Apple iPhone News

As two of the biggest companies connecting people in today’s world, it comes as no surprise that Facebook and Apple, the maker of the iPhone, would be a match made in heaven for many of today’s users who enjoy socializing via digital means. The Facebook app for the iPhone has now been reported to have more than 100 million users who make use of it each month. Of the more than 150 million users making use of Facebook via mobile devices each month, the iPhone’s share is definitely high. This bodes well for both Apple and Facebook who are looking to further expand their demographics, but some insiders have anonymously told the press that well over half of the usage of apps on the iPhone actually comes from the Facebook user base. Of course, given the condition of anonymity, this data can’t be confirmed by the media and is seen as being extremely sensitive for both companies at present. If true, this would mean these two services are most likely striking the same user demographic, experts have said. The latest version of the iPhone’s Facebook app includes new features such as Places which is only for users in the United States right now, but allows these users to post their location so that their friends know where they are.

The new update for the iPhone also lets users more specifically define the privacy settings they would like and allows for threads in their inbox that can include multiple users at the same time.

All experts agree that Apple, Inc. has certainly made a name for itself as the king of the smart phone market in recent years, but the competition is getting not only tougher, but a lot bigger, too. Now that Google, Inc. has moved in on the market with its Android rival smart phone, it appears that Apple is at long last being given a serious run for its money. In the 2nd quarter of 2010, use of Android’s Google based operating system has grown by nearly 30 percent, a market improvement over Apple’s stats for the exact same quarter which was only a little over 20 percent. In terms of the whole market, Research in Motion’s Blackberry is still top thanks to its utilitarian use in government and corporate circles with a full 35% of the market. The iPhone trails right behind at 28%, but Android is gaining steadily at 13% at this present time. Among smart phone users in the last 6 months, Nielsen research shows that Google has shown the most significant levels of growth and managed to top all other operating systems on the market.

RIM is hoping that their latest Blackberry 6 platform, which is set to arrive late in 2010, will help them push their market share up, but Apple is not only newer to the market, they have already reached the iPhone 4 in just 3 years, winning over a myriad fans to their platform despite the fact that its primary appeal is with tech savvy consumers rather than mass purchase corporate buyers. RIM will have to work hard, analysts say, if they want to own more than just the corporate market share.

With each succeeding generation of the iPhone, Apple seems to be able to find a new way to win over fans and increase its market share. The iPhone 4 looks to be set to do exactly that and a big part of that appeal is the new design. The phone continues to have the same general appearance as the earlier models of iPhone, but this time many reviewers and critics alike are raving about the upgraded appearance and embracing it like never before.

Much of the credit for this reaction to the design of the iPhone 4 should go to designer Jonathon Ive. He is the mind that came up with the concept of flattening the smart phone by reducing the bulges that earlier models had in order to give it a more streamlined and utility based appearance that would match other products from Apple such as the

In a move that has totally taken app experts and critics alike by surprise, the Major League Baseball’s At Bat app for iPhone has not only come out in a new incarnation for the latest upcoming season, this time it is priced at a level that many find utterly impossible to believe: $14.99 for a single download. Even though it is so expensive, it has actually climbed to number 8 on the iTunes charts as proof that baseball’s popularity is alive and well in the United States. In fact, baseball fans will be able to get so much from this particular app that they are gladly paying the price in order to be able to get the streaming audio versions of the games, particularly since the sounds can keep playing while the user does other things on their iPhone. One live video of a game per day are another major incentive for those who have not gone for the MLB.tv package.

A large range of features that will appeal to the sport’s traditionally hard core fan base will also be offered and these range from excellent coverage of the events themselves to actual up to the moment statistics as the season progresses. No blackout restrictions will be placed on the audio and there are different announcers for the home and away sides of the field that are sure to help customers be able to get the view of the game that they are most interested in having. Plenty of supplemental content is expected to be provided, as well.

As the iPhone continues to become a valuable educational tool in the hands of many users who are leveraging its potential for information delivery, many have decided to create apps that will raise the bar and offer full source guides to a variety of subjects. One of the companies doing this is Indigo Publications who have recently released their five dollar Reef Fish Hawaii app that covers more than one hundred and fifty nine different species of fish that are native to the Hawaiian islands and surrounding areas. For snorkelers, this is a dream come true because it allows them to expand their knowledge of the local sea life in a quick and easy way. A free version is offered that will show case some of the fish in the area, but it is not nearly as in depth as the paid version which is far more comprehensive in both listings and content.

The app goes into detail to educate amateur fish studiers in the ways of the fish that they are learning about, even going so far as to list the scientific name, a description, size, habitat and plenty of photos. A double tap brings up a much larger image of the fish so identifying them rapidly is very easy to do. Perhaps the only real downfall to the app is that users who want to use it while in the wild with the fish will need to buy a waterproof case for their iPhone or risk it being damaged by the saltwater conditions in which these fish live.

Long time followers of Apple’s impending landing in China will be familiar with the long and twisting road that they have been taking over the past few months in trying to get their product into the hand of the Chinese public, but the process keeps getting side tracked or railroaded and has not ended in much of a break through for any of the sides involved. Recently, Wang Jianzhou, CEO of China Mobile, the largest mobile service provider in the nation of China, announced that China Mobile is again back at the negotiating table with Apple, this time trying to strike up a bargain to help it compete against China Unicom, its rival for market share. Since Apple and China Unicom have a non-exclusive arrangement, it is possible for China Mobile to create a deal for the distribution of the iPhone through China Mobile’s segment of the market.

Experts have long predicted that China Mobile would need to come to an agreement with Apple in order to expand its own market and bring its loyal customers what they want, but so far they have been divided on the best ways to pull that off. The change could come from China Mobile being able to offer its customers a low priced EDGE 2G model iPhone which would run over the EDGE network that is already used by China Mobile customers - who number just over half a billion in all. An upgrade to 3G has not yet captured the interest of most Chinese subscribers right now so the 2G has seemed the easiest solution.

Apple iPhone users have long been looking for a simple way to be able to edit images on their phone and that is what propelled Savoy Software, developers of Liquid Scale, to develop a package that would allow users of both the iPhone and the iPod Touch to be able to edit, hide or scale their photos so that they can edit them to their favorite social media sites right away and use the photos as part of the networking interface offered there. The package was designed to be very user friendly and completely simple to use, making uses of the touch screen and a rapid editing system that would be able to be used intuitively to cut images down to size and adjust them for the proper specifics needed for whatever site users wanted to send them to.

With Liquid Scale, iPhone users will be able to gain greater control over the image editing process and touch up their pictures for publishing with ease, according to Savoy Software. There are various types of distortion and manipulation that can be done to create visually tricky images which mix together to create whole new images that invoke the special effects features of the software to create different illusions or compilations of images. As a low cost app, it functions to a very high level and allows users to blend photos together in a way that does not require the kind of skills needed to operate a more advanced image program such as Adobe Photoshop.

Fashion and the hi tech world have long been seen as similar since both tend to operate on the same rapid type of growth, but never before has a smart phone merged with a pair of jeans in quite the same as WTF Jeans and Apple’s darling, iPhone, are doing thanks to designers Pedja Puselja and Sanja Rastovac. The two fashion designers from Strasbourg, France have come to the conclusion that the world definitely needs a pair of pants designed to interact not only with the iPhone, but also the iPod Touch and they have used micro fiber interiors to protect the pocket in which the iPhone will be stored. These fibers not only protect the device, they have the added fringe benefit of cleaning it, as well. An additional pocket that is hidden in the jeans to allow for memory stick storage is also built into the jeans.

The jeans are being produced to be sold online and this limited run will only sell a thousand pairs before it is ended. The first one hundred pairs have already sold for a price of just over $80 and the next run of four hundred pairs will be priced nearly twenty dollars more expensive while the final five hundred pairs will retail for nearly double the price of the first one hundred. The designer pair who came up with the jeans idea have definitely cut some new ground it fashion and more is expected from them in the future as reviewers crave more gadget friendly clothing that is both easy to wear and functional.

One thing that users of the iPhone have long craved is the ability to get even longer periods of use out of their mobile devices without having to charge them again and this is one place where developers of products have been focusing their energies to try and create an extended market. Many users complain that their iPhone rarely holds a charge for longer than twenty four hours and this would be expected due to the amount of heavy use these phones tend to get on a day to day basis. A number of cases have now come onto the market which offer to help extend the life of the battery that the iPhone comes with in a variety of methods. The X-type is one such device which retails for just under $70 and protects the phone in addition to offering extending of the battery by four and half hours after a three and a half hour charge.

Other, more expensive products have also hit the market such as the Standard which retails for just under $80 and offers itself in 27 different colors and textures. The device uses magnet closures and can be purchased with a belt clip. This device doubles the battery life of the iPhone, but does not go quite as far as the $100 XR, which is identical but increases the iPhone’s normal battery life by a full two hundred percent. It is one of the most sought after, but analysts suggest this is an emerging market that much more can be expected from in the coming years.

In a move that comes as a major shock to many and a merely understandable situation for others, DARPA (The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) is seeking to utilize its hi tech wizardry to create iPhone apps that would be of use to those in the US military. The agency formerly founded what is today known as the internet, one of its most impressive projects to date, and is the most advanced lab of computing in the defense industry and perhaps within the US government at large according to many tech experts. The agency’s stated goal when working with mobile devices and in particular the iPhone, is to explore and uncover both commercial and non commercial apps that might be useful for not only the military, but also the national security sector, as well. By leveraging existing technology in this way, the agency hopes to create programs of aid to the sector it services.

The apps would not be limited to only tactical military situations such as warfare, they would be developed for a range of other military applications such as disaster response situations, recovery efforts after a disaster as struck and humanitarian aid that goes along with large scale calamities such as Hurricane Katrina or other unforeseen tragedies which require a mobilized national response. That said, battlefield situations that would require a high level of technical information such as being able to determine ballistics calculations for snipers or serve as part of a warfighter battlefield scenario with real time information gathering are also expected to be part of the program, even extending so far as a handheld language translator.