Looking at Apple’s education announcement and the later statements by McGraw-Hill CEO Terry McGraw that; 1.  school boards would have to pay the $14.99USD “pilot pricing” per year per student and. 2.a paper text book costs $75.00USD per book and is replaced once every five years or so, and that Mr. McGraw expected to make money on “volume”, I had to wonder how Apple was going to knife the publishers? There has to be a plan to take out the publishers, because it is in Apple’s corporate DNA to screw the old school content providers. They almost have to, because the scheme as presented has absolutely no cost savings to cash strapped American school boards, and the prospect of a huge investment into the Apple ecosystem.Here is how I think it is going to play out.  In the US, publicly funded schools are generally overseen by the various states and each county and or city has its own school board that is for the most part funded by local taxes. Apple is going to point out to the state oversight school boards (if the states don’t figure it out on their own) that they can create their OWN textbooks using their own state university resources (ie graduate students) Essentially, once the primary texts are done, its just  a mater of updating and revisions.  For example, the American State of Tennessee has 971,524 students enrolled in K-12. (Think of it as Grades 1-13) The cost of one Apple iTextbook at say $15.00 USD would be $14,572,680. Admittedly, the number includes the entire group of K-12, but, I could see using iPads in kindergarten even if they were not issued to students below 3rd or 4th grade. Assuming 6 courses per student per year and figure 6 textbooks (at least-don’t forget lab books in upper forms)per student, per year, doing the  iMath comes to at least $90USD a year. per student, not counting the cost of the iPads.  However, if the schools create their own content, even at market cost there is about a five year break even for the cost of an iPad. Over, $14 million  US dollars would pay for a lot of work study time to do the basic research and writing of the texts All that has really stopped many state school boards from doing their own textbooks was the economies of scale for for publication.Take out the printing costs and its a whole new match. One the textbook publishers are likely to lose.

Commentators have mentioned that nothing was said about university level textbooks. I suspect not only that was deliberate on Apple’s part, it is where textbook publishers will start feeling the heat. Uni professors love to inset their own spin on the texts they use, even to almost writing their own. In the US, college textbooks are hitting $200USD a book in many subjects. Whilst UK textbook costs are usually 20-50% lower in the US, everyone is looking to cut costs.  Not to mention the potential savings on classes where you get a lecturer who almost never uses the book, but often has other material to read.  In the college setting, an iPad based textbook ecosystem could pay for itself in the FIRST TERM.  The idea of updated content is particularly appealing for technical subjects. From  the university’s perspective, there would not be any real need to issue iPads, students would be expected to buy them.

Where is Apple in all this? Selling a lot of iPads. Where are the textbook publishers? Trying to steal the pudding of the record companies at the home for obsolete business models.

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Is this Apple’s plan for the textbook market?

Thursday, Apple announced the release of iBooks2  and iBooks Author; new and free textbook reading  and authoring tools.  Apple also revealed a partnership to create and sell low cost interactive textbooks with the big three textbook publishers that account for 90% of the sales of textbooks to the first 13 grades of American schools, known as K-12. Finally, Apple expanded its iTunes U uni lecture series to the K-12 market.   Missing from the announcement was any price break for the beleaguered American school system and that it was a closed Apple hardware only system. Also absent was the fact that if you create content with iBooks Author, you have to sell it in the Apple store.

Apple has not indicated any similar arrangement with UK publishers, but as I mention here, that may not be Apple’s scheme in any case. Stay tuned, there may be a bit more to this story as it plays out.

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Apple announces iBook 2 for US schools. Will the UK follow?

A user called kenlo over at GiffGaff has posted an excellent price comparison of contracts over PAYG phones using GiffGaff.

Just in case you missed our review, GiffGaff is our new favourite PAYG provider offering outstanding prices, unlimited texts and internet and great service all while running on the O2 network. What’s not to like?

The comparisons aren’t always like for like, in fact GiffGaff looks less appealing the more minutes you want. If you don’t use loads of minutes, text a lot and use a lot of internet, which seems to be the case for the majority of people I know, then GiffGaff seems to be the way forward. Alternatively if you phone people a lot then three seems to be offering some pretty good contracts.

For light users:

Medium Users:

Heavy Users:

Shorter Contracts:

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iPhone 4S Price Comparison : GiffGaff PAYG vs Contract

The iOS 5 update went live about 1:00 PM -5 GMT.  Users are reporting all over the world that they are having multiple issues with the download and Apple has confirmed that the problem is on their end.  Making matters worse, there are reports that aborting the update is duplicating the contacts list and one user who had set up mail in Mac preferences is getting this message:

The word from Apple is to wait a couple of hours and try again. For those of you with mail issues the link to Apple message boards can be found here.   The smart money is on the iCloud servers being overwhelmed. That said, the Apple iCloud engineers are going to have their work cut out getting ready to activate about three million iPhones in a couple of days not to mention the iCloud music roll out at the end of the month.

