According to an Engadget exclusive, Apple brought a new specification for optical port connection to Intel who, after some heated back and forth, has produced Light Peak:

Based on what we’ve learned, Apple will introduce the new standard for its systems around Fall 2010 in a line of Macs destined for back-to-school shoppers — a follow-up to the “Spotlight turns to notebooks” event, perhaps. Following the initial launch, there are plans to roll out a low-power variation in 2011, which could lead to more widespread adoption in handhelds and cellphones. The plans from October 2007 show a roadmap that includes Light Peak being introduced to the iPhone / iPod platform to serve as a gateway for multimedia and networking outputs. While the timing doesn’t line up, a low-powered Light Peak sounds like the kind of technology that would be perfect for a device with a need for broad connectivity but limited real estate for ports… like a tablet.

Can one port rule — and replace — them all? Do we want to kiss our USB/FireWire, VGA/DVI/DisplayPort, Ethernet, and all other connectors goodbye and replace them with a single, standardized optical cable? Check out Engadget’s full post for more, then let us know what you think.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Apple Gets Intel to Create “Light Peak” Optical Connection — All Your Ports Has Belong to Us

Every week a few of us from team TiPb, bloggers and forum crew alike, will bring you our current favorite, funnest, most useful App Store apps, WebApps, jailbreak apps, even the occasional accessory, web site, or desktop app if the mood strikes us. As long as they’re iPhone (or iPod touch) related, they’re fair game.

So who’s on deck this week and what are our picks? Find out after the break!

Chad’s Pick: RunKeeper Pro

Since picking up my Vibram FiveFingers shoes, I can’t use Nike+ so I needed a solid alternative. RunKeeper Pro really eliminates the need for anything else! It uses GPS to track your route, distance, speed, elevation and pace! You can create your own custom workouts and there is voice feedback too. When a workout is done, the information can be sent to their website and sent to Twitter or Facebook. I am very pleased with the product and the developer is promising new features! Checkout http://runkeeper.com! [$9.99 - iTunes link]

Chris’ Pick: FanGraphs Baseball

I am a big baseball fan, and a fan of math and stats – the two go hand in hand. Well, I recently saw a new baseball app put out by fangraphs. This cool little app gives you a graphical output of the win probability as the games are in progress, and adjusts it as events unfold. You can also see standard box scores, in-game events, and look up statistical information about any player in history (lots of cool stat,s including things like $ value and WAR). For any stats oriented baseball fan, I recommend taking a look at this! [$2.99 - iTunes link]

Jeremy’s Pick: Army of Darkness Soundboard

The Army of Darkness soundboard is a simple app but it is so damn cool for the hardcore Bruce Campbell fans out there. It’s just so “Groovy”… [Free - iTunes link]

Matt’s Pick: FoodScanner

From the creators of the Daily Burn app & Occipital’s RedLaser technology comes FoodScanner. If you have used DailyBurn before, then you should know that tracking the foods you eat can become tedious at times, especially when you can’t find just the right food to enter into your Food Log. FoodScanner simplifies the process by scanning the barcode on the food product. The barcode detection is incredibly accurate even for reflective surfaces. Highly recommended for anyone logging/tracking their food intake. Check out the full review for more. [$2.99 - iTunes link]

Rene’s Pick: NAVIGON MobileNavigator North America

What a difference a year makes. Last year’s iPhone 3G and the debut App Store had no turn-by-turn navigation apps — the SDK didn’t even allow them! Now, with iPhone 3.x, as long as your BYOM (bring your own maps), turn-by-turn is good to go. And go it’s gone, with everyone from the biggest players in the game to upstart and open source contenders. But that makes choosing one really difficult. Based on Chris’ reviews so far, and on feature sets delivered, I decided to give NAVIGON MobileNavigator North America. And so far, so very good. Directions are precise, the text-to-speech for street names is understandable, and the app itself is highly usable. [$89.99 - iTunes link]

Your Pick?

You’re part of team TiPb too, so what’s your pick? What app was your absolute fav last week? Let us — and everyone — know in the comments!

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

RunKeeper Pro, FanGraphs Baseball, Army of Darkness Soundboard, Foodscanner, NAVIGON MobileNavigator — TiPb Picks of the Week

Boy Genius is reporting that AT&T MMS seems to be down for some users in some states, and what’s more:

a quick call to AT&T's customer care line revealed that there is a known latency issue with MMS in all states with no estimated time of repair.

So how about it? Are you experiencing any delays in sending or receiving MMS? Any outages? Either way, let us know where you are, and how long you’ve been having the problem.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

AT&T MMS Network Outage Already?

