AI, Mobile, and Eveything Around the Cloud

The goal rings from the Activity app on the Apple Watch should be familiar with many iOS (and Apple Watch) users who have seen it in action or read about and seen it online. It's effective to a point and most people find them useful. However, since I make it a point of getting of my desk a few times an hour at work, I rarely get a notification to get off my butt and move. I can see some people who do need to be pushed to move around a bit after sedentary for a while. The active minutes ring is also very important for those who do not move around enough. Neither of those are an issue for me. I find the active calories more important and trying to reach my 900 daily calories has helped me greatly. What has been driving me is keeping up the streak of days that I have hit that goal. And while that has been important and helps me lose about 3-4 pounds since I started wearing the Apple Watch a little less than two months ago, I hope Apple will have other health and exercise re...

Here is a rumor that I find interesting enough that to speculate on what Apple's auto plans may be.  Supposed Apple isn't quite ready to build a car on its own or not in the time frame that it wants to push out an Apple car.  It would have to find a partner.  In this rumor (9to5Mac) , Apple may be in talks with BMW (or had discussions) to use the i3 (wiki) as the basis for its own car.  It's anyone's guess why Apple is talking to BMW and only a tell-all-book about Tim Cook, Jony Ives, or just the iCar in 2020 will answer that question and it may not even be definitive, suppose Apple is not build its car right away.  Supposed it only wants to showcase its own designs and technology in an existing car like the i3 for the world to see - this is an Apple designed car.  And it is willing to work with different brands, perhaps Mercedes, Audi, Porsche, or any other luxury brand cars to co-develop showcase electric vehicles not unlike how Google is using the Nexu...

There is a report out today suggesting the Apple Watch commands 75% of the market.  And without Apple provide real sales numbers, no one knows for sure what its share of the market is.  However, even if Apple Watch share isn't really 75%, maybe say 60%, it does mean that a larger percentage of iPhone users are getting into the mobile wearable experience than Android users are. And we know this because in terms of units sold, Android still dominate the market - between 75% to 80%.  You'd think if same percentage of Android users buy a compatible Android Wear device, they it would be Android Wear commanding 75% of the market instead of the Apple Watch. There could be a couple of reasons why that is the case.  Early Android watch experiences were too raw and ahead of the time - most were not sanctioned by Google if anyone. Folks lik Samsung really jumped the gun thinking that be going to the market before its competitors, it could claim not only to be the first among it...

Yesterday, Apple reported an insane quarter - adding enough cash to push its total over $200 billion.  On top of that, it commands a market share in mobile profit that is just insane.  On top of that, Apple's growth in China and elsewhere in the world isn't done.  Still, Wall Street managed to knock down the stock price because Apple merely beat its own guidance but not ones that Wall Street "analysts" pulled out of their darkest reaches of their behinds.  So, while this is how Wall Street works - a legalized manner to manipulate stock prices. However, Apple itself probably isn't too worked up about it.  In fact, with tens of billions set aside for stock buybacks, it probably is pretty happy.  So, it makes one wonder if Wall Street is help Apple out.  A more conspiracy minded person may very well think that. I'm sure Tim Cook and these so-called analysts would not comment about it.

Source:   Macworld . Yes, the Apple Watch is pretty good and the more I use it, the more I like it.  And this seems to be confirmed in the survey Macworld pointed out.  And what's interesting is the non-tech folks seem to be more impressed with it than the techies.  I think I land squarely in the middle but I do feel something is lacking. Is it a deal-breaker?  Not really.  I had been hold off on the Apple Watch until I received mine as a gift.  So, I decided to keep it.  It has helped me in one significant manner:  I've lost weight and felt healthier since.  That's about it.  Now that sounds like I'm being a bit flippant about it.  I'm not.  I only suggest that my Apple Watch was going to help me in other ways and the health feature was going to be secondary.  The survey noted in the Macworld post did not mention in what ways were people impressed with their Apple Watches so I cannot say for sure if their experiences...

I think it's great that Apple, Google, Microsoft (rumored that Facebook as well) have been racing to outdo one another in the field of AI where Cortana, Google Now, And Siri are becoming more and more part of our mobile computing experience and striving to become more of a true companion.  It will be a multi-year if not perpetual AI race.  But I do think there is something that is fundamentally feasible for these tech companies to do in the near future - having their current OS or AI understand more voice commands like switching between apps or tabs in the browser or even fundamental OS functions.  If there are such features, I have not found them to be adequate.  And it goes towards improving accessibility functions as well for users who are physically or developmentally challenged.  What's interesting is that Apple has had Siri working on the iPhone and iPad for years and it is noticeably absent from OS X.  Only Apple knows why that is.  And there ha...

One man's trash is another man's treasure as the saying goes.  Unfortunately, there is more backlash as it appears that Amazon and its partners are using Prime Day to unload junk inventory.  Don't take my word for it.  Take it from social networks ( BGR ). The level of snarkiness on Twitter just says it all.  For Amazon, it may not matter in the short run as long as those who sign up for Prime forget to cancel later.  Otherwise, Prime is truly a great deal.  It's just unfortunate that Amazon thinks leaf blowers, wealth/real estate books, dandolions, and guitar picks for girls are what people signed up for.

