Yogi Land

Somewhere, the spirit of Steve Jobs is smiling.

The company he so reluctantly left behind is in better shape than ever. Jobs’ hand-picked successor, Tim Cook, is a well-compensated, self-effacing steady hand on the tiller — exactly as advertised. And every indicator of the company’s health you care to name is doing better than even the most optimistic predictions.

Apple had $97.6 billion in the bank as of the end of its first quarter, it announced Tuesday; that amount has almost certainly crossed the $100 billion mark by now. (The company’s first quarter actually ended on December 31.) It sold 37 million iPhones in the quarter, 7 million more than Wall Street was expecting. Sales of iPads and Macs also beat estimates. In other words, Apple owned Christmas.

And yet, far from crowing, the company sent out one clear message on its earnings call Tuesday evening: we can do better.

Cook was quick to point out that Apple had been struggling with shortages all quarter. Tragic floods in Thailand have led to poor availability for components across its devices. The company has not been able to make as many iPhone 4Ss as it would have liked. And it wasn’t even able to sell the 4S in mainland China, due to a rampage on launch day.

All of which left analysts wondering: what would the quarter have looked like if everything went Apple’s way? And if none of those problems can lay the company low, when will this amazing growth spurt end?

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An Abundance of Caution

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If anything seems likely to hobble Apple in the future, it’s that Cook’s greatest strength — his caution — is also his weakness.

Jobs may have ruled with an iron fist, and it was he who began storing up Apple’s cash to make a war chest large enough that it could be wielded as a weapon. But he also knew the value of throwing out as many spitballs as possible, in the hopes of finding one that stuck. At Jobs’ memorial service, design guru Jonathan Ive fondly remembered the one phrase Jobs would use above all others: “Hey, Jonny, here’s a dopey idea.”

Those dopey ideas begat the iMac, iPhone and iPad. They also begat the countless tiny improvements which helped each of those devices redefine their category.

But it’s hard to imagine Cook peppering Ive with dopey ideas. So who is throwing out spitballs at Apple now? Is upper management making it okay for the company’s designers and engineers to try new ideas and fail fast? Or is caution the new watchword throughout Apple?

If so, then Apple could find itself being out-innovated by the competition. As one of the analysts on the earnings call pointed out, Android phones already beat the iPhone in a couple of categories: screen size and speed (ie. 4G). Cook responded that Apple didn’t consider itself in a race with Android and was focused on creating the best product it could.

Yet if Android handset makers manage to overcome the battery life issues that plague 4G phones — the Droid Razr Maxx, set to launch Thursday, promises to do just that with an eye-popping 21 hours of battery life — then they have a very real claim to be selling more innovative devices than Apple. If that impression sticks among consumers, even Apple’s giant war chest won’t necessarily help it turn the tide.

It may seem almost too ridiculous to consider that Apple could be knocked off its lofty perch. But rest assured, it will happen sooner or later. All companies die eventually; all rise and fall. Cook is doing his best to push all problems into the far future, and in many ways he’s doing the best job imaginable.

But Apple already has two bars to jump this year: the launches of the iPad 3 and the iPhone 5. Expectations are ridiculously high. To meet them, Cook had better be throwing lots of spitballs behind the scenes — or appointing Jobsian idea-generating leaders who can.

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People close to Apple have reportedly spilled the beans on a media-related event that will happen in New York City before January ends.

The announcement likely will not involve the iPad 3, Apple TV or other interactive television efforts, suggests All Things D, adding that the event may focus on a small-scale advertising or publishing revelation.

Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of Internet Software and Services, reportedly will be in attendance, All Things D adds: “Cue is in charge of a large swath of Apple’s media units, including the iTunes Store, App Store, iBookstore, as well as iAd and its iCloud services.”

What do you think Apple will announce at this NYC event? Make your best predictions in the comments below.

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Bonus: Apple in 2011 — A Bittersweet Year for Tech’s Most Valuable Company

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January

Apple started the year on a high, surpassing $300 billion in market capitalization.

The launch of the Mac App Store brought the "App Store experience" to computer users, with more than 1,000 free and paid apps available for download. The Store saw one million downloads on the first day, while the App Store also hit a milestone in January -- 10 billion apps downloaded worldwide.

After more than four years, AT&T’s exclusivity with the iPhone came to an end as Verizon became the second official U.S. carrier for the Apple mobile.

The news that Apple CEO Steve Jobs was to take another leave of absence for health reasons was quickly followed by Apple reporting record-breaking earnings for its fiscal first quarter.

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1. miFrame

The miFrame turns your iPad into an 8-inch by 10-inch photo frame. Available in black or silver, it's a slimline storage solution for your iPad, even lending it useful, aesthetic functionality while you're not using it.

Cost: $79

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So, Santa dropped an iPad 2 down your chimney? Lucky you. One of the great things about buying into the Apple craze is the rich and diverse range of accessories available for all iProducts.

