iPhone - page 431

I didn’t think anything could make me happier than Netflix coming to the iPad and soon iPhone, but I was wrong.

It’s just a mere mention, and there’s no promises or commitments, but Boxee has hinted at eventual expansion into Apple’s mobile universe. In Boxee’s post about payment system provider Vindicia, they mentioned their plans to move to the mobile platform:

Vindicia’s flexibility also makes it possible for us to enable payments on our website and across mobile platforms like the iPhone, Android and iPad. Boxee’s eventual expansion to these platforms will pave the way for universally accessible content no matter where a user is (we love this idea!).

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.

Hot on the heels of reports that Verizon might very well get a CDMA iPhone by September comes word from Mobilecrunch that AT&T has been tweaking its upgrade eligibility dates for the next iPhone.

Most people who purchased an iPhone 3Gs at launch were due for upgrade eligibility this November 21st, but now AT&T is pushing that date up to June 21st, 2010. Since Jobs is likely to formally announced the new iPhone at WWDC at the beginning of June, AT&T’s revised upgrade eligibility date seems like a pretty good bet for the next-gen iPhone’s official release date.

If Verizon is getting a CDMA iPhone in September, AT&T trying to get as many people to extend their contracts in the three month window after the new iPhone’s June release makes a lot of sense. They want to lock in as many existing customers as possible, before their subscribers actually have a choice. If you’re sick of AT&T’s lackluster service, you might well want to wait on taking them up on their “generous” offer to upgrade you early.

[via TUAW]

Swallow a mouthful of salt before you believe this one, but John Biggs over at Crunchgear is reporting a doozy of a rumor today: Verizon will be getting the fourth generation iPhone at the end of the summer.

According to Crunch’s tipster, advertising firm Landor Associates is working on a branding campaign for Verizon for the launch of the upcoming iPhone. Landor and Verizon have been working together since 2007, and since they primarily work in branding, whatever they’re working on is not another of Verizon’s anti-iPhone ad campaigns.

If true, this is huge news for American iPhone owners, who might finally be able to abandon AT&T for Verizon, a far more reliable (although not quite as fast) provider. Still, let’s not get our hopes up until Steve Jobs hits the stage and holds up a new, CDMA handset. We’ve all been burned too many times on this Verizon rumor before.

Apple just can’t seem to keep its hands on a prototype these days. Less than a month after Gizmodo released the first full teardown of the fourth generation iPhone, new teardown pictures of a different handset have been posted to Vietnamese forum Taoviet (link includes breakdown images, which are also mirrored at MacRumors)

The NPD claims that Android is outselling the iPhone and commands seven percent more of the US smartphone market than Apple, but now Cupertino, in a rare response, is saying “Not so fast.”

Who knew that the headphone jack on your iPhone could be so freaking functional?!

Perhaps anticipating the release of no-brainer summer blockbuster MacGruber, HMB Tec has a host of gadgets that plug right into your iPhone headphone jack and turn your device into an oscilloscope, stethoscope, thermometer, or pocket fan–whichever necessary tools your dire situation requires.

The accessories cost between $20 and $90 (not including shipping) and HMB TEC’s apps cost between $ 0.99 and $4.99.

httpvhd://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adSZdQTk0nI&feature=player_embedded

httpvhd://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6QqE3a8LzA&feature=player_embedded

[via recombu.com]

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.

It’s time for our weekly digest of tiny iPhone reviews, courtesy of iPhoneTiny.com, with some extra commentary exclusive to Cult of Mac.

This time, we review AlphaBattle, Chop Chop Runner, Compression, ESPN Pinball on iPad, Mini Golf Wacky Worlds Free, Opera Mini, Parcel Panic, and Pinball HD.

Things sure have changed for music-lovers in a big way over the last decade; I still remember balking at paying $50 for a pair of Sony earbuds not so long ago. Then the iPod ushered in the age of the portable MP3-player revolution, and things would never be the same — the earbud market exploded, and a wealth of hi-fi earbuds roared onto store walls.

The $200 Ultimate Ears 700s, with their phenomenal performance, compact, whisper-light profile and no-frills approach, could be considered the two-seater sports car in this mass of earbuds; right down to their lack of tolerance for abuse.

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

iHome’s pantheon of docks, clocks, and speakers for the iPhone and iPod are pretty hard to keep straight, but their flagship iP90 alarm clock docking station has always been one of their more visible products… and now they’ve updated it with a host of new features that make the iP90 a better buy than before.

Like its previous incarnation, the iP90 will charge and play music from the iPhone and iPod, and functions as a speaker dock, a dual alarm clock and an AM/FM radio. The new iP90’s most immediately obvious improvement, though, is a larger and more clear display, as well as improved sound quality thanks to Reson8 stereo speaker chambers as well as adjustable bass and treble.

In addition, the iP90 now has a Time Sync feature that automatically sets the time on your clock to the more trustworthy time on your iPhone or iPod. A switch for changing the clock to daylight savings time is also there, although if your phone is setting the time for you, I don’t really see the point.

Like the earlier model, the iP90 looks like a good addition to any iPhone owners bedside table. It will cost $99.

