2009: Yearly Archive

Speaking of Storm8, Unity-engine code, private API, and Gruber, A recent Twitter exchange between him shows just how seriously all of this is now being taken by the App Store:

Hockenberry: Hearing lots of reports about apps getting rejected due to private API usage. Maybe now you’ll believe me when I say it’s a bad idea…

Gruber: Yup: Apple recently started running apps through a static analysis tool to look for private API calls.

Google set off some of the private API discussion when they implemented them as part of the Google Mobile app (though it’s our understanding those API were later made public). Generally, private or unpublished API are kept that way because Apple (or whichever platform maker is supplying the APIs) hasn’t finished working on them, are planning changes, or is otherwise reserving their use — if 3rd parties implement them anyway, any future OS update can break them and cause problems for end users. Public API, on the other hand, are supported and intended to let developers do their thing without worrying about platform-level changes wrecking their apps.

Following our posts last week concerning the lawsuit against iPhone game developer Storm8 that alleged they used private API’s to violate user privacy by collecting their phone numbers, the developer, Storm8, contacted TiPb with their side of the story:

I just saw your post on the iPhone blog that discusses Storm 8 and the Unity games issue, and I wanted to make sure that you saw the statement that we put out to our users outlining the proactive steps we’ve taken to address concerns so it can inform your coverage. This includes updating the applications in August so that current game versions do not download, store or use iPhone telephone numbers when a game is opened.

They further pointed us to a statement they issued on their community forum.

If this issue concerns you, take a read and let us know what you think.

[Updated: Storm8 didn't use the Unity-engine, but they did allegedly use the private API's that allowed access]

Last week we covered the analyst accounts that Apple’s iPhone was more profitable than Nokia’s handsets. Since Apple makes high margin on one premium phone, while Nokia has a range of featurephones and smartphones, including low-to-no margin ones, it didn’t seem too unlikely. Joe Wilcox, however, broke out his abacus and begged to differ, saying no they weren’t, and everyone was stupid for thinking they were. John Gruber then tapped Calculator on his iPhone, looked at GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles) and non-GAAP numbers, and said the estimates were within reason. Wilcox updated his original post, decrying the use of non-GAAP numbers, and re-asserting his original conclusion.

Who’s side are we on? Why, the audiences’ of course, with popcorn, hotdogs, and spicy drink in hand. It’s not like either Apple or Nokia give us a cut of the winning profits, and though we love our iPhones a lot, we’ll take a blog v.s blogfight any time.

[via TUAW]

Every week a few of us from team TiPb, bloggers and forum crew alike, will bring you our current favorite, funnest, most useful App Store apps, WebApps, jailbreak apps, even the occasional accessory, web site, or desktop app if the mood strikes us. As long as they’re iPhone (or iPod touch) related, they’re fair game.

So who’s on deck this week and what are our picks? Find out after the break!

Read the rest of this entry »

Oh yeah — Looks like in the near future that OnLive thing might just take off and lucky iPhone users will be able to play along with their PC gaming friends. However, many roadblocks still exist. Steve Pearlman OnLive’s CEO Says:

I’m afraid we are not announcing a date for availability of OnLive on particular cell phones just yet. We have further development to do, and we need approvals from some cell phone makers before we can release OnLive to the public. So, for now, OnLive on a cell phone is only a technology demo. But, for those of you who have been asking about OnLive on cell phones, the answer is yes, it is coming. And, it is REALLY cool.

The OnLive service will begin in Winter 2009, however they are currently looking for beta testers. You can sign up here.

[via Engadget Mobile]

Did Apple meet with mobile advertising company, AdMob before Google acquired them last week for $750 million? That’s what “people familiar with the matter” told Bloomberg:

Buying AdMob would have allowed Apple to expand into online advertising, a strategy that Nokia Oyj is pursuing, [IDC analyst Karsten Weide] said. “If a lot of traffic goes through my devices, why can’t I become the middleman that serves ads against that inventory? AdMob would have allowed them to do that quickly.”

