Free Blog

Exactly as rumored, Apple announced the new monstrous 16GB version of the famous or better yet notorious Apple iPhone. Currently the new Apple iPhone 16GB is available through the Apple store and AT&T stores in USA. The European carriers offering the iPhone are a bit slow to catch up in active promoting - they are expected to start offering it as of tomorrow - the 6th February 2008.

The Apple iPhone is probably the single most controversial mobile phone in the industry and it’s changed the US mobile market beyond recognition. We are not going to elaborate on its features but we’ll better concentrate on its price tag right after this graphic jump.

The latest Apple iPhone 16GB will be sold for USD 500 before taxes, while the current 8GB model will be selling for the same USD 400 price (again before taxes). If you ask us, it’s simply a matter of time before Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs announces the next price cut just as he did with initial iPhone 4GB/8GB models.

As far as European carriers are concerned, the only details we have now, is that O2 UK will be selling the new 16GB model for GBP 330, which is around EUR 440 or USD 650. You probably already know that the iPhone is selling with a hefty European premium here at the Old Continent (some serious tax burden as it seems).

The other interesting announcement today is that the iPod Touch, the iPhone’s cousin, also has received a doubled storage space. The new iPod Touch 32GB will be selling at a USD 500 price tag (before taxes). The 16GB version which has been available for quite some time retains the USD 400 price, along with the 8GB model, which is still priced at USD 300.

The new Apple iPhone 16GB is already available for purchase.

Source: Mobile Phones

Novelist, daughter of a wine merchant at Retford, where she was b. She married a Captain Gore, with whom she resided mainly on the Continent, supporting her family by her voluminous writings. Between 1824 and 1862 she produced about 70 works, the most successful of which were novels of fashionable English life. Among these may be mentioned Manners of the Day (1830), Cecil, or the Adventures of a Coxcomb (1841), and The Banker’s Wife (1843). She also wrote for the stage, and composed music for songs.

Miss Tennessee 2007

Grace Gore, the Lexington resident currently wearing the tiara of Miss Tennessee, is one of 52 ladies competing tonight at the Planet Hollywood Resort and Casino in Las Vegas for the title of Miss America.

The pageant begins at 7 p.m. local time on the TLC cable channel.

I watched all four episodes of “Miss America, Reality Check” as part of my duties at Ugly Betty News.  Michael Urie, one of the stars of UB, hosted the reality show on TLC.

The premise was simple: Miss America is hopelessly out of date, the whole pageant world does not represent real women, nobody cares anymore, and this show (MARC) was an attempt to change all that.  Instead of hair and makeup that made the girls look like they were 40, new, fresh, “it” looks would be crafted for each contestant.

Some of the makeovers were stunning.  Miss Alaska basically cut off 90% of her hair.  The short cut really fit her vibrant personality.  Miss New Mexico went from that plastic look to a kind of beauty a man can’t take his eyes off of.  What they did with her, and a few of the others, was a stark change, and for the better.

Apparently, the pageant is undergoing even more changes than to superficial things.  If the broadcast tonight follows the same pattern as the reality show, gone will be the “world peace” type Q&A.  For instance, in last night’s episode of MARC, they posed a surprise question to Miss Washington about gay marriage.  She then coolly revealed that she had two daddies herself.  (Being a reality show, of course it was pre-planned, IMHO).  But, can you imagine this kind of discussion in the Miss America pageant?  There might be fireworks!

Even the choosing of the contestants themselves seems to have changed. Miss Utah is a soldier, and to be honest, the least feminine of all the contestants.  Yet, I found myself cheering for her .

One disappointing thing, Miss Tennessee, Grace Gore, might be gorgeous, but the reality show made her come off as a jackass.  I have no idea if she’s really a jackass - reality shows have a tendency to distort reality through creative editing.  She really seemed to have a problem with the very outgoing, silly, and brash Miss Alaska.  But that was probably just editing.  You can read this profile and see she’s no idiot.  But, you never know;  she may still be a jackass.

Anyway, since they are apparently trashing all the old conventions and who knows what the heck is going to end up happening tonight, are you interested enough to watch the pageant on TLC tonight?  We’ll be watching, at least.

Boy Genius Report may have gotten their hands on early specs of the upcoming touch-interface BlackBerry 9000. And according to their sources, the (iPhonesque?) 9000 has two hardware advantages over the iPhone. First, it features a 624MHz Intel XScale PXA270 processor that just edges out the iPhone’s 620MHz ARM 1173 processor (on paper). Second, the 9000 will introduce speedy HSDPA to the line (a welcomed 3G first for the BlackBerrys). Here are the rest of the specs:

- 480 x 320 resolution screen
- 1GB onboard memory
- GPS, WiFi, HSDPA
- Maybe a 3.2MP camera
- Maybe dropping in Q1 or Q2 of 2008

Looking good, but can anyone get over a loss of button-driven QWERTY?