Eric Slivka
Eric is the Editor-in-Chief of MacRumors and has been writing for the site since 2008.
An avid swimmer and former biophysicist, Eric has been using Apple products for over 35 years and has been interviewed for pieces by The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Reuters, BBC, CNBC, and other publications.
Eric's current primary role involves day-to-day oversight of the editorial operations at MacRumors, but he also contributes occasional news and review articles while handling various other duties related to the site's operation.
An avid swimmer and former biophysicist, Eric has been using Apple products for over 35 years and has been interviewed for pieces by The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Reuters, BBC, CNBC, and other publications.
Eric's current primary role involves day-to-day oversight of the editorial operations at MacRumors, but he also contributes occasional news and review articles while handling various other duties related to the site's operation.
Eric Slivka's Articles
'Documents To Go' for iPhone Shown at Mobile World Congress
At this week's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, The iPhone Blog was able to get a hands-on demonstration of the upcoming iPhone version of Documents To Go from DataViz. Documents To Go, which currently provides editing capabilities for Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files to a variety of mobile platforms, is planned for release on the iPhone sometime in the second quarter of this year. ...
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Android Market to Offer 24-Hour Return Policy on Apps
In the wake of recent announcements regarding upcoming mobile application stores on platforms other than the iPhone, additional details about these new stores are beginning to come to light.
Notably, Androinica reports that Google's Android Market is offering a 24-hour return policy on application purchases. App browsing is a breeze when all of the products are free to try, so how will that...
'South Park' Application Rejected From App Store
Boing Boing reports that an official South Park application, demoed and submitted to Apple in October, has been rejected for inclusion in the App Store. According to an e-mail received by Boing Boing from a member of the South Park team, the application was deemed by Apple to be "potentially offensive". "We first announced our iPhone App back in October, after we submitted the Application to...
17" Unibody MacBook Pro Orders Begin Arriving
Two MacRumors readers (123free, UFOGoldorak) have reported receiving their orders for the new 17" unibody MacBook Pro today. UFOGoldorak has also posted preliminary benchmarks for the 2.93 GHz model with 4 GB of RAM.
Image posted by MacRumors member '123free'
Originally planned for late January availability, Apple in early February informed customers of a delay that would result in...
AMBER Alert Coming Soon to iPhone
CNET reports on the upcoming release of AMBER Alert, a free iPhone application providing notifications of AMBER Alerts, which are issued throughout the United States by law enforcement agencies in response to confirmed reports of child abductions. According to the application's author, Jonathan Zdziarski, AMBER Alert will provide real-time notification of alerts, complete with photos and...
Smule Raises $3.9 Million in Venture Capital
MacDailyNews reports that Smule, creators of the popular iPhone applications Ocarina [App Store] and Zephyr [App Store], have raised $3.9 million in a round of venture capital financing led by Granite Ventures. Bessemer Venture Partners, the lead investor in Smule's first round, participated in this new round alongside existing investors Jeffrey C. Smith, co-founder and CEO of Smule, and Maples...
Nevada Casinos Watching for iPhone-Toting Card Counters
The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports that the Nevada Gaming Control Board has alerted the state's casinos to the existence of card-counting programs for the iPhone and iPod touch. Card counting is a strategy for card games mostly commonly applied to blackjack in which a player tracks the values of cards being played to determine when the cards remaining to be dealt are more likely to be in the...
MobileMe File Sharing Now Available
Apple has announced on their MobileMe news page that they have enabled file sharing via iDisk. We're pleased to announce that you can now use your MobileMe iDisk to share files with others simply and easily. Instead of attaching a large document to an email and hoping it's not too big to be received, you can place the file in your iDisk and use the new Share File command in the iDisk web app. It ...
Apple Releases Security Updates, Addresses Safari RSS Vulnerability
Apple today released several security-related updates through Software Update and Apple's Support Downloads site.
Security Update 2009-001 addresses a number of vulnerabilities detailed in the update's support document, notably including the Safari RSS vulnerability disclosed in mid-January. Multiple input validation issues exist in Safari's handling of feed: URLs. The issues allow execution of ...
