Only Google treats us as well as this. Other software developers insist on adding functionality to their updates; only Google gives us the benefit of enhanced version numbers. These people really care about us. It brings a tear to my eye, it really does.
You yourself might not be an actual superhero, but with Earthcomber, a free GPS-leveraging search/mapping/social networking app for iPhone and iPod Touch, you can have “superhuman awareness,” according to developer Jim Brady.
Preloaded with a comprehensive database of restaurants, movie listings, events, historical sites, local information and more, the app lets users tag their interests – for example, Greek cuisine, historic buildings, hot chai tea, or free WiFi access. They can also add their own items, and invite friends so they can find them as well.
Earthcomber then scans an area for any matches, using the iPhone’s GPS. Any place that has anything of interest is announced by an optional chime.
Earthcomber is different, according to Brady, because it utilizes multiple technologies so the user doesn’t have to jump from one application to the next to accomplish related tasks. “That’s the whole point,” Brady said. “We don’t have to turn off our eyes to start up our ears, and we sure don’t have to fill out a search box for our brains to work. Earthcomber uses mobile technology as a powerful extension of our natural abilities, so that we can be constantly aware of what’s right around us.”
Earthcomber won Nokia’s 2008 Mobile Rules! competition for “Best Infotainment” application. The company provides USA service today and plans international coverage with a coming update.
Retina-X released the unsubtly named Mobile Spy software for iPhone on Wednesday, a product the company says “will reveal the truth for any company or family using Apple smartphones.”
Mobile Spy operates in stealth mode, invisible to the iPhone user, but permits parents or employers who install it to silently monitor incoming and outgoing text messages (SMS) and call information of children or employees – even if activity logs are erased. The software starts when the phone is booted up, records all call and SMS activity and uploads the data in real time to Retina-X servers, which may be accessed from anywhere on the Internet.
The company says it is working on adding spy awareness to email activity in a future release.
Because the software runs in the background, sending and receiving data across the network while other software is in use, Mobile Spy violates Apple’s iPhone SDK, so you won’t find it on the app store, but it is available on the Retina-X website.
Priced at $100 annually, $70 semi-annually or $50 quarterly, it is compatible with iPhone 3G only.
This holiday season you may want to beware of parents, bosses and spouses bearing iPhone gifts.
One of the most depressing scenes in the already depressing “Sex and the City” movie is the one where Carrie Bradshaw gets left at the altar.
The groom, aka Big, hasn’t shown up. In a scene where all the stars especially look like they need a good night’s sleep and more calming carbs in their diets, Samantha holds an iPhone, set off against a fire-engine red dress.
Apple doesn’t sell its own iPhone 3G mobile devices on its web store, but you can now get both new and refurbished 3G models online through AT&T. Following last week’s quiet launch of on-line sales for new 3Gs, AT&T began Tuesday also offering refurbished units at $150 for the 8GB model, while both the black and white 16GB models sell for $250. As with new units, purchase of the refurbished phones requires the buyer to sign a two year service contract with AT&T.
Rapper Lil’ Wayne recently launched an iPhone, iPod touch app designed to give fans a taste of what it’s like to be him.
Well, what it means to look a little like 25-year-old Dwayne Carter, or to paraphrase the old cosmetics slogan: “You, only blinger.”
The app developed by Lil’ Wayne and his record company Universal Music, comes from epictilt, the makers of iPhone app ESPN Cameraman.
The Lil’ Wayne app adds gold jewelry, his trademark teardrop tats and oversized hats to your pics. If you’re unsure you want to pop $0.99 for it on iTunes, you can check out a photo gallery here. The app allows fans to check out other Wayne-ified photos and buy his music.
One guarantee: you get to look fierce but avoid Lil Wayne’s real-life arrests with corresponding mug shots.
Via iPhone Savior
iBend marketing materials call it “the thinnest stand for the iPhone and iPod Touch.”
$5 gets you what appears to be two pieces of plastic or maybe laminated card stock (the website doesn’t say) cut in such a way they could be mistaken for “Snidely Whiplash”-style fake mustaches, but that, when “bent” just so, will hold your device in place on any flat surface so you can look at it (and the video or slideshow you’re watching on it) without having to hold it in your hand. The iBend is thin enough to fit in your wallet, pocket or purse.
iBend is patent-pending and manufactured in California.
What will they think of next?
