macworld 2013
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Using your iPad mini as a phone
iMore's Rene Ritchie has written an interesting post about a trend I've heard mentioned a few times before: using your iPad mini as an actual phone. During his trip to Macworld/iWorld 2013, Ritchie wanted to save battery charge on his iPhone, so when he needed to check his itinerary or make a quick phone call, he pulled out the iPad mini and used Skype or browsed around the internet. And at the end of what Ritchie says was a 19-hour trip, his iPad mini was still chugging right along, with more than 30 percent battery left. As I said, I've heard a few people talk about doing this before. The iPad mini is a powerful device, and while it is larger than a standard iPhone, the size allows you to carry it around in just one hand and use it like its smaller iOS predecessor. The larger screen provides a nice wide-open feel, however, which can be very nice for games, and can make even productivity apps feel cleaner. As Ritchie says, combine the iPad mini with a headset and make a call on Skype, and you've just got a larger-than-usual iPhone. So far, we've seen plenty of rumors about a bigger iPhone model, but no actual news from Apple just yet. Still, experiences like this, along with the fact that other smartphone companies have seen success with larger phone models, point to the possibility that there's a sizable demand for a larger iPhone out there.
TUAW TV Live: Randy and Sande wrap up Macworld/iWorld 2013
Today Randy Nelson and I will be talking about ... what else? ... Macworld/iWorld 2013. Randy and I met up in meatspace for the first time last week, and now we're back into our cyber selves for an hour of discussion with the chat room peanut gallery. Below, you'll find a Ustream livestream viewer and a chat tool. The chat tool allows you to participate by asking questions or making comments. IRC fans can join us in chat room chat1.ustream.tv, #tuaw-tv. You'll be watching the show in glorious HD! If you're driving somewhere and would like to watch TUAW TV Live while you're stuck in traffic, please don't -- keep your eyes on the road! However, if someone else is doing the driving, you can watch the show on your iPhone and join the chat by downloading the free Ustream App. It's a universal app and is wonderful on an iPad, both for viewing and participating in the chat. In addition, the live stream and chat will be available through our Facebook page. Just point your browser here to watch the show and chat with other viewers while you're on Facebook. We'll start at about 5 PM ET, so if you're seeing a prerecorded show, be sure to refresh your browser until you see the live stream. For those of you who are not able to join us for the live edition, you'll be able to view it later this evening on our TUAW Video YouTube channel and as part of the TUAW TV Live podcast viewable in iTunes or on any of your Apple devices.
What Starfish can learn from its failed Macworld appearance
If you haven't read it yet, please check out Lex Friedman's account on Macworld's site of his attempts to view the Starfish smartwatch prototype. Lex does an amazing job summarizing how the company stumbled and stumbled again in its attempts to show the Mac community its competitor to the Pebble smart watch. TUAW got lucky. It was by pure chance that I happened to return to the booth just as the working prototype was being passed from hand to hand. After about five minutes, the prototype was handed to me. Tale of a failed watch Midway through our Friday afternoon coverage of the show, TUAW editor-in-chief Victor Agreda forwarded the team a tweet from Panic Inc. co-founder Cabel Sasser that talked about the watch. "An AirPlay mirroring... watch? But... how would it.. and how do you.. can someone at Macworld report from Booth 214?!" Sasser tweeted. I was in-between stories, so I scooped up my camera and headed to the show floor. Starfish was on the far side of the exhibit space. A few booths were clustered near the tables where people grabbed a hurried bite to eat or rested their aching feet. It was easy to miss Starfish's booth at first. There were no products, no people clustered around the table like at the Square Jellyfish booth a couple steps away. Two women sat at the table doing what we all do when we're bored -- messing with their phones. I asked one of the booth attendants if I could see a demo. There was a delay, and the prototypes aren't here yet, one told me. I could come back tomorrow. I asked them a few more questions about the watch, but they didn't know much about it. Saturday morning, I returned to find no one at all at the Starfish booth. I shot a few photos of the empty table and headed off in search of a better story, namely the monkey across the room. A couple of hours later, I swung by the booth with TUAW colleague Randy Nelson shortly before 12:30 p.m. to find that the prototype had arrived, along with several watch bands with empty spaces where the device should be. The man at the table, who was not CEO Jason Buzi, admitted that neither he nor Buzi had ever used the prototype, and that he wasn't even quite sure of what it did. He told me to come back in 30 minutes to an hour. During that wait, I did some research. I found the Pocketables story from November 2012 with the initial ad in the November-December issue of iPhone Life. I found SlashGear's post about the plan to debut the watch at Macworld/iWorld 2013, and I checked out Starfish's Facebook page. About 30 minutes later, Kelly Guimont sought us out. She and Rod Roddenberry had gone