Filed under: Holidays

January 1 is always a little strange. A quiet time after a night out, a time to take the tree down and deal with all the green light cords that started out so neatly applied and wind up a tangled maze of complexity. Time to get rid of all the holiday wrappings and hope the trash pickup is soon.

It is also a time to reflect on all things Apple and how the ecosystem of products has changed our lives in ways we sometimes forget or are barely aware of.

This morning I was in a melancholy mood and needed some music to match. I thought a good idea was for some music by Eric Ewazen, [iTunes link] who writes some pretty deep and mystical compositions. I had already bought some of his tracks from the Apple Store. In the old days, waking up on a holiday and craving some music you don't have was a lost cause.

Now I can get what is admittedly an obscure album of music, download it to my computer, put it on my Sonos system with a few clicks and sync it to my iPhone for my morning jog. Basking in the early morning Arizona light I loved hearing Ewazen's 'Hymn for the Lost and the Living' while contemplating a new year with new challenges. Apple enabled much of what I was able to do, and we take it for granted, but when you stand back from it all you can see how changed our lives are.

Some of my other favorite things from this year include MacSpeech Dictate, software that allows me to reliably dictate my emails, some longer reports, and even some of my TUAW posts. It's truly science fiction in the here and now (or is it 'hear' and now?) and some updates in 2009 made it easier to use and far more accurate.

In some more bright, shiny, and happy Apple news for this first day of 2010, Computerworld is reporting that Apple's online store took top honors for customer satisfaction in terms of the holiday shopping experience at a computer or electronics manufacturer's site.

The numbers from Michigan-based ForeSee Results showed Apple's satisfaction rate at 82%, four percentage points higher than those in 2008. The market research firm measures customer satisfaction by surveying more than 10,000 visitors to the top 40 retail Web sites as ranked by annual sales revenue.

The two closest computer and electronics sites to Apple were Newegg.com and TigerDirect.com, posting scores of 81% and 80%. Dell and HP came in at 79% and 78%, respectively, while the least satisfying shopping experience was provided by Circuit City's Web site at 73%.

While Apple led computer and electronics Web sites in terms of satisfaction, the company wasn't even in the same ballpark as Amazon.com. The online shopping giant grabbed a whopping 87% customer satisfaction rating in ForeSee's survey figures. Other companies that were ahead of Apple in the rankings were Netflix (86%) and QVC.com (83%).

The ForeSee report also notes that the biggest retailers are getting both larger and better, at the expense of smaller online retailers. The big boys on the block can offer larger discounts, free shipping and better customer support that can't be matched by the small fry.

Can't figure out what to put on the iPhone or iPod touch you got as a gift? We've got the prescription: holiday giveaways galore! Here's an app giveaway that will help you catch up on the classics while you're on the go: the $9.99 ereader Eucalyptus [iTunes link], which gives you access to over 20,000 volumes from the Project Gutenberg online library. We've got ten copies to give away to ten eager readers.

Just leave a comment on the post letting us know about your favorite classic book, and you'll be entered in the giveaway.

• Open to legal US residents of the 50 United States and the District of Columbia who are 18 and older.
• To enter leave a comment on this post letting us know your favorite classic/public domain book.
• The comment must be left before Tuesday, 12/29 at 11:59PM Eastern Daylight Time.
• You may enter only once.
• Ten winners will be selected in a random drawing.
• Prizes: each winner will receive one promotional code for Eucalyptus (ARV $9.99).
• Click Here for complete Official Rules.

The crowds in the stores and the recuperation from holiday over-indulgence got you down? We've got the prescription: holiday giveaways galore! This one is perfect for your New Year's Eve entertaining; we're giving away five copies of the $2.99 Cellar for iPhone [iTunes link], which can help you keep track of that wine you liked so much that you forgot what it was called, not to mention your own middle name and where you live. Viva la vino!

Just leave a comment on the post letting us know about your favorite wine, and you'll be entered in the giveaway.

• Open to legal US residents of the 50 United States and the District of Columbia who are 18 and older.
• To enter leave a comment on this post letting us know your favorite wine.
• The comment must be left before Monday, 12/28 at 11:59PM Eastern Daylight Time.
• You may enter only once.
• Five winners will be selected in a random drawing.
• Prizes: each winner will receive one promotional code for Cellar 2.0 (ARV $2.99)
• Click Here for complete Official Rules.