Taking their cue from start-ups like Square, Visa is planning to get in on the iPhone payment act, with a line of special iPhone cases that will allow you to make credit card purchases at retail just by waving your handset in front of a cash register.

Over at Daring Fireball, John Gruber pointed out this excellent alt-universe mock-up of what icons for non-universal iPhone apps should look like on the iPad home screen.

Apple’s always experimenting with new ways to interact with their devices, and their latest patent takes that experiment one step further into turning your iPhone into a programmable heart rate monitor.

The patent describes a design in which a series of electrodes are seamlessly embedded into the iPhone’s shell in such a way that they are not “visibly or haptically distinguishable on the device.”

You may not be able to see or feel these electrodes, but that doesn’t mean they don’t do anything: instead, they’ll constantly measure your heart rate, with the data used to do anything from measure burned calories to change your music depending on your mood to automatically discharge the battery as a “paddle shock” when your heart suddenly explodes. Win!

Over the past few days, the latest beta of the iPhone OS has afforded a treasure trove of revelations about upcoming software improvements, but few previously unknown details about the hardware of the upcoming 4G iPhone and iPod Touch.

This is news, though: two new presets in the underlying architecture of iPhone OS 4.0 tease the possibility that the next iPhone, and possibly the next iPod Touch, will gain the ability to shoot 720p video.

These are the video presets in question:

AVCaptureSessionPreset640×480
AVCaptureSessionPreset1280×720

That’s about what we expected: phones are more than capable of recording HD videos these days. Still, it’s nice to get further confirmation that the iPhone’s wimpy camera modules are about to get an industry-best upgrade.

An exciting new feature in the latest iPhone OS 4.0 beta might finally address a long standing complaint of both users and app developers: the inability to easily move non-media files between the iPhone and a computer. According to Boy Genius Report, iPhone OS 4.0’s new File Sharing feature will allow you to transfer and sync files directly between your iPhone and your computer.

All you do is plug your iPhone into iTunes, go to the Apps tab and scroll down. On the left side of the screen, you choose an app from a list of supported programs, while the right side of the screen allows you to copy files into that app’s sandbox or save them from your iPhone onto your computer.

The File Sharing feature doesn’t work yet, but it’s an exciting hint at things to come. It looks like a lot of the office and productivity suites on the iPhone OS are about to get a lot easier to use across multiple platforms.

Beta 3 of the iPhone OS 4.0 SDK has a couple of great new interface features, including the ability to close background apps through a hold-and-close method similar to the way deleting programs functions on the operating system, but I think I like the new media player widgets best.

In the latest beta, if you load the multitasking interface you see a new set of widgets that sit in the dock to control iPod playback. The widgets include three buttons for track navigation (Play/Pause, Track Back, Track Forward), a shortcut to launch the iPod application, and a software orientation lock which serves the same function as the iPad’s hardware switch. Accessing the widgets is as simple as swiping left on the dock.

Very slick, but what interests me most is the possibility of further widget sets. If third-party developers can program their own widgets to control background apps from the dock, multitasking on iPhone OS 4.0 is just going to rock. Skype widgets anyone? My guess is that’s just what Apple has in mind, and the screen orientation lock will be the one standard icon

In what might charitably be called the most toothless and limp parody this side of your dentureless grampa doing a timely Grover Cleveland impersonationation right before nap time, Ellen DeGeneres went on her talk show on Monday to poke fun at the iPhone 3Gs.

Ellen’s hilarious gag? When she wants to send a text message, she can’t do it through the “Maps” application. The punchline? The iPhone’s hard to use!

I am all for the Federal government funding and deploying a robust and relentless antitrust division. I don’t wish to go into detail or name examples here and now, but I believe the emasculation of antitrust and restraint of trade investigation and prosecution over the past 30 years has meant a great disservice to the public and to the economy. If that arm of the Justice Department gets revived under Obama it will be a good thing for the country and for the world.

With respect to antitrust claims against Apple related to either the iPhone Developer’s Agreement or the iAds program I don’t think Apple has a thing to worry about.

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 took the plunge on the Spirit jailbreak over the weekend, no need to wait for AT&T to fulfill their long ignored promise to bring data tethering to the iPhone in the United States: the MyWi App will turn your iPhone into a wireless 3G modem right now.

The app costs $10 on jailbroken iPhones and it looks pretty simple: you just launch the MyWi app, flip the “WiFi Tethering” switch to “On” and then you can connect any WiFi-capable device to your iPhone.

This would be a great way to make your iPad WiFi 3G capable while saving yourself $130 bucks. If you want to try MyWi, you can grab it now through Cydia.

[via Gadget Lab]

According to the Wall Street Journal, industry insiders are predicting that Apple will cave on the terms of the iPhone 4.0 SDK rather than be dragged into an antitrust battle over them.

As a contributor to Cult of Mac, you can probably guess that I’m an Apple fanboy. I showed up to the Apple Store at 5:45 AM on April 3rd (iPad Day for you civilians) ready to have my mind blown. Little did I know that I would soon be returning my iPad to that same Apple store.

I blame iPhone OS 4.0 and here’s why: