11.53 am - Jobs is now having key members of the Apple team that created the iPhone 4 stand up and be recognized. Event is now over. Live blogging is over.
11.52 am - Up to 40% longer talk time with the larger battery (made possible by a smaller processor chip). No mention this morning about Verizon being a second carrier to support the iPhone 4. So the iPhone 4 remains an exclusive to At&T.
11.46 am - Video is playing now that gives an overall rundown of all the features of the new iPhone 4.
11.44 am - Dock will cost $29. Apple making its own case -they 're calling it a "bumper." Comes in six colors. $29 for the bumper. Offering iOS 4 upgrades for iPhone 3 GS and iPhone 3G and iPod touch - free on June 21. Not all features will be available for the 3 G and iPod touch due to limitations of the hardware.
11.40 am - The video is getting applause for showing two hearing impaired users doing sign language to each other over an iPhone 4. FaceTime is offering its application as open source. Jobs is starting to wind up. Price & availability: Two colors - black & white. $199 for 16 GB model, $299 for 32 GB model. AT&T will make an upgrade offer. If your contract expires anytime in 2010, you are immediately available for an iPhone 4 if you top off your contract for another two years. Go on sale June 24. Will sell in five countrie on June 24 launch date. Many others in July.
11.36 am - He's calling it FaceTime -- anywhere there's wi-fi, iPhone 4 to iPhone 4 only. No set up required. You use either the front or rear camera, portrait or landscape orientation (landscape would be nice if you have two people on camera). Wi-fi only in 2010 but will work with cell providers. 10's of million FaceTime devices will be shipped in 2010. Jobs just introduced a video demonstrating FaceTime.
11.31 am - Now "One More Thing," Jobs big surprise. stage is now awash with dramatic lighting. Steve is now demonstrating two-way video calling since the new iPhone 4 has a front-facing and a user-facing camera. Jobs is demonstrating a two-way call right now.
11.27 am - Ads are interactive. It can bring up additional data about a product, let you turn an image of a car so you can see it from different angles, etc. If you click on a banner ad, it will play a 15-second ad. Ads will be very visual. iAds will launch July 1. Over $60 million in ad sales so far. It's estimated that mobile ad sales in 2010 will be about $250 million. Apple's $60 million will be only for the second half of the year, so it thinks it could have a 50% share of the mobile ad business.
11.20 am - Over 150 million accounts with credit cards registered to app stores. 16 billion downloads. Now he's talking about iAds. Banners will now be displayed in developers' applications to help them make more money. iAds keep people in the app so they don't stray. Jobs has talked about this before, indicating that he wants a new kind of mobile advertising -- ads that have an emotional connection to the user. Apple will sell and host the ads. 60 percent of revenue goes to the developer. Selling iAds for 8 weeks. Brands coming up in the next six months include Nissan, Citi, Unilever, AT&T, Chanel, GE, Liberty Mutual, State Farm, Geico, Campbell's, Sears, JCPenney, Target, Best Buy, DirectTV, TBS network, and Disney. Everyone is working on their iAds now; they're still works in progress. He's going to show one for Nissan that's in development.
11.15 am - This month, Apple will sell its 100 millionth iOS device (iphones, iPods, iPod touches and iPads). There's definitely a market for your applications, Jobs says. Now he's shifting attention to iBooks. Adding it to the iPhone. You can download the same book to all your devices for no extra charge (iPhone, iPad, iPod). iBooks automatically will sync your place, bookmarks and notes so you can pick up where you left off in a book as you shift reading from one device to another.
11.13 am - Jobs is now extolling how enterprise customers will like OS 4 for its improved data protection, mobile device management, etc. Google will remain default search engine, but Apple is adding Bing.
11.09 am - Jobs is now proceeding with a demo of the operating system's capabilities. Some of this was shown to the media earlier this year. He's showing how an iPhone user will be able to stream music from the Pandora music site while browsing the internet. This was not possible before. (Getting people in the room to shut off their wi-fi networks has worked. Jobs was able to click on a web link, and the website came up quickly.) There's a folder system to help people organize all the app's on their iPhone. This also was demonstrated to media before. However, this is important to show to developers so they can see where Apple is heading in terms of improving the operating system.
