GarageBand now available on iPhone and iPod touch

Apple announced recently that its popular GarageBand music creation software is now available on the iPhone and iPod touch. Prior to Tuesday, it was only available on Mac computers and on the iPad. “GarageBand on iPad has been a big hit and we think customers will love using it on their iPhone or iPod touch," Apple's senior vice president of worldwide product marketing Philip Schiller said. “The innovative Multi-Touch interface combined with Smart Instruments makes it easy to create great sounding music, even if you've never studied music or played an instrument before.” GarageBand is available for $4.99 to new users or for free to those who already own the app on an iPad. It is supported by the iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S and the third and fourth-generation iPod touch. Read on for the full press release from Apple.

GarageBand Now Available for iPhone and iPod touch Users

CUPERTINO, California - November 1, 2011 - Apple® today announced that GarageBand®, its breakthrough music creation app, is now available for iPhone® and iPod touch® users. Introduced earlier this year on iPad®, GarageBand uses Apple's revolutionary Multi-Touch™ interface to make it easy for anyone to create and record their own songs, even if they've never played an instrument before.

"GarageBand on iPad has been a big hit and we think customers will love using it on their iPhone or iPod touch," said Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. "The innovative Multi-Touch interface combined with Smart Instruments makes it easy to create great sounding music, even if you've never studied music or played an instrument before."

GarageBand features a collection of fun Touch Instruments that sound great and make it easy for beginners or experienced musicians to play and record keyboards, guitars, drums and basses in a wide variety of styles. Smart Instruments now allow you to choose from an extensive new library of custom chords so you can play and strum along with your favorite songs.

You can plug your electric guitar into iPad, iPhone or iPod touch to play and record through classic amps and stompbox effects, or record your voice or any acoustic sound using the built-in microphone. GarageBand allows you to record and mix up to eight tracks and then share your finished song with friends or send it to your Mac® to keep working on it in GarageBand or Logic® Pro.

Pricing & Availability

GarageBand 1.1 for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch is available on the App Store™ for $4.99 (US) to new users, or as a free update for existing GarageBand for iPad customers. GarageBand is a universal app that runs on iPad, iPad 2, iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S and iPod touch (3rd & 4th generation).

Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork and professional software. Apple leads the digital music revolution with its iPods and iTunes online store. Apple has reinvented the mobile phone with its revolutionary iPhone and App Store, and has recently introduced iPad 2 which is defining the future of mobile media and computing devices.

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Google launches official Gmail app for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch

Google released an official Gmail application for the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch on Wednesday. According to Google, the application supports the following features:

• Get alerted to new messages with push notifications and sounds
• Find an email in seconds with search across your entire inbox
• Autocomplete email addresses from your Gmail contacts or select from your device's address book
• Upload photos with a click using the new attachment button in compose view
• On iPad, navigate your inbox and read your mail simultaneously with split view

Additionally, Gmail for iOS offers a priority inbox feature for finding your most important messages, threaded conversations, labeling, archiving and more. It also supports touch gestures so that users can swipe left or right to view labels and folders. Gmail requires an iPad, iPod touch or iPhone running iOS 4 or newer. It is available for free in the iTunes App Store now.

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Google launches faulty Gmail app for iPhone, iPad, iPod touch

Yesterday we've heard it's coming, and today it's here: Google has announced the launch of its official Gmail app for iOS devices (iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch).

The app features an interface optimized for iOS, push notifications, comprehensive search across the whole inbox, threaded conversations, one-click photo uploads, and split view (only on the iPad).

Unfortunately, mere hours after its launch via iTunes, the Gmail iOS app has been removed by Google because “it contained a bug which broke notifications and caused users to see an error message when first opening the app.” Google is currently working to fix the problem and re-release the app. Meanwhile, “everyone who's already installed the app can continue to use it.”

When the bug is fixed and the Gmail app is again available in the App Store here, it will be compatible only with devices running iOS 4+.