by the Starfish booth after my initial report that the prototype had arrived. They approached the booth to ask some questions. The man covering the booth told them that he would be right back -- and then he walked off, leaving the booth (and empty watchbands) unattended. Kelly wasn't impressed. I decided to check the booth one more time. There was the usual throng of people wanting to check out a new product. And there was the watch, looking nothing like the magazine mockup. I made sure to capture a video for posterity. When it was passed to me, I held it, not quite sure what to do with it. I pressed a few buttons, tapped the screen, and nothing happened. I gave it to Buzi and asked for a demonstration. You could tell he wasn't used to this sort of attention, and he admitted on Facebook that it was a stressful experience because he didn't have a product to show. But neither he nor his friend were as combative toward me as his friend (the one who spoke with me earlier) later was when speaking with Macworld's reporters. I returned to the media room and showed the raw footage to Victor. "That's not an AirPlay watch," he said as soon as the first frames flickered on his MacBook Air. His guess? Buzi was obtaining a watch from China and trying to re-sell it here for a profit, and that's why he knew so little about his own prototype. Friedman's subsequent interview with Buzi confirmed Victor's suspicions. What can be learned from this? One of the main reasons that the Pebble smartwatch was funded successfully was because of how prepared they were at the beginning of the process. While production delays caused the watch to be delivered months after it was funded, they had working prototypes on hand before beginning the publicity process. Disclaimer: I have successfully run one Kickstarter in the past, and I'm in the middle of conducting a second one. Starfish has a long road to go if they want to succeed at funding any sort of Kickstarter, and to start with, they have to earn the trust of their potential backers. As one Macworld commenter pointed out, thanks to the catastrophic Macworld/iWorld experience, they're pretty much doomed from the start. As Friedman said, it's odd that this sort of vaporware doesn't show up more often at expos (though I am still waiting for that TARDIS iPhone dock from CES 2011). What could Starfish have done differently? Hold off on advertising. They shouldn't have run any ads or reserved a Macworld spot until a working prototype was in hand. They should have known exactly where they were going with the watch before spending thousands of dollars on magazine ads and an expo booth. That's money that could have gone into research. Choose the friends helping you wisely. Whoever is helping to pitch the product -- from booth sitters to best friends -- needs to know just as much about it as the CEO, and given the circumstances that's not much of a bar. Supply them cheat sheets. We heard answers ranging from "the Kickstarter has been conducted" to that it was coming later (the latter being the right answer). Teach them how to interact with people asking the rough questions. The friend trying to help Buzi who got aggressive with the Macworld reporting staff wasn't doing him any favors. The entire point of the expo was for reporters to come and ask those questions. Make face time for yourself. A CEO launching a product should spend as much time as possible at the booth, even if the product isn't there. Have your laptop out, show people schematics and discuss the product with them. These are your potential backers, and you owe it to them to be as open as possible about the project. Also, show enthusiasm about your product. Be excited about it, be into it, and convey that to people. Yes, it's extremely hard when you're not used to doing that. But that passion about your own work will go a long way toward convincing people to back you. Use prior experience you have to show that this isn't just vaporware. When I launched our first Kickstarter, I had never published a print book. But, I did have 10 years of newspaper experience as a reporter and designer. My partner and co-creator had two books published in Canada. Between us, we had a 14-month archive of comic pages online. Having that content available, along with our combined experience, helped both Kickstarter projects to be successful. Be realistic about your project. As we know with Pebble and Nifty MiniDrive, there could be massive production delays. Components might be faulty, and other factors might cause you to adjust your schedule. Be open about them with potential backers. Perusing the Pebble and NiftyDrive update schedules on their Kickstarters will help you get a good idea as to what can go wrong. Even smaller products can have this happen. With my current Kickstarter, our printer suddenly bailed on us. I had to rearrange for the book to be printed elsewhere very fast. If all else fails, bail out of the expo. Yes, you'll be out a few thousand dollars, but it could have also saved face for Starfish in the end. A straightforward "our prototype didn't arrive on time, and we didn't want to show people a product we didn't have" will go a long way toward earning good will. It means you're acting in good faith and not trying to scam folks. Things could turn around for Starfish, they could be successfully funded, and we could see Starfish watches alongside Pebble at some point in 2014. Or, they're not funded. Or, they could turn out like Code Hero developers and potentially face a class-action lawsuit, and that's something I don't want to see happen to anyone.
