When Apple bought multitouch maestros FingerWorks for their talent (and patents, ‘natch), they kept FingerWorks.com and all it’s old product photos and pictures online and intact. No longer, according to MacRumors:

The removal seems to correspond with the impending announcement of an Apple tablet later this month. One possible explanation is that Apple will finally be implementing many of the same advanced multi-touch keyboard gestures that were originally pioneered by Fingerworks.

And, again to speculate widely, a possibly closely aligned iPhone 4.0, since Apple has proven over and over again that they’re very good at leveraging technology developed for one platform to another.

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

Apple Offlines FingerWorks.com on Eve of iTablet and… iPhone 4.0?

No sooner did France Telecom prop up iTablet rumors do French site Challenge.fr start some “4th generation iPhone coming in May” craziness.

Now, we have no reason to believe this, but since Apple is so secretive, anything is possible (and frankly it’s nice to see some good old fashioned iPhone rumors amid all this iTablet hype!). Here’s the deal, translated by iphon.fr:

• “Apple to launch a new iPhone in May”
• “It will be the fourth version of the well known smartphone launch on the 29th of June 2007. A way to counter the Google attack”
• “Apple will launch, in early may 2010, a new version of its iPhone, as we heard from some mobile operators.”.

Apple, of course, has announced and launched new iPhones in the June/July time frame for the last 3 years and they don’t often change their cycles. So does that make this fake, le fakety-fake fake, or just fake enough to hide an early launch? Get crazy with the French and their carriers by letting us know what you think!

[Thanks Laurent for the tip!]

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

Now the French Want the 4th Gen iPhone in May!

The Motorola Endeavor HX1 is the latest salvo in the Bluetooth noise-reduction arms race, and it takes it to another level — reading the bone vibrations in your inner ear and digitally converting those vibrations into recognizable speech. That’s right, when regular microphones fail, when even noise-reduction won’t work, Motorola is actually turning off the microphone entirely and reproducing what you say based on sound waves in your skull. It won’t sound as good as a mic, however, but in a crowded place like the floor of CES 2010, rather than a dull, indistinguishable crowd roar, you can actually be heard.

Video after the break!

[UPDATE: And the TiPb Store folks told me they just got the Motorola Endeavor HX1 in stock, and it's on sale 31% off, if the video entices...]

[YouTube video link]

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

Motorola Endeavor HX1 Bone-conduction Bluetooth Headset Hands-on — TiPb @ CES 2010 [Updated, Sponsored-ish]

Did France Telecom/Orange exec Stéphane Richard just get caught off guard enough to confirm the immanent arrival of Apple’s iTablet/iSlate, with a webcam? NowhereElse.fr has the video clip (go to 6:10 to see the relevant bit), and Techcrunch provides the translation for those who don’t understand French:

Jean-Pierre Elkabbach: According to weekly Le Point, in a couple of days Apple will be launching its tablet computer …
Stéphane Richard: Yes.
Jean-Pierre Elkabbach: … equipped with a webcam.
Stéphane Richard: Yes.
Jean-Pierre Elkabbach: Are Orange customers going to be able to enjoy it?
Stéphane Richard: Of course!

We’re still waiting on Apple to announce it (or announce the rumored Jan. 27 announcement!), however. And word on whether or not Steve Jobs has hopped a plane to France, ready to kung-fu death-touch his loose lipped Euro carrier partner…

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

France Telecom Exec Confirms Apple iTablet with Webcam

Gosh, did anything happen last week? Oh yeah: there was that one show, the Consumer Electronics Show. Good times – here’s what we liked:

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

Best of Smartphone Experts, 10 Jan 2010