Visit TED.com now on your iPhone or iPod Touch and watch video clips of talks and performances by some of the world’s most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes).

Here are two screen captures taken from my iPhone of the presentation by Joel Levine titled “Why we need to go back to Mars”.

Tapping on any video clip thumbnail in Safari brings up the dedicated Quicktime player which downloads and plays the footage.

I saw this ad in the The Star newspaper (issue Dec 02, 2009).

(Click to see a larger image. The photo was captured using a Fujifilm FinePix F200EXR, and edited using Adobe Lightroom 2.5.)

Maybank is giving away 50 iPhones in a contest that runs from 1 Dec 2009 to 28 Feb 2010.

Each time you spend RM50 using either a Maybank Credit or Debit Card (one example is the the regular Maybank Visa ATM Debit Card), you stand a chance to win a free iPhone 3GS.

More information can be obtained from Maybank’s branches, www.maybank2u.com website, or by calling 1300 88 6688.

The fine print states that you’ll have to register for a Maxis iValue Plan for each iPhone 3GS won.

I’m not greedy, I just hope to be able to win one unit, so it looks like it’s going to be RM50 gas / petrol / fuel refills from now on, until the end of the promotion.

Opinions

Hamranhansenhansen’s experience with the iPhone as a user and developer – Hamranhansenhansen says:

My experience with Apple as a user has been excellent. I appreciate that they prioritize my needs as a non-techie user (90% of us) over your needs as a developer or technology enthusiast (10% of us). I’m an artist, not a computer scientist, so I appreciate that I could 1-click install a $10 multitrack recorder into my iPhone without any fear of malware or viruses (and I have a deep and abiding love for the developers of that app.) I appreciate that my iPhone is always responsive without showing me a task list and forcing me to manage processes. I appreciate that I don’t have to hire I-T help to maintain my own Mac because otherwise I would not be using a computer, I’d be using dedicated recording gear and dedicated art tools. There are no other computer platforms I can use to do my work. I’m not looking for Apple’s systems to become more like everyone else’s systems, I’m specifically using Apple’s stuff because from my view it’s the only one that’s useful. A PC without CoreAudio is a doorstop to me. A PC that gets viruses or can’t maintain the privacy of my data has no place in my studio.

And my experience with Apple as a Web app developer has also been excellent. Since 2003 Apple has had the fastest and most W3C-compatible browser, and the 3D acceleration in Safari is awesome, the advanced CSS is awesome. Apple’s Web app developer documentation reads like “Web Development: The Missing Manual.” Apple has been as instrumental as anyone in getting us out of the IE-dominated proprietary Web of HTML4 and onto something truly open. I use the Apache2 and PHP5 that came with my Mac as a development server. I make iTunes LP and that is absolutely excellent: self-contained HTML5 apps that run in iTunes and which have access to the media library. We are in heaven as Web developers and creative pros.

RoughlyDrafted Magazine – Why Apple’s iPhone is still not coming to Verizon
Daniel Eran Dilger:

Remember too that all the work Apple would go through to develop a CDMA phone will become obsolete in just a couple years. Verizon certainly isn’t going to shut down its CDMA network, but by 2012 there will be no CDMA smartphones competing for the iPhone’s position. They’ll all be LTE phones. LTE will make CDMA look like 3G makes GPRS look today. Again, as the entire world moves toward LTE, Apple will eventually migrate to LTE and at some point be able to offer a phone that works across both AT&T and Verizon in the US. But that’s still many years away.

One-handed computing with the iPhone – Kottke says:

My wife spends about five hours a day breastfeeding our daughter and has only one hand available for non-feeding activities. That hand is frequently occupied by her iPhone; it helps her keep abreast (hey’o!) of current events, stay connected with pals through Twitter & email, track feeding/sleeping/diaper changing times, keep notes (she plans meals and grocery “shops” at 3am), and alert her layabout husband via SMS to come and get the damned baby already.

Straphangers in NYC and elsewhere know what a great one-handed device the iPhone is. Riding the subway and reading has never been so easy, especially during rush hour when pointy hardcovers become weaponized. (Getting shived by a hardbound Harry Potter on the 6pm 5 train is no joke.)

melgross says:

[...] Multitasking is another issue entirely. I’ve used the Pre, and it’s SLOW. Very slow. And that’s with almost the exact same hardware, except for a less powerful GPU. The Nokia N97 is also SLOW from that, though it does use the last generation HW. Multitasking is given as a major reason. Multitasking is also given as a reason why Win Mobile phones crash so often. I’d rather Apple wait to get it right.

