The big day is finally here, the Apple store in downtown Montreal is opening today. It’s about 3 hours until opening and there’s about 15 or 20 of us in line so far. Just like for the iPhone line up 2 weeks ago the people are friendly and the weather is great, so it’s fun.
Nothing to report so far. Looks like Steve Jobs isn’t in Montreal but Apple Inc did send a VP here. The store isn’t as big as the New York stores but it’s a big step up from the Laval store that opened in 2006, here in Quebec, Canada.
Here’s a pict of the line so far.
Well today the WordPress application for the iPhone and iPod Touch was finally released and I’m currently writing this from my phone to test it out. The whole thing seems to work pretty well so far although of course you get to use the standard iPhone interface to write so that means no formatting or anything like this.
That being said, I think it’s great to see an app like this free one for the iPhone. There’s also a free one for Typepad that’s out there but since I haven’t used Typepad in a few years, I haven’t checked it out yet.
Of course, there’s also the free Facebook application that now allows you to write on your friends’ wall. If you got that one right after launch make sure you grab the update since the first version didn’t allow you to write on walls.
Here’s a picture if for no other reason than to see if it works.
So the iPhone 3G is out. In a move that surprised absolutely nobody, I ended up waiting in line for 10 hours to be one of the first in Montreal to get the new gadget. Since I didn’t know just how long the lines would be, I figured getting there at around 11PM would be OK. When I got there, I was 2nd in line at the flagship Rogers store in downtown Montreal.
The night was weird to say the least. Being second in line meant giving at least 30-40 interviews over the night (and morning) to just about every major news organisations in Montreal. Since I was one of the first out of the store with the iPhone, it meant even more interviews after getting the phone. Got to meet the Rogers VP who told me “please don’t be negative during your interviews”. He said that laughing, but you could tell he meant it. That was such a big day for Rogers, any negative publicity would have contributed to ruin the day.
I wasn’t interested in torpedoeing Rogers anyway. I used to pay $60 a month for 50MB a year ago on my Blackberry, so the $30/6GB ends up being quite a deal for me. The Visual Voice Mail is, quite honestly, a game changer for me. This feature alone was worth the price of the phone. I had always hated the damn Voice Mail system, but this makes it so easy to check messages that I’m almost looking forward to getting more messages.
I spent the last year with a first gen iPhone, so the update is minimal, but I have to say the App Store is really quite nice. I’ve already downloaded over 12 free apps for the phone, some of which are really nice like Shazam which detects a song that’s playing in the background and can tell you the song’s name and author. Twitterrific is also quite nice. I’m using the Mac desktop version of this app and it works quite well, so having it on the phone makes it perfect. The Facebook app (also free) is pretty nice although I’m not a big fan of the site, on the desktop or on the go.
Overall, I’m very pleased with the phone. If you’ve never had an iPhone, its UI alone makes it a phone that no other phone can touch. You really need to try one to understand the difference. I loved my Blackberry Curve, I really did, but the iPhone is such a superior phone in every possible way that even though the Curve is a really good phone, in my opinion it can’t quite compete, even though it does have a few advantages as far as emails and instant messenging go.
Well, seems the launch of web applications never goes without a glitch. Apple’s new MobileMe service was no exception to Murphy’s Law—if anything can go wrong, it will. It forces me to revise my description of the service. There is now an official call back on the meaning of the word “push”. From Apple:
“Another snag we have run into is our use of the word “push” in describing everything under the MobileMe umbrella. While all email, contact or calendar changes on the iPhone and the web apps are immediately synced to and from the MobileMe “cloud,” changes made on a PC or Mac take up to 15 minutes to sync with the cloud and your other devices. So even though things are indeed instantly pushed to and from your iPhone and the web apps today, we are going to stop using the word “push” until it is near-instant on PCs and Macs, too.”
You know how summer usually provides excellent settings for taking time off the regular routine, especially when this routine is embedded with technology. If you don’t know about iTunes U then you must look it up. It’s a choice among several in the Store of the iTunes application.
If you’re lucky enough to own an iPhone with the iPhone 2.0 software upgrade, you will have noticed the Apps store which was recently added. That’s a sidetrack, but Apple has allowed developers to sell or offer software and obtain a percentage along the way. Apparently, downloads have already exceeded the 10 million mark in one week-end. But that’s off topic and warrants a review in by itself. 
iTunes U is rich with courses offered for free. Time to get the old brain cells fired up again. I’m especially impressed by MIT’s Open Courseware offerings. Have a look at something light and pick SP.287 Kitchen Chemistry, Spring 2006. Looking for something more involved? Look at Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs. There is a lot more on iTunes U, have a look at it and synchronize your iPod and/or iPhone. Enjoy your time off!
Get Smart is a great TV series from the 60′s by Mel Brooks and Buck Henry, turned into a 2008 movie. MobileMe is the new Apple service soon to replace .Mac (maybe as soon as today). Apple tackled many problems at once and came up with a potent combination of key personal and business web services. They got smart, as in smartphone. The idea is that a “cloud” i.e. a server on the Internet, keeps track of all incoming emails, contacts, events and “pushes” the information simultaneously on all registered devices (iPhone, iPod touch, MacBook, any Mac).
Of course, this has been the idea and the success of the Blackberry for years. It was also the Achille’s heel of the first generation iPhone. Thanks to the upcoming iPhone 3G— coupled with MobileMe— corporate communications will never be the same. Guess what, the service is Microsoft compatible…
This is a definite tendance inspiring web 2.0 start-ups picking up on the trend of creating virtual desktops. Look at Jooce and Wixi. Dunno what their chances of success are as the OS is eroding the notion of the desktop in the traditional sense. If the big boys clue in, soon there won’t be a “personal” computer anymore but rather a distributed presence in the cloud. Google, Microsoft and Apple stand to dominate the necessity of dispersing data and its ineluctable synchronization.
I could never keep up with the synchronization of all my computers, mixed with my permanent mobility, my many mail accounts and FTP servers. Apple has succeeded in finding a solution to another modern age plague— the multiplicity of devices and user mobility. Allow me to coin a new term: mobilicity. Just kidding we haven’t talked about the abundance of data yet…
The recently released Firefox 3.0 is really worth the free download. It is packed with new features and has been streamlined. It is faster and nicer looking. It rightfully claimed the “default browser” title from Safari 3.1.1 on my computer.
Now, you don’t have to be as accurate as humanly impossible upon entering an address in the url input box. Enter a term and Firefox will suggest sites related to this word or expression. Nice. The interface is also more polished à la Safari, slick grey.
You might want to boost your Firefox experience by installing the following add-ons: Zotero, a powerful search utility allowing the fast notation of web sites and Showcase, a quick way to open as thumbnails all your opened bookmarks, in one convenient window. In addition, you might consider Speed Dial, it enables up to nine default thumbnails and associated urls onto one practical page.
Also, if you’re like me and you feel your web browsing should be kept to yourself— or sold at a fair price—disable “Accept third party cookies” (on by default, go figure) under Firefox, Preferences, Privacy. Third party cookies are really annoying as they are put on sites by firms like Double Click (bought by Google) managing ads on behalf of the site.
