“I believe Apple’s brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it.”

That is what Steve Jobs said in his resignation letter from August, and now, despite his passing, we’re starting to understand why. Citing sources within Apple, the DailyMail says that Steve Jobs carefully planned out four years of new products for the company to release. They specifically cite new iPod, iPad, iPhone, and MacBooks, and while these items are highly anticipated, they aren’t terribly surprising.

So what should we really expect from Apple in the years to come? We can get an idea by looking at a recent piece by TechCrunch, citing an unnamed but “veteran” Silicon Valley CEO who says that Apple has 5% of it’s non-retail workforce devoted to chip design and architecture alone:

“Steve Jobs told me he has 1,000 engineers working on chips,” he said. “Getting low power and smaller is the key to everything.”

Why so many engineers on chip design? And how might low power and smaller chips translate into new products?

“form factor no longer becomes an issue,” explained the Silicon Valley CEO

Going further, TechCrunch quotes their own MG Siegler from a few months back, who was told by sources that future Apple products will “blow your mind”:

It’s the longer roadmap that should really be the grand finale in the Jobs’ fireworks show.

Talking to sources in recent months, there has been one common refrain: that the things Apple is working on right now are the best things the company has ever done. These are things that will “blow your mind”, I’ve been told.

All of this adds up to quite a teaser, and so the future of Apple very well may be Job’s final “One More Thing…”.

Apple has released iTunes 10.5 in preparation of iOS 5 and iCloud. The latest version is a major update that includes full iCloud support, in addition to the highly anticipated Wi-Fi syncing feature, which allows anyone to sync an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch with iTunes wirelessly as long as they’re on the same wifi network.

iTunes 10.5 is required for installing and using iOS 5.

Download iTunes 10.5

There are several ways to get the latest version of iTunes:

• Download iTunes 10.5 directly from Apple.com (Windows & Mac OS X)
• Check Software Update in Mac OS X
• Update directly within iTunes 10.4

If you choose to download through Apple, keep in mind that you don’t need to fill out an email address, and you can just click on the big blue “Download Now” button to get iTunes.

The release notes attached to Software Update are as follows:

What’s new in iTunes 10.5

• iTunes in the Cloud. iTunes now stores your music and TV purchases in iCloud and makes them available on your devices anywhere, any time, at no additional cost.

• Automatic Downloads. Purchase music from any device or computer and automatically download a copy to your Mac and iOS devices.

• Download Previous Purchases. Download your past music, TV, app, and book purchases again, at no additional cost. Previous purchases may be unavailable if they are no longer on the iTunes Store.

• Sync with your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch with iOS 5.

• Wi-Fi Syncing. Automatically sync your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch with iTunes any time they’re both on the same Wi-Fi network.

For information on the security content of this update, please visit: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1222.

Stay tuned, iOS 5, iCloud, and Mac OS X 10.7.2 are soon to follow.

If your Mac OS X desktop quickly turns into a cluttered mess of files and folders while you work, you’re not alone. The busier (or less organized) you are, the quicker this accumulates, until finally the Finder is so covered in files that you can barely see the wallpaper. Sometimes mine gets so full that I just hide the desktop icons so I can deal with them later, but that’s not necessarily the best solution.

This is where Clean steps in, the free app automatically moves files from your desktop to a specified location, which are then grouped by day or month. You can set it to run once a day or once a week, or you can force it to run at any time just by clicking the “Clean now” button.

Download Clean from the Mac App Store (free)

What if you have a really important file or folder sitting on your dekstop? Give it a Finder label and set Clean to ignore labels, it’ll stay there while the rest are swept away into your previously chosen destination. A great use case is to create an alias to the folder that you are sending all the desktop files to, and give that folder a label so it stays put, that way you can quickly access all your organized and tidied up files directly from the desktop.

Clean is a simple timesaving app that is a must have for anyone who fears desktop clutter, plus it’s free, highly recommended.

Ever wonder why the iPhone has a 3.5″ screen while the Android world is off pushing into greater and greater dimensions? Dustin Curtis theorizes that the reason iPhone continues to have a 3.5″ screen is so that nearly everyone can use the phone one-handed, because their thumbs reach nearly everywhere on the screen without trouble. Curtis put together the graphic shown above to demonstrate this, comparing thumb accessibility on an iPhone with its 3.5″ screen vs a Galaxy S II with a 4.2″ display, which he complains is too large. As demonstrated, large portions of the Android screen are inaccessible one-handed by his thumbs, and presumably for many other individuals as well.

Touching the upper right corner of the screen on the Galaxy S II using one hand, with its 4.27-inch screen, while you’re walking down the street looking at Google Maps, is extremely difficult and frustrating. I pulled out my iPhone 4 to do a quick test, and it turns out that when you hold the iPhone in your left hand and articulate your thumb, you can reach almost exactly to the other side of the screen. This means it’s easy to touch any area of the screen while holding the phone in one hand, with your thumb. It is almost impossible to do this on the Galaxy S II.

Furthermore, John Gruber of DaringFireball suggests that Apple could have chose a 4″ screen a long time ago, but decided on the 3.5″ display sometime in 2006:

Bigger is not necessarily better. Apple decided on the optimal size for an iPhone display back in 2006. If they thought 4-inches was better, overall, as the one true size for the iPhone display, then the original iPhone would have had a 4-inch display.

These are interesting thoughts to consider, but personally I’d be surprised if Apple never went to a larger display on the iPhone. I think a 4″ screen would be more than usable by nearly everyone, assuming the devices border was thin enough to easily reach beyond the border (remember the edge-to-edge screened iPhone rumors?).

Steve Jobs death certificate has revealed the official cause of death to be respiratory arrest, with “metastatic pancreas neuroendocrine tumor” as the underlying cause. The certificate, as mentioned by Bloomberg, also notes that the death occurred five years after the onset of the tumor, which suggests that Jobs had a recurrence of cancer sometime in 2006.

Mr Jobs was initially diagnosed with a rare form of pancreatic cancer in 2003, which was followed in 2004 by a surgery to remove the tumor. Initially thought to be a successful surgery, in 2009, Steve Jobs then underwent a liver transplant for unspecified reasons. Jobs took his final medical leave in January of 2011, before resigning as CEO of Apple in August, and passing away at about 3:00pm on October 5, 2011.

The death certificate listed his occupation as “entrepreneur”, and also notes that Steve Jobs died in his Palo Alto, California home. He was buried at an unspecified non-denominational cemetary in California’s Santa Clara county on October 7 at a private funeral.

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The wait is over, Facebook has released their much anticipated iPad app onto the iOS App Store and it is now available to download from Apple. The app is full featured but seems to focus on photo sharing and the ability to play existing Facebook games directly within the application through HTML5. Facebook emphasizes the following points on the iPad apps page:

Enjoy bigger, better photos
Your photos take on new life on the iPad. They’re big, high-res and easy to flip through—like a real photo album.

Focus on what matters
With less on the screen, it’s easier to zoom in on your friends’ photos, updates and stories.

Navigate anywhere, fast
Just tap, slide or pinch to get from one screen to another and back again in no time.

Never lose your place
Use simplified navigation to send a message, see your notifications or browse your bookmarks without switching screens.

Play games on the go
Play your favorite Facebook games wherever you are, and on a bigger screen.

Tap to send messages
A simple dropdown menu makes it easy to scan and send messages without visiting your inbox.

Apparently Americans spend 16% of their total online time using Facebooks web site and mobile applications, so this is a fairly significant app release.

Grab it from the App Store here as a + version or check out Facebooks page

Read more »

Want to add some additional eyecandy to Mac OS X Lion‘s Launchpad feature? Open Launchpad and hit Command+M to enable a motion blur that is seen at various Launchpad events.

You can immediately see the effect by swiping between Launchpad screens or by using the Command+Arrow keys to navigate around. The motion blur also effects opening folders in Launchpad, as the folders spring open the icons will blur as they zoom down:

(Yes that is a custom Launchpad folder background)

Screenshots only do the motion blur effect so much justice and it’s best experienced directly. If you want to disable the blur, just hit Command+M again and you’ll be back to the default setting.

The blur effect was seen in the very first introduction to Mac OS X Lion last year at the “Back to the Mac” event, but for whatever reason Apple decided against enabling it by default in the shipping version of OS X 10.7. I have noticed that if OS X is running low on memory or if CPU use is heavy, the blur can be somewhat choppy, which may go to explain why it’s not a default setting.

Enjoy this? Check out some more Launchpad tricks while you’re at it.

Demand for the iPhone 4S has been explosive, and the next gen phone has sold over 1 million units in the first 24 hours of pre-sales, according to Apple. This smashes the previous 24-hour record of 600,000 units set by iPhone 4 last year, making the iPhone 4S the most successful product launch in Apple’s history.

CUPERTINO, California—October 10, 2011—Apple® today announced pre-orders of its iPhone® 4S have topped one million in a single day, surpassing the previous single day pre-order record of 600,000 held by iPhone 4. iPhone 4S is the most amazing iPhone yet, packed with incredible new features including Apple’s dual-core A5 chip for blazing fast performance and stunning graphics; an all new camera with advanced optics; full 1080p HD resolution video recording; and Siri™, an intelligent assistant that helps you get things done just by asking.

“We are blown away with the incredible customer response to iPhone 4S,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “The first day pre-orders for iPhone 4S have been the most for any new product that Apple has ever launched and we are thrilled that customers love iPhone 4S as much as we do.”

The remainder of the press release covers iPhone 4S pricing and availability information and can be read on Apple.com.

There were early indicators last week that the 4S would be a massive hit, when the initial pre-orders quickly sold out, which in turn pushed delivery time back a few weeks for any new orders. As of this moment, the delivery schedule for new orders remains at 1-2 weeks across all carriers, but if you want to get your hands on a 4S right away you may have to wait in line at an Apple Store this Friday.

Charlie Rose has spent the latter half of this week with segments and interviews devoted to Steve Jobs. The video above features discussions with former Google CEO and current Google Chairman Eric Schmidt, Wall Street Journal reporter and friend of Jobs, Walt Mossberg, and Marc Andreessen, a venture capitalist and the creator of the Mosaic web browser and Netscape.

The video is slightly under an hour and well worth watching for anyone interested in Steve Jobs and his legacy. This is the third episode of Charlie Rose in recent days to be devoted to Jobs, the first was a re-airing of a 1996 interview with Jobs about Pixar and the film Toy Story, and the second featured Steve Wozniak and Bob Iger – that video is yet to be posted online.

Update: Video has been moved below to prevent auto-playing on the home page, our apologies.

Read more »

Sony Pictures Entertainment has bought the rights to make a movie on Steve Jobs life, based on the upcoming biography by Walter Isaacson. While this was initially a rumor, the New York Times has since confirmed the news:

The studio late this week concluded a deal to buy film rights to the authorized biography “Steve Jobs,” from Walter Isaacson, according to a person who was briefed on the deal and spoke on the condition of anonymity because the studio had not authorized a public statement.

Isaacson has been reportedly paid $1 million in advance for the rights, and another $2 million will go his way if and when the movie is produced. There is no word yet on a filming or release schedule.

It’s hard to anticipate the style of film, but Sony Pictures Entertainment is the same movie studio that produced The Social Network, the dramatic and darkly intriguing film about Mark Zuckerberg and the founding of Facebook that garnered critical acclaim and won several Oscars.

Interested in Apple history? You should download Guy Kawasaki’s book “The Macintosh Way”, which he just made available for free as a PDF right here. Guy Kawasaki worked at Apple from 1983 to 1987 and was one of the employees charged with marketing the Macintosh at its introduction in 1984.

Adding even more Apple history to the book, the Foreword is written by former Apple executive Jean-Louis Gassée:

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Anyone who’s a fan of Portal should appreciate this mockup video, which features the voice of the malevolent AI system from the game series, GLaDOS, replacing the default voice of Apple’s new Siri assistant. So nerdy, but so cool, it’d be great if this actually came to fruition, but don’t get your hopes up.

Siri is exclusive to iPhone 4S with iOS 5, although there is some speculation that the voice assistant feature will come to iPad 2 in the near future as well.

Original Siri video from Apple is shown below:
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If you’re a fan of the most portable aspects of Apples lineup, you’ll like this setup. Two white iPad 2 3G models at 64GB, a 2009 MacBook Air 13″, a 2010 MacBook Air 13″, and a first-gen iPad WiFi model with 64GB make up this great collection of Apple gear.

Thanks for sending this in Emir!

Apple looks to have another hit on it’s hands with the iPhone 4S. Pre-orders of the device have already sold out by shipment on the release date of October 14th, and now Apple and all US carriers are giving a 1-2 week shipping delay for the next-gen iPhone. In fact, AT&T has already proclaimed the 4S as their “most successful iPhone launch”, having sold over 200,000 pre-orders in the first 12 hours alone.

With the device already sold out, this likely means that if you were hoping to get your hands on the iPhone 4S on launch day, you’ll probably have to wait in line at an Apple Store.

The rapid sell out is sure to impact iPhone 4S availability both in the US and abroad, although there is speculation that because Apple maintained the iPhone 4 form factor, they’ll be able to catch up to demand quicker. Nonetheless, with Fortune estimating over 500,000 pre-orders before Apple ran out, the shipping time for new orders placed online are likely to increase even further as sales continue to accumulate.

It’s been a week where some humor is much needed, so the guys who put together the ridiculous and so-called ‘banned’ promo videos for various Apple products pulled through with a drunken rendition for the iPhone 4S. It’s got some inappropriate language so it may not be the best thing to blast on your work speakers.

If you are a fan of Mac tips and tricks and customizing OS X, you absolutely have to get TinkerTool for Lion.

TinkerTool is broken into 12 main sections covering Finder, Dock, General, Desktop, Applications, Fonts, Font Smoothing, Login Items, Safari, iTunes, QuickTime X, and Resume (OS X Lion’s Restore feature), each section has a handful of options ranging from UI tweaks to behavioral changes. The other great thing is that you can always return to the default state and undo all the changes you make, meaning there’s no threat of accidentally screwing something up.

A free download, the new version is updated with a ton of OS X Lion specific tweaks and customizations, adding to it’s already robust abilities. It covers tons of things we’ve discussed here in the past, and everything is enabled through the apps simple GUI by just clicking on checkboxes. No defaults write commands, no digging around in /System/Library/CoreServices/, it’s by far the easiest way to access many of the hidden features of Mac OS X.

• Download TinkerTool from the Developer for free here

If there’s only one app you get for customizing OS X, TinkerTool should be it.

Soon you will be able to run Android apps directly on the iPad, with the help of a third party tool called Alien Dalvik. The technology works by packaging each Android application into it’s own virtual machine that runs atop iOS, giving the appearance of the app running natively on the iPad. Performance is claimed to be impressive enough for the end user to not notice much of a difference, and a live demo will be shown next week at a conference by the creators of Alien Dalvik, the Myriad Group.

Read more »

Apple has announced that unlocked iPhone 4S models will be available starting in November, slightly later than the general 4S availability for both the US and other countries. These phones will work on any GSM carrier worldwide, you simply need to pop in a local GSM providers micro-SIM card and follow the onscreen activation instructions. The dependence on SIM cards does mean that the unlocked iPhone 4S will not work on CDMA carriers, however.

Unlocked iPhones are ideal for users who travel internationally on a regular basis and need to be able to utilize local carriers, this offers a significantly cheaper option than paying the roaming overage charges through a home carrier like AT&T. Unlocked phones also provide a pre-paid option, allowing you to use GoPhone, T-Mobile, or other pre-paid GSM choices.

The downside to an unlocked device is the costs. The price of the iPhone 4S contract-free is quite a bit higher than the subsidized price through a carrier, with the 16GB model starting at $649, the 32GB model costing $749, and the 64GB model coming in at $849.