It appears that Apple has flipped the switch on iAds, which are now showing up for iPhone users outside the United States and United Kingdom. I’ve personally downloaded a free iAd-supported iPhone app and I got to see two different campaigns: a CitiBank one and an AT&T one. Both the iAds are working fine in Italy.
With Apple getting ready to release iOS 4.2, a worldwide launch of iAds for iPad as well wouldn’t be much of a surprise. Read more
Good news, Xmarks fans: the service is not dead. Actually, it’s definitely alive and looking forward to introducing free and premium plans under a new owner, the official Xmarks blog reports.
I’m pleased to announced that we’re in the final stages of completing a sale of Xmarks to a new owner who is 100% committed to keep our great browser sync service running smoothly.
The Xmarks service will evolve to have both a free component and a premium component – we’ll share all the details once the deal is done.
Many doubts and questions arose when Xmarks announced it was shutting down back in September due to the impossibility to find a feasible plan to keep things going. Loyal and regular users of the free bookmarking service signed dozens of petitions to keep the service alive and pledged thousands of dollars through unofficial campaigns to save Xmarks.
We look forward to the future of Xmarks.
According to an industry source contacted by CNET, Intel’s Light Peak technology development is nearing completion and it should be ready to go public in the first half of 2011 – earlier than initially expected. Light Peak is faster than USB 3.0 and can transfer up to 10 Gigabits per second in both directions simultaneously. USB 3.0 is not supported by Apple and a very few other PC makers have implemented the technology in their computers. Most of all, Intel itself hasn’t released chipsets compatible with USB 3.0 yet.
On the other hand, Light Peak has the chance to be backed next year by two major computer makers in the industry, Apple and Sony. Back in 2009, in fact, Intel stated that they had showed early prototypes of Light Peak to third parties and incorporated the feedback they got into their next designs, adding that Apple is an “an innovating force in the industry”. The demo Intel run on stage was based on a Mac, and Sony showed its appreciation for Light Peak in the past, too.
Even though Intel claims that, actually, they’re committed to the USB 3.0 project, it is clear that the money’s on the table with Light Peak, which is faster and lightweight enough to be implemented in new computers without adding bulk or extra space. Apple is expected to reveal new MacBook Pros in the April - June 2011 timeframe – that would be a good time to announce Light Peak coming to the next generation of OS X, wouldn’t it?
With Lion coming next summer, new MacBook Pros and a developer conference in June, the pieces might be coming together pretty soon.
Looks like BGR has managed to find a good source amongst Apple Geniuses: according to a new leaked internal document, Apple has acknowledged the MacBook Air bugs we talked about two days ago.
Apple hasn’t publicly addressed the issues yet, and the document clearly says the information are not to be disclosed externally. The document mentions the display flickering issues many users have experienced, together with colors fading to light after waking from sleep. The suggested solution? Close the lid, wait 10 seconds and open the computer again.
Apple also confirms an upcoming software update will fix the issues.
Some things in life are so cool, geeky – let me just say it, awesome – that you’ve got to see them with your own eyes to believe. I’ve always been attracted by the “digital becomes real” experiments (there’s this video on Vimeo about Facebook, Twitter and OS X created with cardboard I can’t find anymore), and what “interface artist” Johannes P Osterhoff has come up with is just too cool to not end up here in the late night geek coverage of MacStories.
He basically took the standard OS X home icon, created a wooden version and carried it around on his shoulders. I know, insane. He’s the same guy that painted images using Aqua graphical elements and created actual shields out of the UI of Windows Vista.
Please, go check out his post about the “project” here.
If you own an Apple TV and you’ve managed to jailbreak it, then you must be happy about this: you can install Plex on it. As noted by 9to5mac, you can turn your tiny black Apple box in a dedicated Plex device, with the media server running, say, on your home Mac. Plex is a great looking and full-featured media center for OS X which recently released a great iOS companion app.
Instructions from the developer of the hack are available here, and require some manual hacking.
At the mobile event at Facebook HQ in Palo Alto, Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that the iPhone app – the app that, in his own words, it’s being used on the vast majority of iPhones –is getting an update with the new Groups interface they launched a few weeks ago, improved tagging in Places and easier photo attaching in check-ins.
The app update still isn’t live in iTunes, it’ll probably will be later today. Other new features Facebook is announcing today are single sign-on for mobile apps, new location APIs and a Deals platform.
[image via TechCrunch]
As noted by MacRumors, earlier today Apple posted a new support document detailing the issues experienced by many users with the Clock app on iOS 4.1 after the switch to DST. It happened in New Zealand back in October and Europe earlier this week, but Apple still hasn’t released a firmware update to address the issue.
It’s very likely that iOS 4.2 –now in Gold Master version, final release really around the corner – will put an end to this annoying bug.
From the support document:
In some regions, shortly before or after the daylight saving time (DST) change, repeating alarms created in the Clock app may work incorrectly.
To resolve this behavior for existing alarms, set the repeat interval to Never. You will need to reset these alarms for each day you need them.
After November 7th, 2010, you can set your alarms to repeat again.
A few days ago I stumbled upon the preview page of Discourse, an upcoming iPhone app developed by Emilio Peláez (the developer of Notified, available in Cydia) and designed by Mathieu White which, according to the website, aims at being a unique and fresh dictionary app for iPhone. Can a dictionary app be unique? – I asked on Twitter. What could a developer ever do to make sure his take on digital dictionaries – a rather boring subject, one might think – feels fresh and innovative?
I got into Discourse’s beta group and Emilio was kind enough to let me talk about the app on MacStories. I’ve been running the app on my iPhone since last night and, admittedly, they’re building something that feels fresh, beautiful and, to an extent, unique. Here’s a sneak peek. Read more