Clean My Mac 2 coming in February
Clean My Mac is an app that arrived a few years ago from developer Macpaw, and allowed you to go in and clear up any unneeded system files that you happened to have sitting around on your drive. Last week on the show floor of Macworld 2013, Macpaw was in attendance showing off version 2 of the software, which is set to be released for sale in February. We got a nice tour through the app at Macpaw's booth, and it looks exactly like what the second version of a great app should: It's both simpler and more powerful. The complicated list on the side of the first version has been replaced by a smaller list of cleaner options, though the new app offers just as many opportunities (more, in fact) to wipe any offending files off of your hard drive forever. At the top of the window, as you can see above, there is an option for Automatic cleanup. If you want, you can just set Clean My Mac to start running and clean your computer with the default settings, but each of the other little windows offer additional options. System Cleanup lets you choose which system files you would like to wipe off of your hard drive, and "Large and Old Files" lets you target exactly that, listing bigger files or files that haven't been touched in some time that you can delete at your leisure. After that, the tabs offer some new options. iPhoto Cleanup targets Apple's photo application. Some users may not know that when you edit a photo in iPhoto, your Mac actually saves both the new photo and an old copy, so if you've made a lot of edits in that app, you could have a number of duplicates in your library that you don't need (speaking personally, I know my iPhoto library is often one of the most wasteful areas on my hard drive). Clean My Mac can clear those out with just one button push. Trash Cleanup is pretty self-explanatory, offering the option to wipe out your trash folder, without an issue. The app also has a "paranoia mode," which will not only wipe out the files of your choice, but then overwrite those with random code, meaning that they really are gone forever, without any hope of recovery. Obviously, that's not for casual use, but if you want to make sure those files are gone, that's a nice option to have. Finally, the Uninstaller and Extensions Manager tabs have been completely rewritten. The Uninstaller is similar to the great AppZapper, and will allow you to kill any apps you have installed, along with any other related files you happen to have on your hard drive. The Eraser tab offers you full control over your hard drive. It's faster than Finder, Macpaw says, and it will allow you to go in and delete any files you want anywhere in your file system, regardless of the consequences (which you'll have to deal with yourself). Because Clean My Mac offers such control over your computer (and could possibly damage your file system if you happen to delete something that's necessary), Macpaw isn't offering it over the Mac App Store at all -- the company says that Apple wouldn't allow it. But the app will be available through the company's website next month for US$29.99. And current users of the app, Macpaw told us, will get the update for free. Clean My Mac remains a powerful solution for cleaning up your hard drive, and the second version offers a much cleaner and more sensible interface for this great app.
Henge's horizontal dock will be a great investment for your Retina MacBook Pro
For Retina display MacBook Pro owners, the Henge Horizontal Dock will be the best investment you can make in your system beyond the computer itself, especially if you utilize multiple displays. Originally unveiled at CES, the US$249 system nabbed a Best of Show award at Macworld/iWorld 2013, and a brief demo proves that it deserves the status. This meaty dock boasts an impressive 14 ports, including two audio ports, six USB 3.0 ports, FireWire 800, Ethernet and an SD card slot. It can also manage up to three external displays, as seen above. A push button neatly ejects the MacBook Pro from the dock, and software will allow you to configure your screens so everything snaps into place once you plug it in. There will be two flavors of the horizontal dock: one with Thunderbolt support ($349) and one without. The horizontal dock without Thunderbolt support will be released during the third financial quarter of 2013, the one with Thunderbolt during the fourth quarter. The docks will accommodate MacBook Pros with Retina displays and all MacBook Airs.
Rain Design launches iSlider at Macworld/iWorld 2013
We haven't seen much out of Rain Design in the past few years. The iRest won Macworld Best of Show in 2011, but there was nothing new new at Macworld in 2012. Later in the year, the company rolled out the mTower, a stand that looks like it was designed to compete against TwelveSouth's BookArc line and upgraded its mStand to include a swivel base. For Macworld/iWorld 2013, the company unveiled another iOS-centered accessory: the iSlider. Made of anodized alumnium like many of Rain Design's other products, the stand can fold down into a small wedge and be tucked into the side pocket of a bag. It's billed as being used for an iPhone or iPad, but this is best suited for an iPad or iPad mini. The iSlider will retail for US$49.95, but Rain Design doesn't have it on its website yet.
