A month after Apple started selling its iPhone in China, the device expanded its Asian reach Saturday with a much-heralded launch in South Korea.
In keeping with the tradition of lining up hours in advance for an iPhone launch, hundreds queued up overnight outside the Olympic stadium in Seoul to snag the smartphone as soon as it officially landed amid blaring music and strobe lights. The hoopla appeared to far trump the phone's more subdued arrival in China, where it launched in the October cold and rain to smaller-than-expected crowds.
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Apple)
KT Corp, South Korea's second largest mobile carrier (after SK Telecom) and the local distributor of the iPhone, says about 65,000 people have preordered the phone, which hit the South Korean market two months after the government approved its sale.
Mobile penetration in South Korea is high--an estimated 93 percent of the country's population subscribes to a mobile service--but smartphones have yet to take off there due to cost, lack of apps, and high data rates by mobile carriers.
"We're hoping that this iPhone will be a trigger point for the smartphone market in Korea," said Yang Hyun-mi, chief strategy officer at KT Corp, according to the Canadian Press. Smartphones make up just 1 percent of all cell phones in South Korea, she said.
KT is pricing the 32GB iPhone 3GS at 396,000 won ($338) for customers who subscribe with a monthly service fee of 45,000 won (about $38). Customers who subscribe with a monthly fee of 65,000 won ($55) can get the phone for 264,000 won ($225) 65,000 won. And premium users who sign up for monthly plans based on a 132,000 won ($113) basic rate can get the phones for free.
An 8GB iPhone, meanwhile, can be had for 132,000 won for subscribers signed on the 45,000 won monthly plans.
KT projects that iPhone sales will fall anywhere 200,000 to 500,000 units, a showing that's widely expected to shake up the country's mobile market, which is dominated by homegrown giants Samsung and LG Electronics. Indeed, in good news for cost-conscious consumers, Samsung has already slashed the price of its 8GB Omnia 2 smartphone by 44,000 won ($37.50) to 924,000 won ($788).
Watch a South Korean iPhone television spot below.
Hot on the heels of its win against Mac clone-maker Psystar, Apple is suing another company that's making knockoffs of its products, but this time its power adapters.
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Apple)
Apple filed the lawsuit against Media Solutions Holdings in the California Central District Court on Monday, according to InformationWeek. Apple claims the power adapters violate a patent the company holds on the design of its own adapters.
The power adapters in question come with Apple's MacBook and MacBook Pro line of notebooks. Apple also sells the adapters separately for $79 from its online and retail stores.
While several of Media Solutions Holdings Web sites, including Laptopsforless.com, Laptopacadapter.com, and Ereplacements.com, have Apple replacement parts in stock, none currently has the power adapter in question when CNET checked on Friday.
Media Solutions Holdings sells replacement parts for many of today's popular brands of computers like Sony, Toshiba, Lenovo, Acer and HP, among others.
Update 2: Apple's US Black Friday sale is up, and while not spectacular, there are some rare discounts to be found. To go back to the same examples we used for the UK and Australian Apple stores, the base model 13-inch MacBook Pro is $1,098, down from $1,199.
In fact, it looks like all MacBook Pro models are exactly $101 off, while the $999 white MacBook is not discounted at all. The 32GB iPod Touch is $268, down from $299.
This sale is good online and in Apple's retail stores and runs until 3am EST on Saturday November 28.
Update: Even though it's not quite Black Friday in the US yet, it's past midnight in some other parts of the globe. Notably, Australia and the UK have both seen their respective Apple Web sites updated to reveal Apple's one-day sale. While we can't say yet that the deals in the US will be exactly the same, there's no reason think they won't be.
On apple.com/uk, we saw a 13-inch MacBook Pro, originally £1,149, marked down to £1,078. On apple.com/au, the same unit was A$1,868, marked down from A$1,999.
Similarly, a 32GB iPod Touch is £208, marked down from £229 on the UK site, while while in Australia, it's A$358, down from A$399.