Apple Retail Stores to Receive Facelift Highlighting Software?
ifoAppleStore reports that Apple will soon be revamping their retail stores to focus on software and the user experience rather than hardware. According to plans still being rolled out, hardware will become a secondary focus of the stores' marketing efforts, making way for a spotlight on applications and the digital features of Apple products.According to ifoAppleStore, visitors to the redesigned...
WhatTheFont Comes to iPhone
WhatTheFont is a popular Web-based tool to aid in identifying unknown fonts. Users can upload screenshots of text in an unknown font, and the automated tool, with a bit of input from the user to help verify that its interpretations of the characters are correct, provides a list of fonts that most closely match that shown in the image.
MyFonts has now released a free iPhone version of WhatTheFo...
'iTunes Replay' On-Demand Video Coming?
AppleInsider reports that Apple is developing an on-demand video service that would allow users to stream their purchased iTunes movies and TV shows from Apple's servers for playback on personal devices. The service, to be called "iTunes Replay", would eliminate the need for users to provide significant storage space for their libraries of purchased digital video.
In particular, devices with...
EmotiFun! Released: Apple Relaxing Policies on Emoji Enablers? [Update: Removed]
EmotiFun! [App Store], a free application whose sole purpose is to enable the use of Emoji for non-Japanese iPhone users, has appeared in the App Store. Emoji, emoticons and pictorial characters popular in the Japanese instant messaging culture, were introduced to Japanese customers as part of the iPhone 2.2 Firmware update, but have required workarounds to be enabled for non-Japanese users....
Apple Releases MobileMe Control Panel 1.3 For Windows
Apple today released MobileMe Control Panel 1.3 (for Windows). The MobileMe Control Panel 1.3 update delivers faster syncing of contacts and calendars between MobileMe and Microsoft Outlook.
With this update, contacts and calendars automatically sync whenever a change is made in Outlook, and likewise when a change is made on the web or from another device. A new tray icon also indicates...
Apple Issues Update Signaling iPhone Compatibility With AT&T's MicroCell
Late last week, Apple issued a "carrier settings" update for iPhone users in the United States. While Apple provides few details on the contents of such updates, MobileCrunch discovered several image files in the new update package that appear to signal the iPhone's compatibility with AT&T's upcoming 3G MicroCell technology. The 3G MicroCell device connects to a user's existing broadband...
Google Sync Beta Now Available for iPhone
Google today announced the release of a beta version of Google Sync for iPhone. Google Sync serves to automatically synchronize Gmail contacts and calendar entries between a user's Google account and their mobile device. Originally released last year for the Blackberry, today's beta release extends the functionality to the iPhone and Windows Mobile devices, as well as providing contacts-only...
Details of iPhone Negotiations Between Apple and China Mobile Emerge
Interfax reports on details of the lengthy negotiations between Apple and China Mobile over bringing the iPhone to China. According to their source, China Mobile president Wang Jianzhou revealed in a recent visit to the China Mobile Research Institute that talks between the two companies have broken down three times over the past year and a half.
The negotiations, which have reportedly...
17" Unibody MacBook Pro Begins Shipping
Apple has quietly updated their pages for the new 17" unibody MacBook Pro to reflect a change from accepting pre-orders to offering shipment in 7-10 business days for new orders. In addition, several international Apple online stores have added a "Now Shipping" badge to the 17" MacBook Pro ad on their front pages.
MacBook Pro ad banner from Apple's Canadian online store
The new 17" MacBook...
iTunes Plus Upgrades Now Available on a Per-Track Basis
Macworld notes that Apple has instituted a new feature that allows iTunes Store users to upgrade their music libraries to iTunes Plus tracks on either a per-track or per-album basis.
At Macworld San Francisco, Apple announced a number of changes to the iTunes Store, including the immediate removal of digital rights management (DRM) from approximately 80% of available songs and the option for...
