iPhone News and Information

iJailBreak is an automated jailbreaker for your iPod Touch licensed under the GNU General Public License v2 written by 13-year-old AriX. The only user interaction required is for you to restart the iPod Touch. Works on Macintel OS X Tiger. PPC version is in the works.

Google code site is here.
Direct download is here

Adobe released Flash Lite for mobile devices like iPhone or iPod touch with full FLV support, which is Flash video support needed to view sites like Youtube.com. All cellphones with S60, WM5 WM6 and a few others should be able to run this plug in. However, since Flash video is rather greedy when it comes to memory and processing resources, some phones may struggle to play larger format videos. However, Youtube on a mobile browser is one step closer.

 Adobe press release

Gizmodo is reporting that iPod touch does not have the same screen and the iPhone. Their tests show that iPhone displays black and dark gray color a lot better.

Today Apple Inc.  made an announcement that on Sunday iPhone sales surpassed one million units.  Apple admitted that sales came ahead of company’s internal target to sell one million units by the end of September. Apple share are up mildly as Wall Street is discounting the news in light of aggressive price cuts and retroactive rebates.

It appears that $200 price cut announced yesterday did not sit well with early adopters. In response Apple will be giving $100 credit to every customer who bought their iPhones at the original prices. This comes as a good news to consumers and a likely letdown for Apple investors. However, investors should not read it as a $100 loss on each iPhone sold prior to a price cut. First, this is a store credit, which means that consumers will be spending it on another Apple product. Second, many store credits do not get used. Based on rebate industry we can expect that only about 60% to 80% of credits will be claimed. Although profit margin on iPhones is effectively reduced, it is offset by a profit margin on additional products that rebate holders will be purchasing (many of them would not purchase anything without a $100 incentive).

The new iPod Touch is a borderline device between a media player and a PDA. Two or three years down the road this technology may turn disruptive for cellphone carriers like AT&T, T-Mobile, etc. The scenario for this is rather simple…

Since WiFi networks are becoming very pervasive, early adopters may resort to using a soft phone instead of a real cellphone as their primary voice communication device.  iPod Touch is a perfect platform to host such soft phone.  At this time Skype is the the best candidate as a free or ultra-low cost voip service. Here are the reasons why:

• it already has a broad user base;
• it offers all levels of communication: text, voice, video;
• It has some traits of social networking (avatars, user profiles, buddy lists, conferencing, skypecasts);
• Skype has  gateways into traditional telephone carrier infrastructure;
• Same service is available on all platforms: PC, laptop, iPod.

Whichever company comes up with an easy to use mic/headset adapter for iPhone and Skype client may start yet another communication revolution.

Click to enlarge

Here is a one hour stock chart which illustrates how stock market reacted to each news item as they were unveiled by Steve Jobs. Time stamps for annoucements were taken from Engadget liveblog coverage, while the chart comes from Scottrade streaming quotes observed during the event.

It is obvious that fatty nano came as a big disappointment; iPod Classic had a lukewarm welcome; and most importantly iPod Touch was largely expected and did not come across as a surprise. Other news were really marginal and contributed to disappointment.

AAPL was trading steadily at over $144 /share prior to the conference, it was down to $141 at the end and plummeted further to $136.74 at 3PM market close.

On the eve of Apple news public is clearly expecting an updated iPhone. Most speculators are betting that Apple will release an iPod that shares features and components with wildly successful iPhone. Obviously this would make both devices cheaper due to economies of scale in parts ordering and manufacturing. This would also be great news for consumers, but what about Apple as a company and AAPL stock?

There are many potential customers  who want the iPhone features, but so far they have not jumped to buy the iPhone due to carrier contractual obligations or existing contracts on current cellphone plans. The new iPhone would be a good opportunity to to attract such customers, but it is clear that such similar product would canibalize iPhone sales and have negative effect on profits and AAPL share price. The question here is which is more profitable for Apple: iPhone with re-occurring carrier kick backs or iPod with re-occuring sales via iTunes. It is logical to think that Apple may want to keep products somewhat distinct in order to push consumers into buying both devices as opposed to only one.

Even Wall Street Journal is picking up this rumor. A direct quote from WSJ summarizes this unlikely rumor:

Separately, Apple appears to be exploring new opportunities to more deeply integrate its products with the entertainment systems inside vehicles. Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs met recently with Volkswagen AG CEO Martin Winterkorn, according to Hans-Gerd Bode, a spokesman for the German auto maker. German financial magazine Capital reported the two executives discussed a possible “iCar” project that would feature products by Apple, whose iPod music player already has some integration with car stereo systems.

Mr. Bode said “there’s nothing going on in the direction of having cooperation” with Apple. An Apple spokeswoman declined comment.