I have 7 pages of apps, and I’m annoyed at all the swiping too. But as long as you remember the name of a program, using the search works pretty well, much better than the methods used on most other phones. I would like folders though.

What’s wrong with Mail? That’s one of the best mail apps around.

We’ve got 8 months to go before 4 comes out. So far, no one has been able to come up with a phone that’s as good, much less better. no other phone has managed to sell more than a fraction of the iPhone’s numbers, so consumers are not thrilled with them.

The Palm Pre has been a miserable failure. Despite all the glowing reviews, consumers don’t seem to like them. The N97, which was supposed to be a serious competitor, has seen disappointing sales, and no others have stepped up yet. No Android phone has yet to sell in serious numbers.

We’ll see with the Droid, but how many do they expect to sell? Even if it gets great reviews, that doesn’t mean that people will like it.

So far, none of RIM’s iPhone competitors has taken off, and the newest high end phone, the Blackberry Tour, has had so many problems, it’s got a 50% return rate, and has really ticked Verizon off. People who hate the Mighty Mouse’s little track ball will also be glad to know that the one on the Tour also doesn’t work, but it only takes a few days to fail.

Apple has a plan for their devices, which so far, every other manufacturer lacks. They are all trying phones for every different class of person, ensuring that none sell really well.

That’s the problem with every other companies phones. They are all so different in hardware features, that the software features don’t work properly on all, or don’t work at all.

I’d rather stick with Apple and wait for other features than mess with a number of different phones, being disappointed with each after a while, and moving constantly from one to the other every time a new one comes out. a real waste of time and money.

Tips

Call vs music / podcast / streaming audio on the iPhone – adnrw writes:

The iPhone itself will fade out the music when the call comes in, and fade it back in when the call is finished.

You can get music out of the dock connector, but the phone audio only routes through the built in speaker, the speakerphone, or the headphone jack, and won’t work through the dock connector. That means that any FM transmitters that connect through the dock connector will only output music, not the phone audio.

However, any FM transmitter that works through the headphone jack will output both the music and the phone audio. The downside to this is that you’ll need to either plug in the transmitter or have it run on batteries. The sound quality is also diminished compared to the line-out achievable through the dock connector. I’ve had the best results with DLO and Griffin offerings.

My current setup is with an old DLO Transdock, which holds the iPhone nicely, and I just plug a 3.5mm audio cable from the headphone jack to the audio-in on the Transdock. I’m waiting for an updated Transdock that will also charge my iPhone [and stop the annoying "This accessory is not supported" message that pops up when I plug it in].

Bear in mind that any calls you receive whilst plugged into the FM transmitter are transmitted over the airwaves, and can easily be picked up and listened in on by any nearby cars that are tuned to your station.

The cheapest way to buy a new 3GS in the US:

Get a 2-year contract with AT&T and then cancel it, paying the $175 early termination fee. Even with the activation fee you are saving quite a bit of money over the unsubsidized price.

Nasser adds:

You will save around $50 doing it that way because if you cancel within 30 days you will have to give back the iPhone. So you will pay for the iPhone, activation fee, two months of service, and cancelation fee ($199+$36+$69+$69+$175 = $548 + tax on the device and two periods of service). However, I am not sure if they will give you back part of the second period fees.

Cases

solipsism says:

If you don’t care about the thickness and want more battery life then get a Mophie Juice Pack Air. It’s cheaper than a battery replacement and it doubles as a case. The included cable will charge both batteries and sync to iTunes without removing. With as much as I use my iPhone it’s definitely worth it.

Advantages

October 2009, nikon133:

There is another thing that actually worries me a bit – the 3GS seems to be very sensitive regarding signal quality. Much more than other phones I’ve been or still am using. I was actually considering possibility that my phone has faulty radio, but I’ve seen another two 3GS units behaving exactly the same. As it is, I’m hoping it is more of an software issue than radio itself.

But for some strange reason it doesn’t worry me much; I love Stanza. I love email client in iPhone (compared to the one on the BlackBerry and Nokia E63, it rocks). And this is my first phone that I can actually browse Internet with.