UPDATE: As has been consistently reported, it appears that i was incorrect and that Apple did not, in fact, intentionally leak the new iPhone. I still find it incredibly strange that Apple would the prototype to such a young, inconsequential employee. I’d still like to know why they thought that was a good idea.

What is all this hubbub Gizmodo is reporting this morning that Apple did not leak the iPhone 4 prototype out to the public? On the contrary, I think they did and here is why.

In an admittedly great blog post this morning on Gizmodo by Joel Johnson, Giz’s editor-at-large, Johnson details why he believes Apple didn’t intentionally leak the iPhone basically because there was nothing to gain from the move. I happen to disagree, as it seems to me that Apple had much to gain from this move, and the circumstances surrounding the “lost” iPhone 4 seem ridiculous.

Much To Gain

Let’s just right off the bat acknowledge that previous Marketing Executive of the Cupertino company, John Martellaro, had admitted that Apple has intentionally leaked product specs, pictures or even given out false information as part of their PR strategy. If we look back to January, when everyone was sure that the iPad was to be called the iSlate and that it was going to cost “about $1,000″…those leaks were coming from Apple themselves. What did Apple stand to gain from these leaks? Well contrary to what Johnson has wrote, all this PR is about Social Engineering/Media buzz and that kind of buzz (not Google’s version) is good to have for a product launch 2 or 3 months away.

This is the single biggest story of the year thus far. Every tech-media blog has written about it, it has been retweeted 10′s of thousands of times and the speculation will continue for the next 2 to 3 months. This is ALL free advertising. FREE! Tell me, why that is not a desire of a company who leads the industry in how they handle and control their PR?

This Is Just The Beginning

OK. So now the public has an idea of the kind of hardware that will be in the next gen iPhone. The buzz doesn’t stop here though. Now that the hardware has been leaked, we can only speculate about the kind of software that will run on that hardware. A front-facing camera? Hello iChat with video support! What about a mobile version of Photo Booth or Aperture?

There has also been a lot of talk about how the iPad is a content consumption device and much less of a content creation device. I do believe that before the mobile revolution, Apple wasn’t about content consumption but content creation. Their product line was, and still is, mostly about content creation whether it be the hardware like high end Mac Pro’s used almost exclusively in the video editing community for their insanely powerful processors or the software of OS X that allows dragging and dropping of files almost everywhere and features such as Expose that increases work-flow by some 40%.

The point is that maybe, just maybe Apple is trying to fuel the mobile content creation market, which has barely been tapped. Devices with the kind of hardware that was in that prototype have this ability, and the excitement, for me at least, to push the buzz through until the actual unveiling.

Gray Powell, and Apple – Come On…

Gray Powell. The young 27 year old software developer who is the one who supposedly “lost” the iphone. It is absolutely ridiculous that Apple, the most secretive consumer device manufacturer on the face of this planet, would go from bolting down the iPad to tables at Apple HQ in order to prevent a leak, to giving a young, 27 year old, just another software developer at Apple, the prototype of a flagship product to freely walk around with, and obviously use enough where he brings it with him to social situations where anyone with an eye looking over his soldier could have seen that it was a different kind of iPhone.

It is absolutely ridiculous that Apple, the most secretive consumer device manufacturer on the face of this planet, would go from bolting down the iPad to tables at Apple HQ in order to prevent a leak, to giving a young, 27 year old, just another software developer at Apple, the prototype of a flagship product to freely walk around with, and obviously use enough where he brings it with him to social situations where anyone with an eye looking over his soldier could have seen that it was a different kind of iPhone.

You know, I was going to write more, but then while doing research I just stumbled across this fan page of Gray Powell and after reading the comments, I think I’ve made a good case for why Apple intentionally socially engineered this whole thing. If you can’t see how controlled this entire thing was by Apple, from the open letter to Gizmodo stating it is indeed an iPhone to this Facebook page, it just screams everything that Apple has ever tried to avoid; and that alone makes this story bogus.

P.S. – I want one.

Made this with processing:

So I have been using WordPress for, how long? Like three (3) years? It’s about time that I put together another WordPress plugin list. But this isn’t any list, here I present plugins that help save Web Developers timewith commonly asked-for website fuctionality.

Many times I have a client ask me for a specific implementation (most commonly carousels or slideshows) and instead of developing a functionality from scratch, I just grab one of these plugins and customize it a bit. I use these the most often:

NextGen Gallery

Very customizable picture gallery.

Contact Form 7

Simply the easiest AJAX powered contact form. Fully customizable.

LightBox 2

If you don’t know what a Lightbox is, then I feel sorry for you. Make your clients pictures pop, literally off the screen.

TubePress

As time goes on, more and more of your clients will also have YouTube accounts.  Why not use the click of a button to import, list, and play their YouTube videos right on their website? Tubepress is easy to use, and for additional features you can upgrade to TubePress Pro for a one time donation.

My Page Order

Learning WordPress for the tech-impaired is like a sensory overload.  Keeping track of page order by way of those little numbers in the edit-page area can be managed much easier with My Page Order. It uses a drag and drop interface to order pages.

Finally after nearly 3 months of going into the studio, Brandon and I finished the Skin Pink Album.  It wasn’t a stressful process at all, as it has been in the past when I went into the recording studio with my previous band, Paperhouse.  The recording process is a very robust emotional experience that entails frustration, love, hate and competition. It taking everything that want, and setting it in stone.

Brandon and I have been friends since mid-high school, but only recently did we start playing music together.  We each, for the most part of our friendship, had our own respective bands, and rarely, if not ever, played together.  About a year ago, upon a quick visit to Pittsburgn (where Brandon went to college at Dusquesne), we went to a Bob Dylan show and wrote our first song together named “Drink It Quick”.  An experimental country tune, I think we both realized that maybe we could make something together that was unique, yet completely accessible even to the popy-ist ears.

This experimental pop, if you will, matched our personalities perfectly, as well as our conventions in songwriting respectfully.  I am more of a pop writer.  I have never found interest in experimental sounds.  To me, anyone can sit down and make sounds that sometimes, out of pure luck, produce a song that sounds interesting or really conveys a powerful emotional response.  Now in pop music, and by pop music I mean music that makes you want to tap your foot, dance, sing out loud and is so accessible it appeals to every audience.  I do not mean music that is produced by major labels with tons of production and requires almost no intelligence to create.  Ok, off that tangent and back to pop music.  Pop music, to me, has the unique ability to touch some kind of inner part of us that appeals to everyone in some profound way and is at the same time insanely creative.  I love that. That is what I want to create, listen and ponder when it comes to music.

Brandon, on the hand, takes all of this one step further.  He is an experimentalist.  A crazy man who throughs himself into a black hole of originality, and comes out perfectly understandable to those who are willing to listen.  Yes, sometimes it comes off as abrasive.  But almost all of the time, it is deep and relatable, and makes you either laugh or cry.  And I mean these things in the best possible way.  He is by far and away, the most original and creative individual I know.  And when it comes to music, his experimental side really creates an experience to listen to.

Now when you combine the both of us together, you get our new album.  It’s a pop artist, and an experimental veteran of creativity.  Boom. Experimental Pop.

The album starts with a straight up rock-punk piece thats about devotion and the absurdity of love.  Then goes on to detail a psychedelic paranoia adventure of the anxiety of growing older, back to the timeline of love from knowing how deep it goes to experiencing its end.  The lyrics that Brandon wrote, are beautiful.  I highly recommend you listen to what its trying to say as much as how it sounds.

I couldn’t be happier with it.

Download Here