All Articles in Apps

We all know Google isn’t a search engine company, they’re a company that makes googzillions of dollars monetizing search (and trying to monetize other things) via their AdSense advertising platform. For iPhones, this was previously constrained to the browser window of Mobile Safari (or Chrome Lite for Android users). Now, however, the Official Google Blog announces:

AdSense for Mobile Applications allows developers to earn revenue by displaying text and image ads in their iPhone and Android applications. For our beta launch, we’ve created a site where developers can learn more about the AdSense for Mobile Applications program, see answers to frequently asked questions and sign up to participate in our beta. Advertisers can also learn about the benefits of advertising in mobile applications.

Advertising lets Google and others supply lots of free services to users. Will it be as successful embedded in apps as it is in the browser? Developers, are you interested in Google AdSense monetizing your apps? Users, would you put up with Google advertising if it meant cheap or free apps?

[Thanks to Icebike for the tip!]

First push-Instant Messenger (IM) apps, now Turn-by-Turn Navigation? Can our long standing dreams finally become reality?

A few days ago we mentioned Gokivo + Yahoo! Maps had made it into the App Store. Now it’s joined by:

AT&T Navigator [free - iTunes Link] provides an iPhone front end to AT&T’s $9.99/month subscription service.

MobileNavigator Europe ($94.99 - iTunes link) features Reality View Pro, Lane Assistant Pro, Speed Assistant and Day & Night Mode component as well as the opportunity, to show POIs along the route. (See YouTube for the gist)

What’s interesting from a user-perspective is the ranger of options we’ll likely be seeing: either free or $0.99 up front and ongoing subscriptions, or more expensive up front (will $100 be the price point?) and no subscriptions — though will we have to wonder about charges for updated maps eventually?

What’s your preference?

Still waiting for its turn to get into the slow-moving App Store, IM+ is ready with version 3.1 which adds support for iPhone 3.0 Push Notifications. Text alerts, badges, and sounds are all supported, and can be individually enabled or disabled both through Apple’s Notifications Settings panel.

IM+ supports a ton of services, including Skype, AOL, MSN, Twitter, Facebook, Yahoo!, Google Talk, Jabber, ICQ, and MySpace. Testing it with AOL proved to be a quick, clean experience, with IM+ launching and re-connecting to their server in a brisk and snappy manner on an iPhone 3GS. Copy and Paste also worked well, albeit it only in the text input box (I couldn’t find a way to select or copy text from previous chat bubbles).

Hopefully Apple will approve IM+ 3.1 with Push for the App Store soon. In the meantime, you can take advantage of sale pricing on the previous version, 3.0 (which pushed via re-direct to email). $5.99 via iTunes.

More screenshots after the break!

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Pinch yourself. You’re not dreaming. It took longer than we’d hoped, but push IM apps are finally starting to appear in the iTunes App Store.

BeeJiveIM [$9.99 - iTunes link] with Push and AIM [$2.99 - iTunes link] are the first out of the goat, and hopefully more will follow.

Update: IM+ with push notification for IM, Skype, and Twitter is also now live in the App Store.

If you get your push on, tell us how it works for you, and what if any tweaks you make to the push settings to control your level of interruption. And if you notice more push apps going live, let us know!

[Thanks to Bruce everyone who sent this in!]

NOTE: iPhone 3G S need not apply!

While I don’t have anywhere near the midichlorians Jeremy has for all things Jailbreak, I can tell when the infamous iPhone Dev-Team has their game on:

redsn0w is an easy to use, multi-platform, multi-device jailbreaking and unlocking (iPhone 2G only) tool for the iPhone 2G (original iPhone), the iPhone 3G (but not the 3GS) and also the iPod touch (first and second generation). Currently it is available for Windows and Mac OS X (there are some issues using redsn0w with OS X PPC, please use an Intel Mac until we have this problem resolved).

They point out that that redsn0w provides similar functionality to Quickpwn, and provide more instructions in their full post.

As always, experts only and proceed completely at your own risk. If you don’t understand something — put your iPhone down and back away slowly!

If you need help, check out our iPhone Jailbreak Central forums.

Pinger fulfills the longstanding demand for SMS-style alerts with iPhone 3.0-style support for Push Notifications in the aptly named Textfree 3.0 ($5.99 - iTunes link).

What does that buy you? One year of free text messages for the iPhone (and iPod touch!). With support for every U.S. mobile carrier, including AT&T, Verizon Wireless, Sprint, T-Mobile, Alltel, and others, if the idea of paying Big Telco big money for incredibly small amounts of text doesn’t appeal to you, check out Textfree 3.0 and let us know what you think!

Screenshots after the break!

