Apps

Piracy on iOS: 60% of Monument Valley installs on iPhone and iPad not paid for

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated November 19, 2018

Even though this particular data point is a few days old now, I think it's highly relevant in light of Apple's glowing App Store stats revealed yesterday.

According to developer Ustwo Games, its award-winning and incredibly successful Monument Valley, an atmospheric puzzle game in which you manipulate impossible architecture inspired by the works of M.C. Escher, has seen a significant chunk of its potential revenue lost to piracy because only 40 percent of the $3.99 game installs on the iPhone and iPad were paid for.

The vast chunk of the remaining sixty percent iOS installs were illegitimate, or to put it bluntly — pirated. On Android, the paid install base is a paltry five percent (you read that right), as a huge hunk of the remaining 95 percent of users opted to steal Monument Vally on Android rather than pay four bucks to enjoy it.

Is the 60 percent piracy rate on iOS a worrying number for Monument Valley developers and a bad sign for Apple's mobile platform? Read on for the full reveal.

Burstio turns your burst photos into videos or animated GIFs

Sébastien Page ∙ January 9, 2015

Bustio is a new app released in the App Store that will turn your burst photos into animated GIFs or videos, which you can then save to your Camera Roll or share with others via several channels.

The concept is pretty simple. After taking a series of photos in burst mode with your iPhone camera, simply launch Burstio, and select the burst of photos you want to use. From there you have the option to adjust the playback speed from slow, to normal, to fast. Then hit the export button to convert the burst photos into an HD video or an animated GIF.

The Princess Bride gets official iOS game

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 9, 2015

The official mobile game of The Princess Bride, the 1987 classic fantasy adventure movie adapted from William Goldman's 1973 namesake novel, is now available in the App Store.

Featuring four different games, The Princess Bride lets you experience all the favorite scenes from the film. You'll be wrestling giants, engaging in sword fighting and more, earning awards along the way and unlocking images and sound clips from the movie.

Microsoft’s Office Sway for iPhone now available in US App Store and other countries

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated November 19, 2018

After soft-launching in the New Zealand App Store in November, Microsoft's Office Sway for iPhone is now available more broadly in a number of markets around the world, including in the U.S. App Store.

Office Sway is a free application that makes it easy to create attractive interactive presentation with images, captions, headers and styled text that can be viewed in a web browser on any desktop computer or mobile device.

In addition to the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and India, Sway is now available more broadly in a whole bunch of other English-speaking countries.

5by for iOS will serve up videos based on your mood

Jake Smith ∙ Updated April 18, 2018

5by is an app on the iTunes App Store that will serve you with videos based on your mood. I've often done this through YouTube, where I'm in a really bad mood and will search for comedy videos to help brighten my spirits (I'm rarely mad, but it happens). 5by, also available on the web, will help expedite the process.

OneDrive gains Document Provider extension, Recycle Bin support, push alerts and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 9, 2015

Microsoft's iOS client for its cloud-storage service, OneDrive, has received a significant update Friday bringing out a Document Provider extension of its own. The Document Provider extension is one of the major new extensibility features in iOS 8. With Document Providers, developers can write apps which expose their custom remote or local storage functionality to the operating system.

What this means for OneDrive fans is that they can now access their files in other apps. To see how this works and learn more about other changes in OneDrive 4.6, jump past the fold.

Apple institutes app price hikes in Europe, Canada and Russia as iPhones get more expensive in Brazil

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 9, 2015

As reported by AppleInsider, Apple has raised minimum prices of iPhone and iPad applications in the App Store in Canada, the United Kingdom, Norway and in the European Union.

As a result of the changes, customers in Canada will now see a minimum app price raised from $0.99 (USD$0.83) to $1.19 (USD$1.01). In the United Kingdom, the new minimum tier has gone up from £0.69 ($1.04) to £0.79 ($1.19) and €0.99 ($1.17) in the European Union, up from €0.89 ($1.05) before.

In addition, smartphones, tablets and other gadgets Apple sells in Brazil saw their prices skyrocketing by an average of 10 percent due to the steady devaluation of the country's currency, real.

More details surface for Twitter’s video feature: Shoot, edit, post videos from app

Jake Smith ∙ Updated April 30, 2018

Twitter plans to unveil its new video feature in the next few weeks, reports Recode, and apparently some of the past details shared were wrong. Instead of a 10 minute video limit for the Twitter Video service like previously believed, it will be closer to 20 seconds and actually have a lot of similarities to the six-second, Twitter-owned Vine.

Mayday! Deep Space review: talk your way out of danger in this stealth game

Lory Gil ∙ Updated February 9, 2018

I’m always up for a good stealth game. Wait until the coast is clear and then, head to the next hiding spot. Make sure you’ve got enough time to get out unseen, and then run. A good stealth game will give you something fun to do in the meantime.

Mayday! Deep Space is a stealth game that puts you in the position of helping a survivor on a medical space station. You have an overview of the entire area and must help direct your new friend out of harms way. We’ve got a game review of Mayday! Deep Space for you today.

Task-focused email app Mail Pilot 2 gets previewed

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated February 6, 2018

Following its iOS and OS X debut in April 2013 and January 2014, respectively, Mail Pilot, a powerful task-focused email application by Mindsense, is about to get a whole lot better and prettier.

Mail Pilot 2, currently in beta, looks really nice with its overhauled interface that was redesigned around getting you on your with your day even faster.

Just earlier this week, Mindsense, the brains behind Mail Pilot, has shared some of the upcoming enhancements in a brand new preview video. You may not necessarily need yet another email app in your life, but I urge you to give this clip a quick watch as it could make you reconsider your stance.

Apple names unique puzzler ‘Mujo’ its free App of the Week

Cody Lee ∙ Updated March 2, 2018

Apple has just named Mujo, by Oink Games, its App of the Week for this week. This means that from now through next Thursday, you’ll be able to pick up the unique puzzler for both iPhone and iPad, for free—a nice little savings of $3.

In Mujo, players are tasked with fighting off monsters using power obtained through an on-screen puzzle. The gameplay feels like a mix of tile-stacking, similar to that in the hit game Threes!, and strategic character leveling of an RPG.

Evernote launches ‘Scannable’ iOS app for automatic document scanning

Cody Lee ∙ Updated March 2, 2018

Evernote today released a new app for scanning various types of documents called Evernote Scannable. The app, which has been in beta for several months, is capable of scanning and managing contracts, receipts, business cards, and virtually any other kind of paper item you can think of.

Scanning happens quickly and automatically. Simply load up the app and point your device's camera at the document you want to scan in, and it will capture the image and make adjustments on the fly—such as rotating, cropping, sharpening, etc.—so your scans are clear and easy to read.