Might be some iTerminations come the first of November, but we hope not.

Thanks to crimonsonsky76 for the tip!

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iOS5 install problems-Its Apple’s Fault

The worldwide press is saturating all media with the death of Steve Jobs, who passed away Wednesday from complications of pancreatic cancer. Rather than repeat all the typical reporting of his passing, it is better to focus on a celebration of his life and his many, many accomplishments that has shaped and changed the world everyone lives in today.  The list is long, the Apple I, the Apple II, the Macintosh, the Lisa during his first stint at Apple. During his time away from Apple he founded NeXT Computing and created Pixar out of pieces that he bought from LucasFilms. Pixar under Jobs became the gold standard for animated films, and is widely credited as revitalizing the genre and the fortunes of Walt Disney Studios when Disney subsequently purchased Pixar for almost ten billion dollars.

All this seemed to be only a prologue for the return of Mr. Jobs and what was arguably his and his teams greatest contributions to the way the world consumed its music, media, and used its phones. Starting with the iMac, Mr. Jobs and the people he surrounded himself with, went on to revolutionize the way we consume music, the iPod and the Apple Music Store.  Starting in 2001, the iPod completely changed the music industry and in all likely hood stated the death spiral of music CDs.  Moving from that the iPhone in 2005, and then the iPad in 2009. It is easy to forget that Apple did not found any of those product categories. Music players, smart phones and tablets all came about well before Apple entered the scene. The tribute that should be rendered to Steve Jobs and his team was that in each product area, Apple came along and arguably perfected the category.

What are your thoughts of your experience of Apple and thoughts on Steve Jobs?

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A Celebration of the Life of Steve Jobs

14 months after the release of the iPhone 4, Apple have finally announced its successor, the iPhone 4S. Touted as the most anticipated device ever, announcement turned out to be a massive disappointment to many offering a minor update to the iPhone 4 and leading to a 5% drop in shares.

It was originally rumoured that there would be 2 phones announced the 4s and the 5 with the 5 possibly having a new design and larger screen. Unfortunately the 5 was not announced the the 4S offered minor upgrades including a new Dual-core Apple A5 processor, and an 8 megapixel camera. These are similar specifications to phones like the Samsung Galaxy S2 and the Motorola Atrix which have been around for months now.

While the iPhone 4s will undoubtedly be a fantastic phone but the main improvements come from the launch of iOS5 which will be available on the 3GS upwards.

With the announcement of the Samsung Nexus Prime just around the corner it is quite likely that the iPhone 4S will be outclassed in terms of hardware by Christmas.

iPhone 4S

iPhone 4

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Apple announces iPhone 4s – 14 months to release an out of date phone!

CNET reported earlier this week that Apple has lost another prototype iPhone. Losing the phone has become old news and the twists and turns of the story have overshadowed the disappearance of the  phone itself, with the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) first being involved in the investigation, then denying that Apple had filled a report. Now it’s being reported that SFPD officers accompanied Apple security personnel to the home of  Sergio Calderón and while the policemen waited outside, the Apple employees searched the home and computer of Mr. Calderon, finding nothing.Previous reports indicated that Apple was able to track the phone to the Calderon apartment, probably through the Find My Phone application. Mr. Calderon denies any knowledge of the lost iPhone but has said to the media that he thought all of the individuals who visited him were police officers and further claims that he was threatened on one hand and offered money on the other to return the phone, no questions asked.When confronted by a reporter from the SF Weekly, a spokesman for the SFPD indicated that all the officers did was to escort the Apple investigators to the residence. Mr. Calderon  states that he thought all six individuals were law enforcement officers and would not have consented to a search of his home otherwise.  If this is the case, then Apple, its involved employees, and the San Francisco Police Department could be looking at civil and possibility criminal liability under American law.  It is possible that Apple was able to originally prevail on law enforcement to not file any reports in an effort to keep the affair under the press radar and avoid a repeat of the media frenzy that accompanied the widely reported loss of a prototype iPhone 4 in April of 2010.All that is known at this time about the missing iPhone 5 is that it was reportedly sold on Craig’s-list for $200.00.  In light of the legal firestorm that resulted from Gizmodo buying and disassembling the then unreleased iPhone 4 last year, it’s highly unlikely that the new missing iPhone will ever see the light of day.

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Apple loses another iPhone prototype- might be the least of its problems

Steve Jobs  today informed the Apple Board of Directors that he was resigning as Chief
Executive Officer effective at once and recommended to the board that Tim Cook,
Apple’s Chief Operating Office be named as has successor. According to an Apple
press release issued at the same time as Mr. Jobs letter, the Apple board not
only named Tim Cook as Apple CEO, but also named Steve Jobs as the new chairman
of the board of Apple.