Via Edible Apple
Apple released the 10.5.6 update to Leopard on Monday with a feature that makes it impossible to jailbreak and/or unlock an iPhone or iPod Touch using PwnageTool or QuickPwn, according to a report at iPhoneAlley.
Blogger Erica Sadun explains in more detail that engineers at Apple propagated to all 10.5.6 loaded Mac systems USB kexts (kernel extensions) that prevent a Mac from recognizing an iPhone or iPod in Device Firmware Update mode, a high level communication protocol used for firmware restores among other things.
The battle between Cupertino and a dedicated band of Apple users who believe the company’s mobile platform should be opened for general use and development outside the limitations of the AppStore has been going on since the original iPhone was unlocked weeks after its initial release in June 2007. Subsequent updates to the mobile firmware have ben decoded within days of their release.
Many, though not all users who jailbreak/unlock their iPhones do so to enable them to operate on cellular telephone networks other than AT&T, the exclusive authorized service provider in the US. Others see the advantage of an unlocked phone that can run software developed for it that has not otherwise been approved by Apple for sale and distribution in the iTunes AppStore.
Sadun confirmed with sources inside Apple that the current roadblock to unlocking efforts was deliberate and both she and iPhoneAlley suggested those wanting to operate jailbroken iPhones and iPod Touches ought to wait to install the 10.5.6 update on their Macs until developers working to maintain the open mobile platform have devised a workaround.
One possible avenue around the DFU mode restriction has been suggested by Phone developer Steven Troughton-Smith, who told Sadun the problem relates to devices plugged directly to Macs. He relates that DFU mode can be used with a unit connected via a hub and can be pwned as normal, even with the 10.5.6 update.
Rogue Amoeba Software added to its lineup of innovative audio software titles Monday with the release of Radioshift Touch, software that lets users listen to internet radio anywhere on their iPhone or iPod Touch.
Powered by RadioTime, an internet radio catalog with thousands of stations from around the world in its database, Radioshift allows users to browse by genre, search by keyword and view listings for thousands of specific radio programs as well.
The app leverages iPhone firmware’s GPS capabilities to serve up local stations based on the user’s location and uses a feature called “SmartStream” to point to the most bandwidth-friendly stations, depending on the connection. Users can access Internet radio via, WiFi, EDGE or 3G.
Radioshift Touch is available at the iTunes AppStore for $9.99.
Given the host of free and low cost music programs available on the AppStore, including the ever-popular Pandora, and ClearChannel’s iHeartRadio, it will be interesting to track the success of Radioshift, with its relatively expensive price tag. Paul Kafasis, lead developer at Rogue Amoeba, has a sterling reputation for developing useful, high quality audio software for the Mac, so we invite Cult readers who try Radioshift to let us know what you think.
We recently wrote about iBreviary, an iPhone and iPod Touch app that gives the morning prayer, evening prayer and night prayer or complines for the day.
The Italian priest who had the brainwave for the app, Don Paolo Padrini, informed us that the 1.2 version of the prayer app, which he says has the blessing of the Vatican, is now available in Spanish, French, English and Latin (for those, like the Pope, who want a return to pre-Second Vatican Council days) and a version that follows the Ambrosian Rite, for the five million Catholics or so in the Milan area.
iBreviary costs $0.99 on iTunes and now also comes with a how-to page to help those unfamiliar with daily prayer rituals. The original Italian-language version was gratis, Father Padrini says the price of the app is a contribution for the developers.
Don Padrini also says an app is in the works for Facebook called that “Praybook” that will let groups use the Breviary via social network.
First: Try My Nose!! No, really! Try it!
“Just select a nose you like, hold it next to you current nose and surprise your friends!”
Or – now here’s a radical thought – just stick with the nose you were born with! Maybe it suits you just fine! Maybe – oh never mind. Next!
The Blagoblogs are a-buzz this evening with word that Microsoft, though it definitely has no ZunePhone to show at next month’s CES (I know, I’m just as heart-broken as you are), will almost certainly launch some sort of software ‘n’ services platform for Windows Mobile called Zune Mobile. According to ZDNet’s Mary-Jo Foley, who is as interested in Zune Mobile as it is possible for a non-Microsoft employee to be, the platform may include “music purchase, playing, sharing and subscribing — and maybe even a little something special for podcasters/podcast listeners, too.”
