iPhone News Feeds

Copyright © 2008 PatrickJ. Visit the original article at http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2008/12/29/iphone-nano-rumors-now-at-raging-inferno-level/.

Rumors about a new iPhone Nano model being launched soon, possibly at next month’s Macworld event, have been circulating and heating up over the last few weeks. They now seem to have moved past smoke and fire, and gone into full-on Raging Inferno mode.

iPhoney Alley has got a report up this evening stating that a ‘reliable source within Apple’ has told them they are working on an iPhone Nano and will announce it at Macworld.

They also point out that Vaja Cases – a well-established (and excellent) manufacturer of cases for the iPhone and tons of great mobile devices – have now got a page up listing the iPhone Nano, and allowing you to sign up to be notified as soon as the cases are released.

Check out the iPhone Alley piece HERE for more details.

I reckon the iPhone Nano is looking like it really will be coming out soon. What do you all think?

Copyright © 2008 PatrickJ. Visit the original article at http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2008/12/29/iphone-favorites-darts-app/.

If you like playing darts (and if you don’t why the heck not???), you should love the free Darts app for the iPhone …

I like playing darts. I spent a lot of time in London and, of course, in pubs in London. Drank an awful lot of good beer, and played a fair bit of darts. I’m a decent player, generally a bit more than decent after a couple pints So I was very happy to find the Darts app for the iPhone a few weeks back.

Since installing it, it has rapidly become my favorite iPhone game, and one of my main distractions when watching (crappy) late night TV and using the iPhone Read on for some quick thoughts on why I like it so much and more screencaps …

The first thing I liked about Darts is that it is very, very easy to get the hang of ‘throwing’ the darts, which I had worried would be awkward. Both aiming – via a rotating circle that you place over the spot (say the Trip 20 segment, for example) you want to aim for – and throwing (with a simple swipe gesture) felt natural to me within very few minutes.

When you first launch it, Darts lets you choose to practice, play against its AI, or get help.

The Help section is excellent – offering guidance on the game’s interface, as well as good rundowns on the rules of the two main darts games it offers, Cricket and X01. So even if you’re not too familiar with the rules, the app will get you going and understanding them quickly.

The two darts games it offers – Cricket and X01 (301, 501 etc) – are generally the most popular games when playing real darts. In addition to choosing which type of game you want to play, you can also set options like difficulty level (Beginner, Intermediate, and Master) and, with the 301/501 etc. games, whether you want to play straight in / straight off (no need to get a double to start the game or finish it), single on / double off (so a double is only required at the finish), or double-on / double-off (you need to hit a double to start scoring and a double to win).

I’ve played many games of both 501 and Cricket now, and the gameplay is excellent. The game responds quickly, shows just about no lag anywhere, and the DartBot’ you play against is not messing around refilling his glass when it’s his turn – he throws quickly every time so you can get straight back to teaching him how to play the game .

Darts’ difficulty levels seem pretty reasonable to me as well, letting you ease into the game, but also providing a decent challenge as you move up the levels. You can also make it even more challenging by changing the throwing method (to ‘Original Flick’) from within the iPhone’s Settings app. You can also use the Settings-based options to set things like your player name, preferred dart color, whether sound effects are on, and so on.

Which reminds me, I also like the game’s sound effects quite a bit – the throwing sound is great, and I like the vibration effect you get when you hit a bullseye.

So far, I’ve honestly found nothing at all to gripe about with this app, and lots to love about it! The only thing that’s missing when I’m playing it is a lovely pint of Strongbow or Stella to improve my game just a little

Copyright © 2008 PatrickJ. Visit the original article at http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2008/12/29/featured-iphone-theme-glass-2/.

It’s been a long while since we’ve done any iPhone themes posts – partly because I wasn’t as active for a time, and partly because I haven’t been jailbreaking as much since the App Store launched. I’m not currently running a jailbroken phone, but I do miss theming, a lot!

So I’m going to try to start following themes a little more again, and hopefully start featuring some cool ones on a regular basis again. Here’s one that caught my eye today and made me wish I could give it a whirl:

It’s the ‘Glass 2‘ theme, by MMi forum member Teknofrik. It’s only his second theme apparently, and it looks striking to me – really like the transparent effects on the icons.

You can check it out and download it via This MMi Post. I’d love to hear what any of you think of it if you do try it out …

Copyright © 2008 PatrickJ. Visit the original article at http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2008/12/29/sketches-on-sale-for-60-off-in-the-app-store-until-end-of-the-year/.

Sketches – the popular iPhone app for drawing and making notes on photos – is on sale for $1.99 (60% off its normal price) until the end of 2008 in the App Store.

Sketches has been one of my favorite iPhone apps ever since its launch way back in early jailbreak days. Very nice to see it at a greatly reduced price for the holidays.

Check it out HERE in the App Store …

Copyright © 2008 PatrickJ. Visit the original article at http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2008/12/28/should-apple-be-banning-books-from-the-app-store-for-objectionable-content/.

That’s because when Carnoy enlisted a software developer to submit the book to the App Store, Apple rejected the book for containing “objectionable content” … In its rejection letter, Apple singled out the passage in question, which we actually can’t print either. Let’s just say it involves a teenage girl telling a detective that she overheard her friend asking a gentleman caller to “love me like you mean it,” just with a slightly more emphatic verb.

Ironically, in the same month that they loosened App Store restrictions enough to allow us to be overwhelmed by a slew of farting apps, Apple has also drawn attention for rejecting a book (of the self-contained ebook variety) on the grounds of having ‘objectionable’ content.

‘Knife Music’ is the name of the rejected novel, which is a medical thriller that is being sold on, and receiving some pretty good reviews on, Amazon – it’s page is here.

In their rejection notice to the developer, Apple showed a screencap of at least some of what was considered objectionable content and, as indicated in the quote from a CNET post at the top of this post, they seem to be objecting to the use of ‘the F word’. As the CNET post points out, there are many valuable pieces of literature that contain the same word, and the iTunes Store certainly stocks some movies that contain ‘objectionable’ content. For movies though (maybe for music too – I don’t know as I rarely shop for music via iTunes) there is a ratings system, presumably in an effort to keep people below a certain age away from certain types of content – and there is no equivalent or similar ratings system for books.

Tom Krazit, author of the CNET post I keep referencing seems to think Apple is going to have their work cut out for them in this difficult area:

If Apple really wants to offer books on the App Store, it is going to have to strike a balance between a desire to keep out-and-out porn off the App Store while avoiding comparisons to a modern-day Anthony Comstock. Apple doesn’t have to sell erotica if it doesn’t want to, but simply rejecting books because they use one of George Carlin’s seven favorite words is going to exclude an awful lot of literature.

I think this is a really tough and tricky area for Apple all the way around. It’s one thing to protect us from ‘rogue’ or unsafe / unstable applications – but quite a different thing to start making decisions for us on what is ‘objectionable’ content. Seems like maybe they will need to look at some sort of ratings system for books at some stage.

What do you all think? What’s the best way for the App Store to handle this subject?

Source: CNET via Gizmodo

Copyright © 2008 PatrickJ. Visit the original article at http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2008/12/28/apple-staff-love-their-pwnage-jailbreak-tools/.

Lovely little tidbit from an iPhone Dev Team video presentation titled ‘How The iPhone Was Hacked’.

Just in case it’s not clear in the screencap above, the last point mentions that there are some 180 IP addresses from within the Apple corporate range that very actively update their Pwnage Tools.

Just keeping tabs on the opposition in the ongoing cat and mouse game, or are some of them in the ‘if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em’ club?

The video is an hour long, and apparently heavily technical – I haven’t watched all of it yet, but couldn’t resist sharing that little part of it. Check out the MMi link below if you’d like to see more of the video.

Via: MMi

Copyright © 2008 PatrickJ. Visit the original article at http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2008/12/28/bizarro-iphone-app-of-the-day-hello-governor/.

Do you ever find yourself wishing you had a British accent? Do you wish you could greet your friends and family with a big “Hello Governor!”? Are you too shy to actually say it in public? Well, your dreams have come true because the power is now in your hands. Hello Governor, allows you to greet anyone with a friendly English hello, by simply pushing the play button. Choose from a male or female voice that says ‘Hello Governor!”. This application is a must have for anyone who wants to spice up their hellos!

That is the full iTunes App Store description of the spectacularly bizarro Hello Governor iPhone app. I just couldn’t leave any of it out. It makes me want to say “Cost of new and entirely bizarre and craptastic iPhone app – $0.99. Reading the description of that same app – priceless”.

