Apple spin-off Apperian is hosting private-label iOS app stores for Cisco, Procter & Gamble, Estee Lauder and others.
Smarter Technology reports: “Apple’s over-the-air protocol enables any enterprise to bypass iTunes and create its own private-label application store, with complete IT control of provisioning, with Apple spin-off Apperian Inc. providing the necessary cloud-based hosting services.”
Apperian was spun off with Apple’s blessing in 2009. One year later, Apple’s over-the-air protocol became available.
Apperian CEO David Patrick says the service will also be adding Android apps in the future.
Amazon may be selling a tablet computer as early as October, report people familiar with the matter.
The new tablet is expected to feature a 9-inch screen and run on Android’s operating system (but will reportedly not include a camera). An Amazon-designed second tablet may be available next year.
Amazon is still expected to introduce two new Kindles in the third quarter.
With its own online retail operation, Amazon is well positioned to compete with Apple. Moreover, one analyst says Amazon can offer a cheaper alternative and make up the difference with movie, music and book sales.
“Video Time Machine” is an entertaining and informative 99-cent iOS app from Original Victories, Inc. (compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad).
The app chronicles more than a century of compiled movies, commercials, TV broadcasts, and other moving images (the iTunes Preview description reads: “Watch over 10,000 hand-picked videos from 1860 to 2011”).
A simple interface enables users to select a year and then browse categories, including: news, games, sports clips, ads, movies, TV, and music.
For those more interested in entertainment surfing than a specific year or category, the app features a “random” button.
According to the Engadget post (which includes a video demo), all of the cataloged videos are available via YouTube, but the Video Time Machine “isn’t designed to simply mimic it; rather, the program’s meant to act more as a history lesson, giving us a unique opportunity to witness a slice of life.”
According to a recent Nielsen study, the average iPhone user commits twice the average amount of time to playing mobile games as compared to other mobile gamers, suggesting that iOS may have the most engaged gaming audience.
The study also indicates that 93 percent of app customers have paid for games in the last 30 days.
The average iPhone owner spent 14.7 hours playing games during the month, while the average Android owner spent 9.3 hours (the overall average for smartphone gamers is 7.8 hours/month).
The report explains that consumers are typically more willing to spend money on games than other types of apps.
Nielsen breaks down the leading categories of most popular apps for Q2 2011 in the following order: Games, Weather, Social Networking, Maps/Navigation/Search, Music, News, Entertainment, Banking/Finance, Video/Movies, Shopping/Retail, Dining/Restaurant, Sports.
Apple announced the 15 billionth app download this week. The App Store has been open three years.
There are some 425,000 apps and 100,000 iPad apps available to users in 90 countries.
Apple has paid more than $2.5 billion to app developers to date.
From the Apple press release: “Users of the more than 200 million iOS devices around the world can choose from an incredible range of apps in 20 categories, including games, business, news, education, sports, health, reference and travel.”
The legal debate continues regarding the divergent approaches to cloud-based music lockers proposed by Amazon, Google and Apple.
The 2008 Cablevision decision in the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals allowed for a remote DVR feature (when done at the direction of users and separate copies were stored for each user as would be done for an in-home DVR). The decision is the strongest legal case for a music locker service.
EMI’s current suit against MP3tunes.com will also impact the situation. EMI asserts that music locker services must remove material if they become “aware of facts or circumstances from which infringing activity is apparent.”
While Apple has signed agreements with the major labels, it has not yet done so with smaller labels.
According to Ars Technica: “Either Apple wasted millions of dollars on licenses it doesn’t need, or Amazon and Google are vulnerable to massive copyright lawsuits.”
Google and Amazon will assert their rights under DMCA Safe Harbor and the Cablevision case. In addition, they may have some protection under rights they have to sell music through their online stores.
Apple has joined Sony and Fox News in the growing list of companies experiencing recent security breaches.
In what appears to be a warning salvo, 27 user names and encrypted passwords from an Apple website were reportedly posted online over the weekend along with a warning of future attacks from hacker group Anonymous.
The hacker group posted a list of data supposedly taken from an Apple Business Intelligence website. Apple has not commented on this.
Anonymous hacker group, which linked to this leak in a Twitter post, threatens that Apple could be a target of its attacks.
Anonymous is running “antisec,” an operation that threatens government, law enforcement and corporations.
The annual iTunes Festival kicked off Friday in England, streaming select performances live in HD to iPads and iPhones for those who downloaded the free app.
The event is scheduled for 31 consecutive nights at the Roundhouse in London.
Paul Simon was the first artist to take the stage. Additional headliners include Coldplay, Linkin Park, My Chemical Romance, Foo Fighters, Jimmy Eat World, Moby and more.
Apple funds the event by recording the live sets and selling them exclusively on iTunes.
Wired suggests an alternative business model: “But it makes me wish more festival organizers would do this the other way around — free recordings of the gigs you paid to see at festivals. Or perhaps a handful of free tracks to choose from an entire festival’s lineup, with the complete collection put on sale. There’s no better live recording than one created during the night you attended.”
Google missed out on the $4.5 billion auction for Nortel’s patents, losing to a consortium made up of Apple, Microsoft, EMC, Ericsson, RIM, and Sony.
Google’s loss of the patent portfolio puts its Android platform at a disadvantage, and the company will not have access to over 6,000 patents covering a range of technologies.
It has been reported that Google may respond with a Restraint of Trade suit in an attempt to force the consortium to license some or all of the patents.
The consortium’s participants will likely take key patents for their own use. For example, Apple’s $2 billion may give it ownership of Nortel’s LTE (4G) patents.
In his new book, iPad in the Enterprise (available this August), Nathan Clevenger examines how the Apple iPad has started to transform the way enterprise IT departments are operating. Some interesting excerpts from the book are listed below.
“The day the iPad was introduced we had some discussions about adding them into our environment; 24 hours later, we had 500 devices accessing e-mails,” said Frank Modruson, the CIO of Accenture. “CIOs who resist will eventually be forced to change.”
“As we move forward into a world where cloud enabled networks are the norm,” says Art Glasgow, the CTO at Ingenix, “CIOs have to accept the fact that the world has changed. Any device at any time on the network will be the norm and it will have to be done without sacrificing security and manageability. Cool matters and usability rules the day so devices like the iPad have to be not just accounted for, but designed for. The good news is that devices like the iPad aren’t just cool. They are flexible, multifunction tools that are changing the way we work and create and in that sense may very well be not just an innovation themselves, but a catalyst to innovations.”
An open letter to Research In Motion senior management reportedly written by a “high-level RIM employee” gives a frank description of what’s wrong and makes startling recommendations.
The letter starts with: “I have lost confidence.”
It suggests there is a need to focus on the end user instead of strategic alignments, partner requests or legal advice.
It also recommends focusing on a few projects as Apple had to do when Jobs returned — and calls for a “new, fresh thinking, experienced CEO.”
Developers, not carriers will “make or break us.” Also, reach out and get input from the employees.
Apple may soon “amp up competition with Android” by offering its iPhone 3GS for $0 (with a qualifying service contract).
The iPhone 3GS was launched in the U.S. in June 2009.
RBC Capital Market analyst Mike Abramsky suggests the free phone will be made available the same time that Apple releases its successor to the iPhone 4, providing options for different demographics.
Abramsky also forecasts the free 3GS could “expand the iPhone’s worldwide marketshare from some 64 million users to more than 150 million users.”
Google’s Android is currently the top-selling smartphone platform in the U.S.
For the Galaxy Tab: higher display resolution (1280×800 vs. iPad’s 1024×768); more RAM; 9 ounces lighter and 0.01 inch thinner than the iPad; Adobe Flash playback capability; features new Plane to Line Switching (PLS) panel technology that enhances brightness, clarity and viewing angles; higher megapixel cameras and 1080p video capability.
However, Galaxy Tab’s thinness was achieved by excluding USB, HDMI and SD card slot.
For the iPad 2: better battery life than the Galaxy Tab (10 hours vs. 6 hours under similar conditions); better speaker sound, particularly at a higher volume; and perhaps most importantly, more than double the number of available apps (425,000 and growing).
The Galaxy Tab is powered by Honeycomb 3.1 OS: “And, no matter whichever way you look at it – slice it or dice it – Honeycomb lacks the finesse and elegance of iOS.”
Conclusion: “Galaxy Tab is the best Android tablet to be ever released. No doubt about that. But if you’ve made up your mind about getting iPad 2, don’t give it a second thought. The UI of iOS will not make you want to regret your decision.”
Edge Magazine speaks with Phil Harrison, former president of Sony Computer Entertainment’s Worldwide Studios, and recently appointed advisory board member of cloud-based streaming game service Gaikai.
Harrison answers questions on the future of gaming and suggests the following projections: Games will rely increasingly upon social networks; free-to-play will become the predominant business model in 20 years; local storage will disappear; music, film and television will be consumed like a utility and browsers will replace consoles (in the wake of a next-generation browser war).
On the future of non-physical media: “If you live in Korea, it’s already happened, if you live in China, it’s already happened. That’s an easy prediction to make: there is undoubtedly a generation of kids alive on the planet today who will never purchase a physical media package for any of their digital entertainment.”
On Apple’s impact on the market: “At this trajectory, if you extrapolate the market-share gains that they are making, forward for ten years – if they carry on unrestrained in their growth, then there’s a pretty good chance that Apple will be the games industry.”