We've also examined some Black Friday deals from other retailers, click here for that.
Our original post continues below:
According to purportedly leaked documents on the tech rumor site Boy Genius Report, Apple is gearing up to offer a series of post-Thanksgiving bargains on products from iPods to MacBooks.
The deal, allegedly good only on November 27, lists "up to" discounts of 30 percent on iPods (excluding the Shuffle and iPhone), 25 percent on Mac laptops and desktops, and 15-percent on accessories, software, and other hardware.
The Boy Genius Report Web site says: "One of our connects just hit us up with some intriguing Apple information. According to them, what you see detailed above is a shot of Apple's yearly Black Friday deals. It's reported to be something Apple will email out shortly."
Of course, with the vague use of "up to" and no specific products listed, we can't be sure if these will be good deals or not. But if you're interested in being the first in line to check them out, the leaked doc also says that select Apple stores will be opening at 6 a.m. on November 27.
(Credit:
Boy Genius Report)
Having diligently hewn Psytar's legal coffin over the past year and a half, Apple has now taken up its hammer and set about nailing the Mac clone maker into it. This week, the company called for a permanent injunction against Psystar's operations.
"Psystar...has built its business on infringing Apple's copyrights and trademarks, free-riding on Apple's research and development efforts, and trading on Apple's hard-earned reputation for high quality, innovative and easy-to-use computers," Apple said in its motion.
"Psystar's appropriation of Apple's intellectual property and goodwill has been systematic and brazen, from the name of Psystar's 'OpenMac' computers to its deliberate pirating of Apple's Mac OS X," the company added.
"Psystar even seeks to profit from Apple's efforts to protect its rights, extolling this litigation as Psystar's 'opportunity to gain market share,' in a pitch to venture capitalists....Unless Psystar is permanently enjoined, it will not stop its unlawful conduct-conduct that is causing irreparable harm to Apple's business, brand and goodwill."
Catch that? Psystar was pitching VCs on its plan to use Apple's IP to "compete directly against Apple." Shameless. Little wonder Cupertino is so intent on burying the would-be rival.
And make no mistake, Apple legal is going to grind Psystar into fine silicon dust. In addition to the injunction, Apple is requesting compensation for legal costs and statutory damages owed under the Copyright Act and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. And according to Apple's expert witness (PDF), statutory damages for the former should run "between $1500 and $300,000″ and for the latter "between $449,500 and $4,495,000."
Suffice it to say, that's quite a bit more than the current value of Psystar's assets which, according to its bankruptcy filing, are no more than $50,000.
Story Copyright (c) 2009 AllThingsD. All rights reserved.
Additional stories from AllThingsD
eBay is playing virtual Santa this holiday season with a free "Deals" app for the iPhone that leads consumers to the better buys on the auction site.
Launched Tuesday, eBay Deals is designed to deliver a stream of the best deals on the site from across hundreds of millions of listings. Like eBay Mobile, the company's regular iPhone app, Deals lets you search, shop, and pay for your items from your iPhone or iPod Touch.
All featured deals spotlight items with no bids, no reserve price, free or fixed-rate shipping, and less than four hours remaining to bid.
You can browse deals across eight categories, including apparel, computers, electronics, and collectibles. If you spot a deal you like, just tap on it, and its listing pops up where you can watch it or bid on it. Not crazy about the current deals? Just shake your iPhone or iPod Touch, and a new set of deals appears.
If you spot a deal that may be better for someone else, you can e-mail it or share it via your Facebook or Twitter account.
Besides browsing eBay's virtual aisles, you can search for your own deals by entering a product name, category, and price range. You can save your customized search results to return to them later.
Starting Friday, eBay will also be unveiling a "12 Days of Deals" feature promoting a new promotion each day until December 8. Friday's deal will offer Samsung's N120 Netbook.
"As the world's leading online marketplace we have insights into how people really want to shop...and they clearly want to shop on their phones," eBay Marketplaces President Lorrie Norrington said in a statement.
