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Woz: Apple Had A Phone Ready In 2004, Android Will Win The Race [Updated]

Steve Wozniak is that kind of guy who has no problems in saying exactly what he thinks. He co-founded Apple, but criticizing Apple and talking about the great features of Android OS isn’t a problem for him.

That’s exactly what happened in an interview with Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf: as Engadget reports, the Woz apparently revealed that Apple was collaborating with a “well-known Japanese consumer electronics company in 2004 to develop a phone that was ahead of its time”. That would be the iPhone that was released in 2007, and it’s interesting that Steve Jobs and his team had the thing ready in 2004 and decided to put it on the shelf for 3 years. Perhaps multi-touch wasn’t ready? Perhaps because of high manufacturing costs? Who knows. Read more

Apple Is Bringing iAds To Europe In December

Today Apple announced they’re bringing their “revolutionary iAd network” to Europe. iAds will launch in December in the UK and France, Germany will follow in January. As for the partners, the rumors were correct: Apple managed to close deals with L’Orèal, Renault, Luis Vuitton, Nespresso and Perrier & Unilever.

iAds started to roll out internationally two weeks ago, and while the ads were visible to non-US users they weren’t target to specific audiences. For instance, I was able to see an AT&T iAd in Italy.

Press release follows below. Read more

Verizon CEO on Apple, LTE And The iPhone→

Verizon CEO on Apple, LTE And The iPhone

The Wall Street Journal:

Mr. Seidenberg said his embrace of LTE has drawn the interest of Apple Inc., and helped Verizon get the iPad. But he didn’t comment on when Verizon might get the iPhone. “If the iPhone comes to us, it’s because Apple thinks it’s time,” he said. “Our interests are beginning to come together more but they have to take steps to align their technology with ours.

Meaning: it’s not up to us, we want the iPhone. I know the folks at Cupertino are testing a Verizon-compatible device, but we’ve been told to wait.

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Zen Bound 2 Now On The Mac via Steam

This summer, there was this friend of mine at the camping – Marco – who regularly came asking for my iPhone 4 to play one game: Zen Bound 2. He had become addicted to it since I first showed the app to him, and he turned out to be so good at covering creepy wood shapes with paint that I had to make him stop. Seriously, I uninstalled the app.

For those who of you unaware of the total awesomeness of Zen Bound 2, here’s the gist: in this game you have to wrap a rope around wood objects, the rope covers them with paint, you have to cover objects with a certain percentage of paint to complete a level. Absurd, simple. A must-have available at $2.99 for iPhone and iPad with Game Center support and Retina graphics. Read more

Real Racing HD Updated with iOS 4.2 Support and Online Multiplayer via Game Center

Award-winning game Real Racing (well, at least the iPhone version) received a major update today: owners of the iPad version are now able to start online multiplayer sessions thanks to Game Center built into the update. Multiplayer supports up to 4 players, and you can invite friends to play also via Game Center.

As many other apps these days, Real Racing HD has also been updated to support iOS 4.2: it basically supports persistent state now, so you’ll be able to quickly pause and resume when switching between apps.

Real Racing HD is available at $9.99 here. Check out the full changelog below. Read more

HootSuite Official iPad App Now Available

HootSuite, the online service to manage multiple social networks in one single place, released its first official iPad app a few minutes ago in the App Store. The app is free and available here.

HootSuite for iPad features all the options and functionalities iPhone users have been able to enjoy for almost a year now, but it sports a native interface for the tablet that takes advantage of the larger screen to display multiple “columns” at once, so you can keep track of your Twitter messages and mentions without having to switch between different views, for example.

The app currently supports Twitter accounts (lists and searches are included), Facebook profiles and pages, Foursquare checkins and, of course, HootSuite’s own URL shortening and analytics system ow.ly. Read more

TikTok+LunaTik: Multi-Touch Watch→

TikTok+LunaTik: Multi-Touch Watch

Speaking of cool iPod Nano watch mods:

TikTok and LunaTik simply transform the iPod Nano into the world’s coolest multi-touch watches. The idea to use the Nano as a watch was an obvious one ever since the product was announced. But we wanted to create a collection that was well designed, engineered and manufactured from premium materials and that complemented the impeccable quality of Apple products. Not just clipped on a cheap strap as an afterthought.

Designed by MINIMAL, I suggest you watch the video with the explanation of the concept. This is serious design work.

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Kinect, OS X and iPad Come Together In Futuristic Cubes

As if being able to display Kinect’s captured images on OS X wasn’t enough, the solid community behind Kinect’s incredible hacks managed to manipulate the data recorded by Kinect and output everything on OS X using cool futuristic cubes (a system called Box Cloud). These neon cubes may vary in size according to the distance of the subject from the camera – it’s overall a pretty cool thing to look at.

But modders and hackers took the whole concept a step further and allowed iPad users to control “planes of interest” using their multitouch tablet. With the iPad you can change the colors visualized on screen, adjust zoom by tilting the device. Somehow, it all comes together in the video below.

It’s only hacking, but we like it. [via Engadget] Read more

Slap The Nano→

Slap The Nano

We’ve wrapped a memory-metal wristband with soft silky silicone. Slap’s flexible, spring-steel band lies flat and rigid until you slap! it onto your arm. Snap Slap open, then snap Slap shut around your wrist. (Say that 10 times real fast.) The Slap band self-adjusts to a comfortable fit, exactly your size.

Griffin’s latest accessory for the iPod Nano looks like an interesting alternative to those Nano wristbands that have been floating around on eBay. Available at $24.99 here.

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