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Must Have Jailbreak Utility TinyUmbrella Gets Updated

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The must have jailbreak utility, TinyUmbrella, a tool written by Semaphore that assists you in saving your iOS devices SHSH Blobs has been updated with new features and a completely redesigned user interface.

You can download the update version 4.1.8 for Mac OS X, Linux, or Windows.

If you are so inclined you can even play around with the core source code of TinyUmbrella.

Click the link below to see a complete list of the updates made to TinyUmbrella.

Tea Party Electoral Rage: There’s an App For That

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TeaPartyMemo

As New York Times reporter Kate Zernike notes in her new book “Boiling Mad,” a good portion of the Tea Party movement is composed of youthful, tech-savvy hipsters — so it really shouldn’t be surprising that the movement has its own iPhone/iPad app.

The app features top news of interest to members of the movement, polemics from 11 conservative bloggers, Tea Party videos, and wouldn’t be complete with a feature called “Outrage of the Day.”

Smaller, Cheaper MacBook Air At Next Week’s Event?

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There may be a new smaller, cheaper MacBook Air in the air, according to rumor reports:

  • 11.6-inch screen
  • Significantly cheaper than current $1,499 starting price
  • Unibody case with carbon fiber — may weigh less than 2.7lbs
  • Intel Core 2 Duo CPU and Nvidia MCP89 graphics (but may have first AMD CPU used in a Mac)
  • Solid State hard drive

MacRumors: Apple to Introduce 11.6-Inch MacBook Air With ‘SSD Card’ Integrated Storage Next Week?

AppleInsider: Sources: Apple to unveil revamped 11.6-inch MacBook Air next week

CNET: Source: Smaller MacBook Air on Apple’s agenda

Halloween-Themed ‘Devil Voice’ Alters Voices In Real Time [New App]

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It doesn’t do much — no fancy vocal wizardry, just adjusts the pitch of the user’s voice up or down — but Devil Voice looks like the first instance of a real-time voice-changing app, without the need to record a user’s voice first before playback — though it can, if desired.

The app is a dollar, and  comes out just in time for Halloween; see our forthcoming Halloween Guide for examples on how to duct tape it and attached speakers into a Darth Vader mask and whatnot.

How Much You Can Really Make on the App Store

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Apple’s App Store is a textbook case of the way Capitalism is supposed to work, according to one developer, who quit his day job when he realized all he needs to earn a living is a laptop and an Internet connection.

Getting information out of anyone who works at Apple can be more difficult than getting truth out of a politician, but every now and then someone pipes up with a personal revelation that sheds light on what it’s like to work with the 2nd largest company in the U.S.A. today.

A case in point is Dylan Ginsburg, developer of River of News, a $3 Google Reader app for the iPad, whose software has enjoyed what he describes as “modest” success since its release in August. Ginsburg pulled back the curtain just a bit in a blog post he wrote because “no one talks about what they make on the App Store.” If Ginsburg’s experience is typical of developers whose apps enjoy even middling success, it’s not just the big hitters in the App Store line-up who stand to gain from developing software for Apple’s mobile devices.

Developing River of News has been the most rewarding “work” of my life. It’s not even close. My sleeping is all screwed up because I keep thinking about how I can make my software better.

That’s right, “my software,” Ginsburg wrote. “What a great thing to be able to say. I’ve gotten such tremendous satisfaction from creating something that people use and like.”

It’s early in the game yet, and River of News could well be supplanted by a new flavor of the month at any time, but Ginsburg felt he has enough of the big picture in focus to have quit his corporate software job — the one at which he earned twice as much as he’s been making so far with River of News — and is a confirmed believer in the App Store business model. “The genius is they created an ecosystem that benefits them, the developer, and the customer [it’s what] you are supposed to get from capitalism.”

AT&T to Help Apple Sell iPads to Business

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Photo by nibaq - http://flic.kr/p/7SwVLa
Photo by nibaq - http://flic.kr/p/7SwVLa

Whether you are an employee wanting to use your iPad on the road or a company looking to integrate the Apple tablet into your workspace, AT&T says it has you covered. The exclusive U.S. iPhone carrier announced Friday it will offer plans to sell the iPad Wi-Fi + 3G to business customers.

“iPad is a great fit for our enterprise customers across a wide range of industries who are looking for ways to increase business productivity and offer greater flexibility,” said Michael Antieri, President, Advanced Enterprise Solutions, AT&T Solutions. The iPad provides “businesses with the tools they need to accelerate mobility-led productivity,” he adds.

TomTom App Updated With New ‘Navigate-To-Photo’ Feature, More

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Alone, the iPhone’s functions are pretty cool; then someone comes along, combines two (or more) of them and bam — vigorously ups the wow-factor.

