iPhone 4.0 revealed, to be released in "Summer"

New iPhone point releases are always exciting, especially because this is a way for older iPhone and iPod touch users to be able to catch up with the inevitable new iPhone and iPod touch models that'll be released in the second half of the year, and it gives developers a way to dig into what Apple is planning but hasn't announced yet (like iChat).

Yesterday, Steve Jobs discussed the "7 tentpole features" that the existing base of 85 million iPhone and iPod touch users will be able to get their hands on this "summer". The primary feature of note is pretty much the ability to multitask by double-tapping the Home button, but the new firmware also offers an organizational metaphor unflatteringly called Folders, an upgraded Mail app, a port of iBooks, a preview of the Xbox Live-esque "Game Center", more Enterprise features like Exchange 2010 support and wireless app distribution, and a mobile advertising platform called iAd.

Again, like all those other times, my initial gut reactions of the announcements made during the event are to follow below. If you want to watch the on-demand stream of the event, click this link.
============================

This is it. iPhone OS 4.0. What will it hold for the world's best-selling smartphone?

First up, Steve goes down to iPad business. 300,000 iPads in the first day and 450,000 today. 250,000 iBooks in the first day and 600,000 iBooks today (to the tune of someone whistling), and over a million iPad apps in the first day, and 3.5 million apps today. Truly some amazing figures to appease the stockholders.

Steve also wants to show this little picture of a little girl loving her iPad to some applause.

More figures regarding the App Store and the iPad... I'm having a sense of deja vu. Shall Scott Forstall come to the stage for not too long? Well, for now, Steve's pretty much enumerating his favorite iPad apps for now, and I have to admit, they all look quite impressive.

"Now let's go to the iPhone."

Steve briefly brags about the phone in terms of browser usage, consumer satisfaction, and sales figures to date (FIFTY MILLION iPHONES + THIRTY FIVE MILLION iPOD TOUCHES).

Like all other iPhone OS's before it, 4.0 shall be released in the "Summer" and developers will be able to get their hands on a beta for free today. Users will also pretty much have more features as well ("more than a hundred) including a digital zoom, the ability to gift apps, create playlists, check your spelling, change the backgrounds, and use a Bluetooth keyboard. All pretty cool, but Steve wants to talk more features, as in "7 tentpole features".

1) Multitasking
"We're not the first to the party, but we're gonna be the best."

"Worries about multitasking like battery life and sluggishness", says Jobs, "will not be necessary because we have nailed it". Obviously, there shall be a demo.

With the double-click of a Home button, all the open apps are shown in a small strip and tapping the app will let you go there. (Steve also plays a little Tap Tap Revenge) But seriously, how about if I didn't mean to summon that little strip? Steve doesn't seem to want to address that yet, but we'll see.

Scott Forstall is summoned into the fold to explain the efficiency of iPhone multitasking and he basically says that the core services of an app will only be running instead of the whole damn app to preserve CPU and battery life. Meaning that if you opened Pandora, it won't really go to the Internet to refresh its recommendations, but it will still keep playing songs in the background, which is pretty much the point of the service.

Apple will be offering 7 major services to complement multitasking, but I won't really be running them all down here. Why? Because we finally have multitasking. I'm quite worried that several services will conflict each other in practice (and essentially render the floating iPod controls useless) but we'll see if Apple truly nails this.

Voice over IP services like Skype will be able to work like it should: like the Internet-enabled phone service it should be. The iPhone will be able to receive calls from Skype contacts even if the app isn't open, and if you're in the middle of a call, you won't find the need to keep caution of the home button because the call will be preserved while outside the app, like the regular iPhone Phone app. To say that this will make the iPod touch a bit of a legit Wi-Fi enabled phone is a bit of an understatement...

Social services that also take advantage of the GPS sensor will be able to take advantage of multitasking by tracking your location whilst not opened. A little icon on the status bar will indicate that an app is tracking you, and you'll be able to close Location Services one app at a time.

Push notifications... will they be better? Scott Forstall wants to tell you that yes, they will be. I don't know. But Local Notifications are gonna be added in addition to this. Basically, this is a notifications system that doesn't need a connection to the Internet, meaning that Things can finally alert you of a task you need to do, or TV Guide will say that Desperate Housewives is on.

