iTunes 8.2 preps for new iPhone firmware

Earlier today, Apple updated iTunes to get it ready for the anticipated iPhone firmware upgrade to version 3.0. The company also updated its QuickTime video player.

iTunes 8.2, for Windows and Mac, makes the program ready for the iPhone and iPod Touchoperating system upgrade by pushing out changes made to recent prerelease versions of iTunes that had been available to only iPhone developers. It also includes one security fix.

Quicktime 7.6.2, for Windows and Mac, contains several security fixes, including patches for holes that could have been exploited to run arbitrary code by maliciously created PSD, JP2, and some movie files.

Come Ye to Apple, or Get Ye Thine Own Help - One to One Revamped

You've heard of One to One. You like it. You might have even bought it for some one. It's where you get a year of personal training (no more than one personal training appointment per calendar week) on a Mac, from a Mac specialist, in a Mac store, for $99. Nice idea, and useful for hordes of Mac n00bs.

Well, as of tomorrow, in a push to try and encourage customers to purchase their Mac inside an Apple Retail location, Apple will soon be doing away with One to One as we now know it. Soon it will only be available to customers at the time of purchase of a new Mac computer.

Here's some info on the new service:

• The new One to One service will be rolling out on June 2nd in Apple Stores (June 8th for online customers).
• This means that tomorrow (June 1st) Is the last day to purchase a One to One standalone (without a computer)
• Current One to One customers will be able to renew for one more year (as soon as their current membership expires)
• New One to One members (after purchasing a computer), will be able to renew for 2 additional years after the first year expires. Once these two renewals are used, they cannot buy One to One again unless they purchase another computer.
• The new One to One will include a data transfer and personal setup with a Mac Specialist, and will include a free "getting started" class. These classes will take place every day at 5pm.
• There will be no more "free" data transfers with the purchase of a new mac. (Unless you purchase One to One of course).
• One to One sessions, which previously cut off at 1 hour, may now go up to 3 hours, and may include up to 3 participants. (How bout we rename this to One to Three, then, Apple?).

In a continuing focus on the retail aspect of their business, Apple will also be remodeling over 100 stores this year, and opening 25 more.

Man Twitters and is attacked by tree

Human behavior is changing at a blistering pace.

Why, someone in Starbucks held the door for me today and actually waited until I could grab the door from him, rather than letting it swing tantalizingly before I could get there.

However, a British office worker called James Coleman has pointed us toward the perils of over-committed tweeting. According to a report in the Telegraph, Coleman, 23, was jogging when he suddenly felt the enormous uncontrollable urge to pull out his BlackBerry and Twitter.

Perhaps you have experienced a similar sensation. The buttocks tighten, the eyebrows begin to quiver and your hand reaches into the pocket of your tracksuit, desperate to clutch your most precious jewel.

You grab your BlackBerry with the intention of informing your 25 followers that you have, indeed, just reached into your pocket to grab your BlackBerry while jogging.

Should there be "Danger. No Twittering" signs?

(Credit: CC Angelin Richmond/Flickr)

Coleman, as almost everyone on the streets of Manhattan, temporarily lost sight of his own proportions.

Twitter can do that to you.

Before he could even finish his tweet, he thought he might have temporarily lost sight in an eye. Even more strangely, he was lying on the sidewalk and his head was beginning to throb.

Had a passerby, appalled at this arrogant thrust towards modernity, karate-chopped him to the ground? No, it was a tree. More precisely, a substantial, low-hanging branch that decided to play lumberjack.

"I could only see through one eye for a couple of days afterwards, but the swelling has started to go down now," Coleman told the Telegraph.

The experience hasn't, however, dampened Coleman's enthusiasm for ensuring that his 27 followers stay close to his footsteps, as well as his missteps.

Monday morning, he tweeted: "I am somewhat disappointed that my 15 minutes of fame stem from running into a tree whilst tweeting..."

Sir, but we are not disappointed. You have taught us so much. You have made us think very carefully about the wisdom of jogging and tweeting. However, you don't seem to have been put off by your own Twittering headbanging.

As I see that your latest tweet reads: "Running home--looking out for curbs, lamp-posts, cars, trees and all things stationary and moving :)"

Oh, Coleman, I am worried for the future of British business.

Report: Best Buy's iPhone supply running low

iPhone 3G supplies are dwindling. Does this mean a new model is on the way?

(Credit: James Martin/CNET)

First-generation iPhone 3Gs are becoming a lot more scarce at retail.

