Dragon Age II Coming to the Mac on the 8th of March

By Graham Spencer

Dragon Age II will be brought to the Mac simultaneously as it is launched on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Windows on the 8^th of March this year. The game, which is available for Pre-Order now for $59.99, is the sequel to the widely acclaimed epic, Dragon Age: Origins that was launched in 2009 by BioWare.

Game Tree Mac will be porting the game to the Mac, a company known for other Mac ports such as the Grand Theft Auto trilogy, Sims 3 and Prince of Persia. A simultaneous release of Dragon Age II on the Mac is certainly quite a boon for Mac gamers who typically have to wait months if not years for a port and perhaps signifies a growing Mac gaming market.

Apple Steps Up Washington Presence, Hires New Lobbyist Firm

By Graham Spencer

Official lobbying disclosures show that Apple has hired a new lobbying firm, Fierce, Isakowitz and Blalock to help lobby Federal politicians as issues such as taxes, privacy, patent and trade reform get underway this year. Apple has typically shied away from most Washington affairs, only spending $1.6 million on lobbying whilst competitors such as Microsoft spent almost $7 million in 2010.

Politico understands that the new firm began representing Apple from February 1^st and amongst the lobbyists handling Apple’s work is the firm’s president Mark Isakowitz and Kirk Blalock, both of whom have extensive experience in Washington. Politico also makes note that:

Apple has received scrutiny from regulators, who have eyed its App Store guidelines and its handling of Flash video on the iPhone. At the same time, Capitol Hill has ramped up debate over issues such as online privacy and competitiveness – topics that could affect Apple’s bottom line.

Apple’s 2010 lobbying forms reflect the company has been an active participant in those conversations, speaking to lawmakers and federal regulators about patents, research funding, free trade agreements and taxes. It’s new outside firm, Fierce, Isakowitz and Blalock, has handled some of those issues for other industry clients such as CTIA, the National Cable and Telecommunications Association, Time Warner Cable and the Coalition for Patent Fairness.

[Via Politico, 9to5Mac]

iPhone and iPad Changing People’s Reading Habits

By Graham Spencer

Read It Later, the Instapaper-esque service for saving articles for later consumption has released some fascinating information on how users of the service, depending on the device used, have very different reading habits.

Posted on their blog they reveal that content is encountered pretty much constantly throughout the day, with only a slight drop after work finishes at around 5PM. As for when articles are read, those who use the computer have two key periods, during work at 8AM – 4PM and during the night at 6PM – 9PM with a slightly higher peak during which articles are read.

Vodafone Reportedly Blocking VoIP Applications Over 3G

By Graham Spencer

There are reports coming in tonight that Vodafone within Europe has begun blocking all VoIP applications from functioning over the 3G networks, restricting them to use WiFi.

iSpazio notes specifically that the ban seems to be enforced in Italy with VoIP apps such as Skype, Viber and Tango no longer functioning over a 3G network and that when Viber tries to make a call over Vodafone’s 3G network that the following message is displayed;

An Internet connection is required to place free calls Viber. Check your connection and try again. Place a regular call instead.

Pre-Order’s for Verizon iPhone Now Live

By Graham Spencer

As confirmed yesterday by Apple, Pre-Orders for the Verizon iPhone 4 are now live on Apple’s website here and also on Verizon’s site here. Be quick though if you want one, demand is expected to be high and orders will be fulfilled on a first come, first served basis.

If you are purchasing from the Apple Store you have to be an existing Verizon user and you have to sign up to the two year contract.

For the full pricing details head over here.

UPDATE: People on Twitter are noting that the Verizon site is having difficulties and crashing. It’s really hit and miss, some on Twitter have had seamless experience, others having errors. Perhaps try the Apple site, no reports of it going down, also some are recommending to avoid Firefox which seems to be having issues with Verizon’s site.

UPDATE 2: More and more people are having troubles with Verizon pre-orders, some have then tried going through Apple and it has worked without issue. Highly recommend people to try through Apple here.

The Verizon iPhone 4 is being sold for $199 for the 16 GB model and $299 for the 32 GB model with a two-year contract. Sales in Apple retail stores and 2,000 Verizon Wireless stores will begin on Thursday, February 10th and 7 AM — just like AT&T did for the iPhone 4 last year.

iOS 4.3 To Be Released Within Two Weeks?

By Graham Spencer

Rumors and nuggets of information circulating around the web seem to suggest that the next update to iOS, 4.3, will come within the next two weeks. These suggestions come from a few sources, from David Pogue to John Gruber and The Daily’s launch.

As 9to5Mac was able to pick up on, David Pogue’s review on the Verizon iPhone contained a snippet that was later updated and removed. It was the statement that AT&T’s iPhone will get the Hotspot feature on February 13, there was no insinuation by Pogue that this was his guess but just written plain out as a fact.

All the Verizon iPhone News From Today

By Graham Spencer

So today has brought quite a bit of Verizon iPhone news, if you’ve struggled to keep up, this post has links to all our recent coverage. Plus there’s even more news after the break which includes information that Verizon is urging it’s staff not to buy the iPhone, you may need to save old voicemails if moving to the iPhone and Apple Stores adding antenna’s to boost Verizon reception inside.

Today

First Verizon iPhone Reviews Are In

Verizon Contact Transfer App for iPhone Now Available

Verizon iPhone Coming to Best Buy on February 10

Apple Confirms Verizon iPhone Available for Pre-Order Tomorrow

Previously

iPhone 4 Cases Now Available On Verizon’s Website

iTunes 10.1.2 Now Available, Adds CDMA iPhone Compatibility

Verizon iPhone Plans Now Live on Apple.com

AT&T and Verizon Finally Together In Apple’s New Ad

Mac App Store Developers Fall Into Open Source Rabbit Hole

By Graham Spencer

Lugaru, the game that is available for the Mac and other platforms about a violent rabbit is now available on Mac App Store. Except there are two apps for the same game, one at $10 and one at $2, the pricier one called Lugaru HD is made by the original developers whilst the other called Lugaru is made by a Michael Latour from iCoder. The original developers of the game have no idea who Latour is and are quite understandably angry that someone else has started selling the exact same game at a much cheaper price.

Lugaru’s developers claim Latour’s app is a complete fraud of their own app with their own source code being sold by a guy with no affiliation to them. Jeffrey Rosen, one of the Lugaru developers told Kotaku “We are not happy about this situation. It is not uncommon for people to sell pirated copies of our game, but we were completely caught off guard that Apple would approve this for sale on the App Store without any due diligence.”

First Impressions of News Corp’s The Daily

By Graham Spencer

News Corp.’s much hyped foray into an iPad exclusive digital Newspaper has just launched and it has some high expectations to live up to, not only for consumers but for Murdoch’s News Corporation which has endured a shrinking reader base and advertising revenue. Jump the break for our first impressions and a tonne of screenshots of the app.

OK well that’s it for our first impressions, undoubtedly some of us here at Macstories will in the next day or so write up an in-depth summation of our feelings towards The Daily so keep an eye on the site and our Twitter account for that!