The Early Edition for iPad is the digital newspaper and RSS reader that launched alongside the iPad. Over the course of 12 months, Glasshouse Apps has redesigned it from the ground up and just released The Early Edition 2 – and we’re gifting away 5 copies!
I wasn’t a fan of the original Early Edition, but I am loving The Early Edition 2! The UI is gorgeous and the app runs nice and smooth on my iPad 2. Because of my love for eye candy, one of my favorite features is the manilla envelope that pops up when sharing an article to a social network and the “Shared Copy” stamp that appears just before it pops up.
The Early Edition 2 is a beautiful, up-to-the-minute newspaper that puts you in the editorial seat. RSS feeds are the basis for content and now it can be used either as a standalone app or in sync with a Google Reader account.
We like The Early Edition 2 so much, that TiPb is gifting it to 5 lucky readers! For a chance to win, just leave a comment below promising that you’ll add TiPb to your RSS feed! Must have a valid US iTunes account to win. Apple’s rule, not ours!
The Early Edition 2 for iPad is available for $4.99. This is not on update to the original app, so even if you previously purchased the original Early Edition, you must make a separate purchase for The Early Edition 2. The Early Edition 2 requires iOS 5.
The Early Edition for iPad is the digital newspaper and RSS reader that launched alongside the iPad. Over the course of 12 months, Glasshouse Apps has redesigned it from the ground up and just released The Early Edition 2.
I wasn’t a fan of the original Early Edition, but I am loving The Early Edition 2! The UI is gorgeous and the app runs nice and smooth on my iPad 2. Because of my love for eye candy, one of my favorite features is the manilla envelope that pops up when sharing an article to a social network and the “Shared Copy” stamp that appears just before it pops up.
The Early Edition 2 is a beautiful, up-to-the-minute newspaper that puts you in the editorial seat. RSS feeds are the basis for content and now it can be used either as a standalone app or in sync with a Google Reader account.
The Early Edition 2 for iPad is available for $4.99. This is not on update to the original app, so even if you previously purchased the original Early Edition, you must make a separate purchase for The Early Edition 2. The Early Edition 2 requires iOS 5.
Join your hosts Marianne Schultz and myself for The Show: 39 – “Brain Was Fried”. You can subscribe to our show on iTunes, grab our RSS feed, listen now or download directly. We broadcast our iPad and iPhone podcast live each week. If you missed the live show, we hope you’ll join us next week for live chat and more. Our next show will early next week, most likely Tuesday at 7pm EST. Follow @everythingicafe on Twitter for updates on timing. If you’d like to be included on a future broadcast, please call 646-820-3431 and leave your name along with your question. If you’d like to provide us with feedback, we’ve set up a topic in our forums.
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Apple has posted a picture of their celebration of Steve Jobs‘ life, which included executives like Tim Cook and Jony Ive, board members like Al Gore and Bill Campbell, and performances from artists like Norah Jones and Cold Play.
The iPhone is a lot of things but as amazing as this gadget is, it is not immune to the occasional mishaps on the part of iPhone users. In its natural state (lacking a really good casing), the iPhone is very vulnerable to all sorts of damage every year thousands of users are affected by various accidents or theft. Like most other high-end smart phones, a loss could mean a huge financial disaster for the owner of the phone. After all, an iPhone can easily cost as much as a reasonable PC. For a long time this delicate and incredibly popular device was at the mercy of the user’s luck but thanks to insurance schemes for smart phones, the iPhone users can sleep peacefully at night. Now, Apple plans to take its insurance coverage to the next level and provide iPhone users with unrivalled service.
The new plan, dubbed AppleCare+, will be available exclusively for iPhone users for $50 a month. It will provide one year’s worth of hardware coverage and 90 days of telephone tech support. Since a new iPhone automatically comes with one year limited warranty, the total cover is increased to two years. More importantly, it allows for up to two “incidents of accidental damage due to handling.” Most other rivals smart phone makers also offer limited one-year guarantees but these do not cover accidents or theft, but rather they are confined to manufacturing defects only.
The AppleCare+ will also rivals the insurance schemes provided by carriers such as Verizon and AT&T. The former offers a scheme called “Total Equipment Coverage”, which covers accidents and theft. Meanwhile, AT&T offers $7/month scheme, which covers a variety of accidents and theft. In the long run, Apple’s move maybe aimed at creating a more fulfilling iPhone user experience and slowly distancing itself from carriers within the US. AppleCare+ will be available for $100 from October 14th onwards.
