MacRumors

CNet reports that Apple's plans for cloud computing could go well beyond music. Apple is said to have been in negotiations with some of the major film studios to offer streaming video service to users.

Apple has told the studios that under the plan, iTunes users will access video from various Internet-connected devices. Apple would, of course, prefer that users access video from the iPad, the company's upcoming tablet computer, the sources said.

The move makes sense in light of the iPad device which offers a nice video consumption device, though without a lot of onboard storage, maxing out at 64GB. It seems Apple has lot of convincing to do, however, as movie studios are working hard to avoid locking their content into one particular platform. Movie studios would prefer content purchased on one device could also be used on other devices.

Apple has been making apparent moves into streaming content with the acquisition of LaLa media and their North Carolina data center, but previous rumors had focused primarily on music streaming.

The Wall Street Journal reports (subscription required) on comments made today by AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson at an investor conference in which he noted that he expects Apple's iPhone to be an important part of the carrier's offerings for "quite some time". Stephenson did not address, however, whether the company is expecting to lose its exclusivity for the iPhone in the U.S. in the near future.

Stephenson also noted that he is pleased with the progress AT&T has made on its network, particularly in New York City and San Francisco, where users have been troubled by poor performance. In addition to voice quality issues, which Stephenson noted should be greatly improved by mid-year, AT&T has also been working to increase data capacity, with the company now handling half of all wireless data traffic in the United States.

Another topic of conversation at the conference was "variable pricing models", which Stephenson said are inevitable. The comments are reminiscent of similar talk from AT&T Mobility CEO Ralph de la Vega last December that led some to believe that tiered data pricing was imminent. AT&T moved to downplay such speculation in the following weeks and may find itself again having to clarify Stephenson's comments on the matter today.

One of the issues AT&T faces is the large amount of wireless traffic the iPhone generates. He said that AT&T is carrying half of the nation's wireless data traffic.

He said that carriers will eventually move to a "variable pricing model," and that it was inevitable that heavy users should pay more than low users. He added that emerging market products such as an electronic reader already follows the variable model.

On the issue of LTE (4G) deployment, Stephenson reported that AT&T is "not in a tremendous hurry" to deploy the next-generation network, noting that the technology is still being developed and widespread availability of products taking advantage of the technology is not expected until 2012.

In a separate report, Reuters notes that Stephenson also addressed Apple's iPad, claiming that he sees the device as being mainly a "Wi-Fi driven product". The report curiously explains that Stephenson does not expect the iPad to generate significant numbers of new "subscriptions" for AT&T, although customers are expected to use "prepaid" services.

While AT&T has agreed to provide wireless connections to the iPad tablet computer, Randall Stephenson said he does not expect the device to result in many new service subscriptions for AT&T as consumers will instead use Wi-Fi or prepaid services, where they do not subscribe to a service contract.

It is unclear what these terms are referring to, as Apple has only announced that AT&T will be providing month-to-month, contract-free data services for the iPad that could be considered both "prepaid" and "subscriptions".

A new Apple job listing posted yesterday confirms just that, with the company looking to hire a manager for its "Asia Pacific & Canada" iBooks division. While the exact geographic coverage for the position is not given, it appears at this time to be primarily focused on Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, with other countries also in the mix.

The role includes: working with management, regionally and in Cupertino to determine strategies and priorities for iBooks in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and other countries; identifying content providers to target, establish and develop relationships; working with legal and production teams to finalize relationships and secure content; and coordinate launches with partners, production, and marketing. This role will also be responsible for marketing the books offering on the iBooks store by coordinating with Apple's production teams, the marketing team, and the production and marketing teams of partners.

The successful employee holding the position will be based in either Markham, Ontario (outside of Toronto) or Sydney, Australia.

Apple is also beefing up its broader iBookstore staffing, with brand-new job postings seeking publisher account managers, including one focused on independent publishers, as well as several operations-side and marketing employees. Apple is presumably also pursuing international deals in countries other than those covered by the "Asia Pacific & Canada" division, although there are no currently open positions listed for such regions.

The iPhone team is looking for a manager to work on supporting next generation mobile advertising. This will involve managing a talented team of developers working on the frameworks included in the iPhone SDK. The ideal candidate will be responsible for the day to day management of the engineering, as well as related frameworks. He or she will spend much of their time interacting with the engineering team, program managers, other engineering teams, and executives. We need someone who is comfortable working in a fast paced environment with rapidly changing priorities.

A glance at Apple's jobs site reveals several other newly-posted positions related to mobile advertising, including a user experience/design engineer and concept designer based in Cupertino and a web user interface developer in Boston.

Apple purchased mobile advertising firm Quattro Wireless, which is based just outside of Boston in Waltham, Massachusetts, several months ago and has reportedly been looking to revolutionize mobile advertising to address Apple CEO Steve Jobs' view that "mobile ads suck".

