Well, who doesn’t like a little Michael Jackson, dancing babies and quick, snappy edits in a smartphone commercial?
But does anyone think Apple’s legal department won’t soon notice the uncanny similarities between the UI for LG’s Arena and Apple’s own iPhone?
It’s no secret that Apple loves LG displays, but whether that love extends to a willingness to overlook LG’s ripping-off the iPhone’s UI remains to be seen. On the other hand, it’s possible LG licensed the UI. Neither Apple nor LG representatives were available for comment at press time.
Text strings in the latest beta release of iPhone 3.0 software indicate support for the 802.11n wireless standard, according to several reports over the weekend.
In addition to representing an upgrade to the WiFi capabilities of yet-to-be released versions of iPhone and iPod Touch, support for Broadcom BCM4329 chips — through which 802.11n would be accessed — could improve battery life on Apple’s mobile devices. iThe iPhone and iPod Touch currently only support slower 802.11b/g networks.
Perhaps the more interesting implication of details emerging in the 3.0 beta is the promise of video recording and upload capability, a feature some have derided the iPhone for lacking in its initial releases. A recently discovered video upload screen indicates a new version of the iPhone is meant to be able to upload video to MobileMe accounts, which would no doubt come as a welcome feature upgrade for users of Apple’s web services product.
It’s possible video uploading would be supported to any server, and that Apple will also be releasing iPhone software to edit video on the fly, but even if official support for video is limited, whole new avenues for 3rd party development will open up as a result of video on the iPhone.
As others in the smartphone market struggle to catch up to Apple’s product and services offerings, it appears Steve Jobs may have been right when he said his company is already years ahead of the competition.
Sony has added what the company calls “USB 1-wire” connectivity to select models of its 2009 car audio line up, enabling direct digital connectivity for USB powered audio devices such as iPods and iPhones, as well as other MP3 players and even USB thumb drives.
If you’ve ever been frustrated by the sketchy signal provided by radio frequency car adapters such as iTrip, or been dissatisfied by the sound quality of AUX in connectivity trying to get your iPod playing in the car, Sony’s Xplod line of head units is well worth a look and listen.
“We’ve needed to do this as an industry for some time,” explained Mike Kahn, Sony director of marketing for mobile electronics at a media meet and greet in San Francisco Wednesday night. Direct digital connection of the external device to the auto sound system is quickly becoming a standard feature for manufacturers such as Sony, Alpine and Pioneer, which is no surprise given the boost in sound quality over cobbled together analog connectivity solutions of the recent past.
Sony’s gear is very price competitive with its major rivals and its USB 1-wire technology doesn’t require any special cabling – you can use your standard iPod USB cable to plug right into the head unit, browse the device’s library and select songs right from the auto unit’s controls.
USA Today ran an article Wednesday saying the Skype for iPhone app is “raising concern among public-policymakers and consumer advocates,” who are irked that Skype calls are limited to WiFi and not permitted to access cellular or 3G networks.
I’m reminded of nothing so much as Lewis CK’s appearance on Conan O’Brien’s show, in which he pointed out how amazing things are in today’s world, and yet no one is happy.
Are Apple and AT&T actually “trying to handicap” Skype, as implied by Chris Murray, senior counsel to Consumers Union? Is there an “urgent need” for Congress and the Federal Communications Commission to revisit the rules and regulations for wireless voice services?
I’m no fan of Apple’s “walled garden” approach to the AppStore, nor do I love the fact that AT&T is my only service provider option for using iPhone in the US.
But in just over 24 hours of playing with Skype on my iPhone, I feel confident in saying Skype doesn’t need congress’ help in its competition with AT&T. If people will have a little bit of patience, Skype and other VoIP service providers will soon be providing them with communications services and calling options they couldn’t have imagined just months ago.
The cat is really out of the bag now, so just find a good WiFi connection and enjoy your free Skype calling. It’s only going to get better from here on out.
It might have helped a few folks if Debt Snowball Pro, a new app coming to the iTunes app store, had been released sooner, but who can really argue with the timeliness of a tool to help eliminate debt using the “debt snowball” method endorsed by finance guru Dave Ramsey and other professionals?
You can choose to pay off debts with higher interest rates first (to save money), or those with the lowest balances (for small, motivating successes along the way). Debt Snowball Pro shows you just how much money you’ll save by choosing these methods over making minimum payments. And it keeps you up do date on how much interest you’ve saved, when your payoff dates are, and when you’ll be debt-free.
Due to be priced at $2.99, Debt Snowball Pro is similar to the Parallel Focus app Pay Off Debt (opens iTunes), which it follows into the AppStore by just two weeks.
What it is: A simplified air-traffic control game. You drag paths for aircraft to direct them to designated landing zones. The number of aircraft on-screen rapidly increases, making it harder to avoid a collision. One collision and the game ends.