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BeeJive is my IM solution of choice. I don’t use a lot of the more advanced features, but the reason I keep going back to it is just this: speed. It gets me in, working, and back out fast. And BeeJive IM 3.0 with support for iPhone 3.0’s new Push Notification service is no exception. In fact, it rules.

One of the problems with Push Notification is that while the actual alerts are speedy, acting on them is not. Take IM for example. If you enable Text Alerts, an SMS-style popup window presents, tells you the IM app has a new message, and lets you Dismiss or View. If you View, the iPhone then has to 1) close the alert, 2) launch the app, 3) re-establish the app’s server connection (Push Notification uses a different, Apple-powered server), 4) download the IM to the app, and potentially 5) issue the app’s own internal alert if that’s enabled as well.

That can be some overhead. Sure, maybe iPhone 3G S (for speed, remember) will quicken the pace, but BeeJiveIM on an iPhone 3G was impressively responsive already.

Testing it over the last couple days, alerts presented, I tapped them, and everything listed about was handled smoothly and quickly. So, again, I was able to get in, work, and get back out fast. It’s everything that was great about BeeJiveIM 2.0, plus the convenience of Push.

BeeJiveIM 3.0 for iPhone and iPod should be hitting the iTunes App Store any time now. We’ll update with the link as soon as it’s live.

Screenshots after the break!

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Update: TiPb contacted Sirius XM regarding the omission of some of their most popular content within the application, they had no comment.

If you’ve been waiting for this application I’m sure you are well aware of the history leading up to it’s release. Well, TiPb is here to tell you that you can finally wave hello to the long awaited Sirius XM streaming application. [iTunes Link] The application is free to download and there are a few monthly payment options available to you:

Streaming to iPhone and iPod Touch is FREE with a paid Premium SIRIUS Internet Radio or Premium XM Radio Online subscription. You can also sample great SIRIUS & XM content with a FREE TRIAL. Visit siriusxm.com/oniphone for more details.

Now the bad news for all of the Stern fans out there, you can not listen to the Stern show on the go! If that is not a kick below the belt I don’t know what is…

Some select programming, including MLB® Play-by-Play, NFL Play-by-Play, SIRIUS NASCAR® Radio, and Howard Stern, will not be available on the iPhone and iPod touch. Listeners will continue to be able to access that programming through the platforms they are currently offered on.

I don’t know about you, but I’m keeping my $2.99 a month.

[Ed: If by some stretch you're still interested, check out Jeff Scott's write up over at 148Apps]

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again (and again), 1Password is the first app I launch when I (re-)install a Mac, and the first iPhone (and iPod touch) app I go to any time I even think about logging in to a secure website or using credit card data. It’s one of my all-time favorites, and it’s just gone Pro.

The video above shows off the new iPhone 3.0 support in 1Password Pro 2.1, and the ability to extend secure logins out of the embedded browser and into Mobile Safari is very welcome. Better yet, the fine folks at Agile Web Solutions promise even more features are coming soon.

Available now via the iTunes App Store at a special introductory price of $5.99, and because Agile is awesome, they’ve given us ten (10) promo codes to give away to you.

Want one? Get over to the forums and tell us the lamest, most insecure, and useless password you can imagine. And ten of you will get free copies of the strong, secure, incredibly useful 1Password Pro in return.

TiPb had the opportunity to test drive Gokivo Navigator ($0.99 + In-App Purchases - iTunes link) over the last couple of days. This is one of the first iPhone 3.0 specific apps in the App Store, so first off it was great to see turn-by-turn navigation working (even in Canada!), and second it was interesting to see how Apple handles in-app purchases.

Getting this going is a little bit of work. You start the app and type in a destination. I found Apple Canada in my contacts so hit that. Similar to the built in Maps app, Gokivo will show you your location on a map. Instead of Street View, however, you have a green GO button. Hit that and you’re on your way to turn-by-turn.

If you don’t already have a subscription, Gokivo activates the aforementioned in-app-purchase engine, and once you login with your iTunes ID and buy a month of service ($9.99 in the version we tested) the GO gets going.

It takes time to acquire a good GPS signal, and will advise you if there isn’t one to be had. Once it locks on, however, you’re in for a pretty smooth turn-by-turn experience. Arrows point your way and a synthesized female voice tells you when and where to turn and, and preps you for upcoming turns. We repeatedly went the wrong way, and were impressed with how quickly and accurately Gokivo recalculated and tried to get us back on track.

Note, Gokivo isn’t free just for the app because Apple doesn’t let developers do in-app purchases for free apps. Hence, $0.99 will likely be the foundation for what TiPb considers iPhone “scaleware”. Whether the $9.99 monthly fee — or other in-app-purchasing options — suit your needs and budget you’ll have to tell us.

Gallery after the break! Read the rest of this entry »