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My iPhone is a NON wi-fi Satellite Radio?! …A reality now with Sirius XM SkyDock.

Jason Ser — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 03:26:17 +0000

This unqiue piece of plug and play gadget is called XM SkyDock , an iPhone and iPod companion which once plug into your iPhone and iPod base, can not only act as a car dock and charger, but also as a satellite radio antenna!
All you need is simply get an free tuner app into your iPhone or iPod Touch.

Not only can you use the SkyDock to receive Internet streaming channels from existing Sirius XM app ,you can also taps into XM’s satellite radio signal which all other known Sirius iPhone app can’t. And the best part is, SkyDock doesn’t need a mobile phone or wi-fi signal to work! Meaning, it will work in the anywhere and evrywhere! A good news for iPod Touch owners as it do not have a cellphone signal.

According to it’s creator, Sirius XM, this “i Gadget” companion is still under evaluation and had granted “preliminary” approval by the FCC. They plan to launch it during fall this year at the price point of USD120.

Yes! Your iPhone or iPod Touch Satellite Radio is Now a reality with Sirius XM SkyDock.

via[ Reuter]

Apple iPhone Apps Gets You Marijuana?

admin — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 10:13:25 +0000

If you are thinking of getting “illegal high” here, well you will not. ‘Cannabis’, an Apple’s App which will locate nearest available marijuana supply for it’s user is strictly for legitimate user of medical marijuana only.

This controversial iPhone Apps are created by the founder of Ajnag.com, which was founded in 2006 and was the first medicinal marijuana locater on the Web.

The Apps is a location based services, where they will get the users current location info and use it to display relevant “Marijuana” information. Cannabis provides the locations of legal marijuana locations in the 13 states where medical marijuana is legal, as well as in the parts of Europe where marijuana use is legal.

In case of “grey areas’, Cannabis can even helps you locate your nearest lawyers who specialize in marijuana cases. And if you an active reformist who lives in one of the 37 states where marijuana is not legal, the app also provides you with the location of the nearest marijuana activist groups–so you can do your part to promote reform.

Marijuana and Apple Apps….who can see this coming?

“Not So Pleasant” Surprise as Apple announced iPhone 3Gs during Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in San Francisco

admin — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 13:32:13 +0000

iPhone3Gs expanded the voice control App

The anticipated USD100 iPhone turned out NOT to be the way most will like it. The USD99 Iphone is simply an agreement between At&T and Apple to sell the “old” 8GB iPhone at USD99 and the 16G’s at USD149.

Yes , the USD99 iPhone is NOT the New iPhone 3Gs 2009!

But still, the iPhone 3Gs do have some other rumours of improvement pretty much confirmed during the Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in San Francisco on Monday.

The iPhone 3G S in 2 choices of a of 16GB and 32GB – will be available in black and white. It also had confirmed that it will comes with a 3MP camera that can record 30 fps video where user can edit videos directly on the device.

Speed is another important theme for the iPhone 3Gs( that’s where the “s” behind the 3G actually mean) where Apple claim an increased of 2 X to 3.6 X faster performance on the iPhone’s a wide range of apps, and also a faster data transfer speeds from 3.6Mbps to 7.2Mbps HSDPA.

While Voice Dialing is something most other phones had fro years, Apple do make it interesting by expanding a little more of the voice control technology to the Music app, like playing your choice of track, even album and artist name.

Another cool feature is called “Find My iPhone” where you can locate your iPhone if for any reasons you had lost your phone.Once activated, the phone will enables the “Find my iPhone” service on your Mobile Me account at me.com.” It would appear that the service obtains the iPhone’s location and makes it available to the MobileMe user on request if the unit is lost or stolen.

Other added functions pertty much stays the same as what Apple had revealed back in March including copy and paste, MMS, voice memo recording, Spotlight search, landscape email/notes/messaging, 3G tethering (via Bluetooth or USB), stereo Bluetooth (A2DP), peer-to-peer Bluetooth connectivity…etc.

So now it boils down to 2 questions for all future iPhone Owners: Getting the USD99 8G iPhone or the new USD199 or USD299(for 16 & 32G respectively) iPhone 3Gs?

A little Sunday fun: Apple’s App Store approval process

Shawn Farner — Sun, 10 May 2009 17:10:25 +0000

After much speculation, we’ve finally discovered Apple’s method for accepting and rejecting App Store applications: a Magic 8-Ball.

