TouchSmarter: Touch Screen Gadgets

Apple has just posted the two new iPod adverts to its website. The iPod nano advert shows all nine colours of nano flying in and resting on a surface while paints runs off the bottom of the screen, ending with the phrase “nano-chromatic”.

The iPod touch advert shows the device off as mainly a gaming device, describing it as the “funnest iPod ever”.

During Apple’s “Let’s Rock” event the company announced two new sets of iPod headphones and additionally announced the ability to record voice notes on the iPod.

The first set of new headphones are similar to the standard earbuds that ship with all iPods but have the added feature of play/plause/forward/reverse and up/down volume controls as well as a small microphone. The Apple earphones with Remote and Mic are priced at $29 (£19) but are not currently available to purchase.

In addition Apple has updated its in-ear headphone set, these headphones contain two drivers in each earpiece (tweeter and woofer) and ship with three sets of silicone ear tips (small, medium, large). The headphones also incldue the controls described previously.

The new in-ear headphones are listed as “coming soon” and are priced at $79 (£55).

The headphones are compatible with the new iPod classic, 4th generation iPod nano, and 2nd gen iPod touch.

After yesterday’s announcement that iPod touch users would be the first to receive the 2.1 software update it became a desperate wait for Apple to unleash the download to the world.

Late Tuesday night iPod touch users began receiving the update which adds many of the features present on the brand new second generation iPod touch.

Some of the changes in 2.1 include the Genius feature for automatically creating a playlist of related music, battery life improvements, and a large amount of bug fixes.

A full list of fixes is now available from Apple.

The software update is free to iPod touch users who have already upgraded to version 2.0 of firmware, those using any version 1 software must pay $9.99 to unlock and download the 2.1 update.

The 2.1 update will be available for free to iPhone users on Friday.

Apple has posted a QuickTime stream of today’s “Let’s Rock” special event.

During the event company CEO, Steve Jobs introduced, brand new iPod nanos, a revamped iPod touch and iTunes 8.

During today’s keynote speech Steve Jobs stated that Apple has distributed over 100 million applications via the App Store since July 11.

More than 3,000 applications are currently available on the App Store, with over 90 percent priced at less than $10 and more than 600 offered for free.

“iPhone’s unique capabilities, easy SDK and the ability to reach an audience of millions via the App Store made this an easy development choice for us,” said John Pollard, Jott CEO. “To date, we’ve had hundreds of thousands of downloads of Jott for iPhone, which has been a major win for our company.”
“Because I already had a full-time job I used the iPhone SDK to create Trisim in my spare time and in my wildest dreams I never expected this kind of result,” said Steve Demeter, founder of Demiforce. “Selling over 27,000 downloads in the first three weeks means I now have a significant new income stream and some exciting career choices that I didn’t have a couple of months ago.”
“As an 18 year old iPhone Developer Program member I won an Apple WWDC student scholarship and used the opportunity to complete my app over the summer,” said Bryan Henry, developer of Equivalence. “It was a lot of fun to pull it together and certainly the most lucrative summer job I’ve ever had as I made over $8,000 in my first month of App Store sales.”
“Our new account registrations on the App Store are 300 percent better than all our other registration avenues combined,” said Chris MacAskill, SmugMug’s co-founder. “We’ve been able to do things with our iPhone app that we just couldn’t have dreamed of doing on any other mobile platform, so these are revolutionary times for us and for iPhone and iPod touch users.”

Today Apple demoed a brand new version of iTunes for Mac and PC. iTunes 8 includes the new breakthrough Genius feature, which lets you automatically create playlists from songs in your music library that go great together—with just one click. Genius helps music fans rediscover favorite songs in their existing music library and suggests related music on the iTunes Store they might want to add to their music collection. iTunes 8 features new ways of viewing your music and video libraries, and adds television programs in stunning high definition for sale on the iTunes Store.

Using Apple’s breakthrough Genius feature is easy—select any song, click the Genius button, and iTunes instantly creates a playlist of songs that go great together from your own library. You can preview the playlist Genius creates, refresh the list to choose different songs and save Genius playlists to enjoy again later. You can even create Genius Playlists on-the-go with the new iPod classic, iPod touch, iPod nano and iPhone. The Genius sidebar appears right in iTunes and recommends music from the iTunes Store that you don’t already have, based on the songs you select.

iTunes 8’s new visual browsing interface displays your music and video libraries using your album and video covers, and also provides a great way to navigate your movies, TV shows, iPhone apps, podcasts and audiobooks.

