MacRumors

Apple has set up a feature on its iTunes Store main page to allow users to donate to the American Red Cross in support of relief efforts in the wake of Tuesday's massive earthquake in Haiti. The donations, which are available in six denominations ranging from $5 to $200, will be processed as any other iTunes purchase, allowing convenient billing for existing iTunes users, and 100% of the donated amount will be passed along to the Red Cross.

On January 12, a series of earthquakes measuring 6.5 to 7.3 on the Richter scale devastated Haiti. The American Red Cross is working with its partners in the global Red Cross and Red Crescent network, including the Haitian Red Cross, and other partners to assist those affected by this disaster.

Your gift to the American Red Cross will support emergency relief efforts to help those affected by this earthquake. Assistance provided by the American Red Cross may include sending relief supplies, mobilizing relief workers and providing financial resources.

In addition, Macworld notes that a number of Mac developers are donating proceeds from sales of their software to the relief effort. One group in particular is organizing under the Indie+Relief banner to set January 20th as a one-day fundraising push for the effort, with over twenty as-yet-unnamed developers already on board according to Macworld.

As part of its cover story this week on the Apple-Google rivalry, BusinessWeek reports that Apple is seriously looking at ways to revolutionize mobile advertising, leveraging its recent acquisition of Quattro Wireless to go head-to-head to with the Google/AdMob conglomeration.

According to a source familiar with his thinking, Jobs has recognized that "mobile ads suck" and that improving that situation will make Apple even harder to beat.

Not one to shy away from a challenge, particularly when it offends his aesthetic sensibilities, Jobs and his lieutenants have discussed ways to overhaul mobile advertising in the same way they had revolutionized music players and phones, say two sources close to the company. The sources did not reveal specific plans at Apple but say there are several possible ad approaches.

As examples, the report points to the possibility of Apple using geo-location and user data to enhance the relevancy of mobile ads, as well as the creative use of features built into the iPhone to engage users, concepts the company has explored in several patent applications.

Also noted is Apple's vast quantities of user data generated by its closed ecosystem, which could offer Apple a distinct leg up on other competitors as it looks to take on Google.

Apple has a vault of valuable data that can help drive an ad business. It knows precisely which apps, podcasts, videos, and songs people download from iTunes; in many cases it has detailed customer information such as credit-card numbers and home addresses. That gives Apple a chance to blend advertising and e-commerce in new ways, particularly after the acquisition of Quattro. The startup already works with advertisers, including Ford (F), Netflix (NFLX), and Procter & Gamble (PG), to help them figure out when and where to place ads on the sites of publishers, such as Sports Illustrated and CBS News. By tying Quattro's ad-serving technology into its own, Apple would be able to tell advertisers how often and under what circumstances a person clicked on particular ads. "Apple is one of the few brands that could actually go head to head with Google," says Kevin Lee, chief executive of search marketing firm Didit.

One other item of interest included in the cover story is speculation may look to dump Google as the default search engine provider for the iPhone in the future, perhaps striking a deal with historical competitor Microsoft for Bing or developing its own search engine. The move would serve to cut Google off from a significant chunk of Apple's iPhone user data as the rivalry between the two companies continues to grow, limiting Google's ability to use Apple's data to improve its own offerings.

CNET reports that it has received an e-mail from a "prominent" iPhone application developer noting that the developer's application has been updated for iPhone OS 4.0, implying that Apple has already delivered an early version of the updated operating system and development tools into the hands of select developers.

iPhone OS 4.0 is imminent. At least, that's the only conclusion I can draw from an e-mail I just received from a prominent app developer.

The message includes the following snippet: "Just wanted to give you a heads up that we've submitted an updated app for the new iPhone OS 4.0 software."

In the past two years, Apple has held March media events introducing iPhone OS updates and providing tools to allow developers to implement the new features included in the revisions ahead of the public launches of the new operating systems in June or July. Apple has, however, offered demos of applications running on the new operating systems at these March events, indicating that select developers had been provided even earlier access to development tools for the new iPhone OS versions.

