MacRumors

Earlier this week, Apple seeded a new version of OS X 10.5.7, termed Build 9J58, to developers. World of Apple publishes the seed notes, which list only a pair of changes related to compatibility fixes between the CFNetwork framework and VPN, iChat, and Safari. Apple has also added iChat to the list of focus areas upon which developers are being asked to concentrate their testing.

As with numerous previous developer builds, the inability to install Safari 4 Beta remains the only documented issue. Development on OS X 10.5.7 has been presumed to be wrapping up for several weeks now, but Apple appears to still be finding a few bugs that require their continued attention. The last developer release, Build 9J56, was seeded in the middle of last week.

Considering all the leaked evidence of video recording and editing in the iPhone 3.0 beta, it's not really a stretch to predict that the next iPhone will offer long-requested video features. Still, Businessweek's Peter Burrows confirms that to be the case based on a source familiar with Apple's plans for the next iPhone.

In fact, Burrows suggests that video recording won't simply be an afterthought but a major feature of the new iPhone.

Evidently, shooting video is as easy as it is with a Flip, the ingenious device made by Pure Digital (recently purchased by Cisco). Then there's an iMovie app that lets you quickly save the sections you want, right there on the phone itself. There may also be support for MMS, so the clips can be shared wirelessly with friends. And because of the iPhone's relatively large screen, your friends dont have to schlep to your PC or their Facebook page to see that video of your kids or your safari. Just hand them your iPhone.

Burrows even suggests it could be as successful as Apple's late, yet dominating, entry into the MP3 market with the iPod. An easy to use video recording, editing and sharing iPhone could be a breakthrough usage for the device -- allowing people on a large scale to quickly record and share videos without bothering to connect to their computer.

For what it's worth, MacRumors has similarly heard that the next iPhone will support Video recording and YouTube sharing which has been supported by evidence found in the iPhone 3.0 beta.

AppleInsider reports that Apple is preparing to introduce cheaper Macs as soon as this spring. The move reportedly comes in response to consumer buying patterns shifting toward cheaper computers, including those in the netbook category.

Still, people familiar with the matter say Apple's move towards more affordable Macs isn't so much a response to Redmond's marketing antics as it is an interim solution to combat the proliferation of budget notebooks -- often called netbooks -- until the company is ready to introduce its own take on the market in the much rumored Newton-like web tablet, a project which is taking considerably longer to complete than once anticipated.

The report presumes that the pricing changes would appear in the consumer MacBook and iMac lines, although exact details on models and price points remain unknown.

While exact pricing is unclear or still undetermined at this time, the Mac maker earlier this month quietly flaunted its capacity to deliver a premium system at near recession pricing when it began offering educational institutions a 2GHz, 20-inch aluminum iMac for $899. Even when priced at a $100 to $150 markup for the consumer markets -- as Apple is more than likely eager to preserve its margins -- such an offering would make a material dent in the entry-level cost of owner or switching to a Mac.

AppleInsider claims that the MacBook could see price reductions as part of a minor revision to Apple's notebook lines in the near future.

Engadget reports that a version of NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 285 graphics card for the Mac Pro will be released in June.

The GTX 285 is currently NVIDIA's fastest single-processor GPU, offering 240 processing cores and 1 GB of video memory. AnandTech recently reviewed the PC version of the GTX 285 and found that it consistently outperformed the ATI Radeon HD 4870, whose Mac counterpart is currently available as an upgrade for the Mac Pro.

NVIDIA just last week announced the upcoming Quadro FX 4800, offering a professional-level graphics card option for Mac Pro users at a price point of $1799. The GTX 285, however, should provide a significant performance boost over the current standard-level offerings for the Mac Pro at a price point closer to $400.

MCV reports that Richard Teversham, Microsoft's senior director of business, insights and strategy for Xbox, is departing the company to take a position at Apple. Teversham reportedly will take on an "education-related" role in Apple's European office. Focused on EMEA (Europe, the Middle East and Africa), Teversham had been at Microsoft for the past 15 years and worked on business aspects of Xbox since its launch in 2002.

Teversham had worked at Microsoft for over 15 years. He held the role of Xbox director for platform and marketing between 2005 and 2007 before becoming strategy boss.

A Microsoft spokesperson told MCV this week: "We can confirm that Richard Teversham, director of business, insights and strategy, has taken a new opportunity outside of Microsoft. A process is underway for recruiting his replacement."

While Teversham's role at Apple remains unclear, the addition of a significant player in Microsoft's international strategy and marketing for Xbox suggests the possibility of Apple further increasing its efforts in the gaming industry. In particular, Apple has been positioning the iPod touch as a gaming platform in much of its promotional material.

A patent application from Apple filed in October 2007 and published today reveals that the company is researching the use of carbon fiber composites for use in the exterior shells of electronic devices. Specifically, the patent application relates to the use of a "scrim" layer on the exterior surface of the carbon fiber laminate allowing for an "improved cosmetic surface."

