MacBlender

You’ve probably wondered what it takes to become a Genius at an Apple Store. I mean, they’re called Geniuses, and it’s Apple, and they only deal with Apple products, so they know them to the core, right? Well, in at least one Apple Store, not so much. MacBlogz’s Aviv went through the whole process of applying, which he has helpfully documented for us. After answering 17 out of 20 ridiculously easy technical questions correctly, he was offered the job for $17 an hour (which you can see in the letter below). Because that made him not just a Genius, but a superstar.

One of the two managers interviewing told him that it actually didn’t matter how many he was able to answer—most of the staff can’t even answer half of them, stuff like:

• What is special about the Mac Pro’s current Ram setup?
• What is Automator and what does it do?
• If a user account keeps crashing on login what do you do?
• What are 3 keyboard combinations you can boot your computer with?
• Are you familiar with OS 9?
• If a customer asks you to sync music from their iPod to computer, what do you say?
• How do you answer a customer who wants to share music with his friend via iTunes?

If you can pass that weak filter—I don’t even own a Mac (unless you count my recently built Hackintosh) and I can answer five of those—you’ll be welcomed into a loving environment that is ” ‘very strict’ with its employees and what they do with their free time.” Lovely, but Aviv turned the offer down.

It just shows you that Geniuses are no different from any corporate tech support group, be it Geek Squad, Firedog or Crapkitty Battalion: Some of them really know their shit, but almost (or just) as many don’t know the command key from that gaping, screaming hole in Steve Ballmer’s face. [Macblogz via Valleywag, Image via presta]

From: Gizmodo: Apple

This week marked the start of more interesting times for mobile apps. You may have heard, even, that Android is here—on T-Mobile’s G1. Perhaps it wasn’t a coincidence that it was a relatively quiet week in the App Store, as devs watch a new challenger take the stage (and power on their iPhone lightsabers). But as always, gems abound.

I’m really excited for the Android Market. It has a lot of potential to revolutionize the way apps work with phones. We’ll be diving into this in-depth early next week, so keep a watch out. For now, on with the competition:

Lightsaber Unleashed: It was here, it was gone, then it was back again (briefly), and now it’s actually here for good. What was first one man’s cheesy lightsaber app has now become an official part of the Lucas juggernaut—now featuring heavy branding for the Force Unleashed! Whoo! As you can see it’s fun to swing around. Free.

Pool Sharks Lite: Shooting up to the top of the free apps most popular list was Pool Shark Lite - a free 3D pool game. Because you can’t always be in a bar.

TokyoFlash Watch: Publicize your geeky timekeeping tendencies a little more discreetly with this clock replacement that tells time in the various abstract ways made famous by TokyoFlash. Free.

PanoLab: And hey—what’s this? New functionalities for your phone? PanoLab stitches together your iPhone cameraphotos into panoramas. Free.

ResistorCode: And another useful calculator: this one for decoding the various colors of resistors to find the resistance in ohms. For you DIY folks. Free.

And this week’s iPhone app coverage on Giz:

•A little something called Android is here. App Store, look out.

•Adding to the growing backlash against Apple’s controversial app approval process was news that rejection notices sent to developers will now be done so under the gag order of an NDA.

•Making the open ridicule of rejections notices like the one sent to MailWrangler, for “Leading to User Confusion” a thing of the past, theoretically.

•And in related news, Apple can’t stop kicking the poor Podcaster folks when they’re down—this time, shutting down their ad-hoc distribution workaround for non-App Store installs.

•We also heard firsthand from developers of Android and iPhone, comparing the pros and cons of both platforms in Matt’s fine feature.

•Hands-on: Japanese “Boob Engineer’s” breast-fondling Web app

•Konami Code 2.0: Does Imagine Poker have a cheatcode based on shaking the Phone at the opportune time?

•iPhone Software 2.2 Beta 1 was seeded to developers.

This list is in no way definitive. If you’ve spotted a great app that hit the store this week, give us a heads-up or, better yet, your firsthand impressions in the comments. And for even more apps: see our previous weekly roundups here, and check out our original iPhone App Review Marathon. Have a good weekend everybody.

From: Gizmodo: Apple

Softalk has announced the release of the first spreadsheet application for the iPhone. The product, simply named “Spreadsheet”, features over 50 functions with the ability to email spreadsheets created on the iPhone to a mailbox for subsequent opening in Microsoft Excel 2003 or above.

Softalk CEO Simon Bates said: “The iPhone’s popularity is growing rapidly […]

From: iPhone News, Reviews, Accessories and more

Lacquer has expanded its Conduit platform, which now has software to support the Pixel Bender technology in Flash Player 10. Pixel Bender lets developers bypass Flash’s normal effects and blending systems, for the sake of implementing their own shaders. Shaders are also said to enable use of multicore processors, whether for rendering graphics or running other Flash-based processes….

From: MacNN | The Macintosh News Network

Zest Prod has developed a new photo app designed to take advantage of the iPhone’s multi-touch capabilities. Photoboard allows users to pick a variety of images to display in the app, and then solely through the use of gestures, manipulate their content. Photos can be resized by pinching, moved around by dragging, or organized by holding a finger on the screen, which bring up a circular menu. The…

From: MacNN | The Macintosh News Network

A new rumor claims that Apple's long-rumored new MacBooks are making the rounds among NVIDIA's workers as evidence of its hardware prowess, and adds that the public itself might not have to wait much longer for its own turn.

From: AppleInsider

The Apple part of the iPhone battery class-action lawsuit has been dismissed by U.S. District Judge Matthew F. Kennelly, who looked at the claims brought by Jose Trujillo and deemed them as dumbtastically stoopeed. Not exactly in those words, but I know that’s exactly what he meant with his words:

Apple disclosed on the outside of the iPhone package that the “battery has limited recharge cycles and may eventually need to be replaced by Apple service provider.” Under the circumstances, no reasonable jury could find that deception occurred.

However, AT&T is still a defendant in the case. Judge Kennelly denied the company’s motion to compel arbitration, saying that at the time of purchase Trujillo didn’t have access to the terms of service documentation. The next hearing will be on September 29. [Bloomberg]

From: Gizmodo: Apple

30GB HD, 2-3 hr Battery, Airport, Tiger, Power-Seller! Current Price: $497.5 Bids() End Date:06-Oct-2008 16:33:53 GMT

From: Macbook For Sale

From an alleged leaked shot of iPhone firmware 2.2, we see that Apple has tweaked the browser ever so slightly (old version left, new version right). The Google search magnifying glass icon is gone in favor of a separate Google search bar (similar to Safari desktop). Technically it won’t save any button presses over the old version, but Luddites will be less likely to type “Google.com” into the address bar with every search. The price for this fancy design? The refresh button is shrunk into the address bar. [iPhone Atlas via Wired]

From: Gizmodo: Apple

Oh, what’s that? I didn’t here what you said. Hey check this out (3:30)… [Colbert Nation]

From: Gizmodo: Apple