AI, Mobile, and Eveything Around the Cloud

Apple announced a bunch of new features like Maps and Facebook integration.  They got all the attention. Oh, Passbook is nice and it's not getting much love from blogs.  Nor are a bunch of small unhighlighted improvements that taken together shows how Apple's attention to details make iOS and the iPhone and iPad so popular among mobile warriors. Here are a couple that I like: Geofencing for Find My Friends and Reminders.  Seriously, how awesome is this?! Better privacy features - this will give the user more control than Google or Facebook will ever give its users. Store improvements - as good as the App Store is now, Apple will continues to try to make it even better for app discovery.  The same goes for iTunes.  In fact, Apple is moving the podcasts over to a standalone app.  And when you download/update an app, iOS doesn't take you away from the store.  It has been an annoying "feature" we've had to put up with for years. Different mail signa...

The day Steve Jobs returned to Apple, no one then could have thought that Apple would still be around today let alone remain one of the most valued companies in the world.  And through it all, Apple has resurrected its Mac computers, disrupted markets, created new devices, and continue to innovate to this day.  Easy, right?  Definitely not. Sure, Steve Jobs, now Tim Cook, and the rest of Apple made it seem easy but I’m sure it’s the challenges of creating the perfect Macbook or crafting a device that they themselves would want to use and the continual assaults on its position is what is driving them forward. Today, Macs are selling at a healthy clip but its still computers installed with Windows that dominate the market.  Apple just refreshed its Macbook lines from the Macbook Pro with the new Retina Display to the Macbook Air, it’ll look like the back-to-school season is going to be a blow-out one for Apple.  Still, the PC market will be dominated by W...

It’s been a couple of weeks since I’ve put up any awesome Friday movie clips and while I’ve got a few more zombie-themed ones, I think I’ll go in a different direction.  No Pixar stuff this week either.  It’s from a movie that I didn’t think much of but, more and more, I think when I first saw it, I did it know.  Yup, that’s right.  I watched the move wrong. I wanted great acting, smooth dialogue, and a Oscar caliber story.  But with a bunch of anging former action stars, all you’re gonna get are loud over the top explosions with our heroes winning seemingly impossible battles and bad guys who cannot hit anything at all with their guns. That was The Expendables.  And now, I can’t wait for The Expendables 2 to come out.  This time around, Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger will be joining the fight.  I saw the commercial for it during either the Stanley Cup Finals (which the LA Kings won its first ever championship despite East Coast bi...

My iPhone 4 died yesterday so I went to the Apple store hoping that they would replace it with an iPhone 4S as I’ve heard from various online reports.  Unfortunately, that didn’t happen.  There was some kind of part that the Apple genius replaced quickly within a couple of minutes and I was sent on my way.  However, I did not leave without getting a good look at the new Retina Display Macbook Pro. Wow, oh, wow, oh, wow… On so many levels, the RDMBP is the perfect laptop for a majority of the mobile market.  From a design perspectively, Apple said this was the best Macbook they’ve designed.  I think they did a great job with the Macbook Air, particularly, my 11” Air so it was kind of hard to top but I think many fans will at the very least agree it’s on par with anything Apple has come out with.  The thinness of the RDMBP was apparent sitting next to a regular Macbook Pro.  And the lid with the screen was sickly thin (but in a good way). I...

Competition is good for consumers in general.  And specific to the mobile market, the continuous battle between the various tech giants has been great for us mobile fans.  And with Apple’s Siri, it was an answer to Google’ voice commands.  And Siri, with its beta problems, is clearly setting the mark to hit.  So, I wonder where is Google’s , or Microsoft’s, response to Siri? Yesterday, Apple unveiled iOS 6 with a marginally improved Siri.  I reckon it’ll still be a beta feature through the life of iOS 6 because I think there is just too many basic functions, that while works, require more improvements.  And this has offered Google an opportunity to upstage Apple, RIM, or Microsoft. Perhaps, we’ll see Google’s Siri killer baked into Android 5 when Google releases it later this year.  Or it could operate as a standalone app being made available on competing mobile platforms.  Right now, we just don’t know yet.  In the past, there were r...

Mark this day.  Verizon’s ridiculously expensive shared plan is going to do in the wireless providers and give more boost to the prepaid market.  Why?  The stupid $30 a pop cost for regular phones and $40 a pop for smartphones.  And considering that many industry observers believe the rest of the big four would follow suit, it looks more like this is about the carriers trying to “meterize” data. Remember, AT&T regretted going with the unlimited data plan and I’m sure its competitors at the time were like “what are you thinking”? So, what happens now?  As a Verizon subscriber, I find this plan to be idiotic and once my  service is up, I’m likely to shop around.  So far, my family plan only has onewo smartphone and if I were to add more and be forced to switch over to Verizon’s new plan, I will definitely be leaving.  Grandfathered unlimited data plan be damned.  Obviously, I could go the unsubsidized route and keep my current plan....

Considering that this is a focus on social and mobile warriors, new Macbooks coming out of Cupertino (headquarter of Apple Inc) are always welcoming news and drives traffic for Mac and mobile blogs such as this one.  As of now, we are a bit over an hour away from Tim Cook kicking off Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference in San Francisco. So, let's do a bit of speculation on what new Macbooks will have and what is more important to us mobile users.  Retina Display has been much rumored/speculated about in the blog world.  Even mainstream media, which now relies on us for much of their news, are beginning to pick up on this.  So, I ask you.  Between Retina Display and battery life, which is more important to you? As the proud owner of an 11" Macbook Air, I am quite happy with the screen quality.  I have never made the mistake of comparing it with my iPhone 4 Retina Display nor my mom's 2012 iPad with its own Retina Display.   Sure, I would be am...