Nicole Martinelli is a San Francisco freelance writer who heads up Cult of Mac Magazine, our weekly publication available on iTunes. You can find her on Twitter and Google+. If you're doing something new, cool and Apple-related, email her.
We’ve written about how iPads are used in schools and pilot training, but it’s fascinating to see how they are changing the plays on the basketball court.
From playbooks to bus schedules, a number of NBA teams are making sure players don’t miss a beat by using iPads, according to a detailed piece in slamonline.
“We use it for everything. We put our whole playbook and rulebook on it,” said Washington Wizards assistant coach Ryan Saunders, whose father, head coach Flip Saunders, unofficially made the team the first known NBA franchise to use iPads for team operations. “Our whole calender is mapped out. Guys can know when buses are leaving, when planes are leaving.”
Italians use the same word – filibustiere – for long-winded attempts to slow down legislative sessions, now they are using the iPad to combat boredom at work.
These pics were snapped during what was apparently an endless session about shortening trials.
Like a raven attracted to bright, shiny objects it’s hard to miss a headline like “The underground iPhone: Million-dollar jailbreaking industry thrives on legal loophole.”
The million dollar part sort of sticks in your craw.
Here’s the supporting evidence:
Early jailbreakers were inspired by rockstar-like fame, stardom, and the urge to test limits of creative ambition. Money followed in time and soon some of the jailbreaking vanguard started following money. Now iPhone jailbreaking is a multi-million dollar semi-underground business and there are legal loopholes that facilitate the growth of jailbreaking. (Emphasis ours.)
Your doctor probably loves his or her iPhone for reading news on the go as much as you do. A massive survey of U.S. doctors found that while Android use is growing in the general population, physicians prefer iPhones.
Bulletin Healthcare found that iPhone mobile consumption of its subscription-based medical news climbed 45% between June 2010 and February 2011. The growth spurt was found in its 550,000 healthcare providers.
Some Texas residents can now report crime or suspected illegal activity directly to police from their iPhones.
Called Eye on Laredo, the app was made available gratis in iTunes March 23 and deemed suitable for anyone over the age of four.
Local Sheriff Martin Cuellar is billing the app as the 21st century upgrade for the neighborhood watch program, though it sounds a little more like digital vigilante.
A registered sex offender was sentenced to two decades in prison after engaging in sexually explicit chats and exchanging photos with a 12-year-old and a 13-year old girl.
Franklin DeCapua, who was living in Rochester, New York, found the girls in Nebraska by using a popular social networking app called Whoshere on his iPhone.
The girls, who are neighbors, were using it on the iPod Touch. The trio sent each other sexy pics and chatted about meeting for a sexual encounter. DeCapua was arrested before the planned meet-up.
Toy giant Hasbro Inc. is bringing 3D to your iPhone and iPod.
For about $35, their new goggles called My3D promise to bring a new experience to your Apple devices. Available in black or white, they launch in exclusive at Target stores on April 3; the U.S. retailer has an exclusive for the goggles until June.
The design is a little more streamlined than the version we showed you back in November, but it still looks a little like a View-Master, which first brought the 3D experience to kids in 1939 and slunk off into the sunset due to declining sales in 2009.
Instead of those little plastic discs of the View-Master familiar to kids the world over, with My3D you’ll be able to download special apps from the iTunes store.
There are currently eight free apps available on iTunes, ranging from Tunnel Pilot and Shatterstorm to 360° Shark.
Hasbro promises there will be a mix of gratis and paid content available — likely to include trailers and movie snippets following the 3D film trend.
Concerned citizens in Kentucky can report “suspicious activity” to their state branch of Homeland Security through an iPhone app.
Called Eyes and Ears of Kentucky, the app is offered gratis on iTunes. The handiwork of developers NICUSA, it has been in the store since March 7. So far, it has not received enough reviews to reach an average rating. Through the app, you can report a suspicious incident or activity along with details about the alleged subjects and their vehicles.
Calling himself “Steve Jobs’ best customer,” a politician in charge of a government efficiency drive in the U.K. hopes to end the “monopoly” from companies like Microsoft, Fujitsu, BT and HP.
