iPhone Finally Surpasses Windows Mobile in U.S. Smartphone Usage

FierceDeveloper reports on data from research firm comScore showing that Apple's iPhone has finally surpassed Windows Mobile in share of the U.S. smartphone market usage. The data is based on monthly user surveys averaged on a quarterly basis, and t...

Apple Rolls Out iTunes Movie Bundles

The iPhone blog notes that Apple has launched movie bundles in the iTunes Store, offering consumers the opportunity to purchase a limited number of themed movie multi-pack downloads at discount pricing.

For example, the Godfath...

iTunes Offers Movie Bundles for the Holidays

iTunes is now offering Movie Bundles [iTunes link] with a variety of double, triple, and quadruple features ranging in price from $9.99 to $34.99.

The US iTunes store looks to have the best selection, with tons of options both in SD and some in HD. As always, regional catalog availability and licensing rights are the Bah Humbug of the digital age. Still, if you need to fill up your iPhone or iPod touch for a long trip home for the holidays (or iTunes or your Apple TV for some much-needed relative-escaping couch distraction), you can find some good deals.

I’m holding fire on the Austin Powers trilogy and Lethal Weapons 1-4 bundle right now, because I’m goofy and old like that, k? Let us know how your iTunes store stacks up, and what if any bundles catch your eye.

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

iTunes Offers Movie Bundles for the Holidays

Review: CalenGoo for iPhone

This app, which integrates your Google Calendar with your iPhone or iPod touch, succeeds on many levels, providing the sort of connectedness that makes bouncing back and forth between your online calendar and the app itself seamless and trouble free.

Redesigned iTunes App Store - How Do You Like It?

TiPb Invades PalmCast #88 — Smartphone Round Robin Style!

Derek, and Keith were gracious enough to invite me on to this week’s PalmCast live to help Dieter figure out why he couldn’t find a physical keyboard on the iPhone 3GS, and how to get to all the amazing games and apps in the App Store amid tens of thousands of $0.99 farty flashlights. He did fine. Hopefully we all did, and it’s live on the web and in iTunes now for one and all to enjoy… or to give us what for in the comments.

And remember, every day you help me help Dieter on the TiPb iPhone forums, you get entered for a chance to win a brand new iPhone 3GS! (Details on smartphoneroundrobin.com)

Listen in!

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

TiPb Invades PalmCast #88 — Smartphone Round Robin Style!

Hyper-Reality 3D Displays and Dynamic Music and Video for Better iPhone Battery Life — Apple Patent Watch

Tis the season for Apple patents, with both hyper-reality 3D displays, and a dynamic music and video system for better battery life on the iPhone and iPod.

First up, the hyper-reality 3D display — perfectly timed for the Avatar hype as well, we’ll note — involves changing the perspective of 3D object on the display to match the tracked head position of the user. As MacRumors points out, this sounds similar to what Johnny Chung Lee has previously demonstrated with a Wiimote (see video embedded above).

Next up, Apple wants to track user preferences for volume and other settings and automagically apply them, and de-emphasize or skip songs the user seldom listens to. MacRumors also points out a second patent which would also alert users when there’s not enough battery life left to play the movie they’ve just selected and offer to downgrade the video quality and/or reduce the brightness levels to try and get the whole thing in anyway.

As always, no one outside Steve Jobs knows if we humble consumers will ever see products using these patents, but it’s nice to glimpse one of our possible infinite (loop) futures.

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

Hyper-Reality 3D Displays and Dynamic Music and Video for Better iPhone Battery Life — Apple Patent Watch

Morgan Stanley Report Claims Apple Is In ‘Pole Position’ In Mobile Internet Computing Race

VideoLAN Considering Options for VLC as Mac Developers Disappear

A notice posted earlier this month in the forums of VideoLAN, the open-source team behind the popular VLC media player, reveals that a lack of Mac volunteer developers for the software has forced the project organizers to consider new plans for the M...

An app with everything but sales

Filed under: Gaming, iPhone, App Store

TriplePoint PR's site has a post on their blog about Orbital [iTunes Link], an iPhone game released a while back that I presume is one of their clients. Obviously, they've done their job: we're talking about the game, which is $.99US or available in a lite free version [iTunes Link]. But they've also provided us with a little insight into just how things are going in the app's release, and they picture they paint says "not well." Oh, sure, it's been reviewed well, there's a little bit of buzz about it, and the game itself, says the firm, is good (trust them at your own risk, but they sound like they really do enjoy it). So what's the problem? It's not selling.

To be fair, it is selling. They've sold less than 100,000 units, they say, and even half of that is a nice chunk of sales. But apparently that's not a success, and they're wondering why. Piracy is their first guess -- we've heard before that piracy can be a huge issue, even on cheap apps. They say the game had an 80% piracy rate in the first week, which has since dropped down to 24%. I'm not convinced piracy can be blamed completely -- there's no guaranteeing that all pirates would have bought a real copy anyway.

