Since developers have rushed to get the Apple SDK for iPhone, each one of them has been trying to develop iPhone apps that can attract millions in users and potentially money. The latest report from TechCrunch confirmed that Social Gaming Network’s (SGN) Fleet Air Superiority Training, short for F.A.S.T. has successfully made $1 million in the first week of it launch only.
Trapster(R), your iPhone alerts you as you approach police speed traps, red light cameras, and other kinds of traps. It’s a high tech way to do the same thing people have been doing for years with CB radios and flashing headlights at other drivers to warn them of a speed trap ahead. It works using the GPS and WiFi location capabilities of your iPhone 3G.
Find the cheapest gasoline nearest to where you are, then map a route to where the cheap gas is. Cheap Gas features price timestamps, all grade prices displayed, sort by distance or by price, locate stations by device location or by postal code, interactively search by postal code, distance to station displayed, ability to refresh stations without restart, ability to update grade pricing, and ability to record new stations.
(more…)
Here is a new iPhone app wetnink worth a try. The slogan hails “All your network are belong to us”. Sounds patronising? authoritative? if so, you can skip this part and get down to what this little iPhone cool app does.
Traditionally, you will need to keep switching between a couple of apps to keep tabs and update Facebook, Tiwtter, Flickr and other. Not anymore. Zensify allows to you to connect to 12seconds, Delicious, Digg, Photobucket and YoutTube. Support for more services is in the pipeline acording to the developper.
The first time you run it, it will ask you to sign in to all you various accounts. This a one time process which could take some time, but will save you shifting through those social networks later on.
Besides providing you with a list of all your friends updates in a single view, Zensify also allows for search through all your social networks. Those searches can also be saved, which comes in handy.
We think this an iPhone app that has a lot of room for expension and will make life easier for people adicted to social networks.
Palm previously suggested that users will be able to drag and drop their music file from their PC to Pre device. That’s usually a simple task, but music management will soon be a nightware. So Palm figured, why re-invent the wheel? how about using something popular which users are already familar with? You can call it an attempt to step on iPhone toes, expand on existing iPhone market share, but Palm likes to refer to it as a feature that will allow Pre users to transfer DRM-free music, photos and videos. More on Palm Pre webOS here.
The question now is, how Apple feels about having it software used by a competitor? Will Apple in act of “monopoly” release an update to block non-iPhone and non-iPod device syncing with iTunes?
We have seen an unprecedented number of iPhone apps rejections by iTunes store in the past few weeks. In some cases, it seems that Apple is willing to bend the rules from time to time if needed to silence screams of rejection, bad media attention or a law suit such as the one we reported in a previous post. We have compiled a list of 5 most problematic and controversial iPhone and iPod Touch apps in the past few weeks:
Eucalyptus E-Book Reader
What is it for?
An e-Book reader that allows the iPhone user to find, download and present classic books from Project Gutenberg.
Rejected by iTunes App Store on Thursday, 21 of May 2009. This is due to the fact that it’s possible, after explicitly (more…)
Fake Watch app displays the time of day using the appearance of “look-like” famous watches maker. Cartier didn’t seem too happy with this and they decided to to file a complaint yesterday in federal court in Manhattan with claims that Fake Watch app violates a trademark.
Apple’s “use of Cartier’s Tank mark and Cartier’s trade dress and proprietary designs is likely to cause consumers to believe that Cartier’s and defendant’s goods originate from the same source,” Cartier said in the complaint.
The app in question is made by Digitopolis Co. and is available on Apple’s online iTunes store, according to the complaint. Apple is yet to comment.
UPDATE on 23-May: Wall Street Journal reported that Cartier International withdrawed the law suite after Apple removed the two apps in question from Apple Store. In a statement Cartier stated that our concerns have been addressed.
This is the second complain in a month that Apple received, the previous being an app that requires the user to shake the iPhone to silence a crying baby.
The number of apps available for iPhone and iPod touch in iTunes store has exceeded 40,000 at the end of April 09. With every developer or company trying to get as many sales as possible, some will eventually drop price. There are already many available for free. This has been somehow backup by a recent report on App Store from Distimo, which is a new ducth company in the crowded mobile market. The report contains some interesting findings that seem to relate apps pricing and its ranking.
Distimo aims to release market-wide data on all Smartphones apps stores (Blackberry, Palm, Android..etc) on a monthly bases. There will be broad report on the US market for free and another one with more insight on worldwide markets for a charge. The first full report of Apple store is available for download here.
One month’s data may not be enough (more…)
What's your Top-Tens?
iPhone apps store has an app for almost anything that comes to mind, but does it have an app to keep track of them all? or maybe give the best ones per category? or perhaps the Top Ten news, music, video and other matters? frequently updated online? This is where the idea of Top-Ten app for iPhone and iPod touch was born.
Top-Tens allows users to track and monitor different types of Top 10 lists which are constantly updated, including Movies, Books, Music, Online Deals, Computer Viruses, Product Recalls, and many more.
A FREE version, Top-Tens LITE is now available for iTunes store. The full and paid version is available here.
Top-Tens LITE has the same feature set as the full version of Top-Tens. The only difference being that Top-Tens LITE only shows the Top 3 entries in each list instead of the Top 10.
Rod Cambridge, developer of Top-Tens says “Everyone has an interest or hobby that they like to keep tabs on (more…)
