[BlackBerry Guy]

Rene and iMore got some recognition by the Canadian Press. Congrats and great job!


Apple mini iPad secrets spun by Canadian sleuth websites iMore and Loopinsight

Apple mini iPad secrets spun by Canadian sleuth websites iMore and Loopinsight

Bloggers Rene Ritchie and Jim Dalrymple have impressive records in revealing details of Apple products

On Tuesday, the worlds attention will turn to California, where Apple is set to make a product announcement that will undoubtedly flood Facebook and Twitter with countless posts lusting after whats expected to be a smaller, more mobile 20-centimetre iPad.

Apples product launches are closely guarded secrets but leaks are inevitable.

In the high-stakes world of Apple rumour-mongering, two Canadian bloggers have built sterling reputations for accurately revealing details about new iPhones and iPads well before the company does.

It was five months ago that Montreal-based Rene Ritchie forecasted that Apple would be releasing its new iPad mini sometime this month for between $200 to $250. Whether he was right will soon be revealed, but past posts on his iMore.com site accurately reported details about the iPhone 4S, the iPhone 5 and the new iPad before Apple made its official announcements.

So whats his secret? Ritchie says he has various sources within Apple and at other manufacturing, retail and mobile carrier companies that feed him information from time to time.

Im just lucky enough that I get enough pieces that I can start to put things together, says Ritchie, 40, who notes that he sweats every prediction he makes.

Im really, really careful, I consider our readers attention really valuable and I dont want to just throw everything at the wall and hope something sticks.

Im very patient, I try to wait until Im really sure of something until it seems I dont want to say confirmed, because nothing is ever confirmed until Apple puts it up on stage but I just take my time.

Other elite tech bloggers have come to trust Ritchie given his spot-on coverage over the past year or so, says Jim Dalrymple, another Canadian whos looked to for Apple scoops.

Rene in the last year has nailed the last two or three events that Apple has had, so its been interesting to watch him, says Dalrymple, who co-runs the website The Loop out of his home office in Bedford, N.S., just outside Halifax.

Dalrymple, a tech industry veteran who wrote for Macworld and MacCentral before starting Loopinsight.com, has his own style when it comes to breaking Apple news, mostly choosing to confirm the reports of other bloggers as he did with Ritchies early reporting on the iPhone 5 in July.

Hell often post a short excerpt of another outlets report and add a simple yep.

Tech observers have come to consider a Dalrymple yep as reliable as official confirmation from Apple itself.

I have been around for so long doing this, I really dont need to be the first to report something, says Dalrymple, 45, who notes he hasnt been wrong with a yep yet.

I get as much satisfaction out of saying yep as I used to writing the big, long stories. I know that Im right and people I guess maybe its the years Ive been doing it or the fact Ive been right so often trust me.

As soon as a rumour goes up on the web, my Twitter feed is full of people asking for a yep. Its kind of grown into its own thing now.

Although its widely thought a smaller iPad will highlight Tuesdays event, Dalrymple says theres always room for surprises.

Theres some things only Apple knows, theres no doubt about that, he says.

Tim Cook, the engineers at Apple and the executives there, theyre the only ones that know for absolute certain whats coming.

Ritchie has been wrong with some details in the past he originally posted that the iPhone 5 and forthcoming iPad would be revealed at the same event but says its sometimes difficult to know whether his reporting really was incorrect or whether Apple just made last-minute changes.

With Apple (making predictions) is particularly difficult because theyre an incredibly agile and nimble company and they can make decisions very late in a device cycle, he says.

So if I report something in July thats going to happen in September its quite possible that it will actually change. The physical aspects of the device have to be locked down early enough for them to manufacture it but anything else like the name, the price, all those things can be decided literally at the last minute.

So Im confident thats what the details were when I heard it but Im not confident that they wont change it.

Apples event is scheduled for Tuesday at 10 a.m. PT.

Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

[Laura Knotek]

Kudos to you guys and to iMore.

[Just_Me_D]

Congratulations to the iMore family. Job well done!

[rdiddy_25]

Much respect iMore!!