I spent the wee hours of my Saturday morning in line for the grand opening of a new Apple Store. If you’ve never been to one, it’s an event.

The line starts early and by the time the store is almost ready to open, it snakes its way around the mall or down the street. Suddenly, the noise starts to build and build, and then Apple Store employees come racing around the corner or down the stairs, clapping and cheering and screaming. They run down the line, pumping fists and slapping hands, and it gets louder and louder. They form up in front of the store, bright colored shirts against wood, glass, and steel. Managers and specialists and concierges and geniuses all, they cheer for the crowd, and they scream for the crowd to bring that noise right back at them. Then they race away, the lights go out, the employees re-appear inside the store, and the doors open.

When line is released and it’s the crowd’s turn to run, into the store, grabbing one of the thousand free, location branded t-shirts they give away, and through the gauntlet of Apple Store employees who cheer and slap hands again, greeting every new customer.

So what’s the point? It’s an experience and a carefully, attentively crafted one — that’s the point. The Apple Store is meant to be an experience. Buying an iPhone — for which they now have new, dedicated activation centers in the store — is meant to be an experience. Opening the iPhone box likewise, turning it on, using it. Macs have welcome videos that play the first time you turn them on. Safari 4 has the same. It’s a wonder iPhones don’t as well (they do have fairly slick screen-savers that play while on display at the store).

It’s all about the customer — and the customer becoming a user — experience. Apple pours a lot of passion into crafting that experience (too much, sometimes, when the control of that experience alienates rather than empowers the user — but that’s often the price of unchecked passion).

They won’t do video on an iPhone 3G because the framerate is below their 30-FPS standards. They won’t put a camera in the iPod touch because VGA just isn’t good enough quality for a flagship device. Steve Jobs has said he and Apple are just as proud of the products they didn’t ship as the ones they did. He also said Apple makes the products they themselves want to own. And that’s the key. That’s the passion, and the focus on experience.

We just know Jony Ive prototyped the heck out of the iPhone hardware and packaging designs, and Scott Forstall and the software team, if not counting clicks, definitely counted on every tap, swipe, shake, and pinch to bring a smile to a new user’s face.

TechCrunch’s MG Siegler nailed it when he spoke of Apple’s enthusiasm. It’s easy to see everywhere from Jobs’ keynote product introductions to Apple Store employees in the ‘burbs.

It’s not just Apple’s great build quality and trend-setting user interface other companies are competing with — it’s Apple’s culture which is as passionate as it is (often maddeningly) secretive. That’s the culture that gets customers lining up for new store openings and new product releases, and makes the stores and products that they’re lining up for. And it’s not easy to maintain in large companies, which are often fragmented fiefdoms competing as much, or more, with themselves as they are with others.

How long Apple will be able to maintain that passion is anyone’s guess, and they certainly make their share of mistakes along the way (insert G4 Cube joke here), but for now, especially for iPhone lovers, they’re still firing on all cylinders.

(For anyone particularly interested in the the Apple Store opening I went to today — Fairview Pointe-Claire, just outside Montreal — I placed a few pictures up on Twitter).

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Apple and the Power of Passion

Boxcar [$2.99 + In-App Purchases - iTunes link], a push-enabler for iPhone and iPod touch originally launched with support for a couple of Twitter clients. Then it added a bunch more. As several Twitter clients now offer support for push themselves, what’s Boxcar to do for a 2.0 encore? Add Facebook and Email push, of course, as well as Twitter Search and Twitter Trends.

Okay, sure, some major Twitter clients like Tweetie and Twitterrific still haven’t added push support, so if they’re your go-to apps, Boxcar may still be a go-to middleapp. Likewise, while Google supports Gmail now via GoogleSync, Exchange users can’t hand over their only ActiveSync slot, so email push-enablers still have their place. Lastly — and it’s a big lastly, while Facebook 3.0 for iPhone just launched, it did so without push support, and so if you don’t want to wait for 3.1 to get your push on, well, here’s your middleapp for that as well.

But… it comes with a price. The $2.99 app price comes with one service built in. If you want to add another, like Facebook, you need to make an additional $0.99 in-app purchase. Email, that’s another $0.99. Twitter Trends and Twitter Search likewise. And since you can have multiple Twitter, Email, Twitter Search, etc. set up, you can go from that base $2.99 to $4.99, even $9.99 or more. Basically, you pay for what’s valuable to you. If you’re working customer service and being push-alerted when your company (or your competitor!) and the word “problem” hits Twitter, $0.99 is a steal. If you don’t care about trends or searches, or Facebook for that matter, you get a cheaper entry price for the app.