Why it’s good: It’s an original concept, perfectly suited to the iPhone touchscreen, and utterly compelling. At first, it seems like the game will be a breeze, but the difficulty curve is steep, and after only 20 or so landings, you’ll find the screen full of aircraft to deal with. The game also has a great sense of humor in its presentation (including twee aircraft ‘muzak’), and, for those moments where it all gets a bit much, a handy pause button. Like Tetris, it’s a simple game that you’ll return to regularly.
Here’s another next-gen iPhone concept worth pondering: Can Apple pull off adding features and functionality to the iPhone while making it even slimmer and sexier than it is today?
We’ll know soon enough, as anticipation for a June or July release event continues to build. More concepts ought to be popping up like spring flowers, too and the big design question seems to be whether any changes will be subtle, or will they push the device in an entirely new direction?
Let us know where you think Apple’s headed in comments.
If you travel frequently in the US and need to book a cab, an iPhone app may be a piece of wizardry worth downloading.
Called “Taxi Magic” the app from RideCharge Inc. allows travelers to book and pay for cabs via the iPhone.
The “magic?” While a number of apps will help you find a cab telephone numbers, this one connects to taxi computer dispatch systems directly, without making a phone call, and gives you live updates on the arrival of your cab. Plus you can pay with a credit card input on the system.
The hat trick is probably most impressive for business travelers, though. While the app is free on iTunes, the service charge by operating company RideCharge is $1.50 per booking if you pay via credit card.
Currently available for: Atlanta, Austin, Baltimore, Boston, Charlotte, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Kansas City, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Nashville, Orange Co., Phoenix, Portland, Sacramento, San Antonio, San Francisco, San Jose/Silicon Valley, Seattle, St. Louis, Washington DC Area.
Skype for iPhone is due to be announced at CTIA 2009 on Tuesday morning.
The world’s busiest long distance service provider and its new partner Apple helpfully made the free Skype for iPhone app available for download via the iTunes AppStore (opens iTunes) Monday night, and a quick lap around the track implies quite an upgrade to iPhone’s voice functionality.
Simply logging in with a user’s current Skype username and password automatically populates the mobile apps’ database with contacts, recent call history, and account information including avatar image, profile information, Skype Credit account balances, Online number information and voicemail history.
Making a call to a Skype friend is as easy and intuitive as it is from the familiar PC interface, and the sound quality on a connected call is equal to that using a headset on a PC, especially when using a headset with mic attached to the iPhone or iPod Touch.
It should be noted that Skype voice calls are dependent on the initiating caller having a strong and stable WiFi connection to place and maintain the call. Weak or intermittent WiFi connectivity will downgrade call quality and easily lead to dropped calls, and Skype will not in any way access or rely on the cell network to complete or maintain voice calls.
Another issue some may have yet to consider in championing the arrival of Skype as a watershed in mobile VoIP calling is the limitation imposed by Apple’s mobile OS that prevents more than one app from running at a time.
Should an iPhone user be engaged in a Skype call when a normal cell phone call comes in, the WiFi connection will be broken, and the Skype call automatically dropped as the cell call rings in. Absent the ability to place an iPhone in “Do Not Disturb” mode, this will remain a persistent potential problem for those relying on the iPhone’s ability to deliver voice over WiFi.
Otherwise, at first blush, Skype appears to have delivered a seamless integration of its PC-based application for making calls over IP networks.
More details will come to light as hundreds of millions of Skype users begin to make and receive calls using iPhone and iPod Touch.
It will be interesting, as well, to see how the introduction of iPhone 3.0 operating software, due this coming summer with its promise of push notification may affect Skype for iPhone’s usability.
Skype’s much-anticipated VoIP application for iPhone and iPod Touch will launch in the iTunes AppStore on Tuesday, according to a report at Cnet, which published Sunday evening a pre-launch review.
Set to go live in the AppStore in concert with its introduction at CTIA 2009, Skype’s Apple product is said to leverage a couple of nice iPhone-centric features such as being able to take a photo from within Skype to serve as your avatar image, or pulling a picture in from the camera roll — and the look and feel is less heavy on Skype branding, more attuned to other apps for Apple’s mobile platform.
The Cnet review found lack of SMS, file transfer and conference calling set-up disappointing but those features may well be forthcoming in a post iPhone 3.0 update.
The big question is whether Skype will get the VoIP ball rolling on iPhone and iPod Touch, where other apps such as Truphone, Fring and Nimbuzz, which have offered different levels of VoIP capability on the iPhone for a while already, but have yet to take off.
Muadib hasn’t posted a lot of stuff at Vimeo, but this mock-up ad for the new iPhone that you just know is coming has design sense and a bit of welcome humor, too.
