Posts in news

Last.fm Co-Founder Doesn’t Like Apple’s Subscriptions

Just about everyone on the Internet now knows that some folks are really upset over Apple’s recently announced subscriptions for iOS apps. In case you missed the news, Apple is now allowing publishers to implement subscriptions for content-based apps using the same iTunes payment method customers rely on for their App Store purchases, but Apple keeps a 30% cut off every recurring subscription. As you can guess, several publishers think a 30% cut off a minimal monthly (or yearly) fee is too much, making it impossible to break even. In fact, music service Rhapsody has already announced it won’t offer subscriptions for iOS devices. And it looks like other publishers will follow if they think a business model can’t be built upon Apple taking its 30% on every transaction.

While the fact that Apple takes a cut on purchases made through its App Store doesn’t come as a total surprise, the 30% number does as many, including yours truly, initially thought subscriptions would feature a lower cut from Apple. Still, this is happening right now and what we can do is wait and see what publishers and content providers like Amazon and Netflix will do. But in the meantime, it appears that Last.fm co-founder Richard Jones isn’t really excited about these subscriptions, either. “Excited” is actually an euphemism, considering that in a private IRC chat posted by GigaOM he says “Apple just f****** over online music subs for the iPhone”.

While we can’t verify on the authenticity of IRC chat, there’s more coming from Mr. Jones. He suggests Apple might have come up with these high terms to leave room for its own music streaming service later in the year, which will surely make some companies like Spotify and Rdio struggle to find their way between affordable consumer prices and Apple’s cut on subscriptions. Oh, and what about Last.fm? They announced their very own subscription-based service two weeks ago, and now if they want to keep their app in the Store it looks like they’re going to have to rethink the whole strategy. Or perhaps Last.fm will simply pull the app from App Store, as Jones believes “people on the iPhone will always subscribe using iTunes” because it’s easier.

So far, Apple’s subscription service hasn’t been a popularity success among publishers. But we believe we’ll hear the actual results of this new functionality in a few weeks, when customers will get used to the advantages of iTunes-based subscriptions and some publishers will (likely) see the first promising numbers coming in. If Apple will have to change its stance on subscriptions, you can bet they will. Now, we wait and see how the publishing industry reacts in the App Store.

Video of the Day: Grandparents Using Photo Booth

Here’s a video for a bit of Thursday evening fun. Remember Photo Booth? The app that ships by default with every Mac and allows you to take funny snapshots of yourself through the iSight camera using effects like squeeze, fisheye, dent and many others. Well, now imagine if your grandparents, not exactly the usual Mac geeks, discovered Photo Booth and started recording videos with it.

That’s exactly what the video below (via Thought Catalog) is all about. Grandparents using Photo Booth. It’s genuinely funny, and made me fire up Photo Booth to take some photos with my dad right away. Check it out after the break. Read more

Mac Keeps Outperforming Overall PC Industry

We got a feeling Mac computers were reporting strong sales and health on every Apple’s quarterly conference call, but having to deal with the raw data of the Mac’s growth over the past 19 quarters is a different story. As reported by All Things Digital, the Mac has outpaced the PC market again in December 2010, for the 19th consecutive quarter, in every market segment. We’re talking business and enterprise customers, consumer market, government. While the PC industry has reported negative numbers over the years (first the recession, then the second coming of tablets), the Mac has simply kept growing.

In the global home or consumer market, the Mac posted shipment growth of 17.1 percent, while the broader market posted a decline of .6 percent. In the business market, Mac shipments grew 65.4 percent compared to the market growth rate of 9.7 percent. And in government, they grew 549.5 percent compared to the broader market’s 8.4 percent.

With the stunning adoption rate of iOS devices since 2007, the fact that the Mac hasn’t stop selling doesn’t come as a surprise. After all, what we’re seeing here is Apple selling not a line of notebooks or desktop machines, but an experience. And the millions of people that bought an iPhone or iPad in the past years are likely attracted by this integrated ecosystem Apple is so heavily investing on. Sure, Macs can perfectly live on their own without being used in conjunction with iOS, but apparently consumers like the possibility of being part of an ecosystem. And so the Mac keeps growing.

OpenFeint Connect Promises Cross-Platform Integration, But No Simultaneous Play

It looks like mobile gaming OpenFeint has no intention on leaving all the fun to Apple’s Game Center. In fact, OpenFeint has become more than a simple alternative to the Game Center with cross-platform integration (OpenFeint works on Android devices, too) and in-app purchasable content that’s not tied to App Store approval. The service sports 65 million users and it’s about to expand a lot more with the upcoming launch of OpenFeint Connect.

