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Google Latitude App Starts Rolling Out In International App Stores [Update: Pulled?]

As noted by TechCrunch a few minutes ago, Google released its official Latitude app for the iPhone in the Japanese App Store. The app is available there but, actually, we can see it already online in a few other international stores such as the Italian, French and German ones. My guess is, Google isn’t limiting this to Europe and / or Japan but iTunes is simply slow to register the changes. The app is propagating.

Google Latitude for iPhone lets you check on your friends’ location. You can see your friends on a map and see who’s nearby so you can meet up, share your own location from the mobile app, tweak the privacy settings to share only your city. You can also disable the automatic background updating. Google’s Latitude service has been available for Android devices for a while now, but couldn’t make it to iOS due to Apple’s limitations…or something. Basically, Google announced they wouldn’t bring Latitude to the iPhone when Google Voice was a no-no either, but things are different now. There is an official Google Voice app in the App Store. Until today, Latitude has been a web-only service.

iOS 4 is required for background updating. Go check out the app while we’re updating this post with more screenshots and details. Full app description below. Read more

Apple Confirms Devs Can Use The Same App Name Across iOS and Mac App Store, Provides Other Tips

Three weeks ago we reported Apple updated its Mac App Store submission FAQ for developers to inform developers that it was possible to submit apps with identical names to the iPhone, iPad and Mac App Store. Today they’re making it official by posting the news on the Developer News website:

You can now submit a Mac OS X version of your app to the Mac App Store with the identical name as your iOS app on the App Store. Having the same name for your app on both the App Store and Mac App Store allows you to maintain the consistency of your brand and makes your app easily recognizable to customers.

Earlier today Apple also posted a series of tips regarding in-app purchases and app metadata. Apple reminds developers that “there is certain metadata which cannot be edited, such as keywords and the name of your app” and suggests in-app purchases should come with accurate screenshots and predictions.

According to a rumor surfaced yesterday, Apple may be a targeting an early Mac App Store opening for next week. We haven’t been able to verify this rumor with the developers we contacted, though, as no one apparently got notified from Apple about the change of schedule.

Apple Releases QuickTime 7.6.9

A few minutes ago Apple pushed an update to QuickTime, which reaches version 7.6.9 and includes various security fixes for vulnerabilities found in previous iterations.

QuickTime 7.6.9 is propagating now in Software Update, or you can download it from Apple’s website. More information about the update are available here.

Instagram Gains Native Twitter.com Support With Inline Viewer→

Instagram Gains Native Twitter.com Support With Inline Viewer

We’re on a mission to give you more great multimedia content on Twitter, and today we’re adding five new companies to bring you independent TV shows, photos, works of art, slide presentations and entire songs, all right inside the details pane.

Check it out here. Seems like Instagram is really redefining the rules of mobile photo sharing, after all.

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Move Your Browser Tabs Across Mac and iOS Devices

In a perfect world, we wouldn’t have to worry to manually trigger any sync process. Everything would happen in the background, in your local wireless network or over-the-air, and manual sync would be an option to customize contents and options. In today’s world, and especially if we happen to have multiple iOS devices, we’re stuck with cables and fragmented databases.

Several developers are trying to put an end to this by supporting online sync services such as Dropbox in their mobile apps, some devs are even trying to do this on the desktop. Apple, on the other hand, still forces you to sync music, apps and movies with the cable, in iTunes, on your computer. Read more

Macworld’s 26th Annual Editors’ Choice Awards→

Macworld’s 26th Annual Editors’ Choice Awards

2010 was a big year for the Mac. The beginning of the year was all about the iPad—followed by the iPhone. But the buzz and success of those two products trickled down to the Mac. Later in the year, we saw upgrades to the Mac lineup, as well as solid signs from Apple that the Mac hasn’t been forgotten. With record sales of Macs posted by Apple, it’s a very good time to make products for the Mac.

Some curious choices, but I’m glad gems like Instapaper, Text Expander and Pogoplug Pro made the list. I wonder if Tweetie 2 for Mac will be there next year.

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Watch Flash Videos On iPhone & iPad, No Jailbreak or Apps Required

Most of web video has been optimized to display just fine on iOS devices, but it’s still annoying to open an article from your favorite blog and find out that the author didn’t use Vimeo’s updated embed code compatible with the iPhone and iPad. Vimeo offers a new embed technology to support iOS devices, but it’s not turned on by default. Just like Vimeo, other services such as Flickr, Megavideo and Dailymotion sometimes struggle in offering video embeds capable of being displayed on Apple’s mobile devices.

The Skyfire browser has been making the rounds recently: an iPhone app that can take any Flash video from any web page, and convert it in seconds to an HTML5-based video you can watch on the iPhone. The app is paid though, and perhaps many users don’t need all of its functionalities. Then, some developers even released tweaks and hacks in Cydia to activate Flash on iOS – with very disappointing results, I have to say. Put simply: either you jailbreak your device to sorta gain access to some Flash content on the web, or you buy Skyfire to convert Flash videos. But there’s no easy way built in Mobile Safari to play that Vimeo embed on the iPhone.

This is changing today, thanks to this neat bookmarklet called iOSFlashVideo I found on iSpazio (Italian) and installed on my iPhone and iPad a few minutes ago. With just the tap on the bookmarks bar, you’ll be able to instantly watch videos from Dailymotion, Flickr Video, MegaVideo and Vimeo through the iOS standard media viewer. It’s very simple to install. Read more

Steve Jobs: MobileMe Will Get “A Lot Better” Next Year

Surprised? MacRumors is reporting of a new email from Steve Jobs to one of their readers who, annoyed by MobileMe performance issues such as duplicate entries or unreliable syncing, emailed him to ask if Apple was working on it, to make it better. Jobs, as usual, replied with a very concise email saying that, yes, MobileMe will indeed get a lot better in 2011.

Q: I love my iPad and iPhone4 and am a huge fan of yours and all that Apple does. I desperately want to stay inside of Apple’e ecosystem as much as possible.

However, MobileMe is making it very difficult for me to do so. Unreliable/unpredictable syncing, creating duplicate entries (sometimes scores of them), etc. It’s almost unusable.

And I know from forums (including Apple’s own support boards) that I am not the only one experiencing these very real and frustrating problems.

Please tell me it will get better, and soon?

Jobs: Yes, it will get a lot better in 2011.

Sent from my iPhone

Of course it will get better. Apple is always working on making its product line better year after year and, even if some issues of MobileMe weren’t addressed during 2010, don’t forget Apple made Find My iPhone free, introduced note and iBooks bookmarks syncing, revamped the web UI of MobileMe. Changes were made in 2010, so perhaps 2011 will bring several performance improvements – we’re talking about speed, sync, support for multiple clients. And maybe some new features, too.

Also, don’t forget the data center Apple has been busy building in North Carolina. Because we’re pretty sure that will be behind MobileMe getting a lot better next year.