The iPad is no exception. You can choose from a bewildering array of cases, stands, speakers, dock, and other peripherals available for the Apple tablet. If you’re looking to accessorize your shiny new iPad 2, we’re here to help. We’ve hand-picked a selection of 10 companion products we think stand out from the crowd.

SEE ALSO: 28 Cases For Your New iPad 2 [PICS]

Take a look through our image gallery of worthy great accessories. Let us know in the comments if any of these tempt you, and link us to anything else you’ve seen that has caught your eye.

More About: accessories, apple, features, gallery, ipad, ipad accessories

Apple has appointed Arthur Levinson, one of Silicon Valley’s most respected leaders, as the company’s new Chairman of the Board. Who exactly is Levinson, and why has Apple chosen him to lead the board?

Levinson has served on Apple’s board of directors for more than a decade. In 2000, Steve Jobs asked Levinson to join Apple’s board when Levinson was chairman and CEO of Genentech, the multibillion-dollar biotech company now owned by Roche. Only Intuit’s Bill Campbell and J.Crew’s Millard Drexler have served longer on Apple’s board.

“Art is a highly respected CEO and leads one of the most important and successful science-based companies of our time,” Jobs said when Levinson first joined the board. “We look forward to his insight and counsel.”

Levinson was born in Seattle in March 1950 to Sol and Malvina Levinson. From his childhood he was interested in the sciences. He points to Carl Sagan’s Intelligent Life in the Universe as one of the most influential books in his early life. That inspiration took him to the University of Washington, where he graduated with a B.Sc. in molecular biology in 1972. He received a PhD in Biochemstry from Princeton in 1977, a year before he got married.

His career at Genentech began in 1980, when he was recruited as a research scientist by Genentech co-founder Dr. Herbert Boyer. Levinson quickly moved up the ranks, becoming the VP of research technology in 1989 and senior VP of R&D in 1993. In 1995, Levinson was named CEO. In 1999, he was also named chairman of the board.

In 2009, Levinson stepped down from his CEO duties at Genentech after the company was acquired by Roche for $46.8 billion. He remains the company’s chairman and serves on a variety of boards, including the boards of Roche, Amyris and the Broad Institute. He also joined Google’s board of directors in 2004, but left in 2009 not long after the departure of former Google CEO Eric Schmidt from Apple’s board.

What kind of change can we expect from Apple with Levinson in charge of the board? Not much. Levinson has served as co-lead of Apple’s board since 2005, only relinquishing that title in August when Steve Jobs stepped down as CEO and became the company’s chairman. Levinson has been one of the company’s most visible leaders for a long time.

In other words, don’t expect Levinson to change Apple’s magic formula. He helped create it. If you want to get a feel for Levinson and his personality, check out this video of a speech he gave to Genentech employees when Roach bought out the company:

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1. Pixelated Hands Sticky Note Pads

What better way to get someone's attention than these sticky notes?

Cost: $4.99

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The ubiquitous hand-shaped pointer has been a part of the consumer computing experience since the early days, and is familiar to both PC and Mac users.

It’s this familiarity that has crossed it over into real life, with a variety of hand-shaped accessories — both pixelated and not — created in a homage to the iconic design.

SEE ALSO: A Brief History of the Emoticon

Take a look through our image gallery celebrating the hand-shaped pointer. Let us know in the comments which items you’d like to have at your fingertips.

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Apple has announced that the iPhone 4S will make its debut in Hong Kong and 14 other countries on November 11.

In addition to Hong Kong, the new iPhone will make its debut on the same day in Albania, Armenia, Bulgaria, El Salvador, Greece, Guatemala, Malta, Montenegro, New Zealand, Panama, Poland, Portugal, Romania and South Korea. The device will be available for pre-order in most of these countries on November 4.

The iPhone 4S is already available in 29 countries, but Apple promises that 70 countries will have the phone by the end of the year.

Apple is looking to do more to tap into the massive Chinese market. Currently only one service provider, China Unicom, officially has the phone, but Apple is hoping to strike a deal with China Mobile, the world’s largest carrier. 9.5 million people already use the iPhone on China Mobile, despite the fact that China Mobile’s network doesn’t currently support 3G for the iPhone.

Apple also has yet to translate Siri, the flagship feature of the iPhone 4S, for Catonese and Mandarin.

More About: apple, iOS, iPhone 4S

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1. Twickenham Riverside by Andy Blackwell

Fancy a slow stroll along the river? We don't either.

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At this time of year we like to indulge ourselves with as many delicious chills as we can. To this end we’ve been taking a look at some spooky iPhotography.

We have found 10 creepy iPhone photographs that made the hair stand up on the back of our necks.

SEE ALSO: Fall Foliage: 10 Fantastic iPhone Photos That Celebrate the Season

Take a look through our spooky photo gallery. Let us know in the comments which images send a shiver down your spine.

More About: apple, features, gallery, Halloween, iphone, iphotography, photography, Photos

Could Siri, the voice-based virtual assistant for every iPhone 4S owner, constitute a threat to Google’s Android operating system?

