Sling Media today announced that an updated version of SlingPlayer Mobile adding the ability for users to stream media to their iPhones via 3G has appeared in the App Store. The update comes less than two weeks after AT&T announced that it would allow Sling Media's application to stream over the carrier's 3G networks.
"We're delighted the SlingPlayer Mobile App now has 3G capability," said John Gilmore, senior vice president and general manager at Sling Media. "Slingbox users in many countries around the globe, including the United States, can now enjoy their living room TV experience on their iPhone and iPod touch whether on a 3G or WiFi network."
AT&T's announcement earlier this month created a bit of controversy, as quotes from AT&T Mobility CEO Ralph de la Vega stated that AT&T and Sling Media had worked together to "revise the app to make it more bandwidth sensitive", possibly appearing as a partial explanation for nine-month delay following AT&T's original refusal to allow the application on its network. Sling Media has denied that it worked with AT&T to revise the application, noting that the company "didn't change anything" regarding the application's 3G streaming capabilities between AT&T's initial denial last year and its recent change of heart.
As predicted, Microsoft today unveiled Windows Phone 7, the next-generation smartphone operating system serving as the successor to and rebranding of the company's Windows Mobile software. One of the software's key features is the use of integrated "hubs", offering content views based on content rather than specific applications. Hubs will include People, Pictures, Games, Music+Video, Marketplace, and Office.
Windows Phone 7 "People" hub
In addition, "live tiles" on the system's Start screen will offer real-time information updates, and a dedicated hardware button will provide one-click access to Bing search tools.
With Windows Phone 7 Series, Microsoft takes a fundamentally different approach to phone software. Smart design begins with a new, holistic design system that informs every aspect of the phone, from its visually appealing layout and motion to its function and hardware integration. On the Start screen, dynamically updated "live tiles" show users real-time content directly, breaking the mold of static icons that serve as an intermediate step on the way to an application. Create a tile of a friend, and the user gains a readable, up-to-date view of a friend's latest pictures and posts, just by glancing at Start.
A number of handset manufacturers and carriers have committed to the Windows Phone 7 Series platform, and the first handsets based on the operating system are scheduled to become available in "holiday 2010".
Samsung Wave
Samsung yesterday also announced the Samsung Wave, the first handset to be based on the company's own bada platform. The Wave offers an 800x480 active-matrix OLED screen, 5-megapixel camera, Samsung's revised TouchWiz 3.0 user interface, and 2 GB of internal storage with a microSD slot allowing for up to an additional 32 GB.
The Samsung Wave offers a Super AMOLED 3.3" display that makes the screen truly come alive, a Social Hub to bring you closer to your contacts and connections, and TouchWiz 3.0 for an intuitive and hugely customizable user interface. The Wave's high-speed CPU ensures swift, smooth application experiences and multi-tasking, making the device an always-on mobile multimedia companion. The Samsung Wave has been built to offer users an unrivalled level of performance, customization and choice in how they connect with their world. The stunning full touch mobile will be available globally from April 2010.
At Macworld, iTouch Gloves (left) and Telefingers (right) both offered solutions for using the iPhone's capacitive touch screen while wearing gloves. iTouch Gloves offer high end leather glove styles that start at $99.95.. They offer a variety of styles in both women's and men's styles.
Telefingers' solution is quite a bit less stylish but also much cheaper. For only $15 a pair, you can get a thinner (non-leather) pair gloves with specialized tips that allow you to control your iPhone screen. Either way, it's better than using sausages.
Xserve Racking Solution
Electrorack offers a wide variety of server racking solutions, but this one caught our eye. It's a rack enclosure for Xserves and RAID configurations that happens to styled like an oversized Mac Pro.
SurfaceSound in Your Helmet
TuneBug has been offering its SurfaceSound solution Vibe for some time already. Vibe is a small device that takes an audio source and turns any surface into a speaker. TuneBug has taken this same concept and applied it to both Bike and Snow/Skateboard helmets.
Shake connects via Bluetooth to your iPhone and then transmits sound waves throughout your helmet, letting you listen to your favorite tunes without headphones. Shake is expected to ship in April for $119.95.
U-Socket - USB Power in Your Wall
Fastmac claims this is the first of it kind due to some regulatory issues they had to clear. The U-Socket allows you to have a wall plate with both USB and regular power outlets. No more hunting for your USB->Power dongle, just plug your USB cable straight into the wall. U-Socket can be installed on any existing wall socket. The price is $19.95 now, but normally $29.95.
If you've been missing a way to watch live television on your iPhone, Mophie and FloTV have teamed up to provide just that solution in the next couple of months. FloTV is a new wireless TV service that has been put in place across the U.S. It provides 18 channels of television service with broad coverage.