Though designed for the mobile crowd, eBay's daily deals can also be found online at the auction site's Deals page.
eBay has been busy lately sprucing up its mobile auction site for the holidays. The vendor recently added social networking to its eBay Mobile app, letting you share a listing through e-mail, Facebook, or Twitter.
Since its launch in 2008, eBay's mobile app has been downloaded more than 5 million times, said the company. With a purchase made every two seconds, the company said, more than $500 million worth of items are likely to be traded through eBay mobile this year.
It seems that Apple doesn't respect Verizon's Droid phone quite as much as it does Microsoft's PCs. But two new ad spots, launching Monday evening, come as close as Apple has done thus far to directly attack the allegedly do-it-all robotphone.
The Droid, you see, went after Apple in its teaser campaign with some telling remarks and the hearty claim that Droid does what the iPhone doesn't. Then Verizon decided it would be fun to knock both the iPhone and AT&T's spotty 3G coverage with its "Misfit Toys" concept.
AT&T has already replied by hustling a hastily-dressed Luke Wilson into directing a few resentful pins at Verizon's effigy. However these new ads, while entirely in keeping with the iPhone tone and style, end with a line that expressly assaults the doings of Droid--or rather, its alleged non-doings.
Both ads focus on the iPhone's ability to allow you to use voice and data capabilities simultaneously over the AT&T network. By asking gently at the end of each spot "Can your phone and your network do that?" Apple is bursting what it sees as the inflated stealth bombing that accompanied the launch of the Droid.
Apple iPhone Ad - Did You See My Email? from Arik Hesseldahl on Vimeo.
Apple iPhone Ad - What Time's The Movie? from Arik Hesseldahl on Vimeo.
These ads don't mention the Droid or Verizon by name. But the fact that Apple has decided to address its rivals, however obliquely, suggests that one can look forward to more accusations, more bickering, and more attempted one-upmanship.
'Tis the season of goodwill, after all.
Apple's App Store has been a runaway success, but it's also been mired in controversy due to the application approval process. The company, however, isn't making apologies for its stringent gatekeeping and insists it's acting in the best interest of its customers.
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Apple)
"We've built a store for the most part that people can trust," Phil Schiller, Apple senior vice president of worldwide product marketing, told BusinessWeek in an interview posted Monday. "You and your family and friends can download applications from the store, and for the most part they do what you'd expect, and they get onto your phone, and you get billed appropriately, and it all just works."
Schiller offered BusinessWeek a breakdown of app rejections. Of the applications sent back to developers, about 90 percent are due to technical issues and simply need code tweaks to make the apps work properly.
About 10 percent are rejected because they try to steal personal data or try to help someone break the law or because they contain content that Apple considers inappropriate, BusinessWeek reported.
About 1 percent are turned away for reasons that fall into gray areas, Schiller told BusinessWeek.
One of Apple's latest run-ins with a developer was over the use of Apple product images in Rogue Amoeba's audio-streaming app called Airfoil Speakers Touch. After three-and-a-half months of back and forth over an update for the already-live app, Apple is apparently going to let the company resubmit the app update with the product images intact as originally submitted. However, the ordeal has apparently soured Rogue Amoeba on future development for the App Store.
"At this time, we have no plans to return to the platform," Rogue Amoeba CEO Paul Kafasis told CNET on Monday. "Apple has corrected one small problem with their review process. But the platform as a whole still has many issues that need to be addressed before we consider it a viable place for our business to commit resources."
The App Store currently has more than 100,000 third-party applications available for download. Apple has reported more than 2 billion downloads since the online store opened in July 2008.
Another iPhone worm has been spotted in the wild.
Unlike the previous exploitation, which merely changed a jailbroken iPhone's wallpaper to a picture of Rick Astley of "Rickrolling" fame, this new threat allows hackers to steal sensitive information.
According to security firm Sophos, which wrote about the exploitation after a Dutch ISP spotted it late last week, the worm attacks jailbroken iPhone and iPod Touch devices only.
