Hasta La Gadget!

There’s been a lot of fuss over the yesterday’s release of iOS 4 for the devices that support it. Also about the fact that when a number of iPhone 3G owners upgraded to the new operating system, they found that–unlike iPhone 3GS owners (and iPhone 4 owners, when they get their devices tomorrow)–they were unable to set a custom background for their home screens.

Over at GIzmodo, one intrepid reader took the question of why backgrounds on the iPhone 3GS were supported but not the iPhone 3G all the way to the top: She e-mailed Steve Jobs directly and put the question to him. Steve e-mailed back in short order with a one-sentence response: “The icon animation with backgrounds didn’t perform well enough.”

Apparently the bottom line is that Apple didn’t think that the backgrounds on the iPhone 3G were up to par with the 3GS and the iPhone 4, so they decided to pull them entirely. Alternatively, it could just be one more reason for iPhone 3G owners to go ahead and upgrade to an iPhone 4. If you’re debating an upgrade, check out our benchmarks of iOS4 on the iPhone 3G and 3GS at PCMag.com.
 

AT&T announced today that folks who didn’t pre-order their iPhone 4 devices won’t be able to get phones in stores until June 29.

Even pre-orders are in question, in fact: according to AT&T’s announcement page, “AT&T retail representatives will begin calling customers this week to let them know their iPhone 4 is available for pick up in store.” Notice the words “this week” and “begin.”

The official launch date for the iPhone 4 is Thursday, June 24, but some people who pre-ordered phones for home delivery on June 15 are starting to see them arrive early. Phones pre-ordered now will ship by July 14th, Apple says on their Web site.

Apple, however, will still have phones in retail stores on Thursday. On the official pre-order page, Apple says, “Limited iPhone quantities are available in store starting June 24.”

AT&T and Apple were overwhelmed by the pre-orders for the new iPhone 4, saying that they had processed more than 600,000 orders on the very first day of pre-ordering, June 15.

A number of outlets are reporting an update to Apple’s privacy policy,
which now gives Apple the option to store your location, if you opt in.

Frankly,
this is all a bit puzzling. Users have been asked to provide
location-based data to location-centric apps for years now. But Apple
has apparently made this explicit in its privacy policy, leading
to a small round of hand-wringing.

The passage in question:

To provide location-based services on Apple products, Apple and
our partners and licensees may collect, use, and share precise location
data, including the real-time geographic location of your Apple computer
or device. This location data is collected anonymously in a form that
does not personally identify you and is used by Apple and our partners
and licensees to provide and improve location-based products and
services. For example, we may share geographic location with application
providers when you opt in to their location services.

Some location-based services offered by Apple, such as the
MobileMe “Find My iPhone” feature, require your personal information for
the feature to work.

As
you might expect, there’s a provision in the settings from turning off
the location features.

The LA
Times seems quite worried that Apple might collect and store
location information. If you’re that concerned, you might consider a
GPS-less featurephone.

It may not be a big deal — Android’s done it for years — but some will no doubt be interested to learn that Apple can monitor your GPS. In the latest revision of its privacy policy, presumably updated for iOS 4, it revealed the company can anonymously track the “real-time geographic location” of devices and is free to share that data with “partners and licensees” as well. In a nutshell, that means Cupertino could potentially sell location data, but don’t get in a tiff just yet — the company says it will do so anonymously and for location-based services only.

Speaking of sales and personally identifiable data, another addition to iOS 4 is the ad network iAd, which monitors your browsing habits and interests and serves up targeted advertisements respectively. According to the updated privacy policy, however, you don’t need to let the OS do that. Simply navigate to http://oo.apple.com to shut down automated cookie collection, and you’ll see boring, generic ads instead.

iOS 4 privacy policy updated: Apple can anonymously collect location data, you can take away iAds’ cookies originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 21 Jun 2010 22:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Apple iPhone 4 should be able to shoot some pretty decent HD video, but you don’t want your footage looking all jerky, right? You might be able to record some great footage with it, if you could hold it steady enough. Stepping in to help you out is the Tiffen Company, with the Steadicam Smoothee. This stabilizing mount can be used with the iPhone, Motorola Droid, or the Flip Mino, among others.

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