Lars Ulrich rejoice, Napster will NOT be heading into Apple’s coveted App Store any time soon. Strange considering they once toyed with our emotions by mentioning an iPhone app was in the works? Sadly, unlike Spotify, it is just not going to happen anytime in the near future. Did Apple reject it? No, so do not go ditching your iPhone for a Android or RIM device just yet — Napster have scrapped apps for those devices as well.
One of the most common questions Napster receives is, “When will you offer an iPhone app?” Well, Napster has created an iPhone application that allows subscribers to stream music on-demand to their iPhone—including personal playlists, albums and radio stations. You can imagine the company is also looking at streaming applications for several other mobile platforms as well (Blackberry, Android). However, due to the high licensing fees for streaming to a mobile phone, Napster has not yet submitted the iPhone app to Apple for approval or attempted to bring the application to market.
Now let’s think about this for a moment, they put their iPhone application on hold due to “high licensing fees”. If Spotify and Rhapsody can pull it off why can’t Napster? Maybe it’s due to the fact those companies charge $10.00 more a month for their service perhaps.
Whatever the case may be, would you be willing for fork over some extra cash to get Napster on your iPhone?
Apple has gone and shocked the world again as, according to the company’s Twitter feed, popular VoIP service Vonage has been approved for the iTunes App Store.
Vonage has announced that Apple approved its mobile application for iPhone and iPod Touch. Vonage is currently conducting a beta test and general availability will be announced at a later date. This new service, along with the recent launch of the Vonage World unlimited calling plan, continues Vonage’s heritage of using innovative technology to create significant value for its current and future customers.
While it remains to be seen if Vonage will be granted 3G access, or made WiFi only like Skype, if you follow them on Twitter, you may have noticed Vonage was searching for a few lucky volunteers to become official beta testers of their iPhone app. Were any of our readers lucky enough to be selected as the chosen few?
If so, let us know how the testing is going in the comments!
Rockstar Games announced yesterday that it will be porting one of their most popular games over to the iPhone platform. Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars will make its iPhone debut sometime before the year is over (price still to be determined).
This is simply more verification that Apple’s iPhone OS can pull its weight in the handheld gaming wars. If you can’t wait until GTA’s release, Gangstar: West Coast Hustle from Gameloft [iTunes Link] should be good enough to hold you over.
According to Rockstar, screen shots will be coming soon but until then feel free to take a look some Sony PSP images after the break.
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Apple went ahead and gave the green flag for the music streaming service Spotify, whose biggest selling point is the fact you can create playlists in a free desktop app, and then listen to those playlists via your iPhone at any point in time, with or without a data connection. Apple told the developer:
“The current status as of right now is it’s been approved, and we hope to add the app to the more than 65,000 apps on the app store very soon, We’ve been in constant communication working with the developer and have already notified Spotify that the app will be in the app store very soon.”
The good news is Apple approving this application for iPhone owners. The bad news being it is currently only available in Sweden, Norway, Finland, Britain, France and Spain. The weird news is that we still don’t see it actually in the App Store in those countries?
Spotify’s popularity has grown to over 2 million subscribers in Britain and they hope to have their service available here in the US before the end of the year. Perhaps this approved iPhone app will help things move along quicker. Music lovers can only hope.
Would any of our readers be ready to lay down their hard earned money for a service such as Spotify?
A robbery victim has taken advantage of his MobileMe service and put it to good use. A Pittsburgh man, who’s name has been withheld, told police he was forced to turn over his wallet, his PIN number and his iPhone at gun point (Pellet Gun as it turns out) by 3 robbers early Sunday morning. Lacking any tech savvy skills or common sense for that matter, the robbers were clueless about one of MobileMe’s very helpful features, “Find My iPhone“.
After calling the police, the man used his computer and MobileMe to track down his iPhone along with the 3 not so smart criminals having a late night snack at a local restaurant.
Police said they will charge Bryant Rather, 22, of West Mifflin, Brent Ray Potter, 22, of Swissvale, and Myron Knox, Jr., 22, of Homewood, with two counts each of access device fraud, conspiracy, receiving stolen property and possessing instruments of crime. Mr. Rather and Mr. Potter will also be charged with robbery.
Exploding iPhones have been a very popular topic as of late, but now an alleged tier 2 iPhone support agent has contacted Gizmodo to further back up Apple’s claims that the exploding iPhones are not the result of faulty batteries but rather simply cases of user abuse.
I’m a Tier 2 iPhone agent for Apple. I’d like to add that roughly one to two calls out of every thousand that I take deal with the battery “overheating”. Generally, this incident can be described as “uncomfortably warm”, and I have not ever received or heard of a coworker receiving a call about someone being injured by the iPhone, including people too stupid to stop using their phones after the screen is broken.
The email later goes on to say Apple gets tens of thousands of calls and zero of them have proven to be safety issues. From the beginning of this debacle we’ve had a feeling that this was simply the media blowing this way out of proportion. We still get this feeling…
Does this alleged tech support email put some of your minds to rest regarding the “exploding” iPhones?
Apple has finished their investigation in the case of the exploding iPhones/Pods and the results are not shocking – the battery malfunction theory has been rejected. It was first rumored that defective batteries were more than likely the cause of the devices going boom but as it turns out, excess force was the reason – according to Apple.
“The iPhones with broken glass that we have analysed to date show that in all cases the glass cracked due to an external force that was applied to the iPhone.”
With 26 million iPhones and 200 million iPods sold to date, Apple claims there are zero confirmed battery overheating incidents for iPhone 3GS and the number of reports of overheating they have investigated are in the single digits.
So are you buying what Apple is selling? Could these isolated incidents actually be due to excessive force in every case or could there still be something up with those batteries? What do you think?
The NFL’s regular season is fast approaching and what a better way to kick the season off then with some Madden 2010 on your iPhone (or iPod touch)?! EA has been promising us some Madden action on iPhone for a while and now they finally will deliver.
The game will contain real NFL rosters and, based upon the screen shots, will include Brett Favre and Michael Vick on both of their new respective teams. While EA is promising a release date of no later than opening day, September 10th, there is no official word on a price point. All of that aside, we think you can expect Madden 2010 to stiff arm it’s way into the App Store at $9.99.
RealNetworks recently submitted their on-demand music streaming application for the iPhone and iPod Touch to Apple for review. Yes, this is the moment all of you Rhapsody subscribers have been waiting for.
Rhapsody is a subscription based service, $12.99/Month, that allows you the ability to listen to any single song or album on-demand. Current subscribers to Rhapsody can simply log into the app with their existing user name and password and can be streaming music in no time. If you are not a subscriber you will have the opportunity to take the app for a free limited time test drive.
The big question is whether or not Apple will approve this app but given the amount of negative press Apple’s app approval process is currently getting, we are leaning towards this one being approved.
Subscription based music streaming is in high demand on devices such as iPhone so it makes us wonder – when will Apple make it’s move into the music streaming business? Not that this would be likely to actually happen but Apple could even offer the service as an extra perk to all of us who subscribe to their MobileMe service.
Would you be willing to pay Apple for a service such as Rhapsody or are you perfectly content with current iTunes setup?
TomTom insists on teasing us all with the above video yet there is still no mention of pricing or availability. As you can see, this car kit brings a lot more to the table than a simple window mount for your iPhone. With the following extras, you can count on this being a pricey addition to your accessory collection.
Hands-free dialing
Louder speaker
Enhances GPS signal
Charges iPhone
As impressive as the TomTom car kit looks, we are thinking you possibly may have to dish out up to at least $100 for this tricked out window mount. Are you still interested in making this purchase?