The worm "uses command-and-control, like a traditional PC botnet," Sophos wrote in a blog post on Saturday to warn users about the exploit. "It configures two startup scripts, one to execute the worm on boot-up, and the other to create a connection to a Lithuanian server to upload stolen data and cede control to the bot master."
Jailbreaking, which has been around for about two years, is a hack that enables iPhone and iPod Touch users to download applications unavailable through Apple's App Store.
Sophos wrote that the worm attacks users on several ISPs, including UPC in the Netherlands, Optus in Australia, and T-Mobile in several countries worldwide. Worse, the worm spreads faster on a Wi-Fi connection than a 3G connection. Users with affected devices might notice extremely short battery life while on Wi-Fi. According to Sophos, that's mainly due to the worm engaging in "so much network activity."
When a device is infected, it's assigned a unique number so that the attackers can easily pinpoint a single device. It also looks for authentication systems that use SMS, better known as mTANs. mTANs are frequently used by banks that send an SMS message with a password to mobile phones, allowing people to log in to their online accounts, Sophos wrote.
In essence, this threat is serious.
Sophos recommends that people with infected iPhones and iPod Touch devices restore them back to Apple's most recent firmware update. For now, there is no other way to fix the problem.
Don Reisinger is a technology columnist who has written about everything from HDTVs to computers to Flowbee Haircut Systems. Don is a member of the CNET Blog Network, and posts at The Digital Home. He is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure.
Apple's iPhone platform has attracted a wide range of developers, including many gaming companies over the last year. While competition in attracting developers is increasing among mobile operating system companies, it seems the performance of the App Store will keep Apple at the top of list.
French mobile gaming company Gameloft said at an investor conference on Friday that it is cutting back its investment in Android in favor of the iPhone, according to a Reuters report. Gameloft's finance director Alexandre de Rochefort said "many others" were doing the same thing, although he didn't mention the other companies by name.
Rochefort said the main reason for choosing the iPhone over Android was "due to weaknesses of Android's application store."
"It is not as neatly done as on the iPhone. Google has not been very good to entice customers to actually buy products. On Android nobody is making significant revenue," said Rochefort.
Gameloft has more than 75 games available in the App Store and Rochefort said they sell 400 times more games for the iPhone than they do for Android.
Games are a big focus for Apple, especially with the release of its newest iPod Touch in September. It was there that Apple began comparing itself to the gaming elite like Nintendo and Sony.
Phil Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing, said during the event that the buying experience was "too expensive" and "not a lot of fun." Schiller also pointed out that, at the time, there were more than 21,000 gaming titles on the iPhone, compared to 3,600 on Nintendo, and 600 on Sony.
Earlier this month, Apple said it had more than 100,000 apps available with over two billion downloads.
I have nothing against smoking, save for the difficult odor that emanates from every part, breath, and piece of clothing belonging to a smoker. I could no more live with a smoker than I could live with a third ear perched off the end of my nose.
However, I am embalmed in a curious sympathy after reading a report from The Consumerist concerning two Mac users whose AppleCare warranties appear to have been voided due to the presence of cigarette smoke in their homes.
One, named Derek, recounts the tale of his overheating black MacBook. He took it into the Apple store in Jordan Creek, West Des Moines.
He told The Consumerist: "Today, April, 28, 2008, the Apple store called and informed me that due to the computer having been used in a house where there was smoking, that has voided the warranty and they refuse to work on the machine, due to 'health risks of secondhand smoke.'"
He continued: "Nowhere in your AppleCare terms of service can I find anything mentioning being used in a smoking environment as voiding the warranty."
Derek's resulting appeal to the office of Steve Jobs bore him no joy, so he resorted to blowing some compressed air at the machine, leading it to restart its wondrous functions.
Then along came Ruth, who took her son's iMac to an authorized repair center. After five days, they apparently told her they couldn't work on it because it was contaminated with cigarette smoke and was therefore a bio-hazard.
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