With a press release, Apple announced that its latest iPhone model, the iPhone 4S, will be available in China and 21 additional countries on Friday, January 13. Making it the fastest iPhone rollout to date, the iPhone 4S will be available in over 90 countries by next week; Apple targeted a launch in 70 countries by the end of 2011.

Customer response to our products in China has been off the charts,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “With the launch in China next week, iPhone 4S will be available in over 90 countries making this our fastest iPhone rollout ever.

On January 13, the iPhone 4S will become available in: Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Bolivia, Botswana, British Virgin Islands, Cameroon, Cayman Islands, Central African Republic, China, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Grenada, Guam, Guinea Conakry, Ivory Coast, Jamaica, Kenya, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritius, Niger, Senegal, St. Vincent and The Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, Turks and Caicos and Uganda.

Since its introduction in October, the iPhone 4S has seen a steady rollout to meet Apple’s expectations of availability in 70 countries by the end of 2011. Just as U.S. carriers were reportedly struggling to meet the 4S’ demand and Apple launched an initiative to reserve a model for in-store pickup, the device launched in Hong Kong and South Korea, several countries in Europe and India. At the same time, Apple began selling unlocked iPhone 4S units in the United States, and confirmed they were “very pleased” with the initial demand for the device.

In October, it was reported the 4S sold 4 million units in its first weekend. Apple hasn’t disclosed new numbers since, but the company is expected to reveal financial results for the past quarter on January 24, where they’ll likely give out new pieces of information regarding the 4S’ performances in different markets. As a side note, Apple’s press release doesn’t include any details on the carrier(s) that will support the 4S in China, which has been an ongoing source of speculation among rumor sites and Apple watchers in the past few months due to China Unicom’s (the country’s second largest carrier) reported interest in the 4S.

Our South American and chilly Siberian friends will have the opportunity to grab an iPhone 4S as soon as December 16th. While Apple themselves haven’t indicated any upcoming launch dates, advertisements and announcements are confirming the details. Currently the iPhone 4S is available in 44 countries, with plans to bring it to 70 countries by the end of the year.

Russian retailer Digital.ru has already announced they’ll be selling the iPhone 4S on the 16th. Brazil carrier Claro has published their promotional page noting the 16th as well.

MacRumors:

Brazil and Russia are not the only countries set to see iPhone 4S launches on December 16th, as reports are also coming in from Taiwan, the Philippines, South Africa, and Malaysia citing that same date for their iPhone 4S debuts.

Thanks to a quick international rollout, it looks like plenty of new iPhones will be available just in time for the holidays.

[MacRumors via iDownloadBlog]

For the past few days, the Internet has been alive with concerns about Carrier IQ, a tracking technology that captures information such a key presses, web site addresses, and more without asking for your permission. It is an intrusive technology buried within smartphone software, and one that carriers have been quickly responding to due to the seriousness of a privacy invasion. While Google flatly denied that their flagship phones such as the Galaxy Nexus harbor such software, other Android handsets have been found with Carrier IQ installed and running in the background.

Late last night, early iOS software releases came under fire as references to Carrier IQ were found in iOS 3.1.3 and the more current iOS 4 and iOS 5, although it couldn’t be determined how active the tracking-ware was or exactly what information it sends. Carrier IQ, however, may only be used when the phone is when diagnostic logging is enabled. Apple made an official statement this afternoon to address the concerns:

Apple’s statement:

We stopped supporting Carrier IQ with iOS 5 in most of our products and will remove it completely in a future software update. With any diagnostic data sent to Apple, customers must actively opt-in to share this information, and if they do, the data is sent in an anonymous and encrypted form and does not include any personal information. We never recorded keystrokes, messages or any other personal information for diagnostic data and have no plans to ever do so.

[via All Things Digital]

I still take photographs the old fashioned way, but photographers with a tripod and mount will love this tip. From the Why Didn’t I Try This department, OS X Hints shares that you can use the volume up button on the included Apple headphones to snap a picture. Photographers who don’t want to be hands on with their iPhones when taking photographs will appreciate having free remote bundled in with their iPhones — those headphones don’t need to be in your ear after all.

