Apple News

Analyst: There’s a market of four to five million iPhones a year in China

January 30th, 2010 at 02:30am Under Hot Apple News+ Iphone

Filed under: Apple Financial, Apple, iPhone

I thought Apple sounded a tad bit defensive about China on the conference call Monday, but Morgan Stanley analyst Katy Huberty says there’s nothing to worry about: she expects Apple to sell up to four or five million iPhones in China per year. Apple told us on Monday that they’ve activated about 200,000 iPhones in China so far, but Huberty claims that there’s a market for maybe 50 million iPhones over there, and echoes Tim Cook’s assertion that price is the main issue. “Hardware pricing, service plan pricing and the large up-front payment,” she says in her report, “were cited by 85%, 66% and 56% of respondents respectively, as reasons they were not likely to purchase an iPhone.”

Keep in mind that the four to five million figure is a top end — in the first year, Apple has said that they’re aiming for more like one or two million. But there is definitely a solid market to be found in China, and significant sales there could help buoy Apple earnings reports over here for sure.

TUAWAnalyst: There’s a market of four to five million iPhones a year in China originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 29 Jan 2010 19:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ski resorts busted by iPhone app

January 13th, 2010 at 01:00am Under Hot Apple News+ Iphone

Filed under: Software, Odds and ends, iPhone, App Store

Want to see past a ski resort’s lies? There’s an app for that. The iPhone’s ability to track snowfall at ski resorts has been well publicized (it even showed up in an official Apple commercial), but apparently there’s been an unintended consequence: ski resorts are actually losing money. The UK’s Globe and Mail reports that before iPhones existed, people would just call up to the slopes to ask them if there was snow on the trails — and the ski resorts would more often than not reply that there was, in order to pull in some more weekend customers. It was usually just white lies (no pun intended) — they’d usually say there was about 20% more snow than actually existed. But now that the iPhone provides a much more objective look at exactly how much powder there is up there, resorts are finding that they can’t push that weekend boost any more. And that’s cutting into their yearly profits as a whole.

Now, you may argue that resorts being held accountable is a good thing, and according to the article, most of the resorts themselves would agree with you: they weren’t in it to outright lie to people, because telling people that there was a foot on the ground when you can see grass would have an even worse effect on their business. But hearing from someone on the phone that the slopes are plentiful is a much different experience than seeing a number in an iPhone app, and it’s interesting that the difference is directly affecting resort profits in many cases.

Not that resorts have too much to worry about, especially the ones who have plenty of snow anyway. It just shows you how much the iPhone is still changing all kinds of industries in strange ways.

TUAWSki resorts busted by iPhone app originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Tue, 12 Jan 2010 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Apple seizes 16 domain names from squatter

January 9th, 2010 at 12:00am Under Hot Apple News

Filed under: Internet, Apple

Apple dropped the hammer on a domain squatter the other day, reclaiming sixteen different domain names in one fell swoop. The company filed a complaint a while back against a guy named Daniel Bijan, who didn’t bother to fight his case at all (not that he has one), and the result earlier this week gives them the rights to all of them. They run the gamut from iphonecheap.com to macbookpro.com (how did Apple not own that one?), and as of this writing, we couldn’t find any that were actually being used by Apple yet — they all seem to point to either a blank Apache page or a simple domain placeholder.

And as you may have noticed, there are no secrets here — macfriend.com is probably just a stab in the dark on the part of the domain squatter, and ipodsbaratos.com means “iPods cheap” in Spanish. Just Apple reclaiming some of their rightful web space.

TUAWApple seizes 16 domain names from squatter originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 08 Jan 2010 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Engadget meets Woz

January 5th, 2010 at 05:00am Under Hot Apple News

Filed under: Cult of Mac, Odds and ends, Apple, Apple History

Engadget’s Josh Topolsky got to chat with none other than Woz recently, and they’ve finally shared a great video of their meeting. Woz says a lot of interesting things in the video (he runs six navigation systems at a time in his car just for comparison’s sake, and carries two iPhones nowadays, just in case the battery life runs out), but the most intriguing thing about this video is just seeing the great Wozniak thinking machine race along at the speed of Woz.

For example, those two iPhones he carries are the two different colors available. Why? “White and black, black and white. Resistor color codes: zero and nine. Those are the digits they end in!” Gosh, we love Steve Wozniak. You can watch the whole video after clicking the link below.

TUAWEngadget meets Woz originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 04 Jan 2010 22:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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$10,000 worth of iPhones stolen from Lancaster, PA Apple Store

December 12th, 2009 at 02:00am Under Hot Apple News

Filed under: Retail, Odds and ends, iPhone

Apple Stores continue to be sizable targets for theft, it seems — the local paper in Lancaster, PA reports that four young men stole 17 iPhones from the displays at an Apple Store recently, resulting in almost $10,000 worth of losses. The robbery took place during the day; at around 1:30pm, the young men just started grabbing, and walked out of the store with as many iPhones as they could carry.

Not that it’ll probably do anything but get them in trouble. All of the phones are already entered in a crime database, and they were removed from the store without SIM cards, so any attempt to officially activate them will probably raise flags somewhere. Of course, from my time in retail I know that most retailers just usually write losses like this off, as it’s just cheaper to eat the loss than deal with going after whoever stole the units. But you never know — the police apparently have video and everything, so if the kids are caught, maybe they will face the music.

Moral of the story: don’t leave your iPhone lying around an Apple Store? On the other hand, the warehouses aren’t safe either, at least not in Belgium…

[ via @esposimi]

TUAW$10,000 worth of iPhones stolen from Lancaster, PA Apple Store originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 11 Dec 2009 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Stolen Belgium iPhone 3GS Show Up in Russian Black Market

December 2nd, 2009 at 11:18pm Under Hot Apple News+ Iphone

Where did the Russian Black Market, get 4000 stolen iPhones 3GS? If you guessed from that from that Belgium iPhone warehouse theft, you would be 100% correct.

Russia currently does not sell the iPhone 3GS and the importing of unlocked phones is a hot commodity. Cult of Mac is reporting that the stolen goods [...]

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Stolen Belgium iPhone 3GS Show Up in Russian Black Market

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Close to 4,000 iPhones Stolen from Belgium Warehouse

November 18th, 2009 at 03:28pm Under Hot Apple News+ Iphone

Over the weekend in Belgium thieves made a clean getaway with close to 4,000 iPhones. The market value of that many iPhones, 2 million euros, or $3 million U.S.

The iPhone thieves cut a hole in the ceiling of a warehouse where the devices were being stored waiting to be delivered to Mobistar in time [...]

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Close to 4,000 iPhones Stolen from Belgium Warehouse

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Steve Jobs helping overhaul Disney retail

October 13th, 2009 at 06:00pm Under Hot Apple News

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Retail, Steve Jobs, Apple History

The New York Times has posted about a new project that our own Mr. Jobs has taken on: he’s now helping out Disney Stores with their retail business. You have to hand it to Disney, no matter what you think of the Mouse House — when they have a problem with part of the business, they bring in the experts. First they have Pixar’s John Lasseter come in and take over animation (and they’re about to release what looks like the best 2D movie in ages), and now they’ve got Steve Jobs himself sprucing up their retail spaces. Sounds like they’re making the store more interactive (walking by some displays with certain products will create an audiovisual reaction), and taking some of the tech as well (employees will be able to check out items on mobile units, and control certain displays in the store with iPhones).

They also borrowed another page from Jobs’ playbook: they’ve apparently created a prototype store (just like Apple did way back when), not only to test out what everything might look like, but to give a charge to executives and investors who get a tour. Sounds interesting, but then again, it makes sense. What else is an Apple Store, but a toy shop for big kids?

[via MacUser]

TUAWSteve Jobs helping overhaul Disney retail originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Tue, 13 Oct 2009 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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CNN: Our iPhone app is “not a hobby”

September 29th, 2009 at 08:00am Under Hot Apple News

Filed under: Multimedia, Software, iPhone, App Store

CNN chatted with our good friends at DLS about the news network’s iPhone app (scheduled to hit an App Store near you very soon), and it actually sounds pretty premium: in-app video, breaking news live video streaming, a Coverflow-style way to browse news information, the ability to store news to read later, and social sharing through Facebook, Twitter, and the usual suspects. CNN even says they want to add more to the app in the future, including some iReport-style news delivery functions, so people with iPhones out in the world can send news in as quickly as possible.

Ok, CNN, we get it — you care about this one. It does sound like they’re making a major push in terms of making their content interactive on the iPhone, but on the other hand, maybe they’re just trying to sell you on the “premium” price: $1.99, with (we’re told) non-intrusive advertising included. Obviously, $2 is cheap, but on the other hand, especially with advertising both from the network itself and outside clients, the crankiest of App Store browsers will probably flinch at it a little bit. If you are interested, however, CNN would love to take your money: their app should be available in the App Store as soon as Apple lets it through.

TUAWCNN: Our iPhone app is “not a hobby” originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Tue, 29 Sep 2009 01:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Apple: “Exploding” iPhones succumbed to external pressure

August 31st, 2009 at 06:30am Under Hot Apple News

Filed under: Apple Corporate, Hardware, iPhone

There’s been much news of “exploding” iPhones lately. If you’re unfamiliar with the story, the European Commission formally asked Apple to investigate a series of reports that users’ iPhones were abruptly cracking and/or catching fire. According to the French periodical Les Echos, an iPhone in Aix-en-Provence, France, started to “crackle and pop like a deep-frier” before breaking violently apart.

This past Friday, Apple said that, in all cases, the iPhones in question were damaged by an “external force,” not a faulty battery or glass screen:

“To date, there are no confirmed battery overheating incidents for iPhone 3GS and the number of reports we are investigating is in the single digits. The iPhones with broken glass that we have analyzed to date show that in all cases the glass cracked due to an external force that was applied to the iPhone.”

It does seem odd that at least four cases have been reported in France in short order. Still, it’s even stranger that iPhones would suddenly turn into Molotov cocktails. We’ll keep you updated on this story.

TUAWApple: “Exploding” iPhones succumbed to external pressure originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Sun, 30 Aug 2009 23:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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