Hasta La Gadget!

Clever online sleuthing over the weekend led to the discovery of iSlate.com, a domain Apple purchased in 2007. Could the company’s rumored tablet device be called the iSlate?

Wired’s friend Arnold Kim of MacRumors sniffed out the domain-name registrant history, which revealed Apple as the owner of iSlate.com as of 2007. The website is currently inactive, but Kim speculates Apple could be reserving the domain for a tablet product, which is rumored for a January 2010 announcement.

The “Whois” record of iSlate.com provides solid evidence that Apple bought the domain in 2007 and subsequently transferred the address to MarkMonitor.com, a registrar that handles domain registrations for several companies, including Apple. The purpose of the move is presumably to help obscure products prior to release.

That said, it’s still inconclusive that iSlate will be the name of an Apple touchscreen tablet. (It is, after all, still inconclusive that an Apple tablet even exists.) It’s possible iSlate is one of many candidates for a product name — Apple could have chosen several others and purchased domains for those, as well.

But the iSlate mystery only gets more interesting. Further investigation by TechCrunch revealed iSlate was filed as a trademark in 2006 by an unknown Delaware-based company called Slate Computing. No such company appears with a quick web search. The theory is Slate Computing is a dummy corporation set up to conceal Apple as the true owner of the trademark. Apple employed a similar trick with the iPhone trademark, originally filed by Ocean Telecom Services, another anonymous Delaware-based company.

Finally, the iSlate trademark application reveals the signatory of Regina Porter, who, according to her LinkedIn profile, is Apple’s senior trademark specialist. It seems safe to conclude that the owner of the iSlate trademark is Apple.

Comes off as awfully protective, doesn’t it? However, it’s difficult to tell whether secretly registering trademarks and domains so far in advance is a standard procedure for Apple when deciding on product names. We’re in the process of contacting lawyers to get their perspective on Apple’s moves. We’ll keep you posted.

Long story short, Apple at least considered iSlate as the name for a product and took measures to stealthily reserve it. Whether Apple delivers an iSlate next month, this is a marvelous example of internet-detective work.

See Also:

• Times Editor Leaks ‘Apple Slate’ News — Sorta
• Approaching January, Apple Tablet Rumors Run Wild
• Video Demonstrates Wired’s Concept iTablet App
• Everything We Know About Apple’s Touchscreen Tablet

Photo illustration of a fake Apple tablet courtesy of Sergio Cabral

Considering the present date, it’s no longer a mystery that Fermi won’t be seeing the glaring lights of store shelves this year, but now DigiTimes reports that the delay might be even longer than feared. Sources from within board manufacturers have been informed by NVIDIA that the launch of the 40nm GPU will be pushed back to March 2010. Though NVIDIA’s flagship DirectX 11 card has yet to get out of the starting blocks, ATI — already the proud papa of a litter of DX 11 parts — is said to be preparing a renewed onslaught on the mainstream market with two new releases slated for late January or early February. The HD 5670 (Redwood) and HD 5450 (Cedar) will slot in alongside the unannounced HD 5570 and HD 5350 to flesh out the lower and middle portions of ATI’s Evergreen refresh. So that’s one whole family of DirectX 11 parts from ATI, and one long wait from NVIDIA.

NVIDIA Fermi pushed back to March, ATI prepping midrange refresh for early Q1? originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 28 Dec 2009 07:02:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Apple tablet rumors are at a fever pitch, yet again. Depending on what you’ve read, it’s all but confirmed that the company’s got a January 26th event scheduled at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA) in San Francisco, CA. All this, of course, with nary a word or comment from Cupertino HQ, and without the context that this trend has come and gone ad nauseam, both with the tablet and before with the years of lead-up to the iPhone. Here’s the latest bit: MacRumors has dug up information about a Delaware-based company, Slate Computing, LLC, that was founded in November 2006 and owns the trademark “iSlate,” the signatory of said trademark being Apple’s Senior Trademark Specialist Regina Porter. Given that Apple owns “iSlate” trademark in Europe and that it’s allegedly pulled similar stunts with a “fake” company and the iPhone trademark, sure, we could buy into this being just a dummy corporation… but does it really confirm an impending tablet that’ll be called the “iSlate?” Not at all. We wouldn’t be surprised if Apple has done this for numerous other trademarks, either to give itself more options or to prevent others from trying to manufacture products under those names. (Slate Computing, LLC also happens to own the “Magic Slate” trademark, just so you know.) Also bought up in 2006? The domain iSlate.com, which again according to MacRumors (with help form Mark Gurman of AppleRejectedMe.com) was apparently and briefly shown to be owned by Apple at some point during 2007. Food for thought, but trust us, you don’t want to confuse hearsay for concrete fact.

Which brings us to December 24th, where we see a statistically significant uptick in Apple’s stock value. Seeing as the fiscals were released back in late October along with the last refresh of hardware (Mac Pro specs notwithstanding), it seems everyone decided to spend their holiday bonuses on some Apple shares. Now, we’re not claiming to be professionals here by any stretch of the imagination, but it seems a lot of the activity here can be attributed to the recent flux of rumors. Jason Schwarz of The Street has an interesting take on it, which if you’ve got 15 minutes to kill should be worth your time to browse through.