Perhaps the best part is that this can be paired with Bluetooth devices! I’m not sure if every headset with volume controls will work (as the buttons need to map correctly to the iPhone), but if a Bluetooth headset can increase the iPhone’s volume it should work.

You can turn your bluetooth headset into an instant wireless remote.

A steady photograph is ultimately a cleaner photograph. You can reduce a lot of camera noise, improve the quality of the picture, and take better night photographs by simply steadying your iPhone. If you have the kit available to prop your iPhone for photographs, then getting even more hands off will really help make the different between a good photograph and a great one. The iPhone 4S camera is among the best in class for smartphones, and what better way to utilize as a semi-professional device than to use what we already have available as a remote shutter release? It’s an excellent tip, and if you hadn’t already tried this, consider it a worthy addition to your knowledge noggin.

Quick note: Camera+ recently got its volume-snap back, and it works here too. Don’t forget about the GLIF (shown above) for easy iPhone mounting to your favorite tripod.

[OS X Tips via Macgasm]

Note: We published this tip in our initial iOS 5 tips roundup, but none-the-less it’s a great reminder for new iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S owners.

U.S. carriers continue to struggle with high demand for the iPhone 4S, The Wall Street Journal reports today. Apple’s latest iPhone, launched on October 14th in seven countries including the United States, has been a success for the company in early sales, reaching over 4 million units sold in the first weekend of availability. For comparison, the iPhone 4 sold “only” 1.7 million units in its first weekend last year. But according to U.S. carriers, the iPhone 4S’ popularity isn’t just a passing fad among Apple fans and early adopters: as the device’s popularity continues to build. carriers are finding themselves struggling to get inventory from Apple.

Verizon Wireless customers may have to wait more than three weeks for the device, according to the carrier’s website. That compares with as much as 21 days at AT&T and up to 14 days at Sprint Nextel. While some tech blogs have suggested Apple’s manufacturing isn’t keeping pace, the carriers point to unexpectedly strong demand for the handset.

“We are having some supply issues in the sense that demand’s huge,” AT&T’s president of emerging devices, Glenn Lurie, said Wednesday. “We have had just record-breaking sales on it.

Obviously, both Apple and the carriers prioritize in-store retail sales over online orders; Apple, for instance, is giving customers the possibility to reserve an iPhone 4S at their local store, and it’s generally easier to find an iPhone 4S just by walking into a store, rather than ordering it online. On Apple’s online store, shipping times for the iPhone 4S are now set at 1-2 weeks. Furthermore, it appears the problem with shortages isn’t due to Apple’s manufacturing process — there’s simply too much demand for the device than Apple can meet both online and in physical stores at the moment.

At the Q4 2011 earnings call, Apple CEO Tim Cook said they were extremely pleased with the initial demand for the iPhone 4S and customers’ reaction to the new model, adding that the company was confident they had enough supply to meet demand. Since its U.S. launch, Apple has been quickly rolling out the iPhone 4S in new countries, reaching 44 in less than a month and with another round of international rollouts reportedly set for later this month.

As reported by The Next Web, Apple’s iPhone 4S is set to launch in India on Friday, November 25. Indian carrier Aircel has confirmed that it will begin selling the device next week, whereas another major operator in India, Airtel, is rumored to be joining sales on the 25th as well. Airtel and Aircel brought the iPhone 4 to India only in May, almost a year after the original US release, and this November launch seems to signal Apple’s intention to have a rapid rollout for the iPhone 4S in more than 70 countries before the end of 2011.

Prices for the iPhone 4S in India haven’t been confirmed by the carriers, but The Next Web suggests the 16 GB model will be priced between ₹ 35,000 and ₹ 40,000, with additional price drops for the iPhone 4 and 3GS.

Based on the latter’s launch and the fact that the unlocked iPhone 4S starts at $649 in the USA, however, we expect to see the iPhone 4S to be priced somewhere between ₹ 35,000 and ₹ 40,000 for the 16GB model and offered carrier unlocked with a reverse subsidy. This would mean that customers would pay the full price of the phone upfront and then be reimbursed part of the cost in the form of discounted tariffs for the next two years of usage.

