2010 February | iPhone Hill

Internet Alert

February 28th, 2010 admin Comments off

Internet Alert, from Modern Digital Media AB, is about as straightforward an app as you can imagine. Its purpose is amazingly simple: to notify you whenever a web page is updated.

On the plus side: it will track up to 15 separate web pages. It’s also easy to set up and monitor; all you have to do is type in (or paste) the web page address you want Internet Alert to watch and then press “save”. From there, whenever the page is changed or updated, your iPod Touch or iPhone will make a cartoon spring sound (boing!) and a notification badge will appear on the Internet Alert icon. Open the app, select the web page that’s been updated and you have the option of viewing the script changes to the page or visiting the page in Safari.

I have a few websites and blogs that I follow closely, sites that alert me to app price changes, breaking news, long form journalism and blogs of various writers I like. Although I have all their RSS feeds in my RSS app, there are some sites whose updates are more important to me than others. If there are changes with them- any new articles or posts- I want to know about them as soon as possible.

In that respect, Internet Alert is a neat app. As a utility, it is useful and something I could see myself using day after day. If I were looking for a job, Internet Alert would be my right hand in keeping me in the know, because as they say, the early bird catches the worm.

On the minus side: although I like this app, there are some pretty big minuses. First, there’s the cost. Internet Alert is a pricey $4.99. Although that price includes six months of service, there’s nothing in the app description or Modern Digital Media’s website that discloses what an additional subscription rate might be. It could be as low as .99. If so, I think I’d probably pay that. If it was a little more than .99, I’d have to think about taking out an additional subscription. If it was another $4.99, I’m certain I would say “thanks, but no thanks”.

So in the end- at least to me- the minuses of this app would appear to outweigh its pluses.

iTunes Link – Internet Alert

Version 1.3

Tested on an iPod Touch 3.1.3

Categories: News Tags: $4.99, Utilities

App Sale: Compression

February 28th, 2010 admin Comments off

Compression is on sale for free – normally $1.99
Compression is a snazzy, Dr. Mario – style tetris game that I reviewed a few months back.

It’s casual, fun and pretty easy to pick up and play. There’s also a new $0.99 in-app purchase that unlocks another addictive game mode. A recent update fixed some of the issues with the first version, giving you another reason why you should definitely pick up this game while it’s on sale.

iTunes Link – Compression

Version 1.1

Categories: News Tags: App Sale Alert, casual, free, Games, sale

Steve Jobs: Birthdays, Awards, Contest Calls, Shareholder Meetings, and iPhone 3.1.2

February 28th, 2010 admin Comments off

Apple CEO Steve Jobs turned 55 this week according to TUAW, so we’ll start off by wishing him a healthy, happy, peaceful, and prosperous birthday! What do you get the man who gave us the Apple II, Mac, Pixar, iPod, iTunes, Apple Retail, iPhone, and iPad? Well, a couple of awards aren’t a bad place to start…

MWC and Jim Henson Awards

While neither Apple, nor the iPhone were at Mobile World Congress, Macworld reports Steve Jobs still won their award for “Mobile Personality of the Year”. (Stephen Fry accepted on his behalf).

Macworld also tells us Jobs received a Jim Henson Company Award/Celebration Honor for reflecting “the core values and philosophy of the legendary Jim Henson and the company he founded.”

Calling all iTunes $10K Winners

While not winning awards, Steve Jobs has been personally calling the winner of his own contests — in this case the man who won the 10 billionth iTunes song download. Rolling Stone got the details:

Sulcer first thought was that he was being pranked. “He called me and said, ‘This is Steve Jobs from Apple.’ I said, ‘Yeah right, I have a son that loves to play tricks and he does that every now and then — calls me and imitates somebody.” After three or four times of asking “Come on now, who is this,” Sulcer realized that his caller ID read simply “Apple,” and only then did he believe that he was the winner of the contest and a $10,000 iTunes card.

Apple Annual Shareholder Meeting

Jobs also ran Apple’s annual general meeting, fielding questions in classic style according to Business Week. On why Apple needs a $40 billion war chest:

“We know if we need to acquire something — a piece of the puzzle to make something big and bold — we can write a check for it and not borrow a lot of money and put our whole company at risk. The cash in the bank gives us tremendous security and flexibility.”

In defense of Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt, now resigned from the Apple board:

“Eric conducted himself as a board member appropriately and recused himself whenever discussing matters that might involve conflict.”

Macworld caps it off with a response on what keeps him up at night:

“Shareholder meetings,” Jobs quickly quipped, before giving the meeting a cold splash of reality.

“Apple requires stability in the world. People aren’t going to worry about which laptop to buy if they can’t afford dinner, can’t afford to send their kids to school, can’t afford textbooks. There are things much bigger than us that are out of our control. So we try to just do the best we can.”

iPhone 3.1.2

Amazingly, Steve Jobs managed to do all this, according to 9to5mac, while still rocking iPhone 3.1.2. That’s the older version of the iPhone OS updated a couple of weeks ago to 3.1.3. (We too were hoping he at least would be on iPhone 4.0 by now!) This was determined by looking at the email headers in a response he sent to an Apple customer concerned about developers let go on the Final Cut Pro Team: