What is more popular than Apple Laptops? Right, Apple Bottoms - on Google at least. Apple Bottoms is the 2nd most searched Apple related search term just right after “Apple”. Apple Bottoms has nothing to do though with Apple, the Cupertino b…
Original post by Yahoo! News Search Results for apple computer and software by Elliott Back
Apple’s iPhone will be available from more than one mobile operator in Australia and India later this year, further signs that Apple is breaking with its history of exclusive iPhone distribution agreements with operators in other markets.
Original post by ScuttleMonkey and software by Elliott Back
Electronic Weekly’s David Manners writes (via CNet.com.au) about a revealing encounter he had with Luigi Licciardi, executive vice president for technology and operations at Telecom Italia Mobile (TIM). Licciardi confirms what everyone essentially k…
Original post by ScuttleMonkey and software by Elliott Back
Like a first love or a first car, a first computer can hold a special place in people’s hearts. For millions of kids who grew up in the 1980s, that first computer was the Commodore 64. Twenty-five years later, that first brush with computer addiction is as strong as ever.
Original post by Yahoo! News Search Results for apple computer and software by Elliott Back
Perhaps no single device has had more impact on mobile music than Apple’s iPhone.
Original post by Yahoo! News Search Results for apple computer and software by Elliott Back
Apple Computer chief executive Steve Jobs has never been keen on the concept of a tablet-based Mac but an Apple cell phone may be a completely different story , according to personal accounts from one of the company’s former higher-ups published by the UK’s Guardian on Thursday.
Original post by Yahoo! News Search Results for apple computer and software by Elliott Back
In April, SwitchToaMac.com published a rumor that Apple would be launching the 3G iPhone earlier than expected… in May. At the time, the rumor didn’t seem to correspond to the circulating expectations that the new iPhone would be launched in June …
Original post by ScuttleMonkey and software by Elliott Back
An Apple Computer patch released last week doesn’t completely fix a high-profile Mac OS X flaw, leaving a toehold for cyberattacks , experts said. The update added a function called ‘download validation’ to the Safari Web browser, Apple Mail client and iChat instant messaging tool.
Original post by Yahoo! News Search Results for apple computer and software by Elliott Back
If you’ve been inundated lately with bounced email from addresses you’ve never sent a note to, you’re experiencing the heartbreak of backscatter. Backscatter is an attempt by scammers to get you to read unsolicited email by sending it using your return address - forging it, which is simple - and then having you open the messages that mail servers innocently return.
(We dare not speak the name of a certain type of email represented typically by a trademarked processed meat name because it results in our email being banned by many mail filters. So excuse my coyness.)
I’ve received thousands of backscatter bounces in the last few weeks, even as my unsolicited email filters have worked relatively well. It’s irritating, because I have to handle it much more manually than any other unfiltered message.
Your return email address can be forged without any effort by anyone - including systems that let you forward links to other people from news sites - because return addresses aren’t registered in any fashion. DNS (domain naming system) may control the use of domain names, but there’s no such similar method of looking up email addresses to validate them.
Way back in 2004-03-22, I wrote “Sender Policy Framework: SPF Protection for Email,” an article about an independent effort to create a way to register authority for email return addresses via DNS. Microsoft, Yahoo, and AOL all got in the game in different ways, extending SPF, developing their own system, deploying anti-forging rules, or adopting rules to prevent forged messages from arriving for their email users and customers.
But none of the efforts has really emerged as a winner, and verifying return addresses is still only one of several pieces that would restrict unsolicited email of a con-game nature. It’s a shame that even with several companies handling hundred of millions of email accounts, the kind of cooperative work that would be required to improve several parts of the way in which Internet email still seems beyond our reach.
Copyright © 2008 Glenn Fleishman. TidBITS is copyright © 2008 TidBITS Publishing Inc. If you’re reading this article on a Web site other than TidBITS.com, please let us know, because if it was republished without attribution, by a commercial site, or in modified form, it violates our Creative Commons License.
MARK/SPACE, INC: The Missing Sync provides the very best inOriginal post by glenn@tidbits.com (Glenn Fleishman) and software by Elliott Back
LowEndMac has an in-depth article on the origins of one of Apple’s most elusive products : the Newton. “Sakoman’s end goal for Newton was to create a tablet computer priced about the same as a desktop computer.
Original post by Yahoo! News Search Results for apple computer and software by Elliott Back
Today, 1st April 30 years ago, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak founded Apple Computer , one of the most influential (whether you like it or not) and recognizable (oh yes ) companies in the tech industry.
Original post by Yahoo! News Search Results for apple computer and software by Elliott Back
We at TidBITS try to avoid obsessing about the iPhone - there are plenty of other media outlets that already do that. But a number of recent events are worth summarizing for what they indicate about both the current utility of the iPhone and its future in the United States and worldwide.
Wi-Fi: It’s Up, It’s Down, It’s All around Confusing — AT&T toyed with its customers’ affections this last two weeks by offering a peek into what it plans to provide in the way of free Wi-Fi on its aggregated hotspot network to iPhone subscribers. AT&T scored a deal in February 2008 to take over Starbucks’ Wi-Fi network from T-Mobile (see “Starbucks Deal Brewed with AT&T Has Hints of Apple,” 2008-02-12), and started to convert locations starting with AT&T’s headquarters city of San Antonio, Texas, a few weeks ago. They’re expected to be complete across all 7,000 Starbucks company-owned freestanding outlets in 2008.
But eagle-eyed Wi-Fi users spotted a new network name - “attwifi” - at Starbucks stores at the same time as on the T-Mobile network - “tmobile” - a square link appeared in the upper right corner of their gateway page welcoming AT&T customers. That wasn’t unexpected or odd. However, a MacRumors reader seems to have been the first to document when on 30-Apr-08 an iPhone-customized gateway login page appeared that asked for a subscriber’s phone number to gain free access.
A few days later, that gateway page went away. On 07-May-08, MacRumors again was apparently first with the news that AT&T’s iPhone plans page had been updated to note that an iPhone included free access to 17,000 U.S. hotspots available through AT&T. Two days later, that text was gone. AT&T told Fortune’s Philip Elmer-DeWitt that it was all human error, but they planned ultimately to provide free Wi-Fi to iPhone users, as has been expected all along.
(Seven million AT&T residential customers - anyone with DSL that’s 1.5 Mbps downstream or faster or their fiber service - already get free access to AT&T Wi-Fi Home, a set of 17,000 U.S. hotspots that includes 9,500 McDonald’s locations and 7,000 Starbucks - in progress - but excludes most hotels and some airports that are found in AT&T’s broader Premier roaming package. Premier service includes all U.S. hotspots and 53,000 international locations, and costs $10 more per month for those who qualify for free service, and $20 per month for everyone else.)
AT&T Wi-Fi will clearly ultimately be available and free to iPhone users, but it’s vaguely incomprehensible why AT&T has muffed this whole Starbucks transition and not simply offered the network already. It’s part of a long-term loyalty play by the company to retain its subscribers, and would improve your iPhone experience by gaining faster Wi-Fi based access when you need it at no additional cost.
iPhone 2.0, iPhone SDK, 3G iPhone, and No iPhones to Purchase — It’s 10-May-08 as I write this, and there are no iPhones to be had via the Apple Store in the United States nor via O2, Apple’s UK partner. That’s plain weird. Apple has said that it plans to release its revised iPhone 2.0 firmware along with a release version of the iPhone SDK (software developers kit) in June 2008, most likely at the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) (see “Apple Announces iPhone 2.0, Releases SDK,” 2008-03-06).
This is when everyone anticipates the expected third-generation (3G) iPhone, one that uses AT&T’s faster HSPA (high speed packet access) network, will be announced or released. The HSPA network has speeds AT&T reports as an average range of 600 Kbps to 1.4 Mbps downstream versus the current 2.5G iPhone’s 100 to 200 Kbps downstream rate.
So it’s quite peculiar that Apple and its partners should happen to run out of stock now. Would this argue that a 3G iPhone is ready to go, and we’ll see a surprise announcement this next week? Hard to say. I can’t quite believe Apple would give up a full four weeks’ sales just to avoid making more phones in the interim. As usual, they give no indications, and we’ll just have to wait and see.
Expanded Carrier Relationships in Europe, Latin America — Even as the iPhone seems to be in scant supply in the United States and the UK, Apple has inked deals with carriers for broader relationships. Vodafone, which owns a minority percentage of AT&T competitor Verizon Wireless, will sell the iPhone starting later this year in territory that encompasses 1.4 billion people: Australia, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Greece, India, Portugal, New Zealand, South Africa, and Turkey. Apple will let both Vodafone and Telecom Italia offer the iPhone in Italy, making it the first market where more than one provider has a contract to sell the phone.
To the west, America Movil SAB will sell the iPhone to customers across Mexico and 15 other Latin American countries as well as Puerto Rico. The firm has 37 percent of the market in its territory.
Apple seems well on its way to meeting its target of a cumulative 10 million phones from the device’s first sales until to the end of 2008. In fact, Apple seems to think its biggest problem is that there’s so much pent-up demand for the iPhone that perhaps as many as half of the iPhones sold have been purchased unlocked or later cracked to allow their use in countries that don’t yet have a domestic carrier offering the phone. Apple’s chief operating officer Tim Cook said in April 2008, “We see this phenomenon as an expression of very strong interest in the iPhone globally, and in that way it’s a good problem to have.”
iPhone Forever — Sequels sometimes suck, but iPhone 2.0 and the 3G iPhone - which may arrive together or nearly so - will likely improve and extend the product. I’ve owned an iPhone since the night Apple unleashed them on the world, and while it’s by no means perfect, it has the lowest frustration to enjoyment ratio of nearly any electronic product I’ve ever owned, and is at a fair approximation 100 times better than any cell phone I’ve owned or tested. Bring the next release on!
Copyright © 2008 Glenn Fleishman. TidBITS is copyright © 2008 TidBITS Publishing Inc. If you’re reading this article on a Web site other than TidBITS.com, please let us know, because if it was republished without attribution, by a commercial site, or in modified form, it violates our Creative Commons License.
WebCrossing Neighbors Creates Private Social NetworksOriginal post by glenn@tidbits.com (Glenn Fleishman) and software by Elliott Back
We at TidBITS try to avoid obsessing about the iPhone - there are plenty of other media outlets that already do that. But a number of recent events are worth summarizing for what they indicate about both the current utility of the iPhone and its future in the U.S. and worldwide.
Wi-Fi: It’s Up, It’s Down, It’s All around Confusing — AT&T toyed with its customers’ affections this last two weeks by offering a peek into what it plans to provide in the way of free Wi-Fi on its aggregated hotspot network to iPhone subscribers. AT&T scored a deal in February 2008 to take over Starbucks’ Wi-Fi network from T-Mobile (see “Starbucks Deal Brewed with AT&T Has Hints of Apple,” 2008-02-12), and started to convert locations starting with AT&T’s headquarters city of San Antonio, Texas, a few weeks ago. They’re expected to be complete across all 7,000 Starbucks company-owned freestanding outlets in 2008.
But eagle-eyed Wi-Fi users spotted a new network name — “attwifi” — at Starbucks stores at the same time as on the T-Mobile network — “tmobile” — a square link appeared in the upper right corner of their gateway page welcoming AT&T customers. That wasn’t unexpected or odd. However, a MacRumors reader seems to have been the first to document when on April 30th an iPhone-customized gateway login page appeared that asked for a subscriber’s phone number to gain free access.
A few days later, that gateway page went away. On May 7th, MacRumors again was apparently first with the news that AT&T’s iPhone plans page had been updated to note that an iPhone included free access to 17,000 U.S. hotspots available through AT&T. Two days later, that text was gone. AT&T told Fortune’s Philip Elmer-DeWitt that it was all human error, but they planned ultimately to provide free Wi-Fi to iPhone users, as has been expected all along.
(Seven million AT&T residential customers - anyone with DSL that’s 1.5 Mbps downstream or faster or their fiber service - already get free access to AT&T Home, a set of 17,000 U.S. hotspots that includes 9,500 McDonald’s locations and 7,000 Starbucks - in progress - but excludes most hotels and some airports that are found in AT&T’s broader Premier roaming package. Premier service includes all U.S. hotspots and 53,000 international locations, and costs $10 more per month for those who qualify for free service, and $20 per month for everyone else.)
AT&T WiFi network will clearly ultimately be available and free to iPhone users, but it’s vaguely incomprehensible why AT&T has muffed this whole Starbucks transition and not simply offered the network already. It’s part of a long-term loyalty play by the company to retain its subscribers, and would improve your iPhone experience by gaining faster Wi-Fi based access when you need it at no additional cost.
iPhone 2.0, iPhone SDK, 3G iPhone, and no iPhones to purchase — It’s May 10th as I write this, and there are no iPhones to be had via the Apple Store in the U.S. nor O2, Apple’s UK partner. That’s plain weird. Apple has said that it plans to release its revised iPhone 2.0 firmware along with a release version of the iPhone SDK (software developers kit) in June, most likely at the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), the first day of which I’ll be attending as press (see “Apple Announces iPhone 2.0, Releases SDK,” 2008-03-06).
This is when the expected third-generation (3G) iPhone, one that uses AT&T’s faster HSPA (high speed packet access) network, is announced or is ready to ship. The HSPA network has speeds AT&T reports as an average range of 600 Kbps to 1.4 Mbps downstream versus the current 2.5G iPhone’s 100 to 200 Kbps downstream rate.
So it’s quite peculiar that Apple should happen to run out of stock now, along with its partners. Would this argue that a 3G iPhone is ready to go, and we’ll see a surprise announcement this next week? Hard to say. I can’t quite believe Apple would give up a full four weeks’ sales just to avoid making more phones in the interim. As usual, they give no indications, and we’ll just have to wait and see.
Expanded carrier relationships in Europe, Latin America — Even as the iPhone seems to be in scant supply in the U.S. and UK, Apple has inked deals with carriers for broader relationships. Vodafone, which owns a minority percentage of AT&T competitor Verizon Wireless, will sell the Apple phone starting later this year in territory that encompasses 1.4 billion people: Australia, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Greece, India, Portugal, New Zealand, South Africa, and Turkey. In a first, Apple will let both Vodafone and Telecom Italia offer the iPhone in Italy.
To the west, America Movil SAB will sell the iPhone to customers across Mexico and 15 other Latin American countries as well as Puerto Rico. The firm has 37 percent of the market in its territory.
Apple seems well on its way to meeting its target of a cumulative 10 million phones from its inception until to the end of 2008. In fact, Apple seems to think it’s biggest problem is that there’s so much pent-up demand for the iPhone, that perhaps as many as half of the iPhones sold have been purchased unlocked or later cracked to allow their use in countries that don’t yet have a domestic carrier offering the phone. Apple’s chief operating officer Tim Cook said in April, “We see this phenomenon as an expression of very strong interest in the iPhone globally, and in that way it’s a good problem to have.”
iPhone Forever — Sequels sometimes suck, but iPhone 2.0 and the 3G iPhone - which may arrive together or nearly so - will likely improve and extend the product. I’ve owned an iPhone since the night Apple unleashed them on the world, and while it’s not perfect by any means, it has the lowest frustration to enjoyment ratio of nearly any electronic product I’ve ever owned, and is at a fair approximation 100 times better than any cell phone I’ve owned or tested. Bring the next release on!
Copyright © 2008 Glenn Fleishman. TidBITS is copyright © 2008 TidBITS Publishing Inc. If you’re reading this article on a Web site other than TidBITS.com, please let us know, because if it was republished without attribution, by a commercial site, or in modified form, it violates our Creative Commons License.
WebCrossing Neighbors Creates Private Social NetworksOriginal post by glenn@tidbits.com (Glenn Fleishman) and software by Elliott Back
LONDON — High Tech Computer (HTC), a fast growing Taiwanese handset manufacturer, unveiled in London its new flagship product, the HTC Touch Diamond, a product that is widely expected to pose a challenge Apple’s iPhone.
Original post by Yahoo! News Search Results for apple computer and software by Elliott Back
robipilot writes “Mac stolen, Mac comes online, owner connects using ‘Back to My Mac,’ owner takes picture of culprit, and viola, criminal caught. OK, it wasn’t quite that simple, but here’s an interesting story of using some built-in technology on the Mac to recover a stolen laptop.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Original post by kdawson and software by Elliott Back
Earlier today we posted a screenshot on our iPhone section that claimed to depict an new On/Off option to enable 3G speeds. This new preference was found in the latest iPhone 2.0 Beta 5 distributed to developers. Be default, the preference…
Original post by kdawson and software by Elliott Back
A clever Mac user who had her laptop stolen led the police to the alleged burglars using Back to My Mac. Three roommates in White Plains, N.Y., had about $5,000 worth of computer and entertainment equipment stolen 27-Apr-08. Then this last Tuesday, one victim who works at an Apple Store, Kait Duplaga, received a text message from a friend, who, spotting her on iChat, thought she’d recovered her computer.
