (typically the best for consumer electronics companies). Apple’s last holiday quarter earnings, Q1 2011, saw revenues of $26.7 billion.
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They’re at it again folks, and it only gets uglier and uglier.
Samsung has filed another complaint against Apple, according to the International Trade Commission website, this time to request an import ban against the iPhone, iPad, and iPod.
Should the ITC choose to investigate the complaint, we won’t get a final decision for at least 16 months. → Read More
Sony’s Walkman may have lost the portable music player market in Japan and the rest of the world to Apple, but that doesn’t stop big S from releasing accessories for their rival. In Japan, Sony announced [JP] two new DSP speakers today, the SRS-GX50IP and the portable SRS-GM5IP. → Read More
On 28 April 2002, a few months after Apple launched the very first iPod (yes, it’s been that long already), someone registered the domain name iPods.com.
It apparently took the Cupertino company a little over 9 full years to decide that, instead, it should be the rightful owner of the domain name, which until earlier this morning took people to some shady mp3 download site (though it no longer resolves, it seems). → Read More
While, arguably, HEX was first to market with their rubber sports band for the iPod Nano, they are now inexplicably creating more iPod watch bands for the millions of people out there who want to reduce the overall functionality of both their watch and their iPod in one fell swoop. The bands come in metal and leather and top out at $69 for a stainless-steel model. → Read More
The iPod Nano may have something cool up its sleeve. This patent, discovered by PatentlyApple, describes a dynamic screensaver that will take cues from the outside environment, changing according to motion, light, and the colors around the device. → Read More
It looks as though the forthcoming seventh-generation iPod nano will undergo some hardware changes, according to some allegedly leaked pictures. Apple may be bringing back the camera – but losing the clip. → Read More
Spotify, the music service Americans don’t get to enjoy, announced several very cool new features today. The European music service is rolling out new versions of its desktop and mobile apps today, which will allow all users (even those pesky ad-supported freeloaders) to sync Spotify desktop tracks with mobile devices, be they iPods, iPhones or Androids.
And just in case it wasn’t clear whether or not Spotify intends to compete directly with iTunes, Spotify is also introducing its own music store, or “download service”, in which users can buy a range of MP3 “bundles” at 10 songs for roughly 8 pounds. Or 100 songs for 50 pounds. (Roughly the equivalent of $13 and $82, respectively.) → Read More
A charming couple in Ottawa, Canada, Chrys and Dom Coballe, is making some handsome, if expensive, iPod Nano watch bands that pop out and even turn at an angle to offer multiple viewing angles. Although I think the hey day of the iPod Nano watch is over, they seem far too charming to just ignore. → Read More
Quick! You’ve got three and a half hours (as of my writing this) to pick up a new iPod touch at this solid price — $185 is $45 off the normal $230. 8GB isn’t a lot of space, to be sure, but for a dedicated streaming music and app machine, this is a great deal. Head over to eBay’s daily deal page to pick one up. [via 9to5Mac] → Read More
