App for That: How to send videos to the cloud

There are hundreds of thousands of iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad apps for just about everything — so how come the one you need, the one you know just has to be there, is so hard to find? Enter TiPb’s new weekly feature where staff and readers alike sort through the App Store and help you find just the right App for That. This week, George asks:

Next Month, I’m going to a YouTube gathering in London called Summer In The City. As its a YouTube gathering there is going to be alot of video taking. However, I’m only going to take my 16GB iPhone (and clothes and stuff), so was wondering if there was an app that would let me store the videos when I ran out of room, as I can’t put it on a computer or anything.

To see what we found for George, follow along after the break!

Dropbox [Free - iTunes link] is the perfect solution for George! Dropbox is an iPhone and iPad apps that allows users to upload videos, as well as other files, that can later be accessed from a computer or other iOS device.

A free dropbox account provides 2 GB of space (with incentives to increase that). If George is concerned about space, he can subscribe to the 50 GB or 100 GB plan. They are priced at $10/mo and $20/mo, respectively, but he can cancel his subscription after returning from his trip and transferring the videos to his computer.

Anyone else have any App for That suggestions for George? Let him — and all of us — know.

Having trouble finding what you need in the app store? Send us an email to iosapps@tipb.com and let us know what you’re looking for, and we’ll do our best to find you just the right App for That!

10 Reasons Not to Buy an iPad for College-Bound Students

Summer Break’s end is right around the corner, which means hitting the shops to get everything on your back to school, school supplies list. This also means college-bound students will be hoping for iPads from their parents. But media editor Jeff Somogyi from dealnew points out ten reasons parents should not even consider buying their children iPads – especially for use instead of regular laptops.

The ten reasons include:/> 1. It’s Expensive

2. It’s Not the Best Solution for Note-Taking or Editing Documents

3. It’s Too Distracting

4. It’s Ultra-Portable and Ultra-Droppable

5. What Makes it Desirable to your Kid is What Makes it Desirable to Criminals

6. It’s Meant for the Enjoyment of One Person, Which Means Social Seclusion (you saying that I’m not social?!?)

7. Digital Text Books are a Marvel, but There’s No Secondary Market

8. It’s a Status Symbol, Plain and Simple

9. It’ll Already be Old Technology by the Time You Buy It

10. They’ll Also Want a onclick="javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview('/outgoing/www.worthavegroup.com/laptop-insurance');" target="_blank" title="Laptop" href="http://www.worthavegroup.com/laptop-insurance">Laptop, Too

I, of course, don’t agree with some of the aforementioned reasons. Some just seem like filler-reasons to complete a list of ten overall. However, I do think that iPads should not take the place of regular laptops. For the price of an onclick="javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview('/outgoing/www.ipadngravy.com');" target="_blank" title="iPad" href="http://www.ipadngravy.com">iPad, $499 at the cheapest, you can get a better-than-good PC or pay just a bit more and go ahead and get a onclick="javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview('/outgoing/www.macbookinsurance.com');" target="_blank" title="Macbook" href="http://www.macbookinsurance.com">Macbook.

So what do you think? A list that’s going to make your parents think twice about buying you that iPad, college-bound students?

[News via onclick="javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview('/outgoing/finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/10-reasons-not-buy-ipad-students-174406688.html');" target="_blank" href="http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/10-reasons-not-buy-ipad-students-174406688.html">Yahoo!]

Track your expenses with Touch Expense

Touch Expense, by MobiApps, is an iPhone application designed for tracking your expenses.

Touch Expense is an innovative and easy way to put your daily expenses.
Insert and tracking your daily expenses has never been faster and enjoyable.

I’m not sure how I feel about the UI for entering in expenses. You must slide your fingers up (and down) the big circular sliders to enter the amounts – the left one is for dollars and the right one is for cents. Having a keypad pop up would be faster, in my opinion. The look of the UI, however, is really neat and makes me want to get used to the entry method. In fact, the look reminds me of my favorite weight tracking app, Weightbot.

Touch Expense is available on the iPhone for $1.99. Screenshots after the break.

[iTunes link]

Have an app you’d love to see featured on TiPb? Email us at iosapps@tipb.com, tell us about your app (include an iTunes link), and we’ll take a look.

Rumor: AT&T Employees Instructed of Vacation Blackout at end of September

Yet more possible evidence of an iPhone 5 release this coming September. Gizmodo received a tip from an AT&T employee, noting a vacation blackout during the last two weeks of September. We’re assuming they checked the headers on the email, confirming it was indeed coming from someone at AT&T. The content of the email follows:

href="http://cdn.everythingicafe.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/2269708.jpg">src="http://cdn.everythingicafe.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/2269708.jpg" alt="Vacation blackout" title="2269708" width="450" height="300" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-22820" />/> id="more-22819">

From: ************/> Date: Fri, Jul 29, 2011 at 12:27 PM/> Subject: Iphone 5 release time/> To: [email protected]

I’m an att employee and my boss just announced that vacation requests for the end of september will be denied due to an “event blackout”. Historically the only time they’ve done this was for an iphone release. So we’re looking at the last two weeks of september.

-********

Some meet fire.