One wildcard in the development of iPhone OS 4.0 may be Apple's tablet device, which has been rumored to be at least based on iPhone OS and is expected to be introduced later this month. A report from earlier this month indicated that Apple may be preparing to launch a beta version of iPhone OS 4.0 at this month's rumored media event. A separate report earlier this week claimed that the tablet does in fact run on the iPhone OS kernel and that the inclusion of tablet-related code in the latest iPhone OS versions has precluded Apple from offering any new software updates for the iPhone recently.

Sketchy evidence of iPhone OS 4.0 appeared in Boy Genius Report's browser logs in mid-December, although such data is easily faked. Soon after, an entry for iPhone OS 4.0 appeared in a developer's analytics data.

Update: MacRumors has identified and communicated with the developer of the application in question, and it appears that the mention of "iPhone OS 4.0" was in fact an error in the press release issued by the company. As was postulated by The iPhone Blog, the application had actually been updated to version 4.0 rather than for iPhone OS 4.0, which was likely the source of the error.

BusinessWeek reports on Apple's recent acquisitions of Lala Media and Quattro Wireless, noting that the moves may be part of a broader strategy by the company to utilize its vast cash hoard to increase its historically low frequency of such acquisitions.

In particular, the report notes that Apple last year hired Goldman Sachs investment banker Adrian Perica to assist with such deals. The hiring of Perica, who is believed to be the first dedicated mergers & acquisitions specialist on Apple's staff, reportedly replaces a "super ad hoc" process in which Apple department heads were themselves responsible for building the case for an acquisition and negotiating the terms.

Jobs has long preferred for his company to develop technology in-house and avoid the risks that come with integrating other companies into Apple's unique, finely tuned culture. In the past, there was no organized M&A effort, say three former executives at the company. Instead, business chiefs were supposed to keep an eye out for deals and go to Jobs if they thought there was a beneficial one to be made. After getting Jobs' O.K., the champion of the idea would pull together a team to make an overture, negotiate terms, and work through the administrative details. "It was super ad hoc," says one of the former executives.

A turning point for Apple was reportedly Google's acquisition of mobile advertising firm AdMob. Apple had reportedly been in discussions to acquire AdMob itself when Google swooped in and made its deal. Stung by the loss of AdMob to Google, Apple apparently moved quickly in its bid to lock up streaming media firm Lala as Google and others began to get involved.

According to the report, experts believe that Apple is unlikely to engage in any blockbuster acquisition deals, instead relying on the small deals that bring very specific technologies, intellectual property, and talent to the company and that the company has relied on in the past. The addition of Perica and the loss of AdMob to Google's grasp, however, suggest that Apple may be looking to become more aggressive in its pursuit of those companies that fit its needs.

Yesterday, Valleywag received considerable attention for its questionably legal offer of up to $100,000 for legitimate information on Apple's much-anticipated tablet device. It didn't take long for Apple's lawyers to respond to the offer, with Michael Spillner of Apple's law firm Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe sending Valleywag and Gawker a cease-and-desist letter requesting that the contest be discontinued by 6:00 PM Pacific time today.

As your offer acknowledges, Apple has maintained the types of information and things you are soliciting -- "how it'll work, its size, the name, the software", as well as any possible details about the product's appearance, features, and physical samples -- in strict confidence. Anyone who might have access to such information would be bound under the strictest contractual obligations not to disclose the information to third parties.

To that end, Spillner cites California law prohibiting the inducement of disclosure of trade secrets, putting Gawker Media "on notice" that the information it is seeking to obtain is a trade secret and thus disclosure of such information would violate California law. In addition to the demand that Gawker Media end the competition, Apple also requests that Gawker turn over any confidential materials it may have received or may yet receive and refrain from publishing or sharing them.