It makes a lot of sense, doesn’t it? The Magic 8-Ball is an unpredictable beast that dishes out advice without flinching. It seems reasonable then to assume that each Apple employee that reviews iPhone applications must keep an 8-Ball on his or her desk. It’s much easier to shake a toy for guidance than to remain objective during the approval process.

By the way, the Nine Inch Nails application we wrote about a few days ago was suddenly let in after all – without changes. I guess someone gave the 8-Ball another chance to make things right.

Nokia bringing 20,000 ‘items’ to new Ovi Store

Shawn Farner — Fri, 08 May 2009 16:00:16 +0000

According to a post from Engadget, Nokia may be planning to launch its new Ovi mobile application store with as many as 20,000 “items”.

I’m sure you’re wondering, as are we – why the hell did they say “items”? Why didn’t they just say “20,000 apps”? This decision was very likely made to pump up the numbers for launch. Apple’s iPhone App Store currently has over 40,000 apps, so Nokia maybe be throwing out a big number so people believe that their store has a lot of developer support. In actuality, an “item” could be a ringtone, a wallpaper graphic or a screen saver – not necessarily an application.

Though Nokia may not be launching the Ovi Store with 20,000 applications, they will very likely top Google’s launch of the Android Market. Google introduced their application store with only 50 apps last October.

AT&T myWireless Mobile finally released

Shawn Farner — Wed, 06 May 2009 22:03:47 +0000

I wrote a few weeks back about Cell Minute Tracker, the iPhone app that allows you to view your AT&T Wireless usage. The application isn’t without its flaws, but still, it’s useful enough and is something AT&T should have introduced a long time ago. They finally decided to join the party and today unveiled their own app – AT&T myWireless Mobile [iTunes link]. While they are late to the game, you know the old saying: better late than never.

Why they decided to go with such a hideous name, I’ll never know, but the application does what Cell Minute Tracker does and then some. One of my chief complaints about Cell Minute Tracker was the method of paying your bill – instead of streamlining the process through the app, they instead opened the AT&T My Account page in an inline browser. AT&T’s new app takes it to the next level by allowing you to pay your bill easily inside the app.

So what does this mean for Cell Minute Tracker? Who knows. The PageOnce app was selling for $0.99 in the App Store and I assume sales will take a hit now that AT&T is offering its own app for free. It may fade into obscurity as the AT&T application becomes more popular. We’re going to try and get in touch with PageOnce to see where they’ll go from here.

Trent Reznor rips Apple for rejected Nine Inch Nails iPhone app

Shawn Farner — Mon, 04 May 2009 21:53:22 +0000

Hell hath no fury like a scorned Trent Reznor and, unfortunately for Apple, the Cupertino-based company is now feeling the wrath of the Rez.

The recently-updated Nine Inch Nails iPhone application has been rejected by Apple for “objectionable content.” Apparently, whoever was sitting behind the app approval desk at the time decided that NIN’s 1994 album, “The Downward Spiral”, contained content that was unsuitable for the App Store. Funny thing is, users of the original NIN app were able to listen to parts of the album already. That part didn’t change. What did change? Whoever was approving apps, probably. One person’s “objectionable” is another person’s “acceptable” and, in the end, Apple looks silly and the App Store’s approval process looks like Michael Scott from The Office – good intentions but totally stupid.

Here is Reznor’s reaction to the situation:

…I’ll voice the same issue I had with Wal-Mart years ago, which is a matter of consistency and hypocrisy. Wal-Mart went on a rampage years ago insisting all music they carry be censored of all profanity and “clean” versions be made for them to carry. Bands (including Nirvana) tripped over themselves editing out words, changing album art, etc to meet Wal-Mart’s standards of decency – because Wal-Mart sells a lot of records. NIN refused, and you’ll notice a pretty empty NIN section at any Wal-Mart. My reasoning was this: I can understand if you want the moral posturing of not having any “indecent” material for sale – but you could literally turn around 180 degrees from where the NIN record would be and purchase the film “Scarface” completely uncensored, or buy a copy of Grand Theft Auto where you can be rewarded for beating up prostitutes. How does that make sense? You can buy The Downward Fucking Spiral on iTunes, but you can’t allow an iPhone app that may have a song with a bad word somewhere in it. Geez, what if someone in the forum in our app says FUCK or CUNT? I suppose that also falls into indecent material. Hey Apple, I just got some SPAM about fucking hot asian teens THROUGH YOUR MAIL PROGRAM. I just saw two guys having explicit anal sex right there in Safari! On my iPhone!