Remember how Apple asked for fans to send their remembrances of Steve Jobs after his death? With more than a million people emailing those through, Apple has updated their Steve Jobs page to show them off. At the top of the page, they simply say:
Over a million people from all over the world have shared their memories, thoughts, and feelings about Steve. One thing they all have in common — from personal friends to colleagues to owners of Apple products — is how they’ve been touched by his passion and creativity. You can view some of these messages below.
And share your own at rememberingsteve@apple.com
And beneath that is a constantly updating stream of the more than one million emails and messages sent through by admirers, fans, and techheads. It’s not too late to send in your own, if you want to add your name to the crowd.
The Gorilla Glass on the iPhone 4S is pretty sturdy stuff, but sturdy enough to stand up to a .50 caliber incendiary round? I don’t think so. Normally I’m not a huge fan of pointless destruction of shiny new gadgets, but this one’s actually pretty freaking cool.
iOS 5 brings a lot of great new features to iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad but more than that — it lets developers bring us even better apps and games! Whether it’s a great old app that’s been updated with amazing new functionality, or a brand new app that never would have been possible before, they now get access to everything from Documents in the Cloud to AirPlay Mirroring to Twitter integration to Newsstand, to persistent location and more.
There will no doubt be a flood of them soon but for right now, right this minute, here are a list of our favorites, the ones we think are the best — TiPb’s Top 5 apps that support awesome new iOS 5 features!
Apple’s iWork productivity suite includes the Numbers spreadsheet, the Pages word processor, and the Keynote presentation maker. While not as powerful as Microsoft’s ubiquitous Office suite, for smaller jobs they can make for even more beautiful, better laid out documents. And now, Documents in the Cloud. It only makes sense that Apple is right out of the gate with iCloud support for their own apps, and that the support is pretty good. Any Numbers, Pages, or Keynote document that you start on your iPhone or iPad is stored up on iCloud and pushed back down to all your other devices, including — eventually — the iWork apps on the Mac.
There’s no file system, no file management. The idea is for you to simply open your apps and find your documents there waiting for you, up to date and ready for more. If editing on all your iOS and OS X devices is important for you, iWork is now a powerful, easy way to do it.
Note: iWork apps are universal, so you only have to buy once to use on all your iOS devices, including iPhone and iPad. However, each app needs to be bought separately, and the Mac versions need to be bought separately as well.
While many people seem to hate even the presence of Newsstand on their home screens, it actually manages to very neatly solve several problems previously associated with subscription media like magazines and newspapers. It’s really just a custom folder, and magazines and newspapers are still served up as apps, but Newsstand keeps them all in one place, updates automagically when new issues “come out”, and takes you to a subscription section of the App Store so you don’t have to wade through games and novelty apps to find your periodicals.
Those magazine and newspaper apps had to update for iOS 5 to support Newsstand, but many already have and many more will update shortly. If subscriptions are your thing, Newsstand, if not perfect, is certainly better.
Note: Some apps are universal, many aren’t. Check for the + symbol on a case-by-case basis.
FireMint is always at the cutting edge of iOS gaming and iOS 5 is no different. They’ve already updated Real Racing 2 for iPhone and Real Racing 2 HD for iPad to support the new AirPlay Mirroring feature. It lets you stream your iPhone 4S or iPad 2 interface — including any app or game — through an Apple TV to a big screen HDTV. FireMint takes it to a whole new level — they offer full on Party Play. What that means is you and up to 4 people total can each use an iPhone 4S or iPad 2 to race, multiplayer style, on the big screen. Not only is that a whole lot of fun — it’s a shot across the bow of every console in the casual gaming space.
Hopefully soon we’ll see all sorts of board games, shooters, and other great titles support to feature. Until then we’ll be busy playing Real Racing 2.
Note: It’s not a universal binary, so you’ll have to buy it separately for iPhone and iPad if you want it on both, but right now it’s on 40% sale so it’s as close to a no brainer as you can get.
iOS 5 has built-in Twitter integration so you can rapidly tweet a photo, YouTube video, etc. iQuick Tweet smartly took that rapidity and made it the focus of a dedicated app. You launch, you type a Twitter status, you hit send, you’re done. It’s just that simple and it’s just that fast.
If you want to read timelines, search through @mentions, explore profiles, check trends, or do a lot of other stuff besides tweeting, there’s an embarrassment of full fledged Twitter clients on iOS, but if all you want to do is blast off a message, iQuick Tweet has you covered.