How far off do you suppose the neural interface revolution is? Because you just know it’s coming.
Skype for iPhone could appear in Apple’s iTunes AppStore as soon as next week, according to a report Thursday at GigaOm.
Citing a “very reliable” source, the report says an iPhone app for Skype could launch next week at the CTIA Wireless conference in Las Vegas. The report notes there have been other clues suggesting such a launch, such as other VoIP services changing potential launches of their own. Which makes sense, because when it hits, Skype will immediately become the big dog in the yard with its 400+ million users world wide.
Other VoIP services, such as TruePhone and Fring already have iPhone applications but have yet to catch on as methods for bypassing the cell network to make and receive phone calls. Other applications, such as web-based RF.com are also known to be working on providing native options for VoIP calling on the iPhone.
Skype has grown to become the most well-known and widely used VoIP provider in the world and its appearance on the iPhone would impact the development of mobile VoIP as well as the business fortunes of Apple and AT&T.
Proctor & Gamble is now behind (pardon pun) global public bathroom finder app “Sit or Squat.” Below the list of facilities in the area, a Charmin logo appears with the phrase “Gotta Go? Relax. We got your back.”
The app, offered gratis on iTunes, has info on where to find bathrooms, changing tables, handicap access and other amenities. Users can add new content to the service and rate featured toilets.
“Our goal is to connect Charmin with innovative conversations and solutions as a brand that understands the importance of bringing the best bathroom experience to consumers, even when they’re away from home,” explained Jacques Hagopian, Brand Manager for Charmin in the press release. “Helping people find a bathroom that is clean and comfortable is exactly what the SitOrSquat project is all about.”
So far, SitOrSquat has compiled information on more than 52,000 toilets in 10 countries worldwide. Some 1,600 users have downloaded the app, although complaints about the user interface and slow loading times are frequent.
Apple must have the sweetest distribution deal in the entire retail universe, if a report published Wednesday at TechCrunch is to be believed.
The AppStore refund policy allows purchasers a full refund up to 90 days from the date of download of any application purchased in the iTunes AppStore. Which seems questionable enough in the light of, say, the Android Market’s 24 hour return policy.
But a clause in the developer’s contract all iPhone developers must sign in order to have their apps sold in the AppStore indicates that in addition to a three month return policy, “Apple will have the right to retain its commission on the sale of that Licensed Application, notwithstanding the refund of the price to the end user.”
In effect this means Apple will charge 100% of the sale price to a developer for every refund given, even though the developer only got 70% of the price of the sale in the first place.
Many iPhone app developers are on the record as having no problem with Apple’s 30% sales commission for applications sold through the iTunes AppStore. The thinking goes that independent developers gain access to many more potential customers by having their products in the widely visited venue, save tons of money on marketing and transaction costs and generally benefit from being associated with the legitimacy of the Apple brand.
When consumers get wind of this policy, which may be a new development, according to the TechCrunch report, developers of some widely purchased though basically useless apps could be in for a rude awakening.
UPDATE: No developer is likely to go bankrupt in the real world, according to a level-headed explanation posted Thursday by Erica Sadun, a developer/blogger for ArsTechnica.
The reason, which makes perfect sense when you think about it, is that Apple never gives refunds, except in extreme circumstances and then, only after causing the customer many headaches.
There have been a number of stories recently about doctors armed with iPhones, using the device to save time and start making the almost extinct house call come back.
Business Week got on the case with a long feature about “Dr. iPhone,” calling it a “critical tool for saving time and improving the quality of the care” provided by the doc profiled, Dan Diamond, a family practitioner who works at the Doctors Clinic in Silverdale, Washington.
“If I leave my iPhone at home, I will turn around and go back for it,” he says. “It’s that important.”
Of 22 applications Diamond has installed on his iPhone, 10 are health related. The most important, he says, is Epocrates Essentials, which lets him quickly check for drug interactions, look up disease symptoms and find out what lab tests he might need to order. “I don’t have everything I need to know memorized,” Diamond says. “This makes me look like I do.”
Interesting that traditional media is looking into how smart phones change the medical profession — just like they are changing police work and other sectors — but how many docs use them?
The subtle humor of New Yorker Cartoons are now available in an iPhone app in animated form. Michael Fry and long-time feature animation writer and producer Jim Cox bring the strips as films, one a day, offered on iTunes gratis at this writing.
UPDATE: This post corrects a post written and originally published on 4/18 that contained incorrectly attributed information.
The single most talked about and demonstrated feature of iPhone 3.0 software at Tuesday’s launch event — push notification — remains absent from the beta release distributed to developers, with no indication thus far forthcoming from Apple when it will become available.
Scott Forstall, Apple’s Senior VP for iPhone software spent over half an hour Tuesday extolling the virtues of push notification and explaining why — although promised by the company over a year ago — it has taken so long to roll out. Developer “demand we didn’t anticipate” caused Apple to “completely re-architect the server infrastructure for push notification,” he said.