Come on Apple, think your policies through and for fuck’s sake get your app approval scenario together.

I’ve written in the past about the App Store’s pitfalls and this is just another case to prove my point. Apple needs to cut the cord and let developers build what they want. If they want to protect the masses, they can slap a parental advisory on an app. Developers and users alike are growing tired of the app approval circus and, if Apple keeps it up, platforms like WebOS are going to start looking very inviting.

[via PC World and Engadget]

The iPhone App Store: One billion served

Shawn Farner — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 00:49:10 +0000

Well, it’s official. After weeks of speculation on when Apple would serve up its billionth iPhone App download, today turned out to be the day. The iPhone App Store has now reached 1963 McDonald’s numbers – one billion served in just nine months.

The focus now shifts from the countdown itself to the contest Apple was running to reward the billionth app download. Who’s the lucky guy or gal that will walk away with a MacBook Pro, a 32GB iPod Touch, an Apple Time Capsule, and a $10,000 iTunes gift certificate? The official Apple site says the winner will be announced soon. We’ll wait and see.

iPhone App Review: Cell Minute Tracker

Shawn Farner — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 00:43:09 +0000

Every once in a while, an iPhone App comes along and makes your phone immeasurably more useful than it had been previously. So useful, in fact, that you wonder why Apple (or AT&T, even) didn’t produce a similar app themselves. After getting a chance to review the Cell Minute Tracker app from PageOnce, I can safely say that this is one of those applications that can make your handset more useful and at the same time spice up various iphone deals in the market.

As the name states, Cell Minute Tracker helps you keep tabs on your remaining cell phone minutes. On top of that, it also lets you know how many texts you’ve sent and received and how much data you’ve used. Having this information at your fingertips is a godsend – the AT&T-provided ways to check your minutes (text messages, web site) are much less convenient.

In addition to tracking cell phone minutes and messaging/data usage, the Cell Minute Tracker can also show you your most current bill. The application breaks your bill down into previous balance, your monthly service charge, usage charges, credits/adjustments/other charges and government fees. You get a pretty good look at what makes up your bill, though it would be neat if you could take a more in-depth look at what made up your usage charges.

Under Bills, there’s a “Make A Payment” button – a nice touch. Currently, this button logs you into the AT&T Wireless web site through an integrated browser. It would be great if there was a more mobile-friendly way to pay your bill – the rest of the app does a great job at letting you avoid the web site, so it seems strange that the site is brought up for this feature. My suspicion is that it is a matter of security and the issue is probably on AT&T’s side, not PageOnce’s.

All in all, Cell Minute Tracker does what it says – it keeps track of your usage and it does it well. While I’m certainly not someone who is in danger of overages (look at my minutes – my billing cycle is up in 3 days and I’ve used 144 of 450), it’s still pretty cool to see exactly where my account stands. Parents of teenage daughters – this app could potentially save you from a billing nightmare. If your daughter is constantly ringing up $200 bills, this would be a $0.99 well spent.

If you decide to check this app out, let us know what you think!

Mr. Cook, tear down this wall (or: the App Store sucks)

Shawn Farner — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 16:04:35 +0000

The iPhone App Store is crap, plain and simple. Crap because of what they sell inside it and crap because of what they aren’t selling.

Apple has made it clear that they are more than willing to let countless fart applications into the App Store but aren’t so keen on useful applications like, oh, I don’t know – turn-by-turn GPS navigation, tethering, video streaming and so on. We’ve even seen Apple block applications from entering the Store just so they could introduce their own version.

It’s time to end this nonsense.

With Steve Jobs on a leave of absence, Tim Cook is now the man behind the wheel for Apple. There’s a golden opportunity here for the iPhone to reach its full potential, but I highly doubt that Cook has the balls to make such a bold move – he’s just a placeholder, after all.

Still, I’ll make this appeal: Mr. Cook, tear down the App Store wall. Let the users sort out the gems from the junk. Let developers squeeze every bit out of the iPhone that they’re able to, regardless of your own plans. Why is it okay for you to stifle innovation and not anyone else? Do the right thing.