45 Applications That Will Be On My iPhone Next Year

By Sebastien Page on Dec 31, 2009

A couple weeks ago I wrote about the top 40 iPhone apps of 2009 in the App Store. This article got quite a bit of success (especially on Twitter) and a few of you asked me what where my favorite iPhone apps of 2009.

I’ve had many apps come and go this year so I guess the best way to tell what my favorites are is to tell you the one I will keep with me for next year.

Facebook – Need I say more? Indispensable if you have a Facebook account (note: you may want to join our Facebook page).

Byline – This is to me the best RSS reader for iPhone. Fast and easy!

Flight Control – My favorite iPhone game. Ever! It’s fun and addicting. My best score is 357 planes landed. Can you do better?

Bejeweled 2 – My fiancée turned me on this game. I used to play it a lot but I got over it.

Tap Tap Revenge 3 – I just downloaded it as it was free for a limited time. I drive my fiancée crazy with it because I always play the same song (Tap Tap DomiNation by Stroke 9).

Pro Surfing – If you’re into surfing, this game is a must-have. Very fun and well done. Last time I checked, I was #3 in the world!

Surf by Wavewatch – A great app for surfers. Gives you reports about pretty much any wave in the world. Even better, you get live cams of the spots when available!

Surf Report – Yet another surf report app. Not as fancy as Surf by Wavewatch but it does the job very well.

WordPress – I love WordPress as a blogging platform but the version 2 of their app is pathetically useless. It’s buggy, crashes all the time and provides very little features. Yet it’s still on my iPhone “just in case” they update it and make it a better app.

Tweetie 2 – The best Twitter app for iPhone to me, despite the fact it lacks a good RT feature.

Mobile Fotos – Probably the best mobile client for Flickr. I used to use it a lot to upload my pix to Flickr but now I just use the “email to Flickr” feature. Still nice to have it when I need to look for some of my pix.

myLite – One of the zillion flashlight apps in the App Store. This one does a great job for me.

Skype – I don’t use this app much but it’s nice to have it, just in case I need to make a quick call to France for cheap. I use Skype with VoIPover3G so it works on both wifi and 3G.

Dictionary – This app would be great if I thought about using it… I usually go to Google when I need a definition… Need to use this app more often. I really like the thesaurus feature.

Wiki Tap – With Wikipedia now going mobile, this app becomes more and more irrelevant. Still nice to have it here.

SmackTalk – The app that made me laugh the most in 2009. No doubt about it!

Sound Grenade – If you like to piss people off on certain occasions, then this is the perfect app. It creates a very annoying sound that will drive people nuts while wondering what it is and where it’s from.

Star Walk – Hands down the best app in the App Store. I don’t use it much but when I do, it always amazes me and my friends. Point it at the sky at night and learn about the stars and constellations thanks to the GPS an digital compass.

Currency Converter – A must-have if like me you travel a lot overseas. It allows you to select several currencies and gives you quick conversions for each of them. In less than 5 seconds, I can find out what $100 is worth in 8 different currencies vice versa. It works both online and offline.

Photoshop.com Mobile – The mobile version of Photoshop. When it came out everyone was ecstatic about it. I don’t think it’s that good but I still use it a lot to crop my images when necessary.

Brain Exercise – The famous Doctor Kawashima made the jump from the Nintendo DS to your iPhone in order to help you exercise your brain. I stopped using this app as it was driving me nuts. My brain still seems to function ok. Should be deleted by January 2nd.

IMDb – I never used this app but I figured it might come in handy when I’m looking for the name of “this” actor in “this” movie.

gPush – Gmail push notifications for your iPhone. I downloaded gPush a few months ago because I was expecting an important email. I don’t really need this anymore as I know use Google Sync for iPhone.

FlightTrack – Another must-have for travelers. This apps tracks your flights and gives you important info like time, delays, gates, etc… This app saved me $200 once.

FM 94/9 -That’s the app of my favorite radion station back home in San Diego. I use it to listen to Brunch With Bob & Friends every Sunday morning. If you’re into Bob Marley, you owe it to yourself to listen to this show.

PhoneFlicks – There might be better than PhoneFlicks to manage your Netflix queue but this one works great for me.

myWireless – The official AT&T app. It’s really good for keeping track of your usage, but most importantly for paying your bills online.

Duo – This app allows you to update both your Facebook status and Twitter at the same time. I love it!

Midomi Sound Hound – Just like Shazam, Midomi can help you find a song just by singing it or my bringing your iPhone close to the speaker. I think it’s much better than Shazam.

Light Saber – Every iPhone user owes it to himself to have this light saber app. Kids love it.

