Posts Tagged "iPhone"

Yesterday, Josh Williams of Gowalla posted about 2 new features in Gowalla: Trips and Bookmarks.

Custom trips have been talked about by many on Gowalla’s GetSatifaction.com forum and now they’re available, but their creation is only available from the web site. You can access near by trips from the app so you can do them. You can create as many as 5 trips, each including up to 20 spots. Not bad. More improvements to that will be coming also in the future. You can also create bookmarks now for your favorite spots, from the web site and from the app.

Gowalla Logo

Here’s the blog post:

Today we’re thrilled to announce the launch of two new features: Trips and Bookmarks. Let’s talk about Trips first.

Until today, all Trips in Gowalla have been curated by the team at Gowalla with a little help from select friends. But our goal has always been that you would help us create these trips. And today you can. Simply login to your Gowalla account on the web, visit a spot page, then click the Add to Trip button. You’ll be able to name your trip, give it a description, add up to 20 spots of your choosing, then publish it to Gowalla. Your published trips will be viewable in the Gowalla app by your friends.

Here’s where it gets fun: We’ll be looking for unique and exciting trips created by our community to feature in Gowalla. Featured trips will be promoted based on the quality and relevancy of the trip, the number of people who have completed the trip, and will be given their own custom pin artwork that will be rewarded to those who have completed the trip.

As of today, you can create as many as 5 trips, each including up to 20 spots. As we improve the feature we’ll allow you to create more trips, order their lists of spots, and categorize them into logical groups like Pub Crawls, Nature Hikes, and the like. Also, for now, you may only complete featured trips and trips created by your friends. This is just the first step in making trips a truly key part of Gowalla’s future. We have lots more to do.

Today you can view nearby, featured and friend-created trips in Gowalla 1.4 on your iPhone by tapping the Browse button in the upper-left of the Trips tab. Our forthcoming Android and WebOS clients currently in development will also support this feature.

I’d also like to tell you a bit about bookmarks as well. Now when you visit any spot page at Gowalla.com you can bookmark that spot. You’ll be able to find all your bookmarks in Gowalla for iPhone by tapping Browse on the Spots tab. This simple feature makes it easy to find your way back to a favorite spot. Soon you’ll be able to add bookmarks from your mobile device as well.

Today’s release of Trips and Bookmarks to our community is simply a first step. There is a lot of depth here to be explored. We’re excited to hear your feedback as we continue to improve these, and other, features. Thanks for going out with Gowalla!

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EA Mobile has released their second iPhone game in the SPORE universe today, SPORE Creatures. It starts off where SPORE Origins left off. You come out of the prehistoric water onto land where you need to continue to evolve to survive.

SPORE Creatures Icon

You can customize your SPORE Creature with over 45 unique body parts like legs, mouths, shells, and wings, plus different skins, shapes, and colors. EA Mobile says there’s over a billion possible combinations within the SPORE Creature Creator. Plus there are 20 levels across 4 different sprawling zones: Sandy Shores, Barren Desert, Dark Forest, and Icy Mountains. You will need to avoid snapping, carnivours plants, shooting urchins and more while trying to solve puzzles to complete each level. And like SPORE Origins, you will need to collect DNA to evolve. There are 5 abilities to max out to build your survival skill-set.

You can get SPORE Creatures at the App Store for $6.99.

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In a statement, Apple CEO Steve Jobs said that “the products we are planning to release this year are very strong, starting this week with a major new product that we’re really excited about.”

Apple sells 8.7 million iPhones during fiscal Q1 2010, 100% more than last year

Total iPhone sales are now at a total of 42,445,000 as of the press release today. Apple sold 8,700,000 iPhones in during fiscal Q1 of 2010. That’s up 100% unit growth over the year-ago quarter. AMAZING! That’s over 1 million more than Apple’s best iPhone selling quarter, fiscal Q4 2009, which saw 7.4 million iPhones sold.
Read the rest of this entry »

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Now you can get your favorite comic strip character on the iPhone! Dilbert Mobile is out now. It’s the official Dilbert iPhone app! Get immediate access your daily Dilbert comic as well as the 20+ year archive of the entire Dilbert collection – all from your iPhone.