Or, in other words, Microsoft may, if it plays its cards right, bring the technical media functionality of the iPhone to the legendarily poor interfaces of a thousand mediocre Windows Mobile phones, many of which have enough on-board storage for two or even three albums worth of music. Rather than attempting to a build a ground-up 21st century mobile platform, Microsoft is attempting to bolt on features that meet current user expectations, and then leave it up to dozens of hardware makers to see if the experience actually holds together. If true, this is a pretty sad bit of competitive response out of Redmond. At best, it’s a duplicate of a famous Apple failure — iTunes for the Motorola ROKR.
In that unfortunate experience, Apple brought iTunes support to a third-party phone, and then ran screaming as it realized the only way to ensure its name would only appear on a great phone would be to build the software and the hardware from the ground-up on its own. The iPhone resulted. Zune was Microsoft’s first attempt to follow such a strategy, to poor results thus far (in large part because Apple’s ecosystem was much stronger). Now, it would appear, Microsoft is relying on its standard software-only approach to respond to the iPhone juggernaut.
That’s pretty sad. As an enormous Apple fan, I would like nothing better than a credible challenge to the iPhone’s dominance — it means an even better iPhone than I can imagine in two years’ time. But if this is the best the Distinguished Competition has to offer, all we have to rely on is the vision of Steve Jobs. Good thing he can see for miles and miles, eh?
Via ZDNet
Microsoft finally got around to testing Apple’s AppStore waters this weekend with the release of Seadragon, a free project of Micrsoft’s LiveLabs that lets you see giga-pixel images on your iPhone using a nifty zooming algorithm to get super-close on a map or photo, with just a few pinches or taps of your finger.
The app comes pre-loaded with images and lets you view yours or others’ Photosynth images, or content from any RSS feed.
The embed above shows of the experience in a fashion similar to the one you’ll find on the iPhone or iPod Touch, according to a report at TechCrunch.
Via 148Apps
Seems like the big news over the past few days at the AppStore tends mostly to the questionably mature, if not downright asinine.
First, the re-emergence of Pull My Finger, an ingenious application that produces the sound of flatulence, generated over 200 stories in the Apple web-osphere yesterday. After initially rejecting the app as something with no discernible utility, Apple has reportedly sorted out how to handle this particular genre of application, according to Pull My Finger’s developer.
Then there there was the implication of either uncertainty or perhaps some discrimination with respect to apps intended for “mature audiences,” with developers of apps rated 17+ finding they cannot – as of this writing – issue promotional codes that other app developers were recently given to enable easier review and testing. Apple has described the restriction as a “minor glitch” that should be resolved shortly, according to a report at iLounge.
Finally, also on Saturday, the application Poo Price made its debut. Poo Price counts time while you’re doing your business on the toilet at work and tells you how much money you made during that time “working” based on your salary. What price good humor, eh?
The interesting thing about Poo Price, though, is that it may be an example of an app that works in the background, in violation of the SDK’s prohibition on such functionality, according to a piece at Venture Beat.
Amid recent concern that Apple may have given Google preferential treatment in approving the search giant’s voice search application for sale in the AppStore, and discussion over SDK restrictions that appear to be keeping Flash off the iPhone in any meaningful way, concern over how Poo Price keeps its timer going even when the user switches out of it while, say, checking email in the restroom, may not be the most pressing thing on many people’s agenda.
As MG Siegler writes for Venture Beat, Poo Price “is probably just another crude app in the new, racy App Store.”
Topping at least one luxe list of trendy items for Christmas are these customized iPhones from Continental Mobile.
The iPhone rimmed in 24k gold costs about $1,800 (£1,199), if that doesn’t wind you up there are ruby and diamond versions, about $4,600 (£3,099) and other serious stones like sapphires and emeralds. iPod Touch versions are also available.
If you decide to put this much sparkle under your tree, make it fast. Each item is “hand crafted in England” and takes seven to 10 days for delivery.
Via Black Book Mag
If you’ve got an old 1940s style rotary phone lying around and about 7 hours you’re not sure what to do with, you can contact Michael at fonejackerhacker in the UK and find out how he made this iPhone docking station. It’s powered by a 16W amp with one speaker behind the dial (10w) on the front of the phone and two speakers in the handset (2x 3w).
The IR sensor and controls are fitted to the side of the phone and the docking port is hidden under the receiver when the hand set is off. Because the speaker is an official ‘works with iPhone’ product all of the normal charging and iPhone features are uncompromised.
Michael is working on a version with a microphone on the handset and, with the use of an iPhone app that he is developing, you’d be able to use this as a handset for the iPhone, or as a headset.
