Apple

Wired’s Gadget Lab:

Since when has Best Buy, the nation’s most well-known electronics retailer, become a player in the Apple rumors game?

We asked, and Best Buy answered: “The customer survey was a routine offer effectiveness survey conducted by one of Best Buy’s research partners. Any brand reference was hypothetical. The survey is no longer available,” Best Buy told us in a statement.

John Gruber responding to a misguided article by Lance Ulanoff:

Apple doesn’t need to pay for Super Bowl ads to get high-profile attention for major announcements.

Why is it that the PC-focused press continues to pretend they know Apple? Ulanoff’s comments show he doesn’t understand how Apple works and perhaps never will.

Apple doesn’t do what other companies do. They don’t have to.

The Next Web:

Apple has updated its iBooks Author app in order to clarify the language of its End User License Agreement. The changes to the EULA clarify that Apple does indeed intend the packaged product to be sold on the iBookstore only, but also makes it clear that it does not lay claim to the content that you use to create the book, nor does it try to limit what you can do with that content elsewhere.

Clarifying what intelligent people already knew.

CNET:

An ad out of Taiwan for the Action Pad, which appears to be an iPad-type device produced by a company called Action Electronics.

The presenter might strike you as somehow familiar. It is an actor, dressed to resemble the late Steve Jobs — and equipped with with halo and wings.

Spectacularly tasteless.

Mental Floss:

In 1984, Apple defined the Super Bowl Commercial as a cultural phenomenon. Prior to Super Bowl XVIII, nobody watched the game “just for the commercials” — but one epic TV spot, directed by sci-fi legend Ridley Scott, changed all that. Read on for the inside story of the commercial that rocked the world of advertising, even though Apple’s Board of Directors didn’t want to run it at all.

A lot of people don’t realize the reason why this weekend’s Super Bowl commercials will be as talked about as the game is the iconic Apple 1984 ad. It is still considered, almost thirty years later, the greatest commercial ever shown.

A number of news outlets picked up on a rumor from a Japanese blog this morning saying that Apple would hold an “unusual” event in February. [...]

TheNextWeb: Apple has named former Microsoft Product Marketing chief Robin Burrowes as the head of App Store Marketing for iTunes Europe, becoming the latest games executive to join Apple’s ranks. Apple’s previously hired executives from Nintendo and and Activision for … Continued

[caption id="attachment_19525" align="aligncenter" width="167" caption="Crunchie"][/caption]TechCrunch:

This year’s fifth annual Crunchies Awards has just finished up at the classy Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco, and it was a smashing success. We poked fun #humblebraggers, got cussed at by Siri, honored former TechCrunch CEO Heather Harde, and gave wild monkey trophies to tech’s greatest innovators. Check out the full list of nominees and winners.

Apple took a Crunchie for Siri in the “Best Technology Achievement” category and was nominated for “Best Tablet Application” (Garageband) and “Best New Device” (iPad 2) but lost out to Fotopedia and Nest respectively.

Tony Hart:

Tony,

I talked to many people and John was the best by far. I think you will be as pleased as I am. His role isn’t to bring Dixons to Apple, [it's] to bring Apple to an even higher level of customer service and satisfaction.

Tim

If nothing else, Cookie’s emails to customers are longer than Jobs’ ever were.

David Boles:

I was having such a good day today. Then Apple threatened me in a nasty email.

The question is, are those footers we see in some emails – the ones like “This transmission may be privileged and may contain confidential information intended only for the person(s) named above” – legally binding and/or actionable? Many of us have always assumed they are put there just to satisfy some corporate weenie and can be safely ignored.

IDG News Service:

Apple has appealed a Chinese court ruling last December that rejected its ownership of the iPad trademark in the country, and could expose the company to trademark infringement lawsuits from a local company.

The maker of the iconic iPad filed the appeal on Jan. 5 with the Higher People’s Court of Guangdong Province, according to a statement from Proview International, a little known Chinese display monitor company that claims control over the iPad trademark in mainland China.

If Apple loses their appeal, the company may be forced to pay out huge licensing fees or perhaps even change the name of the iPad in China.

Chris Chang, M.I.C. Gadget:

Yesterday, thousands of hopefuls stood for hours outside a labor agency located in the Chinese city of Zhengzhou, the largest city of Henan province in north-central China.

The lines stretched more than 200 meters along the road, and the people who were waiting in line with their applications just hope to get a job at Foxconn, as the electronics contracting giant ramps up its iPhone production at Zhengzhou plant.

Bobbie Johnson, GigaOM:

Immediate reaction to the news was intriguing, because it was split down the middle. On one side were those who read Browett’s credentials and the PR puffs. To them, it looks as if Apple has just hired a man who has succeeded at most things he’s tried, and spent the last five years steering a large retail business with more than 1,200 stores through a difficult period for the economy.

On the other hand, for those who know Dixons as it exists in the real world, the reaction was somewhat different: the most common refrain I saw was “Has Tim Cook ever been in a Dixons store?”

Brooke Crothers, CNET:

Should you boycott Apple products, as many commenters have suggested and some publications are now calling on you to do?

That question opens a pandora’s box that taken to its logical conclusion would mean eschewing pretty much all devices made in China–including the one on which you’re reading this post.

It’s a slippery slope.

The cries from the media blaming Apple for the conditions at Foxconn are getting out of hand. Blaming Apple solely for the problems at the factory is like blaming one car-maker for greenhouse gasses. It doesn’t make sense. There are many companies and many factors that make Foxconn what it is. [...]

ifoAppleStore:

During the 90-minute JC Penney briefing, former Apple retail chief Ron Johnson explained his plans to remake JCP into “America’s favorite store” over the next three years, admittedly drawing from his 10-year stewardship of Apple’s stores. In fact, the very first item on Johnson’s agenda was to explain why he left Apple, and the very first presentation slide was an Apple logo.

“It’s the best decision I’ve made yet,” he said of moving to JCP. The only hard part of the decision was driving to Steve Jobs’ house to announce he was leaving. Jobs looked up at him and asked, “Are you serious?”

It will be interesting to see how Johnson can bring the Apple Retail experience to JCP.

The New York Times:

Apple and its high-technology peers — as well as dozens of other American industries — have achieved a pace of innovation nearly unmatched in modern history.

However, the workers assembling iPhones, iPads and other devices often labor in harsh conditions, according to employees inside those plants, worker advocates and documents published by companies themselves. Problems are as varied as onerous work environments and serious — sometimes deadly — safety problems.

ReadWriteWeb’s Dan Frommer:

There are plenty of impressive stats in Apple’s December quarter earnings report, such as 37 million iPhones shipped, $46 billion of overall sales, and $13 billion of profit.

But Apple’s most impressive stat continues to be its growth rate: Apple is not only huge, but it is growing at a rate far greater than its peers. And, even more incredible, its growth rate is accelerating.

Keep that in mind. Apple has a huge amount of room to grow, whether it be in the PC, phone or tablet market.