In the background for the application, Apple objects to the appearance of typical carbon fiber composite materials:

Despite the many benefits of carbon fiber composites, such composites are typically black and the carbon fibers are typically visible on the composite surface. In addition, the fibers (either as a unidirectional, woven, or nonwoven substrate) are typically variable in their construction and therefore are variable in their surface presentation. As a result, the resulting carbon fiber composite can have cosmetic imperfections that reduce the aesthetic appearance of the molded article formed therefrom. Further, carbon fiber composites, often being black, provide a narrow range of surface appearance to the molded article and therefore may give a "tired", unexciting look.

Apple's insistence on aesthetic designs has apparently led the company to focus efforts on improving the visual appeal of such carbon fiber composites, which hold significant appeal for notebook computer design due to their strength and light weight.

A rumor from November 2008 claimed that Apple was exploring the possibility of replacing the bottom case of the MacBook Air with a carbon fiber composite in order to shave approximately a quarter pound off of the machine's total weight.

The Wall Street Journal explores the reasons why Apple has been moving towards designing their own chips rather than using off-the-shelf components. This strategic shift was first revealed when Apple acquired chip-designing company P.A. Semi last April. That news has since been followed by a number of new hires from AMD as well as online job postings looking for individuals to test "Apple developed silicon."

According to individuals "familiar with the matter", Apple's current chip plans include lower power designs to prolong battery life in the iPhone and iPod touch as well as improved graphics circuitry for better gaming and HD video playback. In addition to whatever competitive advantage Apple might get with their own custom designed chips, another benefit would be the ability to maintain more secrecy over their products.

People familiar with Apple's thinking say executives have expressed concern that some information shared with outside vendors could find its way into chips sold to Apple competitors

Jobs reportedly told P.A. Semi engineers that he specifically wanted to develop chips within Apple to prevent knowledge of them leaking out. Apple, of course, is well known for their secrecy. This secrecy has been harder to maintain in recent years due to the number of partners Apple must work with in launching a product. With the iPhone, we've seen rumors coming from both component suppliers as well as mobile carriers who need to be briefed about upcoming releases.

The Wall Street Journal points out, however, that this trend is contrary to most big electronic firms who have moved towards outsourcing components in an effort to reduce costs. Apple is not expected to launch products based on these internally designed chips until next year at the earliest.

The Inquirer reports that Raja Koduri, currently Chief Technology Officer of the Graphics Product Group at AMD, will be joining Apple. The rumor comes on the heels of the discovery just two days ago that Bob Drebin, Koduri's predecessor in the position at AMD, has already joined Apple.

Between PASemi, Bob Drebin and other things we can't talk about yet, Apple is building up some serious hardware talent. All they need now is a good reliability person and a fire chief, and things will get really interesting on the hardware front in Cupertino.

Apple's acquisition of P.A. Semi in April 2008 generated speculation that Apple is developing its own system-on-chip solutions for the iPhone and iPod touch. The subsequent recruitment of Mark Papermaster from IBM and now Drebin and Koduri from ATI/AMD demonstrate significant enhancement of its expertise in chip and system design.

With the iPhone/iPod touch being touted as a gaming platform and the upcoming deployment of OpenCL in OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard to harness the power of graphics processors for general-purpose computing, Apple's interest in acquiring expertise in this area is unsurprising, although the extent of its recruitment of significant players in the industry suggests that Apple has made a significant commitment to expanding its efforts.

Continuing a pattern of biweekly releases, Apple tonight seeded the fourth beta version of iPhone OS 3.0 to developers. Apple also issued a developer pre-release version of iTunes 8.2, which is required to activate the new beta. No new features in the fourth beta version have been revealed as of yet.

The iPhone OS 3.0 was first demonstrated at a media event in mid-March and will bring over 100 new features to users. The iPhone OS 3.0 is expected to be a major focus of Apple's sold out Worldwide Developers Conference to be held in San Francisco in June.

Update: One forum poster points out that the latest iTunes 8.2 beta carries references to Blu-Ray data from Gracenote, suggesting that iTunes could support the reading/recognizing of Blu-Ray discs. This note is not present in the current version of iTunes:

Apple quietly posted a notice on their WWDC site that the developer's conference had sold out for 2009.

The news should come as no surprise to most as Apple's WWDC sold out last year as well. With the massive success of the iPhone App Store this past year, many expected interest in this year's conference to exceed last year's.

WWDC takes place between June 8-12th in San Francisco, CA. Apple is expected to reveal more information about the iPhone 3.0 SDK and Mac OS X Snow Leopard at the conference. Rumors also suggest that we'll also see an announcement about the next generation iPhone.

In a brief report (subscription required), The Wall Street Journal claims that Microsoft and Verizon are in talks to launch an iPhone rival in early 2010. MarketWatch summarizes the report:

The Microsoft phone, code-named "Pink," is expected to appear by 2010 and would extend the tech giant's Windows Mobile cellphone operating system, according to the Journal.

Similar to Google's Android platform, Microsoft will reportedly work with a third party who will manufacture the device, but Microsoft will play an integral role in design and development.

