Apple, Electronics | featured news

Is the future of computers a hybrid gadget that will combine the battery life and computing heft of a laptop with the portability and ease-of-use of a tablet?

When Verizon Wireless started selling the iPhone, AT&T sounded a defiant note, saying that its customers would remain loyal. A year later, it's clear that the Verizon iPhone has crimped AT&T's stride. Verizon had little problem attracting new customers before it started selling the iPhone. In fact, it was the only wireless carrier that managed to keep up with AT&T's iPhone-fueled growth.

Apple generates more gossip than the Kardashians. There's a constantly spinning mill of rumors about Apple products, most of which turn out to be untrue. What's unusual this week is that talk has revived of a smaller iPad model, an idea company founder Steve Jobs derided publicly a year before he died.

Few products have been launched with such a blizzard of publicity as Apple Inc.'s iPhone... The iPhone is nothing more than a luxury bauble that will appeal to a few gadget freaks. In terms of its impact on the industry, the iPhone is less relevant... Apple will sell a few to its fans, but the iPhone won't make a long-term mark on the industry.

If French designer Philippe Starck is to be believed, Apple Inc... An obvious guess for Apple's new product would be the much-anticipated Apple TV. Or Starck might be helping the tech giant design its newest iteration of the iPhone, which is expected to be released later this year. Or -- brace yourselves, Apple fans -- the company could have something completely new in the works. What do you think?

By the year’s end, worldwide media tablet sales will approach 120 million. That’s according to new research from Gartner (NYSE: IT), which reports that tablets will experience a 98% increase from 2011 sales to 60 million. Not surprisingly, Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) is credited as the producer of the dominant media tablet operating system, iOS, which is “projected to account for 61.4% of worldwide media tablet sales to end users in 2012,” Gartner wrote in its release. “Despite the arrival of Microsoft-based devices to this market, and the expected international rollout of the Kindle Fire, Apple will continue to be the market leader through the forecast period.”

The U.S. government has filed an antitrust lawsuit in New York against Apple Inc. and various major book publishers. The lawsuit said the alleged conspiracy came as Apple was preparing to launch the iPad.

Apple, already the world's most valuable company, hit the $600 billion level for the first time Tuesday....

Five people in China have been charged with intentional injury after a 17-year-old sold one of his kidneys to pay for an iPad and an iPhone, the Xinhua News Agency reported.

Microsoft, struggling to dent the dominance of Apple and Google in the smartphone market, is aggressively courting app developers for its Windows Phone.