Apple’s ‘iSlate’ and other rumors that have given its stock a holiday boost originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 26 Dec 2009 13:36:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Digitimes, a site which likes to predict the future of Apple hardware by keeping track of the components Apple orders from its suppliers, has a juicy tidbit regarding the iPhone camera. Not only has Apple, apparently, ordered 40-45 million camera units from OmniVision Technologies for 2010 (up from around 21 million for this year), but those camera-chips are packed with five million pixels apiece.

That Apple would be upgrading the camera in the inevitable summer iPhone announcement is not a surprise, but it’s good to see the camera being taken seriously after the neglect of the first two iPhones. Hopefully these five megapixels will be good pixels, and not the terribly noisy pixels like those found crammed shoulder to shoulder in my Samsung 5MP phonecam, squashed onto the sensor like Tokyo subway commuters at rush-hour.

This rumor points to one other interesting iPhone fact, too. Now that the handset has everything it needs, from 3G to GPS to a compass, what can Apple do to improve it? The iPhone is really about software now, so we don’t expect the hardware to change much at all, other than faster chips and a few visual flourishes to make last year’s model look like, well, last year’s model.

OmniVision orders for iPhone expected to rise significantly in 2010 [DigiTimes]

See Also:

• Analyst Dismisses Rumored iPhone Component-Supplier List
• Asus Eee Pad Tablet 'Inspired by Rumors'
• DigiTimes

Photo illustration: Charlie Sorrel

Apple is planning to offer television subscriptions over the internet, according to multiple industry sources, and so far CBS and Walt Disney are considering the idea.

The subscription service would involve allowing customers access to some TV shows from participating networks for a monthly fee, anonymous sources have told The Wall Street Journal. The subscription content would presumably be integrated into the iTunes Store and iTunes-compatible hardware. Though Disney and CBS are rumored to be interested, the companies have not officially commented on their plans.

Assuming the rumors are true, a subscription model would be Apple’s second major move to seize the digital video market. The Cupertino, California, company introduced the Apple TV in 2007, which stores and plays video content downloaded through iTunes. However, Apple has repeatedly referred to the Apple TV as a “hobby,” implying the product has not made a serious dent in the entertainment market.

Also, the iTunes Store’s offering of video content pales in comparison to competitors’ catalogs. In March, Apple reported the iTunes Store had accumulated 40,000 downloadable TV episodes and 5,000 movies. Around the same time, Netflix, which offers a rental service in addition to streaming-video hardware, had amassed 100,000 DVD titles and 12,000 choices of streaming content.

Apple’s rumored subscription strategy, if successful, could reshape the TV industry by offering a compelling (and cheaper) alternative to the pricey bundles sold by television providers. However, it will be tricky for Apple to get TV networks on board, said James McQuivey, a Forrester analyst who focuses on the consumer video market.

“It’s very hard to walk into these folks’ door and say, ‘I’m going to deliver revenue to you,’ when in the past few years they haven’t been able to do that,” said McQuivey, in a phone interview.

How could Apple persuade networks? The video-subscription strategy could work if Apple implements a streaming model, McQuivey said. That would involve allowing iTunes customers to stream TV shows without downloading them straight to their hard drives.

Studios typically prefer streaming technology over direct downloads. Streaming video is not only difficult to pirate; it also enables studios and networks to track their success. With streaming video, they can insert dynamic advertisements, create interactive experiences that can be measured, and report on success of promotional campaigns and content strategies.

McQuivey added that Apple could possibly offer to handle the bandwidth for streaming TV shows so that a subscription service could cost networks next to nothing.

“Apple could say, ‘We’ll pass revenue to you, and we won’t burden you with a single drop of cost,’” McQuivey speculated.

That would be a plausible gesture, since Apple is currently building a 500,000 square-foot data center in North Carolina, which could handle the bandwidth required for streaming video. The corporation also recently acquired Lala, a music streaming service, whose infrastructure could be shared with video.

However, McQuivey noted that streaming is getting “dirt cheap” thanks to technological innovations, and it’s poised to get even cheaper — so Apple will have to think hard about how to sell the idea of a subscription service to enough networks in order for the model to ever come into fruition.

TV networks will be especially defensive against Apple, in light of the corporation’s takeover of the digital music market. For the first half of 2009, iTunes-purchased songs accounted for 69 percent of the digital music market; Amazon is in a distant second with 8 percent. iTunes also accounts for 25 percent of the overall music market — both physical and digital — according to research firm NPD Group. iTunes is slowly chipping away at CD, still the most popular music format with 65 percent.

“You can’t get away with that in the video industry because they watched what you did, Apple, with music,” McQuivey said. “[TV networks] are going to be looking for short-term deals and offering no exclusive for content. It’s going to be difficult for Apple.”

See Also:

• Why Apple TV Must Evolve to Avoid Extinction
• Apple’s Next Media Frontier Will Be Streaming Video
• What We Want in an Apple TV
• The 27-Inch iMac Is the New Apple TV
• 5 Reasons Why Apple TV Rules, 5 Reasons Why it Sucks

Photo: niallkennedy/Flickr