Apps will also be able to take advantage of multitasking by, for example, uploading photos to Facebook in the background and notifying you if the photos have finished uploading.

Lastly, there is "Fast app switching" which basically preserves the condition of an app as you left it, which enables the iPhone to use less battery.

2) Folders
Since iPhone 2.0, the advent of apps has been a boon for the mobile industry in general, but for the iPhone, just navigating through pages upon pages of apps becomes quite hellish. Folders changes all that.

Just tap and hold an app and drag that app on top of another app. Done. Finished. Simple.

Steve also demoes how you can put wallpapers on your home screen which is pretty simple (you can also change the wallpapers for the lock screen and the home screen individually and separately). Kinda like how you would on an iPad.

Folders basically renders the 180 app limit to 2160 apps. Nice.

3) Enhanced Mail
When a MacRumors user e-mailed Steve Jobs about the unified inbox, he replied with a resounding "Yes.".

And here we are.

You'll be able to see the messages in your e-mail accounts (even several Exchange accounts), and more awesome: you can finally organize your e-mails by thread. Like G-Mail, you'll be able to see the conversation in a logical way.

Also, attachments can be opened through other apps.

4) iBooks

Featuring the same familiar bookshelf and e-book store, iBooks is pretty much a port of the iPad app (including the free Winnie The Pooh) and, well, you get to read frigging eBooks ala Stanza and Amazon Kindle.

Logically, the app also enables wireless synchronization of pages and bookmarks (meaning the app remembers the page you stopped in your iPad and continue from there on your iPhone).

5) Enterprise
Scott wants to introduce more features for the Enterprise, and it'll have better data protection (passwords for e-mail and apps), mobile device management (managing swarms of iPhones in one master device), wireless app distribution (boss distributes an app without having to go through iTunes), multiple Exchange accounts (Server 2010) and SSL VPN support.

No demoes here because general users aren't interested.

6) Game Center
But this one is one thing users will be interested in.

Since the iPod touch is being marketed as a gaming device, and Microsoft is about to launch Xbox Live for Mobile when Windows Phone Series 7 (eff that name!!!) comes out, Apple is coming to the fold and offering leaderboards, challenges, matchmaking, social networking, and yes, achievements.

It will be available for all "later this year". Does this mean that it will be a separate app like iBooks?

7) iAd
Using their acquisition of Quattro, Apple is rolling out iAd which is basically like AdMob. If you've noticed, many free apps offer ads but as Steve Jobs says, "they suck".

Usually, search engines are "where it's at", but Steve Jobs thinks that "on the iPhone, apps are where it's at". Using statistical jargon, Steve Jobs wants to entice developers to use Apple's own mobile advertising platform. With iAd, Steve says that they want to have that advertising be more interactive, but deliver the same emotion that TV ads offer. I don't know what the hell that means, but we'll see when this plan goes into motion.

With multitasking, iAd will also not take the user out of an app and go back "any time they want" so people are more interested in clicking them.

60% revenues for the developer, Apple will sell and host all them ads.

So yes, Steve Jobs will actually offer a demo for this new platform with their own mock-ups "using the brands we love, all using HTML5".

Essentially, Apple's pretty much bringing a less annoying AdMob (as in Google Adsense... but you can just tap the X button to exit the ad instead of be forced to use Safari) that adds interactivity that can very much rival the likes of Flash (which, if you were keeping track, Steve Jobs is allergic to).

Obviously, this is a feature very much focused towards developers and their moneys, especially because the pressing matter behind developers making free apps is pretty much the revenue- or lack of it.

While Jobs is emphasizing on their competitive advertising program (versus Google, of course), the way he says "dude" makes for a bit of entertainment, but it's all pretty much a demonstration of HTML5 technology, and how it'll be able to substitute Flash.

The keynote is pretty much done at this point, with a little review at the end. All features are compatible with iPhone 3GS and the 3rd generation iPod touch. The iPhone 3G and 2nd generation iPod touch will run "many things, but not some things because hardware doesn't support them", especially multitasking. No word on the first iPhone and the first iPod touch, but come on, Apple, at least give those devices the ability to, I don't know, change the wallpaper?! iPad users will have to wait longer for multitasking and company: "Fall".