For iOS 5 users, foursquare now offers the new Radar feature, with ability to alert you when your friends are near and doing something fun — even if your iPhone is in your pocket. This awesome — or terrifying — new feature means you don’t have to have your iPhone out and foursquare open all the time, in constant fear you might miss out on what’s happening around you. While it’s not as granular as Apple’s new Find my Friends app, if your goal is to know where the cool stuff is happening, foursquare Rader is a lot more powerful.
Favored as the best way to devour web articles by geeks everywhere, Instapaper proves that it’s not just the big, flashy iOS 5 features that can make a difference — the little ones matter too. Support for the built-in dictionary and native brightness controls means downloading the app is faster, and reading your saved articles is more comfortable than ever. (The UI has also received an excellent overhaul.)
Note: Instapaper is a universal app so you can buy it once and use it on all your iOS devices.
A lot of Jailbreak apps and tweaks are also being updated to support iOS 5. If Jailbreak is where your heart lies, keep your browser locked on TiPb.com/Jailbreak for all the updates.
iOS 5 is only a week old and we’ve only just begun to scratch the surface of what iOS 5 apps and games will bring to our iPhones and iPads. Did we miss any of your favorites? Did we leave any of the best new apps and updates out? Is there anything else that should have made our top 5 list?
For the first time since the inception of the iPhone, Apple chose to break out of their normal yearly update schedule. Almost 14 months after the release of the iPhone 4, the company has released what all would consider an evolutionary update in the form of the iPhone 4S. The iPhone 4S shows no distinguishable changes to the physical appearance from its predecessor, but that’s only half the story. Read on for our full iPhone 4S review.
Physical Appearance
Despite rumors of an all-new design in the form of an iPhone 5, this year’s new iPhone utilizes the same design as the iPhone 4. Apple chose to retain the form factor design of the iPhone 4. The outward physical appearance of the iPhone 4S is no different than the iPhone 4. The glass backing with mirror cutout Apple, iPhone logos and legal information adorn the back. The new 8- megapixel with LED flash and all new optics positioned at the top left.
Moving to the front, again the same glass design. The front camera is VGA, which is suitable for Facetime video calling and self-portraits. The home button returns, but offers up more of a clicky feel. It’s hard to tell if this is due to improvements Apple has made in the manufacturing process or simply because it’s has the benefit of less clicks when compared to a 14 month old iPhone 4.
The retina display still provides vivid, bright colors. Apple has continued with a 3.5-inch display, which is starting to feel small. I’ve noticed a yellow cast when compared directly to the iPhone 4.
Both the front and back uses Apple’s anti-fingerprint oleophobic coating, which is nothing new, but remains to highly effective. After heavy usage, fingerprints largely remain unnoticeable, even more so when the display is on. Having used several devices that claim to have anti-fingerprint coating, I haven’t found a device that delivers on the promise like the iPhone 4/4S. By comparison, look at this image of the HP TouchPad’s display.
Wrapping around the sides is a brushed aluminum with volume up, volume down and the ringer switch on the left hand side. The power button and 3.5mm jack are at the top, with Apple’s standard 30-pin connector at the bottom. All models, include Sprint and Verizon CDMA models, include a microSIM card slot. Sprint is currently shipping the iPhone 4S with the microSIM card unlocked, but that is expected to change with a software update. The iPhone 4S is a world phone, but expect roaming costs when using the carrier supplied microSIM cards, unless you opt for a GSM unlocked model which will be available from Apple starting in November.
Camera
One of the main highlights is the camera. It gets a boost from 5 megapixels to 8 megapixels, but photo quality isn’t measured by megapixels alone. While important, any good photographer will tell you that optics are what’s most important and those have been improved with the iPhone 4S. With an f/2.4 aperture, the iPhone 4S can allow more light allowing for brighter images.
I took both my iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S out shooting one late afternoon. The iPhone 4 performed admirably, but there is a clear difference in the image quality when compared to those taken with the iPhone 4S. Images are rich with detail and have a wider color spectrum. These improvements were also noticeable from the camera app. Images on the screen were visibly sharper. The faster A5 processor also resulted in quicker shots, which will help you catch those important moments. Click through on each image below to see the full, original size image – without any editing.
Taken with iPhone 4
Taken with iPhone 4S
When it comes to photography, I’m as amateur as you can get, but I do enjoy taking photos. Like most, I don’t carry around a DSLR or a point and shoot. My iPhone is by far the camera I use most and I would forgo image quality for convenience. In looking at the quality of image produced by the iPhone 4S, that’s no longer a concern. The iPhone 4S can produce high quality images that are on par with a very good point and shoot camera. The best camera is the one you have with you and most likely that’s going to be your phone. With the iPhone 4S, using a phone for pictures is no longer a concession to sacrificing quality.
