WWDC Live: ds MediaLabs at the iPhone Intelligence Party

Filed under: Software, WWDC, iPhone

Ben Stahlhood of ds MediaLabs presented 3 new iPhone games to TUAW when I met him at the iPhone Intelligence Party at WWDC. A 3-D version of LightRiders (think TRON), a carnival game and a role playing game designed to get role players out of the basement and into the world. Have fun watching!

Continue reading WWDC Live: ds MediaLabs at the iPhone Intelligence Party

WWDC Live: ds MediaLabs at the iPhone Intelligence Party originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

WWDC Live: ds MediaLabs at the iPhone Intelligence Party originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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TomTom for iPhone: Turn-by-Turn GPS App with Voice Navigation Coming Soon

AT&T Offering “Loans” not “Subsidies”?

Interesting take from the Macalope this week with regards to the ongoing confusion and resentment surrounding current iPhone 3G owners and the price they’ll likely have to pay when upgrading to the iPhone 3G S on AT&T. See, the Macalope believes both sides of the debate have it wrong:

[AT&T fronting part of the hardware costs to Apple] isn’t a “subsidy” by the traditional definition. It’s a loan. AT&T is loaning you the money to buy an iPhone and you’re signing a contract to pay it off over the next 18 months. If you decide you want out of your loan, you have to pay a buyout. [...] See, AT&T gets its money one way or the other. Nobody’s “subsidizing” anything.

Even if it is more of a “loan” than a “subsidy”, though, does that make understanding the pricing model easier?

Also worth reading, In typical fashion, the Macalope thoroughly gores PCMag over their WWDC take-away — using ponies, and their reaction to today’s Safari 4 download numbers.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

AT&T Offering “Loans” not “Subsidies”?

AutoStitch raises the bar on iPhone panoramas

Filed under: iPhone, App Store, App Review

There are quite a few programs that allow you to create panoramas on the iPhone. I've reviewed some of them, and they all get pretty good reviews. The differences are often in how much work you have to do versus letting the software do the alignments of the various images. Since iPhone photos are almost always hand held, there are going to be issues of the camera not always being level.

AutoStitch [App Store] is a US$1.99 app that gets most of the process just right. When you run it, it asks you to import images from your camera roll, as many as you like. They can be horizontal for a wide panorama, or stacked vertically. As an experiment I shot both vertically and horizontally, and rocked the camera significantly out of level by tilting it up to about 45 degrees. I took 10 images, and the software assembled the images in the proper order. There were a couple of gaps, where there was no image, but that was my fault, not the application's. The result was pretty impressive: not as a great image, but that AutoStitch could make sense out of the jumble of shots. You can see this image in the gallery I've created.

No panorama software I've seen is perfect. When I look closely at the full resolution images I see a bit of ghosting in the distant mountains, but overall AutoStitch is an excellent program that lets you take the pictures while it does the work. All panoramas need some cropping cleanup, and iPhoto can do this when you import from the camera. If you want to do all the post-processing on the iPhone itself, I suggest Photogene, [App Store] which will straighten and crop your photos, plus lots of other functions if you want them. It's a great US$2.99 investment. I'll be reviewing this app in a future post.

Here are some sample panos taken assembled with AutoStitcher. I've reduced the size of these images so they will load faster. You can find more on the developer's web site.

Image Examples:

AutoStitch raises the bar on iPhone panoramas originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

AutoStitch raises the bar on iPhone panoramas originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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MMS and tethering functional on some AT&T iPhone 3Gs running 3.0?

AT&T's been feeding us a story that it'll offer MMS on the iPhone only "once [it completes] some system upgrades that will ensure our customers have the best experience," but here's the thing: it seems that it works right now -- if you've got a build of OS 3.0 that'll let it. None of us have been able to get it going ourselves, but we've been sent screenshots from a tipster that seem to indicate that both MMS and tethering are in full effect on the network, so there doesn't seem to be a network restriction involved (we can't verify whether the build we see here was tweaked, so we're thinking there might be some hackery in play). The strategy for ultimately deploying the features to AT&T customers is unclear, but seeing how some folks in Europe running the exact same gold build of 3.0 have access to MMS and those of us stateside do not, it's got to be a software switch that can be triggered remotely. Some form of SMS provisioning, perhaps? Let us know what you've seen out in the field in comments.

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

MMS and tethering functional on some AT&T iPhone 3Gs running 3.0? originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 16:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Review: Mariner Calc 1.2 for iPhone

An update to MarinerCalc has improved the Excel compatibility of the iPhone and iPod touch spreadsheet app, while adding new features.

Kaloki Adventure and Peggle on sale, plus free music

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Gaming, Software, Freeware, Developer, iPhone, App Store, iPod touch

If you didn't jump to pick up Kaloki Adventure [App Store link] after our first look last week, now's your chance: the game is on sale today (not tomorrow, apparently -- you've got under 24 hours) for just $1.99, a buck cheaper than the usual $2.99 price. The game offers some fun but casual real-time strategy business simulation, so if your dream has ever been to own a burgeoning spaceport, they don't come cheaper than that.

And as an added bonus, NinjaBee is also offering a catchy tune from the game's soundtrack on their website for the low, low price of completely free. It's the jumpy, swingin' background music to the main gameplay, composed by Eric Nunamaker, who's apparently been working on video game music for quite a while.

Oh, and finally, while we're talking about awesome iPhone games on sale, Peggle is only a buck. 'Nuff said.

Kaloki Adventure and Peggle on sale, plus free music originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Kaloki Adventure and Peggle on sale, plus free music originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Palm Pre coming to Verizon in January?

The Wall Street Journal reports that the Pre will be on Verizon's network early next year. PC World's Ian Paul looks at that possibility as well as what it might mean for the AT&T-Apple partnership.

WWDC Live: bChamp at the iPhone Intelligence Party

Filed under: Multimedia, WWDC, iPhone

At the iPhone intelligence party, it was hard not to notice the guy walking around with the practice amp making 808 sounds. After picking up his audio in all of my other videos, I tracked down monodomo and the bChamp application. Take a look at the video in the second half of the post, you'll quickly get the simple concept behind this beatboxing application. It's currently 99 cents in the App Store [iTunes link].

Continue reading WWDC Live: bChamp at the iPhone Intelligence Party

WWDC Live: bChamp at the iPhone Intelligence Party originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

WWDC Live: bChamp at the iPhone Intelligence Party originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Apple’s Terrifying App Store Rejection Policy: Because We Said So

Tim Daley let us know via Twitter that his app, What Would Chuck Do?, was rejected by Apple’s iTunes App Store for the most terrifying reason imaginable. Because they said so:

Thank you for submitting WWCD - What Would Chuck Do to the App Store. We’ve reviewed the Application and, consistent with the criteria considered in our approval process, we have chosen not to publish this application. As you know, Apple reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to reject an application for any reason.

Regards,

iPhone Developer Program

While as a publisher, this is absolutely within Apple’s rights, as a platform that needs to nurture and maintain the support of both its developer and user base, it’s suicidal. And what’s worse, it’s stupid. In this day and age, especially for a company as connected as Apple, poor communication causing bad PR is as astounding as it is inexcusable.

Steve Jobs and Eddy Cue need to pull out whatever flame-thrower they marched the halls of MobileMe with last year and turn them full-throttle on whatever passes for the current App Store rejection policy. If any reviewer even thinks of typing “because we said so” they should immediately be transfered to whatever passes at Apple for Siberia.

It’s getting tiring to keep typing this, but developers deserve clear, consistent guidelines, users deserve top notch reviewers to make sure we get the best technical quality in apps, and Apple deserves a happy developers and PR experience that matches the phenomenal success of the App Store.

It’s such an easy thing to fix, which makes it all the more stupefying Apple not only hasn’t fixed it, but hasn’t even reached out to developers to show they understand the frustration level and are working to fix it.

For more examples, see TUAW’s recent reports from Christina Warren on MiniPops and Erica Sadu on iLaugh Lite.

Stupefying.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Apple’s Terrifying App Store Rejection Policy: Because We Said So

GeForce GTX 285 Appears in Apple Online Store

Earlier this week, the EVGA GeForce GTX 285 graphics card appeared in Apple's online store. Compatible with the "Early 2008" and "Early 2009" Mac Pro models and currently listed as shipping in 1-2 weeks, the GTX 285 is priced at $449...

New Snow Leopard Features Continue to Emerge

In the days since Apple previewed the forthcoming Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard at its Worldwide Developers Conference keynote and distributed a new build to conference attendees, users have been scouring the new operating system and its associated docu...

iPhone 3G S: What you need to know

Here's Macworld's FAQ file for the iPhone 3G S: What you need to know about Apple's new smartphone.

