Sad – but not unexpected – news when I woke up this morning: Steve Jobs has died at the age of 56. A month after leaving Apple permanently, one day after the iPhone 4S was announced and just a few weeks before his (authorized) autobiography will come out. Regardless what you think you know about the man: he changed the industry and the world. Yes, I can say that without sounding dramatic. Just take a look around next time you commute from home to work. How many Apple products do you see around you? How many brands you know that […]
The tablet (r)evolution
Three months after a very sick looking Steve Jobs unveiled the iPad 2, I jumped on the tablet bandwagon as well. Yes, I now own an iPad 2. To be exact the white 16GB 3G version (I wanted GPS and for that you need the 3G version). So far I can say that it is by far the best gadget I ever bought. It fills the gap between laptop and smartphone in a way I never dreamed of. Last year I bought an Android powered smartphone (the Samsung Galaxy S) and I love it. It basically can do anything the iPad […]
What if: Steve Jobs and his iPad in Dragon’s Den
Here in Holland (and in many other countries) we have a series of reality television programmes called “Dragon’s Den“, featuring ‘wannabe’ entrepreneurs pitching their business ideas in order to secure investment finance from a panel of venture capitalists. It is quite a fun format: the contestants always (think they) have a very profitable business idea, but just lack funding (one can wonder why). So they pitch their idea to five (very) rich, successful entrepreneurs: aka the “dragons”. Before each show the contestants name an amount of money that they need to get, and the rules are that if they do not raise at […]
In a Galaxy far, far away…
This June I wrote about getting a new smartphone. I was about to buy an HTC Desire, when I (fortunately) decided to wait and see what Steve Jobs had to present on the Apple event that was taking place later that week (June 2010) . It happened to be the launch of the infamous new iPhone 4. I really got stoked about the iPhone 4 and so I decided to wait for it before I would buy an Android phone: I wanted an iPhone 4 badly! However: a few days after the official launch of the phone, reports started to […]
Jobs addresses ‘Antennagate’: “Smartphones have issues”
As announced Thursday, Apple addressed their problems biggest public relation issue in a long time: the new iPhone 4, in a special press conference that took place Friday at 7pm (CET), 10am pacific time. Steve Jobs himself took the stage and addressed, what he dubbed ‘Antennagate’. You can watch his whole speech at the Apple site and I encourage you to do so and then read on. So what did Jobs do? Well, after throwing some data at the press (“3 million iPhone 4’s sold in 3 weeks”) Jobs first demonstrated how other (popular) smartphones have antenna issues as well. Jobs continued […]
Don’t buy an iPhone 4 – yet
The soap surrounding “the best iPhone ever”, is nearing it’s climax. Apple is holding a press conference later today to address the problems with the iPhone 4. Rumour has it that Apple might appease customers by offering the “bumper case” (a flimsy plastic cover) to disgruntled buyers for free. Analysts do not expect Apple to announce a recall as that would probably be more damaging to the company even though a poll at the Wall Street Journal Online shows that about 60% of the readers think Apple should issue a recall. Analysts estimate that such a recall would cost Apple around […]
Apple’s response to Grip of Death: you’re holding your iPhone wrong
My initial enthousiasm for the iPhone 4 has faded within a week. Yes, once again Apple has lived up to it’s reputation of delivering bad crappy 1.0 products. No kidding: as long as I have been following Apple (basically since 2002) they have been delivering their new products with some sort of problem. So it’s no surprise that the beautiful iPhone 4 has problems as well. For starters the special glass casing (advertised as “…20 times stiffer and 30 times harder than plastic, the glass is ultradurable…”) seems to not nearly as scratch resistant as Steve Jobs wants us to […]
Damn, I’m converted
Ok, <insert confession mode here> this is a big step for me, but I confess that I have been converted. I just saw the new iPhone 4 revealed by Apple CEO Steve Jobs as only he can do. It’s gorgeous – and – I want one. There, I said it. I want an iPhone. Finally iPhone is up to par – and now even trend setting – feature-wise – with other phones. They finally added multitasking (my phones did that 4 years ago already) and a front cam (both my Nokia E71 and HTC Diamond Pro have that already). But also a gyroscope, dual-mic […]