By upgrading the camera, that of course means that your video benefits from the improved optics. Apple has also included support for 1080p HD video and improved video stabilization. I had similar findings, with the iPhone 4 video appearing washed out compared to the 4S. In the sample videos below, I attempted to reproduce camera shake as I panned back from R-L to get an idea of the benefits of camera stabilization. Hardly scientific, but it seems clear there is some advantage to having this built-in.
Pictures taken with the iPhone 4 are still of a high quality and sufficient for sharing on Facebook, Twitter or via MMS, iMessage. The new camera on the iPhone 4S is perfect for those who are looking to print or preserve memories. Improved optics and increased megapixels offer a significant improvement.
Processor
Before this new model was introduced, I would often speak to people who picked up the iPhone 4, despite rumors of a new model. For them, it was hard to imagine a phone offering more and the iPhone 4 is no slowpoke. When you compare the old with the new, things just move faster on the 4S. Apps open quicker, camera is more responsive and anything that is processor intensive will see a boost. Gamers will rejoice at 7 times the graphic processing power of the previous generation.
Browsing in iOS 5 on the iPhone 4S resulted in webpages rendering faster, when compared with the iPhone 4 on iOS 5. If you utilize your phone to browse the web on a daily basis, these improvements might be the highlight for you, as they are for me.
When I compare the devices, these are improvements that are nice, but definitely not earth shattering. I’ve been going back and forth between the devices over the past few days. When moving to the older model, it’s not as if I feel like I moved from a BMW 335i to Prius. Side by side, you’ll appreciate the improvements, but that’s not a real world scenario.
Siri
Apple has included a new virtual assistant in iOS 5 called Siri that responds to voice commands. Press and hold the home button from either the lock-screen or anywhere within the phone to initiate interaction with Siri. You’ll see a microphone and hear two short tones. From there, you can ask Siri a question or issue one of many supported commands.
Apple has packaged a new Reminders app into iOS 5 and it works hand in hand with Siri, making it more useful than traditional to-do lists. Siri has no problem matching contact names, setting appointments, making calls or sending text messages.
Siri can also provide you with the weather and interject that it’s going to be “windy tomorrow”. It’s this sort of response coupled with the name that creates an odd-like bond with Siri. My wife has started to feel some competition from Siri.
For me personally, I wonder how useful I’ll find Siri when in public places. Are you going to be that guy who starts talking to Siri in a Starbucks? Speaking of which, Siri is very adept at finding places and even maps. “Siri, find me a Starbucks” makes quick work of that task. I’ve found Siri to be great at finding places nearby. Siri also has a sense of humor, as evidenced in this screenshot when I pressed her to tell me a joke.
Siri is currently in beta, but works quite well for simple tasks and saves time by avoiding keystrokes. In some ways, the beta tag should extend to users, who now have to rethink how we get things done. Siri changes things, for the better.
Software: iOS 5
Included on the iPhone 4S is Apple’s iOS 5, the latest update to the operating system that includes over 200 new features. If you have an iPhone 3GS or greater, then you’ll receive the free iOS 5 update. While some manufacturers hold updates hostage with exclusives, that’s not the case with Apple. That hasn’t seemed to hinder sales, but it is one less reason to upgrade.
If you are considering an iPhone for the first time, there is plenty to love about iOS 5. Notifications appear directly on your lock screen and with a swipe, you can respond to a text message, tweet or any other notification. There are no shortage of apps that make use of notifications. Understanding this, Apple has created the notification center, where you can sort messages by time received or manually. It’s also easy to turn off notifications from specific apps. From anywhere with the software, you can access the notification center by swiping down from the the top of the screen. This can reveal weather, stocks, missed calls, messages and others.
If a notification comes in during usage, it will appear briefly at the top of the screen and then disappear. It leaves no trail or icon to indicate what notifications might be sitting in the notifications center. While notifications have improved in iOS 5, they are still lacking compared to Android and webOS still remains as the best in class for notifications. It would be great to have an option to see a small icon at the top, but I’m guessing Apple realized this could fill up quite quickly. Either way, I’m not 100% satisfied with how notifications are handled, so hopefully there will be improvements in a future iOS update.