Pixelmator's Shapes interface coming soon
Pixelmator is one of my favorite apps on the Mac -- I've been following it for a long time, and whenever I want to do any photo editing beyond a quick resize (and sometimes even when I want to do that), I click the Pixelmator icon in my Dock. This week at Macworld/iWorld 2013, Pixelmator's Ausra Meskauskaite kindly stopped by the media room to visit with the TUAW team, and chat about what Pixelmator's Lithuania-based developers have been up to recently. It turns out they've been busy: The company is just about to introduce the long-awaited Shapes feature, allowing designers and artists to drag pre-created (or custom-made) shapes onto a digital canvas, and then edit various attributes of those shapes, like painting them with a color gradient, growing or shrinking them, and masking or layering them as needed. Pixelmator has planned to implement a shape element for a long time, and Photoshop users will know how useful dealing with shapes can be. But Meskauskaite told me that Pixelmator took its time working with the new feature, because they thought they could implement it better than Adobe did with Photoshop. The final interface certainly does seem simple -- you can just drag a shape out, and then drag a gradient onto it as needed. Clicking on the placed shape brings up a series of control points, and those can be dragged around to get the shape exactly where you need it. You can even convert text over to a shape, and then interact with it in the same way. I'm not a design expert, but the whole interface seemed very fluid and easy to use. Pixelmator is also working on an interface for layer styles, although I didn't get a chance to see that one in action just yet. Meskauskaite said that the company spent much of 2012 just making sure the app was running well and correctly, and now that 2013 has arrived, the focus will move to start putting new features in, like the shapes and upcoming layer styles interfaces. Unfortunately, not everything has gone smoothly with Pixelmator in the last year or so. Meskauskaite told me that whenever Apple offers a cool new feature in OS X, "we take it and place it in the app." Pixelmator saw Apple's Auto Save feature, and immediately decided to add it into the app, but that change ended up rubbing a lot of users the wrong way. The problem is that Auto Save automatically wrote over any changes users made to images, which means that "Save As..." no longer worked (since the original image was replaced by the image being worked on, rather than being separate from it). Instead of "Save As...", Pixelmator has implemented an "Export" screen, but the change in workflow has caused a lot of problems for users, admits Meskauskaite. She told me that "we had debates day and night" about how to deal with the Auto Save problem, and in the end, "we had to choose Auto Save." Users who understand how Auto Save works have dealt with the change better, she says, but Pixelmator also understands why users still attached to the old workflow would be frustrated, and the team is working on finding a solution that makes as many people happy as possible. Pixelmator famously moved exclusively on to the Mac App Store a little while ago, and Meskauskaite says they're very happy to be selling apps (a lot of apps) via Apple's platform. I asked what the company might want out of the App Store in the future, and Meskauskaite said the number one thing they're looking for is volume purchasing. That's a feature that came to the iOS store a while ago, but hasn't yet shown up on the Mac App Store yet, and Pixelmator believes they would do well with it. As for the future, Pixelmator certainly has plans, but couldn't share any of them just yet. Getting the 2.2 Blueberry "Shapes" update out is the current focus, and it should be available soon, and definitely in a beta form later on this month. As for the other updates, we'll just have to wait and see.
Airturn is a Bluetooth-enabled music page turner for iPad
We heard about the Airturn when it first released a few years ago, and the company is here at Macworld/iWorld 2013 this week in San Francisco, showing off both the older two-pedal unit, and the brand new four-pedal unit you can see above. That piece in the middle of each unit is a Bluetooth device, and it hooks up to about 40 different music apps and score readers on iOS, so that musicians can turn pages and scroll down virtual music sheets without using their hands. There's even optional bite- and tongue-switch accessories The standard Airturn unit, called the BT-105, is US$120, and you can set up the pedals in quite a few apps to not only turn the page, but also toggle audio or navigate lists as you go. The four-pedal version arrived last year, and it's $159 (though both models have a discount on at the expo this weekend). Airturn shared a booth with a company called The Gig Easy, that makes music stands for the iPad. They seemed very sturdy indeed, and I'm not sure what else you'd want from a way to hold your iPad up while you play. Seems like there are plenty of excellent options for musicians looking to use iOS to read and play their tunes.
MMT offers a mobile monitor for your Mac or iPad
This is the first Macworld for MMT, Mobile Monitor Technologies, and the company is offering a slightly different twist on portable USB monitors. Each is wrapped in brushed aluminum, and each has a nice build quality with what appears to be an outstanding screen. But there's a model with a numeric keypad installed (handy for your laptop), and a model which allows you to show your iPad's screen (for presentations). The Monitor2Go model for iPad is somewhat like a clamshell case, but as you can see from the picture below, it's not really designed as a case. Instead, you have a monitor which you can flip up and swivel 180 degrees around, allowing you to show someone sitting across from your what's on your iPad. There are also USB and HDMI connections, which are handy. The 1,366 x 768 resolution Monitor2Go sells for US$299, while the 1,600 x 900 version sells for $329. Both screens are 15.6 inches diagonally, and both support the iPad 2 and iPad 3 with built-in slots for both. The Field Monitor Pro is the Mac version (seen below), with a numeric keypad built into the aluminum chassis. It's DisplayLink-certified, and according to MMT you can daisy chain up to six of these things off a single USB! The Field Monitor Pro also includes USB and HDMI, and features a resolution of 1,366x768 on a 15.6-inch screen. It retails for $289. We hope to have a hands-on with one or both of these in the future.
