Articles by Rene Ritchie

The 5 megapixel, dual LED flash Verizon/Motorola Droid camera beats the iPhone 3GS 3 megapixels on specs alone, right? Not according to the Chicago Sun/Times’ technology columnist, Andy Ihnatko, who put some side-by-side comparison shots up on Flickr.

Ihnatko also seems to share many of my opinions about the Droid’s dubious introduction commercial, though he writes it out ever so much better. About the camera specifically, he says:

But does the Droid actually take better pictures than the iPhone? Overall, no. Over the past few days I’ve shot lots of scenes with both phones and the iPhone consistently produced prettier images. Where software inside the Droid is easily bamboozled by uncooperative lighting, the iPhone’s camera app almost always finds a workable and attractive solution.

Droid Day in November 6th. Android Central has one in the house, and Casey’s already crowing about it, so stay tuned for more!

[Via Daring Fireball]

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Apple is reviewing 100 new claims they want added on a 10+ year old patents says Peter Hoddie on Twitter.

Hoddie ran the QuickTime team at Apple after the departure of original lead, Bruce Leak, and is currently co-founder of Kinoma, which develops multimedia solutions for Windows Mobile and Nokia S60. While he didn’t elaborate on which patents or what additions were being reviewed, but given his former position, it’s not hard to imagine it has to do with Apple’s own multimedia framework.

A quick search of the US Patent Office shows Hoddie listed in the following QuickTime-related patents:

• User interface for presenting media information
• Techniques for capturing information during multimedia presentations
• Apparatus and method for storing a movie within a movie
• Methods and apparatuses for transmitting data representing multiple views of an object
• Method and apparatus for identifying user-selectable regions within multiple display frames
• Method and apparatus for synchronization of data retrieval and presentation
• System for data retrieval by scheduling retrieval if number of units scheduled equals or less than predetermined number and retrieving before or at time elapsed
• Method and apparatus for identifying user-selectable regions within multiple display frames

QuickTime has become one of the core display layers of both Mac OS X and iPhone OS X. So is Apple trying to secure against the future or setting up for some more patent pugilism? As Hoddie states, there’s clearly a reason…

Apple has launched a new sub-section of iTunes devoted to music movies. Why music movies? It seems like while iTunes sells a lot of music, they’re not yet selling as much video and Apple seems to think they can use the music tie-in to promote the movies. (We’ll spare you the iTunes LP-esque “and it will look great on an iTablet!” line this time. Whoops.)

According to Billboard:

One of the first exclusives is “It Might Get Loud,” the documentary about guitar gods Jimmy Page, the Edge and Jack White, which iTunes will offer from Dec. 8 – 22 before any other outlet. Pre-orders start today. Another is the Kings of Leon concert film “Kings of Leon, Live at the O2″ from Nov. 3 – 10.

Big Music stands to benefit as well, since their music DVDs haven’t exactly been flying off the shelves. Will online exclusives and easy impulse purchases help? We guess that depends on whether you’ll be loading up your iPhone with them?

[Billboard via AppleInsider]

Looks like Apple snuck a little something extra into iTunes 9.0.2 for iPhone and iPod touch users — 180+ app management.

Instead of just mirroring the 11 visible iPhone 3.x Home Screens (with their maximum 180 app slots), iTunes will now let you add even more apps. These additional apps are displayed on grayed-out Home Screens (because they’re not visible on the iPhone — you have to use Spotlight Search to launch them), but in iTunes are otherwise easy to organize and remove.

[via TUAW]

Bell Mobility has just announced that their new GSM/HSPA network, shared with previously-CDMA frenemy Telus, has gone live! What does that mean? Yesterday, Rogers and their Fido subsidiary were the only place to go for Apple’s iPhone (or a BlackBerry Bold if that’s how you roll). Today — technically as soon as Telus announces — you have your choice of 3.5 carriers (Fido is still Rogers).

So this means massive competition, price wars, and a huge win for consumers, right?

Eh… not so much. Like Orange UK, multiple carriers seems only to mean multiple non-competitive pricing plans, as each one wants as much as they can get, and don’t feel any pressure to compete — yet.

Hardware prices are the same, up to $299 for the iPhone 3GS on a 3-year contract, with service plans ranging from $45 for 100 minutes, Fab Five, 500MB, night/weekends 9pm-7am to $95 for 500 min, Fab Five, 2GB, nights/weekends.

(Along with $6.95 system access fee, monthly e911 fee, $2 paper billing option, $35 activation fee, and other nickel and diming…)

If you’re planning to hook your iPhone up to Ma (Canadian) Bell, let us know what you think of the pricing, and what you choose!

Apple has just announced that there are now, officially, over 100,000 iPhone and iPod touch apps in the iTunes App Store:

“The App Store, now with over 100,000 applications available, is clearly a major differentiator for millions of iPhone and iPod touch customers around the world,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “The iPhone SDK created the first great platform for mobile applications and our customers are loving all of the amazing apps our developers are creating.”

Effusive developer quotes abound as well:

“The App Store has forever changed the mobile gaming industry and continues to improve,” said Travis Boatman, vice president of Worldwide Studios, EA Mobile. “With a global reach of over 50 million iPhone and iPod touch users, the App Store has allowed us to develop high quality EA games that have been a huge success with customers.”

“With 10,000 downloads a day, worldwide customer response to our I Am T-Pain App has exceeded our wildest expectations,” said Jeff Smith, CEO of Smule. “The App Store has given us a unique opportunity to create and grow a very successful business, and we’re looking forward to an exciting future.”

Serving 77 countries, with well over 2 billion downloads, jokes, whines, complaints, and rejections aside for the moment, that’s a massive milestone for Apple. Congrats.

Squarespace [Free - iTunes link] is a brand new app that lets you administer your Squarespace web site — at least the blogging aspects — right from your iPhone and iPod touch.

The innovative hosted content-management system has become the darling of the technorati due to its robust online management tools and ability to scale to handle huge spikes in traffic (i.e. Digg effect). The app features:

• Posting and editing content
• Posting pics
• Multiple site support
• Site stats and graphs
• New site registration

Next on the list will be comment management, slated for version 1.1.

Note: While the app is free, Squarespace itself is a paid monthly service. But if you’re a user, and you try out the app, let us know how it works for you!

Verizon’s “Map for That” ad was witty and kicked AT&T right where it hurt most — right in the network. AT&T, naturally, didn’t find it so amusing and has now decided to take Verizon to court. Engadget has been covering (and updating the coverage) today, and here’s where it stands:

• AT&T complained that the original ad was misleading, saying customers could still use iPhones outside of 3G coverage (on EDGE).
• Verizon has apparently already changed the ad once, adding some small print to disclaim the above.
• AT&T still isn’t happy, thinks Verizon is confusing customers, and thus is sicking the lawyers on them.

What do you think? Were you confused, or were you too busy laughing (or crying, if you live in SF or NYC).

Ever wanted to know how to change the icons of a particularly ugly app? Well, if you’re Jailbroken and have SSH access you’re in luck! Resident theming genius, Ally (iMuggle on TiPb Forums and in the Twitter) has begun collecting her excellent tutorials into one easy to browse place. Here’s a sample:

you need to know how to do a few things in order to do this. After jailbreaking, you need to know how to SSH into your phone. If you’re not familiar with SSH, you need to get familiar with that first. *Note: Unless you feel completely comfortable doing this, I don’t recommend it. Point being, SSH’ing will give you access to ALL of your iPhone’s core files, so deleting/editing certain files could be disastrous if you don’t know what you’re doing. If you’re still reading, and you’re okay with all of this, continue on.

So, fair warning, that’s why we call these iPhone Ninja tips. They’re not for the casual user — hard core only.

If you’re interested and eager, however, give Ally’s tutorials a look and let her (and us!) know your results.