Although there's little doubt Apple has delivered the goods on countless occasions with regards to its product ranges, it's fair to say that at times, the Apple brand / logo has carried a sizeable chunk of total sales. Brand power is certainly not infallible, but it is a real reflection on a company's marketing ability, and although Steve Jobs - one of the best sellers / marketers of Apple-branded products - unfortunately passed away an year ago, the brand of the company he left behind is as strong as ever, with an estimated value now eclipsing that of every other company in the world bar Coca-Cola.
It has been suggested over the past year or so that the iPhone 5 was the last device to receive input from late Steve Jobs. Moreover, it has also been said that it was Jobs' last project, which he worked on as the rest of the company focused on the largely unchanged iPhone 4S, and a feature-length post over at Businessweek sheds some light on this.
Whenever a new smartphone hits the market, there are a few key areas we, as consumers, focus our attentions on. Storage space, camera quality, processor speed, design, display size - these are all factors we tend to take into consideration - however, in line with the widespread push to look after the planet, more and more consumers are looking to see which smartphone is the least harmful to the environment.
Apple’s “iPad Mini” has been strongly rumored ever since the announcement, release and success of smaller and cheaper tablets like the Kindle Fire, and more recently, Nexus 7 and Kindle Fire HD. With the hype surrounding iPhone 5 settling down, rumors for the iPad Mini are coming in hot!
The iPhone 5 has certainly had its moment in the limelight, and with Windows Phone 8 looming, a lot of the focus is no turning towards the initial batch of devices arriving for Microsoft's upcoming platform. In order to further entice consumers away from Apple's offering and towards its upcoming Lumia range, Nokia has put out an advertisement in which it takes a shot at the same old, black and white configurations offered with the iPhone 5.
It's almost a year to the day that Apple co-founder Steve Jobs passed, and in the past twelve months, we've seen a marked uprising in previously unreleased, unseen and unheard content concerning the former Apple CEO. Recently in August, a rare twenty minute audio recording of Steve Jobs speaking at the 1983 International Design Conference in Aspen began doing the rounds, anybody wishing to listen in could do so by heading over to the Center for Design Innovation’s website.
In countries like the USA, smartphones are mostly sold at a subsidized rate. On the face of it, paying $199 for a high-end smartphone may seem cheap, but since it always comes with a postpaid contract with your wireless carrier that can last up to three years, it isn’t always the case. As a matter of fact, it’s been shown over the years that buying a subsidized phone with a contract is actually more expensive in the long run compared to getting an unsubsidized, factory unlocked phone and choosing your own prepaid plan on your network of choice.
It may not be news that will appease disgruntled iPhone 5 owners immediately, but it looks like Apple could be working hard on a solution that could potentially lay to rest the issues surrounding accessory compatibility with iOS devices that are built with the company's new Lightning port embedded within. The launch of the iPhone 5 didn't throw up any surprises in relation to the smaller dock connector port, mainly due to the fact that we had already seen multiple reports of the change but that didn't mean it was any less controversial.
The iPhone 5 has been in the public domain for over a week now, and during that period it has managed to shift over five million units, showing just how popular the device is going to be. The initial popularity doesn't detract from the fact that a number of users have been experiencing issues with the sixth-generation device, one of which is centered entirely around a purple glare appearing on images taken with the 8-megapixel rear-facing camera on the handset. In a rather surprising email response, an AppleCare customer support agent has issued a response to one disgruntled photography fan.
The last few weeks have been extremely busy for Apple with the official public release of iOS 6 and the sixth-generation iPhone, and if today's speculation is anything to go by then it looks like Apple is set to ramp things up to the next level. Reports are suggesting that Apple has started the initial process of manufacturing the rumored iPad Mini that we have been hearing so much about in the Federative Republic of Brazil.