Absolutely, says Gary Morgenthaler, a partner at Morgenthaler Ventures, recognized expert in artificial intelligence, and a Siri board member and investor. Apple, he argues, now has at least a two-year advantage over Google in the war for best smartphone platform.

“What Siri has done is changed people’s expectations about what’s possible,” Morgenthaler said in an interview with Mashable. “Apple has crossed a threshold; people now expect that you should be able to expect to speak ordinary English — and be understood. Siri has cracked the code.”

This threshold, from mere speech recognition to natural language input and understanding, is one that Google cannot cross by replicating the technology or making an acquisition. “There’s no company out there they can go buy,” Morgenthaler says.

Google has Voice Actions, a voice search application for Android. So what’s the big difference? It comes down to semantics, Morgenthaler says: “Siri understands what you mean.” She has a far more precise understanding of what you’re saying and the context you’re saying it in, in other words.

Morgenthaler calls Google’s Voice Actions a “capable speech recognition program,” and says it was the state-of-the-art voice-based user interaction program. That was, until Siri, with all her semantic prowess, debuted on iPhone 4S. (Of course, Morgenthaler may well have a financial stake in Siri’s future; the terms of the company’s sale to Apple were never disclosed.)

Currently, Google is making dismissive public pronouncements about Siri: “your phone shouldn’t be your assistant,” Android chief Andy Rubin told the AsiaD Conference. But Morgenthaler believes they’re scrambling to catch up behind the scenes, because Apple won’t stand still with this technology.

Rather, it will use Siri to solidify the strength of its platform and steal advertising dollars away from Google, he argues. “Siri is a platform,” Morgenthaler says. “It’s not just limited to those things that Apple has done at launch.”

SEE ALSO: I Want My Siri TV: Is Apple Aiming to Make the Remote Obsolete?

At the moment, Siri has a lot of iPhone-centric functions. But Siri the company implemented more than 45 APIs prior to being acquired by Apple — meaning the possibilities of a conversation interface to the web are endless. Back in April 2010, just after the Apple acquisition, Mashable noted Siri’s potential role as a driver in mobile search.

“Apple has the opportunity to outmode the entire Android ecosystem,” Morgenthaler says. Of course, that hinges on Apple making those APIs available to iOS developers, but he believes Apple will do just that: “This will be the differentiating factor in the iOS platform.”

Siri’s threat to Google could reach further than Android. In fact, Siri challenges Google’s entire search empire and shakes it to the foundation, Morgenthaler says.

“Google has made a huge contribution to all of our lives … they’ve made search comprehensive and instantaneous … but the whole paradigm is wrong,” he says. “[People] don’t want a million blue links, they want one correct answer. All the rest is noise that you’d rather have go away.

“Apple has the opportunity to really understand the question that you’re asking, and apply semantic knowledge such that [Siri] will deliver you the right answer, or a small set of highly relevant answers.”

When that happens, Morgenthaler says, all the steps that typically comprise an online search, including the ads served against search results, become completely irrelevant. He believes Apple can and will circumvent this search experience, passing consumers to merchants by way of Siri — and earning a finders fee for doing so. Under this paradigm, Google could be completely forgotten.

In short, forget the search engine — Siri will be an answer engine. She can perform executable actions and change consumer expectations in the process.

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BONUS: Siri Politely Answers 10 Absurd Questions

The classic question

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Few events can boast headliners like Tim Cook, Norah Jones, Jonathan Ive, Al Gore and Coldplay. But Apple‘s campus-wide celebration of the life of Steve Jobs last Wednesday was hardly an ordinary event. The entire Cupertino-based company was crammed into its outdoor amphitheater; Apple stores shut around the world as retail employees watched live.

The Apple family is a fairly insular one, and outsiders were not admitted to this moving tribute to its fallen leader. On Monday, however, the company began streaming a replay of the event online. You can watch it here, and we highly recommend it: 84 minutes of memories, catharsis and great music. But if you’re pressed for time, peruse our slideshow of some of the event’s best quotes and performances.

Steve Remembered

Giant black and white photographs of Jobs were draped around the campus amphitheater.

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Oct. 23, 2001: The iPod

The very first iPod launched with "1,000 songs in your pocket."

It had 5GB of storage space, weighed 6.5 ounces, featured a 160 x 128 pixel display and FireWire connectivity and cost $399.

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Since its debut in 2001, the Apple iPod has evolved from the seminal white box with a mechanical scroll wheel to, ultimately, a sleek touchscreen multimedia device.

Over the years the various versions of the iPod have gotten smaller/larger and more colorful, they’ve lost buttons and gained them, have added cameras, speakers, radio, accelerometers and more. The only thing that hasn’t changed appears to be the enduring popularity of the devices.

Join us on a look back through the last 10 years of the iPod. Let us know in the comments below which models you’ve owned — and which were your favorites.

Thumbnail image courtesy of 37prime

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