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Bluelounge MiniDock for iOS cuts the cord, declutters your life
Forget about that Klimt print and your torn John Belushi Animal House poster, if you've got a few of those Jony Ive-crafted iSlabs lying around, you should flaunt'em -- according to the designers at Bluelounge. Available for iOS owners in the US, UK and EU, the company's MiniDock makes use of your existing Apple USB power adapter for a cordless, outlet-mounted charging and display station. The design studio created the dock with a clutter-free existence in mind, but its focus on "customers who are passionate about their iPhones" is a much more telling inspiration. You can go ahead and snag one of these for $20 now, just keep it tucked away from any Android-toting houseguests.
Rumors of Jon Ive moving to the UK reportedly false
Jonathan Ive, Apple's senior vice president of product design, has no plans to take his talents back to the United Kingdom, an in-depth profile of the designer in the Daily Mail revealed last week. Recent speculation suggested the 44-year-old planned to cash in his US$30 million in Apple stock options and relocate to a mansion he owns in Somerset so that his children could receive an education in the UK. Last month, the Times of London reported that Ive might be looking to leave Apple whose trend-setting designs he's helped shape for nearly 15 years. The Times suggested Ive remained an Apple employee only to reap the benefits of a "golden handcuffs" option grant from 2008 that he is now eligible to sell. With his net worth currently estimated at $128 million, many believed Ive could easily retire from Apple and return home to the UK with his family. Fortunately for Apple, last week's profile in The Daily Mail states, in no uncertain terms, that Ive has no plans to leave California and that his $4 million home in Somerset, UK, will remain empty. "I'm not sure there is any truth he wants to come back," a former colleague told the Daily Mail. "My last conversations with him were that he was planning to sell his house in the UK." Ive's career at Apple started quietly in 1992 when he often worked out of his own basement office, cranking out futuristic prototypes that were entirely under-appreciated by his superiors. "For the first three years Jony was having a pretty miserable time designing Newton PDAs and printer trays," Clive Grinyer, who co-founded tangerine, a UK consulting firm, with Ive in 1989, told The Daily Mail. "It was a bad existence." Then, Steve Jobs returned to Apple and quickly recognized the value of Ive's design talent. With the responsibility of designing Apple's future, Ive got off to a fast start with the iconic and colorful iMac. Despite falling short of Jobs's high standards for perfection, the iMac was a huge hit with customers and rejuvenated Apple essentially overnight. Since then, Ive has become one of Apple's strongest assets, consistently raising the standard for industrial design both at the company and throughout the world. Many consider Ive and current acting CEO Tim Cook to be Apple's most valuable executives behind Steve Jobs. With Ive apparently staying with Apple for awhile longer, Apple fans can look forward to more beautiful Macs, iPads, iPhones and iPods that define thoughtful, modern industrial design that's both functional and beautiful.
Ive due $30m stock windfall, may seek relocation back to UK
Other than Steve Jobs' brain, the mind most clearly at work in Apple's history of compelling and human-centric products belongs to Jonathan 'Jony' Ive, 44. After joining Apple in 1992, he rose to become the company's senior vice president of product design and has contributed his own clean, minimalist aesthetic to the wall of industrial design legends. With Tim Cook firmly established as the executive/operations lead on Apple's depth chart, anyone looking for the creative future of Apple has to have Ive at, or near, the top of the list. Today's Times of London (behind paywall) reports that Ive is about to reap the rewards of his service and dedication. Ive received a 'golden handcuffs' option grant in 2008 when Apple's stock was at a low ebb of around $100, allowing him to buy shares that -- having remained in Apple's employ -- he is now eligible to sell. Ive's profits from these options could approach $30 million, thanks to the dramatic runup in AAPL over the past two years. With his additional wealth -- his net worth after the options cash in is estimated at $128 million -- Ive and his wife Heather might want to move back to England with their twin sons. The Times suggests that Ive and the Apple board have "been at loggerheads" over Ive's desire to spend more time back home, but the Ives reportedly want to educate their children in England. Ive owns a manor house worth about $4 million in Somerset. The paper quotes an anonymous friend of the Ives on the topic of a commute from the UK to Cupertino: "Unfortunately he is just too valuable to Apple and they told him in no uncertain terms that if he headed back to England he would not be able to sustain his position with them ... It's a shame. We hardly ever see anyone at the house." Apple's spokesperson gave the Times a 'no comment' on the option grant and deemed the report of his desire to move to England "speculation." Photo of John Lasseter & Jonathan Ive from wikimedia commons (cc)
Make a free Apple-oriented Christmas Creche
If you've got a bit of time on your hands before Christmas (yeah, that could happen), you might want to build a Christmas Creche using a bunch of Apple favorites and pundits to witness the birth of the iPad. Our Dutch friends at One More Thing have put together a free print, cut and glue kit, where you can download all that you need to build your very own version of the Apple nativity scene. If you know your way around a pair of scissors, you can probably construct it in about an hour. The cast of characters include: Steve Jobs and a segway-riding Steve Wozniak as Joseph and Mary, Jonathan Ive, Tim Cook and Phil Schiller as the shepherds, and three pundits -- David Pogue, Walt Mossberg and John Gruber -- as the three wise men. Interesting choices there. It looks like Pogue is announcing the miracle using FaceTime. Take a look after the break for a quick video on how it all goes together.