The crowds in the stores and the recuperation from holiday over-indulgence got you down? We've got the prescription: more cowbell holiday giveaways galore! There's several on tap for this weekend, and a couple of them will be App Hub exclusives, so you'll have to check there later today to see what pops up in the freebie cornucopia.

The first giveaway du jour is a valuable prize pack for any NBA basketball fan, so fire up those commenting fingers and get ready for gametime. You can enter the giveaway just by leaving a comment with the name of your favorite basketball team. One lucky reader will be going home with these items:

• Two NBA iPhone apps, the audio game tracker NBA Game Time Mobile [$9.99, iTunes link] and the live streaming video app NBA League Pass [$39.99, iTunes link] to keep you up to speed on all the action through the rest of the 2009-2010 season
• A NBA-branded gift pack including an Adidas league sweatshirt, handy backpack and other assorted b-ball swag

Our thanks to Patrick W. and the NBA for providing today's giveaway prizes. There's more to come!

• Open to legal US residents of the 50 United States and the District of Columbia who are 18 and older.
• To enter leave a comment on this post letting us know your favorite basketball team.
• The comment must be left before Monday, 12/28 at 11:59PM Eastern Daylight Time.
• You may enter only once.
• One winner will be selected in a random drawing.
• Prizes: One copy each of NBA League Pass for iPhone and NBA Game Time for iPhone; NBA branded merchandise pack (total ARV $150.00)
• Click Here for complete Official Rules.

'Tis the season to shop until your brains melt (or skip it all entirely, depending on your interpretation of the term holiday). In that spirit, for the next few weeks we'll be rounding up a dozen daily deals courtesy our friends at DealNews.com. Each afternoon tune in to TUAW for this handy summary. Keep in mind that while our posts will live on, the deals won't. Each is lovingly generated by the deal-bot every day, so get 'em while they're hot. Enjoy!

• Apple Store: [iMac] Refurbished Apple iMac 22" LED-Backlit Desktops from $999 + free shipping, more
• Shop4Tech: [Digital Camcorders] 4GB Pen DVR Digital Camcorder for $33 + free shipping
• iTunes Music Store: [iPhone / iPod Apps] Mega Man II for iPhone downloads for $1
• Best Buy: [Media Receivers] Sling Media SlingCatcher Digital Media Receiver for $100 + $7 s&h
• Swift Ink: [Printer Supplies] Swiftink.com coupons: 40% off Canon, Epson, and Brother ink
• MidnightBox: [Computer Speakers] Refurbished Logitech AudioHub Laptop Speaker for $19 + $4 s&h
• Cellular Factory: [Cell Phone Accessories] Cellular Factory Roundup: Dual Cigarette Lighter Adapter for $1 + free shipping, more
• Buy.com: [iPhone] Sunpak iCharge Case and Battery for Apple iPhone for $50 + free shipping
• B&H Photo Video: [Digital SLR Cameras] Nikon D3000 10.2MP Digital SLR Camera w/ lens for $450 + free shipping
• Sam's Club: [40" - 42" LCD TVs] Philips 42" 1080p Widescreen LCD HDTV for $598 + free shipping
• HandHeldItems: [Cell Phone Accessories] HandHeldItems.com: Up to 80% off HTC cell phone accessories + 30% off coupon
• Staples: [USB Hard Drives] Seagate Expansion 640GB Portable USB 2.0 External Hard Drive for $100 + free shipping

a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

Photo by

At this point, midday on Christmas Eve, basically all shipping deadlines have passed. If you're lucky you can find a store that has items for people on your gift list, but let's get real: You're choosing between gas station beer cozies, dancing reindeer and clearance VHS tapes. If you want to find something that will please your peeps now, I have a few ideas for you below.

* Paid upgrades. A lot of people of varying levels of geekitude are users of "freemium" services like Flickr and Evernote. They'd probably appreciate an upgrade to a paid account (or an extension of their existing paid account). This is nice because it's practically instant, and it isn't like the size or the color will be wrong. Print the email out and put it in a card, or get super creative with the presentation, and you're done.

* Online smarts. You can get a gift account for something like Lynda.com or Safari and help your nerd friend achieve +5 Intelligence in the subject of their choosing. There are a wide range of topics here, so your recipient will likely find something they enjoy.

* Software licenses. Know someone who uses the previous version of a particular application because they never got around to getting that new license? You can get a lot of software licenses online now, so buy someone you love a license for that program they love. Or encourage someone to dive into software you already love: Something like Scrivener (if they are writer-types) or TextMate (if they have been really good).

