There are weather apps, and then there are weather apps; Nooly is, apparently, the latter. Nooly is so accurate, its press release claims, the app “is capable of predicting the exact minute it will rain or snow and can do so effectively, wherever you are, for every 0.4 square miles.” That’s pretty precise.
When it comes to buying a smartphone right now, there are pretty much only two choices – Android or iPhone. Yeah, you could go buy a Windows Phone or a BlackBerry if you really want to, but no one else is.
Both the iPhone and Android ecosystems are growing so fast that competitors can’t catch up. According to the latest figures from Strategy Analytics, 92% of all global smartphone shipments in Q4 of 2012 where either an iPhone or Android.
Apple’s fifth-generation iPad is expected to finally ditch the existing design and adopt a new form factor that’s said to be much like the iPad mini’s, according to a new report that has surfaced today. A physical model of the device indicates it will be significantly smaller in almost every way, with virtually no bezel down the sides of the display.
As for the iPhone 5S, that’s expected to be very similar to the iPhone 5 — as you may have guessed; while Apple’s new low-cost iPhone, which will reportedly launch some time this year, will be built with China Mobile’s 700 million customers in mind.
Google Currents 2.0, the latest edition of Google’s magazine-like news reader, has today arrived on iOS — just over a month after it launched on Android. The update brings a whole host of new features and improvements, including the edition sidebar, fast scan, and breaking stories ranked by Google News.
Samsung vice president JK Shin has confirmed that the company will be announcing the Galaxy Note 8.0 at Mobile World Congress next month, but you don’t need to wait until then to see what it’ll look like. Thanks to these pictures of the device out in the wild, we can see that the iPad mini competitor looks a lot like a giant Galaxy S III, with a traditional button setup that’s unlike other Galaxy tablets.
The first batch of Pebble smartwatches began shipping on Wednesday, nine months after the device broke Kickstarter records by securing more than $10 million in funding. Reports had suggested, however, that the accompanying Pebble iOS app would be delayed due to Apple’s approval process — but it just appeared in the App Store.
Pebble was at CES earlier this month to announce that its much-anticipated smartwatch had entered mass production and was ready to begin shipping today, January 23. The company has now begun notifying some early backers that their order is on its way, but the vast majority will have to wait a little while longer. The device has been hit by supply issues that have somewhat scuppered its rollout, and the first batch is said to include just 500 units.
Meanwhile, the Pebble app for iOS is delayed, too.
Tonido, a new service from CodeLathe, is a great way to access the music, movies, photos, and documents you have stored on your Mac or PC using another computer, or an Android or iOS device. Unlike cloud-based storage services, which require you to upload your content just to download it again, Tonido turns your computer into your storage locker and then provides other devices with direct access to it.
It’s easy to set up, and you sync up to 2GB of data without paying a penny.
Siri wasn’t always baked into iOS. It started out as a standalone iPhone app that launched in the App Store almost three years ago. Three weeks after it went live to the public, Apple showed interest. Siri was bought by Apple a few weeks later for hundreds of millions of dollars. The personal assistant was then reborn in the iPhone 4S in October 2011.
Many don’t know the fascinating history behind Siri, like the fact that it started as a research project for the U.S. Defense Department, or that Steve Jobs personally spearheaded the acquisition. Apple is lucky it swept in when it did, because Siri was almost made a default app on Android.
Apple’s iPhone continues to beat out Android as the best selling smartphone platform in the US, showing 51.2% of the market for a twelve month period which ended December 23 of 2012. According to the data released by market-analyst Kantar Worldpanel ComTech, Android has remained stable in market share since the same period of time in the previous year, at 44.8%, while Windows phone brings up third place at 2.6 percent of smartphone sales sold in that time period.
Google just announced its earnings for Q4 2012, and guess what? They made a ton of money. We’re shocked.
Actually, Q4 2012 was really great for Google. The company earned $14.4 billion in revenue, which is 36% better than what they did last year. While we tend to think of Google as an American company, only $5.99 billion of that revenue came from the U.S. while the rest was made in international markets.
There has been a lot of talk over the last few weeks about how Apple is failing. That the iPhone isn’t cool anymore, and that basically Apple is just too old and stubborn to be successful.
We won’t know until tomorrow how many iPhone 5s were sold last quarter, or if there’s any truth to the claims that Apple is stumbling, but if Verizon’s financial report is any indication, Apple’s probably doing just fine right now.
Apple hasn’t updated the Mac Pro significantly since 2010, much to the dismay of professional Mac users. That’s why there’s keen interest in the future Mac Pro: Apple has reiterated its committment to the beefy desktop powerhouse, yet it’s the only Mac to not undergo a major redesign in the last couple of years. Eager eyes look to the future of the Mac Pro line to see what’s next.