As noted above, the iPhone 4S benefits from advanced optics that puts it on par with a high quality point and shoot camera. With iOS 5, you can easily edit photos directly on the iPhone. Features include rotate, auto-enhance, red-eye removal and cropping. These features all dead easy to use and there are an assortment of ways to share the final image.
Also included is iMessage, or Apple’s version of BBM that has been so popular on BlackBerry devices. You can iMessage anyone with an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch and it will not count as a text message. It works exactly the same as SMS, but iMessage has the uncanny ability to know whether the recipient is also using iOS 5. From the user perspective, messages that show up in light blue are iMessages and will not count against your text messaging allocation.
Twitter integration is also baked into iOS 5. You can tweet photos directly from the Photos app. Safari, Camera, YouTube and Maps also allow you to tweet directly from within the app. With any of the above tweets, iOS 5 allows you to personalize your message, add your location and send. All with great ease, which is the hallmark of an established operating system.
PC Free Set-up
Nothing worse than cracking the plastic on a new iPhone and having to go through the customary iTunes set-up process. That is officially a thing of the past with iOS 5 and the iPhone 4S. Set-up and activation can be accomplished without a PC or Mac. While it’s still advised that you make use of a computer in order to transfer media to and from, the PC Free setup is a welcome feature.
There are over 200 new features in iOS 5. Please consider reading our iOS 5 Guide for a more in-depth look at the most important new features and how to make use of them. As someone considering the iPhone 4S, you should feel comforted that iOS 5 is a highly effective and refined operating system, that is very easy to use.
iCloud
A new feature in iOS 5 makes it easy to enjoy your content on other devices. Every new iCloud account comes with 5GB of free storage with a vast array of upgrade options 10GB/$20, 20GB/$40, 50GB/$100. Take a photo with your iPhone 4S and the image is wireless transmitted to iCloud, whereby it’s pushed to all of your iOS devices and your Mac. Apple calls this your “Photo Stream”. These photos, in addition to your apps do not count against your 5GB allocation.
iCloud also syncs your contacts across all of your devices, making wired syncing a thing of the past. One caveat to iCloud is that it requires iOS 5 and Mac OS X Lion. Getting all of your devices updated to support iCloud can be a bit of task, especially those who are weary of upgrading your computer or phones, for fear of incompatibilities or change.
Battery
There have been a number of reports in our iPhone forums of poor battery life. My experience is that the iPhone 4S is for some reason, not on par with the battery life of my iPhone 4. It could be based on usage patterns of the phones (SIRI) or an issue that plagues that A5 dual-core processor. It’s quite possible this could be fixed with a software update.
Pros:
Cons:
Conclusion
If you like the iPhone 4, then you’ll love the iPhone 4S. It’s faster, takes better pictures and most will find value in Siri, Apple’s voice activated virtual assistant. This phone remains the gold standard in smartphones, despite this being an evolutionary upgrade. There are no physical changes to the external hardware and the 3.5 inch display is starting to feel dated.
The only drawback to the iPhone 4S is that it’s not an iPhone 5. The iPhone 5 not a reality today and won’t be until sometime in mid to late 2012 at the earliest. That being said, iPhone 4 owners who don’t have a need for point and shoot quality photos, might want to sit this one out. Siri is amazing technology, but I’d surmise that users will find a varying degrees of usefulness.
Apple has taken a winner and improved upon it. Better internals, better software and it still has the best in class selection of apps of any operating system. If you are in the market for new smartphone, you cannot go wrong with the iPhone 4S.
Facebook Messenger for iPhone has been updated and brings the ability to see when the other person is typing, shows if a person is online or mobile, and has the people you message most quickly accessible.
Despite Facebook’s claim of bringing the ability to see when the other person is typing, I haven’t seen any such indication. How about you?
Facebook Messenger is a faster way to send mobile messages to friends. With Messenger, you can send and receive messages with any of your friends around the world or anyone in your mobile contacts list. Messenger is available on iPhone, Android, and BlackBerry.
Here’s the update details:
Facebook Messenger is available on the iPhone for free.
Busy day in tech yesterday, with Android Central running a never-ending live blog, covering everything from the new Motorola RAZR to the Galaxy Nexus, to Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS). If there’s a common hardware thread to be had, it’s that Android continues to spit out phones that are big, thin, and as wedged as an iPhone 5 rumor. The Galaxy Nexus in fact, with a 4.65 inch screen looks big enough for me to hollow out and use as an iPhone 4S case. Pretty much top-tier components all around, including innovative features like NFC beam for content sharing and facial recognition-based unlocking. The camera seems strangely weak, however, and Super AMOLED while bright and beautiful still doesn’t seem as well balanced as LED.
