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Steadily over the years, the big names in music have come to terms with iTunes, including Led Zeppelin, and, in 2010, the Beatles. Recently, AC/DC agreed to sell its music there. Still, you won’t find Garth Brooks and others. Whose music have you looked for, unsuccessfully, on iTunes? Who should Apple be coming to terms with next?
theamazingios6maps.tumblr.com A melting map of Las Vegas.
People pining for a Google Maps app on their Apple devices will get one eventually, but likely not for another couple months or so.
Google is developing a maps application for iPhone and iPad that it is seeking to finish by the end of the year, according to people involved with the effort who declined to be named because of the nature of their work. There has been widespread speculation about whether and when Google would release a maps application for Apple devices since Apple released a new version of its iOS operating system with an Apple-made maps service.
One reason that it will take Google some time to build the iPhone app: it expected the app with Google’s maps to remain on the iPhone for some time, based on the contract between the two companies, and was caught off guard when Apple decided to build a new application to replace the old one.
Apple’s service has been widely ridiculed for inaccuracies in addresses, mislabeled landmarks and other mistakes. It has been compared unfavorably to Google Maps, which previously supplied mapping services to iOS users through an app Apple bundled with the devices. Apple has said its new service will improve over time.
Publicly, Google has been cagey about whether it will provide Google Maps for iOS devices as an app, beyond saying that it wants to provide its maps to users on any device they use. On Tuesday in Tokyo, Eric Schmidt, the executive chairman of Google, said the company had made no move to submit a Google Maps app for the iPhone.
But Google does intend to build a Google Maps app for iOS, according to people who have been involved in an effort to create the app.
There are several complicating factors to Google’s development of the app. Google’s contract with Apple to keep the maps app on the iPhone had more time remaining, and Google did not know that Apple had changed its mind until Apple said publicly in June that it would replace the app with its new maps app, according to two people briefed on the decision. Google is now navigating business relationships with Apple that grow more tricky by the day.
Another complication, according to a person with knowledge of Google Maps: Google would likely prefer to release a maps app that includes 3-D imagery so it is comparable to Apple’s. But Google has 3-D images in Google Earth, which is a separate app with a separate code base from Google Maps, so it would take some time to combine the two.
The Verge earlier reported some details of Google’s iOS maps efforts.
Article source: http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/25/google-working-on-maps-for-iphone-ipad/?partner=rss&emc=rss
This year’s gift possibilities include scaled-down tablets for children, toys that talk and dance, and some creative uses for Apple devices.
Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=def311d8781e9cd9e5ee091c83e466b9
Microsoft said its net income rose 6 percent, to $5.74 billion, or 68 cents a share, from $5.41 billion, or 62 cents a share, a year ago. Revenue jumped 7 percent, to $17.37 billion, from $16.2 billion a year ago.
Analysts on average estimated Microsoft would earn 68 cents a share on revenue of $17.24 billion, according to Thomson Reuters.
The PC market, or at least for the vast majority of PCs inside companies running Microsoft’s Windows operating system, have suffered lately as economic uncertainty has crimped spending on information technology. Newer types of devices like tablets and mobile phones have sapped some of the business as well. Microsoft said its revenue from selling Windows rose less than 2 percent during its first quarter, which ended Sept. 30.
Microsoft’s shares fell 1 percent after it released the financial results at the close of normal trading hours.
Shipments of new PCs grew only 3.6 percent globally in the quarter, which ended Sept. 30, according to the research firm IDC. Apple defied the trend, reporting a 26 percent increase in the number of Macs sold during the same period, the company said on Tuesday.
Brendan Barnicle, an analyst at Pacific Crest Securities, said the company’s revenue from Windows sales were weaker than he had expected. “We’ve now had a year where Windows hasn’t come in in-line with analyst expectations,” he said. “It’s less of a miss than in the past.”
One other problem for Microsoft is that some of the stronger sources of growth in the PC business are now in developing markets like China. While that is good news for other players in the PC business, like Intel, that make hardware components, Microsoft has a harder time in those regions because of high software piracy rates and lower average selling prices for its products.
Microsoft’s Windows business is also facing a growing challenger in the iPad. Tech industry executives are divided about the degree to which Apple’s tablet computer is eating away at sales of traditional PCs, but even Microsoft executives concede there has been an impact, especially on low-end notebooks.
Earlier this week, Apple’s chief executive, Tim Cook, said he believed that the iPad was cannibalizing some sales of Macs, but that a “materially larger” number of iPad buyers were choosing the tablet device over a Windows PC. Apple sold 11.1 million iPads in its last quarter. “With cannibalization like this, I hope it continues,” Mr. Cook said.
Microsoft intends to tackle the threat from the iPad with a new version of Windows, known currently as Windows 8, that has been redesigned for the touch screens of tablet devices, but that product is not expected to appear for about another year.
Peter Klein, Microsoft’s chief financial officer, said in a news release that the company’s “product portfolio is performing well, and we’ve got an impressive pipeline of products and services that positions us well for future growth.”
Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=5b768feda19b585682d1f19a9c32b4e4
The coming of the Civil War destroyed the two-party system.
Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=453eb617ad87335ac6fcee3d9a351336
According to a person familiar with the matter, the studio is negotiating to pay about $1 million for the rights to the project.
The person declined to be identified because the deal has not been finalized.
Sony was also behind the Oscar-winning biopic “The Social Network,” about Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, and “This Is It,” a documentary made of concert rehearsal footage of pop star Michael Jackson.
The news was earlier reported by Hollywood blog Deadline.com.
After Jobs’ death on Wednesday, publisher Simon Schuster pushed up the release date on Isaacson’s “Steve Jobs” by a month to Oct. 24.
Large numbers of pre-orders of the digital e-book for $16.99 pushed the title to No. 1 on Apple’s iTunes store and No. 2 on Amazon.com. Pre-orders of the hard cover copy, for $17.88, put the book at No. 1 on Amazon.
Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=21f0aaa7136e6dbea8d122c3cb63450d
Economics doesn’t have to be complicated. It is the study of our lives — our jobs, our homes, our families and the little decisions we face every day. Here at Economix, journalists and economists analyze the news and use economics as a framework for thinking about the world. We welcome feedback, at economix@nytimes.com.
Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=9e80f3dc79c5bdfb1a9f97f0f269c25b
In Tripoli, Libya, citizens re-emerge on the day after the city’s liberation to find streets of damaged beauty.
Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=3e0cfe1026b33015d78a0e265875f6e1
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: June 9, 2011
An earlier version of this story mischaracterized The Financial Times’s motivation for shifting to a Web-based app. It was to avoid Apple’s store, not to attract readers from the store.
Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=8afb579cd7213c5116ae20a0abc339af