2007 June | Signal to Noise

If this is true, Apple blew it

Read Om’s comments. He seems to think that the iPhone just won’t be available without a contract, period. If that’s really the case, then Apple can add this to the list of dumb mistakes they’ve made over the last 12 months, along with charging thirty cents more for songs that are already available inconveniently for free and conveniently for ninety-nine cents.Â Is Apple’s head getting too big–or are they getting beat around like a buoy tossed in a sea of angry old-guard establishments like EMI and Ma Bell?

If the iPhone went Enterprise

Garrett has a really cool speculative piece (with illustrations) about what the iPhone would look like if it were “docked” in an IP hardphone appliance. Really neat stuff here.

Safari for Windows: Ode to Om and Russ

Reading over Om’s recent post and Russ’s recent post about Safari for Windows, I was compelled by the point they both agree on: Apple has ported Safari to Windows in order to ease the switch from Windows to Mac. The theory being, Windows users, having already used Safari, will therefore be comfortable with a piece of Mac software and have an easier time making the jump. But the more I thought about it, the less it made sense.
It sounds good, but it’s not practical thinking. Here’s why.

Safari, in terms of features, is no longer a standout piece of software. Before Firefox was out of beta, and before IE got tabs, then it was. But it isn’t any more. About the only thing Safari does that really blows the lids off of its competition is the parental control feature. Easy, simple, sufficient. But this is hardly a compelling reason for a Windows user to sit through a 5 minute download in order to install “yet another browser” on their XP machine.

If Apple really wanted to compel people in the direction of Mac, they’d release a piece of free software for Windows that actually is a market-leading, excellent piece of free software. For example, iMovie. Or perhaps iPhoto. Both do a specific task with more elegance than Queen Elizabeth, and they do it faster, better, and cheaper than Paris Hilton.ï¿½ Safari–not so much.
Point is, if the idea were to get people to have a comfort level with Mac software, Safari would seem an odd choice. After all, 95% of what you do with a web browser–clicking, scrolling, and typing into forms–is exactly the same on any browser, and on any OS for that matter.

If I were a Mac cultist, I’d be screaming for Apple to get one or two pieces of iLife ported over to Windows–iPhoto would be perfect. Bundle it with digital cameras instead of that garbagy Microsoft photo editor crap they give you. Get people used to theï¿½ “Mac way” and then they might want to make the big leap to the Mac platform. But Safari–sorry, guys, it’s really no different from Firefox or IE any more.

That’s why I say Steve is up to something more. Think about the release of Safari on Windows and on the iPhone–what does it mean? Well, it means they obviously are slinging Windows Cocoa around like crazy over at Apple HQ. It also means that (Rosetta anybody?) there might be a new form of universal binary coming–a single executable that runs on OS X and Windows. In the very least, we’re looking at a pending embrace of Windows developers to start using Cocoa frameworks. Safari is a big part of that, since it’s filled with chocolaty Cocoa goodness. Windows is a big part of Apple’s strategy, people. If you can’t bring the users to you, then you go to the users.

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Handy: Guitar tuner for your mobile phone

What better place to tune your instrument that on your mobile phone. It has a microphone and sound-processing capability, and since most mobiles are highly programmable, why not use the one thing you take everywhere on the gig nights when you forget to bring your Korg pocket chromatic? Here are some mobile phone guitar tuners you can download:

Nokia

PocketPC / W Mobile

Nokia #2

Yes ubiquitous WiFi changes the rules of the telco game

Saw this post from a guy who has discovered the SIP potential of his E61:

Iï¿½ve now got the phone set up as, appropriately enough, ï¿½extension 61ï¿½ on the local Asterisk PBX. This means, in practice, that it is now simply another handset here at the office. Except that ï¿½the officeï¿½ stretches anywhere there is wifi. In other words, Johnny can pick up the phone in his office, dial ï¿½61ï¿½ and my mobile will ring. Whether I am in the office next door or drinking absinthe with Olle in Copenhagen.

While this is technically elegant, it would also seem to signal a rather cataclysmic shift in the mobile marketplace: wifi is everywhere; once wifi-enabled phones are everywhere, is there any reason to have a SIM and be tied to expensive rates, dreadful service and poor features?

I’ll take that a step further. How’s about carrying your WiFi credentials with you on the SIM card, too–so you don’t have to muck with WiFi setup everytime you go to a new coffee shop or place of business.

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State of Ohio Major Security Flub

From Newsnet 5 (A Cleveland TV station):

Sensitive personal information on every state employee has been stolen, Gov. Ted Strickland said Friday in a press conference.

The information included Social Security numbers and other personal information on the thousands of people employed by the state.Strickland said the information on a stolen disk will not be easy for criminals to get to. He said the files would require specialized knowledge and hardware.Someone stole the disk from an employee’s car. The employee took the disk home as part of a security procedure.That security procedure is now under fire.The disk was stolen on Sunday night and the theft was reported on Monday.Strickland said that for the past four days, they’ve been working on figuring out exactly what is on that disk.

Safari for Windows: Why?

Unlike iTunes, Safari has no sexy exclusive device like the iPod to prompt a Microsoft-to-Apple software switch. Moreover, unlike iTunes, which had no credible competitor on any platform when it arrived, Safari is going into a hellstorm of competition with free browsers Internet Explorer and Firefox. Add to that the fact that Firefox is arguably better, and it all makes me ask, “What the heck is Apple thinking?”

I mean, why bother. Is Steve unable to pick his battles? Or does he have something good up his sleeve?

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Teddy Wallingford, Rock and Roll CEO