Wished Twitter Looked Like This

Now I kinda want an iPad just to play with this.

iPad Day

It's a bit of a disappointment for me, but the iPad is still a big enough deal to warrant much press. Is it only because it's an Apple product? Well, that fact is rather debatable especially because of the number of potentially incredible apps being developed for it, but whatever the case, the United States is gearing up for yet another line of ridiculous length.

There doesn't seem to be any last-minute change as far as the press can tell, but it has actually been garnering some surprisingly positive reviews from major news sites.

Still, the fact that the device is coming out with some rather excellent exclusive (and not so exclusive, but enhanced) apps this early in its cycle is kind of a good thing, so props to the developers!

Apple is not oblivious to this fact, and the company is actually using their marketing muscle to feature some familiar apps ported (and enhanced) from the iPhone (like Labyrinth 2 HD, Real Racing HD, At Bat 2010, Asphalt 5, Scrabble), as well as a few exclusive apps like The Elements and Marvel Comics.

The Elements is a rather particular standout, as it not only features a visual representation of a model of each element in the Table of Elements (aside from being connected to the Wolfram|Alpha search engine), it's compatible with 3D glasses which are sold separately. 3D's a bit of a gimmick, but at least it's a bit of a nice visual way to learn the table of elements.

Also of note are potential new standards for pricing in the App Store. Not only does the new device force a few potential buyers moving from an iPod touch or iPhone to rebuy a few of their apps (although some apps will update with "universal" compatibility), some of these apps will feature a higher price. Call of Duty: World at War Zombies, Need for Speed: Shift, and Mirror's Edge are all high-profile games that have a price tag of $14.99 instead of the usual $9.99. Still, some developers are at least working hard to make these enhanced iPhone apps worth a buy: Civilization: Revolution for example, will be adding a new scenario as well as a world editor to compensate.

Some major iPhone developers are also making some splashes on the platform; namely, Chillingo and Tapulous.

Tapulous now has its new iPad game out in the wild, and it is called Tap Tap Radiation, and it's pretty much Tap Tap Revenge but with "high-definition" 3D graphics. Like Tap Tap Revenge, it's free, and it will feature in-app purchases for premium artists as well.

Chillingo on the other hand, will be releasing Zen Bound 2, with better graphics and the same rope tying mechanics featured in the popular first game. It will offer much value for its $7.99 as it will not only feature the original levels found in the first game, but it will also offer more than a half a hundred new levels.

Surprisingly, Telltale Games will also be releasing Sam and Max: The Penal Zone, the first episode of the critically acclaimed Sam and Max series, for the iPad for $9.99. Activision will also offer Geometry Wars: Touch for the same price.

Apps Weekly: Words With Friends + Words With Friends HD

In the tradition of mail chess, Newtoy has an iPhone app that somewhat resembles that game but electronically, and that's Chess With Friends. I'm not too good at chess, but I do like a bit of Scrabble, and thankfully, Words With Friends is there to fill that void.

Words With Friends
Free with ads, $2.99
Newtoy, Inc.
Compatible with iPhone OS 2.2.1 or later

Arguably, this game is a bit like Scrabble, but the twist here is that your opponent is a real person, and he'll take his time to think about his next move. And what I mean by that is that your opponent might take longer than a minute to a day before he gives you his move. While one could say that this sluggish pace could be a bit of a turn-off, a person with a busy lifestyle is actually the perfect candidate for this game. If you gotta go to a meeting in the middle of a game, you could always exit the game and get some work done. Don't worry, your opponent will understand (and if you're really worried about your opponent's patience, you can just say that you have to leave through Chat).

This screen is basically the home screen of the game, but when you first run it, you'll be asked to put in your e-mail address and username. After a few seconds, you'll be able to start creating games and making moves.

I don't exactly know the mechanics that determine whether you or the other player goes first, but whatever the case, this leisurely paced version of Scrabble plays as you'd expect. There are score bonuses when you have tiles in either the Double/Triple Word score or the Double/Triple Letter score, and you can swap some letters off as well as pass a turn when you're really stumped.

In a smart move, the app also features some in-game chat so as to maximize the "social" aspect of the game. You can talk about movies while in a game, or trash talk to some random dude you're playing against. Heck, you can do these things simultaneously, because the game allows you to create up to 20 simultaneous games so chances are, you won't end up too bored when a player is not online (as marked by the googly eyes near the Chat button). If you want to play with your actual friends, you're given the chance to do that as well. You can post an alert to your Twitter or Facebook account, so your friends can go online and play with you.

