We already knew Apple sold — and upsold — 1 millioniPhone 3GS devices opening weekend, but an internal memo shows just how big an event that was for AT&T. Massive summer blockbuster, thy name is iPhone 3GS.
On this year’s launch day, iPhone sales exceeded sales recorded on 2008’s iPhone launch day, Black Friday 2008 and Dec. 26, 2008 — all heavy-volume sales days. In fact, this year we surpassed 2008’s launch day sales at about noon Central time, and sustained our previous peak hour record, also set in 2008, for 11 straight hours.
Now imagine how many they would have sold if MMS and tethering were ready, and they’d expanding their network to better handle iPhone traffic.
(What, the dead horse had it coming!)
[Via MacDailyNews, thanks to everyone who sent this in!]
In an ideal world, Mac and iPhone hacker Charlie Miller would discover vulnerabilities, inform Apple, and Apple would then patch them before they had any chance of being exploited “in the wild”.
Miller, however, prefers to keep them to himself so he can win MacBooks and detail them at Black Hat conferences. The good of the hacker obviously outweighs the good of the users, every one. So be it.
Miller’s latest iPhone-related find was disclosed at SyScan in Signapore:
a hole that would let attackers “run software code on the phone that is sent by SMS over a mobile operator’s network in order to monitor the location of the phone using GPS, turn on the phone’s microphone to eavesdrop on conversations, or make the phone join a distributed denial of service attack or a botnet.”
Apple, for their part, is hoping to have this patched before Miller’s upcoming Black Hat gig.
Rolando 2 Quest for the Golden Orchid [$9.99 - iTunes link], available now for the iPhone (and iPod touch) shows that Ngmoco not only takes great gaming concepts and beautifully renders them on the iPhone, but that they can make those great concepts and renders even better.
New gameplay includes a 3D stylized world, driving, swimming, and flying, and — now the Rolandos can fight back!
The first Rolando game won TiPb’s Editor’s Choice Award last time around, how does the new one stack up? If you give it a try, let us know!
Well, well, what do we have here? Seems one Britney Spears is using an iPhone in her new music video, Radar. Leanna assures us it’s at the very beginning, so if your head is turned more by gadgets than starlets, you can get your fix early before you lose an ear or anything.
However, if you love some Britney vids, enjoy the double pop-culture dose.
A slew of new Apple patent applications have come to light covering a rather odd range of functionality that may — or may not — make it into future iPhone software and hardware models.
First up is haptic feedback via a “grid of piezoelectronic actuators”, which would provide a varied tactile response when touching the iPhone screen to better orient users (and let them type without locking their eyes on the keyboard, ideally).
Second is a technology that seeks to identify fingerprints — i.e. not only that a user has touched the screen, but which specific finger touched the screen. So, for example, touching with the index finger would produce a different reaction than touching with the middle finger.
Third is for placing a RFID (radio frequency identification) reader in the screen so that, in addition to finger touches (and multi-touches), it could identify the unique tag given to objects as well.
Lastly is a method for letting users sing to the iPhone, and having the iPhone provide feedback on tone, pitch, etc. Basically, rating the quality of your karaoke — or of the latest pre-packaged Hollywood auto-tune single, we imagine.
Again, there’s no telling when, or if at all, Apple will release real-world products based on these patents, but they do give some hint as to which direction(s) Apple’s thinking.
It’s that time again — time for us to pick out some of the hot topics on TiPb’s forums. In order for you to reply to any of the following threads please be sure to register. It’s a painless process that will only take a moment of your time.
Todays first thread in the spotlight was started by Ivoryplum, what would you like to see in the iPhone 3.1 software? We already got word two days ago that the 3.1 beta has been made available to developers and along with some of the new features that are included in the release. What else would you like to see added and/or corrected in the 3.1 software?
By now, chances are you already own a iPhone 3GS – how is it holding up? Do you have any hardware related issues similar to those good folks over at PreCentral.net? If so, stop by the following thread and share your troubles with us: iPhone 3GS Bugs/Issues. Luckily for all of us here at TiPb, we have zero issues.
This next thread was started by rrrl17, while a new iPhone has just been released it’s never too early to start discussing the next generation! What do you expect from the next generation of iPhone? Will Rene’s dream of an iPhone HD finally come true?!
Our last thread of the day comes to us from Joey Neat and he wants to know about battery life on the iPhone 3GS? So far TiPb can’t complain too much, it pretty much appears to be what we expected. And for those of you really think it is lacking in battery power, hopefully the 3.1 software will give you a little bit of a boost.
Whether the idea of push notification for the iPhone Facebook app makes you want to do a happy dance, or just run screaming for the delete button, according to a recently published note, you won’t be getting it in the 98% completed Facebook 3.0 anyway:
Push Notifications, is in development but it won’t make it into 3.0. You can expect it in a 3.1 update later this summer.
So what will Facebook 3.0 bring? The “new” news feed, ability to “like” status, events with rsvp, notes, pages, better photo management and browsing, a new home screen, fixed comment notifications, SMS and call from friends screen, and auto-save so incoming calls don’t kill your unfinished messages.
Daring Fireball’s John Gruber posted the following last night:
A decade ago, my first PowerBook was a secondary machine to the desktop anchored at my desk. Now, my main machine is my MacBook Pro, but it feels a bit like an anchor now. My mobile secondary computer is my iPhone
A couple of friends of mine who work in IT administration have been telling me the same thing since the iPhone 3G launched. One of them recently left his laptop behind and took only an iPhone with him on a motorcycle trip and conference, and was still able to keep on top of his servers.
While the sheer volume of writing and editing demanded by TiPb still keeps me chained to a laptop, I’ll also admit to leaving the MacBook behind and running out with only my iPhone whenever I can — and yes, I’ve been likewise amazed at not only how much I can now accomplish with a mobile computing device, but how easily I can accomplish it.
Have you been using your iPhone as a laptop replacement? How does it fit your work needs, and what have your results been so far?
Looks like Apple wasn’t quite done unveiling new iPhone 3GS commercials, as a a third one began airing last night focused on video recording, editing, and sharing.
Like the previous two, which highlighted copy and paste and Voice Control, Apple’s keeping them all about the new features — and the ease of use of the new features.
So that means compass and landscape keyboard are next, right?