As to RAZR, where’s the flip? My old RAZR flipped. Just saying…
ICS seems to deliver on the promise of merging phone-bound Gingerbread to tablet-bound Honeycomb, creating a consistent UI that scales across the vast range of Android device sizes. It looks like they finally let Matias Duarte — the designer of webOS who went over to Google — loose to interesting effect. There’s a new font, which clones Helvetica better than Microsoft’s Arial ever did, and now looks very close the iPhone’s current Helvetica Neue. It’s also decidedly un-skeuomorphic, with flat, untextured regions that are deliberately unlike iOS. (We’ll talk more about that on the next Iterate. The lack of clear differentiation between smaller screen phone and larger screen tablet apps could be either brilliant or baffling. We’ll have to see.
Meanwhile over at BlackBerry DevCon 11, CrackBerry sat through the longest. Presentation. Ever. Seriously, it had an intermission. RIM co-CEO Mike Lazaridis hosted most of it, almost like Regis Filbin doing a gadget segment, but the technology they showed off was really impressive. Everything from the new QNX-based BBX operating system to the Torch-powered HTML5 engine to the TAT-driven new Cascade UI and framework elements show that while RIM did fall behind, they’re investing heavily in getting ahead. The developer story remains a little overwhelming — yes, there can be too many options — but the focus on results seems better. Much of this will make it’s way into BlackBerry PlayBook 2.0. Sadly, no new BBX superphones were so much as previewed. Yet.
With iOS 5 and iPhone 4S here, the competition isn’t giving Apple any breathing room, and a ton of new devices are already hurtling towards us like a fleet of Star Destroyers.
Check out all the Android and BlackBerry coverage and then jump back here and tell us if any of it tempts you away from iOS.
Facebook Messenger for iPhone has been updated and brings the ability to see when the other person is typing, shows if a person is online or mobile, and has the people you message most quickly accessible.
Despite Facebook’s claim of bringing the ability to see when the other person is typing, I haven’t seen any such indication. How about you?
Facebook Messenger is a faster way to send mobile messages to friends. With Messenger, you can send and receive messages with any of your friends around the world or anyone in your mobile contacts list. Messenger is available on iPhone, Android, and BlackBerry.
Here’s the update details:
Facebook Messenger is available on the iPhone for free.
If you are currently jailbroken on iOS 5 you can now return to skinning and theming your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch to your heart’s content — Saurik’s most recent update to Winterboard (0.9.3901) adds iOS 5 compatibility.
Although Winterboard is now compatible with iOS 5 it still isn’t safe to assume that all themes and skins are. As always, make sure you’re reading the descriptions carefully. In most cases themes just don’t apply properly if they haven’t been made compatible but it’s still good to check.
Anyone found any awesome themes that work with iOS 5 they want to recommend? Let us know!
Fun for Kids HD is an iPhone and iPad app that includes a picture book, puzzles, and games. It covers four main groups: animals, baby animals, vehicles and things and offers support for English, German, Spanish and Swedish.
An attractive design with clear images, sound and text catch your children’s curiosity and keep them interested with independent activities.
Fun for Kids HD is available on the iPhone and iPad for $0.99.
We assume that like every other carrier, it’ll cost $199 and up on contract.
The fact that such a small carrier can score the iPhone 4S has got me thinking about why T-Mobile doesn’t have it yet. You’ll notice that all of the non-AT&T carriers that have the iPhone are CDMA: Verizon, Sprint and C Spire. I wonder if AT&T doesn’t still have some sort of GSM exclusivity in the USA, preventing Apple and T-Mobile from forming a deal.
Everyone’s still digesting just how useful Siri actually is, and what you can do with it, and we’re slowly starting to get a better feel for the incredible power behind this thing. Over at CrushApps, Jim Rhoades has devoted a couple of blog posts into how to control Siri, including what words you can say to make her use specific linebreaks, punctuation and more.
ElectricPig has been asking Siri questions that it knows it can’t answer, and as you can see in the image at the top of the page, it says “I haven’t yet learned to take dictation”, perhaps hinting that Siri will in the future.
The incredibly brutal and fun Death Rally has just been upgraded to version 1.7, and now you can ruthlessly destroy the cars of your friends and loved ones in four-player deathmatch! You need iOS 4.2.1 or newer to make it happen, but once you do you can get your destruction on. Not only that, but the update provides the flamethrower as a new way of devastating your enemies.