Dilbert Mobile features a random button (called “Random Comic”) that will flash you back to hilarious Dilbert comics from the past. You can also pick the date of the comic in Calendar View or by week with Weekly View. Even select your favorites. No matter where you are you can always get your Dilbert fix.

This app is a must for any Dilbert fan. Pick up Dilbert Mobile for $3.99 at the App Store.

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Caught this very creative image just a few minutes ago over at One+Infinity. If you have all the right apps and align them up properly, you can have a lot of fun!

fuck your smartphone

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So, back in October I posted that Star Wars: Trench Run was coming out. I received a comment stating that “Not sure that this is true” and I I got a few replies to my tweets about the post saying the same thing (I don’t recall if it was the same person or not). Guess what folks, Monday Apple approved & released THQ Wireless’ STAR WARS: TRENCH RUN (App Store link). I was right. HA HA!

swtr1

I was reluctant to buy the $4.99 game, but eventually succumbed to the Dark Side. For a Star Wars fan, the game is a must. Taken from the old 1980’s version of the Star Wars arcade game, Star Wars: Trench Run is just you, playing as Luke Skywalker in his X-wing fighter during the Battle for Yavin 4 (the last battle during Star Wars: A New Hope [Episode IV]), you dogfight with TIE Fighters and do the trench run (hence the name of this game) in an attempt to destroy the Death Star.

You use the iPhone’s accelerometer to control the flight of your X-wing in the game. It takes a little bit to get used to, but once you do you’ll enjoy the game. There are four parts to the screen, divided into 4 quadrants: change view (chase cam/cockpit views), pause, slow (using the Force), and fire weapon.

There are 2 modes of gameplay: Mission and Arcade. The Mission mode you must complete each mission before you can advance to the next step of the game to eventually when you get the chance to blow up the Death Star, complete with clips from the movie. In Arcade mode, you pick either doing the trench run or dogfighting the TIE Fighters. You must clear several distances or waves of TIE Fighters to see how far you can go. And there are also different levels of difficulty to play. I’ve had the game for about 24 hours and played it several times and it does get harder and harder.

Star Wars: Trench Run is definitely a good and fun game to get and a must for any Star Wars fan. It has great game play and great graphics. It’s only $4.99 so pick it up from the App Store.

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I’ve come across two iPhone apps that people say are fun to have, play, and use. First, I found Gowalla (App Store link). Nice interface. Interesting GPS-based location game. You start off with a blank passport. You go to different locations (they call them ’spots’) and check in. When you check in, you get a stamp for the spot. You can also pick up items or drop items at the spot for others to get. If you come across a new spot that no one has been to before, you can easily enter the location’s info into the app to create the new spot for Gowalla. If you drop an item in that new spot, you become the founder. You start of with five objects. Unfortunately for me, don’t live in a major city so I’ve had to drop all of items to become the founder of new spots. Not too big of a deal. I don’t think I’ll have a large collection of items until for a while. One nice thing, Gowalla will surprise you sometimes with giving you an item when you check into spots sometimes.

Gowalla

As for the finding ability of Gowalla, it uses the GPS on the iPhone and it works SPOT ON. No issues. If you make a mistake, you can edit the spot’s name, actual location on the map, category, and check-in radius. As far as I can tell, it’s for the web site only. There are multiple spots set up close together called trips. You can complete trips by going to each of the trip’s spots. You can also create trips for others to complete.

One last note about Gowalla: Do not get discourage if you drop all of your items if you live in an area where there aren’t many Gowalla users. You’ll find more when you check into spots. Trust me.

Next, is foursquare (App Store link). It seems to be popular in some major cities worldwide. It works similar to Gowalla in that you go to different locations and check into them. Instead of getting stamps in a passport, you can get badges and earn points for different things you do, like go to a new spot, bringing friends with you, and traveling some distance.

foursqure

I’ve played with the app for a few days and have be very disappointed. Since I don’t live in a big city that’s supported by foursquare, I’ve had to create new locations. After doing so a few times, I’ve discovered that this app is not GPS based, but based off of addresses from Google Maps. So my new locations are way off from their actual location because foursquare does not use GPS to pinpoint my iPhone’s location. Even if you do edit the address of a created location, it still won’t be right due to Google Maps. I’ve tested this on the iPhone and on the Google Maps web site. The problem is with Google Maps. foursquare tweeted me after I tweeted with what I’ve found and they were quick to blame the iPhone’s GPS for the errors. They said “Phone GPS can be wonky sometimes… esp when deep indoors.” That might be true IF I was indoors, but I was outside. I WAS OUTSIDE. Now this might work great if you live in a major city, but I don’t. I live in the suburbs.