XMG Studios announces Evil Empire, Hero and one more at Macworld
Just as they were last year, XMG Studios is on the floor of Macworld/iWorld 2013 in San Francisco. XMG has three new games to talk about that aren't playable just yet, but should be released this year. XMG's Lydia Schaele told us about a big title called Evil Empire. It's darker and more stylistic than older XMG games like Cows vs. Aliens and last year's Ghostbusters title. Evil Empire is a military combat strategy game set in an alternate reality during the Cold War, in which the USSR is more powerful than it was at the time. In this wild, propaganda-filled setting, an alien creature lands on Earth. As the player, you must use various units and tactics to lead the rebels against a strong, alien military. Evil Empire is still in the planning stages, and XMG is dong its homework. The company took a close look at the App Store, and determined that going with a more complex strategy-style game would land them in the right part of the market. Evil Empire is also expected to be a free-to-play title, with in-app purchases centered around customization and extra content. The game is being designed according to XMG's new philosophy, which we were told targets four main pillars: Character, Choices, Collection and Community. Characters and story will play a big part in Evil Empire's narrative, while meaningful choices will keep player experiences very different each time through the game. Collecting will be a big part of replay value, and of course XMG has quite a bit of experience already with building up social features and communities, so Evil Empire should show off that talent as well. Evil Empire sounds fascinating, but Schaele said that XMG plans to take its time with development. We should see more on this one before the end of the year. Also in development is a game that's code-named Card Battle, which is very similar to the current hit Rage of Bahamut. It's due near the end of May, and will feature original, colorful card art. Card Battle is a card game that features an evolution mechanic and plenty of collection options. XMG wants to make a popular card game that's a little bit better quality than what's currently available, so that should be excellent. And finally, we got to see some concept art of a game called Hero, which is another card game, though this time much more character and story driven. That game will have a rarity system, with various tiers of cards to go after and collect, though the mechanics haven't been defined. Schaele also told us that XMG will attempt to beta test technique with this game. The studio may release it on Android for just a few devices, and let players try out the game on that smaller platform first, before eventually bringing it over to iOS. This isn't the first time we've heard this idea from developers -- right now, the traditional iOS beta test is to release the game in Canada before bringing it to other countries, but with cross-platform development easier than ever, a smaller Android release may become the testing method of choice. We should see more about Hero in June or July of this year. XMG's lineup for 2013 looks pretty solid, and we'll stay tuned for any more news on these titles.
A taste of Macworld/iWorld 2013: Bowblade, Eset, Kanex and more
Here's a little taste of the atmosphere on the floor of Macworld/iWorld 2013, plus a closer look at the Bowblade we wrote up yesterday, a chat with the antivirus/anti-malware maker Eset, and a look at what's new from Kanex. Enjoy!
Attending Macworld/iWorld 2013? Join us for the TUAW Meetup tonight
For the past few years at Macworld Expo and Macworld/iWorld, we've sponsored a meetup to get together with TUAW readers, enjoy each other's company and do some great giveaways. This year is no exception, and we have a meetup planned for tonight -- Friday, February 1, 2013 -- starting at 8:30 PM at Jillian's, 175 4th Street, San Francisco. That's just across the street from Moscone West, where Macworld/iWorld is taking place. We'll be providing refreshments, billiards and tons of giveaways, and the meetup is always a fun place to meet the TUAW cast of characters and new friends. So please join us for what's sure to be an enjoyable evening! This year's event is made possible by the generosity of our sponsors: HP -- be sure to visit the HP team at booth 602 to see how technology can empower people to help them create, make the digital tangible and harness the power of human information. Readdle -- one of the amazing success stories of the iPad era has been Readdle, the developers of such great productivity apps as Documents for iPad, Remarks, PDF Expert and Scanner Pro. Pad and Quill -- beautiful cases for iPad, iPhone, MacBook Air and Kindle. Handcrafted in the USA by a small Minneapolis-based family company, using local craftsmen to construct bookbindery cases for touch devices. Many thanks also go out to the many other manufacturers and developers who have donated the products to be given away at tonight's event. What's in the goodie bags? You'll have to show up to find out! (Note that we did not deliberately choose to cross-schedule with the annual Cirque du Mac festivities hosted by our friends at The Mac Observer; that's just how the venue availability shook out this year. If you're headed to Cirque, come by and say hi on your way!)
