Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Wowsers!!! iPhone is here and it Rocks!!

well folks the iphone is beyond awesome!! I dont have one yet but i have only heard great reviews that it is the best cell phone ever made. When folks like Leo Laporte and John C. Dvorak are telling me so, it must be true!!! No seriously this phone is amazing..worth every bit of the hype. Sure there are improvements to be made but this is version 1.0. Can you imagine how slick this thing will be in a couple years?? I think it is safe to say the iPhone is the next iPod. Excuse me now while I go buy some Apple stock!!!!!! :)

Friday, January 12, 2007

iPhone is coming!!!!!!!


Well ladies and gentlemen, its here. Well, actually its coming in June. Apple is releasing a phone that runs OS X. This phone looks amazing. It uses a touch-technology that no stylus or little plastic keyboard is needed. Check it out!!

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

Tower Records Closing



Well, another big music retail store goes under. This is really sad, as Tower Records was very influential in the sale of music. You can still see footage of crowds lined up at the late hours getting Metallica's Black Album or Guns N Roses Use Your Illusion I and II. It is really a shame as these buildings will either remain vacant or a Starbucks will replace them. Tower records could have avoided this demise by simply lowering their prices instead of charging 18.99 for a CD when it is 12.99 at Best Buy. Only the true Music purists would pay 6-7 dollars more just to buy their CD at Tower. Hopefully some other music retailer will open in the current Tower Stores.

Wednesday, July 05, 2006

Apple Introduces $899 Education Configuration for 17-Inch iMac


Wednesday July 5, 8:30 am ET

NECC, SAN DIEGO, July 5 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Apple? today introduced a new $899 configuration of the 17-inch iMac? designed specifically for education customers featuring a 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo processor, a built-in iSight(TM) video camera and iLife? '06, the next generation of Apple's award-winning suite of digital lifestyle applications. The 17-inch iMac for education is available immediately and will replace the eMac?, Apple's last CRT based computer, providing students and teachers everything they need to learn and create in today's digital classroom, all in the ultra-efficient iMac design.

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The ultimate in design simplicity, the iMac is ideal for the space saving needs of both the classroom and the dorm room with the entire computer built right into a two-inch thin display. The iMac design has continuously improved generation after generation, resulting in increased material efficiency, decreased packaging mass and volume, and decreased energy consumption -- all of which lead to a smaller environmental footprint.

Featuring a 17-inch widescreen LCD display, the iMac for education includes a Combo drive for burning CDs and reading DVDs, 512MB of 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM memory expandable up to 2GB and hard drive storage capacity up to 160GB. Every iMac also includes a built-in iSight video camera for video conferencing out-of-the-box using Apple's award-winning iChat AV, or recording a video podcast or iMovie? using iLife '06. Providing the latest in high-performance connectivity options, the 17-inch iMac for education includes built-in 10/100/1000 BASE-T Gigabit Ethernet for high-speed networking, built-in AirPort? Extreme 802.11g WiFi for up to 54 Mbps fast wireless networking*, a total of five USB ports (three USB 2.0) and two FireWire? 400 ports.

Designed with today's digital classroom in mind, every iMac comes with iLife '06, the next generation of Apple's award-winning suite of digital lifestyle applications featuring iPhoto?, iMovie HD, iDVD?, GarageBand(TM) and iWeb(TM), a new iLife application that makes it super-easy to create amazing websites with photos, blogs and Podcasts and publish them on .Mac for viewing by anyone on the Internet with just a single click. Every iMac also comes with the latest release of the world's most advanced operating system, Mac OS? X version 10.4.6 "Tiger" including Safari(TM), Mail, iCal?, iChat AV, Front Row and Photo Booth, running natively on the Intel-based desktop.

Pricing & Availability

The 17-inch iMac for education is available immediately for education customers through the Apple Store for Education (www.apple.com/education/store) or by calling an Apple education sales representative at 800-800-APPL. The eMac will no longer be in production and is available for purchase while supplies last through the Apple Store for Education (www.apple.com/education/store) or by calling an Apple education sales representative at 800-800-APPL. Apple will showcase the 17-inch iMac and its complete line of products and solutions for education at the National Educational Computing Conference in San Diego, California from July 5-7, 2006. For details, please visit www.apple.com/education/necc.

The 17-inch 1.83 GHz iMac, for a suggested education price of $899 (US), includes:

-- 17-inch widescreen LCD display;
-- 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo processor;
-- 512MB of 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM expandable to 2GB;
-- 24x Combo drive;
-- Intel GMA 950 graphics;
-- built-in iSight video camera;
-- built-in AirPort Extreme wireless networking;
-- 80GB Serial ATA hard drive running at 7200 rpm;
-- mini-DVI out (adapters for DVI, VGA and Composite/S-Video sold
separately);
-- built-in stereo speakers and microphone; and
-- Mighty Mouse and Apple Keyboard.

Build-to-order options and accessories include up to 2GB DDR2 SDRAM, 160GB Serial ATA hard drive, iWork(TM) '06 (pre-installed), Apple Remote and Apple USB Modem.