I lived in London for a dozen years, love London and the UK as a whole. But … somehow I just don’t feel any need whatsoever to say – or have my iPhone say for me – Hello (or even ‘Ello) Governor.

Clicking on the web-site link for this app’s developers gave me no further info on it, but did show me another ‘Bizarro’ nominee called ‘Lady Biz’. I’m not a lady, but I’m really hoping that if I was, I would hate the name and sound and description of that one as well.

Anyway, if you do need a handy 99 cent pocket companion to chirp out “Hello Governor’ for you, it’s in the App Store now …

Copyright © 2008 PatrickJ. Visit the original article at http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2008/12/28/quick-look-google-mobiles-new-voice-search-feature/.

The popular Google Mobile iPhone app now does voice search

I’d seen a post a few days back talking about this new feature in Google Mobile, and finally got round to installing the update and giving it a try last night (and this morning). I love the idea of this feature – press to speak, or even simpler, just hold the phone to your ear and speak, and get back your search results.

So far, I get pretty good results with the voice search. It was 100% on recognizing the phone-to-ear gesture – and always invoked the voice search just as it’s supposed to. It has also done well on accuracy / getting the search terms right most of the time. My daughter and I gave it a good once-over during this morning and it got most things right first time, from ‘black bear’ and ‘elephant’ sort of queries, to ‘tony romo’ and several other athlete / celeb names.

One thing that either I’m not doing right (haven’t found the way to set maybe) or that could do with some improvement is how it handles prioritizing its search items from the different ‘Searchable Items’ categories. For instance, I did multiple searches for the names of people in my Contacts list. It had a much harder time recognizing these (pretty sure that was my bad on not speaking clearly enough), but once it did get the search term right, it invariably showed me web results, rather than first (or ever) showing me results from my Contacts.

So … if I’m not just overlooking a setting somewhere, I think there needs to be an option to say ‘Always show results from Contacts First’ or similar, or better still to set the order in which it uses and displays results from each of its categories.

Despite that one complaint, I like the Google Mobile voice search feature a lot, and so does my daughter!

There are some good tips for general usage of the Google Mobile app, and for the voice search function, from a Google team member, HERE.

Google Mobile is in the App Store now and is a free app …

Copyright © 2008 PatrickJ. Visit the original article at http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2008/12/28/mmi-iphone-forum-fans-update-your-bookmarks/.

As we have previously posted, ModMyi.com is now our permanent domain. While ModMyiPhone.com and ModMyiFone.com have redirected to our new domain since the change, these domains will no longer redirect as of January 1st, 2009. While we would like to continue redirecting, our agreement with Apple (which has allowed us to keep our doors open) requires our previous domains go completely inactive.

ModMyi (formerly known as ModMyiPhone and ModMyiFone before the lawyers hit their doorstep) is one of the most popular and useful iPhone forum sites – especially if you’re into modding and jailbreaking.

Their permanent domain name has recently changed. The important thing to note in their statement above is that redirection from their old addresses will be turned off at the end of this year as part of the legal settlement with Apple. So … if you have a bookmark for them that points at modmyifone.com, it will no longer work on January 1st, and you’ll be sad

So, do as suggested above and update your bookmarks – to point at http://modmyi.com – so that you can continue to enjoy the MMi forums …

Copyright © 2008 PatrickJ. Visit the original article at http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2008/12/27/2009-iphone-survival-kit-up-for-grabs-in-woips-great-contest/.

Welcome to our “2009 iPhone Survival Kit” Giveaway.
Whether you just got your iPhone or are an experienced iPhone-user, this is a great package.
It currently includes…over 30 applications, a leather Sena case for iPhone, an Etymotic HF2 headset, and more.
(The package is growing every day and we’ll update you as it does.).
One grand prize winner will receive it all!

Our good friends over at WOIP (What’s On iPhone) have got a great contest going, with a prize package that’ll get you and your iPhone off to a flying start for the new year.

You’ve got to make a bit of effort (and have some fun along the way) to get entered. You’ll need to check the link below for all the details, but the short story is you need to review an app to gain a valid entry.

They’ll be picking a (very) lucky winner at 11:59 Eastern on New Year’s Eve, so hurry on over to:

2009 iPhone Survival Kit Contest