11.03 am - Can export video as 360p, 480p or 720p. The demo is getting very enthusiastic applause. Now Jobs is back on stage. $4.99 for iMovie app. He hasn't said yet when the iPhone 4 will be released. Jobs is having the lights turned up to ask attendees to police each other and have all wi-fi shut off. They estimate there are 570 wi-fi networks operating in the room. I am operating on a network modem so I am not impacted and will continue to blog. Jobs is now announcing a new name for iPhone OS4. It will be re-named as iOS 4. Over 1500 developer API's. Over 100 new user features - newest is multi-tasking.
10.59 am - An Apple engineer is now demonstrating iMovie editing on the iPhone 4. Can do theme transitions, create own Ken Burns effect, create opening titles, all on the phone. Phone records geo-location information automatically so it can insert location where video was shot.
10.53 am - Whole new camera system in the iPhone 4. 5 megapixel camera (up from 3 megapixels) and adding a backside illuminated sensor. 5X digital zoom. tap to focus. LED flash built in. He says photons are more important than pixels sinc emany people take low light photos with their cameras. Adding HD video recording at 720p at 30 fps to the iPhone 4. Built-in video editing, one click sharing, and LED flash will stay on during video recording. Announcing iMovie for the iPhone.
10.50 am - Apple is adding a gyrometer to the iPhone 4 to improve positioning information. Perfect for gaming as an adjunct to the accelerometer that allows objects in games to tilt, move, rotate, etc. With gyro, movement will be far more precise and smooth. Jobs is demonstrating the capability. "We don't have to be on the network to do this," he joked.
10.45 am - The new iPhone 4 screen will deliver 78% of the pixels on the display of the iPad. Existing app's look better, Jobs says. He's encouraging developers to go with the new retina display. Developers are applauding. OK - here we have it. The iphone 4 is powered by the A4 processor from the chip maker Apple acquired a year or so ago. It's the same processor inside the iPad. The battery is bigger and the A4 chip is so efficient, power life will be better on the iPhone 4. 7 hours of 3G talk, 6 hours of 3G browsing, 10 hours of web browsing 3G. Up to 32 GB of storage. Quad-band HSDPA/HSUPA, 7.2 Mbps down, 5.8 Mbps up. That's up/down speed that the carriers don't support yet.
10.41 am - Jobs is seeing how slowly the New York Times site is displaying that he's trying to show off. He's joking about the unpredictability of network speed. Oops -- now Jobs is having problems getting to the web on a back-up system. Everyone laughed when a pop-up screen indicated the iPhone 4 is unable to get a network connection. It's working now using photos not on the web. Lots of hushed criticism of the AT&T network among the crowd here. Jobs is saying they're on wi-fi, which means he's not on the AT&T network directly.
10.37 am - 326 pixels per inch... no display like it. About 300 is the limit of human retina to differentiate the pixels. They're so close together, things look like continuous curves - like text looks like a finely printed book. Jobs is now showing examples of how retina display is so much sharper for text. Images and video also will be sharper with more pixels. Jobs is going to do a side-by-side live demo of the improved pixel display using a 3GS and a new iPhone 4.
10.33 am - 9.33 mm thick. The thinnest smart phone on the market, Jobs says. A front facing camera, micro SIM tray, camera and LED flash on back, mic, 30 pin connector and speaker. Headset, mic #2 for noise cancellation. There are 3 black bands on the case - part of the structure of the phone. The steel edge band is part of the antenna system. Bluetooth, wi-fi, GPS, UMTS and GSM. He's now talking about retina display. It's a way to quadruple pixel density to make graphics.
10.29 am - Nielsen says RIM has35 percent of the smart phone market, while iPhone is 28 percent. iPhone has 58.2 percent of all US mobile browser usage, according to other research. Jobs is making a point of saying Google and Android are far behind. In 2007, the iPhone re-invents the phone. In 2008, the iPhone 3G and the app sotre. In 2009, the iPhone 3GS is twice as fast. In 2010 -- he's announcing the iPhone 4. "This is really hot," says Jobs. Over 100 new features. All-new design. "How many have you already seen this?" quips Jobs. Believe me, he says, you haven't seen it. Glass on front and rear, steel edge. He compares it to an old Leica camera. Really thin, he says.
