All Blogs

Simon Jary - It’s T time for Apple

Wed, 25 Jan 2012

Tangerine   Apple is usually very particular about its colours, favouring a strict monochromatic policy ruled with an iron – or more likely a brushed aluminium – fist. From 1984 to 1990 just about every Apple product (except for its lurid logo) had to conform to the Snow White design language, which pinpointed exactly the correct tone of white or near beige the casing should be in. This was all down to Steve Jobs’ severe notion of perfect aesthetic beauty.

So it was more than a small surprise when on his return he launched a series of translucent, vibrantly coloured computers that shocked the tech world, and went on to revolutionise all sorts of consumer gadgetry.

Macworld Team | Simon Jary | Read more...


Andy Ihnatko - Photographic evidence

Thu, 19 Jan 2012

I love this idea. A case that makes your iPhone look like an old-timey camera? That's an old gag. The Gizmon iCA (http://gizmon.com/) is an iPhone case that makes your phone work like an old-timey camera.

(Here we define "old-timey" as "back when people subcontracted all of their photography operations to a completely separate device designed specifically and solely for that purpose.")

Macworld Team | Andy Ihnatko | Read more...


Jason Snell - The iPhone: Five years later...

Tue, 10 Jan 2012

Five years ago, Steve Jobs stood on stage at Macworld Expo and unveiled the iPhone.

At the time, it seemed like a big deal. In hindsight, it seems even bigger.

Macworld Team | Jason Snell | Read more...


Simon Jary - Apple’s crazy S words

Fri, 23 Dec 2011

Safari  In 2003 Apple released its own browser called Safari. Surfin’ Safari. Surfing the web. Geddit? As of October 2011 Safari accounts for nearly 9 per cent of web traffic, behind Chrome, Firefox, and Internet Explorer. However, as the browser on Apple’s iPhone it accounts for a massive 62 per cent of all mobile traffic.

Sagan  Superstar space gazer Carl Sagan was annoyed when he learned that the Power Mac 7100/66 was code-named after him. He wrote to Apple demanding it change the code name. Apple’s project engineers changed the name to BHA, standing for ‘Butt-Head Astronomer’. In April 1994 Sagan sued Apple for defamation of character, but lost.

Macworld Team | Simon Jary | Read more...


Andy Ihnatko - What lessons can we learn from the Kindle Fire?

Wed, 14 Dec 2011

First, that “The Love Guru” isn’t such a terrible movie after all. Oh, it’s bad. Absolutely. But nothing so bad as what I had been expecting after reading the aerobically-bad reviews that were published on the weekend of the film’s release. “Only my dog, who once ate a five-pound bag of flower and then spent the next several days passing a large block of paste through his system, can understand the intensity of pain that I went through during the 87 minute running time of this movie,” wrote the collective soul of public movie critics.

It’s an exceptionally-bad movie, sure. But I was expecting Category-5 (“Sex And The City 2”) bad. This was merely a Cat 3 (the recent Russell Brand remake of “Arthur”). I learned this because I impulsively rented this movie as a test of the device’s video playback quality; now I pass this wisdom on to you.

Macworld Team | Andy Ihnatko | Read more...


Simon Jary - Apple gets the right Rs

Fri, 09 Dec 2011

Radius  There was once a day when computer displays were sexy – in a geeky way, of course. Mainly those monitors were made by Radius. We shouldn’t be surprised that this company’s products were cool, as it was set up by a breakaway bunch of brilliant engineers from Apple’s original Macintosh team, including Burrell Smith (Mac motherboard maven), Andy Hertzfeld (self-proclaimed “Software Wizard”), Mike Boich (the first Apple Evangelist), Matt Carter (digital type guru, and designer of Verdana), Alain Rossmann (the brains behind WAP), and others.

Its first product was a game changer – the Radius Full Page Display, which was the first large screen for a PC and pioneer of multiple-screen computing. Its next monitor was the Radius Pivot. Believe me, if you were using a Mac in the late 1980s you wanted a Radius Pivot. The full-page Pivot could be rotated 90° between landscape and portrait modes, with real-time remapping of icons, menu, and screen drawing. This stuff still
looks cool on an iPad. Twenty years ago it made grown DTPers and designers faint with envy. It was designed by Terry Oyama, who helped design the original Mac case.

Macworld Team | Simon Jary | Read more...


Andy Ihnatko - Had Jobs 'finally cracked' TV?

Thu, 24 Nov 2011

It’s that most depressing time of year for any tech pundit: the time just after Apple’s autumn iOS event. That’s it for new products for the rest of the year; it’s a drought that won’t break until January at the earliest.

It leaves us feeling all edgy and out of sorts and at a loss for what to say in social situations. “So what do you think the new iPhone is going to be like?” is how people normally greet us. It’s not an offensive question, trust me. I could answer that question. The ones that electrify me with blind panic are questions like “Hey, have you met my wife, Angela?”

