Apple‘s ailing chief executive Steve Jobs made a surprise appearance at a company event here on Wednesday to unveil a new version of the iPad that is thinner, lighter and features video cameras.

“We’ve been working on this product quite awhile and I just didn’t want to miss a great day,” said Jobs, who appeared gaunt but energetic.

The new iPad 2 features front- and rear-facing video cameras to enable video chat and is thinner than the previous version.

Internet users can now travel along the canals of Venice from the comfort of their own homes to prepare their trips, with a new website called veniceconnected.it.

The website is made up of 360-degree HD photographs snapped by a camera mounted on a boat travelling the length and breadth of Venice’s famous canals.

Apple has started production of a thinner, more powerful version of its popular iPad tablet computers, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The second-generation iPad will have more memory and a front-facing camera for capabilities such as a Face Time video-conferencing feature on Apple iPhone 4.

Cupertino, California-based Apple said that it sold nearly 15 million iPads in the eight months after the tablet computers were introduced in April of last year.

A minimalist iPad case from Jil Sander’s Spring/Summer ’2011 collection.

The beige case is made from 100% calf leather, which has been specially treated to create its delicate finish.

This iPad case has a top scotch leather grain finish and a single silver hook detail. The case is now available from Oki-Ni ($290).

The inventor of art du voyage, Louis Vuitton have released an iphone application to follow up their iconic City Guides.

This ground-breaking application, Amble, calls to all the elegant travellers out there to “see the world through the eyes of Louis Vuitton“.

Amble is a free app in which users document and share their travel adventures by creating an ‘Amble’ – a memory or journey recorded on the iPhone in photo, video, audio or notes.

The most secure wallet ever, the Dunhill Biometroc Wallet. This wallet is secured with a biometric fingerprint reader, ensuring that only you can open it

It can be linked via Bluetooth to the owner’s mobile phone – sounding an alarm if the two are separated by more than 5 metres!

This provides a brilliant warning if either the phone or wallet is stolen or misplaced.