Verizon Droid tethering will cost you

The Verizon Droid launches today, and Verizon will be offering a tethering plan for the handset, at the cost of $30 per month. Still, it's a win over the iPhone, which doesn't yet offer the feature.

Is Motorola Droid’s 5MP Camera Better Than iPhone’s?

Apple Preps Broadway Store for Opening

Fortune reports that Apple has issued media invitations for a preview of the company's fourth Manhattan store scheduled to officially open in New York City's Upper West Side at Broadway and 67th Street on Saturday, November 14th.<p class="quo...

Verizon’s Droid launch: your complete guide

Can you feel the tremors? Verizon's hotly anticipated Motorola Droid finally arrives on Friday.

Updated iTunes LPs for Apple TV 3.0 Now Available

Apple today began notifying purchasers of its iTunes LP offerings that updated versions compatible with the new Apple TV 3.0 software are now available for download. Apple delivered the Apple TV 3.0 software update to users last week, bringing a num...

iPhone vs Motorola Droid: Let the battle begin

The reviews are finally starting to come in and when all is said and done, it appears to be a draw. The bottom line here is that Verizon had to do something to stop all of the tech freaks from running over to AT&T and Motorola had to do something to get back some [...]

Get a SmartCase with Battery for Your iPhone That Will Double the Usage Time

IvySkin have released their new SmartCase for the iPhone featuring a battery as part of the packaging for the iPhone and makes the claim to offer double the amount of battery life that the regular battery currently offers. For anyone who has been out on a long night or that has used their iPhone a [...]

Apple Building iPhone Prototypes with RFID?

According to AppleInsider, Near Field Communications reports that Apple has built iPhone prototypes equipped with RFID (Radio-Frequency IDentification).

For those unfamiliar, RFID is either super-convenient, terrifyingly insecure, or both. In a nutshell, it broadcasts a signal that can be read from a short distance to process financial transactions (an easy-pay card), determine identity (some nations’ passports), and more futuristic concepts where devices can auto-discover and connect with each other based on their tags.

The convenient part is you could swipe your iPhone to pay for goods or services rather than carrying around cards. Your iPhone could also keep track of tagged item like keys so you can find them between your sofa cushions.

The terrifying part is when hackers and other bad guys read your financial information from a distance, or “see” what country you’re from when trying to determine targets in less friendly parts of the world. Or, just use them to track you instead of your keys.

The future is not for the timid, however, so let us know — do you want?

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

Apple Building iPhone Prototypes with RFID?

Follow Friday: iPhone Twitter Lists and “New Style” Retweets Edition

We’ll save you the preamble this time; suffice it to say iPhone+Twitter = peanutbutter cuppy goodness. And now Twitter is rolling out new features to either make it dark chocolatey super good, or just to give us a sugar headache, we’re not sure which (though we’re fairly sure we’ve strained the confectionary metaphor well beyond the point of painful, so moving on…)

Twitter Lists aims to help with discovery — to let more users find more interesting people to read and follow. Basically, if you follow hundreds, thousands, or more, it was nigh-impossible to keep up with a few specific ones, or to organize them in any way (sort of like iPhone apps on the home screen, don’t get us started!). With lists, you can create groups/categories and add the people you’re following to those lists. Family, friends, co-workers, fellow gadget enthusiasts or movie geeks, pretty much any system you can think of. Then, to see what that list is up to, you just go to the handy list view and voila, all their tweets, nice and separate. You can also follow other people’s lists if you find a group you really like.

We’ve set up a few already:

• TiPb Staff, for all our editors, writers, reviewers, and moderators.
• SPE Network, for TiPb sibling sites and their Android, BlackBerry, Nokia, Palm, and Windows Mobile coverage.
• SPE Site Editors, for behind-the-scenese commentary and random thoughts from those who manage the above-mentioned sites.
• SPE Everybody, for the master-list of everyone involved with Smartphone Experts.

We’ll be adding more if/when they make sense, so if you have requests, send them our way!

New-style retweets is more controversial and potentially confusing. As Twitter rolls these out, when someone you follow retweets something, you no longer see them and their retweet, but the original tweeter, (even if you don’t follow them), along with a note saying which of the people you followed retweeted it. Again, it’s supposed to help with discovery, but it’s already driven Justine Batement into curse-riddled outrage, and depending on how it’s implemented on the web and in clients, could jut be a bad of Twitter hurt. (Techcrunch posted the above screenshot of how Tweetie 2.1 will be handling them, pink corners and all).

If you’ve tried them, let us know what you think, either in the comments below, or on Twitter:

@theiphoneblog, @reneritchie (Rene), @backlon (Dieter), @iChadman (Chad), @JFSikora (Jeremy), @jamesus (James), @llofte (Leanna), @JHamilton24 (Josh), @justin_horn (Justin), @msproductions (Matt), @skeetobite (Chris).

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

Follow Friday: iPhone Twitter Lists and “New Style” Retweets Edition

The DROID Invasion Has Begun…!

A new, phantom menace emerges today in the iPhone world. Verizon’s massive network has opened their drop-bays, and the DROID invasion has begun. Android Central is providing Generally Grievous-level coverage, while SPE’s own Darth Tyranus, editor-in-chief Dieter Bohn deployed at 5 am to find… no line ups, but hopefully a lot of new gadgets to power his darkside.

Nokia Expert’s Matt Miller is concerned about Verizon’s pricing, as is PreCentral.net’s Keith Newman, at least compared to Sprint, though he seems happy enough with the device itself. CrackBerry Kevin of CrackBerry.com? He’s busy with the BlackBerry Bold 9700 and Curve 8530 launches. (He loves his berries. A lot.) And TiPb, well you know where to find our coverage so far.

If you get a chance to try out a DROID or DROID Eris this weekend, let us know what you think!

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

The DROID Invasion Has Begun…!