Mac Geek Gab listener Chad sent us a note on Friday with a joke. It's a funny one about Werner Heisenberg and Erwin Schrödinger, chock full of nerdy humor. Two physicists speeding in a car? What could go wrong, right? In any event, the joke: Heisenberg and Schrödinger are driving, and get pulled over. Heisenberg…
Bryan Chaffin
Bryan Chaffin is the cofounder of The Mac Observer and currently serves as Afternoon Editor. He has contributed to MacAddict and MacFormat magazines, and co-authored the last two updates of iPad and iPad Pro for Dummies with Bob “Dr. Mac” LeVitus and Ed Baig. You can find out more about Bryan at his personal site, GeekTells, or find his Twitter link below.
Articles by Bryan Chaffin
Samsung EU Patent Abuse Settlement Talks Highlight Role of SEPs
South Korean electronics giant Samsung is in talks with European Union regulators to settle patent abuse charges. The EU charged that Samsung violated EU antitrust rules when it tried to win injunctions against Apple using standards-essential patents. The European Commission launched its complaint against Samsung in December of 2012. Unnamed sources told Reuters that Samsung…
Apple Defiant in Closing Statement for Ebook Antitrust Case
Apple's attorneys were defiant during their closing statement in the U.S. Department of Justice's antitrust lawsuit. Both sides delivered closing statements on Thursday, though Apple's lead attorney Orin Snyder took two and a half hours to deliver his, while the DOJ's attorneys spent just 90 minutes. The case has taken many ups and downs in…
Pegatron Chief Talks Openly about Low-Cost iPhone, Disputes 'Cheap' Label
Pegatron chairman T.H. Tung has been openly discussing the new low-cost iPhone his company is building for Apple. In a shareholder meeting, Mr. Tung said that the cost of the device will be “quite high,” and that it shouldn't be considered cheap. This would appear to violate the first rule of Apple Supply Club: Don't…
USPTO Reverses Course, Confirms Apple's 'Overscroll Bounce' Patent
The U.S. Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) reversed a “final” ruling from April that invalidated key claims in Apple's “overscroll bounce” patent. The USPTO informed Apple that it would be issuing a reexamination certificate for the patent that confirms four key claims, including claim 19 that a jury found Samsung infringed in 2012. In April,…
Is It Apple’s New Mac Pro or a Japanese Trash Can?
This is too fun: Amazon Japan sells a trash can (Google translation) that looks a lot like Apple's brand spankin' new Mac Pro. Some may find that fitting since there was a barrage of “it looks like a trash can” comments when Apple announced the device on Monday. As the story goes, this trash can,…
A Pixar Artist on Testing Apple's New Mac Pro (w/out Seeing It)
You've probably seen Apple's new Mac Pro. It's gorgeous. It's sexy. It's powerful, too, according to some people who have been working the device in recent weeks. In an Apple video called “Painting the Future,” the lead developer of 3D rendering tool MARI and an artist at Pixar both talked the Mac Pro and how…
New 'Mac Pro' Image Pushed to Mac Sites [Update]
[Update: Apple announced the real deal on Monday morning, and it turns out the image below wasn't it. Actually, the real Mac Pro does have dual GPUs and Thunderbolt 2, so that part was correct, but the form factor was off and then some. See our full coverage and John Martellaro's analysis for more information.…
Redesigning the Look of iOS Is Jony Ive's First Step Towards CEO
“You need a very product-oriented culture, even in a technology company.” – Steve Jobs, 2004 Sir Jonathan Ive I've been thinking about Apple CEO Tim Cook and the company's design guru, Sir Jonathan Ive. It started when former VP Scott Forestall was fired and Sir Jony was put in charge of the look and feel of…
Microsoft Giving Away Vaunted Keyboard Cover with Surface
Click it! That's been part of the marketing message delivered by Microsoft for its Surface tablets. It's the sound the company's keyboard covers make when they attach it to their Surface, and it was what Microsoft was betting would really kick Windows 8 into the media tablet market owned by Apple's iPad. Ah, the dreams…
Samsung Wins Import Ban on iPhone 4 & iPad 2 for AT&T
Samsung has won an import ban from the U.S. International Trade Commission. On Tuesday, the ITC announced the import ban for the iPhone 4 for AT&T, T-Mobile and some regional carriers, as well as the iPad 2 with Wi-Fi +3G for the same networks. The ITC found that the two Apple devices infringed on a…
Researchers to Show How To Hack iPhone with USB Charger
Researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology will be demonstrating a proof-of-concept method of hacking an iPhone using a malicious USB charger. Billy Lau, Yeongjin Jang, Chengyu Song announced the demonstration for Black Hat USA 2013, an annual conference for hackers and security researchers that begins on July 27th in Las Vegas. The short version…
Tim Cook Disses Google Glass, Hints at iWatch
Wearable computing could be as big a branch of the technology tree as iPhones and iPads, according to Apple CEO Tim Cook. Speaking Tuesday night at this year's D conference, Mr. Cook said that he was “extremely interested” in wearables, but he dismissed “glasses”—i.e. Google Glass—as a niche product and said that other forms of…
What's Black and White and Flat All Over? iOS 7
The first delicious rumors have emerged on what Sir Jonathan Ive is doing to iOS 7. 9to5Mac reported that unnamed sources have described the new look and feel for iOS 7 as “black and white and flat all over,” a play on the old-school riddle about newspapers*. The sources also said that iOS 7 will…
Japanese Rumor Says Apple Prepping Multicolor iPhone & iPhone 5S
Apple is working on an inexpensive iPhone model that will come in multiple colors, according to Japanese site Macotakora. The same story also said that Apple was working on the expected iPhone 5S, and that this device might also be available in different colors. “I have [two sources of] information about color variation of cheaper…
Judge Cote Likely to Side with U.S. Against Apple
Judge Denise Cote said on Thursday that she expects the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) will be able to prove that Apple conspired with publishers in the run-up to the release of the iPad. The judge issued a “tentative view” to attorneys representing the DOJ and Apple to that effect, adding that the opinion is…
Samsung's Delusions of Relevance
I've been wrestling with the right way to put this for weeks. There was something about Samsung that's been bugging me since the Bizarro World media event to introduce the Galaxy S4 back in March, but I couldn't put my finger on it. At first I was thinking the company had delusions of grandeur, but…
Pentagon Approves iPhone & iPad for Military Use
The Pentagon approved Apple's iPhone and iPad for use on military networks Friday, a first for the Cupertino company. The U.S. Department of Defense approved Apple's mobile devices that run iOS 6, giving Apple the chance to play a greater role in future U.S. military information systems. Technically, the DOD issued a “STIG,” a Security…
Google to Sell De-Samsunged Version of Galaxy S4 for $649
Google announced on Wednesday that it would be offering customers a version of Samsung's new Galaxy S4 (GS4) that has been stripped of Samsung's layered-on-top interface and other added software. At Google I/O 2013, the company's annual developer conference, Google said that it was “Google's take on Android”*, and that it would sell the device…
Tim Cook Charity Coffee Date Closes at $610,000
How much is an hour with Apple CEO Tim Cook worth? Roughly a 2013 Lamborghini Aventador judging by the final results from a CharityBuzz charity auction. That auction closed Tuesday at US$610,000, tying CharityBuzz's previous record for the above-mentioned super car. Mr. Cook offered up a coffee date to auction to benefit the RFK Center…
iMovie 9.0.9 for Mac Improves Importing from iMovie for iOS
Apple released iMovie 9.0.9 for Mac on Tuesday. The update improves support for importing projects from iMovie for iOS. It also includes a bug fix and unspecified stability improvements. Apple's patch notes in full: What's New in Version 9.0.9 Addresses issues where iMovie does not recognize video cameras connected to your Mac Improves compatibility with…
HTC First ‘Facebook Phone' Reportedly Being Pulled, TMO 'Shocked’
Shocked, we say. Shocked. We are utterly shocked*. Sales of the HTC First—the so-called “Facebook Phone—have reportedly been so bad that AT&T is ready to kill it. The device was announced on April 4th, but according to BGR, AT&T has sold just 15,000 units and is ready to pull the plug. TMO's Dramatic Reenactment of…
Bill Gates: I Wish I Had Steve Jobs's Sense of Design
Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates was recently interviewed by Charlie Rose for 60 Minutes, and one of the topics of discussion was the late Steve Jobs. Mr. Gates became quite emotional when thinking back to his last meeting with Mr. Jobs, and he said he wished he had Mr. Jobs's sense of design. Bill Gates Thinking…
Hike Adds $100,000 Sidebet to Apple's 50 Billionth App Contest
The developers of Hike, an instant message app, have launched a brilliant promotion, offering US$100,000 in additional prizes to the winner of Apple's 50 billionth app download contest if the winning app is Hike. Hike Screenshot From the company's announcement, “The lucky winner will be gifted $100,000* worth of Apple products and accessories from hike!…