For its part, Valleywag has not ended its contest, instead reiterating its position that tipsters should "stay within the bounds of the law" and use anonymous e-mail addresses to prevent identification. It has also named Spillner the first "winner" of the contest for offering "the most concrete evidence yet" that an Apple tablet is under development.

Being Manan notes (via Redmond Pie) a newly-published patent application from Apple describing the ability to add users' contacts directly to the iPhone's home screen, offering one-touch access to various functions related to that contact.

Users can create icons for a mobile device, where the icons can represent often accessed user contacts. User created icons can allow convenient access to all information and applications related to a contact. Thus, consecutive access to applications related to a contact can be greatly diminished.

Taking things one step further, the patent application also describes a system in which icons for contacts could automatically appear only temporarily based on the user's proximity to the contact. Such a system is similar in some respects to Google Latitude and Loopt, but would offer direct home screen integration with proximity-based services. Apple has also expressed interest in such "location sharing" technologies in other patent applications.

Today's application also specifically addresses the potential for proximity-based advertising using the same functionality, allowing businesses to offer information to nearby users in the form of contacts that can appear on the home screen of the users' devices.

In some implementations, a contact 610 can temporarily appear on a mobile device 100 when the mobile device 100 is within a determined proximity of a contact host. The contact host can be a server or device operated by an individual, entity or service capable of providing the icon and related application information. In the present example, the contact host is a server operated by a coffee house called "Rocket Java". An alert can be presented on the mobile device 100 to indicate that a temporary contact or application is available to the mobile device 100. In one example, the alert can have two options: "dismiss" and "view contact." After the contact has been viewed, other options can be presented, including options like "add to local contacts" or "save to the home screen."

Apple's proposed system allows for customization of alerts when the user is near a proximity-based contact, either automatically adding the contact to the user's home screen while in close proximity or first requesting permission to do so.

Apple has explored the use of location-based content delivery in previous patent applications, suggesting that it may hold more than just a passing interest in the technology.

The new patent application, filed on July 9th, 2008 and published today, is credited to Apple designer Marcel Van Os.

Kodak today announced that it has filed suit against both Apple and Research in Motion for infringement of patents related to digital camera technology.

The Kodak complaint, filed with the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC), specifically claims that Apple's iPhones and RIM's camera-enabled BlackBerry devices infringe a Kodak patent that covers technology related to a method for previewing images. Separately, Kodak filed two suits today against Apple in U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York that claim the infringement of patents related to digital cameras and certain computer processes.

Kodak, which invented the digital camera in 1975, claims that it seeks only what it considers proper compensation for the claimed intellectual property, noting that it has attempted to work with Apple and Research in Motion but has been unable to come to an agreement.

"In the case of Apple and RIM, we've had discussions for years with both companies in an attempt to resolve this issue amicably, and we have not been able to reach a satisfactory agreement. In light of that, we are taking this action to ensure that we protect the interests of our shareholders and the existing licensees of our technology.

"Our primary interest is not to disrupt the availability of any product but to obtain fair compensation for the use of our technology," Quatela said. "There's a basic issue of fairness that needs to be addressed. Those devices use Kodak technology, and we are merely seeking compensation for the use of our technology in their products."

Apple is also currently embroiled in a patent dispute with Nokia, one that has expanded to include multiple suits and countersuits and has resulted in Nokia seeking the halt of the importation of "virtually all" Apple products into the United States until the situation can be resolved.

Spanish site faq-mac.com, which was first to note an Intel promotion yesterday apparently revealing at least one forthcoming MacBook Pro based on the company's new Core i5 processors, now reports [Google translation] that Intel has revised the promotion to offer HP Envy notebooks instead of MacBook Pros, blaming a marketing error for the incorrect promotional materials.

Intel has apologized for the mistake and the confusion they have created with this slip, which it blamed on a lack of communication from their central marketing agency.

Intel has modified the artwork for the promotion, which was available in several countries, to reflect the "new" laptop model available for the drawing.

Apple is expected to introduce an update to its MacBook Pro line, which was last revised in June 2009, in the relatively near future, with Intel's new Core i5 processors seen as the most likely candidate for inclusion in the next-generation models.

