Archive for February 17th, 2010

iH8sn0w, through a new tweet, informs that his new utility f0recast will be released tonight.

There are many different iPhone and iPod Touch models and firmware versions for them. Each device has it's own bootrom, bootloader, iBoot and baseband versions that determine if user can perform jailbreak and unlock. So it is quite complicated for users to answer a simple question: "Is my device jailbreakable?". f0recast will solve this problem.

f0recast is a small Windows application that will able to give a straight answer if the iPhone or iPod touch is able to be jailbroken. Just connect your iPhone, launch the app and push a button.

f0recast is only an informational tool which determines if your device can or cannot be jailbreaked. It will NOT jailbreak your device.

The annual Pwn2Own hacking contest is coming up next month. During the event competitors will be given the chance to win cash prizes.

The competition will start on March 24 at the CanSecWest security conference in Vancouver, British Columbia. This year, hackers will take on an iPhone 3GS, a Blackberry Bold 9700, an unspecified Nokia smartphone running the Symbian S60 platform and a Motorola, most likely a Droid, powered by Google 's Android. A successful hack must result in code execution with little to no user-interaction. Any exploited phone wins its attacker $10,000 in cash.

Opera had finally demonstrated new Opera Mini for the iPhone at the Mobile World Congress.

In comparison to the default iPhone browser it looks pretty quick - Opera Mini loads the New York Times like 5x faster than its rival. Its main disadvantage is that it lacks the all-important feature pinch-to-zoom, and the only alternative is a method of double-tapping the webpages. Generally, the iPhone owners will find that the usual silky smooth scrolling through favorite webpages and responsive interface are maintained at the very best.

Unlike other platforms, the iPhone variant actually remembers the website you happened to browse last - the feature that will obviously be favored by a legion of iPhone admirers.

Company says as soon as beta tag is removed the browser will be submitted for approval. And it is not obvious whether Apple approve it or not, because it maintains the option of rejecting any app that "duplicates functionality" of the apps Apple builds into the iPhone. Opera co-founder Jon von Tetzchner has his own point of view on this:

"Opera Mini is the world's most popualr mobile browser and users on the iPhone deserve a choice."

There is a handful of people who have been trying to tell the story of Steve Jobs, chief executive of Apple and one of the front-rank hi-tech innovators of modern era. A number of attempts to tell about this remarkable personality have either enjoyed very modest success or were vehemently repulsed.

It looks as if only Walter Isaacson, the author of two other best-selling biographies and former editor of  Time magazine, could persuade Jobs to take part in the project. He says that the book will cover the most important stages of the Steve’s life, from his life in the notorious Silicon Valley through the years at Apple.

Though the Apple spokesmen do not comment on these rumors.

Steve Jobs’s attempts to convince publishers to provide the content in a useful digital form were not that successful and the negotiations initiated in February have "stumbled."

Some newsmakers report of "friendly" talks, but speak of Apple's business model as a crucial change for the publishing business. They aware of the impact iTunes had had on the songs industry in 2003. Then the number of downloads of single songs from Apple influenced the resulting purchases of the singers’ albums.

Apple has been conquering the e-reader market long before the new iPad was on offer. So that is not a surprise that such companies as Amazon, which previously dominated the market have to increase their prices in response to the iPad’s outbreak.

According to 9to5Mac it seems that Apple will present the new Firmware 4.0 on a new event scheduled for March 14, 2010. The news were received from a reliable source, but this is still rumors. Previously Apple was expected to release firmware 3.2 in March-April and firmware 4.0 some time in July. We'll see!