The new iPad mini was the big topic of discussion this week, especially the starting price of $329. Is that too expensive considering that you can get some Android tablets for around $100 cheaper? As several have pointed out, including California attorney David Sparks in a well-written post, Apple's goal was not to create something cheap. Apple's goal was to create a thinner, lighter, smaller iPad, but one that still has all of the qualities of an iPad including all of the premium features. The fact that the end product is more expensive than some cheap Android tablets is irrelevant to Apple (and many consumers). Andy Ihnatko of the Chicago Sun-Times makes a similar argument. So perhaps that just leaves the question: should you get an iPad mini, especially if you already use a full-size iPad? I decided to bite the bullet and order one early this morning when they first went on sale so that I can see how it works in my law practice and provide an answer to that question. I'll let you know what I think. And now, the rest of the news of note from the past week:
- New York attorney Neil Squillante, publisher of the TechnoLawyer newsletters, has one argument for lawyers using the iPad mini that I had not thought of myself: it might be the perfect size for note-taking.
- California attorney Monica Bay, editor-in-chief of Law Technology News, talked to lots of different attorneys to get their take on the iPad mini and published this report.
- California attorney Scott Grossberg offers advice to attorneys looking to use Siri.
- Bellefield's impressive iTimeKeep app gained support for LexisNexis JurisSuite, according to this press release from Bellefield.
- South Carolina attorney Bill Latham of The Hytech Lawyer recommends iPad apps to create photos, videos and audio.
- Macworld published one if its "what you need to know" articles on the new fourth generation iPad and the iPad mini.
- Jason Snell and Dan Moren of Macworld published this hands-on report on the iPad mini.
- I suspect that many of you, like me, have been using a small handheld electronic device of some sort since the 1990s. Shaun McGill wrote an extensive article on his Lost in Mobile site about the history of these devices that led up to the iPhone. It's a good read and brought back memories of numerous devices that I have used and loved in the past, including for example my Palm III that I purchased in 1998 and the Treo 650 that I used for years before becoming an iPhone owner.
- The iPhone continues to dominate U.S. phone carriers. AT&T announced this week that it activated 4.7 million iPhones in the past quarter, which is 77% of its smartphone activations, as noted by Sam Oliver of AppleInsider.
- Sprint announced that 10% of its 32.1 million postpaid subscribers upgraded their handsets during the last quarter, and of those 3.2 million, 1.5 million got an iPhone. This data comes from a Sprint news release linked to in this report by Bryan Wolfe of AppAdvice.
- Verizon announced that it sold 6.8 million smartphones last quarter, and 3.1 million were iPhones, according to a report by Scott Moritz and Cornelius Rahn of Bloomberg.
- Apple announced its quarterly results at the end of the day yesterday, and I plan to have a full report on Monday.
- The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency announced that its 17,600 employees will start using iPhones instead of BlackBerries, according to this report by Nicola Leske of Reuters.
- Trying to figure out the name / artist for a song? Michael Gowan of TechHive compares the leading iPhone apps that do this: Shazam and SoundHound.
- If you want another take on the Apple's new product announcements from earlier this week, check out the outlandish "live blog transcript" posted by Scoopertino.
- And finally, are you still using an iPhone 4 or 4S but envious of your friends using the taller iPhone 5? The fine folks at Etch have come up with just the solution for you, and it won't cost you anything but your own time. Simply click here to get information on the iFaux 5, a project you can print out and attach to your current iPhone to make it look exactly (ahem) like an iPhone 5, complete with an extra row of icons. (via Cult of Mac)
