Mac to the future

Apple rises above the IT crowd with its design for life

by Alex Watson on 14 October 2010 in Mac to the future
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Why the 30-pin iPod Dock connector tells you almost everything you need to know about Apple – a company that has its eye on the long term. I did warn Nik, MacUser’s editor, before I started writing this column. ‘It might get quite geeky,’ I said. ‘That’s the point,’ he replied. ‘Go for it.’ Perhaps [...]

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Will the new Apple TV find a space in our living rooms?

by Alex Watson on 30 September 2010 in Mac to the future

Apple is pitching the Apple TV as a way to stream TV shows and movies from iTunes, but will this new clarity be enough to persuade us to buy it? One of the things I remember Steve Jobs saying when he first introduced the iPhone in 2007 was that ‘everyone hates their phone’. How wrong [...]

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iPhone versus Android: the ultimate culture clash

by Alex Watson on 16 September 2010 in Mac to the future
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Culture as much as technology is driving smartphone design, as shown by the different directions Google and Apple are taking with their handsets. Discounting a few months back in 2001 when I worked for a website that existed solely inside the soon-to-be-popped dotcom bubble, I’ve spent all of my career as a journalist at one [...]

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You can’t hide from location-based services

by Alex Watson on 2 September 2010 in Mac to the future
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Using your phone’s GPS to find out where you are is just the beginning, as location-based services will be hard fought over by Apple and Google. In previous columns, I’ve talked about how Apple is increasingly concerned about its dependence on Google. This is unsurprising: while people who currently want a web- or app-orientated smartphone [...]

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Looking into the face of future computing

by Alex Watson on 19 August 2010 in Mac to the future
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As innovative as the iPhone’s touchscreen interface is, it still relies on icons and text input. So how long till computers can listen and see us? As I’m writing this, my wife is downstairs, occasionally calling up to me to ask how it’s going. The study window is open, and as it’s a warm afternoon, [...]

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The true provenance of the iPad’s innards

by Alex Watson on 5 August 2010 in Mac to the future
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Now the iPad is out, the CPU that powers it has been unmasked, so exactly how much of the A4 was really designed by Apple in California? Steve Jobs once declared that the problem with Microsoft was that ‘they have no absolutely no taste… I don’t mean that in a small way, I mean that [...]

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