Research firms Gartner and IDC yesterday released their preliminary quarterly personal computer shipment data, offering up a picture of market performance during the fourth quarter of 2009 and for the year. As usual, the two firms' data sets contain some differences, but both reveal a strong rebound for the PC industry, with worldwide shipments growing between 15 and 22% and U.S. shipments growing approximately 25% between the fourth quarters of 2008 and 2009.

According to Gartner's report, Apple slipped behind Toshiba into fifth place in the U.S. market in grabbing a 7.5% share, down 0.2% over the year-ago quarter. The number is also down from an 8.8% share in the previous quarter, although Apple typically sees a decline in market share in the fourth quarter of each year as it comes off of the strength of its third quarters buoyed by educational sales.

Apple's U.S. unit growth for the quarter was 23.3% year-over-year, trailing only slightly the U.S. industry growth of 26.5%, but fell victim to astounding 70.7% growth from Toshiba that propelled the Japanese computer maker past Apple for the quarter.

IDC's report paints a slightly different picture, showing Apple gaining market share in the U.S. as it slightly outpaced overall industry performance. According to IDC, Apple's U.S. shipments grew 31% year-over-year for the fourth quarter, ahead of the 24% growth of the overall industry and allowing Apple to move from 7.0% market share in the fourth quarter of 2008 to 7.4% in the fourth quarter of 2009. As in Gartner's study, however, Apple was still leapfrogged by Toshiba's 71.5% growth, pushing the Mac maker into fifth place in the U.S. market.

For the year, IDC's numbers show Apple edging out Toshiba for the fourth position in the U.S. market, claiming 8.0% market share on over 5.5 million computers shipped. That number was up slightly from 7.9% for calendar year 2008, and came on 8.2% unit growth. As usual, neither Gartner nor IDC covered Apple's worldwide performance for the fourth quarter or the full year, as the company does not rank in the top 5 by global shipments.

Given Steve Jobs' distaste for styluses, it comes as a surprise that Apple has recently applied for a patent application exploring the use of a stylus for the capacitive touch sensors found on the iPhone. Unlike the recently revived Newton patent, this new patent was actually filed with today's technology in mind.

The document explores the use of a stylus on modern devices such as the iPhone which are typically tuned for finger detection. Unlike older resistive screens, the new capacitive screens require styluses to have special conductive tips in order to be recognized. While we don't expect Apple to offer a stylus for the iPhone, the input methods for the upcoming tablet has remained up for debate.

The patent application is authored by John Elias, one of the co-founders of Fingerworks.

In an interesting twist as fourth-generation iPhone rumors begin to gather steam in the new year, Bloomberg cites Goldman Sachs analyst Robert Chen, who predicts that Apple's next iPhone may take some cues from the company's new multi-touch Magic Mouse and incorporate a touch-sensitive casing in addition to the traditional touchscreen.

Magic Mouse, a computer mouse released in October, has a touch-sensitive solid plastic shell that replaces mechanical buttons. The technology may be replicated in the new iPhone to offer touch-sensitive features on the rear of the handset, Chen said.

No evidence for Chen's claim is given beyond the citing of an unidentified source, however, and no specific suggestions of how the touch sensitivity might be utilized are offered.

Chen also claims that the new iPhone will make an appearance "as early as June" and will offer a 5-megapixel camera, up from the 3.2-megapixel camera found in the iPhone 3GS. A report late last month indicated that Apple had in fact placed orders for 5-megapixel camera sensors for the new iPhone, with another claim last week suggesting that Apple is looking to add an LED flash to the iPhone's camera capabilities.

Valleywag today announced that it is offering a bounty of up to $100,000 for information on Apple's much-anticipated tablet device. The reward ladder begins at $10,000 for "bona fide pictures" of the device, increasing to $20,000 for video. Potential rewards for more ambitious tipsters include $50,000 for pictures of Apple CEO Steve Jobs holding the device, and $100,000 for anyone willing to let Valleywag play with it for an hour.