Macworld Team | Andy Ihnatko | Read more...


Simon Jary - Apple Qs round the block

Wed, 09 Nov 2011

Quadra  Before Steve Jobs simplified the company’s product range (see below) Apple gave its computers all sorts of nonsensical names, like Centris and Performa. One name that could at least be explained was the Quadra, which used Motorola’s 68040 processor – hence the ‘quad’. The Quadra line of pro desktop Macs was the last before Apple moved to superior PowerPC chips. The Quadra 630 was the first Mac to ditch internal SCSI disk drives for IDE. And that’s about as interesting as the Quadra got.

Quartz   The graphics and imaging engine at the heart of Mac OS X. It replaced previous imaging technology QuickDraw. Those guys really loved the letter ‘Q’.

Macworld Team | Simon Jary | Read more...


Andy Ihnatko - The accidental celebrity

Wed, 02 Nov 2011

I am in New York for some meetings, which, through divine ordinance, take place the same week the city is hosting the country’s second-largest annual comic book convention. Last night was Preview Night. The floor was open only to press, industry pros, and those who’d shelled out for the full four-day pass. So the crowds were a little thin. Nonetheless, I spotted plenty of people dressed as their favourite movie, comic, and cartoon characters.

If over the course of the weekend I don’t see at least three people dressed as Steve Jobs, I’m going to be very surprised and a little disappointed. At last year’s New York Comic-Con, I saw someone in a homemade Optimus Prime costume that was so true to the movie original that it, too, could out-act Shia LaBeouf. In comparison, a Steve Jobs costume is a snap: jeans, black turtleneck, and if you really want to go all-out, the right New Balance sneakers.

Macworld Team | Andy Ihnatko | Read more...


John Dix - Moving from BlackBerry to the iPhone 4S

Thu, 27 Oct 2011

I’ve been a BlackBerry user for years but finally decided I needed a device that provided a better Web browsing experience so just made the leap to an Apple iPhone 4S and thought I’d share some impressions.

Let me say up front this is an apples to oranges comparison. My BlackBerry Curve 8530 was great for what it was: a small, lightweight phone/email device with limited browsing capacity and a few other goodies. RIM has many other devices, such as the Bold 9900, that are much better for accessing the Web and, while I looked at them, they didn’t offer all the bells and whistles the 4S does and I quickly decided to make a clean break (so this review isn’t meant to be a comparison of the 4S and any of RIM’s more modern Web-driven devices).

Macworld Team | John Dix, Network World | Read more...


Kirk McElhearn - How the iPod changed the world of music

Mon, 24 Oct 2011

Back around 1979, I was an early adopter. Before the first Sony Walkman was available for sale in the United States, I had bought a Sony Pressman, a brick-sized and -weight device that could both play and record cassette tapes. I was initially interested in this device to record music that I played with friends; it had a built-in stereo microphone, as it was designed for recording interviews. But I quickly realized, as I carried it to and from my friends’ homes, that I could also listen to music on it.

In those days, the bands I listened to were The Cure, Joy Division, Theater of Hate, The Durutti Column, Talking Heads, and other postpunk bands. I would walk through the streets of suburban Queens, New York, the Pressman wedged in the back pocket of my blue jeans—or, in winter, in a coat pocket—with a pair of headphones on my ears. Back then, you didn’t really see people wearing headphones. The Walkman wasn’t introduced until June 1980, and even then, it didn’t catch on very quickly. You would occasionally see people in the streets of Manhattan with headphones on, but it took a few years before it became common.

Macworld Team | Kirk McElhearn | Read more...


The Macalope - Crazy making

Sun, 23 Oct 2011

The gap between reality and the iPhone 4S commentary makes the Macalope go all sarcastic. But will he have enough sarcasm left for Wall Street analysts? Click “read more” for the surprising answer (which is “yes”)! Finally, it’s time to gird your loins as Steve Jobs’s biography hits the shelves next week.

Can we talk for a minute about what a fail this iPhone 4S is? Ugh, mega-fail. Total disappointment fest. Lackluster-o-rama. Lame-a-palooza.

Macworld Team | The Macalope | Read more...


Simon Jary - Apple gives Ps a chance

Mon, 17 Oct 2011

PC  Seemingly the opposite of the Mac and everything Apple, of course the term PC or Personal Computer applies just as much to Apple as it does Microsoft, Windows and the legion of dull, beige (now plasticky grey/silver) boxes called PCs. In fact, there’s no computer more personal than one of Apple’s, be it a Mac, iPhone or iPad – for all are personal computers. Unlike Microsoft, Dell, HP et al, Apple somehow builds not just personification but personality into its computers and its brand. DOS and Windows PCs are faceless. The Mac not only had a face, it even said “Hello”.

PageMaker  Aldus Corporation, developer of PageMaker, the software that kickstarted desktop publishing, was named after Aldus Manutius, the inventor of italic type and the semicolon.

Macworld Team | Simon Jary | Read more...


Andy Ihnatko - Rewriting the AppleScript

Tue, 11 Oct 2011

I refuse to get upset about the tight level of control that Apple maintains on its products, and by extension its developers and its users. It comes down to this:

1) Yes, Apple hardware comes with restrictions that would be insane in any other context. But...

Macworld Team | Andy Ihnatko | Read more...


Simon Jary - Oh no! ‘O’ is for ‘Out’

Thu, 29 Sep 2011

Out   The media fascination with Apple co-founder Steve Jobs reached a new high on news of his August 2011 resignation as CEO. Apple is doomed, cried many. It’s business as usual, calmed others. But Steve has resigned before – and then he left the company altogether (he remains as chairman today, although in poor health). What was the outcry then? Not so different, but certainly less affectionate.

In 1985, just a year after the revolutionary launch of the Macintosh itself, Steve Jobs found himself clearing his desk at Apple’s Cupertino HQ. Into the hemp bag went his signed photo of Woz, Mont Blanc pen and worn-out ‘You’re Fired!’ rubber stamp. Jobs had been forced out of the company he’d founded after a power struggle with John Sculley, the Pepsi marketing whizz he’d recruited as CEO to turn Apple into the first true consumer computer brand. When news reached Sculley that Jobs was planning a coup, he acted fast – forcing Steve into the non-operational role as company chairman.

Macworld Team | Simon Jary | Read more...


Andy Ihnatko - What's next must come first

Wed, 28 Sep 2011

At this point, all that could be said and should be said about Steve Jobs’ transition from hands-on CEO of Apple to “active chairman of the board” has been said. Many things that should never have been said have also been said, but the less said about those, the better.

As we move through September – which for years has traditionally marked the start of Apple’s theatre season – and we start to imagine what an iPhone or iTunes product announcement event would be like without Apple’s star frontman, I wonder if it isn’t time for Apple to remove the show from its business.

Macworld Team | Andy Ihnatko | Read more...


Simon Jary - Apple’s N of the road

Wed, 17 Aug 2011

Nano   Apple shocked the gadget world in 2005 when it scrapped its best-selling iPod, the iPod mini, for an altogether different product, the iPod nano. Apple probably thought ‘mini’ was just not small enough to describe the new miniscule – I mean nanoscule – MP3 player. The nano was smaller than the mini – although it was only 0.1in shorter.

Newton   Fourteen years before the iPhone and 17 before the iPad Apple threatened to turn computing on its head by releasing a handheld PC that you could fit in your pocket – if you had really big pockets.

Macworld Team | Simon Jary | Read more...


Ted Landau - Mac OS X Lion compatability problems continue

Ted Landau - Mac OS X Lion compatability problems continue

Mon, 15 Aug 2011

As Michael Corleone said, “Just when I thought I was out… they pull me back in.” That’s my current reaction to Mac OS X Lion compatibility problems. After devoting my three previous columns to this topic, I was ready to move on. But new issues continue to demand attention. Here’s the latest:

iWow for iTunes If you use SRS’s iWOW for iTunes, SRS confirms that there is an issue “with the latest iTunes and OS X Lion updates. The SRS engineering team is quickly addressing the problem and a fix will be available shortly.” The symptom (at least on my Mac) is that, when you launch iTunes, an error message appears stating “iWow Error! Internal Error: Could not insert menu bar item.. Error code = 5603.”

Macworld Team | Ted Landau | Read more...


Andy Ihnatko - The invisible Mac

Fri, 12 Aug 2011

Nearly every tech company in the world tries to sell parachutes to people who are already falling. The only reason PC makers can’t sell their parachutes for $25,000 is that during free-fall there are about forty other companies in jetboots hovering around the consumer vying for the sale.

Apple’s different. It’s in the parachute business, yes, but it’s taken the unusual tack of selling them to people on the ground. Even more impressive: they convince these people that throwing themselves out of aeroplanes for fun is the greatest thing ever.

Macworld Team | Andy Ihnatko | Read more...


Andy Ihnatko - In the eye of the iCloud storm

Thu, 04 Aug 2011

We’re now in the calm, cozy eye of the iCloud storm. The anticipation and speculation period was followed by the day of the announcement and the Getting of the Facts, which was followed by the analysis of the announcement and the grinding but not-at-all necessary process of converting one’s initial enthusiasm into an endless list of reasons to be deeply concerned about the future of our great Republic.

Each of these things is stressful. The next step after this is the most stressful yet: it’s the bit when iOS 5 actually ships and we get our first chance to see how iCloud might destroy our day-to-day lives for real, instead of just hypothetically.

Macworld Team | Andy Ihnatko | Read more...