Via SlipperyBrick
The developers at Mokugift, the kind-hearted people behind the iPhone/iPod Touch app A Real Tree, may not be the greatest app developers, but they are good at math.
For every one of the 99¢ apps purchased on Apple’s iTunes AppStore, one of Mokugift’s 12 internationally recognized tree planting partners will plant, yes, a real tree in places fighting deforestation such as Belize, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Burundi, Senegal, Zambia, India, Philippines, and Haiti. These countries are in tropical regions where tree planting is the most beneficial in the fight against global warming.
To be sure, the app is not going to wow the average game-addled, accelerometer-addicted iPhone user. When the app is launched an animated tree grows out of the ground into full bloom. Ta-daa! Tap once and watch a little bird circle around and land. But Mokugift’s Hans Chung understands that Apple has sold more than 13 million iPhones. “If every iPhone owner planted one tree,” he says, “the environmental impact would be equivalent to taking 500,000 cars off the road.”
Chung’s A Real Tree project works with organizations that provide materials and education to local communities to plant trees in an ecologically-beneficial manner. Local communities learn how to plant trees while avoiding toxic pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers. The trees they plant produce nutritious fruits and crops that they can live off and make a living on.
It seems like an effort worth contributing 99¢ to, doesn’t it? “People spent $8,000 dollars on that frivolous “I Am Rich” app, Chung said, “That inspired us. We knew we needed to develop something meaningful.” If that’s not enough to turn you over, Chung promised more small ‘Easter egg’ surprises will be added to the tree and the little bird with future updates.
Via iPhoneSavior
In the wake of developer Craig Hockenberry’s “Dear Steve” letter complaining about feeling forced to drift in a sea of 99¢ “ringtone apps,” and the inevitable charges of petulant whining that some accused him of in response, developers at Appcubby have published detailed financial records showing, down to the dollar, what goes into keeping food on the table for an iPhone app developer.
Among the things Hockenberry mentioned in his developers’ wish list to Steve were: ways to accurately track who exactly is downloading apps (and which ads/links they clicked on to get to the store), and the ability to offer free demo version of apps that expire after a given time, prompting people to buy the full app. Appcubby’s records would appear to support the view that Hockenberry was not just crying in his beer, and their post supports his call for free demos and more ad-tracking capabilities as two things that would greatly help the situation.
Via Gizmodo
For the discerning Apple fan on your list, or for yourself, GelaSkins may be just the thing to personalize and protect precious laptops, iPhones and iPods this holiday season. Made with a patented 3M adhesive, GelaSkins are easy to apply and leave no residue behind when you change or remove them. The adhesive allows you to reposition the skin easily for a perfect fit.
They feature richly colored, photo-quality graphics ranging from fine art prints to contemporary urban images designed by artists from around the world and certainly make any mobile device stand out in a crowd.
GelaSkins can be purchased online or at retail outlets world wide and range in price from $12.95 for iPod skins to $29.95 for laptop skins. The Gelaskin website has a convenient store locator with good contact information, and offers a web-only deal of a 4th skin free when you buy 3.
Check out the gallery of just a small sample of the arresting designs available below and head to the GelaSkin website for more. Definitely a “Think Different” gift idea.
Gizmodo has the scoop on the launch of Pastebud, a third-party workaround for basic copy/paste on the iPhone using a couple of clever bookmarks and a webapp.
I say basic, because it is dependent on the bookmarks and so will only work with Safari, or with webapps that run within it.
I think the most interesting thing about Gizmodo’s scoop is the comment by Bandit underneath:
“No gadget in 2008 should require someone to create a workaround like this, let alone a gadget from a company as prominent as Apple. Apple should be embarrassed.”
You said it, Bandit. You said it.
Geek rapper GOSHone shot a video for his song “Newteknowledge” on an iPhone 3g.
He says it’s the first music vid shot entirely on an iPhone, but whether someone else has done it or not, the song is catchy as hell (though we do wish he’d given “props up to my fellow nerds” on CoM instead of CNET) and the video where he looks like the overtaxed nerd next cubicle over is clever.
He filmed the clip with Cycorder (the app “rocks,” he says but only works on jailbroken phones) and edited with After Effects, because Final Cut had issues with Cycorder resolution and frame rate.
The song is part of GOSHone‘s album “ctrl_alt_ego” which can be downloaded gratis from his website. A three-year labor of love, it includes tracks like “Laptop Muzik,” “Big Brains” and “Data Flow.”