So, whether this particular app is worth it to you, and whether or not the in-app purchase upgrades are worth it to you, we’re liking options and being able to choose — and pay for — only what we find of value.

So, if you need push now and you decide to try Boxcar 2.0 out, let us know how it works for you, and what you think of the pricing model!

More screen shots after the break…

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Quick App Update: Boxcar 2.0 Push Notification for Twitter, Facebook, and Email — Via In-App Purchase

Apple has set up a new, environment-focused section of their website, which covers their full product range and life-cycle — including TiPb’s titular iPhone [PDF link].

Give it a look and let us know how you think Apple’s doing.

[Thanks everyone who sent this in!]

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

New Apple and the Environment Website Shows It’s Easier Being Green

Looks like China Unicom is set to launch the iPhone 3G 8GB (sans WiFi) for $300, which might sound expensive compared to the US $99 price, but here’s the no-shadow kick — the monthly plan is $20.

Granted, there’s likely no one in the world who feels their iPhone plan is cheap — and many who likely feel it ranges from expensive to exorbitant, but $20 a month compared to $70 or $100? Taken for one year that maths up to $240 vs. $840 or $1200. Two years, that’s $480 vs. $1680 or $2400. Three years… you get the idea (likely painfully and right in the wallet). Makes that $200 up front savings pretty insignificant doesn’t it.

Of course, the aforementioned lack of WiFi may make non-Chinese iPhone owners feel a little better about themselves, and there’s still no way to know how the Internet in general, never mind the App Store will survive the Great Firewall of China.

Hao bu hao?

[Xinhua via Fortune]

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

iPhone Plans in China Starting at $20/month — Aiya!

TomTom has finally gotten around to revealing the price point for their much anticipated iPhone car kit, which provides its own GPS as well as iPhone charger, loud speaker, and hands-free dialing.

TomTom car kit for the iPhone will have a recommended retail price of EUR 99.99 or USD 119.95.

The TomTom car kit will be available this October and will be sold separately from the TomTom app. It will be compatible with the iPhone 2G, 3G and 3GS.

When you add in the price of the TomTom iPhone app, that more than $200 for the combo, not exactly a bargain compared to a stand-alone GPS device. Then again, this saves you having to carry around a second device just for GPS, so does convenience trump cost, or does TomTom need to rethink their business model here?

Could they offer a second version of the TomTom app — one that only works with the car kit — at a greatly discounted price for those who shell out for the car kit? More importantly, should they?

[Via GPSTracklog via TUAW]

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TomTom iPhone Car Kit Pricing Revealed

UPDATE: Google’s response, with commentary from Casey.

According to sibling site Android Central, Google has sent a cease & desist order to well-known Android custom ROM maker, CyanogenMod.

Google is not happy that CyanogenMod is distributing closed source Android applications like Gmail, Android Market, YouTube, etc. [...] CyanogenMod explains that he’s not breaking any copyright issues because he develops specifically for Google Experience devices (G1 & myTouch 3G), devices that already include said closed source applications.

Casey asks if this could be a sign of Google finding their inner evil. We re-hash our own cliche: any company sufficiently powerful is indistinguishable from evil. It’s just that Apple (and Microsoft) tend to get called on it more.

But, hey, if any clever Android modders want to port that Gmail app over to the iPhone Jailbreak community, we promise we won’t object…

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

The (Slightly Evil?) Competition: Google Targeting Hackers Too?

AT&T, according to the WSJ, has asked the FCC to investigate Google Voice for violating federal call-blocking rules. Basically, Google isn’t letting Google Voice users connect to pricy adult chat lines and conference services. (The nerve!)

Slapped around by the FCC a couple of years ago on the same charges, AT&T wants Google to get a taste of that medicine, and likely wants to throw some of the heat they caught over the whole Apple rejection/still-studying Google Voice debacle right back Google’s way.

Google’s blog responds thusly:

AT&T is trying to make this about Google’s support for an open Internet, but the comparison just doesn’t fly. The FCC’s open Internet principles apply only to the behavior of broadband carriers — not the creators of Web-based software applications. Even though the FCC does not have jurisdiction over how software applications function, AT&T apparently wants to use the regulatory process to undermine Web-based competition and innovation.

Ah, new technology and the laws that trail far back behind it. Google may be technically right in that they’re something new and different than what the law was originally designed to govern. Clearly the spirit of openness — which Google pays enormous lip-service to when it suits them — is what’s important, though. Isn’t it Google?

[Via Gizmodo]

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

AT&T Strikes Back: Asks FCC to Investigate Google Voice