Spicebox's Mauz aims to make your iPhone an all-in-one controller
One of the weirdest devices I've seen so far here at Macworld is Spicebox's Mauz controller. The company recently started a Kickstarter for the project (their second, after a case that tracks your opening of multiple beers called the Intoxicase), but even though that campaign hasn't yet come anywhere close to the US$150,000 goal, the unit is already being prototyped and built by the company. It works like this: The company has produced a little box (only a prototype so far, though Spicebox told me that the circuits inside have been finalized and are headed to production already) that will plug into your iPhone's 30-pin adapter. I didn't see a Lightning version, but presumably it's being worked on as well. Once that unit is plugged in, it connects via WiFi to a driver running on your Mac, which Spicebox is right in the middle of developing. The unit on your iPhone will use the WiFi connection to send information about movement bidirectionally, so not only can your phone tell your computer how it wants to move the mouse or keyboard, but the computer can tell the mouse, for example, what app has gained focus, or what kind of gestures should become available on the phone. There are four different ways the phone sends control information, then. The first is just through the touchscreen itself -- as you can see above, the default look of the phone imitates two mouse buttons and a wheel, and those work just fine when you tap them. On the bottom of the plug-in accessory, there's also a (low-power, says Spicebox) mouse laser, so the device can tell when you move it around on a mousepad surface. So at the very minimum, your phone can work as a tabletop mouse when the accessory is plugged in. But of course that's not all. The little accessory also hooks into the iPhone to grab gyroscope and accelerometer movement, so the developers are working on allowing you to do Wii remote-style movement, where you can move the iPhone around in real space to push or pull around elements on your computer's screen. This function wasn't working when I saw it here in the booth at Macworld, but its makers say development is still well underway and they hope to have it up and running soon. Finally, there's one more method of control with the Mauz. That mode uses the iPhone's front-facing camera (while it's sitting face up on a flat surface) to read live video of your hand passing by, and attempts to turn that into 2D movement (so, for example, you'd swipe your hand in front of the iPhone to spin a Google Earth globe). Spicebox even wants to try and track 3D movement (so you'd move your hand toward or away from the phone as it's lying down to push things in or out of the screen). That function was at least working on the show floor, but not in a usable way: The Spicebox guys were waving their hands back and forth above the prototype phone, with very little movement to see on the screen. So there's a lot of work yet to be done. Spicebox says the unit's inner electronics are finalized, but the casing outside of the device is still being prototyped and developed. The software is still a work in progress as well. Spicebox says the beta for the device should hopefully start sometime in April, and then they're hoping to have everything finalized and ready to go later on this year. I was told the company is aiming for a price "in the $60 range, and I believe we'll get there," said one of the company's founders, Gilad Meiri. Mauz is definitely an interesting idea. I have my doubts about how exactly the implementation will work, and while the company has some big plans, they're still very much in the prototype stage, especially in the software department. But I won't discourage anyone from dreaming big: If Spicebox can iron out the hardware and get the software to do what they want it to do easily and responsively, the Mauz accessory could be very useful indeed.
Aspyr Media charges on in the wild world of Mac gaming
I've been vocal for many, many years now about Aspyr and their like, and exactly how I feel about them. I'm a big fan of gaming, of course, and a big fan of Apple and the Mac. And Aspyr sits right at the intersection of those two worlds: They're a company, based in Austin with about 50 employees, that ports AAA and big-budget games over to the OS X platform. Given my dissatisfaction with the company and how vocal I'd been about it in the past, it was with not a little bit of temerity that I went to finally meet with them here at Macworld 2013. But Aspyr's VP of Publishing Elizabeth Howard and Sales Manager Michael Blair kindly welcomed me into the company's suite and sat down to talk about the state of Mac gaming from their point of view. The good news is that Aspyr has seen all of the signs that I've seen the past few years, and the two main concerns I've had for so long are their concerns as well. Buggy ports of PC games on the Mac was a big problem, but in the past few years Aspyr has worked hard to make things better, and even I'd agree that the ports we're seeing these days, from Aspyr and other companies, are light years better than what we used to see. The other big complaint I've had is delays -- games on the Mac often come out months or even years behind their PC and console releases. But both Howard and Blair agreed this was an issue as well, and in fact one of their biggest concerns. Late Mac releases was "definitely the most important thing to us in 2012," said Howard. Aspyr is working as hard as it can to juggle licensing partnerships, engineers, code bases and platforms to try and get these games out as close to the PC release as possible, and Howard says that "it's getting much better." With a few exceptions, Aspyr essentially has the porting process down to just a couple of months, with most releasing coming out either day and date or soon after. It's not perfect. Just recently, Aspyr had to release Borderlands 2 without multiplayer content on the Mac App Store, though it was able to get multiplayer ready for the Mac Steam release (and the Mac App Store patch is coming as soon as it's ready). But both Howard and Blair said they share the timing concerns, both because they are fans of Mac games, and simply because games released alongside the PC versions (and alongside all of the marketing and promotion for them) . "Revenue is a huge difference for us" when games are released together, said Blair. It turns out that fans like me aren't the only ones bugging Aspyr -- the companies they license the games from aren't always helpful either. Not only do a lot of AAA developers not have time for Mac ports, but they often don't have time to even help Aspyr figure out what code goes where, which adds time to the process and frustrations to Aspyr's engineers. Finally, Aspyr has one more source of concern, and it's the distributors that it chooses to deal with. The company releases games on its own website through the official GameAgent store, but most of its sales come these days through either Steam or the Mac App Store, and Howard says those are two very different marketplaces. How sales look on one or the other tends to depend on the title you're talking about (Rollercoaster Tycoon 3, for example, does well on the Mac App Store, while Borderlands 2 is a much better hit on Steam, presumably because of that multiplayer problem, among other things). But Howard said that just releasing games on one platform or the other is even more work for the company's engineers: Steam has its own achievements and features, and the Mac App Store of course has Game Center and other features to deal with. I