In order to achieve this on the iPhone, Mophie has integrated the FloTV chips into one of their iPhone battery packs (Juice Pack TV) (not pictured above). The FloTV application will be a free download from the App Store and will interface with the FloTV chips using Wi-Fi. The end result should be live TV viewing from your iPhone as well as additional battery power from the Juice Pack TV.
Square - Mobile Credit Card Processing
Square UP was showing their new credit card processing solution for the iPhone. They are planning on offering a no-hassle way for individuals to start accepting credit card payments. Simply buy their $1 app from the App Store, sign up for service, and they will send you a small hardware dongle that will swipe credit cards (shown right). No individual merchant account is required as Square UP handles all the processing and payments and takes a 2.9% cut of all sales.
The Square service is currently in beta testing and should arrive later this year.
iV Plus - Universal Remote, Camera Flash and Battery Pack
FastMac showed of their latest creation at Macworld. The iV Plus is a combination case, IR Remote, Flash LED, and Battery Pack. The enclosure wraps around the iPhone like a case much like the other battery solutions available, but the inclusion of the IR port and Flash LED add a significant amount of functionality.
FastMac will also be providing free Universal Remote software to work in conjunction with the case. The software allows you to customize your remote settings and a more advanced paid version will include live TV guide with show searching support. Meanwhile, support for the Flash LED is also coming in the form of a free camera app that will snap a picture and also trigger the flash.
The iV Plus is expected to ship in Q2 for $130.
Navigon MobileNavigator 1.5 - Integration with Other Apps
Panorama View (left), MyRoutes (right)
Navigon was out showing off its upcoming 1.5 update to its MobileNavigator turn-by-turn guidance software. The update is due in March and brings several new features:
- Panorama View 3D: NASA sourced elevation data to provide 3D views of the landscape - MyRoutes: Gives you up to 3 alternative routes with different route recommendations based on current traffic conditions as well as your personal driving profile. - Facebook and Twitter Integration: broadcast where you are and where you're going.
Also announced was a new OpenAPI "Appinteract" for Navigon's software that will allow other App Store developers to pass destinations directly to MobileNavigator. For example, if a restaurant is found within iPhone App Where To?, a single tap can launch and initiate routing within MobileNavigator. The actual data is simply passed as a specialized URL, so the implementation should be simple for developers, but is much more convenient to the end user. The 1.5 update to MobileNavigator should arrive in March.
One of the big new announcements at Macworld was Tell Tale Games' release of a Mac version of Tales of Monkey Island available immediately. The company has also committed to delivering Wallace & Gromit's Grand Adventures, Strong & Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People, and Sam & Max to the Mac. The next game to be released is up for user vote.
Tales of Monkey Island is a 3D graphic adventure game based on the classic title Secret of Monkey Island and originally released for PC and WiiWare in 2009. Tales represents the 5th in the Monkey Island series and is the only modern version that has become available for the Mac.
Want to use your 27" iMac as an HDTV? Kanex was showing off their HDMI to mini Display Port adapter that lets you connect your Playstation 3, Xbox 360 and Blu-ray players to your 27" iMac. Both video and audio are transmitted across at a resolution up to 1920x1200. The retail price for the device will be $149 and its expected for release in the next couple of months.
Wireless USB A/V Adapter
That is a MacBook screen being shown on a HDTV wirelessly. Wisair announced Mac support for their wireless USB DisplayDock at Macworld.
The Wireless USB DisplayDock Set allows you to easily connect your MacBook using a single USB adapter. Both wireless audio and video are transmitted at up to 1440x1050 screen resolution. The wireless base station that connects to your TV supports VGA, HDMI, and a 3.5mm audio jack.
The Windows version of the device is shown on the website, and is sold at retailers under a variety of brands. The hardware is identical for the PC and Mac, but the official Mac drivers won't be here until the end of March. Those drivers should become available on the manufacturer's pages, or you can wait until a Mac-packaged version becomes available in about April.
Consumer Reportsannounced this week the results of a study it commissioned assessing the monthly data usage for customers of Apple's iPhone and other smartphones. The data, obtained from over 1,000 consumer accounts linked to online bill analysis firm Validas, reveals that iPhone users consume an average of 273 MB of data per month, five times that of BlackBerry users and nearly twice that of users of other smartphones.
On average, iPhone users consume 273 MBs of data per month. That compares with 54 MBs for consumer users of Blackberrys and 150 MBs for consumers who use other brands of smart phones, the Validas study found.
The disparity in data usage is particularly evident at low levels, where 80% of BlackBerry and 54% of "other" smartphone users consume less than 50 MB of data per month while only less than 20% of iPhone users maintain such low usage.
Consumer Reports points to the data consumption of iPhone users and the strain they have placed on AT&T's network in the United States as a possible key source of discontent that led to the carrier placing last in the magazine's recent overall and city-by-city ratings.
