Put Things Off 2: Fun, Beautiful Task Manager for iPhone

I wrote many times in the past that most users don’t need the complexity and feature set of GTD apps such as OmniFocus (for Mac and iOS) and online project management tools like Basecamp. Even if apps like OmniFocus and, to an extent, Things have their loyal userbase, most people just want a simple and effective app to manage their daily activities and reminders.

Put Things Off, recently updated to version 2.0, tries to merge task management with straightforward “reminder” functionalities to create a mix that’s beautiful to look at and simple enough to capture lots of App Store dwellers’ hearts. Read more

Turn Your iPhone and iPad Into Pinball Cabinets

Oh, those dear old pinball machines. I used to spend actual money on those things during summer at the beach – I remember there was a Spider Man one at the bar I somehow managed to break the record on. Anyway, the money-spending trend stopped when I found out that there were well-done pinball videogames (bear with me, I was 10) and, years later, iPhone apps for that.

For as much as they look “real”, apps and console games don’t give you that feeling of touching the whole structure, tilting and pressing buttons. No wonder building an actual pinball machine requires a lot of money: each machine is a work of art and state-of-the art engineering. If you’re feeling like you don’t want to go back to spending bucks on real machines and you want to keep playing pinball on your iOS devices, here comes a cabinet for iPhone and iPad that does just that: it turns the phone and tablet into pinball cabinets, with working flipper buttons and the possibility to tilt.

You just have to place the device inside the mini-machine and download the free app to play. That’s it. Sounds awesome! Too bad the iPad version isn’t available now and will cost you $79.95 once it’s out. The Pinball Magic for iPhone is in stock and available at $29.95. [Gizmodo via Brookstone]

$250,000 Engagement Ring Sold Through iPhone App→

$250,000 Engagement Ring Sold Through iPhone App

Forbes reports:

Blue Nile, of course, is the online website dear to the hearts of many hopeful girlfriends: on it one can design an engagement ring from a wide choice of stones, settings and prices. Its main shoppers, though, are men  - a group to whom Blue Nile has taken considerable pains to target. That list of top ten engagement rings on the homepage? It was put together with the befuddled male shopper in mind. So were the mobile tools the site launched in recent months, including a new iPad app.

Blue Nile hit pay dirt with the latter a number of days ago when it sold a $250,000 ring through the app.

This is the app. It even integrates with PayPal Mobile. [via Rosa]

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The Mac That Saved Apple→

The Mac That Saved Apple

I remember covering that crowded midnight rollout at a Palo Alto, California, store, and talking with then Apple hardware-engineering honcho Jon Rubenstein, who was beaming like a proud papa. An exhausted proud papa, to be sure, but grinning ear-to-ear nonetheless as he watched a long line of purchasers plop down $1,299 for the latest shiny-shiny, and lug their big boxes out of the store, smiling as broadly as Rubenstein himself.

Rubenstein told me that the iMac was going to redefine consumer computing. He was right.

Reminds me a lot of the iPad announcement and launch. But this time Apple doesn’t need to be saved.

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Richard Branson’s “Project” Magazine for iPad Coming Tomorrow, Here’s A Sneak Peek

We talked about Richard Branson’s upcoming “Project” magazine for iPad last week, and it looks like everything is ready to go for tomorrow’s launch. Project Mag’s blog is up and running and, as noticed by The Next Web, a sneak peek of the “front cover video” featuring actor Jeff Bridges has surfaced online.

The video shows an animated front cover, but it’s not clear whether the app will feature interactive, animated pages or not. We just know that the first issue of this magazine specifically built for the iPad will feature the Tron: Legacy movie, and that’s about it.

There’s a banner with a direct link to the app up on Project Mag’s blog, but iTunes returns an error when clicking on it as the app isn’t out yet. It should be tomorrow. We’ll keep you posted about it. Read more

Today’s AirPlay Is Just A Teaser

Yesterday we posted a tutorial on how to turn your iOS devices into AirPlay-compatible speakers using a jailbreak hack that involves copying two files to iOS’ filesystem. 24 hours into using it, I have to admit this has already radically changed the way I think of AirPlay – Apple’s streaming functionality for audio and video content introduced in iOS 4.2.

This is a taste of the AirPlay that’s going to be, and it looks a lot like an integrated model, all over again. Read more

MacStories Interviews: MG Siegler

[MacStories Interviews is a new series of email interviews and conversations with with well-known developers, bloggers, journalists, geeks. You can check out more MacStories interviews here.]

Please welcome MG Siegler, writer at TechCrunch. You can follow him on Twitter as @parislemon.

- Tell me a little about yourself: who are you, what do you do, etc…?

I’m MG Siegler, a technology writer for TechCrunch. Before that, I was at VentureBeat. Before that, I worked in web development. And before that, believe it or not, I worked in Hollywood.

I love my job as it allows me to merge the two things I’m most passionate about: technology and writing.

- What’s your current setup?

I currently have 6 Macs — a little extreme, I know. But my urge to have the latest and greatest forces me to upgrade when something new comes along, and other machines become backups or media centers. Currently, I mainly use my i7 iMac (late 2009) and a new 13-inch MacBook Air. I absolutely love the latter. I’m even thinking about getting an 11-inch as well. It has replaced my (early 2010) i7 MacBook Pro,

When I’m on the go, I always have the iPhone 4 with me. And I often bring the iPad as well. I also have a ridiculous number of iPods, which mainly don’t get used anymore, as the iPhone is my source of all music. Read more

Report: Apple Stores Sold 8.8 iPads Per Hour on Black Friday

Everyone goes shopping on Black Friday (well, unless you prefer to check out online deals), and Apple Stores are no exception to this trend. With some pretty decent discounts set up for the day after Thanksgiving, we knew Apple was going to sell a whole bunch of iPads and new MacBook Airs on that day – but we may have the actual numbers here.

Fortune is reporting that, according to a report from Gene Munster’s team at Piper Jaffray, Apple sold approximately 8.8 iPad units per hour on Black Friday and 8.2 Mac units per hour. A rough estimate of 8.8 iPads sold per hour across 236 US stores in a 12 hours timeframe leads us to 25.000 iPads sold on Black Friday.

Most notable in our observations,” he writes, “we noticed that the iPad is gaining traction (driven by lower price vs. the Mac) among demographics in which the Mac has historically not been successful. The bottom line is that Apple’s addressable market is expanding with the iPad.

Munster also states the iPad is “becoming the Mac of the masses”. An interesting statement looking forward.