Today that someone is TomTom, who has just updated its popular turn-by-turn GPS app (we’ve linked to the North American version, coz that’s where we’re based) to include a “navigate-to-photo” feature that lets users enter a destination simply by tapping on any geo-tagged photo on their iPhone.

The update also includes new optimized accuracy for the iPhone 4 and is currently available only for their North American and European versions.

Elusive White iPhone 4 Spotted in NYC

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The elusive white iPhone 4 that many of you wish you could get your hands on was recently spotted in New York. The folks over at Pocket-lint managed to catch up to a guy who was seen holding and using a white iPhone 4, which currently, is just as hard to spot as a Yeti in a snow storm.

How this guy happened to get a hold of his white iPhone 4 isn’t clear, but there are several ways this could have happened. He may have gotten it from someone at Apple that he knows, he may work at Apple, or this could be a clever iPhone 4 makeover.

Report: iPhone 4, iPad Shortages Could Slow Apple’s Runaway Revenue Expectations

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Photo by Sanjay Parekh - http://flic.kr/p/7yR7kL
Photo by Sanjay Parekh - http://flic.kr/p/7yR7kL

Normally, Apple is able to deliver Rolls-Royce earnings numbers when Wall Street is predicting just Cadillac financial figures. Shortages in the Cupertino, Calif. company’s two most popular products – the iPad and iPhone 4 – could prevent Apple from reporting its usual 15 percent premium on expectations, one analyst cautions.

Wall Street consensus if for Apple to report Monday earnings-per-share of $4.03 on $18.76 billion in revenue for the three-month quarter ended September. However, for Apple to deliver its usual 15 percent above-expected earnings, the company would need to report $4.08 per share on $18.8 billion in revenue, something Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster doesn’t foresee.

John Sculley Was a Great Apple CEO [Comment of the Week]

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Comment of the Week comes from @Ron regarding our interview with John Sculley about Steve Jobs. Going against the common wisdom that ex-CEO John Sculley was bad for Apple, @Ron has a different take on Sculley, who I feel has been unfairly demonized for his decade-long stint at Apple’s helm.

Great article. I worked with John occasionally in his last years at Apple. I didn’t realize at the time how burnt out he was, but it make sense now in retrospect. He was shy and seemed withdrawn.

John was a great CEO for the first few years. It’s easy to forget that Steve left Apple in complete disarray – it’s safe to say that he hadn’t developed his management or relationships skills at that point. Sculley held things together and got the place to run as a business. It’s only later when his lack of product vision caught up with him.

Command Your Boat (or Starship) with this Dual-iPad Helmsman’s Chair

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For Serious Ocean Mariners and Starfleet Captains of the Mind, Norwegian chair manufacturer NorSap has just unveiled a new concept iChair.  Designed to offer strength and flexibility for helmsmen during long sea voyages, this Enterprise-worthy throne comes complete with two iPad docks – so you can navigate and goof off at the same time –  cushioned forearm rests and an (optional) heated footrest!

Looks a bit like a cross between a dentist’s chair and Captain Pike’s wheelchair.  I’d pilot this for a while.

[via TUAW]

Hong Kong Railway Unveils App With Chinese Fake Steve Jobs

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httpvhd://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAVQPa9L3jg

Steve Jobs’ hypnotic cadence and idiosyncratic showmanship is obviously well-known enough to be channeled by international comedians looking for a laugh: over in Hong Kong, the Mass Transit Railway has just launched a new app, and they did so by hiring their own Chinese Fake Steve Jobs in the form of Law Kar-Ying to reveal it on stage. Law seems to have studied the man he was emulating quite well: he gets everything right, from the gulps of bottled water to the Levis and turtleneck. Hilarious.

[via TUAW]

Apple Stores Running Low On iLife ’09, ’11 Next Wednesday?

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Next week on October 20th, we can take it pretty much for granted that Apple is going to unveil the next iteration of OS X, 10.7 codenamed ‘Lion’, along with their annual October MacBook refreshes. What about iLife ’11, though, which we’ve been seeing burbling up for months now in the form of Idiot’s Guides and instruction manuals on Amazon and the like? Can we expect that to be announced as well?

It’s looking good. Apparently, retail employees of Apple’s stores are running low on their supplies of the last iLife software suite, with no new stock due to come in. This is in addition to seeing prices drop on Amazon: an inventory clear out that usually serves as precursor to a new iLife launch.

What’s new in iLife ’11? Hard to say for sure, but rumor has it that iDVD may go the way of the iDodo and the whole suite may have been rewritten from the ground up for 64-bit. There’s also rumors about beefier iOS integration and maybe even FaceTime support. We’ll all know next Wednesday.