Jonathan Ive on Apple's material obsessions
Core77 had a chat with Apple's Jonathan Ive about the iPhone 4 and the materials that it's made out of, and Ive says that the process is very holistic; Apple has really gone from start to finish with the types of metal and glass that make up the latest iPhone, and they've worked at every step of the process to try to make them better designed. He says that the glass on the front and back is "scratch-resistant aluminosilicate glass," and the metal around the edges is one full band of stainless steel. (The "seams" are just cosmetic -- it's all one piece, apparently.) "That understanding, that preoccupation with the materials and processes," Ive says, "is essential to the way we work." Ive does have his usual ethereal lightness about how hard design is to grasp. "You cannot disconnect the form from the material -- the material informs the form," he says. If nothing else, though, the interview definitely shows just how obsessive he and Apple are about designing and manufacturing these devices. iPhones become commonplace so quickly after launch that you tend to forget all of the work and thought that has gone into every single feature of their hardware. Apple isn't really doing anything magical here; it's just sitting down and grinding out exactly what materials work best in which ways in order to make a really beautiful and functional object. [via 9to5Mac]
You've come a long way, Jonathan Ive
It's gotta be tough for a guy who designs the sexiest devices on the planet. No, not the million-dollar paycheck or the international fame and fortune. When you're one of the world's top designers, you must make sure your image portrays cool and sexy. If you're a built guy with a shaved head and an English accent, you've done a good job. On the other hand, if you're wearing beige fleeces with huge collars and sporting a pretty wicked 'stache, you might have a problem convincing people that you, y'know, design some of the sleekest, sexiest devices on the planet. Oh, how the Internet is going to make all of us have to relive our worse style decisions over and over. Gizmodo has dug up this video clip of Jonathan Ive talking talking about how a computer "can be sexy" circa 1999. You've come a long way, Jonny...
Jonathan Ive buys a couple of iPads
Steve Jobs wasn't the only one paying a visit to an Apple Store on iPad launch day. Jonathan Ive, Apple's top industrial designer, was snapped buying two of his own products at an Apple Store on April 3rd. It's not clear which store the above pictures were taken in, but you can clearly see the form of two iPad boxes in the bag. What's the iPad's number two creator doing buying a toy that he helped create? Some might joke that Apple is cheap. Some might say it's a move for more free publicity (like the iPad needs any more free publicity). Me? I'm chalking it up to professional courtesy and class. Support your product in all the ways that you can; get out there to get a buzz off of the excitement you've helped create, and use that buzz to funnel your energy into making the next version even better. I've got one more image for you below. It's a shot of Steve Jobs during his visit to the Palo Alto Apple Store. [images via 9to5Mac]
The Apple Tablet: a complete history, supposedly
It's no secret to us (or our readers) that Apple's products tend to generate what some might consider insane amounts of interest for weeks, months, and even years before they're launched or even announced. Whether you love the company or hate its guts, you can't deny that Apple is particularly prone to being fodder for the rumor mill. It comes in all forms: leaked photos (be they real, fake, or merely imaginative fan creations), analyst speculation based on "what if" scenarios for investors, "insider" reports from Asian supply chains, and a fair amount of conjecture via the press, both mainstream and blog alike. Here at Engadget, we've always been pretty proud of our ability to decode fact from fiction, and we try not to add too much noise to the echo chamber in which the gadget world seems to sometimes live. That said, we do cover plenty of rumors -- and the Apple Tablet (in its many rumored form factors) may just be the biggest and most twisted of them all. Apple's been kicking around the idea of a tablet since at least... oh, 1983. From real, physical prototypes to out-there ideas such as the Knowledge Navigator -- the company (who did not, alas, invent the idea of a tablet PC) has, somewhat unsurprisingly, seen fit to investigate the possibility for almost as long as it's been around. For one reason or another, though, they've never actually produced a device which saw the light of retail day (well, besides the Newton). Perhaps that's part of the fascination that Apple fans have with the product -- it's been rumored so long, and seemed on the verge of actual arrival so many times that it's become a Holy Grail of sorts for the tech community. The rumor timeline 2004 - 2006: The early years 2007 - 2008: Backburner 2009: The heat is (back) on 2010: The year we make contact? Wrap-up Follow the saga Evidence that any tablet actually existed or would come to retail, however, has always been slim at best. In the entire lifespan of Engadget, not one viable photo of a real-looking prototype has ever emerged, and not one source within Apple itself has ever really hinted that it was at work on such a product. Oh sure, there have been dozens -- possibly hundreds -- of people "familiar with the matter," but almost no one who would or could go on record to talk about the tablet, and in the end, it's always seemed like a non-starter. The Apple Tablet rumor started in earnest around 2002 -- before Engadget was even around. By the time we arrived to the party, the idea that Apple might be working on a tablet or slate PC was pretty firmly entrenched into the psyche of the avid gadget geek, but again, perilously little evidence existed to support the idea, or shall we say... the hope? And here we are, in January of 2010, on the verge of yet another expiration date for the rumored launch of an Apple Tablet (though let's be honest -- this thing is starting to feel pretty real). We thought now might be as good a time as any to take a look back -- back through the rumor timeline of one of the gadget world's longest-standing, and seemingly best-loved unicorns. Join us for the ride, won't you?
Apple's Jony Ive waxes eloquently about new iMacs on video
Slow pans. Deliberate zooms. White background. Yes, it's another all too brief sit down with Apple's chief designer Jonathan Ive -- this time talking about the company's freshly revised iMacs. Among other things, Ive seems to be particularly keen on how well that those big new 16:9 displays have been integrated into the design, noting that "it's just display, and then no display." Indeed. Head on past the break to check it out for yourself.
Continuity: Executive succession plans in history
We all know that Steve Jobs will eventually leave Apple, and Apple's executive team has a responsibility to draft a succession plan to help minimize the turmoil when that day comes. To figure out what Apple might do, we can look to the past for other examples. Ford Motor Company was founded in 1903 by Henry Ford. In 1918, at the age of 55, Henry handed the presidency of the company to his son Edsel. When Edsel died in 1943, Henry came back to Ford Motor Company ill, "mentally inconsistent, suspicious, and generally no longer fit" for the job. Most of the board didn't want him to be president. Even with no official title, he'd been in de facto control of the company since Edsel took over. Nevertheless, the board elected him (rather than cross him), and he served until the end of the second World War. Gravely ill, he turned control of the company over to his grandson, Henry Ford II, in 1945. Henry Ford died two years later. Steve Jobs has four children, the oldest of whom is Lisa Brennan-Jobs, a 30-year-old journalist. None have publicly expressed any desire to run Apple.
Ive scores another design award for the iPhone
Apple's Senior VP of Industrial Design Jonthan Ive has won yet another design award, this time for the iPhone. The Mobile Data Association recognizes "those UK companies and individuals who have made an outstanding contribution to the uptake and success of mobile data over the last 12 months." Ive won the MDA Personal Achievement Award for the physical "design of the Apple IPhone and its user interface" which "sets the bar very high for all present and future competitors and as such, is shaking the mobile phone industry."You've got to figure by this time Ive is using things like this as doorstops, but it is yet another (completely unsurprising and thoroughly deserved) testament to Apple's design leadership. [via Infinite Loop]
WALL???E - Robot with the heart of a Mac
Several TUAW readers have reported after seeing midnight showings of Disney-Pixar's new and highly-rated movie WALL•E that when the robot boots up, he makes the standard Mac startup sound. That's not the only Apple connection with the movie.Of course, Steve Jobs is the largest single shareholder of Disney after Pixar was purchased by the entertainment giant for $7.4 billion in 2006. He still serves on a steering committee for Pixar that oversees the Disney-Pixar animation businesses, and he's on the Disney Board of Directors. I'm not sure, but he may be tapped to be the first CEO of BuyNLarge...WALL•E's job is to wander around an abandoned Earth, pick up trash, and compact it into small blocks. However, when he finds something nostalgic that he likes, such as an iPod or Rubik's cube, he keeps it.The object of WALL•E's desire, EVE, was actually designed with the assistance of Apple Senior VP of Industrial Design Jonathan Ive, who apparently spent a day with the Pixar team in 2005 consulting on the ultra-sleek floating robot.Thanks to Matt for the heads-up and inspiration for this post!
