Monday, January 10, 2005

First Pictures of the Motorola iTunes Phone.

itunes_phoneces.jpg imageA cruddy little picture has surfaced on Apple Insider, showing what might be the first glimpse of the fabled Motorola and Apple "iPhone"—or as I think it's probably better to call it, the "iTunes Phone." I actually talked to the Moto exec who showed it off last night and he wasn't real hep on discussing it, but he did say to expect the product announcement in Q1ish of this year. The interface is "just like an iPod," except you use the phone's joystick instead of a built-in scroll wheel. Basically you'll just hook it up via USB as a secondary device with a special playlist in iTunes and it will sync up just like a regular iPod would.

There are even plans to purchase songs via cellular, if that floats your boat. The phone will be carrier independent, and is essentially a traditional Motorola phone with a special iTunes/iPod program running on top (and it's Java). It really sounds like it's just an iTunes program, which means it's quite possible that most Motorola phones next year will have the program, as well. Hopes of an phone-wide Apple-designed UI are premature, it seems.

Motorola previews iTunes phone (images [AppleInsider]

[Gizmodo]
11:49:59 AM    comment   

Headless iMac == iHome?.

garmine_c330.jpg imageI have no idea how legit it is, but someone has posted pictures of a headless iMac, called the iHome. They're grainy and naturally suspect, but there's even a video and it looks surprisingly real.

More pictures after the jump. (Thanks, Asa!)

iHome Pics [TecknoHost]

Update: I can't begin to tell you how many people have written in to debunk this. If it's fake, it's fake—I've made my peace with that. But you guys are some pedantic so-and-sos, for real. Well done.

[Gizmodo]
11:48:23 AM    comment   

Video Over Satellite Radio? Maybe Not Such a Great Idea. Sirius Satellite Radio and XM Satellite Radio are moving towards broadcasting video to the vehicle, with Sirius again demonstrating the technology at the CES last week. But for a variety of reasons both technical and financial, this may be an idea whose time has not yet come. [Wireless IQ - News Feeds]
11:45:18 AM    comment   

Murdoch Buys Rest of Fox Shares in $6 Billion Deal. Rupert Murdoch, consolidating his global media empire in the U.S., announced that he will buy out the shareholders of his Fox properties. By By ANDREW ROSS SORKIN and GERALDINE FABRIKANT. [NYT > Home Page]
11:44:29 AM    comment   

Urge to Merge Could Hit Small Cellphone Companies. With some of the biggest cellular phone companies merging, investors are turning their attention to the smaller cellphone companies that dot rural and suburban America. By By KEN BELSON. [NYT > Technology]
11:39:25 AM    comment   

Momentum Is Gaining for Cellphones as Credit Cards. By embedding a computer chip or other type of memory device, a cellphone can double as a credit card. By By MATT RICHTEL. [NYT > Technology]
11:38:28 AM    comment   

Observers Wonder If Apple Plans Low-Cost Macintosh. Talk about suspense. Just what does Steve Jobs plan to announce at Macworld? By By JOHN MARKOFF. [NYT > Technology]
11:37:53 AM    comment   

Join the dots. I’ll pick on two of David Isenberg’s recent entries, but there are many others that illustrate the same point. First quote: The Death of Distance first appeared in The Economist about a decade ago. In that decade we’ve seen international... [Telepocalypse]
11:35:47 AM    comment   

A wave of discontent. A tragicomic excerpt from Private Eye magazine (a scurrilous UK satirical bi-weekly) neatly shows how computers are not social, and only people are. (The jury’s out on the replicants, though.) The tsunami disaster seems to have gone unnoticed in the... [Telepocalypse]
11:34:08 AM    comment   

Presence problems. Time for a rambling rant on the failures of presence. I’ve just upgraded to Skype 1.1, which has the little pop-up presence indicators in the bottom right of your screen when buddies come online and offline. I also have Yahoo!... [Telepocalypse]
11:24:45 AM    comment   

DirecTV's HD future is MPEG-4. DirecTV's HD upgrade path includes the switch to MPEG-4. Sounds good for consumers in the long run, although new hardware would have to be purchased. [eWEEK Technology News]
11:24:00 AM    comment   

Verizon Wireless Extends 3G Network, Launches Multimedia Service. The carrier unveils a new service that will allow subscribers to access video, music and 3-D games on 3G handsets, and announces plans to expand its 3G network into 12 additional cities. [eWEEK Technology News]
11:23:06 AM    comment