Nicole Martinelli - page 32

The urge for YouTube fame got the better of a trio of three teen crooks, whose iPod recording of an assault and robbery of another teen got them arrested.

Two 14-year-olds and a 13-year-old in Waldorf, Maryland approached a 13-year-old on a neighborhood basketball court at 5:30 pm. They reportedly tried to pick an argument with the victim, who packed up his stuff and tried to walk away from them.

The suspects attacked him, striking him on the back of his head. One of the suspects recorded the assault on his iPod while the other two stole the victim’s backpack.

If you think Apple’s dogged pursuit via a police raid of blogger Jason Chen’s was a little extreme, you’re in good company.

Uber geek and Mac user Bill Amend’s Fox Trot strip offered one explanation for Apple’s dogged pursuit of the lost iPhone.

In the Sunday strip, 10-year-old Jason Fox gets a fake ID, to use as bait for attracting tech bloggers.

But the joke’s on them and knee-jerk fan-folks, although some of us (and many of you) haven’t defended at least the superficial, brick-like looks of the lost iPhone.

Amend did say, via Twitter, that there was at least one situation where the said 12GV iPhone might come in handy…

A new iPhone app promises to help combat that up-all-night, zombie-by-day havoc jet lag brings.

Jet Lag Fighter, $1.99 on iTunes for the iPhone and iPod Touch, gives you a bunch of tools to shorten your next woozy flight hangover. (We have promo codes to give away, check our Twitter account for details).

The app offers two main strategies to attack jet lag: either sleep adjustment (getting you on schedule for the new time zone before you leave) or light therapy (telling you optimal times get out in the sunshine to lessen the lag time).

During the flight, the also app calculates ideal nap times and lengths; if there’s no light available when you need it or you skip a sleep session, the app adjusts your recovery schedule accordingly.

Virtual Aviation, which runs full-motion flight simulators in the UK, is using iPads as high-tech teacher’s assistants to train pilots.

Instead of instructors lugging around heavy cases filled with maps, charts, manuals, weather reports, flight plans and checklists every time they go into the simulator — they use iPads instead.

Using the iPad leaves busy instructors with an almost hands-free way to show would-be Airbus and Boeing pilots the ropes at Heathrow and Gatwick.

Veteran pop artist David Hockney, who has been fingerpainting daily on his iPhone, has now started sketching on an iPad.

It seems he may be ready to ditch the phone for the digital sketch pad:
“The iPad is far more subtle, in fact it really is like a drawing pad. They will sell by the million,” Hockney told The Standard. “It can be anything you want it to be. This is the nearest we have got to seeing what I would call a universal machine.

Hockney, 72, has been using Apple devices to create art since 2009, favoring the Brushes app, which is what he uses on the iPad, too.
“What makes the iPad better than the iPhone is its larger size. The iPhone was more about the relationship between the hand and the ear whereas this is all about the hand and the eye and makes for far better co-ordination.”

We’ve done a few stories on iPhone art, if you’re ready to trade the iPhone for the iPad — or not — we’d like to hear from you.

One year after his liver transplant, Steve Jobs is back to his old self. While he still struggles with low weight as a result of health issues, insiders and analysts say he’s “invigorated,”  and “fully operational” partially as a result of the iPad launch.

“Except for the fact that he’s lost a lot of weight, he’s the Steve Jobs of old,” said Tim Bajarin, who has followed Apple for more than two decades as founder of technology consulting firm Creative Strategies in Campbell, California told Bloomberg.

“At the visionary level, technology and design level, he seems to be working at the same level as he was before he was sick. If I was an investor, I’d be thrilled.”

President Obama knows how to get a laugh: say you are all thumbs when it comes to iPods, iPads and the like.

His quip — that he doesn’t know how to use iDevices or gaming platforms — got laughs at what otherwise might have been a ho-hum commencement address at Hampton University on Saturday.

“And meanwhile, you’re coming of age in a 24/7 media environment that bombards us with all kinds of content and exposes us to all kinds of arguments, some of which don’t always rank that high on the truth meter.

And with iPods and iPads; and Xboxes and PlayStations — none of which I know how to work — (laughter) — information becomes a distraction, a diversion, a form of entertainment, rather than a tool of empowerment, rather than the means of emancipation. So all of this is not only putting pressure on you; it’s putting new pressure on our country and on our democracy.”

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A charity group is hoping that if you spend a few days with a homeless person — even an animated one on your iPhone — you’ll understand the problems they face. And perhaps donate to the cause.

iHobo was developed by Depaul UK, a charity devoted to youth homelessness. With a donor base largely over age 65, the iPhone app is a way they hope will get younger people involved. Players can also donate to the charity using the free app, currently available only in the UK store.

iHobo works much like Tamagotchi: the game takes place in real time over three days. Instead of a “pet” you play with a realistic, animated homeless man that you can give a sleeping bag, food or money. Take your choice and that’s it… until you start getting push notifications on your screen updating you on the man’s status.