We also expect to see both carriers drop the prices of the iPhone 4 and iPhone 3GS—which currently retail at ₹ 34,500 and ₹ 19,990 respectively—after the launch of the iPhone 4S.

As of today, the iPhone 4S is available in 44 countries around the world: the device launched in 7 initial countries on October 14th; 22 countries followed on October 28th, and last week (on November 11th) the iPhone 4S launched in 15 more countries including Hong Kong and South Korea. On November 11, Apple also started selling unlocked iPhone 4S units in the United States.

Alongside the international launch in 15 more countries, Apple today began offering unlocked iPhone 4S units through its US online store. Current orders for unlocked iPhones ship in 1-2 weeks, and the models are available at $649 (16 GB), $749 (32 GB) and $849 (64 GB). The unlocked iPhone 4S only works on GSM networks such as AT&T in the United States and allows for micro-SIM cards from local GSM networks when travelling internationally. The unlocked iPhone 4S doesn’t work on Verizon or Sprint.

The unlocked iPhone includes all the features of iPhone but without a contract commitment. You can activate and use it on the supported GSM wireless network of your choice, such as AT&T in the United States.* The unlocked iPhone 4 or iPhone 4S will not work with CDMA-based carriers such as Verizon Wireless or Sprint.

If you don’t want a multiyear service contract or if you prefer to use a local carrier when traveling abroad, the unlocked iPhone is the best choice. It arrives without a micro-SIM card, so you’ll need an active micro-SIM card from any supported GSM carrier worldwide. To start using it, simply insert the micro-SIM card into the slot on your iPhone and turn it on by pressing and holding the On/Off button for a few seconds. Then follow the onscreen instructions to set up your iPhone.

Apple launched the iPhone 4S in October and promised unlocked versions would be available starting in November. The unlocked and contract-free iPhone 4S can be purchased from Apple’s online store here.

I got my iPhone 4S two weeks ago, and have been experimenting with Siri and my best American accent since then. In spite of the software still not supporting maps and directions in Italy (more countries, including Italy, will support Siri in 2012) and weather requests, I’m having my fun in playing around with Siri for things like messages, notes, emails and Wolfram Alpha questions (I thank Americans for giving me a reason to convert their units to the metric system). Siri makes for the perfect iPhone demo to non-iPhone users, but impressive presentations aside it’s actually a great tool to quickly “do stuff” that would require looking at your phone and manually interacting with apps otherwise. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve already asked Siri to send messages to my co-workers while I was driving, change songs, call my girlfriend, or create new calendar appointments.

A few days ago I was sent a link to “Talking to Siri: Learning the Language of Apple’s Intelligent Assistant” by TUAW’s Erica Sadun and Steven Sande. I’ve read the book using the Kindle app on my iOS devices and Amazon’s CloudReader on the web and, let me tell you, it’s a great book to learn more about Siri.

At first I was skeptical — why would I need a book when Siri is so intuitive? It turns out, Erica and Steve have put together an impressive collection of things Siri does that I didn’t know about, also explaining with a friendly and familiar style (if you’ve been reading TUAW, which I do) how you should ask things to Siri. The book is organized in sections, covering every system app that’s integrated with Siri as well as built-in tools such as Wolfram Alpha and Yelp. Erica and Steven have also included lots of screenshots and descriptions, so you’ll be able to immediately understand and see what they’re referring to in describing Siri. It’s an incredibly pleasant read for new iPhone 4S users, and a nice handbook to get started with Siri. Without spoiling much, let me just say that I’ve learned a lot about things you can ask Wolfram (built into Siri), how to keep adding new items to a note, sunrise and sunset times and recurring reminders.

“Talking to Siri” covers in great detail every possible combination of commands Siri supports, providing a comprehensive guide to know more about what Siri can do for you. You can buy the book on Amazon as Kindle edition.