Ian Watmore, former head of the e-Government Unit, is now CEO of the coalition government’s Efficiency and Reform Group. He’s calling for smaller, less expensive IT projects (capping them at £100m), criticizing the previous administration’s “over-ambitious projects.”
Bono Vox reportedly handed over another iPod in the name of diplomacy, this one loaded with music by U2 for Argentina’s President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner.
U.S. President Barack Obama famously gave the Queen of England with an iPod, loaded with majesty-friendly music like “Dreamgirls” and “The King and I.”
Roqbo, a jukebox app with the inevitable social media component that debuted at SXWX, is now animating one San Francisco bar.
CTO Ketu Patel got the brainwave for it because walking over to select the right tunes on the jukebox at the bowling alley in his small California town was ruining his game mojo.
Instead of waddling around with change for the jukebox, you can buy credits or earn them by interacting with the app – confirm your email address, rate songs on the bar’s playlist, or post your picks to Facebook or Twitter and you get more DJ credits.
Roqbot runs on any internet connected computer, iPod Touch, or Roku hooked up to the locale’s speaker system and owners can choose what music plays when from 20 catalogues or create their own playlist. The app is free to download for users and available for iPhone and Android.
The app currently is getting the most traction at San Francisco SOMA watering hole Bar Basic, where the six top spinners there have been playing stuff like Lil Wayne “A Milli” and Far East Movement “Girls on the Dance Floor.”
Anyone up for a Cult of Mac meetup and DJ-off there?
A thief fleeing with an iPhone pushed a woman to her death down a flight of metro stairs in Chicago.
At rush hour on Monday, a man snatched an iPhone from a woman who was using it at Fullerton station platform in the Lincoln Park neighborhood.
As he ran off, the man knocked over Sally Katona-King, 68, on her way home from her church receptionist’s job.
Katona-King died yesterday after tumbling down the station stairs. Hospital officials believe that she suffered a cerebral hemorrhage.
“It’s a worldwide problem where iPhones are being taken, resold to fences, which are then resold for a higher price,” detective Cmdr. Gary Yamashiroya said. “It’s something that police departments across the country are trying to find solutions to.”
Police have not located the perp, though they hope video surveillance footage will help lead them to him.
The lines for the iPad 2 have been long and dragged on for weeks the launch. Many have lamented that they haven’t been able to get one, despite the wait .
For all of you iPad 2 fans outside the U.S. who waited for the new device over the weekend, here’s one unboxing from an Italian customer that underlines the reverential quality many Apple fans experience when opening a new product.
I’m not entirely sure the Vatican would approve, though the garlic and dried peppers — perfect for aglio, olio e pepperoncino, every Italian’s pinch-hit pasta dish — are a nice touch.
If you waited in line to get your iPad 2 on March 25, was it what you hoped?
The iPad 2 hits stores today in 25 countries — from Australia to Canada — and Apple fans around the world are lining up just like their U.S. counterparts for the latest edition of the device.
In Sydney, Australia, the line stretched around the block. In Liverpool, England about 20 people started camping out last night to get ready for the 5 p.m. launch today. Some are second-time buyers.
Calling the online petition signed by over 150,000 people a “calculated smear campaign,” by gay activists to remove the Exodus International app, the president of the Christian organization responded to Apple’s decision to pull it from the iTunes store.
Here’s an excerpt of what Exodus President Alan Chambers has to say about Apple’s decision:
Here is my point. It is becoming apparently clear that there is no room in this culture for diversity of thought or opinion. It goes beyond Apple having the right to discriminate. It is the fact that simply offering someone support as THEY CHOOSE to live their life through the filter of their faith rather than their sexuality is now considered not only offensive, but also dangerous. People with biblical convictions are now being labeled bigoted and homophobic for simply upholding someone’s right to self-determine how they want to live their lives. It’s astounding.
Do you think this decision is going to come back and bite Apple in the you-know-what?
As promised, here’s the statement from Apple over the removal of the Exodus International “gay cure” app.
Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr said Wednesday:
“We removed the Exodus International app from the App Store because it violates our developer guidelines by being offensive to large groups of people.” (Emphasis ours).
It’s short and sweet — but opens up a big can of worms for other groups or companies who may have apps approved that later are targeted as offensive to “large groups of people.” In the case of removing the Manhattan Declaration, a “large group” was about 6,700 online signatures, for Exodus it reached 150,000.