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Vibroy Portable Vibration Speaker For iPod And MP3 Player

The Vibroy is a unique pocket-sized gadget that is able to turn just about everyday objects into speakers. The portable vibration speaker comes equipped with a “magic sticker” that will easily stick onto just about any surface including an empty box, an empty food container, a chair, or a coffee cup. The Vibroy portable vibration speaker is compatible with any gadget that uses a 3.5mm headphone jack such as iPhone, iPad, iPod and MP3 players. $29.99 is all you need to bring home this fancy gadget. [Product Page]

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Ten Years of iPod

October 23, 2011, marks the tenth year since the iPod was introduced. The iconic portable media player has since become tiny and powerful, touch-capable and interactive throughout its different models and generations.

Then-CEO of Apple Steve Jobs introduced the first iPod 10 years ago at a special event. It has 4GB of storage, can hold up to a thousand songs, lasts for up to 10 hours, and can easily fit in one's pocket. Although it was not the first MP3 player introduced in the market, the iPod was the first to become immensely popular among consumers.

To date, over 300 million iPods have been sold, but it did not come easy. The first iPod had a hefty $399 price tag on its launch and since at that time it can only be connected to iTunes-installed Apple computers, the rest of the world (who mainly uses Windows-based PCs) did not care. Things only began to pick up in 2002 when Apple came up with a Windows-compatible version of iTunes. By 2003, Apple had sold one million iPods. A year later, sales had reached 10 million.

There was concern on the fate of the iPod when more and more people are beginning to carry their music on their smartphones. While iPhone sales are exploding, iPod sales cannot seem to catch up, accounting for just 8 percent of Apple's total revenue in the fourth quarter of 2010. The iPod Classic also did not get its update this year, as it usually does.

Whether new versions of iPods will be introduced or it will be shelved due to redundancy, the impact of the iPod in casual listening, as well as in the music industry itself, remains undeniable.

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10 years and 320 million units later, the iPod is slowing down

Ten years ago, Steve Jobs pulled a little white box out of his pocket and promised that it would revolutionize the music world. We were not so convinced back then that this little MP3 player would sell, but Apple managed to ship more than 320 million so far.

Back on October 23, 2001, we were expecting something huge from Apple when we watched Steve Jobs discuss the digital media world in Apple's auditorium in Cupertino, which recently was also used to unveil the iPhone 4S. A 5 GB, HDD-based music player was hardly revolutionary and I was not the only one who felt that the device had no future with an MSRP of $399. Apple gave every person in the audience a beta-release iPod, with 25 free CDs to match most popular music tastes and transferred all songs via Firewire interface within a minute or so to the player.

Back at home – the iPod software was pretty buggy – the iPod failed to impress me, but I felt that Apple had invented something special. It was the first MP3 player I was willing to actually display in public and use with my regular stereo equipment in my living room. Ten years later, Apple has sold an estimated 320 million iPods with generated more than $60 billion in revenue. Since its original introduction in 2011, Apple launched 22 different models of iPods and the original version has survived in the form of the sixth- generation iPod Classic which is offered in a 160 GB version for $249. The current iPod line starts from $49 with the 2 GB Shuffle and ends with the 64 GB iPod touch for $399.

Current shipments are slowing down significantly as sales are shifting toward iPhones. Apple said that it sold 6.6 million iPods in Q3, down from 9.1 million one year ago. However, Apple claims that it still sells more than half of the world's MP3 players and still has 70 percent market share in the U.S. While Apple does not break out iPod model shipments from the total number, the high-end iPod touch is now the key model that secures profit margins for the iPod line and is aligned with Apple's iOS strategy. The company said in September that it has sold more than 250 million iOS devices (iPod touch, iPhone, iPad).

Over the years, the iPod has survived several high-profile lawsuits as well as Microsoft's Zune MP3 player, which was announced in 2006. Back then, Microsoft said that it was in the MP3 player game for the “long haul” and predicted that it could beat the iPod sometime in the future. Earlier this month, Microsoft announced that it will stop selling Zune players.

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