Here’s the full changelog:
* FIRST MULTIPLAYER UPDATE: Race online against other Death Rally players from all around the world!
* FANTASTIC NEW WEAPON: The Flamethrower is now included in the 1st Reward Booster pack!
* NEW CAR PAINT JOB: The Retro Fighter for Shrieker.
* New achievements.
* Enhanced anti-aliasing for iPad 2.
FIRST MULTIPLAYER UPDATE CONTAINS:
* Up to 4 person multiplayer mayhem!
* 1 car (Shrieker), offering multiple paint schemes, separate level advancement than single player for upgrades * 2 upgraded weapons to choose from (shotgun and gatling)
* 6 maps available to race on (including Eureka which is a paid extra map in single player)
Apple has put “iTunes Match (Coming Soon)” placeholders up on iTunes in pretty much every country store we’ve checked, including the US, UK, and Canada, and the Music Settings in iOS 5 have just gotten an iTunes Match ON/OFF toggle, so… is iTunes Match about to go live? And if so, will it really go live everywhere?
iTunes Match was announced as part of iCloud and is Apple’s version of a music locker service. For $24.99 a year, iTunes Match will scan your desktop iTunes library, give you a 256-bit AAC version of every song it finds there that’s included in the 20 million strong iTunes catalog, and let you upload any songs (at the original quality) that aren’t. It’s been in developer beta since the end of August, with the only public launch date give as “coming soon”.
That means it’s perfectly feasible that Apple is indeed getting ready to launch iTunes Match. At least in the US. And maybe a few other countries. However, music licensing being what it is, it’s very hard to imagine Apple has secured the rights for every country that currently has the “coming soon” tag in place.
So we’re going to expect it when we see it, with the strong feeling it’s coming “sooner” to some countries than others.
UPDATE: While the page is still there, the link saying iTunes Match (Coming Soon) from the menu seems to be gone from the Canadian and UK Stores. Maybe Apple pushed that piece out wider than they intended to?
iCloud is Apple’s new, free don’t-call-it-sync service that stores your stuff up on Apple’s gigantic servers and pushes it down to all your devices. And it works great… but it can be a challenge if you have a family. Now apple has never been great about handling the whole family thing to begin with. Their digital hub has always been fantastic for a single person but started to break down when you wanted to manage a family, especially with multiple accounts. iCloud is no exception.
So what are you doing about it? Are you settling for one iCloud account that just shares everything for every family member, from spouse to child and back again? Are you keeping separate accounts for you and your significant other, but sharing one with your child? Did you use your iTunes account for iCloud, did you transition a MobileMe account, or did you create a new one?
Find my iPhone certainly works better when shared, and it’s cheaper to buy apps on one account than buy them more than once on several accounts, but things like Photo Stream end up being like crossing-the-streams — an explosion of stuff on everyone’s devices that no one particularly wants.
So how are you handling iCloud in your family? Any tips on keeping things economical and productive but still contained and manageable?
You’re sitting at your computer, mapping out your latest plan to take over the world, as your brand new iPhone 4S sits next to you, its accelerometer quietly measuring your every keystroke, figuring out what you’re writing… and sending it back to SHIELD.
Sound like science fiction? Something out of James Bond, Chuck, or Person of Interest? Not according to Georgia Tech.
“Using a smartphone accelerometer—the internal device that detects when and how the phone is tilted—to sense keyboard vibrations and decipher complete sentences with up to 80 percent accuracy. The procedure is not easy[…]but is definitely possible with the latest generations of smartphones.”
Needless to say, you could just think of all the espionage and privacy issues this raises. Personally, I’m just waiting to see which lazy screen-writer skips character development and wedges this into a spy flick first…
PCMag notes that Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son revealed in an interview with the U.S. Ambassador to Japan, John Roos that Apple CEO Steve Jobs was working on Apple’s next big product up until the day before his passing.
“I visited Apple for the announcement of the iPhone 4S [at Apple headquarters in Cupertino, California]. When I was having a meeting with Tim Cook, he said, ‘Oh Masa, sorry I have to quit our meeting.’ I said, ‘Where are you going?’ He said, ‘My boss is calling me.’ That was the day of the announcement of the iPhone 4S. He said that Steve is calling me because he wants to talk about their next product. And the next day, he died.”
iPhone 4S/iOS 5 untethered Jailbreak that’s being shopped around — yes, a paid Jailbreak. Needless to say, it’s fake. Fake.
Don’t ever pay for a Jailbreak. Not ever. Every legitimate Jailbreak to date has been given away to the community by the well known Jailbreakers and/or Jailbreak teams.
