I don’t know about you, but I’ve never really got my head around LinkedIn. It does the connections thing very well, but I’ve never considered it as a social networks. It’s not a place I go to, you know, faff about. So do I want it on my iPad? Ummm.
Apple’s Newsstand feature wasn’t without controversy as the company rolled it out. Issues around Apple’s control of subscriptions as well as the company’s 30% cut of content sales were hotly debated last year. However, with Newsstand a hit, publishers (and Apple) are reaping $70,000 a day from it.
And, if publishing execs everywhere agree with The Economist’s CEO Andrew Rashbass, that controversy is dead and buried – and it’s other iOS digital distribution models that pose a threat to publishers.
It’s no secret that the iPad is Apple’s fastest selling product ever. That fact was made clear during the company’s recent financial call when Tim Cook compared how long it took for other Apple products to reach current iPad sales figures. What hasn’t been as clear is just how much the iPad is expanding Apple’s overall customer base.
A new NPD study, however, shows that the iPad is playing a significant role in helping Apple attract new customers. It turns out that one out of every four iPad buyers have never owned an Apple product before.
Ever think your mobile game high score was Guinness World Record worthy? Well, starting today it just might be. Although arcade and console game high scores have long been recognized by the Guinness World Records, mobile gamers have been left with screenshots, Facebook shares, and tweets as their only method of grandstanding.
Screenshot Journal was created “with iOS designers and developers in mind,” but it is useful for anyone who takes a lot of screenshots. For instance — and I’ll pick a completely random example here — tech bloggers.
The (universal) app does one thing: gather all the screenshots from your camera roll and organize them for your viewing pleasure.
Sparrow is possibly the best iPhone app I’ve purchased so far this year; it has completely replaced the built-in Mail client on my device. But it does have a couple things missing: It doesn’t yet support push notifications, and of course, it’s impossible to make it your iPhone’s default mail client.
However, a new tweak for jailbroken devices called Sparrow+ fixes both of these things.
ZeptoLab recently updated their Cut The Rope app on both Android and iOS with a new DJ Box featuring 25 vinyl-scratching levels. Om Nom has been sitting idle long enough and he’s hungry and ready to party. These additional levels should keep you busy for about an hour and then it’s back to waiting. Other features included in the new update include:
Maybe for some odd reason you decided to buy an Android phone rather than the iPhone 4S. Maybe you wanted a phone with 3D video and 16 processing cores so you could dual-boot the same crappy games in both Android and Ubuntu at the same time. I do not know your reasons, but if you’re suffering from iPhone envy there’s a new app that can transform your ugly Android device into an iOS styled phone so you can be like the rest of us at Cult of Mac.
Mobile management and security vendor Good released its quarterly device activations report. The report covers January through March and showed that the iPhone 4S was the commonly activated mobile device among Good’s business and enterprise customers followed by the iPad 2. The iPad overall (original, iPad 2, and new iPad) accounted for virtually all tablet activations.
Good’s quarterly report focused on iOS and Android device activations. The data is based on a mix of both business-owned devices and employee personal devices used in the workplace as part of a BYOD strategy.
Streamified is a social media client for iOS, giving you an all-in-one overview of all your networks, plus RSS and blog feeds from elsewhere. The aim is to simplify everything, but in testing it can become a bit overwhelming.
Earlier this week, Boston’s commuter rail system announced plans for a program that will allow riders to purchase tickets right on their iPhones and display a scannable code as proof of purchase. The model follows the success that Starbucks has had in using its iPhone app as a virtual gift card.
Not to be outdone, drugstore and pharmacy chain CVS recently added similar functionality to its CVS Pharmacy app.
Evernote is planning on giving away over $100,000 in prizes in its second annual worldwide developer competition: the Evernote Devcup. Devcup challenges software developers and designers to create awesome products that integrate with the Evernote API for desktop, mobile or the web. The competition, which opens in 4 days, will award developers with over $100,000 in prizes and give finalists the chance to present their work to the attendees at Evernote’s Trunk Conference in San Francisco.