Not all locations around the world are seeing such prompt shipment of 27-inch iMac models, however, as Apple's online stores in Australia and New Zealand are seeing 5-7 business day windows and European stores are showing as much as two-week delays in availability. Apple's 21.5-inch iMac models and other machines are shipping within 24 hours in those countries, and availability of the 27-inch iMac should continue to improve as Apple is able to push more machines into its international sales channels.

Apple today announced that it has filed suit against handset manufacturer HTC regarding alleged infringement of 20 iPhone-related patents. The patents cover such aspects as the user interface, architecture, and hardware.

Apple today filed a lawsuit against HTC for infringing on 20 Apple patents related to the iPhone's user interface, underlying architecture and hardware. The lawsuit was filed concurrently with the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) and in U.S. District Court in Delaware.

"We can sit by and watch competitors steal our patented inventions, or we can do something about it. We've decided to do something about it," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "We think competition is healthy, but competitors should create their own original technology, not steal ours."

HTC has become a prominent player in the rapidly-growing Android handset market, and is Google's manufacturing partner for the Nexus One released earlier this year.

Apple is currently involved in a number of high-profile patent lawsuits primarily stemming from the iPhone, but also extending into other aspects of the company's business. Apple and Nokia have filed suits against each other citing infringement of each other's patents, while Kodak recently filed complaints against Apple and Research in Motion related to digital camera patents.

Imagine that Netflix offers its subscribers the ability to instantly watch movies & TV episodes on their iPhone. The selection availability to instantly watch includes some new releases, lots of classics and TV episodes. There are no advertisements or trailers, and movies start in as little as 30 seconds. You can fast-forward, rewind, and pause or watch again. The movies & TV episodes you instantly watch are included in your Netflix membership for no additional fee.

Whenever you want to instantly watch content on your iPhone, your iPhone must be connected to a Wi-Fi network (such as one you might have at home or at work, or in public places like coffee shops, book stores, hotels, airports, etc.)

If this functionality were available, how likely would you or someone in your household be to instantly watch movies & TV episodes on your iPhone via a Wi-Fi network?

Despite a report last August that Netflix would soon be adding access for the iPhone, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings noted the following month that such a service was likely but would not be deployed in the "short term". Today's report notes, however, that earlier surveys asking users about interest in streaming to gaming systems such as the PlayStation 3 and Wii did precede introduction of those services, suggesting that the company may be moving forward with plans for the iPhone.

Media Memo reports that popular ringtone site Thumbplay has launched a new subscription music service, offering consumers unlimited streaming for $10/month with the option to purchase songs from a catalog of 8 million tracks at the same $0.69-$1.29 price points found on Apple's iTunes Store.

While the launch of yet another music service is not terribly newsworthy by itself, Thumbplay has also announced the hiring of former Apple executive Pablo Calamera as Chief Technology Officer. Calamera has held several positions at Apple, most recently a Director in Apple's Engineering division, overseeing development of MobileMe since 2006. He also spent time with Microsoft acquisitions Danger and WebTV.

Commented Schwartz: "We are thrilled to have Pablo join our team. He has unique experience with Apple, Danger and WebTV in delivering and syncing content across multiple platforms for a scaled customer base. He has also managed major integrations with U.S. and international carriers; an area of ongoing strategic importance for us. Over the course of his career, he has done an extraordinary job of building state-of-the-art consumer products and services from concept to completion. Technological innovation is paramount to Thumbplay, and Pablo's talent, experience and commitment to excellence will play a vital role in keeping us at the forefront of mobile entertainment offerings."

Building on its ringtone roots, Thumbplay is positioning its new music service as focused on mobile device streaming, with Research in Motion's BlackBerry line being the initial target. The company is reportedly also planning to offer a desktop app and will deploy iPhone and Android apps later this year.

Mockup of Mac mini with HDMI port in place of existing DVI port

More specifically, prototypes of a new Mac mini -- Apple's smallest and most affordable system, commonly employed by tech savvy Mac users as an ad-hoc living room media server, has been making the rounds with an HDMI port in place of its legacy DVI connector, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The Mac mini prototypes are claimed to look otherwise identical to existing models and continue to offer a mini DisplayPort alongside the HDMI port.

As the report notes, HDMI is electrically compatible with the DVI standard, allowing conversions from one connector to the other with a simple dongle. Unlike DVI, however, HDMI also offers support for audio, which would allow purchasers of future Mac mini models to connect their machines to their televisions or home theater systems with a single HDMI cable, as the Apple TV does today.

The report's sources claim that the Mac mini prototypes include NVIDIA's MCP89 chipset, although a licensing dispute between Intel and NVIDIA over chipsets for Intel's Nehalem platform suggests that Apple may have to continue using Intel Core 2 Duo processors in the next-generation Mac mini models if it is planning to use NVIDIA's chipset. Alternatively, Apple may choose to utilize an Intel chipset that would allow it to take advantage of Nehalem processors.