LBX Shaver – This app fakes an electric shaver. Great for playing jokes (check mine out).

Gun App – In the same class as LBX Shaver, this app fakes several weapons. My favorite is the taser that makes this funny song and vibrates and you press the screen. My fiancee freaks out every time I use it on her.

Discover – A great app that allows you to transfer files from computer to iPhone over wifi.

Vonage – I have Vonage at home, on my laptop and I love it. This app however is greatly disappointing. I keep it in hope that Vonage will make it a VoIP app someday.

What’s On? – This is a by far the best TV guide for iPhone.

Evernote – Everyone says it’s a great app. I downloaded it to try it out but I guess it’s too fancy for me as I don’t really use notes. Still experimenting with it.

QuickSense – It allows me to check my Adsense earnings directly from the phone. It is fast and very reliable. Definitely a keeper!

CB Stats – This app gives me quick access to my ClickBank stats. The features are very limited but it does a good job at giving you the basics rapidly.

CheckCB – Another app to check my ClickBank earnings. This one is much better than CB Stats as it gives you very detailed info. The downside is that it’s much slower…

Analytics Agent – I use the free version. Not the best analytics app for tracking your websites stats, but it is the fastest one. I use it to check my daily visits only.

Analytics App – If I need deeper analytics for my websites, then I use Analytics App. The downside of this app is that it is pretty slow, especially if you’re not on wifi.

1Password – I downloaded this app when it was free in the App Store. I never really use it. Maybe I should just delete it.

iExpenseIt – This is a great app for keeping track of your expenses. See, since I’m running a business, I am required by law to keep track of everything I spend. I update it once or twice a month with new spendings and give it to my tax guy at the end of the year.

Mint – A good app for checking your finances. It syncs with your banking accounts and credit cards to give you a quick picture of where you’re at money wise.

Ego – I use this app to track how many feed readers I have on this blog.

So these are my apps. If you feel like it, please share your tops fav apps in the comments.

 

ProSwitcher Multitasking App for the iPhone

By Sebastien Page on Dec 30, 2009

I can’t remember the last time I was so excited about a jailbreak app. Maybe it was for Action Menu, or for mQuickDo? I’m not sure, but what I know is that ProSwitcher has radically changed the way I use my iPhone.

ProSwitcher is a multitasking app for the iPhone that kinda replicates the Palm Pre “cards” feature by adding a very nice UI to Backrounder, the jailbreak app that allows you to run apps in the background.

I never was a fan of Backgrounder. Having to close the app to launch another one kinda defeated the purpose. But ProSwitcher makes app switching seamless, and I have to say, with a certain style.

9 to 5 Mac gives a pretty good description of how it works:

You can trigger the cards view by opening the application from home-screen, touching the status bar, or by double clicking the home button. To add an application to the Cards view, you simple have to launch the app, then hold down the home button for about one to two seconds. To remove an app from the “Cards” view click the close button on the top left of the card, to swipe the card up the screen.

Here is a short video of ProSwitcher in action:

I ran ProSwitcher on my 3GS for a few hours with up to 10 apps open at once. It didn’t crash, it didn’t lag and the battery didn’t seem to take a big hit from it. Obviously your mileage may vary…

What I like the best about ProSwitcher is how you can smoothly switch between apps without having to close/reopen them. Actually no! What I like the best about ProSwitcher is that it is free on Cydia via the BigBoss repo. Yes it’s free, so grab it until the dev realizes that he should make you pay 10 bucks for it.

ProSwitcher is one of this application that should be implemented in the next iPhone OS and honestly, I really believe (and predict) that Apple is already stripping down the code of this app and trying to make it its own for iPhone OS 4.0.

Have you tried ProSwitcher yet? How do you like it?

 

Your Favorite iPhone Articles Of 2009

By Sebastien Page on Dec 29, 2009

For this end of the year, I thought I’d give you a little wrapup of the articles that had the most success on the blog within the last 12 months, whether it is a term of amount of comments or retweets on Twitter.

There are many articles that got hugely popular at the time they were written but that are now outdated (ie. unlock iPhone 3.0) so I didn’t include those articles.

Note that this list is in no specific order.

Are there any article you read here this year that you think should make the list? Please feel free to add the link in the comments.

