Apple had plenty of opportunities to improve their navigation app without Google's help. For starters, they could have made it so that the phone wouldn't lock itself when in navigation mode. I can't count the number of seconds I had to take my eyes off of the road to enter my password. Apple: people use this app while operating a vehicle that weighs thousands of pounds - I thought you were the guys that put thought into the user experience of your software. I hope for everyone's safety that this "feature" has been fixed.

And finally, I'm not trying to troll here, but I can't help but wonder how all of this would be playing out if Google had patented every trivial feature of their map and navigation software like Apple does for all of its apps. That would certainly have made this scenario a hell of a lot more interesting.

You mean an application that duplicates the functionality of a built-in app?

You really think Apple is going to allow this in the iOS store?

If Google wrote the original Maps app for iOS and Apple is going to let them publish a map app, why didn't they just publish the original app? Or, supposing that they for some reason licensed the source to Apple, why didn't they create a new app from scratch? It wouldn't have been hard and they have had plenty of time. Either they don't want to, or Apple won't let them. Apple did refuse to let them publish apps in the past, and only allowed them to publish apps after they received heavy scrutiny from the FTC. What makes you think that the leopard (or mountain lion if you prefer), has changed its spots?

Sorry I didn't mean "three hours" I meant "three miles". Being in Portland, OR I have a metric ton of coffee places within three hours of my house...

Apple spent 7.8 billion dollars on Samsung parts in 2011. Since both its Mac and iOS sales are only increasing that figure likely increased. So for Samsung even a billion dollar loss only amounts to about a 12.5% discount on all gear they sold Apple for a year.

Even if they left, they wouldn't leave. Most iOS devices use Samsung displays.

For now - it's rumored that the new iPhone (which I do hope they'll just call iPhone 5 instead of 'New iPhone') will be using an LG display (with the capacitive touch sensor bits integrated into the display tech). http://www.engadget.com/2012/08/22/lg-display-starts-volume-production-of-in-cell-touch-screens/

When Apple really, really doesn't like you - they have no qualms just shutting you out. See also the replacement of Google Maps, the removal of YouTube app pre-install, the long delay in approving Google Voice (Siri 'competitor').

Samsung's electronics division doesn't make anything that is unique enough that Apple couldn't just jump ship on.

You can press win+left or win+right to move+resize your window to half the screen. I can't remember how you do with mouse, and the mouse equivalent doesn't work on multiple screens afaik.

Spare a thought for all those poor people at Comedy Central who have to watch Fox News all day in search of comedy material for Jon Stewart.

I hope so. Reading some of the comments on The Washington Post is disturbing. There seems to be a vocal group that thinks president Obama can now just cruise to victory. That's the kind of complacency that loses elections.

If it weren't for their disqualifying views on abortion, I think Romney might well have gone for someone like Lingle.

The SIG716 is not an "assault rifle" and you won't be "mowing" anything down with it. It is a conventional semi-automatic rifle that can be legally owned just about everywhere. Also, it is in a large caliber that makes it better suited for hunting than for rapid fire.

Did you figure that out all by yourself? Why would Apple advertise to people who are already buying their crap? They're trying to sell their crap to people who aren't buying it, like every other business ever.

That's true, but it doesn't make them any less weird. They aren't funny like their Mac vs PC commercials were or impressive through subtlety like their iPod/iPhone/iPad commercials usually are. They seemed kind of pointless...almost like Microsoft commercials, except with more obviousness.

Apple customers need help for even the simplest thing on their Apple computer. Apple customers lack common sense. Apple customers don't even know what an Apple computer is.