MacRumors iPhone and iPad Blog: Apps, News, and Rumors

Bloomberg is reporting that YouTube has seen its mobile ad sales triple in the past six months, which is partly due to increased usage of its ad-enabled YouTube apps on both iOS and Android. The company has seen a 42 percent increase in app usage from a year ago, with 70 million smartphone owners using the app in March the United States.The recent growth in usage follows Apple Inc.'s...

Hulu Plus for iOS was updated to version 3.0 today, notably offering a redesigned iPad interface intended to facilitate easier content discovery. With the updated app, users can minimize videos with simple pinch gestures to navigate through the app while the videos continue to stream. There's also a discovery panel that offers up details on both shows and individual episodes, along with a new...

Vesper is a new note taking app that also incorporates to-do elements, allowing users to capture thoughts, tasks, and ideas quickly and efficiently. The app comes from newly minted company Q Branch, which includes Apple blogger John Gruber, developer Brent Simmons, and designer Dave Wiskus. Vesper offers a simplistic user interface that focuses on both quick input and customizable...

Airplane manufacturer Airbus has previewed an iPhone-enabled smart luggage prototype called 'Bag2Go' that uses a number of new technologies to help airlines and flyers keep track of baggage, reports Australian Business Traveler.The bags include RFID chips for next-generation airline baggage handling and a barcode that syncs with an iPhone app that includes a 'Find My Bag' feature that hooks...

Earlier this week, we noted that Apple had begun in-store repairs of iPhone 5 displays, a $149 procedure that is part of an effort by Apple to revamp its AppleCare and warranty services. We had been told that Apple had sent new equipment to the stores in order to allow Geniuses to calibrate the replacement displays once they had been installed, and 512 Pixels has now shared a photo of one of...

Apple has released an update to its iTunes Festival London 2013 app to add Passbook functionality and support for landscape photos. With Passbook, ticket winners can download event tickets directly to their iPhones. What's new in version 3.8: - Passbook functionality - Photos with landscape perspective - Various bug fixesThe annual 2013 iTunes Festival in London was announced last week,...

Amazon has updated its Kindle iOS app to version 3.8, adding the ability to adjust line spacing in the app along with multipage highlights that can be used to highlight book passages that span more than a single page. The update also includes accessibility improvements that allow users to increase maximum font size and it also comes with a number of bug fixes and stability enhancements....

Plex, the advanced server-client media player, has released a new client for the Apple TV -- however, unlike the existing ATV client, this one does not require the device to be jailbroken.Plex allows users to store movie and TV show files on a server and then view those files on a wide variety of client devices including Macs, PCs, a number of smart televisions, the Roku box and the Apple TV....

Last year, social game-maker Zynga acquired OMGPOP for roughly $200 million. OMGPOP is the development house behind the once-incredibly popular Draw Something.Today, Zynga is shutting OMGPOP down as part of another round of layoffs at the company. Zynga has laid off 18 percent of its staff -- 520 employees -- reports AllThingsD.The move today will affect every part of the San Francisco social...

Last week Google announced an inbox redesign for both the mobile and desktop versions of Gmail, which was implemented on iOS today via an update to the Gmail app. The new design offers a tabbed layout that supports up to five different organizational tabs to allow users to organize mail into specific categories. In addition to adding support for the new inbox, the update also brings enhanced ...

Google has updated its Chrome browser app for iOS to version 27, adding conversational voice search capabilities that were introduced at Google I/O and later deployed in the desktop and Android versions of the browser. Voice search, which is already possible via Google’s Search app for iOS, can be accessed in Chrome through a microphone bar that has been added to the top of the keyboard....

PopCap first hinted at a Plants vs. Zombies sequel in March, announcing a summer launch date. The company followed that up by narrowing down the release date to July, and now PopCap has announced that the game's official launch is planned for July 18. In addition to unveiling a new animated trailer, PopCap has also provided some details on the upcoming game, which is titled Plants vs. Zombies...

A day after the Chicago Sun-Times fired the entirety of its 28-person photo staff, Chicago media critic Robert Feder (via Cult of Mac) is reporting that the newspaper is training its reporters in iPhone photography to produce the photo content the paper requires. Sun-Times reporters begin mandatory training today on "iPhone photography basics" following elimination of the paper's entire...

Taiwanese blog Apple.pro, which has on a number of occasions discovered photos of parts from upcoming Apple products, has 璃曝光？/">shared a new phot [Google translation] of what is claimed to be the front panel and digitizer assembly for the upcoming fifth-generation iPad. The photo, which was posted to a Photobucket account, shows the rear of the part and includes the ribbon cable for the...

Originally announced in October 2011, Adobe has finally released its Adobe Kuler color theme generation app for iPhone.The app was to be part of a new suite of mobile apps for Adobe, meant to enhance the desktop experience for desktop artists. Currently, only three of the six apps have been released, Photoshop Touch, >Ideas, and Kuler.Adobe® Kuler lets you capture color inspiration anywhere...

Last week, news leaked that Bioware and LucasArts' Star Wars RPG Knights of the Old Republic would be coming to the iPad, and as of today, the game is available for download from the App Store. Originally released 10 years ago, KotOR is based on the Dungeons & Dragons d20 role-playing system, which has contributed to its popularity. In the game, players choose from three character classes,...

Google's new subscription music service 'Google Play Music All Access', which launched earlier this month, will be landing on iOS in the next few weeks according to Google's Sundar Pichai.According to Engadget, Pichai, speaking with Walt Mossberg today at D11, said the service was to be "universally accessible" and that "when there's a mass of users, we invest in more platforms."He did not...

The August Smart Lock is a new iPhone-compatible locking system that has been designed by Jason Johnson and Yves Béhar, who serves as Jawbone's Chief Creative Officer. Béhar, who has worked on products like the Jambox and the UP, has created a simple universal lock that is designed to connect to a smartphone using Bluetooth. The lock itself is crafted of anodized aluminum and looks similar...