Famed architect Daniel Libeskind touts beauty of the ‘App World’ in Apple WWDC video

Yesterday Apple kicked off its World Wide Developer Conference for 2014 (WWDC 2014), the 25th anniversary year of the confab that has grown tremendously over the years. The youngest developer in attendance at WWDC this year is 13 years old. Apple now has 9 million registered software developers.

Kick Off Video—Architect Daniel Libeskind Featured

In a series of vignettes Apple’s introduction video kicked off with a sequence of individuals colorfully discussing what a developer looks like, humorously exploring the cultural concepts and identifications of software developers. Then the video breaks away after this little parade, the music changes and suddenly moody architectural scenes are filling the screen. And you hear a voice speaking—just a voice initially. It is the voice of famed architect Daniel Libeskind.

“You can talk about a project, you can articulate it rationally but you cannot communicate architectural ideas without a drawing. I use an app called Paper by 53,” announces Daniel Libeskind, as the screen flashes to see him drawing a beautiful slender skyscraper with his finger on an iPad. “It really provides a sense of freedom, a sense of emancipation from technology. It allows you to communicate as if directly from your heart, from your soul—it’s just part of you,” he states.

01 – Architect Daniel Libeskind talking and working on Paper by 53 on an iPad about the joys of our new ‘app world’ in as seen in Apple’s WWDC 2014 introductory video. Well done Apple! (screen grab from Apple video, Copyright Apple. All rights reserved.)

Libeskind concludes: “And I think that magic is part of the app world.”

Macs Grew Past Year—Now 80 Million Strong

Mac OS X installed base is now over 80 million users worldwide. Apple has installed over 40 million copies of Mavericks, its very latest operating system. With 50 percent of the installed base using the latest operating system Mavericks has been the fastest adopted personal computer operating system in the history of PCs.

Apple introduces “Dark Mode” in OS X.

Apple has many superb new features planned for the upcoming OS X release named Yosemite, due this fall. One such killer feature is the ability to answer a phone call from your Mac and the new Continuity features planned between Apple devices. Yet, what new feature caught this author’s eye because it will add that serious professional quality to the OS X interface that has long been admired in many of the apps in the pro market—including Apples! And that is the new “Dark Mode” user interface option. I think pros are really going to like this feature and I can see every architect, viz pro and designer or artists using it instead of the brighter white default user-interface option. Way to go Apple!

To watch the whole keynote and see Libeskind in action in the video go here. He takes places less than 4 minutes into the video.