Apple is looking to expand into China even further, saying they will be adding more stores in Beijing, Shanghai and beyond. The store will have almost the exact same features of other Apple stores. One big highlight missing when the store opens will be the iPhone. Apple is still in talks with China’s primary wireless provider to lay out plans for the introduction of the iPhone. The largest obstacle will be implementing the 3G iPhone as China has no standard 3G network as of now.

The 32 GB iPod Touch will be available when the store opens, which will retail for 4,488 Chinese yuan (USD $647.33). This will be a story to keep an eye on going into next week, to see how successful Apple is with their first official foray into the Chinese market.

Here are some good videos I found of opening day at the Apple Store. The more I watch them, the more it makes me want to really take a trip to Boston.

The schools need to do a better job of teaching critical thinking to students, lest they become adults who take passages like this satirical one from the North Denver News as truth:

Thomas Martel, 28, of Bonnie Brae is a big guy. So he has a hard time using the features on ever-shrinking user interfaces on devices like his new iPhone. At least, he did, until he had his thumbs surgically altered in a revolutionary new surgical technique known as “whittling.”

It’s worth a chuckle at best, but a number of people didn’t get the joke, which required an editor’s follow-up explaining the punchline:

For those who have “debunked” the HUMOR piece, thanks for pointing out that there are no muscles in the thumbs, and that the timeline from iPod release to successful surgery is pure fantasy. Also “whittling”?!?! Come on, pollexplasty, from the Latin for thumb, pollex, perhaps, but not whittling!!

Additionally, many commentators have derided Mr. Martel for stupidity first and foremost, which may indicate something about their credulity.

People should be paying more attention to the iPhone’s ability to transmit their thoughts to servers at NSA headquarters in Fort Meade, MD, where Homeland Security professionals scrutinize them for suggestions that the iPhone’s owner might harbor un-American thoughts like looking forward to the Bush Administration’s departure from Washington. (Note: that was satire. There’s almost no chance the iPhone can read your mind.)

John Gruber writes at Daring Fireball that the omission of cut and paste from the iPhone may be Apple’s way of conditioning people to do things in the manner that Apple wants them to do:

But, I not only understand why they’re absent today, I can even see the argument that — while they’re essential — it’s good that the 1.0 iPhone shipped without them. And therefore, alas, why it might be a while before they appear.

The iPhone way is different. For anything you might want to use in another app, Apple has tried to anticipate the common cases and make them directly available. You don’t copy a picture you took in the Camera app, switch to MobileMail, and paste it into a message; you tap the photo to bring up the toolbar, tap the “do something with this picture” button, and then tap the Email Photo button. You don’t copy a URL from MobileSafari, switch to Mail, and paste it into a message; you tap the URL, then click the Share button that appears.

The option to cut or copy an item and paste it into another item is an old way of thinking about the user interface. Apple’s way seems to indicate a smarter, more direct approach to getting stuff like incriminating photos to the recipient of one’s choice.

Via Daring Fireball

We had to make the obligatory note about Apple’s upcoming event in Cupertino. If you weren’t on the Apple telephone invitation list, that’s right, phone, not mail or even email, here’s what AppleInsider had to say about the invites and the possible new Apple branded stuff:

AppleInsider was told, and Gizmodo confirms, that the event will be restricted exclusively to Mac announcements. In speaking to journalists by phone, Apple representatives were reportedly very clear in expressing that no iPhone or iPod product announcements were in the cards.

Apple chief executive Steve Jobs is widely expected to use the gathering to take the wraps off a new generation of 20- and 24-inch iMacs, which were first detailed back in March and later pinpointed for a release in late-July/early-August.

This should put a rest to the rumors of a new super-slim keyboard for the iMac. Pictures of the purported keyboard have been making the rounds online, and it looks A) very sleek and B) like an appointment with a surgeon for RSI treatment waiting to happen.

