Apple: The Phone Maker Of No? Yes. And no.

Another YouTube video clip from Pirates of Silicon Valley. Bill Gates:

Steve, all cars have steering wheels, and no one tries to claim that the steering wheel was their invention… You and I are like two guys who had a rich neighbor, Xerox, who left the door open all the time, and you go sneaking in to steal the TV set, only, when you get there, you realize that I got there first. I got the loot Steve. And you’re yelling?

Why was Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt sitting on Apple’s board of directors? To be watched by Apple or to steal from Apple?

Fake Steve and YouTube video from Pirates of Silicon Valley where an Apple employee accuses Microsoft’s Bill Gates of stealing from Apple:

You know, Steve thinks IBM is the enemy. He doesn’t get it. You guys are.

Steve Jobs missed seeing that Microsoft was the enemy back in the early 1980s. Has Steve missed seeing what Google is today?

The economy remains anemic and people are cutting back on expenses, changing their lifestyle to reflect new economic realities. What are people not willing to live without? Rick Newman of US News & World Report covers the Top 10 Things We Can’t Live Without:

1. Portable computers
2. High speed internet access
3. Smart phones
4. Education
5. Movies
6. TV
7. Music downloads
8. Pets
9. Booze
10. Coffee

It does make you wonder how bad it really is out there.

From Evelyn Rusli in Seeking Alpha on Google I/O’s Vic Gundotra’s keynote address:

Gundotra enjoyed several jabs at the iPhone maker, making fun of Apple for not supporting Flash, the relatively slow load time of the iPad, and for trying to control the mobile ecosystem. His opening remarks set the tone: Google doesn’t want a future where one man controls mobile. Hmm, whoever could that be?

Google doesn’t mind controlling web search and web advertising. Was Google fearful that Apple’s growing share of the smart phone market would translate into a position similar to the iPod’s portable media player monopoly and domination? Apparently.

Of course, the iPad and the new iPhone operating system were not safe from Gundotra’s fire. During several demos, Gundotra put the iPad’s speed to the test by matching it against the Android 2.2. Surprise, surprise, the Android 2.2 consistently outperformed, often by a significant degree.

Great. Apple has some competition from a bunch of immature techno-children with mediocre presentation skills. One more thing, where can I buy an iPad-like Android 2.2 device? Oh, I see. Gundotra’s demonstration compared a future device against a currently shipping device. Yeah, and my dad can beat up your dad of the future.

Sorry. One more thing once more. How much money has Google made in the mobile device space to date? Either revenue or profits. You choose.

John Pacskowski in All Things Digital on the future of really personal computing:

Here’s a stunner of a data point: Apple is selling more than 200,000 iPads per week.

What a surprise. The iPad costs half as much, does nearly as much for average computer users, and is much easier to use.

There’s the story of a woman who saved her money to buy an iPad, but Apple wouldn’t let her because she wanted to pay in cash. Michael Finney from ABC:

Apple stepped up to the plate Wednesday, responding to a 7 On Your Side report about a woman who tried to buy an iPad using her carefully saved up money, only to be told she could not pay with cash. The story caused outcry all across the country and Wednesday Apple not only changed its policy, it provided a happy ending to the story.

Apple apologized and gave her a free iPad for her trouble. Alright, I want to buy a new Mac Pro and I can only pay with cash…

Tweetie has long been my favorite iPhone and Mac Twitter app. Rick Broida on Twitter’s official iPhone Twitter app in CNET:

The interface looks bland and colorless compared with TweetDeck and Twitterific, and the lack of toolbar labels and built-in help are sure to confuse newcomers to Twitter and/or Twitter apps.

Twitter, which now owns Tweetie, had a chance to improve the app, but, instead it’s become corporate blah-lah. Is a boring, official, Mac Twitter app around the corner?

The Google Font Directory is now available for web sites.

All fonts in the directory are available for use on your website under an open source license and served by Google servers.

In other words, a number of new and beautiful fonts are coming to web sites. The Google Font API and FAQs.

This is a big deal.

UPDATE: For example, I just changed PixoBebo’s standard headline font from Georgia to Crimson Text.

I missed this from last week: Larry Dignan in ZDNet on the FUD spray from Adobe’s founders:

In the end, we believe the question is really this: Who controls the World Wide Web? And we believe the answer is: nobody — and everybody, but certainly not a single company.

Why is that the question? How does Apple’s position on Adobe’s Flash and Adobe’s cross-platform development tools undermine the web?

Apple doesn’t want resource hogging, crash-prone Flash on their mobile devices. And, Apple doesn’t want lame, mediocre, cross-platform development tools to create apps for their mobile devices. What does that have to do with the Web?

Still $999, but now with a faster CPU, faster graphics, and a 10-hour battery life. This is a great selling point which proves Apple knows what customers want most.

Its built-in lithium-polymer battery now lasts up to 10 hours on a single charge,1 which makes it perfect for long flights, all-day workshops, and marathon study sessions. The new energy-efficient NVIDIA integrated graphics processor improves battery life by using less power for everyday tasks like writing email and surfing the web. And thanks to advanced battery chemistry and adaptive charging technology, the MacBook battery can be recharged up to 1000 times — good for about five years of typical use — and lasts nearly three times the lifespan of typical notebook batteries. That makes for less waste. And that, in turn, makes for one environmentally friendly battery.

Schools love the MacBook. I’ll bet they will love the iPad even more.

Dan Frommer reports in Business Insider on the hubris exemplified by AT&T’s CEO, Ralph de la Vega:

• 70% of AT&T’s customers are on family plans, which is a pain in the butt to move everyone over to a new carrier
• 40% of customers are on corporate discount plans, which are also a pain to let go of

When Verizon gets the iPhone I’m gone.

Ed Sutherland in Cult of Mac on a survey which points out the obvious. The iPhone is better than sliced bread:

The next time you try to explain how your invention is the greatest thing since sliced bread, you may want to use the iPhone as comparison, instead. Turns out the iPhone ranks No. 8 in a UK consumer survey of the 100 most important inventions, far outdistancing sliced bread at No. 70.

The iPhone also topped the flushing toilet, painkillers, and cars, but behind penicillin, the wheel, the airplane, and the light bulb. Android didn’t make the list. Google came in behind toilet paper.

That seems fitting.

Dave Girard reviews Apple’s Aperture 3 in Ars. Bounce to page 7 for the summary:

For pros who just want to get work done, Aperture 3’s improved interface, flawless curve adjustment, multiple maskable edits, and 64-bit update are more than enough reason to upgrade. Add the metadata improvements and the high-ISO RAW conversion, and you have an essential upgrade. If Apple can rein in the glitches, give pros a toggle for the gooey effects, and polish the masking tools, then the rest is just gravy.

The verdict in fewer words:

So good that I’d put up with the crashing to use it

I ran into the same slow and crash problems from about 10,000 photos.