A 44-year-old man is in federal custody after using a social networking app to meet and have sex with a 14-year-old girl.

Moses Virgil Campbell Jr., 44, allegedly used the “iDate-Personals Dating Service for Singles of Any Sex” app on his iPhone to hook up with a teen, according to an affidavit written by FBI Special Agent Alicia M. McShane.

This is the third sex case involving minors and iPhone apps we’ve come across — after one in Canada involving Grindr and another unnamed social networking app in Phoenix.  Both Grindr and iDate are free apps and classified as “games,” require users to be 18 or over.

First quarter iPhone shipments are more than double what they were in 2009, IDC reports.

Apple now has 16.1% of the mobile market share, landing it in the top three smartphone vendors after Nokia and Research in Motion.

The bump in shipments was in part due to iPhones reaching outside North America, the report noted, adding forthcoming developments that may keep the numbers rising:  “CEO Steve Jobs announced the latest operating system update, enabling multi-tasking, folders, enhanced email, iBooks for consumers, and iAd, a mobile advertising platform, for developers. A fourth generation iPhone is expected to arrive this summer.”

The explosive growth isn’t limited to Apple — the report notes 54.7 million units shipped in the first quarter, for a 56.7% overall spurt — but it may change the minds of analysts who said the iPhone would remain a niche product and proclaimed a death watch.

Via CNET

If you don’t want to go out with a PC, there’s a new start-up determined to help you meet other Apples: Cupidtino.

The reasoning behind it?

Diehard Mac & Apple fans often have a lot in common – personalities, creative professions, a similar sense of style and aesthetics, taste, and of course a love for technology. We believe these are enough reasons for two people to meet and fall in love, and so we created the first Mac-inspired dating site to help you find other Machearts around you.

Right now, Cupidtino consists of a skeleton staff of three based in San Francisco, who say that the MacMatchmaking site should launch in June.

They also say the site will be gay-friendly, as long as you don’t bring a “Vista laptop, Windows Phone & Zune.”

We think the idea is clever — and plan to corral Cult of Mac singleton staffers to act as lab rats for the beta. In the meantime, if time you sign up, let us know!

UPDATE: CoM writers Lonnie and Eli have agreed to check it out. More to come…

The iPad is smoldering hot, especially in a professional grade microwave where it goes in pristine, then bursts into flames and comes out a charred, broken brick.

Kenny Irwin, aka dOvetastic, who zaps everything from 1960s telephones to gas masks in an industrial microwave on YouTube, ordered an iPad 3G just to fry it in a performance art piece.

In this 10-minute video, watch and flinch as he gets an iPad 3G straight from FedEx, unboxes it, registers it, then sticks it in the oven with the voice of disturbed/disturbing fanatic.  It quickly goes up in flames, then the charred carcass is taken out with what looks like a pizza oven spatula.

Campus police at the University of Illinois are testing an iPhone app that lets them keep an eye on students that puts security cam footage at their fingertips via iPhones and iPods.

They’re using an app called iRa C3, a video command center designed for security personnel and first responders that can be accessed via web interface, iPhone, or iPod touch.

Cost is based on the number of cameras and users; the campus set-up of 15 cameras covered in high-risk crime areas cost $25,000. (Or it would have: app maker Lextech lab, founded by alumnus Alex Bratton took $15,000 off the price, a parent’s group ponied up the other $10,000).

Even if you don’t jailbreak, step on or otherwise open up your iPad you can always wear the innards on your chest with the Exploded iPad tee.

This is the latest model in the Exploded Apple series — like the 128K and iPhone —  from artist Garry Booth and Dion Briggs.

Also available in a poster version, the design is printed on American Apparel tees in 100% cotton. You can snap up either one for $19, plus shipping.

Beats the heck out of the jokey iPad tees that have flooded the market so far.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCU0RcoxKxE&feature=player_embedded#!

Italy’s Justice Minister used an iPhone to cite a wiretapping law during a prime-time talk show.

Minister Angelino Alfano, best known outside Italy for a controversial immunity law meant to save the bacon of beleaguered Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, pulled out a patriotic iPhone to consult an app called Laws and Codices (Codici and Leggi).

The €19.99 euro app promises to guide users through Italy’s notoriously complicated legal system, which often makes the old quip true that “in Italy, under the law, everything is permitted, especially that which is prohibited.”

Alfano used it on the show to quote verbatim a  much-debated law on wiretapping, the talk show was about the “war over wiretaps,” which has again exploded recently.

While there’s no shortage of politicians who use Apple products — of late iPad aficionados Norway’s Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg and Russian premier Dimitri Medvedev — this may be the first time one relies on an app to get it right in public.

Via iPhoner, hat tip to  Andrea Nepori

If you are looking for a way to check your hair surreptitiously at the upcoming WWDC, behold the “MocBook” pocket mirror and card holder.

It comes from Japan, where locals love mignon tech, and is available in versions that mimic the MacBook, MacBook Pro and MacBook Air.

Cult of Mac reader Ian Chan was inspired by our recent story of a football player getting grounded after listening to his iPod during landing to pen the above comic on airplane safety.

Chan — along with everyone else who has forgotten to turn off a device on board — says:

“I might be overreacting, but perhaps you (the FAA) should worry more about your pilots making $17,000 a year and being on food stamps [warning, link to Michael Moore] than me listening to Miley Cyrus on my flight home.”

Word.

Via Ian Chan

New York Jets wide receiver Santonio Holmes created a flap on a flight from Newark to Pittsburgh by using his iPod during landing.

Authorities filed an “incident report” on Holmes — he was not formally charged with violating FAA regulations on the use of personal electronic devices (PEDs) during flight.

Holmes got off easy,  one unlucky iPhone user was detained after keeping the device in airplane mode.

Less than a month since its release, there are nearly 5,000 apps available for the iPad, most are games but there are some important early sellers in the medical and finance titles.

Distimo, a start-up that analyzes app stats, tallied some 4,870 applications for Apple’s magical tablet to date. (You can download the full report here.)

Games dominate iPad apps, with 32% of the total at 1,577 titles so far, Entertainment and books trail far behind, together they total about half as many apps with 455 and 396 titles, respectively.

Adobe Chief Technology Officer Kevin Lynch posted a brief reply about the break-up with Apple over Flash.

His post follows Steve Jobs’ lengthy public letter “Thoughts on Flash” where Apple’s CEO  said that despite a “golden era” the companies had “grown apart.”

Lynch titles his 200-word reply “Moving Forward,” and while he does say that if the companies had managed to work it out, Adobe could have provided a “terrific experience with Flash on the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch,” they’re not down with the legal terms Apple imposed on developers.

Gay hook-up app Grindr, in the hot seat after a 15-year-old Canadian teen says he was assaulted by a 54-year old met via the free app, has issued a statement about the case.

App makers Nearby Buddy Finder are standing by their terms of use and parental control in the hopes of avoiding legal problems:

“Grindr has a very strict 18 years-and-over terms of use policy that all users of our service must agree to, additionally we actively monitor for potential violations of this policy and bar anyone who violates its terms.

We voluntarily have this policy in place to help protect the safety of minors. Unfortunately, as with any Web technology, people can find ways to bypass even the most robust control mechanisms.”

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These grips made from recycled tire rubber in five different designs assure your iPad won’t slip. (Insert obligatory sanitary pad joke here).

They look cool —  throwing star design anyone? — and will make sure your device will stay firmly in hand, even in those awkward situations like the iPad puppy effect.

NinjaGrips cost $15 each and ship most places worldwide starting the first week of May.

If you want to cover your precious iPad with the LV logo, be prepared to shell out about two-thirds the cost of the device itself.

In stores next year, the Louis Vuitton case will come with a price tag of $366 compared to the $499 for the basic iPad.

Touted as the first designer iPad sleeve from a major fashion house, you have to wonder what’s taking the rest of the overpriced, logofied pack so long. By the time this one, and others, are on shelves there may be an iPad 2G already available.

Via Geeky Gadgets, GQ

A 15-year old teen is pointing the finger at social networking iPhone app Grindr for being assaulted by a 54-year-old man.

The incident happened in Vancouver, where Brent Tynan is being charged with sexual interference, invitation to sexual touching and sexual assault following an incident that took place last August. Tynan, who was arrested April 13, is expected back in court today.

Tynan met the teen through free app Grindr, which uses GPS in order to connect users to nearby gay and bisexual men.

Sure you can buy iPhone cookies and cupcakes, but artisan chocolates in the form of iPhone icons are definitely the most delectable knock-offs to date.

The original 20-piece sets of organic chocolates sold out within a week of launch, but there’s a special Mother’s Day edition “created as a tribute to modern mothers.”

The iChocolates box features four flavors of extra-dark, 100% cocoa butter chocolate, a graphic designer was called on to help give the yummy icons a true-to-life look.

That iconic goodness doesn’t come cheap, either, at $46, they cost about as much as a universal charging dock for your actual iPhone.

The Paris-based iChocolate seller says they ship worldwide and promises your iPhone chocs will arrive intact.