Whatever the case, this game is a perfect game in this fast-paced world. When you're resting from that exhausting run for a promotion or grade, you'll be able to be comforted by the fact that your Words With Friends game will always be waiting for you- that is, unless you ignore it for 7 days.

That's not to say that the app is the most perfect app. For one thing, there's quite a bit of lag during gameplay. I've also encountered a bug that forced me to pass several turns (a letter that was stuck on the board), and the game does crash sometimes. Still, push notifications work flawlessly in notifying that you have to make a move in the board. Still, just making a move takes more than a minute to do, because the sending is just a ridiculously long wait. Is it because it's loading an ad? Oh ads, you annoy the hell out of me.

But that's where the $2.99 version comes in; the full version eliminates those annoying ads that pop-up after every move you make.

Still, I think Words With Friends is one of the better games out there, and I hope I can play with anyone reading this some time.

Rating: 7.5/10

In one of the laziest attempts at a "preview", I'd like to cover the companion iPad version of the game I just reviewed, which is Words With Friends HD.

You can get a taste of the sheer expansiveness that the iPad's resolution offers by clicking the screenshot on top.

Obviously, it will feature a much more comfy way to play this game, and the Chat feature will actually not be all that intrusive to the gameplay, as it will only appear in a little window. The game looks like fun on the iPad and it seems that it will launch alongside the product this Sunday.

Developer Newtoy will be holding a little party at the Apple Store in Frisco as they will be giving away some promo codes for this game. Sadly enough, no actual iPads to give away, but you might want to consider joining a certain Twitter giveaway if you really want one.

iPad revealed + event coverage

Apple just revealed the much-rumored tablet device, and the name isn't iSlate, iTablet or iTabulaRasa, but iPad.

Essentially a bit like a 10 inch iPod touch, this Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and 3G enabled device does a lot of things: music, videos, e-mail, photos, and even iPhone apps.

It comes in 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB models and will start at an amazingly high (but kind of low) price of $499.

In addition, it also has an app called iBooks, designed to compete with the Kindle, et al.

First thing that comes to mind: Delicious Library. Only, with book reading capabilities. No text to speech however so it could be said that it's not quite there yet...

Still the firmware has been detailed to have support for external displays (plug that bitch to your TV!), file sharing (woot), and universal apps (iPad and iPhone optimized apps).

It is slated to come in March (WiFi models) and April (3G models). June or July for other countries.

And now, per usual, here's my "live blog but not live" transcript... now chock full of pictures!

----------

"We want to introduce a revolutionary product today."

Really?

But before that, Steve will have to go through the fundamental roadblock of announcing sales figures. You know, for the stockholders.

250 million iPods sold, admittedly made me woah there for a moment. Then it's retail time. 284 retail stores around the world, hmm, and 50 million visitors last quarter, that's quite high. Anything else high, Steve?

Yeah, you took that literally with that frigging aerial shot of that new NYC store near Broadway. Fine, fine. I have to admit, it is a beauty.

More figures: 140 thousand App Store Apps, 3 billion downloads, and aww, nostalgia shot. 1976 was the inception of Apple, and after a few decades, they ended the fiscal first quarter of 2010 with $15.6 BILLION dollars of revenue. WOW.

"Even I don't believe that," remarks Jobs.

And now, Apple sort of admits its expertise in the portable market: laptops, iPods, iPhones... the iMacs and Mac Pros apparently don't sell as much. Yeah, please the stockholders.

"Last time there was this much excitement about a tablet, it had some commandments written on it."
- The Wall Street Journal

After those 5 minutes of stockholder ass-kissing, Apple finally cuts to the chase... but with a little history lesson first. Powerbooks set the standard for laptops, iPhones set the standard for smartphones, and now Apple wants to find some middle ground.

"[In order for us to create a third class of portable devices,] it has to be far better at doing some key things- better than a laptop or a smartphone. Otherwise it has no reason for being. Some people have thought, 'that's a netbook' but the problem is, netbooks are not better for anything. So they're not even better than laptop, they're just cheap laptops and not even worth a new category of device."

And now, ladies and gentlemen, Jobs finally shows the name of their new device: the iPad.