 

Dear #Tweetie Developer, Please Bring The Old RT Feature Back in Tweetie 2

By Sebastien Page on Dec 28, 2009

This post is a call to action to anyone who uses one of the best Twitter iPhone apps out there: Tweetie 2. Note that if you don’t use Tweetie, you can still help. Read on for more details…

Since Atebits launched the version 2 of Tweetie, they crippled a key feature of the application: the RT (retweet) feature. In the old version, you could RT a tweet by simply tapping “Retweet”. It would then look like this:

RT @tweetie I should improve the RT feature on #Tweetie2

In the new version of Tweetie, you have 2 different options to retweet. None of them really fit me or most power users. You now have the option to “Retweet” using Twitter’s new RT feature, which 64% of users don’t like, or you can use the “Quote” option, which is not really a retweet and adds the odd “/via @username” at the end of you tweet.

A quick search on Twitter shows that I am not the only one disliking the new way Tweetie handles retweets and I was thinking we should tell the developer that we want the old RT feature back.

The best way to get heard is to retweet the hell out of this article so @Atebits (the developer) or @Tweetie hear us. Hopefully the developer will listen to the community and bring the old RT method back to life.

If you are on Twitter, please help us out by clicking here to retweet this article (there are also 2 RT buttons on this page). Thank you in advance for your help!

 

What You Missed This Week: iPhone RSS Reader, Microsoft and Apple Against Google, And More…

By Sebastien Page on Dec 27, 2009

In case you missed any of this week’s articles, here is a brief summary of what was posted on the blog.

Happy holidays to all of you :)

 

Everything You Need to Know About Jailbreaking And Unlocking Your New iPhone

By Sebastien Page on Dec 26, 2009

If you just got a new iPhone for Christmas, then congratulations, you are going to love it. Next step now is to jailbreak your iPhone in order to release the full potential of it. If you’re not sure what jailbreaking is, I suggest you read a bit more about it. As you will see, there are many reasons to jailbreak your iPhone.

Now if someone offered you an iPhone and you don’t want to use it on an official carrier (like AT&T in the US), then you will have to unlock your iPhone. Unlocking is fairly easy, even for non techy people and there are very few risks of doing any damage.

Brand new to this whole jailbreaking and unlocking thing? I understand it might be a little confusing. I wrote an article about the difference between jailbreaking and unlocking that might help you understand both better, so feel free to check it out if want to learn more about it.

Let’s get into it now. This article aims at giving a quick overview of possibilities for jailbreaking and unlocking the iPhone. For both jailbreaking and unlocking, the method used depends on what iPhone model you have and what software (firmware) is currently installed on it. At this time, I will assume that your iPhone comes with firmware 3.1.2 preinstalled on it.

First things first. Before unlocking an iPhone, you first have to jailbreak it. Read More

 

What Did You Do For Christmas?

By Sebastien Page on Dec 26, 2009

Not iPhone-related at all… What did you guys do for Christmas?

As I said yesterday, my fiancee and I were traveling for Christmas.

I kinda miss home right now, so please share what you did for Christmas… That will cheer us up :)

 

Ho Ho Ho, Merry Christmas!

By Sebastien Page on Dec 25, 2009

I wish you a Merry Christmas, I wish you a merry Christmas, and a happy new year…

No new article on the blog today but just a friendly post to wish you and your family happy holidays.

I am not celebrating Christmas this year. My fiancee and I are currently in a nice campervan between Sydney and Byron Bay, Australia, which is part of our year-long trip around the world.

You can follow our adventures on our travel blog, or you can follow me on Twitter and Posterous.

Merry Xmas everyone :)

 

Featured iPhone Theme: Amphibious

By Sebastien Page on Dec 24, 2009

I found this really funny theme on Cydia called Amphibious so I thought I would feature it on the blog. I personally don’t see myself with such a theme but it is pretty original…

 

Apple and Microsoft to Join Forces Against Google?

By Sebastien Page on Dec 23, 2009

Last week I wrote about the new war that is sparkling between Apple and Google and in an interesting article, PC World even suggests that Apple may go as far as partnering with Microsoft in order to fight the almighty Google.

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

Apple could build its entire iPhone strategy on this one Arabian proverb. The combination of the rising smartphone stake held by the iPhone, and Microsoft’s dominant position among enterprise communications and productivity applications could create a whole greater than the sum of its parts.

Alex Williams over at RWW is more specific about the possible synergies of an Apple/Microsoft alliance:

As PCWorld points out, Microsoft may be smart to team up with Apple. The iPhone is a solid, smart phone. Microsoft could do well by developing applications for the iPhone that serve its customers. Its Exchange Server and Office products still dominate the enterprise. As it is platform agnostic, Microsoft can develop applications for the iPhone that support its customers and protects its market base.

Apple needs a good partner like Microsoft to make any significant dent in the enterprise. It does not have the enterprise infrastructure like Research in Motion does with the Blackberry Server. Without an enterprise management service, Apple will find it tough for the iPhone to make any deep play into the corporate world.