Apple has never re-instated an offensive app after pulling it — but I suspect there will be some backlash on this one.
Cult of Mac broke the story of the Exodus International app getting removed from the iTunes store yesterday evening. Cupertino still hasn’t opened for business yet, so we are still awaiting a statement from Apple on its policy for content in the store.
The president of Exodus International Alan Chambers warned via Twitter last night that it may be open season on other apps that draw protest.
“It’s official, the @ExodusInl App is no longer in the @AppStore. Incredibly disappointing. Watch out, it could happen to you.”
It looks like Apple has responded to the outcry over an app from Christian group Exodus International aimed at “homosexual strugglers” by removing it from iTunes.
Some 145,000 people signed an online petition demanding it be removed. (That’s the entire population of Pasadena, California, Rochester, England or Beihei, China).
The real issue: Apple has no coherent policy about what kind of content gets approved and remains in iTunes.
Apple has not yet released a statement about why it yanked the app, which had been available since February 15 and marked 4+ for containing no objectionable content.
Our obsessive checking for it just showed that poof! The Exodus International app was no more.
There’s nothing about it in Apple’s online press room, though it is likely a spokesperson will issue some kind of statement when reporters start ringing tomorrow — since they took the app out after close of business today here in California. (We’ve also put in another request for comment.)
As of this writing, Exodus’ site still has a prominent front page splash for the app and gay rights group Truth Wins Out hasn’t updated the poll with the news, either.
Does that means Apple has pulled the app, like more than 140,000 customers have asked? It’s hard to tell; Apple hasn’t issued an official statement yet. Until they do, it’s important that we keep up the pressure, so that Apple hears loud and clear that “ex-gay” therapy deserve no place in the App Store.
The hubbub over the app from Christian group Exodus International keeps growing. The petition against the app for “homosexual strugglers” has reached nearly 130,000 signatures.
Apple has still not responded and, at this writing, the free app is still in the iTunes store. The battle is also being waged in the reviews for the app – currently there are 371 five-star reviews and 836 one-star reviews.
Exodus International spoke to the Christian Post about how they hope Apple the reviews won’t shake the initial 4+ rating for their content – meaning it contains no objectionable material — and how the app has been misunderstood.
The Boston Business Journal reports that first gen iPads are “flooding” the resale market and prices are tanking as a result.
Before the Pad2 hit stores on March 11, electronics recycler Gazelle.com was offering as much as $530 for an iPad 64GB WiFi + 3G model in excellent condition with the original accessories. Today, the offering price is $328. A 32GB WiFi model in excellent condition was fetching as much as $340 prior to the release of iPad2. Today, the model is worth about $249.
A quick check of Cult of Mac’s local Craiglist, San Francisco Bay Area, shows a few of those 32GB WiFi models listed as low as $220, most in the $400-$500 range.
Does this sound right?
If you sold your iPad, did you get what you thought you would for it?
There are plenty of questionable apps available on iTunes – from the plethora of fart clones to belly jam – but here are some that Apple approved then removed because they were offensive.
What Apple approves, keeps or pulls in iTunes was on my mind over the weekend as I watched the number of signers to the online petition to remove a “gay-cure” app from Christian group Exodus International boom.
When we first wrote about the app, there were 6,700 signatures – about as many that got the much milder Manhattan Declaration pulled – there are now nearly 90,000.
An online petition to pull an app from iTunes targeted at “homosexual strugglers” has reached 20,000 signatures.
Apple has not commented publicly on whether it intends to pull the free app from Christian group Exodus International and did not return Cult of Mac’s request for comment.
Last November, Apple removed an app called the Manhattan Declaration from the iTunes store after outcry and over 7,000 signatures on an online poll that the content was an anti-gay and hate-mongering. The app makers asked to have it re-instated to no avail.
They issued the following statement: “If Apple continues to bury its head in the sand, we will hold a press conference in front of their offices featuring sexual and spiritual abuse victims of “ex-gay” programs.”
Game guru Peter Molyneux has launched a £1000 reward for the return of his stolen iPad.
Molyneux, the mind behind Dungeon Keeper, Populous and Black & White, got his iPad and passport nicked from his car in parked in Stamford Brook Road London.