10.23 am - Senior VP Karthik Bala from Activision is going on stage to talk ab out Guitar Hero. New versions for the iPhone and iPod touch. It's fascinating to look around the darkened room and see people craning their necks and sitting forward to catch the video demo of Guitar Hero on the big screen on stage. The new Guitar Hero is available today in the app store for $2.99. Jobs is back on stage, pointing out there are 225,000 app's in the app store. Last week, Apple reached the 5 billion mark in downloads for app store. Jobs says 70% of the revenue from app sales goes to the developers, and developers have now made $1 billion from app sales. OK -- now the iPhone is coming up.
10.19 am - Zynga is about to take the stage. CEO Mark Pincus is on stage. He's announcing "Farming" for the iPhone. 35 million people a day play Zygna games. It's a game that people have been playing on Facebook, but now it'll be on the iPhone as well. It lets people plant, harvest, buy livestock, etc. (Yoo hoo - does this mean anybody can have a green thumb?!) The cuteness factor is too much. They're showing how you can learn how to operate a tractor.
.12 am - Jobs is talking about the company's full support of HTML5 platform. He's now shifting to talk about the App Store. 15,000 applications submitted per week (including updates). Come in up to 30 different languages. 95 percent are approved within 7 days. The 3 top reasons why 5 percent are rejected -- they don't function as advertised b y the developer, use of private API's, and the app crashes. He's now going to talk about the eBay app. 10 million downloads last year of the eBay app on the iPhone. It did $600 million of volume in its first year. It's going to be $1.5 billion to $2 billion this year. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings is now coming on stage with an announcement. Netflix launched its app on iPad two months gaps; it's one of the top 10 most downloaded app's. He's announcing that a Netflix app for the iPhone will be released this summer.
10.05 am - Apple is now playing a promotion video showing lines at stores around the world as the iPad was released. iPad will be available in 19 countries by the end of July. 35 million iPad apps have been downloaded (about 17 app's per iPad sold). Jobs is now showing off some of the app's. Jobs is now announcing an update to its iBook. Over 5 million books have been downloaded so far -- that's about 2.5 books per iPad. Share of total eBook sales is about 22% from the five or six major publishers with titles in the iBook Store. Enhancements to iBooks -- the ability to make notes on the books you're reading and the ability to view PDF files.
0.03 am - Jobs is now starting with an update on various products. First up, the iPad. "I was sitting in a cafe with my iPad, and it got a girl interested in me. Now that's what I call a magical device" -- an email to Steve Jobs. 2 million sold - one every 3 seconds. Being sold in 10 countries now.
1000 am - Precisely at 10:00, Steve Jobs walks on stage and is greeted by a standing ovation. Keep in mind this is a company that has been having a phenomenal year. "It's great to be here," Jobs says. Stock price is up 21% this year. More than 5200 attendees from 57 countries are here for the developers conference.
9.57 am - An announcement was just made for everyone to turn off their cell phones and PDA's. This is pro-forma since Jobs and other presenters on stage are using wireless microphones and probably wireless keyboards. Google had an embarrassing glitch a few weeks ago, also at Moscone, when a demonstration of Google TV was halted because of what was believed to be bluetooth interference. You can be sure that this crowd has at least one if not more wireless devices with them.
9:47am - There are at least 4,000 people packed into this room to hear Steve Jobs. I've seen TV crews from China Central TV and from many other international news operations. The excitement is building. A camera riser is so packed that still and video cams are now lined up tandem-style on the floor. New Orleans style jazz is being played over the PA system. Not surprising that most people using laptops here are using Apple products.
9.26am - Good morning from the third floor of Moscone West convention center in San Francisco where Apple CEO Steve Jobs will be presenting the keynote speech at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference. Long lines are queued up outside to get into this sold-out event to hear what new devices and services Jobs will unveil at his 10 AM speech. This is an important gathering for developers, who create the applications, including games, that run on the iPhone, the iPad and Mac laptops and desktops.
We're expecting some surprises this morning, despite the incident last month where a prototype of the 4G iPhone was dissected and revealed on the Gizmodo tech site. Jobs is not one to disappoint. Two companies acquired by Apple are expected to play key roles in possible announcements today -- a company that makes mobile processors to could speed up the iPhone (its A4 chip is already in the new iPad) and lala.com, which Apple shut down recently but could be the foundation for allowing iTunes users to store their music in the "cloud" and be available for streaming on-the-go.
We'll be posting live all morning, so stay tuned for the latest from Apple.