Best Buy is anticipating its iPhone inventory running very low over the next few weeks, according to AppleInsider. A memo from Best Buy corporate to its sales employees says the stream of iPhone 3G inventory to its stores will slow to a trickle. Some stores may run completely out of the devices.

Reports surfaced last week of an Australian distributor that supplies iPhone 3Gs to carriers saying there was "only a few weeks stock available."

This is a similar pattern to what unfolded last year, when first-generation iPhone supplies began to run low at retail locations ahead of the launch of the iPhone 3G last July. Apple cut production perhaps a bit too early during the last go-round, resulting in very few iPhones sold during the second quarter of 2008.

This year, the reports of dwindling iPhone supplies are coming more than a month later than last year, suggesting that perhaps Apple has fine-tuned its iPhone model end-of-life process.

It also, of course, suggests what almost everyone is expecting at WWDC next week: the announcement of new iPhone hardware to go with the new iPhone OS 3.0 software

Dell cans its Mini 9 Netbook

Dell has stopped selling 8.9-inch Netbooks, focusing instead on ones with slightly larger screens.

Visitors to Dell's U.K. Web site earlier on Monday found the Mini Netbook page displaying the phrase "Available in 8.9" but no actual options for buying the Mini 9 model. The site focused instead on Dell's Mini 10 and 10v Netbooks.

U.S.-based tech site Engadget noted that a customer service representative in the U.S. had confirmed the "end of life" of the Mini 9.

Dell is the latest Netbook manufacturer to move away from 8.9-inch-screen devices. It appears that most consumers prefer screen sizes measuring 10 inches and above, despite the fact that such devices have the same screen resolution as their smaller kin.

Dell's Mini 9 can still be bought through Vodafone, which bundles the Netbook with a monthly mobile broadband subscription over a two-year contract.

'Android' Eee PC: The un-Intel Netbook

An Eee PC Netbook based on a Qualcomm processor that runs Google's Android operating system looks promising as an alternative to the millions of Netbooks out there tethered to Intel Atom processors and Microsoft Windows.

An Asus Qualcomm-based smart-book is a promising alternative to Windows-Intel Netbooks

(Credit: Asus)

Asus was showing a Netbook at the Computex conference in Taipei running the Android OS on top of Qualcomm's Snapdragon processor, according to TweakTown.

When Asus plans to ship a Netbook based on Qualcomm's Snapdragon processor isn't clear and Asus is not disclosing its plans (later this year?), but it becomes even less clear when you add Google's Android operating system to the mix. Michael Rayfield, an Nvidia executive, doesn't expect Android Netbooks to appear commercially until next year.

What is clear, however, is that these Netbooks are different from the Windows-Intel variety. Qualcomm is calling them "smartbooks" rather than Netbooks to draw attention to the fact that they will operate more like smartphones: standard 3G connectivity, always-on, and all-day battery life.

And what makes this Asus demonstration at Computex interesting is that all Asus Netbooks to date have run on Intel processors. Obviously, Asus thinks the Snapdragon technology is different enough to warrant a separate design.

Other specification for the Netbook include a 10-inch screen, a built-in Webcam, and a universal 3G radio that supports UMTS and CDMA networks on all frequencies used globally, according to an IDG News report.

Google giving small businesses local search data

Google is giving local merchants the ability to access data about how Web surfers arrive at a local listing in Google Maps, in hopes of figuring out why so many people in a particular neighborhood are searching for pizza.

Google lets small businesses create a small Web listing that appears next to queries such as "pizza San Francisco," which pop up in Google Maps with a link to a business' Web site and address information through a service called Local Business Center. Inside the center, they've been able to do things like verify their address and phone number, but Google is now adding search results data to the dashboard within Local Business Center, said Carter Maslan, director of product management for local search.

For example, San Francisco pizza parlors will be able to see the zip codes from which searches originate that wind up at their listing, the keywords that searches are using to find their result, and basic stats about search activity, Maslan said. The idea is to give those businesses a set of metrics from which they can make business decisions about expanding delivery areas, advertising in certain areas, or what people are looking for in a local pizza joint.

"It's that kind of new visibility into search patterns that we hope will help business owners," Maslan said. This feature is not linked to any of the accounts that businesses might have with Google's AdWords or AdSense programs.

The service is gradually rolling out Monday to those in the U.S. with Local Business Center accounts, with support for additional countries coming later.

The new dashboard for Google's Local Business Center now comes with a lot more data.

(Credit: Google)