Source: href="http://gizmodo.com/5826068">Gizmodo

90 second iTunes previews starting to roll out internationally

The new, longer 90 second iTunes music previews seem to be finally rolling out internationally. They aren’t available on all songs yet, and in my testing of the Canadian iTunes Store, it seems hit in miss as to whether you’ll get them or not, but at least some songs are going the full 90 seconds.

After a November 2010 notification to record labels Apple originally switched to 90 second previews in the US back in December of last year. Why it took that email so long to reach beyond American borders is unknown, as is how long it will take to fully roll out now that it has begun.

In an effort to crowd source this, let us know if you’re seeing the 90 second previews, what country you’re in, and whether or not the 90 second previews are everywhere or just on a few songs.

Fun Fact: Apple Has a Bigger Budget Than the U.S. Government

We all know that Apple is a monumental company, but if there is one figure that puts that fact into perspective it is when we compare it to our own government in the United States. Following Apple’s previous earnings report, the company has a total of $76.2 billion in the proverbial bank. This week marks the U.S. Treasury’s attainment of $73.8 billion balance.

For comparison sake, Microsoft, Apple’s closest competitor in the technology industry, is just shy of $70 billion. In total, 29 worldwide companies are wealthier than the federal government.

With Apple’s unprecedented growth over the last few years, it is not impossible that the difference in revenue between the government and the world’s biggest technology company will broaden further. Especially with the national debt looming on us. (Another fact for you, but this one isn’t as fun: analysts have found that our national debt in the trillions is currently impossible to pay off even if the U.S. Government collected every dollar in circulation.)

Maybe Apple just knows how to find the right people to manage billions and a wide reach of power. It would not hurt if the government looked at Apple for a few pointers on how to run a multi-billion dollar establishment, but the government’s system may already be too cluttered to be fixed by a precisely-neat company that dominates practically every market that it enters.

Who says Apple won’t run the world one day? Plus, that day seems close. Especially if our government goes under. (That was a joke of course, that is not likely to happen anytime soon. However I should probably bring up the national debt again that for all intent and purposes is impractical to work out.)

All kidding aside, the collation merely demonstrates Apple’s influence not just in groundbreaking technological strides and inventions but also its significant power in the world.

[figures via onclick="javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview('/outgoing/www.firstcoastnews.com/news/article/212929/11/Apple-Has-More-Cash-Than-US-Government');" target="_blank" href="http://www.firstcoastnews.com/news/article/212929/11/Apple-Has-More-Cash-Than-US-Government">First Coast News]

Add NFC payment capability to your iPhone 4

Do you want to add NFC to your iPhone 4? If you do, there is now actually a way to do it; but it is not for the feint hearted. NFC is an acronym for Near Field Communication. NFC enables you to pay for items by waving an enabled card or phone in front of an NFC enabled credit card terminal. There is no need to input a pin number or sign anything; it is all done with a wave of your phone. NFC has been widely rumored to feature in the iPhone 5 too.

NFC is currently available on certain Android handsets and now you can add it to your iPhone 4 too; if the jealousy is just too much to bear. According to Unplggd, all you need is one of the new credit cards from your bank that supports NFC; it should have a logo on the card that looks similar to a WiFi logo. Some banks call these cards Tap & Pay.

Once you have the card, all you need to do is remove your iPhone 4 back panel, position the credit card behind the battery then replace the back cover. You now have an iPhone 4 with NFC payment capabilities. The glass back apparently does not interfere with transactions and it can even work when you have a case on too.

Now I do not know why you would ever want to risk opening up your iPhone 4 to do this. NFC is hardly a killer feature yet. I don’t think I have ever seen it being used in the UK. Also the additional pressure this may put on the glass rear panel worries me greatly. This could stress the glass making it much more susceptible to cracking. Is anyone remotely interested in giving this a try?

[Unplggd]

 

The BookBook is now available for the iPhone 4

The iPhone 4 is a marvel of 21st century technology. It incorporates security, entertainment and productivity in one single device. You can work with it, play with it and just have an amazing time without compromising on the benefits or services. The style of the iPhone 4 also aptly represents this idea. On the other hand, traditional leather bound books bring out a sense of nostalgia, and is just amazing to hold. The texture is set to remind us of decades or even centuries gone past; our amazing journey as a species.
The reason I have brought these two very different things up is that now there is an iPhone accessory that can combine the technological brilliance of the iPhone 4 with the warm feeling of a leather-bound book: the BookBook vintage case.
The BookBook case allows you to walk around with your iPhone 4 securely held within a high quality leather case. When you open it up, it looks as if you are reading a book, except you will be flipping through a touch-screen wonder. The BookBook also features slots for your id, debit cards, credit, cards and cash. By combing your wallet with your iPhone, this nice little accessory will reduce the length of your pre-travel checklist while giving you unprecedented convenience.
However, do not let its vintage look fool you; this accessory was designed with your iPhone 4 in mind. The case securely holds down the iPhone and protects the screen. It also provides edge-to edge protection, meaning, your phone is secure from any unwanted scratches or bumps. You can also easily attach your headphones while the iPhone is in the BookBook.
This wonderfully thoughtful accessory goes for only $59.99 but provides you with a wallet, iPhone 4 casing and awesome style.