Patently Apple

Video: Google's Sergey Brin Shares his Philosophy about Glass

It's not a demo, more of a philosophical argument: Why did Sergey Brin and his team at Google want to build an eye-mounted camera/computer, codenamed Glass? Onstage at TED 2013, Brin calls for a new way of seeing our relationship with our mobile computers -- not hunched over a screen but meeting the world heads-up.

Sadly, more Suicides from Foxconn Factory have been reported

According to a new press release by China Labor Watch, another Foxconn employee from their Zhengzhou factory where Apple's iPhone is assembled jumped off a building to his death last Tuesday. The news that was officially made public hours ago stated that this was the third employee from the same factory to have fatally jumped off of buildings in the span of the last 20 days.

Apple to cut iPad mini Orders to AU Optronics, an iDevice Camera Shortage is Brewing & Corning Upgrades their Glass

In November we reported that AU Optronics was having problems ramping up to mass production of the 7.9 inch display panels used in Apple's iPad mini. The company was only producing about halve of their production target. Today we learn that AU Optronics is once again unable to keep up with Apple's orders.

Apple Moving Away from Hon Hai may be a Good Thing

Hon Hai, the world's largest contract manufacturer of electronics suffered their biggest decline in sales in its history, according to a new Bloomberg report. To give this a larger perspective, a new report out of Beijing yesterday stated that "Foxconn's net loss in 2012 was US $316 million, the biggest loss it had suffered since listing in Hong Kong in 2005." So Hon Hai's downward trend has been ongoing since 2012. In April we posted a report titled "Windows 8 is a Disaster Leading the PC Sector to its Worst Quarter in Roughly 20 Years." Bloomberg echoed this in their report by stating that the "failure of Microsoft Corp.'s Windows 8 to drive PC growth pushed Hon Hai's revenue down the most in at least 13 years." So Hon Hai's downward trend isn't caused by an "Apple slowdown" alone, but rather a number of problems with the tech industry at large and the company itself.

With Gartner seeing a Slowdown in Feature Phones in 2013, Is it Time for Apple to Step into the Mid-Range Smartphone Market?

New research data from Gartner states that sales of Mobile Phones in all regions except Asia/Pacific declined in the First Quarter of 2013. The new Gartner statistics show us that Apple's iOS operating system remained in the number two spot in Q1 2013 but dropped 4.3% from the same quarter last year.

The Organ & Tissue Donor Registry that Steve Jobs Pushed for Opened Today

Back in In October 2010, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law a bill that made California the first state in the nation to create a live donor registry for kidney transplants. The bill also required California drivers to decide whether they want to be organ donors when they renew their driver licenses. According to one supporter, this second measure alone should double the number of organ transplants available in California. This was a project that Apple's late Co-Founder and CEO Steve Jobs pushed hard to get done. The registry created by that bill opened today.

BlackBerry's Social Networking App (BBM) is coming to iOS

BlackBerry announced during their conference today that their BlackBerry Messenger (BBM), their mobile social network is coming to Android and iOS in the coming months. BlackBerry has more than 60 million monthly active customers, with more than 51 million people using BBM an average of 90 minutes per day. The service sends and receives more than 10 billion messages each day, which is nearly double what other mobile messaging apps produce. BlackBerry states that "iOS and Android users would be able to add their contacts through PIN, email, SMS or QR code scan, regardless of platform. Android users would also be able to connect using a compatible NFC-capable device."

New Wi-Fi Standard in the Works with Ten Times Speed Boost

Late yesterday, the Nikkei reported that some 20 global companies including Electronics, NTT, Qualcomm, Ericson, China Mobile and Samsung have agreed to jointly develop a new Wi-Fi technology that is ten times faster than the current standard.

Samsung Sets up New Korean Patent Foundation to Eliminate Royalty Payments to US and European Companies by 2023

Although Samsung is the world's biggest manufacturer of smartphones, televisions and supplier of chips and flat-screens, Samsung continues to pay outsiders billions of dollars in return for using patents in semiconductors, displays and other software. Samsung wants to have first access to cheaper home grown ideas and solutions in the future and in order to get their hands on this new technology Samsung has set up the new "Samsung Future Technology Foundation."

ABC to Introduce "Live" TV for Apple's iDevices on Tuesday

It's being reported today that ABC will be quietly revolutionizing its app for iPhones and iPads with a button called "live." Users around New York and Philadelphia will be able to live-stream all the programming from ABC's local stations there, the first time that any major broadcaster has turned on such a technology.

We're stuck with Mobile 4G Communications until 2020

If you were hoping for a faster wireless technology to come along in the next few years to replace 4G so that you could quickly download games and movies, you're out of luck. Korea IT News is reporting today that 5G technology won't be coming to market until 2020, if not longer.

Hon Hai Reports Boost in iPhone Shipments in April

Mainland China's Central News Agency reports today that Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., the world's largest contract electronics maker of products such as Apple's iPhone and iPad, reported more than a 12 percent monthly increase in sales for April, citing strong demand for consumer electronics products. Hon Hai currently holds about a 70 percent stake in Foxconn which experienced a pickup in iPhone shipments in April from the first three months of the year