As for Apple's other Mac lines, the report claims that Apple has also prepared a mini DisplayPort-to-HDMI adapter capable of carrying both video and audio. The adapter reportedly had been scheduled to ship with Apple's most recent iMac revision alongside Blu-ray drives, but was scrapped as part of the decision to not include Blu-ray compatibility.

"We have ... heard that the upcoming iPad launch may be somewhat limited as a manufacturing bottleneck has impacted production of Apple's newest device," Misek writes. "An unspecified production problem at the iPad's manufacturer, Hon Hai Precision, will likely limit the launch region to the US and the number of units available to roughly 300K in the month of March, far lower than the company's initial estimate of 1,000K units. The delay in production ramp will likely impact Apple's April unit estimate of 800K as well. It is also possible that, given the limited number of units available in March, the launch will be delayed for a month."

The source and veracity of Misek's information is unknown, although it is perhaps wise to note that Misek predicted that Apple's January media event that saw the introduction of the iPad would also include the introduction of iPhone OS 4.0 and an announcement regarding a Verizon-compatible iPhone for mid-2010, neither of which came to fruition.

Update: According to Wired, an Apple spokeswoman has confirmed Apple's plans for late March availability of the iPad, but did not address any possible shortages or tightening of geographical distribution at launch.

Update, 11 a.m. PDT: An Apple spokeswoman told Wired.com on the phone that the "iPad will be available in late March."

The New York Times reports that magazine publisher Cond Nast is firming up plans to bring its content to Apple's iPad, rolling out dedicated versions of a number of its high-profile titles beginning in April.

The first magazines for which it will create iPad versions are Wired, GQ, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and Glamour, the company plans to announce in an internal memorandum on Monday.

GQ will have a tablet version of its April issue ready. Vanity Fair and Wired will follow with their June issues, and The New Yorker and Glamour will have issues in the summer (the company has not yet determined the exact timing for those).

The report notes that Cond Nast will be running a multi-month test with the titles, examining pricing, advertising, and technological implementations as it looks to to develop its platform strategy. The publisher will be making its content available through iTunes during the test phase, with Wired also being made available in a non-iTunes format, although it is unclear exactly what that distribution method entails.

Cond Nast has been relatively proactive about bringing its content to the iPad, having demoed a digital version of Wired for tablet devices as early as last November with no direct knowledge of Apple's iPad plans. The publisher also already offers an iPhone application that has seen relatively strong sales since it launched late last year.

Ars Technica's Jon Stokes counters this belief with multiple sources who indicate the new processor is actually based on the Cortex A8 -- the same design as the current iPhone and iPod Touch.

As I watched the videos and read the reports of the iPad in action at the launch event, I was thoroughly convinced that the device was built on the out-of-order Cortex A9, possibly even a dual-core version. But it turns out that the the A4 is a 1GHz custom SoC with a single Cortex A8 core and a PowerVR SGX GPU. The fact that A4 uses a single A8 core hasn't been made public, but I've heard from multiple sources who are certain for different reasons that this is indeed the case. (I wish I could be more specific, but I can't.)

We've heard similar whispers which make us believe this report is true. The iPad A4, of course, runs at a higher clock speed (1GHz) than the processors found in the iPhone (600Mhz) and iPod Touch. Stokes goes on to speculate that the PA Semi team could have added their expertise in lower power consumption, and the A4 could find its way in a future iPhone release.

The screenshots (above) posted to the thread reveal Mac OS X menu components in the Steam file directory -- though some have suggested that these could simply be a Mac OS X-based theme. More convincing, perhaps, is the presence of Mac OS X-like menu definitions and strings that suggest support for multiple platforms:

"steam_welcomeaction_platformwrong" "%gamename% is not available on your current platform."

Even more suggestive of Valve's plans was a recent report that Valve Software's Chris Green has been recruiting for Mac engineers:

Chris Greens Summary

I work for Valve. You should work for Valve.

REALLY looking for senior Linux + Mac engineers.
Always hiring Senior Engineers, Artists, and Mappers

Steam is only available on Windows/PC at present.

It appears likely that the application will require a paid subscription as the new organization continues its attempts to monetize mobile distribution of its content, although an AP executive suggested that it may appear as a free application at first.

The group already has drawn up plans to charge for an application designed for the iPad, a 1.5-pound tablet computer that Apple Inc. is scheduled to release at the end of March. The price of the application has yet to be determined, although it might start free, according to Jane Seagrave, a senior vice president who becomes the AP's chief revenue officer Monday.

Much like the AP Mobile news product, the iPad app will show custom packages of headlines, stories, photos and video from the AP and from newspapers and broadcasters that choose to contribute their content and share the revenue. AP members also could use the same system to offer their own iPad apps that show their own content.

Attempts to bring newspaper content to the iPad have hit a few hurdles as the device's launch approaches with internal units of The New York Times reportedly vying for control over the distribution and disagreeing over pricing for the newspaper's content. Newspaper and magazine publishers have also been expressing concern over revenue sharing with Apple and the company's unwillingness to share subscriber information that publishers depend on for marketing and tailoring their content.