Verizon has been linked to several rumors regarding the iPhone from mainstream news sources in recent days, first with renewed claims that the iPhone may be making its way onto the carrier's network sometime next year, and earlier today with rumors that Apple and Verizon are developing two new products, an "iPhone lite" and a larger "Media Pad", also slated for release as early as 2010.

Apple and Verizon partnership rumors seem to have taken on a life of their own with multiple reports that the companies are planning to work together as early as 2010. Businessweek provides the most intriguing report yet with claims that Apple could be working on releasing two different devices with Verizon: an iPhone Lite and a Media Pad.

One device is a smaller, less expensive calling device described by a person who has seen it as an "iPhone lite." The other is a media pad that would let users listen to music, view photos, and watch high-definition videos, the person says. It would place calls over a Wi-Fi connection. One of these devices may be introduced as early as this summer, one person says.

BusinessWeek was able to confirm with Verizon Wireless CEO Lowell McAdam that Verzion had been in talks with Apple but could not get any details from McAdam.

Instead, the magazine cites "two people familiar with the subject" as the source for these two possible Apple devices. The Apple media pad is said to be smaller than Amazon's Kindle ebook reader but its touchscreen is bigger than the Kindle's. The source predicts that this new product will be a category defining breakthrough device:

"The media pad category might go to Verizon," said the person who has seen the device. "We are talking about a device where people will say, 'Damn, why didn't we do this?' Apple is probably going to define the damn category."

Meanwhile, the iPhone Lite is said to be thinner, smaller, and cheaper than the current iPhone. Most of the cost savings are said to come from a new system-on-chip that has reduced costs.

The Inquirer reports that former ATI chip designer and executive Bob Drebin is apparently now a Senior Director at Apple. Drebin was formerly the Chief Technology Officer for the Graphics Products Group at AMD, assuming the position as part of AMD's acquisition of ATI in 2006. As detailed in his still-active AMD profile, Drebin brings extensive experience in graphics chip design.

Bob Drebin is the chief technology officer of the Graphics Products Group within AMD. In this role, he oversees the technical strategy and direction for AMD's graphics related businesses.

Mr. Drebin joined AMD with the ATI acquisition in 2006. At ATI, Mr. Drebin led the architecture and design of many of ATI award-winning graphics processors. Before ATI, Mr. Drebin managed the architecture and design unit of ArtX, where he was instrumental in development of the graphics component for the Nintendo Game Cube. Prior to joining ArtX, Mr. Drebin was a chief engineer in Silicon Graphics' Advanced Graphics Division, where he spent nine years developing high performance graphics systems.

While the details of Drebin's new role remain unknown, his experience in graphics hardware suggests that he may have a similar focus at Apple, which is known to be focused on development of OpenCL, a key component of Apple's upcoming OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard that will allow the operating system to take greater advantage of parallel processing across multi-core CPUs and graphics chips.

Notably, Drebin appears to have left AMD in January 2008 and did not assume his position at Apple until earlier this year, possibly due to non-compete clauses in his employment contract. Similar non-compete terms delayed the appointment of Mark Papermaster to his new position of senior vice president of Hardware Devices Engineering at Apple and triggered a lawsuit from his former employer, IBM. Apple announced in January that the dispute had been settled, and that Papermaster would assume his new position as of April 24th. As noted by CNET, Papermaster did indeed begin work on Friday, and his biography has been added to Apple's list of executives.

Apple today announced that it has filed an amended Form 10-Q with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, correcting errors in the reported vote totals for shareholder-submitted proposals at its most recent annual shareholder meeting.

Last week's filing incorrectly reported the voting percentages for shareholder-submitted proposals because abstentions were counted as "No" votes. Very shortly after the original filing, the company learned that these votes had been incorrectly tallied and an internal investigation confirmed the mistake was due to human error, which Apple regrets. Today's amendment correctly reports the voting results.

The correction affected the outcome of one shareholder-submitted proposal, known as "Say on Pay," which successfully passed with approximately 51.63% of votes cast under corrected counting procedures.

As a result of the corrected vote count, Shareholder Proposal No. 5 Regarding Advisory Vote on Compensation, known as "Say on Pay," was approved with a majority of votes cast. The Compensation Committee of Apple's Board of Directors has been closely following the Say on Pay issue, and anticipates that new laws or regulations will require some form of Say on Pay vote at all public companies in the near future. Even if that does not occur, Apple is committed to implementing an advisory Say on Pay vote next year.

As noted in shareholder materials for the annual meeting, the "Say on Pay" proposal will allow shareholders to cast advisory votes regarding compensation for Apple's senior management at each annual meeting. The referendums would be non-binding, but would allow shareholders a greater voice in communicating with Apple management. Apple had formally opposed the proposal as an ineffective means of offering shareholder input.

Executive compensation has become a popular topic among shareholders throughout the corporate world, with several countries recently passing laws requiring such opportunities for shareholders and the U.S. considering similar legislation.