Twitter was buzzing last week when a Singapore-based iOS developer, Arun Thampi, posted a note about Address Book and privacy. It seems the issue did not travel far up the media pipeline to most of us, but a number of industry insiders commented on it, most notably ZDnet. Gizmodo republished the post and thousands of users showed concern. That’s thousands of users, while Apple reports that they sold 37.04 million iPhones in the first quarter of fiscal year 2012. This is an issue that concerns all of us that use iOS devices and we should be acutely aware of who takes our personal data and how they use it. Further, what safeguards does a company use to protect our data against potential misuse.
It all started with the reposting of Thampi’s notes by ZDNet Jason O’Grady and others that the popular Path social media app copied your Address Book data to its servers. Path claimed it needed your data to help you connect with friends across multiple social media sites. Once this news became public, Path addressed the issue, first by offering to remove your data if you emailed them, but later the company replied that they had removed everyone’s Address Book data from their servers. Path was updated on 2/13 and now prompts you to opt in or out of sharing your Address Book with their servers. While this one company responded to user complaints and reacted favorably, it is still unclear how many other apps may be storing your personal contacts on their servers.
The release of iBooks Author brought criticism several weeks ago that the license agreement forbade users from exporting PDFs to be sold outside of Apple’s own store. But Apple clarified things this week by stating that the restriction is only for the iBooks format, which can only be used in iBooks anyway. iBooks Author can be used to produce PDFs that can be sold anywhere, and even iBooks-formatted files that can be distributed freely anywhere.
Apple continues to push the new feature of Lion Internet Recovery to more Macs. Many 2010 models received a firmware update this week that allows them to boot using firmware, connect to Apple servers and install Lion onto an empty hard drive. This functionality is needed as Lion does not come on a DVD like previous operating systems.
Every time a format dies, he has a bonfire and holds a little ceremony. He did it with vinyl records, video tapes, CDs and now DVDs. But in the future I wonder how he’ll burn “the Internet.”
As a new iPad 2 owner I was rooting around the Web to see what help resources are available. I looked at cases, software reviews, and hardware accessories. What I found are a lot of photos of people with their heads bent down in an odd position while using their iPads. I thought that doesn’t look comfortable!
As I mused on ways to hold the iPad in a more comfortable position, I wondered if anyone had noticed the odd way people hold their necks while using the iPad. Lo and behold, I found a Harvard study quoted on the LA Times web site. The study, “Touch-screen tablet user configurations and case-supported tilt affect head and neck flexion angles” found that positions that users engage in while using any tablet contributes to excessive head bending which results in large muscle strains. These large muscles involve the neck and upper back and affect posture while sitting or standing.
The small study notes that the position in which you hold your iPad does affect how you feel:
Higher display locations lead to decreased head and neck flexion that approach more neutral postures; while lower gazes lead to increasingly flexed postures which are associated with an increase in neck extensor activity.
Apple released updates to Mac OS X Lion and Final Cut Pro this week. The OS X update, version 10.7.3 includes support for some new languages, as well as bug fixes and security fixes. The security updates are also available for Snow Leopard users. These updates can be downloaded by simply running Software Update.
Final Cut Pro version 10.0.3 adds multicam project support, allowing videos to automatically sync using timecodes or audio. Also included are new chroma keying features, a media relinking interface, better support for XML 1.1 and broadcast monitoring over Thunderbolt devices. The update can be downloaded using the Mac App Store.
In other news, apple has hired a new senior vice president for retail: John Browett, former CEO of Dixons, a european electronics retailer. He replaces Ron Johnson who oversaw the creation and evolution of the Apple Stores before leaving to become CEO of JC Penney last year.
“I’m always online. I constantly update my blog, a YouTube page and my Twitter stream.”
“Want to come by and see me tomorrow?”
“Sure! What’s your URL?”
I wanted to write about the specific troubles in Apple’s manufacturing facilities in China for today’s commentary, but then I thought: To what end? What will beating this live horse of an issue help? Instead I find myself more interested in commenting on how the story was publicized. I know I was disappointed when Apple chose to take their manufacturing to foreign shores about 10 years ago, but I didn’t stop buying the products. I bet you didn’t either. While Apple has tried to investigate the worker complaints and problems at foreign plants for at least four years, it seems little progress has been made to end worker abuse. You can see Tim Cook’s response to the newest problem reports in a letter first published on 9 to 5 Mac on January 26. The letter is in direct response to a rather extensive exposé on the problems in the New York Times on January 25.
The troubling aspect of the issues to me arise from the fact that reports have been seeping into the US about these problem for a few years before the New York Times published their story. Problems were cited for years. Everyone claims that information is so readily available all over the Internet, yet it still takes a traditional media giant like the New York Times to engage most consumers. It seems Apple started investigating complaints at least five years ago, but has not impacted the factories in question as yet. So, the issue then becomes why did Apple wait until it became a major newspaper story before they addressed the problem publicly with a staff memo and pages on their web site. Plus, why did it take the New York Times to activate outrage from consumers?
I suppose in some respects, the poor reporting of the issues by some of the new media heighten my dismay. For example, The Daily Beast states: “When The New York Times blew the lid off of terrible workplace standards at Chinese tech manufacturing factories, … these tweeters decided it was time to say, ‘iQuit.'” In fact, The New York Times didn’t blow the lid off the story, they just published a rather lengthy account of the story that has been available on other media sites for a couple of years. In addition, because of the NYT reports, The Daily Beast goes on to say that 18 people tweeted they would boycott Apple. If they’d done a bit more research, they would have found many more people who are now reluctant to buy and possibly boycotting Apple products in comments found on forums in numerous sites.
This is a multifaceted issue, that not only deals with manufacturing abuse and selected ignorance on our part by ignoring stories on less acclaimed news sites. It also highlights the cultural problems presented by creating products in a different economic system in another country.
The question remains, does what you have read about the workers’ experiences in Apple’s manufacturing plants in China affect your purchasing plans? Do you have faith that Apple will be able to solve the problems and continue to manufacture products according to our work standards? Just what is our responsibility in making sure, in this global economy, that other countries adhere to work ethics of which we approve or are we naive to expect a different culture to buy into our high (moral and humane) standards?
It seems that almost every quarter Apple breaks new records. With $46 billion in revenue and $13 billion in net profit the 20122 holiday quarter was more than twice as profitable as 2010.
More than half of Apple’s revenue comes from the iPhone which sold 37 million units. iPad sales totaled more than 15 million. Also more than 5 million Macs were sold, a new record for a quarter. The Mac sales broke down into 3.7 million MacBooks and 1.5 million desktops.
“Yes, I know that iPhone is way too big. So was the wish-list of new features you wanted added to it.”
The release of iBooks Author by Apple last Thursday has created a flurry of mixed reactions among writers in the computer industry. While the iBooks 2 reading app adds some great features for reading books, such as highlighting text, flash card creation, and high quality interactive books, the authoring program seems to have some issues. It’s a no brainer that iBooks 2 will reduce the long-term cost of textbooks for students, yet the initial investment may be a problem for those that cannot afford an iPad.
What seems to irk potential authors though, is the licensing agreement for those who want to create books in iBook author. The supported ePub format book may only be published in the iBookstore if you charge for your creation, there’s a 2GB limit, Apple gets a 30% cut of the sales, and you must make a sample available. Some of the restrictions do not apply if your book is free.
