This week was filled with new additions, anniversaries and, unfortunately, more class action lawsuits for Apple.  Let’s start with the bad news:

Another Class Action Lawsuit for Apple

Apple is included in another class action lawsuit, this time they are named along with their American bosom buddy AT&T as defendants in the suit.  Earlier this week, a lawsuit brought on Apple and AT&T regarding an alleged illegal monopoly over American iPhone consumers was bumped up to class action status by a Northern California district judge.  Essentially this means, anyone who has ever purchased an iPhone in America is now included as a plaintiff in the suit.  Looking at the extreme popularity of the phone since it’s release this lawsuit will include millions of “plaintiffs”.  Most likely we’ll see an out of court settlement occur and considering the sheer number of plaintiffs, iPhone customers shouldn’t hold their breath waiting for any substantial compensation.  However, this suit may shed some light on the elusive terms of the exclusivity contract between Apple and AT&T which would be a nice piece of information for those who are holding out for Apple to switch carriers.

Tiny Apple Touchscreen

We were treated to photos of a new Apple component this week.  It’s a small, 1.18″ square touchscreen.  People are speculating this may be anything from a new display for the next generation nano to an ‘iWatch’-type device.  It comes from Apple.pro a website that has provided us with pictures of pre released white iPhone 4 cases and MacBook Pro unibody enclosures.  Now don’t get too excited, many times we have seen patents, images of components and heard rumors about concepts Apple is working on that never see the light of day so for now file this in the “wouldn’t it be cool if Apple made a…” file.

Shanghai Store Opens Doors

The highly anticipated opening of the new Shanghai Apple store took place earlier this week.  Among those in attendance was Apple’s VP Ron Johnson.  The store itself is a thing of beauty.  The store is similar to the New York 5th Ave store with an above ground 40 ft glass structure (this time in the form of a cylinder boasting the world’s largest curved glass panels) with a magnificent silver Apple logo hanging from the center.  Walk through the glass doors, go down a winding stair case and you’re presented with one of the largest Apple stores carrying the demo gadgets in any store.  This marks the 2nd store in all of China.  Early store patrons received a special edition Apple shirt (I want). From the videos of the store opening the energy was similar to an Apple product launch time 100.  So if you’re ever in Shanghai stop by, from the looks of it, you won’t be disappointed.

App Store Anniversary

Yesterday, July 10th, the Apple App Store celebrated it’s two year anniversary.  It’s hard to believe that just two years ago we were introduced to the electronic store that would give developers an avenue to create and disseminate an app for anything.  If you remember, the app store sold more than 1 billion app downloads within it’s inaugural year.  Now, two years, 225,000 apps and 5 billion downloads later the App Store is still going strong.  This concept, developed by Steve Jobs, has truly revolutionized the way developers reach consumers and, even more so, the way consumers use their smart phones.  To mark this anniversary a group of developers created “Appsgiving“.  To learn more about this Apple fan holiday click here.

While the buzz over the most recent class action lawsuit seems to be much lower than last week’s, the fact is, Apple is still facing two significant class action lawsuits.  Obviously these lawsuits have not distracted Apple from their daily bouts of genius, opening one of their largest retail stores and celebrating the wild success of their App Store has kept Apple on top of their game this week.

Josie is an avid tech junkie and Apple fangirl who loves writing about anything related to Web 2.0, social media, gadgets, and, of course – Apple.  You can read more of Josie’s work on her website, Geekulous and on Twitter – @geekfab.