Apple today introduced the second generation iPod touch featuring an amazingly thin contoured metal design, a gorgeous 3.5-inch widescreen glass display, 802.11 b/g Wi-Fi wireless networking, integrated volume control buttons, a built-in speaker for casual listening, a built-in accelerometer and other advanced sensors, and Apple’s revolutionary Multi-Touch user interface. iPod touch, now available for just $229 (£169) for the 8GB model.

“iPod touch is the funnest iPod we’ve ever created,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “Users can listen to millions of songs, watch thousands of Hollywood movies and now, thanks to the App Store, download and play hundreds of great games on their iPod touch.”

The new iPod touch is smaller and lighter than the original, with a sleek new design that features a contoured metal enclosure with integrated volume control buttons and a brilliant 3.5-inch widescreen glass display. With its rounded edges, flush display and curved, more compact design, the new iPod touch is more comfortable to hold and more portable than ever.

The new iPod touch also features built-in Nike + iPod support making it an incredible workout companion. Users simply place the optional Nike + iPod sensor ($19 US) in their Nike + shoe to seamlessly connect with the new iPod touch to track miles run or sync with the latest generation gym equipment.

The new iPod touch is available immediately for a suggested price of $229 (£169) for the 8GB model, $299 (£219) for the 16GB and $399 (£289) for the 32 GB model.

Photos of the 2nd generation iPod touch introduced at Apple’s Let’s Rock event on September 9 2008.

View the gallery.

It would be completely foolish for anyone that knows anything about analyzing the electronics industry to write off a product that Microsoft has created.  If there is one thing the corporation has shown again and again it is that they can market a thoroughly bad product to death and make it into a good product through sheer force of will.  The Surface is by no means a bad product in the absolute sense, but has been made to look bad because of cost overruns and a comparatively fantastic iPhone sales number.  However, Microsoft has been plugging away with the Surface, getting marketing deal after marketing deal to the point where the Surface Computer and the Multitouch technology it carries has been recognized as a mainstream product in hotels and retail stores around the country.

Now, with yet another astonishing marketing turn, Microsoft has been able to market the Surface Computer to MSNBC for their coverage of the 2008 American Presidential Election.  This coverage is something that is very much enhanced by the Multitouch display that has allowed people to touch places on a map of the country and then move votes to or from those places by virtue of dragging their fingers across the screen.  The newest Surface Computer that MSNBC is using actually comes with McCain and Obama action figures, both of which are uniquely recognized by the Surface display.

With this kind of theatre you can only tip your hat off to the Microsoft Corporation that is really pulling out all the stops to make their Surface Computer as mainstream as possible.

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Just a few days after the announcements surrounding the placement of the Surface Computer in some of the key retail areas of the country, Microsoft has come back with yet another announcement.  This announcement has to do with their newly introduced Multitouch Cell and the announcement is that the future of Minority Report is here.

Well, that isn’t actually the announcement, but it really does capture the gist of what Microsoft was trying to get across with this particular release.  The massive Multitouch Cell wall device is meant to be something for the super rich to purchase that will allow them the chance to experience the future of technology before everyone else.

The Multitouch Cell features products that come in 32 inch and 42 inch displays and have a maximum resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels.  This massive screen will allow you the opportunity to push pictures, notes and other program windows back and forth across the surface using the same Multitouch technology that is featured in the Microsoft Surface Computer.  In this way, the Multitouch Cell can really be thought of as the Microsoft Surface on steroids, something that is a very pleasant image for anyone that loves the Surface Computer.

What does the Multitouch Cell mean for the Microsoft Corporation?  At the current moment in time the answer in practical terms is not much.  The Multitouch Cell does absolutely nothing for Microsoft’s efforts to break into the mainstream Multitouch market, although it does have the potential to do so later in the future when these units are mass produced.  In that sense, it is a much better flagship product for Microsoft than the Surface ever was.

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