Steve gets it out of his armchair and... it just looks really nice. Cue wolf whistle from the audience.

Thicker than I expected though, but not as huge. And the browser looks like... wow. Now that Steve emphasizes it, I like the idea of a whole web page displayed on screen (sadly, STILL no Flash). Of course, accelerometer rotation, that's a given. and e-mail... HUGE.

Hell, I like the touch Apple does with the Inbox. It doesn't occupy the whole screen, it's a pop-up, just the way it somehow should be... for me anyway.

But the iPad will definitely have to have some hitches, and that's the keyboard. Tried and tested on the iPhone, but how about a bigger screen? Jobs claims it to be near life-size, but I'm still not convinced as to how accurate it is. Theoretically, you can just lay your palms and type as you would on an actual keyboard, but seriously now, not too ergonomic. Still, Jobs says it's "a dream to type on". A bit of a stretch for me to believe. For now. Oh, and how about Portrait keyboard? Surely typing won't always need a rotate to landscape?

And of course, it's gotta have the thing it's bound to be used for: a digital photo viewer. Truly, it looks like a frigging digital photo frame. Devices like this are definitely meant for photos. Videos though? Hmm... I'll need to see the actual thing to believe it.

Still, Calendar, Maps and Contacts look awesome, even the Music app is very much overhauled to look like the actual iTunes app (although to be honest, the button design looks like crap from afar). Even YouTube looks frigging awesome.

Hello, print ad:

So OK, we're literally watching Steve Jobs browse the web. And check his e-mail. And somewhat struggle to type e-mail (alas, auto-correct saves the day).

Next up, the photo viewer. Yawn, swipe through photos, categories... and then!

When I saw the photo gallery, I thought, "you should be able to pinch the thumbnails to reveal the photos but I doubt Apple will put that in till iPad 2.0". Alas, I was proven wrong!

And yes, there are slideshows, but there's something new... Origami? What transition is that?

Well, hokey country music and some photos. And then they fold. And they fold nice. Won't take long before iPhoto gets this.

Then the music player. I CAN'T GET OVER THE CRAPPY BUTTON DESIGN.

The iTunes Store thankfully fares better aesthetics wise. But wait, no iTunes LP?

But the calendar just looks beautiful.

Also the contacts.

The movie browser is excellent, IMO. (I also love Star Trek)

OK, I'm convinced about videos.

Going to the hardware side, Apple has included its own homemade processor the Apple A4, and it comes in 16GB-64GB iterations... kinda like the iPod touch. All housed in a 10 inch IPS display.

It also has WiFi 802.11n, and Bluetooth. It also has accelerometer, compass, speaker, mic, and the iPod USB connector, so no USB ports for your other devices. Sorry creative dudes and dudettes. You can't mount your camera and import photos from the iPad.

But more unbelievable, 10 hours of battery life. For a device positioned to take on the tablet and the netbook markets, that's pretty decent, especially for a huge screen. It also has a month of standby time. Put it in sleep mode for a month and it won't die.

So how about apps? Well, Steve Jobs summons Scott Forstall for this and the first thing he mentioned was out-of-the-box compatibility with existing iPhone apps, which will be able to run in its original resolution, but also with an inflated resolution without app modification. That's pretty good for consumers, I have to admit. But how about game performance especially in the larger resolution display?

HELL, how do you even play Tap Tap Revenge, or, I don't know, LABYRINTH with this huge device? Wouldn't it hurt? I don't know.

Well, looks like racing games don't get affected by the resolution inflation. The Sims 3 would run VERY well on this, I have to admit, but an inflated one would be much more appreciated.

Apple will also be releasing the SDK today, and it will even include an iPad simulator, which will definitely be welcomed by developers.

Now Scott goes on to highlighting some iPad-specific apps this time, all developed in 2 short weeks.

Gameloft:
Gameloft has rewired NOVA to be more user-friendly for the iPad gamers.

They've added a mini-map, control customization and even a shortcut to throw grenades. Heck, there's even "simultaneous target shooting" which is actually kind of cool to be honest.

Still, ain't the controls gonna be awkward?

New York Times:
This was certainly a given. I mean, huge screen equals a pretty nice display for news reading.

Includes iPhone syncing too.