Bloomberg BusinessWeek and The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) report that Microsoft is set to demonstrate its next-generation smartphone software, to be known as Windows Mobile 7 or Windows Phone, at next week's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. According to BusinessWeek:
On Feb. 15, Microsoft will unveil its latest effort to get back into the game. The renamed Windows Phone operating system, set to be introduced at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, will "move the bar forward," said Robbie Bach, president of the company's entertainment and devices division.
With Windows Mobile 7, Microsoft is reportedly seeking to pursue tighter integration of its software with third-party hardware, looking to place stricter limits on the basic characteristics of devices running Windows Mobile 7 so as to ensure a more consistent quality of user experience and reduce the need for application developers to make sacrifices otherwise required for applications to run on the wide variety of hardware running Windows Mobile in its current form. From The Wall Street Journal:
New devices based on Windows Mobile 7, due out later this year, will be the first to reflect a much tighter focus at Microsoft on how its software works with hardware made by other companies. In the past, Microsoft has taken much the same approach in mobile software as it has in the PC market, licensing its operating system to nearly any hardware maker that wanted to install it on their systems.
Microsoft's new strategy addresses the level of integration possible in the iPhone, with Apple making both hardware and software, and Android, where Google has taken a more active role in handset design to improve the Android user experience. Microsoft has seen growth of its Windows Mobile user base stagnate, with Apple calculated to have passed Microsoft in U.S. sales as long as ago as late 2007 and moved beyond Microsoft in installed U.S. user base late last year.
Mobile analytics firm Flurry today released a report revealing trends seen in its user data for the month of January. Among the more interesting developments discussed in the report was a nearly three-fold surge of new App Store applications registered with Flurry to integrate its analytics into the applications. Such increases have typically been seen in advance of new device launches, and thus Flurry hypothesizes that the growth was the result of excitement surrounding Apple's iPad despite the fact that the device was not formally introduced until the very end of the month.
Developers integrating Flurry analytics into iPhone OS applications in January increased by nearly three times over December. This represents the single largest spike in Flurry history, with over 1,600 new iPhone OS application starts for January. Historically, Flurry has measured surges in new application starts within its system in anticipation of new device launches, including for the Motorola Droid and iPhone 3GS. As such, we hypothesize that excitement generated by Apple's iPad event in January is driving this growth. For developers who get a jump on customizing their applications for the iPad, there may be an opportunity to stand out early on, and earn more downloads.
Similar data for the Android platform has demonstrated steady growth ramping up over the past six months, with only a 25% jump in new project starts between December and January, substantially lower than that seen for iPhone OS. Consequently, the proportion of new starts dedicated to iPhone OS applications compared to Android rose to its highest level since last July.
SachManya announced Yapper at Macworld, a web-based tool that allows you to build an iPhone App based on an RSS feed. The product is targeted at bloggers and other content providers who want to create an iPhone app quickly based on their existing content.
Yapper handles app creation after the customer submits the rss links and relevant icon graphics. The final app is submitted by Yapper for approval in the App Store. The basic cost for app creation is $99 with additional fees for additional features.
Quickoffice demoned Quickoffice Connect Mobile Suite, a $9.99 iPhone application that allows you to access, view, edit and share Microsoft Office documents on your iPhone. The app also integrates with various cloud services including MobileMe, Dropbox, Google Docs, and Box.net. Features include:
- Create, Open & Edit Microsoft Office Files (DOC, DOCX, XLS and XLSX) - Email, View & Access Attachments with Popular File Formats (PPT, PDF, iWork, HTML, PNG, JPG, GIF, SVG, TIF, MP3, etc.) - Remotely Access Files via Cloud Storage Services (Box.net, Dropbox, Google Docs and MobileMe) - Share Files via Email or Cloud Service Providers - Manage and Transfer Files via WiFi
Macworld hosted a DEMO presentation showing off 6 of the "best of" products being shown at the expo.
Macworld Expo San Francisco 2010 kicked off yesterday with a presentation by The New York Times' David Pogue and guest appearance by actor LeVar Burton. While the Pogue keynote was a huge departure from Steve Jobs' traditional keynotes, it was infused with music, humor, theatre, and even an interview with the team behind AutoTuneTheNews (who happen to use Macs).
Also new in this year's Macworld was a Best of Show DEMO session held immediately prior to the opening of the show floor featuring six of the best products at Macworld Expo.
The video embedded below shows off Ten One Design's Mac software which allows you to use the MacBook, MacBook Pro and MacBook Air's multi-touch trackpad as a pressure sensitive trackpad when using a Pogo Stylus:
The full list of "Best of Show" DEMO products are listed here:
The Macworld show floor was contained in a smaller space this year, but the early foot traffic seemed particularly busy on opening day. It was genuinely difficult to make your way through portions of the hall due to the number of attendees.
Impressions from both vendors and long time attendees were quite positive, given the number of visitors.
Virtualization developer VMWare was present showing off version 3 of Fusion which was released in October. Version 3 had brought Windows 7 support, Snow Leopard optimizations, and more to Fusion. VMWare Director of Personal Desktop Products Pat Lee seemed optimistic about the strong early showing at the event.
Macworld continues on Friday and Saturday, and dates for next year's Macworld Expo have been set for January 25th-29th, 2011.
Apple today unveiled a "Countdown to 10 Billion Songs" promotion via the iTunes Store, offering the contest winner a prize of a $10,000 iTunes gift card. A counter on the main iTunes Store page and Apple's home page currently displays in excess of 9.8 billion downloads.
According to the official contest rules, participants may make up to 25 entries per day either by purchasing/downloading songs from the iTunes Store or by filling out an entry form on Apple's web site. The contest begins today and ends once the 10-billion-song milestone is reached.
The prize will be awarded for the entry (either through a song download or through the non-purchase online entry) sent immediately following the download of the 9,999,999,999th song. The potential winner will be determined by the order of the entries received. In the event that more than one entrant would be a winner based on the simultaneous timing of entries, one entrant will be randomly selected from those entrants as the winner. Each entrants chances of winning are dependent upon the number of eligible entries received.
Apple has periodically offered similar contests in the past, such as its One Billion Song contest in 2006 and a One Billion App contest last year.
This update is for Mac Pro (Early 2009) computers running Mac OS X v10.6.2. This update reduces processor utilization during audio activities, such as playing or recording music.
Full details on the update, which weighs in at 1.64 MB and requires Mac OS X 10.6.2, are included in the associated support document.
The issues, first reported in our forums last October, have manifested themselves in the form of excessive power usage and processor core heat load when performing audio-related tasks as simple as playing music through iTunes. While today's update addresses only Mac OS X Snow Leopard-based machines, users have also reported difficulties while running under Mac OS X Leopard. No issues have been observed by users running Windows under Boot Camp or on older, pre-Nehalem Mac Pros.
Microvision showed their SHOWWX which they described as the world's first laser pico projector. Like all pico projectors, the purpose of the device is to project video from your laptop or iPhone/iPod Touch to a wall or screen. The use of laser technology gives the SHOWWX a few advantages including being always in focus and vivid colors with a brightness of 10 lumens. A cable allows you to output video directly from the iPod touch or iPhone.
Macworld hosted a DEMO presentation showing off 6 of the "best of" products being shown at the expo.
Ten One Design showed off their Inklet trackpad tablet software for the Mac. Inklet is a $25 application that allows you to use your MacBook, Pro and Air multi-touch trackpad as a pressure sensitive drawing tablet. The drawing area is shown in the second screen and can be resized (pinch/zoom) and panned around (two finger drag). This video shows it in action:
Macworld hosted a DEMO presentation showing off 6 of the "best of" products being shown at the expo.
Canson demonstrated PaperShow which is a presentation tool that uses a paper/pen combination that controls your presentation and allows you to annotate in real time.
The product includes specially marked paper and a pen with a camera. You print out your presentation onto the special paper and annotate it in real time with the pen. The pen follows the microscopic dots that are on the paper to translate your markings onto the screen. Besides drawing lines, there are different colors, shapes and functions. The starter package is $199 which includes the pen, bluetooth adapter, paper and pad.
Macworld hosted a DEMO presentation showing off 6 of the "best of" products being shown at the expo.
Silicon Alley Insider reports on information from a source claiming that rumors of Apple looking to develop its own search engine are untrue and that Apple's current deal with Google to provide default search functionality for the iPhone is currently worth over $100 million per year to Apple in revenue sharing.
Our source tells us "there's too many options" for search on the market, so there's no reason for Apple to build its own search engine.
Another reason Apple might not want to build its own search engine: It's getting over $100 million a year from Google in its revenue share deal, according to our source.
For Apple, that's not a lot of money. But, it's enough that it doesn't make sense for Apple to put considerable resources towards building its own Internet search engine. And, if Apple wanted more money or options, there's Microsoft -- with Bing and a big checkbook.
A report from BusinessWeek last month had in fact claimed that Apple and Microsoft have been in talks to make Bing the default search provider for the iPhone as the relationship between Google and Apple has reportedly soured as competition between the two companies has become increasingly intense.
Carina Software demoed their Sky Voyager application which is a virtual planetarium that has a large database of stars and deep sky objects. It also supports the iPhone 3GS compass to identify stars and objects by holding your iPhone up to the sky.
The app also supports their SkyFi wireless adapter which provides a serial interface for remote telescope control directly from your iPhone.
Macworld hosted a DEMO presentation showing off 6 of the "best of" products being shown at the expo.