asked Howard, given how much success the company has found on the Mac App Store, what Apple could do better for games like theirs, and she said Steam is really leading the charge in supporting game developers. Steam "engages that audience constantly," she said, putting together lots of regular sales and promotions for customers to find, and leaving promotional banners and ads up as long as their relevant, rather than changing them out from week to week. Apple, on the other hand, isn't quite as active in its promotion, and definitely isn't as open in terms of how it deals with the store, says Howard. That seems to be a legacy of Apple's relationship with gaming in general: The company has never really understood gamers, and even on the Mac App Store tends to promote and sell more of its own apps rather than much more popular games. Aspyr didn't have a lot of information to share about their exact catalog this year (unfortunately, recent changes in the gaming industry have put some of their titles in question for the moment), but Howard said the content lineup for 2013 would be very impressive. She promised more content for Civ 5 (Aspyr has published both the game and the Gods and Kings expansion on the Mac), some more indie-style titles, and lots of other new titles on Mac and Steam. Howard also mentioned, though again without specifics, that the company was thinking about a new plan as well: Bringing "catalog Mac experiences" over to the iOS platform. She mentioned Grand Theft Auto: Vice City as a desktop game that had done well on Apple's mobile devices, and said that Aspyr was considering bringing games that were a few years old to touchscreens. There's no more information on that, unfortunately, but it was definitely an intriguing idea. Aspyr is definitely working hard to try and make all of its Mac ports better, and while I'm still not completely satisfied with the release schedule (and I definitely got the impression that Howard and Blair weren't yet either), it's definitely clear that the company is facing a whole lot of pressure from all sides for doing something that all of us Mac gamers want: Bringing us high profile games that run natively on the computers that we love. The quality and timing of the ports has gotten better over the last few years for sure, and I would no longer call the company "a complete dealbreaker," as I wrote five years ago. Still, there's always room for improvement, and hopefully we'll see even more of it this year, as Aspyr is able to convince more and more of the companies it licenses games from just how wonderful and loyal the Mac community can be.
Crowdfunding collective TinyLightbulbs shows off its iOS products
Last year, e-commerce site TinyLightbulbs formed in Denver, focusing on products that are funded via crowdfunding sites such as Kickstarter and Indiegogo. TinyLightbulbs brought five of the products available on its site Macworld/iWorld 2013, including: SlingShot: This smartphone stand received more than US$70,000 in funding on Kickstarter and acts as a combination tripod and cradle for your iPhone. An attached handle helps create smooth panning shots. Erica Sadun took a look at it in October. Ultima: A smartphone stand for the car that is made with an aluminum body with a suction cup that is use to secure it to your car's interior. It raised more than $64,000 on Kickstarter. CableKeeps: This was my favorite of the products offered at this booth. These fish-shaped rubber cable holders were funded in 2011. Insert an Apple iPhone or iPad charger in one end, then thread the 30-pin or Lightning cable through the tail and wrap it around the fins to keep the cable in one place. When it's in use, you can use the fins as a stand for your iOS device. The CableKeeps are offered in three styles: two for iPad adaptors and one for the smaller USB adaptor used with iPhones, iPods and the iPad mini. SoundJaw: Steve Sande reviewed the SoundJaw in 2011. Originally developed for the iPad 2, this clip attaches to an iPad near the speaker and boosts the sound by directing the sound waves forward. It raised $17,000 on Kickstarter and is compatible with the iPad models that came out in 2012. Soft Touch Flex: This iPad mounting system is available with a clamp or a mic thread to fit it to a microphone stand. It comes in white and black.
Givit makes video editing, sharing easier
Every year at Macworld/iWorld I see another great video application for iOS. Last year one of the Best of Show winners was Game Your Video, a nifty app for adding effects to video. While I enjoyed the app, it wasn't very straightforward, and editing wasn't a great experience. Givit, on the other hand, almost nails the simplicity of finding and adding those moments you capture to a cohesive timeline and gives you some worthwhile sharing options (in other words: Not just Facebook). In fact, the full name is Givit Video Highlighter. That's pretty much what it is, but there are some power tools lurking under the surface. First, you can take whatever video you want using your iDevice. Next, you bring in your clips and find the moments you want, and select what are called "highlights" -- which then pop into a small timeline (although the metaphor is not emphasized, as it is more familiar to video editors). I was impressed at how easy it was to find clips and add them to the timeline. There are a few video effects possible, like speeding up and slowing down video, and tricks like "instant replay" will loop a certain number of times while also adding slow-motion. I'm told there may be more effects later, but if you shoot family or sports videos, Givit is already a powerful option. Unlike Vine, there isn't really a specific time limit. A person at the booth said "they could be 30 minutes" but I didn't get a hard limit on the time. For now, Givit is a bit limited to streamlining editing, adding some effects if you wish, and putting some music into the video. I'm told they are adding titles and the ability to import images soon. The sharing and collaboration features are outstanding, however. While I didn't get a chance to try them out here at Macworld, the team behind Givit has some experience working on the Flip cameras which had sharing tools built in (after they were purchased and subsumed by Cisco). Of course you have your standard Facebook, YouTube and Twitter sharing. Givit supports cards on Twitter, which makes for a more pleasant experience. But Givit also provides a private sharing option. Just upload your video to Givit and you'll get an email which you can send to others. Anyone wanting to view the video will need to set up a free account, but it's not a bad option for sharing family videos. Even better, via the web interface you can connect Givit to your Dropbox or SkyDrive account. You can then drop video clips there, open them up in the app and edit the videos. This collaborative video editing on iOS is a wonderful idea, and I'm not aware of another app which does it this well. If you're shooting video at one location and need to quickly get it to your editor at another location, this may the easiest thing to use to get the job done. If you happen to upload more than 5 GB, Givit has a premium storage offering at just under US$30 a year. Like Flickr, if you are a power user this will be a great and relatively cheap option. Givit isn't perfect, as I found the UI could use just a bit more polish and style. But Givit has two great things going for it: It is one of the easiest video editing apps I've ever seen, and collaborative editing is a powerful tool for content creators. As a free app to try and use, I suggest giving it a spin.