But certainly there's something going on here -- you can have a terrific app that's well-reviewed and buzzworthy, and if it doesn't end up in the right place at the right time, it still won't be successful (or at least as successful as you want). Everyone is still working to unlock success in the App Store, but with over 100,000 products on the shelves, it has become increasingly more difficult for the good apps to stand apart.

An app with everything but sales originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

An app with everything but sales originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Apple Patents: Tailoring Music Playback and Dynamically Prolonging Battery Life on iPods and iPhones

While perhaps not as glamorous as 3D display technology, a couple of other patent applications from Apple reveal that the company is working on improving the audio/video experience of their iPod and iPhones.

Apple describes how they m...

NOVA now LIVE in the App Store!

For those of use that have been patiently waiting for the arrival of Gameloft’s NOVA, the day has arrived! This game looks to be the ultimate FPS for the iPhone with an unrivaled multiplayer experience. I have only had time to quickly run through the tutorial level, but so far, so good; I am hooked.

The game borrows heavily from Microsoft’s Halo franchise to create a world where the space marines fight against an alien invasion. With a solid single player campaign, online and local multiplayer (the YouTube video above shows some of the awesome multiplayer action)and leaderboards, this is a game I will be playing for a while; and just in time for the weekend! What do you think of the game? [$6.99 - iTunes link]

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

NOVA now LIVE in the App Store!

Going to Vermont for a White Christmas? Relax - you’ll have 3G service

Filed under: Odds and ends, iPhone

So, you and your song-and-dance partner have decided that you're going to follow a few classy dames that you met at a nightclub in Florida up to Pine Tree, Vermont, where they're going to be spending the Christmas holidays performing their sister act at a lodge. The only problem is, you have AT&T service and you've heard that 3G service is nonexistent anywhere in the Green Mountain State. How are you going to be able to stream a live video from your iPhone 3GS to the Ed Harrison show so you can get your old Army buddies together for a tribute to the lodge owner, who is the General you served under in WW2?

There will be no problems this White Christmas, since AT&T is in the process of lighting up their 3G network in Vermont starting today. This week, service will roll out in Bennington, Brattleboro, Brownsville, Killington, Vernon, Warren, West Dover, and White River Junction. By New Year's Eve, service will be extended to Burlington, Colchester, Essex Junction, Fayston, Hartford, Jamaica, Jeffersonville, Middlebury, Rutland, South Burlington, St. Albans, Stowe, Waitsfield, West Rutland, West Townshend, West Wardsboro, Williston, and Winooski. In the first quarter of 2010, Barre, Montpelier, and Northfield will finally see the light of 3G goodness glowing in their iPhones.

Wait a second... I didn't see Pine Tree in that list. Maybe it's not going to be a Merry Christmas after all!

[A tip of the TUAW Santa hat to Vermont resident Bradly for sending us the news]

Going to Vermont for a White Christmas? Relax - you'll have 3G service originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Going to Vermont for a White Christmas? Relax - you'll have 3G service originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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EyeTV iPhone app granted 3G streamability, App Store’s WiFi-only club hemorrhaging members

Happy day, iPhoners; your days of living life one hotspot at a time are over. You can now use that data plan for all its worth as more and more apps break through the WiFi-only iron curtain. Last week it was Ustream, the week before Knocking, and now EyeTV has released an updated app able to stream your own personal TV broadcast to your iPhone wherever you are. Assuming, of course, you're not situated within a "coverage gap" -- or a major metropolitan area.

EyeTV iPhone app granted 3G streamability, App Store's WiFi-only club hemorrhaging members originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 07:58:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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iPhone, iPod touch leading product search for Christmas

Filed under: Hardware, Internet, iPhone, iPod nano, iPod touch

This is an interesting little statistic, but it could be very telling about what's going on in terms of sales this holiday season. 9to5Mac says that over in the UK, the iPhone and the iPod touch are the current most searched-for products this holiday. iPhone made up 1.75 percent of all product searches last week, and 14% of mobile phone product searches. Meanwhile, the iPod touch was in second place at 1.29 percent, and the iPod nano was actually third, at .5 percent. Over three percent, then, of all product searches in the UK were for Apple's handhelds.

Of course, just because one in 34 people are searching for an iPhone or iPod doesn't mean that they'll be huge gifts necessarily -- maybe the searching just means that they want one, not that they'll be getting one. But there's no question that as big as Apple's 4th quarter has been so far, it's going to get even bigger, in the UK and probably everywhere else as well.

iPhone, iPod touch leading product search for Christmas originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 07:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

iPhone, iPod touch leading product search for Christmas originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 07:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Apple Working on 3D ‘Hyper-Reality’ Displays

Apple's patent applications are always provide an interesting peek into what Apple researchers have been working on. In one of the more interesting patent applications we've discovered, Apple appears to be researching 3D displays in which the user w...