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iPhone App Magnets To Appify Your Fridge

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If – like me – your fridge is black, then these shiny iPhone app fridge magnets from Jailbreak Collective will look very smart indeed displayed on the door.
Just 13 bucks gets you a set of these icon almost-replicas. I say almost because if you look carefully, you’ll see they’re not identical to the Apple originals. [...]

Which iPad To Buy? Get the 32GB iPad With Wi-Fi + 3G. Here’s Why.

If you’re in the market for an iPad — and you know you are, because it’s killer — you’re probably wondering which model to buy.
Naturally, you’re looking at the cheapest $499 iPad, which has Wi-Fi only, but you’re thinking you might also want 3G. After all, you can pay-as-you-go for data, and who knows when you [...]

Is Apple Selling 20K iPads an Hour?

Did you buy an iPad when Apple began pre-sales this morning? If so, you weren’t alone. Indeed, Apple may have sold 20,000 iPads per hour, leading one commentator to suggest the Cupertino, Calif. company was earning $10 million per hour on its new tablet device.
The estimate comes from Andrew Erlichson, CEO of Phanfare, a photo [...]

Reader Poll: Will You Pre-Order an iPad?

As we predicted, the iPad went on pre-order in the US this morning in the Apple store after a nail-biting world blackout.
Are you going to reserve yours today or wait? Which one are you getting? Buying your customer limit (2) at once?
Let us know the whys and wherefores of your purchasing decisions in the comments.

Stella Artois Debuts Augmented-Reality Bar Finder App (iPhone Beer-Proofing Insurance Not Included)

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Now, if you’re in the middle of a pub crawl, your reality is already pretty augmented. But if you’re just starting out, or aren’t yet wasted to the point where dropping the iPhone down a street grating is a real possibility, then finding the closest watering hole has never been easier — thanks to Belgian beer-maker Stella Artois’ just-released, free, augmented-reality bar-finder app.

I know, there’re apps like Yelp that do the same thing; but Stella’s does away with all the useless features — like finding pet stores or hospitals — and zeroes in on what you really want: the next crawl stop. Plus, it can lookup bars in other countries, just in case your next stop is, say, Petah Tikva, Israel (although my birthplace, South Africa, isn’t on the list; neither is — hello — Germany).

Sadly, this app isn’t terribly functional in either of the two cities I flit between most:

In Phoenix, it plain won’t work; apparently, the Arizona state legislature wants me to find grog the hard way — see image below — which I think probably involves a horse of some sort (though Yelp doesn’t seem to have any trouble showing me where to celebrate after a Cardinals win).

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And quite frankly, if you really need augmented reality to find a bar in San Francisco, you’ve already had too much to drink and have probably thrown up all over your iPhone, rendering it (and the app) useless.

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About the author

Eli Milchman

When he was eight, Eli Milchman came home from frolicking in the Veld one day and was given an Atari 400. Since then, his fascination with technology has made him an intrepid early adopter of whatever charming new contraption crosses his path. He calls San Francisco home, where he works as a journalist and photographer. Eli has contributed to the pages of Wired.com and BIKE Magazine, among others.

Email the author | Read more posts by Eli Milchman.

2 comments

    Oh what is the big fuckin’ deal about these things ….

    You press a button & it says: HEY, THERE’S A HARDWARE STORE OVER THERE. to whatever hardware store submitted there coordinates — for God knows *how* much money — that happens to be closest to you.

    “Augmented Reality” ….
    DOUBLE *yecccch* ….

    Cary, couldn’t agree with you more — in a majority of cases, AR hasn’t been employed very usefully within iPhone apps. There are some notable exceptions though, like Sun Seeker.

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