We've had enough of trying to follow all the speculation around Apple's impending tablet -- how it'll work, its size, the name, the software and whether it will save magazines. We want answers, dammit! And we're willing to pay.

As a disclaimer, Valleywag "encourages" tipsters to stay within the law and notes that it will not pay out any prizes until the Apple tablet debuts in order to ensure authenticity. Despite the disclaimer, however, Valleywag's offer could easily face legal challenges as pointed out by TechCrunch.

We spoke to a lawyer about the legality of the bounty, who says that Apple could have a claim against Gawker/Valleywag for inducing breach of contract, since anyone who has their hands on the tablet is certainly under a nondisclosure agreement. This could result in tort damages, with potential for punitive damages.

Apple has reportedly scheduled a media event for later this month, where it is widely expected to introduce the new tablet device, likely giving potential entrants for Valleywag's contest just two weeks to produce their information.

24/7 Wall St. reports that Apple and App Store developers appear to have lost approximately $450 million to piracy since the marketplace for iPhone and iPod touch application opened in July 2008. The rough number is based on several estimates regarding the proportion of downloads that are paid applications, the piracy rate for paid applications, and the proportion of pirated app users who would have paid for the applications had pirated versions not been available.

There have been over 3 billion downloads since the inception of the App Store. Assuming the proportion of those that are paid apps falls in the middle of the Bernstein estimate, 17% or 510 million of these were paid applications. Based on our review of current information, paid applications have a piracy rate of around 75%. That supports the figure that for every paid download, there have been 3 pirated downloads. That puts the number of pirate downloads at 1.53 billion. If the average price of a paid application is $3, that is $4.59 billion dollars in losses split between Apple and the application developers. That is, of course, assuming that all of those pirates would have made purchases had the application not been available to them for free. This is almost certainly not the case. A fair estimate of the proportion of people who would have used the App Store if they did not use pirated applications is about 10%. This estimate yields about $459 million in lost revenue for Apple and application developers.

Based on Apple's take of App Store sales of 30%, the report concludes that piracy has cost Apple itself in the neighborhood of $140 million over the past year and a half, a significant loss for the company, especially considering Apple's estimated total App Store revenue of $500-$700 million.

The report also notes that Apple has remained silent about the issue and taken no significant steps to address the issue beyond the initial security measures deployed in the App Store. Assuming Apple's true goal is to sell iPhones and iPods, then like the original iTunes Music Store, the App Store may very well be viewed as a means to that end. Consequently, the hit to Apple's bottom line may be considered somewhat acceptable to the company if it continues to drive device sales, leaving developers to bear the brunt of the revenue loss.

Boy Genius Report reveals that it has received information from a source regarding Apple's much-rumored tablet, noting that it is basically an "iPhone on steroids" and offering a few details about the device.

- The tablet's multi-touch gestures are "out of control."
- It's powered by an incredibly fast ARM CPU
- It runs on the iPhone kernel.
- The internal model number is K48AP.
- There hasn't been an updated iPhone OS build because there's too much tablet-related code/references in the OS and Apple obviously didn't want that to leak. Oops.
- The tablet is basically an "iPhone on steroids."

The report is not the first to refer to Apple's tablet as carrying an internal model number of K48AP, as a Reddit user previously made the same claim, along with an assertion that the next-generation iPhone will carry internal model number N90AP. (The iPhone 3GS carries an internal model number of N88AP.) It is unknown whether the two sources are independent.

Boy Genius Report has had a mixed track record, incorrectly reporting in recent months that Apple and AT&T were looking to launch an 8 GB iPhone 3GS before Christmas and publishing a faked Apple Black Friday sale announcement. The site did, however, correctly offer information on iPhone app organization and Twitter/Facebook sharing in iTunes 9, although it later published faked iTunes 9 screenshots.