In the  letter, addressed not only to the Board of Directors but the “Apple Community”,
Mr Jobs stated:

I have always said if there ever came a daywhen I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO, I would be the first to let you know.Unfortunately, that day has come.

I hereby resign as CEO
of Apple. I would like to serve, if the Board sees fit, as Chairman of the
Board, director and Apple employee.

No reason was given for Jobs stepping down.  While there has been recurring rumors of
declining health since his transplant surgery in 2009, it is equally possible
that he has simply elected to leave the day to day operation to others. Not
only was Mr. Jobs a co-founder of Apple,  but he also has led Apple from the shambles
the iconic co-founder found upon his return in 1997 to create perhaps the most dominant
tech company in the world today. Further, it seems clear that he will still be
playing an active role as Chairman.

Tim Cook has been with Apple for the last thirteen
years and stepped in to run day to day operations during Mr. Job’s prior leave
of absence when dealing with his illness. With his elevation to CEO, Mr. Cook
also will be joining the Apple board.

Source: Apple via
Tech Meme

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Letter from Steve Jobs

Apple has released a 2nd update of the MacBook Air in 9 months with the latest Intel Sandy Bridge processors, thunderbolt and backlit keyboards.

Intel are claiming that the new Core i5 and i& processors make the MacBook up to 2.5x faster than previous generations, it also comes with the Intel HD Graphics 3000 processor, which includes an on-chip engine for video encoding and decoding.

The new MacBook also has the new Thunderbolt port which Apple has been pushing a lot recently, this is a dual channel port running at 10 Gbps, that is twice as fast as the single channel USB 3m and over ten time faster than USB 2.0. Unlike USB technology, Thunderbolt provides native support for Mini DisplayPort displays. It also supports DisplayPort, DVI, HDMI and VGA displays through the use of existing adapters.

The 11.6-inch MacBook Air starts are £849.00 with a 1.6GHz dual-core Intel Core i5, 2GB memory and 64GB flash storage, and the 13 inch models starts at £1,099.00 including a 1.7GHz dual-core Intel Core i5, 4GB memory and 128GB flash storage.

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Apple updates MacBook Air

ModulR has announced that casings for the iPad 2 are now available. The casing system is designed to protect the iPad and allow for added functionality by allowing users to add various accessories to the casing system. This allows users to use the iPad in a variety of other ways that would be impossible with a standard protective casing.

The iPad 2 case costs $39.99 and includes a very useful hand strap. It is currently available in three colours: tech white, classic black and crystal clear. The case itself has a very good protection and has a very elegant design.

There are currently six accessories that are available for the case:

Hand Strap $14.99: This allows to firmly hold your favourite iDevice without straining your had. It also removes the risk of the iPad slipping or being knocked off your hand.

Shoulder Strap Pro ($19.99): this accessory offers added mobility, you can carry it like a normal bag. It also includes a hand strap and a free stylus holder.

Car Headrest Strap ($19.99): As the name suggests, this one allows you to attach your magical tablet to your car seat, allowing you to provide instant entertainment for your passengers.

Slim Wall Mount ($19.99): The Wall Mount allows users to attach their iPad to the wall. You can choose between adhesive or screw mounting options.

Quick Stand ($14.99): This helpful accessory helps you to mount the iPad in two different angles for viewing and typing.

Utility Mount ($14.99): If you want to attach your iPad to virtually any surface, then this is the accessory you need.

In addition, ModulR also plans introducing two new accessories very soon.

iPad 2 Case Custom Insert ($9.99 – free shipping included): allows you to add custom logos, images or other material in the back of the cover.

iPad 2 Cover Stand ($29.99): This cover stand uses the iPad 2′s own magnetic design to auto wake and close securely. Unlike other cover stands, it will minimize the hassle of manually adjusting the stand.

If you are not in the mood to actually go and select these accessories individually then you can opt for a bundle. ModulR offers two bundles: The anywhere pack (case + shoulder strap + car head strap + slim wall mount) and the Startup Pack (case + slim mount).

Ideally, if you need a mobile solution then the best solution would be the iPad case and the shoulder strap pro. Since this includes the hand strap, you will not exactly have a problem carrying it or using it while moving. In addition to this, it would be best to get a quick stand or a cover stand (when it becomes available). Other than that, I doubt any of the other accessories will be of much use for mobility. If you want to create a home entertainment or security system using the iPad 2, then it would be best to choose either the Slim Wall Mount or the Utility Mount. The Car Headrest Strap would be great if you need to provide your passengers with regular entertainment during long car rides (e.g: driving your kids around).

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ModulR Case for the iPad 2