Clearly advertising isn’t a core Apple business the way it is for Google, but then again with Google getting into so many of Apple’s core businesses (smartphone OS with Android and now desktop OS with ChromeOS), Apple could be looking to give them a dose of their own expansion. Given that Apple recently filed a patent for an ad-supported version of Mac OS X (something Microsoft explored years ago for Windows), they could also be looking for alternate ways to subsidize the cost of their platforms going forward. Right now carriers like AT&T foot the advance for the iPhone (and theoretically might do the same for an iTablet or 3G-connected MacBook) but the more options to reduce up-front consumer costs, the better — especially in the increasingly competitive landscape.

We’ve said before Apple should have snapped up Grand Central before it became Google Voice, is Cupertino growing slow to react, or is Google just hitting warp speed?

(iXpenseit Forum Review by cjvitek. For more Forum Reviews, see the TiPb iPhone App Store Forum Review Index!)

iXpenseit [$4.99 - iTunes link] for iPhone and iPod touch is a budget tracking app that has recently appeared on the iPhone commercials. It allows a user to track monthly and daily spending, breaking items down into categories, as well as allowing the user to see overall spending.

Read the rest of this entry »

Verizon has unleashed yet another Droid-centric, anti-iPhone attack ad (YAAiPAA), a page in Sports Illustrated, that’s closer to the first tragic iDon’t commercial rather than the later, more clever “map for that” ones. And what’s more, CNET thinks they’re getting more personal, expressing feelings about their (ongoing) negotiations with Apple to bring the iPhone to Verizon, and perhaps even attacking Steve Jobs himself for his role in those negotiations. Here’s the text:

This is a world of “nope,” “nuh-uh,” and “sorry, Charlie.”

A world of smiling denial. Petty tyrannies that have made their way into our cell phones. Into the very way we choose to speak to another human being. There are dozens of doesn’ts. Doesn’t allow customization. Doesn’t run multiple apps. Doesn’t allow you to swap out batteries. doesn’t allow open development. These arrogant little devices are barely worth more than the pocket link they rest upon. Because now there’s a phone so smart, so strong. So subservient to its user, it refuses to include “doesn’t” in its dictionary app.

In a world of doesn’t. Droid Does.

Also specifically targeted again are the commonly-voiced frustrations of certain power iPhone users, and those philosophically opposed to Apple’s iPhone model, with whom the above is certain to resonate. Who knows, maybe it will even push Apple to address some of those issues in a future product revision. Ultimately, that’s as good for consumers as Verizon ditching (mostly — yikes!) their own incredibly controlling, consumer-hostile practices in order to be able to make these claims in the first place. (Call us cynical, however, for not believing Verizon has had any huge philosophical turn-around beyond cold, profit-centric, anti-iPhone competitive positioning, though we’d love to be proven wrong).

But back to this specific ad. Is it effective, and is it personal? Did they just take it to the iPhone, Apple, and Steve? (And are they trying to make his brain explode with that typography and punctuation alone?)

[Thanks Icebike for the tip!]

It looks like Apple is using its rejection power for good this time — removing games built on the Unity engine which included private-API calls that could be used to steal private user information like your iPhone’s phone number.

Not all of the rejected/removed games were engaged in privacy violations (or even had the network capability to exploit it), but Apple isn’t taking any chances following the Storm8 lawsuit. Touch Arcade has the details:

The Unity engine currently uses the two private API calls that Storm8 allegedly exploited to steal user data, NSGetEnviron and excserver. Mantas Puida of Unity Technologies explains these two API’s utilized by the Unity engine serve the following functions:

_NSGetEnviron is used by Mono runtime to provide implementation of .NET core API method: Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable().

exc_server is also used by Mono runtime to provide graceful NULL reference exception handling.

The Unity engine, however, has been updated to remove the offending API calls, and the games are being recompiled and resubmitted to the App Store. Hopefully this will keep users’ data safe from unscrupulous developers, while the scrupulous ones continue to turn out great games.

[Touch Arcade via TUAW]