One thing I wish Apple’s Game Center did was sync game saves across devices. If I start a game on my iPad I want to be able to continue it on my iPhone if the game is available in the same form. Since it’s all tied to your iTunes account I don’t see why it isn’t possible apart from being bandwidth intensive. Perhaps thats one of the features coming in the revamped MobileMe next year? With their spunky new data center opening soon there’s no “we don’t have enough bandwidth” excuse any more.

Oh Apple when will you learn? Collections wasn’t what was missing in iBooks, affordability was. I’m never going to pay more for a digital book than I am for a paper one. It’s no wonder Kindle is still far in the lead.

It’s iPhone day!

Well iPhone reveal day because it’s WWDC this week and today is Steve’s Keynote in which lots of lovely new stuff is revealed. Stuff that could happen/I’m excited about:

1) New iPhone - The worst kept secret in the tech world since it was “found” by Gizmodo a couple months ago. Looks different to the current iPhone (unlike the 3GS to the 3G) and is apparently quite a big upgrade inside. I don’t know that I’ll upgrade but I have the option if I want to ;)

2) Nike+ - I don’t know if this’ll be part of the new iPhone or not but I think there might be some Nike+ stuff announced which I’m interested in. I think they might put the pedometer from the Nano in the iPhone but maybe they’ll bring some other stuff.

3) iPad camera - I don’t think Apple will wait to put a camera inside the iPad in the next model, I think they might release an attachment that’ll plug in the dock jack. It makes more sense since maybe only 10% of people would upgrade for a camera but maybe 50% will buy an attachment. If it’s priced right they could sell a ton. It could also be made to work with the iPod Touch since that’s lacking a camera.

4) Magic Slate - There’s a rumor circulating about some sort of Magic Slate/Trackpad thing that’s basically a wireless trackpad for Macs. I don’t really get it but I’m wondering if it’s maybe a tablet for artists or it might just be a trackpad. With the Magic Mouse only coming out last year I don’t see why Apple’d release just a trackpad, we’ll see I guess.

5) Macs - I don’t know if the Mac hardware will get a makeover but I think they might announce iLife ‘10 or ‘11 and also Safari 5 is apparently coming too.

That’s my hopes/thoughts but really nobody knows anything till Steve takes the stage and announces it himself. Wouldn’t it be awesome if the iPhone looked nothing like the one Gizmodo got?

iPad camera connector kit

Since the iPad has now launched internationally I finally got to buy the Camera Connection Kit. It’s two little adapters that plug in the bottom: one for SD cards and one is just a USB port so you can attach it direct to your camera. Apparently you can also use it to attach other things. Since my camera uses an SD card I won’t likely be using the other one so it’s a bit annoying you have to buy both. It’s £25 for both which seems a bit steep especially considering most people will only use one or the other. Why not charge £15 for each one? 

When you attach the little dongle to the iPad it brings up thumbnails of all the photos on the card. It’s pretty quick but the thumbnails are quite small and there isn’t any way to enlarge them before importing them.

It’d be nice if you could look at the photos full screen before you imported them but tapping on the photo only lets you select it and then either import either that image or delete it.

I do like that you can delete the photos from the card after importing them, it makes using the iPad as a laptop replacement on vacations much easier to sell. With the image editing app, Filterstorm, I can even do light editing on the go as well. 

One thing I’d REALLY like to see Apple do is extend the camera kit to work with the iPhone. While it works great on the iPad it could kill on the iPhone with photographers who want to see a photo on a bigger screen while out and about but don’t wanna carry the iPad about. The iPhone screen is about twice as big but I imagine it’s a crisper display. Please do this Apple.

Overall I’m happy with the kit as it allows me to go away without having to take my MacBook with me. And I can probably give Tim the other adapter to use.

I’m really digging the Wired iPad app/magazine. So far I’ve not skipped a single article, something I wouldve done in the dead tree version. Even the ads (check out the True Blood and Nissan Leaf ads if you have it) are worth looking at because they often have embedded video or multiple pictures.

If they bring out a reasonable subscription pricing model (it’s something like $10/year in the US for the print version) then I would definitely consider subscribing.

Other magazines take note: this is the future, get your arses in gear.

IT

I finally finished Stephen King’s IT! I think it’s the longest single book I’ve ever read and at 1349 pages I don’t think anything will be beating it soon. It took me nearly three weeks to get through and I read half in paperback and half on iPad and I have to say I preferred the iPad version. Either way it was a really good book, I like that with long books you end up feeling like you know the characters since the author goes into so much detail. However that makes it sadder when one of them dies :(

I don’t know that I liked the ending of IT with them all going back to their lives and forgetting about each other again. It’s poetic in a way sure but it is also slightly flawed in that if Ben and Beverly stay together then they won’t forget each other and therefore won’t forget the others. 

I’m gonna tackle The Stand next as I hear that’s good.

iPad

So not only was yesterday election day here in the UK but it was also iPad day! Can you guess which one I found more exciting?

Some initial thoughts: it’s heavier and larger than I thought it would be. I don’t know why but i was imagining it to be the same size as a Kindle but it’s actually the same size as a Kindle DX. The screen is gorgeous and photos look stunning on it, videos when encoded properly do as well. I also like that I can stream from my MacBook without having to load them on the device which is great for a spontaneous watching of Modern Family lying in bed!

Reading on it is actually better than I thought it’d be, I’ve been using iBooks to continue reading It and I didn’t have any problems after reading for an hour or so. I haven’t tried out the Kindle app yet and I don’t see why I’ll need to to be honest.

This thing is great for gaming, I was playing GodFinger this morning and really enjoying it, it’ll be excellent for RTS games I’d imagine.

I haven’t tried reading in sunlight yet (not much chance of that in the UK!) but I hear it’s a bit of an issue.

Also the UK pricing was announced for the iPad today and it’s £499 for the 32GB model which I have and I paid £526 including postage so that’s not too bad.

I typed this post entirely on my iPad and it was no bother, you’re obviously not gonna get physical keyboard speeds but with it resting on a flat surface it’s easy enough to type on.

iPad’s on it’s way

My iPad is currently winging it’s way across the continental US on it’s way to Seattle for a brief pitstop before it flys across the Atlantic into my open arms. I should hopefully have it by next weekend if it doesn’t get held up by all the flight disruption of last week. WHICH IT WONT!