Apple CEO Tim Cook took the stage Tuesday evening at the Wall Street Journal's D11 conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, California. Kicking off the conference, journalists Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher interviewed Apple's chief after nearly two years on the job.
Google could be releasing a touchscreen version of its Chromebook before the end of the year, according to rumors. The report from the Wall Street Journal claims that the search giant is working with an unnamed hardware manufacturer to build the notebooks, which if true would directly compete with existing Chromebook offerings from Samsung and Acer.
Throughout the month of September, the Wall Street Journal is offering free Wi-Fi across more than 1,300 hotspots in New York and another 1,000 in San Francisco. The New York hotspots blanket the entirety of high-traffic neighborhoods like Times Square, West Village, and Washington Square Park. Popular locations such as Nob Hill and Fisherman's Wharf will be covered in San Francisco.
The rumor that Amazon is working on a smartphone has been corroborated by a Wall Street Journal report. Unnamed part suppliers for the online retailer claim to have narrowed the screen size to between four and five inches diagonally, adding to details from previous leaks.
More fire is being added to the rumors of a 7-inch (or 8-inch, depending on the source) "mini" iPad. Both the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) and Bloomberg claim to have anonymous sources with "knowledge of the plans" that confirm a screen between seven and eight inches in diameter, and the component suppliers in Asia are preparing for a mass production of the device in September. The source of the screens, however, differ from more recent murmurs.
For Apple, 2011 was a momentous year in many ways. It was a record-breaking year in terms of success that saw the company surpass both Google and Microsoft to become the world's most valuable tech company. It was also the year that saw the loss of the company's co-founder and iconic CEO, Steve Jobs. The Wall Street Journal reports that eight of its top 10 most-viewed corporate stories were about either Apple, Jobs or both.
Amazon on Monday gave into Apple's demands and pulled the Kindle Store button from its iOS app (free, App Store). Following similar moves by Google, Kobo, and the WSJ, Kindle readers using version 2.8 and up will now have to purchase the books on the web and only sync them through the iPad or iPhone. Apple as of July officially allows only its own store to have a direct purchase link.
Kobo and the Wall Street Journal said Sunday they would stop offering a direct gateway to buying books or subscriptions through their iPad and iPhone apps. Both had decided to follow Apple's new iOS subscription rules barring links to something other than iTunes. Purchases for either will have to now go through the web without direct links.
Wall Street Journal publisher Les Hinton has highlighted the strong performance of paid subscriptions for News Corp's tablet editions. The number of paid subscribers is said to have quadrupled from last year, reaching a current level of 200,000, according to Hinton's comments today at a speech in Boston.
The Wall Street Journal has now made a version of its Tablet Edition app available for Android tablets. The download requires Android 2.2 and brings with it full-screen video, the ability to save articles for offline viewing, market data and more. Full sections of each day's newspaper are available through the app.