If someone is offering you a Jailbreak for money, they’re trying to rip you off, just like any scam. They want to steal some money now before the real Jailbreak is released.
Until that time comes just sit tight, the moment the real Jailbreak is ready, the news will be everywhere.
(Please pass this on to your friends, especially new iOS users.)
Apple has posted a new page on its site titled simply “Remembering Steve”. The page contains messages and tributes it has received for Steve Jobs from all around the world. The messages have all been emailed through a special email address that Apple has arranged. The messages displayed are constantly changing on the page.
Over a million people from all over the world have shared their memories, thoughts, and feelings about Steve. One thing they all have in common — from personal friends to colleagues to owners of Apple products — is how they’ve been touched by his passion and creativity.
If you want to send your own message, it is not too late, just use the email address rememberingsteve@apple.com.
As previously announced, Apple Retail Stores will be closed today so employees can share in Apple’s internal celebration of their co-founder, Steve Jobs‘ life.
They’ll be closed for 9am to 12pm PDT, 12pm to 3pm EDT.
Let’s be blunt — if you’re not already in the TiPb Forums you’re missing out on the best darn discussion in iPhone and iPad today, so head on over and register now!
Every day, TiPb gets flooded with announcements for new and updated iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad apps and games. So every day we pick just a few of the most interesting, the most notable, and simply the most awesome to share with you!
Mishu The Dragon: When little Mishu’s egg cracks open, he is faced with a world full of evil and threatening creatures who are out to get him. Born in such a hostile place, your challenge is to help Mishu survive for as long as possible on his dangerous and exciting adventure. [$0.99 for iPhone - App Store link]
Fuze: Gets rid of all the actual difficulty and danger of defusing bombs and just leaves in the cool part where you get to save everyone. [$0.99 for iPhone and iPad - App Store link]
vclock: Turn your iPhone, iPad or iPod into a “Live” desktop clock with mesmerizing video backgrounds and beautiful typography. Place vlock on your desk and amaze everyone that passes by. Your friends WILL want a second look. [Free for iPhone and iPad - App Store link]
Speedometer+: A good looking speedometer. Include a trip meter and logs your fasted speed. [$0.99 for iPhone and iPad - App Store link]
MailShot: Lets you email groups of contacts directly from your favourite apps, just as if this feature was built into your device. [Free for iPhone and iPad - App Store link]
Any other big app or game releases or updates today?
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.
For today only, the TiPb Store has the Marware C.E.O. Glide for iPhone 4S on sale for only $14.95!. Eco-friendly leather luxury in black, brown, and red. Get them before they’re gone!
Jonathan Mann has put together a duet with none other than iPhone 4S assistant Siri. Jonathan is a musician and songwriter who is currently writing one song a day and has been doing it for over 1000 days.
This song is all about Siri, in fact it is a full on duet, with Siri taking its part in the lyrics. Check it out in the video below and let us know what you think. Will Siri just be an assistant forever or do you see a career in the music business?
Motorola has announced that it will soon be releasing a watch that looks very similar to an iPod Nano. The MOTOACTV comes out of the box as a watch so you don’t need the accessory strap like you would with an iPod nano.
It is 46mm square and powered by Android. It features a GPS system, heart rate monitor and wait for it…. Bluetooth so you can use it with wireless headphones; of course it is an MP3 player too. It can also pair with your phone and you can then read text messages and other alerts as well as answer calls using the 1.6-inch touchscreen.
The MOTOACTV will be available in early November and comes in two flavors, an 8GB version for $249 and a 16GB version at $299. Apple could do so much more with that iPod nano, what a shame!
C-Spire Wireless, formerly Cellular South, has announced they’ll be launching the iPhone 4S on their network “in the coming weeks”. Pre-registration starts today.
So there’s your fourth carrier in the U.S., and it still isn’t T-Mobile?
Motorola has announced that it will soon be releasing a watch that looks very similar to an iPod Nano. The MOTOACTV comes out of the box as a watch so you don’t need the accessory strap like you would with an iPod nano.
It is 46mm square and powered by Android. It features a GPS system, heart rate monitor and wait for it…. Bluetooth so you can use it with wireless headphones; of course it is an MP3 player too. It can also pair with your phone and you can then read text messages and other alerts as well as answer calls using the 1.6-inch touchscreen.
The MOTOACTV will be available in early November and comes in two flavors, an 8GB version for $249 and a 16GB version at $299. Apple could do so much more with that iPod nano, what a shame!
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