Here is a wrapup of all the articles that were posted this past week on the blog:
Best iPhone apps of 2009 Apple Vs Google: the war is on! What's the Dev Team up to? iPhone OS 3.1.3 and 4.0 into the wild iVideoCamera records video to your iPhone 2G and 3G How to create custom SMS ringtones for your iPhonePlease check out these articles and leave a comment :)
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.
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 160x213. 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.
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/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?
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.
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 The Sims 3 The Oregon Trail Need For Speed Undercover Madden NFL 10 Tiger Woods PGA Tour Assassin's Creed Flight Control - my favorite game Cooking Mama Civilization Revolution Wheel of Fortune Spider: The Secret of Bryce Manor Real Racing Zenonia Ravensword: The Falle King Earth Vs Moon Episode 2 Sally's Spa Ragdoll Blaster Canabait Blades of Fury DOOM Classic Apps MobileNavigator North America MLB.com At Bat Textfree Unlimited TomTom US & Canada - I have this but I mostly use Google Maps Golfshot: Golf GPS SlingPlayer Mobile ColorSplash Pocket God Quickoffice Mobile Office Suite The Moron Test ReelDirector Magellan RoadMate 2010 North America Jamie Oliver's 20 Minute Meals I Am T-Pain - I think this app is useless CBS Sports SketchBook Mobile Star Walk - one of my favorite apps Convertbot Leaf Trombone PanoWhich of these apps do you own?
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.
I found this interesting piece on GigaOm and thought I'd share it with you. It doesn't say how much money Apple is making off the iPhone though a quick math can give us a vague idea.
If it costs $180 to build an iPhone and Apple sells each unit to AT&T (or other carriers) at $550, then it makes a profit of $370 per unit sold.
$370 times 5.2 million iPhones sold in the third quarter of 2009 makes Apple a profit of $1,924,000,000 (for quarter 3 only). That's almost 2 billion dollars in profits!!! To this, you have to subtract costs such as marketing, salaries, etc... but still, that's a hell lot of money.
These are obviously rough numbers but they shouldn't be too far from reality.
As you can see on the image below, it takes AT&T 2 years to make these $2 billion (in revenue, not profit). Apple is definitely cashing in...
So you thought you're iPhone was safe from getting any worm or virus because you didn't jailbreak it? Think again! We talked before about Ikee, iPhone/Privacy.A and other unnamed worms but only those jailbroken iPhones were vulnerable. Now your brand new stock iPhone may get infected too...
According to the Register:
Swiss iPhone developer Nicolas Seriot has published research on security shortcomings that could create a mechanism for hackers to lift data from regulation iPhones. Email accounts, keyboard entries held in cache and browser history files are all potentially exposed by a malicious app.
Seriot has developed a proof of concept app, called SpyPhone, in order to demonstrate how Apple’s own APIs might be misused to read or edit a user's address book, browse web surfing history, recent GPS position and more.
The full presentation is available for download from here (pdf).
If you're thinking that you're still safe because Apple will never allow such an app in the App Store, then you're wrong. As Martin Bryant reports, it seems that it'd be relatively easy to fool Apple into approving a spyware app by delaying deployment of the spyware, encrypting the payload or by using clever coding tricks.
Scary, isn't it? More scary is that some of these apps might already be in the App Store. Haaaaaaa! Alright, people, relax! While this is all true and possible, I highly doubt that we should worry too much for now.
Are you worried?
In an article in the Wall Street Journal yesterday, AT&T Mobility CEO Ralph de la Vega talked about the crappy 3G coverage in key areas such as New York and San Francisco, which he admitted are "performing at levels below our standards."
According to de la Vega, the good news is AT&T is working on it. I don't know if we should hold our breath on this because AT&T has been working on this issue for over a year now...
What I found more interesting in this WSJ article is the fact that AT&T might start charging iPhone users on a per-byte basis, as I kinda predicted in an article last month:
With about 3% of smart-phone customers driving 40% of data traffic, AT&T is considering incentives to keep those subscribers from hampering the experience for everyone else, he said. “You can rest assured that we’re very sure we can address it in a way that’s consistent with net-neutrality and FCC regulations.”
Many customers don’t know how much bandwidth they’re consuming, Mr. de la Vega added. When AT&T conducted a broadband test, customers often reduced their data use. Longer-term, he said, a pricing scheme based on usage is likely, though it will be determined by industry competition and regulatory guidelines.
This news comes at the right time as I was going to write an article on how I think it would make sense for AT&T to charge per usage.
As the WSJ says, 3% of users are responsible for 40% of the Internet consumption and it's not fair for a "little user" to pay the same price as a "power user".
I came to this conclusion as I am traveling around the world and using pay-as-you-go plans. I realized that I don't nearly use as much data (aka Internet) on my iPhone as I thought I did. On a pay-as-you-go plan, if I use less, I pay less, which makes sense.
In short, I think it's a good idea because it benefits me. But what about you? Does such a pricing scheme would benefit you? Are you willing to be charged on a pay-per-byte model?
There are hundreds of Twitter apps for iPhone in the App Store but after weeding out those with useless features, bad UI and the such, it basically comes down to a handful of applications that deserve our attention.
I've been asking people on Twitter what's their favorite iPhone Twitter app and I've been keeping track of the results. I've also had a close look at these 2 polls to come up with what I think is the ultimate list of the best iPhone apps for Twitter.
Of course we all have our favorites (mine is Tweetie 2), but we have to agree that the following apps are "la creme de la creme" of Twitter clients on the iPhone. For each application, I will also highlight what YOU like about them, according to my survey on Twitter.