Via AppleInsider

Phone calls, Internet browsing, media playback, and radio. That last option could be quietly waiting for a wakeup call from Chairman Jobs and the Central Committee at Cupertino, along with other nifty little applications found by iPhoneology:

While all of these have lots of potential, most seem like they could just be direct ports from the Tiger Dashboard equivalents. The most exciting of these seems to be the mobile.radio, as it suggests the possibility that Apple may be looking forward to supporting streaming radio or hopefully, an FM tuner on the device.

Terrestrial radio isn’t quite dead yet, and offers a change of pace for iPhone owners who may be a little burned out on the current playlist. I wonder if there’s any chance Apple could hook up with Sirius, XM, or both if their merger goes through.

Via iPhoneology

You won’t find buttons on the CEO’s trademark turtlenecks, and very few of them on his company’s products. The Wall Street Journal said he sees them as “blemishes” that add complexity and detract from aesthetics:

Buttons have long been a hot-button issue for Apple’s CEO. Bruce Tognazzini, a former user-interface expert at Apple who joined the company in 1978, says Mr. Jobs was adamant that the keyboard for the original Macintosh not include “up,” “down,” “right” and “left” keys that allow users to move the cursor around their computer screens, giving it a sleeker appearance than other personal computers have. Mr. Jobs’s reasoning, says Mr. Tognazzini: Omitting the cursor keys would force independent software developers to create programs that used the Mac’s mouse — a novel technology at the time.

When Apple put a new keyboard, with cursor keys and other buttons, up for sale a couple of years after Apple forced Jobs out of the company, it sold like hotcakes.

Via The Wall Street Journal (subscription req’d)

Heat is very, very bad for the lifespan of the iPhone battery. Since it’s summer in the US, people should resist the temptation to leave their $600 device in the glovebox or on the dashboard. That would be bad.

Ars Technica said Apple has posted some helpful advice on extending the battery’s life span. Since changing the battery involves sending the iPhone back to Apple and paying $85 for a replacement battery, anything one can do to put that off would be a good idea.

Apple said the lithium battery needs to be used, so use the iPhone regularly (also helps with that revenue sharing Apple has going on with AT&T). Lock the iPhone when it is not in use (this deactivates the touch screen), and optimize settings:

• Wi-Fi: Wi-Fi consumes power even if you are not using its features to connect to a network. You can turn it off to save power. Go to Settings > General > Network > Wi-Fi.

• Bluetooth: Likewise, you can turn off Bluetooth to maximize battery life, as it also consumes power when not in use. Go to Settings > General > Bluetooth.

• Auto-Brightness: Turning on Auto-Brightness allows the brightness to adjust based on current lighting conditions. Go to Settings > Brightness.

• Equalizer: Adding EQs to playback uses more of your processor, since they aren’t encoded in the song. Turn EQ off if you don’t use it. If, however, you’ve added EQ to tracks in iTunes, you’ll need to set EQ to “flat” in order to have the effect of “off,” because iPhone keeps your iTunes settings intact. Go to Settings > iPod > EQ.

Via Apple

Apple has a patent application in process with the USPTO. The “dynamic lyrics display for portable media devices” patent sounds like a way to turn one’s iPod into the technological facilitator of people badly mangling the words to Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit.”

AppleInsider thinks this is part of a plan to license lyrics from Gracenote for re-publication:

Back in April, the iPod maker was rumored to be in talks with digital media company Gracenote over the possibility of licensing authorized song lyrics for redistribution on its ubiquitous iTunes Store.

The move, which would follow a similar pact between Gracenote and Yahoo! Music, was said to be part of a larger industry-backed push to stifle proliferation of rogue websites that currently dominate online lyrics market, often offering inaccurate lyrics and never compensating artists for their work.

Such a deal would compensate artists every time someone thinks they can nail something like Social Distortion’s “Ball and Chain” at a wedding reception when they sneak up to the microphone while the band takes a break. “Well it’s been ten years and a thousand tears/And look at the mess I’m in.”

Via AppleInsider