Brushes:
Brushes is a cool app that has spawned some pretty amazing works of art. And with the iPad, Brushes just seems like an undoubtedly great fit.

Apparently, iPad OS is iPhone OS 3.2, thus the weird delay between OS firmwares.

Even cooler: the iPad version of the Brushes app is also able to playback the actual painstaking process of drawing the actual picture!

Electronic Arts:
Need for Speed Shift is being demoed and it looks quite pretty.

EA has also added some new gameplay mechanics, and it can even go hyperspeed. Phew.

MLB:
I'm not a fan of Major League Baseball, but apparently, it is a popular sports app in the US, so okay.

Go stats-happy while you watch a video highlight.

Scott Forstall leaves and Jobs comes back. And he introduces the big elephant in the room, the e-book reader called iBooks.

It looks very good, and you can even look at two pages at once without the disturbing flashes of e-ink displays.

And Apple has also developed an e-book store exclusively for the device called the iBooks Store, with 5 major publishers on board.

Now Jobs demoes the buying process, and it's pretty much similar to iTunes. It is simple, but visually stunning to look at, lol.

And to think that Steve Jobs once said, "People don't read books anymore."

Flipping pages is like flipping the page of an actual book. As in swipe. One of the subtler touches include font switching, font size changing, and even the option to just stop flipping the page halfway, as if you're readying yourself to get to the next page while you finish up that last sentence.

Apple uses the ePub format, which is NOT proprietary. -insert smiley here-

Next iPad app: iWork.

Apparently, there was a bit of apprehension when the idea first came up, since iWork was pretty intensive.
However, they pulled it off, and... WOW. This is killer.

Phil Schiller will be speaking about this one though, but whatever. I want to see this thing in action!

Hello new Keynote.

Hello new Pages.

Hello new Numbers.

They look sick. You simply need to see this in action...

Multi-touch wowsers. There's even a few effects, even Magic Move. Microsoft Office Mobile does not hold a candle to this.

Next up, Pages.

Excellent page navigation, and even word wrap. This... this is awesome.

Lastly, Numbers.

Sheets are displayed in tabs on top, and there's even a data entry keyboard which gives access to formulas and commands. And yes, there are a lot of functions built in.

I'm not even a big fan of Numbers nor Excel, but this just looks like... fun.

iWork is basically the iPad's killer app. Color me wowed. They'll only cost $9.99 each too and even have compatibility with the Mac versions and connect to projectors!

The iPad will apparently be also able to restore from your iPhone backup too, not a surprise. Now Jobs switches to the topic of wireless networks.

OK, there's WiFi obviously.

But there's also 3G.

The plans: 250MB per month for $15, and unlimited data for just $30. Alas, it's AT&T powered over there, but I'm optimistic that Globe will be able to handle this device as well.

But the great thing is that the 3G need not be activated through a computer, and the contract is prepaid so there's NO contract.

And now, there's international plans, and hopefully, Apple gets those deals done by June. So, iPad models sold here will NOT come with any sim, any sim can be inserted for use with any iPad sold in the Philippines, and that is unprecedented... AND AWESOME.

All in all, the things that wow me include: iWork and always-on 3G. E-books? Hmm...

Now Jobs talks pricing. "If you listen to the pundits, we're gonna price it for a thousand dollars, which is code for 999. When we set out to develop the iPad, we not only had ambitious technical and user interface goals, but also an aggressive price range because we want to put it in the hands of many people. We have met our cost goals."

The iPad will start at...

FOUR HUNDRED NINETY NINE DOLLARS. That is 23 thousand pesos. A pretty fair price considering.

But 16GB? And $130 additional for the 3G model? Err...

Still, the iPad will also be available in 32 and 64 gigabyte models, but that's an even bigger bag of hurt.

Next: Accessories.

There's gonna be a dock that'll both charge your iPad and even make your iPad a digital photo frame.

However, there's also a keyboard dock.

And there's even a functionally fashionable case that also serves as a great dock for video and typing.

Next, a video for the iPad starring Jonathan Ives.

"Do we have what it takes to carve a third product category? Well, I think we've done it. The iPad is our most advanced technology in a magical and revolutionary device at an unbelievable price."

Phew, that was quite the keynote. In his last remarks, Steve invites the media for the hands-on and for the Q&A. And the event is over.

More thoughts on the iPad, tomorrow.