Business and career social network LinkedIn has finally released an iPad app – or, more accurately, a universal app for both the iPad and iPhone. In designing the new app, LinkedIn scrapped the clunky and somewhat confusing user interface of its earlier releases completely and built the new version based on the usage habits of users browsing the site from their iPads. The result is a complete new and stunningly simple app with a very Apple-like feel to it.
Apple’s iOS devices have been stealing market share from portable consoles since the day the App Store opened its doors. Four years later, they have led Nintendo to report its first ever annual operating loss of $454.4 million.
Six months after its initial debut on iOS, Jetpack Joyride is still receiving some terrific updates. In fact, its latest promises to be “the biggest and most anticipated update” yet. In addition to new achievements and new stats, version 1.3 brings 15 (yes, 15!) new gadgets, including the Gravity Belt, the Freeze-O-Matic, and the Missile Jammer.
Gameloft released a teaser video for the upcoming N.O.V.A. 3 game which is rumored to be powered by Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 3. This is the third installment in the N.O.V.A. franchise, which stands for Near Orbit Vanguard Alliance, and picks up with Kal Wardin crash-landing towards Earth. Gameloft has been known for their console-quality mobile games and N.O.V.A. 3 doesn’t look to disappoint.
Tickets to Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference sold out in less than two hours this morning. WWDC is a great event for any developer to attend. The media focus around WWDC, however, always centers on the keynote that kicks of the conference Monday morning – and with good reason. That’s the only public event at the show and also the least technical part of the conference.
The keynote is always more Apple announcement and preview than it is developer content. Apple uses it to announce and preview new technologies in the next iterations of OS X and iOS. The company has also used its WWDC keynote to launch new products (like the iPhone 4 in 2010).
This is Fragile Earth, an interactive photo gallery designed to teach you a little about ecology, conservation and the natural environment.
This year’s WWDC track listing has a focus that seems evenly split between between OS X and iOS development. There’s also a fairly even amount of material for both experienced Mac and iOS developers as well as those new to developing for Apple’s platforms. One track that Apple appears to have axed from WWDC 2012, however, is the IT or enterprise technologies track.
An IT or enterprise technology track has not been a guaranteed WWDC staple, but Apple has offered several times over the past decade. The track, which typically comprises the only non-developer events at WWDC, has always offered large enterprises and IT professionals things that they rarely get from Apple – a roadmap or sense of where Apple is heading technologically as well as insights from Apple engineers and other Apple-focsed IT professionals.
A new music service by Microsoft is expected to rear its face at E3 and should give us a better look into the “Spotify-like” Zune replacement code named “Woodstock.” While we generally wouldn’t be too interested in Microsoft news, the new service is reportedly going to be cross-platform and will indeed be available for Android and iOS.
Following the announcement of the already-sold-out WWDC 2012, Apple has officially begun accepting nominations for its 2012 Apple Design Awards. Mac and iOS apps can be nominated to win the most prestigious developer awards Apple gives each year, and past winners include apps like Infinity Blade and Things.
Registered iOS developers can nominate apps today and Apple will announce the winners at WWDC in June.
Forget stunning 3D graphics and fancy gesture-based gameplay; good, old-fashioned 2D arcade fighters are still some of the most entertaining games money can buy. And Marvel vs. Capcom 2 is the latest addition to that genre on iOS. It’s one of the most popular fighting games of all time, featuring 56 legendary characters and an insane, tag-team fighting experience.
Apple has announced this morning that this year’s Worldwide Developers Conference will kick off on June 11 at San Francisco’s Moscone West (just as we expected). The five-day event will run until June 15 and will share the latest news about Apple’s iOS and OS X Mountain Lion operating systems.
Angry Birds Space, the latest title in the hugely successful Angry Birds series, has received its first update today, bringing 10 new levels, a golden “eggteroid” and more to Android and iOS. Those playing on an iPhone or iPad will also receive 20 free Space Eagles, plus one extra Space Eagle every day they play.
Groove 2 is the music player that your iOS device’s built-in Music app should have been. It really is an incredible app, and if you haven’t already downloaded it, I urge you to go and do it now. It’s packed full of incredible features that music lovers shouldn’t be without, and with its latest update, it just gets better.