Back in mid-April, Apple updated its developer agreement for iPhone OS (now known as iOS) to ban analytics companies from gathering data from iOS devices being used on their ad networks. The result of the change initially appeared to be a crippling of third-party networks in favor of the company’s own iAds platform, as advertisers rely heavily on analytics to assist them in their advertising efforts.
As last week’s interview at the D8 conference, Apple CEO Steve Jobs forcefully noted that the change was sparked by analytics company Flurry’s publication of data showing devices in use on the Apple campus. Jobs was apparently referring to was January report from Flurry showing approximately 50 tablet-style iPhone devices being used at Apple. Acknowledging the value of analytics data for a number legitimate uses, however, Jobs said that Apple would be willing to revisit the topic of data collection with those companies once Apple had cooled down over the issue, “but it’s not today.”
MediaMemo now reports that Apple’s has again modified the relevant portion of its developer agreement, Section 3.3.9, to at least partially open the door to limited data collection for analytics purposes.
If you compare and contrast with Apple’s earlier version, you’ll see the message is clear: It’s OK to collect user data to help sell ads — though you will need to get their permission to do so.
There is a catch, however, as Apple’s new wording requires that any analytics company receiving data be an “independent advertising service provider whose primary business is serving mobile ads (for example, an advertising service provider owned by or affiliated with a developer or distributor of mobile devices, mobile operating systems or development environments other than Apple would not qualify as independent)”.
The “independent” qualifier would would seem to prohibit AdMob from receiving such analytics data due to its status as a subsidiary of Google, which is clearly a developer of mobile operating systems. Smaller competitors such as Greystripe and Medialets, however, should be free to obtain analytics data upon receiving appropriate permission.

Apple has posted the QuickTime stream for Monday’s keynote address for WWDC 2010.

The keynote has also been added to Apple’s podcast feed.

Apple announced a number of items including:
- Apple’s iAds Going Live on July 1
- iBooks Update to Include Notes, PDF Compatibility
- iPhone OS 4 Becomes iOS 4, Available June 21 for Free
- Apple Announces iMovie for iPhone 4
- Apple Announces FaceTime for iPhone 4 Video Calls
- Apple Announces iPhone 4 with Retina Display, HD Video Recording

Calling it the “biggest leap since the original iPhone,” Apple chief exec Steve Jobs proudly unveiled the widely expected iPhone 4, which indeed looks pretty much like the lost iPhone prototype that Gizmodo got its hands on a couple of months ago.
“I don’t know if you’ve ever seen this,” Jobs joked, provoking a roar of laughter from the audience as he showed off the now-familiar redesign of the new iPhone, complete with a front-facing camera (good for video chat via the new “FaceTime” feature), the new rear camera with LED flash (yes!), and a 9.3mm profile that makes the new iPhone “the thinnest smartphone on the planet,” Jobs bragged.
The flat, stainless-steel-rimmed iPhone 4 — and yes, that’s the official name — will be available in black or white, and it’ll go on sale June 24, Jobs said. Expect to pay $299 for the 32GB version (same price as last year’s 32GB iPhone 3GS, provided you sign a two-year AT&T contract), or $199 for the 16GB model. Also: The iPhone 3G is being discontinued, and the old iPhone 3GS will now sell for $99. (Nope, no discussion of an iPhone for Verizon or any other carriers.)
Among the new (and mostly expected) features for iPhone 4: a revamped, higher-resolution (960 by 640) display, now boasting 326 pixels an inch (or 78 percent of the pixels on the iPad) — good for “really, really sharp text” that’s virtually indistinguishable from “text in a fine printed book,” Jobs claimed. The new 3.5-inch screen (same size as before, by the way) even gets its own new name: a “retina display.”
Very catchy, but Jobs ran into a little hiccup during his demo when Web pages on the spiffy new iPhone 4 refused to load. An error pop-up that read “could not activate cellular network” provoked a knowing titter from the audience. Jobs asked audience members to turn off their Wi-Fi and even fished for suggestions, prompting one smart aleck to shout out, “Verizon!” Ouch. (Later during the keynote, Jobs even asked bloggers in the audience to turn off their mobile Wi-Fi hotspots … a request greeted by a chorus of boos.)
After a few minutes, Jobs’ demo was back on track, with the chief exec noting that the iPhone 4 runs on Apple’s new custom-made “system-on-a-chip,” the A4 processor that powers the iPad.
Jobs also promised more battery life thanks to the iPhone 4’s bigger battery and improved power management on the A4 chip — to the tune of seven hours of talk over a 3G network, six hours of 3G Web browsing, 10 hours of video, or 40 hours of music. (That’s Jobs’ claim, of course; the proof is in the pudding, after we run some field tests.)
Also new on the iPhone 4: a three-axis gyroscope, which combined with the existing digital compass and GPS sensor should make for better tracking of the exact direction in which the iPhone is pointing — handy for games or finding your way in a confusing neighborhood with Google Maps.
Meanwhile, the iPhone 4’s camera gets an upgrade to 5 megapixels (up from 3MP on the iPhone 3GS), a 5X digital zoom, and (at last) an LED flash. Another cool new feature: HD video recording, or 720p-quality video at 30 frames per second, to be precise, same as on the new HTC Evo 4G for Sprint (which, with its 8MP camera, still has the upper hand in terms of resolution). Even better, you’ll be able to edit your videos directly on the iPhone, with a little help from the new iMovie for iPhone app (available now for $4.99).
‘FaceTime’ video chat
The big reveal in terms of the iPhone 4’s camera (the “One more thing … ” at the keynote, incidentally), was FaceTime — two-way video chat, a feature that pretty much everyone in the blogosphere had predicted thanks to the front-facing camera on the lost iPhone prototype.
FaceTime gives you a full-screen view of the person you’re chatting with, as well as your own video image in a smaller, inset window. Nifty, but FaceTime will work only over Wi-Fi, “in 2010,” Jobs said, and only from one iPhone 4 handset to another. When will FaceTime work over 3G, you ask? No word on that, beyond the fact that it won’t happen this year.
More iPhone OS details
We already got the biggest news about the latest version of the iPhone OS — support for multitasking — back in April, but Jobs filled in some of the blanks Monday, announcing support for searching via Bing on mobile Safari (in addition to the existing Google and Yahoo! options), as well as talking up the new OS’s enterprise and security features. Oh, and iPhone OS 4.0 now has a new name: iOS 4.0. It’ll be available for download in two weeks, on June 21
Jobs also spent some time on iAds, Apple’s new mobile advertising platform, including a demo of an ad from Nissan that lets you spin around the automaker’s upcoming electric car with the swipe of a finger. The first iAd advertisement should start popping up on the iPhone starting in July, Jobs said, with Apple hoping to rake in a cool $60 million in ad revenue during the second half of 2010.
Netflix, Guitar Hero, iBooks apps
We’ve had Netflix for the iPad for more than two months now, but when will the killer app arrive for the iPhone? The answer: this summer.
Netflix CEO Reed Hastings showed off the new Netflix for iPhone app (which Netflix reps had hinted at shortly after the release of Netflix for iPad) during Steve Jobs’ WWDC keynote Monday, and it looks pretty much like a smaller, iPhone-sized version of the current Netflix for iPad app.
Features include full-length streaming of movies and TV shows directly on the iPhone, as well the ability to pause and pick up videos where you left off, either on the iPhone itself or on your other Netflix-enabled devices, such as PC, a Mac, a game console, or (of course) the iPad.
You’ll also be able to rate and search for videos, as well as manage and add titles to your “instant” queue. Nice, but will Netflix for iPhone work over 3G networks, or only via Wi-Fi? Guess we’ll find out later this summer.
Meanwhile, we’ll also be getting an official Guitar Hero game for the iPhone, complete with classic songs from Queen and the Rolling Stones. Poised to compete with two other popular iPhone-ized rhythm games — Tap Tap Revenge and Rock Band — the new Guitar Hero app boasts a new “strumming mechanic” developed specifically for the iPhone version of the game, according to an Activision exec at the keynote.

The graphics on the game itself (available today in the App Store) look pretty sweet, at least from what we’ve seen during the brief demo, and the price tag — $2.99 — is also hard to beat.

Finally, Jobs showed off an app we’d already seen back in April: iBooks for the iPhone, complete with the same features as on the iPad version of Apple’s e-reader app (including note-taking, highlighting, in-app book purchasing, and the ability to tweak font sizes and background colors).

The wait is almost over. Come Monday’s keynote at Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference, odds are we’ll get a look — perhaps not the first, after all those crazy leaks — of the next iPhone, complete (supposedly) with a new, flatter shell, dual cameras, and a higher-resolution display. But what else will Steve Jobs pull out of his bag of tricks?
Fourth-generation iPhone
Barring a jaw-dropping surprise from Apple, we’ve probably already seen the new iPhone, thanks in part to a hapless Apple engineer who lost a prototype (or had it stolen from his backpack, depending on whom you believe) a couple of months ago. Gizmodo paid a $5,000 finder’s fee to publish detailed photos and videos of the handset in a series of blog posts. Additional snapshots from another purported leaked iPhone later surfaced in Vietnam.
The handset they documented would represent the most radical change in the iPhone’s form factor since the original iPhone debuted in 2007. The curved back of the iPhone 3GS would be replaced with a smooth, flat ceramic shell, complete with flat aluminum edges and buttons.
Also new, according to the bloggers who poked and prodded the prototypes: a revamped, higher-resolution display (960 by 640, to be exact, or twice the resolution of the original iPhone), dual cameras (one in back with a flash, the other in front, apparently for video chat), a version of Apple’s new A4 processor (the same one that powers the iPad), and a larger battery. The phone is also thinner than the iPhone 3GS, but slightly heavier than the current 4.8-ounce model, the bloggers said.
That’s what we (think we) know. What we don’t yet know is how much the new iPhone will cost or what storage capacities will be available. The 32GB iPhone 3GS goes for $299 with a new, two-year AT&T contract; the 16GB version sells for $199 with service. Will Apple stick to $299 as the upper end of its price range, and will it double the capacity of the priciest iPhone (to 64GB, in this case) as it has in years past? Will the current $99 8GB iPhone 3G be phased out? We’ll have to wait and see.
Other question marks: the exact resolution of the new camera(s); whether and how AT&T will support video chat, assuming the front-facing camera is the real McCoy; whether the iPhone is coming to other carriers, namely Verizon (maybe eventually, but probably not Monday); the precise day when the next iPhone goes on sale; and what the new iPhone will end up being called. (The iPhone HD? 4G? Something else?)
iPhone OS 4.0
The most dramatic change coming to the iPhone has, in fact, already been announced: multitasking for third-party apps, which will arrive as a feature in the latest version of the iPhone operating system. Also coming in iPhone OS 4.0: a universal e-mail inbox, home-screen folders, a social-gaming network, and support for Apple’s new iAd mobile advertising platform. Of course, we already got most of those details during an Apple presentation in April; hopefully, we’ll get an exact release date at Monday’s keynote.
iTunes in the cloud?
Here’s where we start wandering deeper into rumorville, with speculation that Apple might launch an “in the cloud” version of iTunes because of its acquisition of Lala earlier this year. Sounds like a good idea — and an inevitable one — but All Things Digital’s Peter Kafka thinks such an “iTunes.com” service is still a long way off, pending “negotiations with the [music] labels.”
Revamped $99 Apple TV?
One of the hotter rumors last week had it that Apple was primed and ready to get serious with its Apple TV “hobby,” staring with a new, compact Apple TV device with a minimal amount of flash storage and powered by the iPhone OS — and best of all, it would cost just $99. It’s a nifty idea, especially if it meant streaming movies and TV shows from iTunes rather than having to store them on your Mac’s hard drive. It would also be a logical move in response to the upcoming Google TV. But Jobs poured cold water on the rumor this past Tuesday, telling conference-goers at D8 that “nobody’s willing to buy a set-top box” because they’re used to getting cable/satellite set-top boxes for free. A new, cheaper Apple TV still might happen, but the conventional wisdom is that it won’t arrive Monday.
Free MobileMe?
MobileMe — a service that syncs contacts, calendar events and an in-the-cloud “iDisk” among Macs, iPhones, iPod Touches and iPads — launched back in 2008 and landed with a thud after early adopters found themselves locked out of their Apple mail, unable to log into the MobileMe Web interface, and stuck with calendars and contact books that were hopelessly out of sync — oh, and the $99-a-year subscription fee didn’t help.
Steve Jobs ended up apologizing for the snafus, and Apple eventually managed to iron out the kinks (indeed, as a MobileMe subscriber myself, I can attest that the service is running more or less smoothly now), but MobileMe’s image never really recovered from its early black eye. Nixing the $99 annual fee would be a great incentive for users to give MobileMe a second chance, however, and rumor is that such a move could be announced Monday.
One more thing …
Steve Jobs promised last month that despite all the leaks, we “won’t be disappointed” by Monday’s WWDC announcements. Is another dramatic “one more thing” on the agenda? Maybe the long-awaited (if long-shot) Verizon iPhone, that new Apple TV I just mentioned, an iPod Touch with a camera, or something else out of left field?

Yesterday at the D8 conference in Los Angeles, Steve Jobs laid out his vision of what’s to come. While Apple’s CEO went in-depth on a plethora of interesting subjects (e.g. Adobe Flash, the lost iPhone, iAds), he spent much of the stage time talking about the future of computing, specifically the PC.
Kara Swisher and Walt Mossberg of AllThingsD asked Jobs whether the tablet is going to replace the laptop. Jobs’s response was an analogy:
“When we were an agrarian nation, all cars were trucks. But as people moved more towards urban centers, people started to get into cars. I think PCs are going to be like trucks. Less people will need them. And this is going to make some people uneasy.”
That short exchange says a lot about the direction Apple could take computing over the next decade. Apple still sells the Mac and the Macbook, and while the term “PC” is now synonymous with Windows machines, the meaning of PC — personal computer — can also apply to the Mac and Macbook.
Was Apple’s CEO referring to not only Windows PCs, but Macs as well? It’s tough to say for certain, but I think it’s very likely. Jobs clearly thinks PCs are on the way out, in favor of the more portable, less complex tablet and mobile form factors. His iPad has already validated the market for tablets, and we expect many more tablets to enter the market over the next few years.
Apple lost the PC market to Microsoft years ago. If Jobs has his way though, that won’t matter — the market will shift towards mobile computing devices like the iPhone and the iPad, both of which Apple has complete control over. The tech titan doesn’t have full control over the Mac OS or its desktop, which must be frustrating to a man who relishes control.
Will the tablet replace the PC? Not in the next decade, at least. Hell, the Windows XP operating system is still the world’s most popular OS. It takes time for disruptive technologies to take hold.
For now, the tablet will be a complementary device to the PC. The PC has had far more time to be fleshed out and performs countless tasks faster and better than the iPad or any other tablet device on the market. In a decade though, we may be singing a different tune.

Sales of Apple’s tablet are on pace to surpass even the most optimistic predictions put out before its launch.
Even the most die-hard Apple fans need to admit the company’s sales of the iPad are somewhat surprising. It took the company four weeks to sell one million units, and another four weeks to sell an additional million.
This torrid pace would put it on par to possibly surpass even the rosiest predictions put out by analysts before the device’s launch in April of this year. It now puts into doubt whether Apple will really need to make adjustments to the price of the device, which it had said it would be willing to do in order to ensure the device meets its sales goals.
If it’s selling well now and hard to keep in stock, why make less of a profit now? May not be great for us consumers, but it is surely good for Apple’s investors.
Apple’s iPad successes make the current tiff between Microsoft and Google somewhat amusing. For those that missed it, Microsoft’s Steve Guggenheimer told the Wall Street Journal that manufacturer’s current apparent preference for Android on tablets was nothing more than a red herring, and that the company would lead the market overall in due time.
Kind of funny for two companies squabbling over products which for the most part haven’t even shipped yet, no? On top of that, I’d argue that Microsoft should be worrying about surpassing Apple in the space, not Google.
I am definitely interested to see how Apple does once Microsoft and Google have their own tablet devices on the market and in front of the customer. I believe that the iPad’s success has a lot to do with the popularity of the iPhone-a “halo effect” of a different kind if you will-and the device really does not have any competition at this point.
With alternatives on the market, and quite possibly at a lower price, will Apple’s name be enough to carry the day? I guess we’ll be finding out.

Computerworld — Wal-Mart (WMT) today dropped the price of Apple’s (AAPL) 16GB iPhone 3GS by $100 to $97, according to the retailer’s Web site.
Multiple reports, including from the Associated Press and the Wall Street Journal , had said that the giant retailer’s new price would go into effect Tuesday and run indefinitely. As with all iPhones, customers buying the lower-priced 3GS must commit to a two-year contract with AT&T.
iPhone OS 4.0: Ten Pressing Questions
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Wal-Mart’s Web site listed the new price on the site at 6 a.m. Eastern time today. At 2 a.m. EDT Tuesday, the site had still posted the 16GB iPhone 3GS at $197, a $2 savings over Apple’s and AT&T’s $199.
Wal-Mart was not available for comment late Monday.
The move will likely be seen as the best evidence yet that Apple CEO Steve Jobs will unveil the next iPhone June 7, the opening day of the company’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC).
It’s unknown when Apple would start selling the next-generation iPhone. However, if it sticks to last year’s timetable, Apple will launch its newest iPhone Friday, June 18.
Although Wal-Mart’s timing may be unexpected, the price cut is not: When Apple introduced the iPhone 3GS in early June 2009, it immediately slashed the price of the previous model, the entry-level 8GB iPhone 3G, to $99. Apple and AT&T continue to sell the iPhone 3G at that price.
Most analysts expect that Apple will repeat the move this year: When it unveils the new smartphone, Apple will drop the price of the iPhone 3GS to $99. If so, Wal-Mart would retain its current $2 price advantage over Apple and AT&T.
Rumors that bolstered that speculation hit several Apple and technology blogs earlier Monday. The Boy Genius Report , for example, claimed that its sources said Apple had stopped shipping the 8GB iPhone 3G to AT&T stores, and that further production orders for the 2008-era smartphone would not be placed.
The disappearance of the iPhone 3G makes sense, not only because it makes way for a cut-rate iPhone 3GS, but also because the older model is not able to multitask , the flashiest new feature in iPhone OS 4, the mobile operating system upgrade that Apple previewed last March and promised to release this summer.

Apple Inc shot past Microsoft Corp as the world’s biggest tech company based on market value on Wednesday, the latest milestone in the resurgence of the maker of the iPhone, which nearly went out of business in the 1990s.
Apple’s shares rose as much 2.8 percent on Nasdaq on Wednesday, as Microsoft shares floundered, briefly pushing its market value above $229 billion, ahead of its longtime rival.
Both stocks ended down after a late-day sell-off, but Apple emerged ahead with a market value of about $222 billion, compared with Microsoft’s $219 billion, according to Reuters data.
Apple shares closed down 0.4 percent at $244.11 on Nasdaq, while Microsoft fell 4 percent to a seven-month low of $25.01.
Shares of Apple are worth more than 10 times what they were 10 years ago, as it has profited from revolutionizing consumer electronics with its stylish, easy to use products such as the iPod, iPhone and MacBook laptops.
The last time Apple had a higher market value than Microsoft was December 19, 1989, according to Thomson Reuters Datastream.
Microsoft, whose operating system runs on more than 90 percent of the world’s personal computers, has not been able to match growth rates from its hey-day 1990s. Its stock is down 20 percent from 10 years ago.
Apple, which struggled for many years to get its products into the mainstream, resorted to a $150 million investment from the much larger Microsoft in 1997 in order to keep it afloat. At that time, Microsoft’s market value was more than five times that of Apple.
Microsoft still leads Apple in sales. In the latest quarter, Microsoft reported $14.5 billion in revenue compared with Apple’s $13.5 billion.
Cupertino, California-based Apple is now the second-largest company on the Standard & Poor’s 500 index by market value, behind energy behemoth Exxon Mobil Corp.

A new survey shows consumers are “overwhelmingly leaning” toward the iPad instead of netbooks, and cheap laptops are also taking a toll on netbook sales. The study, which surveyed more than 1,000 U.S. consumers, was commissioned by consumer electronics site Retrevo.
Apple’s iPad has proven popular with shoppers, as more than one million devices have already been sold. That popularity is hurting netbook sales, says the survey, as the iPad offers many of the same advantages that netbooks offer over a traditional laptop, such as higher portability and longer battery life.
The Retrevo survey asked consumers whether they are planning on buying an iPad or a netbook: 78 percent said they would be choosing an iPad, while only 22 percent would choose a netbook.
Respondents were asked whether they held off on buying a netbook after Apple CEO Steve Jobs unveiled the iPad in January. 30 percent answered that they did, and consequently bought an iPad, while 40 percent did hold back but eventually bought a netbook instead. 30 percent of respondents said they did not hold back and just bought a netbook.
Regular laptops are still popular with U.S. consumers, the survey shows, especially the cheap lower-end models. 65 percent said they would go for a laptop instead of a netbook when faced with the choice this year.
Those who preferred netbooks over laptops or iPads said that the main feature that attracted them to a netbook was the smaller footprint of the machines (55 percent), while 20 percent considered price, and 19 percent considered battery life as the main trait.
Analysts say however, that the iPad won’t cripple sales of netbooks, at least not this year, mainly because the $200 or so gap in pricing between the two types of devices. Jeff Orr, an analyst with ABI Research, reportedly said earlier this month that just one percent of potential netbook buyers would be impacted by tablets, like the iPad.

Google just announced that it bought Simplify Media, a startup that offers software that lets you share your iTunes music across platforms, including the web.
The software lets you share your photos and music using programs like iTunes, iPhoto and Windows Media player. According to the startup’s site Simplify Media “connects people directly with their content, without the hassles of synching or uploading all their files. Simplify users can also share their personal media with family and close friends in a private, secure group.”
It appears that that deal may have taken place in March, when the company announced a “new direction” on its blog, discontinuing its software to users and removing its iPhone app from Apple’s App store.
Google VP Vic Gundotra said that Simplify’s technology will be used to offer a desktop app that will give you access to all of your (DRM-free) media on your Android devices remotely, using Google’s new iTunes competitor on the web.