I usually take rumors of upcoming Apple products with a grain of salt, but every once in a while you see all of the most credible publications saying the same thing. Yesterday, John Paczkowski of the All Things D website (an affiliate of the Wall Street Journal) wrote that Apple will introduce the next version of the iPad in the first week of March. He reports that sources tell him that the next iPad will look similar to the iPad 2 but will have a vastly improved Retina Display, much like the iPhone 4/4S. Then Nick Wingfield, Nick Bilton and Brian Chen of the New York Times reported the same thing based on their sources, stating that the next iPad will have a "truly amazing" screen. Also, the often-in-the-know Jim Dalrymple of The Loop wrote about the All Things D story: "Yep." Now that the trinity of the most reliable sources for Apple rumors are in agreement, I think it is safe to predict that we may see a new iPad in just a few weeks — the iPad 2s? the iPad 2HD? The iPad 3? — and it will have a vastly improved screen. If you are about to buy an iPad 2 but you can wait a few weeks, this seems to be a good time to wait. And now, the rest of the news of the week:
- If you are an AT&T iPhone customer still grandfathered in to an "unlimited" plan, that plan just became a little less valuable. Mikey Campbell of AppleInsider reports that AT&T has started to throttle users who use a lot of their "unlimited" bandwidth, including people who just use more than 2 GB a month. Sure, you can keep on downloading files without hitting a limit and paying extra, but the downloads start happening a lot slower. I gave up my "unlimited" plan about a year ago so that I could add tethering to my package and share my iPhone's data with my (non-3G) iPad. I never go over 4 GB of data a month anyway, so the "limit" hasn't ever been a problem for me, but your mileage may vary.
- The huge Houston-based energy company Halliburton announced that it is giving up on the BlackBerry and moving to the iPhone, according to Toronto newspaper The Globe and Mail.
- The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is also shifting from the BlackBerry to the iPhone, according to Jim Dalrymple of The Loop.
- The $5 iMovie app from Apple does a great job of editing movies on the iPad or iPhone. Now iMovie has some competition with the $5 Avid Studio app for the iPad. Leanna Lofte of iMore compares the two apps.
- Torotono attorney Ted Tjaden writes on the Slaw website about the recent LegalTech 2012 Conference that took place in New York and mentions some great iPad apps.
- Here's a great before and after picture of the world of cellphones before and after the iPhone, via Josh Helfferich.
- I suppose this has nothing to do with the iPhone or iPad, but watching Justice Sotomayor settle disputes among the Muppets on Sesame Street is awesome. (via San Francisco attorney Kevin Underhill of Lowering the Bar)
- Virginia attorney Rob Dean of WalkingOffice discusses using PDF Expert to review documents.
- Richard Acellow writes for the ABA Journal about iPhone and iPad support by law firm IT departments.
- Alan Cohen of Law Technology News writes about the advantages of attorneys upgrading an iPhone or iPad to iOS 5 — a little curious since iOS 5 has been out since October of last year, but on the other hand, I know lots of attorneys at my own firm who have still not updated yet.
- New York attorney Niki Black recommends iPad apps for attorneys for The Daily Record.
- Microsoft Office on the iPad. Sounds great, right? You can now sort of get it with the OnLive app, but Galen Gruman of InfoWorld says that it is a "train wreck," and California attorney David Sparks agrees.
- For reasons I've described before, I like having the ability to use Wi-Fi on airplanes via the GoGo service, but I think that the service is too expensive so I don't use it very often. Matt Hamblen of Computerworld writes about this and other reasons that the service still hasn't caught on much.
- I was impressed when I reviewed the new TranscriptPad app last month. Indiana attorney Bill Wilson reviews the app for his Third Apple website, and he calls it a "kick-buck iPad app."
- This guy in China realy likes Apple products. (via Bryan Chaffin of The Mac Observer.)
- And finally, that guy in China would probably love this video, a quick look at Apple products over the years compiled by Rob Beschizza of BoingBoing. I used a whole bunch of these over the years; I still remember how amazed I was when I first used the Apple QuickTake 100 my law firm had purchased to take digital photographs at a then-amazing 640x480 resolution.