Interesting, isn’t it? I’m sure some fanboys out there would cut their own throats opened if Apple and Microsoft joined forces but all in all, I think that it might be a great move from the two giants to put a stop to Google’s uber dominance of the interweb.

What do you think?

 

Is The iPhone Coming To Verizon In 2010?

By Sebastien Page on Dec 22, 2009

AT&T has been under fire lately for many reasons, but mostly because their network can’t really handle the data monster that is the iPhone. A couple weeks ago, AT&T even went as far as mentioning that it may charge iPhone users on a per-byte basis in the near future. I predict that this will happen sooner than later.

In the meantime, Verizon seems to prepping up its network for the iPhone. According to BusinessWeek:

Verizon Wireless has even made upgrades that would make its network more capable of handling extra traffic that would be generated by the iPhone, Verizon Wireless Chief Technology Officer Anthony Melone says in an interview.

“We have put things in place already,” Melone tells Bloomberg BusinessWeek. “We are prepared to support that traffic.”

It’s interesting to note that a few weeks ago, Verizon ridiculized AT&T andApple’s iPhone with their ad campaign called “there’s a map for that”, but now they expect to get the iPhone…

Even though Verizon appears to be a more reliable network than AT&T, I really doubt the iPhone will go to them next year. The main reason is that Verizon is a CDMA network while pretty much the rest of the world operates on the GSM network. This is just a hardware issue but I don’t think Apple will make the necessary changes just to catter to Verizon specifications.

Besides, Apple has a 5 year exclusive agreement with AT&T and this contract is supposed to expire in 2012. Now of course they could cancel this agreement but I believe it would cost Apple lots of this money it makes from the iPhone.

If anything, I think the iPhone would go to T-Mobile, but this is pure speculation and I don’t have any proof to back this up. It’s just a gut feeling.

Do you think the iPhone will go to Verizon next year? Would you make the switch from AT&T to Verizon if that was the case?

Image: Momentum Of Failure

 

The Best RSS Reader For iPhone

By Sebastien Page on Dec 21, 2009

A few weeks ago I wrote an article about the best Twitter apps for iPhone which got quite a bit of success, especially on Twitter. A few of you asked me to write the same time of article, only about the best RSS reader for iPhone.

I was just going to write such an article but my friend Patrick from JAiB had the same idea and got a chance to write about some good iPhone RSS reader before I did. Patrick gave a quick look at 6 RSS apps for iPhone that sync with Google Reader and I suggest you read his article for more details about la creme de la creme of RSS reader apps for iPhone.

He quickly reviews the following apps:

UPDATE 04/24/2010: My favorite reader app is not Byline anymore. Reeder is now the best RSS reader for iPhone. Read my mini review of Reeder here.

My personal preference is Byline. I like how fast it is and also the ability to cache each feed for offline reading. What I like the most about Byline is how I can see all my folders and choose to read all New Items at once, or folder by folder.

This is a great feature because I like to read my RSS feeds by category in the morning. For example, I like to read iPhone news first. Then I usually read the France and world news. Then I usually read tech news, SEO, and marketing-related news.

Byline gives a quick overview of each item and shows you the title as well as the beginning of the item. It allows you to choose to read more about each article or not. Simple and practical. That’s exactly how I like my apps.

I tried a few others but Byline is by far my favorite. But as Patrick puts it, there is not really a best iPhone RSS reader app. What works for me might not really work for you. These six applications are very solid and should do an excellent job no matter what.

I’m curious to see what’s YOUR favorite RSS reader for iPhone. Please share in the comments.

 

What You Missed This Week About The iPhone: Best Apps, Apple Vs Google, and More…

By Sebastien Page on Dec 20, 2009

Here is a wrapup of all the articles that were posted this past week on the blog:

Please check out these articles and leave a comment :)

 

How to Create Custom Text Message Ringtones On Your iPhone

By Sebastien Page on Dec 19, 2009

Have you ever wanted to create your own custom text message ringtone for your iPhone? I know I have! Today I found a great tutorial that explains exactly how to do it.

Go to this article on iClarified and check it out. I haven’t tried it myself since I’m traveling and don’t really have time to “experiment” but I am hoping that some of you will try it and share some feedback.

Let us know by leaving a comment below.

 

Record Videos On Your iPhone 2G or 3G With iVideoCamera

By Sebastien Page on Dec 18, 2009

Until now, the only way you could record videos on your iPhone 2G or 3G was to jailbreak it and use Cycorder. For some reason, Apple didn’t deem necessary adding video recording to the 2G or 3G, even though this isn’t a hardware issue, but simply a software one.

