With over 150 store openings as of last September, you can expect the 2011 Apple Store season to be huge. Where’s the money? Apple must be a fan of MacStories, because Cupertino will be brining our international audience (Italy in particular) a little slice of home throughout the year. That’s not to say new stores won’t open in the United States (New York’s pretty lucky to be getting yet another store), and we advise you to check past the break for a run down of expected store openings according to ifoAppleStore.com’s latest report.
Apple Stores Everywhere: List Of Store Confirmations To Open 2011
Jon Stewart Is Pretty Excited About The Verizon iPhone
You know people have been waiting for the iPhone to lose exclusivity to AT&T when even The Daily Show covers the announcement of the Verizon iPhone. Indeed, Jon Stewart’s segment about the iPhone 4 now available on another – better, according to him – carrier perfectly shows all the excitement that has surrounded this historic announcement over the past years.
Stewart says that to be part of the iPhone community he has sacrificed the ability to make actual phone calls for many years. In the name of carrying around photos, videos, music and a compass, he – and millions of other users like him – stayed on AT&T to have an iPhone. But starting February 10, it will be all over.
So jump after the break, and check out The Daily Show’s take on the Verizon iPhone. [via CrunchGear] Read more
Homebrew Satarii Star iPhone Dock Follows Your Every Move
A couple of pals under the name Satarii have been working out of a garage-office for the past year perfecting the Satarii Star, an iPhone dock that follows your every move. In conjunction with a wearable tracker, the Satarii is a rotary base that follows you around around a scene such as your living-room. FaceTime conversations would be rather awesome when you could grab a cup of coffee without having to worry about the ol’ shaky cam, and imagine the possibilities in self-producing quality video? Imagine the MacStories reviews that could come of this thing! We’re pretty excited about this neat gadget because it’s a novel idea. Support the team and help Satarii reach their goal of $20,000 so we can see this thing get some legs.
Personal Hotspot For All iPhones with iOS 4.3 In March?
Here’s an interesting rumor coming this morning from BGR: according to their source, iOS 4.3 will become available in March and will feature the Personal Hotspot functionality for all iPhones, although there will need to be carrier support. This means that iOS 4.3, according to BGR, will sport Personal Hotspot out of the box, but it’s up to a carrier like AT&T or Vodafone Italy to support it.
BGR also reports 4.3 will have build number 8F5148b, baseband will be 04.08.00 and “technical acceptance is planned for March”. It is unclear when we’ll see a developer beta for the next OS, and if AT&T in the US will support the hotspot feature.
Yesterday, both iPhoneclub.nl and iPhoneHellas reported Personal Hotspot would be available with a forthcoming iOS update for all GSM phones.
Wozniak Is Happy About Verizon iPhone, Says LTE Will Come
Steve Wozniak is glad about the iPhone finally available on Verizon, arguably the “best carrier in the United States”. In the following video posted by VentureBeat, the Woz also goes on to say he’s excited about the mobile hotspot feature which, in the past, saved him a couple of times. Woz, as usual, is a fan of choice, and he thinks that the device available on two carriers will give people the chance to evaluate options and pick the carrier that has the best reception where they live.
About different carriers, Woz explains he was happy when in the early days of unlocked phones you could have a device with two numbers on two carriers at the same time. He says he would be glad to see this coming back in the future, with iPhone capable of easily switching between AT&T and Verizon. Oh, and 4G LTE? Woz says it’ll come, to the iPhone as well. That’s pretty much a given, although we don’t know when.
Check out the video of the Verizon-loving Woz below. Read more
Reeder for iPhone Adds Readability Support, Fullscreen Image Viewing
Reeder for iPhone, our favorite RSS client on iOS, was updated a few minutes ago to include features already seen in the iPad version. Reeder 2.3, available in the App Store at $2.99, now allows you to read full-length articles from any website thanks to Readability integration. Readability, also used by Apple in Safari Reader, can fetch text from articles on the web removing all the clutter such as unnecessary ads and banners. Reeder can now display this “elegant” content with the tap of a button while in reading mode. You can also pinch to open an article through Readability.
Another neat feature of this new version is fullscreen image viewing. Available only on iOS 4 and later, you can pinch on images to reveal them in fullscreen and tap to read an image’s description. Pinch out, and you go back to the standard article mode.
Last, the app can now load up to 5,000 unread items. This should be great news for those who daily skim through a huge list of unread feeds – personally, I never found myself in the situation of having to deal with thousands of articles waiting to be marked as read. Still, the functionality is in there now.
Reeder is a $2.99 purchase in the App Store and it’s an absolute must-have for iPhone owners.
Verizon iPhone, Personal Hotspot and MyWi - Which One?
With the Verizon iPhone, Apple today showcased a new software feature that comes pre-installed with the slightly-redesigned device: Personal Hotspot. Already available for several Android devices running on Verizon’s network and made deeply integrated into iOS with a new software build, Personal Hotspot will allow you to create a mobile WiFi network to share your 3G connection with up to 5 nearby WiFi devices. The feature, put simply, looks great: you can activate wireless tethering with literally two taps and a password, or go with Bluetooth and USB tethering. As suggested by Apple’s Phil Schiller himself, Personal Hotspot makes for a great alternative to popular MiFi hotspots and will allow iPad owners to carry around an iPhone on Verizon’s network and have constant access to the Internet even if the iPad is WiFi-only. Read more
Verizon To Start Selling CDMA iPad, Too?
It looks like Verizon doesn’t want to stop at a CDMA version of the iPhone 4 that runs on its network. According to Bloomberg, Verizon Wireless will start selling iPads that can connect “directly” to its network. Such an iPad would have to include a CDMA chip to eliminate the need of a portable, external hotspot as in the current iPad configuration Verizon is selling in its retail stores.
Verizon Wireless will sell a version of Apple Inc.’s iPad tablet computer that can connect directly to its network, posing another challenge to AT&T Inc. as the carrier’s exclusive hold on the iPhone draws to a close.
Verizon will get an embedded chip in the iPad for use on its network, Francis Shammo, chief financial officer of Verizon Communications Inc., the parent of the wireless unit, said today in an interview in New York. IPad users currently need an extra device to connect to Verizon’s network. Shammo declined to say when the change may happen.
Verizon started selling the iPad on October 28th, offering the option to bundle the device with a mobile hotspot for 3G connectivity. Verizon’s current pricing for iPad + MiFi is the following: a 16GB Wi-Fi iPad bundled with MiFi costs $630, 32GB Wi-Fi iPad + MiFi is $730, and 64GB Wi-Fi iPad plus MiFi is $830. A CDMA-enabled iPad wouldn’t need an additional hotspot or a SIM card slot as seen in the current iPad WiFi + 3G units, also sold by AT&T.
Amazon Releases Deals App for iPhone
“Never miss another deal.” Amazon has released an official iOS app for their deals called Amazon Deals. I think it’s about time, there are tons of crazy deals that we miss every day until someone tweets about it. No more! The app lets you check availability of current offers, future offers and one you may have just missed (so you can cry over it). You can also schedule reminders for future offers and also purchase from within the app after signing into your account in the Settings tab. You can also share Deals from within the app. Click the ‘share’ icon in the upper right of the detail screen and send via E-mail, Twitter, Facebook or even SMS. Read more