Opinion: Are missing iPhone 3G S specs an Apple smoke screen?

Apple argues that it's trying to market the "black box" iPhone 3G S as a snappier new it-just-works upgrade. But its futile attempt to exclude certain details of the gadget may be an attempt to avoid a brewing conflict over the App Store and performance.

App Store Lessons: the game changer rejection

Filed under: iPod Family, Bad Apple, iPhone, App Store

A new kind of App Store rejection is making the rounds in the iPhone World. It's not about violating the SDK. It's not about objectionable content. It's about Apple empowering its reviewers to reject software without providing any substantive reason or feedback. TUAW reader Kenneth Ballenegger received the following rejection notice for his iLaugh application.

This kind of rejection is a gamechanger. Devs have complained that Apple's review policies to date have been inconsistent and arbitrary, since it was relatively easy to compare rejections and demonstrate the multiple standards in play. This rejection shields Apple's internal processes even further. Instead of moving towards transparency and responding to developer concerns, Apple has pointed itself in the opposite direction.

Making this rejection sting more, the app already was in the App Store; this submission was a bug-fix update. The premium edition of the same app, submitted at the same time, was approved without issue. It seems that previous and current approvals for the same application would argue in favor of letting this version through, or at a minimum providing an explanation of what's wrong with this one. As Christina posted yesterday, developers aren't getting straight answers about App Store rejections, even at WWDC.

"Sole discretion" hides a lot of possible review errors, both subjective and accidental. It makes it harder than ever for smaller companies to appeal rejections and denies them a factual basis on which to evaluate whether their rejection was issued in error. It also gives a firm answer to those who have been hoping for a transparent ticketing system and a open appeal process. Apple isn't interested; it's their store, their rules, and Caveat Developer to anyone whose business plan depends solely on Apple's beneficence.

An app full of admittedly lame jokes might be an appropriate candidate for App Store rejection, but the combination of veto power, the opaque review/appeal process, and inconsistent and capricious application of Apple's ax adds up to a troublesome situation in the developer ecosystem and in the App Store.

App Store Lessons: the game changer rejection originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

App Store Lessons: the game changer rejection originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 12 Jun 2009 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Best Buy to Offer iPhone 3G S Insurance

So we all know that AT&T, for whatever reason, does not offer insurance for any iPhone. It seems as if Best Buy is now stepping up to the plate to offer it’s customers some iPhone 3G S insurance, Geek Squads Black Tie Protection.

This is great news for some of you but keep in mind it comes at a pretty hefty price. Normal cell phone insurance via Best Buy will cost you anywhere from $7 to $10 a month. Not the case with iPhone 3G S, Best Buy has raised this fee to a cool $15 a month. This premium fee is most likely due to the full retail price of the 3G S being so high at $599 and $699.

Good news is that this insurance will cover all sorts of damage - liquid damage, cracked screens, cracked casing, etc… All you have to do is bring your damaged iPhone into any Best Buy, they will fix it or replace your device on the spot.

So at $15/month is this something you’d be willing to pay for some piece of mind?

[Via Apple Insider]

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Best Buy to Offer iPhone 3G S Insurance

Lady Gaga Revenge

Lady Gaga Revenge is the latest and greatest release in the wildly popular Tap Tap Revenge series, this time featuring 14 tracks and remixes by international pop sensation Lady Gaga. This special edition of Tap Tap Revenge features: * 14 tracks by Lady Gaga, including 4 remixes of smash hits * 4 boss tracks, that, for the [...]

Review: Touch Poet for iPhone

Touch Poet may draw its inspiration from Magnetic Poetry -- those refrigerator magnets that let you compose poems. But the app's look-and-feel are smarty implemented, making this app a delight to play with.

New Apple patent looks to improve emergency calls on the iPhone

A newly-disclosed Apple patent application shows that the company is working on a system to enhance emergency calls on the iPhone, a very generous and interesting move indeed. Titled ”Method and system for prolonging emergency calls,” the patent describes a system for determining when a call is an emergency call, either by automatically classifying numbers [...]

New iPhone 3GS processor will be 50% faster; closer look

One of Apple’s wireless partners is confirming that the new iPhone 3G S indeed sports an embedded ARM processor that’s 50 percent faster that the one employed by its predecessor. T-Mobile of the Netherlands is amongst the first to publish full specifications for the iPhone 3G S’s processor and onboard memory, noting that the device includes [...]