The UK Independent talks to Ive about design
Hot the heels of Apple's recent double D&AD Black Pencil victory for excellent design the British newspaper the Independent interviewed Jonathan Ive, Apple's senior vice-president of industrial design and now holder of a record six Black Pencils. There's a charming sense of British lad made good about the piece, and it's always interesting to learn about how Ive approaches his craft. He says that his "goal is simply to try to make products that really are meaningful to people. Ultimately there is something motivating and inspiring in seeing someone using an Apple product and enjoying an Apple product." And fortunately for our favorite fruit company Ive insists that he can't possibly imagine working anywhere but Apple.[via Gizmodo]
Jonathan Ive being groomed to take over for Jobs one fateful day?
You've probably heard of Jonathan Ive: darling of the technology and industrial design worlds, and El Jobso's handsome, mountain of a right hand man in product design since the CEO's second coming at Apple. You might also know him as the dude that birthed the iMac, titanium Power Book and MacBook (Pro), iPod, iPhone, and just about every decent-looking Apple product in the last decade. Well, he's also apparently the guy the most people seem to be pontificating -- whether officially or not -- as Jobs's successor, according to the Times. Of course, there's another obvious, prominent theory about why the ever tight-lipped Apple hasn't done as most publicly traded companies and made a formal contingency plan for succession of the CEO gig: Jobs is immortal. As if you didn't already know that. There can be only one!
Ive wins 2007 National Design Award
Cooper-Hewitt, the design museum in New York, has just announced the winners of this year's Nation Design Awards and you might recognize a name of the list. Jonathan Ive, designer of such items as the iPod, the iMac, and the iPhone, has won this year's award for 'Product Design.' The designs for the iPod nano, Apple TV, the MacBook, and the iPhone seem to have cinched the win for him.Kudos to you, Jonathan , and the whole team of designers at Apple.
Jobs, Ive nominated for Time's "most influential"
Steve Jobs and Jonathan Ive have been identified as candidates for the next Time 100 Poll, which is a list of the nation's most influential business people. Both Steve and Jonathan have appeared in Time before (Steve made the cover five times), and Steve has made previous Time 100 lists. Magazine covers, national recognition, a billion-dollar company...just another day at the office.[Via MacNN]
Apple designer receives honours
British born Jonathan Ive, designer of the iMac and iPod, became a Commander in The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire today. According to a Macworld article, Ive received this honor at the Queen's New Year Honours ceremony. Ive was recently promoted to senior vice president of Industrial Design at Apple. He has been with Apple since 1992 and was named 2003 Designer of the Year by the Design Museum in London. Ive originally studied industrial design at Newcastle Polytechnic.
More Apple tablet rumors
Here's the rumor that won't go away. United States Patent Application #20060026536 (which features the signature of Jonathan Ive) concerns "...Methods and systems for processing touch inputs are disclosed. The invention in one respect includes reading data from a multipoint sensing device such as a multipoint touch screen..." Is an Apple tablet in the works (yes, I'm bringing that up again)? Hrmph! even has a very nice round-up of images related to using "gestures" with a touchscreen-based user interface. Note the iPod-like scroll wheel in Fig. 27D. Seriously, though, who would you trust to deliver a tablet PC that's both beautiful and useful? Mr. Ive and Apple, that's who. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for this one. [Via Engadget]
Jonathan Ive Awarded CBE Award
Every year, Britain awards influential Britons Orders of the British Empire, such as Knight, Commander, and Officer. The highest order is Knight, but also well-known and prestigious is the Commander of the Order of the British Empire, or CBE.Jonathan Ive, Apple's creative designer behind many of its revolutionary products such as the families of iMacs, and the iPod, has become a CBE on this year's New Years Honours List.Thanks to all those who sent in this news item.
