Archive for 2010

A placeholder on the signup form for Apple's iPhone Developer Program reads "Need to update this for the 27th launch.". This might indicate that Apple, as rumored, will announce a new version of the iPhone OS at today's keynote.

Site gizmodo published the results of the photoshop contest, where they asked users to design some new concept interfaces for iPhone 4.0. The image above rated #1. Here are the others:

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IGF announced the finalists for their 2010 mobile games competition. Last year's winners were dominated by iPhone games. This year's finalists are:

Best Mobile Game Design

• MiniSquadron (iPhone)
• Glow Artisan (DSi)
• Spider: The Secret of Bryce Manor (iPhone)

Achievement In Art

• Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP (iPhone) – unreleased
• Guerrilla Bob (iPhone)
• Zombie Pizza (iPhone)

Technical Achievement

• Stair Dismount (iPhone)
• SCVNGR (iPhone)
• Tumbledrop (iPhone)

Audio Achievement

• Lilt Line (iPhone)
• MuBlip (iPhone) – unreleased
• Zombie Pizza (iPhone)

Best iPhone Game

• Spider: The Secret of Bryce Manor (iPhone)
• Drop 7 (iPhone)
• Hook Champ (iPhone)

The finalists for IGF Mobile will compete for $5,000 in prizes. The results will be announced on February 8th and will be showcased at GDC 2010 in March.

Apple rejected Google Voice native application for iPhone. Now Google is launching a new version of mobile web app for iPhone OS 3.0 and higher. It uses the power of HTML5, so users can run it right from the Safari browser.

To get started, just visit http://m.google.com/voice in your mobile browser. For quick access, just create a shortcut to this URL on your home screen.

There is only one day left until Apple's event on Jan 27, where Apple Tablet is expected to be presented. The number of rumors thow grow rapidly. There are discussions about the name, the price, specifications and much more.

Here are two images published on TechCrunch:

The photos are really well done. In previous rumors we have heard that the tablet should have a shape similar to that of the iPhone and a Home button. How Apple Tablet will actually look like? Nobody knows yet.

In addition to the photos here are couple videos, which look like fake, but a very good one.

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According to a (now deleted) tweet by major German electronics retailer Media Markt, the Apple iPad will go on sale March 1st at a price of 499 Euros (~$700) with T-Mobile contract or 899 Euros (~$1200) without. In the US prices would likely be around $500-$600 with contract and $999 without. These numbers were calculated comparing Apple items sold in Euros and USD (Mac Mini: 549 Euros / $599 USD, MacBook 899 Euros / $999 USD).

The company, however, quickly deleted the tweet but not before it was retweeted a number of times.

Redsn0w is a cross-platform jailbreaking, unlocking, and customizing tool for iPhone and iPod Touch. New version redsn0w 0.9b3 supports the latest firmware 3.1.2. The most recent release before this one was redsn0w 0.8, which targeted Apple firmware 3.0/3.0.1.

redsn0w 0.9 beta3 supports:

• All iPhones and iPod touches except the iPod touch 3G
• Windows and Mac OSX (x86)
• Apple firmwares 3.0-3.1.2

When it's out of beta, it will support the iPod touch 3G, PPC OSX, and Linux.

If you need a carrier unlock, redsn0w will handle iPhone 2G by itself (by installing the BootNeuter utility). For the iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS use Cydia after you're jailbroken to install ultrasn0w (baseband 04.26) or blacksn0w (baseband 05.11).

If you have a late-model iPhone 3GS, or if you have an iPod touch 2G whose serial number begins with “MC” (newer than week 40 of last year), you can use redsn0w to jailbreak but you are currently restricted to “tethered” rebooting. That means you need to connect your device to a computer each time you boot it - so just try no to reboot.

You can download redsn0w 0.9b3 here.

In this test one man writes a long paragraph on several different devices (including pen and paper) to test the speed. The results may surprise you.

The contestants are:

• Apple iPhone 3G’s software QWERTY keyboard (2009)
• Apple Newton MessagePad 2100’s handwriting recognition (1997)
• Palm Treo 650’s hardware QWERTY keyboard (2004)
• Palm VX Graffiti handwriting recognition software (1999)
• MacBook full-size QWERTY keyboard
• pen and paper

The test is not completely fair, since with handheld keyboards the speed greatly depends on how often you use them. The tester has been using an iPhone as his main handheld for 18 months.

The tester used an article with 221 words. Here are the results:

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Acrobat.com mobile allows you to access your acrobat.com account from anywhere to view, share, and fax your Acrobat.com documents.

You can use the iPhone 3Gs camera to scan physical documents right into your Acrobat.com account! The application comes with the ability to scan up to 5 pages and fax 2 pages for free; then it will prompt you to purchase additional scan and fax pages through in-app Purchase. This is the perfect complement to your Acrobat.com account to let you work from anywhere, at anytime!

You can download Acrobat.com mobile from the App Store for free (link).

Gameloft has posted a cinematic trailer for the upcoming iPhone game, Brothers In Arms 2: Global Front. The game will be available on the App Store in February. Let's watch the video:

Apple Tablet is expected to be announced on January 27. Site Macobserver has already published several photos of the tablet's glass.

On the photo the tablet looks a lot like a large iPod. One of the pictures shows the glass sitting on top of a MacBook Pro's keyboard:

More photos:

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Voice Band iPhone applicatin let's you make music with your voice. By simply singing into your phone, Voice Band transforms your voice into 10 different instruments in real time. Looks really cool. Take a look:

Here is another good video with "Smoke on the Water":

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Businessweek reports that Apple and Microsoft are currently in negotiations to replace Google as the default search engine on the iPhone with Microsoft's Bing.com. The talks have reportedly been underway for weeks.

"Apple and Google know the other is their primary enemy," says one of the people, who's familiar with Apple's thinking. "Microsoft is now a pawn in that battle."

With Google's entry into the mobile phone business as well as Apple's recent acquisition of a mobile ad company, the two businesses have encroached on each other's territories. Apple has even been said to be working on distancing itself from Google's Maps data in the iPhone.

If the negotiations are successful, it could also mean that Bing could eventually replace Google as the default search engine for Apple's desktop version of Safari as well.

Kevin Rose posted a video on his blog showing the Square device in action. This device allows us to make payments with a credit card via the iPhone.

For now Square is still a prototype, but we expect that this innovation can break through, thanks to its simplicity and convenience. Here's the video:

As always before the release of a new device many designers and regular users make interesting concepts. Here is a new one for iPhone 4G:

The author also provided a probability percentage value for each functionality of seeing it actually implemented:

• Removable battery (30% probability)
• Flash LED (50%)
• Back (Case) touchscreen, like the surface of the Magic Mouse (75%)
• Front camera (70%)
• Contacts on the Home Screen, as shown by a recent patent (70%)
• 64GB flash memory (60%)
• Dual-core processor and more RAM (80%)
• OLED display (90%)