She said no, and used Back to My Mac’s remote screen sharing feature to monitor her laptop’s built-in iSight camera to grab a photo of one of the alleged thieves. She then used remote file sharing to find pictures of the other stored on the laptop. The two men charged in the burglary were arrested with the equipment in their apartment, and are reportedly friends of a friend of the roommates who had their stuff stolen.
Fortunately for Duplaga, the alleged malefactors had a router with UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) or NAT-PMP (Network Address Translation-Port Mapping Protocol) turned on, without which Back to My Mac rarely works. And they left the victim’s laptop signed into .Mac.
I’m finishing up a book on Back to My Mac, and one thing I’ve discovered is that the service can both be hard to get up and running and hard to eliminate from your system. (I address both in the book.)
While I’ve heard of people using tools like iAlertU to capture images of someone in the processing of using your computer without permission, this is the first remote sleuthing I’ve heard of with Back to My Mac.
A commenter on this story at BoingBoing wondered if the Back to My Mac access goes both ways - and that’s a supremely valid and freaky concern. Back to My Mac assumes that you control the .Mac account in question and any computers on which you’ve logged into .Mac. The alleged thieves could just have easily have monitored Duplaga, had she logged in to .Mac and enabled Back to My Mac on another Mac, just as she monitored them.
If you want to forestall this problem, use the .Mac preference pane to log out of your .Mac account, and then run Keychain Access in Applications > Utilities. Find all the .Mac referenced certificates and passwords attached to your login identity and delete them.
Copyright © 2008 Glenn Fleishman. TidBITS is copyright © 2008 TidBITS Publishing Inc. If you’re reading this article on a Web site other than TidBITS.com, please let us know, because if it was republished without attribution, by a commercial site, or in modified form, it violates our Creative Commons License.
Fetch Softworks: Fetch 5.3 has a new look for Leopard,Original post by glenn@tidbits.com (Glenn Fleishman) and software by Elliott Back
A very clever Mac user who had her laptop stolen led the police to the alleged burglars using Back to My Mac. Three roommates - none of whom were identified by name - in White Plains, N.Y., had about $5,000 worth of computer and entertainment equipment stolen April 27. Then this last Tuesday, one victim, who works at an Apple Store, received a call from a friend to see if she was “logged onto the Internet,” which must mean “signed on to iChat.”
She said no, and used Back to My Mac’s remote screen sharing feature to monitor her laptop’s built-in iSight camera to grab a photo of one of the alleged thieves. She used remote file sharing to find pictures of the other stored on the laptop. The two men charged in the burglary were arrested with the equipment in their apartment, and are reportedly friends of a friend of the several roommates who had their stuff stolen.
Fortunately for the victim, the alleged malefactors had a router with UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) or NAT-PMP (Network Address Translation-Port Mapping Protocol) turned on, without which Back to My Mac rarely works. And they left the victim’s laptop signed into .Mac.
I’m finishing up a book on .Mac, and one thing I’ve discovered is that the service can both be hard to get up and running and hard to eliminate traces of from your system. (I address both in the book.)
While I’ve heard of people using tools like iAlertU to capture images of someone in the processing of using your computer without permission, this is the first remote sleuthing I’ve heard of with Back to My Mac.
Copyright © 2008 Glenn Fleishman. TidBITS is copyright © 2008 TidBITS Publishing Inc. If you’re reading this article on a Web site other than TidBITS.com, please let us know, because if it was republished without attribution, by a commercial site, or in modified form, it violates our Creative Commons License.
Fetch Softworks: Fetch 5.3 has a new look for Leopard,Original post by glenn@tidbits.com (Glenn Fleishman) and software by Elliott Back
Both the U.S. and U.K. online Apple Stores are currently out of both the 8GB and 16GB iPhones.
Customers trying to order the iPhone will find that both models are “currently unavailable.” This comes just days after UK’s O2 c…
Original post by kdawson and software by Elliott Back
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. - Beware the all-seeing eye! In an age when it seems like computer-savvy thieves have a leg up on honest Internet surfers, here’s one victim who…
Original post by Yahoo! News Search Results for apple computer and software by Elliott Back
The Internet company acquires Inquisitor, software that augments the search process on Apple’s Safari Web browser.
Original post by Yahoo! News Search Results for apple computer and software by Elliott Back
Apple and NBC were embroiled in a feud last year over iTunes pricing. But signs point to a thaw in the frosty relations between the two companies, as NBC shows have appeared on the U.K. version of the iTunes Store.
Original post by kdawson and software by Elliott Back
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