I guess I'm not alone.  Many are disppointed by the offerings Amazon is offering to Prime users ( CNN ).  The only good deals, for some, are Fire devices that Amazon owns.  As for the rest, there are a lot of things that are kinda just fillers that people don't really need.  And while there are a few intresting items for sale, they're don't appear to be Black Friday prices. Like leaf blowers?  Really?  Reflective vests?  No Thanks.  Ditto for the chef's hat.  And those external batteries?  Amazon has similar ones that are priced about the same for the same capacity.  No deal there.  There are MicroSD cards that I might be interested in but we'll have to see what if the price is right. I'll be running an update all day to see if things change.  Oh, and you have to be fast.  Decend items sell out rather fast...last I checked, the leaf blower and Fire devices have not sold out.  Update 1:  The PNY cards have so...

A couple of times during the past month, I nearly pulled the trigger on the new 12" Retina Macbook.  I've done as much research on it as anyone can possible do - what folks who have it are doing with it, battery life, portability, and general sense of how it fits as a replacement for their other laptops or Macbooks.  And I've decided that I can "try" to live without one for a few more months until Apple releases the iPad Pro that is very much real given the amount of smoke coming from that general rumor.  So far, there is nothing beyond what we are hearing about the iPad Pro that is more than a bigger screen iPad with a pen running iOS 9.  However, I'm hopeful that given the Pro is supposed to be more of a productivity tablet, Apple may release some development tools for it as well.  And iOS device capable of developing apps for the iOS.  Currently, the iPad works well enough for most productivity tasks with new features like split-screen from iOS 9 that wi...

Source:  Just google, it's all over the Web. Okay, get this. Apple is barely scratching out a 20% share of the global smartphone market in terms of units sold.  And this is from Apple running with all cylinders firing and task masters at Foxconn factories whipping workers to churn out as many iPhones as they can.  Okay, minus the whips and the task masters but you still get the point.  Apple took months to meet demand and just as it had, we are now onto the next upgrade mere months away. Still, all that work and Apple only managed to take one-fifth of the market.  Doomed, many would say.  Well, except for the fact that for every dollar of profit generated, 92 cents of that goes to Apple.  The rest goes to Samsung while others barely break even or are in the red. Many would like to think that Apple's fortune is the result of Samsung's collapse in the high-end segment of the market but the truth is, Apple's iPhone appeal does not have a single competitor...

Source:  NY Times . It's ironic that a while back, Amazon requested the Department of Justic to look into possible collusion between Apple and major publishers over pricing and, now, a group representing authors and booksellers are hitting Amazon right back by requesting an inquiry regarding Amazon's possible anti-trust actions. It really stems from Amazon's battle with publishers that at times become very public with Amazon trying to justify their actions, like removing books from publishers they have contracts disputes with from sale, to the public.  It has not worked out exactly as Amazon had hoped.  It do appear that Amazon usually end up accepting publisher terms. Still, Amazon's actions do state to the leverage it has in the publishing world and terms it has offered to independent authors.  One of Amazon's most controverial move is to price its books below market price to drive competitors like Borders out of business.  Even now, Barnes and Noble is barely...

It's interesting that Apple has supported podcasts and podcasting for years and, without much effort beyond updating the podcast app on iOS, the podcasting community has grown in sophistication and numbers of quality podcasts as well as tens if not millions of listeners.  And now with Beats 1, Apple may well be focusing and evolving at its usual pace when disrupting markets the whole streaming music and podcast market - creating a network not unlike SiriusXM with content that already exist. In this Macworld post , it focused on how Beats 1 can be the start of something at Apple to take on SiriusXM There have been calls in the past that Apple should buy SiriusXM but I always found that to be a big unlike Apple.  After all, Apple had the podcast app that allowing users to curate podcasts to their own tastes and interests.  And yes, there are music podcasts already.  And more content than even Sirius can hope to have. There was also a time when it looked like Apple was ...

Satoru Iwata passed away over the weekend.  If you don't know who he is, well, the dude is a giant in modern video games.  He lead the Nintendo to new highs and innovations.  He helped usher in the moble gaming industry that we know of today. Think Wii, Mario, and Pikachu.  That's him. If it was not for him and Nintendo, gaming on your Androids and iPhones would be vastly different and quite possibly inferior. Too young at 55.  

I read this Gizmodo post about Apple Music.  Granted that I have not used it yet (waiting for iOS 9 beta to have it next week), when you get rid of the Taylor Swift drama and the will-they-or-won't-they-sign of the indie labels, I'm not sure Apple is offering anything other streaming services do not already have. There is the Beats One "radio station" that Apple has that no one else does for now.  It could be the first step to something even better.  If Apple Music evolution follows other Apple product improvement, we can see annual improvements up to a point and where it makes sense. So far, the bar is pretty low given the state of the streaming segment of the music market.  There are plenty of players so it is good to see there are competitors that will continue to push Apple foward. Once I've gotten a chance to play with it, I will looking into what features I love to see that might be missing or improved.