This week, Apple finally approved the first video recording app in the App Store. The application is called iVideoCamera and can record videos at a whopping 3 fps… According to MacNN:

Users will be limited to one-minute segments at 3 frames per second, while the resolution is just 160×213. The developer, Laan, claims the next update will bring improvements to the frame rate, resolution, and clip length.

Just like the video camera of the iPhone 3GS, iVideoCamera allows you to save your videos directly to your camera roll and share them on FaceBook, YouTube, Vimeo or Twitter.

iVideoCamera [iTunes Link] is available from the App Store for $0.99.

 

iPhone OS 3.1.3 and 4.0 Into The Wild

By Sebastien Page on Dec 17, 2009

According to what Boy Genius Report found in their logs, it seems that Apple has been field testing 2 new iPhone OS.

The first one is iPhone OS 3.1.3, which should be made available pretty soon. I don’t think any major features will come with 3.1.3 and the usual “bug fixes” are expected.

The second and most important is the discovery of iPhone OS 4.0. We won’t see iPhone OS 4.0 until the new iPhone comes out sometimes in June or July next year but it’s interesting to see that Apple is already working on it. I guess these iPhone 4G rumors are not rumors anymore…

I looked at my logs and couldn’t find any track of an iPhone OS 4.0. I guess Apple engineers aren’t reading this blog ;)

http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2009/12/13/iphone-os-3-1-3-coming-soon-os-4-0-discovered/
 

What Is The iPhone Dev Team Up To?

By Sebastien Page on Dec 16, 2009

I don’t know if you’ve noticed but the Dev Team has been very quiet lately. I mean, the last time we heard from them was through a blog post about an UltraSn0w update.

MuscleNerd and I a buddies on Twitter and he always reply to me when I have a question or comment so last week, I asked him on Twitter what was the Team up to these days. He never replied!

I don’t think he simply ignored me. I think the Dev Team is on to something but they don’t want any info to be leaked and screw up everything, just like it did when the 24kpwn exploit was “leaked”, which led Apple to fix it in a minute.

So what could they be up to? An untethered jailbreak and unlock for the 3GS is the most probable project they’d be working on and I believe they are waiting for Apple to release an update to the iPhone OS before making this jailbreak available.

Doesn’t that make sense? Why do you think the Dev Team has been so silent lately?

 

Apple Vs Google: The War Is On

By Sebastien Page on Dec 15, 2009

Last week, Apple purchased online music site Lala for $85 million. Rumors are already flying that Apple acquired the start up for the quality of its engineers, and most importantly because it wants to move iTunes to the cloud as music streaming is getting more and more mainstream so to speak.

There is another reason why Apple bought Lala: it didn’t want Google to buy it first! It sounds a little childish but billions are at stake and it is safe to say that the war between Apple and Google is just starting.

According to the WSJ:

The twin pursuit of the start-ups reveal that the two tech titans have further plans to move deeper into each other’s business: Apple wanted to get into advertising, while Google sought a music service.

The relationship between the two companies has been heating up for quite a bit. First the resignation of Schmidt from Apple’s board, then the rejection of Google Voice from the App Store. More recently, Google snatched AdMob, the mobile advertising platform, from Apple. Now, Google is even entering the mobile market with its own device: the Google Phone.

Things are about to get ugly as the two companies will start bumping into each other more and more. I think competition is great for innovation and for bringing prices down and I can’t wait to see what’s to come in the close future.

 

Top 40 iPhone Apps of 2009

By Sebastien Page on Dec 14, 2009

With over 100,000 apps in the App Store, it’s not always easy to figure out what the best applications are. Besides, what’s best for me might not be best for you as we all have different needs.

One criteria that makes it easy to figure out if an app is good or not is the amount sold. The more it sells, the better it is, right? Apple recently came up with a list of those top best seller and top rated apps.

Games

Apps

Which of these apps do you own?

 

What You Missed This Week: iPhone Twitter Apps, Virus, and More…

By Sebastien Page on Dec 13, 2009

In case you missed any of this week’s articles, here is a quick summary…

My iPhone in New Zealand – I’m talking about my experience traveling with an iPhone in New Zealand.

When you shouldn’t use your iPhone – A flowchart to help you figure out when and when not to use your iPhone while spending time with your loved one.

The best Twitter apps for iPhone – A selection of the best Twitter applications for the iPhone.

AT&T to start charging by the MB – AT&T is officially thinking abiout charging iPhone users depending on their usage.

All iPhones are subject to worms and virus – Just because you didn’t jailbreak your iPhone doesn’t mean it is not vulnerable.

Who’s getting rich off the iPhone – Find out how much money Apple and AT&T are making off the iPhone.

 
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