Spanish site faq-mac.com reports [Google translation] that chipmaker Intel has sent an e-mail to members of its Intel Retail Edge program touting a chance for participants to win one of two MacBook Pro notebooks based on Intel's new Core i5 processors during the month of January. Apple's MacBook Pro line currently utilizes Intel Core 2 Duo processors.

Other sources have confirmed that similar promotional e-mails have gone out to program participants in the United States and United Kingdom. Intel's Retail Edge Program is targeted at employees of retail stores that offer Intel-based products for sale, and offers them training opportunities to increase their knowledge of Intel products as well as contests and special discounts.

Early benchmarks have shown the Core i5 processors to hold significant performance advantages over the Core 2 Duo line, with similar battery life for systems based on the two lines. As noted by our Buyer's Guide, the MacBook Pro is nearing the end of its typical lifecycle, having last been updated in June 2009.

Apple is reportedly scheduled to be holding a media event in San Francisco at the end of this month, where it is widely expected that the company will introduce its long-anticipated tablet device. It is unknown whether Apple would also take that opportunity to introduce revised notebook offerings or if it would do so at a separate time.

As rumors of an Apple tablet reach a frenzy, there's no shortage of opinions of what Apple could or should do in an upcoming tablet device. One major question that has remained is the input method that Apple will choose to adopt for the tablet. This became the most obvious issue when you start holding 10-inch tablets as we did at CES. Traditional soft keyboards simply don't scale well in size. Gizmodo summarizes and explores the problem well:

I had a chance to play with a few different sizes of tablets at CES, nearly all of which had traditional onscreen keyboards -- in particular, the Android 2.0 keyboard, which is aesthetically different but functionally almost identical to iPhone OSes. None of them worked, at least in the way that I wanted them to, for one reason: they were too big. Seven-inch tablets were too large to comfortably thumb-type on, while 10-inch tablets made text input all but impossible.

This exact issue dates back to when Apple first introduced the Newton MessagePad, which offered handwriting recognition as its primary input. One of the main benefits of handwriting recognition was the fact that it could be used while standing and holding a slate-type device. As device sizes shrank over the years and chiclet keyboards, and subsequently touch-screen keyboards, took over, the issue has been mostly forgotten.

The simplest (and arguably the most likely) solution will be for Apple to split the touch keyboard in some way. This is the same solution (DialKeys) that Microsoft adopted when they introduced their UMPC devices in 2006. Halves of the touch keyboard would sit along the left and right edges of the screen to be more accessible to your thumbs while holding the device with both hands.

A more intriguing solution, however, would be the reintroduction of handwriting recognition in at least a limited form alongside a more robust multi-touch keyboard. While much has been said of an old handwriting patent application that reemerged in November, the claims in that patent date back from Newton days and the provided image is clearly a depiction of the Newton MessagePad (image), complete with up/down arrows in the toolbar.

Instead, the most interesting multi-touch patent that has emerged from Apple in recent years is one that dates from February 2008, and describes a comprehensive multi-touch system which incorporates touch controls and proximity sensors to allow the device to handle a multitude of different input types, including stylus-less handwriting recognition:

Apparatus and methods are disclosed for simultaneously tracking multiple finger and palm contacts as hands approach, touch, and slide across a proximity-sensing, multi-touch surface. Identification and classification of intuitive hand configurations and motions enables unprecedented integration of typing, resting, pointing, scrolling, 3D manipulation, and handwriting into a versatile, ergonomic computer input device.

FingerWorks founder Wayne Westerman describes a system where the "pen grip detection module" checks to see if the hand imprint on the multi-touch screen matches up with that of holding an imaginary pen. If so, the movements are interpreted as digital ink and can be used for drawing, signatures or even handwriting recognition. This would go along nicely with Steve Jobs' dislike of styluses.

To be honest, we're not sure how such a system would work in practice, and the remainder of the patent application is likely to be more relevant to Apple's actual plans. The advanced recognition and processing involved paints a picture of an intuitive multi-touch input device that adapts to the user's intent.