Connect will allow iOS, Android, Windows Phone 7, OS X and Windows users to communicate through the OpenFeint platform, share leaderboards and achievements as if everyone was playing the same game on the same device or computer. In fact, Connect could also work with Facebook games and a plethora of other online gaming services. Unfortunately though, simultaneous cross-platform play won’t be possible (guess it’s a little tricky to implement real-time multiplayer on iOS vs. Android).

A private beta of OpenFeint Connect is available here for developers who want to experiment with the API. [via Download Squad]

MANsaver: The iPhone App That Will Save Your Relationship

It is no secret that men usually forget about things. Especially if you’re married and you have to think about paying the bills, your job, kids and that car insurance that just won’t go away, it might happen to forget about your 4th anniversay, the perfect gift for Valentine’s Day, or the anniversary of the day your first met with your wife. While girls seem to remember any kind of holiday, anniversary and important milestone with ease, guys…well, usually just forget. And if your relationship is anything like mine, you know this could become a problem. Like, a huge problem.

Now, for as silly as it sounds, we there’s an app for that. MANsaver, a free iPhone app by Oven Bits and Creation Code, is aimed at collecting all these kinds of holidays and anniversaries you should remember into a single list view that – and here comes the real trick – will also send you notifications five days ahead of a scheduled event, and on the same day as well. This app, also nicely designed, is literally a man saver: it allows you to build custom lists of dates based on your relationship, set up reminders and even send text messages based on “romantic templates”. This is an iPhone geek’s relationship-oriented OmniFocus, basically. Read more

“Pixels: The Art of iPhone Photography”

Attention budding iPhoneographers, think you can shoot some mean pixels with your iPhone? Addicted to photo apps like Instagram, Camera+ and Hipstamatic? Why not test your creative ability and submit some of your own original works of art?

The Orange County Center for Contemporary Art, or OCCCA, in Santa Ana, California, is opening an exhibit from March 31 to April 20, 20111 called “Pixels: The Art of iPhone Photography.” If you are interested in participating, here are the rules: all photos must be shot and processed with your iDevice (iPhone and iPod Touch devices are both acceptable) and you cannot use any photo editing software on a desktop computer. Read more

Today In Apple Patents: Dense Lithium Cells, iOS Controls via Smart Bezels

Two patents uncovered today by AppleInsider and Patently Apple give us some insight on technologies and features Apple might implement in future MacBooks and iOS devices. Smart bezels (a subject we’ve covered before) make a comeback today in a patent that describes how tablets could benefit from losing physical buttons and delegating functions like volume and brightness adjustment to touch-sensitive hardware parts running around the screen of a device. Read more

Vowl: Free, Simple Mac App For Flickr Slideshows

Vowl by Steven Frank is a straightforward Mac app, available for free in the Mac App Store, that generates an automated Flickr slideshow based on tags assigned in the app’s preferences. The app is really simple with its translucent black window style, and also allows you to click on any picture to get to the Flickr photo page with your default Mac browser.

In the preferences, you can set the delay between photos, add and remove tags (by default, the app comes with “cat”, “dog”, and “chicken” tags) and make the app float above other application windows. When resized to take the most part of your screen, Vowl becomes a pretty effective way to get random Flickr photos on your desktop, and I have to admit I loved the kitten ones.

The app is a free download here, or on Steven Frank’s website.

Plants vs. Zombies Now Available In The Mac App Store

While we’re still waiting for Bejeweled 3 to become available on the iPhone and iPad, PopCap Games has released its hugely popular “Plants vs. Zombies” in the Mac App Store. You can find it here at $9.99.

The game, successful on the iOS App Store and firmly positioned in the first spots of the paid software charts, looks like a straight port of the iPad version, made bigger to run on every Mac’s screen. That means you’ll find the 49 zombie-killing plants you know and love, 26 different types of zombies to block from accessing your house and all the strategies and skills you’ve already implemented on the iOS platform. The game, for those unaware of its addictiveness, revolves around the concept of killing a horde of zombies marching towards your property using only seeds, powders and bombs released by…plants. Colorful graphics and funny sound effects, together with a great gameplay, made this game an absolute must-have for iPhone and iPad owners.

Perhaps Plants vs. Zombies for Mac won’t generate the same sales numbers of the iOS counterpart, but if Angry Birds is of any indication – it really looks like users are willing to pay again to play their favorite iPhone games on OS X. Go download the game here, and don’t forget to play The Cranberries’ “Zombie” every once in a while. Just to get in the right mood.