Macworld 2013: Ashton Kutcher and Josh Gad talk about playing Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak
Actors Ashton Kutcher and Josh Gad, who are playing Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak in the upcoming movie jOBS, helped kick off Macworld | iWorld 2013 today, in a panel moderated by expo general manager Paul Kent. The two chatted with Kent about how they approached their roles in the film, what it was like visiting and recreating all of the locations and events from Apple's history, and how telling the story of the two Steves affected the actors. Gad and Kutcher first walked through their past experiences with Apple before the film. Gad said he was a Mac newbie until recently: His wife first brought an Apple computer home and he says it "completely changed my entire view of what technology could mean." Gad mostly experienced Apple, however, through post-Mac products like the iPod and the iMac, and says he was fascinated with learning the story of how that company came about as the movie went along. His entire knowledge of Wozniak, he said, "was Dancing with the Stars" before he jumped in and really researched what Woz was all about. Kutcher knew much more about Steve Jobs: He said he started out as a child with an Apple IIgs, went to school to study biochemical engineering with a Mac, and later in life has worked as an angel investor with technology companies. Kutcher said that Jobs is an "iconic hero" for him, and that when he first heard about the movie's screenplay and decided he wanted to get involved, he concluded that "if this story's going to get told, I want it to get told in a way that honors my hero." Gad said Kutcher's familiarity with Apple and technology was readily apparent during shooting: At one point, while the pair were filming in the actual garage where the Apple I was built, Kutcher saw a prop in the background dressing, and told the crew to remove it from the shot. "This wouldn't have been built for another year," Gad remembered Kutcher saying. "Get rid of that." Kent showed a short clip of the movie that had previously been seen online, and asked the actors how they approached accuracy in the film. Wozniak, in particular, has seen the clip and called out the film for some "totally wrong" storytelling. But Gad and Kutcher admitted that while the clothing or the dialogue may not have been exactly right, what they tried to do was recapture the feel of what was happening back then. "It's not a documentary," said Gad. "It's an interpretation of events." Kutcher said he talked to many people he'd met through his investing who lived and worked alongside Jobs, and that he tried, as best he could, to capture the feel of what Steve Jobs' early Apple days were like. "You have to ride the arc of the entertainment of the film," said Kutcher, as Gad added that "we went to great lengths to capture of the essence of his journey." Finally, Kent asked the duo what they'd gained from exploring and playing these two real-life characters. Gad said he found a lot of interest in Woz' playful side, and remembered a story from Woz' biography that talked about him working hard and then being distracted by whales outside his window. "It can't all about about work," Gad said he learned. "You can't lose the passion in the work." Kutcher talked emotionally about the three things he'd learned from portraying Steve Jobs. Focus was one: Kutcher said that he'd heard Jobs say that "there's no virtue in saying no to things that are easy to say 'No' to," and that statement has resonated with him a lot in his own daily life. He said he also was inspired by Jobs's "compassion for the consumer." Jobs, Kutcher said, realized that rather than tempting or ripping off customers, "care is the thing that will produce the profit margins and the successful company." Lastly, Kutcher teared up a bit as he said that "Steve believed it was possible to do something impossible." He said that studying Jobs and his life told him that we didn't have to just "settle for what life gives you. Make life better," entreated Kutcher, channeling what he'd learned from Steve Jobs. Gad joked that his whale answer wasn't quite as brilliant in comparison to Kutcher's impassioned speech. But Kent got the last laugh: He asked Kutcher, as an investor, if he were confronted by a younger Steve Jobs, "barefoot and maybe not smelling so great," if he would have invested in Jobs' ideas. That question threw Kutcher for a loop, as he shrugged noncommittally, and the audience gave a knowing laugh. But Kutcher said that in his investing, he's always looking for ideas that solve problems, and that he hoped "I'd be wise enough" to support Jobs' vision back in the day. Follow all our Macworld | iWorld coverage here.