Via podcasting news
Promo App Codes, a web forum, tradingpost and clearinghouse for iPhone app developers and the people who love them, launched this week and seems to already be generating considerable interest on both sides of the aisle.
For developers, the site is an oppportunity to promote their work and share Apple’s recently authorized promotional codes, a device for getting early-release and review copies of AppStore approved apps quickly into the hands of up to 50 app testers/reviewers. For reviewers/bloggers/app-nuts, the site provides an easy way to learn about new apps and to establish relationships directly with developers while giving them the valuable feedback to optimize and improve their applications.
Amanuel Tewolde, a developer and founder of Promo App Codes, told Cult of Mac, “When I first heard that Apple will give me 50 promo codes for my apps in the store, I didn’t know who to give them out to.” The site was conceived as he began to consider that “user testing is expensive, and these codes provide a cheap alternative, not to mention help with some positive buzz.”
Potential reviewers and developers alike register for a free account on the clean, simply designed site, with developers having the opportunity to post app information and screenshots in blog-fashion. Registered users have the opportunity to post comments on each “post” about an application.
Users/reviewers/bloggers create profiles and add apps to a “wish list,” entries which show up to developers as interest in their apps, and developers then contact users with free promotional codes. The site maintains a rating system for each app and hosts a forum where all interested parties can communicate with one another. At this writing the site has registered 685 accounts in the two days it’s been open for business.
“We still have lots to learn and do but things look very exciting and the timing seems right,” says Tewolde. “It is christmas season, could there be a better time to start a site where people get free apps?”
We reported last week on internet voice service provider Truphone’s mobile app that enables Voice over IP phone calling over WiFi using Apple’s iPod Touch. Wednesday, the company announced availability of Truphone Anywhere, an update to its iPhone app that lets iPhone users make VoIP calls “even if you’re not connected to WiFi or a 3G network.”
With TruPhone Anywhere you pay for a local connection – meaning your call is routed to the cellular network – before the rest of the call is connected using VoIP. Change-o, presto: cheap international calling is here.
Except that it’s been here for more than a year. San Francisco-based service provider RF.com has enabled the same type of calling with any VoIP provider (Skype me, anyone?), and even Asterisk, since shortly after the debut of the original iPhone.
Another mobile VoIP provider, JAJAH, had an app to enable VoIP-completed cellular calling ready for the AppStore launch this past July, but Apple rejected it “because the VoIP service is active over the cellular network, which as outlined in the iPhone SDK Agreement section 3.3.15 is prohibited: ‘If an Application requires or will have access to the cellular network, then additionally such Application: – May not have Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) functionality,” according to JAJAH spokesman Fredrick Hermann.
Perhaps Apple is less concerned with enforcing the SDK’s VoIP via cellular prohibition today; perhaps Truphone’s “Anywhere” functionality slipped through, or perhaps its app will be pulled from the AppStore tomorrow, or next week. As usual, Apple isn’t saying anything publicly.
Either way, VoIP over iPhone is here to stay.
Via GigaOM
Griptonite Games, makers of the wildly overpriced iPhone trivia game Ben Stein: It’s Trivial ($4.99 at the AppStore), announced Wednesday an opportunity to receive an autographed “diploma” from the dour funnyman and crypto-pundit/economist for the first 100 players who successfully complete the game and steal Ben Stein’s mansion. Winners will be inducted into the “Hall of Stein” and be entered into a drawing for the chance to play the game live against Stein himself.
It’s Trivial features fast-paced, tongue-in-cheek gameplay and over 1200 ranked trivia questions. Alongside simian cohort Cheex the Monkey, players go up against a virtual Stein, disguised as the Master of Trivia, to win points and prizes from Ben Stein’s Estate.
Players who complete the game can submit screenshots online at www.bensteinitstrivial.com. Of the first 100 submissions, one player will be randomly chosen to compete against Stein in a live broadcast event.
Oh, joy.
Oh look, Delicious (or del.icio.us for us old-skool users) has gone all mobile-friendly with a new site at m.delicious.com.
It works well on an iPhone, complete with a shiny icon if you decide to add it as a home screen bookmark. It’s great if you want to access your bookmarks on the move; what’s missing (and is equally important in my opinion) is a view of your network’s bookmarks.
I agree with Fraser Speirs – my Delicious network is a fabulous source of links, news, ideas and stuff of interest, and it’s compiled automagically for me every day by 58 people I know, like, and admire. I couldn’t live without it.