Developer representatives from a half dozen companies were trotted out for a dog and pony show to demonstrate how amazing push notification is going to be in the next version of iPhone software, and yet, despite distributing documentation of how the service is intended to work, Apple has yet to provide developers a method for implementing and testing push notification in their apps.
Forstall spoke plainly in his presentation Tuesday (see 26:45 into the video) “It is now really scalable, and we’re ready to go.”
Apparently not.
Calls to Apple for explanation were not returned as of press time, but we’ll be sure to keep readers apprised as this story develops.
Hey, “festering dumpster biscuit,” I’m talking to you. Or at least I would be, if I’d shelled out $.99 for the Mud Slinger app.
Mud Slinger puts over a million different combos of contemptuous rudeness at your fingertips. Some are funny, none are really obscene and most would be challenging to shout at the guy who just cut you off in traffic.
A few results from the “Unspeakably Foul Insult Generator”:
* Mutant rump worm penetrator
* Closeted dingle berry strainer
* Cretinous bubble jam
* Leaking member fondler
* Pulsating dill-knob fluid
A police officer in Benton County, Washington is using his iPhone on the job as a translator.
Described in the local news story as a “crime-fighting gadget,” Deputy Doug Hollenbeck has been relying on his iPhone for the last eight months to help boost rudimentary Spanish skills while dealing with everything from roll-over accidents to routine traffic stops.
Hollenbeck says he’s admittedly at a disadvantage because he can’t speak fluent Spanish in a significantly Hispanic community.
“I’ve got some basic vocabulary skills but other than that, not so much,” he adds. That has translated to the phone being somewhat of a staple in his line-up of gear. No mention of exactly which app he’s using.
Are translator apps fast enough to be used on the job? Let me know what you’re using in the comments…
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTOCgkvJ03c
The teen star was trying to play nice with paps waiting for her outside a Pilates studio, taking pics of them with a camera and answering questions.
Then, as the pap was handing her drink back, she let his iPhone drop. That’ll teach ’em.
Well, it’s more of an unfortunate oversight. But the iCount logo — a numbers game for the iPhone, iPod touch — looks like it’s all about something else thanks to the dropping of the “o”. Oh, my. Chalk up another one for the iTunes store censors.
Registered iPhone developers began playing around with the beta release of iPhone 3.0 late Tuesday, and initial reaction to the enhancements announced earlier in the day are quite favorable, according to a report at AppleInsider.
The beta release includes an updated Software Development Kit (SDK) with over 1,000 new Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) including In-App Purchases; Peer-to-Peer connections (tethering); an app interface for accessories; access to the iPod music library; a new Maps API and Push Notifications.
Apple also announced over 100 new features that will be hotly anticipated by iPhone and iPod touch users when the public software is released this summer, including cut, copy and paste; MMS functionality for 3G iPhones; landscape view for Mail, Text and Notes; stereo Bluetooth; syncing Notes to the Mac and PC; shake to shuffle; parental controls for TV shows, movies and apps from the App Store; and automatic login at Wi-Fi hot spots.
The iPhone OS 3.0 beta also showed off a new Voice Memo app and expanded search capability for all key iPhone apps, as well as Spotlight search across the entire device. Spotlight is said to be very responsive and functions just as you would expect having used the feature previously on a Mac. Copy & paste is also being well received, according to the report.
Any Cult readers who are also iPhone developers are invited to share your impressions in comments and let us know if you have any great screen shots we need to feature.
Spykee is an odd little $300 robot “toy” that’s everything from a webcam to digital music player to VoIP phone and can be controlled via WiFi.
Spykee ships with software that allows it to be controlled from a Windows or Mac PC, but Televolution CEO David Beckemeyer thought it would be cool to control it from his iPhone, too, so he built an iPhone web app that permits just that.
With Beckemeyer’s iSpykee controller, now robot fans can use their iPhone or iPod Touch to send Spykee down the hall to check on the sleeping baby or set it to act as a motion detector and send an alarm or photo in email.
The iSpykee controller is an open source project that, by publishing the source code used to implement the robot’s communication protocol, Beckemeyer hopes will assist other developers in creating interesting apps to control the versatile robot.
We’ve written before about iPhone and iPod Touch apps designed by parents to keep the wee ones busy and busy parents sane.
Geek dad Darren Murtha created the Shape Builder app to keep his four-year-old amused. If the video demo is any indication — Murtha’s son puts shapes of animals and figures in place accompanied by his own merry made-up sound effects — it’s a winner.
Designed for kids age three to six, Shape Builder provides 120 puzzles including musical instruments, fruits and vegetables, animals and the alphabet sounded out by a speech therapist.