If foursquare ever changes how their app finds location then I’ll give it another try, but my clear favorite is Gowalla. Both apps are free, so it doesn’t cost you anything to give them a try and see for yourself.

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This is be a brief commentary on my first impressions of the app. Not much of a review. I still need to play with the app some more.

I’ve had some time to play with this new app for the iPhone and it seems pretty nice. It recommends apps to and from people you follow on Twitter and/or friends on Facebook. Instead of just one app doing it for itself, Chorus does it for every iPhone app out there. The app uses those two social media sites to find you apps and recommend apps to your friends. It’s great idea.

I found one thing lacking (as of now) in Chorus and that is it will only pull a picture/avatar from Facebook. Why the developer, envIO Networks, left the basic functionality to import a picture directly from the iPhone or be able to log into their web site and manage your profile I have no idea.

chorus

Why do I find this a missing feature? Because I keep Twitter and Facebook separate, besides a few friends that are on both sites. This basic functionality should have been present upon release of the app. I’ve been talking to their support (@ChorusSupport) and they have said “But I did just confirm that we’re working on an easier way to add photos as I write this.” And they agree with me that this should have been there. How did I spot this? I do QA at work on programs and applications all of the time. This is basic end-user functionality/design. Simple as that.

You may not see this as an issue, but I do and hope that this is corrected soon.

If you want to check this free app out, get it here at the App Store.

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iDon’t need vague information
iDon’t need scare tactics
iDon’t need to imitate
iDon’t need a droid…unless it’s R2D2
iDon’t have a problem with iTunes
iDon’t buy brands who bash other brands

Video from DroidDont on YouTube. Nice job!

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I love zombie movies. I also love Marina Orlova, known to millions of fans around the world as a sexy master of language from HotForWords.com. She has two degrees in philology (the study of linguistics and origins of words), her own book out, and now a iPhone app featuring her! This app is Attack of Zombie Bikini Babes from Outer Space from Smort (the “evil twin” of Smule, who brought you Sonic Light, Sonic Boom, Ocarina, Leaf Trombone and others).

attack-bikini-babes-big

There is a lite version for free and the full version of the game for $0.99. I opted for the full version since I trusted Smort (aka Smule) on the quality of their apps. I played a few times and the game is very fun, but your thumbs will eventually get tired. You might need to play a practice game or two until you figure out how to aim the dual slingshots at the incoming army of Zombie Bikini Babes from Outer Space that look like Marina. Although I do prefer to use guns while fighting zombies, this is what you got to start with since you play as a hillbilly (you’ll see when the game starts up).

You score points for killing the zombies and points to buy more weapons and upgrade them. You can upgrade your dual slingshots to better ones that fire faster. You can also get small, furry animals to slow the zombies down with. And if that doesn’t help, you can throw Molotov cocktails (and dynamite from upgrading) at them too. The blonde zombies walk at you, the red headed ones run at you, and the brunette ones take more hits to go down. Beware the large brunette ones though, they’re even harder to take down!

Of course the game has the spinning globe like Smule’s other apps that shows the scores of other people that are playing the game around the world. A nice touch to the game is the soundtrack and Smort recommends that you have the volume all of the way up. In the globe view you can hear people (pre-recorded from the soundtrack) talking over radios about the alien zombie invasion. While fighting off the zombies, you can hear Marina’s catchphrases in the background. Every third wave (I think) you have an option from the main menu to make the zombies dance. They’ll stop and start dancing to the soundtrack, giving you time to knock them out until they start coming at you again.

You can find her little video trailer on her site or the full trailer on YouTube. Again, there is a lite version for free and the full version of the game for $0.99.

Enjoy killing those zombies!

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