Friday, June 23, 2006

GarageBand changing the face of music creation

�GarageBand is bringing music to the masses in a way that is very easy... �You feel that you are in a creative mode right away. There are always people that want higher-quality recording, but the basic fundamentals need to be delivered in a simple package and that's what GarageBand does.�

read more | digg story

Tuesday, June 20, 2006

Variety has posted an update on negotiations between Hollywood execs and Apple on the rumored iTunes Movie Store. According to the report, negotiations are still ongoing with Hollywood execs, who don't know whether to regard Jobs as a friend or foe.

"He came in with a lot of bravado and said, 'We set our mind to what we were going to do in the music business and revolutionized it, and now we want to do the same thing with film," recalls one studio person close to the talks for movie downloads.
Movie execs anxious to beat piracy are debating how much power to give Jobs, who recently was successful in strong-arming music executives into sticking to a flat $.99 (USD) pricing model per song. Movie execs are hoping to have a tiered model, whereas Jobs is insisting that movies be sold at an easy-to-remember $9.99 (USD).

On March 14th, Apple made its first full-lenth TV movie feature available on the iTunes Music Store at $9.99 USD. The movie seemed to indicate that much of the technical groundwork had been laid for iTunes movies, with only content left to be obtained.

Also complicating the deals: The studios are working out terms with a host of other distributors, including Amazon, Movielink and BitTorrent, in part to make sure that one company does not dominate. It seems that none of the studios wants to be first in making a deal with Apple. Disney would be the logical leader, but even they are cautious, fearing it will look like in-house synergy rather than a business decision.
Movie studios have been rolling out their own movie services in past months, including Starz's Vongo (subscription-based) and Universal's own download-to-own store.

Thursday, June 15, 2006

By Daisuke Wakabayashi

REDMOND, Washington (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq:MSFT - news) founder
Bill Gates said on Thursday that over the next two years he will ease out of a day-to-day role at the company he built into the world's biggest software maker.
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His decision to step down immediately as chief software architect and to relinquish all managerial roles in July 2008 comes at a time when Microsoft, whose Windows operating system runs an estimated 90 percent of the world's personal computers, is struggling to find new sources of growth.

Gates, 50, passed the technical mantle to Ray Ozzie, who joined Microsoft last year and is at the heart of Microsoft's push to maintain its dominance by transforming software into services that generate an ongoing stream of revenue instead of just a one-time sale.

By July 2008, Gates said, he will be working full-time for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation -- which he has funded with his software billions to promote health and education projects around the world -- but will still be working "part-time at Microsoft."

The world's richest man, whose wealth was estimated at $50 billion in March by Forbes magazine, will remain as Microsoft's chairman and an advisor on key development projects past the 2008 transition.

"Obviously, this decision was a very hard one for me to make," Gates told a news conference. "The change we're seeing today is not a retirement, it's a reordering of my priorities."

Few expected the news would affect operations at the Redmond, Washington-based company, which employs more than 60,000 people worldwide. Gates began taking less of a role when he handed the chief executive reins to long-time deputy Steve Ballmer in January 2000.

"Bill Gates may step away from day-to-day responsibility but he will never, ever step away from Microsoft," said Anthony Sabino, professor of business at St. John's University.

Shares in Microsoft rose 0.9 percent to close at $22.07 on the Nasdaq, and fell 9 cents in extended trading on the Inet electronic brokerage after Gates' announcement.

Microsoft stock, whose stratospheric rise during the 1990s inspired a generation of tech entrepreneurs, has fallen 13 percent over the past year as investors question its ability to find new growth markets.

Microsoft has been trying to respond to threats from companies such as Internet search leader Google Inc. (Nasdaq:GOOG - news) and Apple Computer Inc. (Nasdaq:AAPL - news), which built a lucrative business around its iPod digital music player.

The company has also stumbled in releasing the next version of Windows, delaying its shipping date several times and cutting out some highly anticipated features.

Its MSN network of online services has struggled to gain traction against Google and Yahoo Inc. (Nasdaq:YHOO - news), and it has spent billions of dollars trying to unseat Sony Corp. (6758.T) in the video-game console market.

"I bet to a certain degree he (Gates) might be getting tired of beating his head against the wall and trying to find other profitable revenue streams besides their Windows operating systems," said Shannon Reid, manager of Evergreen Strategic Growth Fund, which owns Microsoft shares.

At the same news conference as Gates, Ballmer, 50, spoke with his usual confidence and enthusiasm, saying Microsoft aimed to add another 1 billion customers in the next decade.

"We're really also announcing the transition we're making as a company to reach the next level of success and meet the needs of a world hungry for new technology," Ballmer said.

"We will continue his vision of thinking big and executing even bigger."

Gates said Ozzie -- who created Lotus Notes, which was one of the first popular corporate e-mail programs and is now sold by IBM -- will replace him as chief software architect. Craig Mundie, another chief technical officer, will take the new title of chief research and strategy officer.

Ozzie, 50, joined Microsoft last year as one of three chief technical officers after it bought his Groove Networks start-up focusing on collaborative software.

"Certainly, he's got the experience and respect within the industry, but he's not going to be able to take on all Bill Gates' roles because as the founder, Bill Gates had a kind of moral authority that no one else can really take on," said Matt Rosoff, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft, an independent research firm.


So what does this really mean? I'm thinking Bill is going to be so embarrassed about further delays of Vista that he is going to just retire altogether from Microsoft. Thats my guess!