By the Funny or Die folks and starring Justin Long as Steve Jobs and Jorge Garcia (Lost) as Steve Wozniak, this alternate look at Steve Jobs’ life is available online now. Coming in at almost 80mins, this is the longest production ever by Funny or Die.
Watch it now – iSteve on Funny or Die and let me know what you think of this!
Update – This isn’t anywhere near funny from Funny or Die.
We usually feature crowdfunding projects from Kickstarters that benefit us with our iPhones or iPads, but here’s one locally started crowdfunding project which deserves our support – Silverline:Smartphones for Seniors.
Silverline is a new project that creates apps specifically designed for seniors. We have spent the last 18 months working with underserved seniors, providing them with donated second-hand smartphones and building apps to address their needs. It’s been amazing to see how this new technology has improved the quality of their lives. But we’re just scratching the surface. Now we want to bring this concept to all seniors – to our parents and grandparents – so they too can benefit from the smartphone revolution.
Currently they have a few apps that enables senior citizens to make better use of a smartphone – Discover helps users to snap pictures of where they are or interesting things they see and documents them in a time orientated photo album, Well Being provides reminders to take medicine, exercise and also helps monitor their moods and tips to keeping healthy, Inspire syncs human interest stories and headlines in text, picture and videos, keeping users updated of current events and raise spirits, Connect gives easy access to family and friends with user-friendly interface and Emergency enables easy access to emergency services and if a fall is detected or the phone remains idle after a period of time, a message is sent out and if it remains unverified, a message will be sent to caregiver’s phone notifying them of the situation. The funds they receive will be used to improve the apps and develop more for senior citizens to use.
Funding options start from US$5 and from now till April 14, there will be a dollar-to-dollar matching by one of their supports. There is also an option to fund a refurbished iPhone 3GS with a year-long voice and data plan plus all Silverline apps which will be given to one under-served senior for just US$79. Currently, they just pipped 50% of their funding target of US%50,000 and with ten days left, every dollar receive will help in them developing their apps and contributing back to the society.
Do take a look at the Silverline funding page or Facebook page and help support their work.
Apple posted iOS 6.1.3 update to fix a bug that allows someone to bypass the passcode and access the iPhone app and also improvements to Maps in Japan.
Note that for those who had jailbreak their phone with evasi0n – 6.1.3 is not supported yet – so refrain from clicking the upgrade button.
IOS 6.1.3 is out.Jailbreakers stay away!There’s no coming back to 6.1.2 JB even if you saved blobs (except iPhone4 and ipt4g)
— MuscleNerd (@MuscleNerd) March 19, 2013
China’s state-own TV network CCTV ran an annual live consumer protection show that hammers well known brand for their shoddy products, scams or non-existant after sale service. This year, their target was Apple. One of the topic brought up was Apple’s replacement program for faulty iPhones where they will exchange it with a refurbished (not new) set with the old backcover so that the warranty will not reset but continue from where the old set left off. (Here in Singapore, you will get a refurbished set and with new serial number
After the show, China’s Sina Weibo was ablaze with criticisms of Apple about their practices and a number of them came from celebrities. But one that came from Peter Ho (何润东), got local netizens thinking that it might be a coordinated campaign by CCTV to get celebrities to post such anti-Apple sentiments. It read like this:
#315isLive# Wow, Apple has so many tricks in its after-sales services. As an Apple fan, I’m hurt. You think this would be acceptable to Steve Jobs? Or to those young people who sold their kidneys [to buy iPads]? It’s really true that big chains treat customers poorly. Post around 8:20.
Within minutes, that first post was removed and re-posted without the words “Post around 8:20″, followed quickly by another post which says that his account was hacked and illegally posted about Apple.
Weibo users who spotted the first post quickly linked that last sentence as a sign that it was a paid, coordinated effort by CCTV to get celebrities to endorse the sentiments put forth on the show. The hashtag #postaround820 became viral and many denounce the hypocrisy surrounding the postings of those celebrities. Ironically many of these were posted from either an iPhone or iPad.
What started off as a tirade against Apple became a PR disaster for CCTV, Sina Weibo and the celebrities involved. Many are speculating the agenda behind all these – from Samsung’s involvement to some arm-wrangling by CCTV to get Apple to advertise on their network – nobody will actually know. But this will not stop Apple’s inroad into the Chinese market.
(via The Atlantic, TeaLeafNation, Lady.163.com, OffBeatChina)
Apple recently added a new section within the US’s iPhone product page called Why iPhone which talks about why iPhone is better than everything else in the market. There are awards on customer satisfaction, emphasis on Apple’s focus on quality in finishing, the retina display, battery life, processors, connectivity and camera. Besides the hardware, the page also highlighted Apple’s huge apps ecosystem, iOS, Siri and iCloud. The last point was about customer service.
For example on the build of the iPhone 5:
It’s nearly impossible to make a device so thin and light without sacrificing features or performance. Yet iPhone 5 achieves that goal. It’s an accomplishment of engineering as much as one of design. Every detail and every material — particularly the sleek aluminum enclosure — has been meticulously considered and refined. And it’s made with a level of precision you’d expect from a finely crafted watch, not a smartphone. As a result, iPhone feels substantial in your hand and perfect in your pocket.
Most feel that this is in direct respond to Samsung launching the Galaxy S4 and that Apple finally is feeling the heat and is on the defensive. Yadadada. With most media out there taking the easy route and sounding Apple’s death knell, it is no surprise that Apple whip up this page to remind people that though the iPhone 5 is half a year old, it is still one of the best smartphone in the market.
With new product announcements possibly coming only in the middle of the year, we will definitely see more of such marketing efforts from Apple.
