Hardware Geeks

If you have any apps that Apple does not want you to have, for example the “Tethering App” your iPhone may eventually phone home and the iPhone will disable it and prevent you from using it.

C|Net News.com says the author of “iPhone Open Application Development and an iPhone forensics manual” has found a URL inside the coding of the iPhone software that list bad apps. While the list is currently empty he fears that Apple can easily tell iPhones to disable applications.

Looking at the supposed Blacklist Apps page, the wording on it makes me wonder if Apple just wants to disable Apps it considers malicious such as spyware or maybe an App that simply does not work correctly and interferes with the normal use of the phone.

Apple today announced that it had sold 1 million iPhone 3G in the first weekend of its launch.

“iPhone 3G had a stunning opening weekend,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “It took 74 days to sell the first one million original iPhones, so the new iPhone 3G is clearly off to a great start around the world.”

The iPhone 3G is available in 21 countries and will be available in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK and the US—and will go on sale in France on July 17th.

Apple and HBO today announced that the Apple iTunes service will sell episodes of popular HBO series such as, Deadwood, Rome and The Wire.

“We’re very excited to make these legendary HBO programs available on the iTunes Store,” said Henry McGee, president of HBO Video. “Whether catching up on ‘Sex and the City’ in anticipation of its upcoming movie release or reliving a favorite ‘Sopranos’ episode, we think viewers will love being able to watch these shows on their iPod or iPhone.”

I’m sure I’m in the majority when I say that I want as few applications on my system as possible, and periodically delete those which I believe have similar functionality to other applications on my computer.

I recently came across a blog post, where someone argued their case about why Quicksilver (QS) is not a useful app. He wrote of Quicksilver (I will refer to this as QS from now on) as purely an application launcher, and considered it redundant since Tiger’s introduction of Spotlight. Here I will ignore this basic launcher feature, and write about other uses of QS, which you may or may not have known about.

Today Apple announced it has updated it’s iMacs to include the latest intel Core 2 duo processors and improved the graphics capabilities of the iMacs.

The systems will have a starting price of $1,199 and most systems will come with 2GB of memory standard. The 24-inch iMac now offers a 3.06 GHz Intel processor and the high-performance NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GS graphics.

“The iMac’s gorgeous aluminum and glass all-in-one design has been an incredible hit with our customers and is just one of the reasons Mac sales are growing three and a half times faster than PC sales,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “With the latest Intel processors, a faster new graphics option and more memory, customers now have even more reasons to love the iMac.”

According to a recent survey done by BrandChannel, consumers around the world would rather have dinner with Apple than any other brand.

People have also said they relate more to Apple, are inspired more by Apple and can’t live with out Apple. The same survey shows that Microsoft is considered evil in a way as most people want to argue with them and think it’s time the company is re-branded.

However the survey in my opinion is kind of biased, 2,000 people responded to the survey 74% of them work in marketing, and quite honestly the last time someone who worked in marketing decided what I liked and wanted, I ended up with a Microsoft Zune Original.

This week I made my way to San Jose California, and had the honor of passing by Apples HQ. While we drove by I honestly could sense a certain eliteness which quickly faded as we drove away.

But my buddy Xavier who is probably one of the biggest Apple lovers I know has had some bad luck with Apple products, and it’s somewhat of a trend as more people who have told me they only use Apple products find themselves in Apple stores hanging out at the Genius Bar instead of hanging out at a real bar.

Today Apple updated their Airport Express mobile base station to support 802.11n.

The new base station from Apple will be the smallest station that supports 802.11n and it weighs only 6.7 ounces. The Airport Express Mobile base station plugs directly into a wall socket, to give you a wireless connection where ever you need it. 

It would appear that the iPhone SDK is in hot demand, as Apple today announced that since its availablity there have been over 100,000 downloads, and that is in just four days.

“Developer reaction to the iPhone SDK has been incredible with more than 100,000 downloads in the first four days,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “Also, over one million people have watched the launch video on Apple.com, further demonstrating the incredible interest developers have in creating applications for the iPhone.”