These iPhone 4s Cost 8 Million Dollars

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Usually when we see an iPhone like this, it’s the handset of some Saudi Arabian oil prince or B-list rapper whose definition of class is synonymous with champagne fused with gold flakes, and whom has duly paid Swarovski some forty or fifty grand to dip his iPhone 4 into some horse glue and then roll it in their overpriced crushings of glass.

This handset is actually different, though. Instead of paying $40,000 for a Swarovski iPhone 4, two Australian businessmen paid customizer Stuart Hughes eight million dollars to plate their iPhone 4s in gold and then encrust them in over five hundred diamonds totaling over 100 karats.

Skype 5 for Mac Promises Facebook Integration, Group Video Calling And Questionable Interface Overhaul

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Yesterday, Skype 5.0 dropped onto the PC for Windows users, bringing Facebook integration and group video calling into the mix. That update is not yet available for the Mac, but according to a post on Skype’s official blog, a new version of the popular VoIP application is coming to OS X soon.

I’m worried, though. In the blog post, Skype alarmingly mentions a “complete overhaul, both in terms of the way it looks, and in terms of functionality.”

Look, Skype isn’t a very well designed app by Mac standards, I agree… but have you ever seen the absolutely unidentifiable puddle of mashed up design elements that comprises the Windows interface? If you’ve got a minute, I’ve got an anecdote that might help describe it if you haven’t.

AMD CEO Says iPad Is Impacting Notebook Sales

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Chipmaker AMD hasn’t been doing well lately. Last year, they chalked up a third quarter loss of nearly $128 million. This year was scarcely any better at $118 million. At least this quarter, though, they have an excuse: the iPad’s killing notebook sales, even according to their own CEO.

MobileMe Web Calendar Leaves Beta

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Apple’s finally seen fit to make their MobileMe Calendar web app an official product after a long period in beta. It’s now available to all comers, and will allow you to check or update your MobileMe calendar from any computer or Apple device, as well as share calendars with friends and colleagues, or send out invitations to events to your droogies.

Remote Pad App Turns Your iPad Into A Canvas

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The iPad seems a fairly small canvas, but it’s not much smaller than the Mona Lisa, upon which was painted the enigmatic face of history’s most beloved transvestite. Why not sling it up on an easel, then, and do some painting with Remote Palette… easily one of the neatest painting apps we’ve seen lately, largely through its fun cross-device universal functionality.

NY Times Finally Releases a Real iPad App

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One of the great disappointments of the iPad has finally been remedied. After six months of living with the extremely limited app NY Times Editor’s Choice, the iPad has finally gotten “All the News That’s Fit to Print.”

The App Store pushed out NY Times 2.0 less than an hour ago. The free, all-new iPad appcontains the full content of the Paper of Record, along with the contents of a select number of the Times’s blogs. It’s the whole newspaper, but better than the print edition.

Enjoy it while it lasts, though. The Times promises that a paid subscription will be required starting in early 2011. Here’s hoping that a print subscription will grant access, unlike what the New Yorker is doing with its iPad app.

Download now! (iTunes)

Check The Status Of Your Battery — Your Chevy Volt’s Battery, That Is [New App]

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Apparently, OnStar thinks the iPhone isn't photogenic enough; their promo images exclusively feature Droids. Hmmm...
Apparently, OnStar thinks the iPhone isn't photogenic enough; their promo images exclusively feature Droids. Hmmm...

Potential and current (see what I did there) Chevrolet Volt owners will be pleased to hear that the mostly electric car’s iPhone app will finally be hitting the App Store at the end of October.

The app includes a ton of interesting controls and features: Charge the Volt immediately or schedule a charge time; check charge status and battery level; display expected range; and display various data tracked while driving like how many miles were electric-only, how many were gas. That’s on top flashy functions like being able to start the car from the app and mess with the door locks.

An OnStar spokesperson told us the Volt comes with five years of free OnStar service — other cars get six months free — and that the app will be free for the iPhone (and the Droid — sorry, Blackberry). Not impressed with (mostly) electric vehicles? OnStar will be making the app (sans Volt-specific functions) available for about a dozen or so additional OnStar-equipped cars in the near future.

“Get A Mac” Ad Used to Explain al-Qaida’s New Media Ops

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Adam Gadahn as "PC" and Anwar al-Awlaki as a "Mac."

Those iconic “Get a Mac” ads were recently used by an intelligence analyst to explain the emerging styles of two of al-Qaida’s American recruits.

At a classified intelligence conference outside Washington, the audience laughed and applauded when American al-Qaida members Adam Gadahn and Anwar al-Awlaki were swapped in for PC John Hodgman and Mac Justin Long in an Apple commercial.

Other analysts agreed that the award-winning ads featuring an uncool PC and a laid-back, charismatic Mac are apt characterizations of the two high-ranking American al-Qaida media strategists.