A new series of concept images by Peter Zigich have been doing the rounds today, and they are getting a lot of buzz. The images describe a Mac Pro that isn’t just significantly smaller and more power efficient than the existing Mac Pro, but that eschews Intel’s server-class CPUs in favor of custom-built A-series chips.
Darrell Etherington over at Techcrunch says that while “obviously a flight of pure fancy, ” Zigich’s concept is “one that takes serious the question of what comes next for the standalone desktop PC in a mobile-first world.”
It does nothing of the sort. Zigich’s concept isn’t just a flight of fancy, it’s nonsense. Here’s why.
Amazon has today announced that its in-app purchasing service, which is already available on the company’s Kindle Fire tablet and other Android devices, is coming to Mac, PC, and web games. This will allow developers to take advantage of Amazon’s service on those platforms to provide their customers with a new way to purchase additional content using their credit card or virtual Amazon currency.
While Amazon isn’t the first company to offer an in-app purchasing system, its service does come with some advantages that developers may not get from its rivals. One of those advantages is that their content will be available via Amazon.com.
Although Mozilla has stated that it won’t produce hardware for its upcoming Firefox OS, the company has teamed up with Spanish startup Geeksphone to offer a pair of developer devices. Called Keon and Peak, the devices are designed to provide developers with the opportunity to “tap the future of mobile” and get to grips with the platform that will soon be trying to steal marketshare from Android and iOS.
If you’re into iOS but don’t know how to turn that passion into revenue, then the latest Cult of Mac Deals offer will be just what the doctor ordered. With The Master iOS Programming Course, you’ll be able to turn your iOS passion into a new lucrative hobby – and for just $47 to boot!
HypedMusic is a brand new app for the iPhone that promises to provide you with access to millions of tracks for free. Just like Spotify or Rdio, music is streamed to your device over the Internet, but there is no subscription fee — and no fee upfront for the app itself. It also offers support for online playlists, social integration, and more.
You may have noticed that people are making a lot fuss about Research in Motion’s upcoming BlackBerry 10 devices. And so they should. BlackBerry fans have been waiting for these handsets for several years, and they have high hopes for them. Furthermore, the devices are likely to determine whether or not RIM can save itself amid increasing competition from the iPhone and Android-powered devices.
The first BB10 devices won’t get their official unveiling until later this month, but numerous handsets have already found their way out into the wild. In the video below, a leaked BlackBerry Z10 goes up against the iPhone 5 in a comparison against size and form factor, as well as features.
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In an internal video released today by web browser company, Opera, the initial programmer of the new concept showed off a beta of the new Opera browser scheduled to go live for iOS and Android in February of this year.
The video, posted on Pocket Lint, shows a browser that looks to redefine the typical mobile browsing experience, with icons instead of tabs and gestures instead of buttons. The focus is on the user and using rich web applications, like Google Maps.
The iOS lock screen is a boring place. It displays the time, any notifications you’ve received since you last unlocked your device, and a shortcut to the Camera app. But that’s it. When you compare it to Android’s lock screen, which now has support for all kinds of cool widgets, it’s clear there’s room for improvement.
One way Apple could start improving it for iOS 7 is with this awesome concept from Jean-Marc Denis.
If you’ve pre-ordered a Pebble smartwatch, the first thing you’ll want to do when it arrives is connect it to your smartphone. After all, that’s the whole idea, right? Then you’ll be pleased to know that Pebble’s official apps for Android and iOS will be available before the device arrives on your doorstep.
If you believe recent reports and predictions from analysts, Apple must make its iPhone cheaper or introduce a low-cost model if it wants to compete with Samsung going forward. The Korean company currently boasts the largest smartphone market share in the United States, and its lead is expected to increase throughout 2013. But did you know that Apple has actually sold more devices? 88 million more, in fact.
Raymond James analyst Tavis McCourt has been comparing Apple’s cumulative smartphone sales with Samsung’s, and it appears the Cupertino company’s iPhone outsold the Galaxy S and Galaxy Note lines 219 million to 131 million.
Steve Jobs used to like Larry Page and the guys at Google, until they went and made their own smartphone operating system by copying iOS. Steve Jobs was livid. He threatened “to go thermonuclear war” on Google over Android, and the relationship obviously soured.
Now that Larry Page is the CEO of Google, he’s got a lot to worry about, but Steve Jobs’ thermonuclear threats haven’t seemed to bother him. In an interview with Wired’s Steven Levy, Page was asked about competition, and Jobs’ threats of war, but rather than going on an anti-Apple rant, Page’s answer was pretty calm, cool, and collected.
Even though we’ve seen some positive news over the past few months regarding Apple’s smartphone marketshare, there’s no denying that Android is the most dominant mobile platform in the world right now.
Apple may continue to grow its marketshare of the world smartphone market for another year or so, but according to one analyst, Apple’s marketshare will peak sometime in 2013 unless Samsung does something really stupid.