* Geek Time. If you are a consultant by trade, or just the alpha geek in your particular circle, get a card for someone and offer them a block of time with unlimited access to your brain. Or give them a certificate for a specific task: help setting up that iPod, upgrading to Snow Leopard, or implementing a backup solution. (Tip: This can be a team gift, if you know someone else got them some tech.) There are a lot of ways you can go with this one.

* Photo albums online. It always seems like someone is missing at Christmas time, so what better way to include them? Get some nice shots of all the gift opening and toss them on the photo sharing service of your choice. Get a short URL from someplace like bit.ly and customize it, then send it off in an email or give the person a call. Get extra points for having a group photo holding up a "Merry Christmas Uncle Albert!" sign.

If you have any additional ideas for last minute gifts, let's see them in the comments.

Update #1: ryemac3 has a great suggestion: vanity domain names. Get your parents the site they've always wanted at 'thewilkersons.net' and watch the fun!

As we reported last week, Apple is again rolling out their '12 Days of Christmas' promo for almost all of Europe. From December 26 to January 6 anyone with a iTunes account in the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Austria, the Netherlands, Finland, Luxembourg, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland, and Ireland can download a free song, music video, app, television show, or film from 'some of the biggest star performers' on iTunes.

To help you remember to download the daily giveaway, Apple has created a '12 Days of Christmas' iPhone app [UK iTunes link]. It uses push notifications to alert you when the new download is available and also allows you to connect to Facebook and recommend the download to your friends. So if you live in Europe, get downloading! The promo starts December 26th, but the app is available now!

Yes, it's that time of year when we empty out the TUAW swag vaults and pass the savings on. Our candidate today: He's avian, he's blue, and he might be coming to you....

Yes, it's the icon come to life who chirps his way into your heart, Ollie the Twitterrific bird. The Iconfactory's chatty quasi-mascot has been rendered into toy form (both in regular and limited-edition flocked versions) by designer David Latham and Strangekiss Art Toys, and we've got four of the wee blue birdies to give away to our lucky readers.

Leave a comment below telling us about your favorite childhood toy, and you'll be entered into the giveaway. One entry per person please! We'll ship out the birds after the first of the year, so they won't make it under the tree, but they'll keep you company for all of 2010. (Bonus geek cred to anyone who rigs their Ollie up with a USB speaker and Growl to announce incoming tweets.)

The rules:

• Open to legal US residents of the 50 United States and the District of Columbia and Canada (excluding Quebec) who are 18 and older.
• To enter leave a comment describing your favorite childhood toy.
• The comment must be left before Wednesday, December 23, 11:59PM ET.
• You may enter only once.
• Four winners will be selected in a random drawing.
• Prize: One of four Ollie dolls (regular or flocked). Doll type selected at random. ARV of prize: $19.95 regular, $26.95 flocked.
• Click Here For Official Rules.

Sunday night means it's time for our world famous talkcast, and tonight's going to be a good one. I'll be hosting the last pre-Christmas show, so I'm sure we'll fit in some last minute gift discussion, and we'll chat about the most popular posts of the past week, including Operation Chokehold, AT&T's thoughts on it, and the aftermath, our favorite free Mac apps of the year, and why iPhone users are delusional. And of course we'll have a nice panel of TUAWers on board -- I'm told Joachim Bean, Kent Pribbernow, and Steve Sande should be on the line to chat live.

It starts at 10pm Eastern / 7pm Pacific this evening right over on Talkshoe -- it's just the thing you need to have a nice enjoyable night of Apple news discussion right before the holiday season takes over later this week. See you tonight!

To participate on TalkShoe, you can use the browser-only client, the embedded Facebook app, or the classic TalkShoe Pro Java client; however, for maximum fun, you should call in. For the web UI, just click the "TalkShoe Web" button on our profile page at 10 pm Sunday. To call in on regular phone or VoIP lines (take advantange of your free cellphone weekend minutes if you like): dial (724) 444-7444 and enter our talkcast ID, 45077 -- during the call, you can request to talk by keying in *-8.

If you've got a headset or microphone handy on your Mac, you can connect via the TalkShoe 'ShoePhone' VoIP client or with the free Gizmo (now a Google product) or X-Lite SIP clients; basic instructions are here. Talk with you soon!

Ah, the virtues of email. Quick, convenient and free -- but most email greetings don't really look all that spiffy. Jumsoft comes to the rescue with some free email templates you can easily customize and get to your friends in plenty of time for the holidays.

Jumsoft makes all sorts of apps and and adds on to Keynote, Aperture, Numbers and web templates. They've offered a nice sampling of goodies for free, and I like their holiday card mail templates designed as Apple Mail stationery.

I think most users never check the stationery feature, either because they don't know it exists, or because they find the templates tacky or not relevant.

If you've never seen the templates at all, open Apple Mail, create a new message, then click on stationery in the upper right of the message window and you'll see the default catalog.

Jumsoft provides some tasteful and graphically dynamic holiday cards that are certainly worth exploring. They also offer a paid set of mail stationery that covers just about anything, and are the best I've seen offered.

It might be worthwhile to explore the Jumsoft goodies page. There are free downloads for Keynote objects, iWeb, Freeway and RapidWeaver themes, and some polished themes for Keynote. They are all samples of larger sets that Jumsoft sells, and a great introduction to the quality of their work.

And do get those greeting cards out before the 26th!

Thanks to Dick for the tip on the freebies.

We're about to hit the big holiday travel peak, and it's a great time to survey what we've seen this year for iPhone GPS apps. GPS navigation by satellite has been around a long time, but it's never been this inexpensive or desirable. There's an explosion of choices, with competitive features and falling prices. For many of our readers, facing long trips to see family and friends, getting the right GPS app is a priority.

A few words about this guide: I haven't seen or tested everything on the market, and the choices are constantly changing and updating. I've done my best to keep up and get some time on the road with each of the apps listed here. If I haven't talked about your favorite app, it's not because I don't like it, but because I can't vouch for it.

Like all of you, I have some criteria by which I judge a GPS app. My list contains the things I think are really, really, important. Your list could be different. Such is life.

Read on for my (long) list of must-haves, and for the rundown of the GPS apps themselves.

Apple has begun brodcasting a new holiday ad: 12 Apps of Xmas. Though it's not nearly as cool as past Christmas ads, it does spotlight some interesting apps, including one app (Schlage LiNK) that can light up a Christmas tree, at least when it's paired with the appropriate Z-Wave home automation module and the $12.99 monthly service plan [iTunes link].

Here's the lyrics to the new ad, so you can all sing along to the video below.

On the twelfth day of Christmas my iPhone gave to me:
12 cookies cooking
11 cards a sending
10 gifts for giving
9 songs for singing
8 bells for ringing
7 slopes for skiing
6 games for playing
5 gold rings
4 hot lattes
3 flights home
2 feet of snow
And an app that can light up the tree

Apple has thoughtfully compiled an App Store page where you can see all the apps in the TV ads, although it may not be completely up to date. If you've identified one of your favorite apps in this ad, tell us about it in the comments below.

MacUpdate, one of my favorite websites for keeping up on Macintosh software, has taken eleven applications and rolled them up into one convenient package they like to call the Holiday Bundle. This is the third year they are offering such a deal. Total price individually of all these programs is $446.77, but in the bundle you get them all for the low low price of $49.95.

But wait! There's more!

If you are one of the first 10,000 to buy this bundle you get three additional programs for free! That's right, absolutely free! All you have to do is be one of the first 10,000 to purchase! Call now!

Sorry. I have watched a lot of daytime television lately. I couldn't help myself.

Much has been made of the "bundle" concept by developers. Some are against, saying that losing money selling software isn't the soundest of business decisions, and some are for, claiming the exposure is a benefit since there's not a computer software version of the store Apple has for that phone they make.

Here are the bits of the bundle that got my attention:

Path Finder (retail: $39.95) - Virtually replaces the Finder on your Mac. Just the bits I saw in the promo video had me reaching for my Visa. If I get one program this great and then I also get all these others too? Sign me up!

DragThing (retail: $29) - Fantastic launcher-slash-Dock utility. It looks pretty flexible and with the different tabs and options I think this would save me time by the truckload (if you could measure time in truckloads).

Yep (retail: $39) - Document management. I have needed this for so long. If nothing else I should get this just so I can wrangle my Documents folder once and for all. Tags for files is an idea whose time has come.

Radio Gaga (retail: $39.99) - You can listen to and record LOADS of Internet radio stations. Did I say record? Oh yes. Quit missing shows you like, and time-shift them. This is TiVo for Internet radio. (Our own Brett Terpstra found it lovely)

Keep in mind there are seven other programs that are part of this bundle, and it seems like a pretty good deal just on these four. If you need to streamline your workflow, play a few games, or just want to keep in touch with your social networks, there's at least one program for that in the MacUpdate Holiday Promo. Pro Tip: Got a Mac friend or recent switcher you think could use the help? Get a bundle for them too!